The following forecast for the 2026 fiscal year is based on the business development described in this Annual Report and takes into account the potential opportunities and risks.
The Board of Management of Covestro AG expects the key management indicators to change as presented below.
| Forecast for key management indicators | ||
|---|---|---|
| 2025 | Forecast 2026 | |
| EBITDA1 | €740 million | Around prior year6 |
| Free operating cash flow2 | (€283 million) | Significantly improved compared to prior year |
| ROCE above WACC3, 4 | –10% points | Significantly improved compared to prior year |
| Greenhouse gas emissions5 (CO2 equivalents) |
4.3 million metric tons | Between 3.9 million metric tons and 4.5 million metric tons |
1 EBITDA: EBIT plus depreciation, amortization, and impairment losses; less impairment loss reversals on intangible assets and property, plant and equipment.
2 Free operating cash flow (FOCF): cash flows from operating activities less cash outflows for additions to property, plant, equipment and intangible assets.
3 ROCE: ratio of EBIT after imputed income taxes to capital employed. Imputed income taxes are calculated by multiplying an imputed tax rate of 25% by EBIT.
4 WACC: weighted average cost of capital reflecting the expected return on the company’s equity and debt capital. A figure of 6.8% has been taken into account for the year 2026 (2025: 7.3%).
5 Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions (Scope 1 and Scope 2, GHG Protocol) of all Covestro’s environmentally relevant sites.
6 This may entail a variance in the single-digit percentage range.
For the Covestro Group, we expect EBITDA to be on a level with the year 2025*. Similarly, for the Performance Materials segment, we expect EBITDA to be on a level with the previous year* (2025: €375 million). We also expect the EBITDA of the Solutions & Specialties segment to be on a level with the previous year* (2025: €681 million).
We anticipate that FOCF of the Covestro Group will improve to substantially above the prior-year figure. We expect in this context that the FOCF of the Performance Materials segment will perform significantly better than in the previous year (2025: –€104 million). For the FOCF of the Solutions & Specialties segment, we assume that it will develop slightly better than in the previous year (2025: €386 million).
For ROCE above WACC, we also forecast a substantial improvement compared with the previous year.
The GHG emissions of all the Covestro Group’s environmentally relevant sites, measured as CO2 equivalents, are projected to be between 3.9 million metric tons and 4.5 million metric tons.
The earnings of Covestro AG, as the parent company of the Covestro Group, largely comprise the earnings of that company’s subsidiaries. As a result of the profit and loss transfer agreement with Covestro Deutschland AG, net income of Covestro AG is particularly impacted by that company’s income from equity investments in Germany and abroad. Since we anticipate that the transferred result from the Covestro Deutschland AG will be substantially up in the year 2026 compared with the previous year, we assume that Covestro AG will generate a significantly lower net loss in fiscal 2026.