Compagnie de Saint Gobain SA

XMUN:GOB

Good morning. It is my pleasure today to present our first half 2026 results together with Maud Thuaudet, our Group CFO. Once again, we delivered a very strong performance in the first half.

To show our Lead & Grow plan in action, as always, I start with a few examples of Saint-Gobain solutions being used around the world in iconic residential or nonresidential buildings such as this Brazilian medical center, also this airport in Singapore, where we leveraged our waterproofing solutions to enter early in the specification stage in the project and subsequently specified 12 other Saint-Gobain solutions, both in the building and on the runways. So Lead & Grow in action very actively across the board.

Now moving to our financials. We have delivered strong operational execution in H1 2026. Organic sales growth up 0.7%, strong EBITDA margin at 15.4%, robust EUR 1.7 billion recurring net income and also strong free cash flow with a 65% conversion ratio on EBITDA.

In the first half of 2026, we have also delivered successfully on our key Lead and Grow strategic priorities. On outperformance, first, all regions have been growing strongly in the second quarter and have accelerated the rollout of their solutions in nonresidential and infrastructure markets. Altogether, the group has delivered plus 3.5% organic growth in the second quarter.

Second priority, we continue to invest in high-growth markets. Our Construction Chemicals solutions have strongly outperformed. It's a strategic priority as well, strongly outperformed with 8.5% organic sales growth in the second quarter. And 13 out of our 14 new lines and plants have been opened in H1 in North America, in Asia and emerging markets.

So a very decisive and clear capital allocation on growth markets. And finally, as you have seen, we have moved decisively on M&A with 23 acquisitions and divestments being signed or closed in the first half with around EUR 3 billion of sales rotated since the beginning of the year. That is 1/3 already 1/3 of our sales rotation target of more than 20% by 2030. So altogether, I'm very pleased with both the strong operational and the strong strategic execution of the group in the first half of 2026, which bodes well for the rest of the year and for all our Lead & Grow plan for the next 5 years. I now leave the floor to Maud, who will take us through our financial metrics.

Thank you, Benoit. Good morning, everyone. I'd like to give you the details of our financial performance for the first half 2025 -- '26. And I will start with the top line, where we achieved sales growth of 0.7% like-for-like in H1. This was driven by a robust Q2, up 3.5% like-for-like with growth in all our regions.

We saw strong growth in Asia Pacific, up 7% like-for-like, a return to growth in Europe, up 4% and positive like-for-like growth in the Americas. Prices were up 0.8% in H1, stable in Q1 and up 1.6% in Q2, thanks to the price increases and the transportation surcharges that we passed as the cost environment turned inflationary. This reflects again the value added of our solutions and the disciplined execution of our teams. As you know, the situation in the Middle East is volatile and changing day by day.

We continue to expect mid-single-digit inflation on our EUR 12 billion raw material, transportation and energy bill, but this is a moving target for 2026. Overall, we remain confident to deliver a slight positive price/cost spread for the full year. On energy specifically, I would highlight that our energy bill is below 4% of group sales, half gas, half electricity, and we are well hedged for the year and beyond for this year at 75% plus in 2026.

The exchange rate impact was minus 1.3% in H1, including around minus 6% in North America and Asia. It turned slightly positive in Q2. For the structure impact, it was minus 0.5% in the first half, reflecting our active management of the group's profile. We have announced or closed divestments and acquisitions close to EUR 3 billion year-to-date with an accretive impact on the margins of 40 to 50 basis points on a full year basis.

We are again strengthening the profile of the group, allocating capital to our investment priorities. Regarding EBITDA and margins, we delivered strong operational execution with an EBITDA margin of 15.4%. This benefited from the return to growth in Q2. Foreign exchange still had a negative impact in H1 as the regions most impacted by the depreciation versus the euro were North America and Asia and have higher margins than the group's average. Hence, there was a dilutive effect.

Depreciation increased by 3% in H1 with the recent opening of new lines and plants. Now if I move to EPS, nonoperating costs were similar in H1 2025 and we continue to expect a bit below EUR 250 million average per year. The capital gains and losses line is particularly low this half, but should improve once we close the Dahl divestment. Net financial expense was slightly down with the decrease in gross debt.

The tax rate on recurring net income was 25%. And lastly, EPS decreased 2.6% in local currencies. Let's look at cash now. We generated free cash flow of EUR 2.1 billion in H1 with a cash conversion ratio of 65% on EBITDA and 125% on recurring net income. Operating working capital was stable at 24 days sales in June 2026, a very good level.

CapEx was at a similar level to last year, and we expect it to remain around EUR 2 billion for the full year. We maintained a strong financial discipline and a strong balance sheet. The net debt ratio is 1.6x. We once again made disciplined capital allocation decisions towards value creation for shareholders with EUR 1.4 billion returned to shareholders in H1, including EUR 292 million of share buyback year-to-date, reflecting our opportunistic approach to our share buyback program and around 90% of our growth CapEx and investment in M&A were deployed in high-growth markets.

Return on capital employed over the first half reached 13.5% in local currencies, impacted in actual terms by the foreign exchange. Now let's look at the results by region, starting with Europe. Looking at Europe overall, we saw a return to growth in H1 with sales up 1.7% like-for-like. This was driven by Q2 with like-for-like growth of 4.1%, the strongest growth in the region since 2022. In terms of local dynamics, first starting with Northern Europe, we delivered 3.7% organic growth in Q2, driven by all countries with the exception of the U.K., which faced a softer market.

Elsewhere, Nordic countries grew, also benefiting from the mix improvement with high value-added solutions. Germany returned to growth, supported by good trends in insulation and light construction. And Northern Europe continued to outperform with double-digit growth in Poland and in the Czech Republic, including an additional 1 percentage point achieved, thanks to cross-selling by the teams.

Now turning to Southern Europe, Middle East and Africa, which delivered 4.5% organic growth in Q2, driven by new construction, Industrial Solutions and market outperformance. We continue to outperform in France, thanks to our large offer in terms of solutions and services. Spain and Italy grew with continued market share gains in interior solutions and construction markets. The Middle East achieved double-digit growth in Q2 with a strong performance from Turkey and all the tribute going to our exceptional teams in the region.

In terms of margins, Europe were flat over the half and the start of the year was affected by unfavorable weather conditions, but by return -- balanced by return to growth in Q2 and good pricing and cost management. Moving to the Americas. North America saw 1.2% organic growth in Q2, a strong improvement compared to Q1 with the normalization of weather conditions.

Despite new construction remaining down, volumes were driven by roofing, plasterboard, siding and construction chemicals, where we continue to outperform strongly with double-digit growth. Prices increased slightly year-on-year in Q2 and sequentially, the price increases led to more substantial improvement. Latin America decreased 1.3% like-for-like over H1 on a high comparison basis.

The region saw slight volume growth, but prices below last year given lower raw material and energy prices in H1. Prices were up in May and June, however, as the environment turned inflationary. If I look now in Brazil, new construction market is soft, but we continue to gain market share in light construction and construction chemicals. Mexico and Central America continue to benefit from the double-digit growth of Cemix. Overall, the Americas region delivered an EBITDA margin of 19.5%, stable versus H2 2025 as we expected. Turning lastly to Asia Pacific, which grew 8.4% in local currencies and 7% like-for-like in H1 with growth in all our major countries as well as in Industrial Solutions.

India once again delivered double-digit growth, volume growth and further market share gains, thanks to our complete innovative and sustainable offer. We participated to a number of infrastructure and nonresidential projects, thanks to a particularly well-fitted construction chemicals offer from FOSROC. Southeast Asia continued to show dynamic growth with double-digit growth in Vietnam, in Indonesia and the Philippines. Australia saw growth accelerate in Q2 in an improving new construction market. We are benefiting there from our specification model.

Last, in China, once again, we outperformed, continuing our growth seen in -- since H2 2025. The EBITDA margin for the region reached a record of 18.5%, supported by volume growth and good price and cost management. So to sum up, we delivered robust Q2 growth with positive like-for-like in all our regions.

Operational performance was strong with good price realization. Our priorities from here are clear: outperformance, margin, cash and disciplined capital allocation. We are fully committed to deliver value creation for our shareholders. Now Benoit, I turn it to you for the strategy.

Thank you, Maud. Let me now give you an update on our strategy. We are the only provider of comprehensive solutions, delivering both performance and sustainability across all construction markets. And this is a crucial competitive advantage and our solutions through a push and pull dynamic deliver value for Saint-Gobain with cross-selling, upselling and specified sales that increase our share of wallet, our mix and our margin. We have also broadened our addressable markets to target EUR 500 billion across residential, nonresidential and infrastructure markets. And as you know, we systematically roll out our solutions across all our geographies. So let's start with a look at Europe first. New build is improving, driven by better affordability since 2023.

We see today strong improvement in housing starts across multiple countries. We also continue to see policies that are supportive for energy-efficient renovation. And importantly, this is what you have at the bottom of the slide, Green value continues to increase, up 8 points on average, reflected in real estate overall prices. We are well positioned with our unique one-stop shop offer.

We are the partner of choice for more than 400,000 craftsmen in France with, for example, a unique customer journey dedicated to energy efficiency performance upgrades. We track our solutions on added value products, 47% of sales in Germany, on specified sales, 37% in Czech Republic, -- staying in Eastern Europe, you have seen that it's a very strong dynamic as we speak for us.

So in Eastern Europe, cross-selling gains generated approximately 1% of additional growth in the first half. In Europe, we also leveraged our full range offer to expand in nonresidential and infrastructure markets. Take schools, for instance, we know it was a very acute topic in the last weeks in France, but across Europe.

They have been severely disrupted by the successive heat waves in the recent weeks. We can decrease indoor temperatures by at least 10 degrees during a heat wave, thanks to our full range building envelope offer for summer comfort, including solar control glass, cool roof waterproofing, attics and facade insulation, distribution digital services and so on.

Once again, climate adaptation is an urgent need. The cost of inaction starts to escalate rapidly. So climate adaptation is growing in Europe and around the world. Saint-Gobain is there to deliver the best comprehensive offer. I now turn to North America, where we are the preferred partner for our customers in residential.

Our strong leadership allows us to further roll out cross-selling actions. And I can tell you that having invested more than $8 billion in the last years makes us extremely credible in the eyes of this win-win partnership with the large distributors. With our full exterior solutions, we are the best player to address the increasingly extreme weather conditions in North America. We have, for instance, a differentiated offer, including our patented integrity roof system that exceeds the Fortified standards and can reduce insurance premium by at least 22%. So a very meaningful economic impact.

As a result, we have a 7% increase in our contractor engagement program and strong brand loyalty across our multiple products. In North America, we are also expanding in nonresidential and infrastructure markets. We are well positioned to serve fast-growing segments such as hospitals, data centers and airports.

We have established strong dedicated offers, and we differentiate with highly innovative solutions, not only on building materials, but for instance, like our chip-level liquid cooling tubes for data centers, very, very close to the processing units.

As announced this week, we have also signed a framework agreement with Microsoft to help them accelerate the build-out of their data center footprint using the full set of group integrated solutions. On infrastructure, we will soon further enrich further our offer with the recently announced Xypex acquisition in Crystalline waterproofing. Let's now turn to India, Southeast Asia, where we outperformed with our solutions.

We have delivered double-digit sales growth in local currencies in the first half in those geographies. In India, first, where we have the undisputed #1 position on buildings that has been the case for several years already. We are expanding fast on infrastructure with our sales being multiplied by 4x last year, thanks to our leadership in construction chemicals that we have acquired with FOSROC delivering extremely well altogether in India.

In Southeast Asia, we have also delivered strong sales growth in H1, leveraging dedicated specification teams and catalogs on our priority end markets. Look at Australia, where we have a #1 position in interior and exterior solutions with extremely strong and iconic brands and also a very strong key account management approach across architects, builders, contractors, and we leverage all this towards the full Saint-Gobain offer accelerating in Australia and New Zealand.

In Mexico, we are also accelerating on cross-selling and specification with Cemix leading the way and continuing with a double-digit sales growth now for 18 months since the acquisition in early 2025. So I've gone through the first 2 pillars of Lead & Grow, which are the rollout of our solutions both across geographies and also end markets. Now the third pillar of our strategic plan is to continue to optimize with determination the profitable growth profile of the group, which has created over the last years, a lot of value for our shareholders and will continue. We continue to actively steer our portfolio optimization.

We have rotated around EUR 3 billion of sales since the beginning of the year, of which EUR 2.8 billion with divestments and a bit more than EUR 200 million in acquisitions. We continue to build and work on a healthy pipeline of value-creative acquisitions. And we are always very disciplined on capital allocation with the same clear priorities day in, day out. We invest on the higher growth regions in North America, Asia, emerging countries with 90% of our acquisitions and growth CapEx being invested in those regions on the first half.

And we invest on construction chemicals. This is our journey towards EUR 9 billion of sales by 2030. So it's both a very strong performance on organic growth plus acquisitions with very attractive ones in the first half, such as Xypex in North America that I already mentioned, AGC waterproofing in Japan that we have announced at the beginning of this week and also Morteros de Europa in Dominican Republic.

You know that at the core of our value creation model, we have our country platforms with experienced and empowered country CEOs compounding profitable growth. Take, for example, North America, where our teams have increased our sales by 60% since 2019. Mexico, Eastern Europe, India, Southeast Asia, where we have multiplied our turnover by 1.5 to more than 2x over the same period.

All our country CEOs, I can tell you, are committed to creating value and outperforming our market by rolling out operational excellence and the full offer, the full solutions offer towards all their end markets. In order to do that, our country CEOs, they are helped by multiple group expertise platforms. One of them is on AI. We leverage on artificial intelligence, the group scale, expertise, master data. We have been a very large organization.

We have a lot of data. This is extremely important to train the LLMs. And we are rapidly rolling out our advanced purpose-built AI solutions that create a significant competitive advantage for the group. In distribution, we are multiplying our sales opportunities with very fast automated quotes. It's a big job within the sales outlet to answer quotes for the craftsmen and the faster you answer the higher the chance for the craftsmen to win the ultimate job.

This is what we call internally our DeviGo solution, enhancing customer experience and salespeople productivity for, at the end, a larger average basket, saving time. So they have time to work on something else and follow up with customers, so increasing customer intimacy and also better mix in terms of sales.

We also rely on in-house AI tools to increase the conversion rate of our specification sales. On R&D, another example, we leverage AI to substantially increase material discovery and time to market up to 40%. And in our plants on manufacturing, we roll out tailor-made AI tools to increase efficiency. For instance, when you have a changeover from product A to product B in manufacturing, you can use AI quite a lot. And of course, we are generalizing the use of AI tools across all support functions to boost the group's efficiency. Let's now turn to our outlook for the rest of the year. You can see our expectations for each geography with overall like-for-like sales growth in the second half.

Europe growth with contrasted trends by country, Americas growth in an uncertain environment and Asia Pacific growth led notably by India and Southeast Asia. We expect an EBITDA margin of more than 15% in 2026. To conclude, we are well on track to succeed in our Lead & Grow strategy, leveraging on our 2026 momentum. Lead & Grow gives us a very powerful road map for the next 4.5 years. First, deepening and reaching our value-enhancing solutions and expanding them across nonresidential and infrastructure markets where we have a lot of market share still to gain.

We have seen the momentum in the first half already. And second, sharpening constantly the group's business profile through active and value-creative portfolio rotation. All this with ongoing excellence in execution supported by our proven operating model by country. So I'm very confident that all this will continue to deliver strong value creation for all Saint-Gobain stakeholders and that 2026 will be a good year for Saint-Gobain.

Thank you very much, and we now turn to your questions for both Maud and myself.

[Operator Instructions] There are no questions in the room. I see a lot of Saint-Gobain faces. So we will take questions from Saint-Gobain a bit later on. So let's start maybe Jean-Christophe, one question from the room.

Well, thank you. Maybe not everyone is familiar with your topic. Indeed, we have a participation, which is very interesting in Ecocem, which is very low carbon cement out of slag. And with the addition of Chryso, of course, you need special mixtures for that. So it's the journey of Saint-Gobain to deliver sustainability and performance across the value chain of construction.

We all know the big, big topic is to decarbonize both concrete and cement. So Ecocem with the innovation of Chryso is important. Of course, Point.P is also part of the equation and using that. So it's our journey towards decarbonization, sustainability performance. So -- each time you do that, there is more value indeed on the special admixtures or the special additives. So it's good. And it's very important now that we have the full presence across the value chain.

So it has been almost a 20% partnership with Ecocem, but the addition of Chryso in the last 4, 5 years, of course, has been extremely important to align all the dots on the journey. And Ecocem is growing fast indeed because we need to move towards more low-carbon cement. So there are multiple investments from Ecocem going forward, but I think some of them are confidential. So -- but yes, it's a growing journey and very important for Saint-Gobain for Chryso both on growth and innovation.

No. Ecocem is active on cement. So it's also valid for low carbon cement.

Thank you. Any other questions from the room? I don't see. So let's come to the call. I think it's a question from Elodie. If you can see also the screen on Saint-Gobain screen.

Yes.

Thank you, Elodie. So I suggest Maud you take #1 and #3, and I will answer number 2.

Sure. So regarding price cost spread, indeed, we said we confirm we would deliver slight positive price/cost spread for the full year. If I look at how we have delivered in H1, again, I mentioned that we have seen pricing realizing through Q2 to indeed overall reach 1.8%.

We are slightly negative as we speak in terms of price/cost spread, and we'll continue to work towards this slightly positive price cost for the full year. It's been a very hard work from the teams, obviously, to deliver country by country, and I'm quite happy with how we have taken measures from day 1 from the beginning of the conflict and ramped up on the price realization, and it's going as planned as far as price cost spread is concerned.

Question number two, so your questions on margins in the second half. Margins in the second half should not be very different from last year, probably a bit below.

We have new construction, which remains weak versus some of the past last year. We have the assumption also of continued inflation, which is still going on in North America. And of course, we are working on it on the pricing on the pricing side to catch up and continue to catch up in terms of pricing, also keeping in mind the strong timing of price increase that we had last year.

We have a good momentum, a very good momentum on nonresidential infrastructure and particularly construction chemicals, which should continue. The weather impact has been normalized. So any weather impact could be an upside, of course, in roofing going forward. Now there are still a bit of volatility in the U.S. in the second half.

So this is the picture all in all in North America. It's still early in the second half, but I can tell you that the teams are very dedicated on the ground, and we have been happy about the performance and the delivery in the second half, both in terms of volumes and also pricing improving strongly in the second quarter.

Yes. And the third question regarding in particular surcharges. So we passed transportation surcharges in some geographies, transportation being quite volatile with the fluctuation of the oil price. Just to remind you that transportation costs are about EUR 2 billion out of our EUR 12 billion total raw material, energy and transportation costs.

So that gives you an order of magnitude. And obviously, in terms of where we are in pricing, again, we've seen good momentum and good mobilization from the team as soon as the conflict started. So again, I'm looking at -- with quite a lot of confidence on H2 with us, of course, being opportunistic on the surcharge and being very watchful of all the situation in terms of inflation, where, as I said, the situation is quite evolving day by day.

Thank you. Now we have questions from CIC, I see. Please go ahead. If not from CIC with second on the list, we'll go to Arnaud from Bank of America.

I think it's Yes, go ahead one of you.

You take the first one, Maud.

Yes, sure. In terms of pre-buying, as we said also at the end of Q1, it's quite limited, as distributors have limited ability to stock in the supply chains. We would not anticipate a very significant pre-buy impact. And that was -- yes, that was it.

And I can tell you that in July, we see a continuation of Q2 good momentum. So obviously, we clearly expect like-for-like growth in H2 for the group.

With, of course, depending on the duration of the conflict, you might have a bit more of pricing versus volume. So that will evolve as the situation evolves because, again, it's quite fluctuating.

And on AI, Arnaud this is, of course, a moving topic, but I can tell you that all the group is strongly mobilized, and I highlighted just a few examples. Fundamentally, we go after growth. Of course, there will be efficiency gains. But fundamentally, it's a fantastic tool for us to outperform the market.

I shared the example of this unique the DeviGo tool for our distribution business in France. But I can tell you on the cross-selling, all the opportunities on specified sales, we have designed, for instance, multiple suites of initiatives for sales, for salespeople on how to get trained on all the offer of Saint-Gobain, how to look at quotes, how to go after specification, how to cross-sell. So it's more a growth agenda than a pure cost savings.

Of course, we will gain efficiency and have some resources that we will redirect elsewhere, if you can improve so much with customer service, that means you have more time to pick up the phone and call on additional customers. So it's more this sales growth momentum that we are looking at the time to market on R&D. If you are faster to launch new products, it's more growth rather than taking 10%, 20% or 30% of the R&D capabilities of Saint-Gobain, which are unique. So it's a growth momentum.

And it's already delivering some outperformance. If you think of the example of Brazil, where we have a dedicated AI tool to train the sales forces, that's already part of the explanation of the outperformance that we see in that country.

So I guess we lost the question from CIC, which disappeard from the screen. So maybe we will have answered that already. And we go to UBS, Julian Radlinger, please.

This is not what I said. Elodie asked specifically about margins in North America. And I said that margins in North America should not be very different from last year. If I take the group margin, you have the target for the year, above 15% EBITDA.

As you know, we are always very ambitious on the margin. I think there was a nice beat on the margin in the first half. Remember that we delivered semester by semester on the margin. So we stay very ambitious for the margin at the group level in North America, we said that it will be more or less. In the Americas, it will be more or less the same than last year, if anything, slightly below.

Again, it's early in the semester, and there is a bit of volatility or unknown midterm election in November, et cetera, et cetera, in the U.S. And any weather impact, which we have not factored could be an addition and an upside also in North America.

I think I've been clear on second half. I commented answering the question of Elodie, which was specifically on second half Americas margin.

Yes, I can answer that. And I think I partly answered in my speech, which is basically at constant foreign exchange rate, we reached 13.5%. So you have a strong dilutive effect from the FX at this stage, but we definitely plan to be within our guidance of above 13% for the full year.

Indeed, yes. What I said basically, it was an interview in the Financial Times that was published earlier this week, if I'm correct. It's to basically grow from a 20%, 22%, depending on the exchange rate share of the group towards 30%.

This is, by the way, what we highlighted already at the time of the Capital Markets Day of Lead & Grow. So remember, there was a specific slide on the evolution of the different regions within Saint-Gobain, less Europe. And I can tell you that in the first half with the sales rotation we have done, we have already changed by 3 points, the share of Europe versus North America, Asia, emerging markets and investing faster as we have done towards North America and Asia emerging markets.

So it's highlighting and putting numbers on this interview. Many fronts, I would say. First, continue to deliver well on organic growth, leveraging our solutions. We do that. We gain share. I think some of our performance in the second quarter versus the market, again, is that, notably on construction chemicals. So we continue to gain share, thanks to our solutions. We have a lot still on organic to do on nonresidential and infrastructure market on organic.

After that, on top of it, yes, we will look at acquisitions. And most of them, as you highlighted, will be directed towards increasing our presence on nonresidential and infrastructure market. Xypex is bang in line with that. Interstar last year in Canada was also construction chemical, bang in line with that.

So we have both organically and inorganically, a lot to continue to build in terms of offer, market share and therefore, sales growth within Saint-Gobain on nonresidential and infrastructure markets where we have now dedicated teams on construction chemicals, specifically, we had double-digit growth in the second quarter in North America. So that shows the strength of the teams on which it is quite powerful to build further momentum.

Commercial roofing specifically for us, it's around $400 million. That's something we could grow organically or inorganically. We have no specific project as we speak. But clearly, any meaningful value creative evolution on nonresidential and infrastructure, we will look at it with always the same discipline but continue to build on our platform, both in the U.S. and Canada.

Let's not forget about Canada. We are #1 in Canada on building materials with a very good presence and quite a good momentum. So it's both U.S. and Canada. So it was basically expliciting on the FT, what we said maybe a bit too fast during the Lead & Grow Capital Markets Day.

Next question from Bernstein.

Yes.

So on the first question, we -- what Maud said is that we are seeing a normalized weather in Q2. It's still early in, I would say, the hurricane season in the second half. And so far, Saint-Gobain is not a weather forecaster. So I can tell you that we see normal volumes as we speak.

Again, still early in the season. Any meaningful weather activity, so-called weather activity will be an upside going forward for roofing. But we have not banked anything like that in our overall forecast. On M&A, Well, we have done a very large portion of what we wanted to do in terms of divestiture.

As you know, we are always looking at opportunities with not. So we will continue to do that. But there is no specific project as we speak. Autoglass, I said it multiple times, it's very intricated in the glass overall performance of the group with a lot of innovation, a lot of joint sites, a lot of joint R&D, notably all the technologies on coating. We are performing well, well above the market, both in terms of margin and growth on that business, which delivers growth. So it's part of the core strategy of Saint-Gobain going forward. We have fantastic growth in Mexico, in India, in all those emerging markets. So there is no particular idea for Autoglass divestiture.

As I said, now we are on the acquisition side, mostly. Part of that was already asked by UBS analyst a bit earlier. So we have a rich pipeline of accretive and attractive targets that we will roll out in the coming years along the same lines and the same criteria, high-growth regions, North America, Asia, emerging markets and construction chemicals.

You have seen that also we announced something on plasterboard in Vietnam. We are #1 in Vietnam. That's a country which is moving towards EUR 250 million, EUR 300 million of sales. So it's a meaningful country with double-digit growth. So we continue to have those acquisitions pipeline of bolt-on acquisitions, and this is how we can continue to create very significant value for the shareholders.

Ebrahim is back.

Yes. Ebrahim, please turn.

Yes. Regarding your question, I think I understood about the carryover in terms of pricing. Is that correct? So, yes, indeed, we will see that carryover. Of course, being, again, very agile based on the situation of where inflation goes, and we will pilot that very thinly.

It's always a very -- on the field for the teams, for the commercial teams always a very thin trade-off of commercial aggressivity and then putting the pricing. At the end, the target is slight positive price cost spread, and that's what we target, maximizing the growth, slight positive price cost spread and delivering a good year for Saint-Gobain.

And on your question on cross-selling, we have highlighted some examples country by country because I think it's important to go on the ground country by country. So it's part of the 1% to 2% outperformance that we want to deliver. For instance, I said cross-selling specifically in Eastern Europe was 1% of additional growth.

But more importantly, it's not only growth, it's also margin because when you cross-sell, you tend to have the same SG&A resources. And of course, you have then a better impact on the margin. So -- now outperformance could be bigger. If I take construction chemicals, 8.5% in the second quarter. It's more 3 points of outperformance than 1 to 2 points. So this is cross-selling, upselling and also specified sales. This is the way we monitor our solutions rollout country by country. We have a question now from Rothschild on the call.

So maybe I'll take the first and you take the rest, Maud. So turning into the second half, clearly, we see like-for-like sales growth in the second half. Depending on how the situation goes, there could be a bit more pricing than volumes.

But clearly, all this moving in the right direction. If I give you a bit of color by region, in Europe, we continue to expect sales growth driven notably by new construction. It will still be a bit contrasted by country, for instance, U.K. being down.

But in other countries, we have double-digit housing starts, be it in France, Germany and some of the Nordic countries, Eastern Europe being also very, very strong. North America, we will have an easier comparison basis.

We are a bit cautious going forward on new construction, which remains weak. As I said, we have no crystal ball on the weather demand, but it could be an upside, potential upside for roofing. And Asia Pacific, we enjoy and we continue to expect to enjoy strong growth driven by the market demand, the penetration also of our solutions, the outperformance that we have clearly by 3 or 4 points in countries such as Indonesia, Vietnam or India in particular.

So we are confident that we will have good growth in Asia Pacific. You have seen that also Australia turned to kind of mid-single-digit type of growth, which is a good momentum as well in Asia Pacific and in Australia specifically. So moving in the right direction for the second half.

Okay. So regarding your question on energy, again, EUR 2 billion of energy bill. We are hedged half gas, half electricity. We are hedged, what I said is 75% plus for this year. And of course, the way we hedge is always year 1, year 2, year 3. So you can imagine that we have taken some -- we are well hedged ahead of 2026.

To your question about the below-the-line items, if I go line by line, I would say that on the capital gains and losses on disposals, there we -- once we close the Dahl divestment, we will get a positive on this line.

On this particular half, we have had an impact from the currency translation effect from the Telhanorte distribution in Brazil. But again, when we close the Dahl distribution, and we indicated that should be by early 2027, that should turn -- that should be reversed.

If I look then at net financial expense, it is slightly below last year and should remain so. Income tax was for this half at 25%, which is roughly where we are. It can fluctuate a little bit, but this is roughly where we are.

So let's turn now to the questions from the Internet. We'll start with Paul Roger. I will read the question because I'm not sure everyone reads or sees the question. So let's read them.

From Paul, you have reference AI tools helping drive outperformance like DeviGo in France, for example, are your platforms global? How much are you investing in AI and are capabilities built in-house or outsourced?

So some platforms are local. If I take distribution in France, it's for distribution France because this is the business which is growing fast and outperforming. So others are global, for instance, what I mentioned regarding the sales tools and all the training and the help on specification, on conversion rates on how to help on the solutions, the salespeople. This is something we will roll out globally, and we have someone dedicated to that.

Are they built in-house or outsourced? Of course, we use LLM tools from outside, but then we have in-house capabilities and talents. Remember that we have more than 2,000 IT developers in India. We have some in Europe, but also leveraging our in-house capabilities in India, which are extremely powerful to accelerate on AI development across the board. We have more than 700 bots across the group. Maud, yeah.

And leveraging our data because we have also a strong data governance. And of course, we leverage that to implement all of those AI use cases, which are very beneficial.

And the last part of the question is how much are you investing? So it's not so much on the token we pay. It's more on the people. So that's something I would prefer to keep confidential, but we are accelerating and investing substantially on the time of the people. Even I can tell you, the Executive Committee has spent a lot of time together with external push and help and training on best experts to truly lead the way on AI.

So we are also strengthening the governance of the group on AI in terms of capabilities and focus with someone that will be at the executive committee level driving AI. So that's going forward, extremely important.

Second question from Paul. Are there any green shoots in the U.K., not specifically as we speak.

There was some delay because of the different building codes and regulations that now have been cleared. So I think we should see some acceleration, notably on nonresi in the second half. But so far, it's not really meaningful, I would say.

And the last question from Paul, did you reverse strategy and prioritize volume over value in U.S. roofing during Q2?

It looks like Saint-Gobain outgrew the market. No, we are always extremely disciplined on pricing and continue to push. I think you heard it, we continue to have some actions to land pricing in roofing in Q3 versus last year. We, I think, outperformed in Q2, but we underperformed the market in Q1. So within Roofing, keep in mind that there are always swings quarter-by-quarter, depending on whether you are a bit bigger in retail, a bit bigger on professional roofing. So yes, we outgrew in the second quarter. And I think we outgrew slightly in the first half altogether, but not meaningfully.

And we made progress on our contractor engagement program, which is also a great way to secure the pricing and the strong brand equity of CertainTeed in the U.S

Now we move to a question from Kepler Cheuvreux.

Please elaborate on the key drivers behind Saint-Gobain's remarkable organic growth in construction chemicals in H1. Well, first, it's not only in H1 of this year. It was during all the year last year, full year. So it's not just a one-off effect in the quarter. It has been now almost a bit more than 2 years, if not more.

I think it's a combination of multiple things. First, we have all the best brands. When you take GCP, Chryso, FOSROC in India and in the Middle East, we have the iconic brands of construction chemicals. We have also all the available technologies that we need to have the right offer. We have very strong teams on the ground, and we have a lot of people joining the party because they saw the acceleration of Saint-Gobain in construction chemicals. And after that, the second parameter is this push and pull effect of our solutions.

Sometimes it's the glass facade that could pull something on an airport because you start with the design of the facade with our Sage electrochromic glass on airport. We have specified it on 30 airports in the U.S. And then you can talk to the owner, the lead on the airport to drive additional solutions. It could be fireproofing, it could be acoustics, it could be flooring solutions.

It could be admixtures for the runway. So it's a push and pull. And sometimes it's the other way around. It could be all the construction chemicals components driving and pulling the rest of Saint-Gobain. So this is this push and pull effect that we'll continue to leverage having this unique offer across the board on holistic solutions.

I think, Benoit, you have a question on the phone from Martin.

Okay. So let's go back on the call from Goldman Sachs. Go ahead, please.

So maybe I'll take the first on categories, of course, gypsum also is an important category for us, Siding. Siding is performing well, and it's a smaller category within Exterior Solutions than roofing, but we I think, outpaced the market on siding with multiple product lines. On gypsum, I can tell you that I think we are on par with the overall market statistics we have seen.

I think we have done better than some of the public figures we have seen recently because we are in a kind of minus 2% like-for-like in the second quarter. So we have -- I think on gypsum, and it's part of the strategy of Saint-Gobain is that we have, for instance, flattish volumes in the second quarter because we have this commercial presence.

We have a mix on added value products on plasterboard towards hospitals, data centers, which is richer than some of our peers, which are extremely powerful, extremely strong, but on standard boards. So this ability to play with different markets, not only residential but also commercial buildings is important and helps also gypsum when new construction is a bit weak as we see in those days.

So all categories are important for Saint-Gobain because they play together as one solution. So overall, in Americas, we are pushing all solutions. I can tell you that gypsum on top of construction chemicals is doing extremely well in Brazil. We have 3 lines of plasterboard that are sold out, and we think of additional investment going forward. So all this is also powerful on gypsum across Americas.

On data centers, it's a few hundred millions of our global turnover, but it's growing, of course, fast. We have a pipeline of around 1,000 projects across geographies, and it has nearly doubled in the past year.

So clearly a growing segment where we have a dedicated offer and that is declined country by country and pushed country by country with quite a lot of success. And we have those hero products, which actually enable to just open the door of the data center and then from there, funnel in the full offer of Saint-Gobain.

And those can be, again, construction chemicals for waterproofing, for self-leveling floor and static floor, but as well as specific ceilings, which we have developed in partnership with some of those actors in the sector, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And you might have seen as well our partnership with Microsoft to specify our solutions as part of their specification for data center with the objective of speeding up the construction of data center, which obviously is the criteria on this specific market vertical.

So let's go back to the questions on Internet from On Field. Could you also give us more color on the pricing momentum across your geographies and division in H1 and what you assume for H2? I think you gave quite a lot of color already. Maud, do you want to add anything?

Yes. I think, again, we are -- we will deliver slight positive price/cost spread being very agile in terms of how the situation evolves in the Middle East in particular.

Another question from Citi. Can the growth in the region, North America accelerate in H2 '26 even without help from weather conditions? As we said, we will have growth in Americas in the second half, keeping in mind that in terms of volume momentum, we had a rather slow momentum last year. So overall, we expect in the Americas like-for-like sales growth in the second half.

We will not comment on specific product line. Question from Morgan Stanley. We have seen a strong inflection in volume growth in Q2 versus Q1. Can you give some perspective on how much of the improvement you think is down to a catch-up post weather impact in Q1 or down to prebuy?

Maybe a quick answer on that. We have seen in March within Q1, a catch-up after the very bad weather in North America as well as in France and Central Europe. Remember the snow, the flood in France, et cetera. So that was March in Q1. And in Q2, not specifically and not meaningful prebuy activity as Maud already answered in Q2.

Another question from Morgan Stanley. Can you talk about volume development in Q3 so far? Which regions are seeing sequential improvement versus Q2 versus a sequential slowdown? I think I highlighted the fact that in July, we see a continuation of the Q2 good momentum with different colors by region. But yes, we continue to see the momentum so far that we have seen in Q2.

And we have seen same question or another question from Morgan Stanley. We have seen Eagle Materials report a double-digit decline in pricing for wallboard recently, while we see competitors in roofing talking about higher pricing. I'm not going to comment specifically on one publication versus the other. I can tell you that we are always working on the price cost spread, including some catching up in North America.

We have seen a moderate low single-digit type of price erosion in some of those categories in North America, keeping in mind that we have U.S. and Canada together. I think also we should keep in mind what I mentioned is that we have a mix towards added value products towards specified sales, including on gypsum and commercial buildings, which is quite different than some other peers.

One element to keep in mind also is the different pricing timing in North America this year versus last year. Last year was more January and April, and this year is more April and June, July. So that is parameter.

And sorry, because there was a second question from Kepler Cheuvreux that I had skipped. Sorry about that, Martin. Can you please provide a range for your target of a slight positive price/cost spread in full year 2026? I didn't skip it on purpose. I truly skip it because I roll the iPad too fast. Maud?

Yes, nothing much more to add. I think we've commented quite a number of times on the price/cost spread. Again, slight positive price/cost spread for the full year. We have a 1.6% pricing in Q2, which shows how fast we have been in terms of implementing the pricing starting from 0% of pricing in Q1. And again, we will be very agile, keeping in mind the mid-single-digit inflation of our -- on our EUR 12 billion raw material transportation and energy bill. So that's all in all.

Of course, what we leverage in those price increases and how we drive the price spread is everything that Benoit has described in terms of differentiation, in terms of cross-selling, upselling, specified sales, all of that enables us to clearly outperform and push and push for the value to customers.

There was a specific subquestion from Morgan Stanley about any notable difference between Canada and U.S. I would say no. And actually, what we need to do and what we are doing on the ground is to dig deeper because it's more differences between regions in the U.S. or between provinces in Canada.

For instance, Ontario, no surprise because of the overall geopolitic has been more impacted than the West or the East of Canada. So it's more by province. And for instance, if I take Canada, we have 6 plasterboards across the country from Vancouver to Quebec, Winnipeg, Calgary, Toronto, Montreal, et cetera. So that's the way we leverage the local differences.

Same in the U.S. the different regions are different in terms of dynamics in the U.S. So -- and we are granular, as you know, because we have 125 plants in the U.S., 39 in Canada. So those are more the local differences in the U.S. and Canada. Since we have exhausted all questions. Again, thank you very much for your time.

As a conclusion, I would like to say again that Lead & Grow is in good order and moving up nicely and with a very good dynamic internally and externally also from a customer perception. We are there to deliver in more difficult times or uncertain times around the world.

I've been amazed by the double-digit growth we had in the Middle East in the second quarter. So thanks to fantastic teams. So Lead & Grow is delivering on solutions. You have seen some examples on cross-selling, upselling and clearly outperformance. We have a fantastic avenue for growth in nonresidential and infrastructure markets.

We are very committed to continue to rotate the business sales of the group and continue to strengthen the profitable growth profile of Saint-Gobain because it's something we have done successfully over the years. We have a dense and rich pipeline, also teams on the ground ready to integrate them extremely well, like FOSROC in India and Middle East, like Cemix in Mexico and Central America, like Xypex out of North America.

So all in all, Lead & Grow is a good, solid, very robust strategic program for Saint-Gobain to create value for our shareholders and to take again a lot of good dynamic and outperformance. Thank you very much. I wish you a very good summer. And last point, I should not forget last point, which is important. We have some time for you on December 1 with a visit for investors in Milano.

You will have the pleasure for the analysts who have followed Saint-Gobain for multiple years to see Gaetano Terrasini in exercise as a super powerful country CEO for Italy and Greece. This is the correct date, December 1. So we will give you more details, but please save the date on Milano December 1 for a fantastic showcase of what we are doing across multiple end markets in Italy and all the product lines of Saint-Gobain. Thank you, and I wish you a very good summer.