億滋國際 (MDLZ) 2013 Q2 法說會逐字稿

Good day, and welcome to the Mondelez International second quarter 2013 earnings conference call. Today's call is scheduled to last about one hour, including remarks by Mondelez Management and the question-and-answer session.

(Operator Instructions)

I would now like to turn the call over to Mr. Dexter Congbalay, Vice President Investor Relations for Mondelez International. Please go ahead, sir.

Good afternoon, and thanks for joining us. With me are Irene Rosenfeld, our Chairman and CEO, and Dave Brearton, our CFO. Earlier today, we sent out our earnings release. This release and today's slides are available on our website, Mondelezinternational.com.

As you know, during this call, we will make forward-looking statements about the Company's performance. These statements are based on how we see things today. Actual results may differ materially due to risks and uncertainties. Please refer to the cautionary statements and risk factors contained in our 10-K and 10-Q filings for more details on our forward-looking statements. Some of today's prepared remarks include non-GAAP financial statements. You can find the GAAP to non-GAAP reconciliations within our earnings release and at the back of the slide presentation. With that, I'll now turn the call over to Irene.

Thanks, Dexter, and good afternoon. Our second quarter and first half results played out essentially as we told you they would. Although our top line was below our long-term targets, our underlying business fundamentals were solid. We exited the second quarter with strong volume mix and Power Brand gains, faster growth in emerging markets, and increasing market shares around the world. This positions us well to accelerate organic revenue growth and expand margins in the back half of the year and in 2014. Earlier today, we also announced a substantial increase in our share repurchase program, as well as an increase in our quarterly dividend, our first raise since 2008. These actions reflect our Board's confidence in our future, our balance sheet strength and our commitment to create value for our shareholders.

Let's take a closer look at the key metrics behind our first half results. In both the second quarter and first half, we delivered organic revenue growth of 3.8%. As I mentioned, that's below our long-term target, but consistent with our first half guidance. As expected, the impacts of lower coffee prices and capacity constraints tempered revenue growth by about 1.3 percentage points.

Beneath the top line number, our fundamentals were solid. I say that for several reasons. First, we delivered high quality growth, fueled by strong volume mix. In fact, volume mix accounted for about 3 points, or more than 75% of our top line growth. What's more, this strength was widespread. We grew vol mix in each of our regions. We're especially proud of the performance of our European team who once again drove strong underlying revenue in a very challenging macro environment.

Second, our focus on Power Brands continued to pay off, with revenue up 8% in the first half, more than double the total Company rate. Third, our two largest categories posted strong revenue growth. Biscuits grew 8%, while chocolate was up 6%. Although gum remains a challenge, we are seeing encouraging signs of share recovery.

Fourth, in emerging markets, our revenue growth was 9.5%. Over the past few quarters, it has accelerated from 8.4% in Q4 last year to 9.3% in Q1, to 9.7% in Q2. Importantly, it's now approaching our long-term target of double-digit growth. Revenue in BRIC markets also continued to improve sequentially, up nearly 13% in Q2, including very strong results in both Russia and Brazil.

Fifth, we're taking the opportunity to fast track a number of emerging markets' investments originally planned for the future. The impact of this is more than offset by the benefit of some tax favorability. These investments will generate attractive returns and are expected to benefit both revenue growth and margin expansion in 2014. And finally, our share performance was terrific. On a global basis, we're gaining or holding share in nearly 60% of our revenue, with particular strength in biscuits, chocolate, and coffee.

Let's take a closer look at results in each of our core categories. As I mentioned a moment ago, biscuits were up 8% in the first half. In emerging markets, revenue increased low teens, led by growth in Latin America. In developed markets, biscuits were up mid single digits with strong growth in both North America and Europe. Our Power Brands grew 12%. Globally, Oreo was up nearly 15% and belVita, Tuc, Club Social, Barni and Chips Ahoy each posted impressive growth.

In addition, we continue to deliver outstanding share performance, with more than three quarters of revenue in key markets gaining or holding share. In chocolate, global revenue was up 6%. In emerging markets, revenue was up low teens, with strong growth across all geographies. Developed markets were up low single digits. Power brands grew 11%. Cadbury Dairy Milk was up double digits, including more than 20% in Asia-Pacific. Milka increased double digits, while Lacta delivered solid growth. Our chocolate share also remains strong, with more than half of our revenue in key markets gaining or holding share.

Turning to gum and candy, global revenue declined 2% in the first half. Candy was up mid single digits, driven by Hall's. Gum in emerging markets was also up mid single digits, led by the successful launch of Stride in China. So the challenge continues to be gum in developed markets, which was down mid to high teens. However, we're beginning to get some traction from the four initiatives that we've been executing. Better price size architecture, stronger marketing campaigns, focused on fresh breath and oral care, more impactful displays, and getting the right product assortment on shelf. In the second quarter, gum shares increased in the US for the first time in a couple of years, and also grew in most of our European markets as we implemented these same initiatives. Despite the share recovery, revenue lagged somewhat, due to the short-term impact on inventory as our customers reset their shelves. This should correct itself as the year progresses.

Finally, in beverages and cheese and grocery, first half revenues held steady, with Power Brands up 3%. As expected, coffee was down mid single digits as we passed through significantly lower green coffee costs. This masked the underlying momentum. Vol mix was up single digits. And market shares were strong, with more than half of revenue in key markets gaining or holding share. In addition, our Tassimo business continues to thrive. Revenues grew nearly 40% in the first half, as brewer sales more than doubled. Finally, in powdered beverages, we once again delivered double-digit growth led by Tang.

With that as background, let's take a closer look at our top line results by region. In Latin America, organic revenue was up 9.6% in the second quarter and more than 11% in the first half. Brazil delivered strong growth, despite an increasingly challenged economic environment and softening category trends. The business grew low teens with a good balance between vol mix and pricing. Outside Brazil, most of the region's growth was driven by pricing in the inflationary economies of Venezuela and Argentina. We remain cautious on these markets due to their volatility. Overall, the region's Power Brands increased 13%, led by Club Social, Oreo, Hall's, and belVita.

In Asia-Pacific, organic revenue grew 3.3% in the second quarter and 4.6% in the first half, with vol mix gains driving nearly all of the growth. The region's Power Brands grew 18% led by Oreo, Chips Ahoy, Cadbury Dairy Milk, Stride, and Tang. The story in this region, however, is the tale of two cities. Or more precisely, a tale of the contrast between emerging and developed markets. Emerging markets across the region were up double digits in the first half, including midteens growth in China and low double digits in India. Despite its strong results, China slowed sequentially from more than 20% in Q1 to low double digits in Q2, reflecting softening category trends in biscuits. Our Power Brands, Oreo and Chips Ahoy delivered solid gains, but some of our smaller brands declined. The success of Stride gum, however, continued to boost our top line.

In India, we again delivered double-digit growth led by Cadbury Dairy Milk. That's despite capacity constraints that continued to temper growth in chocolate. With new production lines now on stream, we expect revenue to accelerate in the second half, as we look to fully support the category, which continues to grow at more than 20% a year. In contrast, the developed markets in the region were down low to mid single digits, mainly due to gum and candy weakness in both Japan and Australia.

Turning to EMEA, organic revenue grew 11.3% in the second quarter and nearly 8% in the first half, fueled by strong vol mix gains across most markets. Power Brands grew 12%, led by Cadbury Dairy Milk, Oreo, Barni, Tuc, and Tang. Our turnaround in Russia drove the growth, as we significantly improved our sales execution. In the second quarter, Russia was up midteens, as exceptionally strong vol mix was partially offset by lower pricing in coffee and chocolate.

Looking at Europe, organic revenue increased modestly, up 0.2% in both the second quarter and first half. Vol mix gains were largely offset by lower coffee pricing. In fact, lower coffee revenues reduced Europe's overall growth by 1.3 points in the quarter and nearly 2 points in the half. But our vol mix was exceptional, up 3.8 percentage points in Q2, and up sequentially from 1.3 points in the first quarter.

In the first half, chocolate revenues rose mid single digits, driven almost entirely by vol mix. Biscuits were up mid single digits, with about three quarters of the gain due to vol mix. Oreo, belVita, and our Choco Bakery platforms delivered much of the growth. Coffee was down mid single digits due to pricing, but our convenient coffee format, such as Millicano and Tassimo were up strongly. Gum and candy revenues were down high single digits, all due to gum. And Power Brands increased 3% across the region.

In North America, organic revenues increased 2.3% in the second quarter and 2.4% in the first half. US biscuits was a standout, with revenues up more than 5% in the second quarter. In fact, that represents the eighth consecutive quarter of growth of 5% or more. Oreo, Honeymade, belVita, Chips Ahoy and Triscuit each made solid contributions to the second half.

This business continues to benefit from the renewed focus on in-store execution by our direct store delivery sales force following the spin. For example, through our one more in the store initiative, we increased the number of displays nearly 17% in Q2. DSD is also a key enabler to get our new products on shelves. In the first half, 9 of the top 10 new biscuit products in the US were ours. As a result, our market share is up 140 basis points in the quarter and 100 points year to date.

In contrast, gum and candy was down high single digits. Candy once again delivered solid gains, but gum declined sharply as our customers reset their shelf assortments. As I mentioned earlier, though, our gum share in the US has improved, gaining 0.4 point in Q2 and 1 full point in the last two weeks of the quarter. From a margin perspective, we have a lot of work to do, but we're making progress toward our goal of increasing margin by 500 basis points over the next five years.

We recently announced plans to invest approximately $350 million in the construction of a new biscuit manufacturing facility in Mexico. When its stores open in the second half of 2014, this facility will support biscuit growth across the Americas and will enhance margins by utilizing state of the art technologies that enable manufacturing at world class costs. We also announced our transition to a category-led organization effective January 2014. Modeled after our success in Europe, this structure is designed to simplify processes, reduce costs, and increase the speed of decision making. Ultimately, we expect this category-led structure will accelerate top line growth, drive share, and improve margins, much as it did in Europe. With that, let me turn it over to Dave to discuss margins, earnings, and our outlook for the balance of the year.

Thanks, Irene. And good afternoon. As Irene just described, we're poised to accelerate revenue growth in the second half and in the 2014. We expect gross profit margin to expand in the back half of the year as well, as productivity programs pick up steam and as we drive leverage from stronger revenue growth. In the first half, however, adjusted gross margin was essentially flat, as pricing and vol mix gains offset higher input costs. Adjusted operating income margin in the second quarter improved sequentially to 11.4%, up from 10.3% in Q1. For the first half, however, adjusted OI margin was 10.8%, down 170 basis points, but in line with the expectations we communicated earlier this year. The results reflect a combination of factors, including about 50 basis points from cycling of prior-year one-time items, about 30 points from the valuation of the Venezuelan currency, and about 20 points from ongoing restructuring costs. In addition, we invested over $100 million to drive growth in emerging markets. While this tempered margins by about 70 basis points in the first half, it sets us up for a much stronger 2014, on both the top and bottom lines.

Turning now to earnings per share, adjusted EPS for the quarter was $0.37, including a negative $0.01 impact from currency. On a constant currency basis, adjusted EPS was up 5.6%. For the first half, adjusted EPS was $0.71, including a negative $0.05 impact from currency. On a constant currency basis, adjusted EPS was up 13.4%, driven primarily by lower taxes. As I mentioned, however, our incremental investments in emerging markets were a key driver of the $0.04 decline in operating earnings.

Turning to guidance, we continue to expect organic revenue this year to grow at the low end of our 5% to 7% long-term target. And on the bottom line, we're reaffirming our outlook for adjusted EPS of $1.55 to $1.60. This range reflects average 2012 foreign exchange rates, as well as an estimated negative $0.04 impact from the devaluation of the Venezuelan Bolivar. As you know, the dollar has strengthened since the start of the year. Based on translation impacts recorded to date, and spot rates as of July 31st, our EPS would be about a nickel lower than the $1.55 to $1.60 guidance. We fully recognize that reaching our full-year outlook will require a step-up in top line growth and margin expansion in the back half.

So let me give you some understanding of why we believe we'll deliver. In the second half, we expect to achieve top line growth of about 6%, despite a slowdown in our categories that we and many of our peers are experiencing. Let me tell you why. First, we're entering the second half with good momentum. Our vol mix gains and market share performance have been strong.

Second, in the first half, we hit faced headwinds from capacity constraints and lower coffee pricing, which together were nearly a point and a half drag. We don't expect capacity constraints to be a significant issue going forward. Coffee pricing will still be a headwind, but we expect it to be less than the 1-point impact in the first half. Third, we have favorable comparisons with the prior year, especially in Q3.

And fourth, our emerging market investments in sales capabilities, route to market expansion and A&C support behind our Power Brands will reinforce our momentum and should help offset the impact of slower category growth. With respect to margins, we continue to expect adjusted OI margin to be essentially flat at about 12% for the year. With the first half coming in at just under 11%, this implies a second half margin of about 13%. How will we get there?

First, in the back half, we expect non-sales overheads to be in line with prior year, as cost reduction programs lessen the impact of dysynergies. As a result, we should benefit from overhead leverage as revenues increase. The impact of this should be even more pronounced in the fourth quarter due to its higher revenue contribution. And second, a disproportionate amount of the benefits from productivity are weighted to the back half. As we outlined at recent investor conferences, we expect to increase our adjusted OI margin to 14% to 16% within the next five years. That's starting from 12.2% in 2012 with a 2015 target of about 13%. That's over 13.5% excluding ongoing restructuring charges.

Let me give you a sense of how that plays out specifically for 2013 and 2014. As you can see on this chart, base margins will expand in line with our algorithm, both this year and next, about 60 to 90 points per year. Next month, with the back-to-school conference, we'll provide more details on our plans to deliver this base margin increase. Originally, we targeted spending about $100 million on investment in emerging markets this year. As we mentioned in May, based on affordability, opportunity, and return, we have chosen to accelerate a number of investments that were originally planned in the future.

As a result, rather than a 20 to 30-basis point impact, we now expect these investments to more than double and temper margins to 50 to 70 points this year. That creates a bigger margin headwind in 2013, but that spending is now in our base, which means a much smaller incremental impact in 2014. These programs are all expected to generate returns well in excess of our cost of capital and deliver sustainable profitable growth.

In China, for example, we're improving sales coverage in traditional trade outlets in Tier 1 and Tier 2 markets, as well as continuing to develop routes to market in Tier 3 and 4 cities. We're also increasing A&C to create brand awareness in these new outlets. In India, we're expanding distribution in the south as well as stepping up A&C support. In Russia, we're investing in sales capabilities that will improve our availability in the hot zone and traditional trade outlet. Across these markets, we expect increased A&C to translate into improved share results in the second half of this year and into next year. Benefits from investments in sales and distribution will take a little longer to realize, but should contribute in 2014.

Also, as we said in May, in addition to the 2012 to 2014 restructuring program, we intend to invest up to $100 million in ongoing restructuring in 2013. That will reduce margins by about 10 to 20 basis points this year. We plan to invest somewhat more in 2014, en route to the $200 million to $300 million in annual spending we will reach in 2015. This spending is key to the cost reduction efforts needed to deliver our long-term margin goals.

So in 2013, as we said, we expect adjusted OI margin to be roughly flat, at about 12%. But in 2014, we get the benefit of two years in one, as much of our base margin increase will flow through. So we expect to expand margins to the high 12%s next year. So how do we expect to drive double-digit EPS growth this year as we increase our emerging market investments? The answer is lower taxes.

In the first half, our adjusted tax rate was around 6%, which reflected a number of discreet items. For the full year, we now expect our tax rate to be 12% to 14%. That implies a tax rate in the second half of 16% to 20%. The Q3 rate is likely to be well below that range, while the Q4 rate will be higher. In terms of EPS, the lower tax rate will generate a benefit of $0.11 to $0.14 for the full year. Putting it all together, we expect adjusted EPS to be $0.84 to $0.89 in the second half, And for the full year, we continue to expect 14% to 18% EPS growth on a constant currency basis. Let me now turn it back to Irene.

Before I wrap up, in a separate press release today, we announced our intention to increase the return of capital to shareholders. As you may recall at Cagney, we committed to resuming share buybacks and dividend increases once our leverage ratios were back in line with our targeted credit rating. As a reminder, our priorities for cash are first and foremost to invest in the business to drive sustainable profitable growth and as we've discussed, we're doing that. We're also aggressively expanding capacity, increasing capital expenditures from about 4% of revenues, to about 5%. That includes, for example, the expansion of a biscuit plant in China, the construction of the new growth facility in Mexico that I mentioned earlier, and a new green field site in India. It also includes a number of other high return expansions around the world.

Our second priority for cash is tack-on acquisitions. At present, we believe we have ample flexibility to manage the M&A opportunities that may become available in the near term. The third priority for cash is the return of capital to shareholders in the form of share buybacks and/or higher dividends. And the fourth is paying down debt. We've now reduced our gross debt to about $18 billion and net debt to about $15.5 billion. At these levels, our leverage ratio is now consistent with our target rating, investment grade with access to CP. So with investments fully funded and a solid credit profile, we can now return more capital to shareholders, while still preserving our ability to pursue future strategic opportunities. As such, today we announced an increase in our quarterly dividend to $0.14 a share, an increase of a $0.01, or 8%.

We're also significantly increasing our current share buyback authorization to $6 billion, or about $1 billion to $2 billion annually through 2016. We believe that the combination of double-digit EPS growth, higher dividends, and a substantial increase in share buybacks creates a highly attractive mix that, taken together, will drive superior returns for our shareholders. So to wrap up, our first half results demonstrated solid underlying business momentum, including strong vol mix and Power Brand gains, faster growth in emerging markets, and increasing market shares globally. We will build on these strengths in the second half to deliver improved performance. On the top line, we'll benefit from our first half momentum and increased investments in emerging markets, as headwinds from coffee pricing and capacity constraints begin to subside. And on the bottom line, we expect margins to expand as revenue growth accelerates and as we aggressively drive productivity and overhead cost savings. As a result, we're positioned to deliver our commitments for 2013 and to drive sustainable profitable growth in 2014 and beyond. Now we would be happy to take your questions.

(Operator Instructions)

Chris Growe of Stifel.

Good afternoon. Hi. Just two questions for you. The first one I would like to ask, as you think about the emerging market investments Irene did, you had some tax variability in the first quarter, you have some more here in this quarter. You let some of that flow through in the first quarter. I just want to get an understanding now, all the tax benefits that are coming through this year, should we assume that the majority of those would be reinvested back in the business? I'm trying to put some color on the amount of incremental reinvestment back into the business.

I think, Chris, we gave you a schedule to show that. We said we would generate about $0.11 to $0.14 favorability from taxes. We gave about $0.03 back in the first quarter, as you recall. Our investments are about $0.06. That just gives you a sense of how we're thinking about that.

Okay, and then if I could also ask a question, I guess maybe more for Dave, regarding your increase, the share repurchase authorization and your increasing likelihood to repurchase shares, is there an expectation that you would take on debt? I was trying to think about your free cash flow over the next year or two. Is that free cash flow growing faster than you expected and allowing you to do more share repurchase activity, or is there the capacity to take on some more debt?

The free cash flow is pretty much in line with what we laid out at Cagney at this point in time, but I think as you think about what we said at Cagney, '13 and '14, we've still got the restructuring program spending in there. As we get going forward beyond '14, that will disappear out of the base and we'll be delivering a stronger cash flow. So we may have to take on a small amount of incremental debt in the near term, but I think it's well within what we can afford as we go over time.

Okay. Thanks for the time.

Andrew Lazar of Barclays.

Good evening, everyone. One thing I wanted to follow up on Chris' question, just to make sure I understand the new full-year guidance, when you reported the first quarter, you mentioned you were holding I think $0.03 to $0.04 of tax flexibility in your pocket for the rest of the year. As I look at your current guidance, you're saying it's still $1.55 to $1.60. But you also beat this quarter, tax is more favorable than you thought, even at the end of the first quarter, and relative to our model, interest expense was also much more favorable. I'm just trying to get a sense of where some of that flexibility is going.

Yes, Andrew, we're still looking to keep our powder dry as we look to the balance of the year. There's, there's quite a bit of volatility in a number of these markets and we want to make sure that we, we are appropriately hedged to deliver our commitments.

Okay, and then we're now I guess five weeks into your third quarter and I wanted to get a sense from you if you could, just even directionally, are the trends you're seeing so far in the third quarter relatively consistent with your expectation for the kind of acceleration you're expecting in, most importantly, in the organic top line growth that you're looking for in the second half of the year.

Yes, I don't want to give you week by week guidance, but I will tell you is certainly we've expressed great confidence in the back half of the year for all the reasons that we've said and there's nothing we're seeing that's inconsistent with that.

Thank you.

Bryan Spillane of Bank of America.

Hi, good afternoon. Question about, as we look at the organic sales performance in the first half, especially in the second quarter, one thing that's been really encouraging is that volumes have accelerated sequentially over the last couple of quarters. And, if you go back to some of the years where the period where organic sales growth was at the high end of your range, there was probably more of a pricing component. Actually, volume wasn't really a big contributor to revenue growth. I guess what I'm asking is, you move into the second half of the year, do you expect that vol mix to continue to be in that 3% to 4% range in terms of the contribution of revenue growth first? And then second, of all the pieces that are still sort of below, sort of your long-term expectations, whether it's gum, some of the developed markets, coffee's contribution, where do you think the, we should look for sort of the acceleration? Should it come from even more growth in the emerging markets or should some of those weaker areas begin to contribute more?

I think on the first bit, I can cover that. Then Irene can cover the second bit. I think, when you go back to those days when we had much lower vol mix, it was a very high pricing environment. That was when we had the commodity run-up. Naturally, there was a bit of pullback on vol mix as consumers and the trade frankly reacted to those price increases. Obviously, we're in a very benign pricing environment today. So almost the entire revenue growth you're seeing is coming from vol mix. As we look at the back half, I'm not looking to input costs to increase or pricing to measurably improve. So most of that revenue improvement on the back half is going to have to come from vol mix.

But if you think about it, just to put it in some perspective, Bryan, I think if you think about the 3.8, as we said we believe that about 1.3 points is due to coffee is about 1 point and about 0.3 due to capacity constraints. As we then exit the first half, those headwinds will -- certainly in the case of coffee will lessen. It's still going to be there. The capacity constraints should be behind us. So as we look to what we're going to execute in the back half, we feel quite comfortable that the momentum we've got in the front half, the spending that we've got in our emerging markets, and our overall share performance will carry us through.

So I guess it stands to reason that your confidence in an increase in A&C spending in the second half will have an influence because you're really targeting consumption growth as opposed to pricing. I mean, the idea is that if you spend more in advertising and consumer spend, you should drive even more consumption.

That's correct, but I would also tell you that the programs that we are investing behind are proven programs. It's things like the launch of Golden Oreo in China, the route expansions that Dave alluded to in both China and India. It was some incremental preseason support on Tang. These are proven programs that we have invested in. So we have high confidence that we'll get a good return on those investments.

Okay, great. Thank you.

David Driscoll of Citi Research.

Great. Thank you. And good evening, everyone. Wanted to -- Dave, wanted to just maybe ask very directly the EPS guidance or you didn't actually give it, but on the third quarter, it seems like you're expecting stronger revenue growth, but the OI margin expansion isn't as good as in the fourth quarter. There seemed to be a number of puts and takes on the tax rate, et cetera. Bottom line, would the third quarter EPS all-in, it should be a little bit less than the EPS contribution for the fourth quarter. I think I've taken into account everything, but can you confirm that?

I don't want to give you quarterly EPS, but I can give you two pieces to sort of help. Firstly, on the OI margins, I wouldn't compare to prior year, because prior year was pretty unusual, given the timing of a lot of spending and a lot of revenue as we were preparing for the spend. So last year was pretty unusual. This year, I think it's going to more normal. You'll see our OI margins improve progressively through the year, and our high point will be in quarter 4. So that would be the first point.

Secondly, on the taxes, we did say a few minutes ago that we would expect our taxes in the back half to be higher, but frankly, Q3 is going to be well below that 16% to 20% rate I said a minute ago, and Q4 will be higher. Again, it's because of some discreet items that we would expect to hit Q3, that will benefit Q3. So those are two elements I can give you some guidance on.

And then, Dave, just three other quick ones. Tax rate, I get this question a lot. Is the low tax rate in 2013 going to be a headwind for 2014, or is the comment that you've reinvested it and that even when this tax rate normalizes to something higher, the fact is that there are other pieces of the P&L that will change in '14 to compensate? Is that a correct way of thinking about the tax issue?

We've given guidance for a tax rate for the next three to five years. It's going to be around 20% plus or minus. This year was unusually low. So I'm not going to give specific guidance for next year. This year was really an outlier. Last year was 20%. This year, we're down quite a bit below that. Going forward over the next three to five years, I would expect to see closer to 20% again. In terms of substantial offset, maybe returning back to the OI conversation we had, by accelerating the emerging market investments from future periods into 2013, we have essentially built that into our base and so it means we're going to get two years of OI margin expansion in one next year. And we would expect our margins to grow from, as we said this year, flat to last year, up in the high 12%s next year. So our EPS next year is largely going to be OI driven.

Okay. Final two for me. Fast ones. Marketing -- what was marketing up in the first half of the year? And last question, on interest expense, can you give us interest expense guidance for '13?

Marketing is about 9.5% of revenue, so it's similar to what it was in the first, in the first quarter. And interest expense, I mean, I wouldn't expect -- we had a small one-timer that we called out as we talked about. It was $0.01 to $0.02, but otherwise I would say our trend on interest should be relatively even through the year.

We're about $18 billion on gross debt and our average, weight of average rate is about 5.9.

You had some options in the back half of the year though on debt pay down. So I think there were some questions as to whether or not interest expense was going to change in the final couple of quarters. You're saying second quarter run rate's a good run rate?

Yes, we've got $1.8 billion coming due in October. We would expect to pay that off with a combination of cash and commercial paper issuance.

Okay. Thank you.

Okay.

Robert Moskow of Credit Suisse.

Hi. A follow-up to Dave Driscoll's question. I think that you said that marketing was 9.5% of revenue in Q1 and Q2. But what was it last year? And does it reflect an increase in marketing spending year-over-year? And then secondly, just to drill down a little bit on US gum, we took a look at some Kantar Media data and it showed big declines in track media spending in US gum. I think it could have been reflected on the fact that you might be increasing digital in your mix, but I thought that you had a lot of digital spending last year, too. So I'm just trying to get a sense of whether the advertising cuts might have caused some of this decline in US gum. Thanks.

I'll answer the first bit. Last year, our spending was 9.4% of revenue. Versus last year, you would see within our mix we're spending a lot more in emerging markets and we are a little tighter in the developed markets.

Bob, we feel quite comfortable with the level of spending we have behind our gum. As I've talked about, we have made some important changes in the price/size architecture. We have strengthened our campaigns. Any declines that you see are really reflecting the mix we are increasingly investing at point of buying as opposed to on television. For example, it's much more focused on digital and point of buying. So you would see a reported change in Kantar, but it does not reflect this level of support that we got behind the business. And as you've seen from the share numbers that I quoted to you, we're feeling very, very good about the results that this spending is generating.

Okay, and then one more question on the guidance. You said that you've seen some slowing growth in categories in China, Russia, and Brazil. To what extent does that affect your overall top line? Like, could you quantify what that would mean, just to the category growth assumption for the year, and just to give us a sense of how much harder your business has to work to grow for the remainder of the year, to offset it?

Well, let me just give you some perspective. We start with the fact that we're growing our share, growing or holding share in about 60% of our revenue. So a key offset to the slowing category is our share gains and we're seeing very strong share performance around the world and a lot of the investment that we're making in our franchises, particularly in emerging markets, is designed to help us there. But just for perspective, if you think about the BRIC markets, for example, GDP has gone down from about, about 5% -- year to date, about 5%. It was about 6% the same time year ago. And yet our revenue within those markets, is up 13%. So there is not a direct correlation, nor should there be. There's no question we have to work harder in the face of some of these category slowdowns, but the strength of our brands and the investments that we're putting behind brand equity, as well as route to market is what will carry us.

Got it. So you're up double digit. That's more than enough to offset a 1% change in BRIC GDP?

As an example, yes, in aggregate. Yes.

Okay. Thank you.

Eric Katzman at Deutsche Bank.

Hi, good evening. Dave, I guess let me ask you a question. On, I think it was maybe Chris Growe, but when I do the math, you basically have about $3 billion of net income. You've got depreciation and amortization of $1.2 billion, $1.3 billion. CapEx has been running $2 billion. And your dividend are at least $2 billion, with, and you're increasing that. And that evens out to a free cash flow after dividends of basically zero. So where is, other than straight-out leveraging over the next year or two until CapEx comes down, where is the share repo funding coming from?

I think when we talked at Cagney, we actually laid out our cumulative cash flow over the '13 and '14 period. So if you can go back and look at that, but I think we essentially said we had about $1 billion a year, and I think what we're talking about here, if we're buying $1 billion to $2 billion, there's no question that if you took the midpoint of that in the short-term, we would have a modest increase in our debt. But I think as we wind through that restructuring program and the cash spending on that goes through, this is a program that we can pay for out of our ongoing cash flow. So there will be a short-term increment, but it won't be big.

Okay. And then unrelated question, when I look at your performance in the latest quarter across the regions, most of them are actually pretty solid in terms of volume mix and EMEA outlier of up 12%, I know you said there was a big recovery in Russia, but I'm just a little worried that in the past, the Company has been kind of stung by overshipping consumption and we'll find out later that it was a, kind of a false positive. So why shouldn't I be worried that one segment was so strong relative to everywhere else in the world? I mean, was Russia just a complete disaster a year ago and it's such a strong rebound? Or maybe you could just add a little more color there.

Yes, I think I would say two things. Number one, Russia did have a very strong rebound and that's a combination of good marketing and share gains again this year, but a soft space as well a year ago. So that is true. Also I would say we've got good growth in most of the EMEA markets. We are growing well over 20% in Egypt. We're growing well in Ukraine. We're growing in high single digits down in South Africa. We're growing in double digits in North Africa and Nigeria.

And as well, I think as you may recall from the first quarter in the Saudi Arabian market, we had a joint venture that we set up and essentially had to wind down shipments to the existing distribution network and didn't ship much in that first quarter. So we've got to rebound from that as we get back to normal shipments in quarter 2. So there's a lot of factors. Would I expect to be growing 12% vol mix every quarter? No, but I think we feel pretty good that it is widespread strength. And no, I'm not worried that we're shipping ahead of consumption.

Okay. I'll pass it on. Thank you.

Thanks, Eric.

Alexia Howard of Sanford Bernstein.

Good evening, everyone. Two questions. First of all, the investments, the $100 million investments in sales capabilities and ramped market expansion and C support, could you tell us a little bit about where those are being deployed? Are they in the already profitable BRIC countries, or is this the beginning of getting into the next wave markets that presumably aren't making money as yet?

No, at this time, Alexia, the focus is on the already good gross margin, BRIC markets. It's investments, as I said, behind -- if you think about the A&C support, it's business behind businesses like Oreo. In particular, I talked about Golden Oreo launch in China. It's the opportunity to continue to expand our sales coverage both in China and in India, and it's the opportunity to continue to expand some of our innovation platforms. So these are proven programs that have high returns and that's why we felt quite comfortable accelerating them.

And Alexia, to jump in on the other markets, we do make money in almost all of our emerging markets. So we talk about the BRICs because they are the biggest and they have very strong gross margins and good OI margins. We also have very good gross margin, very strong OI margins in our other emerging markets. We don't talk to them as much because they are smaller, but they all have very good margins and we would not invest in any country that didn't have a very strong gross margin such that we could get good return on investment on those, on those bets.

Okay, great. And then as a follow-up, your Power Brands are growing much faster than your non-power brands. Does that mean that there is SKU rationalization going on in those non-power brands globally? And I was wondering if you could give us an idea of how many SKUs you have globally and where that might go to over time if that's happening. Thank you, and I'll pass it on.

Yes, I don't think I want to get into an SKU discussion, but you can ask us that on future conference. I think it is a combination of it depends on the market. There is some SKU proliferation that we're pulling back on clearly. There is simply a matter of focusing on the brands that are going to be the future of the Company and spending less support on the secondary and tertiary brands. And there's just smaller brands in markets that just don't have the scale over time to sustain themselves. So they have been broadly for the last two or three years, those sort of non-power brands have been broadly flat, has kind of been the traditional trend we've been on and I would expect that's probably a realistic expectation going forward as well.

Great. Thank you very much. I'll pass it on.

Jason English of Goldman Sachs.

Good evening, guys. Thanks for the question. It's been a while since you've done this, but I was hoping that maybe you could disaggregate the volume and mix for us to give us a better sense of volume trends and how big the mix headwind is.

No, we stopped doing that, because truthfully if I give you a classic example it, comes down to, if you change the pricing, that obviously is pricing. If you start doing downsizing, then you get into very complicated volume versus mix calculation. So that's the reason we went away from it. Also, gum doesn't weigh a lot. So we will continue to report vol mix as one number.

Okay. I wanted to circle back then to Rob Moscow's question on what's ailing gum. I mean, I think I heard you say you don't think it's a spend issue, at least in terms of measured media. But when you look at the numbers, since the end of 2008, sugar confection up like 366% in measured media, chocolate, up 97%. Gum, down 57%. How can we look at those numbers and not think that there's a spending problem or a marketing investment problem behind the category?

Well I'll tell you, Jason, we talked about the facts two years ago when we bought the business. We felt that there was a spending problem. There's no question that Cadbury in the final moments had pulled back quite extensively on marketing support for gum and had very aggressively priced the category, and that was part of the reason that we started to see some weakness fairly early on. We corrected that very early on. So that's why I feel quite comfortable with the level of spending.

The issue for us is just making sure that we've got the right marketing mix within that spending. I think the issues that we've talked about, there's really four that we've been focused on. It's been about pricing and sizing, both at the lower end and the upper end, particularly in markets like Southern Europe, where the economies are still quite challenged. And we are finding that we're getting very good consumer takeaway as we do a better job of covering the spectrum of price points within gum. So that's been a very important part of our fixing program.

The second is, as I said, some of our marketing spending, we were not feeling was as effective as possible. Some of the campaigns had gotten a little bit too esoteric and we brought them back to the fundamental category benefits of breath freshening, as well as oral care, and we're finding we're getting a good response to that. The third is more impactful displays. We have a number of examples around the world. Argentina is probably our best example, where we have displays that are increasing takeaway by 30%, 40% and we've more broadly implemented those displays in a number of our key gum markets.

And then last, which is probably the most significant, is the category over time got very heavily dependent on innovation, to the point where a lot of the base SKUs were being replaced by some of the innovation and we were participants in this. But it turns out that some of those innovations were not carrying their weight. And so it has taken us some time to manage the category, to get our customers to change their shelf sets. And as I mentioned, part of the reason there is a lag between our share performance and the revenue growth is simply because it takes a while for our customers to make these shelf set changes. But really, those are the four areas that we've been focused on and we are beginning to see some good traction in our key gum markets, particularly in the US and in Europe.

Great. Thanks a lot. I'll pass it on.

Matthew Grainger of Morgan Stanley.

Hi, everyone. Thanks for the question. Could you just provide a bit more detail on the deceleration in volume trends in Latin America during the quarter? What were some of the factors? You called out Mexico in particular as having weaker vol mix. What were some of the factors at play there? And are there any additional markets you would highlight where volumes softened or where you saw more pricing come through and just shift the balance during the quarter?

Yes, I think, I would start with we had very good vol mix in the most important market, which is Brazil. And that was really the key one. I think vol mix declines really were driven by Argentina to some degree, which has its own economic issues and Mexico. And Mexico was really obviously -- it's gum, so it's the same old thing. And an increase in competition in powdered beverages, but it's really those two categories in Mexico that drove the negative vol mix.

Okay. Thanks very much.

Ken Goldman of JPMorgan.

Hi, good afternoon. When you think about some of the macro trends you're seeing, I know you touched on this a little bit, in emerging markets versus Western Europe, there seems to be maybe a bit of a consensus thesis out there that emerging market's slowing a bit, Europe recovering a bit. Is it fair to say that you're seeing that as well? One interpretation of some of your numbers sequentially would suggest that it is, but I'm just curious if that's a fair analysis on a broad scope.

Okay. Now, I would say that's not exactly what we are seeing. I mean, I would say our Western -- we are very pleased with our Western Europe trends and we really feel very good about the progress that we've made in a number of our core categories. Certainly in the most troubled parts of the Euro zone, Southern Europe in particular, we're still continuing to see softness.

I do want to try to put though the category slowdown in some context. When the emerging market categories slow down, they are still growing at three to four times the rate that we see in the developed markets. So, yes, there's been a slowdown in a number of these markets and I cited the GDP to revenue relationship that we're seeing in the BRIC markets, for example. So there's no question we are seeing some slowdown.

I talked about biscuits in China. Biscuits category in China grew last year about 18%. The first half of this year, it's up only about 6%. So when I talk about slowdown, that's the kind of dynamic that we're seeing. But we're still seeing the emerging markets for the most part are growing quite a bit faster than any of the developed markets. But I feel quite pleased with the performance that we have seen in a number of our developed markets. I talked about the strong US biscuit performance, for example, as well as the strong underlying performance of our European business.

Great. Thank you.

Ken Zaslow of Bank of Montreal.

Good evening, everyone. Just two quick questions. One is, how do you decide to repurchase stock and go that avenue rather than accelerate investments or cost cutting efficiencies?

Yes, I think, as Irene laid out, we basically, we had our three cash priorities that we are focused on. And the first was, as you rightly indicate, investing in the business. Whether that's cost reduction opportunities or whether it's investing in growth. As we sit here today, we believe we funded the investments we need to deliver the numbers we put out in '13 and '14 and beyond. So that was the first step. We did look at M&A and we think we have the flexibility for that. We always said, the third step, the place we would turn to next would be returning cash to shareholders. So we did follow that sequence in looking at the opportunities. And we did wait until we got our debt in line before we started those discussions. So it was a thoughtful process and it was tied really into our strategic planning process.

And then my last thing, as you gain share in gum, can you talk about your profit profile change just to see how that actually had changed?

I don't think we give profit by category. And I wouldn't want to go down that road now. Gum is a highly profitable business at the gross margin line. I think that's as far as I'll go.

Great. Thank you very much.

Okay.

Thilo Wrede of Jefferies.

Good evening, everybody. Maybe I'm a little bit slow tonight. I'm just trying to figure out what all the puts and takes for the guidance are for the full year. I have on the plus side the maybe lower than expected tax rate, maybe some share repurchases, the interest expense is lower, and then that is partially offset by reinvestments and currency. Am I missing anything? Is the net-net of this a positive impact on the full-year guidance or does it just even out?

Yes, I think we held our full-year guidance at constant currency at $1.55 to $1.60, that's the same number we gave back in May. Within that, taxes would be favorable to that. We would have invested more behind that. Interest is very small. And share buyback frankly would be very small as well because we're doing most of that towards the end of the year. So I think, that would be the two big swing factors. Currency, we called out that there was a $0.05 risk on currency because the guidance we give is at constant currency. If currencies stayed where they were on July 31st for the rest of the year, then the number would come down by about a nickel.

Okay. Got you. The other question I had, the pricing in Asia-Pacific turned negative this quarter. What's behind that?

It's just a question of timing of promotions and reacting to competitive events. But I think importantly, we're focused on maintaining the gross margin going forward.

Okay. So that shouldn't set a trend for the rest of the year?

No.

Okay. Thank you.

John Baumgartner of Wells Fargo.

Thanks for the question. Good afternoon. Irene, wondering if you could speak a little bit to your introduction of the Nespresso-compatible capsules over in Europe. I know we've seen other branded competitors do that in recent years, it's worked out quite well for them to reinvigorate their brands. So, just wondering if you would speak maybe to the details of that program, maybe your thoughts on the broader opportunities to grow premium roast and ground coffee across Europe in general?

Well, without a doubt, the driver of our coffee performance has been our more convenient coffee forms, as I mentioned. Tassimo, up about 40%. Millicano up very strongly in the double digits. And so that continues to be an area of focus. We did announce the launch of a Nespresso-compatible pot. We're starting with Care Noire and Jacobs in France and Germany as we speak. And we'll expand that to a number of other countries in the later part of the year. So we see it as an opportunity and we're, we believe we have very strong brands that will perform well in that system and that's what we're doing.

Great. Thank you.

This concludes the allotted time for today's question-and-answer session. I would now like to turn the conference over to Mr. Dexter Congbalay for any closing remarks.

Nick and I will be around later on this evening to take any calls. You have our numbers. And thank you for joining the call.

Thank you. This concludes today's conference. You may now disconnect.