Sociedad Quimica y Minera S.A.

Good morning and welcome to the SQM third quarter 2024 earnings 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 telephone keypad. To withdraw your question, please press star then two. Please note, this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Isabel Bendek, Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thank you, operator. Good morning, and thank you for joining SQM's earnings conference call for the third quarter of 2024. This conference call will be recorded and is being webcast live. Our earnings press release and presentation with a summary of the results have been uploaded to our website, where you can also find a link to the webcast. Ricardo Ramos, our chief executive officer, will be speaking on the call today. Gerardo Llanes, our Chief Financial Officer. Carlos Diaz, CEO of SQM Salar. Mark Fones, CEO of SQM International Lithium. Felipe Smith, Commercial Vice President of SQM Salar. Pablo Hernandez, Senior Director of Business Strategy and Development of SQM Salar. Pablo Altimiras, CEO of Iodine and Nitrates, and Juan Pablo Velolio, Commercial Vice President of Iodine and Industrial Chemicals, are also available to answer any questions. Before we begin, I would like to remind you that some of statements made during this conference call regarding our business outlook, future economic performance, anticipated profitability, revenues, expenses, and other financial items are considered forward-looking statements. Please note that the same cautionary language used in our press release and presentation also applies to this call. Now, I will leave you with our Chief Executive Officer, Ricardo Ramos.

Hi, thank you. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. We have published our third quarter 2024 financial results with positive volume growth in almost all our business lines compared to last year. Specialty plant nutrition has shown solid dynamics with a market-sized recovery. Volumes in this business line were more than 20% year-on-year, increasing our revenues more By more than 12%, despite lower prices seen during this period, we are positive in the specialty fertilizer market and foresee stable price behavior in the mid-term. In iodine, we have observed a subtle but continued price increase since the beginning of the year. We believe that the strong demand growth and limited supply could lead to a slight price increase in the coming quarters. We continue to work hard in several projects that should increase our production efficiency, and the seawater pipeline, which will enable us to increase capacity, is moving on schedule. In lithium, We are proud that we post our first revenue coming from Mulholland, and today begins our first Spodumene concentrate buying event. With this initiative, SKM International Lithium expects to promote fairer and more transparent pricing information, enhancing the lithium market efficiency. The refinery is under commissioning and is scheduled to start operating in mid-2025. Regarding our lithium sales, we reported sales volumes of more than 51,000 metric tons of lithium products, and 18% growth year-on-year, demonstrating a strong demand in the market, as anticipated, prices during the third quarter continue the downward trend, with average realized prices 24% lower than the second quarter this year. Although demand continues to grow at a strong pace, mainly driven by a strong EV sales growth in China, we continue to see the prices pressured by a temporary oversupply, which has been decreasing considering the production curtailment announced by other market players. We believe current market prices are far from equilibrium, given the fact that demand keeps on growing at a strong pace, while current prices are significantly below the incentive price required for projects announced by different players in the market. Our more than 30 years track record in the lithium industry has proved that we have a long-term view in this business. And therefore, we strongly believe in the lithium market and its fundamentals, which are highly related to the clean energy transition that we're living in a strong competitive position and well-prepared to continue developing our projects in Chile and abroad to harvest the benefits of this transition. Thank you.