Assurance report of the independent german public auditor on a limited assurance engagement in relation to the group sustainability statement1

    Assurance report of the independent german public auditor on a limited assurance engagement in relation to the group sustainability statement1

    To the PUMA SE, Herzogenaurach

    Assurance Conclusion

    We have conducted a limited assurance engagement on the Group Sustainability Statement, included in section Sustainability Statement of the combined management report, of PUMA SE for the financial year from January 1 to December 31, 2024. The Group Sustainability Statement was prepared to fulfil the requirements of Directive (EU) 2022/2464 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 14 December 2022 (Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive, CSRD) and Article 8 of Regulation (EU) 2020/852 as well as Sections 315b and 315c of the HGB (Handelsgesetzbuch: German Commercial Code) for a Group non-financial statement and Sections §§ 289b to 289e of the HGB for a non-financial statement of the company.

    External references and the reports of other assurance practitioners in relation to the assurance of information, from sources within the value chain, contained in the Group Sustainability Statement and as referred to in the Group Sustainability Statement are not subject to our assurance engagement.

    Based on the procedures performed and the evidence obtained, nothing has come to our attention that causes us to believe that the accompanying Group Sustainability Statement is not prepared, in all material respects, in accordance with the requirements of the CSRD and Article 8 of Regulation (EU) 2020/852, Sections 315b and 315c for a Group non-financial statement, Sections §§ 289b to 289e of the HGB for a non-financial statement of the company and the supplementary criteria presented by the executive directors of the Company. This assurance conclusion includes that nothing has come to our attention that causes us to believe that:

    • the accompanying Group Sustainability Statement does not comply, in all material respects, with the European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS), including that the process carried out by the entity to identify information to be included in the Group Sustainability Statement (the materiality assessment) is not, in all material respects, in accordance with the description set out in section Sustainability Statement of the combined management report, or
    • the disclosures in the Group Sustainability Statement do not comply, in all material respects, with Article 8 of Regulation (EU) 2020/852.

    We do not express an assurance conclusion on external references and on references in the Group Sustainability Statement to assurance reports or reports of other assurance practitioners (see appendix to this Assurance Report).

    1 Our engagement related to the German version of the Group Sustainability Statement 2024. This text is a translation of the assurance report of the independent German Public Auditor in German, with the German version being authoritative.

    Basis for the Assurance Conclusion

    We conducted our assurance engagement in accordance with International Standard on Assurance Engagements (ISAE) 3000 (Revised): Assurance Engagements Other Than Audits or Reviews of Historical Financial Information issued by the International Auditing and Assurance Standards Board (IAASB).

    The procedures in a limited assurance engagement vary in nature and timing from, and are less in extent than for, a reasonable assurance engagement. Consequently, the level of assurance obtained is substantially lower than the assurance that would have been obtained had a reasonable assurance engagement been performed.

    Our responsibilities under ISAE 3000 (Revised) are further described in the section “German Public Auditor’s Responsibilities for the Assurance Engagement on the Group Sustainability Statement”.

    We are independent of the entity in accordance with the requirements of European law and German commercial and professional law, and we have fulfilled our other German professional responsibilities in accordance with these requirements. Our audit firm has applied the requirements for a system of quality control as set forth in the IDW Quality Management Standard issued by the Institut der Wirtschaftsprüfer (Institute of Public Auditors in Germany) (IDW): Requirements for Quality Management in the Audit Firm (IDW QMS 1 (09.2022)) and International Standard on Quality Management (ISQM) 1 issued by the IAASB. We believe that the evidence we have obtained is sufficient and appropriate to provide a basis for our assurance conclusion.

    Responsibilities of the Executive Directors and the Supervisory Board for the Group Sustainability Statement

    The executive directors are responsible for the preparation of the Group Sustainability Statement in accordance with the requirements of the CSRD and the applicable German legal and other European requirements as well as with the supplementary criteria presented by the executive directors of the Company and for designing, implementing and maintaining such internal control that they have considered necessary to enable the preparation of a Group Sustainability Statement in accordance with these requirements that is free from material misstatement, whether due to fraud (i.e., fraudulent sustainability reporting in the Group Sustainability Statement) or error.

    This responsibility of the executive directors includes establishing and maintaining the materiality assessment process, selecting and applying appropriate reporting policies for preparing the Group Sustainability Statement, as well as making assumptions and estimates and ascertaining forward-looking information for individual sustainability-related disclosures.

    The Supervisory Board is responsible for overseeing the process for the preparation of the Group Sustainability Statement.

    Inherent Limitations in Preparing the Group Sustainability Statement

    The CSRD and the applicable German legal and other European requirements contain wording and terms that are subject to considerable interpretation uncertainties and for which no authoritative, comprehensive interpretations have yet been published. Therefore, the executive directors have disclosed their interpretations of such wording and terms in the respective sections of the Group Sustainability Statement. The executive directors are responsible for the reasonableness of these interpretations. As such wording and terms may be interpreted differently by regulators or courts, the legality of measurements or evaluations of sustainability matters based on these interpretations is uncertain. As further set forth in section ESRS 2 BP-1 of the Group Sustainability Statement, the quantification of the non-financial performance indicator is also subject to inherent uncertainties due to limited data availability and the need for estimates.

    These inherent limitations also affect the assurance engagement on the Group Sustainability Statement.

    German Public Auditor’s Responsibilities for the Assurance Engagement on the Group Sustainability Statement

    Our objective is to express a limited assurance conclusion, based on the assurance engagement we have conducted, on whether any matters have come to our attention that cause us to believe that the Group Sustainability Statement has not been prepared, in all material respects, in accordance with the CSRD, the applicable German legal and other European requirements and the supplementary criteria presented by the company’s executive directors, and to issue an assurance report that includes our assurance conclusion on the Group Sustainability Statement.

    As part of a limited assurance engagement in accordance with ISAE 3000 (Revised), we exercise professional judgment and maintain professional skepticism. We also:

    • obtain an understanding of the process used to prepare the Group Sustainability Statement, including the materiality assessment process carried out by the entity to identify the disclosures to be reported in the Group Sustainability Statement.
    • identify disclosures where a material misstatement due to fraud or error is likely to arise, design and perform procedures to address these disclosures and obtain limited assurance to support the assurance conclusion. The risk of not detecting a material misstatement resulting from fraud is higher than the risk of not detecting a material misstatement resulting from error, as fraud may involve collusion, forgery, intentional omissions, misrepresentations or the override of internal control. In addition, the risk of not detecting a material misstatement in information obtained from sources not within the entity’s control (value chain information) is ordinarily higher than the risk of not detecting a material misstatement in information obtained from sources within the entity’s control, as both the entity’s executive directors and we as practitioners are ordinarily subject to restrictions on direct access to the sources of the value chain information.
    • consider the forward-looking information, including the appropriateness of the underlying assumptions. There is a substantial unavoidable risk that future events will differ materially from the forward-looking information.

    Summary of the Procedures Performed by the German Public Auditor

    A limited assurance engagement involves the performance of procedures to obtain evidence about the sustainability information. The nature, timing and extent of the selected procedures are subject to our professional judgment.

    In performing our limited assurance engagement, we:

    • evaluated the suitability of the criteria as a whole presented by the executive directors in the Group Sustainability Statement
    • inquired of the executive directors and relevant employees involved in the preparation of the Group Sustainability Statement about the preparation process, including the materiality assessment process carried out by the entity to identify the disclosures to be reported in the Group Sustainability Statement, and about the internal controls relating to this process
    • evaluated the reporting policies used by the executive directors to prepare the Group Sustainability Statement
    • evaluated the reasonableness of the estimates and related information provided by the executive directors. If, in accordance with the ESRS, the executive directors estimate the value chain information to be reported for a case in which the executive directors are unable to obtain the information from the value chain despite making reasonable efforts, our assurance engagement is limited to evaluating whether the executive directors have undertaken these estimates in accordance with the ESRS and assessing the reasonableness of these estimates, but does not include identifying information in the value chain that the executive directors were unable to obtain
    • performed analytical procedures and made inquiries in relation to selected information in the Group Sustainability Statement
    • conducted site visits remote and onsite
    • considered the presentation of the information in the Group Sustainability Statement
    • considered the process for identifying taxonomy-eligible and taxonomy-aligned economic activities and the corresponding disclosures in the Group Sustainability Statement.

    Restriction of Use / Clause on General Engagement Term

    This assurance report is solely addressed to PUMA SE.

    The engagement, in the performance of which we have provided the services described above on behalf of PUMA SE, was carried out on the basis of the General Engagement Terms for Wirtschaftsprüferinnen, Wirtschaftsprüfer und Wirtschaftsprüfungsgesellschaften (Allgemeine Auftragsbedingungen für Wirtschaftsprüferinnen, Wirtschaftsprüfer und Wirtschaftsprüfungsgesellschaften) dated as of January 1, 2024 (www. kpmg.de/AAB_2024). By taking note of and using the information as contained in our report each recipient confirms to have taken note of the terms and conditions stipulated in the aforementioned General Engagement Terms (including the liability limitations of EUR 4 Mio. specified in item No. 9 included therein) and acknowledges their validity in relation to us.

    Nuremberg, 11 March 2025

    KPMG AG

    Wirtschaftsprüfungsgesellschaft

    Koeplin
    Wirtschaftsprüfer
    [German Public Auditor]

    Stauder
    Wirtschaftsprüfer
    [German Public Auditor]