USCF Midstream Energy Income Fund Price & Performance (UMI)

And as we said, we were going to come in below that €650,000,000 We came in at €555,000,000 We have return on capital of 12.3% and a leverage ratio of 1.9 Now if I have a first glance at our foundation businesses, and that I really, really would like to highlight that we have here a strong and robust performance of the foundation business. In Catalysis, are publishing EBITDA margins close to 26%, return on capital more than 40% despite a slower internal combustion engine market. For Recycling, return on capital close to 80%, EBITDA margin [indiscernible] Sorry, is there anything on the line? Okay. EBITDA margins of 36% And here we have seen lower revenues the Recycling segment, but I will come to that later on. Specialty Materials, EBITDA margin came in below 20% and return on capital of 9%. This is not where we want to be. And this is mainly related to cobalt Cobalt and Specialty Materials, on which I will give a bit more color also later on. Now if we then look, of course, Battery Materials and this is a business on which we already exchanged quite a bit over the last [indiscernible] And this business, as you all know, is And this business, as you all know, is characterized by a slowdown in demand for electric vehicles.

And this also had a reflection on the ramp up of our customers the volume developments at Umicore. Now as you all know, we have the strategic review ongoing and we're finalizing that one. And I really look forward to exchanging with you on these key messages, of course, in the upcoming Capital Markets Day in March. In the meanwhile, not awaiting, of course, the CMD updates, we have been targeting on our CapEx. And these came in 35% lower year on year. And this excludes still an equity contribution of €175,000,000 towards Transfence with Iron Way with its specific guardrails, of course, coming with that joint venture. Now also announced that we're going to pause the battery materials plant construction in Canada. And I'm also, of course, pleased to share that we were successful in integrating these customer contracts in our plants in Korea. So always in the spirit of filling capacity utilization line with our customer commitments. Now we also have been realigning our operations This, of course, reflecting the base the slower ramp up of our customer. We have adjusted our volume projections. And we are focusing with our CapEx expansions really on the existing foot and Korea, that's where the CapEx is growing.

Next, of course, the standard maintenance CapEx that we foresee for the business. Now if you look at the 2024 adjusted EBITDA for Battery Materials, we gave you an updated guidance at the midyear that we would come in close to breakeven per year ends, and that is also what we see for the business now at the close of the year. Of course, I also would like to come back on the very painful 1,600,000,000 impairments, which we had to take in H1. We all know that this is not where we want to be, but we will continue to focus on that value recovery for this business.

Now at group level, of course, we did not just focus on Baffling Materials. We have been significantly stepping up our efficiency and cost saving measures across the group, we accelerated even more in the second half of the year and we came in with €100,000,000 EBITDA on efficiency and value based initiatives that's realized in this €100,000,000 EBITDA well ahead of the €17,000,000 targets we have put for ourselves. Now transiting to the dividends, we know that the environment around us at this point in time remains uncertain. We have a delayed ramp up with our customers and also our earnings, as a consequence, have dropped significantly for 2020 In that context, the Supervisory Board proposes a cross annual dividend of €50 per share, which is €0.25 on top of the earlier paid interim dividends over Now this still represents a payout ratio of 4747% on the current net earnings per share. The Supervisory Board also intends to reset the the annual baseline for the dividends at €0.5 per share and that's well in line and with ongoing policy of a stable [indiscernible] dividends. Let me now zoom in a bit more on the different business [indiscernible] [indiscernible] we clearly have a decrease in revenues and EBITDA for Battery Materials compared to the previous years.

And let me start off with the revenues. We know that we have lower CAM sales volumes. We debate with we have lower refining income And this is mainly reflecting slowdown in the EV sales and also the slower ramp up of our customers and the tailing off of legacy contracts faster than we initially expected. Of course, also in 2023, there was a nonrecurring lithium effect, which was sizable, which is affecting the year on year comparison. If we look at the EBITDA, That also was a substantial nonrecurring effect in 2023, which we will now have for 2024. And we have been able to partially offset these drop in EBITDA with lower overheads and a positive one off of roughly €40,000,000 in 2024. CapEx came in at $3.00 €7,000,000,000 well below 2023 And I repeat myself, focused on the finishing of the plants in Europe as well as Korea to serve against our customer commitments. And we paused, of course, the plants in Canada. If we now go to Catalysis, Now let us first have a look at the market for Catalysis. And there we see that if we look at 2023, there was roughly 79,000,000 ICE vehicles sold And if you then look to the year 2024, we do see a reduction of close to 3,000,000 vehicles and especially in the second half of the year.

We exchanged on that also during the half years and we anticipated that in our forecast for the second half. And so basically predictions came in according to what we expected at that point in time. Now let me give some more color on the specific submarkets. Let me start off with China. China was roughly stable in terms of IC production but underlying there was a significant shift in that market. We clearly see that local OEMs, Chinese OEMs are taking more market share at the expense of Western OEMs. Classically, Numicore has grown with Western OEMs in the Chinese markets. Within the last two, three years, we also heavily focused on gaining market share with the local OEMs. We are quite successful with this. But despite that, we still lost some market share in China. But again, good progressions with the local OEMs, and we remain positive about this market going into 2025. On North America, a small contraction of the markets and there, we lost market share mainly because of the unfavorable customer mix. If we then go to Europe, it's the opposite. There, the market lost close to 7% but the overall market share grew for this segment.

In Japan and Korea, we performed well, but the market in general dropped by 6%. We had strong business in South America as well, where also our market position remains very strong. If we then look at the HDD business, we do see a weaker economy being reflected in the HDD numbers in Europe. But also in China. And in China, more specifically, we also see much more CNG trucks being sold at the expense of HCT production. So this is also an underlying volume effect that plays in our business. For Catalysis.

Now if you now look at the numbersets, let me talk first of Catalysis as a whole. And in Catalysis as a whole, we also have impacts, of course, of an exposure to the PGM prices. And we are very clear that some of the favorable PGM price lock in effects that we have are tailing off across this business group. If I now zoom in a bit on the difference underlying business groups here as well, For Automotive Catalyst, I must say we had an outstanding performance which is really reflecting the impact of our structural measures and value orientation. Also our footprint optimization and are focused on having selective R and D and then reduced overhead spend is really paying off but also the general culture that we have embedded in this business unit is really showing paying off results with Yes, really impressive results, I would say. The fuel cells and stationary catalyst there we had basically two elements.

The one hand, the Stationery Catalysts business performed really strong. While the Fuel Cell business, we saw a slower 2024 mainly related to volumes being lower in China at the back of a subsidy scheme that was not yet into effect. The construction of a fuel cell plant, so the PEM fuel cell plant in Changshu in Shanghai is progressing well. Well within budget, well within time, and we will expect this to become operational 2026. And Fresher's Metals Chemistry, that the main impact on the results was basically also the reduction in that PGM price environment but we saw stable sales for our HOC, so our homogeneous catalyst business. Now let's have a look at recycling. For recycling, there are two main drivers here. First of all, we have to highlight that there's an unfavorable trading context, especially for the Precious Metals Management environment. Especially for rhodium and palladium, If we then look, for instance, at precious metals refining, there the main impact place around volumes. So we had the plants shut down in the first half of the year, and we had a an operational smelter issue in the second half of the year affecting the volumes. Smelter is again, of course, well up and running and processing well.

If we look at the gym business, there, I would say revenues were stable. And overall, a good business intake and we're happy with the performance of this business for the year. Now let's have a look at Specialty Materials Specialty Materials is the first time that we report full year results on it. And here we see that the performance of Specialty Materials was slightly worse than last year. Can maybe be attributed to the business unit Cobalt and Specialty Materials, which is the heavyweight also in that group, where we see a weak cobalt and nickel markets out there. And this has, of course, led to competitive pressure. In Electrotech Optic Materials, revenues were slight and and the recycling business and a good performance of the infrared applications. Earnings slightly lower because we had some production challenges in the infrared solutions, which are being tackled and where we're making again good progress for the year twenty twenty five. In MDS, an all in all stable market although that underlying product mix was changing, but a good performance for this business unit. As well. So, Manas, let me now pass the word to you for more a deep dive in the financials.

Thank you, Bart, and good morning to you all. [indiscernible] earlier by Barton twenty four, we faced substantial headwinds in different markets. We succeeded in implementing sizable cash saving measures to offset some of these headwinds. The revenues decreased with 11% year over year. Amounted to €3,500,000,000 for 2024. Decrease is primarily reflecting the slowdown in Electrification and Battery Materials and the global decline in light duty and heavy duty vehicle production in Catalysis. In Recycling, revenues were affected by the maintenance shutdown and the less favorable VGM trading environment. Revenues in Catalysis and Recycling were also impacted by the lower PBM price environment, but our hedging strategy continued to create a substantial support versus spot prices, in particular for rhodium and palladium. The adjusted EBITDA amounted to €763,000,000 which is $2.00 €9,000,000 below previous year. In Battery Materials, volumes weakened in the second half of the year and the year over year comparison was also impacted by the lower level of one offs compared to last year. And the delayed ramp up in battery materials, we immediately initiated additional measures to adjust our basis. This included a strict review and control of all group wide spending a hiring freeze and additional linesizing of the group.

As a result, we achieved over €100,000,000 in efficiency gains across the group. Which is substantially higher than our initial target of €70,000,000 for 2024. In Catalysis, quality of earnings furthest further increased despite volumes and PGM prices. EBITDA remained roughly flat, which is another impressive performance versus last year's record result in a maturing market.

In corporate, net operating expenses improved by almost 10% again reflecting the efficiency measures taken. EBITDA margin for the group remained strong at 22%. Now moving to the consolidated P and L. As you can see, depreciation and amortizations decreased to a level of €285,000,000 due to the impairment in Battery Materials.

Adjusted EBIT amounted to EUR478 million versus €674,000,000 last year. Adjusted net finance costs slightly decreased to €108,000,000 The interest income on our cash deposits went up, while the cost of gross debt remained stable.

The average cost of gross debt amounted to 3.2% and is expected to remain well under control given the long term debt maturities and the high share of fixed rate debt.

The adjusted tax charge decreased to €109,000,000 following the lower adjusted taxable profit.

Due to increased provisioning for uncertain tax positions, the adjusted effective tax rate increased to 29% versus roughly 22% last year. The adjusted net profit group share amounted to €255,000,000 which resulted in an adjusted EPS of €1.06 The net result was impacted by adjustments to EBITDA of €1,800,000,000 is mainly due to the €1,600,000,000 non cash impairment and write down in better materials. A consequence, the net result group share amounted to minus €1,480,000,000 Now moving to the consolidated balance sheet. As you can see, Property, Plant and Equipment [indiscernible] inventories and equity were substantially impacted by the in Batter Materials. Here, I would like to highlight the strong liquidity of the group, with a cash position of €2,000,000,000 average deposit rate increased to 3.6%, which is exceeding our cost of debt.

Gross financial debt increased to €3,400,000,000 versus €2,600,000,000 last year. I will come back to the debt movements later in this presentation. The equity of the group amounts to €1,900,000,000 and against the net financial debt of €1,400,000,000 net gearing ratio remains balanced at 42.6 Now on this slide, we show the breakdown in the evolution of the free operating cash flow. The free operating cash flow for 2024 remained strong €384,000,000 We managed to reduce net working capital needs with €392,000,000 across the different businesses, thanks to a strong focus on timely collection Payment terms and inventory management. Reduced CapEx to $3.00 €3,000,000 or one third versus previous year. CapEx, including capitalized development expenses amounted to €582,000,000 And as Bart mentioned earlier, this is well below the guidance that we shared during the half year results. The reduction in CapEx is primarily driven by better materials, where we passed the investment in Canada and where we also maintain the investments in Europe, and Korea in line with the long term commercial agreements. Now looking at the net cash flow movements. As you can see in this bridge, the free operating cash flow of €384,000,000 did not fully cover the cash out related to taxes and financing, equity contribution of €175,000,000 to Iron Way and dividends As a result, the net financial debt increased with €159,000,000 amounted to US1.4 billion dollars The leverage ratio increased to 1.87 times last twelve months adjusted EBITDA.

Now we continue to be committed to a strong balance sheet going forward. And with the delayed ramp up in battery materials, we accelerated sales initiatives to further reduce cash out.

In 2024, the efficiency measures contributed over €100,000,000 CapEx was reduced by 35% and working capital needs were reduced by €392,000,000 For 2025, we target to generate an additional €100,000,000 of efficiency savings, which come on top of the savings of 24 And we also anticipate to reduce CapEx with another 20% mainly in better materials. For Iron Way, both partners continue to fund the investment through equity injections until the project financing is in place. At the start of 2025, Yumicore injected €250,000,000 out of a total plant contribution of €400,000,000 for the full year.

Total partners are targeting to have the nonrecourse debt financing in place in the second half of twenty twenty six. Now the combination of all these measures support the balance sheet. Ensure that the leverage will remain in investment grade territory.

For 2025, we expect that the leverage ratio will increase [indiscernible] of 2.5x.

Now as I mentioned earlier, the group has a strong liquidity with €2,000,000,000 cash on balance. And on top of that, over EUR 1,000,000,000 of committed and undrawn long term credit facilities. In 2024, we successfully raised €750,000,000 of long term debt with the European Investment Bank and a U. S. Private placement. As you can see in this graph, the debt maturity profile is well spread with an average maturity of five point six years after repayment of the convertible bond in June 25. [indiscernible] debt that we need to refinance in 2025 and 2026.

Is well covered by the current Now finally, I would like to highlight that in '24 we continue to lock in future strategic metal exposures through forward contracts. Over the past six months, we increased forward metal hedges in particular for platinum until 2028, but also for rhodium, palladium and silver in 2028. And we also initiated the first hedges for 2029.

The group also manages a portion of its energy price through forward contracts. Today, we have hedged more than 75% of the expected European electricity and natural gas consumption until 2027.

And thanks to this hedging approach, we protect future earnings from price volatility but we also increase the visibility on our future cash flows. Now before heading it back to Bart for the outlook, I would like to repeat that we have taken a wide range of measures improve the financial performance across the group and to increase the cash generation across the group. And this will help us to maintain a robust balance sheet. Thank you.

Yes. Thank you, Johannes.

And let's now have an outlook a look at the outlook for 2025. So in general, we should say, of course, that there's still limited feasibility in the market. I mean, still a lot of elements are in flux. And of course, we will continue our focus on maintaining resilience, adaptability and of course, the efficiency and value focused initiatives I talked about So we are guiding early in the year, given despite all these uncertainties, we're guiding early in the year that we will have group earnings for the adjusted EBITDA between SEK $720,000,000 and SEK €780,000,000 But I want to be very explicit on this, and that's also why the disclaimer is there. This is not taking into account any market effect or conditions related to geopolitical tensions or tariffs which would come into effect in the current markets. Now for Batting Materials, we anticipate that the adjusted EBITDA will be in the range of last year yet without the one off of 2024. For Catalysis, earnings are expected to be around the outstanding performance of the previous years. Recycling earnings will be below 2024 as some of these favorable hedging hedges hedges are tailing off. And Specialty Materials will be slightly ahead of last year's earnings.

We do anticipate that our corporate costs will be down. Compared to 2024. We reduced our CapEx by another 20% and we are upping our efficiency goal from the initial goal cumulative for 2025 of 100,000,000 We up that to SEK 200,000,000, and this is well integrated into the guidance we give at group level. So the €720,000,000 to the €700,000,000 Now wrapping everything a bit up. Now expect to say that 2024 was a sobering and intense year for Yumicor, its shareholders but also its employees. So it was a year marked by significant headwinds and during which we had to take difficult decisions and also have to have to impair a big part of our Battery Materials business. Despite this challenging context and the slowdown of the EV growth, we really had a solid performance in our foundation businesses. We have taken decisive actions in capital discipline efficiency and cost measures, and we are committed to keep a solid balance sheet. We are determined to lay the groundwork for the future and I'm looking very much forward on exchanging with you on this during our Capital Markets Day on March 27 in London. I continue to believe the value creation of this great group sociological underlying trends that strengthen our position going forward.

And once again, I'm now open to the Q and A and very much looking forward to exchange on our midterm future during the Capital Markets upcoming March.

Thank you very much. Ladies and gentlemen, We will take our first question from Ranulf R from Citi. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Hi. Thanks for taking the question. It's just one on Iron Way, please. Can you give a bit of an update on the program there, the timeline? And where you expect minimum returns to come on the equity injections? Thank you.

Good morning, Reynolds.

So looking at Inway, we are well on track So looking at the capital injection, this is where the capital injection injections are somewhat more front loaded because the project financing is a process that is lengthy and demanding. So it does take time to put this into place. We have confirmation from banks that this is a very bankable project, so that gives us the confidence And that's also where both partners are targeting. Have the project financing in place as from the second half of twenty twenty six Looking at the return targets, at the same time, we cannot be explicit or share too much commercial details on this, but we continue to have trust in this overall relationship.

Yes. And I would add to that, Juan, of course, that value creation is always a guiding principle we have here at Umicore, so also for the IMO twenty twenty venture. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. We will take our next question from Chetan Udeshi from JPMorgan. Your line is open. Please go ahead. I just wanted to maybe first discuss what are the implications on Numicore from any trade tariffs or on metals, etcetera? How are you or how might you be directly and indirectly impacted from that? The other question is I'm sorry to be a bit blunt here, but And I appreciate you are cutting CapEx in battery materials, but it still implies that you are probably going to spend $200,000,000 CapEx in 2025. On top of $400,000,000 that you are aiming to contribute to the IronWave JV, mean your EBITDA in this business is zero, last year was zero. I'm just curious where is all this I mean I understand iron way, but where is that €2,000,000 on battery materials being spent? Your facilities are predominantly underutilized everywhere. So I'm just curious why the CapEx is not even down more? Than what you are guiding to?

Yes. Thank you for the questions, Sitar.

Highly appreciate. So first on, of course, trade and geopolitical. That's, of course, a very big question and not an easy one to answer. We have seen, for instance, just a movement in steel and aluminum based on certain tariff announcements. We know that for instance there's also threats against Mexico and Canada. So very difficult predict how things will move. Because First of all, how will the overall competitive landscape move in such a way? How will metal flows be impacted? But here, we really have to focus on our core strengths, And our core strength is that we have an agile footprint from which we can supply customers. We also have a diversified supply basis So if any countries would be maybe struck or hit, with certain tariffs for PGMs, then we might have optionalities to supply a different country. Again, putting here a number, then I would go really in the territory of pure speculation because I have no clue what the legislators have in mind. And what potential reactions to some decisions might be from other countries. So I'm sure you appreciate that. And that's also why we had the disclaimer really on the outlook because I mean, that's sort of there, I would say.

Now if you look to the CapEx and Iron Way, I mean, I'll tackle Iron Way first, I've said that again. We have strong guardrails in these contracts. Value creation is is what we focus on as Umicore. So that's really an investment in a partnership. On the CapEx for Basement Materials for 2025, well, first of all, let me go to Canada. In the sense that we decided not to continue with Canada to really save significantly on CapEx because there we would have to spend big if we would have continued with that project. The consequence, of course, is that we have to repatriate the customer contract into Korea. And that's really a strong proof point and it's really a success that we were able to do that. But in order to deliver against this future customer commitments, we do have to debottleneck the plant in Canada sorry, in Korea And that's where, of course, CapEx is going. And indeed, we're also still having some CapEx going into Europe to finish up the current footprint against our customer commitments. But let's say the longer term profile and inputs, I will be glad to discuss that also, of course, March at the CMD Chetan.

Maybe if I can just still add to the trade tariffs and potential threat of trade tariffs. We have been running a program in the company in order to match the different flows And this is also where we see having the footprint, the global footprint in catalysis, that this can create options also to circumvent or reduce or mitigate some of the impact. Same for the precious metals flows, also here we have a global setup where we can source and deliver out of different regions. And this can also help to mitigate potential impact if certain measures would be taken. Can I follow-up on volumes that you were [indiscernible] you had talked about eighteen month delay? Is that delay getting longer because just curious, you are starting to debottleneck the Korean plant And frankly, we don't even have any volumes. I'm just curious why is there a disconnect, to be honest?

Yes. I mean, not any volume is probably enough absolute statement that you make there, Chitana. So I mean, we also hinted during the mid year results that we have, we do have capacity utilization Korea and that it's moving to a pretty good level in the years to come. And that's That's what we clearly indicated. But on the volume picture, indeed, the outlook remains mixed for the time being because EV sales remains somewhat slow at this point in time. Now at the same time, we always talked also about the strong contractual guard place that we have. Basically, we also have the take or pay provisions, which will protect our EBITDA profile. So that's where we stand. Can there be a longer period than eighteen months in the ramp up? Possibly, difficult to say because the outlook remains mixed. But again, have put these strong contacts in place for situations like this. And we will utilize these contracts.

Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Chetan.

Thank you. We will take our next question Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Yes, good morning. I just wondered if I could focus in on Materials business and then a question on the cash costs for the restructuring. So first of all, on battery materials, when you were looking at all of the contracts that you have and where you wanted to place CapEx. Was at any time there ever a consideration of exiting some of the larger contracts that you have?

So that you can actually save more CapEx. And then secondly, with the increase in the Iron Way equity contribution, do you expect to create positive free cash flow in 2025? Are related to the additional savings that you expect to get in 2025?

Okay. Let me talk about let me take the customer part and then you take the second Well, Geoff, I mean, we have strong contractual contracts. So we have these stake up base inter, but we also, of course, have customer commitments and we are building against these customer commitments. Also indicated at the midyear that while we still see that progression, of course, on that volume curve for the existing customer portfolio that we have, that we continue also to look and further customer diversification There's a continued interest in Europe also by Asian players. So I continue to believe in that differentiating asset that we have here in Europe. So Juan is maybe you can go to the other two. [indiscernible] So looking at the free cash flow for the group in 2025, [indiscernible] Looking at the different components, so we have the EBITDA range the guidance that we give between €720,000,000 and €780,000,000 We have the CapEx where we say below €450,000,000 We have the XT contribution of €400,000,000 So free cash flow will be negative, I would say. And this is also where we expect the net debt to increase where the leverage will also increase towards the level of 2.5.

Now looking at the cash cost restructuring, This is what we have provided for So what we have included in the provision for 2024 is, I would say, roughly 70,000,000 which is linked to the restructuring Catalysis, which we announced in the first half, also linked to the rightsizing of the group, which we announced in the second half. Of the year. And this will add then into the cash cost savings for $2,025,000,000 euros where we say that we are aiming to generate another €100,000,000 of savings on top of the €100,000,000 that we have generated in 2024.

Yes. And indeed, on this restructuring, especially also in Belgium, I think we made great progress and with a very good and constructive dialogue with our social partners. Think we have panned out the right supporting measures for our customers and now we are actually in the implementation phase of these measures. So we should indeed see that effect in 2025.

Just to clarify that there is no further cash costs related to the cost savings program that you've got in 2025, that was all taken in 2024, yes?

That is correct. Thank you.

Thank you. As a reminder, We will move to the next question from Tristan Lamott from Deutsche Bank. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Hi. Thanks for taking my questions. I've got three. The first is, what are the remaining restructuring costs on the cost programs and how will that impact cash? The second is, you talked about an impact from metal hedges rolling off in 2025. Given your hedges are kind of up to four years do you expect to have another impact in 2026 again? And then third question on back Materials. Just wondering with the take or pay contracts, so kind of at the minimum, what kind of EBITDA could you do in 2026?

Okay. So looking at the restructuring, just to be clear, so we provided for the the restructuring amounts, but the cash out will be in the year of 2025, and this is what they refer to the SendibleIT. Then looking at the metal hedges. So in 2024, we had still a substantial support looking at metal hedges in particular for palladium and rhodium. And this is where we see a roll off in '25. And there will be a further roll off in 2026. Looking at the last question, take or bay.

Yes, I can take that one, Hassan. Take or pay. I mean, in 2025, some take or pay will be in effect for the year. And we also intend to include this as part of our EBITDA because it's an integral part of our business and these contracts. But we're not going to guide for 2026 on this number, and we can discuss more at the CMD March.

Thanks a lot.

Thank you.

Thank you. We will take our final questions from Charles Bentley from Jefferies Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Thanks so much for taking my question. I was just a simple one just on the the Ion Way investment. I remember correctly, it was €2,900,000,000 in social funding. Of which half was meant to come from debt and then kind of half from each of the partners, so it's €725,000,000 total.

That would suggest that by the end of this year, there's still €200,000,000 remaining. Is that Is that the right number? And is the kind of debt to equity components of the funding structure Is that unchanged or is there any risks to that?

Yes. So Board Barn is still target to fill at least 50% of the cash needs through debt financing. So that remains. Looking at the projections on the on the equity contributions, again, this is where we are a bit more front loaded. And where for 2025, we expect another €400,000,000 versus the SEK250 million that year to date we already contributed looking at past years. And then the outlook for 2026, this is where it will depend on the timing of of the effective project financing. I think overall looking at the overall CapEx budget, this is, of course, something that is commercially sensitive. That we [indiscernible] share, but at Santander, there is also some inflation that plays a role. Looking at that project. [indiscernible] I mean, Juanas, maybe to the point, Anita, I mean, the [indiscernible] period. So indeed, we do see some inflation on this project like many other projects, of course, within Europe. But again, let me guide again that We work with committed waves for this project. And of course, for these projects or this kind of setup, we do have strong guardrails So our commitment and belief in this joint venture is completely intact, Charles.

Just for clarification, so looking at the equity contribution, so looking at the years 2023 and 2024, we had €250,000,000 of equity contribution for this year. We expect to have €2,400,000,000 of equity contribution.

Thanks very much, guys. Thank you, Charles.

That was the last question. For today. I will now hand over back to Mr. Sapp for any closing remarks. Please go ahead, sir.

Yes. Thank you for attending the 2024 full year results. As said before, it was a sobering and intense year. Also for here for us at Humicore, but I really would like to look forward and engage with you on the future of this great company that we have at the Capital Markets Day at the March. So see you all in London and looking forward to that exchange. A wonderful day.

Thank you for joining today's call.