American Vanguard Corporation

Thank you, Tom.

Good afternoon and welcome to American Vanguard's second quarter 2025 earnings review. Our prepared remarks will be led by Dak Kay, Chief Executive Officer, and David Johnson, Chief Financial Officer. A copy of today's release along with supplemental slides are available on our website. A replay of the webcast and transcript from this event will be available on our website shortly as well. Before we begin our comments, We'd like to remind everyone that today's press release and certain of our comments on the call include non-GAAP figures and forward-looking statements, and actual results may differ materially. Please refer to the cautionary language included in our press release and slides and to the risk factors described in our SEC filings, all of which are available on our website. It is now my pleasure to turn the call over to CEO Dak Kay.

Thank you, Anthony. and welcome everyone to our second quarter 2025 earnings conference call. As many of you are aware, American Vanguard has been in the midst of a business transformation, and I believe these efforts are beginning to bear fruit. While this quarter shows dramatic improvement as compared to where we were last quarter and last year, in my opinion, this is only the beginning for the company. I believe we will continue to make significant improvements based upon the hard work that has already been completed and some of the initiatives that we are working on at this very moment. We would like to thank the investors who have stuck with us through this challenging period and we look forward to producing even better results over the coming quarters and years. We remain confident that we can achieve our 2025 EBITDA target of 40 to 44 million and our revenue target of 535 to 545 million. Turning to the second quarter, we are very pleased to see net sales grow from 128 million to 129 million, an increase of 1%, and adjusted EBITDA nearly double to 11 million as compared to 6 million last year. The EBITDA improvement can be attributed to cost-cutting initiatives that management executed, while the improvement in sales can be attributed to to commercial activities undertaken by the sales organization in combination with an improving agricultural backdrop. We experienced growth in both our US crop and non-crop segments, while our sales in our international business were similar to the year-ago period. During the second quarter, our green solutions business was soft, though still growing at a rate that was ahead of our broader company. Looking forward, we continue to expect double-digit growth from our green solutions in 2025. Channel uncertainty from tariffs negatively impacted the U.S. green solutions platform during the second quarter, but we expect Central and South American sales to materially pick up in the second half of the year, exhibiting their normal seasonal strength. While I am pleased that the initiatives we implemented during my first few months on the job are beginning to provide tangible results, it is important to remember that we remain in the early stage of our business transformation. There remains much work to be done. The initial improvements that we are seeing in working capital, gross profit margin, and operating expenses are the initial steps. And over the long term, we look forward to returning to double-digit EBITDA margins as we strive for our long-term goal of 15%. Our gross profit margin significantly improved during the quarter, increasing to 31% from 29% in the year-ago period and 26% in the first quarter of 2025. This is the highest our gross profit margin has been in the last five quarters. A portion of this improvement can be attributed to our improved SIOP process and improved manufacturing performance. but a significant portion of this improvement can be attributed to the operational team that we hired in the first quarter of this year. American Vanguard has historically not had a formal procurement organization, and early on during my tenure, identified this as an area where the implementation of modern practices could help both the income statement and the balance sheet. I'm happy to see this initial improvement in gross profit margin And I am also pleased to see we have driven down inventory, which is helping to free up cash, and in turn, this will improve the value of the company for our shareholders. We continue to have a sharp focus on our operational expenses, which declined compared to year-ago levels. Our OpEx as a percentage of sales is down to 27% as compared to 31% last year. This is still far away from our long-term goal of the low 20s. As you will recall from our last quarter's call, I have directed the team to analyze where we can take costs out of the business. Even after this quarter's improvement, the mandate to simplify, prioritize, and deliver remains in place. I believe there are further costs that can be taken out, further improvement at the top line, and greater efficiencies overall. Before turning the call over to David, I would like to discuss what we are seeing in the agricultural economy. It appears the worst of the destocking may have run its course. In slide five, you can see year-over-year destocking on a percentage basis compared to the absolute change of inventory in the channel, with the lowest bar graph representing how much American Vanguard inventory is in the distribution channel. Destocking was only a slight headwind to us during the quarter. Despite this, our sales grew versus last year's second quarter as well as over the first quarter of 2025. Finally, with respect to the farming legislation that was contained in the recently passed budget bill, there are several incentives which should benefit growers. Of greater importance, improving the reference prices for crop insurance should provide security for the US farmers to continue to plant over the coming years. Industry and analysts calculate that the budget Bill will provide $66 billion in subsidies to growers over the next 10 years. I'll now turn the call over to David. David?