Fomento Economico Mexicano S.A.B. de C.V.

Good day and welcome to today's FEMSA's third quarter 2025 results conference call. My name is Sergey and I will be your coordinator for today's event. Throughout today's recorded presentation, all participants will be in a listen-only mode. Later, we will conduct a question and answer session. You may register for questions at any time by pressing star 1 on your telephone keypad. And now I'd like to hand the call over to Juan Fonseca. Please go ahead, sir.

Good morning, everyone, and welcome to FEMSA's third quarter 2025 results conference call. Today, we are joined by our CEO and Chairman, Jose Antonio Fernandez-Carvajal, Jose Antonio Fernandez-Garza-Laguerra, our current CEO of our proximity and health division and future CEO of FEMSA, Martin Arias, our CFO, and Jorge Collazo, who heads Coca-Cola FEMSA's investor relations team. The plan for today is a little different than usual. We will begin with our CEO and chairman who is traveling today and is therefore joining us remotely. Jose Antonio will share with us some thoughts on the past couple of years, where he sees our company today, and how he sees FEMSA positions for the future as he gets ready to step down from the CEO role at the end of this week. He will not be able to stay for the remainder of today's call. Next, we will hear from Jose Antonio Fernandez Garzalagüera, still in his capacity as CEO of our proximity and health division. As you know, he will assume the role of CEO of FEMSA in a few days, but most of his comments today will focus on the performance and trends in our key retail operations during the third quarter, as well as some thoughts on the short and long-term initiatives we are taking to address an evolving consumer. Next, Martin Arias, We'll discuss FEMSA's consolidated and operational results for the quarter in further detail. And finally, we will open the call for your questions. For the Q&A, please keep in mind that as of today, Jose Antonio is still the CEO of Proximity and Health, and there is a lot to discuss regarding those operations. If you would rather ask him about his views on the broader FEMSA platform, I'm sure he'll be happy to provide some high-level directional comments today, but these are early days as he onboards to his new role. Obviously, we'll be happy to dedicate ample time to this topic during our February call and beyond. And with that, let me turn it over to our chairman. Jose Antonio, please go ahead.

Thank you, Juan. Good morning, everyone. As you all know, in June of 2023, I returned to the role of CEO at a challenging moment because of our good friend, Daniel Rodriguez, had fallen gravely ill and we were in the thick of executing on our vicious fence-forward strategy. I committed at the time to wear the two hats of CEO and executive chairman for a certain time with a clear plan to fill the CEO position and return to the separation of these key roles within that timeframe. With the help of our board, we've been able to deliver on that plan. And while I'm happy to hand over the keys to the incoming CEO next week, I appreciated the opportunity in these past two years to get close to the operations again, particularly through such a key process as FENSA Forward. Today, I would like to share some thoughts on our recent past and on our future. Pensa Forward was all about maximizing long-term value creation by focusing on our core verticals, retail and beverages, enabled but digital, and setting out very clear capital allocation targets. In the past 32 months, we've been hard at work executing that plan. divesting nearly $11 billion of assets while in our core at the same time. In addition, the capital allocation framework we put in place in February of last year is guiding our actions and allowing us to move steadily toward our leverage objective by distributing between March of 2024 and March of 2027 and expected a total of approximately 7.8 billion of capital through ordinary and extraordinary dividends and also through some share buyback. As I briefly recap these last two years, there are two messages I want to highlight. First, that everything we set out to do when we announced Cremsa Forward, we have delivered on. We told you what we were going to do, and then we did it. Second, that these actions have been driven by our shared pursuit of long-term value creation for all of our stakeholders. Our purpose and interests are well aligned. Finally, I would like to quickly touch on how I see FEMSA's position today. I feel very confident that our business units have never been stronger. I know this year has been sluggish in Mexico and I know that the team has addressed this and we will discuss this later during this call. But I also know that the last year was a banner year. So I am talking about the forest, not the trees. On the retail side, We have also Mexico filled with at least a decade of continuous store growth at the current pace, world-class returns on capital and a full range of levers to adjust as we ensure our value proposition continues to satisfy a growing number of needs for an always evolving consumer. In Mexico, we have successfully completed the leadership transition to Carlos Arroyo, an experienced retail operator with a decade-long track record who is bringing a new set of capabilities that will serve us well for the challenges ahead. In the proximity convenience environment outside of Mexico and in the discount space in Mexico, we have a compelling set of higher growth opportunities that are ready to be scaled up, such as OXXO Brazil, OXXO Colombia, and VARA, among others. Any one of these opportunities has the potential to create billions of dollars of value over the next decade and beyond. In our other retail investments, specifically Health and Europe, we are laser-focused on organic growth and on improving the returns on our invested capital. At Coca-Cola Fence, we are in the middle of an ambitious multi-year investment phase, continuing to increase our production and distribution capacity, as well as our long-term growth capabilities, underscoring the strength and resiliency of this business, even as we navigate a challenging short-term environment. On that note, the recently announced tax increase in Mexico will present challenges, but we believe this will be like the one we have faced in the past, and we will make the necessary adjustment in order to balance our return on investment capital while allowing us to take advantage of some growth opportunities. At SPIN, We continue to grow our user base and engagement as we make steady progress in developing... Hello, Jose Antonio?

Excuse us while we try to reconnect Jose Antonio.

Ladies and gentlemen, we experience a momentary interruption in today's conference. Please continue to stand by.

And we have back to Antonio. Please go ahead.

Thank you. I'm very sorry. I don't know what happened. I kept talking and I didn't notice when I left. Can you tell me where I... At SPIN. The paragraph of SPIN, José Antonio. Okay. So I will repeat that paragraph. Thank you. At SPIN, we continue to grow our user base and engagement as we make steady progress in developing a digital ecosystem that will better enable our millions of users to navigate and improve their financial lives in a world that is increasingly digital. Although this is one of the longest-term bets in our core verticals, we have a firm belief that the digital capabilities we are building are indispensable to OXO Mexico and will prove to be a source of value creation for decades to come. Jose will certainly bring a fresh perspective to this business. I have been at FENSA for nearly 40 years. During that time, I have lived through several reinventions of FENSA, and today I am as excited about our long-term growth opportunities as I have ever been, and I hope you are too. I will continue to work to capitalize on those opportunities in my role as Executive Chairman, but I will have fewer chances to speak with you. So I want to take this moment to thank every one of you for your interest in our company and for your full support through all these years. And with that, Let me turn it over to our new CEO.

Thank you, Has. Good morning, everyone. Today, I want to structure my comments around three topics. First, the quarter's results, with a particular focus on OXOS Mexico same-store sales and traffic, where despite the still challenging environment, we're seeing some encouraging signs. Next, I want to talk about the actions and initiatives the team has put in place at both the short-term tactical level, but also some ideas about more strategic considerations and projects aimed at strengthening the value proposition and relevance of the OXO store in the medium and long term. Finally, I will share with you some initial thoughts as I get ready to step into the FEMSA CEO role in a few days. So firstly, let's talk about the third quarter. As you saw in our release, same-store sales for proximity Americas increased 1.7%, with average ticket rising 4.9%, and average traffic contracting 3.1%. This represents a clear improvement versus the first half, marking an inflection in our trends that seems to be improving further in October. This quarter was the first to show positive same-store sales growth since the middle of last year, and importantly, we believe a significant part of the improvement came not from a meaningful change in macro conditions, the weather, or the consumer environment, but rather from adjustments we made to address category and channel-specific challenges. As a result, we improved our competitive position in several key categories like beer, soft drinks, and snacks. And in terms of the channel, we believe we also improved our overall competitive position versus the traditional trade, reversing the trend we saw earlier in the year. Which brings me to my second topic regarding the short and medium term initiatives we have launched to improve performance. There is a long list of actions and initiatives designed to drive our short term results which are aligned with our long term strategic objectives. One of our most important such initiatives which I want to highlight is pursuing affordability in our core categories of beer, soft drinks, snacks, and tobaccos. To this end, and working in tandem with our key supplier partners, we were able to improve our assortment and our price package texture by adding presentations at both ends of the out-of-pocket spectrum. Larger multi-serves and returnable presentation in beverages, smaller packages for snacks and beverages, and lower cost brands for cigarettes. In addition, we have implemented aggressive promotional campaigns in these categories and a variety of other categories. These initiatives are being supported by strong communication efforts, access to premia-related data, and a focus on store execution, and we are already seeing positive results, improving our competitive position during the quarter for most of these categories relative to the traditional trades. At the same time, we are executing ambitious initiatives to drive productivity and efficiency across the proximity and health organization, aligned with our long-term strategy, including our recently launched Fit for Purpose corporate overhead efficiency program, which will make our organization leaner and achieve significant cost savings over the next several quarters, generating a reduction in SG&A. Beyond the short term, we are in the early stages of developing the strategy that will guide the evolution of our OPSO platform in the years to come. As powerful as our value proposition has been to satisfy certain consumer needs and occasions around thirst, gathering, and impulse, we believe we can expand our relevance and increase the scope of our value proposition while ensuring affordability in a more integral manner. We also have coffee and food categories, are categories where we can win by making significant improvements. We have performed a deep diagnostic on our current value proposition and are currently in the experimentation phase to launch new offerings. We are excited by the opportunity and we will keep you posted as we advance on this ambitious multi-year effort. Finally, let me talk about FEMSA and my role as future CEO for a minute. As you might imagine, I have been rapidly getting up to speed in all the matters outside the scope of proximity and health. However, although it is still early and I do not start the job until next week, I want to share an initial message of strategic continuity. Over the past few years, we achieved meaningful progress driven by the vision, courage, and strategic clarity of those that came before me. They led a powerful transformation, streamlined our portfolio, and positioned FEMSA to compete with greater focus and strength. I had the privilege of learning from them, and their example continues to shape how I live and think about the future. As a member of the senior leadership team, I was involved and fully supportive of FEMSA Forward and the resulting focus on our core business verticals. and I am completely behind our capital allocation framework and strategy. I am convinced we have in Coca-Cola FEMSA and OXXO Mexico two of the most remarkable and valuable assets in the respective global industries, not just because of what they represent today, but just as importantly, what they can become in the future. Our retail platform is poised for dynamic long-term growth through OXXO Brazil OPSO Colombia, VARA, and although still at an earlier stage of development, OPSO USA. Our other retail platforms, in particular Health and Europe, are solid self-funding operations where our focus should be on maximizing the returns on our existing assets through efficiency and primarily organic growth. And I am a firm believer in the potential and optionality of the SPIN ecosystem. I also want to take this opportunity to share with you that I am bullish on Mexico. We continue to deploy more than $1 billion in our capex in our home country every year. As attractive as some of our international long-term bets are, Mexico will continue to play an outsized role in the value creation at FEMSA for the foreseeable future. As for my management style, I favor thinking in decades while acting in days. balancing a long-term view on value creation with a sense of urgency in setting the right conditions for execution. We will have plenty of opportunities to talk about these topics in the future, but I can share some examples with you of what I mean by that. Thinking in decades requires that we methodically consider our strategy, ensuring that we do not mortgage our future for short-term fixes and gains at the expense of our long-term growth and competitive position. We should always be driven by the objective of long-term value creation, instilling a relentless focus on sustaining or having an achievable and realistic path to ROIC over WAC. Acting in days requires us to rigorously tighten our grasp on actionable expense and cash flow levers, making it a daily habit across the organization. It includes getting the right people in the right seats right now, as well as testing frequently, learning quickly, moving on fast when we fail, and acting decisively when we find a new solution that serves our customer needs. I would also add that I like to communicate in a no-nonsense, straightforward way. And one thing I can offer you now is a commitment to be in touch with you, our investors, and analysts more than in the past. not just on these quarterly calls, but by meeting you on the road. We are already developing the plans for next year with Martin and Juan, and I look forward to seeing you all in the not too distant future. And with that, let me turn it over to Martin to go over the quarterly results today.

Thank you, Jose Antonio. Good morning, everyone. Let me begin by discussing our consolidated results for the third quarter of 2025. During the quarter, we delivered total revenue growth of 9.1%, despite a still challenging but improving environment in Mexico, impacting both proximity and Cobra Colafemsa, which was offset by solid top-line trends outside Mexico. Some curves see tailwinds, particularly in Europe, and the consolidation of the OXO USA operation. Operating income increased by 4.3% year-over-year, reflecting inflationary effects on our costs and expenses, partially offset by expense efficiency efforts across multiple operations, especially at OXXO Mexico, Coca-Cola FEMSA Mexico, Health, and Europe. Net consolidated income decreased by 36.8% to 5.8 billion pesos, driven mainly by a non-cash foreign exchange loss of 1.3 billion pesos compared to a gain of 4.3 billion pesos last year, a swing of more than 5.5 billion pesos, related to FEMSA's U.S. dollar denominated cash position, which was negatively impacted by the sequential appreciation of the Mexican peso during the period. Two, higher expense of 5.5 billion pesos compared to 4.8 billion pesos the previous year, reflecting higher debt at Coca-Cola FEMSA and higher lease obligations across our retail network. And three, lower interest income of 1.9 billion pesos compared to 2.6 billion pesos the previous year, reflecting lower interest rates and lower cash balances. Our effective tax rate for the quarter was 29.3%, showing us a questionable improvement. We understand that the spike in the first half of the year in our effective tax rate, 42.2% in the first quarter and 40% in the second quarter, raised certain concerns. In that regard, I want to make several comments. The quarterly movement of our tax rate can be volatile and difficult to project on a quarterly basis, since it can be impacted in any given quarter by any things. Extraordinary settlement of fiscal contingencies from the past in one quarter, reflecting issues from several years in the past. As the year progresses, we also make adjustments to provisions for tax payments given the performance of the business. Foreign currency gains and losses on our foreign currency cash balances and debts can cause important swings. We are required under tax rules to include or write off deferred tax assets relating to NOLs based on adjustments to internal projections. Movements of accumulated cash, excess cash from our subsidiaries to Mexico, reflecting several years of profits, can cause an increase in taxes. There are certainly structural reasons why our tax rate is higher than the 30% corporate income tax rate in Mexico, including non-deductibility of certain expenses, losses relating to spend, and high rates in countries outside of Mexico. We have guided investors towards a tax rate in the mid-30s range, and we continue to believe that this is the right number under current legislation. Turning to our operating results and beginning with the proximity of America's division, same store sales increased modestly at 1.7%, once again reflecting a combination of a solid average ticket, going 4.9%, offset by traffic decline of 3.1%. This is an improvement over the previous several quarters, and as Jose Antonio just said, it includes some encouraging information regarding the effectiveness of our tactical initiatives, and an incipient recovery in our competitive position in key categories. Total revenues for Proximity Americas grew 9.2% or 4.8% on an organic and currency-neutral basis, mainly driven by expansion of our network by 1,370 stores year-on-year, a strong performance in our LATAM markets, which continue to grow at very attractive rates. The consolidation of OXO USA, as well as favorable exchange rate effect in several of our operating currencies. Gross margin expanded by 80 basis points to 45%, reflecting a continued expansion in Mexico and Latam, despite undertaking the affordability efforts mentioned previously in Mexico, and the consolidation of the U.S. operations, which have a significant component of lower margin fuel. Operating income increased by 7.1%, while operating basis points to 8.8%, mainly due to the consolidation of the U.S. operations, which are slightly above break-even, and despite the fact that Mexico's margin was flat, and OXO-LATAM continued to reduce its operating income losses relative to its revenues. The combined selling and administrative expenses grew at 12%, reflecting continued pressure on wages in Mexico, continued expansion related expenses in LATAM, and consolidation of the U.S. operating expenses. There were some reclassification of administrative expenses to selling expenses in LATAM, which makes comparison more difficult on a disaggregated line item basis. We expect, over the next few quarters, you should be able to see the effects on SG&A as we streamline corporate overhead through our fit for purpose initiatives. On the store expansion front, Proximity Americas had 198 new stores in the quarter, in line with our plan for the year. At OXO USA, the conversion of DK stores into the OXO banner continued to pace, reaching 50 converted stores in Midland, Odessa, and Lubbock. We are making progress in food service with revamped hot food menus and offerings in the 50 OXO stores, adding new partnerships aimed at driving consumer frequency and strengthening the overall food service value proposition, including clip-ins from our Doña Tota and ditch banners. We are also initiating the conversion process in El Paso, as well as testing standalone non-fuel OXO stores in certain locations. At Vara, During the quarter, we continued our accelerated store expansion opening with 40 new stores. And we remain on track to achieve or surpass a 30% growth rate in 2025. We continue optimizing our discount value proposition by scaling our private label strategy. Bara, same store sales, grew 10.8%. In Europe, Valora delivered solid results as total revenues increased by 10.1% in pesos, or 3.3% on a currency-neutral basis, driven by higher Swiss retail sales, coupled with positive trends in Swiss B2C food service, partially offset by softer sales in B2B food service, particularly in the US. Gross profit grew 10.1% in pesos, or 3.4% currency-neutral, in line with revenues and representing a stable margin compared with last year. Total operating expenses grew below revenues. Our selling expenses grew at almost the same rate as sales, reflecting wage pressures and inflation, but were offset by nearly flat administrative expenses. This reflects broad efforts to reduce corporate overhead expenses. Elora reported a 29.1% increase in operating income, 20.7% on a currency-neutral basis, representing a 70 basis point improvement in the operating margin and reflecting strong growth in Swiss retail, positive contribution from Swiss B2C food service, and effective corporate overhead cost management offset by our B2B food service business. Now let me walk you through performance of our health division. Total revenues increased 2.9% in pesos, with same-store sales growing 0.8%, mostly explained by strong top-line performance in Chile and Colombia, offset by Mexico. On a currency-neutral basis, total revenues grew 4.5%, evidencing currency headwinds relative to the U.S. dollar in Ecuador and the Chilean pesos. Growth in revenues occurred despite the continued challenging environment in Mexico, which saw same-store sales declines and the closure of 423 underperforming stores versus the same quarter in 2024. Operating income declined 4% and 1.3% on a currency-neutral basis, resulting in an operating margin dilution of 30 basis points to 4%. This reflects operating deleverage in Mexico and higher labor expenses in South America, particularly driven by the rapid expansion in Colombia. At Oaxaca, same-station sales increased by 8.3%, and total revenues grew by 5%, reflecting growth in retail volume, offset by a decline in the wholesale business. Gross margins stood at 11.8% and operating margin at 4.6%. It's worth highlighting that during the quarter, selling expenses decreased 1.7%, underscoring our continued effort to look for efficiencies and savings to support profitability in such areas as labor costs. Now moving to Coca-Cola FEMSA. During the third quarter, they delivered gradual sequential improvement amid a challenging environment. Total volume declined slightly, driven mainly by Mexico, where a softer macro environment continued to weigh on consumption. On the other hand, South America delivered a resilient performance with volume growth across most territories, demonstrating the adaptability of the business across regions. In terms of profitability, COF protected its margins, mainly through the implementation of mitigation actions, controlling expenses, and generating efficiencies, recognizing a more difficult 2025 than expected. You can dive deeper into the results by listening to the webcast of their earnings call held last Friday. Finally, regarding capital returns to shareholders in the context of our capital allocation framework, During the quarter, we distributed a total of 11.8 billion pesos in a combination of ordinary and extraordinary dividends. In terms of share buybacks, we were not active during the third quarter, so we are a bit behind schedule. As you know, whenever we become active, we will make the required filings and you will be able to follow. As we look ahead to the coming year, we are cautiously optimistic. As we mentioned before, we are beginning to see signs of improvement in the October data in Mexico. In terms of the levers and variables under our control, we are confident we are making the right adjustments and achieving the desired results across our platform. From the consumption side, we will have the additional tailwind from the FIFA World Cup to be held in our continent, with matches being played at the right time of day, and hopefully we will also get a slightly better environment in which to operate in Mexico. We will provide a more detailed update in our next call. And with that, we are ready to open the call for questions.

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, as a reminder, to ask a question, please signal by pressing star one. If you find that your question has already been answered, you may remove yourself from the queue by pressing star two. And please make sure the mute function on your phone is switched off to allow your signal to reach our question. Again, it is star one to ask a question. And our last question is from Ben Turner from Barclays. Please go ahead.

Yeah, good morning. And thank you very much for taking my question, José Antonio. Congrats on the new job. And we have a question for you on the old job. So as it comes to retail, just wanted to understand a little bit and dig a little deeper into your commentary on the same-store sales performance. Well, clearly, traffic was down only 3% versus the give or take 6% we saw in the first half. There was a very easy comp versus last year because of some of the hurricanes. But you did mention there is sequential improvement into October. So I wanted to kind of like understand if you could give us a couple of more data points as to maybe how the performance was from July through September and how that carried into October. and what we should expect here as we move throughout the fourth quarter and then maybe into next year, just with the closing remarks, being slightly optimistic into next year. So just want to understand a little bit the traffic dynamics at Oxo. Thank you very much.

Yes, sure. This is great. I was expecting this one to be either the first or the second question. Fantastic.

You prepared for that.

I mean, obviously, I would say... I am glad that I see a reversing of the trends in OXO Mexico on this quarter, and I do see better performance in traffic compared to the first half of the year, but obviously I'm not satisfied because we had, as you say, some easy comps. To the defense of my team on OXO, there were some adverse effects in weather, especially in September and especially in the central of Mexico. What gives me some optimism is that the last couple of months we've seen market share gains in beer, in soft drinks, and even in snacks, and even in tobacco, especially with the introduction of some lower-priced tobacco. October is still not over, but I am very encouraged by the results. So if that trend continues, I think we should be facing a much better end of the year. What else I can tell you? I can tell you some of the things that we've been putting in place that we think are going to take effect much more or that we're going to take longer to take effect, like promoting coffee and some food items around coffee and breakfast, are really beginning to shape up. Coffee is growing at double digits. And that keeps me optimistic. And then the ability to be introducing multi-return packages, affordability stuff in beer, in soft drinks, are really, really beginning to take place. And I would say in services, we're implementing new and increasing services every quarter. So even though, for example, we're growing a lot with the Asian e-commerce industry, Those things have now scaled back, given some tariff restrictions. We're beginning to see other increases in trafficking services that give us high expectations for growth. We're still waiting for the permit to get back into Banorte and other banks, but cash withdrawals with the main banks, some of the big fintechs, and with SPIM are growing double digits as well. So I would say still not satisfied because I wish we were going better in traffic, but very encouraging signs towards the fourth quarter. Does that help you?

It does, and then obviously into next year we get the really easy comps, correct?

Well, hopefully, yes. I do think there's a lot of things we need to still do on our part, and I am very encouraged by the obsession towards market share gains that we're following through in OXO and I think that's a discipline we need to go forward. But we should get better comps and I do think the World Cup should help as well.

Fantastic. I'll pass it on and thank you very much. Congrats again on your new role as well.

Thank you. We'll now take our next question from Alejandro, folks, from Itao. Please go ahead.

Thank you. Thank you, operator. Hola, Jose Antonio, Martin. Jose Antonio, thank you for the space for questions and congratulations on the new role to Jose Antonio. I have two quick ones, if I may. The first one on OXO Mexico, another strong performance on gross values this quarter. I wanted to see if you could maybe elaborate a little bit more into how much of this is the service mix continue to add to the business, how much of this is maybe the pricing, and what do you see just growth markets in Mexico continue to develop also in the future. And then the second, on Vara and also in Brazil. Another also strong quarter of growth, so congratulations on that. I wanted to maybe, José Antonio, grab your thoughts on what do you see these two businesses in the next 10 years? How much of a priority are they to you and to the team? And maybe if you could elaborate a little bit into what would be the best case scenario for the medium to longer term of Brazil and Vara. Thank you.

Yes, thank you, Alejandro. I would say, obviously, I've always said it, also Mexico has a lot of momentum and still a lot of gross margin to gain. But I think always the gross margin... It's an incomplete number and obviously we don't have the full answer but you would have to say look at the full profit pool all the way from the money of our supplier partners all the way to the consumer. And I always like to see gross margin gains and I think there's a lot to gain still but some of that should be given back to our consumer in affordability. Obviously some categories are more elastic than others And so we have the smart data to play with that and give back to our consumers some of the gross margin gains. As to this quarter and the gross margin gains, it has a little bit to do with commercial income that we continue to grow incredibly well. It has a little bit to do with mix. The affordability thing allows us to even gain some gross margin as we implement some some very profitable promotions in some of the affordable STUs that we are trying to promote. So the mix also helps sometimes with the gross margin, but I would say mainly it's that we continue to win commercial income, and as we grow, what you can expect through the years, I do expect that there's more gross margin to make, but some of it will be given back to the consumer in affordable promotion and price-back architecture. As towards VARA and also Brazil, as I said in this forum and I will say it in the future, those are two of the most exciting avenues for long-term growth for PEMSA. I am incredibly encouraged by the amount of progress that also Brazil has been able to achieve in the last couple of years. We were, just two years ago, we still needed to believe almost a quantum leap in growth margin expansion, in operating cost reduction, in top line goals. And now we are within arm's reach in all of those areas. So we know we're going to have a profitable business in OXO Brazil. We know where our next areas of growth beyond São Paulo will be. We're already mapping them. We're already studying them carefully. The big, big question to ask is, do you believe that it will be a 40,000 store business in Brazil or a 4,000 business? in Brazil. I think it will be something somewhere between, sorry for the wide margin, but it's up to us to really continue to perfectly engineer the whole process of the business to make it be closer to the higher end. But it's one of my big, big ambitions for the next decade in FEMSA. Ambara, we are incredibly Happy with the progress in terms of increasing our return on invested capital of new opening stores. We still need to polish and perfect the value proposition of Vara towards closer, towards a harder discount. We're happy with the deployment and growth of our private label brand, but we still have a long, long way to go But we're following closely and working with private label manufacturers from other countries that want to come and install in Mexico. We're beginning to grow beyond our core region of El Bajio, and we're seeing very positive results in Guadalajara, in Jalisco, and we just opened in the north of Mexico, so we're very excited with the progress there.

That was super clear. Thank you very much, Antonio. Thank you, Alejandro.

And we'll now take our next question from Antonio Hernandez from Antimer. Please go ahead.

Hi, good morning, Congres, on your resource and business position. So a quick question running an update on the health and business. both in Mexico and Chile.

Antonio, can you speak closer to the mic? I'm not being able to hear you.

Yes, can you hear me there?

Yes, better.

Okay, perfect. Just wanted to get an update on your health business. both in Mexico and Chile. So some recent news on a new format in Chile. Also there's a very different trend in Mexico. So I wanted to get an update on that business in both countries. Thanks.

Yes.

So in Chile we were facing a very tough competitive environment in Chile for the last couple of years. And we are very happy that we continue to gain market share. We're growing in all of our channels. As you know, Chile is a multi-channel business. We're in the pharmacy, we're in the franchise business, we're in the distribution to independent pharmacies. And we continue to gain, and we just even opened our discount pharmacy chain in Chile. And we're seeing incredible growth in sales and in market share in all of that. Given that it's a very competitive market, sometimes That does not translate to bottom line growth, but even given the huge competitive environment that we see in Chile, we are happy that we are growing even in the income statement. We expect Chile, it's a mature market. We have very high market shares. But I do feel there's a lot of room for growth in even newer categories in the health and beauty space, in the premium and in the discount space. And we're beginning to get into other adjacencies in the elderly care and in the pet and veterinary care. And so we see new avenues for growth for Chile. Very different outlook for Mexico. In Mexico, we are the number six player. I could obviously put as an excuse a big chunk of our stores are in the Sinaloa region, which have been affected by security, but it's not enough to explain the drops. To be honest, we need to fix Mexico, and we're working very hard to fix it. We have now the right talent in place, but we have to close many stores in Mexico and we're still on the working on fixing that operation and we hope to fix it in the next few months. Thankfully we have a very high growth business in Colombia and even in Ecuador we're seeing market share and revenue and profits gain. So in general health as a business we're happy except for Mexico.

Perfect. Thanks. How amazing.

Thank you. And we'll now take our next question from Alvaro Garcia from BTG Actual. Please go ahead.

Hi.

Hola, Alvaro.

Hey, how are you? All the best in your new role, José Antonio. Two questions. One, the fit for purpose slash corporate restructuring comments you mentioned earlier, the reduction in SG&A. Um, you know, in my head, I have this a hundred million dollar amount that you've typically guided for on the corporate front. Is that subject to change? If you could just give us more color on how you're thinking on structuring, uh, uh, the corporate expenses there. And then just one really quick one on interest expense might be, I don't know if you could expand on, you saw a pretty big uptick at the Femco level X cough. Uh, what explained that? Thank you.

So, uh,

I would say I would split the corporate overhead into phases. The first one, the fit for purpose component is something that me and the OXO team have been working on. And we are, there were opportunities as we deprioritized certain projects in OXO Mexico and prioritized others. There was a good opportunity to reshuffle the overhead in Mexico's headquarters, and there will be some opportunities for savings, but also to leave some room for executives to dedicate to the big projects around food, around services, around affordability that we want to invest. I do expect a big hit on savings, but you will see pool number probably by the end of the year and as we start next year. Eventually, when I become CEO of EMSA, I do plan to take a deeper look on, and as always with big changes in management, there are opportunities to look at the overhead in the pool company and I will comment more on that probably in February and beyond. Hopefully, that's what I can answer for now.

The comments on fit for purpose are for Oaxaca, Mexico specifically at the moment. Yes.

Thank you, Alvaro. Hi, Alvaro. Could you repeat your second question? I just want to make sure I got it right.

Sure. On the interest expense specifically, the ex-coff, we saw a pretty big sequential increase there. I was wondering if maybe there's some derivatives in there that's driving that, or what drove that sequential uptake there?

Well, I mean, I'm looking at the total interest expense.

GOF actually went up from a billion, if I'm looking at this correctly, from a billion fifty-nine to a billion three interest expense net, and it was flat on interest expense. The interest expense went up by 600 million pesos. I'd have to get back to you on the detail exactly in the context of everything. It's not that big a number. Interest income is certainly coming down as our cash balances come down and as interest rates generally come down, particularly in Mexico, but to some degree in the United States. That what appears to be a 600 million pesos increase in interest expense at FEMSA, I'll get back to you.

Thank you. Thank you. We'll now take our next question from Tiago Bartolucci from Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.

Good morning, everyone. First of all, best of luck on your expanded challenges and also congrats to your father on another successful transition. I will be looking forward to connecting more going forward. I have two questions. One is more conceptual. When you think about the one thing that you would like to do differently in FEMSA going forward, what do you think this is the clear opportunity? This is more conceptual, but it's still related to your vision for the company. And this is somehow also linked to the capital allocation strategy How do you think the role that Coca-Cola will have in the SAMHSA overall portfolio going forward? Thank you very much.

Thank you, Tiago. Obviously, great question. I would say, I will answer you with the second one. I would say, obviously, I am in love and have a huge appreciation for the COF as a business and a talent. It's an incredible... and it's an operation that has a lot of things going on for themselves to really keep growing, growing the core. I'm incredibly impressed with the opportunities that we see for the digital transformation of the bottling platform for growth opportunities, not only in their soft drinks category, but in their non-carve. And I see a lot of potential for organic growth in Brazil, Guatemala, Colombia, and even in Mexico, even with the taxes. So I'm very excited for Coca-Cola FEMSA. The relationship with the Coca-Cola company is the best one we've had probably in decades, probably since the JV was formed. It's incredible what the management team from both sides have been able to construct as a growing and fruitful relationship. I do think Coca-Cola FEMSA should play a part in the consolidation space through eventual M&A and I am excited for the opportunities. I have huge respect for the bottlers in South America and obviously here in Mexico. I have huge appreciation for all of them and I do think there are opportunities to keep exploring possibilities with other families and bottlers in the space. I will comment on more detail on what I think of in the future, but that could give you some color of my excitement for Coca-Cola Prensa. From what I would say I would do different, I think I let it be known in my earlier comments. I do think we need a bigger sense of urgency and a bigger sense of counting every penny. We have the ambition in FEMSA to be one of the best or the best proximity retailer in the world, obviously with a Coca-Cola FEMSA company part of it. To do that, you have to have the best management team. You have to have a very demanding workforce, but also live to the culture that you want to instill for the long-term growth of the companies. So I would say my big, big focus on conceptual is bigger demand for excellence in our corporate office, bigger demand for excellence throughout the channels in management, bigger speed in making big decisions on capital allocation, and I think that should give you the color on the sense of urgency that we plan to move versus previous years.

And going back to our Going back to Alvaro Garcia's question, the increase in interest expense was slightly over 600 million pesos. Two-thirds of that can be attributed to an increase in the financial expense associated with lease accounting under IFRS, and likely the consolidation of the U.S. business is a big reason for you seeing this sort of uptick relative to other periods. For other periods, most of it is related, all of it is related to organic growth of leases.

That's very nice. Thank you very much for the follow-up. Thank you very much, Vince.

Thank you. We'll now take our next question for Bob Ford from Bank of America. Please go ahead.

Hey, good morning, everybody, and congratulations on the promotion, Jose. Martin mentioned some reclassifications. Were there any reclassifications or one-time items that contributed to the gross margin improvement at OXO Mexico? And Jose, where do you see opportunities to make further improvements in the value propositions at OXO Mexico? And then one other question, if I could. Could you discuss the charge in discontinued operations? It was a little bit bigger than what we were looking for. We're just wondering how you're thinking about Solistica and the LDL business.

Thank you. Some of the reclassifications, all the reclassifications that happened in Proximity Americas had to do with Oxo-Latam. None of them had to do with Oxo-Manico. And Oxo-Manico, even on a standalone basis, did have an expansion of its gross margin.

In fact, I think, Bob, expansion in Mexico was something like 130.

Yes. Thank you, Bob.

I would say If you look into also Mexico, we are by far or we have a very important market share in what we call impulse gathering, the beer, the soft drinks, the services category. But we still have long ways to go in a couple of categories of the right for winning. One is around food. We are the biggest sellers of coffee. And if you look at our LATAM operations, all of our coffee occasions go paired with very good and tasty food. And I think we have a lot of opportunity to win in food around coffee, and obviously that leads you to breakfast. And if you look at it, there's not really an affordable That's a segment that we have lower traffic than average, so we are very excited with increasing the opportunity for that. We still are very excited about the opportunities we see on segmentation, and I think we're going to go bigger and tougher. on segmentation. We know all of the stores that are close to a discount store or discount supermarket. We have very clear, actionable steps that we can put in place in the affordability space, not only in the categories that compete in the grocery space, but in the impulse and gathering. So we're beginning to do some of that and it's beginning to react incredibly. And there are things that will take longer to mature, but I am very excited about them. Some of them around the BeyondTrade and other services, and that requires working with SPIN towards creating payment options that you can pay at SPIN, but you can also send people money that they can withdraw at Oxfam. You can reward them for withdrawing at Oxfam in a way. We're beginning to see some interesting We are still very excited about our growth in OxoNichos. They continue to outperform in terms of ROIC and we are continuing to accelerate that. This year, 25%, a little bit lower than what we planned, but still much bigger than previous year. 25% of our stores would be on the niche space and that should just continue to gain momentum. I would leave it on that. Those are the things that we see are beginning to help us gain share beyond the impulse and gathering categories and towards food and groceries and others. Does that respond to your question, Paul?

Oh, it certainly does. I just had that one follow-up with respect to the discontinued operations in Solistica. Martin, take that one.

Yes, Soyistica was, the transaction was completed in early July. So you will see an impact from Soyistica being removed from discontinued operations for that quarter. And it should not return. We've had so many transactions going Going forward, we really have no major transactions to complete or close that should impact. Other than this quarter, we reconsolidated the only part of Solistica that we kept, which was less than truckload in Brazil. It's a very small business, but that's the only one that also got removed from discontinued operations and is now consolidated at the holding company level.

Thank you so much.

We'll now take our next question from Rodrigo Alcantara from UBS. Please go ahead.

Thanks for the space of questions.

I would like to focus here a bit on food, which is a topic we also discussed back in those days. I mean, food is not a new thing, right? I mean, it has been there for a while. Remember Doña Tota, right? A couple of years ago was part of the speech, right? Still, ever since food as a percentage of sales in Oxford remains relatively low, right? I mean, kind of like it's on this front over the last decade has been relatively slow. So my question here for you is, What makes you feel so excited about food again? Why this time could be different or could we expect a faster adoption on this front, presumably with Sbarro or what you're doing with Andati, right? That would be my question. I mean, can we expect, you know, something faster on this front as opposed to previous years? And my second question would be, as presumably you will consolidate this operation right once the transaction is approved, any indications on how the consolidation of OXO Brazil may impact your consolidated or your proximity America's margins once you consolidate these operations? Those would be my two questions. Thank you very much.

So I'll answer you first with the second one. Next year, we will give you more clarity or a distinction between South American and our Mexico proximity business. Hopefully, that will not bring a lot of noise. Obviously, it's still our operation there. It's 600 stores, so even if we still combine it on the proximity Americas, it shouldn't move the needle significantly. But our plan is to propose to you guys a different outlook when we show the proximity numbers. We're still working on that with Juan and Martín. On food, obviously food is a very challenging topic and we always get the question, what is different? What are you going to do that's really going to change? I would say one of the things that encourages me is that all of our South American operations are incredibly well developed. really grew the operation since probably they didn't have the services business to rely on. They were very focused on being customer-centric in food first. And since we had a lot of Mexican executives there, they were very humble in asking really the consumer, what do you guys need and want? In Brazil, we sell a lot of power education. We sell a lot of bread. Our SKU bread is our number one SKU. And it's twice in numbers than our second, even in sales, than our second SKU. So it tells you a little bit of how big food can be for the on-the-go consumer. It's no different to Mexico. And obviously, you would say, well, but Mexico is still eating on the street. That happens in Colombia. That happens in Peru. That happens in Chile. And so I think that's no excuse. What we're doing differently is we are really starting with the coffee offering first. We see the opportunity for coffee as... We've always treated coffee almost as a margin developer and now we see it as a huge traffic... We still make money on coffee, but I think it should be much more of a traffic driver. and where we do promotions on coffee, we instantly see the results. I'm very excited with pairing coffee with breakfast products. I would say that's the main thing we're experimenting. But obviously, I am a firm believer that OXO is not a place for you to sell tacos. It's very complex to sell tacos. That is a red ocean that is taken over by the street. And to be honest, street tacos are very, very good. And so we are beginning to play around different things that our consumer wants, that they want to carry in their hands, that they want to get in and out quickly out of the store. And we are beginning to try some things that excite me. Obviously, pizza and our Sbarro partners, it's too early to say. We have two to restaurants here in Mexico, but we are incredibly impressed by the results. But that's, I would say, I don't know if a decade away, but very few years away from being something that can really move the needle. We are doing some clippings in Ditch and Doña Tota, and they are impacting well, but I think where you will see things moving fast is on affordability for breakfast, for on the road, the road warrior of Mexico, where we see a need, where consumers are really demanding more opportunities, and where I think we can differentiate from the taco category.

Hopefully we will be proven right. Yeah. Hopefully. Thank you very much, Jose.

Thank you. We'll now take our next question from Ricardo Alves from Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.

Hola, Ricardo.

Hi, everybody. Thanks for the call. Thank you, José Antonio, for all the support and all the interactions with the investor community over the past few years. We really appreciate that and wishing all the best to the new CEOs going forward. A couple of questions, guys, actually follow-ups. On the gross margin, when we exclude the U.S. proximity, I think that we're getting to something like 46%. And my question initially was if we were close to a ceiling, but I think that from the commentary that was already made, you made it clear that the answer to that question is no, that you see more opportunity to continue to expand gross margin here. My question is how is that possible when you compare your business to other convenience store business outside of Mexico globally in Asia, what do you think is going to be this next leg up driver for your gross margin to continue to expand? That's my first follow-up question. And the second one, I think that as Juan suggested, I will leave more strategic questions at the SAMHSA level to next year, but taking advantage of the transition that is happening right now for the new CEO, I think that we can still talk about longer-term strategic issues at proximity. There's a lot of things going on there. You have full control of Brazil now. Mexico, you're focusing on recovering traffic. All these efforts that we discussed here today Colombia is growing, then you have the U.S. So there's a lot of things going on on the proximity alone. What do you think should be your focus and our focus to see what is really going to move the needle under your leadership as you think about the different regions for the next two or three years? Thanks, everybody.

Thank you. Very helpful. I would say...

On traffic, I mean on margin, we are, I always say the gross margin is a very incomplete number. And I know I said it before, but I think it's important to emphasize. You need to look at the CPG's gross margin, or margins, and the consumer, let's say relative or end price and the relative value. And in that respect, I do think Mexico is an outlier. And you will see it in all the major CPG players that come to Mexico. Mexico is one of the most profitable markets for all of the guys that you guys know well. Obviously for the soft drinks guys, for the snacks guys, for the beer guys, It's incredible the margins that they make here. And Mexico is an outlier because they do have a big love for brands, and I think the traditional trade still plays an incredibly large amount, which creates a moat for the CPG players. We have the added benefit of the commercial income. And as the discount players continue to grow, and they will continue to grow, us and others will continue to grow, The CPGs rely more on obviously the traditional trade, but also on convenience. And they love to use us as a defensible place to promote their brands. And they do see a great benefit in return on promotional income from Oxfam. And that's why we still see a lot of potential for growth. Going forward, as we try to gain share in categories where we're not huge, where it's obviously beyond impulse, beyond gathering, and beyond food, we will go into categories in groceries where we see an opportunity to gain share against the traditional trade and even against the supermarket. And some of that margin will be given back to the consumers. I don't know yet the amount. to have a lot to do with elasticity. So it's very hard for me to say where the end game is. But when I see the margins of my CPG partners, which I love, and I love for them to do business with us, I do still see room for growth, both in promotional income and in gross margin fully in Mexico. So I will leave it at that, and I will give... You will see clearly how we evolve as we begin to get into other categories in groceries in OXO where I see a big opportunity.

I would also compliment what Jose is saying with a couple of things. Comparisons with other players outside of Mexico I think is also difficult because there are very few players that have the weight of financial services and the income that we earn on financial services is very high margin. because there are no cogs really associated with the commissions that we charge for our financial services. It's really more as DNA related to the transportation of cash and technology that we need to have in place. Number two, the issue of when you strip out financial services, the reality is the margin is different and more comparable to things that you may be looking at. Number two, there are very few players outside of Mexico that have such a scale and breadth as opposed to OXO in meeting proximity needs. Really, our competitors are the traditional mom and pop, and I think our value proposition is very, very specific and very distinct, which allows us in certain categories, given the importance that we have that Jose mentioned, to partner up with suppliers for any number of initiatives and work that we do with them. And then, finally, it's an evolving thing. The waves of value at OXO will also impact the margin as we go forward. Food, for example, if properly executed, should be an attractive margin business at the gross margin if you manage to control the issue of waste So I will tell you it's very hard. We don't look at the business sort of targeting a gross margin. We look at the entire ecosystem. There are things that can produce enormous gross margin, but that would destroy the economics of the store because of the complexity it would bring to distribution or the complexity it would bring to the execution in the store, and so we pass on them. And then there are things that are lower margin that drive traffic, are very simple to execute, And it may be very attractive. So each one of our categories is really judged on the merits of competitive dynamics, issues in the store, growth going forward. And so we spend a lot less time sort of trying to project what the total amount of gross margin is going to be as opposed to looking at each category, maximizing the value in that category and let the chips fall where they may.

for opportunities for proximity, I would say first and foremost, Mexico. And I would say even also Mexico, in terms of absolute value, I'm incredibly optimistic about the future. I know there's a lot of volatility and there's some of our categories where we have been having lower declines like tobacco and alcohol and others, but some categories go and some categories come. So I'm very optimistic. We just finished an analysis of how many stores fit. And even if you put a count, you know, a drop in services, a drop in tobacco, we still see thousands of stores. The number is so high that I'm scared to give it to you guys. But it's still at least a decade of growth at this rate. Obviously, within Mexico, VADA is increasingly getting better and better with every cohort. We do see a few thousand VADA in the foreseeable future. Obviously, that market is huge. It's very, very competitive. The competitors are getting better by the year, but I think there's room for improvement. a few of us, so I'm very happy with the results and the expansion. And I would say Brazil is very top on my mind. We still need a lot of work to get it better and better, but we're impressive. We've been growing, thanks to our sales, at double digits for the whole year, and the business keeps accelerating. So I'm very optimistic on Brazil, Colombia, And I would say USA, hopefully eventually we will grow more confident and confident to keep growing it. But it's still on a very early stage there. But I will put my focus on that order. I would finally say I'm incredibly impressed by the progress we've made in Europe. We have a superb management team. I've said it before. Our biggest challenge is to grow it. and we're beginning to see opportunities for growing, especially organically. But we are very happy with the progress in Europe, and we are happy with the economic development of Europe in certain markets where we see opportunities. So we're happy there as well.

Super comprehensive answers, guys. Thanks so much, Jose and Martín as well.

Thank you. We'll now take our next question from Renata Cabral from Citigroup. Please go ahead. Hola, Renata.

Hola. Thank you so much for taking my question. José Antonio, congratulations on the new role. Exciting times ahead and I wish you every success.

Thank you.

All right, guys. Thank you so much for taking the question here. My question is a follow-up also digital ecosystem or financial services. The market in Mexico is quickly evolving on this front and recognizing that OXO's success on this digital front. My question is regarding looking ahead, what is Fence's ambition and where do you see OXO as distinctive in right-to-mean versus wallets, telco, fintech solutions? And what would be the top capabilities that the company are targeting to invest on those fronts? So that's my question. Thank you so much.

That's a very good question, Renata. Thank you. I would say, for me, SPIN is a digital extension of Oxfam's value proposition. That's how I see it. We see it as a lever to really enhance the... with the lifetime value of our users. The premia users average, or premia users which are our power users who have the loyalty program do 3x the average consumption also in a month than the rest. But if you have a SPIN or your wallet and the premia loyalty program, that's 42% above the premia users. So I do think there is a lot of value in embedding the whole SPIN ecosystem throughout our core missions. We can offer rewards, we can offer personalized promotions, we can offer frictionless experiences that really incentivize you to go more often to the store. So for me, we are in the very early stages on creating an ecosystem with SPIN. that strengthens the Oxford relevance in our customer life. Obviously, that includes what some people see as an apocalyptic scenario where everything will go digital, like in Brazil with pigs, which could happen. But for us, the potential value shifts from in-store to digital. We don't see it as a value migration. We do see it as an opportunity increasing dramatically the way people interact and use also almost as a place to cash in your rewards, your points. So we're still very focused on that. I do think at the end it's about convenience, and SPIN is much more convenient than cash, but a lot of people need cash and will need cash for the foreseeable future, even if we go to a PIX level ecosystem, cash will still be important for a big sector of the economy. I am incredibly impressed now that I'm in the onboarding phase, seeing how people are using SPIN in ways that we even didn't imagine. Just to give you an example, the way people are tipping, you're paying your waiter or your people at the gas station, people take pictures of the QR code that QR code that you can just scan in OXO and withdraw cash. And it's becoming the main source of people going to the OXO store to withdraw cash. And it's easier than having to give someone else a spin account or having to give them your WhatsApp account. You just take a picture of the QR and you scan it in OXO. And so we see an enormous amount of little things like that that can enhance the value ecosystem. So obviously there will be there will be a lot of movement towards digital transactions. But digital transactions grow so massively, sometimes exponentially, that the percentage, even if it's 10% that still needs to withdraw cash, will be enough to cover, I think, a big chunk of the services decline that we can see at the store. So to me, it's an optimistic angle. We'll see.

Very insightful. Thank you so much for the details.

Thank you. We'll now move to our next question from Fraulein Mendez from JP Morgan. Please go ahead.

Hi, thank you very much for taking my questions. Congrats on the new position, Jose. You spoke about that the pace of growth can be maintained for at least 10 more years. Can you go deeper into how the breakdown of these growths should be in terms of store expansion, same-store sales, incremental revenue from commercial income? And your thoughts on what is the adequate level of cannibalization that you can see at any point in time? And how do you feel on the ROICs of the newer stores versus the more vintage stores today? Thank you so much.

Oh, that's a very... If I had a crystal ball to be able to predict exactly that... I wouldn't be here, but I would say, obviously, I mean, if you look at the acceptance level of cannibalization that we take every time we open a store and you extrapolate that for the next 10 years at our expansion, we do think we have at least 10,000 stores and about 60% of that should be normal stores and about 40% of that should be also niches. Our numbers say that that's even bigger. I would say, but it's too early to say, so you cannot estimate how much of that growth would come from same-store sales. I don't know, but we are expecting same-store sales at least to be flat or even growing slightly with inflation adjustment. So I think there's that. If we win on breakfast, we win on grocery, and we continue to gain share on gathering, obviously that number could get higher. But it's hard for me to give you a precise number at this time.

Yeah, I think, Troy, this is Juan. In terms of, you know, normally we separate, you know, in terms of new stores, If you model 1,100 per year today, that's 4% and change. And over the years, that will probably get smaller into the threes. But then same-store sales, it's a separate part of the growth algorithm. And there, as you know, our long-term guidance has been to mid-single digits. If you assume an inflation of 4, which is the upper band of the central bank for inflation, and add a point you know, from mix and pricing. It gets you to the mid-single digits. So that's usually what we use for kind of long-term, you know, broader, you know, expectation management, right? So what I'm talking about is right now we're almost at 10. If you add the two together over the years, it probably gets you to the very high singles. Geographically, as you know, there are also differences. It's very different for us when we look at white space in Guadalajara or in the Bajio or even in Mexico City compared to Tijuana or Juarez, right? So a lot of the openings happening in central Mexico. But yeah, that's how I would, if I would be building a model, those are the numbers I would put in.

Also, you should expect that the type of stores, this is Martin speaking, The type of stores will also shift over time. Nichos are becoming, are about 15, 20% of the stores that we're opening. Also Nichos are stores that are open within institutional context, be it factories, hospitals, universities. They tend to have significantly lower staffing. They have slightly different assortment because obviously you're not gonna be selling beer in a workplace. Over time, you could also see us, we've been testing, although we're not ready to roll it out because we don't think there's yet an opportunity, what are called OXO Smart Stores, which are unmanned stores. You could one day see OXO Smart Stores in apartment buildings or smaller offices that would meet needs. So the composition of the type of stores will probably shift over time. creating new white spaces and new opportunities and new consumption occasions.

And one data point that we provided in the past having to do with cannibalization is that it probably represents something like 30 basis points of growth in the overall number. So, you know, I would also use that for my own modeling.

Thank you so much.

Thank you. We'll now take our next question from Hector Maya from Squashy Bank.

Please go ahead.

Hola, Hector. Hola, Jose Antonio Martin. Felicidades, Jose Antonio. Gracias. Thank you very much for taking my question. Would love if you could give us your view, please, on how you are progressing on the banking license ambitions in Mexico and the role of SPIN and SPIN Premier for OXO to have an edge with that. Also, if we think about innovation at SPIN and SPIN Premier, what do you think could move the needle in the next two years, and how could this help SPIN to compete versus strong alternatives in Mexico that are accelerating, like Nubank, Mercado Pago, and potentially Cashi from Wal-Mart? Thank you.

So I will let Martín answer you the first one, and I will defer to February to give you a more detailed outlook as I'm still on the... re-onboarding Faith on Spin, and I would love to give you more clarity, but on February. But for now, Martin, we'll give you some answers.

I think we will not be presenting our banking license for a year. We've decided to start with a bigger focus on our credit part of it. That does not mean we're going to be increasing the pace of our credit business much quicker. As I told you and I promise we'll keep you informed and up to speed. We don't expect that to be more than a $20 or $30 million deployment next year in terms of trying out new things, but we came to the conclusion that we want to have greater visibility and a sense of our ability to use our data to be successful in credit before we went for the full banking license. I'd say we're about a year from making that decision of actually filing the banking license. It's all ready and prepared. And we've done a lot of work on it, but we decided to just wait one year.

Got it. Got it. We promise better details on February and October. Yeah. All right. Got it. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Thank you. We'll now take our next question from Carlos Laboy from HSBC. Please go ahead.

Hola, Carlos. Hola. Good morning, everyone. Congratulations, Jose. And also thank you to Jose Antonio for really turning over the leadership of FEMS at a moment in history when the businesses are really at their most dominant, their most focused, maybe the most talent rich and fiscally sound position that we've seen, right? It's a gift that we can get Jose Antonio to put his full focus on growth and value creation here. So Jose, can you please give us more insights on affordability? Beyond obviously the savings aspect, can you speak to what else is driving consumer sampling, repeat consumption and adoption of maybe some of the more successful discount brands that you are running into in Mexico? And are there any specific categories where this is most evident? Kind of related to that also, is this pressure improving the differentiated proposition that OXO is getting from its big branded suppliers to draw in foot traffic?

I didn't hear the last part.

Yeah, is all this pressure, Jose, from discount brands improving the differentiated proposition that also is receiving from your larger branded suppliers to help you draw in foot traffic?

Yes. It's still semi-hypothesis, obviously. It's an educated, not guess because we've been talking to our CPG partners and as they see the growth of the discount channel, they reinforce their partnership also with strength. I would say first, if you look at the national level, how many stores are next to a discount of our stores are between 600 meters of a discount store and it's still below 10% of our stores. So that tells you it's still not really moving to the middle so much, but they will continue to grow, ours and others. So where we're next to them, something interesting happens. We lose sales in some categories and we even win traffic in some categories because people It's very easy to walk into one of our stores and to the other ones. And so you see people maybe buying the ice with us or buying the beer with us and then going to do their top-ups and their weekly grocery bill in the other one. So it's an interesting dynamic. But that said, it's an increasingly competitive dynamic. Affordability is here to stay in OXO because the Mexico consumer is becoming much more price conscious and we see the opportunity to really gain much more relevance in what we call the replenishment locations. And obviously that has a role to play in beer, where you are beginning to see more returnable glass, the famous Caguamon, we're beginning to increase our coverage in Mexico, but also multi-packs. And we're beginning to see that a lot in soft drinks. I think we were a little late in getting into mini multi-packs, or the mini cans, six-pack or 12-pack, which we're beginning to introduce in the soft drink category, it's driving a lot of success for the bottlers, and we're beginning to introduce that in Mexico. So that's a top-up or a weekly type of consumer location, and that's where we're beginning to see affordability taking place. We're seeing it in tobacco. Interestingly enough, we're not seeing a lot of migration from the premium tobacco smoker to the brand, about 70% of the value brand. About 70% of the, given the information we have from the tickets and the premia, is that most of the value brand buyers in OXXO and tobacco are people that were not coming into the store that frequently. So we are beginning to lose our fear of cannibalization from premium products to mainstream or value. And so we're beginning to develop more and more assortment of affordable prices and affordable SKUs. And our supplier partners are collaborating with us to help us throughout the spectrum. Part of what I tell them is, you know, if we're going to put a value beer in Oxxo, which we didn't used to have for Barrilito, for example, let's also put Negra Modelo in a promotion in San Pedro. And so we like to play on both ends of the spectrum. And I think one of the beauties of our model is that we can really drive affordability in certain regions and corners of Mexico, and we can really drive premiumization in certain regions and corners of Mexico. So we will continue to play that game. I would say that's all about what I can say for WLEV now, but I will bring more information as we continue to gather more granular data about our progress there.

It's very insightful, thank you.

Thank you, Carlos. Thank you. That's all time we have for today's question. With this, I'd like to hand the call back over to our host for closing remarks.

Thanks, everyone. Obviously, we're always available for follow-ups and incremental questions. But other than that, have a great rest of the week. Thank you, everyone.

We will be seeing each other here in every conference call, so looking forward to more interactions.

Thank you. Thank you. This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for your participation, ladies and gentlemen. You may now disconnect.