EuroDry Ltd.

Thank you for standing by. Ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the New York Drive Limited conference call on the second quarter of 2024 financial results. We have with us today Mr. Tassos S. Levy, Chief Financial Officer of the company. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. There will be a presentation followed by a question and answer section, at which time, if you wish to ask a question, put your first star 1 on your telephone keypad and wait for your name to be announced. I must advise you that this conference is being recorded today. Please be reminded that the company announced its results with a press release that has been publicly distributed. Before passing the floor to Mrs. Lee, I would like to remind everyone that in today's presentation and conference call, your drive will be making forwarding statements. These statements are within the meaning of the Federal Securities Law. Matters discussed may be forwarding statements which are based on current management expectations that involve risks and uncertainties that may result in such expectations not being realized. I kindly draw your attention to slide number two of the webcast presentation, which has the full forward-looking statement, and the same statement was also included to the press release. Please take a moment to go through the whole statement and read it. And now, I would like to pass the floor to Mr. S. Leidy. Please go ahead, sir.

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and thank you all for joining us today for our scheduled conference call. I'm Tassos S. Leidy, the CFO of EvoDrive. Together with me is Mr. Simos Pariaros, our chief administrative officer, and Ms. Athena Attalioti, our finance manager. Our chairman and CEO, Aristides Peters, who usually hosts this call, will not be able to join this presentation today due to overlapping engagements. The purpose of today's call is to discuss our financial results for the six-month period and quarter ended June 30th, 2024. Please turn to slide three of the presentation to see our financial highlights for the period. For the second quarter of 2024, we reported total net revenues of 17.4 million and a net loss attributable to controlling shareholders of 0.41 million or $0.15 loss per share, basic and diluted. Adjusted net loss attributable to controlling shareholders for the quarter was $2.45 million, or $0.17 loss per share, basic and diluted. Adjusted EBITDA for the quarter was $5 million. Please refer to the press release that was released earlier today for reconciliation of adjusted net loss attributed to controlling shareholders to adjusted EBITDA. We will go over our financial highlights in a bit more detail later in the presentation. As of August 8, 2024, we had repurchased a total of 313,318 shares of our common stock on the open market, for a total of about 5 million, are under our repurchase plan of up to 10 million announced in August 2028. The program, which was renewed in August 2023 for another year, has been further extended for an additional year. We will continue to use our shared purchase program at management discretion, depending on the level of our stock price, to enhance our ability to increase long-term shareholder value. We are also very happy to announce our 2023 Sustainability Report, which was uploaded to our website today. Please now turn to slide 4 for another view of our chartering, operational, and guidebooking highlights. On the chartering side, you can see that most of our charters fixed during last quarter are for short periods, varying from 25 days on the one end to 80 to 100 days on the other end. Even the motor vessels, the Caterini and Xenia, which are in longer term charters until March and May 2025, respectively, have the rate of their charters linked to indices to the Baltic Index, earning 105.5% and 108% respectively above the average Baltic ComSarmax Index, an index based on the five ComSarmax time charter routes. This strategy is consistent with our view to be exposed to the market as we believe the fundamental supply and demand trends present a strong possibility for the market to strengthen in the near and medium term. It is expected that supply growth will be quite limited over the next couple of years due to the low average ordering for new vessels in the recent past, and thus it is likely that any demand growth will be translated in increases to charter rates. We plan to continue trading under short-term charters for the time being until employment rates start firming up and we see the potential positive effect of demand increases. You can see the specifics of the various chart that we fixed in the relevant slide, slide four. During this period, the second quarter of 2024, our motor vessels Starlight, Maria, and Irini-P underwent the scheduled dry dockings and repairs for approximately 23, 26, and 31 days, respectively. Vessels Marias and Irenis dry dock started in June, in the second quarter, and were completed in July, and the related cost would mostly influence our third quarter results. Also, motor vessels Giannis Peters and Christos Hei are currently undergoing their scheduled dry dockings. In fact, we have decided to perform earlier the dry dockings, mostly for commercial reasons related to them being fully available for employment in case the markets meaningfully recover in the near future. Finally, motor vessel Good Heart encountered a commercial off-car last quarter, a waiting time of four and a half days between two charters. Subsequently, the vessel also experienced a technical off-carry for about 10 days due to the required main engine turbocharger repair. Please turn to slide 5. Your dry fleet consists of 13 vessels, including five Panamax carriers, five Ultramaxes, two Camsar Maxes, and one Supermax. We think of our fleet as having two clusters. a modern Eco-1 of eight vessels, all built after 2014. And our vintage five Panamaxes, all built in Japan at the highest standards of their time, having been the workhorses of the sector. Of our 13 tribal carriers, our 13 tribal carriers have a total cargo capacity of about 920,000 deadweight tons, in another stage of about 13 1⁄2 years. At this point, I would like to remind you that, as previously discussed, Uruguay owns 61% of the entities of the ship-holding companies that own motor vessels Christos K and Maria. The remaining 39% is owned by owners represented by LRT Project Finance, to which we refer during the presentation as LRT Investors. Next, please turn to slide six to see a graphical representation of our fleet employment. As you can see, and consistent with my earlier remarks, fixed rate coverage for the remainder of 2024 stands at around 22% for charters. However, this feature excludes ships and index charters, which are open to market fluctuations but nevertheless have secure deployment. At this point, let me pass the floor to our Chief Administrative Officer, Mr. Simos Vargyaras, to go over the recent market developments.

Thank you, Kassos. Good morning from elsewhere, ladies and gentlemen. Together, we will walk through some market highlights today. Turning on the flight date now. we will go over the market highlights for the second quarter of 2024 up until recently. In the second quarter, the average spot market rate for Panamaxers was around $14,500 per day. By August, spot rates had slightly risen to just below $15,000. In the meanwhile, one year-time set of rates stood for Panamaxers at approximately $16,000 per day during the quarter and have shown a slight softening in the past weeks. However, rates still represent a significant improvement from around $10,500 that was during the same period last year, which marks a notable increase This uplift in employment rate was primarily driven by the ongoing Panama and Red Sea disruptions. Excuse me again. Please now turn to slide 9 to see some data from a recent IMF update. The fund sees a global economy to experience modest growth over the next two years, with cooling activity in the U.S., destabilization in Europe, and stronger consumption and exports from China. As a result, the IMF has maintained its 2024 growth forecast at 3.2%, consistent with its April projection, while slightly increasing next year's forecast by 0.1% at point to 3.3%, with China and India bringing the most notable upward revisions. On the other end, Japan's growth has been revised the most downward for this year to 0.7% down from 0.9%, together with Russia in 2025, which is projected to go down from 1.5% to 1.5% from 1.8% in the previous quarter. As the weight of China in dry bulk shipping is the driver of this market, we continue to monitor China's economic growth. Its property and infrastructure sectors, which have played a vital role in shaping this market, over the past two decades are not growing at levels seen in the past anymore. And despite the fact that the real estate sector has been saturated for more than three years now, we see different trades and commodities developing, like Bauxite Imports from Africa, along with others, which have given significant support to the drive-up market and are expected to continue to do so. So the question is, what will drive this market to a more profitable level if its main workforce is getting more and more tired? On this note, let's say a few things about India, which seems to be the next target that would help the world economy to continue growing at health levels and has material effects on the tribal trade as well. In that respect, India's growth is projected to remain robust at about 7% this year. This support revision is attributed to improve private consumption predominantly. However, for next year, the IMF has cautioned that growth is expected to slow down a bit to 6.5%. Meanwhile, the remaining economies in Asia, like the Asian Five Group, still remain the main engine for the global economy, with the forecast remaining broadly unchanged from April. Now, according to Clarkson's 10-mile demand for dryback trade, it's presently expected to grow by about 4.4% in 2024. This includes about 1.6% uplift for the entire year due to the Red Sea and Panama Canal disruptions. A longer duration of these disruptions in these regions could potentially drive demand even higher. Lower speeds and further congestion are other factors that could further boost demand this year. Demand in 2025 is projected to grow exponentially. by about half a percentage point, assuming conditions in the Panama Canal and the Red Sea normalize and the conflicts are resolved in the Red Sea. If the situation in these areas remain unchanged, we could be surprised on the upside, but at the moment any prediction looks very uncertain. Now please turn to slide 10. Uncertainties about the future of fuels and high new building prices have led to the low order book continuing. As of August 2024, the order book as a percentage of the total fleet is only 9.7%, which is near the lowest historical levels. This suggests a low fleet growth over the next couple of two to three years, Complementing this low flip growth, we also have the effect of increased flow steaming and expected scrapping due to the introduction of the new environmental regulations. This could reduce the effective available bulk supply even further. Now turning on to slide 11, let us now look into the supply fundamentals in a bit more detail. According to Claxon's latest report, new deliveries as a percentage of the total fleet are expected to be about 3.6% this year, 3.3% next year, and 4.7% in 2026 and onwards. The actual fleet growth is, of course, expected to be lower than the aforementioned figures due to scrapping and flip-ups. Also note that about 9% of the fleet is older than 20 years old and, therefore, a good candidate for scrapping, especially if the market remains at current or lower levels. Please now turn to slide 12, where we summarize our outlook on drive-back markets. The bulk trade market has been positive so far in 2024, with average trade rates rising by 35% year-over-year. Despite a slight softening during the last few weeks of July, rates remain healthy and above last year's levels. Global demand growth, especially in the Atlantic region, has positively impacted the market, with the global ship and travel trade indicator showing an increase. Additionally, disruptions in the Red Sea and Panama Canal have also contributed positively. Panama's freight rate reached almost $16,000 per day in the second quarter of 2024, reflecting a 35% increase compared to the second quarter last year. The outlook for the second half of 2024 is optimistic as seasonality kicks in. The rerouting of vessels away from the Red Sea remains a key focus, with Suez Canal bulkhead transit staying relatively stable in recent months, leading to an estimated 1.2% increase in bulkhead demand. Restrictions on the Panama Canal have continued to impact the market, with bulkhead transit recently being less than a third of normal levels. additional daily slots through the rest of the year could increase bulk of transit and bring trends back to normal, potentially slightly reducing the demand for ships. Now, looking ahead into next year, again, we have to take under consideration the timing of the return to normality of the two major passages of Suez and Panama, something that is really hard to predict considering the geopolitical second chances in the lead list. In any case, the relatively small and manageable order book, the introduction of further environmental regulations, the rise in operational and dry token costs, which makes the operations of other ships less competitive, creates favorable dynamics which could trigger a very strong market if the world economy grows at a healthy pace and rival trade demand creates the necessary sparks. Electricity demand worldwide is growing at a fast pace, greatly supported by the introduction of artificial intelligence and the electrification of the vehicle fleet, something that provides great support in the dry bulk market. However, as renewables further penetrate the electricity mix, coal trade dynamics and prospects remain to be further evaluated in the immediate future. Let's now turn to slide 13. The left side of the slide shows the evolution of one-year time charter rates of Panama's vessels since 2005. As of August, the one-year time charter rate for Panama's ships with capacity of about 75,000 tons was just below $16,000 per day, which is approximately 16% above the historical median rate, which is in the region of $13,500 per day. Vessel prices, as you can clearly see, are well above average prices seen in previous years. And with that, I will now pass the floor to our CFO to continue with some financial data.

Thank you very much, Simo. As mentioned in the beginning of the presentation, together with Athena, we will give you an overview of our financial highlights for the second quarter and first half of 2024 and compare them to the same periods of last year. I will now pass the floor to Arthina first to start our review.

Arthina, please go ahead. Thank you very much, Pastor. Good morning for me as well, ladies and gentlemen. Let's turn to slide 15. For the second quarter of 2024, the company reported total net revenues of $17.4 million, representing a 68.7% increase over total net revenues of $10.3 million during the second quarter of 2023, which was the result of the higher time charter rate our vessels earned and the increased average number of vessels operated during the second quarter of 2024 compared to the same period of 2023. The company reported net loss attributable to controlling shareholders for the period of $0.41 million as compared to net loss attributable to controlling shareholders of $1.2 million for the same period of 2023. The net gain attributable to the non-controlling interest of about $80,000. in the second quarter of 2024 represented a gain attributable to the 39% ownership by VNRP investors. Interest and other financing costs, including interest income for the second quarter of 2024, amounted to $2 million compared to $1,250,000 for the same period of 2023. Interest expense during the second quarter of 2024 was higher mainly due to the increased amount of debt and the increased benchmark rate of our loan, while interest income was lowered due to lower cash balances during that period as compared to the same period of last year. Adjusted EBITDA for the second quarter of 2024 was $5 million compared to $2.5 million achieved during the second quarter of 2023. Basic and diluted loss per share attributable to the company for the second quarter of 2024 was 15 cents, calculated on about 2.7 million basic and diluted weighted average number of shares outstanding, compared to loss per share of 43 cents, calculated on about 2.8 million basic and diluted weighted average number of shares outstanding for the second quarter of 2023. Excluding the assets on the loss attributable to controlling share holders for the quarter of the unrealized gain on derivatives, the adjusted loss for the quarter ended June 30, 2024, would have been 17 cents per share, basing and diluted, compared to adjusted loss of 48 cents per share, basing and diluted, respectively, for the quarter and June 30, 2023. Usually, security analysts do not include the above items in their published estimates of earnings per share. Let's now look at the numbers for the corresponding six-month period, standard June 30, 2024, and compare it to last year. For the first half of this year, the company reported total net revenues of $31.9 million, representing a 47% increase over total net revenues of $21.7 million during the first half of 2023, which was the result of the increase in time charter rates of our debtors and the increased average number of debtors operating during the first half of 2024 compared to the same period of 2023. The company reported a net loss attributable to controlling shareholders of $2.2 million as compared to a net loss attributable to controlling shareholders of $2.7 million for the first half of 2023. The net loss attributable to the non-controlling interest of about $50,000 in the first half of 2024 represents a loss attributable to the 39% ownership of the NFT investors. Interest and other financing costs, including interest income for the first half of 2024, amounted to $4.1 million compared to $2.9 million for the same period of 2023. This increase is mainly due to the increased amount of debt in the current period, as well as the increase in the benchmark rate of our loan, while interest income was lowered due to lower cash balances compared to the same period of 2023. Adjusted EBITDA for the first half of 2024 was $7.1 million compared to $4.8 million achieved during the first half of 2023. Basic and diluted loss per share attributable to the company for the first half of 2024 was 81 cents, calculated on about 2.2 million basic and diluted weighted average number of shares outstanding, compared to a loss per share of 98 cents, calculated on about 2.9 million basic and diluted weighted average number of shares outstanding. Excluding the effects on the net loss attributable to controlling shareholders for the first half of the year of the unrealized gain on derivatives, the adjusted loss for the six-month period ended June 30, 2024 would have been $1.75 per share basing and diluted, compared to adjusted loss of $0.33 per share basing and diluted, respectively, for the six-month period ended June 30, 2023, excluding the unrealized loss on derivatives. As previously mentioned, usually security analysts do not include the above items in their published estimates of earnings per share. Let's now turn to slide 16 to review our flip performance. We will start our review by looking at our flip utilization rate for the second quarter of 2024 and 2023. As usual, our flip utilization rate is broken down into commercial and operational components. During the second quarter of 2024, our commercial utilization rate was 99.6%, while our operational utilization rate was 99.4% compared to 98.3% commercial and 95% operational for the second quarter of last year. On average, 13 vessels were owned and operated during the second quarter of 2024, earning an average time charter equivalent rate of $14,427 per day, compared to 10 vessels in the same period of 2023, earning on average $4,179 per day. Our total daily operating expenses, including management fees, general and administrative expenses, but excluding driving costs, were $7,062 per vessel per day during the second quarter of 2014, compared to $7,656 per vessel per day for the second quarter of 2016. If we move forward down on this table, we can see the cash flow break-even level, which takes into account, in addition to the above, the drive-in expenses, interest expenses, and low expenses. For the second quarter of 2024, our daily cash flow break-even level was $15,214 per vessel per day, compared to $14,128 per vessel per day for the same period of 2026. Let us now go over the same figures for the six-month period of 2024 and compare them to the same period of last year. During the first half of 2024, our commercial and operational rate was 99.8% and 98.7% respectively, compared to 99% commercial and 97.4% operational for the same period of last year. On average, 13 vessels were owned and operated during the first half of 2024, earning an average time charter equivalent rate of $13,452 per day, compared to 10 vessels in the same period of 2023, earning on average $11,393 per day. Our digital operating expenses again, including management fees and generally administered expenses, were $6,964 per visit per day in the first half of this year, compared to $7,306 per visit per day for the same period of last year. Again, if we look further down the table, we can see the cash flow break-even rate for the first six months of 2024 which is $13,101 per vessel per day, compared to $13,661 per vessel per day for the first half of 2023. Let's turn our attention to slide 17 to review our debt profile. As of June 30, 2024, our outstanding tax debt stood at $98.1 million and expected to decline to about $67.5 million by the end of 2026. In the remainder of 2024, our debt repayment amounts to about $8.5 million, Then, in both 2025 and 2026, loan repayments are due to decrease to about $10.5 million and $11.6 million respectively, significantly reducing our cash flow break even less. It is worth mentioning on this table that the total cost of our senior debt, with an average margin of about 2.39% and assuming A three-month stop rate of 5.25% is 7.64%. Including the swap portion of debt, the cost of our senior debt stands at around 7.43%. At the bottom of this slide, we can see our projected cash flow breakeven level for the next 12 months, broken down into its various components. Overall, we expect our overall cash flow breakeven level to be around $12,659 per vessel per day, and our EBITDA break-even level could be around $8,745 per vessel per day. And with that, I will pass the floor back to our CFO, Dr. Patelini.

Thank you very much, Athena. Let's now conclude our presentation by moving to slide 18, where we can see some highlights from our balance sheet. This slide offers a snapshot of our assets and liabilities. As of June 30th, 2024, cash and other current assets stood at about 22.8 million in our balances. The other major component, the book value of our vessels, was approximately 197.2 million, resulting in total book value of our assets of about 220 million. On the liability side, our debt as of the end of June as Athena previously mentioned, stood at about 98 million, representing around 44.6% of the book value of our assets, while other liabilities amounted to about 5.2 million, or about 2.4% of our total assets. The remaining book value of 116.7 million inclusive of the book value of our minority shareholder interest, the NIP investors, of about $9.7 million. If we subtract the minority shareholder's book value, $107 million of book value attributed to our controlling shareholders and resulting in a book value per share of about $38. However, Based on market transaction and other market reports, we can value our fit as of June 30th, way above, above the book value, and we estimate that to be 270 million worth, more than 70 million or approximately 37% higher than the respective book values, thus suggesting an NAEG per share in excess of $63,000. Our share price, trading around or between $20 and $24 recently, trades at a substantial discount compared to our net asset value, and thus we present a significant opportunity for appreciation potential for our shareholders and investors. At this point, our presentation is concluded, and I would like to open the floor for questions if there are any.

Thank you. At this time, we will be conducting a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star 1 on your telephone keypad. A confirmation phone will indicate a line is in the question key. You may press star 2 if you would like to remove your question from the key. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star key. Our first question comes from the line of Mark Reisman with Noble Capital Markets. Please proceed with your questions.

Good morning. It seems like the net revenue, our estimates were pretty much in line with the actuals this quarter. Where we were off were the voyage expenses and the dry docking expenses. And so I was kind of wondering if you could just kind of provide a little more color on those two line items for the quarter and expectations for the remainder of the year.

Yeah, I think in kind of my quick circle vote, The dry dock expenses first depend on when dry dock is happening. We have 13 vessels. They dry dock twice every five years. So about one vessel or another should be dry docked every quarter. Last quarter we had more than one dry dock. We had one dry dock completed during the quarter, and we had a couple of dry docks starting in the quarter, which got some costs attributed to them. So that resulted in the higher dry docking costs. On the same note, as I mentioned already, we have two dry docks scheduled for next quarter, and two dry docks are being performed at the turn of the quarter. So we should expect a little higher dry dock expenses next quarter as well. On the revenue side, the mortgage expenses have to do with the type of contracts the vessels enter when they are booked. If we have to travel to get to the area that we load the cargo, we get paid a balance bond, but at the same time we pay for the mortgage expenses. And depending whether we have only time-chartered contracts or mortgage contracts that include the , we might have more or less mortgage expenses.

That's helpful. Then the second part of my question is, you know, we've been in kind of a favorable charter rate environment, and, you know, that looks to kind of continue or at least stabilize maybe for the remainder of the year with a little more uncertainty in 2025. And I guess my question is, you know, even though, you know, we've produced positive EBITDA, I mean, we've had two consecutive quarters of negative EPS. And so what, I guess, what will be the variable here? to move, you know, EPS into the positive category, or would you kind of expect, you know, positive, you know, negative EPS in the third quarter? I guess I'm just kind of looking for, I mean, we're in kind of a favorable environment, yet, you know, we've had two consecutive quarters of loss on a per share basis. And so what dynamic changes that looking ahead?

I think it's a combination, of course, of the market, but also on how many vessels, in our case, have to go through dry dock. As you can see, slide 16 will give you there the break-even level per day. So to cover our expenses, we said in the past, in the first six months of this year, we had a break-even cost of $13,000 per day. That is, if you convert this to a gross time charter equivalent rate, probably our vessels needed to earn around $14,500 to $15,000 a day to break even in the first six months. They earned, as you can see on slide 16, $13,450. So that is the metric that you should follow. If you look again on slide 17, going forward, and this is for the next 12 months, so it's not broken down by quarter, we expect to have a break-even level of $12,000 on a cash flow basis, of course, $600. So we should be able to earn in excess of $14,000 to have cash flow positive balance, but also earnings, because loan repayments roughly are equivalent to our depreciation.

Okay, and so that's kind of sensitive to what the time charter rates will look like. But, I mean, as long as over the next 12 months, if the time charter equivalent rates hold, you should be maybe you have a little wider spread or, you know, you'll need to kind of get your expenses down, which would maybe mean fewer dry docking expenses. But there's still a fairly, I guess it's, not a real wide margin between breakeven and the time charter equivalent rates. So, okay. Well, no, that's very helpful. I appreciate that. Is there any additional color on that?

I think the only additional color I would say is that we, as Seamus analyzed, supply in the dry market is very tight. In the sense that the orders that have been placed over the last, of the previous three years were low. That creates very low supply growth over the next couple of years. So really, we are waiting to see whether demand will return to historical average or higher levels. And that will be translated directly to air-to-rate increases. That's why we are keeping most of our fleet exposed to the market because we and we hope that there will be a situation where the market will perform better.

That's very helpful. Thank you very much. You're welcome.

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Lars with Arctic Securities. Please proceed with your question. Hello.

How are you? Good, good. Right, good to hear. Just a quick one from me. I think you mentioned it pretty to the heart for this quarter, but just in general, how should we think about off-hours days for wrestlers with multiple charges within the same quarter? Is there like an agenda we will form or will it vary from case to case? I mean, the...

The commercial of cars that were reported was, I would rather say, an exception to have to wait before you book your next charter. Of course, any technical of cars are a matter of incidents that happen on operations. The race we typically report includes any ballast legs. that is part of the charter. So if there is a balance like in the charter, we include the balance bonus minus the voyage expenses to provide the time charter equivalent for the full period. So I would say for our own modeling purposes, we use an average of one to one and a half days of off-hire per quarter as a capsule average outside the eye document.

Okay. That's great. Thank you very much. That's all from me.

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Paul Frank with AAGP. Please proceed with your question.

Good afternoon, Texas. Hi, everyone. I was just wondering, if you do sort of the math on the last question, if you sort of do the math on what's in dry dock and what you've highlighted, I'm sort of coming up with an idle day number in the third quarter of about 150 days.

In the third quarter, we would have two full dry docks, so that's roughly 50 days, plus two continuing dry docks, another, let's say, 35 days. So I would say around 85 days, give or take, would be the off-dry days due to dry dock in the third quarter. That is the order of magnitude. Now, they can play up or down a bit, but I assume 25 days for the two full dry docks, and because two are at the turn of the quarter, I assume, you know, something like 35 days in

Yeah, I guess I was looking at the Maria and the Rini that were still on dry dock in July. You know, that looks like about 50 days, and then you have the two other ones. So, I mean, shouldn't it be over 100? Yeah, it could be, yeah.

I mean, I didn't have in front of me the day you choose three of Maria and Rini, but if it's 50, then total would be a little more than 100, yeah. I think there is 43 days that we have that were in Q3, plus roughly 50 give or take for the other two, yeah. A couple of days outside.

And then do you have any dry docks currently scheduled for the fourth quarter, or should it be a pretty quiet quarter from a dry docking perspective?

I think, to the best of my recollection, I think it's a pretty quiet quarter. It's a pretty dry quarter, dry garden-wise.

I like the pun. When you look at the stock buyback program, it seemed to slow down a little bit in the second quarter. Is that a function of the stock price? And correspondingly, how sensitive is the stock buyback program to the stock price?

The stock buyback program has to comply with certain requirements. limits that are imposed by the SEC. We cannot buy back more than a certain percentage of the daily volume, and we cannot trade during the whole day. So we are utilizing in full, to the full extent that we can, but because of the lower volume and the other limits, we are We will have to buy back fewer shares.

Exactly. In turn, to what Asus mentioned, it's not only a matter of volume. When you buy back shares on behalf of your company, you cannot buy from the offer. So it has to be a match on our bid. So otherwise, we cannot go aggressive. As you know, buyback rules are extremely restrictive, and they are there to protect customers. the participants in the market. So we have to follow them and respect them. So it is not up to us to increase the liquidity and try to buy more stock. We are doing the best we can and we will possibly continue to do so, but we have to follow the rules.

We are doing the best we can because we think it's a great opportunity to buy back our stock. It trades at such a big discount, so it's a great opportunity. We want to be the first to exploit it to the maximum extent.

That's really helpful. We have an intention to slow down. It was just a technical one. That's great. Thank you so much. You're welcome. You're welcome.

Thank you. So we have reached the end of the question and answer session. I'll turn the call back over to Mr. Tapia. Thank you very much for attending.

I would like to wish everybody a good remaining of the summer, and we look forward to seeing all of you again in our Q3 earnings call sometime in November. Bye-bye, everybody.