DSM will host its annual Capital Market Days this afternoon and tomorrow.
As usual the day of the start of the CMD, the company issued a press release this morning with some update comments, which included no major news.
We remind that DSM presented new 3-5 year ambitions last year at its Capital Market Days. These ambitions included the 2013 targets of reaching a € 1.4-1.6bn EBITDA and a (pre-tax) ROCE target of >15% by 2013 (vs € 834m and 8.3%, respectively, in 2009 and € 1,161m and 14.6%, respectively, in 2010).
The company stated today it believes good progress is being made towards achieving the above mentioned targets, which is in line with the comments provided at the time of the 2Q11 results release. The company also repeated earlier comments that 2011 is expected to be a strong year, with as said above progress towards the 2013 EBITDA-ROCE targets. The 2011 outlook comments are under the assumption there are ‘no major changes to the overall business assumptions forthe full year’, which is a fairly similar comment as the one given at the time of the 2Q11 results release which indicated increased uncertainties related to the global economy. We forecast EBITDA to increase from € 1,161m in 2010 to € 1,278m in 2011, which is slightly below the consensus of € 1,296m which was assembled by DSM in August.
Some side comments were provided on the various divisions, none of which were surprising. DSM mentioned good progress with the integration and profit growth of Martek and a negative impact from the CHF for Nutrition’s 3Q results also (no real news, 2Q impact was € 20-25m). The company repeated the ambition to increase revenue of the Anti-Infectives JV to € 600m by 2015 with an EBITDA margin of over 15%.
Our View:
The press release offered no major new elements (no new financial targets, no precise quantitative 3Q or 2011 guidance, no fresh insight in the use of the excellent balance sheet position). As the strategic direction of being a dual-tack Life and Materials Sciences company was already set clear in the past and we did not expect changes on that, we mostly hope to get a better feel on current trading conditions at today’s CMD. We still like DSM for the defensiveness offered by its Nutrition division (and which represents approximately 58% of our 2011 group EBITDA forecast) as well as the attractive valuation. We stick to our BUY rating and € 50 target price.