Bunge Global SA

Good morning, and welcome to the Bungie First Quarter 2020 Earnings Release and Conference Call. All participants will be in a listen-only mode. Should you need assistance, please signal a conference specialist by pressing the star key, followed by zero. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. Please also note today's event is being recorded. At this time, I'd like to turn the conference call over to Ruthann Wisner. Ma'am, please go ahead.

Thank you, Robert Reuter. And thank you for joining us this morning for our first quarter earnings call. Before we get started, I want to let you know that we have slides to accompany our discussion. These can be found in the investor section of our website at bungee.com under investor presentations. Reconciliations of non-GAAP measures to the most directly comparable GAAP financial measure are posted on our website as well. I'd like to direct you to slide two and remind you that today's presentation includes forward-looking statements that reflect Bungie's current view with respect to future events, financial performance, and industry conditions. These forward-looking statements are subject to various risks and uncertainties. Bungie has provided additional information in its reports on file with the SEC concerning factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in this presentation, and we encourage you to review these factors. On the call this morning are Greg Heckman, Bungie's Chief Executive Officer, and John Nepple, Chief Financial Officer. I'll now turn the call over to Greg.

Thank you, Ruthann, and good morning, everyone. We know this is a difficult time for all. We appreciate you joining, and we hope all is well with your families and loved ones. Turning to slide three, you can see the agenda for today's call, starting with a few comments on how Bungie is addressing COVID-19. followed by an overview of the first quarter. I'll also provide some thoughts on the potential impact of COVID-19 on our business for the rest of the year, and then hand it over to John, who'll go into more details on our performance. I'll share closing remarks, and then we'll open the line for your questions. Before diving into the quarter, I want to take this opportunity to thank our Bungie team for their hard work and for taking on this challenge with camaraderie, poise, and commitment. Our thoughts are with those who have suffered as a result of COVID-19 and with all the heroes on the front lines of this pandemic. I am tremendously proud of our team and their continued level of execution during this time. As a critical participant in global food supply chains, Bungie is without question an essential business. And we're doing our part to ensure that these critical products are getting from farmers to consumers. This is not an easy or straightforward task. Our colleagues around the world are going to work every day and to put it plainly, showing great grit in getting the job done. Protecting our team, their families and communities as they perform this work is our top priority. Our global task force is working hard to ensure we have the necessary precautionary measures in place to keep them safe while continuing to serve our customers. On slide four, you can see a summary of those measures, which vary by region and facility, but essentially include an expansion of our health and safety procedures along with new protocols to support social distancing. We also created dedicated task forces to monitor developments and coordinate efforts to support our central role in the infrastructure of food. We have not experienced any major disruptions to our plants or supply chains, and operations have functioned well. We're also working to provide support to the communities in which we operate. And last month, we announced a $2.5 million commitment to support health and hunger causes directly related to the pandemic in these areas. All that said, we've remained sharply focused on running the business. And now let's turn to slide five for an overview of the first quarter and the outlook. Our underlying business performed well, and we're seeing the impact of the strength of our new operating model which is allowing us to quickly adapt to changing market conditions and customer needs. In agribusiness, we were able to capitalize on several key opportunities, with notably strong performances in soft seed crush, China soy processing, and grain origination in Brazil, as farmer selling increased with the devaluation of the Brazilian Real. Edible oils produced a strong quarter, benefiting from good demand in an environment of relatively tight vegetable oil supply. The negative direct impacts of COVID-19 were limited in the quarter as lockdowns and restrictions varied by region. COVID-19's impact on the global economy makes visibility difficult, but we expect 2020 EPS to be lower than we forecasted earlier in the year. Agribusiness is positioned to perform well given the strong start to the year and the soy crush capacity we have hedged into the third and fourth quarters. However, results in edible oils will be lower due to COVID-19 related demand interruptions in food service and biofuels. Also, lower ethanol prices and foreign exchange volatility will materially reduce results in our sugar and bioenergy JV. Turning to slide six, despite COVID-19 and its impact on economies around the world, we're continuing to make progress on optimizing our portfolio. As you may have seen, a couple weeks ago we reached an agreement to sell 35 U.S. interior elevators to Zeno Grain Corporation for approximately $300 million in proceeds. This strategic effort supports Bungie's global value chain model and retains our strong presence elsewhere in the U.S. grain marketplace. We'll continue to actively participate in global grain trading and distribution anchored to our Center Gulf and P&W port terminals and and continue to support Bungie's U.S. soy processing and milling businesses. Not only will this transaction allow us to reduce costs and operate more efficiently, we'll reinvest the proceeds into higher returning areas of the company and strengthen our balance sheet. I'm extremely proud of the team for executing this deal in this environment and market. Really well done. And with that, I'll hand the call over to John now to walk through the financial results in detail.