CRH PLC (CRH) 2021 Q4 法說會逐字稿

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. I'd like to welcome you to our 2021 results presentation for CRH. My name is Albert Manifold. I'm the Chief Executive. And this morning, I'll be joined later on by Jim Mintern, our CFO. And together, Jim and I are going to briefly take you through the key headlines of our results for 2021.

早上好，女士們，先生們。我想歡迎您參加我們的 2021 年 CRH 結果演示。我的名字是阿爾伯特流形。我是行政長官。今天早上，我們的首席財務官 Jim Mintern 稍後會加入我的行列。吉姆和我將一起簡要介紹我們 2021 年業績的主要標題。

Now before we go into that, I just want to take a moment to talk to the nearly 80,000 people who have worked for CRH during the course of 2021. We had the continual challenges of COVID trying to live lives in the most normal way, the stop-start nature of what COVID impact upon our world. But all of you went about your life as normal as you could and help produce what was a really strong 2021. On behalf of your management team and your Board, I want to simply thank you for those tremendous efforts. I refer to COVID there. And of course, we all hope we're in the end game of the challenges that COVID has brought to us. Let's see how that plays out.

現在在我們開始之前，我只想花點時間與在 2021 年期間為 CRH 工作的近 80,000 人交談。我們面臨著 COVID 的持續挑戰，試圖以最正常的方式生活， COVID對我們世界的影響的停止啟動性質。但是你們所有人都盡可能地過著正常的生活，並幫助創造了一個真正強大的 2021 年。我代表你們的管理團隊和董事會，感謝你們所做的巨大努力。我指的是那裡的COVID。當然，我們都希望我們能夠應對 COVID 給我們帶來的挑戰。讓我們看看結果如何。

Of course, in recent times, new uncertainties and new challenges have emerged. All I can say to you is that we, as a senior team, most of us have been here for 20 years. And we have seen this country -- this company through some tough times, particularly the global financial crisis and the recent COVID challenges. And we're confident that we have the sensible nature to our lives, the maturity, the experience to see us through a navigate CRH through whatever choppy waters may be ahead of us into calmer waters.

當然，近期也出現了新的不確定性和新的挑戰。我只能對你說，作為一支資深團隊，我們大多數人已經在這里工作了 20 年。我們已經看到這個國家——這家公司經歷了一些艱難時期，尤其是全球金融危機和最近的 COVID 挑戰。我們相信，我們擁有對生活敏感的天性、成熟度和經驗，可以看到我們通過導航 CRH 穿越任何波濤洶湧的水域，進入更平靜的水域。

I should say this morning's presentation, whilst I'm talking to you like this. There'll be some slides and presentations behind me. You can follow this presentation with an accompanying slide deck that's on our website, and I'll be referring to those slides as we go through the presentation.

我應該說今天早上的演講，而我正在像這樣和你說話。我後面會有一些幻燈片和演示文稿。您可以使用我們網站上的隨附幻燈片來關注此演示文稿，在我們瀏覽演示文稿時，我將參考這些幻燈片。

So look, we have a busy schedule this morning and just to give you a sense of the running order that we're seeing here. First and foremost, Jim and I are going to take you through some of the key numbers for 2021. and some of the key trends that were evident in our business during last year and see how they are moving forward in impact on this year.

所以看，我們今天早上的日程安排很忙，只是為了讓您了解我們在這裡看到的運行順序。首先，吉姆和我將帶您了解 2021 年的一些關鍵數據。以及去年我們業務中明顯的一些關鍵趨勢，並了解它們在今年的影響力如何向前發展。

We also want to take you through some of the way we've been positioning our business and repositioning our business in recent years and how that has changed our business. We're changing because construction is changing and how that has been impacted by our delivery of the solutions model that has been underpinning so much of the delivery in recent years. We're also going to talk about our investor update in April and to give you a better sense of what we want to talk to you, our shareholders, about to take you through our thoughts. Of course, we will talk about our expectations for 2022 and see how this year has started and how we expect it to evolve. And as usual, we'll have questions and answers at the end.

我們還希望帶您了解近年來我們定位業務和重新定位業務的一些方式，以及這如何改變了我們的業務。我們正在發生變化，因為建設正在發生變化，以及我們交付的解決方案模型如何影響這一點，該解決方案模型近年來一直支撐著如此多的交付。我們還將在 4 月份討論我們的投資者更新，讓您更好地了解我們想與您（我們的股東）交談的內容，讓您了解我們的想法。當然，我們將談論我們對 2022 年的期望，看看今年是如何開始的，以及我們期望它如何發展。和往常一樣，我們最後會有問題和答案。

Now it's not quite normal questions and answers. We're still living in a virtual world at the moment. But later on, I'm going to be joined on stage by Jim and indeed by Tom Holmes, our Head of Investor Relations, and they will be fielding the questions -- tom will be fielding of the questions that you are sending in online to him, and he will fill them to us during that part of the session.

現在這不是很正常的問題和答案。目前，我們仍然生活在虛擬世界中。但稍後，Jim 和我們的投資者關係主管 Tom Holmes 將與我一同上台，他們將回答問題——湯姆將回答您在線發送的問題他，他將在會議的那部分向我們提供這些信息。

So if I can just move on and looking at Slide 2 of those of you who are following us on the Internet. Just to talk about our year 2021. Look, another strong year, another year of continued growth for CRH. Some great numbers there. But for me, the standout last year were 2 numbers: number one, the margin improvement; and the second one was the cash generation across our business.

因此，如果我可以繼續看一下在 Internet 上關注我們的你們中的幻燈片 2。只是談談我們的 2021 年。看，又是強勁的一年，CRH 又是持續增長的一年。那裡有一些很棒的數字。但對我來說，去年最突出的是兩個數字：第一，利潤率提高；第二個是我們整個業務的現金生成。

We turned $0.80 out of every dollar of EBITDA that we earned into cash, and we deployed that cash quite sensibly across our businesses. We invested about $2 billion investing in developing our business through M&A and through expansionary CapEx. We returned about $1.8 billion through cash returns back to you, our shareholders. And we finished the year with one of the strongest balance sheet we have had in our history.

我們將我們賺取的每一美元 EBITDA 中的 0.80 美元變成了現金，並且我們非常明智地在我們的業務中部署了這些現金。我們投資了大約 20 億美元，通過併購和擴張性資本支出來發展我們的業務。我們通過現金返還給您，我們的股東，返還了大約 18 億美元。我們以我們歷史上最強勁的資產負債表之一結束了這一年。

That relentless focus on generating profitability, turning it into cash and making sure we manage our balance sheet in a disciplined way has long been a part of the DNA of CRH and long may remain so.

長期以來，對創造盈利能力、將其轉化為現金並確保我們以嚴格的方式管理資產負債表的不懈關註一直是 CRH DNA 的一部分，並且可能會長期如此。

This morning, we also announced the proposed dividend for this year of $0.121, a 5% increase on last year. And as most of you will have seen earlier this week, we announced the divestment of our Oldcastle BuildingEnvelope division for $3.8 billion, and Jim is going to take you through some more details of that later on in the presentation.

今天上午，我們還宣布了今年的擬議股息為 0.121 美元，比去年增加了 5%。正如你們大多數人在本週早些時候所看到的那樣，我們宣布以 38 億美元的價格剝離我們的 Oldcastle BuildingEnvelope 部門，Jim 將在稍後的演示文稿中向您介紹更多細節。

If I can just take you through some of the key financial highlights. As I said to you, a robust performance, sales ahead by 12% and profits ahead by 16%. And it's very pleasing for me as Chief Executive of this business to stand and say of the key metrics that we manage: Sales, profits, margins, returns and cash, all heading in the right direction for 2021. But the key metric for me is margins. In a world where we faced significant cost headwinds, when almost everybody else was taking a step backward on margin, CRH was stepping forward. And that really is down to the heart of what we're doing in our business the solutions model, which makes it into much more of a price maker than a price taker.

如果我可以帶您了解一些關鍵的財務亮點。正如我對你說的，強勁的業績，銷售額增長 12%，利潤增長 16%。作為這項業務的首席執行官，我非常高興能夠站出來談論我們管理的關鍵指標：銷售額、利潤、利潤率、回報和現金，所有這些都朝著 2021 年的正確方向發展。但對我來說，關鍵指標是邊距。在一個我們面臨巨大成本逆風的世界裡，當幾乎所有其他人都在利潤率上退步時，CRH 正在向前邁進。這確實取決於我們在業務中所做的解決方案模型的核心，這使其更像是價格製定者而不是價格接受者。

I'm very pleased to see, as you can see on Slide 3, for those following online, again, the returns moving ahead. Few people want to talk about returns for the obvious reasons, but we never stop thinking about them. They're not where we want them to be, but we have been making progress, and there's more to go there.

正如您在幻燈片 3 上看到的那樣，我非常高興地看到，對於那些在線關注的人來說，回報繼續向前發展。由於顯而易見的原因，很少有人想談論回報，但我們從未停止思考它們。他們不是我們希望他們成為的地方，但我們一直在取得進展，還有更多的事情要做。

If I can now turn to our 2 major markets that we're in and principally the first one to North America, which makes up about 70% of our group EBITDA. And just to remind you of the franchise we have in that part of the world. Historically speaking, we were based in the Northeast, Mid-Atlantic and Midwest part of the United States. In the past 15 years, we have had a strong push South and West as we follow basically population trends and economic growth. And now we find ourselves having a great mix of stable cash flow generated in the Northeast and higher growth as we push South and West.

如果我現在可以轉向我們所在的兩個主要市場，主要是北美的第一個市場，北美約占我們集團 EBITDA 的 70%。只是為了提醒您我們在世界那個地區擁有的特許經營權。從歷史上看，我們的總部設在美國東北部、大西洋中部和中西部。在過去的 15 年中，我們在基本遵循人口趨勢和經濟增長的情況下大力推動南下和西進。現在，我們發現自己在東北部產生了穩定的現金流，並且隨著我們向南部和西部推進而實現了更高的增長。

As I talk about that Northeast part of the United States, and I mean all the way across the Midwest, that really is home to the most intensive and extensive road infrastructure network in the world. Now they don't build too many new roads there but they have to do significant repair and maintenance as a result of the really brutal North American winters. Those roads have to be replaced and repaired pretty much every 7 years.

當我談到美國的東北部時，我的意思是一直穿過中西部，那裡確實是世界上最密集和最廣泛的道路基礎設施網絡的所在地。現在他們並沒有在那裡建造太多新道路，但由於北美冬季非常嚴酷，他們不得不進行大量的維修和保養。這些道路幾乎每 7 年就必須更換和維修一次。

CRH has, over decades, built up a fantastic franchise across that geography of 120 million people. We provide great service. We have long-standing partnerships with the states in that part of the world and we have multiyear projects that carry on year after year. That is really just a bond for us that business. It just keeps coming in. It's a great business. And of course, it helps us as we push South and West chasing the higher growth, aligning our business with the stronger growth areas driven by population trends movements and economic growth in the south and west.

幾十年來，CRH 在這個擁有 1.2 億人口的地區建立了出色的特許經營權。我們提供優質的服務。我們與世界該地區的各州建立了長期的合作夥伴關係，並且我們的多年項目年復一年地進行。這實際上只是我們該業務的紐帶。它只是不斷進來。這是一項偉大的業務。當然，這有助於我們推動南部和西部追求更高的增長，使我們的業務與南部和西部的人口趨勢運動和經濟增長驅動的更強勁的增長領域保持一致。

And now we find ourselves here, again, the #1 building materials in North America. The #1 building materials in the most profitable construction market in the world, where demand is underpinned by 3 fundamentals. Strong population growth. The U.S. population grows by about 30 million people every 10 years. Strong economic growth and crucially the money to pay for both public and private investment in construction.

現在，我們再次發現自己是北美排名第一的建築材料。在世界上最賺錢的建築市場中排名第一的建築材料，其需求由 3 個基本面支撐。人口增長強勁。美國人口每 10 年增長約 3000 萬人。強勁的經濟增長和關鍵的資金來支付公共和私人建築投資。

We have a balanced end user across our North American businesses. We are skewed more towards infrastructure. That's where we want to be, both public and private. It's our core competence. We like large-scale complicated horizontal construction, both above and below the ground. That has been underpinned in recent years by strong federal support and state spending. And of course, you will have seen in November of last, the infrastructure and investment bill that was signed that committed a further $1.2 trillion to infrastructure spend in the United States in the coming years. That will increase the spend on infrastructure from the federal government by about 50% over the next 5 years compared to the previous 5 years. And that aligns very, very well with our solution strategy, complex, complicated, specified, highly regulated, large awkward horizontal construction is perfect for us to play because we don't just provide products or materials, we provide services such as design, planning, engineering that goes with it, and that is at the heart of the solution strategy.

我們在北美業務中擁有平衡的最終用戶。我們更傾向於基礎設施。這就是我們想要成為的地方，無論是公共的還是私人的。這是我們的核心競爭力。我們喜歡大型複雜的水平建築，無論是地上還是地下。近年來，強有力的聯邦支持和州支出為這一點提供了支撐。當然，你會在去年 11 月看到，簽署的基礎設施和投資法案承諾在未來幾年再增加 1.2 萬億美元用於美國的基礎設施支出。與前 5 年相比，這將使聯邦政府在未來 5 年內對基礎設施的支出增加約 50%。這與我們的解決方案策略非常非常吻合，複雜的、複雜的、指定的、高度規範的、大而笨拙的水平結構非常適合我們玩，因為我們不僅提供產品或材料，我們還提供設計、規劃等服務，與之配套的工程，這是解決方案戰略的核心。

If I can turn to the biggest business that we have our, Americas Materials business, which is significantly exposed to infrastructure, delighted to see that sales and EBITDA were ahead in 2021 over the previous year. And volumes ahead in all products. But the story of this business is the margin, a business which is hugely exposed to energy costs. And we had very, very difficult headwinds last year, and yet, we still managed to move the margin ahead, attesting to the fact that we have a different business model, and we try to explain it by saying, "We don't sell rocks anymore. We sell complete road systems."

如果我可以轉向我們擁有的最大業務，即美國材料業務，該業務顯著受到基礎設施的影響，很高興看到 2021 年的銷售額和 EBITDA 比上一年領先。並且所有產品的銷量都領先。但這項業務的故事是利潤，這是一項嚴重暴露於能源成本的業務。去年我們遇到了非常非常困難的逆風，但是，我們仍然設法將利潤率提高，證明了我們有不同的商業模式這一事實，我們試圖通過說：“我們不賣岩石了。我們出售完整的道路系統。

We exited that business last year with very strong backlogs and that has continued into the first quarter of this year. And as I stand here today on the third of March, our backlogs are well ahead of last year on the 3 key metrics for us in terms of quantum, dollar terms, in terms of the volumes of products and also the margin within those businesses. So that bodes well for a good start to 2022 in our Americas Materials business.

我們去年退出了該業務，積壓非常多，並且一直持續到今年第一季度。當我 3 月 3 日今天站在這裡時，我們的積壓訂單遠遠超過去年，就數量、美元、產品數量以及這些業務的利潤率而言，我們的 3 個關鍵指標。因此，這預示著我們的美洲材料業務將在 2022 年有一個良好的開端。

On Slide 7, if I can move over to Building Products. Another continued strong performance by this division. This division is made up by 3 businesses. Our APG business, our architectural products business, which mainly is a U.S. residential play for new and repair and maintenance. It provides products for the outdoor living space, the backyard. We own that backyard. Now 2020 was a record year for APG until 2021 came because that also was a bigger year at a new record. That's the gift that just keeps on giving. It's a fantastic business.

在幻燈片 7 上，如果我可以轉到建築產品。該部門的另一個持續強勁表現。該部門由3個業務組成。我們的 APG 業務，我們的建築產品業務，主要是美國住宅的新建和維修和保養。它為戶外生活空間、後院提供產品。我們擁有那個後院。現在，2020 年是 APG 創紀錄的一年，直到 2021 年到來，因為那也是創紀錄的更大的一年。這就是不斷給予的禮物。這是一項了不起的業務。

The second business we have is our Infrastructure Product business. And again, this is effectively play on new infrastructure. This provides the products and materials that transport vital utilities around the United States. Principally, it's in around water, the transportation of potable water, wastewater, sewage around the U.S., but also about vital utilities such as telecommunications, information technology, largely underground, but also overground as well, highly specified work, which is where we like to play.

我們擁有的第二項業務是基礎設施產品業務。再一次，這有效地發揮了新基礎設施的作用。這提供了在美國各地運輸重要公用事業的產品和材料。主要是在美國各地的水、飲用水、廢水、污水的運輸，以及電信、信息技術等重要公用事業，主要是地下，但也有地上，高度指定的工作，這是我們喜歡的地方玩。

And the last business in our Building Products business is our OBE business. The one that we announced the disposal of on Monday, a very solid year on the back of a recovering nonres industry in North America. This is the ninth consecutive year this division has shown profit and margin growth. Now that is not just happening because the [industry] is helping us or there are favorable tailwinds. That's happening because this business is absolutely the focus of our integrated solution strategy, which continues to deliver for us. But we'll talk about that later on.

我們建築產品業務的最後一項業務是我們的 OBE 業務。我們週一宣佈出售的那一年，在北美非資源行業復甦的背景下，這是非常穩健的一年。這是該部門連續第九年實現利潤和利潤率增長。現在這不僅僅是因為[行業]正在幫助我們或者有有利的順風。之所以發生這種情況，是因為這項業務絕對是我們集成解決方案戰略的重點，該戰略將繼續為我們提供服務。但我們稍後會談到這一點。

If I can move over across the Atlantic to our other main region, Europe. I said we're the largest building materials business in North America. We're also the largest building materials business in Europe and crucially, the largest building materials business in the high-growth Central and Eastern European markets. Last year, we saw resilient repair and maintenance business in 3 -- 4 key markets: France, Germany, U.K. and Ireland and resilient residential spend across those markets.

如果我能越過大西洋到我們的另一個主要地區，歐洲。我說我們是北美最大的建材企業。我們還是歐洲最大的建材企業，更重要的是，我們是高增長的中歐和東歐市場中最大的建材企業。去年，我們在 3 - 4 個主要市場看到了彈性維修和維護業務：法國、德國、英國和愛爾蘭，以及這些市場的彈性住宅支出。

Happily, we're starting to see Western Europe really becoming a hub for innovative, sustainable construction in our businesses. And the really good thing about this is that we can then communicate and transport this to other high-growth markets, both in Central and Eastern Europe and the south and western part of the United States. It's easy to transfer that knowledge and understanding, which is key to our solutions business.

令人高興的是，我們開始看到西歐真正成為我們業務中創新、可持續建設的中心。真正的好處是，我們可以將其傳播到其他高增長市場，包括中歐和東歐以及美國南部和西部。知識和理解的轉移很容易，這是我們解決方案業務的關鍵。

In Central and Eastern Europe, the 2 big markets of Poland and Romania again benefited from EU stimulus packages and again, very good demand for residential construction. And delighted to see again in Eastern Europe, a higher take-up for a more complex end-to-end solutions, which are -- which we've seen in other parts of our business.

在中歐和東歐，波蘭和羅馬尼亞兩大市場再次受益於歐盟的一攬子刺激計劃，住宅建設需求再次非常強勁。並且很高興再次在東歐看到對更複雜的端到端解決方案的更高采用率，這是我們在業務的其他部分看到的。

Now before I talk about trading in Europe, I must mention our businesses in Ukraine. We employ over 800 people across 4 locations in Ukraine from Odessa in the South Central and the Black Sea, all across the West, the 2 big operations over there are Mikelive, which is close to the Polish border and Kamenets-Podilsky, which just closed the Moldovan Romanian border.

現在，在我談論歐洲貿易之前，我必須提到我們在烏克蘭的業務。我們在烏克蘭的 4 個地點僱傭了 800 多名員工，從中南部的敖德薩到黑海，整個西部，那裡的兩大業務是靠近波蘭邊境的 Mikelive 和剛剛關閉的 Kamenets-Podilsky摩爾多瓦羅馬尼亞邊境。

Happily, all of our 800 people are safe and away from the conflict zones. We are doing all that we can to work with them, work with their businesses and work with their families to support them in any way we possibly can. For those who want to move west across the border, we are helping and facilitating the movement of them across the border up to this morning. About 60 families have moved across into Poland and Romania principally. And we are supporting them when they get across that border. And I know that all our thoughts are with them this morning in terms of the challenges they're faced with and indeed the future ahead.

令人高興的是，我們所有的 800 人都安全並遠離衝突地區。我們正在盡我們所能與他們合作，與他們的企業合作，並與他們的家人合作，以我們可能的任何方式支持他們。對於那些想越過邊境向西移動的人，我們一直在幫助和促進他們越過邊境，直到今天早上。大約有 60 個家庭主要搬到了波蘭和羅馬尼亞。當他們越過邊界時，我們會為他們提供支持。而且我知道，就他們面臨的挑戰以及未來的未來而言，今天早上我們所有的想法都與他們同在。

If I can move to the trading performance of our Europe Materials division in 2021. Again, I'm very happy to see both sales and EBITDA ahead of 2020. But they should be because we had a big chunk lost out of 2020 as a result of COVID, but they're also ahead of 2019. So we are ahead of pre-COVID activity levels in terms of sales and profitability. But also in margin. The margin we have performance in 2021 in the teeth of those cost headwinds is ahead of a pre-COVID 2019. So when all else are going backwards, CRH are stepping forward.

如果我能在 2021 年轉向我們歐洲材料部門的交易表現。再次，我很高興看到 2020 年之前的銷售額和 EBITDA。但應該是因為我們在 2020 年損失了很大一部分COVID，但它們也領先於 2019 年。因此，我們在銷售和盈利能力方面領先於 COVID 之前的活動水平。但也在邊際。在這些成本逆風的影響下，我們在 2021 年的表現領先於 COVID 之前的 2019 年。因此，當一切都在倒退時，CRH 正在向前邁進。

It's not just good cost control. It's not just commercial excellence. It's about our solution strategy that is embedded within our business, delivering higher performance. And specifically, I call it within our Europe Materials business, we saw a really good infrastructure spend in France, U.K. and Poland and pretty much residential was strong everywhere across our markets.

這不僅僅是良好的成本控制。這不僅僅是商業上的卓越。這是關於嵌入我們業務中的解決方案戰略，以提供更高的性能。具體來說，我在我們的歐洲材料業務中稱之為，我們在法國、英國和波蘭看到了非常好的基礎設施支出，並且在我們的市場中幾乎所有地方的住宅都很強勁。

So that's just a brief review of our main markets. And now I'm going to pass it over to Jim who's joining me on stage, who's going to take you through a more detailed review of the financial performance of our business in 2021.

這只是對我們主要市場的簡要回顧。現在，我將把它交給與我一起上台的 Jim，他將帶您更詳細地回顧我們 2021 年的業務財務業績。

Thanks, Albert. Good morning, everybody. I'm delighted to be here this morning presenting my first set of results as CFO. On Slide 11, what we have here is an overview of our cash flow and our net debt position at the end of 2021. I think this slide is a really good example of how our relentless focus on cash generation and our disciplined capital allocation has ensured a strong balance sheet at the end of December '21.

謝謝，阿爾伯特。大家早上好。我很高興今天早上來到這裡展示我作為首席財務官的第一組結果。在幻燈片 11 上，我們在這裡概述了我們在 2021 年底的現金流和淨債務狀況。我認為這張幻燈片是一個很好的例子，說明了我們對現金產生的不懈關注和我們有紀律的資本分配如何確保21 年 12 月末強勁的資產負債表。

Moving from the left, we exited 2020 with a net debt of $5.9 billion. The cash inflow for 2021 was $4.2 billion. We converted 80% of our EBITDA into cash and we reinvested in the growth of our business. We also returned cash to our shareholders. We completed M&A activity, 20 bolt-on acquisitions and net cash outflow of $1.2 billion, that figure is net of divestment proceeds.

從左至右，我們以 59 億美元的淨債務退出 2020 年。 2021 年的現金流入為 42 億美元。我們將 80% 的 EBITDA 轉換為現金，並重新投資於業務增長。我們還向股東返還了現金。我們完成了併購活動、20 次補強收購和 12 億美元的淨現金流出，這個數字是扣除撤資所得的淨額。

We spent $1.6 billion on capital expenditure. And we returned $1.8 billion to you, our shareholders, and I'm going to go into a bit more detail on each of those in a moment. That all resulted in a net debt position at the end of December '21 of $6.3 billion or 1.2x net debt to EBITDA. That's one of the strongest balance sheets we've had in the history of CRH and gives us optionality for further value creation for shareholders into the future.

我們在資本支出上花費了 16 億美元。我們向您，我們的股東返還了 18 億美元，稍後我將詳細介紹其中的每一個。這一切都導致截至 21 年 12 月底的淨債務頭寸為 63 億美元，即 EBITDA 的 1.2 倍淨債務。這是我們在 CRH 歷史上擁有的最強大的資產負債表之一，並為我們提供了在未來為股東進一步創造價值的選擇權。

I'd now like to talk about some of our acquisition activity in 2021. We completed 20 bolt-on acquisitions for a consideration of $1.5 billion. That represented an EBITDA entry-level pre-synergies of 7x, which really highlights our focus on maintaining our strong financial discipline, which, of course, has been a real hallmark of CRH for many years.

我現在想談談我們在 2021 年的一些收購活動。我們以 15 億美元的對價完成了 20 次補強收購。這代表了 7 倍的 EBITDA 入門級預協同效應，這確實突出了我們對維持強大財務紀律的關注，當然，這多年來一直是 CRH 的真正標誌。

Looking into a bit more detail on those acquisitions, the vast majority of the acquisitions were in high-growth markets in the South, in the West, in the Mountain West states of the United States. And they were in areas where we built out our integrated solutions strategy, adding complementary products and services, leveraging and building out, filling in around our existing materials and products businesses in these same regions.

深入了解這些收購的細節，絕大多數收購都位於美國南部、西部和西部山區各州的高增長市場。他們在我們制定綜合解決方案戰略的領域，添加互補產品和服務，利用和建設，填補我們在這些地區現有的材料和產品業務。

Previously, we used to sell products, but today, we are providing end-to-end value-added solutions to our customers. We're solving the problems they're faced every day. We used to sell rocks. Today, we are selling road solutions to our customers.

以前，我們過去銷售產品，但今天，我們為客戶提供端到端的增值解決方案。我們正在解決他們每天面臨的問題。我們以前賣石頭。今天，我們向客戶銷售道路解決方案。

We have lots of opportunities in 2021 for M&A activity. We have a strong pipeline as we enter into 2022. And I mentioned that we had significant financial capacity coming out of 2021. However, as CFO, I can tell you that whatever opportunities come our way, we will remain disciplined and never lose our focus on shareholder value.

2021年我們有很多併購活動的機會。進入 2022 年，我們擁有強大的管道。我提到，我們將在 2021 年擁有強大的財務能力。但是，作為首席財務官，我可以告訴你，無論我們遇到什麼機會，我們都會保持紀律，永遠不會失去專注關於股東價值。

Albert mentioned earlier that on Monday, earlier this week, we announced the disposal of our Building Envelope business for an enterprise value of $3.8 billion. That represented a very attractive exit multiple of 10.5x 2021 EBITDA, and we expect that deal to close in the first half of 2022. The reason behind the divestment decision followed a comprehensive review of that business. As you're well aware, we have been active managers of our portfolio. We divest, we've reinvested and we continuously recycle the capital.

阿爾伯特早些時候提到，在本週早些時候的星期一，我們宣布以 38 億美元的企業價值出售我們的建築圍護結構業務。這代表 10.5 倍 2021 年 EBITDA 的非常有吸引力的退出倍數，我們預計該交易將在 2022 年上半年完成。撤資決定背後的原因是對該業務進行了全面審查。如您所知，我們一直是我們投資組合的積極管理者。我們撤資，我們再投資，我們不斷回收資本。

And in fact, since 2014, we have divested $12 billion of our businesses at an exit multiple of 11x and we've reinvested $18 billion at an entry level of 8x multiple. And as a result, today, we now have a narrower, simpler, more focused and more connected business, which is a higher-quality asset base, generating higher growth, higher margins, better cash and crucially higher returns.

事實上，自 2014 年以來，我們以 11 倍的退出倍數剝離了 120 億美元的業務，並以 8 倍的進入倍數再投資了 180 億美元。因此，今天，我們的業務範圍更窄、更簡單、更專注、聯繫更緊密，這是一個更高質量的資產基礎，產生更高的增長、更高的利潤率、更好的現金和至關重要的更高回報。

I mentioned earlier about our strong balance sheet at the end of December '21, we exited at 1.2x net debt to EBITDA. And of course, that gives us optionality for further future value creation. When I look at it, this optionality falls into a number of categories. Firstly, in terms of acquisitions, we continue to focus on the high-growth markets. We continue to look for opportunities to build out our integrated solutions, businesses which are connected into our existing material and products businesses in those same areas. We have a good pipeline of activity, but of course, we're going to maintain our discipline when we consider every possible option.

我之前提到過我們在 21 年 12 月底強勁的資產負債表，我們以 1.2 倍的 EBITDA 淨債務退出。當然，這為我們提供了進一步創造未來價值的選擇權。當我查看它時，這種可選性分為許多類別。首先，在收購方面，我們繼續關注高增長市場。我們繼續尋找機會來構建我們的集成解決方案，這些業務與我們在這些領域的現有材料和產品業務相關聯。我們有一個很好的活動渠道，但當然，當我們考慮每一個可能的選擇時，我們會保持我們的紀律。

Looking on to capital expenditure and particularly around expansionary CapEx. We spent EUR 1.6 billion of CapEx in 2021. In 2020, with the pandemic, we had considerable uncertainty across a lot of our markets, and we curtailed our capital expenditure activity.

關注資本支出，特別是圍繞擴張性資本支出。我們在 2021 年花費了 16 億歐元的資本支出。在 2020 年，由於大流行，我們的許多市場都存在相當大的不確定性，我們減少了資本支出活動。

As we exited 2020, visibility improved in our business, and we were able to step up our level of capital expenditure to the $1.6 billion spend in 2021. A lot of those -- that spend happened in those same growth states. So Florida, Texas, into Arizona out into California and as well in that solution space. And I was delighted to be able to support those projects because some of those projects are some of -- they're the lowest risk high-returning projects we have within CRH. So I was delighted, as I said, to be able to see that tick up in CapEx in '21 up to $1.6 billion.

2020 年結束時，我們的業務能見度有所提高，我們能夠將資本支出水平提高到 2021 年的 16 億美元。其中很多支出發生在相同的增長狀態。因此，佛羅里達州、德克薩斯州、亞利桑那州、加利福尼亞州以及該解決方案領域。我很高興能夠支持這些項目，因為其中一些項目是我們在 CRH 中風險最低的高回報項目。因此，正如我所說，我很高興能夠看到 21 年資本支出增加至 16 億美元。

Also further optionality about returning cash to our shareholders. Albert mentioned earlier, we've proposed a 5% increase in dividend. That represents 38 years of a progressive dividend policy in CRH. We're in the current tranche of the share buyback of $300 million, which we'll finish no later than the 30th of March. And that, at the end of December '21, we had returned over $3 billion or almost 10% of our share capital to our shareholders.

還有更多關於向我們的股東返還現金的選擇權。阿爾伯特之前提到，我們提議將股息增加 5%。這代表了 CRH 38 年的累進股息政策。我們目前正在進行 3 億美元的股票回購，我們將在 3 月 30 日之前完成。而且，在 21 年 12 月底，我們已向股東返還了超過 30 億美元或近 10% 的股本。

All of these acquisitions, the capital expenditure, the return of cash to our shareholders are crucially supported and underpinned by our structurally better business that we have today, which is delivering higher growth, higher margins and higher returns. I'll now hand back to Albert. Thank you.

所有這些收購、資本支出、向股東返還現金都得到了我們今天擁有的結構更好的業務的關鍵支持和支撐，這些業務正在實現更高的增長、更高的利潤率和更高的回報。我現在將交還給阿爾伯特。謝謝你。

Thanks, Jim. Jim talks there about a structurally better business. And that's the term we use in CRH, and we've used it for quite a few years. But what we mean by a structurally better business? How do we back up this claim? How do we measure on some of the key metrics, upon which we should be judged?

謝謝，吉姆。吉姆在那裡談到了一個結構上更好的業務。這就是我們在 CRH 中使用的術語，而且我們已經使用了很多年。但是，我們所說的結構更好的業務是什麼意思？我們如何支持這一主張？我們如何衡量一些關鍵指標，我們應該根據這些指標來判斷？

Well, let's go and look at some of those key metrics. First metric I want to look at is our EBITDA growth. Look at our EBITDA growth against our peers. Here, we show our peers being our global peers, the big cement guys that are out there. Our U.S. peers, we've got 2 major U.S. peers, I won't name them, you know who they are. And it looks at the growth in our EBITDA on 2018 to 2021. Now I didn't arbitrarily pick this period of time. Actually, I could have picked any period. You can go back and check it yourself. But here, you can see, CRH has outgrown anybody else in our industry.

好吧，讓我們來看看其中一些關鍵指標。我想看的第一個指標是我們的 EBITDA 增長。看看我們與同行的 EBITDA 增長情況。在這裡，我們展示了我們的同行是我們的全球同行，那裡的大水泥人。我們的美國同行，我們有兩個主要的美國同行，我不會說出他們的名字，你知道他們是誰。它著眼於2018年至2021年我們EBITDA的增長。現在我沒有隨意選擇這段時間。實際上，我可以選擇任何時期。你可以回去自己檢查一下。但是在這裡，你可以看到，CRH 已經超越了我們行業中的任何其他人。

So okay, that's interesting to see. So you can buy growth, you can take on growth anyway, you can be well positioned. How well are you running your business? How efficiently are you running your business? Well, let's look at the margins in our business. Look to the next slide.

好吧，這很有趣。因此，您可以購買增長，無論如何您都可以承擔增長，您可以處於有利位置。您經營業務的情況如何？您經營業務的效率如何？好吧，讓我們看看我們業務的利潤率。看下一張幻燈片。

This looks at the expansion of our margin over the same period of time. Great performance by our global peers, almost 3% ahead. U.S. peers, a little bit ho-hum, but CRH almost 500 basis points ahead. By investing in our business model by investing within our business, by working hard every day, we have improved the efficiency of our business to bring that margin performance.

這著眼於我們的利潤在同一時期的擴大。我們的全球同行表現出色，領先近 3%。美國同行，有點乏味，但 CRH 領先近 500 個基點。通過投資我們的業務，通過每天努力工作來投資我們的商業模式，我們提高了我們的業務效率，帶來了利潤表現。

How does it all end up? Let's look at the next metric. Look at operating cash. In the end, it's all about cash. And here again, you find CRH the winner. The good performance by both our global and U.S. peers, very good, very impressive, but CRH ahead yet again. It doesn't matter what I pick. It doesn't matter the metrics. It doesn't matter the period. CRH outperforms. We have delivered superior value to you, our shareholders.

這一切如何結束？讓我們看看下一個指標。看看營運現金。最後，一切都與現金有關。在這裡，您再次發現 CRH 是贏家。我們全球和美國同行的良好表現，非常好，非常令人印象深刻，但 CRH 再次領先。我選擇什麼並不重要。指標無關緊要。期間沒關係。 CRH 表現優異。我們為您，我們的股東，提供了卓越的價值。

Now we know getting to the top is one thing, but staying there is something else. And CRH has no interest in being static in any way, shape or form. We want to put more distance between ourselves and our peers. And let me explain to you how we think we can go about doing that.

現在我們知道登上頂峰是一回事，但保持在那裡是另一回事。 CRH 對以任何方式、形狀或形式保持靜止不感興趣。我們希望在自己和同齡人之間拉開更大的距離。讓我向你解釋一下我們認為我們可以如何去做。

CRH has been a changing business over the last decade. We have made great changes to our business model and to our structure. We have reshaped our business over the last 10 years. 50% of the business that we owned a decade ago have been sold. We've repositioned our business. We've disposed of the peripheral geographies, and we are focused on our 2 core markets, developed world markets of North America and Europe.

在過去的十年中，CRH 一直是一個不斷變化的業務。我們對業務模式和結構進行了重大改變。在過去的 10 年裡，我們重塑了我們的業務。我們十年前擁有的 50% 的業務已售出。我們重新定位了我們的業務。我們已經處理了周邊地區，我們專注於我們的兩個核心市場，北美和歐洲的發達國家市場。

But importantly, within those markets, we've geographically focused. We've pushed hard to the Central and Eastern European part of Europe where there's higher growth. We've pushed south and west across the U.S. with a strong population and economic growth. We've caught that rebalancing of our business between strong cash cows of Western Europe and Northeast United States supplements the high-growth businesses that we have in the east of Europe and the South and West of the United States.

但重要的是，在這些市場中，我們專注於地理。我們已經向歐洲中歐和東歐地區大力推進，那裡的增長速度更快。我們以強勁的人口和經濟增長在美國向南和向西推進。我們發現，我們在西歐和美國東北部強勁的搖錢樹之間的業務再平衡補充了我們在歐洲東部以及美國南部和西部擁有的高增長業務。

We become a narrower and deeper business. We have refocused our business on core areas of competence. We are less an intermediary supplier of base commodity materials. We have got closer to the ultimate customer, our customer and our customers' customer over the last 10 years. And as we've moved down that value chain, we have understood an awful lot more about our customers' needs and their problems.

我們成為一個更窄更深的企業。我們已將業務重點重新集中在核心競爭力領域。我們不是基礎商品材料的中間供應商。在過去的 10 年裡，我們更接近最終客戶、我們的客戶和客戶的客戶。隨著我們沿著價值鏈向下移動，我們對客戶的需求和他們的問題有了更多的了解。

And that has allowed us to solve some of their problems for us by improving our offering, sometimes, it's about broadening out the product range. Sometimes it's working with them to make them understand how we can adopt our materials and innovate our materials to make their lives easier, off-site construction, more complex construction, working with their designers and their engineers to make their life easier.

這使我們能夠通過改進我們的產品來為我們解決他們的一些問題，有時，這是關於擴大產品範圍。有時它與他們合作，讓他們了解我們如何採用我們的材料並創新我們的材料，讓他們的生活更輕鬆，異地施工，更複雜的施工，與他們的設計師和工程師合作，讓他們的生活更輕鬆。

And I can best express this by 2 of our major business, our fastest-growing business. Our Americas Materials business, 15 years ago, principally just broke rock and sold rock, a basic commodity. Well, then we decided we want to turn that rock into asphalt. And in turning it into asphalt, we decided, well, maybe we should get involved in actually laying some of the asphalt. And having lay some of that asphalt, our customers said to us, "Well, look, if you're providing the rock and the asphalt and you're building the road, who's going to handle all the culverts and the water runoff? And how we're going to manage the on-ramps and the off-ramps and the bridges?" And we got more and more involved in that. And now we are a complete supplier of the whole road solution to our major customers, the federal government and the states in the United States.

我可以通過我們的兩個主要業務，我們增長最快的業務來最好地表達這一點。 15 年前，我們的美洲材料業務主要是剛剛打破岩石並出售岩石，這是一種基本商品。好吧，然後我們決定要把那塊石頭變成瀝青。在把它變成瀝青的過程中，我們決定，好吧，也許我們應該參與實際鋪設一些瀝青。在鋪設了一些瀝青之後，我們的客戶對我們說，“好吧，看，如果你提供岩石和瀝青，你正在修路，誰來處理所有的涵洞和徑流？我們將如何管理入口匝道、出口匝道和橋樑？”我們越來越多地參與其中。現在我們是為我們的主要客戶、聯邦政府和美國各州提供整體道路解決方案的完整供應商。

I look at our APG business, our fastest-growing business across CRH for almost 10 years. 15 years ago, that was a business that basically sold gray pavers that were used for commercial or indeed industrial purposes. And then we started to think, well, maybe we can start making different colors, in different shapes and different sizes, and we can bring to the residential market.

我看看我們的 APG 業務，這是近 10 年來我們在 CRH 中增長最快的業務。 15 年前，那是一家主要銷售用於商業或工業用途的灰色攤舖機的企業。然後我們開始想，好吧，也許我們可以開始製作不同的顏色，不同的形狀和不同的尺寸，我們可以把它帶到住宅市場。

And then we worked with the 2 major big box customers, Lowe's and Home Depots in North America to start branching out and broadening our product range to not just make pavers, but hardscapes and walling products and capstones and [bark mulch] and swimming pool products. So now our offering to our customer and our customer's customer is the complete range of products.

然後我們與北美的兩大大型客戶，Lowe's 和 Home Depots 合作，開始拓展和擴大我們的產品範圍，不僅生產攤舖機，還生產硬景觀和牆壁產品、頂石以及 [樹皮覆蓋物] 和游泳池產品.因此，現在我們向客戶和客戶的客戶提供的產品是完整的產品系列。

And when we talk to the outdoor contractor who designs these and puts this in place, we help him design it for his customers. Again, it's a complete package. We have helped our customers by finding out what their problems were and adding value to our offering to them. And by adding value to our customers, we're getting paid for it. It is no longer any good to be a sole provider of base materials in the world that we live in.

當我們與設計這些並將其安裝到位的戶外承包商交談時，我們會幫助他為他的客戶設計它。同樣，它是一個完整的軟件包。我們通過找出他們的問題所在並為我們提供給他們的產品增加價值來幫助我們的客戶。通過為我們的客戶增加價值，我們得到了回報。在我們生活的這個世界上，成為唯一的基礎材料供應商已經沒有任何好處了。

Quite simply, you cannot run a business in 2022 with a strategy that was conceived in 1970 or 1980. You have to adapt to move on whatever business you're in. And our focus on solving our end customers' problems is at the core of how we're going to grow CRH for the next decade.

很簡單，您無法按照 1970 年或 1980 年制定的戰略在 2022 年開展業務。您必須適應開展任何業務。我們專注於解決最終客戶的問題是我們的核心我們將如何在未來十年發展 CRH。

We call the integration of materials and products and services, we call that Integrated Solutions. And it comes to life by some of the examples that I've explained to you. That evolving part of our business is responsible for about 65% of sales so far across our businesses, and it benefits our customers, it benefits CRH and it benefits you, our shareholders.

我們稱之為材料與產品和服務的集成，我們稱之為集成解決方案。通過我向您解釋的一些示例，它變得生動起來。迄今為止，我們業務中不斷發展的部分占我們業務銷售額的 65%，它有利於我們的客戶，有利於 CRH，也有利於您，我們的股東。

And let me explain how it benefits those 3 important stakeholders. Let me, first of all, talk about our customers. I'm talking to this morning our investors, our owners, our shareholders. Actually, I spend most of my time, as my colleagues do, talking to our customers. And we hear consistent teams coming back to us. They are coming under increasing pressure with regulations, specifications, ever-changing government policy.

讓我解釋一下它如何使這三個重要的利益相關者受益。首先，讓我談談我們的客戶。今天早上我正在和我們的投資者、我們的所有者、我們的股東交談。實際上，我和我的同事一樣，大部分時間都在與客戶交談。我們聽到一致的團隊回到我們身邊。隨著法規、規範和不斷變化的政府政策，他們面臨越來越大的壓力。

They're under pressure to become more sustainable, to decarbonize, to recycle more. They're under pressure to improve the quality of their construction to improve the lifespan and resilience of what they build. And at the same time, they have to speed up construction. They have to clean up construction to reduce the impact of construction in the local environment. And all of this is -- has been on against background of we want lower costs and the construction of the fact that labor supply is tightening.

他們面臨著變得更加可持續、脫碳和回收更多的壓力。他們面臨著提高建築質量的壓力，以提高他們建造的建築的壽命和彈性。同時，他們必須加快建設。他們必須清理施工，以減少施工對當地環境的影響。所有這一切都是在我們希望降低成本和勞動力供應趨緊的事實的背景下發生的。

Now government set vision and they set policy, but they never tell anybody what to do or how to do it. The contractors, well, their job is full. They're focusing on the complex matter of the construction process itself. And more and more, contractors, designers, architects and engineers are turning to manufacturers like ourselves to collaborate and innovate with them on how we produce materials and products that can solve their problems and deal with the challenges they are faced with.

現在政府制定了願景，制定了政策，但他們從不告訴任何人該做什麼或如何做。承包商，嗯，他們的工作已經滿了。他們專注於施工過程本身的複雜問題。越來越多的承包商、設計師、建築師和工程師轉向像我們這樣的製造商，與他們合作並創新我們如何生產能夠解決他們的問題並應對他們面臨的挑戰的材料和產品。

I mentioned already, we are the #1 building materials business in North America. We're the #1 building materials in Europe. The 2 most complex, regulated markets in the world. Nobody has that breadth of understanding of the materials and products of the different end users, the different geographic challenges or the climatic challenges that CRH has. We are the ones who are best positioned to pull all that knowledge across that breadth of end use, geographies, business areas, to put it together to find solutions for our customers. It takes solutions. That ability, that knowledge, it takes our solution strategy right into the heart of our customers' offices as we help with them design the products that will build a world of tomorrow without destroying the world we have today.

我已經提到過，我們是北美排名第一的建材企業。我們是歐洲排名第一的建築材料。世界上兩個最複雜、最受監管的市場。沒有人對 CRH 所面臨的不同最終用戶的材料和產品、不同的地理挑戰或氣候挑戰有如此廣泛的了解。我們是最有能力將所有知識整合到最終用途、地理、業務領域的人，並將其放在一起為我們的客戶尋找解決方案。它需要解決方案。這種能力，這種知識，它將我們的解決方案戰略直接帶入我們客戶辦公室的核心，因為我們幫助他們設計將建立一個明天的世界而不破壞我們今天擁有的世界的產品。

It's good for CRH. Solutions that delivers for CRH because our 2 major markets are, of course, very heavily regulated. There are solid fundamentals of population growth, economic growth and need money to pay for the business going forward. We're focused on our core area of competence, which primarily are infrastructure and residential. They are both very heavy regulators and specified areas. There are policies that are enforced and are required to do business there on the provision of materials and how you construct and there is an ever-increasing focus on sustainability, resilience, increasing efficiency, lowering costs.

這對 CRH 有好處。為 CRH 提供解決方案，因為我們的兩個主要市場當然受到非常嚴格的監管。人口增長、經濟增長有堅實的基礎，需要資金來支付未來的業務。我們專注於我們的核心競爭力領域，主要是基礎設施和住宅。它們都是非常重的監管機構和指定領域。有一些政策是強制執行的，並且需要在提供材料和如何建造方面開展業務，並且越來越關注可持續性、彈性、提高效率和降低成本。

And if you can tick the boxes on all of those issues, you will see increased demand. And companies that innovate and deliver and adapt to that changing environment will be rewarded with extra business. And we see that as being high-quality growth, and that's what has been behind the delivery for the last 3 or 4 years in CRH.

如果你能在所有這些問題上打勾，你會看到需求增加。創新、交付和適應不斷變化的環境的公司將獲得額外業務的回報。我們認為這是高質量的增長，這就是過去 3 或 4 年 CRH 交付背後的原因。

And ultimately, this all comes together for you, our shareholders. It brings benefits to you. You have seen the last 3 or 4 years how we have delivered superior performance. By focusing more on the public purse, by focusing more on what we consider to be a resilient residential demand going forward for the next number of years, we think we have reduced the cyclicality of our business.

最終，這一切都為您，我們的股東而匯集在一起。它給你帶來好處。您已經看到過去 3 或 4 年我們如何提供卓越的性能。通過更多地關注公共錢包，通過更多地關注我們認為未來幾年具有彈性的住宅需求，我們認為我們已經減少了業務的周期性。

But running a solutions business across the materials policy, it's a complex business. You need a different skill set to manage the different parts of the value chain. But CRH has always manage different businesses in different ways. And we have shown our ability to do that in recent years. And we're confident that by the execution of solutions an extension of that business across our existing profile, it will translate into higher growth in sales, profitability, margins and cash.

但是，跨材料政策運營解決方案業務是一項複雜的業務。您需要不同的技能組合來管理價值鏈的不同部分。但華潤始終以不同的方式管理不同的業務。近年來，我們已經展示了我們這樣做的能力。我們相信，通過執行解決方案，在我們現有的業務範圍內擴展該業務，它將轉化為銷售額、盈利能力、利潤和現金的更高增長。

Now I can't leave the subject of solutions, without talking about sustainability. Sustainability is at the very core of our integrated solutions strategy and decarbonization is at the core of our sustainability strategy. We have a long track record of industry-leading carbon reduction in CRH. Last year, we pulled back our 2030 targets back into 2025. And today, we're announcing new targets. We will reduce over the 10 years to 2030, our total emissions of CO2 by 25%.

現在我不能離開解決方案的主題，而不談論可持續性。可持續發展是我們綜合解決方案戰略的核心，而脫碳是我們可持續發展戰略的核心。我們在 CRH 行業領先的碳減排方面有著悠久的記錄。去年，我們將 2030 年的目標撤回到 2025 年。今天，我們宣布了新的目標。我們將在 10 年內到 2030 年將我們的 CO2 總排放量減少 25%。

Let me be very specific. In 2020, we emitted 46 million tons in total of CO2, and we are committing this morning to reduce that to 35 million tonnes by the year 2030. It's a 25% reduction. I wish I had time this morning to go through more detail on that. I don't. It would take about 45 minutes. But that's why we have set aside time in April at our Investor Day to do that. And in April, we will explain to you exactly how we're going to do that when we will achieve it, what will be the cost. All of these plans have been verified by the SBTI, to 2030 and take us in line with our overall ambition of being a net zero carbon company by 2050.

讓我非常具體。 2020 年，我們總共排放了 4600 萬噸二氧化碳，我們今天早上承諾到 2030 年將其減少到 3500 萬噸。減少了 25%。我希望今天早上有時間詳細介紹一下。我不。大約需要45分鐘。但這就是為什麼我們在 4 月的投資者日留出時間來做這件事。在 4 月，我們將向您確切解釋我們將如何做到這一點，當我們實現它時，成本是多少。所有這些計劃都已通過 SBTI 的驗證，直至 2030 年，並符合我們到 2050 年成為淨零碳公司的總體目標。

Now there's a lot more to sustainability than decarbonization. It's also important to talk about circularity and indeed the products that we make that will build a more sustainable world. For a decade, CRH have been focused on circularity. It's a deeply embedded part of our business now. I stand here this morning with great pride to say to you. I'm the CEO of a business that is the largest recycler of any product in the United States.

現在，可持續性不僅僅是脫碳。談論循環性以及我們製造的產品將建立一個更可持續的世界也很重要。十年來，CRH 一直專注於循環性。它現在是我們業務中根深蒂固的一部分。今天早上我站在這裡非常自豪地對你說。我是一家公司的首席執行官，該公司是美國最大的產品回收商。

We recycled -- that nobody recycles more plastic or paper or cardboard we recycle more building waste than anybody else. We recycle more product than anybody else. Well, what do we do with it? Well, we're also the largest road builder in the United States. And today, the roads we're building, 25% of all roads are being built with recycled material. It took us a decade to get there. It's progressive work. It will increase in the years ahead. But by using recycled material in the building of roads, we are protecting and preserving the scarce resources that are out there. And of course, we are extending the vital expensive reserves that CRH owns.

我們回收——沒有人回收更多的塑料、紙張或紙板，我們回收的建築垃圾比其他任何人都多。我們回收的產品比其他任何人都多。好吧，我們用它做什麼？嗯，我們也是美國最大的道路建設者。而今天，我們正在建設的道路，所有道路的 25% 都是用回收材料建造的。我們花了十年時間才到達那裡。這是進步的工作。它將在未來幾年增加。但是通過在道路建設中使用回收材料，我們正在保護和保存那裡的稀缺資源。當然，我們正在擴大 CRH 擁有的重要的昂貴儲備。

Also, 100% of all the products we make are recyclable. Now we have invested over the last decade over $1 billion within our businesses on innovation. A lot of it has been focused on increasing sustainability. A lot of it has been actually responsible for delivering the solution strategy that's delivering for CRH today. And we will continue to do that going forward.

此外，我們生產的所有產品 100% 都是可回收的。現在，在過去的十年中，我們在我們的業務中投資了超過 10 億美元用於創新。其中很多都集中在提高可持續性上。其中很多實際上負責交付當今為 CRH 交付的解決方案策略。我們將繼續這樣做。

However, additionally, we have set up a $250 million venture fund specifically to commercialize some of the really good projects that we have up and running within our businesses to commercialize them more to see exactly how we can get them to market that can contribute not just to our business, but also to the sustainability agenda for our industry.

但是，此外，我們還設立了一個 2.5 億美元的風險基金，專門用於將我們在業務中啟動並運行的一些非常好的項目商業化，以進一步將它們商業化，以了解我們如何將它們推向市場，這不僅可以做出貢獻對我們的業務，也對我們行業的可持續發展議程。

If I can leave you with 3 key thoughts how we think about sustainability in CRH. We are committed to producing the materials that we produce in a more sustainable way. We are also committed to innovating and producing products that will enable our customers to construct in a more sustainable way. It probably means more off-site manufacturing and more industrialization. And crucially, we are committed to innovating and manufacturing products that would help us all live our lives in a more sustainable way. And we will talk a lot more about that when we talk in April.

如果我能給你留下 3 個關鍵想法，我們如何看待 CRH 的可持續性。我們致力於以更可持續的方式生產我們生產的材料。我們還致力於創新和生產使我們的客戶能夠以更可持續的方式建造的產品。這可能意味著更多的異地製造和更多的工業化。至關重要的是，我們致力於創新和製造能夠幫助我們所有人以更可持續的方式生活的產品。當我們在四月份討論時，我們會更多地討論這個問題。

The reason why we've asked for this investor update in April is because we want to have a mature conversation with our shareholders. We want to take time outside of the very busy reporting window we find ourselves in at the moment and take an opportunity to expand on the key components of our integrated solution strategy. There's no big reveal here. This is about a mature conversation to explain to you how we are going to deliver more value to all stakeholders in CRH and how we place sustainability and, in particular, decarbonization and circularity right at the core of our strategy. We'll also set out how our portfolio is going to evolve in the decade ahead and how we are going to allocate the fruits of our work -- the capital to maximize value for you, our shareholders.

我們之所以在四月份要求提供此投資者更新，是因為我們希望與我們的股東進行一次成熟的對話。我們希望在目前非常繁忙的報告窗口之外抽出時間，並藉此機會擴展我們集成解決方案戰略的關鍵組成部分。這裡沒有大的揭示。這是一次成熟的對話，向您解釋我們將如何為 CRH 的所有利益相關者提供更多價值，以及我們如何將可持續性，特別是脫碳和循環性置於我們戰略的核心。我們還將闡述我們的投資組合在未來十年將如何發展，以及我們將如何分配我們的工作成果——為您和我們的股東實現價值最大化的資本。

Now the format of the Investor Day is shown on Slide 27. It's a live webcast. Myself and Jim will be there. We'll be joined by Randy Lake, our Chief Operating Officer. It will be on at 9:00 a.m. East Coast time, 2:00 p.m. GMT, and we'll take about 60 minutes to discuss our plans and our thoughts, and we'll have plenty of time for Q&A afterwards. I'm sure you'll find it very interesting. I look forward to updating you on that.

現在，投資者日的形式顯示在幻燈片 27 上。這是一個網絡直播。我和吉姆會在那裡。我們的首席運營官 Randy Lake 將加入我們的行列。它將在東海岸時間上午 9:00，下午 2:00 開始。格林威治標準時間，我們將花大約 60 分鐘的時間來討論我們的計劃和想法，之後我們將有足夠的時間進行問答。我相信你會發現它非常有趣。我期待著更新你。

So with that, I'd just like to conclude this part of the presentation by talking about our outlook for 2022. You've heard me talk about the fact that we've had a strong start -- strong finish to the year. We've also had good order books. The momentum in our businesses is good. Demand is there. So we look forward with positivity. Of course, there are challenges. There are a challenges with regard to cost. There are challenges with regards to the uncertainty of what's going to happen in Central and Eastern Europe. However, we will have a strong focus on the matters that we can control, our costs, our commercial excellence, and we'll keep focused on our cash. And we'll update you again when we speak to you in April.

因此，我想通過談論我們對 2022 年的展望來結束演講的這一部分。你聽說過我談到我們有一個良好的開端 - 一年的強勁結束這一事實。我們也有很好的訂單簿。我們的業務發展勢頭良好。需求就在那裡。因此，我們以積極的態度期待。當然，也有挑戰。在成本方面存在挑戰。中歐和東歐將要發生的事情的不確定性存在挑戰。但是，我們將重點關注我們可以控制的事項、我們的成本、我們的商業優勢，並且我們將繼續關注我們的現金。當我們在四月與您交談時，我們會再次通知您。

So with that, that's the end of the formal part of the presentation this morning. What I'd like to now do is move to Q&A. I'm joined here by Tom Holmes, our Head of Investor Relations; and Jim. And together, I guess, for the next 25 or 30 minutes, what we're going to do is just take your questions that you have sent in to Tom and answer them in the best way we can. Tom?

至此，今天上午的正式演講部分到此結束。我現在想做的是轉到問答環節。我們的投資者關係主管 Tom Holmes 也加入了我的行列；和吉姆。我想，在接下來的 25 或 30 分鐘內，我們要做的就是把你發送給 Tom 的問題集中起來，並以我們能做到的最好方式回答它們。湯姆?

Good morning. Thanks, Albert. Good morning, everyone. So as Albert said, this morning's Q&A session will be moderated. I will take the questions that have been coming through over the last hour or so. I'll address them here to Albert and Jim on stage. Please continue to submit your questions over the webcast portal, and we'll get through as many of them as we can. (Operator Instructions) There's a lot of overlap and recurring themes in the questions coming through. So hopefully, a lot of them will be addressed over the course of our conversation this morning. If not, if there's any outstanding questions at the end of the session, the IR team and I will be happy to follow up with you directly over the course of the day.

早上好。謝謝，阿爾伯特。大家，早安。正如 Albert 所說，今天上午的問答環節將被主持。我將回答過去一個小時左右出現的問題。我將在這裡向舞台上的阿爾伯特和吉姆致辭。請繼續通過網絡直播門戶提交您的問題，我們將盡可能多地解決問題。 （操作員說明）出現的問題中有很多重疊和反復出現的主題。因此，希望在我們今天早上的談話過程中能夠解決其中的很多問題。如果沒有，如果在會議結束時有任何懸而未決的問題，IR 團隊和我將很樂意在一天中直接與您聯繫。

So to kick us off, Albert, Jim, I have 2 questions here from Robert Gardiner with Davy. The first is can you please quantify the impact of rising energy costs in 2021? And what are your expectations for 2022? And second is, can you explain the strategic rationale behind the divestment of your Building Envelope business? And what are the implications for your integrated solution strategy going forward?

讓我們開始吧，Albert，Jim，我有兩個問題來自 Robert Gardiner 和 Davy。首先是您能否量化 2021 年能源成本上漲的影響？您對 2022 年的期望是什麼？其次，您能解釋一下撤資您的建築圍護結構業務背後的戰略原理嗎？對您未來的集成解決方案戰略有何影響？

Maybe I'll take both, Tom. Well, maybe I'll pass the impact of energy on 2021 to Jim later on. First of all, Bob, hope you're well. Let me deal with the disposal of Oldcastle BuildingEnvelope first and then come back to our energy issue.

也許我會兩者兼得，湯姆。好吧，也許我稍後會將 2021 年的能源影響傳遞給吉姆。首先，鮑勃，希望你一切都好。讓我先處理 Oldcastle BuildingEnvelope 的處置，然後再回到我們的能源問題。

Look, Building Envelope has been part of CRH for about 30 years. It's a very fine business. We built that business up by acquisition and by geographic expansion primarily within the United States. But we have become a very, very big gorilla in a small space. We began -- we owned that space. And in CRH, as you know, of course, we're very focused on operational performance. But actually, we created about 2/3 of our value for our shareholders through the acquisition process directly or indirectly. And that business was -- we had a -- we bought a very big business in 2015, C.R. Laurence and that was the last business we bought in that space. Because actually, we're running out of optionality to buy businesses. And if we have no M&A opportunities, we actually tie one hand behind our back.

看，Building Envelope 成為 CRH 的一部分已經有 30 年了。這是一個非常好的生意。我們通過收購和主要在美國境內的地域擴張建立了該業務。但是我們已經在一個狹小的空間裡變成了一隻非常非常大的大猩猩。我們開始了——我們擁有那個空間。當然，在 CRH，我們非常關注運營績效。但實際上，我們通過收購過程直接或間接為股東創造了大約 2/3 的價值。那家企業是——我們有一個——我們在 2015 年收購了一家非常大的企業，C.R. Laurence，那是我們在該領域購買的最後一家企業。因為實際上，我們已經沒有購買企業的選擇權了。如果我們沒有併購機會，我們實際上是把一隻手綁在背後。

Secondly, that was a business that was focused on the glazing market. Our customer was the glazer. There were no other products we could sell to them. I've already talked this morning how our focus is on customers. We could do no more for them. We could sell more but then we were just an organic growth play and CRH don't really have too much interest in just being an organic growth play.

其次，這是一家專注於玻璃市場的企業。我們的客戶是上釉者。我們沒有其他產品可以賣給他們。我今天早上已經談過我們如何關注客戶。我們不能為他們做更多了。我們可以賣得更多，但那時我們只是一個有機增長的公司，而 CRH 對僅僅成為一個有機增長的公司並沒有太大的興趣。

And the last reason was that it didn't really integrate with our core competencies in and around a strong heavy complex infrastructure, public or private or indeed residential as well. It was a nonresidential business. And when we looked at the opportunities to be able to deploy that capital elsewhere in what we're a business that did sit within our core competence. That did offer us acquisition opportunities. It was actually a decision where we said, let's go and test the values and see if we could crystallize the value we have now to deploy that capital elsewhere.

最後一個原因是，它並沒有真正與我們在強大的重型複雜基礎設施（公共或私人或實際上是住宅）中及其周圍的核心競爭力相結合。這是一項非住宅業務。當我們看到能夠將這些資本部署到其他地方的機會時，我們的業務確實屬於我們的核心競爭力。這確實為我們提供了收購機會。這實際上是我們所說的一個決定，讓我們去測試這些價值，看看我們是否可以將我們現在擁有的價值具體化，以便將這些資本部署到其他地方。

And that was the rationale, just sensible portfolio management.

這就是合理的投資組合管理的基本原理。

With regard to energy costs, you've asked me about what we see about energy dynamics in 2022. I don't know. All I can tell you is that we manage the really brutal energy cost increases during 2021 quite well. Our margin went ahead, so we did manage it well. And all I can tell you is we keep an eye on the process very careful. We've seen energy costs up 35% since the start of the year. .

關於能源成本，你問我關於 2022 年能源動態的看法。我不知道。我只能告訴你的是，我們很好地管理了 2021 年真正殘酷的能源成本增長。我們的利潤繼續增長，所以我們確實管理得很好。我只能告訴你的是，我們非常小心地關注這個過程。自今年年初以來，我們已經看到能源成本上漲了 35%。 .

But remember, we have natural hedges in place. We buy forward. We have our bitumen winter fill program. And we watch very carefully our use of fuels, and we have a constant switch away from fossil fuels as well. So we're confident that we can manage them as best we can. Let's see how the year evolves and I'll probably talk to you about more knowledge and understanding when we talk in August of this year. With regard to energy costs in '21, Jim? .

但請記住，我們有天然的樹籬。我們提前購買。我們有我們的瀝青冬季填充程序。我們非常仔細地觀察我們對燃料的使用，我們也不斷地遠離化石燃料。因此，我們有信心盡我們所能管理它們。讓我們看看這一年是如何演變的，當我們在今年 8 月談話時，我可能會和你談談更多的知識和理解。關於 21 年的能源成本，吉姆？ .

Sure. Bob, as you know, typically, our energy build tends to be, we said in a range of kind of 9% to 11% of our revenue. In 2021, it was just a little under 10%. As Albert said, about half our energy bill tends to be in the liquid asphalt on the bitumen side, and we've always managed that business from a margin perspective. The other half tends to be doing electricity, diesel, gas, et cetera. And typically, heading into any year, we'd have about 60% cover in place, and that's no -- not any different heading into 2022.

當然。鮑勃，如您所知，通常情況下，我們的能源建設往往占我們收入的 9% 到 11%。在 2021 年，這一比例略低於 10%。正如阿爾伯特所說，我們大約一半的能源費用往往是在瀝青方面的液態瀝青中，我們一直從利潤的角度來管理這項業務。另一半傾向於做電力、柴油、天然氣等。通常情況下，進入任何一年，我們都會有大約 60% 的保障到位，這不是——進入 2022 年沒有任何不同。

So when you look at that range of kind of 9% to 11%, I expect it to pick up towards the higher end of that range in 2022. As Albert said, in '21 crucially, despite the very significant inflation kind of leveraging on our solutions business, we were able to push on margins across all 3 divisions.

因此，當您查看 9% 到 11% 的範圍時，我預計它會在 2022 年向該範圍的高端回升。正如阿爾伯特所說，在 21 年至關重要，儘管通貨膨脹非常顯著我們的解決方案業務，我們能夠推動所有 3 個部門的利潤。

Thanks, Jim. So Jim, just a quick one. I see here, the post-tax proceeds for the building envelope divestment. Any thoughts on that?

謝謝，吉姆。所以吉姆，只是一個快速的。我在這裡看到了建築圍護結構撤資的稅後收益。對此有什麼想法嗎？

Yes. We announced Monday. The total enterprise value of $3.8 billion for the divestment of Building Envelope. That included some assumed leases of about 350. So the net cash is about $3.45 billion net of tax, a shade under $3 billion.

是的。我們週一宣布。剝離 Building Envelope 的企業總價值為 38 億美元。這包括一些假設的約 350 份租賃。因此，淨現金約為 34.5 億美元的稅後淨額，略低於 30 億美元。

Next question here is from Gregor Kuglitsch in UBS. Two questions here. First one, given the strength of the existing balance sheet and expected proceeds from Building Envelope, what are your intentions for redeploying this capital?

下一個問題來自瑞銀的 Gregor Kuglitsch。這裡有兩個問題。第一個，鑑於現有資產負債表的實力和 Building Envelope 的預期收益，您打算重新部署這筆資金嗎？

And the second is, can you detail how you aim to achieve the 25% reduction in carbon emissions by 2030? Can you elaborate on the additional costs or CapEx to achieve this?

第二個是，您能否詳細說明您的目標是如何在 2030 年之前實現 25% 的碳排放量減少？您能否詳細說明實現這一目標的額外成本或資本支出？

Again, maybe I'll take the first here. Jim, you might go back to you on the CapEx cost for that, Tom. Gregor, I hope you're well. I take the CO2 reduction question first and foremost. Look, we're going to take the time in April to go through that in detail, but it's primarily focused in 3 or 4 key areas. First and foremost, it's within the process. We're ongoing working on our process within all of our factories, not just our cement business, but also our aggregate concrete, concrete product facilities to decarbonize that. And again, that will be part and parcel of it. Innovating new materials, working with our customers to produce less carbon-intensive materials. Of course, there's expenditure -- there's capital expenditure to invest within our business. And of course, crucially is the area of fuels, not just the fuels we consume ourselves moving more to biomass and greenfields, but also the fuels that the energy that we buy in. And that's the primary areas of where our focus will be. Again, we'll take you through that in detail when we come forward in April.

再說一次，也許我會在這裡拿第一個。吉姆，湯姆，你可能會就資本支出成本回過頭來。格雷戈爾，我希望你一切都好。我首先考慮減少二氧化碳的問題。看，我們將在 4 月份花時間詳細討論，但它主要集中在 3 或 4 個關鍵領域。首先，它在過程中。我們正在我們所有的工廠中持續開展我們的流程，不僅是我們的水泥業務，還有我們的骨料混凝土、混凝土產品設施，以使其脫碳。再一次，這將是它的一部分。創新新材料，與我們的客戶合作生產低碳材料。當然，還有支出——在我們的業務中投資的資本支出。當然，至關重要的是燃料領域，不僅僅是我們自己消耗的燃料更多地轉向生物質和綠地，還有我們購買能源的燃料。這是我們關注的主要領域。同樣，當我們在四月提出時，我們將帶您詳細了解這一點。

I'll go to Jim in a second with regard to the cost of that. Just with regard to the deployment of the capital that we have. Look, I think you just have to trust CRH and trust the system. Over the last decade, we've sold $12 billion worth of businesses, and we bought $18 billion worth of businesses. As Jim mentioned, the $12 billion that business we sold, we sold them at 11x EBITDA, and we bought business at 8x EBITDA pre-synergies.

關於費用，我馬上就去找吉姆。就我們所擁有的資本的部署而言。看，我認為您只需要信任 CRH 並信任系統即可。在過去十年中，我們出售了價值 120 億美元的企業，我們購買了價值 180 億美元的企業。正如吉姆所提到的，我們出售了 120 億美元的業務，我們以 11 倍 EBITDA 的價格出售它們，我們以 8 倍的 EBITDA 預協同效應購買了業務。

So we have targets in mind, yes. It's a long list. Is there a big, expansive, huge deal we're going to do? No, we don't do that in CRH. Ours is an industry that is replete with fragmented smaller businesses. And what we will do is we will continue to gobble up those business because when we buy smaller businesses, we see opportunities to create value in doing so. So it will take time, but we will reallocate that capital back into our business to create value for our shareholders. And we'll see how it goes during the course of this year and next year. .

所以我們心中有目標，是的。這是一個很長的清單。我們要做一個大的、廣泛的、巨大的交易嗎？不，我們不會在 CRH 中這樣做。我們的行業充滿了分散的小型企業。我們將要做的是繼續吞併這些業務，因為當我們收購小型企業時，我們會看到這樣做創造價值的機會。所以這需要時間，但我們會將這些資本重新分配回我們的業務，為我們的股東創造價值。我們將在今年和明年的過程中看到它的進展情況。 .

Jim, with regard to the CapEx cost.

吉姆，關於資本支出成本。

Yes, Gregor, this is, I think, our fourth target that we've put out there in terms of carbon reduction. So -- what we have in place is a very clear process location built up location by location across the group in terms of how we're going to get there. We spend typically about -- in '21, we spent $1.6 billion on CapEx. In '22, we forecasted a little increase to $1.7 billion.

是的，Gregor，我認為這是我們在減少碳排放方面提出的第四個目標。所以——我們所擁有的是一個非常明確的流程位置，根據我們將如何到達那裡，在整個團隊中逐個位置建立起來。我們通常花費大約 - 在 21 年，我們在資本支出上花費了 16 億美元。在 22 年，我們預測會略微增加至 17 億美元。

Looking out in terms of the CapEx required to achieve that target, it's not a material step-up on that kind of level of CapEx, $1.6 billion, $1.7 billion per year. However, I can assure you that all those projects that are required to deliver will again be looked through that same lens that we do for all capital projects. So in terms of returns criteria. So they will also earn a return on those investments. .

從實現該目標所需的資本支出來看，這並不是每年 16 億美元、17 億美元的資本支出水平的實質性提升。但是，我可以向您保證，所有需要交付的項目將再次通過我們對所有資本項目所做的相同鏡頭進行審視。所以就退貨標準而言。因此，他們還將從這些投資中獲得回報。 .

Jim, there's a follow-up here on CapEx. CapEx for 2021 coming in higher than expected. Any thoughts on that? .

吉姆，這裡有關於資本支出的後續行動。 2021 年的資本支出高於預期。對此有什麼想法嗎？ .

Sure. Yes. CapEx came in at $1.6 billion, as I mentioned earlier, the context of that. We were able to pull forward some of that expansionary CapEx in some of those growth markets and again, in our solutions businesses. So -- and as I said in around kind of Florida, Texas, into Arizona, we have opportunities in terms of fast-growing markets and in terms of building out our capacity because the demand was there. So delighted to be able to support them, Tom. As I said, some of the lowest risk, highest returning projects we have and we can get those kind of projects. So that explains the little tick up, we were able to pull it forward.

當然。是的。正如我之前提到的，資本支出為 16 億美元。我們能夠在其中一些增長市場以及我們的解決方案業務中推動一些擴張性資本支出。所以——正如我在佛羅里達州、德克薩斯州和亞利桑那州附近所說的那樣，我們在快速增長的市場和擴大產能方面都有機會，因為需求就在那裡。很高興能夠支持他們，湯姆。正如我所說，我們擁有一些風險最低、回報率最高的項目，我們可以獲得這些項目。所以這解釋了小勾號，我們能夠把它向前拉。

Great. Next question here is from David O'Brien in Goodbody. The reshaping of the business in the last 8 years has been very significant. Are you satisfied with your current portfolio? Or should we expect further evolution from here? .

偉大的。下一個問題來自 Goodbody 中的 David O'Brien。在過去的 8 年中，業務的重塑意義重大。您對目前的投資組合滿意嗎？還是我們應該期待從這裡進一步發展？ .

I just said CRH is never static. We're always moving, not because we want to move because we must move. Our markets are constantly changing. Your markets are too. And we are anticipating those changes and guiding our business where those markets are going to. So yes, I do anticipate to continue to work on our portfolio. It should be. But the reason for that is that we want to develop a better business, a more profitable business and more cash-generative business, a business with higher growth.

我剛才說 CRH 從來都不是靜態的。我們一直在移動，而不是因為我們必須移動而想要移動。我們的市場在不斷變化。你的市場也是。我們正在預測這些變化，並指導我們的業務走向那些市場。所以是的，我確實希望繼續致力於我們的投資組合。它應該是。但這樣做的原因是，我們希望發展更好的業務，更有利可圖的業務和更多的現金產生業務，一個具有更高增長的業務。

And we see the way our world is going. Our world cannot continue to build the way it's been built today. 2 billion people will arrive on this planet over the next 30 years. Where are they going to go? We just cannot afford to construct the world that will accommodate 2 billion people the way we're currently billing today. We're going to destroy the planet.

我們看到了我們的世界正在走向何方。我們的世界不能繼續按照今天的方式建設。在接下來的 30 年裡，將有 20 億人來到這個星球。他們要去哪裡？我們只是負擔不起按照我們今天的計費方式建造一個可容納 20 億人的世界。我們要毀滅地球。

So sustainable construction has to be the way forward. And companies like CRH are right in the center of developing sustainable construction products and materials. And that's why we'll continue to evolve our portfolio. And that's why we'll continue to evolve that portfolio in the developed world because that's where the change will start. So yes, the portfolio work will continue, but you would expect it to do so.

因此，可持續建設必須是前進的方向。像 CRH 這樣的公司正處於開發可持續建築產品和材料的中心。這就是為什麼我們將繼續發展我們的產品組合。這就是為什麼我們將繼續在發達國家發展該產品組合，因為這就是變革的開始。所以是的，投資組合工作將繼續，但你會期望它這樣做。

Thanks, Albert. Another question here from Arnaud Lehmann in Bank of America. What is the outlook for pricing in 2022 in Europe and the U.S.? And do you expect to be able to cover cost inflation? .

謝謝，阿爾伯特。美國銀行的 Arnaud Lehmann 提出了另一個問題。 2022年歐洲和美國的定價前景如何？您是否期望能夠彌補成本膨脹？ .

Okay. I'll take that one again. Pricing, Arnaud, look at very top of the question. I'm sure that question has been asked to every one of my CEOs of all the peer companies out there, and you've heard the responses and so have I. As a response to the very significant cost increases, there's a strong need to get good pricing in the marketplace. And I endorse that comment I think there is, too, as well. We have been subject to some very challenging cost input in 2021. But our business is not just about pricing on, and you can see that. Most of the businesses who are talking about pricing have taken a step back with regard to their margin. CRH didn't. And you have to ask the question, why is that?

好的。我再拿那個。定價，Arnaud，看看最重要的問題。我敢肯定，我所有同行公司的每一位 CEO 都曾問過這個問題，你已經聽到了答案，我也是。作為對成本顯著增加的回應，強烈需要在市場上獲得良好的定價。我也支持我認為也有的評論。我們在 2021 年受到了一些非常具有挑戰性的成本投入。但我們的業務不僅僅是定價，你可以看到這一點。大多數談論定價的企業在利潤率方面都退了一步。 CRH 沒有。你必須問一個問題，為什麼會這樣？

We're not smarter than anybody else. There's no special colleges for pricing that we went to that no one else went to. It's our business model. It's different. We're becoming because of the solutions because we add value to the materials of place we sell and make our customers' lives easier. We get paid more for that. So pricing and a continuation of the solution strategy is how we insulate ourselves against cost headwinds and develop our business going forward.

我們並不比其他人聰明。我們去的沒有其他人去的定價的特殊學院。這是我們的商業模式。這不一樣。我們之所以成為解決方案，是因為我們為我們銷售的地方的材料增加了價值，並使我們的客戶的生活更輕鬆。我們為此獲得更多報酬。因此，定價和解決方案戰略的延續是我們如何使自己免受成本逆風的影響，並在未來發展我們的業務。

How that's going to play out in 2022, I don't have a crystal ball. All I can tell you is if you judge us on our track record for last year, where energy prices went up by 65%, we had margin improvement. Again, as I said earlier to Bob, I'll tell you with knowledge when we stand in front of you here at the half year. .

2022 年會怎樣，我沒有水晶球。我只能告訴你的是，如果你根據我們去年的業績記錄來判斷我們，當時能源價格上漲了 65%，我們的利潤率有所提高。同樣，正如我之前對 Bob 所說，當我們在半年的時候站在你面前時，我會用知識告訴你。 .

Great. Thanks. A lot coming through actually on U.S. highway funding and infrastructure generally around the theme of when do you think it will translate into higher activity levels. That's been the main one. Any thoughts on that, Albert?

偉大的。謝謝。實際上，美國高速公路資金和基礎設施方面的情況很多，通常圍繞您認為何時會轉化為更高的活動水平這一主題。那是主要的。對此有什麼想法嗎，阿爾伯特？

Again, maybe I'll take that. Look, there has been a very supportive environment for federal funding and state funding for the last couple of years on the back of quite good economic performance in the United States. Of course, you're referring to, I think, to the November statement that the bill signed on the Infrastructure and Investment Bill for a further $1.2 trillion investment in infrastructure. And there's no doubt that will supercharge investment for the next 5 years. .

再說一次，也許我會接受。看，在美國經濟表現相當不錯的背景下，過去幾年聯邦資助和州資助的環境非常支持。當然，我認為你指的是 11 月份的聲明，即該法案簽署了基礎設施和投資法案，以進一步投資 1.2 萬億美元的基礎設施。毫無疑問，這將增加未來 5 年的投資。 .

I should mention of that $1.2 trillion, CRH will be a significant beneficiary. Our top 10 states account for over 30% of all of the dollars being spent. $350 billion will be spent on roads. However, another $200 billion will be spent on infrastructure for water, telecommunications and IT, again, which plays right into our Infrastructure Products business as well. So really, almost about $550 billion of that $1.2 trillion will go to the areas that we're focused on. So that should see strong growth. In fact, we anticipate the spend in the next 5 years, as I said earlier, being up about 50% over the last 5 years. So significant growth going forward with regard to that.

我應該提到 1.2 萬億美元，CRH 將是一個重要的受益者。我們的前 10 個州佔所有支出的 30% 以上。 3500億美元將用於道路建設。然而，另外 2000 億美元將再次用於水、電信和 IT 基礎設施，這也直接影響到我們的基礎設施產品業務。所以說真的，這 1.2 萬億美元中的近 5500 億美元將流向我們關注的領域。所以這應該會看到強勁的增長。事實上，正如我之前所說，我們預計未來 5 年的支出將在過去 5 年中增長約 50%。因此，在這方面取得了顯著的增長。

With regard to the timing of when it comes through, look, we are working now our backlogs related to projects that were awarded and planned last year. So if you have a large infrastructure project, you've got to get permission, you've got to design it, you got to plant it, you got to tender it. All of that takes time. There's probably somewhere between a 9- and 18-month lead time on those projects. So we don't anticipate any of the funding for the $1.2 trillion that you may be talking about hitting our business until the earliest the very end of this year, probably start to come through in '23 and '24 will be the big years that benefit from it, but not really that. This year is already set based on last year's funding.

關於完成的時間，看，我們現在正在處理與去年授予和計劃的項目相關的積壓工作。所以如果你有一個大型基礎設施項目，你必須獲得許可，你必須設計它，你必須種植它，你必須招標。所有這些都需要時間。這些項目的交付週期可能在 9 到 18 個月之間。因此，我們預計您可能正在談論的 1.2 萬億美元的任何資金最早會在今年年底之前影響我們的業務，可能會在 23 年和 24 年開始實現從中受益，但並非如此。今年已經在去年的資金基礎上確定。

Another 2 questions here from Paul Roger in Exane. The first is on the outlook for U.S. asphalt margins in the context of higher oil prices and could there be a lag between higher bitumen costs and the mitigating price rises as a result. And the second one around the likelihood of large acquisitions in 2022.

來自 Exane 的 Paul Roger 的另外 2 個問題。首先是在油價上漲的背景下美國瀝青利潤率的前景，以及瀝青成本上漲和由此導致的緩和價格上漲之間是否存在滯後。第二個是關於 2022 年進行大規模收購的可能性。

Okay. Not 15 questions today, only 2. I'm sure the 13 are following tomorrow morning with your note. I'll pass the comment on margins to Jim now in a moment with regard to asphalt.

好的。今天不是 15 個問題，只有 2 個。我相信明天早上有 13 個問題會跟著你的筆記。稍後我將把關於頁邊距的評論轉達給吉姆關於瀝青的內容。

Look, the likelihood of big deals. The only likelihood that of those deals in CRH is value deals. Whether they're big or small, it will all be about value. Because that's the history of CRH. We don't need to go out and do big blowout deals. If I look at our industry in North America, about sort of 15% of the industry is across the top 5 players. 85% is fragmented and unconsolidated. If you look at the deals we did last year, $100 million, $200 million, $300 million deals, businesses that no one ever heard of before. and there is a long list of deals ahead of that, both in Europe and the U.S.

看，大交易的可能性。在 CRH 的這些交易中，唯一的可能性是價值交易。無論它們是大是小，這都是關於價值的。因為這就是 CRH 的歷史。我們不需要出去做大的井噴交易。如果我看看我們在北美的行業，大約 15% 的行業是前 5 名參與者。 85% 是分散的和未整合的。如果你看看我們去年完成的交易，1 億美元、2 億美元、3 億美元的交易，這些都是以前從未聽說過的業務。在此之前還有一長串交易，無論是在歐洲還是在美國。

So I don't really think there will be a big blowout deal by CRH, not unless there's extraordinary value out there. obviously, we keep our eyes open, something could happen. But likelihood is it will be a continuation of the strategy of CRH that you've seen over the last 2 to 3 decades. Margins?

所以我真的不認為CRH會有大的井噴交易，除非那裡有非凡的價值。顯然，我們睜大眼睛，可能會發生一些事情。但很可能這將是您在過去 2 到 3 年中看到的 CRH 戰略的延續。邊距？

Yes. Paul, in terms of asphalt margins, when we look at the asphalt margin, we look at the whole chain, Paul. As we said, we would look everything from the aggregates into the liquid asphalt into the asphalt into the paving and into the service. I think the service in others. So when you look at 2021, as we said in the business overall, we managed to push margin down 20 basis points in 2021, specifically around the question of on the lag, the majority of our states that we -- where we pay in the U.S. are index link stakes. So they're linked -- the pricing is linked back into the price of the liquid. There can be a lag sometimes. But however, you see what we were able to do in 2021, still able to push on the full margin along the value chain from that perspective.

是的。保羅，就瀝青邊際而言，當我們查看瀝青邊際時，我們會看到整個鏈條，保羅。正如我們所說，我們將研究從骨料到液態瀝青、瀝青、鋪路和服務的所有內容。我認為在別人的服務。因此，當您查看 2021 年時，正如我們在整體業務中所說，我們設法在 2021 年將利潤率降低了 20 個基點，特別是圍繞滯後問題，我們的大多數州 - 我們在哪裡支付美國是指數鏈接的股份。所以它們是相互關聯的——定價與液體價格相關聯。有時可能會有延遲。但是，您看到我們在 2021 年能夠做到的事情，仍然能夠從這個角度推動價值鏈上的全部利潤。

Great. Another question here from Elodie Rall in JPMorgan. How do you see U.S. residential demand evolving in 2022 given likely rising interest rates? And do you see a meaningful recovery in nonresidential demand, which could offset this?

偉大的。摩根大通的 Elodie Rall 提出了另一個問題。鑑於利率可能上升，您如何看待 2022 年美國住宅需求的變化？您是否看到非住宅需求出現有意義的複蘇，這可以抵消這一點？

Elodie, hope you're well. Look, with regard to U.S. residential, actually, U.S. residential has been robust now for about 3 or 4 years. And I think there's a couple of reasons because of that. we went through almost 7 or 8 years of significant underbuild. Now I can remember times when we had 450,000, 500,000 new homes being built for a number of years in North America and the United States in a market that requires probably 1.5 million to 1.6 million new homes every year just to feed the market. So that has not been replaced, that slowdown.

埃洛迪，希望你一切都好。你看，關於美國住宅，實際上，美國住宅現在已經穩健了大約 3 或 4 年。我認為有幾個原因。我們經歷了近 7 或 8 年的重大建設不足。現在我還記得我們在北美和美國建造了 450,000 到 500,000 套新房的時候，這個市場每年可能需要 150 萬到 160 萬套新房才能滿足市場需求。所以那個沒有被取代，那個減速。

Inventory levels, if I talk to homebuilders in the United States, which we do quite a lot. Actually inventory are at all-time lows. So with the demand that's there with the inventory levels that are there, you can see it in the pricing. And demand is going to continue strong. Just look at the -- in terms of what's the plan forward. The forecast for this year is 1.7 million new homes. Currently, our run rate is about 1.6 million homes. So I think it's fairly robust.

庫存水平，如果我與美國的房屋建築商交談，我們做了很多。實際上庫存處於歷史最低點。因此，隨著庫存水平的存在需求，您可以在定價中看到它。需求將繼續強勁。看看 - 就未來的計劃而言。今年的預測是170萬套新房。目前，我們的運行率約為 160 萬戶。所以我認為它相當健壯。

I take your point in interest rates because, of course, we have to watch that very carefully. But Powell has been very careful about sort of taking a slower rollout of interest rates, but I don't want to get involved in that debate. Demand is good. We're working from historic lows. And I mean, 30-year fixed rates are now just a touch above 4%. They haven't really moved up all that much in recent times. And we think that will be quite robust going forward for this year, for sure.

我同意你對利率的看法，因為當然，我們必須非常仔細地觀察。但鮑威爾對於放慢利率的推出一直非常謹慎，但我不想捲入這場辯論。需求不錯。我們正在從歷史低點開始工作。我的意思是，30 年期固定利率現在僅略高於 4%。最近他們並沒有真正提升那麼多。我們認為今年的情況肯定會非常強勁。

With regard to nonres, we're starting to see a recovery in nonres. You will have seen the ABI stats for a number of months now, have been above 50. It's good to look at that regionally. But actually, sectorally within that, there's a little bit of a change that's taking place. We're seeing perhaps that retail and hospitality is not moving forward as it had in the past, hardly surprising. But the real growth is coming in data centers, warehouses and indeed medical. And that actually plays to our sweet spot because data centers and warehouses are complicated buildings to build, large spans, large precast units, large footprints significant amount of stone and again, plays to our solutions of specified, regulated air-conditioned heating, all of that must be highly efficient buildings. And again, that's a strong growth area for us again. So good to see the non-res coming back, but specifically coming back in the U.S. in those sectors and specifically down South and out West.

關於 nonres，我們開始看到 nonres 的複蘇。您將看到 ABI 統計數據已經有好幾個月了，一直在 50 以上。從區域來看，這很好。但實際上，在這方面，正在發生一些變化。我們可能看到零售業和酒店業並沒有像過去那樣向前發展，這不足為奇。但真正的增長來自數據中心、倉庫和醫療領域。這實際上是我們的最佳選擇，因為數據中心和倉庫是複雜的建築物，跨度大，預製單元大，佔地面積大，大量的石頭，再次，發揮我們指定的、受調節的空調供暖的解決方案，所有這些那一定是高效建築。再說一次，這對我們來說又是一個強勁的增長領域。很高興看到非資源回歸，但特別是在美國的這些領域回歸，特別是在南部和西部。

Thanks, Albert. A couple of overlapping ones here. Maybe just 2 briefly, 1 on U.K., backdrop in the U.K. at the moment and also Eastern Europe, general exposure to the area and any concerns on activity levels going forward. .

謝謝，阿爾伯特。這裡有幾個重疊的。可能只是簡單的 2 個，1 個在英國，目前在英國和東歐的背景，對該地區的普遍接觸以及對未來活動水平的任何擔憂。 .

Okay. Well, maybe I'll talk about the U.K. and maybe, Jim, you might give some dimension on our exposure to Eastern Europe. Maybe just give us an oversight and overview in terms of how we think about Eastern Europe at the moment given what's going on there. .

好的。好吧，也許我會談談英國，也許，吉姆，你可以談談我們對東歐的影響。鑑於那裡正在發生的事情，也許只是給我們一個關於我們目前如何看待東歐的監督和概述。 .

First of all, in the U.K., I mean, since the Brexit vote in 2016, we saw really a reluctance and a pullback on the [checker] To fund some of the well-touted infrastructure projects that heretofore planned. Happily, we're starting to see in 2021 at last, some of those projects, specifically high speed to coming to the fore, and that's feeding the industry and benefits our business. And also happily the counsel and the boroughs with the United Kingdom are getting a good level of funding from the U.K. ex checker. And again, that's helping small-scale infrastructure. And that has really -- combined with a strong residential market, by the way, has really driven the performance of our business in the U.K.

首先，在英國，我的意思是，自 2016 年英國退歐公投以來，我們確實看到了 [checker] 為之前計劃的一些廣受吹捧的基礎設施項目提供資金的不情願和回調。令人高興的是，我們終於在 2021 年開始看到，其中一些項目，特別是高速項目脫穎而出，這正在為行業提供食物，並使我們的業務受益。同樣令人高興的是，英國的法律顧問和行政區正在從英國前檢查員那裡獲得大量資金。再一次，這有助於小型基礎設施。順便說一句，這確實 - 再加上強勁的住宅市場，確實推動了我們在英國的業務表現。

I should say, we significantly reshaped and repositioned our business post-Brexit because we could see there was a different demand environment evolving in front of us even before COVID than we had thought before that. And that lower cost base, that tighter business in around specific areas has also benefited our bottom line performance.

我應該說，我們在英國脫歐後對我們的業務進行了重大的重塑和重新定位，因為我們可以看到，即使在 COVID 之前，我們面前的需求環境也在變化，這與我們之前想像的不同。較低的成本基礎，特定領域的業務更緊密也有利於我們的底線表現。

And maybe before I ask Jim to talk about the dimensions of what we have in Central and Eastern Europe and indeed, maybe Ukraine. I just want to talk about our own view in terms of what's happening in Central and Eastern Europe and how it affects our ability to think about that part of the world. .

也許在我請吉姆談談我們在中歐和東歐，甚至是烏克蘭的規模之前。我只想談談我們對中歐和東歐正在發生的事情的看法，以及它如何影響我們思考世界那個地區的能力。 .

Our own sense, well, first of all, I think we're all horrified about what's going on there. But our own sense is that this is almost like an event, it's a catalyst that is going to pull Europe together culturally, socially and economically. And therefore, we will see a continuation of the rebalancing of wealth through Europe, which is happening through the stimulus packages that are going to Central and Eastern Europe. So it will accelerate the development within Central and Eastern Europe, obviously, Poland, Romania, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia and indeed down into the Balkans, should be significant beneficiaries of that as well. So we think it will redouble our efforts as Europeans to become more unified in the challenges we're faced with. .

我們自己的感覺，嗯，首先，我認為我們都對那裡發生的事情感到震驚。但我們自己的感覺是，這幾乎就像一個事件，它是一個催化劑，將在文化、社會和經濟上將歐洲拉到一起。因此，我們將看到整個歐洲的財富再平衡將繼續，這將通過向中歐和東歐實施的一攬子刺激計劃來實現。因此，它將加速中歐和東歐的發展，顯然，波蘭、羅馬尼亞、匈牙利、捷克共和國、斯洛伐克乃至巴爾乾地區也應該是其中的重要受益者。因此，我們認為，作為歐洲人，我們將加倍努力，在我們面臨的挑戰中變得更加團結。 .

With regard to our exposure there, Jim? .

關於我們在那裡的曝光，吉姆？ .

Sure. In Eastern Europe, and taken all the way from Finland right down to our business in Romania. We generate about $600 million of EBITDA across that Eastern Europe flank of the business. Very strong growth in 2021, building on strong growth in previous years, really underpinned by strong infrastructure in that area and also good res demand also coming through. Maybe specifically on Ukraine, just in terms of scale, but we're in about Ukraine about 25 years in total, and it's about approximately 1% of our business in total.

當然。在東歐，從芬蘭一直到我們在羅馬尼亞的業務。我們在東歐的業務方面產生了約 6 億美元的 EBITDA。 2021 年非常強勁的增長，建立在前幾年的強勁增長基礎上，真正得到了該地區強大的基礎設施和良好資源需求的支撐。也許特別是在烏克蘭，就規模而言，但我們在烏克蘭總共大約有 25 年的時間，大約占我們總業務的 1%。

Thanks, Jim. One here from Cedar Ekblom in Morgan Stanley. To consider accelerating your share buyback program after the recent pullback in your price, maybe, Jim, one for you.

謝謝，吉姆。一位來自摩根士丹利的 Cedar Ekblom。考慮在最近的價格回落之後加快您的股票回購計劃，吉姆也許適合您。

Okay. Yes, current tranche of the share buyback is $300 million. It will finish no later than the end of this month, 30th of March this month. We're now at an annualized rate of $1.2 billion in terms of a run rate in terms of our share buyback program.

好的。是的，當前部分股票回購為 3 億美元。最遲將在本月底，即本月 3 月 30 日結束。就我們的股票回購計劃而言，我們現在的年化率為 12 億美元。

When I look at share buyback, really looking at it from a capital allocation decision, I went through it earlier. We really have -- we look at options in terms of M&A, in terms of CapEx, in terms of our dividend and also in terms of the share buyback. We exited the year at a strong balance sheet position. But right now, in terms of the geopolitical uncertainties out there, in terms of inflation, in terms of interest rates, I'm quite comfortable with our balance sheet from that perspective. So -- but any capital allocation decision that we will take always look to that critical lens of shareholder value accretion decisions. So...

當我看股票回購時，真的是從資本配置決定來看，我之前經歷過。我們確實有——我們從併購、資本支出、股息和股票回購的角度來看待期權。我們以強勁的資產負債表狀況結束了這一年。但是現在，就地緣政治的不確定性而言，就通貨膨脹而言，就利率而言，從這個角度來看，我對我們的資產負債表非常滿意。所以——但我們將採取的任何資本分配決策始終著眼於股東價值增值決策的關鍵鏡頭。所以...

Great. Great. Thanks, Jim. Just conscious of time for everybody watching on the line. We are up against it here a little bit with a busy schedule this morning. I might just squeeze 2 more in, if we can. And as I say, if there's any outstanding questions over the course of the day, the team and I will follow up with you directly.

偉大的。偉大的。謝謝，吉姆。只是意識到每個人都在線觀看的時間。今天早上的日程很忙，我們在這裡有點反對。如果可以的話，我可能會再擠2個。正如我所說，如果一天中有任何懸而未決的問題，我和團隊將直接與您聯繫。

Two others here have come up quite a bit actually this morning around pro forma net debt levels now comfortably below 1x following the Building Envelope divestment. What do we see as normalized levels? And then maybe just a brief comment on early trading and backlogs so far this year.

今天早上這裡的另外兩個實際上已經出現了相當多的備考淨債務水平，現在在 Building Envelope 撤資後輕鬆低於 1 倍。我們認為什麼是標準化水平？然後也許只是對今年到目前為止的早期交易和積壓的簡短評論。

Yes. In terms of pro forma net debt levels, we said through a normal cycle, right? We're quite comfortable net debt-to-EBITDA of 2. At the end of December, it's a point in time. It's 1.2x net debt-to-EBITDA. As I said, just mentioned in the last question, quite comfortable at that level and that it gives us optionality going forward as to -- in terms of what shareholder value accretion decisions we will take. And in terms...

是的。就備考淨債務水平而言，我們說的是正常週期，對嗎？我們對 2 的淨債務與 EBITDA 之比相當滿意。在 12 月底，這是一個時間點。這是淨債務與 EBITDA 的 1.2 倍。正如我所說，剛剛在最後一個問題中提到，在那個級別上非常舒服，並且它讓我們在未來可以選擇 - 就我們將採取什麼樣的股東價值增值決策而言。而在條款...

Well, maybe I'll just take that through the early trading. Look, we're probably a visibility to the end of the first quarter at this stage. Off to a good start, quite frankly, messy winter in North America, but you know what, it almost doesn't matter in January and a very, very slow in the construction season, maybe down the very south and out the very west of some activity levels. But the winters in America really don't -- they stop construction really till the end of March before we start going into business.

好吧，也許我會在早期交易中接受它。看，在這個階段，我們可能會看到第一季度末。一個好的開始，坦率地說，北美的冬天很混亂，但你知道嗎，一月份幾乎沒關係，而且施工季節非常非常緩慢，可能在最南端和最西端一些活動水平。但是美國的冬天真的沒有——在我們開始營業之前，他們真的停止了建設，直到三月底。

So -- but as I said, the answer is in the backlogs, we said the ahead of last year on the 3 key metrics: quantum, margins and volumes. So we feel pretty good about that. An early season indication. We do have some canaries in the coal mine. Early season indications, in particular in our APG business are positive. So we feel quite good about the U.S. for the first half of the year.

所以 - 但正如我所說，答案在積壓中，我們在 3 個關鍵指標上提前說：數量、利潤和數量。所以我們對此感覺很好。早期的季節指示。我們在煤礦裡確實有一些金絲雀。季初跡象，尤其是我們的 APG 業務，是積極的。所以我們對今年上半年的美國感覺很好。

Europe is a different situation. We've had good weather in Europe for the first half -- first quarter of the year. And again, good momentum in our business continuing what we saw last year and again, a good start of the year. So backlogs in both business is positive, good start in Europe. Okay in the United States. It doesn't really matter at this time here. So I think we'll be okay for the first half of the year, but we're going to update you later on.

歐洲是一個不同的情況。上半年——今年第一季度，我們在歐洲遇到了好天氣。再一次，我們業務的良好勢頭延續了我們去年看到的情況，又是一個良好的開端。因此，這兩項業務的積壓都是積極的，歐洲的良好開端。好的，在美國。這個時候在這裡真的不重要。所以我認為今年上半年我們會沒事的，但我們稍後會更新你。

Look, Tom has just said to you that we've come to the end of our time this morning. I know it's a busy day for everybody. A lot of people at results today. We're going to update you with a trading statement in April, and we've also got an investor update on the 21st of April. I look forward to talking to you then. And until then, I wish you the best and stay safe. Thank you.

聽著，湯姆剛剛對你說過，我們今天早上的時間已經結束了。我知道這對每個人來說都是忙碌的一天。今天有很多人在看結果。我們將在 4 月向您更新交易聲明，並且我們還在 4 月 21 日收到了投資者更新。我期待著與你交談。在那之前，我祝你一切順利，並保持安全。謝謝你。