Grand City Properties S.A.

Good morning, and thank you for joining us for Grand City's Full Year 2024 Results Call. You can view this presentation on Grand City's website, either on the Home section or under Financial Reports of the Investor Relations section.

With me today will be Chairman and Director, Christian Windfuhr; CEO, Refael Zamir; CFO, Idan Hadad; and Head of Investor Relations and Capital Markets, Michael Bar-Yosef. [Operator Instructions] With that, I would like to hand you over to Christian to start with the presentation.

Thank you very much, and welcome to our full year 2024 results presentation. 2024 was marked as a pivotal year.

The second half of 2024 reflected more optimism for the real estate sector as the interest rates continue to decrease and more rate cuts are planned. As seen in our results, the second half removed much of the negativity we have seen in the last 2.5 years.

In 2024, we have seen strong performance across all fronts and have outperformed compared to our expectations and to the outlook we had in the beginning of the year. We have proven our strong access to the capital market, disposed properties successfully, reduced our LTV significantly and have seen property valuations turn positive for the first time since 2022.

Operations remain very strong with a higher-than-guided rent like-for-like while maintaining low vacancy levels. Accordingly, we have reached the top of our guidance after updating the guidance upwards with the semiannual reporting.

We achieved growth on all KPIs and are well positioned to generate growth and value going forward. We revalued our entire portfolio as of year-end 2024, resulting in positive revaluations of 0.5% for the full year 2024, indicating that valuations had reached bottom in the middle of 2024 and started turning positive in the second half of the year.

We will provide more details on the valuations later in the presentation. Looking ahead into 2025, we set ourselves a target to maintain a strong balance sheet, support our rating metrics and create headroom to be ready for potential growth opportunities.

We will wait with the dividend distribution decision until the AGM to see how the market behaves in the coming months. We believe that our current prudent approach will enable us to distribute out of the healthier, stronger and growing company.

More details regarding these and other points will be given in the coming slides. And with this, I would like to hand over to Refael.

Thank you, Christian. Welcome also from my side.

I am happy to present our results to you today, which showed good progress across the board. Please go to Slide 3.

On Slide 3, we present an overview of our key financial results, driven by strong operational growth offsetting the impact of disposals. Net rental income was EUR 423 million, increasing by 3%; adjusted EBITDA increasing by 5%, amounting to EUR 335 million, driven by improved margins.

FFO came in at EUR 188 million, reaching the upper range of the guidance and reflecting a growth of 2% compared to 2023, as operational growth was able to more than offset the negative pressure of higher financial expenses and perpetual note coupons. The strong operational results, supported by EUR 50 million positive revaluation result for the whole year, resulted in a net profit of EUR 242 million compared to a loss of EUR 638 million in 2023.

Looking at the balance sheet, our cash and liquid assets increased to EUR 1.5 billion, higher by 23% compared to EUR 1.2 billion at the end of 2023, supporting with our objective of maintaining a strong liquidity position and reduced leverage. Total equity increased by 4%, mainly because of the profit recorded for the year.

This has supported a 7% increase in EPRA NTA, reaching EUR 4.3 billion or EUR 24.3 per share, emphasizing the pivot back to growth. LTV significantly decreased to 33% from 37% in 2023.

Net debt to EBITDA decreased further on the back of continued operational growth, reaching 8.7x compared to 10x previous year. The company also maintained strong coverage ratio indicated by an ICR of 5.7x.

The cost of debt remained stable at 1.9%, while the average debt maturity is nearly at 5 years. The unencumbered assets amounted to EUR 6.4 billion, reflecting 73% of our portfolio.

On Slide 4, we present a summary of our main portfolio KPIs. Our annualized net rental income increased to EUR 413 million from EUR 406 million in 2023, with operational growth reflecting by like-for-like rental growth of 3.8% despite the negative impact from disposals.

Our vacancy rate increased a bit during the year to 3.9%, but eventually, we succeed to catch up and land at a low rate of 3.8%, exactly like previous year. And our in-place rent increased to EUR 9.2 per square meter.

We revaluate all of our portfolio as of 31 December 2024 with external independent valuator and recorded a positive like-for-like revaluation of 0.5%, indicating the shift in the valuation trend toward a positive momentum. The portfolio value remained stable year-over-year at EUR 8.6 billion, reflecting EUR 2,203 per square meter.

Rental yield increased slightly, reaching to 4.9% compared to 4.8% at the end of 2023. We view our rental yield of nearly 5% as conservative and healthy, positioning the company well going forward.

We are encouraged by the pickup in investment market activity. In 2024, we signed EUR 350 million of disposals compared to EUR 190 million in 2023.

Of those, EUR 125 million were signed in Q4 alone. EUR 85 million out of the EUR 125 million were completed already last week, and the remaining is expected to be completed in the next period.

During 2024, we completed EUR 270 million of disposals sold around book values. On the next slide, we will highlight some key strategic achievements and trends.

On Slide 5, we present more details on our operational performance, where we continue to achieve solid like-for-like rental growth. The rental growth continued to accelerate, driven by strong and sustainable fundamentals, which support the in-place rental growth and amounting to 3.8% in 2024.

Vacancy remains at low level of 3.8%. The sustained increase in rental income support the steady increase in adjusted EBITDA, offsetting our net seller position in the last few years, while maintaining high operational margin despite inflation.

Going forward, we expect rental income to increase above inflation in Germany as regulation indirectly allows for adjustment of rent based on past inflation. In London, softer rental regulation allowed for a faster capture of market rent.

The strong fundamental and supply-demand imbalance in the area where GCP has its portfolio provide us with a high reversionary potential, which stood at 23% as of December 2024. The reversionary potential remained high despite the strong like-for-like increase in the past years.

We expect to continue and capture the potential through reletting and indexation. Moving on to Slide 6, we present on an overview of our deleveraging measures in the year.

We have continued with the disposal of noncore and mature assets, signing EUR 350 million and closing EUR 270 million in disposals in the year at around book values. Supporting the leverage metrics, we notably have reached a turning point in valuations, reverting the slight negative revaluation recorded in the first half of 2024 and registering a like-for-like value increase of 0.5% for the year.

In recent months, we saw an increase in activity in the transaction markets, which enhanced clarity and supported valuations. During December, we have also conducted a small EUR 45 million equity injection through the sale of most of our remaining shares held in treasury as part of a reverse inquiry of several institutional investors, which supported the goal to reduce leverage, which in turn puts us in a stronger position to switch back to growth mode.

As a result of those measures, we have managed to reduce significantly the loan-to-value ratio, decreasing from 37% to 33% as of December 2024 and to decrease the net debt-to-EBITDA ratio from 10x to 8.7x, which was further supported by our strong operational performance. Our credit rating of BBB+ was reaffirmed in December 2024 by S&P, however, the outlook remained negative.

Our results put our rating metrics within the rating threshold, which is encouraged, but do note that S&P expect GCP to maintain a sufficient headroom to its KPIs. Following with Slide 7, we showed our KPI achievement related to the consolidation of our strong financial position.

Notably, 2024 was marked by our return to capital markets, receiving strong investor demand. We conducted exchange and tender offer on our perpetual notes, which had a high acceptance rate of around 85%.

We also issued our first bond in 3 years, raising EUR 500 million with an oversubscribed book of 7x. Since issuance, the spread of the bond had decreased significantly, reaching point in line with the historical average range.

Those transactions illustrated that the strong investor appetite for GCP remained and confirmed our access to diverse source of funds. With this, I would like to hand over to Christian to present the portfolio.

Thank you, Refael. Turning to Slide 9 and 10, where we present some key market data.

I will keep it short, but as you can see, demand drivers remain strong, supported by net migration, while supply remains constrained, with new supply expected to reduce even further in the coming years, well below required levels. This is putting upward pressure on rents, resulting in significant increases in market rental levels well above our own in-place rent level.

Slide 10 shows similar trends for the London market. Construction costs are higher, resulting in difficulties in adding new supply to the market, which is resulting in strong pressure on market rents.

These market fundamentals support our London portfolio and contribute to low vacancy of currently 2.8%, while rental growth remains strong. Looking at Slide 11, we show that our in-place rent continues to increase and stood at EUR 9.2 per square meter in December 2024.

This is an increase of 7% as compared to December 2023 when it was EUR 8.6 per square meter, supported by like-for-like rental growth, the impact of net disposals as well as positive currency impacts in the London portfolio. The total rental like-for-like was 3.8%, 3.6% in Germany and 4.6% in London, where we have the ability to increase rents faster.

As vacancy is kept at low levels of 3.8%, our focus is on extracting like-for-like rental growth through in-place rents. As of December 2024, the estimated annualized market rental value stood at EUR 508 million, representing a 23% upside potential, which we expect to extract in the coming years, primarily through reversion on reletting.

In the meantime, we see market rents increasing further, expanding the upside potential going forward. Continuing with Slide 12, we present an update on the valuation of our portfolio.

As always, the valuations were performed by qualified external valuers, which conducted a full portfolio valuation as of year-end. In 2024, we recorded like-for-like value change of a slight positive 0.5% after a negative 2% in the first half of the year with a positive value like-for-like of 2.5% in the second half of 2024.

This came despite higher cap rates and yields as the solid operational performance of the portfolio offset the yield expansion in the year. As of December 2024, the average rent multiple of the portfolio was 20.5x, reflecting a yield of 4.9% compared to a multiple of 20.9x and a yield of 4.8% at year-end 2023.

The average value per square meter is EUR 2,203, conservative and well below the replacement cost. On a like-for-like basis, adjusting for the impact of transactions over the years, our yields are at the same levels as in 2018, which is a testament to the conservative portfolio valuations.

In the past periods, we have seen lower valuation volatility as the portfolio historically was conservatively valued and increased mostly from rental and operational growth. Turning to Slide 13, we present an overview of our dividend -- of our diversified portfolio, sorry.

In 2024, we have seen an increase in disposal activity, which was carried around book value and on an opportunistic basis. The increase in disposals, specifically towards the end of 2024, reflects an improved transaction market and increased investor appetite.

We closed EUR 270 million of assets around book value, which were mostly located in London, North Rhine-Westphalia, Berlin and Hessen, and we sold an average in-place rent multiple of 17x. We also had a small volume of acquisitions comprising EUR 45 million of properties in London.

Going forward, we expect to execute acquisitions on the back of disposals supporting our rating metrics. As at the end of December, our portfolio comprised EUR 8.6 billion of investment properties structured as follows: Berlin with 23%, North Rhine-Westphalia with 21%, London with 20% and Dresden/Leipzig/Halle with 14%, remaining our largest regions.

Further significant locations are Nuremberg/Fürth/Munich with 4%, Hamburg/Bremen with 4% and Mannheim/Kaiserslautern/Frankfurt with 4%. Additionally, assets held for sale amounted to EUR 233 million, of which around EUR 125 million has been signed but not completed yet.

And now let me hand to Idan to present the financial results.

Thank you, Christian. Moving on to our financial results.

Starting with Slide 15, we present our P&L results. Net rental income increased by 3% to EUR 423 million in 2024.

The growth was driven by strong like-for-like rental growth, which more than offset the impact of net disposals. In 2024, operational costs were reduced, primarily due to lower heating expenses as energy prices have stabilized.

This is also reflected in the operating income component of the revenue. Adjusted EBITDA increased by 5% to EUR 335 million, reflecting improved operational efficiencies.

We recorded a profit of EUR 242 million in 2024 as compared to a loss of EUR 638 million in 2023. The result for the year is primarily driven by the operational profits supported by positive revaluation of the portfolio and reflects earnings per share of EUR 1.14.

Turning to Slide 16, we present our FFO results. In 2024, FFO I increased as adjusted EBITDA growth more than offset the higher perpetual note attribution and a slight increase in finance expenses.

Following the reset of 2 perpetual note series in 2023, which led to a higher coupon payment, we launched an exchange and tender offer for these notes. This reduced our annual coupon payment by EUR 2 million while also positively impacting our credit rating KPIs.

Through proactive measures, finance expenses increased only slightly despite net debt being raised at higher rates than existing debt. This was achieved primarily through hedging strategies, fixing rates on variable and cap rate debt.

As a result, our hedging ratio now stands at 95%. Additionally, interest income earned on our strong cash position further supported our results.

On Slide 17, we provide an update on maintenance and CapEx. Our focus remains on continuously improving asset quality across our portfolio.

In 2024, we invested EUR 25.8 per square meter in repositioning CapEx and maintenance, an increase of -- from EUR 23.7 per square meter in 2023. Of this, EUR 20.2 per square meter is attributed to repositioning CapEx and EUR 5.6 per square meter to maintenance.

Additionally, we invested EUR 25 million in pre-letting modifications compared to EUR 15 million in 2023. These projects focus on creating new rental space and enhancing existing properties beyond standard repositioning CapEx.

This is expected to drive further rental income in future periods. We also spent EUR 2.4 million on modernization projects in 2024.

These are targeted investments aimed to enhance the overall asset quality and rental value, including elevators installation, adding balconies, technical upgrades for power, heating and water supply. Investments aimed at improving energy efficiency and reducing CO2 emissions, such as window replacement and heating system upgrades, are categorized accordingly based on the project specifics.

Adjusted FFO for the period amounted to EUR 105 million, slightly lower than EUR 107 million in 2023, mainly due to higher repositioning CapEx investments. On Slide 18, we present our EPRA NAV metrics, which turned positive after several years of decline.

The metrics were as follows: EPRA NRV per share increased by 4% and amounted to EUR 27.8; EPRA NTA increased by 7% and amounted to EUR 4.3 billion; EPRA NTA per share increased by 5% and amounted to EUR 24.3; EPRA NTV per share was down by 1%; and EPRA NAV was up by 1% compared to 2023. The increase in EPRA NTA was primarily driven by strong operational performance, a slight positive property revaluation in 2024 and higher deferred taxes.

The per share metrics were slightly impacted by the sale of treasury shares. On Slide 20, we review our financial profile.

In 2024, we further strengthened our cash and liquid assets position, reaching EUR 1.5 billion in December 2024, up from EUR 1.2 billion in December 2023. Our LTV ratio decreased from 37% in December 2023 to 33% in December 2024, reflecting our deleveraging efforts.

The EPRA LTV ratio, which includes perpetual notes as debt, stood at 46%, down from 48% at the end of 2023. Additionally, we increased our hedging ratio to 95% as of December 2024, up from 88% in December 2023.

This has allowed us to lock in lower interest rates, ensuring that almost all of our debt is now fixed and swapped, keeping the cost of debt low and reducing volatility. Our capital structure remains solid with return to capital markets, reaffirming our ability to access diversified funding sources.

Furthermore, our high ratio of unencumbered properties, 73% as of December 2024, provides additional funding alternatives at attractive rates. On Slide 21, we present our debt maturity schedule.

As of year-end 2024, our cost of debt remained stable and low at 1.9%. Our average debt maturity stood at nearly 5 years.

The average debt maturity, excluding the maturities covered by our cash balance, is 6.3 years. Through various strategic actions taken during the year, we have further reinforced our cash and liquid asset position, ensuring full coverage of all upcoming debt maturities.

And with this, allow me to hand over to Refael to conclude the presentation.

Thank you, Idan. Before I present our guidance for 2025 and conclude the presentation, please note that in the appendix of our presentation, you will find more details on our financial policy and covenant headroom, the perpetual note transaction conducted in 2024, our portfolio and more market data, ESG, analyst coverage and share development as well as management and credit ratings.

Now please turn to Slide 23 where we present our guidance for 2025. In 2025, we expect to continue to have a strong rental like-for-like growth with a further stabilization in cost inflation and increased efficiencies that will support a moderate increase in adjusted EBITDA.

We expect finance expenses to increase somewhat while perpetual notes attribution to remain stable after 2 years of increases. All in all, we expect to see an increase in FFO I.

Accordingly, we guide for like-for-like rental growth of around 3.5%; FFO in the range of EUR 185 million to EUR 195 million, translating to an FFO I per share in the range of EUR 1.05 to EUR 1.11; a dividend distribution of 75% of the FFO I per share. And as always, we aim to maintain our strong balance sheet and guide for an LTV below our 45% internal range.

Thank you all for your attention. And just before we move to the Q&A, I would like to thank our team members for all their work and for successfully navigating all the challenges that were presented, achieving growth and putting the company in a strong position to start 2025.

Thank you for your attention, and allow me now to move on to our Q&A.

Before we invite your direct telephone questions, we would like to answer questions that we have received by e-mail prior to this call. For simplicity reasons, the team has taken liberty to group similar questions in order to answer as many questions as possible.

Allow me now to read out these questions. Could you give an update on the market and operating conditions in your portfolio locations?

How do you see these dynamics going forward?

Operating conditions in our portfolio locations remain strongly positive and sustainable as these markets continue to be driven by the long-term structural factors that have resulted in a significant supply and demand gap. Demand continues to be driven by urbanization, net migration and smaller household sizes, all factors which are expected to continue over the long term; while supply remains constrained by high construction costs, skilled worker shortage and as well as bureaucratic and regulatory hurdles.

Low unemployment and wage growth have slowing inflations levels, means that rent affordability has improved, particularly in Germany. We believe that these factors will support sustainable rent growth and low vacancy rates for the foreseeable future.

Our portfolio in Germany and London has benefited from these dynamics, and our operations successfully continued to capture the reversionary potential, resulting in higher like-for-like in-place rental growth, while vacancy has remained at historical lows. And as market rents continue to grow strongly, reversionary rent potential continues to be high at over 20%, ensuring long-term cash flow growth.

Softer rent regulations in London compared to Germany mean that market rent increases have been captured faster in this market, resulting in mid-single-digit growth in recent periods. Grand City Properties is thus well positioned to deliver additional robust internal operational growth over the mid to long term.

Could you provide a breakdown of your like-for-like rental growth? What was the like-for-like rental growth rates in London and in Germany?

Which regions are the main contributors? And what is your outlook?

In 2024, the like-for-like rental growth was 3.8%, driven mainly by an in-place rent growth. The 3.8% like-for-like rental growth in 2024 represents an acceleration as compared to 3.3% in 2023 as the high reversionary potential of the portfolio is steadily captured.

The main contributor to the in-place rent growth was the strong reversion on reletting, contributing 2.2%, while indexation was 1.6%. As before, we note that the like-for-like doesn't include large modernization projects, expansion and new construction, and comes at low CapEx and high increase to cash flow.

Rental growth continued to be strong in London at 4.6% in 2024 as reenacted rent regulation mean the reversionary potential can be captured faster. In London, the vacancy has reached a low level of 2.8%, and we focus on lease extension at high levels, which reduce operational costs and void periods, while also slightly extending the period by which we expect to capture the full reversionary potential.

We continue to have a positive outlook for rental growth in London as fundamentals remain strong. In Germany, rental growth was also strong at 3.6%.

We saw positive results in all our main regions, with notable results in Berlin at nearly 5% like-for-like growth as well as in Nuremberg, Munich, Frankfurt and Halle. Looking towards 2025 and beyond, we expect to continue achieving strong like-for-like rental growth over the next several years, which will be strong accretive growth driver for years to come.

As part of our 2025 guidance, we expect to see a total like-for-like rental growth conservatively around 3.5%, thereby driving sustainable operational growth going forward.

Do you expect any possible regulatory changes post German elections?

We remain cautious about predicting possible political and post-election impacts as coalition negotiations amongst parties are ongoing, and we would not like to speculate here. Nonetheless, we do not expect regulatory risk to become significantly stricter, and hope the new government will find a long-term solution to reduce regulatory hurdles to reduce bureaucracy, simplify building regulations, promoting housing investments and lowering energy costs.

However, we note the previous coalition also had ambitious targets, which were not realized. SPD, which is expected to be part of the coalition, may demand some rent regulation changes or an extension of the current rent regulation, which is about to expire.

But we currently feel that an extreme regulatory change is less likely in the coalition format. The Mietpreisbremse, the primary existing framework for rental regulations, is currently set to expire at the end of 2025 on the federal level.

However, the federal government, which included the SPD, passed a draft law in December 2024 before the elections to extend the rent caps until the end of 2029, but which has not yet been signed into law. It is currently our base assumption that the incoming government will extend the existing framework with minimal changes as the CDU, the Christian Democrats, was the governing party when the regulation was initially put into place.

There also remains a very small possibility that the Mietpreisbremse is not extended, wherein existing rents could increase faster in order to cover [ rents ] with market rates, thereby positively impacting our rental growth over the medium term, but we view this as unlikely. Over the past 2 weeks, we have seen a negative reaction in the bond and equity market to the discussions over relaxing the debt brake in Germany.

The debt brake will be used to fund a new EUR 500 billion infrastructure fund, which could potentially support the real estate market. So the overall impact on the German real estate market is yet unclear.

We will follow closely the developments here and continue to take a proactive approach to either pursue opportunities or diffuse threats.

Could you provide more detail on your valuation results? What were the drivers?

Did you see a difference between your locations? And what is your outlook for property values in the next periods?

We were able to see a gradual and consistent improvement in the outlook for property values. We see that valuation has stabilized and turning positive as the low pressure area was reached in mid-2024, and we are pleased to record a positive valuation result for the first time since H1 2022.

In 2024, we recorded like-for-like value change of a slightly positive of 0.5% for the full year, seeing a positive 2.5% like-for-like in the second half of 2024. Looking at the drivers, we can clearly see that the result came on the back of operational improvement.

As operational growth is not fully translated into value growth, we saw year-over-year a slight yield increase of 0.1%. Looking at the valuation parameter, those remained broadly stable with the average discount rate at 5.4% and the average cap rate increased marginally to 4.2% from 4.1% in December 2023.

We saw strong revaluation result in the London portfolio where the like-for-like value increase was 1.8%. For the German portfolio, the value like-for-like result was flat with a small yield expansion.

Looking at our main location in Germany, we saw positive revaluation, particularly in Dresden, Leipzig and Halle, as well as in Nuremberg and Munich, mostly locations which had strong operational growth. Values in NRW, Berlin, Mannheim, Hamburg and Bremen decreased slightly on a like-for-like basis in terms of full year 2024, but have mostly been positive in the second half of 2024.

Going forward, we expect a slightly positive revaluation trend to continue in 2025, driven by strong operational growth and mostly stable yields. Looking ahead beyond 2025, we expect some yield compression beginning in 2026 due to the increased activity in the transaction market.

But also over the medium term, we expect operational growth to continue to be the main driver of valuations. We note that we prefer to take a cautious approach to expecting yield compression.

Additionally, since the transaction market and valuation are closely linked to fluctuation in interest rate and government bond yields, there is always a downside risk that macroeconomic or political uncertain could introduce volatility and slow the positive momentum we have observed in the recent months. While our business strategy remains focused on the long term, driven by strong underlying fundamentals, we have also built a healthy buffer to build potential challenges should they arise.

What are your views on your current leverage position? Do you expect further deleveraging?

Our LTV stood at 33% as of December 2024, a significant reduction of 4% from 37% in December 2023. This decrease in leverage was driven by disposals, operational profits, dividend suspension, equity injection through sale of treasury shares, slight positive property revaluation and bond buybacks at a discount.

Looking at our credit rating metrics, we have seen improvements, though they remain close to the stand-alone downside threshold. S&P expects us to maintain a prudent approach, and we aim to further strengthen our headroom, which would also support our positioning for future growth opportunities.

With discount rates and yield stabilizing, we anticipate a slight increase in property values in line with operational growth, further reducing leverage over time. We are confident in our current leverage trajectory and remain committed to maintaining a strong and resilient balance sheet with conservative leverage.

How do you see the investment market evolving? Can you provide more details on your disposal activity?

Are you expecting to sell more assets? Are you planning to start buying again?

If so, do you see attractive investment opportunities? What would need to happen for you to become a net buyer again?

Throughout 2024, we have seen an improvement in activity and condition in the transaction markets. Market data shows the last quarter of 2024 was the one with the highest deal volume in the last 2 years, and this is expected to continue increasing in 2025.

We see this also reflecting in our own activity, signing EUR 125 million of additional disposal in Q4, making the 2024 total signed disposal around EUR 370 million compared to EUR 190 million in 2023. In 2024, we closed EUR 270 million around book values accounting for 1,900 units.

The location of the disposed asset was mainly NRW, London, Berlin and Hessen, and accomplished at an average multiple of 17x. Looking forward, we have become more selective in the disposal we want to carry out.

As we have improved our position and as the market momentum has pivoted, disposals have become less important for deleveraging. We do, however, expect to continue to dispose going forward, but in the reduced scale than we have seen in 2022 until 2024, primarily for capital recycling purpose and to position us more strongly for external growth.

We currently see some potential deals in the market, but the opportunities we have seen are not attractive enough, and we do not expect to see significant acquisition in the first half of 2025. We do expect more attractive opportunities later in the end of the year or from 2026.

That being said, for the full year 2025, we expect to be a net seller as we expect it will take a bit longer to see the sort of deals that we would like to take advantage of. Regarding our focus, we like our current portfolio distribution and do not expect to make significant changes.

However, as always, we remain opportunistic and we will take advantage of accretive opportunities, either acquisitions or disposals when they arrive in any region that fits our criteria.

What are the latest funding conditions you were able to secure? Do you believe the funding environment has improved or worsened over the last few months?

How is the strategy evolving for hybrids?

We view the current financing landscape as broadly positive with interest rates continuing to decline and credit spreads tightening. The ECB is expected to continue its rate cuts through 2025, albeit at a slower pace.

In July 2024, we successfully returned to the bond market for the first time since 2021, raising EUR 500 million in an unsecured debt bond at an attractive coupon. At issuance, the bond had a spread of 195 basis points.

Since then, spreads have tightened significantly, currently standing at around 140 basis points, broadly in line with historic levels. As a result, we see capital markets as fully open with no restrictions on issuing new bonds.

With mid-swap rates declining, we expect future bond issuances to come at lower rates than our last issuance. Additionally, in 2024, we secured EUR 100 million in new bank loans and remain active in active discussions with several banks for further funding.

We are prioritizing the strengthening of our relationships with local and regional banks as they provide more stable and reliable funding when strong partnerships are maintained. This strategy ensures greater stability and competitive margins across market cycles.

Notably, despite the challenging environment of the past few years, many of our local bank partners have kept their margins steady. Currently, we see margin of approximately 1.2% on new bank debt.

Regarding the perpetual notes, our strategy remains unchanged. The successful exchanges and tenders mean that the majority of uncalled notes have been replaced with new notes, which have their first call date in 2030.

Additionally, there are no upcoming first call dates until mid-2026. Given the significant improvements in market conditions over the past year, we expect that the refinancing this instrument with new one will be feasible in line with our base case, provided market conditions do not materially deteriorate.

Furthermore, as demonstrated last year, we believe we always have the option to exchange the notes should the market recovery not proceed as expected. In any case, we continue to view perpetuals as a key component of our funding mix, offering clear benefits in volatile times.

You have published your 2025 guidance. Can you provide some more details on the individual drivers?

In 2024, we have reached our upper half of our guidance, which we have previously increased as part of our H1 results. In 2025, we guide for a further slight increase in FFO I, which we expect to be in the range of EUR 185 million to EUR 195 million, reflecting FFO I per share of EUR 1.05 to EUR 1.11, reflecting around 11% yield on the current share price.

In 2025, we expect operational momentum to remain strong with like-for-like rental growth around 3.5%. This will be partially offset by the impact of disposals in 2024 as well as the impact from signed disposals, which were not yet closed as of the end of 2024.

We additionally expect a lower volume of disposals coming from our asset held for sale. For acquisitions, we conservatively assume no significant acquisitions yet in 2025.

As a net result, we expect a slight increase in rental income. We expect the recent improvement in the EBITDA margin to remain as inflationary pressures have reduced.

As a result, we expect a low single-digit percent increase in the adjusted EBITDA. We expect finance expenses to be slightly higher than in 2024, mainly as a result of the annual effect of the EUR 500 million bond issued in July, offset by the positive impact of debt repayments across '24 and '25.

We also expect interest income to be lower as a result of lower rates, resulting in higher net expenses. Looking at the perpetual notes, we expect perpetual notes contribution to be just slightly lower compared to 2024 as a result of the impact of the note exchanges and tender offers, but the impact is not very material.

Will you distribute dividend this year?

In 2024, we saw an improvement in the market situation. This has allowed us to strengthen our balance sheet and reduce uncertainty.

We have improved our rating metrics significantly in 2024. However, since our rating outlook is negative, we want to see a sufficient headroom to rating threshold.

We are strongly committed to the rating, which was always a high priority for us, and we wouldn't like to harm our chances to stabilize the rating. A strong credit rating has always been one of the drivers of our exceptional growth.

We believe that by maintaining a strong rating going forward, we will be able to drive stronger accretive growth. We didn't take a decision yet for the dividend, and we still have until the AGM in June to take that decision.

We will wait to see the results of Q1 before we take a decision.

Those were the questions that we received prior to this call. We can now start the open session for your questions.

We would appreciate if you can ask all your questions at once, and we will answer them one by one.

Got 3 questions, if I may. I saw that you have sold the treasury shares at EUR 11.90.

May you could remind us at which price you bought them in the years before? Second question is on Page 161 in the annual report.

I saw that the total debt, the total long- and short-term debt was still unchanged at EUR 4.4 billion. Looking to the debt expiry profile in '25, can we also expect a gross debt reduction?

And the second question -- the last -- third and last question is on the acquisitions. You mentioned EUR 45 million, if I'm not mistaken.

Could you indicate if you have bought full ownership of these units or partial ownership and then aiming to buy the remaining part in the coming years?

Thank you, Kai, for your questions. I'll start with the first question.

Yes, we bought -- we sold at EUR 11.9 per share. As you know, we bought in the past, but it was at a discount as well.

I don't have the price exactly in front of me, but as well was a big discount to NAV. As to your second question on debt, yes, so the gross debt remained quite stable this year because we both issued debt and bought back.

This year, we have quite a lot of repayments, which we'll do from our cash balances. So we don't expect to go up with the gross debt.

We actually expect to either stay stable or go to a lower debt level. And as to the acquisition we did, it was an acquisition we did in London, and it was a full ownership and no minority inside.

So no more acquisitions related to that. Thank you.

I'm just -- we're looking at your comment you made about the reaffirmed S&P rating in December. You mentioned that some further steps might be necessary to maintain that rating.

And I was wondering if you could give a little bit more color on that, if there were some specific issues that were highlighted and what you guys might be discussing internally to maintain the rating. That's it.

Thank you, Ellis. Yes, so rating, we're not expecting to do anything that we haven't done before.

We continue with the business. The main question at this stage is the dividend, which we're still considering whether to pay or not, and that will be our main measure to mitigate.

Thank you.

Questions from my side. First question is on the valuation gains.

Could you give us some details whether there were regions in particular which were driving the valuation gains or whether it was across the board? That would be the first question.

Second question is a follow-up question on the credit rating topic. You explained that main measures to think about is to skip or to pay out the dividend.

Are there any other topics where you are in discussions with Standard & Poor's, what these guys want to see from you to eliminate the negative credit rating outlook? These are the 2 questions, please.

Thank you, Manuel. As to the valuations, yes, as we mentioned, we've seen 0.5% like-for-like growth in 2024.

Germany stand-alone was flat. So we've seen devaluations in the first half.

And in the second half, we've seen more -- on average, the same amount, but positive. We've seen it across all of our locations.

So we've seen good momentum across Germany. And London was outperforming at 1.8% like-for-like value growth for 2024, supported by stronger like-for-like rental growth as well.

So yes, so in general, we've seen very good momentum in H2 across all the board. As to S&P, so yes, there's no additional further measures, as I mentioned, perhaps refraining from acquisitions, which we mentioned we expect to be in 2025 a net seller.

So I suppose that will also be supportive for the metrics. Thank you.

There seem to be no further questions. And therefore, I would like to thank you all who participated in this call and the questions you raised before or during the call.

All the best to you, and goodbye.