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Teresa Urquijo: Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for joining MERLIN's Full Year '25 results presentation. You can find all the materials that will be presented in today's call on our website. I will please ask you to abide by the disclaimer contained in it. Our CEO, Ismael Clemente, along with our two directors Ines Arellano and Francisco Rivas will walk you through the main highlights of 2025. We'll then open the line for Q&A [Operator Instructions]. With no further delay, I pass on the floor to Ismael.
Ismael Orrego: Thank you, Teresa. Good afternoon, everyone. We are in front of a very interesting set of results, certainly, the best I have seen since we have been leading this company. It's been almost perfect year because the fantastic performance of the data center division has been accompanied by very, very solid performance also on the traditional asset classes. And all that has been reinforced by an excellent behavior of the share. So frankly speaking, what can I say? I mean the operating momentum is super strong. We are enjoying satisfactory rental growth in all asset classes, traditional and nontraditional, because in data centers, we are also achieving better rents than underwritten. We have a high occupancy, 95.6%, and continue solidly generating FFO with a plus 5.1% print in the year. In offices, we have a very remarkable like-for-like of 3.5%. But more importantly, an interesting release spread of 4.8%, which is probably the reflection of what we commented in past calls that the Madrid market particularly is now under a certain like short squeeze. I mean, there is distraction on the offer side, which is causing, of course, an effect on the pricing of the demand. The occupancy stays at all-times high, 94.2%, and this is particularly noteworthy in a year in which Barcelona has been a relatively softer market than it was in the past, and has lost occupancy. So Madrid has been able to compensate Barcelona, which will continue for the coming years to be one of our weak spots that we will continue working because sooner or later, the market will digest the current situation of oversupply and will come back to normality. In logistics, we have been positively surprised by the release spread, particularly because, as commented on a number of past calls, this is a market where we were seeing a little bit of less strength than we have been seeing in the past years. But this year has been extremely strong, particularly on the release spread. The reason why the like-for-like is low is simply because we have lost 3 points of occupancy, which is normal, because we were occupied at 99%. And we told you that there was only one way to go from there, which was down. And -- but we ended the year with a very good printing occupancy of 96.4%. Shopping centers, another super strong year, surprising us on the upside with a very good like-for-like of 4.7% and still with very affordable rental levels for our clients at 11.0% in occupancy cost ratio. So very, very strong year in shopping centers. On data centers, well, basically, we have achieved a full derisking of Phase 1. So Phase 1 is now water under the bridge. I mean, we will report it as assets in operation from now on in order to try also to simplify your lives, because if we continue reporting Phase 1, Phase 2 and soon Phase 3 is going to be -- is going to be a rubik cube. So that will convert into assets in operation with an occupancy of 100%. We have also achieved a very interesting derisking of Phase 2 with the lease-up of our Arasur 2 asset 48 megawatts, which is around 20% of the total capacity of Phase 2, but more importantly, it was the next Indian trying to attack the fort. I mean it was ready for service December 2026. And as such, now is done. The next ready for services are end of '27. So we have now plenty of time to work on those -- on the leads in which we are already working and starting exchanging technical documentation, and then we will need to come to terms in the economic side of the business and then move into documentation, which, in some cases, particularly with hyperscalers, can be a painful process. In terms of financial performance, the value uplift has been very strong, but this has been mainly boosted by data centers who have contributed close to EUR 360 million increase to the total revaluation of the portfolio. 4.7% GAV increase in the year. The total shareholder return, 10.2% is fantastic. But more importantly, we believe it's relatively sustainable, because we know what is coming, and we think unless the world goes upside down, which is another possibility, if 2026 is a relatively simply flat year in terms of performance of traditional asset classes, we believe we can achieve very similar figures at the end of December. Our financial situation remains very strong. The loan-to-value is low at 28.9%, 100% fixed rate. And we don't have maturities till November 2026, maturity which is already tackled. I mean with the existing cash at banks and a number of bond taps and bank lines that we are signing in the coming days, that maturity will be already tackled without affecting the CapEx needs of the data center department. And we have been able to maintain our rating, both with S&P and Moody's, which is always interesting because at the end, that cost is one of our raw materials. And we need to continue keeping our competitiveness in terms of rating. In terms of value creation, EUR 129 million in noncore divestments, as already disclosed to market, you were perfectly aware that we had this almost done. And then probably the most interesting thing is that we have another close to EUR 130 million already signed and to be executed in '26 and '27, which is very interesting because basically almost half of our targets for '26 and '27 are already covered in the absence of any accidents. It's important to pay homage to the activity of our different business divisions. The year has been excellent in terms of pre-lets. In offices, we have signed more than 56,000 square meters beyond the daily trading, I mean, the ins and outs that happen every day in the portfolio. In logistics, 73,000 plus and Head of Terms, which we believe is going to become a reality of another 55,000. So significant progress also in logistics. And in shopping centers, to me, the most salient activity in the year has been the inauguration with an almost full pre-let of the Marineda extension, 26,000 square meters, which has made the Marineda concept in La Coruna even more dominant than ever. I mean it's a center, which is really rock solid and is one of the jewels in our little crown. And in data centers, well, we are now at 112 megawatts IT versus 45 latest reporting. And therefore, when 66 new megawatts have been lit and the prospects for the derisking of the rest of the Phase 2 remain brilliant. So in terms of main financial magnitudes, the GRI print was EUR 541.9 million, plus 3.5% like-for-like in the year. The FFO, what we broke our own record is better than the one of year 2019, EUR 326.7 million plus 5.1% year-on-year. But it is important to note that in 2019, we had EUR 84 million of BBVA rents in our belly. So with a little bit of help from data centers, around EUR 30 million, we have been able to overcome the sale of the BBVA portfolio, which, with hindsight, I believe, was an excellent decision because we delevered the company in anticipation of high interest rate cycle. And that gave us also a sufficient financial muscle to be able to develop Phase 1 of our data center deployment program, which was absolutely necessary because have we tapped the market to develop data centers starting from scratch and the market will have been a little bit incredulous about our capacity to do. So we had to do it with our own money, and BBVA was instrumental for that. The EUR 0.58 achieved are plus 7% versus the initial guidance, although we updated to EUR 0.56 in -- I think it was in 3Q, we updated to EUR 0.56. In reality, we expected EUR 0.56, but in dataset, we have had little income from -- particularly from better margin in our data center operation and well, some income also from NRCs from the installation of machinery on behalf of our clients through remote hands agreements in our data center division. The LTV stands at 28.9%, which is pretty low, but more interestingly, net debt-to-EBITDA stands at 9.0x. Of course, it is growing, but it is growing as we are spending in the construction of new units in our Data Center division. The NTA per share is EUR 15.36. And for the first time, we are very, very close in our share price to our NTA, which is incredible to see. I mean, I'm really, really enjoying to see that when I shut on my computer, and I see the share price evolution, I am really humbled. The GAV like-for-like has gone up by 4.7%. But very importantly, with an EPRA net income yield of 4.6%, which is sound, because these days, improving NTA or improving GAV through asset revaluations is easy, but we have taken exactly the contrary way. I mean we have completely recalculated our prospects for particularly logistic pre-lets and part of the logistics division and we have decided to expand a little bit our yields in order to make sure that we repair the roof now that the sun is shining rather than doing it when the things start to get rough. TSR, as commented, and leads us to propose dividend per share of EUR 0.44 for the year, which is slightly above the 80% threshold, but I think we have to share a little bit with our shareholders the good operating momentum of the company. In terms of EPS, we have, after careful reflection for the moment, we have taken the decision to continue to not capitalize interest expenses. We believe it is cleaner. We believe it reflects better the real operation of the company. And therefore, as a consequence of that, we are indicating for 2026, a relatively flat figure in terms of EPS and DPS. But we will, of course, endeavor to bid it if we can. It won't be easy because it is mainly attributable -- the reason why it's flat is mainly attributable to the fact that all the growth in top line is absorbed by more financial expenses as we continue basically building. We continue building our inventory. And as a consequence, we continue employing our debt capacity. And this is, of course, raising the bar of our financial expenses. And for the moment, it is hitting in our top line growth. 2027 will be a different thing. I mean, in 2027, will be a year in which we will start seeing the first hints of what the DC division will bring in the future to this company and '28, '29 and '30 as commented on many other occasions, at least on the model, of course, you never know, but they look like a big party. That is it. I mean I pass the floor to Ines Arellano who is going to comment on the different asset classes and Francisco Rivas will comment specifically on the Data Center Division.
Inés Arellano: Thank you, Ismael. So moving to what today represent 55% of our portfolio, offices. We've generated EUR 292 million of rents, and that is a 3.5% increase in like-for-like as commented by Ismael, very, very sound, with a very high release spread up 4.8%. It is true that if we were to take into account this one lease that we mentioned last year, it would have been 0.4%, but at least it's in the positive arena. The occupancy at 94.2% all-time high. Again, we'll watch very carefully how the evolution in Barcelona keeps ongoing, but we are confident that eventually this will be digested. It's been a very healthy leasing activity market with more than 275,000 square meters contracted. And in terms of valuation, we see a 1.2% like-for-like increase with an implied gross yield of 4.9%, not reaching 5 yet, which as you know, it's always been the number that we thought should be the right one for office.
Ismael Orrego: 5.25%.
Inés Arellano: Okay. And a net initial yield of 4.2%, and this implies a 2 basis points yield expansion. And as said, the little momentum continues, as demonstrated in Slide 8 with five very good examples of standout leasing deals spread across not just CBD, but also key peripheral corridors, and they all have secured very high-profile tenants. You have three assets here that are still in the work-in-progress portfolio, meaning these are not in operations yet. But you also have two like Castellana 278 and Las Tablas where we've secured very high tenants, very high-quality tenants like a university and a bank. Moving to Slide 9. We continue, again, to see a strong trend of reconversions. And we wanted to lay down what is the current stock of Madrid. You see a little bit of everything. So this number may seem a little bit big to you, depending on the source that you used to consider. We've taken the Belbex number -- this is not only made by pure office buildings. It's also taking into account the offices associated to industrial users, some residential buildings that are being used as offices as well and also administrative buildings. What we see is that there's more than 1 million square meters expected to go back to their original residential use, because right now, as we stand, the highest and best use for a lot of these space is actually beds, beds, because this is both living, resi, hotels. And there is an additional 1.5 million square meters that could be reconverted again to these other uses out of the pure office building. What are we doing? We have identified 7% of our stock in Madrid office, okay, not the whole stock, but just in Madrid whereby this doesn't mean that we're going to be selling the whole 7%. But we've identified 33,000 square meters that will be sold so that somebody else reconvert it plus another 27,000 square meters that we are going to suddenly refurbish or reconvert them for educational uses. Moving to Slide 10. What we see is that -- well, we still believe that unique assets deserve to remain as offices. And this is a perfect example, Alfonso XI. There's a clear scarcity of good space, 10,000 square meter size buildings in prime CBD, and we are fortunate of having owning these unique assets, is right in the middle of Madrid, and we know that there are best-in-class tenants looking for space like this one. So we are going to refurbish this asset. We are actually refurbishing this asset, and the expected yield on CapEx will be around 9.6%. So there's another example in Page 11. Again, super prime office building, Liberdade. As you know, this one we bought it on purpose to be converted into what it will soon be probably the best office building in the Lisbon market. And as of today, even if we have not started commercialization, we have fully let to a top luxury group, all the retail, the high street retail space. Then we have Adequa. This is to show you that there's no only demand for pure prime CBD assets. Adequa is one of those examples where a tenant of ours that was willing to expand to grow in a campus, very, very close to Castellana has actually signed an agreement with us, a turnkey project. And so again, the yield on CapEx around this one is around 10%, 10.4%. And we will soon in '28 and '30, we will have these two buildings built up and completing what today is Campus Adequa. And then finally, this is a jewel. This is a very small building, but a true jewel. and it's going to be even more valuable once Renazca project gets executed. As you know, it has been approved. And once it is executed, we know very well that a lot of tenants will be willing to pay very high rent for these unique assets, which for those who have visited Plaza Ruiz Picasso building is just next to it, you can actually monitor the works from that one. Moving to logistics in Slide 15. GRI like-for-like has been positive despite the loss of a tenant in 48,000 square meter warehouse in [indiscernible] that had an impact of 3% in occupancy. The sound 5.8% Release Spread, together with an average CPI of around 2.5%, has helped to increase rents by 2.5 reaching EUR 86 million. Gross yield at 5.7%, slightly higher than the average yield of the portfolio 5.3%, and net initial yield at 5. The leasing activity has been strong with more than 440,000 square meters contracted compared to only 100,000 square meters in '24, while valuation uplift has been moderate being only 1.2% on a like-for-like basis. This has been mainly driven by the increase in CapEx. Certainly more on future development, but a little bit as well on existing assets due to, for example, fire safety measures. In '25, we finished construction and delivered 21,000 square meters fully led to [indiscernible]. And we've also sold 73,000 square meters warehouse that was under refurbishment in Vitoria and have added a couple of projects to the committed pipeline, now amounting to 279,000 square meters. Yield on CapEx for all these projects remain quite appealing at 13.2%. The noncommitted land bank has therefore reduced by 61,000 square meters outstanding at 183,000 square meters located mainly in Madrid and Barcelona. If we move to shopping centers, well, this has been said already by Ismael. it's great performance in every KPI that you can look at, the GRI of EUR 133 million, it's an uplift of 4.7% like-for-like. It's a great combination of a very high Release Spread plus CPI. In terms of valuation, this EUR 2.1 billion portfolio has gone up by 2.9% with an implied gross yield of 6.4 and net initial yield of 5.7. And this portfolio, shopping center portfolio is shifting to adapt to market trends and customer needs, and we are seeing retailers demanding new formats, so fewer, but bigger and certainly better located. The synergies with logistics, they continue to be a reality, and this is value also for the largest storage spaces that they required and experience of our customers keep on being the main and main focus of everything that we do. And in Slide 21, you have a few examples of new retailers leasing space in our assets, mainly focused on health and beauty and leisure/home entertainment. And with no further delay, I pass the floor to Francisco who will explain where the future is coming from, the data centers.
Francisco Gonzalez: Many thanks, Ines. Moving into the Data Center section, I would like to start by congratulating, Ismael did, our data center team and the vision for a fantastic 2025 year, which had a very strong workload and proved the excellent execution. Part of this effort, as you have seen, has been crystallized at the beginning of this year, 2026, with the signing of very significant contracts across our assets. Turning now to the presentation on Page 24, we provide as always an overview of the two phases under operation and/or construction with updated figures. On the one hand, we present the results of Phase 1, which we will now refer as Ismael said, as assets in operation, where the 64 meg have been fully contracted. The originally 14.5% gross yield on cost shared with you 12 months ago has now increased to 15.8% with a stabilized GRI of EUR 97 million above the previous EUR 88 million reported 12 months ago. Regarding Phase 2, which we will refer as work in progress WIP, we have been able to redensify the first two buildings in Lisbon moving from 36 meg to now 40 meg increasing the total size of Phase 2 from 246 meg to 254 meg as you have here in the presentation. And this has led as well to an update of both the total investment amount and expected stabilized GRI now at EUR 397 million, delivering a very attractive 14.4% gross yield on cost. And in terms of commercialization, moving now to Page 25, we have successfully completed the letting of the three assets of this Phase I, following the signing of an 18-meg contract with a very well-known new cloud operating [indiscernible] and first time in our portfolio reaching the full occupancy of our assets in operation. And for those of you who are more curious about the technical aspects, 34 meg out of the 64 are air cooled while 30 meg are liquid cool. And by the type of specification we have it means that these 30 meg liquid cool are targeting above 70 KV per rack. On our experience right now, they are more in the 120 KV per rack, which shows that the type of technology they are using is the last of one of [ NVIDIA ]. On Page 26, we show how the rental income will ramp up on a yearly basis with EUR 31 million already received in terms of rents in 2025 and a forecast of EUR 66 million for 2026, resulting in a stabilized GRI as we mentioned before, of EUR 97 million in 2027. From a value creation perspective, Page 27 shows the breakdown of total costs incurred. The valuation already captured, although it's a little bit more limited in [indiscernible] in the signing of this new contract that the appraisal was not aware of and the expected additional value to be accrued if the value assumptions remain unchanged as we are disclosing in the footnote. So this EUR 291 million estimated value, we expect to be captured in the next valuations if those are retained. Moving to Phase 2. On Page 28, we include a brief reminder of the commercialization status of our data center assets that we divided, as you know, in bookings, advanced negotiations and let or prelet. And with this in mind, in Page 29, we summarize the status of the different projects of Phase 2 with now a total capacity of 254 meg IT. Going one by one, in Bilbao 2, what we call ARA II, the construction is progressing on schedule. After 14 months of execution, we have gained sufficient certainty to enter into prelet agreement as the ready-for-service dates that we show in the presentation, December 2026 are very, very certain. This is a highly complex deployment because we will coexist the deployment of the equipment that we have as landlords, but also the client equipment, which are largely based on a liquid cooling solution. The kind is -- was already in our portfolio is very well, no new cloud operator focused on AI and the level of densities that the client is requesting allows us to know that they are using a state-of-the-art technology, as all of you know. The connection to the substation of this building 2 has been already completed with our first building, what we call ARA III and right now, we are just progressing with cabling of that -- of those that were created for our first asset there. Regarding Bilbao ARA I, as we will show in the following slides, the construction has started at the end of last year, beginning with piling works, and we have maintained our estimated ready for service by the end of 2027. Moving now to the center part of the page, in Lisbon Compos. At the end of 2025, we started the construction of the first two buildings following, believe it or not, 1.5 years of piling works. And please consider the Lisbon region is both flood-prone, as unfortunately, we have experienced some few weeks ago, but also is located in a seismic zone and which has required a significant soil preparation, reason why of this 1.5 years of previous works. And as an example, the piling works have reached approximately 35 meters in depth, just to avoid situations as recommended. And thanks to this preparation, none of the works were affected by the heavy rains experienced in the region earlier this month. From a construction point of view, we have once again redensified the buildings, increasing capacity to 40 mg per building IP, benefiting from the insights gained from client discussions that we have held over the last months. In parallel, substation works have also started with a ready for service in all these first two buildings by December 2027. In terms of leasing, we are in very good progress regarding the initiative that we will comment on the following slides, while keeping the buildings ready for the latest computing technologies in case the first option does not ultimately materialize. Moving into the 2 Madrid projects. In [indiscernible] approval, what we call [Foreign Language] in Spain of the land, and we are in the final stage of securing the organization permits to begin on-site works, which will run simultaneously with the building construction. The ready-for-service is currently planned for the first half of 2029. Regarding [indiscernible] located, as you know, on the same street as [indiscernible] we obtained environmental assessment approval at the end of last year and right after demolition works are started and are going and the construction permit has been already requested just to make sure that when we finalize the demolition works, we can immediately start. Given the previous timing experiences, we are still maintaining ready- for-service in the second half of 2029 although knowing that we have already power on site what in our naming we call power ready supplied, we have already entered in negotiations with several clients interested in this site precisely for the reason that power is already there. Regarding CapEx commitment planning for Phase II and now I'm moving into Page 30. 2025 has been a record year for the company in terms of CapEx commitments. And this is significant because you need to know that a significant portion of this CapEx relates to equipment, which typically has shorter execution timelines once we commission it on site. Commitments have reached EUR 987 million versus the previously reported EUR 836 million, but also the next two years looks very strong in terms of CapEx commitments. So in the absence of any capital event, the company expects to tap the debt market, as Ismael was mentioning before, again, mainly during the second half of the year, once the equity that we raised in 2024 is fully deployed and at work. The target stabilized GRI is planned for 2030 as mentioned in the last quarter presentation, at EUR 387 million, delivering a 14.4% stabilized gross yield on cost. All these figures are reflected in Page 31, 32 and 33, which includes images showing construction progress in both Bilbao, Arasur and Lisbon campuses. And for those attending to our Capital Markets Day in the 9th and 10th of March, you will have the opportunity to see these projects at a human scale, which I think I can tell you that is pretty impressive. Finally, on Page 34, we would like to share the status of our EU Gigafactory initiative. As previously mentioned in the last year call, timelines of this initiative have experienced significant delays and based upon our latest information, the work resolution is now expected before year-end 2026. As we have stated several times, our Phase 2 projects were not conditional upon obtaining the EU Gigafactory award. In fact, this initiative was not even under consideration when we launched Phase 2 and we have always maintained discussions with traditional clients, both hyperscalers and new class operators in line with our original business plan. Nevertheless, as we always say, we've tried to be constructive shareholders -- stakeholders and good citizens, and we remain prepared for initiatives that could benefit the regions where we operate, particularly the Iberian Peninsula and we strong believe we continue believing that bringing the EU Gigafactory status to our region will create a lot of value, whether we are -- whether or not we are directly involved. As you may recall, we have set most of our capacity in Arasur, Capacity 1, and the full capacity of [indiscernible] for this initiative in Spain and the first two buildings for our Lisbon campuses of the Portuguese initiative. And we were always betting an Iberian consortium, so both Spain and Portugal, something that looks like were well received because most of the countries are doing exactly the same in other parts of Europe and offering several locations per country to allow synchronized computing and across the campuses. Situation as of today is that the Spanish government has shown a preference for another Spanish project. And thereby, they have released the capacity that we have reserved for that initiative in ARA II and [indiscernible] I, which, as you have seen, are both now fully let as following the -- what we have always commented to have one option and the other. With regards to ARA I, we are in advance negotiation with a particular client, and those negotiations, of course, will be more intensified and documented once the ready-for-service dates are becoming more and more and more closer. Regarding our Lisbon Campos, we remain committed to this EU initiative, which is now why we are moving forward with the first two buildings in connection with the Portuguese proposal. And once again, as we approach ready-for-service dates, the number of clients inquiring about availability continues to grow. For this reason, we will welcome clarity from the EU in terms of the timing because as soon as we are approaching and approaching delivery times, normally more clients are interested and we would want to have to take a decision there. And now Ismael will close this presentation with the closing remarks and outlook before we enter into Q&A.
Ismael Orrego: Okay. Francisco, thank you. Well, on Page 36, closing remarks and outlook. Everything which is written here is pretty evident. So I'm not going to torture you with any more bulls***. The only thing that I will say is that the idea is to move in terms of lets and pre-lets from the current 112 to as close as possible to 100 megawatts in data centers. And this could be achieved through one of several combinations of facts. I mean, more normally, it will be through the documentation of the Lisbon lease which could come in the form of formalization of the EU Gigafactory program or otherwise, through an alternative route. I mean we have been lately adapting our -- the design of our campus there to the specific requirements of a certain client. You must have noticed that the total capacity has increased by 8 megawatts. Well, this came at the cost of 12 additional million in construction cost that I believe makes sense. And now the white rooms conform to the specifications of concrete SOQ of a concrete client. But more importantly, are perfectly flexible to adapt to the requirements of either other neo hyperscalers or neo cloud clients. So with that, I believe the 2026 should be the year of Lisbon. We will work -- we will endeavor to achieve that target. And that's it, dividend and FFO, we have already commented on it. And I believe the best thing we can do is move into Q&A so that you can make your questions in the line. And we will do our best to be able to reply to your questions.
Operator: [Operator Instructions] The first question comes from the line of Marios from Bernstein.
Marios Pastou: I've got a couple of questions from my side. So firstly, on the lease-up and the pre-letting of your data center pipeline. I think you mentioned that Bilbao building 2 was pre-let to existing neo cloud tenant and that Madrid say, was to a new neo cloud operator. So can you comment on the occupier type you're having discussions with across Phase 2 and whether we should anticipate a diversification of your tenant base across that phase?
Ismael Orrego: Okay. Look, Marios, basically the leasing of Bilbao 02 has been closed with an existing client of ours. The one in Madrid, however, was a different one. At present, the diversification of our tenant roster is perfectly distributable. You can imagine with only 112 megawatts let, that I will beg you all to wait till we are 1 gigawatt in operation in order to calculate the real diversification of our portfolio, because have you calculated our diversification in logistics in 2014, you will have come to the -- this main conclusion that it was 72% DHL. But now no client -- individual client represents more than 10% of our rent. So we need to continue building if we want to continue leasing. What I can tell you, talking about Phase 2 and preliminary conversations for Phase 3 is that we are talking to every kind of clients you can imagine. You love hyperscalers. We are talking to all the hyperscalers except one, which is a self-builder. But the other three, we are talking to them. And we are talking to no less than 5 Tier 1 neo clouds alike. So sooner or later, we will end up closing an agreement with a big hyperscalers and you all will breathe with tranquility. But I need to remind you that closing deals with hyperscalers is not an easy thing. It comes at a cost, because they are the fastest cowboy in town. And as such, they have a big pistol. And you have to be very, very careful because that pistol can kill you. So it's big organizations, complicated organizations, you can engage in very fruitful and healthy conversations with the infrastructure guys, with the cable guys, with the first-line guys, but when you move into middle office and back office, it can be complicated. And at times, it is as frustrating as reaching contractual status and then stopping conversations because the conditions can turn abusive very quickly. So we will end up closing deals or reaching agreements with hyperscalers, but probably already in Phase 2 and more surely in Phase 3, but you need to bear with us for a second because we also need to defend our financials, which are your financials. So let's not be childish on this, and let's not -- let's be careful about what we wish for because closing an agreement with one of these is very easy. However, the fact that this agreement is good is a very different thing, okay? So we have to continue working in that respect. What I can tell you is that we are now technically qualified with 3 out of the 4 hyperscalers, so at least we know that our facilities conform to their technical specifications. And sooner or later, we will end up closing.
Operator: The next question comes from the line of [ Veronique from Kampen ].
Unknown Analyst: Maybe first on just the other business lines. I was hoping could you give some additional color on what you expect in terms of occupancy rate, any big departure planned in '26, especially for offices and logistics? So your view towards '26 for those business lines?
Ismael Orrego: Okay. Well, in offices, the idea is to remain relatively flat. So we have finished this year at 94.2%. The idea is to finish this year between 93% and 94%, which is already a significant effort because you have to take into account that in April, we are losing 11,000 square meters from Meta in Barcelona in the middle of '22 at. Yes, in a building, which is a winner, clearly winner in the market, but replacing 11,000 square meters in today's market in Barcelona is not an easy task. So we have to be prudent, taking into account the situation of the market there. In logistics, our idea is to improve a little bit the occupancy or compared to the 96.4% we have. It's quite binary because it depends a lot on whether we are able to lease one big shed in the Henares corridor or not. If we lease it up, then it's going to be very close to 100% again. But let's not plan for that, at least for the moment, we will inform in due time. And then in shopping centers, we are going to remain relatively flat, because it's almost impossible to go higher. I mean, yes, I mean, you can go 20 basis points higher or that it is complicated to go significantly higher. In shopping centers, in fact, what we are trying to do now is to yield manage a little bit our portfolio, because we are the cheapest shopping center owner in Iberia in terms of OCR. And that is always a very interesting position to start from, and we will yield manage a little bit our shopping centers, although the behavior is impeccable for the moment.
Unknown Analyst: Okay. That's clear. And then one question around data centers. So your gross yield on costs went up again. And you also mentioned that the margins actually were better than expected, but I see that's a number that you haven't changed in the slides. So could you give some color on the movements on those numbers and why you still report a 70% margin if it was actually better so far?
Inés Arellano: Because Veronique, this is Ines. What has been better is the today's margin. While we are on ramp-up, we do not achieve the 70%. So 70% margin is on stabilization. And so we were expecting lower than what we have achieved margin during the ramp-up. 70% remains as the stabilization margin.
Ismael Orrego: Okay. And regarding the growth yield on cost, it is simply a reflection of the fact that the market is helping us. I mean, yes, of course, I mean, there are -- the teams are doing a fantastic job, but we are operating in a market which is quite favorable at present. So this is why we are improving -- if you look at our forecast in data centers, both in terms of cost per megawatt and delivery times, we have been absolutely bang on compared to the numbers we gave you. So our construction cost has been exactly the one we forecasted. Even though you might notice that in Phase 2 is higher than in Phase 1, the only reason is that in Phase 2, we had to buy 2 of the 6 plots of our data centers. And also Phase 2 is fully liquid, while in Phase 1, we had some air, okay? So that is the reason why we have a higher cost. Also Lisbon, as commented by Frank, is a slightly more costly construction to make because of the strict seismic regulations similar to Japan or California. We expect -- I mean, the -- we have already raised by 20 basis points the expected yield on cost on Phase 2. let's see how the leases come up. We might be able to bid it or not. I mean, that we better say than sorry. I mean we prefer to underestimate a little bit rather than being absolutely bullish, particularly when there is so much to be done before inaugurating those assets. I mean the RFSs other than Bilbao, Arasur 2 are expected for the end of '27. And between now and the end of '27, there is a lot to see. So let's continue -- let's remain prudent.
Unknown Analyst: Okay. Clear. Sorry, one small follow-up on Lisbon. I just wanted to double check. It says now advanced negotiations on the slide for the Lisbon asset. Is that referring to the EU effect? Or is that concerning something a different tenant?
Ismael Orrego: That one is concerning the EU Gigafactory. Then with different tenants, it cannot be -- it is not advanced negotiations. It's simply leads, bookings. The Portuguese government is conscious of that. They are honest people, and they are also trying to find a way to firm up part of the commitment rather than leave everything conditional upon obtaining the EU program. They are looking at ways to firm up part of their commitment so that we can close an agreement and we don't need to go through an alternative route.
Operator: So the next question comes from the line of Florent Laroche from ODDO.
Florent Laroche-Joubert: So actually, I would have just one question on data centers. So we can see that -- so you have made a lot of progress on Phase II. So congratulations, but we can see that you have also a lot of work to do before completing Phase II. Why is it today the right timing to present us the Phase III in 2 or 3 weeks? And why it is the right timing maybe to start to launch this Phase III in terms of risk?
Ismael Orrego: Well, the reason is twofold. On one side, we have a number of internal definitions, and we report as we reach the milestones of those specific definitions. But in my mind, I see Phase 2 significantly derisked. Let's leave it that way. Second, power land is a scarce asset in Europe. I mean everyone is dying to get powered land. We are lucky enough to have a lot of power land in our ownership, because we started asking for power in 2021 and '22 when nobody else was asking for that. So I think it is in the best interest of all of our shareholders that we make full use of that powered land. And then the future only God knows, but at least make use of everything we currently have because we continue enjoying very interesting yields on cost. And what is more important, we continue commercializing in clear market. At the beginning, when we explained this new venture of data centers to all of you, our prediction is that we will commercialize maybe Phase 1 in clear market, there will be no competition. But certainly, we were expecting competition for Phase 2. The truth is that the market is full of noise, full of bull****, but in reality, very few people are really building or building to the exact specifications of AI, and therefore, very few can really meet the requirements of AI clients. And to our surprise, we are commercializing Phase 2 almost on a clear market basis. The next reasoning is that if we go fast with Phase 3, we could achieve a very similar result. So basically, I believe it will be extremely unfair to our shareholders not to move. We know it's a lot of complication. We know it's a lot of construction yards. We have recently incorporated one executive just for the control of our works. But I think the best thing we can do if we want to be responsible managers is to move on and continue developing capacity because we are in a situation in the market which is as favorable as you can probably think.
Operator: The next question comes from the line of Celine from Barclays.
Celine Huynh: I just have two questions, please. The first one is on the beat on the FFO this year. It was driven by better gross to net margin in DCs. Can you explain how you achieved that and whether we could expect the same in 2026? And secondly, it's about retail. Your name popped up in the news regarding a large Spanish shopping center portfolio. Can you provide any comments if you can? And if you can't comment, we've seen the expansion into DCs, but there wasn't much mention about retail. So can you clarify your appetite for shopping centers going forward?
Ismael Orrego: Okay. Well, starting by the easiest, which is the FFO gross to net. Well, as commented by Ines, we have basically improved compared to our projections, because we had a better margin. And talking about margin, the margin we expected for this year, that was not the stabilized margin, okay? It was not 70%. It was well below 70%. That was the margin we expected for this year that we have beaten that margin a little bit because we have been able to operate more efficiently our data centers. And then we have, as commented before, we have also benefited from a number of little tweaks and things that we have been doing on behalf of our clients. Many of our clients do not have a super big established presence in Europe. And as such, they rely on our own engineers in order to install equipment or make offices fit-outs, do improvements to their equipment once installed. I mean we are helping them to do that, and they are paying us for that service. And as a consequence, we have improved a little bit the gross to net margin in our data centers, but not to a point in which we are in a position to reforecast the 70% stabilized, which we are -- we will very soon reach. But we cannot reforecast that because, first, 70% is already a very good gross to net margin, particularly compared to what our peers in the U.S. are getting. And second, because we still do not have all the information in order to be able to reforecast that. And then retail...
Inés Arellano: Celine, just to be clear, can you please repeat the question that you made?
Celine Huynh: There was just a news that you were about to bid on a Spanish portfolio, retail portfolio. So could you comment on that?
Ismael Orrego: Well, basically, we are very happy with the performance of our retail. We have in a number of occasions commented with you that being a listed company, sometimes you cannot be too contrarian to the market because if we had, we would have loved to bid for 1 or 2 assets in the past 3, 4 years, but we have been being -- we would have been slaughtered in a public place, I mean had we done it. So now there is a retail portfolio available in the market that we have analyzed in depth in a number of occasions already. It was very difficult to reach an agreement with the sellers because it was a relatively convoluted situation. But now it's out there. What I can tell you is that the assets are high quality. They will make a perfect fit with ours. But I can also tell you that this will be a capital recycling exercise. So if you are afraid about us using one penny out of our data center spending capacity, this is not the case. I mean if we are to bid for this portfolio, which we will only do if we can achieve a positive capital recycling figure, I mean if the capital recycling disappears, we will not bid. And we are not going to participate in an investment banking auction. So we will do our best. We have a number of pros and cons. Our main con is that, of course, we don't control the French connection. Our main pro is that the Spanish staff, we know them very well. They are colleagues in the market and they will be probably very happy to join the family. So we will see what comes out of that process. But if one day, we end up bidding for that and we are successful, what I can assure you is that we will rotate internal capital, try to sharpen the pencil a little bit in terms of ROA, I mean, try to obtain a positive print, positive arbitrage in ROA and make sure that the data center effort is not even disturbed by this acquisition. Remember, there is a big hype in the market about resi transformation, et cetera. We have a number of levers that we could action in order to make sure that we can rotate capital in an efficient way, okay?
Celine Huynh: Okay. Ismael, just to be sure, we're talking about a portfolio that is worth more than EUR 1 billion, right? So you would have to sell more than EUR 1 billion. Is that correct?
Ismael Orrego: Yes. That is...
Celine Huynh: Okay, that is a big amount.
Ismael Orrego: Yes.
Operator: The next question comes from the line of Fernando Abril from Alantra.
Fernando Abril-Martorell: I have 3, please. First on the recent [indiscernible] rent. So it was clearly above your expectations. I think correct me if I'm wrong, but it was around EUR 140,000 more or less per megawatt month. So I know it is Madrid, but how should we interpret your embedded 130 assumption for the entire Phase 2 because it seems a bit prudent probably to me. Also on the contract terms of the Bilbao 2 and Hefata, I don't know if there were any material changes to duration or escalator structures compared to previous agreements. And then last, you know that the Spanish grid operator, and also several Spanish utilities have recently announced increased CapEx plans for the power network. So I would like to know your view on this and whether you believe or not that these investment plans will meaningfully alleviate grid congestion and improve the power availability in Spain or not?
Ismael Orrego: Thank you, Fernando. Well, first, on the price of Hefata 2, we are not going to be very specific because it's our client, and of course, the terms of engagement of our contracts have to remain secret. But it is true that in the global underwriting of Phase 2, we were relatively conservative at 118.5% on average, and we are beating those figures. But it's always good to remain prudent because there could be deviations in course. There could be many things, equipment that could vary. So we have to be -- we have to remain prudent, but it's true that in that particular contract, it's been better than expected. And then in terms of contract, basically the same that we have been doing up to now in the region of 10 years and with fixed escalators, which are now slightly higher because the 10-year inflation swap is also higher. So we are happy with the contract to all terms. Remember that one of the reasons among many that why we moved into data centers is because they were able to improve our WAULT once we sold the 3 portfolio. That, of course, was a secret weapon. I mean it was clearly improving our average WAULT across the portfolio. One of the reasons why we moved into data centers was because the WAULT were pretty attractive. They remain so. And in fact, not only that remain, so the clients are now wanting longer terms if they can, in exchange for rent because they are trying to lock up IT capacity in a market which is starved of IT capacity. There is very few, very few places where you can land 20, 30 megawatts of AI capable equipment. It's -- there are not so many places in the world. Colocation is a different thing. But AI is very special, and there are not so many places in the world where you can do it. And one thing also that the clients like a lot and why they are ready to compromise for longer terms is expansion capacity. I think it was a good vision in our side to bet from the very beginning on super large plots with a lot of energy in which we could grow with the client doing one building, another building, a third building and a fourth building. That has been probably a very good decision and clients like it because once they send their experts, their engineers to a certain location, they achieve significant synergies if they can operate a more significant capacity than simply just one data center and move to another place within the country. So this is the situation. And regarding [indiscernible] and the increased CapEx, it's a much welcome piece of news. Of course, our stance with the regulator has always been that they need to improve the grid. The Spanish grid is, believe it or not, because all of you are affected by the 28th of April blackout last year, but that was a different thing and happened for different reasons. That the Spanish grid is super high quality. It is very well designed, very well duplicated and wet and is very robust. Of course, it will need investment in order to adapt to the new demand because at present, we are coming from a world in which the consumption was going down year after year because many households were incorporating self-generation. And as such, the consumption was going down and down and down. But we are in front of an era in which consumption contrary to some of the official estimates that were made a long time ago and probably wrong with the new circumstances, consumption will go up and will go up very significantly, if only because of the effect of the data center industry. As a consequence, the country has to make an effort in terms of bringing together generation and consumption. So that means investing in distribution and transport. And any news in that respect are very much welcome. The alternative is to allow and probably could be a very interesting complement, the alternative will be to allow private grids. But that is always complicated in Europe. As you know, it's the world -- the word private is not very much allowed in Europe. And private grids are only a reality for very small distances. I mean when you are bringing a certain generation mainly from renewable sources into a certain point that bigger grids are not that common in Europe. So very happy to see that they are starting to move. The only problem is the speed of movement, which, as you know, is a problem always with the public sector. For the moment, the only entry door we have found to the grid is through agreements with renewable producers. And this is what we are doing. I mean we are engaged in a number of negotiations with a number of renewable generators and you will be keeping abreast of our evolution over the coming months/years because it is the only practical way to access the grid as of today. I mean one day, there will be a bigger grid and electricity eventually will be widely available. But if you want to continue honoring your demand request from your clients, the only way is through agreements with renewable generators.
Operator: The next question comes from the line of Stephanie Dossmann from Jefferies.
Stephanie Dossmann: I would have two questions. The first one regarding data centers and the appraisal values. I understand that appraisers recognize the value creation closer to the time of the lease signing. But could you say how much of Phase 2 is currently factored into the appraisal values?
Francisco Gonzalez: So what the appraisers are doing is they're just incorporating into their valuation the assets that are under construction. So once we start construction, then those assets come into the perimeter. You have seen June 2025 that we have incorporated several assets, mainly ARA II and Lisbon 1 because they have already started construction. And then in December 2025, we have incorporated -- we started construction as disclosed before in ARA I and Lisbon 2, which means that the appraisal takes that into the appraisal. The rest of the power land that we have is not being -- so it's hold at cost. And only when we start construction, then is when we -- when the appraisal enters into that valuation. From a valuation point of view, then you need to differentiate between the assets which are under operation and the assets that are considered as WIP. In the cases of assets in operation is exactly what like an office building or shopping center or logistics that we have. So they do normally a DSF of 10 years. And that's the reason why they arrive at this value. And regarding WIP, as you may remember in logistics, appraisers tend to wait until the very last moment when the asset is completed and you have a tenant to reappraise the asset and then we're holding at cost the different development. But also, you need to be aware that those type of exercises normally were carried out over a period of between 9 months and 15 months only because the construction of logistics is much, much quicker. In the case of a data center, it's different. First one is, first, the land that you hold at cost already just because you are starting a construction there. It means that this power land all of a sudden becomes more -- becomes a reality first. And second, you are incurring a lot of cost and approaching pre-lets over the period of the 2 years that normally 2.5 years that takes us to build this type of assets. So I would say that the value is little by little absorbed until delivery times. Of course, the fact that we have pre-lets or not pre-lets of course, give more certainty to the projects, but this is how they are normally approaching it.
Inés Arellano: Stephanie, just to add to what Francisco commented, it is very important for you to know that the 4 land plots that are -- that have been included in the scope of work for the appraisers, they were on land that belong to us. So just by putting the market value, which is powered land and not raw land, they were sitting in our balance sheet at almost nothing, just by consider them as powered land that it's a significant uplift on a relative basis, of course, right? So Phase 2, as Frank said, the first thing to know is or the first thing to bear in mind is how that land -- the market value of that land stands. In our case for what we had before, is certainly an uplift, not -- it is not the same for the land that we buy, of course, because that's the market value. And then as the different milestones of CapEx keep on going and as you approach the cash flow, you will get more value crystallized. But for this 4 particular projects, there's obviously been an uplift because they're sitting in our balance sheet for long at almost 0.
Stephanie Dossmann: All right. And my second question relates to more traditional business. The office market in Barcelona. You said it is softer, of course. I was wondering what you expect on the midterm. I mean I understand you expect no oversupply shortly, but will the demand be strong enough to see higher Release Spread going forward? And what's your view generally speaking on the Barcelona office market?
Ismael Orrego: Okay. Look, the Barcelona office market is in a digestion crisis. 320,000 square meters without client joined the market at the end of '24 and that hit is still being felt across the market. So this is taking a hit on the tension, the demand tension in the 22 ARA, more noticeable in occupancy than for the movement in rents but clearly noticeable. Our expectation in a normal world is that we had positive Release Spread overall in Barcelona this year, not brilliant, 1.7%, but still positive. So rents are holding for the moment. The market has corrected itself, as you can expect. So no new construction starts have happened since 2024. And in normal circumstances, unless the Afghanistan, Pakistan war expands to Iran, Israel and U.S., Russia, normally, within 18 to 24 months, Barcelona should be able to absorb the excess offer and come back to a certain normality. That would be what we would normally expect. Could be a little bit more, could be a little bit less, but Barcelona remains a strong small city, I mean, very specialized in certain submarkets within offices. A little bit of pharma, a little bit of gaming and tech. And as a consequence, we expect the city to continue performing robustly once they have been able to absorb this little blip caused by a situation of oversupply and touristification of the office development.
Operator: And the final question comes from the line of [indiscernible].
Unknown Analyst: I have a couple of questions, if I may. One is in relation to your guidance for 2026. I'm trying to understand what assumptions are going in there in terms of additional debt funding. I think you said that in the second half, you're going to raise some more debt. In terms of share count, if you assume any change in that? And also in terms of the logistics, whether you assume that, that big asset that has been vacated by the client is going to be lifted up at any point during the year. So that's my first question.
Ismael Orrego: Okay, Daniela. Look, regarding the guidance, the guidance stems out of our modeling of the year. We believe that the top line, the income could go up by around EUR 40 million easily, but it's going to be eaten by bigger financial expenses mainly. Why is that? Because there will be two events during the year. Money is fungible, so EUR 800 million will disappear when we have to repay our bond. And second, the speed at which we are spending or investing money in CapEx because of our Phase 2 deployment is significant. Already in 2025, we exceeded our original budget. I say ever, I believe the original budget was like EUR 830 million and we ended up spending like EUR 980 million. So we have spent more money in CapEx commitments, okay, in the year than -- commitment, meaning when we commission a certain equipment, we pay between 20% and 40% upfront, and then we pay the rest upon the reception of the equipment. However, that money for us becomes untouchable because we need to phase that payment if and when the equipment is received. So in our models, this is what we are seeing. Whether that could be achieved, I mean if we are quick in leasing up some logistic gaps, we should be able to improve it. They wouldn't move that much the needle because if you take into account that logistics account for around EUR 84 million of our rents and the rents expected for this year are going to be in the region of EUR 600 million, it's not going to move the needle that much. What share count considered for the guidance, same share count. And that is, of course, a very tricky question, I know, because you are already assuming that there is going to be capital issuance at some point. But this is -- I mean, we are talking apples-to-apples. The 58 is with the same share count we have at present.
Unknown Analyst: Second question, if I may. And that's on Phase 3. I wonder whether there's been any investment, even minimal infrastructure preparation in Lisbon. If I'm correct, Lisbon is Part 1 of your Phase 3. And given what you mentioned about the earthquake risk and all that kind of stuff. I wonder whether there's already been a little bit of investment in infrastructure into that and related to also Phase 3, what would be the earliest date that you would like to start ordering equipment or start properly deploying into Phase 3?
Ismael Orrego: Okay. Regarding the commissioning of equipment for Phase 3, et cetera, we will inform in detail about Phase 3 on the Capital Markets Day. But you will see what is basically the cash flow schedule in -- for Phase 3, and you will see it significantly overlaps with Phase 2. Regarding whether we have already advanced infra investments for Phase 3, yes. I mean, in Lisbon, we have been preparing the ground for plots 3, 4, 5, and we might start precharging land for plots 6 and 7. But we are talking about relatively humble investments. I mean we are not talking about significant things. Likewise, we have spent money in the licensing of a number of projects, including, for example, the one in [indiscernible] where we are already requested construction license, and we have already applied for specific planning status by the autonomous region. We are building up electric capacity in anticipation of Phase 3. For example, the whole purpose of the Solaria agreement in November was that, was to illuminate plots 5 -- 4 and 5 of Arasur and some of the other agreements that we might be reaching in or have reached in as we speak, are also related one way or another to Phase 3 or pipeline. But we will inform about all that in the Capital Markets Day. The only thing that is important for you to keep in mind is that Phase 3 will be defined with everything that is being licensed and has power. So it will not include any pie in the sky or talking about things in which we could get the electricity, et cetera. We will be very specific about that on the Capital Markets Day.
Operator: Thank you very much. There are no further questions. Just a quick reminder, many of you already know, but we'll be hosting our Capital Markets Day in Bilbao the following 9th and 10th of March. It won't be broadcasted. It will be recorded and then uploaded into our website. But all of our material will be published on our website that morning, the 10th of March. So hopefully, all of you can make it so you get to enjoy a nice wine. And you know where we are in case you have any other questions and have an excellent weekend.