Bioceres Crop Solutions - Earnings Call - Q4 2025

Transcript

Operator (participant)

Welcome all to the Bioceres Crop Solutions fiscal fourth quarter and full year 2025 financial results. My name is Drew, and I'll be the operator on the call today. During the call, we will have a Q&A session after the prepared remarks. If you would like to register for a question, please press STAR followed by 1 on your telephone keypad. If you wish to withdraw your question, it is STAR followed by 2. With that, it's now my pleasure to hand over to Paula Savanti from Investor Relations to begin. Please go ahead when you're ready.

Paula Savanti (Head, IR)

Thank you. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to Bioceres Crop Solutions' fiscal fourth quarter and full year 2025 earnings conference call. Our prepared remarks today will be led by our Chief Executive Officer, Federico Trucco, and myself as Head of Investor Relations. Both of us will be available for the Q&A session following the presentation. During this call, we will make forward-looking statements. These statements are based on current expectations and assumptions that are subject to various risks and uncertainties. I refer you to the forward-looking statements section of the earnings release and presentation, as well as the recent filings with the SEC. We assume no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements to reflect new or changed circumstances. Please note, in today's presentation, we'll be making references to certain non-GAAP financial measures. Reconciliations of the non-GAAP measures can be found in our earnings press release.

The conference call is being webcast, and the webcast link is available at our Investor Relations website. It is now my pleasure to turn the call over to Federico.

Federico Trucco (CEO)

Good morning, and thanks everyone for participating in today's call. Please turn to slide number three. I wanted to start today's call by looking at this year's performance, considering the trajectory of our company since 2019. 2019 is the year we launched Bioceres Crop Solutions to the public equity markets. As you can see, this is the first down year in the series, and one that comes with important lessons in terms of risk management and financial prudence, which I'll address towards the end of the presentation today. We are reporting a very disappointing final quarter to an extremely challenging fiscal year. Challenges in fiscal 2025 cannot be attributed to a single factor, but we understand rather stem from a combination of circumstances, including, most significantly, the macro shift in Argentina, our main market.

In fiscal 2024, clients anticipated a significant devaluation of the Argentine peso, and as a result, hedged against this event by pre-purchasing some of the ag inputs required for the following year. In contrast, with no expectation of currency devaluation for fiscal 2025, clients in Argentina had no incentive to maintain high inventory levels. Adverse on-farm economics also led to reduced spending on ag inputs, further exacerbating the company's exposure to the shifting cycle. These circumstances, coupled with deteriorating financial conditions for the sector in general, and our own shift in strategy around the HB4 seed business, landed us in the position we are reporting today. I will now ask Paula to go over the specifics of the quarter and the year before we discuss lessons learned and next steps. Paula.

Paula Savanti (Head, IR)

Thank you, Federico. Let me take you now through our financial results for the quarter and for the fiscal year 2025. Let's turn to slide four to begin, please. In the fourth quarter, we reported revenues of $74.7 million, a 40% decline compared to the same period last year. This decline is explained primarily by two factors. One is the winding down of our seed business. As you can see in the composition by segment of our quarterly revenues, sales in the seed segment were $25 million lower than last year, accounting for about 50% of the quarterly year-over-year decline. The other 50% of the decline is roughly equally split between crop nutrition and crop protection, with both segments affected by the weaker demand for crop inputs in Argentina, given the dynamics that Federico has just explained.

In crop protection, we didn't see in Q4 the typical pattern of preseason sales ahead of the spring planting season, as producers continue to operate this year under a more just-in-time purchasing modality. In this sense, we expect activity to pick up as planting season begins this spring. The decline in sales in Argentina eclipsed the fact that international sales of some of our core technologies grew strongly in the quarter, with, for example, adjuvant sales in Brazil almost doubling, and bioprotection products in the U.S. growing almost 40%. In crop nutrition, sales declined by 34% for the quarter, driven by lower microbiota fertilizer sales in Argentina, as well as lower inoculant revenues in other markets due to the calendar-based timing of the Syngenta agreement, which causes some misalignment with our reporting quarters.

For the full fiscal year, revenues came in at $335.3 million, down 28% year-over-year, with declines in all three of our reporting segments. In crop protection, revenues were $181.9 million, down 20% from the prior year, with full-year dynamics very similar to those seen in the quarter. A strong decline in Argentina offset growth in bioprotection in the U.S. and adjuvants in Brazil. In crop nutrition, revenues for the full year were $89.5 million, down 37% year-over-year. Again, as in the quarter, the main driver of the decline was microbiota fertilizers in Argentina. Sales of this product were negatively affected by a lower corn acreage this year. As farmers feared a repeat of the corn stunt disease, corn acreage fell by about 20% compared to the year before. Additionally, weak on-farm economics and elevated channel inventories generated price pressure, which compressed margins.

In this segment, the expected reduction of $15.7 million related to the Syngenta down payment further weighed on comparisons. Lastly, revenues in the seed and integrated products segment were $63.9 million for the year, representing a reduction of 34%. As explained before, this reduction reflects the scaling back of the HB4 program as we transition the seeds business into a royalty-based model. It's important to highlight that while the new strategy reduces upfront revenue recognition, it sets the stage for a more capital-efficient and scalable business, which we expect will drive growth and improve profitability going forward. Now, let's please turn to slide five to look at the quarterly gross profit by business segment. In the fourth quarter, gross profit was $25.4 million, a 47% reduction compared to the same quarter last year.

Most of the decline is accounted for by the crop nutrition and seeds segments, as can be seen in the bar chart on page five of the presentation. The $10.6 million decline in crop nutrition for the quarter is driven by lower gross profit for microbiota fertilizer sales, for microbiota fertilizers, where, as mentioned, lower sales in terms of volume were coupled with margin compression on account of pricing pressures in the market. By softer margins in biostimulants, as the business expanded into markets with different pricing structures, but with meaningful growth potential, and by lower gross profit from inoculants on account of the lower revenues in the quarter, as mentioned above. In seed and integrated products, the $9.3 million decline in gross profit reflects, as mentioned, the planned wind-down of the seed business.

With no upstream seed sales to report, revenues in the segment were mostly grain inventory being sold off at a lower margin compared to last year's HB4 related sales, which drove a contraction in the segment's gross margin. Finally, in crop protection, gross profit decreased $2.2 million from last year, a lower decline than that seen in revenues, as the products that were mostly negatively affected were low margin non-core products. A more favorable mix, with higher contributions from bioprotection products, as well as stronger margins in adjuvants, resulted in a higher gross margin for the segment in the fourth quarter. Overall gross margin for the quarter contracted from 38% in Q4 to 34% this quarter on account of the margin compression in seeds and crop nutrition. Now, let's please turn to slide six to look at the gross profit and margin dynamics for the full year.

For the year, gross profit was $131.7 million, a 29% decline with respect to fiscal 2024. The decline reflects the lower sales seen across all segments. The largest decline came from crop nutrition, which saw a $31.9 million reduction in gross profit year-over-year, impacted not only by the weaker demand for microbiota fertilizers, but also weighed by a $15.7 million year-over-year reduction from the Syngenta down payment, which carried a 100% gross margin in FY24. The remainder of the decline was split evenly between the other two segments. In crop protection, the decline in gross profit came from lower margin non-core products, resulting in a higher segment gross margin, as product mix improved in favor of higher margin adjuvants and bioprotection products. In seed and integrated products, the gross profit decline follows top line performance.

Overall, for the year, gross margin was maintained at 39% despite the challenging context and the absence of the Syngenta contribution. Now, let's move to slide seven to look at adjusted EBITDA for the quarter. The EBITDA for the quarter, the adjusted EBITDA for the quarter was -$4.5 million, down from $19.9 million the year before. This sharp decline is almost entirely explained by the $22.7 million gross profit reduction discussed before. While there were $5.7 million in savings in operating expenses achieved as a result of deliberate cost control measures, these were offset by $5 million in non-recurring impairments for the quarter. This number is six to seven times greater than our normal impairment run rate and is linked to two specific events: bad debts in Bolivia and the HB4 rollback. Finally, positive contributions from JVs were offset by other expenses during the quarter.

Let's turn to slide eight to review EBITDA performance for the full year. For the full fiscal year, EBITDA was $28.3 million, down from $81.4 million in FY24. As with the quarter, the decline in EBITDA results mainly from a $54.6 million decline in gross profit, part of which can be attributed to the lack of the Syngenta payment this year, but the larger portion of which is due to the performance of the business discussed above. Again, non-recurring expenses due to impairments outweighed OpEx efficiencies achieved through cost control initiatives. Joint venture results also weighed on performance, with Synertech, the JV exclusively dedicated to manufacturing microbiota fertilizers, impacted by weaker product demand in recent quarters. The JV results were offset by higher other income, which reflected the beneficial exchange of non-core soybean trays and intellectual property assets that was disclosed in Q2 2025.

Now, let's move to slide nine to look at cash flow. Thanks to the concrete actions we've taken to improve working capital management, which we discussed in our previous calls and continued to focus throughout the year, we delivered a solid operating cash flow despite the pressure on profitability. Operating cash flow reached $29.9 million in the fourth quarter, up 28% year-over-year. For the full fiscal year, we generated $53 million, a 27% increase versus last year. This underscores our ability to prioritize cash generation, even in a challenging environment. Net cash consumption for both the quarter and the full year came mainly from financing activities, primarily due to debt repayments. With that, let's move to the next slide and take a closer look at our balance sheet and cash position.

As the fiscal year ends, total financial debt stood at $255.5 million, slightly lower than the $259.7 million in Q2 2024. As previously reported, the company entered into amendments to its note purchase agreements and outstanding notes during the fourth quarter, extending the convertible note maturities under new terms that resulted in an increase in the principal base. While the aggregate principal amount of the outstanding notes increased, total debt declined year-over-year and was slightly lower compared to Q2 2025, reflecting the repayment of unsecured public bonds and working capital loans in Argentina. Cash, cash equivalents, and other short-term investments totaled $34.6 million, resulting in a net financial debt of $220.8 million as of June 30, 2025, compared to $217.4 million in the immediately preceding quarter. Given a stable net debt, but a substantially lower adjusted EBITDA, this resulted in a net debt-to-adjusted EBITDA ratio of 7.8 times. I will turn the call back to Federico.

Federico Trucco (CEO)

Ms. Paula, and please turn to slide number 11 for an overview of our current financial strategy. As we discussed in our last earnings call and revisited a few slides prior, we continue to focus on cash generation and improving our working capital profile, where we are targeting a running rate of between 5 to 6 months of sales, which will better reflect our current business model and product mix priorities. Also, we have accelerated adjustments to our cost structure, targeting operating expense savings of around 10% to 12%. These savings will average about $3 to $3.5 million per quarter, as we started to see in the last quarter of fiscal 2025. We have reduced our rate of incremental CapEx and R&D investments by 50%, lowering it from nearly 6% of sales to between 2.5% and 3% for fiscal years 2026 and 2027.

Importantly, we do not expect this slower pace of investment to affect near-term growth, as we already have the key registrations and manufacturing capacity in place to deliver on our three-year plus business plan. Finally, and without undermining the current financial challenges, we'll continue to work closely with our creditors to comply with our existing financial obligations and roll over part of our upcoming debt maturities, as we have done in the past. Where do we want to land? Please turn to the next slide. With these actions, a more normalized ag input market in Argentina and continued positive momentum in the U.S. and Brazil, two agricultural geographies which are key, where last year we grew 17% and 29% respectively, we expect to improve our EBITDA margin levels and steadily progress towards a more robust balance sheet, preparing us for the next phase of growth.

Our main focus will be on scaling up our biological initiatives, including using our key actives, such as RhinoTech and UVB, to functionalize and further differentiate important revenue generators for us, such as adjuvants and microbiota fertilizers. On the seed front, we'll continue to support our key partners in Latin America, Florimond Desprez in wheat and GDM in soy, while we onboard new partnerships in other geographies, mainly the U.S. and Australia. I will pause now and open up the floor for Q&A. Operator.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. We'll now start today's Q&A session. If you would like to register a question, please press STAR followed by 1 on your telephone keypad. To withdraw your question, it's STAR followed by 2. Our first question today comes from the line of Kristen Owen from Oppenheimer. Your line is now open. Please go ahead with your question.

Kristen Owen (Executive Director & Senior Analyst)

Hi, good morning. Thank you for taking the question. I want to pause here on this slide that you left us on here, slide 12, with the looking ahead. Understanding that the 40% gross margin, 22% EBITDA margin, this is sort of where we're targeting over time. As we think about the transition of the business, what are the metrics that we should be focused on, say, the next six to nine months? Initially, it was this top line growth, then EBITDA dollars, cash generation. Just want to know what we should be focused on on this interim term at this stage of the corporate evolution.

Federico Trucco (CEO)

Hi, Kristen. Thanks for joining the call today, and thank you for your question. I think, obviously, cash generation will continue to be a focus, a strong focus for us as we try to get leverage ratios back to more normal levels. I believe that top line growth is less of a priority under the current circumstances and that the expansion of our profitability will be basically dependent on our ability to scale up the most profitable products in our portfolio. Remember, we've recently achieved registration of RhinoTech in the U.S. and Brazil, and we're starting to generate revenues from that new family of insecticides and nematicides. Also, most of the pain from the shifting of the seed business away from the identity preserve scheme that we had has already occurred.

I think that will be an important contributor to going back to sort of the plus 40% overall gross margin profile. With the cost reductions that are sort of meant to right-size the organization for the current business opportunity, I think that we will get to these kind of metrics sooner rather than later. I would say working capital, making sure we're below five months of sales, moderate top line growth, but expanding profitability at the EBITDA level and gross margin level are key indicators as we track progress towards sort of a more stabilized situation.

Kristen Owen (Executive Director & Senior Analyst)

Okay. Thank you, Federico. If I could just add as a quick follow-up there, it sounds like these targets are not reliant on any real growth beyond market growth in the portfolio. It's just growing those products which are new and differentiated, not necessarily a robust return of the end market.

Federico Trucco (CEO)

Absolutely. What I would say is that part of what we need is the rebound to some extent of the ag input market in Argentina, which is not something that is affecting us specifically. In fact, we have not lost market share in any of our key products. If we see that tracking positively, I think that will do a lot in terms of us achieving these metrics. The type of growth that we need in the other geographies as the portfolio scales up, the new product opportunities scale up, is not different from the one we saw last year. That is, I think, what is required for us to get to these more stabilized, more profitable numbers.

Kristen Owen (Executive Director & Senior Analyst)

Okay. Thank you. One final question from me. If you could just say more about the cost savings initiatives, I think you said the cadence beginning in fiscal fourth quarter here was about $3 million to $3.5 million a quarter, and that's going to be pro rata across 2026. Just help us with a little bit of how you're thinking about those cost savings initiatives. Thank you.

Federico Trucco (CEO)

Look, I have my sort of own sort of back of the envelope numbers. I think if we were between $28 million and $30 million a quarter in terms of overall OpEx to get to closer to $25 million, it's where we think we are with the things we have already done. What I'm talking about are the results that we will obtain from streamlining workforce and right-sizing certain capacities that have already occurred. A contributor to that is obviously the shift in the seed business strategy. We have also done changes on other aspects of the organization to give us those levels of savings on a per quarter basis. We should see that reported every quarter on a forward-going basis because we have already seen some of that in the final quarter of the fiscal year we just reported.

Kristen Owen (Executive Director & Senior Analyst)

Thank you. I'll take the rest offline.

Federico Trucco (CEO)

Thanks.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from Ben Klieve from Lake Street Capital Markets. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.

Ben Klieve (Senior Equity Research Analyst)

All right. Thanks for taking my questions. First, on the Syngenta agreement, I understand that last year's $16 million was the recognition of that upfront payment. What was the gross profit within fiscal 2025 from that agreement?

Federico Trucco (CEO)

Hi, Van. Thanks for joining us today. Paula, do we have the specific number there?

Paula Savanti (Head, IR)

We don't have, so those $16 million were from the upfront payment, which this year is zero, right? Because that's already been done in the last two quarters. This year we don't have any. This year, all that we're having from the Syngenta payment for the full year is what comes from the profit sharing that we've been doing, not the upfront payment, right?

Federico Trucco (CEO)

Yeah, but then we have a minimum profit sharing of how much. I think, Ben, there, what we have is probably that the profit sharing from Syngenta comes on a calendar basis. We can give you that number. I think for fiscal year 2025, part of the calendar is still not done because, I mean, half of the year is still remaining. We know from 2023 and 2024, they were on target based on the minimum payment requirements. Now, Syngenta has been setting probably at a slower pace than anticipated so that the minimum payment requirements are being considered in terms of the gross profits that we are materializing, and we're not seeing results in excess of that.

Paula Savanti (Head, IR)

Yeah, for the full year, we have something like, for the fiscal year, which doesn't correspond to the calendar year targets with them, but for the fiscal year, we have about $18 million gross profit from them.

Federico Trucco (CEO)

One eighth.

Paula Savanti (Head, IR)

Yeah.

Federico Trucco (CEO)

Sorry. One eighth is the number, Ben.

Ben Klieve (Senior Equity Research Analyst)

Okay. That's helpful. I'm sorry, you broke up a little bit at the end there, but I think I caught it. I'm sure that was on my end. Next question. The HB4 outlook, I understand this is a fluid situation, and you've got a lot of different efforts here to try to extract some value from this. I'm curious if you can look back over the last year. A year ago on this call was when the air began to go out of the balloon regarding HB4. What specifically has been done within HB4 over the past year that you can point to as efforts that are really beginning to get traction here, that give you a hopeful outlook for the future of that product.

Federico Trucco (CEO)

Yeah. That's a great question, Ben. I think the most important effort over the last year was the agreement with GDM, which we announced in the February call. Even though that might have been a bit overshadowed by other things that were discussed during that call, I think the key there was that in soybeans, which was the one crop where obviously we have a huge opportunity in Latin America, but where we have struggled the most in terms of the ramping up of the HB4 technology, we achieved an agreement with them where they now are using exclusively the technology in Latin America and repositioning that technology not just for the drought tolerance effect, but also as a way to provide a weed control platform that should be attractive to farmers in the region.

That new platform that is branded Dualys, that's the GDM brand for this new approach, has already been launched. This is now being scaled up with a selected number of GDM multipliers and the different channels and will be starting to generate revenues in the upcoming fiscal year, which is very meaningful for us. Obviously, we don't control the go-to-market effort there, or the inventory ramp-up, or even less sort of testing of the grain like we did in the identity preserve channel. That, to me, is kind of the most significant achievement over the last 12 months to reignite the opportunity around the HB4 event under a different strategy in soybeans. In wheat, what we have done is open up the business to some of our key customers in Argentina so that we wouldn't have to do the multiplication and the go-to-market ourselves.

That is a work in progress, but I would say that the most important achievement in wheat was basically structuring a master agreement in the U.S. with Colorado Wheat Growers as an entry point to a consortium of different breeding programs and a herbicide partner, which we cannot disclose to you for confidentiality purposes, that will now scale that opportunity in the U.S. market. Even though this is still a few years away, I think that jointly with what we are doing in Latin America, with Embrapa developing the varieties for the cerrados in Brazil and the major customers of Bioceres executing commercially in Argentina, that will completely reshape the opportunity behind the soy and the wheat events. That's what we have done.

I think that obviously we've learned from the past and we're not going to provide any guidance in terms of revenues, but I think it's a dramatic shift, one that can be managed with a small group of people that are dedicated to the regulatory stuff and the technology demonstration work and not with an extended sales force that was trying to, if you will, scale this up beyond our capacities today.

Ben Klieve (Senior Equity Research Analyst)

Okay. Very good. I appreciate that. Thanks, there's plenty more to talk about, but thanks for taking my questions. I'll get back in queue.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. Our next question comes from Austin Moeller from Canaccord. Your line is now open. Please go ahead with your question.

Austin Moeller (Director - Equity Research)

Hi, good morning. I know you talked earlier in the remarks about the plans for further diversification of revenues into the U.S. and Brazil. How should we be thinking about the upcoming spring planting season in Argentina? It just looks like, at least so far, there hasn't been a lot of advanced purchasing of inputs yet, and there's still a lot of currency and on-farm economic risk in Argentina.

Operator (participant)

Fema, I think you're muted. Can you please check that you need to unmute?

Federico Trucco (CEO)

Can you hear me okay?

Operator (participant)

Please stand by while we connect. Yes, we can hear you now. Please go ahead.

Federico Trucco (CEO)

Okay. I don't know if Austin, can you repeat the question? We had some interference here with the audio.

Austin Moeller (Director - Equity Research)

Sure. I guess what I was just asking was, I know you had previously discussed looking ahead to a more promising spring planting season, but I guess what is your confidence in that, just given there's not been a lot of advanced purchasing of inputs and there's considerable currency and on-farm economic risk in Argentina? Could you just go into a little bit more detail on what you expect in terms of diversification of revenues into the U.S. and Brazil?

Federico Trucco (CEO)

Yes. Thank you for your question. Apologies for the technical difficulties. Basically, in terms of Argentina, the situation here is a bit counterintuitive, no? Whenever there is a risk of devaluation, that tends to drive farmers to pre-purchase products like they did in fiscal 2024. Even though that was not an issue last year because of the more stable macro situation, after the elections of last weekend, I think it's becoming a bit of a driver. We expect an accelerated pace of input sales just because of that. Most importantly, I would say rain and weather conditions have been very favorable. We're looking forward to a great planting season. That, I think, is obviously a key factor in terms of our expectations in Argentina. Remember that we operate on a dollar-denominated business, no?

Whenever there is kind of devaluation potential, that tends to accelerate our sales and eventually dilute part of our fixed expenses, which are the peso-denominated salaries we pay in country. That's in terms of the Argentine dynamics. In terms of diversifying away from Argentina, we've seen good growth last year in the U.S. and in Brazil, as well as in the rest of the world. There, the key drivers are the biostimulant platform, which is important in Europe as those products go into the Americas. The U.S. and Brazil will see revenue increases from the UVB-derived technologies. Also, the recent registration of RhinoTech in both the U.S. and Brazil is allowing us to become more competitive on seed-applied insecticides and nematicides. That, I think, will also give us significant growth in those markets.

There's an aspect of these two products which I also wanted to emphasize, which is the opportunity of selling them not as standalone biologicals, but as a way to functionalize some of our big revenue generators. You can use UVB today in adjuvants, as we've discussed in the past, to improve the recovery of herbicide applications on certain crops. That is a very meaningful technological aspect that we're planning to seize, importantly, because we have installed capacity in adjuvants and a customer base to which we can translate this message. On the RhinoTech front, I think similarly, using that as a way to functionalize the adjuvants that are used in insecticidal applications is a way where we can seize some revenues and growth without the necessity of selling the product on a standalone basis. Those are the initiatives in play.

I think they will significantly help us in those geographies outside of Argentina. That is, I think, going to give us a more balanced geographical mix in a few years. It's not going to happen from one year to the next, but after two to three years, I think we can be less exposed to the type of shifts that we saw last year in the Argentine market.

Austin Moeller (Director - Equity Research)

Okay. Just to follow up, how should we be thinking about the cadence of the Syngenta revenue ramp in the new fiscal year? Previously, you discussed that as sort of being a two-year ramp process to hit what you expect to be the run rate over the term of the agreement for $230 million in minimum profits. I guess how much should we be thinking about in the next fiscal year?

Federico Trucco (CEO)

Basically, the $230 million are over the 10-year period. We started with smaller numbers, and that's why we had the down payment upfront to compensate in part for the gap in the first and second year. I think Paula recently alluded to the $18 million we had in fiscal year 2025 coming from the Syngenta agreement. We're not yet at the average of $23 million per year, if you will. We expect that to be coming up in the current fiscal year as we continue to discuss the agreement with Syngenta and look for opportunities to fortify the relationship. I think this is ramping up as projected without sort of undermining some of the challenges that we have seen in agriculture in general, particularly early on in the agreement in Brazil and other geographies where we are just now coming out of the down cycle in the ag inputs market.

Austin Moeller (Director - Equity Research)

Great. Thanks for all the details.

Operator (participant)

Just as a reminder, if you would like to ask a question today, please press STAR followed by 1 on your telephone keypad. To withdraw your question, it's STAR followed by 2. Our next question comes from Kemp Dolliver from Brookline Capital Markets. Your line is now open. Please go ahead with your question.

Kemp Dolliver (Director - Research & Senior Analyst)

Great. Thank you. Could you talk a little bit more about the current state or level of inventories held in the channel? This seems to be probably one of the most significant obstacles other than improvement in on-farm conditions to your driving, you know, getting some growth, improving your profitability, etc.

Federico Trucco (CEO)

Hi, Kemp. Thanks for joining the call. I think in terms of Argentina, the inventory situation has been almost depleted. That's been the case over the last 12 months. I'll give you a very concrete example. For instance, in the microbiota fertilizer business, which is obviously one of the businesses that was most significantly affected over the last 12 months, if you go back to fiscal 2023 and 2024, in both years, we did about 30,000 tons, no? Of the 30,000 tons we sold in fiscal 2024, 5,000 were in inventory. This year, fiscal 2025, I think we did less than 15,000. We were at 14,000 and consumed the 4,000 or 5,000 that were in inventory from the year before. If you look at the actual numbers, maybe in fiscal 2024, it was 25,000 that were consumed. Fiscal 2025, 19,000.

We believe, on a forward-going basis, we'll be seeing some recovery because those dynamics are indicative of zero inventory in the channel. There might even be a supply concern if, at the end of the day, product cannot be manufactured in time to fully address the planting needs of farmers. I think that's been reverted fully in the Argentine market. That is just one example to highlight a product line that is very meaningful for us. In biologicals, in general, inventories are less of a concern because of the shelf life issues. You cannot keep inventories forever when you're talking about seeds or when you're talking about microbes. They decline over time. In general, the sector or those products are less exposed to inventory situations. In the U.S. and Brazil, I think the inventory problems were prior to last year.

This dates back to 2023, 2024, but mostly 2023, fiscal 2023. We see now that the level of utilization of product is consistent with our pace of sales. That is something that we are tracking in both those geographies to make sure that we are not running into inventory hurdles as we execute on the current business plan.

Kemp Dolliver (Director - Research & Senior Analyst)

Great. Thank you. Do you have your accounts receivable and inventories and accounts payable at year-end at hand?

Federico Trucco (CEO)

Give me a second. I'll pass it on to Paula for that information.

Paula Savanti (Head, IR)

Hi, Kemp.

Kemp Dolliver (Director - Research & Senior Analyst)

Yes, thank you.

Paula Savanti (Head, IR)

Hi, Kemp. Can you hear me?

Kemp Dolliver (Director - Research & Senior Analyst)

Yes, yes. Thank you.

Paula Savanti (Head, IR)

Yeah, sorry, can you repeat what was the question? The level of accounts receivables?

Federico Trucco (CEO)

At year-end, also accounts payables and inventories.

Paula Savanti (Head, IR)

Account payables at year-end are $145 million. Inventories were at $90 million. I'm rounding numbers, but fairly close. Trade receivables, $170 million.

Kemp Dolliver (Director - Research & Senior Analyst)

Thank you. One last question relates to the changing role of the Chief Commercial Officer. What thoughts do you have with regard to what that position will look like, should look like going forward?

Federico Trucco (CEO)

Look, Kemp, that's a great question. I think we're still discussing with the board whether this should be something that integrates operations more fully or be strictly dedicated to commercial the way it was before. I have to also indicate that the departure of Milen Marinov is because he has accepted the CEO position of a company called Horizon starting September 1. It wasn't something that was planned. We were probably intending to continue with the current Chief Commercial Officer role. Because of that departure, we are reconsidering whether we should keep that format or have one that is probably more integral in its nature. By that, I mean have some incremental operating responsibilities beyond the commercial aspects of the company.

Kemp Dolliver (Director - Research & Senior Analyst)

Understood. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. With that, that concludes the Q&A portion of today's call. I'll hand back over to Federico for some closing comments.

Federico Trucco (CEO)

I want to thank everyone for participating in the call and obviously for the patience. We had some technical difficulties today. We are available to address further questions and hopefully turn the page on a very difficult year as we look forward into a more normalized set of circumstances and a sort of a new path of growth for Bioceres Crop Solutions on a forward-going basis. Thanks, everyone, and have a great rest of the day.

Operator (participant)

Thank you all for joining. That does conclude today's call, and you may now disconnect your line.