LVMH Moët Hennessy - Louis Vuitton, Société Européenne (OTCPK:LVMHF) Q2 2020 Earnings Conference Call July 27, 2020 12:00 PM ET

Company Participants

Jean-Jacques Guiony - Chief Financial Officer
Chris Hollis - Group’s Head of Investor Relation

Conference Call Participants

Edouard Aubin - Morgan Stanley
Antoine Belge - HSBC
Luca Solca - Bernstein
Oliver Chen - Cowen
Omar Saad - Evercore ISI
Marion Boucheron - MainFirst
Louise Singlehurst - Goldman Sachs
Charmaine Yap - Redburn

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen welcome to the LVMH 2020 First Half Results Conference Call. I now hand over to Mr. Jean-Jacques Guiony. Sir, please go ahead.

Jean-Jacques Guiony

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, good afternoon and welcome to this conference call. I am Jean-Jacques Guiony, I’m the CFO of the LVMH Group. Before I begin, I must remind you that certain information to be discussed in today’s call is forward-looking and is subject to important risks and uncertainties that could cause results to differ materially. For this, I refer you to the safe harbor statement included in our press release.

Let’s now move to today’s topic, the first half figures. After a brief discussion on the first half highlights, Chris Hollis, Group’s Head of Investor Relation will cover the main developments of our different business groups. I shall then comment on the main figures. And after this, both Chris and I will be available for your questions. The press release is available on our website, as well as the slides for today's presentation and the interim financial reports.

Moving to the first slide of the presentation, I would say that the first half of 2020 was complicated, but shows LVMH’s resilience in a very adverse environment. We shall go into some details, but the main point in my view to bear in mind should be on the negative side, the impact of the global health crisis in all geographies and all businesses. I do not think we have ever seen such a perfectly negative alignment of planets against us.

More specifically, and without getting into details, we have to face closure of most of our physical stores, the lack of purchase, I should say the de-stocking from our wholesale clients, and an almost complete stop of travel retail related activities. On the positive side, I would mention the resilience of our main brands, the strength of our online businesses, the strength of the underlying demand in China despite a very tough Q1, and more importantly the successful emphasis we put on the health and safety of our employees and customers, our top priority in this unheard off environment.

I will now turn to Chris, who’s going to review the main developments within our various business groups. Chris?

Chris Hollis

Thanks, Jean-Jacques. Nice to have you in the same room once again, We'll now go into a deeper dive into the business groups, starting as always with wines and spirits where you can see the key figures on Slide 6. Revenue was down 20% in the first half, owing largely to a decline in consumption, but we are seeing some bright spots that I will discuss in a moment. Organic revenue was down 23% after taking into account a positive 2% perimeter effect due to the consolidation of Château d’Esclans at the beginning of the year and a positive 1% currency impact.

Total revenue reached €1.99 billion. Champagne and wines published revenue for the first half was €754 million, a decline of 21%, compared to the same period last year. Organic revenue declined 26% after taking into account a 5% perimeter effect from the consolidation of Château d’Esclans, which is a high-end rosé the group acquired at the end of last year, and there was a currency effect.

For cognac and spirits, published revenue was [€1.3 billion] in the first half, a 19% decline compared to the same period last year or 20% on an organic basis after taking into account a positive 1% currency impact. Profit from recurring operations in this group was €551 million, a decline of 29% versus a year ago first half breaking that down champagne and wines contributed €103 million and cognac and spirits [€448 million].

The theme for the first half on Slide 7 is essentially a decline in volumes offset by recent gradual improvement, notably fantasy. And you can see here, limited consumption, mainly restaurants and nightclubs was the principal reason for the 30% decline in champagne volumes. We have not let this temporary trend impact our commitment to bringing newness to the market.

We recently introduced Prestige cuvees Dom Perignon Krug, and as I mentioned, the results of this group now include Château d’Esclans high-end rosé acquired at the end of last year. We also applied Château du Galoupet, another high-end rosé strengthen Moët Hennessy’s position in the growing market for these ones. There are some positive trends that Hennessy was that I would like to know why they decline in consumption is a reality for Cognac as well reflected in the 15% decrease in volumes.

We did see a rebound of revenue when China reopened in the second quarter, as well as strong resilience in the U.S. market in particular for Hennessy V.S. Both encouraging trends that we will be – we will monitor. I would like also to note an initiative that Hennessy introduced called “Unfinished Business” to provide support to small family businesses that are owned by African-American’s, Hispanic’s and Asian’s, the communities that have been hit hardest in the U.S. by COVID-19. This initiative will help these businesses to manage their urgent financial challenges.

Lastly for the slide, I would note that both Glenmorangie and Ardbeg received 12 prestigious international awards between them, including Master Distiller of the Year, that was Bill Lumsden at Glenmorangie and Ardbeg received Distillery of The Year.

Looking to the second half, this is now Slide 8, of the year for this business group, our focus is maintaining our value creation strategy while navigating through uncertain conditions, particularly relating to the hotels and the events activities. This means that product innovation continues and we are adapting to new trends in consumption. We are also focusing on continue to increase online sales through strategic marketing initiatives. We also make some targeted investments in key high potential markets.

At the same time, we will continue to be particularly attentive to rigorously managing costs and controlling inventories. This business group also remains focused on numerous environmental sustainability initiatives from the [taken by brands] in areas ranging from sustainable agriculture to packaging and distribution and other areas in between.

Turning now to our Fashion and Leather Goods brands, starting on Slide 10, revenue was €7.99 billion in this group, a decline of 23% or 24% on an organic basis after a [€0.01] positive currency effect. Profit from recurring operations fell 46% to €1.77 billion. These results reflect the very good resilience of our major brands as Jean-Jacques was mentioning despite the closure of operations and stores globally for several months. During this time, there was a strong increase in online sales, thanks to our dedicated customers.

Innovation and excitement is a driving force in maintaining and increasing the desirability of brand Louis Vuitton is of course a foremost example. The Maison introduced new versions of both iconic products as well as new collections. These and other products were highlighted through enhanced digital customer relations and marketing activities. And I should note that Louis Vuitton opened an impressive Maison in Osaka Midosuji in Japan.

Christian Dior gained market share in all regions. [Couture] continues to drive its appeal through reimagining its most emblematic products even as it introduces new ones. The brand received very positive reviews and response to its recent online women’s and men’s shows. It too is focused on increasing digital activities and I encourage you to listen to that podcast Dior Talks, which features fascinating people from within and outside of the brand.

Fendi introduced California Sky and [edited] collection featuring the creative vision of Joshua Vides, the conceptual artist well-known for his black and white sketched designs. Moving along to Loro Piana, it too opened a store in Japan in Ginza district. Celine had a warm welcome for its Triomphe line, while Loewe’s new edition of Paula’s Ibiza collection designed by Jonathan Anderson also performed well. And at Givenchy, the brand introduced Matthew M. Williams, its new artistic director who will present his first collection in October.

As we look to the second half of the year, our brand strategies continue to center on introducing new and innovative products and creating highly competitive stores and online experiences. You’ll certainly see this from Louis Vuitton, as well as Christian Dior, which have an active period with the launch of Air Dior, a new limited edition capsule, collection of sneakers and the opening of a new store on rue Saint-Honoré here in Paris and the continued travels of the exhibit Christian Dior, Couturier du Rêve, which is designers dreams, which represents to the public tomorrow in Shanghai. If you’ve not seen it, I encourage you to watch a video dual posted on YouTube to allow people to enjoy behind the scenes view.

At Fendi, the brand continue to focus on its Roman heritage as its inspiration, and for the other brands you will continue to see them demonstrate their creativity in order to be better positioned for the gradual return to normal.

On Slide 14, for the first half of the year, you'll see that for the first half of the year revenue fell to €2.3 billion for the Perfumes and Cosmetics business group, a decline of 29%. Organic sales feel by the same amount, and this business group reported a loss of €30 million. In the face of significant destocking by Perfumes and Cosmetics retailers across the board, the LVMH brands showed resilience with a long-term vision. Our brands did not want to participate in the parallel distribution channels or gray market that seemed to expand in the period.

To go into detail by brand, Parfums Christian Dior, the innovation engine rules on with the launch – recent launch of Miss Dior Rose N'Roses and the Dior Homme, as well as Rouge Trafalgar in the Maison Christian Dior collection. And Dior released a breakthrough in skincare products with Dior Prestige and Capture Totale Super Potent. Guerlain, the skincare products, Abeille Royale and Orchidée Impériale continue to be a driver for this brand, which is seeing a good recovery in China as well as notable online sales.

Fenty Beauty continues to sell out in all regions where it’s sold. The Skincare brands of Fresh and Ole Henriksen, both performing very strongly despite the current environment, and we've seen solid business development for Acqua di Parma and Maison Francis Kurkdjian. In addition to focusing on the business Perfumes & Cosmetics colleagues, quickly mobilized to manufacture hydroalcoholic gel for hospitals as the pandemic began its global spread.

By now you've picked up on a theme across our business groups, including Perfumes and Cosmetics, so our top priority in the second half is maintaining the innovation and creativity that sets our brands apart in spite of a difficult environment and to ensure we are well-positioned to continue to gain greater market share as the recovery takes hold. Parfums Christian Dior will continue to focus on both its iconic and new products, many of which are inspired by the Couture collection, as well as the brand's roots in Grasse.

Innovation will be evident across categories and we expect development of the Dior Prestige and Capture lines in particular. There’ll be – also be on an ongoing focus on strengthening the brand digital and ecommerce presence and capabilities. Guerlain will open new concepts tools that will reflect the luxury behind this historic brand. Follow the promising start of Irresistible Givenchy, the roll-out will continue in the second half. Fresh will open up concept stores in China with new services. And lastly, | Parfums Loewe will launch a home fragrance line, developed in collaboration with Jonathan Anderson.

On Slide 18, you can see now turning to Watches & Jewelry, this business group too was impacted by destocking across retailers. Revenue in the first half [was] 38% to €1.3 billion. On an organic basis it was a 39% decline after a 1% positive currency effect. This business group reported a loss of €70 million in the period. In addition to destocking at retailers, we're seeing an encouraging rebound in China.

To give some specifics, Bvlgari recovered strongly in China in the second quarter, its new B.Zero1 Rock collection well received in both Asia and the U.S. Like many others across this group, this brand too is focused on rapidly expanding its e-commerce business. I'd also like to note that last month Bvlgari created the virus free fund, a program to support research being done to find cures for different types of viruses at Oxford University in UK and Rome’s Lazzaro Spallanzani National Institute for Infectious Diseases.

TAG Heuer had a highly successful launch of the third generation of its connected watch and opened a new e-commerce website. Hublot also enhanced its online sales capabilities through its site hublot.com. I should also note that Hublot started to celebrate its 40th anniversary with a time to reflect campaign in May and open Ginza Hublot Tower in Tokyo. Chaumet opened its historical store location Place Vendôme and continue to grow its retail business in China.

Slide 20, we look at the outlook. As this group looks to the second half its foremost objective is achieving market share gains. The brands are working to achieve this through launching innovations that will enable them to take advantage of the gradual recovery and maintaining investment to support the introduction of new products and enhancing digital offerings.

To give some highlights of what's ahead, Bvlgari will soon launch the high-end jewelry collection Barocko and roll-out of B.Zero1 Rock in all regions. TAG Heuer will celebrate its [160th anniversary] with launch of some limited editions; Hublot will introduce new Big Bang models with innovations including a connected model. Additionally, Hublot as well as Chaumet and Fred will focus on strengthening their store networks within China.

Now moving on to Slide 22, which is the final business group, Selective Retailing, revenue in this business declined 32% to €4.84 billion and on an organic basis sales were down 33% after 1% currency – positive currency impact. The loss in this business was €308 million. There's also this business group reflects both market share gains at Sephora despite extensive store closures, and on the other hand, the impact of the suspension of travel globally on DFS.

To delve into this a bit, Sephora saw market share gains in key countries. This is driven in large measure by very strong increase in online sales, and the Sephora hybrid store digital experience. Sephora recently held a Virtual Sephora Day in China, a successful digital event with a strong impact on beauty trends. And Sephora too is a product innovation focused, it's launched size up mascara for Sephora collection in the first half.

Moving on to DFS, it experienced a significant decline in activity due to extensive disruption of international travel and store closures. Against this backdrop, the DFS team is focused on tightly controlling costs and this uncertain environment. It is also working to enhance its digital communication with customers to lay the groundwork for the recovery.

Slide 24, as Sephora looks to the balance of 2020, the team's focus is on further strengthening its leadership with the introduction of new and exciting services. They will also accelerate the advantages for collections skincare products, as well as other new products and personalized services. Cost reduction is the core of DFS’ work at the current moment. At the same time, the gradual reopening of its downtown stores in Venice, Macao, Hong Kong will allow to welcome back tourists when they return and offer them omni-channel alternatives. Finally, excitement of Le Bon Marché continues the beginning of the fall little feature and exhibit dedicated to Belgium.

Finally for me, Slide 25, the brief comment on some of the non-financial topics, which have always been equally important. Firstly, a multitude of initiatives to support the combat against COVID-19 have been undertaken both and you've heard some of these before, both at [a management level] and a group level. We were one of the first groups to react to the global health crisis by adapting production facilities to enable a manufacturer of hydroalcoholic gels or masks. We helped with the sourcing and logistics of getting essential equipment to hospitals and healthcare providers, and additionally provided some financial support, most of them and certain key supplies.

Secondly, we remind you that we are a diversified and decentralized group with over 75 [indiscernible] [sells] more than five different activities, more than 160,000 employees, with around 180 different nationalities in more than 70 countries. The talent at LVMH derived from this diversity of profiles is a unique factor and helps us both our creativity and our competitivity.

We are strongly committed to nurturing this diversity, ensuring inclusion, and condemning every form of discrimination. We have a long-term vision and therefore passing on and developing with savoir-faire fitting well in the communities where we work, looking after our employee’s safety and well-being become essential to the sustainability of business model.

Finally, we've had an environmental department since 1992, and were since then on protecting the environment and biodiversity, ensuring the preservation and enhancement of our key natural raw materials, improving the transparency and the traceability of our supply chains. Life 2020, which is LVMH’s initiative for the environment, Life 2020 set-out some clear group objectives in four main areas, which appear on the slide, and we're reporting those at the end of the year, as well as announcing our new ambitions for the future.

These are topics which as I said, have always been important to the group. We have made advances year-on-year towards internal goals at a brand and at a group level, and we will continue to set more ambitious goals in the future. We've concentrated on making progress in the past, we will start to communicate more about these initiatives in the future.

Now I'll pass it back to Jean-Jacques.

Jean-Jacques Guiony

Thank you, Chris. Let's now discuss H1 2020 figures in more details. And I shall start the review with revenues for the first half of the year as shown on Slide 27. As you may see, we ended the semester with a 27% drop in our revenues. All businesses are negative with a particular impact on travel retail intensive businesses such as jewelry and distribution and notably DFS. Wine and spirit and fashion and leather were a bit better than the average while currencies for once were sort of non-events for the first half.

Let's move to Slide 28 where you can see a comparison between the first and second quarters in terms of organic growth. The second quarter was affected by most of the store closures outside China and it is no surprise that the quarter went down 38% in organic terms, twice as much as in Q1. Most businesses registered a 20%, 25%, worsening in their variation rate in Q2 compared to Q1.

Let's now move quickly to Slide 29, which shows a geographic breakdown of revenues in euros, despite the swings in most businesses and geographies really, the relative share of each regions remain quite stable and does not warrant a specific comment.

Moving to Slide 30, you will obviously note that the Group's geographical performance was contrasted to say the least. Europe, Japan, and the U.S. towards a certain extent fell from roughly 10% drop in Q1 to 40% to 50% drop in Q2, while reverse trend was observed in Asia with Q2 being significantly better than Q1 by about 20 points.

Let's now move to the next slide where – 31, where you may see this – our simplified P&L account for the period. The main comments are as follows. We already obviously discussed revenues [with] minus 27%. Gross margin decreased by – in basis points by 430 basis points. Half of the drop is due to depreciation of unsold products during H1 and the other half reflects the impact of under absorption of fixed cost in manufacturing activities.

Marketing and selling are down 18% in organic terms, while admin is down 8%, also in organic terms. Overall operating costs decreased 16% on a constant currency and [indiscernible] basis, reflecting the group's efforts to contain cost in an adverse environment. Profit from a recurring operation is down 68% at 1.671 billion. Other operating income charges are negative by 154 million, reflecting mostly amortization and depreciation of intangibles.

Financial charges are much higher than last year due to the impact of the mark-to-market on our financial investment portfolio. I will comment on this in a separate slide in a minute. The group's income tax rate is around 48%, 20% above last year. I'm sure you will have plenty of questions on this number, and I will be happy to answer, so will not comment further. At this stage, just bear in mind that the full-year tax rate should be around 64% of taxable income, which without being a yield is much more acceptable number. With a fall in minority interest, the group’s share of net profit is 522 million.

Let’s turn to Slide 32. You can see on that chart, the monthly change in our operating expenses, global operating expenses in order to illustrate our cost reduction efforts. As a reminder, OpEx comprise selling, administrative and marketing expenses, and they were down 16% in organic terms in the first half of the year. The chart shows that such drop was not uniform and took place mostly during the second part of the semester.

On a quarterly basis, OpEx were down only 2% in Q1, but a more significant 29% drop in Q2. This shows the magnitude of the effort and the fact that even if it took us some weeks to put together a meaningful OpEx reduction program, we were able to react quite swiftly to a very adverse situation.

Let's now look at the profit from recurring operation, which is broken down by business groups on Slide 33. Wine & spirits was our most resilient division with minus 29%, not so far from the drop in sales. Fashion & leather was a bit under pressure with minus 46%, but overall profit reached the significant level of 1.8 billion.

Perfume & cosmetics showed a small loss despite the resilient and positive performance from the French houses and [Cirque du]. Watches & jewelry was also a small loss with probably less discrepancies between winning and losing brands than in perfume & cosmetics, but these small brands were obviously a driver to the overall performance of watches & jewelry.

And finally very, very tough numbers in Selective Distribution with 300 million loss. Such a large loss comes from a combination of the impact of the health crises on revenues and lower levels of margins compared to other divisions.

On a look at current operating profit on Slide 34, as you can see, both currencies and structure had a very small impact on the world profit and are not really worth of further comments. So I will turn to Slide 35, and the analysis of the net financial expense. A few points to mention, first of all the cost of debt, the cost of aging strategies and the financial costs of lease under IFRS 16 are quite stable compared to last year.

The market value of financial portfolio decreased by 166 million after increasing by about 100 million altogether in 2019. As you will probably remember, we have opted for mark-to-market accounting for our financial asset portfolio, so this item shows market fluctuations flattened capital gains and not actual profit and losses.

Moving to Slide 36, where you may see the balance sheet structure. The main comment is related to the issuance of debt ahead of the Tiffany acquisition currently invested into cash instruments, otherwise, the balance sheet structure is very close to where it was last year.

Turning to Slide 37, a few words on the cash flow statement. The drop in the cash flow from operations reflects a drop in operating profit adjusted for non-cash items, mostly inventory and intangible depreciation. Taxes were very penalizing as cash taxes, unlike [indiscernible] was largely based on 2019 profit. In other words, we paid, in the first half of this year taxes based on last year's profits. H2 should be way better and less penalizing.

Capital expenditures are flat at €1.4 billion. On the face of it, this is somewhat disappointing as we are getting seriously into CapEx, but the [curves] came reasonably late in the semester. Actually CapEx were up 20% in Q1, but down 20% in Q2, so we still feel our CapEx for the year should be around 20% less than last year and 40% less than our initial budget.

I will finish with – on this numbers with a comment on the group's net debt, which reached 8.2 billion as at June 30, about 2 billion higher than at the end of last year. This change comes mostly from the 1.7 negative free cash flow that I already commented, and I will just point out that no dividends were paid during this period as we approved dividend on 30th of June and the payment date was the 9th of July.

I would like to conclude this brief overview of the activity with a few comments highlighting the most important points of this semester in my view. First, I would like to stress, the quality of the work done by the teams in a very difficult environment, to say the least. Despite store and factories’ closures, we have been able to generate close to 20 billion in sales and 2 billion in operating profit. Frankly, even with benefit of hindsight, this is impressive given the magnitude of the shock.

Secondly, our top brands are not disappointed or profitable, less revenue drops than peers’ outstanding margins, market share gains, well-positioned to become stronger in the crisis, which is exactly what leaders should do. Certainly, the outlook gets certainly better or should I say gets progressively back to normal. We are optimistic and confident although there are two things we should not forget in order to be able to react quickly to any change in the environment. First the resolution of [indiscernible] crisis lacks visibility and we cannot rule out further difficulties here and there. And two, the travel retail business is and will be suffering for a number of months and quarters before it comes back to normal. So this is all we wanted to highlight.

And operator, could you please open the line for questions and Chris and I are at your disposal. Thank you.

Question-and-Answer Session

Operator

[Operator Instructions] We have a first question from Edouard Aubin from Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.

Edouard Aubin

Yes, good evening, Jean-Jacques and Chris. So two questions for me, please, so one on operating deleverage, and then one on trading. So operating deleverage, which was, I guess, one of the surprises of the statement tonight is, Jean-Jacques you mentioned that the benefit of some of your cost control initiatives only start to bear fruit in the – mostly in the second quarter. So, should we assume that the magnitude of the operating deleverage in the second half should be sensibly lower than the 2.5 times kind of posted in H1? And if you could please give us a little bit of color on the main deltas, you know, between H1 and H2 in terms of rents and personal expense and A&P? And my second question relates to trading, you just mentioned that you're, I guess, cautiously optimistic about the future. So to what extent, you know, recovery has continued so far in Q3 and that could we have a scenario in which, you know, sales could turn positive by the end of the year, you know, despite the disruption in travel retail that you just mentioned, and assuming no second wave in terms of COVID? Thank you.

Jean-Jacques Guiony

Thank you, Edouard. I'm very disappointed by your questions because I thought we have been much more transparent than usual on cost and sharing Q1 and Q2, but apparently not enough and we should be getting into some more details. Anyway, so operating deleverage, which is your first question, the short answer is, I don't really know because we don't look at this. I mean, we have a business which is undergoing a period of major complexities and we have to manage it to make sure that we do the best of – in between reacting in the full-term and making sure that in the medium term, we are able to benefit from the recovery, which is due to happen.

So in terms of deleverage, we don't monitor, particularly on the group wide basis, the type of ratio that you were mentioning. This being said, you've noticed that we had a sharp drop in costs in Q2, part of it is what we – initiatives that we took. And frankly, it was difficult to [take] initiatives in Q1, due to the fact that most of the impact in Q1 became evident only in second part of March. So, it was a short period to react and I'm not so unhappy that we were able to react in the second part of March and the following month to generate such a drop in cost.

Obviously, part of it comes from variable costs into the P&L and it's not that easy to sort of, sort out what comes from our initiatives and what comes from natural decrease in cost. All the initiatives we have taken will continue, not all of them, but a bunch of them will continue to bear fruits in the future. But I can say that we expect to keep the cost base under control for how long as we think that the business sees some pressure from the global environment and from the situation.

So, we don't intend to relinquish our efforts to control the cost base. On your second question on trading, obviously, you're asking about July and what we expect for the rest of the year, which are two things I absolutely do not intend to comment. As far as July, it’s easier, I don't have the numbers so I can't tell you. What I can tell you is that as far as the end of Q2 was concerned and we saw a significant improvement in the trend. Although some areas were still under some significant constraints in terms of store openings, it’s the case in Asia; it’s the case in the U.S., less so in Europe.

Despite that, the month of June, which I will not comment into further details, that's for your followers on the question that will ask me how much it was, the month of June was significantly better. And July, we'll certainly see some improvements compared to June. For the rest of the year, I mentioned what I had to say. We see month-after-month, the situation coming back to more normalized state and we expect this to continue.

We read the press, we listen to the radio, we also hear that some countries are experiencing some difficulties in containing the virus. This could cause some measures that could have a negative impact on the business. The travel retail is heavily dependent on long haul flights, which are unlikely to resume their – to resume anytime soon. So the business will still be under some pressure. This being said, we – as far as local client base and you will probably have further questions on this, as far as local client bases are concerned, we see a lot of improvement and progressively the business coming back to normal. Will it be sort of regular and leaner return to normal? I don't really know it and I cannot comment.

Edouard Aubin

Okay, thank you, Jean-Jacques.

Operator

Thank you. Next question from Antoine Belge from HSBC. Please go ahead.

Antoine Belge

Yes, good evening. It's Antoine Belge, HSBC, three questions. First of all, and I know it's going to be difficult after you're sort of [warning], but with regards to the sort of more recent trends, would it be fair to say that some of your brands may be, LV and Dior were not far, or maybe, you know, in terms of being flattish for the Chinese cluster overall? Do you think that maybe after a period of revenge buying things are a bit normalizing in China? And also, maybe the U.S. being the positive surprise? Second question relates to the gross margin. I think that's maybe what [consensus miss] is that 400 basis points. The group level of deterioration was some businesses didn't look as being, you know, too much at risk in terms of depreciation. So, which were the division the most, you know, penalized? And would you say that you took quite a harsh assumption in terms of your auditors in terms of assessing the provision? And the third question is, I think you mentioned that currencies were a non-event in H1. Looking at today's [118] euro-dollar rate, you know, maybe if you could help us with your sort of hedging rise and when you think that you will be hit by that if the euro-dollar stays at that level? Thank you.

Chris Hollis

Thank you, Antoine, for your three questions. You're absolutely right. I mean, the first question I am unlikely to answer. Moreover, I think that the question on the Chinese cluster is, in my view, by-and-large quite irrelevant. Given the magnitude of the pressure on the offshore business, that cannot be seriously expected to be offset on the domestic market in such a short period of time. I mean, the [indiscernible] is a thing that we've been discussing many times. It is taking place, it has been taking place for some time, but it was not expected to take place in such a dramatic way in a short period of time.

So, it's – that's why the question of, the global cluster for Chinese, in my view, is not particularly relevant in this environment. This being said, when we look at the business in China, it's obviously doing well, particularly for [Dior and Vuitton], but not only we mentioned at the end of Q1 that some weeks we were in excess of 100% gross for these brands and for some others as well, it's still the case. On average, the division in China is doing more than 65% growth in Q2, so a very good offset in China for the rest of the business, which is suffering.

For Asia as a whole, the Fashion & Leather business is flattish in Q2, so it's a pretty good – it's a pretty good achievement in my view with [Dior] being positive and Vuitton being flattish as well. Obviously, as far as Europe is concerned, the business with the Chinese clients is under some pressure due to the lack of travel and therefore travel retail, but one cannot expect reasonably or seriously this business not to be under pressure under such circumstances.

So that's where we are. I think we are progressing well, particularly in Asia. I try and make comment overall the situation with the main brands with [Dior and Vuitton]. We also very pleased with recovery in the U.S. and in Japan. We had obviously tough numbers in April and May when the – most of the networks were closed, but the recovery that took place in June is very pleasing for both brands. Vuitton being flattish in these two areas and [Dior] being quite positive. So, I think this is very encouraging for the future. That's your first question on the main trends and the Chinese trends for the main brands.

The second question on gross margin and particularly depreciation, yes, obviously we have taken a fairly cautious view as to depreciation. We also have to bear in mind that some products were made available into stores at the end of February as they normally do. This is the spring summer season when product become available in stores, and does not – from a sell-out viewpoint, it was not ideal, I mean as we closed most of the stores immediately thereafter.

So for some products that are not permanent, there is no other choice, but to depreciate such items. So, it's a very conservative view, but also realistic view at the same time. I mentioned in Q1 that we could extend the length of the spring and summer season, which we have done, but obviously, this is not sufficient to ensure a proper sell-out of products that missed more or less 100% of their full price season.

So that's the main explanation for the gross margin otherwise, I mean we have some businesses where the manufacture – we do manufacture inside and therefore we suffered some lack of absorption of fixed cost. It's particularly towards Vuitton and Wine & Spirits and other – and some other businesses.

Currencies on H2, while the hedging is obviously fully in place for H2, as far as the dollar is concerned, the average rate is around 1.12, so it's a pretty good number compared to yesterday's or today's growth for the dollar. And even for 2021, we have already hedged about two-thirds of the year at [1.11], so the hedging strategies, if the dollar continues to weaken will be delivering what they are supposed to deliver in this environment.

Antoine Belge

Thank you. Just maybe a clarification to make sure I understood. So, what you said about the U.S. [LV flattish] on the [oppositive], is that for the month of June, not the quarter, I guess?

Jean-Jacques Guiony

Yes. No, unfortunately. I wish it were the quarter, but it was the month of June.

Antoine Belge

Yes, thank you very much.

Operator

Thank you. Next question from Luca Solca from Bernstein.

Luca Solca

Thank you very much indeed. I had a question about the approval process by anti-trust authorities of the Tiffany acquisition. I wonder if you could tell us where you stand on that process? And then, there was announcements in the media that the U.S. is looking at specific duty increases that relate also to some of the categories that you trade with. I wonder if you calculated the possible impact if these duties are not called off by the end of the year I seem to understand. Thirdly, there seems to be a focused effort by Chinese authorities to try and crystallize the gains in repatriated luxury spend, we saw major changes in duty free regulations in China. I wonder how you look at that, specifically, when it comes to potentially adjusting the mix of your retail network between Europe and Asia. You said in the first quarter that it's very early days to potentially think about capital allocation changes and that you're managing the business with, you know, an open mind, but more of a short-term focus. I wonder how you're thinking is evolving on this front. Thank you.

Jean-Jacques Guiony

Thank you, Luca. I think you'll be a bit disappointed by the answer. So, let's start with antitrust filings. They’re underway. There are still a number of them, about half of those and where we are still expecting the answers. This process has been obviously slowed down by the lockdown as anything else. So, it was suppose – we were expecting most of the authorizations to be given in the course of the summer maybe, but we don't really know. Some of them will take a little bit longer due to the delays connected with the sanitary – the health situation.

So we don't really know and these process are not particularly visible from the outside, it's not – the authorities are not telling us, we shall be giving you the go ahead or in 20 days. I mean that's not the way it works. They are asking question, we are responding and at some point we get to go ahead. So before we get it, it's very hard to know when it will come. So, things are moving forward, that's the only thing I can say. We are being asked questions. We are responding expeditiously, but I don't really know when all the go ahead’s will be given.

On the duties increase, it's been going on for a while. I mean, we've been talking about that for a year now. Some are materializing in – have been materializing in a non-significant way for us. Some are pending, some are threatened. It's very difficult to make any assessment. Obviously, we can make some – we calculate some financial impact, but we – the likelihood of this being implemented is totally unknown at this point in time.

So I really cannot – wouldn't be serious for me to give you any impact without knowing whether that will be implemented or not. It's a likelihood, that's right, but it's not the first time that something likely doesn't happen at the end of the day. Thirdly, on [indiscernible] and what you called crystallization of the repatriation benefit, yes, it's true that the Chinese authorities are trying to keep their people and their business at home, which I think is understandable.

What it means in terms of capital allocation, as you recall, I said in April, that it was probably too early to say. Three months later, it's too early to say. I mean, this type of trend is not something you can decide in 10 minutes. I mean, we have to think about it, assess the consequences, if any and for the time being, it's way too early to say the trends that we see are much tougher than what could result from the simple repatriation of business by the Chinese authorities. People are not shipping abroad because they don't travel abroad. It's as simple as that and not because the Chinese government is willing to repatriate or is willing to favor the repatriation of the business in Mainland China.

So it's not a good point of view to discuss what could happen and what we should be doing particularly in terms of capital allocation in the future. So, give us a few quarters to reassess the situation.

Luca Solca

Absolutely. Thank you very much.

Operator

Thank you. Next question from Oliver Chen from Cowen. Please go ahead.

Oliver Chen

Thank you very much. Hi, Jean-Jacques. Hi, Chris. You've done a really good job managing a lot of the expenses around the modeling of marketing and selling expenses. What should we see going forward? What's within your control in terms of containing that or contracting and/or growing it relative to, you know, the topline? Was also curious if we should anticipate additional inventory write downs going forward? And then finally, Watches & Jewelry has been a tougher category relative to others. Does that have any relationship to your long-term views of the Tiffany brand and the iconic nature of what's available long-term with Tiffany synergies? Thank you.

Jean-Jacques Guiony

Thank you, Oliver. Listen, the first question, I find it very difficult to answer. I mean, I gave you some numbers on Q1 and Q2 so that you can have some form of relationship between the drop in costs and the drop in revenues The higher the drop in revenues, the higher the drop in cost not only due to variable costs, but also because we take tougher measures to reduce the cost base.

There is no such thing as a formula that would tell you given the amount of the drop or the increase in sales, what would be the drop or the increase in costs, and this depends very much on the global environment and the global trends. So I find it very difficult to answer on your question and I wish I had the answer basically because it will simplify my job when it comes to budgeting the second part of the year.

Second question on inventory write-down, obviously, we cannot rule out further inventory write-downs, but as I mentioned before, the bulk of it comes from seasonal products that were put into stores in end of February and couldn't be sold because of the lockdown and the closures of most of the stores thereafter. This situation is frankly unfortunate and quite unique.

Although the traffic has not resumed to its previous level, we still have a decent level of traffic in our stores now and we – and obviously we have adapted what we call the open to buy, which is the amount of merchandise we put into a store to the expected level of demand, which is not something we could do in February just because we had past orders six months before at a time when COVID-19 was not even heard of.

So obviously, the situation is entirely different and we definitely expect the impact of inventory write-downs would be much, much lower in the second half than it was in the first half. Watches & jewelry, you mentioned that the numbers are taking a bigger toll on the current situation than the rest of the group, which is true. I would say that the main reason for this is that this business and particularly Bvlgari is exposed to the travel retail business to the Chinese customer base to start with and to travel retail businesses in Asia and Italy – and in Italy and to an extend in France to allow to a large extent.

So, it's also the case in Hong Kong and Macau. So, this business suffers particularly from the current situation. This doesn't translate into any different sorts on Tiffany. Tiffany is a different business, much more domestic land-base oriented. So, it has a very different approach to its customers. I will not elaborate and get into details. The topic is not to discuss Tiffany now, but we don't think the impact we see on the travel retail portion of the Bvlgari business would be exactly the same on Tiffany in any way. So, it has no particular – we don't have a particular consequence to draw from the current situation.

Oliver Chen

The last question, Jean-Jacques, what's really helpful is there's been a digital step change and a lot of the growth rates we're seeing and even the accelerated investment and the digital and the CRM, as well as supply chain at Tiffany & Co. What do you see ahead with digital innovation and what your customer wants, especially as millionaires become younger and other players like Amazon and Farfetch really make strides with innovation digitally?

Jean-Jacques Guiony

Well, I think the most interesting trend over the last six months has been, in my view, the emergence of e-commerce as opposed to e-retail. E-commerce has always been particularly in luxury. It's relatively small portion of the business and a lot of people commented that in the future, e-retail i.e., third-party distribution of products would take the largest share of the digital business, I'm not fully sure of that.

I mean, when I see the amount of business that we've been able to generate in the last six months in – on our e-commerce platform, I think there is a future for these platforms to generate a significant amount of the global sales and to be a real and genuine distribution channel alongside the brick-and-mortar.

Don't take me wrong, I mean, the brick-and-mortar will remain dominant and we expect it to remain so. But the e-commerce channel provided that we can fuel them with sufficient amount of product, which has proven difficult in the past years, will be as well a very interesting way of approaching some clients and distributing products.

Oliver Chen

Thank you very much. Best regards.

Jean-Jacques Guiony

Thank you, Oliver.

Operator

Thank you. Last question registered for the moment, ladies and gentlemen, Omar Saad from Evercore ISI. Please go ahead.

Omar Saad

Thank you for squeezing me and I appreciate all the information. A couple of questions, a couple quick follow-up questions. Jean-Jacques people are talking a lot about tourism and tourists spend and it's, you know, very difficult to know when travel will normalize in return, but have you talked about or could you share, you know, how big [Technical Difficulty].

Chris Hollis

So, we lost you, Omar.

Jean-Jacques Guiony

We lost you for a few seconds.

Omar Saad

So, my first question is on tourism, you know, everyone's [Technical Difficulty].

Jean-Jacques Guiony

You cut out again. Hello?

Chris Hollis

I’m afraid we cannot really – we can’t hear anything, so.

Operator

So, effectively, Mr. Omar Saad, we cannot really hear you. We are going to the next question from Marion Boucheron from MainFirst. Please go ahead.

Marion Boucheron

Hi, good evening, everyone. Two questions for me, please. The first one on pricing, could you tell us what's been the pricing at LV, what have you done with Dior, and what are the plans for Hennessy? And the second question would be on the businesses more exposed to wholesale and where you commented about destocking, how do you see this going into the second half? Thank you.

Chris Hollis

Thank you, Marion. So, on pricing, there was a global – on the LV, there was a global price increase of roughly 5% that was implemented, if I'm not mistaken, late June or early July. As far as Dior is concerned, there was no such thing as a global price increase, but some adjustments have been – have taken place on specific products, particularly bestsellers. And as far as Hennessy is concerned, there was more or less across the board in between 3% and 4%,, if I’m not mistaken, price increase that took place in between March and April and there won't be anything else.

I mean, as you know, we implement price increase in wine & spirits around the end of the first quarter, early second quarter. As far as destocking is concerned, the situation is very diverse. If I start with wine & spirits, we have a pretty healthy stock situation as we speak, particularly in the U.S., we've seen demand, it a little bit the exception in the global picture. We've seen demand picking up very, very sharply in Q2 in the U.S. and we depleted, I mean our distributors depleted a lot of inventories, so we've seen the level of inventories expressed in number of days going down by half, more or less to 50 days, it’s 25 days now.

So the situation is at the same time healthy because we don't have excessive inventories, but there could be a paradox that we find it hard to fuel the growth for VS in the U.S. in the months to come although we are quite optimistic that we should be able to deliver a large amount VS in the next few months. China, the situation is healthy. There is no stocking, no destocking, so we are at stable level of stock. So, as we saw in the first half of the year, we expect selling and sell-out to be of the same magnitude.

As far as Champagne is concerned, we have no particular worries. The inventories are higher than what they are for cognac, particularly in the U.S., but all-in-all, I mean this is not worrisome in any way. With regards to Cosmetics, we've seen a lot of destocking from our traditional customers in the first half of the year, so this has been the drive on the business in the first half or the more so that we decide to avoid as much as we could or as much as we know, parallel trade, which have been in a meaningful way.

In the first half of the year, a lot of deals were done, but we decided not to participate into that to avoid the long-term impacts on the brand equity. So, we – therefore we were unable to offset the impact of destocking in the traditional retailers. Hence, the stock situation is probably reasonably healthy. Probably more stocks in Watches, the sell-out have not been spectacular. The sell-in have not been spectacular either I would say. So, Watches are probably the category where – within the group where the level of inventories are the highest and likely to have a little bit of impact in H2, but the main demand for Watches is not particularly visible as we speak.

Marion Boucheron

Okay, thank you very much. And would you mind a word on Sephora versus DFS?

Jean-Jacques Guiony

Well, Sephora obviously is not subject to the same impact from travel retail. It's mostly an addition of domestic businesses and therefore has been – is doing okay when stores are opened, and less so when stores are closed. I'm stating the obvious, but that's the reality. The encouraging point is that we've seen significant offset from with online, particularly in the U.S. and Europe, online offset a part – a significant part of the lost business in brick-and-mortar and that's very encouraging and it shows that when investment in online distribution have been done a while ago, which is the case for Sephora, I mean the space off particularly in difficult times.

Marion Boucheron

Okay, thank you very much.

Operator

Thank you. Next question from Louise Singlehurst from Goldman Stanley, oh! Goldman Sachs, sorry.

Louise Singlehurst

Hi, good evening. That [wasn't] my mistake. Hi, Jean-Jacques Guiony. Hi, Chris. Just a couple of quick follow-ups for me because I wanted – Jean-Jacques, you could tell us a little bit more about digital. I don't know if you can tell us about the overall size of digital sales for the group. I'd love a year-on-year growth number as well, but also within the Fashion & Leather component, if there's anything that you can tell us about the increase, even if it's a percentage of sales rather than the absolute number? And then, just in terms of the OpEx point for the second half, obviously very hard to give us any idea given the lack of visibility, but can you just tell us how the team are adjusting particularly on marketing spend, the most variable item, and how you think about that over the next, kind of, six, 12 months? So presumably you need to increase it as people are coming back to the stores and the sales environment normalizes, but where you are in the thought process for the next few months? Thank you.

Jean-Jacques Guiony

Thank you, Louise. The digital numbers, which you're asking, I have them. I don't want to mention that, what I can say is that they are probably too good to be mentioned. What I mean by that is that obviously, these numbers are also function of the fact that stores were closed for a number of weeks. So there is no way such numbers could be extrapolated for the rest of the year. So, we've seen a big surge in the share of the digital business in the first half of the year, not only the digital business has increased sharply, but the rest of the business, as you've noticed, is also on the way – the way down.

So, both generated an increase in the percentage of the digital, but going forward, I mean, this is not the kind of number we can count on. So, it’s exactly the same with a growth rate, so I don't think it's really worth mentioning. Although from a pure qualitative viewpoint, as I said, we are very pleased with the business we've done on the digital front, particularly in Sephora and in Fashion & Leather and to a certain extent in Perfumes & Cosmetics. So it has enabled us to offset part of the lost business in regular distribution channels. So this is encouraging for the future, but as I said, cannot be extrapolated.

Your second question, marketing, how we should look at it going forward, I think we have the ability to match our marketing spend with the level of business. So yes, we shall have to reinvest into marketing although we haven't stopped entirely. What we have stopped basically is investing into marketing when it was totally useless. Take the example for instance of outdoor publishing, nobody was outside for a number of weeks, so what's the point in advertising outdoor at this point in time. This is the kind of thing we have cared to reflect the real situation of the economy and what people are really doing in this complicated times.

So going forward, we think we have the ability to adjust the level of marketing spend to the level of the business. In other words, the business should fund the marketing and not the other way round. So, if – what you’ll fear is a big discrepancy with a big surge in marketing ahead of the recovery of the business, it is unlikely to happen. We will control the marketing alongside the development of the topline.

Louise Singlehurst

Thank you. And one last one for me, if – I think you talked about the U.S. and Japan, Jean-Jacques, just in terms of the month of June. You said it's flattish for Vuitton for both regions, is that correct? Or was it just the U.S.?

Jean-Jacques Guiony

Yes, that's what they said. Positive for Dior and flattish for Vuitton in both regions.

Louise Singlehurst

Great, thank you.

Operator

Thank you. Next question, last question registered for the moment, from Charmaine Yap from Redburn. Please go ahead.

Charmaine Yap

Hi, Thanks. Good evening. I have two questions, please. In terms of the OpEx, if I look at it from a perspective of non-recurring charges, so to speak, other than the inventory write down that you've already mentioned, but were there any exceptional store impairments? I see a little bit of increase on the other expense line, but were there anything there to highlight in the first half already? Or anything that should be taken account into the second half? And the second question is in terms of your employee base and the cost structure, is there anything to highlight here or that you plan to do? I think there might be some streamlining were related to Sephora and JCPenney partnership in the U.S., for example, but anything more in Fashion & Leather Goods? And also regarding to this, am I right in thinking that there were little government support, if that's the right term, in half once and nothing that should reverse in the second half? Thank you.

Jean-Jacques Guiony

Thank you. So your first question on exceptionals within OpEx, they were not that many. I mean, nothing I could think of. I mean, there are pluses and minuses at all times, but nothing really significant to be reported. The second point about the employee costs and what we could do in H2, if what you're referring to is layoff plans and massive cost reduction and that type of thing, it's not at all what we have in mind. I mean, we've been able to address our cost base in the first half of the year without doing anything massive, and keeping our human capital intact, and we think it's quite important. And we will continue to do so.

So, there is no such thing as massive reduction in headcount. There could be some adjustments here and there, but nothing particularly significant, but overall, we tend to continue to invest in our people in the same way as we invest in our brands or in – as we invest in our stores. As I said before, this business isn't a particularly complicated situation, but it will not last forever.

I mean, at some point, the economy will recover from the current situation and will generate much higher level of business and it would be stupid on our side to adjust too much be it the capital base, the human base, or even to streamline too much some brands because when things recover, we want to be in good shape to benefit from that. So there is no such plans being contemplated.

Charmaine Yap

Thank you. That's clear, and it's very helpful. And can I just clarify that whether any government support that you adopted or took part off in the first half?

Jean-Jacques Guiony

Well, we took – it was done on a case by case basis. Some situations were really it was impossible for us to keep our employees active we therefore had some government support, but otherwise, I mean, most – in most of the cases, people were kept working and we were able to continue not business as usual, but a certain level of activity within most of our businesses.

I will take one more question if there is one.

Operator

Yes. We have one last question from David [indiscernible] from Bloomberg Capital Partners. Go ahead.

Unidentified Analyst

Hi, thank you very much for taking my question. Going back to Tiffany, I was wondering if you could tell us what are the geography remaining for the discussions on going and [on to charge]. And then specifically on Europe, could you give us an update on the anti-test process in Europe? Thank you.

Jean-Jacques Guiony

The answer to both questions is no. On the second one in Europe, the update is not – I cannot give you any update because I mean, I can tell you that we've been asked questions and we have answered, but it goes back and forth as it normally does. I mean, there is nothing particular to report. At some point, the European authorities will be satisfied or not. We don't know, but they will issue some form of a statement, before that it's impossible to give you a date or meaningful comment is going on. That's it. And as far as other jurisdictions are concerned, as I said, there is a half a dozen jurisdiction where we are still awaiting the [degree in light]. And we will report to you as we get them as we have done already.

Unidentified Analyst

Thank you very much.

Jean-Jacques Guiony

Thank you. And thank you for attending this call. And I look forward to discussing with you Q3 numbers obviously in a more favorable environment from a health and safety crisis in October. Thank you and have a nice evening.

Operator

Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, this concludes today's conference call. Thank you all for your participation. You may now disconnect your lines.