Lavoro’s revenue reached $1.8 billion for the FY2023, marking a 24% increase compared to the previous year

• Lavoro’s revenue reached $1.8 billion for the FY2023, marking a 24% increase compared to the previous year

• FY2023 gross profit was $332 million, up 34% y/y, with gross margins expanding 140 bps to 18.5%

• Lavoro successfully completed the acquisition of Referência Agroinsumos on July 31, 2023, further expanding its retail presence in the State of Rio Grando do Sul in the South of Brazil. Referência serves over 2,000 farmers, and brings an additional 25 technical sales representatives (RTVs) to the Lavoro family

• On June 30, 2023, Lavoro announced a partnership with Stenon, which will enable us to offer accurate real-time soil analysis to our farmer clients, helping their decision-making and leading to improved agronomic outcomes

• Lavoro provides its FY2024 outlook, expecting consolidated revenue in the range of $2.0 to $2.3 billion, consolidated Inputs revenue in the range of $1.7 to $2.0 billion, and consolidated Adjusted EBITDA in the range of $135 million to $165 million

Lavoro Limited (Nasdaq: LVRO; LVROW), the first U.S.-listed pure-play agricultural inputs distributor in Latin America, announced its financial results for the fiscal fourth quarter, ended on June 30, 2023.

″In recent months, we saw a further worsening in pricing trends in crop protection and fertilizers, as significant global pricing declines were exacerbated by excess channel inventories in Brazil, particularly in herbicides. While we are seeing signs of stabilization of the pricing trends, our expectation is for the retail ag inputs in Brazil to see overall decline of approximately -20% for our fiscal year 2024, led by these pricing headwinds. With that said, our view is that the fundamental long-term secular growth drivers for our Brazil Ag Retail segment have not changed. What we have been witnessing in the past few quarters is simply the normalization of input prices that overshot in ’21-’22 as a result of temporary factors that have now waned, namely the impact of COVID-led plant shutdowns on Chinese agrochemical production, and the effects of the War in Ukraine. We view this as a temporary effect that we expect should not persist beyond the end of this our fiscal year, and should not affect our long-term growth algorithm,″ commented Ruy Cunha, CEO of Lavoro.

″Our scale, regional and product diversification, vertical integration with Crop Care, strong balance sheet, M&A capabilities, and ability to invest in technology and new services, sets us apart relative to the rest of industry. We believe we are uniquely positioned to capitalize on the current environment, accelerate our market share gains and improve our financial performance as market conditions normalize,″ added Mr. Cunha.

4Q23 Financial Highlights

• Consolidated revenue increased by 17% to $265.6 million in 4Q23 compared to the same period in 2022, mainly driven by higher input sales from Brazil Ag Retail¹, attributable to (i) increased unit volumes of fertilizers, crop protection and specialties, (ii) growth in corn seeds price and volumes, partly offset by (iii) price declines in crop protection and fertilizer product categories. Once again, Latam Ag Retail revenue was affected by the depreciation of the Colombian Peso, with a -3% y/y decline. On a constant-currency basis, Latam grew 10%. Crop Care segment revenue decreased -21% y/y, driven by phasing effects at Union Agro, though gross profit grew 60% driven by strong performance of our biologicals product line. For FY23, Lavoro consolidated revenue increased by 24% to reach $1.8 billion, with Crop Care being a notable contributor as revenue growth exceeded 90%.

  
  

• Gross Profit increased by 27% to $46.9 million in 4Q23, with gross margin expanding by 140bps to 17.6%. This was mainly attributable to (i) positive segment mix shifts, led by Crop Care (ii) improved product mix in our retail distribution, as sales of specialties products as a percentage of Inputs revenue improved by nearly 300bps to 9% in 4Q22, and (iii) strong performance from biologicals, our highest margin product line which grew over 80% versus the prior year quarter. These positive drivers more than offset headwinds from steep price declines in crop protection and fertilizers, which in turn were partially alleviated by a $12 million benefit from planned successful renegotiation with our suppliers. For FY23, gross profit reached $331.9 million, up 34% y/y, with gross margin expanding by 140 bps to 18.5%, owing to both segment and product mix shifts.

  
  

• Adjusted EBITDA in 4Q23 was $2.4 million, improving by $18.7 million y/y, with positive incremental contribution from all three segments. The key drivers are similar to those outlined above for gross profit, with the addition of the benefit of an improved SG&A expense ratio vs. last year. For FY23, Adjusted EBITDA grew 64% to $149.8 million, and Adjusted EBITDA margin rose 200 bps to 8.3%. Crop Care yet again was a strong contributor, with segment Adjusted EBITDA expanding 280% y/y, resulting in Crop Care now accounting for nearly 19% of total Adjusted EBITDA in FY23, a jump from 8% in the previous year.

  
  

• Non-recurring expenses increased by $4.6 million to $6.0 million in 4Q23, due to (i) IPO-related consultancy services expenses throughout fiscal year 2023 recognized as non-recurring in 4Q23 ($3.8 million); (ii) the remainder of a one-time DeSPAC bonus to employees paid in 4Q23 ($0.9 million) and (iii) M&A accounting and tax due diligence expenses ($0.8 million). For FY23, non-recurring items other than our Nasdaq listing expense, increased to $14.3 million, with key drivers being (i) $2.8 million impact from stock-based compensation; (ii) $ 5.8 million of one-time DeSPAC bonus; (iii) $3.8 million from IPO-related consultancy services, and (iv) $5.2 of M&A expenses.

  
  

• Financial costs were $11.1 million higher in 4Q23 vs. the prior year, attributable to losses on fair value of commodity forward contracts, and an increase in the benchmark interest rate in Brazil. On a full fiscal year basis, financial results were $76.9 million higher than the previous year, owing to the same drivers.

¹ The segments herein have been renamed to Brazil Ag Retail (Brazil Cluster), Latam Ag Retail (LatAm Cluster) and Crop Care (Crop Care Cluster), to be clearer with the region and business function they are performing. There is no change to the scope of their operations.

Summary of 4Q23 and FY23 Results¹

¹ USD/BRL average period exchange rate used to translate our results to USD throughout this document for illustration purposes: 4.952 for FY4Q23, 5.193 for FY3Q23, 5.280 for FY1H23, 4.924 for FY4Q22, 5.226 for FY3Q22, 5.570 for FY1H22.

² Represents sales between Crop Care and Brazil Ag Retail.

³ Represents expenses related to the business combination with TPB Acquisition Corp I.

Segment Results for 4Q23 and FY23⁴

Brazil Ag Retail

Segment revenue increased by 45% to $197 million in 4Q23, with strong unit volume growth in crop protection, fertilizer and specialty sales, more than offsetting steep price declines that the industry witnessed over the past few months. Gross margin decreased by 110 bps to 13.3%, owing to these pricing headwinds, partly offset by a previously planned $12 million supplier renegotiation benefit.

Latam Ag Retail

The segment grew 10% on a constant currency basis (Colombian peso), primarily due to strong sales in specialties and corn seeds, partly offset by headwinds resulting from the removal of Paraquat, a financially relevant herbicide, from the product lineup one of our suppliers. The devaluation of the peso was a -13% y/y negative contributor, with revenue declining -3% on a US dollar basis. Gross Margin contracted by 100 bps in 4Q23, reflecting the deflationary pricing trends in crop protection and fertilizers.

⁴ USD/BRL average period exchange rate used to translate our results to USD: 4.952 for FY4Q23, 5.193 for FY3Q23, 5.280 for FY1H23, 4.924 for FY4Q22, 5.226 for FY3Q22, 5.570 for FY1H22.

Crop Care

Crop Care segment revenue for 4Q23 saw a -21% decline, resulting from the phasing effects at Union Agro, our specialty fertilizer company, which had some sales pull-forward into 3Q23. Biologicals product sales grew over 80% y/y, partly driven from phasing shift from 3Q23 to 4Q23, as a result of postponement of the timing of biopesticide input purchases by farmers. The strong growth in biologicals, which are the highest gross margin products for Lavoro, led the gross margin expansion to 76.4%, from 37.8% a year ago.

Recent Business and Commercial Updates

Partnership with Stenon

On June 30, 2023, Lavoro announced a partnership with Stenon. Stenon is a step-change evolution in soil chemistry testing, with its FarmLab solution, which is a portable sensor-based devices enabling accurate real-time analysis of Nitrogen and other agronomically relevant soil indicators. With Stenon, as a practical example, our RTVs will be able to provide clients with timely recommendations for nitrogen application across their corn planting area, resulting in improved costs and crop yields. We are planning to sample 100,000 acres in the coming crop season across the state of Parana, where 100 RTVs have been trained and are ready to execute on this service.

Recent M&As Updates

Closed agreements

Referência Agroinsumos

On July 31, Lavoro successfully completed the acquisition of a controlling interest in Referência Agroinsumos. Founded in 2006, Referência has nine distribution locations and more than 80 employees, serving approximately 2,000 customers in the South of Brazil.

Pro forma Financial Information⁵

Full Fiscal Year 2024 Consolidated Outlook⁶

⁵ Pro Forma financial information is calculated assuming the acquisitions occurred at the beginning of the period presented and the prior year (rather than just the partial ″stub period″ contribution). Pro Forma Revenues represent fully combined revenues, which include revenues from non-controlling minority shareholders.

⁶ USD/BRL average period exchange rate used to translate our results to USD: 4.88 for FY1Q24, and 5.02 for FY2Q24 to FY3Q24.