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Good day, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Worldline Q3 Revenue Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. [Operator Instructions] I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Gilles Grapinet, Worldline CEO.
Thank you, operator, and good evening, ladies and gentlemen. This is Gilles Grapinet speaking. Thank you for attending the Worldline Conf Call today on our third quarter 2021 revenue, and I am here, as usual, with Marc-Henri Desportes, our Deputy CEO; and Eric Heurtaux, our CFO. We'll start this presentation with the highlights of the third quarter, before letting the mic to Eric to comment more in detail the Q3 performance by activity. We will have then a Q&A session. First, as planned at the time of the Ingenico's acquisition, the new governance of the group has been implemented by the Board of Directors with Bernard Bourigeaud, formally appointed as Chairman, while I will remain CEO. Second important element, the Board of Directors of Worldline has formally validated the strategy to divest TSS and the group is currently giving priority to the short-term scenario, with technical readiness and ongoing sales discussion, having progressed as per plan. I will come back on this in my next slide. Finally, let me say that I am very pleased with our robust Q3 performance for all our divisions. Indeed, all along the third quarter, Worldline benefited from steady dynamics in payment transaction volumes and our strong recovery in certain sectors, like e-Ticketing fully in line with our central scenario. In this context and despite the much tougher comparison basis than in Q2 and Q4, the group delivered a particularly robust growth with 8.3%. These ongoing trends are expected to course through and paving the way for further acceleration in Q4. And as such, we fully confirm our 2021 objectives with -- which are now, of course, excluding TSS. Moving to the next slide. I want to come back on the status of the strategic review of the payment terminal activity with a few important messages. First message, the Board of Directors, during the quarter, formally confirmed the strategic orientation to divest TSS. Correspondingly, TSS is now accounted as discontinued operations from January 1, 2021, and Eric will drive you through the corresponding scope effect. Second message. The group is technically ready for such a divestment. Indeed, we have completed the definition of all the elements that were necessary for a fully standalone and independent TSS business, including, in particular, its transformation journey, a proper corporate structure, the tested framework for commercial and contractual relationships with Worldline and the documented and detailed carve-out projects and an agreement with French unions. Third message. Regarding the execution of the strategic divestment decision of the Board, the group is currently giving priority to a short-term scenario with ongoing sales discussion having progressed as per plan. Correspondingly, tomorrow during our Investor Day, we will present our vision for the next 3 years only for Merchant Services, Financial Services and Mobility & e-Transactional Services. Now it's my pleasure to hand over to Eric to present to you the detailed third quarter performance.
Thank you, Gilles, and good evening to all of you. Let me start with an overview of our revenue performance in Q3 2021 on continued operations, which are excluding TSS, obviously, as the asset is now accounted as asset held for sale as of January 1, 2020, from a P&L standpoint. During the third quarter of 2021, Worldline revenue reached EUR 960 million, led by a steady dynamic in payment transaction volumes in our key markets. Compared to the second quarter of the year, the comparison basis of Q3 was more demanding as the impact of the COVID pandemic was quite limited for the same period last year. In this context, revenue organic growth was 8.3%, reflecting the robustness of all of our core activities. On the right side, you can see the revenue breakdown by division on our continued operations, with MS representing 2/3, FS 25% and MTS around 10%. On the next slide, I would like to cover the revenue building blocks for the third quarter of 2021 and the quarterly phasing of our performance since the beginning of the year. As a quick reminder, Q1 was still severely impacted by the pandemic, while we have enjoyed a strong growth acceleration in Q2, led by a combination of a strong volume recovery and easier comps, fully compensating the first quarter decline. Let's now comment the Q3 performance per GBL. First, Merchant Services posted a solid 9.2% organic growth despite a relatively high comparison basis. Indeed, Q3 2020 had benefited from a strong increase of domestic payment in all our key countries following the reopening after the first wave of COVID. During the quarter, the positive trend on volumes benefited to Commercial Acquiring and omnichannel payment acceptance resulting in a strong growth in almost all geographies and customer segments and in particular, with SMBs and digital customer despite still limited recovery from travel and airlines. Digital Services was also growing in Q3, which contrast by verticals and in particular, the hospitality business still impacted by COVID-19 restrictions. Second, Financial Services showed a 5% organic growth in Q3, continuing to accelerate quarter-after-quarter, driven by payment flows pickup and ramp-up of large outsourcing contracts. The growth was led by Digital Banking and Account Payment division, thanks to higher volume and new trusted authentication services, ramp-up of UniCredit and a high level of project activity. Acquiring processing and issuing processing performance was still affected in spite of continued volume recovery, largely mitigated by high comparison basis related notably to the build and project activity, particularly high in the same period last year. Third and last, Mobile & e-Transactional Services benefited from the recovery on transactional revenue and the rollout of several projects leading to Q3 revenue reaching EUR 87 million, representing an organic growth of 10.7%. The strong performance was led in particular by the strong volume pickup of the transportation sector, coupled with several development projects in both e-ticketing and trusted digitization. Now moving to the next slide regarding the transaction volumes evolution, which, as you know, explain a large part of our revenue evolution. As you can see, similarly to 2020, our transaction volumes were strong and above last year continuously this quarter, confirming the improving trend experienced since the beginning of Q2 2021. Looking forward, the current momentum is clearly promising with the pursuit of this trend end of October, while Q4 2020 was impacted by strict governmental constraint, as you remember, allowing us to expect a steady performance in Q4 2021. Moving on. As mentioned by Gilles, following the decision to dispose TSS division and in application of IFRS 5, TSS has been classified as discontinued activity with impact on P&L as of January 1, 2021. The change of scope related to be descoping and the new basis of the 2021 guidance is shown on this slide for revenue and OMDA at group level. You can find the detailed per GBL by quarter and semester in the appendix of this presentation. The guidance of the year is still relying on the scenario that we provided at the beginning of the year. Indeed, the development of the first 9 months of the year has been fully in line with the initial scenario and allowed us to deliver a solid performance accordingly. To be noted still that COVID's pandemic, though quieter in Europe, continue to affect other parts of the world, notably Asia Pacific region and could impact performance there. In this context, our current revenue scenario remains unchanged. Let me remind you our key assumptions. The ease of domestic restriction with end of lockdown for nonessential merchant, end of curfews and border restrictions; intra-European travel allowed and a progressive return to normal level of travel flows and no significant intercontinental travels. Let me now finish with the confirmation of our full year guidance. All things being equal and taking into account the mechanical effect of the TSS deconsolidation since January 1, 2021, we expect for the year at least 6% revenue organic growth; an OMDA margin improvement by at least 200 basis points compared to the 2020 pro forma margin of 23.1%; and finally, an OMDA conversion rate into free cash flow of circa 42% stable compared to 2020 when you remove TSS mature activity with a higher conversion rate above 70% and induced by previous Ingenico stand-alone communication. Thank you very much for your attention, and we are now with Gilles and Marc-Henri, ready to take your questions. [Operator Instructions]
[Operator Instructions] We will now take our first question from the line of Mohammed Moawalla from Goldman Sachs.
I have several questions. So first of all, could you just help us understand our terminals. I know that you're no longer kind of disclosing it, but it sounds like the growth probably was negative in the third quarter. If you could just help us kind of quantify that, that would be great. And then secondly, in terms of kind of the strategic review, the fact that you're kind of deconsolidating now, are you kind of closer to sort of finding a solution? As you said, you're pursuing the [indiscernible] option. And when would that kind of be entailed? Secondly, when I look at sort of your Merchant Services growth, especially as we sort of coming out of the pandemic, it seems to be sort of below where a lot of the kind of the peers and kind of the growth rate is coming. So I'm just curious to understand what are the kind of specific effects that Worldline is having that perhaps other peers are not seeing? And why we're not seeing a more pronounced acceleration? And then lastly, as we think over the medium term, if we think of service the whole kind of Worldline investment thesis, it's been around sort of accelerating organic growth, particularly with more online being added in omni-commerce, but also scope to consolidate an M&A. So can you maybe help us understand, as an investor, why we should still -- why do you believe this will still happen? And why perhaps maybe there's more competitive pressure perhaps in the marketplace that you need to navigate? And does that kind of create an incremental risk for you?
Thank you, Mo. I think Eric will take the first one.
So on the terminal business, of course, you understood that will not be reported anymore, and it's not part of what I have communicated so far. The performance in Q3 has indeed suffered from delays in production, in particular, due to COVID in Vietnam, where we have one of our key manufacturing plant.Therefore, indeed, you're right, the performance has been negative close to what we had in H1, one of minus 8%. However, this business is also enjoying, in parallel, one of the most commercial momentum -- one of the best commercial momentum we have seen with huge orders already received. We are not even just talking about pipeline, but order, and a strong catch-up is expected in Q4.Now the team is obviously fully committed to deliver those orders that we have at hand, and this is definitely a day-to-day work, as you know, but the shortage of component is still active.
Thank you, Eric. I think you had also a second question regarding Merchant Services dynamics? Do you want to take it, Eric?
Yes, I can take it, sure. On Merchant Services, I think what I tried to explain and providing you even visibility with the curves with the transaction volume from last year, the Q3/Q4 profile for Worldline, and I guess also for maybe some of our competitors, will be unbalanced with an extremely strong Q4 and a lower Q3 because, simply, in Q3 last year, the recovery was already strong post Q2, in terms of COVID impact, when Q4 was extremely strongly impacted by the second wave of COVID.So I guess, probably you have a proper expectation for the semester for Worldline. I would not be surprised that you have the right data points in your model. However, I think the sequence Q3/Q4 is probably more unbalanced than what you may have expected. We are comfortable again to deliver what we said for this division in H2, a solid double-digit growth. And of course, it will come through a solid Q4.
You had then 2 other questions. One, regarding the TSS divestment process that has been confirmed by the Board and then a more wider question regarding acceleration of organic growth and M&A opportunities? So I will take the first one. I mean the Board has made a very clear decision. The strategic review has been run, and the Board came to a very formal statement. This business will be deconsolidated by Worldline. The decision is taken, and we will execute it.As I said, we are currently giving priority to a short-term scenario that we alluded to at the end of H1 and with discussion with a party that has been progressing so far correctly. And we believe that priority, given to the short-term scenario, is for us our main focus for the time being. This said, we will, of course, keep other options open as much as needed. As we all know, as long signing is not done, it's not done. And we will, in any case, ensure an exit of this business in the course of next year in the next 12 months or a maximum 18 months. That is a clear mandate we received from the Board, and we will just execute on it.Regarding your wider question, regarding the acceleration of organic growth and M&A. Clearly, of course, tomorrow, which will have the CMD. And I can tell you now that I guess you will be here tomorrow. And what we intend to show tomorrow is really once we get the COVID off the way, is really to reveal the power of this new company. And to your point, yes, you will see probably tomorrow very interesting growth perspective for the group, first for its organic development, given the strength of the asset we've been grouping, the transformation we executed and most certainly also very significant M&A potential ahead of us to pursue shaping the Worldline of the next 3 years.So really, I am totally clear, we don't see any additional risk. On the contrary, we believe that we are clearly a winner in the way the market is evolving. And I think we've been doing really what we had to do properly for this company over the last years to be at this rendezvous point. The next Worldline that has been shaped, impressive growth engine and a huge profitability engine. Really don't ask me to disclose what is meant to be demonstrated tomorrow. We are very eager to the team to really drive you into the details of our vision and our plans to actually make the vision a reality for the next 3 years tomorrow.
Just maybe one point on competitive pressure. Indeed, we will probably cover it in more detail tomorrow, but you probably remember that we have closed many deals this year, again, more to come again tomorrow. But it just shows that we are not feeling competitive pressure, and we are definitely at the rendezvous of any M&A transaction that is worthwhile for Worldline.
We will now take our next question from the line of James Goodman from Barclays.
I guess a couple of follow-ups. Clearly, one around these is the terminals business. And appreciate that the reasons were no longer focusing on that. But it would be helpful, I think, just to think about the anticipated strength of the recovery in Q4 that you're expecting for terminals. Quite how big of a swing factor would that be? I mean, do you not expect component shortages to continue beyond the quarter? I mean that would have thought have some implications on the sale process? And I guess what I'm getting at is, had you kept TSS in your current scope? Would you be reiterating, I guess, the prior mid-single-digit guidance that you had before tonight? And then the second question, just maybe in terms of the near-term expectations for the go-forward business. Just wondering if you could be a little bit more explicit around the expectations for growth in Q4 and maybe by division? I mean you've got circa double digits for H2, which would imply a very solid double-digit in Q4. But per my calculation tracking the business ex-terminals through the first 3 quarters would suggest you can get to 6% with more of a high single digit in Q4. So given the easier comp as you talk to, perhaps you could add some commentary on precisely what you're expecting for growth of the go-forward business in the next quarter.
So probably both questions are not for me, but of course [indiscernible] you can add. So on the first one, I think I said it all in the answer to Mohammed, but I'm happy to repeat it. First of all, indeed, Q3 has been impacted. But what is important to note is that we have at end a very significant number of order, allowing us to reach a phenomenal growth in Q4. And indeed, to deliver this phenomenal growth, we need to handle properly the component shortage. Just to let you know, the component shortage is not new. It was there in Q2 and we posted quite a decent performance. In Q3 as well. In Q3, we were more limited by the manufacturing impact that I was referring to. So I think we know how to handle the component crisis. It's -- again, there is a nightwork for the TSS team. They are extremely committed and working hard on this, but I think there is a good momentum. And yes, to answer very bluntly to your question, should we have kept this division? At this stage, we would have -- we would probably have confirmed the guidance due to this backlog and an ability to navigate around this very difficult component shortage. On the second question, which was the growth rate for Q4, we are extremely confident, as I said also, in an answer tomorrow. The perspective for MS is a very solid double digit. You saw that in FS, we are back to mid-single digit, which is where we expect this division to be, not even mentioning the excellent performance of MTS in Q3. So we have everything at hand to deliver the guidance and, of course, do even better if we can, depending on the positive development, in particular, of Christmas, of the online purchase associated with Black Friday and all those types of events that should provide a significant booster for Q4 versus Q3.
And very clearly, we expect a very strong -- very, very strong growth in Q4.
And maybe I can just add a bit of business color to that. The business momentum in all these activities is extremely strong. We see clearly that we are positioning very well on each and every market in which we are. We -- our onboarding of merchants is extremely solid. What we see is we gain market share from competition. It's very clear as well the MTS has benefited from the volume come back in the travel industry, but also the appetite for digital additional services beyond payments.So all in all, the sales activities, the dynamism of the business is completely as where we want it to be. It will -- we will continue to tell the story in the Investor Day tomorrow. And the comp effect of last year makes it very clear for us. There is no open discussion on the guidance for the end of the year. We are very much where we want to be in.
We will now take our next question from the line of Hannes Leitner from UBS.
I would like to maybe dig into the Q4 implied growth rate, which is really like just looking for high single digits. Maybe you can frame a couple of scenarios where you see yourself ending up because you talked about Black Friday, you talked about Christmas? We are aware that the pandemic can be quite tricky in the short term.But we are at the confidence level, maybe you can do that like you did in the Q1 -- H1 and H2, and to help us stay a little bit scaling what could be the upper end of it? And then the second is in terms of Merchant Service business. You talked about volumes being well above. It seems -- it feels at least that revenues are lagging behind the trends. Maybe you can talk here a little bit about, let's say, the mix shift because volumes have been probably replaced from international credit cards with domestic schemes and the revenues attached there? And then I'm thinking also about currency conversion. So maybe you can talk us through about the moving parts and where you see future recovery? And then the last thing is just on terminals. No, actually, let's stop here for this two.
It's already quite, again, a long question indeed on the same topic. So really, Hannes, I would encourage you to look at the chart I put in the pack with the volumes for last year and this year. To me, that's the best proof point I can give you on what I expect for Q4. First, because you see that indeed Q4 last year was quite down, quite low. And also, by the way, and I also commented it in my speech a few minutes ago, you see that the curve starts even to diverge. If you look at the end of Q3 between last year and this year, inducing more growth. And what I said in my comments is that this was continuing in October. So what we have in our hand end of October is definitely an extremely solid performance on the transaction side, which translates into revenue. Let me clarify this point. Last year, it was much more of a difficult exercise, the translation between volume and growth in terms of revenue due to the mix change that you were commenting. This year, we are more or less like-for-like. The large transactions from Chinese and tourism have disappeared last year, and they are still not there today. So we are really comparing the same type of transactions last year and this year, meaning that what will come as both in the volumes, in the transactions will translate much more directly into revenue growth.And that will definitely support the Q4. You have noted the good growth for MTS as well. And FS should also be where we expected in our overall plan. So all in all, I can tell you that all the GBL should contribute as per our plan, which is to have this H1..[Technical Difficulty]
Thank you for your patience. We are now back into the call. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much. Just to know, Eric. I mean you were ...
I was done with my answer to you, Hannes. Was it fair? And could you hear the answer till the end?[Technical Difficulty]
They might have disconnected. We will just go ahead with the next questions. We will just get the names. Bear with us, one second. [Audio Gap]
Are you sure we are connected to the call, somehow?
We are connected to the call, yes.
But everybody has been disconnected, right?
We have a few people who had disconnected, but we do have one person back into queue. We can now take our next question from the line.
We will wait for the people to connect. We will not take the first question.
The message should be -- do you have a way to reinform all participants they can now reconnect?
Unfortunately, I'm not able to do that. But we do have the 30 participants connected. We will just try and get the names as soon as possible. [Technical Difficulty]We are trying to get the names as soon as possible, but we do have the participants queuing on the Q&A queue. If you would like to take that question first, we are just getting the other ones as soon as possible.
Maybe you can ask Hannes? You could hear the full answer to the question, Hannes?
I will just open the line again. Please go ahead, Hannes.
Yes, I was -- it seems like it was not just me. No, I couldn't see -- I couldn't hear the answer. I was kicked off.
Okay. We were all kicked off by the net. either -- we, too.
One second, tomorrow. Or you all are out of the room.
[ That should not it be, Hannes ]Sorry for that. And we -- I'm really ****ed to see that such a thing can happen.
So until few more reconnect, because I understand your...[Audio Gap]
We will take our next question from the line of Paul Kratz with Jefferies.
I have 3 questions on my end. I think the first one is when I look at the Merchant Services business, and I compare it relative to your end-market growth, it implies much weaker revenue growth in-store or a deceleration online that has been more significant than I guess what we would have anticipated. It should be good to understand precisely what are the moving parts between the 2 channels -- [ instead ] the 2 channels? The second question that I have is when we talk about double-digit growth, and I look at the basic comparison into the fourth quarter and the uptick in volumes, I struggle a little bit with how you get to this double-digit growth.So it would be just helpful to maybe give us a little bit more color on how you kind of bridge that gap against that tougher comp? And what is really driving that acceleration over and above just simply recovery in travel? And then finally, just on the IFRS 5 treatments. I mean there's a very specific point here that you commit to basically selling the business, unless there's certain circumstance, I guess, where you don't have to, but within 12 months. And I guess the concern here is, are you prioritizing the speed of the sale versus maybe maximizing shareholder value creation by basically classifying it under IFRS 5?
So I will take the third one, but Eric, I'll let you drive it. But I think there is -- I don't know, maybe I'm wrong, but I thought that you were saying that Q4 would be a tough comp versus Q3, it is the contrary.And last summer, Q3 2020 was a very dynamic summer. Lockdowns were terminated everywhere. -- confinement were done, people were traveling. Q3 was really strong in our key geographies last year. And Q4 was actually, in 2020, always characterized by very significant lockdowns in our key geographies. Germany was closed literally for half of Q4. Same in Switzerland, same in Austria, Belgium and France. All these geographies were severely affected last year by the COVID-related confinements and restrictions. So Q4 is really a much easier comp and just to clarify that point. It was precisely what Eric was alluding to in his very clear curve when you look at the volumes comparison.
I think it's very important you look well at this curve because I see there is a misunderstanding, and you tend to look at the quarter as a growth of Q3 versus the growth of Q2, looking to the growth of Q4. And the underlying business is the curve shown by Eric in terms of transaction. And you see that this year, it follows a clear and steady evolution. It's true that the comparison basis of last year was extremely shaky, with Q2 hugely impacted by COVID and Q3 that was largely restriction-free from all main geographies. And so was the growth we experienced in Q3 start to look a bit more like a long-term growth? To simplify a bit, while we still miss some areas of our business, like indeed we are extremely [indiscernible] first one is the Chinese schemes and this in Europe, we have not seen coming back and the travel is still a bit low. But this being said, if you look at last year, remember, we had this new wave of COVID and it has limited the business a lot. So simply by continuing our journey, we will have this very strong growth in Q4 and average for the H2, what we are after. There is no kind of acceleration of slowing down of in-store and online quarter-on-quarter in logic. We have a good and steady development of our various channels. We have a comp effect of last year, which is a bit indeed distorted. But look at the curve, it's very clear. It's very explicit. If you can give maybe some color on the various business unit because everything actually ...
But I think what you need to keep in mind is that on this continued scope, now Merchant Services represents something like 2/3 our revenue. So this is the one driving the growth. And based on what we told you, you should expect from Merchant Services profile in terms of growth, but it's much closer to what we delivered in Q2 rather when we delivered in Q3. And therefore, if you factor it, which is, again, high double digit, I'm not -- when I say double digit, I don't mean 10% or 11%, I mean more.And if you do the math, applying it to 2/3 of our business, you will see that definitely there is a reason to be confident on the double-digit overall for the company. That's quite a clear calculation. So again, we'll be happy to entertain some further discussion with some of you if need be, to get more details into the calculation. Laurent and myself, we can, of course, be available to talk to you. But just taking into consideration what I told you, Q4 will be like Q2 much more than Q3. You should not expect a kind of continuity and the growth of Q3 being the growth of Q4 due to the COVID impact that Gilles and Marc-Henri were reminding a few minutes ago.
Thank you, Eric. Thank you, Marc-Henri. Paul, I think you got your answer. I will move to your...
I just wanted to actually just follow up on the first question regarding the differences in growth between both of the channels, so in-store versus online. Because when I look at that 9% and I, again, index it versus your end-markets, it does seem comparatively light if I'm not mistaken versus, I guess, online, which should be double digit. And then probably in-store should be very high single digits throughout kind of the third quarter. So just any color on that would be helpful.
What you say is right. Online is double digit, and in-store is high single digits. The point is, in our current mix, we have more than 2/3 of in-store. And I think we were clear about that the online was circa 30% in our overall mix. So all in all, we intend to increase the online part. We are working on this standard dimension, but our current mix is indeed more towards in-store today. And regarding your last question, I mean, clearly -- I just repeated very clearly, so there is no misunderstanding of any kind. TSS will be exited. And you were asking me how we were, I would say, waiting value versus time? I mean we have grown ups here. I mean, time, has always, a value pull, I am also super clear here. About as always, a fiduciary duty, which is to ensure that we will have the fair value and the value representing into initial process to a private party so intrinsic long-term value of the business, but we are cognizant that time has value. It's why also we've been always very clear we have 2 scenarios, a short-term scenario and a longer, very relatively longer because if we took 12 months here to execute potentially a different route. But clearly, I cannot phrase it more clearly. We give priority for the time being to the short-term sales scenario because precisely time has a value. Is it clear enough?
That is very clear.
We will now take our next question from the line of Tammy Qiu from Berenberg.
I'm sorry that I have another question on the same topic. So regarding the guidance in Q4 and also full year, given that TSS was diluted from a growth perspective, isn't that your guidance will be naturally upgraded? Or did you see something that you haven't seen before during the quarter, which makes you lower down expectation of the Merchant Services or Financial processing segment so that the full year guidance was unchanged? That's the first question. I have a follow-up as well.
So I will take this one. Tammy, Eric speaking. So basically, TSS was expected to go double-digit in H2. This is what we said. To compensate for the minus 7% for the H1 when we said that TSS was expected overall low single-digit growth for the year. So that was the trajectory we told you when we had discussions at the end of H1. And that's the basis on which we have built also our full year guidance. So now looking at the rest, because you understood TSS is removed. When I remove this low single-digit growth over the whole full year for TSS, it leads me, indeed, to upgrade my guidance in terms of revenue. I said circa mid-single digit last time. And now we are above 6% growth. So that's quite an increase, which shows indeed that TSS was dilutive in the view of the whole growth profile of the group in 2021.
Okay. That's clear. Okay, great. And also relating to you said disposal of TSS, is as planned. I wonder what sort of update you can share with us in this quarter? Or is your key strategy still unchanged, i.e., you still have to get the price that you wanted in order for you to sell that business?
Well, I've been very clear also and don't drive me into any confidential matters that, of course, cannot be shared on such a call. I mean we are going to sell this business. We needed time to be ready to do it, you understand that we've been steadily working alongside the strategic review to make it technically ready to be divested one way or another, whatever the scenario We had many things to do from embarking our own terminal business into TSS, doing the preparation of carve-out, preparing what could be the future of supporting agreement, to allow the business to start operating independently, discussing with the unions, preparing the commercial framework between Worldline, et cetera. All that was -- I mean it's why we always said it would take a good 1 year because we only closed Ingenico 1 year ago, and we need some time to make our hands around the business. So we are fully in line with our initial view. Nothing has been delayed here and this process is progressing as per our views with always these 2 scenarios on the table, the possibility to execute the divestment very quickly. And again, I don't repeat myself here. We always know that there is a value in executing things faster of divesting it other through routes, somewhere a bit later next year, and we are also getting ready for that definitely. But for the time being, we have only one priority, which is trying to land a proper agreement on the current discussion. Nothing more, nothing less. And then the signing in an M&A deal happens or don't -- or does not happen. It is part of life, but we are ready for managing any scenario. But our priority focus is very clear.
We will now take our next question from Antonin Baudry from HSBC.
Sorry, I'm going back on Q4 on the full year guidance. So I totally understand that you expect Q4 to be more close to Q2 than -- close to Q2 in terms of performance. But at the same time, your guidance is above 6%, so which imply if my [ calculations ] are good, it would imply something like 9% in Q4. So I have really a lot of difficulty to reconcile the very bullish environment you described for Q4. And at the same time, this guidance at 9% for Q4. Why are you so cautious on Q4 despite the very favorable basis of comp on the driver of acceleration of growth? This is my first question.
Okay, thank you. There is a flipside of your question, but that's good to look at it from every angle actually. And indeed, I understand your question based on the answer I have provided. Now when you build the guidance, and especially in such moving on road as the one in which we are, we're always cautious and also taking in mind that we maintain our guidance. We decided not to move it. We just removed the TSS scope. And then we translated the initial guidance in the new one, but that's nothing less, nothing more. And that's the reason why we said, like last time, by the way, if you remember well, above 6%. Last time, it was mid-single digit or above. This time, it is above 6% because we believe that, indeed, if we are supported by positive trends, there is no more negative evolution on the COVID front, there is a chance -- a significant change that we are above 6%.
Okay. My second question is about the deconsolidation of the TSS business. So we will deconsolidate TSS from our estimate, but at the same time, we do not have a price to face that disposal. How should we manage that in our valuation of Worldline today?
By waiting a little bit until you get the news.
Can we fill assumptions to this?
Okay. Anton, I mean, come on, you make whatever assumptions you want. You will see tomorrow that in the end, this is not that much of a topic as a matter of fact, in terms of strategic development of Worldline. I think Eric has some nice charts to share with you about it. And of course, again, what I said is very clear. We have just a fiduciary duty, which is to ensure that we have the proper fair value for a business of this kind of this quality and you will then make your own judgment. And I hope that we will not have to be [indiscernible] too long to put the right figure that you will have at a point in time -- is short-term, a bit longer term. But in the end, in the grand scheme of things of the Worldline journey, this is not a big topic.
We will now take our next question from the line of Sandeep Deshpande from JPMorgan.
And I think it will be our last question, because tomorrow, we have also further things to prepare here and to ensure that the technique will be fully ready for tomorrow, so we are not exposed to a second network interruption, that the one that we all suffered from. Again, sorry for that. Please, Sandeep. Good evening.
So my question -- I have 2 questions here. Firstly, back again to TSS. On TSS, I mean, you've said that this will be gone in 12 months and at most 18 months, but you're not suggesting a structure of a deal here as such. So you might keep a stake. You might not keep a stake. You're not giving us any indication on that at this point. So I mean, is that how we should look at it as such?
Well, Sandeep, thanks for the question. Well, let's keep things in the right order. Current priority is on the short-term scenario. You can guess that in case we are preparing other options. If need be, we will communicate about our main avenues to exit TSS that [indiscernible]. For the time being, let's keep our lives simple. We have one current focus on the short-term scenario, and we will try to lend it in a relatively short period of time. Of course, we've already been starting to prepare alternatives that can take different form and shape. It is premature to talk about them, and let's focus on what is really keeping us busy at this point in time.
Understood. Then my second question back again to growth in Merchant Services and Financial Services. You've talked a lot about Merchant Services. I just want to talk about Financial Services. I mean where the growth is today? I mean, clearly, now a less important driver of the overall business. This was the original part of the Worldline business. I mean can this accelerate from here? I mean, given that -- I mean, the driver of the new company is going to be Merchant Services, and the growth in Merchant Services will Financial Services then be a detractor to that group?
So I think, first of all, we are pleased to be accelerating quarter-on-quarter on Financial Services for now, nearly a year. I think that shows the potential for this division. And to give you some more midterm perspective, I will invite you to connect or to come in person tomorrow to our Investor Day because we will spend quite some time on each and every of each GBL to explain you what is our perception for each and every of those. What are the key drivers for the growth, in particular. So you will have the opportunity to get much more insight and of course, to ask some follow-up questions tomorrow, which we will more than welcome.
Many thanks to everyone of you to be with us tonight. Sorry again for the technical incidents that we've been all suffering from due to the network provider that, apparently, has been facing a technical issue. So I hope you could get all our answers nonetheless, right. Really, we are eager to present to you tomorrow Worldline for the next 3 years our vision or what we do with the management team, with the executive in charge of all our businesses and our plans to pursue growing and accelerating the growth of Worldline. Look forward to that. Good evening to all. See you tomorrow in person, hopefully, for some and in any case, very quickly after during the road show.
This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for participating. You may all disconnect.