Topic: Yesterday, FWAG released FY'23 prelims which came in better than expected. Moreover, management proposed a nearly doubled dividend and hinted towards a conservative passenger guidance.

Sales remained elevated and showed strong growth of 26% yoy to € 232m in Q4 (FY'23: € 932m, +35% yoy) thanks to ongoing strong growth of passenger numbers. Main contributions to the strong sales growth came from the segments Airport (+29% yoy; 46% of sales) as well as Handling & Security (+33% yoy; 19% of sales), but also Malta (+22% yoy; 11% of sales). See p. 2 for details.

Albeit being seasonally softer than Q2/Q3, Q4 EBITDA came in better than expected at € 61m, +53% yoy (FY'23: € 393m, + 33% yoy) thanks to the better than expected top line. On the other side, EBITDA margins (Q4: 26.2%, + 4.4pp yoy; FY23: 41.8%, +0.2pp yoy) seem to have reached cruising altitude, as additional OPEX (Q4: + 21% yoy; FY'23: +32% yoy) are also incurred from passenger growth.

In Q4, EPS grew less strong compared to EBITDA at € 0.13 (+16% yoy; eNuW: € 0.03), mainly due to the € 10m one-off stemming from the penalty for the early debt repayment. However, on a FY basis, EPS grew much stronger than EBITDA to € 2.01 (+56% yoy; eNuW: € 1.90) due to constant D&A (+0.6% yoy) as well as an improved financial result (€ -4m vs. € -9.3m in FY'22).

Consequently, FWAG announced to substantially increase the dividend to € 1.32 per share (+70% yoy; eNuW: € 1.33 DPS), implying a pay-out ratio of 66% (eNuW: 70%) and dividend yield of 2.6%.

FWAG's strong cash generation (FY'23 CFO: € 385m, 204% cash conversion) as well as its strong net cash position of € 362m per Y/E'23 should continue to cover dividend payments (€ 111m) and CAPEX needs (€ 217m), while still generating some excess cash of € 44m during FY'24e, further improving the net cash position to € 400 by Y/E'24e (eNuW). Additionally, this should also support EPS growth, as the interest received (eNuW: € 18m in FY'24e), should also improve the financial result from € -4m in FY'23 to € 15.6m in FY'24e. 

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