BrasilAgro Companhia Brasileira de Propriedades Agrícolas - Q3 2023

Transcript

Ana Paula Zerbinati (Head of Investor Relations and Communications)

Good afternoon. We're here for our conference call for the earnings of BrasilAgro. We will be talking about nine months that ended on March 31st, representing Q3 of the year that ends on June 30. I'm here with our CEO, André Guillaumon, and our CFO, Gustavo Javier Lopez. The announcements, if you wish to ask questions, please click on chat. If you want to send questions in writing, you can send through the platform. We're all connected. For those who are hearing us in English, the presentation is available in the chat in the English version. Once again, thank you for participating, and I will pass the floor to André to begin to talk about what happened in this quarter. Thank you. Okay, André, you have the floor.

André Guillaumon (CEO)

Thank you, Ana. Good afternoon. Once again, a great pleasure to be with you and share with you this.

It's always complex to understand an agro company every quarter. It's good to see the whole year. Yes, we have the quarterly calls. We will talk about what happened in the quarter, how the company is evolving in terms of operations, people development, all the points we have been talking about, and to leave a lot of time for questions. Let's go on to the first page. First 9 months, net revenue, BRL 663 million, BRL 25 million in net profit. Adjusted EBIT, BRL 168 million. Operational revenue. In here, the harvest, practically 100% of soybean in Brazil. We have some 203,000 tons in Brazil, Paraguay, and Bolivia. Although it's in the beginning of April, we did an important sale of farms, the remaining part of Araucária Farm.

This, when we show the numbers, you will see this in the annual numbers. This will certainly place the company having expressive, excellent results. Going on to the next page, a little more color on this topic. Well, just a little more detail. Here we have two sales. We sold the remaining part, I'd like to explain why such a great difference in price. One of these is a lower area with a lot of sand, which had sugarcane. You have also the areas that are mixed, intermediate and lower areas. To try to monetize, we sold the remaining part of Araucária Farm. These two areas, the most expressive one is sale two. One is a lowland area, 300 bags in this low area where you can use it for pasture or sugarcane, but you have more risk to produce grain.

The other area, there we have some areas that we calculated at 1,300 bags per hectare, areas at 300 bags. The 790 bags is a mix of the 3,796 hectares. We had these three types of soil, and it has a different price. We got to 790 bags per hectare. Of the total, 1,600 bags were lowlands. The graph on the right, the first sale, we shall show the recurring results, a transaction that a purchase that began in 2006, and we're divesting the last part in 2023. During these 16 years, we had a return rate of almost 14% in the lowlands and 15% in the farm as a whole.

Very expressive and shows the capacity we have to join operational results with sale of farms. Here on the right we have a summary. We sell the farm in parts, and here we can give you a vision of the whole thing. This farm was acquired in the past, as I said. I said 2006, actually it was in April 2007. This farm was acquired for approximately less than BRL 76 million. This includes CapEx. You, all those who follow us know this, it was bought for BRL 76 million. In our books, it's at BRL 76 million acquisition value plus CapEx of transformation. A small area was transformed. Most of the area was already transformed, but 1,068 hectares were transformed. They were upgraded, and we made sales.

We began to sell in May 2023, then a sale in June 2014, March 2017, May 2017, May 2018, April 2023, the last Tuesday's April 2023. In total, BRL 602 million. When we were talking about nominal value and we're talking about acquisition plus CapEx, and this was a farm that generated cash, positive cash during the years. It's not a simple calculation, BRL 602 million minus BRL 76 million, because we had many years of positive flow, which are reflected in the return rate. They're not reflected in total value generation, which is BRL 602 million to BRL 76 million. This shows, once again, the capacity of our company to serve on times with good prices. The second sale and the first sale were sales. If you notice, we have in a certain way put pressure and the great difficulty of Gustavo explaining.

Last year was different from this year. We wanted to sell well, but also shorten the payment terms. Why? You know very well. We had a price of soybean that was very high, and in the future, we know prices of soybean are dropping. We wanted to shorten the payment terms to capture the better prices in what we were paid and also receive the money in the short term. Next slide. Here, we always tell you about investments, where investors' money is being placed, where we're taking the company. Here we have some projects that are structural projects. They are structural changes. The adoption of connectivity, you know what this can represent, connectivity in the Brazilian GDP, and we have to be part of this. We have connectivity projects being implemented in some units.

A project that is a large operation we're changing. We have an ERP, which supports the company, SAP, and we're substituting the vertical that supported the agricultural part. This was implemented in many units. We have this pie chart showing the status of the projects, connectivity, the progress, and also field monitoring. Infrastructure is something that we presented in the beginning of the year. We're building a seed production plant where this is focused on seeds for our own consumption, soybean seeds. No one thought of this because it represented a very small part of the cost. With biotechnology, the seeds now have a higher cost. Also corn, which was already high. Once again, the company focused on this. We were producing seeds in a simpler way.

Now we're doing this professionally, modern plant for seed production, and this will allow the company to have a lower cost for seeds with better standardization. Irrigation, we have focused a lot, especially in the state of Bahia In São José, we're spending a lot to increase the yields, both in sugarcane in São José farm, also line pressurizing, more pivots that are arriving are being erected, assembled, and also irrigation projects in the units in Bahia. In Arrojadinho and Rio do Meio, these are projects that are making a lot of progress. The last area transformation. Three areas that were included in our portfolio. Panamby farm, part was planted, but very small due to the time when we received, when we prepared the team, they planted a small area, and in the next harvest, it'll be total operation.

Almost 5,700 hectares. Regalito farm, same. They planted this year a smaller area, and now in the next, they will reach 100% of the farm. Fazenda São Domingos we didn't plant this year. This farm, as you remember when we announced, will be included in two steps. Half this year, we should include 3,000 hectares and the rest in the next harvest. In total, in the company, another 15,000 hectares in production, 15,000 hectares addition, 15,000 hectares in the state of Mato Grosso. Just showing you those who are here for a longer time, see how much we suffered. We suffered this year too, in two units in the state of Bahia.

We're preparing the company to have to be able to absorb in a better way the impacts and the diversity of crops and regions. The next slide. A lot of people here are better than us to evaluate this. Here we see the curve getting to BRL 138 million. Here are the highlights. Gustavo will show the company's numbers in this harvest. We're closing at BRL 150 million soybean, and our budget was BRL 157 million. This is a medium and long-term vision. Corn, also a drop. Cotton, we had a small improvement. Cattle raising, you know very well, we have a great restriction in the consumption inside Brazil. This doesn't help the price. Ethanol, good news. Also, in ethanol and alcohol, we have seen an improvement.

This shows the scenario of the commodities. The prices have dropped. On the next slide, there is a scenario of commodities dropping, price dropping. In the last harvest, it was the idea. We planted with a low cost and sold at a high price. Here, all of Brazil planted with high costs, and those who sold very little, sold well, and now the rest. For example, we sold a lot in soybean, but we're seeing in the next year a drop in prices. The first graph, these peaks that you see, this was during the war, but we saw an increase with the effects, restrictions in imports. We see the peak during the war, $1,325.

Last year, this harvest that we're reporting the results was planted with $925 per ton. Now we see a MAP around $580-$600 per ton. I made a quick calculation. If you consider not the peak, $1,325. If you look at what we bought, $955, with the price today, $580, you have savings of $375 per ton in cost. If we consider the MAP, we use 200 kgs per hectare. We're talking about 375 times $0.275. If we consider also an exchange rate of BRL 5 to a dollar, savings in MAP or a reduction of BRL 380 in phosphate fertilizer, the drop in cost.

You can make this calculation for the rest. On the right, we have the status of purchase of fertilizer. We look at the bottom, we see urea and chloride. A lot of what we will report, you will see is sugarcane had a great impact on us, sugarcane has a stronger impact. It has a greater volatility in cost. We talk about soybean, we're talking about 190 kgs of MAP. In sugarcane, it's more than 500 kgs, 600 kgs per hectare. The impact of fertilizer on sugarcane, cotton too, same thing in cotton, the impact is even higher than soybean. Sugarcane, cotton, and corn, there's a greater impact from fertilizer. This drop will be expressive for these three products that I mentioned, the cost reduction.

The graph on the right here, we see the status of purchase. We have advanced in our purchases when we bought little, we closed some, but the others, we waited. We have assessors that give us information about fertilizer. There are people looking at this all the time, we knew that this would happen, the drop in costs. We started to buy little, we sold soybean, we bought chloride. The graph at the bottom on the right, just to illustrate, brings us the exchange between a ton of fertilizer, MAP, urea with the bags of soybean. Here, I believe we should use nitrogenated for sugarcane, using MAP and chloride, we had a historical relationship of 13.50, today we have 19 bags per ton of MAP.

Here we have 11 bags, so it's still a little higher, this exchange. There was an expressive recovery in terms of fertilizer per bags of product due to the drop in the price of fertilizers. Here on the next, many people know our day-to-day work. We're in Q3. Everything planted, harvest, 97% harvested. In the case of soybean, 6% of corn. Most of our corn is harvested after soybean, and also we have the winter crop for corn. In the case of beans, 100% harvested, and in the case of cotton zero percent. We should begin to harvest cotton now at the end of May, beginning of June in the units in Bahia and a little later in Mato Grosso. This is the situation. At the bottom, here we see productivity in brown.

Here we see -7% in soybean versus estimate. Here I'd like to explain this -7%. First, reduction in the area and also in productivity. These are farms that we sold and we did not plant in them, and also less leasing in this volume. Everyone knows we had two operational units in Bahia, Chaparral Farm and Arrojadinho, an expressive reduction in productivity in relation to last year due to the summer of 35 days. Other units produced more. In general, a drop of 7%. Part of this from reduction in the area due to sell of farms and also less in also lower productivity. In Maranhão, almost 75 bags of productivity, very productive. In the case of Bahia with this drought, 40 bags per hectare.

Farms that last year produced 65 bags, 67 bags. Arrojadinho produced 67 bags. This year, we closed, we estimate at 40 bags, 41 bags, a drop due to the drought, an expressive drop in these two units. I believe this shows we were more dependent on Bahia than today. Even with an expressive reduction in these two units, when we look at the whole company, we have a drop of 4%. When we exclude the areas that were not planted due to the sale of farms, then it's 4%. Now, derivatives and how we're working on this. Harvest 2022, 2023 almost closed. Very little to sell. Harvest 2022, 2023, we have part sold, 12% of the harvest sold and an exchange rate of BRL 5.73 per dollar.

In the harvest now, we will have an exchange rate of BRL 5.38 to $1. In the past, it was higher, BRL 5.52 to $1. Now, our currency in Brazil appreciated, and now it's lower. Chicago, on average, we sold at $14.62, and what we're selling for next year, $13.5. On the last line, a very important part, which is receivables from farms. We monitor this in the P&L. When we look at total production plus receivables, we have 28% receivables, 11% production sold. We have a good sales volume and receivables, $13.78. Corn, and we sold very little. Hedge is small. We had positive results. We have a buffer to go to the market and get better prices.

Cotton, we're finalizing, also selling, especially due to the reduction in Chaparral Farm. I apologize, we didn't put here as sold because it's not sold in New York, but we have sales of cotton. We sold practically 25% of physical in the case of cotton, but we have 515. This represents 1,000 points on. We made some transactions of barter with inputs for the next harvest. This barter operation is not only inputs for cotton only. We have 2023, 2024. Ethanol, we have begun to sell. In the last months, we saw an increase in the price of ethanol, so we're selling ethanol. In the last line, receivables from farms, we have 2023, 100% sold. This was sold at a Chicago 14.10.

2024, 30% sold at an exchange rate of BRL 5.69 to a dollar. Well, Gustavo, you have the floor. These numbers will help you a lot to explain things.

Gustavo Javier Lopez (CFO)

Thank you, André. Good afternoon to all the participants in our conference call. Well, let's see the main numbers. Here we will present the nine months that ended on March 31st. Our year begins on July 1st. We see net revenue, BRL 663 million, due to the same factors that we explained in the previous quarter, the company is selling everything that remained from the previous soybean harvest. André mentioned 203,000 tons. This is what we expect. It's almost all 100% harvested. In the future, 120,000 tons of corn, and then a new period to harvest sugarcane.

This drop in revenue, the main reason is lower amount of tons of soybeans sold. We explained already in the same period of last year, we had decided to sell a lot of soybean because there was an uncertainty in terms of logistics. It was a good decision. That's one of the reasons. The price at the time, we decided to anticipate sales. This year we're a little slower in sales. Sugarcane, we already mentioned last year, we had begun with an average of BRL1.45, and we had a drop to BRL 1.14. Another problem then, but we mentioned this, a reduction of 200,000 tons in sugarcane, which was the consequence of the fire that we suffered in the farm, which affected 1.4 million tons.

When we recognized the sale of farms last year, we had a lot of sales in Taquari farm. This year, we have a small sale already announced, and also Rio do Meio. These are the reasons why we're having a drop in revenue. When we look at adjusted EBITDA, BRL 168 million, we see that the margin, EBITDA margin, drops 23%. Last year was 45%, and we have been seeing this drop in margin in grains. We will see this in detail on the next page. In the case of grains, if we had good prices, the pressure on costs, especially fertilizer, may cause this drop. We also have sugarcane.

We had mentioned we had an impact of BRL 150 million, and we explained BRL 50 million for a lower volume, 200,000 tons, with an operational problem in the company, BRL 50 million due to the drop in price, and the other BRL 50 million, the costs. Here we see net profit. Here, BRL 25.8 million. Forward, what do we have? In April, as he mentioned, we announced the sale of the remaining part of Araucária Farm. We sold the remaining part of the farm. This, we have two contracts, and this will be delivered and recorded in the next quarter. We will also have the beginning of the new harvest for sugarcane and the harvest of corn and part of the winter crop too.

On the next page, as mentioned, we see here soybean, this volume that I mentioned. Here, 98,000 tons. Last year, 145,000 tons. 65,000 tons of this corresponds to the harvest we're harvesting now. Unit price, although the value is higher, the prices are high. When we look at the cost per ton, this increase in cost affected the margin for soybean. 47%, 28%, the prices are still good. Looking at corn, 122,000 tons. We sold 100% of the harvest last year, this winter crop, 90,000 tons that we had that were the result of the winter crop, we had already paid high fertilizer costs. We see here the price per ton and the margin.

You can see here the cost, total cost and the margin of 50% at the bottom is higher than historical margins. Sugarcane. This is the most important results. Same situation. We haven't had the results of the new harvest. Here, I'd like to remind you, drop in the amount, number of tons, 1.387 million to 1.161million. These semesters. In 2022, the price had gone up a lot, and in 2022, the harvest that we're having now, there was this drop in price. Here too, taxes, the drop in the price of oil. The price, the cost of sugarcane dropped now. When we look at reais per ton, you can see that why this cost is this way.

If we had the cost of BRL 226, the cost would be BRL 100 per hectare. This also has to be added to operational problems that we had. On the next slide, we will see EBITDA of operations. Here to remind you, we have the net profit without sale of farms. We know that our fortress is the combination of the two results, operational and sale of farms. Here, we eliminated the sale of farms. We included depreciation, we included results from derivatives. Here we see that we had BRL 40 million. We hedged. We used a hedge when we bought the inputs, and then the market price changed. We had a smaller value being, selling at BRL 160 per bag of soybean.

We had hedged at BRL 150, and this impact gave us this negative effect. This year, it's the opposite. We're seeing in the region of the state of Mato Grosso, where we have important operations, we're seeing BRL 125-BRL 130 per bag of soybean. This is the impact. On the right, we have the main crop that is sugarcane and soybean. In the future nine months, we will begin once again to harvest sugarcane, 600,000-700,000 tons. The sale of 140,000 tons of soybean, and also we will sell part of corn. We're not seeing many opportunities for physical sales. We have sales and we believe that part of corn will also have an impact in the next quarter. Next page. Here we see the company's debt.

We have a short-term debt, BRL 226 million. Long-term, BRL 357 million. Total debt, BRL 583 million. 96% CDI in Brazil. 40% with prefixed rates below 10% interest rate. These are older debts. Until the end of the year, we have BRL 226 million short-term debts, BRL 200 million we have to pay. We're working to take out new loans because the leverage of the company is going to be very low. Reminding you that we have BRL 450 million in receivables for farms, there is part of a farm sale that was not recorded and will be recorded in 2024. In our Araucária Farm, we have twice as much as receivables.

We are in a comfortable position in terms of leverage. Net debt, BRL 400 million. We have BRL 240 million in cash, but we have a low cash position because we have receivables from the new harvests of sugarcane, soybean and we have already paid for many of the costs of this new harvest. When we look at all of this, we see that the indicators, the numbers are very healthy. On the next page, we can see the behavior of AGRO3, our share, in relation to the stock market index, where we have high volumes of daily trade. We see that the share price is very low, a good opportunity. We have been making an independent evaluation. This year we hired Deloitte.

They visit farms to confirm the properties, we believe that the company's share value is upwards of BRL 39. There is a great potential for this price to go up and a great incentive for you to invest in this company. We'd like to begin the Q&A session.

Ana Paula Zerbinati (Head of Investor Relations and Communications)

Thank you, André, Gustavo. I'd like to pass the floor to Pedro from XP for the first question.

Gustavo Javier Lopez (CFO)

Good morning, André, Gustavo. Thank you. Two points. The first on the sale. André mentioned a lot. Exchange improved a lot. Could you explain the company's strategy to sell? What are you expecting? When will you buy for 2023, 2024, the inputs? Maybe the table that you gave us was very interesting, the margin per crop, what you're expecting in terms of margin per crop?

Pedro Fonseca (Equity Analyst)

Second point, an update on the recovery of the region where you had a fire in the sugarcane. What it will be the productivity for this area that had a fire, and also how much do you believe you will capture from this price increase in sugar? A third point, very quickly, on the seed operation, seed production plant, whether this is your own, is it outsourced, the production of seeds? Is it only for your own use, or will you sell seeds in the future? Does it make sense to invest more in seed production?

André Guillaumon (CEO)

Thank you. Pedro, we could stay here all afternoon talking about these three questions. I'll try to be brief, and I'll try to help you. Well, 2023, 2024, yes, we're monitoring and we began to buy.

We're seeing that there is a curve, Chicago screen, $13.50, $13.80. The challenge we have today, when you look at what's happening this year, there's a giant increase in production and we had a drop in the basis. The exchange, we have to do this with total price. It's not only Chicago, it's Chicago basis and everything. We believe when you look at the curve basis next year. When we made this budget a year ago, we estimated a basis of 45 positive points with a Chicago that is very similar, $13.70, and we ended with roughly this. The basis went from +45. Today we have a basis of -100. If we look at the screen, the future, we're talking about a basis -5, -10.

You have a reduction, expressive reduction, a drop in price for future basis. What we see, what should we expect? We will be aggressive when we believe margins will recover 30%-35% EBITDA margin. We will be buying and selling. Right now, everyone is waiting pressure on fertilizers and improving the margin. When will you decide to be more aggressive? When we get to something around 30%-35% EBITDA margin, we will believe we'll get there. We have done cost reduction. We estimate we will get to 30%. We will get to this margin. This is what we're monitoring. Sugarcane, the impact. There's an impact from this fire. Not that you don't lose the sugarcane. We have irrigated sugarcane. When you have a fire, you have to use the irrigation in the area that was burned.

Instead of you have to put all the equipment to avoid to try to recover the sugarcane that was burned. When you have burned sugarcane, you harvest earlier. We had irrigated almost 4,000 hectares of cane that would be harvested at the end of the harvest. We lost the extra growth we would have in these 4,000 hectares where we used more water to guarantee productivity. Parallel to this, all the sugarcane that you would irrigate, the rest of the sugarcane, you had to take the water to save the burned sugarcane. It's not that we burned 200,000 tons. The sugarcane that you irrigated, you had to anticipate the harvest and the water you would use to increase production of TCH, you used it to save the burned sugarcane.

In sugarcane, we expect a recovery. Apart from the recovery, especially in the Midwest, we see a recovery. In the case of Maranhão, we are increasing the amount of sugarcane planted to recover this volume, and with more investment. We have a structure to irrigate 20% more than we did last year. 20% more water in a region where water helps productivity, it makes a great difference. We're making efforts in this sense. Concerning price of sugar, unfortunately, Pedro, all our sugarcane production is in ethanol. Of course, if you have a recovery in the price of sugar, you improve, you can improve the price of ethanol. These are points to answer your question. You also asked about seed production. What is the logic?

As I said, five years ago, the cost of seeds per hectare was BRL 170- BRL 190 per hectare. Today, BRL 750- BRL 800 per hectare for soybean cost of seed. It was BRL 200, now it's BRL 800. You have BRL 600 of extra cost due to biotechnology and other things. We began to produce seeds on a small scale. You as a producer, you can produce your own seeds. You have to register these fields for seeds. You produce your own seeds. We began small, developing technology, internal knowledge, forming a team.

Today, we have a coordinator in the company for seed production. We developed all of this and we said, "Okay, let's increase the production, a technical production." The investment we made was to improve the quality of the seeds at UBS, located in Chaparral. Why? Because there we have altitude to produce seeds. We have beside Chaparral, we have irrigation. You can produce more seeds using irrigation, and we want to supply the seeds we need. There is no ambition to sell. No, it's not. Our idea is not a business. We want good seeds to have a good cost reduction for the company. That's the main focus. This is the learning curve in the next two, three years. We learned how to do it.

Now we're using machinery, modern machinery, and now we will increase the scale, produce more seeds. We had 15%-20% seeds. We want to get to 40%, 50%, 60% of the seeds we need. We're not going to produce 100%. We want to reach 60%, 70% of the seeds we need. This would be very good for the company. I can supplement with another point. Concerning the sale, we have soybean, 65% is sold until July 30. What we want, we want to get to 80%, 85%. We see that the premium that was positive historically, we began to see that it becomes negative and the pressure of costs and freight is becoming very high. Now with an interest rate that is so high and we had a good winter crop for corn.

In soybean, we don't see a price recovery. We will try until August to have 100% of soybeans sold. Corn, we don't know. We have a large volume of with hedge, and we don't see demand. We're looking for opportunities to sell, and we're not seeing any demand. Concerning the budget, we made a new budget. The great doubt in terms of buying fertilizer, we're not being able to see the premium and the freight next year. We were working with a freight that is very similar to what we're paying this year, maybe 0.5% below. The history of freight of 40 points basis, we have $13.5 for soybean Chicago. A bag of soybean will give us BRL 140 or a little less.

With lower costs, we're getting to values per ton, a little above what we showed here, a little above. Corn, we're seeing a downward pressure, a drop, a pressure lower than this year. For sugarcane, BRL 50 per ton. We made a new budget, but there are uncertainties. That's why we're not selling. We're not being able to price soybean the way we want.

Pedro Fonseca (Equity Analyst)

Okay, thank you. Very good answers.

Ana Paula Zerbinati (Head of Investor Relations and Communications)

Thank you, Pedro. Now, Henrique from BTG.

Henrique Brustolin (Equity Research Analyst)

Good afternoon, André, Gustavo, Ana. Thank you. First, a follow-up, I'd like to understand your vision, the expressive reduction in the basis. How do you see this in the future? I know there's a great difficulty in foreseeing, but what is your perspective for the next harvest? I believe I'd like to hear a little more.

Also, a follow-up in terms of costs for the harvest, 2023, 2024. Could you help us to reconcile the exchange, the drop in the price of fertilizer is there yet? Did this help the cost of production this year? Looking at this amount used at lower price, how should we think of the cost for 2024. The last, you announced the relevant sale of Araucária Farm. How do you see the market for land? The price of land is going up and should you buy or sell? Thank you.

Ana Paula Zerbinati (Head of Investor Relations and Communications)

André, before answering, just let me join Helmut's question, which is in line with Henrique. He sees that the company didn't buy much land in the last few years in comparison with the sales, the land inventory dropped. What is the company's strategy from now on?

To lease land because the price is very high, or buy land in Bolivia and Paraguay, or wait for opportunities with low price.

André Guillaumon (CEO)

This question is the million-dollar question. Let me try to answer. Fertilizer drop, what you said Henrique is true in Brazil, it's true in most of the companies, and it's not true in our company. Why? Why is it different in our company? We're a company that transforms land. We have a lot of new land. In new land, you can't reduce the amount of fertilizer when you're developing the land. Our dosage of fertilizer shouldn't change much from last year to this year. The use of fertilizer will not drop a lot because we're developing land also. We shouldn't see great changes.

When we say there is a cost reduction in fertilizer, yes, we're not going to recalibrate the dosage. Last year, because we had new areas, we were not able to do this. For example, there is no area with soybean. Instead of 190, oh, I'm going to use less fertilizer, 100. We have many new areas, and this year we still have some new areas like you saw in the slide, Panamby. In BrasilAgro, the cost reduction in fertilizer, the dosage difference is small, a little, but very little difference in the dosage of fertilizer. The second, the future of basis. This is an enormous challenge with the production we have. We will have to work on this. Our agricultural society will have to work on this because you have a limit in terms of exports.

We're seeing more planting in the U.S. We see soybean should lose, should drop in volume in the U.S. and recover the price here. There's another scenario. We have a basis here because we had the effect from Argentina. Everyone is buying soybean in Brazil. World production is changing. We're looking at the basis. You have a new equilibrium in production, you remove the pressure on exports and you balance the basis. Today, we have Argentina with 25 million less and Brazil with 25 million more. Everyone is buying soybean in Brazil. In the medium and long term, we have this new balance in production, you also balance the distribution. Although Argentina produces meal more than grains. The way we see it, the basis should recover, not what we expected.

We expected another 45 points. Like I said, if you look at the screen, we're looking at minus 10. I believe there is space. With this rebalance due to Argentina and production in the U.S., we may have a basis of 30 points, 40 points. This wouldn't surprise me. In terms of land, I'll try to answer the two questions. Yes, we will sell more. I always say the liquidity in land, both higher prices or lower prices in land, you need recurring years with higher yield, higher prices or lower prices. There's a lot of liquidity until now. We receive more offers to buy farms. We will continue being sellers, preparing for the company for the time when we will have to buy again. We will be always buying when there are good opportunities.

We will always be looking for opportunities for many reasons. We will buy when there is an opportunity. What is important, although we're selling land, although we're buying less than we are selling, we're also leasing. The productive area has grown. The production area has grown. If you look at history, operational EBITDA has been growing in an expressive way. Maybe less purchase and more leasing of land. We want to have 40%, 50% our land and 40%, 50% leased land. We have to grow in sugarcane because we grew a lot in grains. We want to grow in sugarcane with leased land. Opportunities, we will continue looking at transformation of pasture area to grains. We still have a lot. Also alert to market opportunities in a market that if we have problems, we have liquidity to offer to producers.

We will be more sellers than buyers. We are being more sellers than buyers.

Henrique Brustolin (Equity Research Analyst)

Very clear. Thank you.

Ana Paula Zerbinati (Head of Investor Relations and Communications)

We have another question from Angelo. Please say your name. We can answer an extra question. Angelo, we can't hear you. Well, we have no more questions. We had a record public, record number of participants plus people watching us on YouTube. Thank you. We're very optimistic with the end of the year, in spite of this more difficult scenario in price and operations. I'd like to thank André, Gustavo for participating, and I'd like to pass the floor to André and Gustavo for their final comments.

André Guillaumon (CEO)

Thank you, Ana. Once again, Ana, we will work, we will do our best to have more sales of farmland.

We had a lot of sales, if you look at the net result of the sale, we will have a very good EBITDA and net profit in the year when we consider the result of this sale. There's more to sell. There's more to sell, more areas to work, leased areas. We're looking at some purchases and more sales. As I said, we will have, I say once again, we will work to make more sales this year in order to monetize this good moment with a lot of liquidity, capitalize the company, and when the time comes, we will buy. We always said this, the company is prepared to serve these good moments and capture the results. Thank you very much, I thank all those who prepared this material and participated with us. We wish you a good afternoon.