Welcome to Ultrapar’s Third Quarter ‘24 Results Conference Call. There is also a simultaneous webcast that may be accessed through Ultrapar’s website at ri.ultra.com.br. and through MZiQ platform. The presentation will be conducted by Mr. Rodrigo Pizzinatto, Ultrapar’s Chief Financial and Investor Relations Officer. And in the Q&A session, we will have the presence of Mr. Marcos Lutz, Ultrapar’s CEO; and the CEOs of the businesses, Mr. Tabajara Bertelli; Mr. Decio Amaral; and Mr. Leonardo Linden. We would like to inform you that this event is being recorded. [Operator Instructions] A replay of this call will be available immediately after it for 7 days. Before proceeding, I would like to state that forward-looking statements are being made under the safe harbor of the Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1996. Forward-looking statements are based on the beliefs and assumptions of Ultrapar management and all 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 Ultrapar and could cause results to differ materially from those expressed in such forward-looking statements. Now I would like to turn the conference over to Mr. Rodrigo Pizzinatto who will start our conference. Mr. Pizzinatto, you may begin.

Good morning, everyone. It is a pleasure to be here once more to talk about Ultrapar’s results. And before I begin, I want to remind you of the reporting criteria and standards presented in Slide 2. And now moving on to Slide #3. As you can see in the chart in the top left side, our recurring EBITDA totaled BRL1.506 billion in the third quarter of ‘24, 24% lower than that of the third quarter of ‘23, mainly due to Ipiranga’s lower EBITDA year-over-year. As you can also see that the accumulated EBITDA for ‘24 is BRL4.93 billion, 4% higher than that of the previous period. Ultrapar’s net income was BRL698 million, 22% lower year-over-year due to the lower EBITDA I’ve just mentioned, partially offset by the lower net financial expenses. The net income year-to-date is BRL1.645 billion, 17% higher than the previous period. I want to highlight that the share of profit of Hidrovias was recorded with a 2-month delay, contributed positively with BRL9 million in the third quarter of ‘24. Investments in its turn totaled BRL519 million in the third quarter of ‘24, up 37% compared to that of the third quarter of ‘23, mainly driven by higher investments in Ipiranga. We had an operating cash flow generation of BRL780 million in the third quarter of ‘24. It would have been BRL1.020 billion if we do not consider the reduction of BRL240 million in the draft discount operations in the third quarter of ‘24. The cash flow generation was 59% lower than that of the third quarter of ‘23, mainly due to lower EBITDA and higher investments in working capital. And moving now to Slide #4 to talk about our liability management. We ended the third quarter with a net debt of BRL7.968 billion, an increase of BRL268…

[Operator Instructions] The first question comes from Monique Greco from Itaú BBA. Monique, please unmute your microphone.

Hello. Good morning. Thank you for taking my questions. I’m going to ask one first question about Ipiranga. Going back to what Pizzinatto has just said about expectations of margins. We got into the second half of the year with an expectation of have a much better competitive dynamic, healthier increasing demand, normalization of inventory. Do you think that the improvement of the dynamic with volumes and so on has already been reflected in this adjustment of margins that you’ve made in this quarter? And when Pizzinatto, you said you want to have the levels over 130. Do you think that – do you still expect an improvement of this dynamic in upcoming quarters? Would we expect some improvement still being perceived in future margins? This is my first question. The second question combines Ipiranga and Ultracargo. What about import of diesel at the forefront. We’ve seen smaller representativeness of independent importers in the total imported amount in the country. So I’d like to hear from Linden – how do you see the impact of that in the competitive dynamic of distribution? And if I could also ask Decio, do you think that small – lower spot imports can impact Ultracargo’s operation? Thank you.

Hi, Monique. This is Linden speaking. First, concerning the dynamic of the third quarter, this fight against illegal practices has improved oil and ethanol. We had a 5% increase of volume over the second quarter of this year, an improvement for regular gas and ethanol, but we’ve observed a competitive market for diesel on the highways and in spot market, the cost of diesel has been increasing, biodiesel and also imported diesel. It has applied pressure to the price at the stations; especially the highway stations had difficulty to adjust prices. So one thing offset the other, and this was somewhat what we observed in the third quarter. Now looking ahead, we believe that better legal practices will always be positive to the industry at large. And we hope that this is going to progress as is so that we can have better and better conditions. We still see competitiveness in diesel, especially in the highways and in spot market. I think this is the kind of balance that we’ve been observed in terms of supply. The market seems to be well balanced. It was a stable quarter. If you look during the 3 months of the quarter, you will see somewhat stable margins. There were no major oscillations or volatility. I think that this is something that’s going to be repeated in the fourth quarter. Concerning imports, yes, there has been some decrease in imports, not significant really, just a minor drop, changing these logics of product coming from the Gulf, from the East European countries. But the Brazilian market is structurally dependent on import. And this is going to keep happening. Maybe things will change somewhat in terms of where the gas comes from.

Thank you, Monique. If you compare this quarter with the same quarter last year, you were going to see a smaller spot volume in this quarter, the inventory levels increased somewhat. Our tanks are fuller. At Ultracargo, the product comes regards of being cabotage or imported. We are very well positioned in Vila do Conde, Itaqui, Suape. The product has to come into the tanks because we need to sell in these regions. Even if there is a reduction of imports. Still, we are going to go into cabotage and the market will just compensate. We are still investing in improvement of structural deficit. And this is why we’ve been investing in spot handling. There are going to be major opportunities of import and product cabotage.

Thank you both.

The next question comes from Pedro Gama, Citi. Mr. Gama, please unmute your microphone.

Hello, good morning. Thank you for taking my questions. The first question is about Ultragaz. We’ve been hearing the market discussing about natural gas and LPG. On the one side, we see that the social programs are encouraging the use of LPG, but constantly discussing the margin of distribution of LPG in recent years. What is your opinion about the social programs and the effects they have on market? And how do you see LPG in competition with other products such as natural gas, ethanol and other energy sources in the country? Second question about Linden and increased volumes at Ipiranga. Last month, the first station of Texaco was open. What’s the strategy for the brand in Brazil? And how does it adjust with the whole strategy of Ipiranga in the country?

This is Tabajara speaking. I’m going to start with the question about Ultragaz. The program gas to wall, liquefied gas to wall is a social program of the current federal administration. We’ve talked about the effect and impacting energy poverty rates. The government is really focusing on it, and this is something positive. We are going to support as much as possible, but there is still a lot to happen before we know how the program is going to evolve. It will probably analyze the possibility of resellers so that the benefit brought by LPG to the society can reach 100% of households in the country even though I have to say there is still a lot to be done. You’ve talked about competition in terms of energy sources. We can see more room now for applications of LPG. There are some limitations of LPG use in some specific applications. We expect the regulatory progress to really release and approve that. Especially in bulk, we’ve been seeing other uses and applications for LPG. And we are also getting ready for the use of other energy sources that the company has in its portfolio, so that we can really have a complete, let’s say, reach of options. For LPG, we still see a very relevant opportunity of growth. So I think those are two potential positive elements for the industry. Now Pedro, concerning volumes in Ipiranga, the growth of volume in the second to third quarter of Ipiranga has nothing to do with Texaco. We just opened one gas station, one service station on the fourth quarter. It’s much more market thing. And our actions in our own network. Now concerning the brand Texaco, what we’ve been doing here with the brand is introduce a different model of business in the country. We are going to have a strategy of regional exclusivity and they will have an exclusivity of the brand in a region that is going to be defined among the parties, and it’s going to be a lighter model in terms of investments. We don’t have any specific guidelines in terms of product from them exactly because we are in a process of reproducing, understanding the model. We have a very good route to follow with Texaco. What do you see volume is from Ipiranga, and it’s going to be more focused on Ipiranga, which is our main sales outlet than Texaco.

My question was really to understand your strategy. So that’s very clear. Thank you very much.

The next question comes from Matheus Enfeldt, UBS. Please unmute your microphone.

Good morning, Rodrigo. Good morning, everyone. Kudos to the result. CapEx, it’s been running below what we had expected and what had been announced in the beginning of the year in all your business units. I would like to understand why – understand in further details to what extent this is going to impact 2025? Is there a gain of efficiency projects that you haven’t done because of higher interest rate, change in assumptions. Just to understand a bit more because CapEx has underperformed – has been underperforming, knowing that it tends to be sped up in the fourth quarter. Now building up on the previous question about Ultragaz, what about the other proposals of regulatory adjustment, use of other brands, the end of support, no users. Could you maybe tell us more about the regulatory adjustments provided by the Brazilian agency of oil and gas ANP?

Thank you, Matheus, for your question. The plan that we shared for 2024 of CapEx was not linear. We tend to accumulate it in the end of the year. And we expect to close it below what was initially planned because of some savings in our projects and because of some carryover to 2025. Let me now hand it over to Tabajara.

You see Matheus building up about – your questions about regulatory affairs. It’s all part of one same package, and the natural progression of regulation, we’ve already discussed about that in the past. And we’ve always taken a very active role. We know a lot about the topic. We see the international reference, and we tend to be highly regulated. It provides more safety, more competition. In such a large country, there is no fraud or illegal practice in products, which is a result of the operational security that agents have and clients have. So it’s a very positive thing, high security and a highly competitive market. The models that have economic rationale can always be analyzed, but it should always take to the economic improvement of the system, making sure that we still maintain the same level of security of inspection without opening room for illegal practices because, of course, it always impacts safety and security and nobody wants that. So I think that the security practices that we have are always very positive. This is what should prevail. I think this is the most, let’s say, appropriate solution for the society at large.

Thank you for your answers.

Now the next question comes from Pedro Soares with BTG. Pedro, please unmute your mic.

Good morning, everyone. I have two questions. First, about working capital. There was quite a use of working capital. I would like to hear more about your expectations for the fourth quarter and also inventory levels. Can you tell us more about the dynamic of the quarter, maybe there were some strategic actions, but was there anything else that resulted from the ethanol competitiveness in auto cycle, just giving more pressure to oil, gas, is it something temporary? Should we expect more over demand for next quarters? And one other question about margins at Ipiranga. The level of 130 seems to be conservative, not only because of the results you’ve reached, but also because it’s below what we observed in the first half of the year. Do you think that this is a level that maintains expected return on investments being healthy levels and also allowing some market share gains? Or no, are you just being conservative as a management team? Thank you.

Hi, Pedro, I’m going to answering about Ipiranga, Linden speaking, and then Rodrigo can build up on it. Concerning turnover, I think there are four components involving Ipiranga and the working capital. First, increase in volume, 5% increase in volumes, secondly, highest price of gasoline and a strategy of anticipation of the buying of biofuel, we’ve seen an opportunity. And fourth option is a reduction of [indiscernible] that we had throughout the year half. Having a position in biofuel as well as the program [indiscernible] are just circumstantial situation and that will be offset in the fourth quarter. Concerning margins, yes, we tend to be more conservative we always say that we see margins over 150 per cubic meter, but we have been more conservative for this quarter and trying to understand the market demand. And it’s not a share strategy. Let us make it very clear, not a shared strategy.

Great. Thank you, Linden.

The next question comes by Eduardo Muniz with Santander. Eduardo, please, the mic is on.

Hello. Good morning. Thank you for taking my questions. The first question is about the initiatives against illegal practices in the area of distribution. We’ve seen the focus of many of the players in the ecosystem. It’s something getting stronger, and we’ve seen that some of the special regimens were just put to an end. What do you also expect to reach this year and the first quarter next year, what else do you expect to be approved to improve competitive market? And secondly, concerning Hidrovias do Brasil, what are the main points that Ultrapar wants to contribute with Hidrovias do Brasil to really double the initiative of Arco Norte with the private use terminal it is it something that you can lend to them as Ultracargo. What are the other options that you could get, given some more information to us?

Well, Eduardo, yes, there is an improvement. I think there is still a lot to be done in terms of fighting against the legal practices. We have seen that things can really get better if we have appropriate fight against illegal practices. When you talk about tax evasion, we have to work with ethanol and monophasic [ph]. Ethanol is still a relevant problem with regular trading. There is also a law that would impose sanctions to those longtime debtors. There is also the RenovaBio with another legislation. There is a very important share of distributors that do not meet their goals of CBIOs, getting really impacts producers and manufacturers because they could be investing in the production of biofuel and they are not. And finally, we expect to have a better control over not mixing biodiesel. For example, right now, where biodiesel costs more than BRL7 per liter, a great difference to D100 and these are situations in which some mix may happen. So, these are all open fronts of initiatives. I cannot tell you whether this is going to happen in this quarter, next quarter or when exactly. But we have been having very interesting discussions led by a number of companies and always supported by the regulatory authorities as well. We have to evolve in this agenda, it’s still a problem in our industry. In terms of Hidrovias do Brasil, we are part of the Board, and we believe the company is capable of running projects with quality. Ultracargo is developing four terminals simultaneously. It has a very good active track record. And of course, it’s a company that will provide support if considered to be necessary by Hidrovias. But right now, we are thinking about long-term, giving a support to the company in existing projects, which were still waiting for approval by shareholders to execute. So, we are very optimistic about the possibilities of expanding their installed capacity of the North area, Arco Norte.

In addition to what Marcos Lutz has just said, Hidrovias have a very good team dedicated to this topic, but we are also contributing with some people that were transferred to Hidrovias to be part of the initiative. Our project manager is someone highly experienced in conducting complex projects. And certainly, it’s someone who is going to help in these initiatives. Now, combining all questions about illegal practices and just to give you some dimension about that, if Ipiranga does not mix biodiesel in November and December alone, Ipiranga will be additional EBITDA of BRL1 billion because of the difference of prices of biodiesel and diesel. This is how much illegal practice affect the industry, and this is why we have to fight against that so that we can have fair competition.

Okay. Thank you very much. If I can have a follow-up for Hidrovias, any expectations of approving some excess capital with Hidrovias?

No news so far.

Okay. Thank you very much.

The next question comes by Leonardo Marcondes, Bank of America. Mr. Marcondes, please un-mute your mic.

Good morning. Thank you very much for taking my question. Most of them have been answered. I am going to ask one about Ultragaz. Pizzinatto has just mentioned that you expect an increased share of – coming from new energy sources. Could you please give us some more information about that, the dynamics of this new segment? And could you please tell us how much that contribution of that share would be?

Well, Leonardo, based on what Rodrigo has said, when we started, this is a combination of our strategy. We have had a very good evolution of our strategies in the long-term, closer to our customers, in all the different segments that we operate, such as bulk. They have evolved a lot and they are probably going to evolve more in the fourth quarter, that’s what we expect. We can see the maturity of the investments we have made in other energy sources, biomethane and electricity. We have already talked about our expectations of 3% to 5% of EBITDA being resulting from that. But they are not segregated operation. We have been really combining businesses to add more value to our clients. This is something that is becoming a reality and really impacting our results. This is probably going to be intensified in upcoming quarters. We have been offering a broader perspective and a broader range of products. So, we expect that improvement in the fourth quarter and in upcoming quarters next year.

Great. Thank you very much.

The next question comes from Bruno Montanari, Morgan Stanley. Mr. Montanari, please un-mute yourself.

Thank you for taking my questions. Just a quick follow-up and one question. Going back to working capital, should we wait, should we expect more working capital released in the fourth quarter? Is it going to be expressive because of the investments you have made in previous quarters? And let me ask a question to you, Lutz. How do you anticipate the development in Brazil, thinking about economy, politics, U.S. election when making decisions about investments in existing businesses, and also in new initiatives that you might have.

Let me quickly answer about the working capital, and then Lutz can answer the question. Yes, it would probably mean a recovery of working capital. Working capital movements are always significant up or down. We expect to regain a lot of what we have invested in the other quarters.

I don’t expect any radical changes in the country, anything that would be relevant to Ultrapar’s businesses. In terms of investments, we have made investments in Hidrovias, which is still going to go through a maturation. There are a number of upsides a company with a great future. All the other three traditional business that we have, have expansion projects. We have been allocating capital to them. We are still maintaining our position, which has deleveraged and always observing closely the economy. The U.S. election, well, I don’t anticipate any impact on our strategy, at least for now.

Great. Thank you very much.

The next question comes from Elena Kalman [ph] with XP. Ms. Kalman, please un-mute your mic.

Hello. I have a quick question here. About your strategy of service stations, we have seen a movement, but I would like to get your update on what do you expect to develop further the strategy of the network of service stations and the number of stations?

Nothing is changing really compared to what we have been doing with the branded network. We make investments selectively, and we have a natural attrition of this kind of business. The main initiative of closing down some of the units is over, if you get the official numbers of a and b of self-stated number of stations, you will see that they are very close. This is a sign of the accuracy of number of stations that we report. And from now on business as usual, make select investments and exclude or close stations that wouldn’t make sense to be maintained.

Great. Thank you.

Thank you. If there are no further questions, I would like to hand it over to Mr. Rodrigo Pizzinatto for his closing remarks. Mr. Pizzinatto, you have the floor.

Thank you all very much for the questions. Any unanswered questions can be answered by the Investor Relations team, and I hope to see you in our next earnings release conference call. Thank you all very much.

Thank you. The earnings release conference call of Ultra is closed now. Please disconnect now. Thank you very much. Have a great day.