ArcelorMittal SA (MT) 2022 Q4 法說會逐字稿

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(Operator Instructions) It's my pleasure, and I would now like to turn the conference over to Daniel Fairclough, Vice President, Investor Relations. Please go ahead, sir.

Thank you, Francine. Hi, and good afternoon, everybody. This, as Francine said, is Daniel Fairclough from the ArcelorMittal Investor Relations team. I'd like to welcome everybody to the fourth quarter and full year '22 Analyst and Investor Call. I'm joined on this call today by our Executive Chairman, Mr. Mittal; our CEO, Aditya Mittal; and our CFO, Genuino Christino.

Before I hand over to Mr. Mittal and Aditya, I would like to remind everybody of a few housekeeping items. Firstly, I want to refer everybody to the disclaimers that you can find on Slide 2 of the results presentation we published on our website this morning. I'd also like to remind everybody that this call today is being recorded, and it's scheduled to last up to 45 minutes. And finally, to repeat Francine's instructions, (Operator Instructions).

And with that, I would like to hand over the call to Mr. Mittal to begin with some opening remarks.

Thank you, Daniel. Good day, everyone. Thank you for joining today's call. I hope you are all keeping safe and well. I'll be very quick in my remarks.

I would characterize 2022 as another year of progress for ArcelorMittal. The results we have published today demonstrate the greater resilience of ArcelorMittal when facing more challenging market environments. And I believe the worst conditions of this cycle have passed.

In the company, we have achieved significant progress on many strategic fronts over the past 12 months, advancing our decarbonization plans, progressing our investments to grow EBITDA, and at the same time, buying back over 10% of our equity. The progress is gratifying, and it's down to the hard work, commitment and dedication of all our people. I expect 2023 to be another good year for the company and all our stakeholders. Adit?

Thank you, and welcome, everyone. In 2022, we have made clear progress on our 3 strategic priorities: the decarbonization of our footprint, the growth and development of our business and capital returns to shareholders. On decarbonization, we have completed the acquisition of the HBI plant in Texas, allowing us to utilize low-carbon metallics and creating significant optionality for the future.

We have acquired 4 scrap processors in Europe with a total capacity of 1.2 million tonnes. We have commissioned our EUR 200 million CCU bioethanol project in Ghent, Belgium. We are progressing on our DRI-EAF plants in 5 countries, and our 1-gigawatt renewable project in India is advancing.

On growth, we've now received CADE approval for the CSP acquisition, which we will complete this quarter adding highest quality capacity at the bottom of the cost curve with the added benefit of access to growing sources of competitive renewables and hydrogen. We're also progressing our strong pipeline of high-return strategic CapEx projects, including the newly announced electrical steel project in France.

In total, these projects add 1.3 billion to our normalized earnings power. That assumes long-term steel spreads and long-term iron ore prices well below today's levels. So at today's levels, the impact on profitability would be even greater.

We're making progress to realize the potential of our JVs, including the announcement of a major investment to double our capacity in India, which is also supported by the recently acquired port and power assets.

Our capital allocation and return policy is working very well. We're growing the earnings power of the business. We bought back 30% of our equities in September 2020 and ended the year with record-low net debt.

In terms of outlook, we have seen some positive signs recently that suggest we're past the bottom of the current de-stock cycle. The customer de-stock that we spoke of the last quarter has eased, and we've seen improvement in steel spreads from the unsustainable lows of the fourth quarter last year.

We are forecasting apparent demand growth in all our core markets. We're well placed to generate positive cash flow, and we'll continue to progress our decarbonization and growth agendas and capital returns program.

Genuino, can I now ask you to provide some more detail on our financial performance?

Thank you, Aditya. In terms of our financial performance, 2022 was very much a year of 2 halves. For the first half, we operated in strong market conditions and delivered very strong levels of profitability. The second half of the year brought several challenges and saw a marked downturn in the market environment that naturally affected our profitability levels.

Full year EBITDA was $14.1 billion, of which $10.2 billion was generated in the first half and $3.9 billion in the second. But our results demonstrate clear resilience at $100 per tonne in EBITDA in the fourth quarter was double the levels of the previous crisis environment. Considering the challenges posed by de-stocking and relatively high energy costs, this revalidates the actions we have taken and the improvements we have made to our portfolio in recent periods. Free cash flow has also been very consistent. Over the past 2 years, we have generated $13 billion in free cash flow.

It is this consistency that is allowing us to progress our strategic agenda. And as Adit mentioned, we expect to continue to generate good levels of free cash flow in the year ahead.

With that, I think we can move to your questions.

(Operator Instructions) And we will take the first in the queue, which is Alain from Morgan Stanley.

And I have 2 questions from my side. The first 1 is on capital returns. I understand that your framework stipulates that only $100 million of buybacks are needed to meet your 50% of free cash flow target for capital returns, but your net debt has come in far below market expectations for Q4. And you still have an authorization to buy back almost 19 million shares. Any reason why you have decided against maintaining the buyback at full steam, given where your share price is today? That's my first question.

Yes, thank you for the question. I'm glad you asked the question because we should clarify. There is no change in our buyback policy or the speed at which we're implementing. We still have 19 million shares to acquire and which we will do. I think all we were highlighting in the results is that 100 million belongs to 2022 because that's 50% of our free cash flow that we're buying -- that we've actually bought in January, and the remainder will apply to the 2023 capital return policy.

Okay. That's very clear. And my second question is around your EBITDA progression going forward into Q1 and Q2 in terms of the key moving parts. Can you give us some pointers around that? And you stated that we are past the bottom of the current de-stock cycle. Is it fair to assume that we're also past the bottom when it comes to quarterly EBITDA in Q4 last year?

Well, let me take this one. So yes, I think as we discussed at the time of our Q3 results, and so we were expecting a very severe level of de-stock in quarter 4. That's exactly what we saw, really strong de-stock happening. It's hard really to say that the de-stock is over, but clearly, it's not going to be as significant as it was in Q4. We start to see certain levels of, I would say, normalization. And our expectation is that, as we move forward, the price steel consumption will be closer to the real demand. In 2022, I think it's important to put that into context. In Europe, if you look at the euro, the real demand was actually okay. So the real demand at the end of the year was we were close to breakeven, slightly positive. So really, the de-stock that we start to see in Q3 and again has intensified in Q4, put a lot of pressure on the apparent steel consumption in the second half of 2002. So that should normalize, and we should see apparent steel consumption get much closer now than to the real demand that we expect will continue to be moving sideways. So that's one.

I think another very important element that we can point out is the energy costs in Europe continue to come down, continue to normalize. So as a result, our order books are improving. We see that. And again, that's linked to the occurrence of the very strong de-stock of Q4. So trying to put all this together, I would maybe start with shipments. So our expectation is to see shipments improving in Q1 in most -- in all of our regions. Appliances, as you know, because prices continued to decline during quarter 4 and because of lags, our prices we expect will continue to be affected in quarter 1.

But as we know, prices have since start to move up quite significantly so that it looks good for our second quarter. So prices we discussed. Volumes up. Costs, we should -- we expect costs to continue to trend down, even though we are seeing more recently, of course, I don't know prices, coal price is moving up. We will not see so much of an impact in quarter 1 because (inaudible) costing. So those are the moving parts.

So I think as we start the year, I think we are cautiously optimistic. We have guided for apparent steel consumption for the year to be up 2% to 3%, and we are guiding for 5% improvement in our shipments for the year. I'll stop here, Alain, to see if you can have any follow-ups.

Thank you, Genuino, maybe just a few quick points to add. So I think Genuino went into a lot of detail. I appreciate that. Overall, and Alain asked, do you see the worst behind. I think we do. So we look forward, we think fourth quarter was the lowest point in the current cycle since we expect Q1 and going forward, the business to perform better. The apparent steel consumption numbers, now natural needs to be in demand (inaudible) that we're forecasting in our core markets. So there's also good development on the real demand side.

So we'll move now to our next question from Tristan at BNP Paribas.

Maybe if you could shed some light on the full year volume guidance. You mentioned that the guidance implies no change in Ukraine. So could you give us a sense of the current output levels at the moment? And is it fair to assume that this is the base case scenario in which your free cash flow guidance is based on?

Thank you for the question. We have not really provided free cash flow guidance. We have provided shipment guidance, and we expect our shipments to build 95 percent year-on-year, and this obviously includes Ukraine. In terms of Ukraine, I think, first of all, I must say that our people have been absolutely heroic. They have been maintaining the operation. They have been defending themselves and their facility, and we're all extremely proud of them, and we really applaud everything that they are doing on a daily basis.

The focus of our people has been to maintain. Maintain our assets. Maintain its integrity. We are taking -- the critical implication of that is that we're maintaining our opportunity to produce steel in the future. Today, the operating levels are roughly 15% to 20% for steel and 20% to 25% for iron ore mines. And as you know, that the facility in Ukraine, as [VoLTE] integrated, i.e., it has its iron ore mines connected through our steelmaking and makes long products. So it clearly can participate in the reconstruction redevelopment of Ukraine when there is peace.

Okay. That's very helpful. And maybe just a quick follow-up on the volume guidance. In Europe, you have a couple of blast furnaces being idle at the moment. And I think only one has been restarted so far. Does your volume guidance include some additional restarts in the region? And is there some possibility when you look at certain blast furnace being idle that some are now cold idle or some close to the end of life. This is context of decarbonization. Maybe some of those blast furnace will not restart. Is that a fair possibility?

Yes. Let me (inaudible). Yes. So I think the -- we are bringing production back as we see improvement to our order book, right? So -- and that's what we have been also very consistent on that. So we will always match supply to the demand that we see. We are not bringing capacity back in anticipation of an improvement. It's really responding to the dynamics, the order books that we have in front of us. So at this point in time, we have some of the plants that we brought down during Q4. As you know, they work for maintenance. We are up and running. We have made an announcement. So some other furnaces are up today. So we only have 1 furnace in Dunkirk that a smaller furnace that is down, that is close to end of life that we may or may not bring back, but that remains available to the group. So all of our capacity remains available for the year.

So we'll move now to the question from Patrick at Bank of America.

I wanted to ask just how you're thinking about the other 50% of free cash flow, for the strategic acquisition. So I mean when you look at your current footprint, obviously the big acquisitions are being the Texas HBI, CSP, and the recycling businesses. Is that how we should think about going forward that you'll look for bolt-on and I suppose low-carbon feedstock for -- basically, how are you thinking about it going forward?

Yes. That's a great question. Yes, I think you're right. I'll just add a little bit more color to your question. So we continue to be focused on how we can effectively deploy our strategic capital. We are looking at opportunities which help us decarbonize our business further or create advantages for us as we decarbonize. We're looking for low-cost, higher-margin assets. And clearly, the real fundamental decision making is how much value do we create, right? What are the returns on these projects and that included, and how do we continue to grow and develop the business, keeping all of these factors in mind. So I think in 2020, we did a great job, right?

We deployed our strategic capital appropriately, Texas, Brazil, scrap processors, renewable investment in India, XCarb fund deployment and different and new technologies, and we managed to return a lot of cash to shareholders, buying back 11% of the company. And as you saw this morning, we also increased our base dividend. So I think you should expect more of the same, i.e., a balanced approach in terms of growing and developing the business but also returning cash and value to shareholders.

As we'll move now to a question from Dominic at JPMorgan.

I have 2 questions. So first on working capital. Given the initiatives that you have for 2023, could you maybe just tell us about how you are thinking about your normalized working capital levels for maybe 2023 and maybe even long term.

And then second question, again, really interested in your comments on the de-stocking cycle. Could you maybe just maybe drill into a little bit on the U.S., how you see the U.S. playing out in current markets.

Yes. Maybe I'll start with the working capital question, Dominic. So as you know, we have invested significantly in 2021/2022. We had, of course, a good release already in quarter 4. And you can see in our release that our expectation is to continue to reduce working capital in 2023. We are not quantifying that, but what give us confidence that we should be able to see that is the fact that the cost of our inventories have cost below a metal stock, are still impacted by the high raw materials that we bought in the first half of 2022.

That's one. Second, the energy costs also that we were very high, especially in Europe up to Q3 also is due, to some extent, fits in our inventories. So as costs normalize, then naturally, we would see our requirements for working capital to come down. So that's one aspect. And typically, as we restocked ourselves in Q4, you'll see also an impact in payables. And as we start also procurement of raw materials, then we cover that support from our suppliers as well. So that's what really gives us confidence. Of course, I mean, the dynamics, the working capital dynamics, as we know, will be really much -- pretty much impacted by what happens in the last 3, 4, 5 months of the year. So but that's our expectation. That's what we can see today.

In terms of the de-stocking, I think the dynamics that we see, they are relatively similar. In U.S., we also saw in the second half a significant de-stock, especially in flex much more than in some of the other segments, longs and tubular. So -- our expectation is that we should start to see that normalizing as well. So the dynamics are the same, although the levels -- the intensity of the de-stock in Europe, they were greater.

So now we'll move to our next question from Rochus at Kepler.

Let me go back to your volume guidance. I think the 5% you're expecting to grow this year is, I guess, quite a constructive number particularly as we're still dealing with kind of a recessionary environment. What I'd like to understand is what your kind of steel demand assumption is behind -- are we talking about kind of a flat demand you're seeing for the fall of '23, and in times of the dynamics of whether we end up in a softer and a hardline scenario for the Western World, in your guidance, have you baked in kind of a similar real demand level in the second half compared to H1? Or is there any major valuation to next for the second half?

So maybe I will just start with the macro. And if we need to provide you further details, I'm sure Genuino can supplement. I think we started with the call that I think that we have a constructive outlook. So it's predicated on a few elements. The first is that we feel that the de-stock has peaked, and there's a lot of evidence of that just based on how our customers are ordering. And what we see in terms of real demand and the pan demand. The second I would add is that energy costs, even though they're still very elevated, had eased relative to the second half, particularly relative to the fourth quarter. And clearly, that's positive momentum as we enter 2023 and is also positive in terms of real demand, right? Because the energy complex is not just impacting ArcelorMittal, but it impacts all European industry and impacts European consumer as all well aware.

In terms of the things that remain outstanding, I mean, first and foremost, is Ukraine, where we don't have a resolution of peace, but the immediate direct economic impact of energy has eased. And we also have a tightening monetary condition environment, right? And that's offsetting the inflationary pressures that we have seen in 2022. So those headwinds remain. China, we still have to see how China comes out of the holiday season and what type of demand environment, but we're also constructive in China. And that is why featuring all of these factors that the overall de-stock has peaked. We see that the energy complex has -- the pricing has eased and that's a positive headwind.

I guess there are tightening monetary conditions, but perhaps not to the same degree that you would have forecasted a few months ago. Relatively good news flow out of China allows us to have a constructive apparent steel consumption outlook. And interestingly enough, in almost all markets, whatever numbers we have posted in our presentation, matches the real demand environment, real steel consumption environment. So it's not that we are forecasting an inventory build into 2023. What we're forecasting is real demand improvement relative to 2022.

Okay. Understood. Maybe on CSP, can you give us an update on when in the Q1 you expect to close the transaction? And do you have any updated numbers in terms of what CSP is actually shipping and maybe also any hint on what their EBITDA performance is at the moment?

As the transaction should close now end of the month, right? And I think we will update you in Q1 in terms of performance. Of course, at this point in time, the level of information that we have is limited. We believe we have evidence that the company continues to do quite well. So we are encouraged by that.

And I think the whole team in Brazil is very excited to waiting for the transaction to close. And I'm sure we will have the opportunity to update you on performance expectations for that plant as we meet in quarter 1. But the transaction closes end of this month.

So we'll move now to a question from Max (inaudible)

So I have a first question on ACIS because, in your press release, you seem quite cautious on the evolution of the region this year. But given the extent of company-specific issues you faced last year, could we expect a better performance for your own operations? And perhaps, can you give a sense of how things will develop to in South Africa because you had a number of issues to last year? And should we expect a rebound to there? So that's my first question.

Max, I missed the last part of your question. A rebound where, sorry?

In South Africa, given that you have also a number of issues there last year.

Yes. Sure. Well, as you know, we have guided for apparent steel consumption to be up by about 2% to 3%. And we are guiding for 5%, so that implies that we expect to be doing a little bit better than the apparent steel consumption overall. And some of the reasons, you mentioned one of them, South Africa. South Africa had a number of operational issues in 2022, not all of them under control of our units. As we know, the country is facing a significant challenge in terms of energy availability and rail availability.

So we hope that the country and as with the providers, we're going to be making some progress. And our expectation is to see an improvement over there. So -- and then in the other regions, we do expect to be following the apparent steel consumption guidance that we're providing. We do expect to do better in some of the regions. In Brazil, a little bit better. We also expect to be a little bit better in NAFTA. So that's why we are taking a target to do for 5% instead of the 2% to 3%.

Okay. And the second question is on your decarb initiatives, notably on DRI-EAF. So you got a good night in Canada recently, but the projects in Europe are still somewhat stunning. So could you give us a sense of the time line of timing there when you can get final go-ahead in Europe and potentially launch those projects?

Yes, sure. Thank you. So you're right. In Canada, we have received the government support for our decarb initiatives at the Dofasco facility. In Europe, we are still waiting. We have 4 applications or 4 major projects that are sitting with the European Union. It's been a while, but -- for them to grant us the approval. But from what we understand, the approval should be granted shortly. And I mean shortly in the next few months.

Okay. That's a good news. And will they take a decision for the 4 initiatives combined? Or will it be an individual decision for each of them?

It's a very good question. From what we understand, it's an individual decision-making process. Maybe 2 out of the 4 will be done first, and then the other 2 later on.

So we will now move to the next question from Phil at Keybank.

Question on the NAFTA segment. How is the ramp of the Mexican outstrip mill go on? Maybe you could give us capacity utilization and walk us through progression there and then an update on your plan to support Calvert with a local EAF.

Yes. Phil, I'll take this one. So we have -- we're quite pleased with the evolution of the hot-strip mill in Mexico. So we have ended the year with a run rate of about 50% of the capacity. So we had a record in December. So the team's quite excited about the progress over there. So it's about 50%, and that's our run rate today. We will continue to ramp up the hot-strip mill.

The focus has also moved a little bit now to more towards also product development, homologation with customers so that we can enlarge the customer base. So I think it's progressing well. We have actually in our release provided the contribution of the hot-strip mill. So we are already at a run rate of about $100 million of additional EBITDA, which is in line with what we had anticipated before, after the full ramp-up to be generating about $250 million of contribution. So I think we are moving in the right direction there.

In Calvert, we are progressing well also with the EAF so expecting to -- our expected completion date is end of the year, and then we'll take it from there. And I think it works well. I mean, as we start in Clavert, then we should also be making progress with the ramp-up of the hot-strip mill in Mexico. So I think it's a good balance. So these labs that are today being transferred to Mexico can then stay in the road and sold domestically in Mexico.

And just a follow-up, if I could. Any update on what your automotive customers are telling you, in Africa and Europe in terms of how they expect the year to play out or anything there in terms of what you're seeing as well in the order book. Appreciate it.

Yes. I think we saw the second half of last year ended relatively well, right, especially in Europe. We had already the first half, and things slowly improve in the second half. So I think we ended the year with a little bit of an improvement in terms of production and we had also similar production increases in NAFTA. And we believe that the demand for automotive, the backlog, the low level of inventory should continue to support our production. So our expectation is that we will continue to see programs increase in production -- automotive production in 2023. So that should be -- and I think at this point in time, I think we are looking at something in the range of 5% increase for 2023.

We will move now to Andy Jones at UBS.

Just a follow-up on the decarb plan. Can you just remind us of what you were expecting from the potential substitute? I think you talked about (inaudible) the CapEx coming from -- potentially coming from government sources. What exactly are you asking for? Can you remind us what the expected sort of CapEx is likely to be on those 4 DRI bands? And how much do you think potentially could come from the government?

Sure. So we have not specifically broken down the CapEx per project, but I would refer to our climate action report. In the climate action report, we talked about reducing our overall carbon footprint by 25% by 2030 and 35% in our European footprint. We outlined a CapEx of $10 billion to achieve that. And we suggested there that government brands would be approximately 50%. So the net CapEx to us is about $5 billion. That remains the plan. And as these projects get approved and finalized in terms of engineering design and scope, and our maturities will be updating you on all of your -- on all the questions that you have asked.

So we will move now to our final question from Bastian at Deutsche Bank.

My question is on the regulatory side in (inaudible) specifically, and I think we just had the vote from the European Parliament today. Could you please give us your view on the outcome of the trial-up meeting in December? Is this really good enough? What else needs to be addressed to shape the regulatory environment in a way that it makes it suitable for you to get the decarbonization done.

Sorry, could you just repeat the last bit of your question? What do we need done, I wasn't clear on (inaudible).

Basically, so we obviously have to see them. Maybe you have some color on the funding support you're obviously discussing CapEx earlier. But I guess outside maybe the (inaudible) and what is decided here so far, what else if you need to be done to basically give you enough confidence that you can go ahead with the decarbonization and make these projects actually a positive return project and not just a negative one.

Okay. Great. That's very clear. So look, you highlighted a lot of it already, and I will just add a little bit more detail. So the first thing is the previous question as the same. We were expecting coming support from the European Union and as European Union approves it, and then the various countries are actually providing that funding support. So if you have a project in Germany, it's actually the German government, et cetera, et cetera. So that's the first. That's CapEx support.

The second, the [C] ban is important to create a level playing field because, in Europe, as you know, there is a ETS system, the emissions trading system, which imposes cost on people who emit CO2 and still coming into the country should have the equivalent cost.

The same in terms of exports, we need some export relief. So there is a C ban legislation, and it's going to -- there's going to be a trial. And I think that's a good development because it's good to see the trial. We will all learn and develop from it, and there'll be more clarity on the C ban, and I think it's clear that the intent is to make it effective. Clearly, the trial and the details will go a long way in determining how effective it actually is.

The third thing is really the IRA in the United States. So you can see there's an active dialog in the European Union to ensure that the EU remains globally cost competitive, whether it is the cost of energy or the cost of hydrogen or the cost of CCS.

And I think that's another very important element because the change since we've announced all of these projects has been the bill in the United States, which creates a very favorable climate in North America. So trying to bring some of those advantages into Europe is also very important. Having said that, I would just add that one of the strengths of our (inaudible) is the fact that it is global.

We have assets in the U.S. We have assets in Europe. We have assets in Brazil. These are all centers which have access to (inaudible) in Europe, but we have assets in locations which have access to either low-cost energy or can benefit from those in the IRA. So the Texas acquisition that we made in Corpus Christi is a great example because there are a lot of CCS projects, a lot of hydrogen projects. It is really the basin of energy. And so we have a very good strategic asset there, which we can grow and develop to supply low-carbon metallics on a global basis.

Your question was on returns. And clearly, that is the most important. As we decarbonize our business, we have to generate an adequate return. We have to make sure the business is stronger, not weaker, post this investment. And as we implement these investments and getting back to the previous question, providing details on the CapEx, where it's been executed first, what is the level of government support, we will provide you clarity on what is the return profile. Just like what we've done with our strategic CapEx, where we talked about $4.2 billion of CapEx, $1.3 billion of EBITDA.

In my opening remarks, you must have heard the highlight that this is based on long-term steel spreads, long-term iron ore prices, which are much lower than what we're seeing in the market today. So we'll provide you with that framework as we embark on these large-scale decarb projects in our facilities.

Excellent. Maybe just a very quick follow-up on the IRA of your -- I guess, your strategic analog is basically, at least on that side, unchanged you added to project in France, but at least versus the IRA, it is unchanged while hopefully, potentially at least, the IRA does give you some potential for other projects maybe to also tap those funds.

Is there anything which you're working on which you have in mind? Or do you actually see the IRA more as a case where it's actually going to drive your demand and support it nicely, but you're not really going to go out there and try to develop a larger-scale project to take advantage of that.

Yes. So that that's a good question. So we all see the demand impact. I think that's something that has been widely discussed. I mean, there's always a buy-American provision and the impacts that can have and have that in the U.S. steel industry. I would say there is an investment opportunity that is absolutely clear. I think the 10 minute on those investment opportunities are twofold. There will be some investment ideas, and that's where the capital comes into play, which are great on a standalone North American perspective and others, which are global.

And I think for that, we have to have clarity on the IRA rule. So the IRA has been passed as a law, but the actual detail and the rules will be decided the summer of this year. And I think very -- and soon after, there would be a similar exercise in Europe. I think post that clarity, you can make the appropriate investment decisions. At this point in time, there's nothing imminent, but clearly something that we're looking at very actively.

Okay. Great. So let's conclude. Thank you very much, everyone. I think we have covered a lot of ground on the call today. If you need anything more, anymore clarifications, please reach out to Daniel and his team. They're always available. With that, we will conclude this call. Stay safe and keep those around you safe as well. Thank you, and all the best.