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Adecoagro S.A. (AGRO)

Q4 2015 Earnings Call· Fri, Mar 18, 2016

$13.67

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen and thank you for waiting. At this time we would like to welcome everyone to Adecoagro's Fourth Quarter 2015 Results Conference Call. Today, with us we have Mr. Mariano Bosch, CEO; Mr. Charlie Boero Hughes, CFO; and Mr. Hernan Walker, Investor Relations Manager. We would like to inform you that this event is being recorded and all participants will be in a listen-only mode during the Company's presentation. After the Company's remarks are completed, there will be a question-and-answer section. At that time, further instructions will be given. [Operator Instructions]. Before proceeding, let me mention that forward-looking statements are based on the beliefs and assumptions of Adecoagro's management and on information currently available to the Company. They involve risks, uncertainties and assumptions, because they relate to future events and therefore depend on circumstances that may or may not occur in the future. Investors should understand that general economic conditions, industry conditions and other operating factors could also affect the future results of Adecoagro and could cause results to differ materially from those expressed in such forward-looking statements. Now, I'll turn the conference over to Mr. Mariano Bosch, CEO. Mr. Bosch, you may begin your conference.

Mariano Bosch

Analyst

Good morning everyone and thank you for joining our call where we present the Company’s earnings for the year 2015, as you will see during the presentation we have achieved very good results despite the fact that we're transitioning a low price cycle of commodities we produce. These results obtained in the difficult environment in this difficult environment is a direct consequence of the focus we have put in having a low cost of production, combined with a very lucrative strategy. Since our inception we have only conceived our company as becoming the lowest lower cost producer of each commodity. In addition 2015 marked a milestone in the relatively short history of our company. First we completed the construction of state of the art sugar ethanol and energy cluster in Mato Grosso Do Sul. This cluster has already started crushing in 2016 for the first time at full capacity. And second, we became free cash positive as a result of not only the outstanding performance of the sugar ethanol and energy asset, but also the contribution of risk of our business trends. And our profound discipline towards obtaining efficiency at all levels of our company. This has definitely put the Company in an excellent position to take advantage of potential opportunity. In a different token [ph] Argentina’s new government has made significant changes to agriculture policy that have positively impacted our margin and profitability. Mainly the elimination of export taxes and export quotas for all agricultural commodities except for soybean which was reduced by 5% and more than 50% depreciation of the Argentine peso. Under this new macro-economical and political scenario the outlook for our businesses having improved substantially and most certainly will bring opportunities to continue growing and improving our results. We have begun the New Year of full challenges and are excited about the prospects of the Company for the coming month. Our teams are fully motivated to execute the Company's strategy in the most efficient and sustainable manner generating value to our shareholders. Now, I would like to ask Charlie to walk you through the main operating and financial highlights of the quarter. Charlie, please go ahead.

Charlie Boero Hughes

Analyst

Thank you, Mariano. Good morning, everyone. I would like to start on page 4 with the brief analysis on the rain in Mato Grosso do Sul. As you can see on the chart, Adecoagro [ph] transformed 2015 the most raining year in the last decade. On the full year basis, rains reached 2,249 millimeters in Mato Grosso do Sul, 40% higher than the 10-year average. On a quarterly basis, the fourth quarter was the most effected by excess of rains, in fact it rained 46% more than the same year average and 62% more compare to the 10th year of last year. I would like remind everyone that sugarcane cannot be harvested when the soil is wet because the heavy combined and trucks will damaged the sugarcane roots and the soil. Let's move to Page 5 to see the impact on our trashing activities. The excess rains during the quarter resulted in significantly delay and disruptions in sugarcane harvesting and crushing. Sugarcane milling during the fourth quarter of 2016 reached 1.8 million pounds, 22% lower year-over-year and lower than our expectations. It is important to highlight that the sugarcane which was not harvested during the fourth quarter, it's schedule to be harvested during the first quarter of 2016. In fact, as of today we have harvested over 1.2 million ton of sugarcane during 2016. On a yearly basis however, sugarcane milling in 2015, increased by 15% driven by higher sugarcane availability together with the higher milling efficiencies in all of our mills. Let's now move to Page 6, where I would like to highlight our agricultural productivity. As you can see on the top charts, our sugarcane yields in the fourth quarter reached 95 tons per hectare, 11% higher than last year. TRS was negatively affected by the abundant range…

Operator

Operator

Thank you. The floor is open for questions [Operator Instructions]. And our first question will come from José Rizardo of BTG. José Rizardo: I have two questions and both are related to your sugar and ethanol business, so due to the rainfall during the first quarter postponed relevant part of sugarcane crushing, so my first question would be, could you give us update about how sugarcane crushing stands as of the first month of 2016 and also these first months of the year and usually the inter-crop maintaining periods. So I would like to know even the fact that your quotient [ph] began in January likely February, does that have any side effect left for the next crop and for the maintenance period? Thank you.

Mariano Bosch

Analyst

Thank you, Jose for your question. I would ask Renato Junqueira Santos Pereira our Head of Sugar and Ethanol Business to answer your question and then I can complement. Renato?

Renato Junqueira Santos Pereira

Analyst

Thank you for question. Due to the weather pattern in our region we have a drier period in the transactional session and a wetter weather in the transitional session. Therefore we have a good condition to crush sugarcane during the first quarter and plenty of time to do our industrial maintaining throughout this year. As a consequence of conditions to rainfall pattern the TRS difference from the very beginning and very end of this year to the peak to the season is much more allowing us to crush a better sugarcane in the first quarter. As already mentioned as of today, we have already crushed 1.2 million tons of sugarcane. Our use is going to 110 tons per hector and the TRS content is around 107 kilogram per ton.

Operator

Operator

Next question will come from Rodrigo Mugaburu of Morgan Stanley.

Rodrigo Mugaburu

Analyst

I have two questions, one, if you how any -- you can tell us something about what you're going to do with the cash of the fund phase in the Argentina and then the other question is looking at the 10-year last year we're up 15% year-over-year, that's 100% of the ag due to ag practices or again in linear that also helped to increase the [Indiscernible], so bottom line my question is, can we use, assuming normal weather for next year or same kind of years for the sugarcane for the coming season? Thanks.

Mariano Bosch

Analyst

Hi, Rodrigo, thank you for your question. And I will answer first, the second -- you second question that is regarding the cane yields, I think that the cane yields have improved because of the two reasons because of all the operational improvements and also because of the range that are giving us a better gain. So I would say that it's a complementary and both things are making this result so I wouldn’t assume forever this exact yield that your taking-- that we're having right now. Then on the first part of your question regarding what it is that we're going to do with the cash generated by the fund saved in Argentina. Now we have a very important change in Argentina and now cash is functional [ph], so we can use the cash from one country to other and that is a huge change that happened for us. So overall the cash we think the same way and as we always answer this question on how it is or what is that we are going to be doing with the cash, the answer is we're looking for growth projects, but we're very disciplined on the return on investment that we need for each of this project. So in each one of our business lines in our sugar and ethanol in the farming business, we are looking for growth in the project and whenever the return on investment is achieved we will execute. So that is one of the things that we are looking to do with the cash. And then we can also reduce our debt level and we can also distribute capital to shareholders, so that three things can be done with cash that we will be generating.

Rodrigo Mugaburu

Analyst

And if I may, another question on the daily business you posted very strong operational results on the business, the economic situation in Argentina is kind of cannot -- been not allowed to have like strong economic results. Do you think -- what's your view on the recent affords from the Argentine government to improve the profitability of this sector, are you optimistic, that anything that is being done or discuss is going to help the economics of the business, are you optimistic that could happen this year or it's going to take a little more time in your view?

Mariano Bosch

Analyst

The international situation of the daily business is a very difficult situation. As we also mentioned we are really low cost producers in each one of these, say commodities. And so even though we are having such difficulties in daily business in general, we are still making money. But it is clear that we are going through the most difficult situation in terms of daily business stuff in general. And particularly, in Argentina we are optimistic that they are taking care and they will find a way on how to solve the particular difficult situation in Argentina. We are still making money, we are still in a reasonable situations compared to most of the industries that is really suffering, so that’s why we are optimistic that this measures will help to develop the industry.

Rodrigo Mugaburu

Analyst

Great thank you so much.

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Our next question will come from Fernando Suarez of Raymond James.

Fernando Suarez

Analyst

I was wondering if you can give us some color regarding the low land that prevents you from buying additional land in Argentina.

Mariano Bosch

Analyst

Okay, thank you Fernando for your question. Sure, this current administration in Argentina is focus on promoting investment in Argentina and that is clear. As part this idea, they are revising this referring ownership legislation. So as an example I can mention that we were in an investor meeting with a Secretary of Agriculture and he pointed out specifically that they are revising this, that this is a priority for them and that they are working with a governance of the different provinces in order to modify or adjusted this land ownership law.

Fernando Suarez

Analyst

Okay, and do you think that current prices will meet your higher return?

Mariano Bosch

Analyst

Depending on -- we believe that the prices of the land are a consequence of the cash yields of that land. That’s why particularly in Argentina, we think that the cash yields have improved and are improving with this new scenario, so we believe that the prices of land should continue to increase at its general idea. So that is the general concept. Then specifically of the different project that we are analyzing, there is always a huge gap between the asked priced and there are certain prices at which we can achieve the returns that we are looking for. So it will depend on the specific opportunity of each one of the thing that we are analyzing today in the different places of that region.

Fernando Suarez

Analyst

Okay great thanks.

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions] And we have a question from Victor Saragiotto of Credit Suisse.

Victor Saragiotto

Analyst

Just want to understand how the company sees a consolidation into sugar and ethanol sector? You mentioned that you have received many offers, just want to know if you see this move or emulation still doesn’t make sense. Thank you.

Mariano Bosch

Analyst

Thank you Victor for your question. We see the sector of course going through many difficulties but again, we think that the important thing here is to be within the low cost producers of sugar, ethanol and energy and in the combination of the three. So we see attractive assets, when these assets are capable of being the low cost producers of three commodity. So there is a combination of soil and climate and availability of cane in order to be able to comply with this essence of characterization [ph]. Then us in particular we feel we are in a very good situation that we are obtaining our results that we outlined in the past and that our cluster is really within the concept of being the low cost producer. Are there opportunities, yes, there are many available not all of them we think are opportunities, but there may be some specific cases where we can comply with our targeted returns and where we can continue to be the local producers. So if these two characteristics happened we may be able to grow and I think our team is very committed and it's very well positioned to continue on.

Operator

Operator

This concludes our question-and-answer session. At this time, I would like to turn the floor back to Mr. Bosch for any closing remarks.

Mariano Bosch

Analyst

So before ending the call, I would like to thank you all for joining and waited our commission to obtain the maximum return for our shareholders in a responsible and sustainable manner .We are aware of the difficult scenario the world is going through, nevertheless in the region and in particular Argentina, is showing clear signs of recovery in our sector and we are confident that we shall take advantage of such favorable environmental and continued generating value. So I look forward to seeing you in our upcoming IR event, thank you again.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. This does conclude today’s presentation. You may disconnect your line at this time and have a nice day.