Bunge Global - Earnings Call - Q3 2025

Executive Summary

• Adjusted EPS beat while revenue and EBITDA came in below consensus; BG delivered $2.27 adjusted EPS vs $1.97 consensus, on net sales of $22.16B vs $23.19B consensus and EBITDA of ~$0.73B vs ~$0.84B consensus; management maintained FY25 adj. EPS of $7.30–$7.60 for the combined company. S&P Global estimates marked with asterisks below.*
• Strong execution and footprint from Viterra drove step-up in Soybean and Softseed Processing & Refining; Grain Merchandising was softer in Q3 with better seasonal setup into Q4 per management.
• Non-GAAP adjustments were material: mark-to-market timing (-$0.87/sh) and notable items (-$0.54/sh) weighed on GAAP EPS ($0.86), underscoring importance of adjusted views.
• Capital allocation: $545M repurchased in Q3; net debt now modestly above RMI (~$0.9B), leverage 2.2x adj net debt/adj EBITDA; ample liquidity (~$9.7B committed facilities).
• Near-term catalysts: synergy capture ramps in 2026 with larger step by 2027; Q4 mix shifts (softer soy/softseed, stronger grain); biofuel policy clarity expected late 2025/early 2026 with soybean oil tailwinds thereafter.

What Went Well and What Went Wrong

• What Went Well
  • Soy and softseed strength on higher margins and added capacity; Soybean adj. Segment EBIT rose to $478M from $286M; Softseed to $275M from $133M, aided by Argentina, Europe and Global Oils execution.
  • Integration benefits beginning: “unlocking efficiencies—optimizing our footprint, coordinating larger flows, and running at higher utilization” (CEO).
  • Shareholder returns and balance sheet: $545M buybacks; upgraded credit profile with strong committed liquidity; adjusted ROIC 8.5% TTM (10% pro forma adjustments) and WACC lowered to 6% (adj 6.7%) (CFO).
• What Went Wrong
  • Revenue/EBITDA below consensus; EBITDA ~$0.73B vs ~$0.84B est; revenue $22.16B vs $23.19B est; Grain Merchandising EBIT weak ($21M), partially offset by seasonality expected to improve in Q4.*
  • Non-GAAP noise significant: mark-to-market timing difference of $0.87/sh and notable items $0.54/sh depressed GAAP EPS; reliance on adjusted metrics to assess core performance.
  • Corporate/Other elevated on integration costs; Q3 Corporate & Other EBIT -$268M (adj. -$167M) vs -$130M (adj. -$68M) prior year; integration costs of $101M in Q3.

Transcript

Speaker 4

Good morning and welcome to the Bunge Global third quarter 2025 earnings release and conference call. All participants will be in listen only mode. Should you need assistance, please signal a conference specialist by pressing Star then zero on your telephone keypad. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To ask a question, you may press Star then one on your telephone keypad. To withdraw your question, please press Star then two. Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Mark Haden, Vice President of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Speaker 1

Thank you, Drew, and thank you for joining us this morning for our third quarter earnings call. Before we get started, I want to let you know that we have slides to accompany our discussion. These can be found at the Investor Center on our website at bunge.com under Events and Presentations. Reconciliations of our non-GAAP measures to the most directly comparable GAAP financial measure are posted on our website as well. I'd like to direct you to slide 2 and remind you that today's presentation includes forward-looking statements that reflect Bunge's current view in respect to future events, financial performance, and industry conditions. These forward-looking statements are subject to various risks and uncertainties.

Bunge has provided additional information in its reports on file with the SEC concerning factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in this presentation and we encourage you to review these factors. On the call this morning are Greg Heckman, Bunge's Chief Executive Officer and John Knepel, Chief Financial Officer. I'll now turn the call over to Greg.

Speaker 0

Thank you, Mark, and good morning, everyone. Before diving into the quarter, I want to thank our team for their continued focus, discipline, and execution in what remains a highly complex operating environment. Across the company, our people are working together, navigating uncertainty, capturing opportunities, and delivering value for all stakeholders. With the Viterra transaction closing behind us, this was our first quarter operating as a combined company, and I'm very pleased with the way our teams have embraced integration and the one Bunge culture. We are already seeing tangible benefits from bringing these two highly complementary businesses together, benefits that go well beyond cost savings. We have aligned the combined company along our proven end-to-end value chain operating model. This structure enables us to run with greater agility, transparency, and collaboration across origination, merchandising, processing, and refining.

What's different and powerful about our combined company is the increased granularity in information we have at both origin and destination. We've connected more local and regional networks into our global platform, giving us insights and optionality we didn't have before. These competitive advantages are allowing us to respond faster to market signals and execute more efficiently across the value chain, identifying opportunities to optimize our footprint, better coordinate flows between origination and destination, and capture margin through improved logistics. These efficiencies are lasting and will benefit the entire value chain over time from farmer to end consumer. They're being unlocked because our teams not only have the same information at the same time, but are also working toward a single set of objectives for our global company.

This knowledge sharing along with collaborative planning is happening throughout the organization, from the elevator operator to the commercial desk to the end customer, and it's already driving better outcomes. Shifting to our operating performance, our third quarter results reflected strong performance in our soybean and softseed processing and refining segments, where we saw the benefits of a more balanced global footprint and the initial impact of our team's work to capture commercial synergies. John will go into more detail in a moment. As we shared on our business update call last month, we recast our full year 2025 outlook to include Viterra. Looking ahead to the fourth quarter, farmers and end consumers remain largely spot, reflecting continued macro trade and biofuel policy uncertainty. Based on what we can see today, we continue to expect full year 2025 adjusted EPS in the range of $7.30-$7.60.

This reflects an expected second half adjusted EPS in the range of $4-$4.25. With that, I'll turn it over to John for a deeper look at our financials and outlook.

Speaker 2

John, thanks Greg, and good morning everyone. On our October 15th business update call, we announced that starting with this quarter, we will change our reportable segment structure from agribusiness, refined specialty oils, and milling to four reportable: soybean processing and refining, softseed processing and refining, other oilseeds processing and refining, and grain merchandising and milling. The changes in segment reporting reflect the realignment of oilseeds operations into processing and refining by commodity type and combining grain merchandising and milling operations into one reportable segment. These changes reflect the tight interconnection of our upstream and downstream operations and align our segment reporting with our end-to-end value chain operating structure. Now, let's turn to the earnings highlights on Slide 5. As Greg mentioned, the newly combined team executed well, delivering a strong third quarter.

Our reported third quarter earnings per share was $0.86 compared to $1.56 in the third quarter of 2024. Our reported results included unfavorable mark to market timing difference of $0.87 per share and an unfavorable impact of $0.54 per share from notable items related to Viterra transaction and integration costs. Adjusted EPS was $2.27 in the third quarter versus $2.29 in the prior year. Adjusted segment earnings before interest and taxes or EBIT was $924 million in the quarter versus $559 million last year. Soybean processing and refining results improved in all regions reflecting a combination of higher margins, strong execution and the addition of Viterra's South American assets. For destination value chain, higher results were primarily driven by processing in Europe and Asia and origination from South America. In North America, higher processing results were more than offset by lower results in refining.

In South America, results were higher in processing and refining and in global oils, higher results reflected strong execution. Higher process volumes primarily reflected the combined company's increased production capacity. In Argentina, higher merchandise volumes reflected the combined company's expanded soybean origination footprint as well as strong South American soybean exports. Higher softseed processing and refining results were driven by higher average margins and the addition of Viterra softseed assets and capabilities. In Argentina, results were higher in both processing and refining. In Europe, results were higher in processing and biodiesel while refining results were slightly down. In North America, results were lower in both processing and refining. Results from global softseeds merchandising activities were higher reflecting strong execution. Higher softseed processed volumes primarily reflected the combined company's increased production capacity in Argentina, Canada and Europe.

Higher merchandise volumes reflected the combined company's expanded global softseeds origination footprint. For other oilseeds processing and refining, high results in North America's specialty oils were more than offset by lower results in Asia and Europe. The addition of Viterra has minimal impact on this segment which primarily consists of our tropical and specialty oils and soy protein concentrate businesses. In grain merchandising and milling, higher results in wheat milling and ocean freight plus the addition of the sugar business were partially offset by lower results in global wheat and corn merchandising. Higher volumes reflected the combined company's larger grain handling footprint and capabilities. Prior year results included corn milling which we divested earlier this year. The increase in corporate expenses was primarily driven by the addition of Viterra and performance based compensation accruals prior year.

Other results included income of $6 million from the sugar and bioenergy joint venture that we divested in the fourth quarter of last year. Net interest expense of $145 million was up in the quarter compared to last year reflecting the addition of Viterra, partially offset by lower average net interest rates and higher interest income from investments in interest bearing instruments. Let's turn to slide 6 where you can see our adjusted EPS and EBIT trends over the past four years along with the trailing 12 months. Over this period, our team has excelled in managing a variety of different market environments while also executing on numerous internal initiatives, most notably Viterra integration, planning and now execution.

The recent performance trend reflects less volatility due to a more balanced global supply and demand environment and the impact of ongoing trade and biofuel uncertainty that has created a very spot transactional market environment. Slide 7 details our capital allocation. Year to date we have generated approximately $1.2 billion of adjusted funds from operations. After allocating $282 million to sustaining CapEx, which includes maintenance, environmental health and safety, we had approximately $900 million of discretionary cash flow available. We paid $324 million in dividends and invested $903 million in growth and productivity related CapEx. We received approximately $1.3 billion of cash proceeds from divestments including US corn milling, an interest in our soy processing footprint in Spain, the Repsol final payment for our interest in the sugar and bioenergy joint venture that closed in 2024, and the Hungary and Poland assets as required for receiving regulatory approval.

We also repurchased 6.7 million Bunge shares for $545 million. This resulted in $386 million of retained.

Cash flow.

Moving to Slide 8. At quarter end, net debt exceeded readily marketable inventories or RMI by approximately $900 million. This change versus recent history reflects the impact of acquisition debt assumed and issued related to Viterra. Our adjusted leverage ratio, which reflects our adjusted net debt to adjusted EBITDA, was 2.2 times at the end of the third quarter. Slide 9 highlights our liquidity position, which remains strong. At quarter end, we had committed credit facilities of approximately $9.7 billion, of which all was unused and available, providing ample liquidity to manage the ongoing capital needs of our larger combined company. Please turn to Slide 10. For the trailing twelve months, adjusted ROIC was 8.5% and ROIC was 7.2%.

Adjusting for construction in progress on our large multi year projects not yet operating and the excess cash on our balance sheet, our adjusted ROIC would increase to 10% and ROIC to 8%. Note that we decreased both our weighted average cost of capital and adjusted weighted average cost of capital from 7%-7.3%, 7% respectively, to 6% and 6.7% respectively, reflecting the recent upgrade in our credit rating, change in capital structure of the combined company and the lower interest rate environment. Importantly, we are not lowering our long term investment return expectations. We also updated our return calculations to align with the change in our combined company profile. The change includes an expansion of merchandising RMI reflecting our greater volume of soft seeds and grains and removing the cumulative translation loss adjustment no longer considered material as a result of our more geographically balanced footprint.

Moving to Slide 11 for the trailing 12 months, we produced discretionary cash flow of approximately $1.1 billion and a cash flow yield or cash return on equity of 9.7% compared to our cost of equity of 7.2%. For this calculation, we also removed the cumulative translation losses adjustment due to our expanded footprint and are converting to a four quarter average to calculate adjusted book equity that better reflects the average capital base employed to generate cash over the period. Please turn to Slide 12 in our 2025 outlook. As Greg mentioned in his remarks, taking into account third quarter results, the current margin and macro environment and forward curves, we continue to forecast full year 2025 adjusted EPS in the range of $7.30-$7.60. This estimate reflects an expected second half adjusted EPS in the range of $4-$4.25.

The difference in EPS ranges of $0.30 for the full year and $0.25 for the second half is due to different weighted average share counts used in the respective calculations. Additionally, we expect the following for 2025: an adjusted annual effective tax rate in the range of 23%-25%, net interest expense in the range of $380 million-$400 million, capital expenditures in the range of $1.6 billion-$1.7 billion, and depreciation and amortization of approximately $710 million. With that, I'll turn things back over to Greg for some closing comments.

Speaker 0

Thanks John. Before turning to Q and A, I want to offer a few closing thoughts. We had a strong third quarter. We are capturing value from the combined platform, operating as one company and demonstrating the benefits of our expanded global network. Externally, we continue to navigate a high degree of complexity in the marketplace and as mentioned, farmers and end consumers remain largely spot. Global grain stocks to use ratios are elevated, dampening volatility and putting pressure on certain margins and policy decisions including biofuels and trade remain in flux as we look ahead to 2026. Our platform is built to perform and to win regardless of the environment. We have the flexibility to adapt to shifting trade flows and keep products moving. That is the power of our combined company.

The scale, scope and resilience of a global network backed by the discipline to manage risk and deliver solutions that create value for all our customers, farmers and end consumers. In short, we have the people, assets and processes to manage through uncertainty and the rigor to stay focused on what we can control, running efficiently, serving customers and creating value for farmers and consumers of food, feed and fuel. With that, we'll turn to Q and A.

Speaker 4

We will now begin the question and answer session. To ask a question, you may press Star then one on your telephone keypad. If you're using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing the keys. If at any time your question has been addressed and you would like to withdraw your question, please press Star then two. At this time we will pause momentarily to assemble our roster. The first question comes from Puran Sharma with Stevens Inc. Please go ahead.

Good morning and appreciate the question. Just wanted to start off by saying congrats on reporting a strong quarter. I think really demonstrates solid execution on your guys' part. I think the first question I wanted to ask about is just around biofuel policy clarity. I know there's a lot of moving pieces to get to that point where of clarity. As it stands right now, are you able to give us a sense of when you think the soybean oil side of the crush margin formula should start to see a notable improvement?

Speaker 0

Yeah, this was complex enough. Let me start and I'll let John follow up. Look, on the RVO, you know, we're hearing, I think, the same that the market is. The final proposal, you know, we expect to be at the end of the year or early next. We all hope in the marketplace, I think, that sooner is better. We'd prefer to have that by year end. We know the volume is going to be significantly higher, but we want to have that certainty and get that locked in. Of course, you know, the SRE issue, seeing that those are reallocated 100% would make sure that we don't lose any of that volume from the RVO and that that gets executed.

Look, the industry has made the investments in the soy and in the canola processing and we need to see that demand put to work because that goes right to the farm gate.

Speaker 2

Right.

Speaker 0

That supports the farmers. That's domestic demand that we can control. You know, from a timing, you did call out, soybean is really only weak here in the U.S. Oil demand has been pretty good globally. You know, that starts to be probably, you know, early 2026. We would like to think that we would start to see that improvement and then that would continue as the year moved on.

Great, great. Appreciate that clarity there, I guess. On my follow up, just wanted to ask about grain under, under the new combined platform. I had always thought that storage income is more stable, but maybe has less upside than grain merchandising income. Does the combined grain business offer more stability in earnings versus the legacy Bunge Global grain business given just the amount of storage infrastructure you have now versus what.

You all had before? Yeah, there's a couple ways you need to think about it. You know, from a baseline, it allows you a number of other ways, of course, to earn money not only from the storage, but of course, drying from a handling and blending certain specifics that depending on what customers want, connecting it to. Remember, this is a vertical merger connecting the origination capabilities that Viterra had, which are much stronger, to the processing capabilities that legacy Bunge had. We are able to drive efficiencies through that value chain around transportation and logistics. Those are kind of, you know, baseline and depending on, you know, crop quality of crop and flows. The other, of course, is you not only earn the storage income, but then you also have the optionality by having the crop in place, knowing what qualities you have.

Whether it is a weather problem or an increase in, you know, a weather problem which hurts supplies, or an increase in demand somewhere in the world that then calls on that storage to those customers, we have that optionality to then serve that demand with the right qualities and the right quantities and the right price at the right time.

Great.

Appreciate the color.

Speaker 4

The next question comes from Salvatore Tiano with Bank of America. Please go ahead.

Yes, thank you very much. Also, congratulations on closing the transaction. Firstly, you know, I wanted to, now that we can talk explicitly about earnings and other segments they are segmenting, I want to see if you can clarify a little bit the impact on Viterra to EPS and EBIT. So when we think about that $2.27 EPS for Q3 or your full year guide, what was the impact, accretive or dilutive, from Viterra versus where would Bunge have been on a standalone basis? Secondly, can you also clarify on an EBIT basis, as we look at the operating income you made in Q3 versus a year ago, how much of that growth was due to Viterra versus just legacy Bunge earnings growth or contraction.

Speaker 0

Yeah. Let me start to let John put a finer point on it. The one thing to understand is we're very quickly bringing this together with one team and running this as one company because that's how we're going to maximize profitability. If you think about the one voice to the farmer to be able to get them to market or the one voice to the consuming customer to get them, you know, what they need. You know, we were much bigger in soy Crush. Think about Viterra brought a great footprint there in Argentina, which made us very balanced globally in soy Crush. We're running a global soy crush business. We're not thinking about it as Viterra versus Bunge, which is why we resegmented it along the lines around the business, you know, soft.

If you think about it on the, on the soft crush, you know, Viterra brought a great origination in merchandising as well as some additional soft crush which balanced out our global soft crush franchise. We are running that as one global franchise as well as where they were much stronger, of course, in the origination, storage, handling on the grain merch size and supporting our milling, but even where the origination then is supporting our milling assets. I will let John put a finer point, but you really have got to think about this as one company here pretty quickly. That is why we are kind of focused on the present and going forward.

Speaker 2

Yeah, I would just add that, Salvatore, that, you know, we had a good third quarter across both. What I would say is the legacy Bunge and legacy Viterra footprints in soy processing and refining and soft processing and refining, you know, so it, you know, probably in totality, I think, you know, they both contributed well, you know, if Viterra was, you know, as you can tell by the overall numbers forecast for the year, Viterra is mildly, you know, mildly dilutive to the year. I think we saw consistent results in Q3 that would support that. Not where we eventually want to get to, certainly with the business and as we go after synergies and everything else. I think early indications are very good as they were strong contributors on both the soft and soy side.

Clearly on grain merchandising results were not where we would expect on an annualized basis in Q3. You know, Q3 is kind of a funny quarter because it is between, you know, global harvest seasons in effect. We have got, you know, Q4 here coming up, North America harvest, obviously European harvest and Australian harvest. We are going to see, I think, better results in grain merchandising in Q4. That will show the power of what we have picked up on the merchandising side. You know, certainly looking forward to where we can go with this thing. I think, you know, early indications are very good. We are happy with the contribution so far. I think into 2026, as we continue to work together and we get after the synergy capture, which is still early, I think we will see more and more of the benefits.

Perfect. I just want to follow up on the synergy capture you mentioned. Were there any synergies so far in Q3 or planned for Q4 material as part of that? I think $341 million you have stated in your proxy. How should we think about the timing of this synergy target? Will a lot of it be realized, for example, in 2026 or is it going to take two or three years for that?

Yeah, I think we'll, you know, look here, here in Q3 and 4 of this year, it's really more about taking the actions it's going to take to see those results. We'll see a little bit probably by the end of the year, but 2026, we'll see a bigger jump in the benefit from synergies for sure. I think we'll peak probably 2027 will be a big, big step change in synergy capture. I do expect, you know, we do expect to capture a meaningful amount in 2026 and I think even in fourth quarter 2025, you know, a number of actions that we'll take on a run rate basis by the end of the year we'll see good progress.

We do expect to be at or ahead of what we scheduled in the proxy as we move along, and we'll be, of course, be sure to keep everybody updated.

Speaker 0

On the commercial synergies, remember we did not call those out. We said those will be to come because the teams, because of regulatory or commercial teams could not work together. As they are now able to work together as one team, you will start to see that in the income line and we are off to a good start. We are just at the beginning of that. That will build over time and we will have to prove that out with our earnings.

Thank you very much.

Speaker 2

Appreciate it.

Speaker 4

The next question comes from Heather Jones from Heather Jones Research. Please go ahead.

Good morning. Thanks for the questions. I guess I wanted to start with Viterra and I know it's deeply embedded now within the Bunge operations, but was just wondering, to the extent you're able to, thinking about Q3 and just the numbers that Viterra reported a year ago, do you have like a really rough breakout of how much was just better execution by the team relative to a year ago and how much was a better industry backdrop for those operations for what we saw in this quarter?

Speaker 2

Yeah, I would, Heather. I'd say we haven't gone back and dissected certainly Viterra's performance from a year ago versus this quarter. You know, obviously we were aware that their performance coming into the close wasn't where we would have expected it. At the same time we've seen significant improvement, you know, already and as I mentioned earlier, meaningful contribution in Q3 across, you know, across both the soy and soft sides of things and then maybe less so on merchandising given timing. As I mentioned earlier, you know, last year there were certainly, you know, more challenges, I think in the environment with poor Australian crop, which we expect to be much better this year, and lower crush environment in Argentina. Those things have improved this year.

I think, you know, generally we feel like there's more momentum on the legacy Viterra side and again, haven't dissected line by line with a year ago their performance. We're really, as Greg mentioned, focused on getting this stuff integrated moving forward, but feel very good about the contribution they made.

Okay, thank you. My follow up is just assuming we get the RVO that I think everyone anticipates. Just setting aside the timing, but sort of like let's just think of run rate as in mid 2026. I'm thinking about it relative to the 2022-2023 time frame. I mean, soybean meal demand has been extremely robust. If we look at what's going on in Europe and Brazil and then the RVO, bean oil, veg oil, demand should be very robust. Yet you do not have the dislocations you had then and you have more soy processing capacity. As you are thinking about those considerations, how are y'all thinking about what the margin structure would look like relative to what we witnessed in 2022-2023?

Speaker 0

Yeah, I mean, I think you started to frame the setup, you know, very well that we should have favorable, you know, U.S. biofuel and trade policy. Now timing will matter when that comes across. You know, we're expecting big crops in South America and then probably a more balanced, you know, China program from the origins than we saw here in 2025. And being in all origins, that suits us. You know, we continue to see strong global soybean and veg oil demand. You know, as I said, outside of the U.S. has been the exception on soybean oil demand. Seeing that pick up would be a positive. As we said, look, we've got, you know, what I feel is the best global machine and the best team.

While these big crops, you know, come off, that should help, you know, improve on the merch side which has been the drag to the business. Now at the very least, it should stabilize because, you know, stocks are not burdensome globally. While we will have, you know, a heavier supply demand, we will have storage, we will utilize our system for that. If there is really any problem in weather, you could see the grain side of the thing get more interesting. While probably do not see back to the 2023 levels, you know, we do see we are at that part of the cycle where it feels like we are at the bottom of the cycle, is kind of when things get better and how much better they get.

You know, as we start to get a view of that or, you know, in Q4 when we do our Q4 earnings, we've always then started to talk about 2026 and start to lay that out. We will be more prepared with more detail and hopefully a few of these things that are up in the air will land between now and then as well.

Speaker 2

Yeah, and I just add to that, Heather, you know, back in 2022, 2023, it was like the perfect storm of not only biofuel demand, but we also had some global disruption, Ukraine, Russia, Canada, crops. So there were some things that created a lot of additional volatility. Certainly some of that could happen. Obviously we are one big weather event away from markets that could get interesting. Nonetheless, as Greg pointed out, I think where biofuel policy is headed, you know, certainly things are going to, should improve from here and the question is how much. I think we feel like we are well positioned to take advantage of the market as soon as it starts to turn.

Thanks so much, I appreciate it.

Speaker 4

The next question comes from Thomas Palmer with JP Morgan. Please go ahead.

Good morning.

Speaker 2

Thanks for the question.

I wanted to clarify maybe expectations as we move from 3Q into 4Q in terms of the different reporting segments. Are there kind of segments where we might see just given the lower earnings outlook in 4Q that's implied more of a step down? Are there other segments that could actually.

Speaker 0

Improve quarter over quarter.

Thanks.

Speaker 2

Yeah Tom, I'll take that and then Greg can jump in. Yeah, I think as you look forward, you know, driven a lot by what we talked about around customers being very in the spot right now and a lot of the uncertainty, we're expecting a softer Q4 in both the story processing and refining and soft processing and refining segments. Again, driven a lot by some of this policy uncertainty and customer behavior we do expect and then largely, you know, relatively flat in the other processing and refining, maybe up slightly. But, you know, we do expect a meaningful improvement in the grain, merchandising and milling segment given timing of U.S., European, I'll say North American and general harvest, European harvest and Australian wheat, wheat and canola harvest season. We do expect a better Q4 there.

And then we had a, you know we do expect in that corporate and other segment as well the negative to be not quite as big in Q4 just given timing of some expenses and things. Overall, you know we knew it was going to be down in Q4 and that as you can imply by the forecast for the year and where we finished Q3 but again driven lower soy and soft and up a bit in grain merchandising and milling. Okay, thanks for that.

Look, I'll try here, I guess. I don't know how much reply I'll get but it's been a few years since you updated your view of mid cycle earnings. I think the last update was $11 with a dollar or more of upside if you opted for larger M and A. I appreciate there might be more to come here in the coming year, but maybe at a high level this outlook, what are maybe big swings to think about because that larger scale M and A did indeed happen.

Yeah, Tom, our plan is to share that with you in March at our investor day. You know we're working on that right now looking at our strategic planning, capital allocation plans, what we expect from the newly combined company, what we think we're capable of. You know with the mega projects coming on line here, Morristown actually this month up and running and then in 2026 having our Destrehan operations up and going by mid year and then following early following year, specialty oil, we're going to recast everything and take a hard look at that. Our intent is to share that in March with what we believe our go forward, you know, mid cycle is and as well as what the upside might be.

Speaker 4

Understood.

Thank you.

The next question comes from Manav Gupta with UBS. Please go ahead.

My first question is, whenever you acquire something, like for anybody, there are some positive surprises, and then you will come across some areas where you expect to have to work a little harder to realize the synergies. Now that you have caught Viterra, help us understand where are the positive surprises and where you think probably a little more work is needed than when you initially decided to buy Viterra.

Speaker 0

Yeah, and I don't know if we're surprised. I think we've had a lot of confirmation of what we thought. We had a lot of time to do the work while we were waiting on regulatory. The thing that's always more work.

Right.

John and I have had the benefit of being a public company, being a private company, working together and being a public company again. You know, Viterra was private, and it was also not, you know, not GAAP, it was IFRS. We knew that there was going to be, you know, a bit of a heavy lift to bring that into a public company and switch over to GAAP. That is always more work than you plan it is going to be. I cannot say enough about the teams and what they have been doing to get prepared and to give the teams the information they need to run and serve our customers every day. That is probably always the heaviest lift and of course, around systems and processes and getting to fewer systems and fewer processes. That is off.

Speaker 2

To a great start.

Speaker 0

The team has a good plan and we're executing it, you know, per the plan and meeting our early milestones, which is exactly where we wanted to be. On the commercial side, you know, I'd say, you know, we knew the cultures were very similar, but again, we couldn't work together with the commercial teams, you know, because of regulatory and to avoid gun jumping. Now we finally get to have those teams work together. You've had teams that were competing, you know, these are highly, you know, competitive, aggressive people that have been competing with one another forever that are now on the same team.

You know, John and I also have worked together a long time, and we've done a number of bolt-on acquisitions and we've done a merger of competitors before. I think we knew what to watch for. That has gone about as well as we could have hoped. It does not always go that well. The way that people have worked together to focus on the priorities, to work as one team, to think about our customers, and they're not looking back, they're looking forward too. I think the surprise of how quickly that has worked has been great. Both had a good risk management culture. I'd say we were probably more developed as a public company around our systems, our processes, our rigor, and our discipline.

am also very pleased how the teams have come together and embraced the risk management culture and the information that we are able to put at people's fingertips and able to run the business and make decisions. I think that has been very positive. I really cannot say enough about our teams and how I feel about them. We are off now. Look, it is very early, we have got a lot more to do. I really like the way that we have started and I cannot say enough about the teams and thank our people enough because this is a real people business.

Speaker 2

Perfect.

My quick follow up is it was great to see the restart of share buyback. I think it was $545 million. As the two companies come together and you are going to generate a lot of cash, help us understand a little bit what would be the uses of that cash going forward.

Yeah. As we get through 2026, we expect to wrap up, you know, our mega projects. The four large projects that we've had underway for a while, one's wrapping up now and the rest will largely wrap up during 2026. We should see, you know, considerable decline in the CapEx, at least that we have planned at this point. Certainly we believe with the strong cash generation, you know, share buyback is going to be a meaningful part of our capital allocation going forward.

Thank you very much.

Yeah, we'll always balance that with, you know, opportunity. But at this point, you know, no doubt it's going to be an important part.

Thank you.

Speaker 4

The next question comes from Ben Toyrer with Barclays. Please go ahead.

Yeah, good morning, Greg. John, thanks for taking my question. Actually, following up on the buybacks, that would be my follow up question. Where do we stand now with that little over $500 million that you've done in terms of what your initial consideration was for the buybacks when it came to the Viterra deal, because I remember it was like $2 billion maybe help us understand where do we stand, what's missing. That would just be a quick follow up. And then I have my other question for you guys.

Speaker 2

Since the announcement of Viterra, we've actually done a little over $2 billion of buybacks, but $500 million of that was related to our sugar divestment. We've got about $255 million left on the actual Viterra program. We'll get that. We're well ahead of schedule on getting that executed and our plan is to get that done soon and then we'll go from there. We're not going to complete that and be done. I think we'll continue to set that like we do with any capital allocation going forward and make sure we're making prudent decisions for our shareholders.

Okay, perfect. Just to understand a little bit, obviously Argentina, thanks to Viterra, is going to play a very important role. Argentina is known for, let's call it, volatility and sometimes uncertainty just because of the political environment. Maybe help us understand a little bit better how you think about the opportunities, but also the risks of the larger footprint in Argentina over the course of the year. How to think about the farmer selling behavior, the crushing out of Argentina, because clearly this is something that's going to be really large within the grand scheme of the new Bunge. Would be great to understand the risks and opportunities here. Thank you.

Sure.

Speaker 0

There's no doubt with the outcome of the election. I think, you know, we all believe that's going to be supportive of kind of improved macros going forward. I think the one key thing to remember about Argentina versus, you know, Bunge pre Viterra and kind of the new Bunge is we're much more balanced globally and especially on soy crush. Where Argentina in the past could be disruptive, we wouldn't have the opportunity to benefit as much from Argentina with our footprint. Now, what that does for our footprint on origination as well as on, especially on soy crush and on soft crush is we're much more balanced globally on all parts of the business.

We are now able to benefit from that and balance our, whether it's our soy crush, our soft crush or our export programs, the wheat origination which is feeding our combined wheat milling. You know, we both had wheat milling in Brazil, which a lot of that's fed out of Argentina. You know, we'll benefit really across all of our external segments now with our Argentine footprint. We're excited on how that kind of, you know, completed the global footprint there and, you know, look forward to Argentina, you know, continuing to improve.

Perfect. Thank you very much.

Speaker 4

The next question comes from Steven Haynes with Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.

Hey, good morning and thanks for taking my question.

Speaker 0

Maybe just to ask maybe a similar.

Question, but on Australia, could you maybe walk through some of the high level supply and demand trade dynamics there?

Just kind of how all that's flowing.

Through, you know, Viterra's legacy assets there?

Thank you.

Speaker 2

Okay.

Speaker 0

Yeah. Australia, we've got a real big crop coming off there on wheat, barley, and rapeseed, which, you know, are all really important global crops for us with our origination now in every key producing region. So that's, you know, that's setting up very well. The thing to watch there, of course, is weather that can kind of depend whether some of that falls in Q4 or falls in Q1. With some of the trade tensions between Canada and China around canola, we'll probably see some increased rapeseed exports coming out of Australia. That should probably be positive. And then, of course, they'll be very competitive in the global market on wheat and barley. Excited to have those big crops and be able to put our origination, storage, handling, export system to work there in Australia.

Got a great business down there.

Speaker 2

Yeah, Stephen, maybe I'd just add that, you know, legacy Bunge we did. We had a small export business there, but not something we talk much about because it just was not really material. But Viterra has a very good, very strong position in Australia. To Greg's point, we're really pleased around that opportunity and things are shaping up there with the crop size this year to be a good beginning of the merger.

Okay, thank you.

Speaker 4

The next question comes from Derek Whitfield with Texas Capital. Please go ahead.

Good morning, guys, and congrats on a solid quarter.

Thank you.

Speaker 1

Thanks, Eric.

Speaker 0

Regarding capital projects, while I understand that.

You're winding down several multi-year capital projects, from a legacy Bunge perspective, could.

You speak to any material projects that?

We're underway at Viterra and if you're seeing new opportunities for growth, investment from a Viterra perspective?

Speaker 2

Yeah, there was nothing really big. I'd say Viterra had a few, they had a few smaller, what I'd call kind of debottlenecking and operational improvement projects underway that we're completing now. They bring a much more modest amount of CapEx pipeline to the combined company than what we had set up with our large projects, our growth. You know, obviously we're looking at a number of things as we always do going forward. We do not on the horizon see any big, large capital projects like the ones we've had underway here for the last few years. You know, we'll continue to look at that. As we've always said, we'd prefer to consolidate the industry than to add capacity where possible. You know, obviously with the broader footprint, more opportunity we'll make sure we take. We'll always be taking a hard look at those.

Again, we do expect at this point to see a pretty meaningful decline in CapEx commitment, you know, post 2026, absent something else coming along, you know, so ongoing, I think our expectation was between, you know, combined sustaining CapEx and growth, we'd be at about $1 billion a year as a combined company post 2026.

Speaker 4

Great color.

Speaker 0

I just add on, just add on. It's been great as we brought the network together. The teams are now refreshing the strategy and our list of projects and priorities because each company had their own list of projects. We're able to look at that combined network to put those priorities together to figure out, okay, where do we have any holes in our global network of origination or processing or distribution? We'll be thoughtful, as John said, how we fill those in, whether it's, you know, a brownfield, a green field, you know, a partnership, you know, we want to be the partner of choice as you've seen us do things in the energy industry and do things with some of the ag input providers. We'll be thoughtful about how we do that.

It has also been great for the teams to do that strategy work together as they get to know one another to do some meaningful work as we begin executing the combined platform. Thanks for that.

Speaker 4

Great color, certainly.

Maybe as a follow up on biofuels policy, what are your thoughts on whether the administration will pursue it? The half RIN concept for foreign feedstocks and products? I guess more specifically to your business, we're hearing the feedstock provision could be difficult to administer. I'd love if you have any thoughts there from a policy perspective?

Speaker 2

Yeah, I think it's hard. It's hard to say right now. We've heard a lot of rumors about technical limitations around executing the half RIN. We've heard mixed news on that. Whether it's really an issue, maybe it's not an issue, we don't really know yet. I think, you know, obviously we are working hard as the industry is for a full RIN benefit, you know, for domestic feedstock, but half a RIN for foreign feedstock. Obviously that's good for the American farmer. It's important to us, you know, in support of the farmers, our key customer, and, you know, we'll see where it goes. You know, we're doing our best to encourage that in D.C. and hoping that it gets implemented beginning in early 2026.

Speaker 4

Okay, was there a follow up, Mr. Whitfield?

Speaker 0

No, that's all.

Thanks, guys. Great teller.

Appreciate it.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Speaker 4

The next question comes from Andrew Stravik with BMO. Please go ahead.

Hey, good morning. Thanks for taking the questions. You guys have mentioned strong execution a number of times. It does look like you outperform the market, outperform some of the competitors. I was just hoping maybe you could provide some color on where that strong execution was you've talked about.

Speaker 0

Still a lot of work to do.

To bring the organizations together and make it more kind of holistic going forward. Where are you already seeing some of that strength? I'm assuming that would be relatively repeatable, but just any color around that would.

Be, would be helpful.

Speaker 2

Sure.

Speaker 0

I think it starts with where we've been able to connect the two systems, the origination with the crushing and whether that's the soy processing or the softseed processing. Then where we filled in, you know, some of the areas where we weren't as strong as I was talking about in Argentina is a great example on soft crush, on sun crush as well as on soybean processing. That gives us that information. In a market that is a bit complicated, like we're operating in, having the information to be able to react more quickly.

In this quarter, it was things like where we still had open legs on the crush executing very well to get every bit of the, of the crush margin that was possible as we, you know, maybe rolled off the financial hedges and, you know, hedged out the physical to actually, you know, execute the programs. Then, you know, where we've, you know, we're a better partner on transportation and logistics.

Speaker 2

Right.

Speaker 0

Working with our transportation providers and even some of the dots that we've been able to connect between our origination and processing. When you look at it as a combined system, you'll make different decisions than when you were running two different systems. There are early wins falling out in the transportation logistics as we're pairing the right origins and destinations. The other is added liquidity in our own system. You can move faster and have the liquidity to get in and out of the positions that you need to, to execute for the farmer and for your consuming customer more quickly. You know, you're working inside your business with less friction internally. That allows us to be externally focused and to move faster and, you know, use that.

That happens a whole bunch of times at a lot of places globally, and then you see it, you know, start to fall out in the P. and L. We will be excited over time as we get to fewer systems and fewer processes. You know, right off the bat we had a big focus on getting the commercial team the same information at the same time about our combined information along the value chains. I think we're seeing that pay some real dividends.

Okay, great, that's helpful.

I know I asked this.

On the business update call.

As we think about next year on our side, is there anything from the back half of the year that we should keep in mind relative to your guidance for the back half of the year in terms of seasonality or, you know, abnormal type things as we start to build on that for next year?

Thank you.

Speaker 2

Yeah, I don't. Andrew, I think the Q3, Q4 combined results, I wouldn't say there are any sort of anomalies there. Obviously we're looking forward to, I think the bigger contribution we'll see next year. Obviously, aside from the commercial synergy capture as we move forward, hopefully we'll get really rolling on some cost synergies. Again, there's still a lot of uncertainty in the market and hence our call down for Q4. Timing of policy change and trade and all those things are creating a lot of uncertainty, making it a bit difficult to predict 2026 at this point. You know, our plan is to provide that at our Q4 call and hopefully by then we should have, hopefully a lot more clarity around biofuel and around trade, things like that.

At this point, I would say not anything unusual in the back half of the year here to draw to other than just, you know, we've done, I think to Greg, as Greg discussed earlier, teams are working really well together, you know, right out of the gate. With that, we're pretty happy and looking forward to seeing what we can do here in Q4 and get our first six months closed out.

Speaker 0

You know, when we're talking, you know, next year and comparing it to this year, I think if you're kind of asking the question about timing things, you know, the ones that we're watching, and I think, you know, we all should be watching, that'll be the timing around the biofuel policies, will be the timing around the trade policies. You know, those will be different in 2026 than we saw in 2025. I think, you know, we'll probably see a China program executed differently globally in 2026 than it has been in 2025. That probably better for the U.S. farmer than it has been. You know, we've got big crops coming off everywhere. The only thing would be if, you know, we've got some La Niña risk. And so if anything developed there, that could, could be an issue.

Of course, you know, we are dealing with these big crops. Everybody will be putting their storage to work. We have big crop here in North America, big crops in South America, big crop in Australia. That will have the storage assets working harder than they did last year. I think when you sum it up, we're really pleased with the deal we did here, bringing these two great companies together. We're really pleased with the way the teams have started off. We've still got work to do, but we like how we started. I think we talked all along.

This was about giving us the diversification and the capabilities to be really relevant with our customers at both ends of the value chain and to have the resilience for whatever the external environment is. What that will ultimately be is us, you know, performing better than anyone else in the low part of the cycle. The real key is we get everything in place. You will really see this machine work as we get towards mid cycle or even some of those, you know, more robust parts of the commodity cycle is when I think you will really see the benefit of this machine. We are excited and, you know, doing the work and cannot thank the team enough.

Great.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Speaker 4

This concludes our question and answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Greg Heckman for any closing remarks.

Speaker 0

I'd just like to thank everyone for joining us today. We appreciate your interest in Bunge and look forward to speaking again soon. Have a great day.

Speaker 4

The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.