Cementos Pacasmayo S.A.A.

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to Pacas Mayo's third quarter 2024 earnings conference call. At this time, all participant lines are in listen-only mode, and please note that the call today is being recorded. At the conclusion of our prepared remarks, we will conduct a question and answer session. I would now like to introduce you to our host for today's call, Mrs. Claudia Bustamente, Investor Relations Manager. Mrs. Bustamente, you may begin.

Thank you, Michael. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for your patience. Joining me on the call today is Mr. Humberto Nadal, our Chief Executive Officer, and Mr. Manuel Ferreiros, our Chief Financial Officer. Mr. Nadal will begin our call with an overview of the quarter, focusing primarily on our strategic outlook for the short and medium term. Mr. Ferreiros will then follow with additional commentary on our financial results. We'll then turn the call over to your questions. Please note that this call will include certain forward-looking statements. These statements relate to expectations, beliefs, projections, trends, and other matters that are not historical facts and are therefore subject to risks and uncertainty that might affect future events or results. Descriptions of these risks are set forth in the company's regulatory filings. With that, I'd now like to turn the call over to Mr. Humberto Narres.

Thank you, Claudia. Welcome, everyone, to today's conference call. and thank you for joining us today. My apologies for the delay as I was landing on a place. This quarter, we delivered very solid results in terms of margins, EBITDA, and profitability. Say at volumes, this quarter recovered on a sequential basis, although still slightly behind the same quarter of 2023. Besides this wide-reaching demand, we were able to achieve a record consolidated income of $154.6 million, an increase of almost 20% year-over-year, as well as a remarkable increase of 35.9% in net income. By basically focusing on operational efficiencies related to pre-care production in our most efficient kiosks, as well as cost efficiencies in our source of raw materials. In our journey to continue developing our building solutions, this quarter we have embarked on two very relevant projects. First, we designed an innovative solution for riverbank protection. As you probably already know, the north of the river is consistently affected by aluminum, resulting in strong rains that overflow the river and therefore cause significant flooding. Traditionally, this riverbank protection is done with steel and rocks, and if there are parts of the north where rocks are not really available, we designed a new solution using mainly cement, local materials, and mortar that is both most cost-effective and more durable. We are currently implementing this in Lambayeque, and the solution is scalable, and we look to expand it to other areas. Secondly, we are taking on a new challenge, a collaborative agreement and vector cooperation in the construction of a water treatment plant at the Minera Yalacocha operation. The treatment of acidic water in mining is absolutely crucial for environmental sustainability, and that's being able to maintain a balance between economic and social development in our country. Proper management of water resources not only minimizes the environmental impact, but also generates efficient use of the natural resources we have today, preserving them for future races. These key projects are other examples of how we are innovating and adapting our products and services to satisfy the current and potential demand for building solutions. Always, and I want to say always, with a scientific view and aligned with our purpose. I would like now to focus on something that is absolutely crucial for the future of our business, including our own, artificial intelligence and machine learning. New technologies will bring a wide variety of opportunities, and there's no doubt that early adopters will be the biggest beneficiaries. Pacamayo's AI strategies have been crafted to a multi-phase approach, starting with a very deep understanding of your business and its needs. A robust operational and educational model was designed to incorporate an expansion of a deepening strategy, capabilities assessment, and a clear governance model. Implementation of roadmap focus on three key fronts. Preparing the organization for AI adoption, experimenting with AI solutions, and expanding the impact of AI across the enterprise. The strategy has resulted in high engagement and satisfaction with 86% of employee participation and an 84% rate of satisfaction. We also developed seven successful pilot projects, including a product prediction model, a commercial virtual assistant, and an automatic bag and content system. Overall, we must say that this challenge has also allowed us to prioritize these cases across various departments and positively impact the value chain. Because not only do we have tangible results, but it has also led the foundation for Pakistanis to become truly, and I mean truly, data and AI-driven companies. The next steps involve defining the scope and resources of food, space, and sanitation in 2025, further submitting that the highest position as a leader may be adopted within the industry. I would now like to turn over to Manuel to go into a more detailed financial analysis.