Corteva, Inc.

During that time, please press start followed by one on your telephone keypad. Thank you. I'd now like to have the call over to Kim Booth, Vice President Investor Relations. You may now go ahead, please.

Good morning and welcome to Corteva's second quarter and first half 2025 earnings conference call. Our prepared remarks today will be led by Chuck Magro, Chief Executive Officer, and David Johnson, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Additionally, Judd O'Connor, Executive Vice President, Seed Business Unit, and Robert King, Executive Vice President, Crop Protection Business Unit, will join the Q&A session. We have prepared presentation slides to supplement our remarks during this call, which are posted on the Investor Relations section of the Corteva website and through the link to our webcast. During this call, we will make forward-looking statements, which are our expectations about the future. These statements are based on current expectations and assumptions that are subject to various risks and uncertainties. Our actual results could materially differ from these statements due to these risks and uncertainties, including but not limited to those discussed on this call and in the risk factor section of our reports filed with the SEC. We do not undertake any duty to update any forward-looking statements. Please note in today's presentation, we'll be making references to certain non-GAAP financial measures. Reconciliations of the non-GAAP measures can be found in our earnings press release and related schedules, along with our supplemental financial summary slide deck available on our Investor Relations website. It's now my pleasure to turn the call over to Chuck.

Thanks, Kim. Good morning, everyone, and thanks for joining us. We plan to update you today on our second quarter and first half performance, share our expectations for the second half of this year, and provide some early thoughts on 2026. In the second quarter, Corteva delivered top and bottom line growth and more than 200 basis points of operating EBITDA margin expansion. For both the quarter and the half, we saw net improvement in price, volume, and cost versus the same period last year. This should tell you two things. First, there is strong demand for our proprietary technology as our growth platforms continue to deliver. And second, our operational excellence initiatives are creating value. In fact, we exceeded our 2025 net cost improvement target in the first half alone, allowing us to raise our full year target to 450 million from 400 million. FEED continued its impressive performance in the first half of the year with 280 basis points of operating EBITDA margin expansion and pricing gains in most regions. The volume improvement we delivered in North America made a significant contribution to FEED's first half results. We also feel confident that we delivered healthy branded share gains in both corn and soybeans. This is a testament to the pioneer business model and the strength of our product portfolio. Our outperformance in North America was also visible in our first half out licensing results, where we achieved a 70 million benefit in net royalties versus prior year, exceeding our own expectations of a 65 million net benefit for the full year. Turning to our crop protection business, as the results make clear, our technology remains critical to farmer productivity. Our global operations are also becoming more efficient, which contributed to over 350 basis points of operating EBITDA margin expansion for the half. Productivity and deflation benefits, as well as volume gains, drove the largest improvements in crop protection solid first half performance. The volume improvement was most significant in Brazil, where we saw strong applications on additional planted area, as well as expansion in our direct sales channel. Although the industry is expected to be about flattish overall for the year, our CP business continues to navigate a competitive market and we expect low to mid single digit pricing headwinds in the second half of the year. However, it's worth noting that this is now our fifth consecutive quarter of CP volume gains, with double digit volume growth in the second quarter. So we are confident we have the right channel strategy and that pricing remains the key constraint to the industry getting back to its normal low single digit organic growth rate. For Corteva as a whole, we remain on track for double digit bottom line growth in meaningful margin improvement. In fact, as you saw from our announcement, as a result of our record first half performance and de-risk expectations of modest growth in the second half, we are raising the midpoint of our full year operating EBITDA guidance, the 3.8 billion, 100 million improvement versus what we guided last quarter. We're also improving a favorable update on free cashflow expectations and forecasting a full year conversion rate of about 50%. David will go into more detail on all of this in a moment, including our latest views on tariffs and how these updates fall within our 2027 financial framework. Turning now to the market outlook. Overall, ag fundamentals remain mixed. Demand for grains and oil seeds continues to grow as farmers prioritize top tier seed and crop protection technologies to maximize their yields. However, overall crop prices and margins have moderated. The US mix shift from soybeans to corn played out as expected and corn futures reflect the fact that crop condition ratings have been running above five year averages. Time will tell, but the market is certainly expecting a record harvest in the US. We all know that the technology keeps getting better and farmers know how to produce more every year. But what is just as important is that global production continues to keep pace with record setting global consumption. So much so that stocks to youth ratio for corn is expected to remain below historical averages, even considering this year's big crop. We're getting close to harvest here in North America and opening up global markets to allow for trade of these critically needed crops would help American farmers continue to feed the world. Regarding ag policy, we're seeing positive signals on the biofuels front. Corn ethanol in Brazil now accounts for 20% of the country's total ethanol production. And in the US, the EPA's 2026 renewable fuel standard proposal should spur additional demand for soybeans. On gene editing, we remain optimistic that policy proposals in the EU for this critically important technology will pass by the end of the year. We're also encouraged by the fact that the new tax bill includes several changes that provide additional support for farmers in this very important industry. Finally, a few comments on 2026. It's still early and we need to see how the full year plays out, but we remain constructive on our views for growth next year. And we are on a path that would keep us well within our 2027 framework, which was set last November. We feel good about what we can control, investing and executing on our growth platforms, as well as delivering meaningful royalty, productivity and cost benefits on a year over year basis. We'll also provide more detail on our views of 2026 on our third quarter earnings call in November. In the meantime, we will continue to deliver top tier technology that gives farmers a competitive edge in achieving higher yields and greater sustainability in every acre they plant. With that, let me turn it over to David for more detailed insights into our financial results and outlook.