InterContinental Hotels Group PLC (NYSE:IHG) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

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Unidentified Analyst: Just a couple of things. On the Iberostar deal, could I understand if the costs that you’re talking about for last year this year are eventually recovered. Are they group costs or system fund cost? I’m not sure I understood that. And the revenue you’re talking about, is that dependent on achieving a performance in excess of a budget? Are those fees performance related so that they could be if you don’t hit target? And then the second question is we’re a little way away from it but if the buyback continues. Have you — would you continue to buy back shares even if it took the company out of large cap indices is retaining index membership an important part of value or would you stop?

Paul Edgecliffe-Johnson: Well, certainly, on the second . I think we’re a long way to go before we would ever get close to falling out of the FTSE 100. I think we’re about number 40 in the FTSE 100. So you’d have to you’d have to buy back an awful lot of stock. Certainly, not something that is in current expectations or thinking. We want to return cash in the most sensible way to our shareholders. So I guess that’s something we look at but it’s going to be — it would have to be some years down the line. In terms of the Iberostar deal, the cost — our group costs, that’s our cost of integration. There are some costs in the system fund as well but that’s separate to what we’ve talked about. And in terms of the deal economics, it’s a mixture of components.

And look, I’m not going to give you exactly all the different ingredients in the recipe because that’s commercially sensitive. But there’s elements of it that will naturally flow and then elements that are more linked to delivery to our systems.

Operator: We have no further questions. I’ll hand back to Keith for any closing remarks.

Keith Barr: I’m just going to say a couple of things and I’ll close off the call. Again, great questions, everyone. Really appreciate the level of engagement on the call. And we’ve talked about — I mean, clearly, the industry is still seeing RevPAR recovery and we’ve talked about kind of ranges of what that could look like. But again, positive tailwinds there, particularly what’s happening in Greater China continued to be a growth business, too. So we’re talking about where we can grow our system this year and continue to accelerate that. We’re going to continue to be disciplined in how we do our costs and grow our margin as a business and be judicious how we utilize our capital to continue to grow revenues, grow profits and really deliver on being able to return surplus cash to shareholders, too.

So I think — with the headwinds we faced in ’20 and ’21, we clearly have a lot of tailwinds and a lot of exciting growth and very proud of what the team has done here to, again, make us a stronger, more resilient company going forward and to deliver on our model. So it’s been great to connect with you. Again, we’re pleased with the year we’ve had and looking forward to the success we have going forward. Before I dial off, I would be remiss if I didn’t say thank you to Paul who will be leaving IHG next month after 19 years with the company. I have truly enjoyed working with him over the years. He’s done a fantastic job as our CFO since 2014. He’s a good friend, a great friend, a great partner. We’ve been through a lot together but you’ve left the company better than you found it which is what you hope to do.

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