Citycon Oyj

Citycon Oyj

2.94
EUR
0.00
(0.00%)
532.35MMarket Cap
Nov 11Next Earn

Q4 FY2025 · Earnings Call TranscriptFebruary 27, 2026

Eshel Pesti

Hi everybody. Thank you for coming, and we will shortly start to present our results for the 2025.

We open the camera just to show you that we are not an AI management. Hilik is the CFO, my name is Eshel, and I'm the CEO, and from now, we will go to the presentation.

Thank you. We will start with the annual highlights.

We can see that the like-for-like NOI grows by 5.4%, which is very good results. The retail economic occupancy is 95.5%.

The retail average rent grew by 3.3% per square meter, and we come to €27.7 per square meter. The like-for-like footfall grew by 2%.

The sales grow by 1.7%, and we add €51.1 million to our fair value. The NOI margin is 93.7%.

The quarterly results for quarter four is like-for-like grows 3.8%. The retail economic occupancy is 95.5%.

3.3% retail average rent growth per square meter, and again we come to the price of €27.7 per square meter. Footfall grow by 1.1%.

The like-for-like sales grow by 2.1%. We gain in the fourth quarter €8.3 million to the fair value, and the NOI margin is 92.9%.

The key achievement in 2025, we actually deal with more than 500, I think 522 contracts, which reflect 142,000 square meter. We have significantly reduced our operation and administrative costs.

During 2025, we add €51 million to our fair value, and we continue to divest non-core assets, and we demonstrate the sales of Lippulaiva Residential by the fair value book €61.5 million. We actually repayment of €830 million during the year, and we reduce our LTV by 240 basis, and we are now in 44.9% LTV.

We can see here how the NOI actually grow by the year by each country or what we call business unit: Norway 3.2%, Sweden 3.7%, Finland 7.7%, and the average is 5.4%. On the right bar, you can see how the price per square meter grow during the quarters, and as I mentioned before, we stabilized in 27.7.

Here is some examples of marketing. We are acting in marketing very, I would say, aggressive.

We actually, I can say, investing by the book almost 5% from our NOI, which is a huge amount of money. We are doing a lot of event to drive footfall to our assets, and we are doing it most of the time, I can say, successfully.

A lot of events that drive footfall, and that's what we have to do as a landlord, and we will keep doing that, of course, next year. Our portfolio is very healthy.

You can see our top tenant on the left side, which actually 50% of them are grocery or hypermarket. If you look to the right, the highlight is that 83% of our tenant are not fashion, which is the most sensitive let's say sector among the retailers.

This is a very, very healthy portfolio. All right.

Capital recycling: in 2025, we divested Lippulaiva, as I mentioned before. We sold it in the book value, in the IFRS book value, 61.5.

In 2026, we put sales on hold of €510 million, while in the next let's say 24 months, we intend or we target to sell between half or between €500 million to €1 billion. From here, I will give the floor to Hilik to run through the financial overview.

Hilik Attias

Hello, everyone. I will start with the NRI.

NRI has landed at €209.2 million for the year versus €214.7 million. That's a -3.1%, and this is mainly to the divestments which we completed in 2024.

The EPRA earnings is landed at €79 million. We're going to touch on the next slide the main drivers for that.

We have finished with €0.43 EPRA earning per share, which is in line with our guidance, which was €0.41 to €0.46. Looking at the next slide, you can see the development of the EPRA earnings bridge.

We lost NRI from divestments in the year €18.4 million, but on the other hand, we had a very strong like-for-like growth of €11.8 million. Also, in addition, we had increased costs, financial costs, aggregate of €6.4 million.

Then and then we landed at €79 million for the year. The quarter, we have the same pattern, slightly better bottom line, €19.1 million versus €20.2 million.

With respect to the fair value change, we have in the in the last quarter, we gained a €8.3 million fair value gain, the whole year €51.1 million. That's a 1.4% of our whole portfolio, which is something that we are happy with.

You can see that the we had a cap rate pressure coming from Finland, but on the other hand, we had again, this is coming from the solid leasing activity, the overall impact was positive 51.1. As for the debt management, we've we've been very active in the debt front.

We've repaid more than €830 million of of debt maturities and and doing tendering, and we also issued a 2031 bond, €450 million, extending our duration, average duration, and and overall derisking the balance sheet. LTV dropped 2.4%, landing at 44.9%.

We're also post-2025 on January, we have successfully signed €270 million of secured financing with an additional €250 million upsize accordion. That is a three-year plus one plus one.

Overall, we're very we're very have very productive discussions with with various lenders, international and local, and we get a lot of interest and attractive termsheets that reflects our quality of assets. The results of all the financing and refinancing that we've done in 2025, you can look at our schedule debt maturities, and you can see that it's well staggered.

We have bond 2026 that is coming due September, €123 million, and 2027 bond €129 million. We have, of course, monitoring and have adequate liquidity for the for the year-end.

As mentioned in the financial review, in the financing question, we gave provided more details around the secured RCF to to have full transparency transparency with all the customary terms, including ownership covenant of 60%, which is very very standard for this kind of instrument. I think on the key metrics, 2% down like as mentioned before, loan-to-value 44.9%, net debt/EBITDA traded lower at multiple 9, very stable ICR, and a gradually increased average interest rate, which we will touch later in the Q&A.

Eshel Pesti

From now on, I will highlight few points that I believe that I have to clarify. The first issue is the divestment.

As I said, in the 24 in the next 24 months, we are intend to sell between €500 million to €1 billion non-core assets. I want to highlight, it's not a call to the predators.

We don't have to sell. Our financial situation is very stable.

It's not that I need the money in order to pay my debt or whatever. We will continue to sell in the book value if there are buyers.

They are welcome. If not, we can continue to work as usual.

This is regarding the divestment. The asset value: there are two actually two lines that we are working in order to increase our value.

The first one is to reduce our OPEX. We tenders almost all the services that we are getting, and we can see already in 2026 that we will reduce our OPEX in some sector even dramatically.

The second leverage is the OCR. Today the OCR of the company is low compared to the market, and I still have let's say 2-3% to increase the rent in all around the portfolio.

Strengthen balance sheet through the repayment of existing unsecured debt in compliance with the covenants. Hilik mentioned it.

We want to always focus on our balance sheet, and we take care about it, and I feel very comfortable with it. Regarding dividend: we'll check case by case, and basically our intention is when you will have free money and we pay our debt, we will introduce another option of distribute dividend.

Last, I want to thank all the Cityconners employees wherever they are in the Nordic. They worked very hard in 2025 and continue to work hard at the moment.

Really thanks for the good results and for the warm welcome that we get when we came here. Thanks again, and now we are open 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 Neeraj Kumar from Barclays. Please go ahead.

Neeraj Kumar

Morning, everyone. A couple of questions on my side.

Can you please update us on the status of the €250 million secured financing you're in the process of signing? Also, if you could help us with the use of proceeds of the €270 million loan you signed earlier this year?

Hilik Attias

The €270 million, as we announced, is already signed, and we are going to draw the money in the next days. It's pretty much how to use the funds in a productive manner.

I think, as I stated generally, we're seeing a lot of appetite from the secured market. We have been approached by international and local lenders, and we're introduced to a relatively attractive terms.

I think, again, this is echoing the quality of our assets. We can see that this is a good path for us to continue leverage ourselves with a decreased kind of coupon versus the rate environment outside.

Neeraj Kumar

Got it. Can you help us understand a bit more about your liquidity profile?

I understand that RCF has a change of control clause, you may not have access to it in the near future. Are there any conditions attached to that €250 million accordion option you have?

Hilik Attias

I think I've mentioned it earlier. We have for this kind of instrument, usually we have customary terms and conditions and covenants, including ownership covenant.

This is something that we also stated in the financial statements. We have 60% ownership covenant in there.

On the other hand, we have €270 million of secured financing loan with an optionality to upsize it by €250 million. I think on the liquidity front, we have adequate liquidity, and we're, of course, looking forward to do more secured financing in the future.

Neeraj Kumar

Got it. How has been your discussions with S&P on the back of all these things?

Because I remember they currently also assign good recovery on your unsecured bonds because of relatively low secured debt. Do you think that may change in the future?

Hilik Attias

Look, I think S&P, it's more of a methodology. S&P has the methodology.

Once G City crossed 50%, the downgrade has happened just because they're looking at us on a group level. If you look at the reporting on a standalone level, they acknowledge the fact that we are improving.

I think to Eshel's points, we are going to concentrate on generating more income from our current portfolio. This is what I can say about the S&P report.

Neeraj Kumar

Got it. Last question on my side.

Can you help us understand a bit more about the dividend policy? Thanks for providing those thoughts earlier.

You mentioned you'll look into it once you kind of repay your debt. How do you see hybrid instruments in light of all those things?

Do you see it as a debt, and do you want to address them as well before upstreaming any dividends, or how do you think about that?

Eshel Pesti

When the hybrids will come, we will consider it. We will do what is the best for the company.

As I said regarding the dividend, whenever we will have money instead of sitting on our bank account, we will consider distribute dividend.

Neeraj Kumar

Got it. Thank you very much.

Eshel Pesti

You're welcome.

Operator

The next question comes from Othman El Iraki from Fidelity International. Please go ahead.

Othman El Iraki

Yes, hi guys. Thank you for taking my question.

Actually, Neeraj already kind of covered a lot of them. Actually, I have one more on how you look at your capital structure going forward.

Do you kind of see yourself as using secured debt and that's it being a kind of secured borrower, or do you still see value out there for some kind of unsecured bond or other instruments, how you look at your funding?

Hilik Attias

I think, look, we are a new management. We're very pragmatic people.

I think right now the unsecured market is limited to none for us. I think the secured financing for us is a good way, a good path to experience a lower coupons and a very stable kind of unlocking of liquidity.

I think we have a lot of headroom. I think this is the path that we're going to take for the time being.

Othman El Iraki

Thank you. Just maybe a follow-up on the RCF.

You're not looking to waive the covenant with the banks? You will be losing this

Hilik Attias

It's not me to waive, right? This is the lenders.

Eshel Pesti

If you can talk to the lenders, we'll be happy.

Hilik Attias

Second, I think the kind of instrument is something that we can consider in the future. Look, we're trying to be very transparent with the terms and conditions, and this is what we're trying to say.

There's a 60% ownership covenant. G City right now sits on somewhere around 59.5% before the MTO results.

We're taking the measures to monitor risk, i.e., entering to secured financing upfront.

Othman El Iraki

No, and I appreciate the transparency on that. Thank you very much.

Eshel Pesti

Thank you.

Hilik Attias

Thank you.

Operator

As a reminder, if you wish to ask a question, please dial pound key 5 on your telephone keypad. There are no more questions at this time, I hand the conference back to the speakers for any closing comments.

Eshel Pesti

Thank you very much, all of you. We will see you soon in the first quarter.

Done. Thank you.

Bye-bye.