Earnings call transcript: Poste Italiane reports record Q2 2025 results

Poste Italiane SpA reported a strong performance for the second quarter of 2025, showcasing significant growth in revenue and profit, along with an upgraded full-year guidance. The company’s stock saw a modest increase of 0.89% to €11.36 ($22.98), reflecting investor confidence in its diversified business model and strategic initiatives. According to InvestingPro data, the stock currently trades between its 52-week range of $18.80 to $25.04, with a market capitalization of $13.83M. The company offers an attractive dividend yield of 3.31%.

Key Takeaways

• Record Q2 2025 revenues and profits, with a 5% YoY revenue increase.
• Full-year guidance upgraded for adjusted EBIT and net profit.
• Strong growth in digital and insurance services.
• Parcel volumes rose by 14% in Q2.

Company Performance

Poste Italiane’s performance in Q2 2025 reflects its robust business strategy, with a 5% year-over-year increase in group revenues to €6.5 billion. The company’s diversified model, spanning mail, financial services, insurance, and payments, has been pivotal in driving growth amid challenging market conditions. Notably, the expansion of its digital ecosystem and insurance offerings contributed significantly to its success.

Financial Highlights

• Revenue: €6.5 billion (+5% YoY)
• Adjusted EBIT: €1.7 billion (+12% YoY)
• Net profit: €1.2 billion (+14% YoY)

Outlook & Guidance

Poste Italiane has raised its full-year guidance, increasing the adjusted EBIT target from €3.1 billion to €3.2 billion and net profit from €2.1 billion to €2.2 billion. The company maintains a 70% dividend payout policy and reports a strong Solvency II ratio of 315%, well above its target of 300%. Continued focus on portfolio stability and returns is expected.

Executive Commentary

CEO Matteo Delfante noted, "2025 is progressing very well, with these results reflecting consistent strength across all businesses." He emphasized the company’s commitment to maintaining stable investment portfolio returns and highlighted the unique business model’s role in sustaining profitable growth.

Risks and Challenges

• Potential market saturation in core service areas.
• Macroeconomic pressures that could affect consumer spending.
• Competition from other digital and financial service providers.
• Regulatory changes impacting financial services and insurance sectors.

Q&A

During the earnings call, analysts inquired about the company’s plans for a full banking license, to which management confirmed there are no current plans. Other discussions focused on proactive portfolio rebalancing in insurance and potential synergies with the TIM mobile business, reflecting the company’s strategic focus on market share and service quality.

Full transcript - Poste Italiane SpA (PST) Q2 2025:

Giuseppe, Moderator/IR, Post Italiane: Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to Post Italiane’s Second Quarter and First Half twenty twenty five Results Conference Call. In a few moments, the CEO, Matteo Delfante, will take you through some opening remarks, and then the CFO, Camilo Greco, will cover the financials. As usual, the presentation will be followed by Q and A session, where you can ask questions either by phone or through our webcast platform. For any topics we won’t be able to cover today, please do contact the IR team. We will provide any clarifications you might require.

With that, over to you, Matteo.

Matteo Delfante, CEO, Post Italiane: And good afternoon, and thank you for joining us today for our Q2 and first half twenty twenty five results call. It is great to have you with us today as we share another record breaking quarter of growth and an impressive 2025 as we continue to deliver on our strategic plan. We have delivered record second quarter group revenues, EBIT and net income. All business units contributed to a solid 5% year on year top line growth to €6,500,000,000 EBIT growth at 12% to over €1,700,000,000 These results are yet another demonstration of the strength of our business model, seamless execution, continued ability to adapt and grow in a dynamic environment, supported by relentless cost discipline. Net profit at €1,200,000,000 is up a remarkable 14% compared to the same period of last year.

Since the beginning of the year, we registered strong net inflows in investment products, confirming our robust commercial performance in insurance products, with record quarterly net interest margin. Our balance sheet remained extremely solid, supporting our upgraded dividend policy. Solvency II ratio remains well above 300, including the impact of the first €500,000,000 of additional remittance from post EBITDA to the parent company paid in June 2025. The strong momentum across our platform and particularly in our Financial Insurance division give us the confidence to increase our EBIT adjusted guidance for full year 2025 to €3,200,000,000 and our net profit guidance to €2,200,000,000 Dividend policy at 70% payout is confirmed. Let’s move to group financial results on Slide four.

Poste delivered a strong performance in the second quarter and first half Let’s focus on the first half with a record top line of €6,500,000,000 up 5% year on year. Adjusted EBIT is at €1.7 and net profit at €1,200,000,000 up a remarkable 1214% respectively. These are our best ever first half results since going public. And for the quarter, adjusted EBIT is at €864,000,000 and net profit is at €572,000,000 up 109%, respectively.

On Slide five, the strong underlying revenue momentum across all our business segments continues in the second quarter. In Mail, Parcel and Distribution, revenue growth was driven by increasing parcel volumes. The anticipated decline in mail volume is effectively mitigated through ongoing repricing actions. In Financial Services, revenue increased by 6% year on year to €2,800,000,000 supported by record level quarterly NII and solid commercial performance. Insurance Services delivered strong profitability in both Life and Protection segments.

Revenues rose 10% in the first half, reflecting growing CSM and higher release. Postpaid Services’ unique and integrated ecosystem of everyday services deliver growth in both revenues and profitability. Payment revenues benefited from an overall increase in card usage by our clients. The telco customer base remains solid and stable, while the number of energy clients has almost doubled year on year, reaching around 900,000 clients. Let’s go please to Slide six and EBIT evolution by segment.

Mail, Parcel and Distribution reported an adjusted EBIT of €67,000,000 for the first half of twenty twenty five, in line with our full year guidance. Financial Services operating profitability is up a sound 27% in the half to five twenty eight million euros driven by record NII and overall strong revenue strength across products. Insurance Services EBIT is up 8% to €789,000,000 in the first half, supported by both Life investments and Protection. Finally, postpaid services EBIT growth at 11% to two seventy six million euros in half one is driven by resilient top line performance and effective cost management. Let’s move to a more detailed review of the financial by our CFO.

Over to you, Camilo, please.

Giuseppe, Moderator/IR, Post Italiane: Thank you, Matteo, and good afternoon, everyone. Let’s move to Slide eight on Mail parcel and distribution. Revenues amounted to €960,000,000 in Q2 and €1,900,000,000 in H1, up both 1%. Mail revenues at €516,000,000 in Q2 and at just over €1,000,000,000 in H1 are in line with the trend that we anticipated with our fiscal twenty twenty five guidance in February. In addition, the year on year comparison on major revenues is unfavorable this quarter as 2024 benefited from positive one off items and Q2 twenty twenty four in particular benefited from volumes related to the EU elections.

Parcel revenues were up 9% to $4.00 €8,000,000 in Q2 and up 8% to $8.00 €1,000,000 in H1, supported by all customer segments with a strong acceleration versus Q1. Distribution revenue from other business units are up almost 4% in Q2 and H1, reflecting positive commercial trends. Adjusted EBITDA of €67,000,000 in H1 twenty twenty five is in line with the guidance provided for the full year. Let’s look at volumes and tariffs on slide number nine. Parcel volumes are up a solid 14% in Q2 and 11% in H1 to €159,000,000 items, with growth in all customer segments from large e commerce platforms to smallmedium merchants as we are managing increasing volumes, gaining market share from competitors.

In Q2, we also increased the portion of items delivered via the postal network to 43% with a positive contribution to overall business profitability. Looking at prices, the average tariff was impacted by higher volumes with lower pricing and unit costs as we saw a strong acceleration versus Q1 of volumes in secondhand items and bulkless returns. Moving to mail. The volume trend is in line with expectations, with the bulk of the volume decline concentrated in lower value items such as direct marketing and unregistered mail. We continue to compensate anticipated volume decline with ongoing repricing actions across both regulated and market products.

Moving to financial services on slide number 10. Gross revenues for the quarter came at €1,700,000,000 and €3,400,000,000 for H1, both up 7%. Net interest income came at a record €671,000,000 in Q2, up 3% and at €1,300,000,000 in the half, up 7%, benefiting from higher average deposits and lower cost of funding. Postal saving distribution fees amounted to €451,000,000 in Q2, up nine percent and €892,000,000 in H1, up 6% in the first six months, supported by improving gross inflows and longer maturity of products sold. Consumer loan distribution fees reached €69,000,000 in the quarter, up seventeen percent and €140,000,000 in the half, up 15%, driven by higher margins.

A different product mix with lower upfront fees leads to Q2 revenues of €46,000,000 and the first half at €89,000,000 in Asset Management, while AUM are growing thanks to positive net inflows. Finally, adjusted EBIT came in at €268,000,000 in Q2, up 23% and at €528,000,000 in the first half, up 27% when compared to the 2024 on the back of positive revenue trends. Moving to slide 11. TFAs continued to grow, reaching €600,000,000,000 in the half, up €9,000,000,000 from the start of the year. Let’s look at each component.

We reported strong €1,900,000,000 net inflows in investment products, confirming the positive trend in life insurance where net inflows reached just under €1,000,000,000 Deposits were up, benefiting from resilient retail deposits at €58,000,000,000 and higher balances from the PA clients, which however have a more volatile nature. Postal saving net outflows were driven by high maturities, mitigated by new commercial initiatives resulting in strong gross inflows. Moving to slide 12. Insurance services revenues amounted to €464,000,000 in Q2, up eight percent year on year and €900,000,000 in H1, up 10% and supported by both life and protection. We continue to report positive net flows also in Q2, driven by strong gross written premiums, up 20% year on year, with increased share of multi class products.

Our new advisory offering built in the context of our new commercial service model is leading to proactive rebalancing of our client portfolios, resulting in a lapse rate of 8.9% in the first half of the year, 45% of which have been reinvested into new life and investment and pension products. Life investment and pension revenues are up 9% to €412,000,000 in Q2 and up 10% to €811,000,000 in H1 on the back of higher CSM stock and CSM release. Protection revenues are up a strong 9% in H1, supported by higher gross written premiums, up 29% in the first half and a remarkable 43% in the quarter, also boosted by new corporate contracts. Combined ratio stood at 83% in the first half, while we confirm our fiscal year 2025 guidance of about 85%. Adjusted EBIT of €789,000,000 in the first half is up 8% to H1 twenty twenty four, reflecting top line trends.

On slide 13, we show the CSM evolution in the first half of twenty twenty five. Our stock of CSM has grown to €14,200,000,000 on the back of strong new business and the recovery of financial variances. This provides us with strong visibility on the future profitability of the business. Normalized CSM growth stood at 3.2% on an annualized basis, up from 2% in 2024, with a significant increase in new business value and expected return more than compensating H1 twenty twenty five release. Let’s look at solvency ratio evolution on slide 14.

PostEvita’s group Solvency II was at three fifteen at the June, well above the managerial ambition of 62% to the cycle. This ratio already embeds the 100% remittance net of profits for the period to the parent company as well as the impact from the first €200,000,000 additional remittance paid in June. The improvement was mainly related to the reduction of BTP spread over the quarter. Our Solvency II ratio currently stands between 305320%. Moving to PostePay service on slide 15.

The PostePay ecosystem continues to represent powerful engine of growth, innovation and customer engagement for the group. Revenues rose to $4.00 €4,000,000 in Q2 and $8.00 €2,000,000 in H1, up 65%, respectively, with a strong recovery in payments growth in Q2. Payment revenues were up 5% to €296,000,000 in Q2 and up 3% to €480,000,000 in H1, supported by transaction value growth of 11% in the quarter and 9% year to date. The total number of ecosystem transactions also accelerated in the quarter with a 15% year on year growth, testament to our clients’ increased card usage. This performance offsets the decline in instant payment revenues following recent EU regulatory changes.

Telco revenues are stable in the quarter and up 1% in H1 to €165,000,000 supported by our resilient client base and the new fiber offer. Finally, energy net revenues are up a remarkable 68% to €57,000,000 in the first half, reflecting an increased customer base currently at around 900,000 clients. Adjusted EBIT grew 9% to €144,000,000 in Q2 and 11% to €276,000,000 in H1, underpinned by solid top line performance and cost discipline. On slide 16, let’s look at workforce evolution. In the first half of the year, the average headcount was just shy of 120,000, with the increase aimed at supporting business growth, both at the holding company and subsidiaries.

HR costs per FTE are up 2% to €47,800 driven by increases linked to the new labor agreement and variable compensation to reward performance. Moving to group HR costs on slide 17. In H1, ordinary HR costs increased by 3% to just under €2,900,000,000 due to the higher FTEs and variable compensation, as already mentioned. In the half, ordinary HR costs on revenues were are down to 40%. Moving to slide 18.

Non HR costs increased by €120,000,000 year on year, mainly driven by €72,000,000 additional variable COGS, reflecting higher business volumes. Fixed COGS are up €10,000,000 D and A are up by €38,000,000 in line with the increase in investments driving our continuous transformation. In general, our focus on cost and CapEx discipline across all divisions remains laser sharp and protecting the bottom line profitability as well as cash flow remains our top priority. Thank you for your time. Let me hand over to Matteo for a wrap up.

Matteo Delfante, CEO, Post Italiane: Thank you, Camilo. I’m proud to say that 2025 is progressing very well, with these results reflecting consistent strength across all businesses, achieving record first half revenues and profitability. We continue to build upon our solid momentum with clear commitment to generate long term value for our stakeholders. The strong performance to date give us the confidence to raise our full year 2025 guidance. We’re increasing it at the adjusted EBIT level from the initial 3,100,000,000.0 to 3,200,000,000.0 and the 2025 net profit guidance from €2,100,000,000 to €2,200,000,000 resulting in a higher shareholder remuneration in light of our dividend policy based on a payout ratio.

We maintain a solid group balance sheet with low leverage and an insurance Solvency II ratio at 315%, well above our managerial ambition, providing us with significant financial flexibility. Our unique model continues to position us well for sustained profitable growth in all market condition and is fully supported by the strong diversification of the group. Finally, want to thank again our dedicated employees whose hard work, commitment and professional skills are key to the strong results that we continue to achieve. Thank you for listening. And Giuseppe, over to you for the Q and A.

Giuseppe, Moderator/IR, Post Italiane: Thank you, Martel. So we’re ready to start the Q and A session. The first question we have is from Gianluca Ferrari, Mediobanca. Yes.

Gianluca Ferrari, Analyst, Mediobanca: Hi, good afternoon. Ciao, Mateo, Ciao, Camilla and Ciao, Giuseppe. The first is on the news of the day. So the article reporting that you might be exploiting a Danish compromise to be applied to the group, and that would also bring a reorganization of your operations. Now the apart from the comments you can make today, my question is, in case of a significant benefit, would you ever consider taking a full banking license?

Second question is on the retail investment flows. Apparently, the number is not that high in Q2. But I think if my reading is correct, you made a very strong requalification on your Life business in Q2 with a big switch from G and A savings into unit and multi class. And if you can remind us what are the margins on those two products? And also on the postal savings, it seems that the net outflows are reducing quite materially, so much more gross flows.

And will this lead to potentially more than €1,700,000,000 for the year? Thank you.

Matteo Delfante, CEO, Post Italiane: Thank you, Gianluca. I’ll take the first question and let Camilo take retail investment flows and gross portal savings. The answer is very simple. I mean, technically today, as you pointed out, we don’t have a banking license. These are decisions that lies with our shareholder, not with management.

But as far as we know, there is nothing in the cards of changing the status of Post Italiane. So there is nothing to focus upon on the Danish Compromise space at the moment as far as we know. Please, Camilo.

Giuseppe, Moderator/IR, Post Italiane: Yes. So I’ll start talking about the net inflows. First of all, I’ll say that the net inflows are in line with our expectations. We have had an acceleration in net inflows in the insurance business. If you compare it to both the first quarter and second quarter of twenty twenty four, which objectively were unsatisfactory with €900,000,000 of net inflows.

And we are, as I said, exactly in line with we expect to do for the full year, which is probably twice that amount. Secondly, I’d also like to point out that we had also very strong performance in terms of gross inflows both on insurance and our postal business. So, retail workforce has been working very hard to convert the gross maturity that we had. And just to give you a number, all in the second quarter and is in the appendix of the presentation, had €1,000,000,000 more of gross inflows if compared to the same period of last year, a bit more than €4,000,000,000 in Q2 twenty twenty four to a bit more than 5,000,000,000 in Q2 twenty twenty five. With respect to the other question on postal savings, we had indeed a good first half.

At this point, we do not intend to change the guidance on specifically this product or on AR product for that matter. What we want to do is that we want to give you an overall feel of what’s going to be the EBIT of the group, which we feel comfortable increasing by €100,000,000 in terms of guidance from 3,100,000,000.0 to 3,200,000,000.0 It is probable to assume that part of the outperformance will also come from postal savings like possibly some other stuff from NII or other of the business. You also asked a question around fees in capital guaranteed versus non capital guaranteed. Yes, we have marginally higher fees in the multi class product, but we’re talking about an amount which I would zero one zero zero hundred basis points order of magnitude. But obviously, what we are doing here is that we are moving our customer base towards products that are more competitive in the current rate environment.

Gianluca Ferrari, Analyst, Mediobanca: Thank you very much.

Giuseppe, Moderator/IR, Post Italiane: Okay. Thank you. Next question is from Alberto Villa, Intermonte. Go ahead, Alberto.

Alberto Villa, Analyst, Intermonte: Hi. Thank you very much for taking my questions. A couple from my side. One is again on the potential reorganization. First of all, just to understand if this is something that you are considering or not.

And then if this will be eventually functional also to manage the, let’s say, reorganization of payments and mobile businesses? And if it could eventually facilitate in the future the combination of the mobile business with the TIM in the future, if that’s something that could be considered in the future? And the second question is related to the revision of the guidance. I see that the NII is stronger than expected and the first half was very strong. So I was considering whether the revision of the guidance is mostly related to NII or there are other parts of the business that are delivering stronger than compared to what you anticipated when you released the guidance?

And finally, on the NII, the dynamics we have to consider on the second half of the year, also considering the resetting in September, please, just to understand what are your expectations for the second part of the year in terms of NII? Thank you very much.

Matteo Delfante, CEO, Post Italiane: Thank you, Alberto. I will take the first question and then let Camille again to prepare for the second one. I mean, there is first of all, at the moment, we are technically not yet fully authorized by the antitrust as owner of TIM. So we’re still in the process of getting the final clearance. Having said that, assuming we will get the clearance sometime down the road, we will explore potential additional synergies on the cost side for sure, and we will start looking at the revenue side of the income statement as well in the future.

But to do that, it doesn’t need to at the moment, we don’t think there is any reorganization needed to achieve within Postal to achieve those results. And so we can carry on as I answer to Gianluca, Alberto, with our current organization. And obviously, we’re always trying to optimize everything we do. But at the moment, winning team is unchanged.

Giuseppe, Moderator/IR, Post Italiane: So with respect instead to the other part of the question, which was what contributes to upgrade the guidance? And secondly, NII, I’ll start with NII. So when we presented the numbers in February, we talked about overall portfolio return of €2,600,000,000 The €2,600,000,000 was a combination of around €2,500,000,000 of NII and around €100,000,000 of what we call active portfolio management, total €2,600,000,000 What we are now saying is that we think that that number will indeed be 2,600,000,000.0 with probably a lower contribution of active portfolio management as the business is performing in a way that we might decide also for overlooking to keep some of those gains in the base of our investments. With respect instead to the guidance, I’ll repeat what I said to Gianluca, which is that we have indeed increased the EBIT of €100,000,000 from 3,100,000,000.0 to 3,200,000,000.0 There are a number of drivers for that decision. One is certainly NII, but not the only one.

Post tax savings are also performing well as was highlighted and also other parts of the business are doing too. Also, both the insurance and the payments business are performing strongly. So, I think I wouldn’t single out a single driver for that decision.

Ian Pearce, Analyst, BNP Paribas: Thank you.

Giuseppe, Moderator/IR, Post Italiane: Okay. Next question is from Andrea Lisi of Equita. Go ahead, Andrea.

Andrea Lisi, Analyst, Equita: Hi. Thank you for taking my question. The first one is on the trend we are observing on the mail business where there is an acceleration in the year on year decline versus of revenues versus the first quarter, especially linked to the trend in volumes. Just wondering to understand if this trend is the one that you were expecting and if we should expect it to continue also in the coming quarters. The second question is on the protection business, where we are observing a strong year on year growth in the corporate side.

Is it already linked to the nat cat, nat recovery or is it linked to something else? How are you positioned on this front? And every last one is still on NII, which benefited from higher volumes of investment and also on the asset yield side. The question is, do you have further margin increase the size of the portfolio also considering the leverage your leverage ratio the position of your leverage ratio? Thank you.

Thank you so much.

Matteo Delfante, CEO, Post Italiane: Okay. I’ll take the last one and let Camilo prepare for the main revenue trend and protection business. We do have marginal room for increasing the leverage. Andrea, thank you for your questions. I wanted to take the opportunity to remind you and the other people on the call that we’ve been working on the stability of the return of our portfolio for the last three to four years.

So when rates back up back in 2022, we took the opportunity to try to immunize and get the highest possible return in our portfolio so that when rates eventually would have gone south, we would have had the maximum possible resilience. And that’s what we are showing today and that’s what we have committed to when we launched our plan in March. So, we are performing our plan, but the aim of the management is to try to keep the investment portfolio return stable year on year, if possible, increasing it when the market allow us to do so. Please Camilo.

Giuseppe, Moderator/IR, Post Italiane: Okay. So, I’ll start with mail. So, I guess that without going too back in time, we have been quite transparent on the fact that the secular trend of mail was downwards as opposed to upwards. We had a positive year in 2024 with sort of above expectation performance. That was also driven by positive one offs, and we specifically talk about one in Q2 twenty twenty five.

As in Q2 twenty twenty four, we had European elections, which contributed around 20,000,000 to the performance of the quarter. The performance of mail business in the second half of the year is not expected at this point to be impacted by other one off. It’s going to be down compared to 2024, but absolutely and very forcefully I reconfirm that it’s going to be at least in line with our expectations. And our expectation is that mail business will contribute €2,100,000,000 in revenues for 2025. So, we are exactly in line with the trend.

With respect sorry, I’ll say a touch more saying that that trend be supported by continued repricing actions, including the also repricing which came as of the April 1, and we had the benefit of repricing around €15,000,000 in Q2 and will continue throughout the year. With respecting to the performance of P and C, we were pleased too by that performance. First general point is that the strength of the business was throughout the different categories, both at Posta Secura, Posta Vita, but also net, our business and net insurance. Things that would single out in Q2 are with regards to specific couple of positive contracts that we won in the corporate world with two large customers. We started to contribute to the P and L of the business.

Here instead, we had given a guidance of the year of premium well in excess of €1,000,000,000 That’s obviously where we will go, probably a bit shy of €1,500,000,000

Matteo Delfante, CEO, Post Italiane: And with respect to the nat cat business, you’re not seeing any revenues there because we haven’t really started. But we are ready. We’re not going to be big in the space, but we have the product and we’re starting to market it mainly to SMEs.

Andrea Lisi, Analyst, Equita: Very clear. Thank you.

Giuseppe, Moderator/IR, Post Italiane: Okay. Next question is from Ian Pearce, BNP Paribas. Go ahead, Ian.

Ian Pearce, Analyst, BNP Paribas: Hi, afternoon, everyone. Thanks for taking my questions. The first one was just on the lapse rate in the Insurance division. Just trying to get an understanding of if you see that higher lapse rate being driven by those commercial actions and if the two point increase that we’ve seen is something we sort of expected and are comfortable with? And the second one is just on the Posterpay.

Unless there’s been a quite marked decline in the total number of car stock at Posterpay, If you could just give some detail on what’s driving that and if the expectation was that this card stock will fall and that would be offset by the digital payments in the plan? Those are my two questions.

Matteo Delfante, CEO, Post Italiane: Okay. On laps, Camilo, and I will be answering on

Giuseppe, Moderator/IR, Post Italiane: cardstock. Yes. So as mentioned, I think, to one of the previous questions, this year we have been much more proactive in terms of commercial actions with our customer base. And we have tried in the benefit of our customers to migrate some of them towards a product that is not fully capital guaranteed, but towards a product that has some flavor of equity content. That has led to close to 50% in the second half of, let’s say, induced lapse rate.

Anyway, if you were to exclude that managerial action, you would have a lapse rate in there of 4%, which is much closer to what we had historically. You should assume that these managerial actions will continue as the strategy is to move more of our customers towards that type of product. We should believe that in this environment is more conducive to value generation.

Matteo Delfante, CEO, Post Italiane: And Ian, on the card stock is correct. We decreased the number of cards, which is a specific evidence of the fact that the Italian government has stopped paying the minimum salary to citizens, and that was done in the past through a postcard. So that’s a specific technical aspect you see there. What I think is more relevant for our business is that we look at the usage of the cards. So, our market share of the transaction that is done with cards, both physical and digital, both on physical sites and on services, so online.

And the first half of the year, from the data we have, was a meaningful increase in our market share of the transaction with cards. So, we restarted growing in 2025 after we were relatively stable for a couple of years after a big increase that we experienced from 2019 to 2021.

Ian Pearce, Analyst, BNP Paribas: Thank you.

Giuseppe, Moderator/IR, Post Italiane: Okay. Next question is from Michael Lapner at Berenberg. Please go ahead, Michael.

Michael Lapner, Analyst, Berenberg: Fantastic. Thank you. Two questions. One, you just mentioned increased market share, and it seems to come through not just in cards, but in mail, obviously. It feels like you’re gaining market share in insurance.

It feels great. But I know it sounds sussile, but there seems to be a shift here, so I’d be interested. And the second one is the FTEs is rising. Now I’ve always hoped or felt that part of the strategy would be to try and reduce or limit the growth in HR costs. And it seems to be the opposite trend, not just in terms of cost per head, but also in terms of number.

My guess is this is linked to what I see as increased market share, but any thoughts would be helpful. Thank you.

Matteo Delfante, CEO, Post Italiane: Okay. Thank you, Michael. I’ll answer the first question and set the scene for Camilo to answer the second one. I think we’re not winning market share everywhere, but we monitor market share very closely because for us, having a platform strategy based on often relatively low margin products, increasing market share is extremely important. So we go for volumes, and we need to see those volumes coming through.

So I think the fact that we are managing to win market share in relatively a high number of products and industry is due to the fact that, one, we offer to our clients the best service in terms of physical versus digital. Let me take the opportunity to say that on the digital side, we are increasing our footprint. Today, we’re doing 26,500,000 daily interaction with Italians. Our unique app, the one that will combine all services of Post Italiane, has reached over 9,000,000 Italians linked to it, and then we have another 6,500,000 that will move by the end by mid October twenty twenty five. So last quarter, we’ll have more than 15,000,000, 16,000,000 Italians on one single app.

That single app has 5x the conversion rate of any sales channel of the legacy Banco Posta and PostaPay. So when you go on that app, the UX is helping us doing the sale. And we also observed the fact that the clients that are buying more products and helping us increase market share across products are the ones that have a hybrid approach about the use of Post. So, they most of the time go digital, but every now and then when they need to, they go to the office. And those are the clients that have more products of Poste and therefore are supporting the market share.

So, hope I was, Michael, clear enough. In one word, hopefully, this is the platform effect.

Michael Lapner, Analyst, Berenberg: Brilliant. Thank you.

Giuseppe, Moderator/IR, Post Italiane: Please, Camille. And with respect to FTEs, it is true that FTEs are up compared to year end. This is also true that we said that for 2025, the FTEs would have stood around 120,000. We are slightly shy of that number. We have a business which is growing and that requires additional manpower, not only at the holding company, also some of our subsidiaries as I mentioned.

So, that is in terms of number of heads. In terms of labor cost, our colleagues have a four year union negotiated agreement, which ends at the December 31. It has specifically specific salary increase on a yearly basis, so that is within our numbers and planned. What we show in the presentation also is that the pivot effect in terms of additional heads that we have where it’s around €37,000,000 whereas instead we have €46,000,000 which are related not only to the salary increase, which is Unions negotiated which I just mentioned, but also related to increased premium to the network to ensure that in fact our products are sold exactly as the CEO was saying. So, we’re basically paying more and more for performance.

Michael Lapner, Analyst, Berenberg: Fantastic. Thank you.

Giuseppe, Moderator/IR, Post Italiane: Okay. The next question is from Manuela Meroni, Banca Aemi. Please go ahead, Manuela.

Manuela Meroni, Analyst, Banca Aemi: Thank you for taking my questions. I have two. The first one is a follow-up on the potential reorganization. Do you see from a theoretical point of view any financial or industrial benefit from reorganizing your all your financial activities under Banco Posta? And the second question is on your active portfolio management.

I noticed that the unrealized capital losses on the government bond portfolio turned into capital gains. You said that you’re not going to realize capital gains in the second part of the year. This is what I understood. So I would like to understand how we can, let’s say, what are you going to do with the capital gains going forward? Are you going to use it in an opportunistic way?

So you can if you can please guide us on that. Thank you.

Matteo Delfante, CEO, Post Italiane: Thank you, Manuela. I’ll take your second question. We haven’t stated that we’re not going to do additional capital gains in the second half. So we’re still assessing the best market opportunity. And it will not certainly be more than what we had in the budget, which is short of 100,000,000 So that’s that you can certainly consider it as a cap for the total year.

The capital gain that we now have in the portfolio has emerged as a significant amount. On a gross basis, we basically reached €1,900,000,000 And we always stated since our first plan in February 2018 that you have a sort of balancing effect of NII versus capital gains over time depending on the interest rate environment. So, we’re probably getting to the phase where the capital gain component of our investment portfolio returns. We will, going forward, grow to balance what we are going to lose on the NII side of the investment portfolio picture. So that’s you could probably consider 2025 as a turning year and from 2026 is probably going to be a different pattern.

And on your first question, I think I don’t have anything more to say. There is nothing in the cards at the moment. There is no further question. So thank you all for joining us today.

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