Brasilagro Companhia Brasileira de Propriedades Agricolas

BOVESPA:AGRO3

Earnings Call Analysis

Company Shows Growth Amidst Challenges

The company posted a net income of BRL 24 million with net revenue at BRL 424 million, representing a 12% dip from the previous year. Despite strong land sales over recent years, annual growth is projected at 8-10%, with current year growth at 3%. Corn harvests are expected to be positive, with declining productivity attributed to less area cultivated rather than yield. Sugarcane has faced challenges in both ethanol and sugar, but improvements are expected. Soybean saw dramatic tonnage and price reduction, from 180 million to 117 million tons, and price drops are anticipated. Fertilizer prices dropped, particularly potassium chloride, aiding cost management. Aggressive sales strategies led to 60% of soybean sold at BRL 13.20, with positive exchange rates, while 72% of cotton sold at BRL 82.50. Receivables from farm sales are a focal point, already including transactions like the sale of Alto Taquari. Ethanol production remained challenging due to pricing policies and reduced taxes, affecting profitability. Precise results from key product sales are anticipated in the forthcoming quarters.

Strategic Sales and Market Positioning

In an insightful earnings call, executives revealed a carefully balanced financial story underscored by aggressive marketing strategies. A notable highlight was their adept handling of soybean sales, having sold 100% at BRL 14.40 in a favorable exchange environment and subsequently adjusting strategy to sell 60% at BRL 13.20. They anticipate potential price drops and are positioning the remaining 40% for strategic sales, with cotton similarly being 72% pre-sold at an opportunistic rate. The company's ability to navigate market fluctuations is further evident in their management of farm sales receivables, particularly from the notable Alto Taquari farm sale.

Cost Management in a Fluctuating Market

Cost control remains central in their financial narrative, with fertilizer prices marked by a significant decrease, featuring potassium chloride dropping from BRL 1,200 to BRL 604. By seizing lower prices for future seasons, the company demonstrates robust planning against market volatility. Moreover, fuel costs have descended from a hefty BRL 6.50, allowing the company to leverage these savings to improve margins which are critical as ethanol production presents its own set of challenges due to policy shifts and tax impacts on pricing.

Fiscal Prudence Amidst Market Dynamics

The fiscal story encompasses savvy debt management, reporting a net debt of BRL 416 million, carefully balanced against cash of BRL 241 million. Strategically, the debt is deployed primarily for fertilizer costs, signifying judicious capital management and readiness to finance costs internally if needed. Remarkably, their cost of debt at 4.9 CDI reflects a competitive rate in the financial market, positioning them favorably for forthcoming financial agility.

Leveraging Technology for Operational Efficiency

Keenly embracing technological advancements, executives outlined a transformative initiative leveraging SAP in collaboration with Agrobit to digitize operations. This integration aims to enhance agricultural production efficiency. It’s a testimony to their commitment to progress, embracing digitalization and intelligent algorithms to inform preventive and corrective measures, ensuring operational excellence and continuity in productivity enhancement.

Investing in Sustainability and Infrastructure

Infrastructure development and sustainability are not overlooked with investments in telemetry and connectivity projects across farms, as well as the installation of new bio plants to boost biological activity. These efforts are in line to fortify their standing as a modern agricultural enterprise poised to meet future demands and environmental standards.

Proactive Market and Financial Planning

Company executives refrained from giving explicit guidance for upcoming quarters. Yet, they revealed an all-encompassing approach in preparing the company's annual budget, which factors in varied revenue streams from their diverse agricultural ventures and real estate sales. This comprehensive planning speaks to a meticulous and disciplined financial approach that remains attuned to market exigencies and opportunities.

Forthcoming Developments and Investor Relations

In closing, the executives addressed investor queries regarding hedge operations and future prospecting. They maintained transparency and assured that while concrete guidance couldn't be provided, sound management practices are directing the company toward a promising trajectory.

Earnings Call Transcript 2024-Q2

[Operator]

Good morning. we are here for our conference call for results presentation for another semester, first 6 months, 2024. Thank you for participating. Thank you for waiting. We're a little late. It's always good to remember that our year at BrasilAgro goes from July to June. So we will be covering the first 6 months ended December 31, first 6 months. [Operator Instructions] Now I will pass the floor to André. And we will begin our call.

[André Guillaumon, executive]

Thank you, Anna. I would like to thank all the participants once again who are with us, investors, analysts, all those who follow us, and thank you. We will try to go over the presentation quickly to leave a lot of time, as much time as we can for the Q&A session, which is very good for both sides.

I would like to begin with the highlights of the first 6 months, BRL 424 million in revenue, net income, BRL 24 million. Net revenue BRL 424 million. Then operational, we will give you data in detail. It's been a challenging year in terms of production. We will say how we did, how things came out and how we're making progress in the harvest, the delivery of 2 million tons of sugarcane, once again being strong as a large producer of sugarcane. So it's going to be a very productive call.

Next, please, next slide. Well, here, I'd like to call your attention. When we look at our CAGR, our growth was 3%. But what I'd like to call your attention to is that in the last years, in spite of being a company that sold a lot of land, we were able to continue to grow the planted area. So we see -- we had important operations, and we have been able to maintain the planted area. So we will work, we expect the CAGR 8% to 10% a year. We are going to work for this. But in the last few years, due to price and everything else, we were more sellers, and we had good prices to sell land. We leased some land, but it's important to say that it's a growth series. And now we sold a lot of land in the last few years.

The graph or the pie charts here on the right show the breakdown of our crops, the cultures. Those who have been following us for a long time, you can see that things are changing. We must have a better revenue in some crops. But when we looked at the first pie chart a few years ago, most of it had 2 crops, sugarcane and soybean, and the rest, we called others. And now we see a much heterogeneous distribution, the pie chart on the right, many other crops, cultures.

So this makes sense when we talk about agriculture, we have to diversify because we need geographic diversification and climate diversification. We've been saying this for a long time. We're always after alternative crops, those that will generate more value on that soil and thus also increasing the value of the land.

The graph on the right shows us the distribution of our land and leased land -- our own land and leased land showing our strategy in our 40-60 lease land, our own land or half and half of our own land. And we have some -- also some land leased to third parties. This is a test drive for buyers showing that our strategy has been to diversify crops, operations, and this has been very important for our operational results and even more important for real estate results, a farm that begins to really plant cotton begins to call the attention of buyers. So that's how we have worked.

Next slide, please. Well, I'd like to tell you about the year, you know very well, especially on BrasilAgro Day, we made an announcement that we would plant less corn in second crop corn. We had contribution margins that were very bad. If you plant to lose money, we don't need that. We plant to make money or at least avoid losing money and so we made an important reduction in corn even before planting. Then there was a small drop also after beginning of the planting. It's soybean, for example, began later than in the last few years. And this would not -- this would not help the second crop of corn. We saw that the breakeven was difficult for corn. We reduced the planted area.

There was a small drop in soybean, especially in the new lands, especially in Bahia. When we saw that the planting window was going to December, we cut down on planting. We're very rigorous in the planting window. So we -- there was a small drop in soybean and part of this reduction in soybean went to beans first crop, then part of corn went to beans. If you look at the bottom, beans had 7,000 and now almost 12,000. There was an important growth in beans and it's a product that we have worked a lot for the domestic market and also beans for exports. So this graph shows what we said in the previous slide, diversification of crops. And the map on the right is a picture of rainfall and you can see the challenge that it was to plant this year.

Well, when we look at the total number, there's an important drop of 17%, but it's based mostly on corn. Corn -- when we look at soybean, we have an expected drop of 6%. And this drop, gentlemen -- ladies and gentlemen, is due to the reduction of the area, not reduction in productivity. Corn also, we see this large drop due to the area. It's not due to productivity. We believe that -- since we planted corn in a restricted window, we believe we will have a very positive harvest in corn. And also the second crop was planted in a good window.

So this shows basically, the reduction in tonnage produced and a product that produces a lot of tons per hectare like corn. So it doesn't mean a big drop in contribution margin since this crop had a very negative price -- very negative result.

Here, sugarcane. In this semester, Gustavo will go into detail about this. We see an important difference when we look at the numbers on the right, and this is linked to the drop to price. We began sugarcane with BRL 1.10, BRL 1.12. We ended the harvest at BRL 0.90. Our sugarcane goes to ethanol, and this has been the challenge of the company to grow in areas where we can have ethanol and also sugarcane for sugar production. But semester after semester, we see more deliveries, less than 180,000. And what we see is the important difference in the price of sugarcane.

We maintained the productivity. There was a small improvement year after year, important gains in the level. We know that we have new areas where -- new areas with sugarcane we're making adjustments, and we see an improvement year after year. This has been very resilient inside the company.

Here, cattle raising, this drought in October, November that had a strong impact on planting in the central region of Brazil. So this made -- this hindered pastures. This was bad for pastures. And when we look, the rainfall has begun in all our cattle raising units as of December 10. Rainfall is back after December 10, so most of this number, as we show here is a picture of December 30, will change. There is a great difference between estimated and actual until now, but reminding you that the impact was especially in November and December, lack of rainfall. Now we have favorable pasture and we will close this gap in GMD.

Inventory. We maintained very similar, a small drop in inventory. This is due to the farm that we leased in Xingu. We were selling and transforming areas. So a drop in inventory comes from that. The pasture area is very similar. And GMD, which is the average daily gain in weight, we hope this will be converted closer to the estimated numbers.

Well, here, you are following us. What has been happening in commodities in the last few months and soybean more recently now in the last month, especially soybean went from 180 million tons two years ago to 117 million tons. And then we will show you the strategy what calls our attention, in spite of the drop in price, we will talk about this later, a good liquidity of real estate. So we're very optimistic. Soon, we will have good news for you in terms of sale of land, sale of farms, and we will bring you real estate, good news for purchase and sale, if you look at the cycle of commodity prices and the sale cycle of the company. When you have high commodity prices, we sell more. When we have low prices in commodities, we buy more land. So this is our strategy.

You will see that we have many transactions selling farms when we have high prices, and then we buy land when the prices are low. When you work with agriculture, this is the name of the game. So we have to have capacity resilience to surf on these moments and to be a company like ours. Well, here a picture. I believe in the previous call, we talked about this. Our cost was not that low and as price drop. So we see these graphs showing a stability now in prices of potassium chloride and phosphated fertilizer. Urea had some fluctuation in the prices, but an important trend we see here with lower prices. When we look at phosphated products, 2023, we had the cost before the war, BRL 1,950 and because of the war and now BRL 500. This harvest that is planted. When you look at chloride, BRL 720 we paid last year. And before that, the price was BRL 1,200 in '22,'23 and now chloride, BRL 624 and even more drops in prices BRL 604 for 2023, 2024. We're beginning to buy chloride with lower prices for the next season. So an important drop in fertilizer prices, especially potassium chloride. Phosphorus also has a drop. Nitrogenated products, this is something that calls our attention. This is the fertilizer that has a lot of fluctuation, but we're trying to buy at the right time.

We know that our demand for nitrogenated product is linear. The great demand is for sugarcane and this is during the months of harvest. Here, we see historical relationships and converging. There are things that historically, we believe, can go down. Phosphated products -- phosphated products are still high. Chloride has dropped a lot, so below historical levels and nitrogenated fluctuating.

Well, here, the previous harvest, this harvest, and this will really be explained by Gustavo. When we look at the first here soybean, we sold 100% at BRL 14.40, and the exchange rate was BRL 5.47. In this harvest, we were aggressive, doing what we thought made sense. We sold 60% in the past -- 60% sold in the past. So this -- that is sold at BRL 13.20 and with an exchange rate that is very favorable when we look at the spot, we have a little over -- a little more favorable at BRL 5.33 in the exchange rate.

It's important to say that we expect a drop in prices year after year because we have another 40% to be sold. And there is this challenge of basis points, knowing that basis is -- depends on ports, depends on countries we're trying to opportunize basis. In the case of cotton on the right, last year, we made sales at BRL 87.50 with an exchange rate of BRL 5.65. This year, we have a price, 72% has already been sold at BRL 82.50, and we have an exchange rate of BRL 5.58 to a dollar. Cotton was sold. We sold more cotton than soybean. We had -- there was more volatility in the past, and we were able to have a good exchange rate.

Receivables from the sale of farms. This is very important. The sale of farms receivables. We have a lot of receivables, transactions already made, especially Alto Taquari, the sale of this farm. This is important to monitor, and we are working on this. So we have almost 60 closed at an exchange rate of BRL 5.39.

Corn is the great challenge. We saw the prices. This is a culture where a crop, where we're optimistic. We know the importance of this harvest. This can strengthen basis and the price of corn in a short period of time.

Ethanol has been a challenge for us due to what you have been following in terms of prices, many of you follow also the prices of ethanol and sugar, it has been a challenge, and we begin to see signs of improvements for the next harvest. Because of this drought we had, we didn't have a super harvest in Brazil. So in ethanol, we have a challenge, the Brazilian harvest. The year before last, we produced 530,000 tons to 540,000 tons, and we went to a harvest of more than 600. This is an expressive amount. There is a policy on the part of Petrobras and also reduction in taxes that compromise the price of ethanol. Well, Gustavo I'd like to pass the floor to you to give details about the numbers.

[Gustavo Lopez, executive]

Thank you, André. Good morning. Good morning to all the participants. Well, let's begin with the main numbers of the semester. Reminding you that we began on July 1 and we end on June 30. So during this semester, the company sells the harvest soybean, cotton, corn and beans, and we also deliver 65% of the harvest of sugarcane also during these 6 months.

André showed a graph, and we saw how the price of soybean and [indiscernible] had a drop in prices. For example, a bag of soybean, BRL 187 at the beginning of the year. Right now, BRL 115, BRL 120, a great drop, a drop of more than 35%. Also, corn was BRL 25, price of ethanol, also BRL 25. In the case of soybean, a product that we had defined with a strategy of 53,000 tons to sell during this period.

This strategy was made in this way because we saw the drop in price, especially due to the record harvest in Brazil, logistics, freight prices, soybean. Soybean was competing, the logistics was competing with corn. So we saw that this was putting pressure on the price. The exchange rate was dropping. So with the prices we have seen in our hedge, the premium was under pressure with drops in prices. And since the cost of this harvest was more expensive than the previous harvest because of fertilizer -- price of fertilizer and so forth, we had an operational margin that was lower than the historical levels. So we thought the best would be to wait until the second semester to sell. And the results of this scenario, we see net revenue BRL 424 million, 12% less.

And as I said, we sold more products and we were not able to capture better prices in all these products. And this has a result in the adjusted EBITDA of the company during this semester, BRL 8 million, in last year BRL 124 million, and we will show you the harvest and behavior of the inventory.

Last year, '22, '23, we thought of using the same strategy as the one we used this year. And we were able to capture better prices. Now for ethanol, it was not different. As André said, prices are lower -- also government policies. The price of gasoline also affects the price of ethanol. Ethanol is always 30% cheaper than gasoline, and the EBITDA margin was also affected, dropped and later, I will show you this fact. Net profit, BRL 24 million and why is it similar to last year? The -- for example, we have receivables from the sale of farms, 5.5 million bags of soybean to receive. And this appraised. There was a positive price, BRL 49 million, and results from derivatives during this period, receivables from farms, also BRL 24 million.

For the next quarter, we will begin to have the sale of these 200,000 tons of soybean that André mentioned, cotton and the new harvest of sugarcane. So the real results will happen as of the next 2 quarters.

In the next slide, we can see here. This is what we were trying to show, the results of the harvest, soybean and corn. On the right, at the -- on top, we have soybean, at the bottom corn, and we can see the results of the harvest '22, '23. And as we said, the margins began to drop in the previous year. We had 21% contribution margin for soybean. And we had a great drop in the price of soybean, but through derivatives, we were able to compensate this drop, and we were able to have a unit price that was 2% lower than the previous year.

So this was in the unit cost. We see what happened in '21, '22 and also in the harvest '22, '23, what we mentioned. Price of fertilizer, phosphate and other products, seeds also, prices went up and gave us this low margin. Now in the case of corn, the contribution margin of 12%, also, there is an impact on the price. But through derivatives, we were able to manage. And the unit costs haven't suffered so much variance because last year, the production of corn, the second crop. In '21, '22, we bought the fertilizers a little before planting with the increase in prices.

Now it's important to look. I'd like to highlight the middle in -- the columns in the middle. We see soybean 53,000 tons. We understood that we could capture better premiums. This did not happen. So the products that we delivered, we had a negative premium, and this resulted in 23% drop in prices, so it was not as good as the previous harvest, where we had 35,000 tons of inventory and we were able to capture very positive premiums last year, BRL 30 million better in our results.

In the case of corn, I mentioned the pressure that existed in the first and second crops, 2 good crops, especially in the region where we have the farms producing second crop, in Mato Grosso, state of Mato Grosso, Xingu. This generated a pressure. Here, we can't store. We had to sell at prices 39% lower than the previous year. And we were able to decrease a little the impact. We had derivatives that on June 30 last year when we saw that the future, in the short term, would have lower prices, we thought it would be the right time to sell our inventory and thus, during the first semester, we obtained negative results of BRL 23 million.

Also when we see the semester last year, and this impacts EBITDA. We see that 114,000 tons generated a result of BRL 36 million. We sold with a loss of BRL 14 million during this semester. Why? Because with the derivatives, we left them to get better results. Here, when we see soybean and corn, BRL 66 million in results generated during this period and this year, we're talking about BRL 7 million negative.

Here, we see sugarcane on this slide. As André mentioned, 2 million tons sold. This was built. We see here the impact of the price. André showed the results, lower planting area, an important drop in revenue. And here, we see in the case of a different cost. André showed the drop in the price of fertilizers. We buy fertilizer as we harvest. So we were able to serve on better prices.

Price of fuel is very relevant for us. In the previous harvest, we had BRL 6.50 per fuel. Today, we're talking about lower prices in fuel, although we have a stabilized production. The margin last year, 26% dropped to 17%, generating a difference in results, BRL 75 million, BRL 38 million less.

On the next slide, showing our calculation of adjusted EBITDA beginning with net profit without sale of farms. During this period, we had small amounts. These were recording postings of the sale of, but not very relevant. Here, we excluded interest, taxes, we include depreciation, and we removed all the effects, and we added the results of derivatives that have to do not with the sale of grains because of the sale of farms, which is based on bags of grain.

And here, we remind you that last year, we had BRL 66 million from grains, BRL 46 million from sugarcane in this year. These amounts were consumed by administrative expenses. On the right, we have the breakdown. We talked about 40% sugarcane, 40% soybean. We know that now with the increase in the planted area that we have with grains. So we can see here that during this semester, the result comes especially from sugarcane, 65%. And last year, this inventory also generated an important result. And this year, corn gave us a negative result and soybean represented BRL 7 million.

Now the debts -- the company's debt, we have BRL 743 million in debt. Cash, BRL 241 million. This is when we have low cash because we have most of the costs already paid for and revenue will come after March. In March, we begin to sell the products. And in March, we began to sell the inventory. Net debt, BRL 416 million, reminding you that we have receivables from the sale of farms, 5.5 million bags of corn and the cost of debt 4.9 CDI. Recently, we issued debentures for an irrigation project, more than 4,000 hectares in Arrojadinho Farm, and we understand that in the short term, these BRL 240 million in debt is a small amount, the ideal to finance our costs. But with very high costs, we thought it would be better to work with our own capital and use this only for -- and use loans only for fertilizers, BRL 350 million working capital. The rest is services and other costs, but we're very comfortable in terms of the payment terms.

The first CRE that we issued for farms are practically all invested and now we are beginning this project with 4,000 hectares, 1,000 we have already finished to implement irrigation and this will result in cash flow to pay these debts without any problem. On the next year, we have some projects we're working on, the efforts we have made in the last 2 years. We always mentioned for those who are in our meetings that the company has been working with SAP as the main ERP. We use SAP. We're implementing this in verticals. We're implementing the software. And this is helping us to control all our processes in terms of production transactions, but we understood that it would be interesting to have a better integration with SAP because management was becoming complex.

So we tried to simplify this process through some implementation, and we began the integration of SAP. We're using now another software tool called Agrobit. It's a partner of SAP. SAP recommends to work with Agrobit to have this integration. So what we're doing here is to make all the management to obtain gains in efficiency in agricultural production. So we began to digitalize all these field operations, and this allows us to plan operations, integrate this with machinery and materiology to have more efficiency.

Now what is interesting in this product is that by accumulating data from different harvests and through artificial intelligence, through this algorithm that the system supplies, we are able to make -- it makes recommendations for us to work in a preventive way or corrective way to avoid losses. So we began this process. It will be in 3 steps. The first is digitalization. It's ready. There's a second to integrate machinery and irrigation equipment. We have this software working. And a third phase, using the formulas, we will be able to look at gas emissions. This is a long-term project. But we will have focus on this because we begin -- this will -- we believe this will help us to increase productivity and have a better idea of our assets.

The next slide -- the next project, sorry, connectivity. The next project is connectivity, although Agrobit can work with cell phones and Internet. First, it's interesting if we're able to connect this to other tools we already have. So we're working with some softwares that also control machinery. Reminding you, we don't have our own equipment. We work with -- we outsource the equipment. These companies supply services, planting, harvesting. We're investing to have telemetry, so we can increase our efficiency, even outsourcing, on San Jose and Chaparral Farms. These farms are very important for cash generation in the company. And we hired the services of TIM and Claro, these are telcos, and one part was already implemented with a shared investment with the mill that produces ethanol on that farm. And in the other, we have a system where Claro has been investing, the telco is investing, and we amortize this with monthly payments for services. Now what we want is to continue increasing the efficiency and cash generation.

Here, we have a high volume of operations, consumption of inputs, especially fuel. We hope to have an improvement in the efficiency of the use of fuel. And last year, we had a problem in San Jose Farm. So we saw the importance of having the whole farm connected and remote monitoring to increase efficiency. So I believe it's a project we will continue. When we finish implementing this at Chaparral, we will implement this in other farms where it makes sense.

Finally, bio plants. To strengthen biological activity, we installed 2 new plants. We already had 2. Now we added 1 in Xingu farm, where we produce soybean, corn, second crop for corn. San Jose also, where we have sugarcane, soybean and corn. We began and we ran some tests with some bugs that are -- that are a threat and gave us problems with the quality of the product. We had a positive result with these bio farms. And we began to use this in other crops, and the result was very good. So it became more relevant.

The company has BRL 18 million in terms of cost with insecticides and herbicides and we're investing in biological also, products, herbicides and pesticides for the next harvest. Here, this is to show the behavior of our shares, AGRO3. And now we'd like to begin the Q&A session. Thank you.

[Operator]

I will pass the floor to Pedro from XP for the first question.

[Pedro Fonseca, analyst]

Good morning. Can you hear me? I'd like to ask a first question concerning mix. In the current harvest, there was an important change in mix. André talked about this due to the climate. And at the same time, with the follow-up that we do of contribution margins. Sugarcane is becoming attractive now. So looking at the next harvest, what can we think of in terms of mix? Does it make sense to use the same strategy as last year or more sugarcane? And the second point, sale of land. We talked recently about this. Recently, André has said, I'd like to understand, for example, there is a drop in prices and return. So if you can give us more color about this price of land. On BrasilAgro RI, André said that the price was BRL 45,000 per hectare. Do you have more information now?

[André Guillaumon, executive]

Pedro. As always, good questions. We could talk hours about this mix. Okay, let's see mix. We begin to see the relevance of the other mixes. What can we expect in the next few years? All these crops present a challenge in terms of market, channels. So we begin to see the growth of the company and beans in a sustainable way because where we have been working in the beans market for 5 years, but it's in its infancy. This will become stronger. Beans will become stronger. Cotton, as you said, cotton this year, if the productivity is right, we will have a profitable crop when you compare with other grains.

In the next few years, I believe the company will plant more cotton, strengthen the mix. And in the case of sugarcane, Pedro, there is no doubt that we will grow in sugarcane in the next few months and next year, we will grow the production of sugarcane. Well, this is the mix.

Price of land. Price of land, you're right in saying that the increase in RJ, I always say that in agro business, communication is very efficient. This is a typical example. This increase in RJ. If you look at Brazilian farms, these are smart people. Brazilian farmers, they work -- for example, they're producing soybean. So they use soybean to buy. We saw more people visiting us because they want to do with land, what they're doing with inputs. They want barter. We always sold land and received in bags of soybean. So commodities, the price of commodity will affect the farmers, but remember that in the last few years, we had a very positive contribution margin.

So the farmers, those who got loans at very high prices from the banks, they're having troubles, but these are not our clients. Our clients are the large producers that grow every year because of the tax efficiencies they have, and they also had important productivity gains. I'm convinced. I'm convinced that we will have important transactions in terms of sales. We will have important sales this year. And the company will show once again that the -- our strategy of production plus real -- sale of real estate is the best. So the market continues. In terms of price of land, this is an important point.

So mature land, the price will fluctuate according to the price of soybeans. If the bag of soybeans has gone down, this land is worth less because of drop in prices. Now you should look that our portfolio has an important part coming from land. We're generating value, transforming land into arable land. If we were a company of mature land, we would suffer more with the price of fluctuations because we depend on this. But in our case, we have a large part of land and then we have land becoming more mature, pasture land that now is planted area, with grains. We have land becoming more and more mature. Land that last year was not fertile, this year is fertile, is ready for cotton. So things change.

So the good thing about this, and it's important for you to see the profile, the portfolio of the company. We're not sitting waiting for commodity prices. Of course, when prices go up, we sell more. When the price goes down, we buy land. That's what we've been doing for the last 17 years. So quickly, I talked about our mix in crops, liquidity. I believe in liquidity still. And the third point, a lot of attention in the company's portfolio, which is changing after year. We're changing.

[Operator]

Now I will pass the floor to [indiscernible] BTG Pactual Bank.

[Unknown Analyst]

I have 2 questions. The first concerning land. Just to clarify some points. First, in terms of price, so you don't see relevant changes in the number of bags, only price of commodity. And can you comment about land, how you see the opportunities for buying farms. In the past, you sold a lot. You said there are good opportunities to sell land this year. But do you believe it's the right time to buy farms, beginning now, or do you believe you will continue selling and not buying. And the other point is on price, especially soybean. What is your expectation of prices for the rest of the year. So possibly, we will have a better harvest. How do you believe prices will be during the rest of the year and '24, '25.

[Unknown Executive]

Yes. You are right. You are right. There will be a drop in multiples, in the number of bags of grain for hectare. If we don't, the land, the land, the seller that didn't need to sell, not those who need -- the sellers who didn't need to sell, they're not even talking about bags of soybean. Now they're asking for money, millions. Yes, if this continues, they will have to go back to a number of bags per hectare. I don't see a reduction in multiples, especially with the drop in prices. To have a reduction in multiples, you need 5 years with drop in price. So if the margin continues to drop next year, then? So it's not time yet to represent a drop in number of bags per hectare as a way to calculate the value.

Acquisitions, I always say it's important to have these price changes. Agro business will continue being responsible for our GDP. It will grow. Agro business will grow in Brazil. Now we have a drop because it was so strong that everyone thought they could make easy money. This is a very specific business, which has its needs. So sometimes, we will have a drop. And this will make some people leave these markets, especially the speculators will leave and now this -- those who are speculators will leave and now we will have farmers who plant. And every year, they have 30%, 35% EBITDA margin.

So I'm thinking of soybean, when I said 30%, 35%. EBITDA margin will go back to 30%, 35%, will change maybe the size of the check they had. So in the last few years, we had farmers making money. They will continue expanding prices. This is the great challenge.

What do we need to understand to see offer and demand and threats and opportunities. Offer, Argentina, for example, they were going to produce 50, they produced 25 this year, they will go back to 50. Brazil, last year, 160 million tons, we had 12% drop. So in Brazil this year, last year, if we didn't have the drought in the South, we would have more than 170 million tons. And on the other hand, Enrique, we see demand smaller in China. So when we look at recovery in Argentina, Paraguay, Bolivia with the same levels and Brazil 150 -- 149 million tons. So last year, the world produced 290 million tons. This year, 315 million tons. So a great offer with lower demand in China, growth of 1%. But it's important, no one wants the worst but there's a lot of geopolitical tension in the world after the pandemic. We saw this today. There is a great concern in this scenario, the U.S. and China, this can change -- this can help Brazil. So if relations get worse between U.S. and China, this helps Brazil. And Brazil, the problem is not Chicago. It's basis that is decreasing the profitability. If the basis was even or 30 positive or 40 as it was historically, we would have a positive contribution margin, a very good one. It is positive, but it would be very good.

So our vision of price. We understand that the space for Chicago to recover, this would need good news in terms of the U.S. production. The production in South America is, 1 million, 2 million or 3 million tons less in South America isn't going to change the price in Chicago. We have to look at the production in the U.S. For Brazilian second semester, we will have elections in the second semester in Brazil. This may strengthen the basis. It's important to say that this is the positive trend that I see.

The negative trend that I see, we have producers, farmers are selling less. On one hand, things help us and the other low farm selling and the farmer now has a more difficult situation. If this scenario changes, things will come back quickly. Otherwise, we would be worried with farmer's situations in the second semester. So what is sold is sold, 60% is sold. What we're seeing today is we see the basis. When you look at the basis screen, you see a drop, but we begin to see points where there is fluctuation.

Last week, we made an operation in Bahia, the day before yesterday, too, in the Midwest, you get trades that have lineup of ships, the need to -- from contracts and then we're grasping these opportunities that come up.

[Operator]

Now the questions in writing about real estate. A question from Antonio [indiscernible].

The revenue from the sale of land is important for BrasilAgro. So what do you expect in the next quarters? But André cannot give you guidance.

Next from [indiscernible].

To comment on operations outside Brazil. Do you expect to go into new countries? What is your strategy for expansion outside Brazil?

[André Guillaumon, executive]

Yes, let me tell you, when we prepare the company's budget -- annual budget, we have operational EBITDA, everything we said until now, soybean, beans, cotton, cattle-raising and we prepare a budget also of real estate results. So the sale of land has goals, disciplined sale of farms. And we prepared a budget this year too. The current liquidity is important. I have no doubts that we're working. And yes, we will reach our goals for real estate. The company will show that we use these 2 strategies. And this differentiates us, sets us apart from the others. So there will be sale. There's important liquidity in some farms, and we're working to close these deals in the next few months.

Who asked about real estate? you can be sure, Antonio. You can be sure, Antonio. The company will deliver the 2 results, operational and sale of farms, real estate, because it's part of the company's objective to deliver this, both acquisitions and also leasing and sales.

The second question, international expansion. When we talk about international expansion. André, so will you have liquidity with adverse conditions? This shows the strength of Brazil, where the company should concentrate. So we begin to see a lot of liquidity in Paraguay. This didn't exist in the past. Paraguay was, in the last 6 months, our farms in Paraguay had many visitors, many visitors. It has liquidity now. I'll explain why. Paraguay, we were the first company to plant in Chaco in Paraguay.

I'm talking about 7 to 8 years ago. So we were the first company to plant there in this harvest. We're planting 242,000 hectares. 10 years ago was zero in the Chaco. They planted very little there, only cooperatives planted some corn to make cattle feed. We saw this going to 240,000 hectares in total, not our, in total. Chaco in Paraguay, apart from this growth, 242,000 hectares, we have a little over 50,000 in cotton. Cotton has been growing strongly in Paraguay. And you know, those who know the price of land know that cotton helps the liquidity and hectares and in sale of land. We're planting a lot of cotton. We planted the year before last. We began with 800 hectors, then 2,000, now 2,500 hectares of cotton in Paraguay, very good for cotton, an absurd natural fertility. So Paraguay is very -- has very fertile land. I don't know -- I don't know any other place in the world where you can plant without fertilizers. Only Paraguay, you can plant cotton without fertilizers.

So we're looking at liquidity. Bolivia, no. Bolivia, no, doesn't have this liquidity as in Paraguay. We made a small sale of land in Paraguay, and we will continue selling land in Paraguay soon. So international expansion is focused on these 2 countries. When we went to these countries, we looked at profitability. Profitability was high, but no liquidity. Today, we see, in the case of Paraguay, an important increase in liquidity because of the development, like I say. For example, so like a house, when things around the house get better, the price goes up.

So we're planting cotton in Paraguay. So we're using biotechnology and this will -- Paraguay will be producing soon cotton with the same quality of fiber as in Brazil because of their good soil.

[Operator]

We have one more question from [indiscernible].

Let's continue with the other questions that came in writing concerning expansion. You are being able to maintain the planted area, even with the sales. Are you leasing land?

[André Guillaumon, executive]

Easy answer, both, both. We have an important growth in leased land. We're leasing land to plant. But looking at long-term leasing. These are long-term leases. We see a great chance. Since its long-term lease, this is a way to buy. When it's a small lease, short lease, it's difficult to capture -- it's difficult to buy the land. So sometimes, in our case, we have long-term leases looking at everything, to have leases to grow in the long term and much of these leases, the commercial part is linked and has the possibility of renewal. We have leases with this growth, 12 or 15 years. Most of them are 12, 15 year leases, long term and always with our creativity to make -- to renew these leases. And we've been able to do this.

In the case of a farm in Piaui, we were able to extend the lease, renew this -- renew the lease for another 12 years. So it's a lease. It's not a volatile lease that we lose in a year. So we like long-term leases, although this will require CapEx to transform the land. We know how to do this.

So if you lease mature land, we would have 1,000 competitors. In the way we were developing land, we have less competitors, and we can differentiate ourselves.

Now concerning expansion, we have expanded our own land. Brazil is almost finalizing the land that we transform from pasture to arable land. The year before last, we bought Panamby Farm, 6,000 hectares of transformation. We transformed the whole farm. It's all transformed for planting. So answering your question, yes, the growth comes from leases, long-term leases, not 3-year leases, long-term leases. This allows us to say that we will have sustainable growth.

So concerning our own land, we're finalizing the development of Chaparral Farm, other areas in Arrojadinho, actually not finalizing. We've a portfolio to develop land in Paraguay. In Paraguay, we have a lot of land to develop. But answering your question in a numerical way, what we did in purchases and acquisitions last year represented a growth of 23,000, 25,000 hectors. We also sold.

So we added 23,000 to 25,000 hectares of new land. Of these, I would say that 60% came from long-term leases and 40% from transformation of pasture land to arable land. So this is how we did.

[Operator]

Well, we have some questions on storage from [indiscernible]. Our strategy for storage of grains to get better prices, to minimize the impact of cycles. Apart from irrigation, are we investing in storage to generate value to farms? What is your vision knowing that storage is a bottleneck in agro business, what is our capacity of storage -- storage capacity?

[André Guillaumon, executive]

A lot of questions. Okay, first, the company is investing in storage this year. Next week, we will have inaugurations. We have an operation in Piaui, an investment that we made at the end of last year. We're finalizing now. It's a farm that begins to harvest on February 20. So we have a new plant being inaugurated with high processing capacity and low storage capacity. This is our vision of storage. We understand that the plants we will build, we have plans. We discussed this because it involves CapEx. But we have -- we need to improve processing in Mato Grosso. So we're looking at this. We're finalizing the plans.

The company just built a plant for processing in Piaui and certainly, we should have projects in other units, too. These plants -- these storage facilities demand a lot of CapEx, demand time, and we shouldn't be building more than 1 per year because it has risks, high investment and risks. You need a lot of attention to all the external factors, accidents, building a silo is very -- is difficult. We're looking at this.

Answering the second part of the question, not with a focus on storage. Our focus is on processing, processing to make mix and storage less. We have a plant in Piaui and storage there, 10,000 tons in Piaui, 40,000, 50,000 tons similar to Chaparral -- in Chaparral Farm 70,000 tons a year and static 20,000 tons storage and processing 70,000 to 80,000 tons. And you can use also other types of storage like bags. So this is our vision. We will continue. It depends on the need. Most of the time these plans help us to save on freight, transportation, logistics.

So we look at priorities where we have greater gains in logistics and less, and that helps us decide where to invest. So depending on the CapEx and gains in logistics, the company's strategy. Storage capacity, we should have a storage capacity, static storage, not processing. Storage, where grains come in and wait. So static capacity in the case of soybean, 35%, 40% of our production. So we have a static capacity 35%, 40% of the soybean we have. Processing capacity is much higher.

Why do other companies store -- have more storage. We have an important concentration of production in Mapitoba, where you can harvest and ship after harvesting. This happens in Mato Grosso. In the state of Mato Grosso, you need more storage and more processing too.

So I don't know if I forgot something. I showed our strategy. This is the storage strategy. We are always alert to this. And as I said, to Enrique, we look at many points, we have large volumes. And if the -- if you have 20,000, 30,000 tons stored, once we sell with one farm, we can fill half a ship. The strategy now is to use these 40% of static storage to get a recovery on the basis in the second semester.

[Operator]

Next question from [indiscernible].

I'd like to know more about the hedge operations for soybean that was stored for sale? Well, how much of the drop in price come from each part? You had an increase in the sale of beans. How are the -- what is the perspective of profit for beans? And also profitability of sugarcane. We will have to be here until tomorrow.

[André Guillaumon, executive]

Okay, Daniel. Gustavo will help me. He's looking at the quarter. Okay. So one part of the question. Yes, yes, we decreased corn. We planted more beans because of margin. We planted cotton too. So sesame, so for example, we reduced the corn. A small part went to cotton and another went to beans. So beans has a seasonal price. We look at domestic price and export market. Beans has seasonality in price, much more inside Brazil than outside. So our strategy, our [indiscernible] is to export more where you have price in dollars. And the exports of beans, there's -- in the domestic market, you have smaller clients, less liquidity. In exports, you have greater liquidity counterparts, large trades, in the case of India. So we're optimistic with price due to the international scenario and the domestic scenario. So this drought that happened in December, January, affected the production of beans in Brazil.

So when we decided to migrate to beans, it was BRL 250 a bag. In the last few months, the price went to BRL 400. We won't get to sell at this price, but we're very optimistic.

In the case of sugarcane, we see sugarcane, we're thinking of a contribution margin due to the lower cost of fertilizer, because in cotton, you have the cost of service. We had a great inflation in services for sugarcane because you have labor, and this, we believe, will take longer to drop. But we have an important drop in the price of inputs for sugarcane. And we want to go back to have 3,500 EBITDA per hectare. This is what we expect in the future. In the case of soybean, what we showed in terms of reduction, maybe Gustavo can talk about the quarter.

[Gustavo Lopez, executive]

And the question asked is about the drop in price, the part coming from Chicago and the part based on basis. I believe it's important to mention how our policy, our hedge position and normally, we sell using Chicago and dollar basis. We don't have a market yet for coverage. So this is how we work here. I can look at what will happen with the harvest now. We have 60% of soybean is already sold with Chicago. We have a type of exchange rate, BRL 5.3 to a dollar, that's the exchange rate. Today, we have 80, 100 points of drop, and this impacts the bag of soybean.

So we estimated soybean at BRL 123 per bag. Today, it's BRL 115, there was a drop, BRL 115, BRL 116, especially basis. When we look at what happened last year, between planting and harvesting, I can go to 80%. Why do we sell only this? Because if we have a quality problem or less productivity, we want -- we don't want to sell everything and then pay penalties. So the 50,000 tons production, 200,000 tons, 20%, we did not sell. We waited. And you saw the graph where you had a drop to BRL 117. We were never able to recover this price. We thought there would be a floor, but this didn't happen. And the small gain that we had in derivatives helped us, so that's it.

In terms of last year, if you look at Chicago and U.S. dollar, in the case of premium, the first sales that we made, 80,000, 90,000 tons, we had a positive premium. So after the super harvest was confirmed, there was a drop for the second semester.

[Operator]

I will pass the floor to André for his final comments. And I'd like to thank all the participants. Once again, we had many participants, excellent questions. We were not able to answer all. Some I will answer by chat. If you have more questions, I and my team, Camila,Daisy, Adriana, we're here to answer the questions. We wish you all a good holiday, Carnival.

[André Guillaumon, executive]

Thank you, Anna. Thank you to all who helped us to prepare this. And I'd like to help thank the participants. So you can continue trusting in the work done by the company, the resilience in delivering results, both in operations and sale of land. So today, Gustavo showed, I'd like to highlight, we're a company of transformation of land. In the first years, productivity of soybean is a little lower but we use a lot of technology to help us get better results and also sale of land. Irrigation projects are important. We're investing in some units, one in Bahia, Arrojadinho irrigation, but we have also in [indiscernible] another project for irrigation. We will have more irrigation projects in the state of Bahia. It's an important place.

We see a migration of cultures. The challenge, for example, we have to use irrigation for cotton, never for corn. So irrigation is good for cotton, and this can bring us good operational results and good gains in these irrigated land, making the land more expensive.

Thank you to all in listening our call. We're available for any questions you may have. Okay. Thank you very much. And congratulations to the team who has worked in a resilient way to deliver consistent results to you. Thank you. And as Anna said, have a nice holiday, Carnival. And everyone says Brazil begins after Carnival, not for us, but so good holidays, and let's come back with new energy next week. Thank you. Bye-bye.

[Statements in English on this transcript were spoken by an interpreter present on the live call.]