Operator
Welcome to the Cibus Q4 2025 report presentation. For the first part of the presentation, participants will be in listen-only mode.
During the questions and answers session, participants are able to ask questions by dialing pound key 5 on their telephone keypad. If you are listening to the presentation via webcast, you can ask written questions using the form below.
Now, I will hand the conference over to CEO Stina Lindh Hök and CFO Pia-Lena Olofsson. Please go ahead.
Stina Lindh Hök
Hello, and welcome to Cibus Q4 presentation. My name is Stina Lindh Hök, CEO of Cibus, and with me, I have Pia-Lena Olofsson, CFO.
To start with here, I just want to say that I'm glad that I have got the opportunity to continue to develop Cibus Cibus further. I have followed Cibus for several years, and I've been at the board for the past year, and I do believe that the company has a very interesting business idea and also is in a very exciting phase.
For those who don't know me, I have most recently been CEO of Nyfosa Fastigheter, listed on Large Cap, and during my time at Nyfosa, we had a strong focus on growth and constantly building stronger cash flows. During the time I was there, we grew from €15 million to €40 million, with focus on increasing cash flow per share.
Cibus has a unique business concept, converting food into yield, which means that the company mainly focuses on grocery properties and are the sole listed daily goods real estate company in the Nordics. The aim is to create stable cash flows and monthly dividend to our shareholders.
The company has been listed since 2018 and has grown from owning food properties only in Finland to having operations now in seven countries: Sweden, Norway, Finland, Denmark, and the three Benelux countries. This platform is a good start to continue growth in existing markets, and we also look into new markets in Europe, and my ambition is to continue this growth journey.
In Q4, we see increasing income and operating income for 2025. What I like to highlight is the profit from property management that has increased to €0.25 per share, an increase of 25% compared to 2024.
Another thing to point out is that we have a positive unrealized value change of €7 million, with an unchanged yield of 6.4%. Pia-Lena will continue to go through the results more in detail.
Some key facts. As I said, strengthened profit from property management, increased by 25% compared to Q4 2024.
That improved profit from property management is partly a result of lower interest rate and better margins in the credit market, but primarily a result of the earnings-accretive transactions that's been made over the year. It's basically that the work from the team over the last year is now shown in the results.
During the fourth quarter, we also bought 36 properties, acquired in Sweden, Finland, Denmark, and Belgium, at a value of €136.2 million. I will give you some more flavor on that later on.
We also had an increased earning capacity, increased up to 1.8 per share, euro, and the step into Benelux that has been a significant part of that growth, but also the acquisitions in our existing market have been and are important part of the work and to grow earning capacity. Increased local presence.
Cibus have properties in seven country now, as I said, and we continue to grow. We also would like to build up new offices in each market.
We are kind of replacing consultants step-by-step. During this year, the office in Denmark opened, and we have now our own employees in all markets except Norway.
I believe with presence, we can become even more proactive in helping our tenants, and we can get closer to the market. When you get closer to the market, more opportunities also arise.
Worth to mention is also that bond issue. We continue to see a strong credit market, which has also been demonstrated after the quarter by Cibus both refinancing and issuing new bonds totaling of €85 million.
The margin was 2.1% and actually the lowest Cibus has received so far on a four-year bond. Finally, the board proposes an unchanged dividend on 0.9 per share, with a monthly dividend as before.
This means that we continue to distribute a high part of our cash flow, but also keep some money for the future investment. Last year, this time, Cibus had a portfolio of or in Q3 4, Cibus had a portfolio of 483 properties.
Today, the number is 672, with a value of €2.6 billion. Here, you also see on the slide that Cibus tenants mainly consists of well-known and established grocery players in our different countries.
Stable cash flow is a key for our strategy. Even though that the portfolio has grown during the year, still 81% of our rental income comes from daily good tenants, and still 95% of the properties are anchored by grocery tenants.
Furthermore, 99% of the leases are CPI-linked, and the average contract length has increased to 6 years in Q4. More than 90% have net or triple net leases.
Also worth mention is that the average property is 2,100 square meter, which means that the exposure to each property or each store is relatively small. Also, in addition to protect cash flow, we also have a hedging rate of 98%.
Earning capacity increased, as I said, up to €1.08 per share. The aim is to continue accretive growth.
It's about constantly trying to find opportunities, and we will continue to work close to the market and search for right deals. This is how we will and shall continue to grow, in form of increased earning per share, but also in form of increased profit from property management per share over time.
We've seen activity in the leasing work over the year, and grocery tenants rarely move, but there is always some ongoing new and relocation work. In 2025, 20 leases were signed for a value of €3.3 million.
There are always also a number of ongoing projects linked to reconstruction, conversion of premises, or energy savings. Normally, we also sign new agreements in connection with these projects.
The lease length has increased to 6 years, and the occupancy rate was 95.7% in Q4. You also see here just an example of this, where we proactively replace K-Supermarket with a Puuilo in Oulu in Finland, and at the same time, increase the length lease with 8 years.
Just some information about the new acquisitions that were made since my start. We have acquired 11 properties through five transactions in four of our existing market: Sweden, Finland, Denmark, and Belgium.
Each of those deal has been found with contacts in each country. That's also shows the importance of being present.
As you also see here, there are some nice add-on properties in the portfolio. We have ICA in Sweden and Axfood in Sweden, we have Netto in Denmark, and Jumbo and Delhaize in Belgium.
We also include a new construction with Tokmanni. All these properties has double net lease structure, and the average contract length is 11.6 years.
This is actually an example of how I hope and where I believe that we can continue with transactions going forward, use our existing platform to find the right opportunities. Over to you, Pia-Lena.
Pia-Lena Olofsson
Thank you. Let's start off with some key events during the fourth quarter.
We made two taps on bond loan 108 at a margin of 210 basis points for a 3.3-year bond, which was the lowest margin to date. Cibus then acquired the remaining shares in the joint venture 1 Plus and became the sole owner.
At the same time, we established a new 50-50 joint venture with a developer, securing the right of first refusal on Belgian retail projects. Then, as we know, Stina was appointed CEO of Cibus.
The 19th of December, we acquired 11 properties, as Stina mentioned just now, across four countries. After the period, we have refinanced bond loan 100 105 at a lower margin of 210 basis points from 400 basis points and at a longer maturity of 4 years.
The nomination committee has proposed that Louise Richnau and Stefan Dahlbo become new board members at Cibus. All other board members are proposed to be re-elected except Nils Styf, who has declined.
Looking at the P&L in more detail, the net operating income amounted to €41.7 million. Administration costs include a non-recurring agreed remuneration to the former CEO of -€0.8 million.
Exchange rate changes amounted to -€0.4 million. Profit from property management excluding non-recurring items and exchange rate effects was €20.5 million.
Unrealized changes in value on properties was +€7 million. During the quarter, all countries except Finland recorded stable or increasing property values.
The value uplift was mainly due from completed acquisitions and lower vacancy assumptions. In Finland, values declined due to expectations of longer lease cycles and the low CPI index adjustments driven by low inflation.
Current tax includes a one-off of -€0.3 million related to exit tax in Belgium in connection with a merger. Earnings for the quarter was €27.3 million or €0.33 per share.
The current earnings capacity shows a net operating income of €167.7 million, an increase of +37% compared to the 1st of January 2025. This is mainly due to acquisitions, but also CPI index increases.
Administration cost increases mainly due to new acquisitions, but also due to continued investments in building Cibus. Profit from property management cash was €88.3 million or €1.08 per share, an increase with +9% compared to a year ago.
Looking at the net operating income in a comparable portfolio, the increase in vacancy during the fourth quarter was primarily attributed to a previously communicated property in Lahti, Finland, where Kesko has vacated. Leasing activity is high, as Stina mentioned, with more than 50 new retail leases signed during 2025, of which €1.9 million will commence after the 1st of January 2026 and is not yet included in the like-for-like.
Index increases was +€1.2 million. We have low inflation and thus low CPI index increases, especially in Finland.
Like-for-like NOI decreased with -2.1% to €119.6 million. The NOI grew with +39% due to acquisitions, the earnings capacity strengthened significantly with total NOI up +37% to €167.7 million.
Cibus segments are countries. Finland remains our largest market, accounting for 48% of NOI, although it's lower than the 68% reported in Q4 last year.
Belgium is now the next largest market with 16% of NOI, followed by Denmark with 14% of NOI. Moving on to the balance sheet.
The property value amounted to €2.6 billion. Secured debt totaled €1.3 billion, resulting in a loan to value on secured debt of 49.9%.
In addition to this, Cibus has unsecured bonds of €275 million. The net loan to value was 58.2%.
The EPRA NRV was €13 per share, up €1.3 per share since Q4 last year. The WAULT increased to 6 years at end of the fourth quarter.
Cibus is an active landlord that continuously extend lease agreements with its tenants. The WAULT has been very stable, as you can see in the graph below.
Over to funding. Average interest rate was at 4%, down 0.2 percentage point from last year, supported by low margins on refinanced bank loans and bonds.
For the fourth quarter, however, it was an increase of 0.1 percentage points on the average interest rate due to a maturing low-rate interest cap that was replaced with a higher interest rate cap. At end of the quarter, we have a record low average credit margin of 1.7%, and we have extended our average interest fixing to 2.7 years.
We've also been active on the bond side, as I mentioned before, doing two taps on the loan 108, and after the period, refinancing a bond of €50 million with a new €85 million bond at a lower margin, which went from 400 to 210 basis points, at a longer maturity. For Cibus, stable cash flows are very important.
98% of our external loans are hedged. Interest rate sensitivity shows that a reduction of market interest rates have a greater impact on earnings than increased market interest rates, since a large part of Cibus hedges are interest rate caps.
An increase of market interest rates with 1 percentage point would affect earnings by -€0.8 million annually, while a decrease with 1 percentage point would affect positively with +4.7, 4.5 million euros annually. Looking at our key credit metrics, the net LTV was stable at 58.2%.
Net debt to EBITDA increased to 10.9 times, reflecting that debt is added on day one while EBITDA is built over time during an acquisition-intensive period. On a forward-looking basis, the net debt to EBITDA was 10.1 times.
The interest coverage ratio strengthened to 2.4 times. For Cibus, as I mentioned before, stable cash flows are essential as they enable us to deliver monthly dividends to our shareholders, something that we have done consistently since September 2020.
The board proposes to the Annual General Meeting an unchanged dividend of €0.90 per share, paid out in 12 installments. The Cibus share is a liquid share, trading at 1.7 times its market cap annually, which is more than 112% above the average liquidity of other large real estate companies listed at Nasdaq Stockholm.
During the quarter, Cibus continues its sustainability work by deepening tenant collaboration, expanding green lease clauses, and installing additional solar panels now on 80 properties. Cibus progresses on climate-related investments such as roof insulation and ventilation, and is phasing out natural gas in Finnish properties to strengthen long-term portfolio resilience.
We also continue with community-orientated initiatives to support local social sustainability. Over to you, Stina.
Stina Lindh Hök
Okay. The strategy will stay firm.
Cibus will continue to invest in food and grocery properties with stable cash flow and which also means limited exposure to economic cycles. Cibus will continue to grow.
We see opportunities in existing markets, and in parallel, we are evaluating new markets in Continental Europe. We will continue to work with refinancing and hedging to keep stable cash flow.
We will build up offices in all markets. It's with presence we continue to create business both with our tenants and also transactions in the market.
We should focus on property management per share, profitable growth with accretive transactions, which will increase both earning capacity per share, but also in longer perspective, profit from property management per share. All in all, continue to grow and develop Cibus in line with the motto converting food into yield.
Thank you, and now we open up for questions.
Operator
If you wish to ask a question, please dial pound key 5 on your telephone keypad to enter the queue. If you wish to withdraw your question, please dial pound key 6 on your telephone keypad.
The next question comes from Oscar Lindquist from ABG Sundal Collier. Please go ahead.
Oscar Lindquist
Hi. Good morning.
I was wondering, could you give some more detail on what's the driver behind the increased vacancy? It seems to be the Finnish portfolio mainly.
Stina Lindh Hök
Should I, yeah? We can do that.
That's mainly a property that we have announced earlier this year, Lahti, which was vacated in Q4.
Pia-Lena Olofsson
I just want to point out that the economic occupancy rate has actually increased to 95.7% end of the second quarter. If you refer to the like-for-like, as Stina mentioned, that is mainly attributed to that single property in Lahti that we have communicated earlier, where Kesko has vacated during the quarter.
Oscar Lindquist
Yes, okay. Sort of underlying in the Finnish market based on what you know today and in terms of lettings, how do you expect occupancy to develop?
Stina Lindh Hök
I do think I've been over there and seen all the properties the latest month. I'm positive for the market in Finland.
Most of the tenants are tenants which really well-functioning and happy. There will always be a few discussions, and there are a few discussions which maybe a few tenants will leave, smaller ones, but then we also have new tenants coming in.
Of course, they could be some kind of month between. I expect it to be, to be honest, pretty stable over time.
Oscar Lindquist
You expect underlying development in occupancy in Finland to be stable. Is that
Stina Lindh Hök
That was I expect. Of course, we don't know what's happen going forward, but for me, there are always a few discussions, but I expect it to be pretty stable going forward.
Oscar Lindquist
Okay. Then just jumping over to values.
You mentioned that lower vacancy assumptions drives values in a positive direction, and then that value changes in Finland are negative. Could you give some sort of indication on volumes here?
Stina Lindh Hök
I don't know if we can
Pia-Lena Olofsson
go It's not a huge difference in any market in that sense. The yield on the portfolio is still unchanged at 6.4%, but they're negative in Finland, as we said, due to longer expected lease cycles, and then positive in other markets, but it's not dramatically in any of the markets, to say.
Stina Lindh Hök
No, and it's a few properties that are valued lower. It's not the whole market.
Pia-Lena Olofsson
We can say that Lahti, as we said, is one of them, since it's been vacated. Yeah.
Oscar Lindquist
Okay. Just on the earnings capacity, firstly, is the softer NOI margin, is that driven by the slightly higher vacancy, or what's driving that?
Stina Lindh Hök
What do you mean by softer? I'm not really sure I got your question.
Oscar Lindquist
The NOI margin in the earnings capacity as of Q3 was 94.7%, it's now at 94.3%.
Pia-Lena Olofsson
It's just a small change, as we said. It's due to that we have some also investments in Cibus, to building Cibus going forward, but it's fairly stable.
It's not a large difference between the quarters.
Oscar Lindquist
Okay. Then on just finally, on announced acquisitions and the earnings capacity, what effect could we expect from announced acquisitions that you have not yet taken possession of, January 1st?
Pia-Lena Olofsson
We have the property in Finland that is being built, and of course, that is not in the earnings capacity yet. Otherwise, we have taken possession of them.
Then, of course, many of the 11 properties that we acquired in December just slightly gave revenue during the quarter. They are in the earnings capacity, of course, because then we have taken possession of them.
As the current earnings capacity is a snapshot.
Oscar Lindquist
The property being built now, what rental income is expected from that?
Pia-Lena Olofsson
We haven't guided on that.
Stina Lindh Hök
No, to be honest, we can look at it. I don't know that in my head exactly.
Oscar Lindquist
Thanks.
Operator
The next question comes from Svante Krokfors from Nordea. Please go ahead.
Svante Krokfors
Yes, good morning, Stina and Pia-Lena. Thanks for the presentation.
A couple of questions. First one, you're present in seven markets, and you're still looking at new markets.
What should we expect there? What kind of markets are you looking at?
Is it fair to assume it's northern parts of Germany, or is there something else that you have on your map?
Stina Lindh Hök
When it comes to growth and new possibilities, we will, as I said, both go into our existing markets and look into Europe. For me, it's not about growing for the growing of sake.
We should do it the best way we can. If we find better opportunities in existing markets, and I would say that we start there, but we will and are looking into new markets in Europe.
It's not clear a specific market because we are really looking into I would say a few of them. If something comes up there which we are interested, we are absolutely there as well.
I will not give you a specific country, because we don't know that yet.
Svante Krokfors
That's fair. Then do you have some comments on the transaction markets and yields in the countries you operate in, perhaps mainly Finland and Sweden?
What kind of market activity do you see there?
Stina Lindh Hök
I think it's been more and more parties in the market wanting to buy grocery stores. No doubt about that.
You need to be close to the market, and I also think that since we are a long-term owner, we've seen that it's been profitable for us because they really want to have a long-term owner when they sell. It's an active market.
We saw a few transactions in Finland. We have also seen in Denmark, and there are also a lot of portfolios out there.
Normally, we see a lot of parties in that. We need to continue to look and be there to find the best of those, to say.
As we see now, we have opportunities in every countries. Yeah.
Svante Krokfors
Thank you. Then regarding your loan to value, 58.2 in Q4, below the midpoint at 58.2.
How do you look at where you want to keep that LTV? I guess it also has to do with the fact that your share is not trading at a smaller EPRA NRV premium compared to where we were 6 months ago.
Are you ready to increase the LTV further from the current levels?
Stina Lindh Hök
No, that hasn't changed. We shouldn't go above 60.
You've seen the limitation between 55 to 65, but we still think that 60 is a good figure to be below.
Svante Krokfors
That's clear. Then in your earnings capacity, if we come back to that, the property expenses increased by 10% or €0.9 million.
That's quite a big increase compared to that the top line increased only with the new acquisitions. Could you elaborate a bit on that increase?
Pia-Lena Olofsson
Sure. It's a little bit different combinations, to say.
Some new properties have come in that, as Stina said, are double net and not triple net. Of course, it makes a difference, and the property expenses as well, in that sense that there's a little bit different composition in that sense.
Svante Krokfors
Thank you. Then a question to Stina directly.
Obviously, you have been involved in the company for a long time, but anything you feel that you would like to change in your CEO role?
Stina Lindh Hök
No, as I said, the strategy will stay firm, and we will continue the growth story. Of course, the team I would say is really forward-looking and really good.
There is always some smaller changes that you do when you come in, but the strategy will stay firm, and the aim to growth is the same, there is no change there.
Svante Krokfors
Thank you very much. That is all from me.
Operator
The next question comes from John Vuong from Van Lanschot Kempen. Please go ahead.
John Vuong
Hi, good morning. Just following up on the question on the transaction markets, are there any specific regions that you are more excited about going into '26?
Stina Lindh Hök
It was a little bit low sound. Did you ask if we should increase in any specific market?
John Vuong
Yes, indeed.
Stina Lindh Hök
No, as I just also said, we are looking in all the markets that we are already in. It's easy to make transactions when you're in the market, you know them better.
If we find possibilities there, we will try to grow those markets. We're also looking into new markets all the time, and we have a pipeline in Europe as well.
That's of course something that take some more time, and we always need to dig a little bit deeper when we take the next step. It's all about having the best transactions, not growing for the growth's sake.
John Vuong
Maybe to ask it differently, looking at your acquisition pipeline or the opportunities that you see, is the geographical split basically the same as how you are right now, or do you see, for example, more opportunities in Norway going into '26?
Stina Lindh Hök
I would say it's a very spread. The opportunities, we see them in all markets, and so I can't really guide you on that because it's basically on every market.
The good thing about it is that you can choose. We take the ones that are the best for the moment.
John Vuong
That's clear. Thank you.
Operator
There are no more phone questions at this time, I hand the conference back to the speakers for any written questions or closing comments.
Pia-Lena Olofsson
We have some questions from the web. How are you going to make Cibus a better company, Stina?
Stina Lindh Hök
A company should always develop, and I think what we can do better is to build up our own offices to be even more competitive, both for tenants and both for new transactions. That's what we will continue to do, as I said.
Also, of course, being very close to the markets and it's about finding the right opportunities going forward. That's what I will focus on going forward.
Pia-Lena Olofsson
We have another question here. What will happen with the vacated Kesko asset in Finland?
Do you expect this to be occupied again in 2026?
Stina Lindh Hök
We have a lot of discussion on that one, but it's really, really hard to say if it will end. It's a bigger property, and you want to find the right solutions.
I don't know about that, to be honest. The discussions are on, but how it will end, I don't know.
Pia-Lena Olofsson
It was vacated mid this quarter also.
Stina Lindh Hök
It's been vacated for just a month or two,
Pia-Lena Olofsson
so. Yeah.
I think we have covered the rest, I think there's no more questions. No.
Stina Lindh Hök
Thank you for listening, and if you should take one thing away from this presentation, it is that Cibus has the highest ambition to continue to grow stable cash flow within the grocery sector. Thank you.
Pia-Lena Olofsson
Thank you.
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