Bunge Global SA

Good morning and welcome to the Bungie Limited Third Quarter 2021 Earnings Release and Conference Call. All participants will be in 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. To ask a question, you may press star then one on your touch-tone phone. To withdraw your question, please press star then two. Please note this event is being recorded. I'd now like to turn the conference over to Ruthann Wisner. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Operator, and thank you for joining us this morning for our third 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 bungie.com under events and 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 Neffel, Chief Financial Officer. I'll now turn the call over to Greg.

Thank you, Ruthann, and good morning, everyone. Turning to the agenda on slide three, I'll start with some highlights of the third quarter and how we're thinking about the remainder of the year before handing it over to John, who will go into more detail on our performance. I'll then share some closing thoughts before opening the line for your questions. Let's start with an overview of the quarter, turning to slide four. I want to begin by thanking our team for an exceptionally strong quarter. Their ability to remain focused on execution helped us deliver our eighth consecutive quarter of earnings growth. In the second half of 2021, we've seen a shift in the challenges created by the COVID operating environment. We've moved away from having to adjust to the fluctuations that came from lockdowns, like the change in demand from food service to food processors. Instead, we're adapting to an environment that is driven by an uneven global recovery. This dynamic demand is driving increases in commodity and energy prices and creating many supply chain challenges. Our team has remained agile, and I'm proud of how we've navigated this market shift. We also responded well to unforeseen disruptions like the great work our team did managing the impact from Hurricane Ida in North America. We also continue to set high watermarks across a number of our key operating metrics. We've done this all while continuing to prioritize the safety of our team, their families and communities as COVID remains with us. In addition to solid operational execution, Our positioning and approach to risk management allowed us to capture opportunities quickly when the market conditions changed. This was especially true as crush margins improved over the late summer when oilseed prices dropped and oil values expanded due to tightening supply. The strength of our global platform and footprint continue to provide benefits. In the face of broad logistical disruptions, our integrated value chains and owned ports have helped us to continue supporting customers at both ends of the supply chain. This quarter and our results over the last year and a half have shown the power of our global network and operating model. Looking ahead, we continue to see a dynamic set of factors, and we're more confident than ever in our ability to react and manage well to capture market opportunities. As part of our work to continue positioning Bungie for the structural shift we are seeing in the consumer demand for sustainable fuel, in September we announced our proposed joint venture with Chevron. As a key step, we will increase production of renewable feedstocks by nearly doubling the combined capacity of two soy crush facilities that will be contributed to the JV. Chevron recognizes our expertise in oilseed processing and farmer relationships, as well as our commitment to sustainable agriculture. And we recognize Chevron's expertise in refining and distribution. Partnering with a global leader in energy is a significant step forward in building the capability to make change at scale to help reduce carbon in our own and our customers' value chains. This partnership will establish a reliable supply from farmer to Chevron's downstream production and distribution to the in-fuel consumer. It also allows us to better serve our farmer customers by accessing demand in the growing renewable fuel sector. It will also enable us to pursue new growth opportunities together in lower carbon intensity feedstocks, as well as consider feedstock pretreatment investments. In addition to the Chevron JV transaction, we announced an agreement to sell our wheat mills in Mexico to Grupo Tremex. As part of continuously looking for ways to improve our portfolio, we concluded the business was not in line with our long-term strategic goals and were pleased with the outcome of selling to a well-respected wheat miller. We expect the sale to be completed in 2022. Turning to our segment performance, results in agribusiness were driven by strong execution and better-than-expected market environment. In processing, we benefited from higher margins in soy and soft crush, in the Northern Hemisphere. Merchandising results were better than expected and very strong compared to prior year. Results in refined and specialty oils improved in all regions with particular strength in North America driven by strong demand from food service and renewable diesel. We're also seeing continuous improvement in our innovation pipeline to enable us to launch exciting new products to the market. I'd like to congratulate our team for their efforts to help customers with creative solutions. This innovation capability, as well as our skill at solving supply chain issues, have helped create a step change in many long-term customer collaborations and commitments. Our team is also making measurable progress, improving sustainability across our operations and investments. Following the launch of the Bungie Sustainable Partnership in Brazil earlier this year, We've already improved the visibility into our indirect supply in high-priority regions to approximately 50%, and that's exceeding our 2021 target of 35%. And while we still have work to do, having this insight into our supply chain will help us meet our industry-leading non-deforestation commitment. And finally, regarding our non-core businesses, I want to call out the role our sugar JV has had in our year-over-year improvements. We're pleased that this business has been performing well in a challenging weather market. Additionally, Bungie Ventures had a successful quarter as a result of the Benson Hill IPO. John will give you more details on the impact of that investment in the quarter. We also repurchased $100 million in shares, and our board authorized a new $500 million repurchase program, demonstrating our confidence in the business. This reflects our balanced approach to capital allocation, where the return of capital to shareholders is always evaluated along with other investment opportunities. And before handing the call over to John, I wanted to note that we've increased our outlook for 2021, reflecting our strong third quarter results and continued favorable market trends. For the full year, we now expect to deliver adjusted EPS of at least $11.50. and we expect the strong momentum to carry over into 2022. So with that, I'll turn the call over to John to walk through our financial results in more details.