Anheuser-Busch InBev SA/NV

Welcome to AB InBev's first quarter 2026 earnings conference call and webcast. Hosting the call today from AB InBev are Mr. Michelle DeCarris, Chief Executive Officer, and Mr. Fernando Tenenbaum, Chief Financial Officer. To access the slides accompanying today's call, please visit AB InBev's website at www.ab-inbev.com and click on the Investors tab in the Reports and Results Center page. Today's webcast will be available for on-demand playback later today. At this time, all participants have been placed in a listen-only mode, and the floor will be open for your questions following the presentation. If you would like to ask a question at that time, please press star 1 on your touch-tone phone. If at any point your question has been answered, you may remove yourself by pressing star then 2. If you should require operator assistance, please press star 0. Some of the information provided during the conference call may contain statements of future expectations and other forward-looking statements. These expectations are based on management's current views and assumptions and involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties. It is possible that AB InBev's actual results and financial condition may differ, possibly materially, from the anticipated results and financial condition indicated in these forward-looking statements. For a discussion of some of the risks and important factors that could affect AB InBev's future results, see risk factors in the company's latest annual report on Form 20F filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on March 3rd, 2026. AB InBev assumes no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking information provided during the conference call and shall not be liable for any action taken in reliance upon such information. It is now my pleasure to turn the floor over to Mr. Michel de Caras. Sir, you may begin.

Thank you, and welcome everyone to our first quarter 2026 earnings call. Today, Fernando and I will take you through our operating highlights and provide you with an update on the progress we have made in executing our strategic priorities. After that, we'll be happy to answer your questions. Let's start with the key highlights. The global momentum of our business continued to start the year. The consistent execution of our consumer-centric strategy drove solid top and bottom line performance. Beer volumes increased by 1.2%, with record high first quarter volumes in Mexico, Colombia, Brazil, South Africa, and Peru, amongst others. Revenue increased by 5.8%, with disciplined revenue management and positive mix from premiumization and beyond beer. Underlying PFs increased by 20.8% to reach $0.97, an all-time high first-quarter ETFs for our business. Our momentum was driven by our mega brands, non-alcohol beer and beyond beer. In the U.S., our sales-to-retailer volumes grew, and we were the number one share gainer in total alcohol as we continued to gain share in both beer and spirits. We increased our portfolio brand power, driven by increased market investments, and estimate that we gained or maintained share in 75% of our markets. This marketplace continues to scale, with GMV increasing by 55%, to reach more than $1 billion in quarterly GMV. In summary, our business delivered another quarter of reliable compounding growth. We are winning in key markets and growth segments. And we are confident in the resilience of our strategy and ability to deliver consistent results. Turning to our operating performance. Total volumes increased by 0.8%. and EBITDA increased by 5.3% with flat-ish margins as discipline, revenue, and cost management enabled increased sales and marketing investments and low-stack transactional effects and wins. The strength of our diversified geographic footprint has continued to enable us to deliver consistent results through different operating environments. Our footprint is both well diversified and balanced. With 70% of our EBITDA generated in emerging and developing markets, we are well positioned to capture future industry growth with a mix of currencies. Now, I'll take a few minutes to walk you through the operational highlights for the quarter from our key regions, starting with North America. In the U.S., our business continues to build momentum. with STR volume growth driven by share gains in both beer and beyond beer, and an improved industry. Michelob Ultra and Bushlight continued to lead our beer performance and were top two volume share gainers. Our beyond beer portfolio delivered revenue growth in the high 60s, led by Cutwater, which grew revenue in the triple digits. and was the number one share-gaining brand in total spirits industry in the first quarter of 2026. Now, let's turn to Middle Americas. In Mexico, record high volumes drove high single-digit, top, and mid-single-digit bottom-line growth, as we continue to outperform the industry. In Colombia, record high volumes drove double-digit top and bottom-line growth. In Brazil, market share gain and an improved industry drove record high beer volumes and double-digit bottom line growth. Our premium and super premium beer brands led our performance and delivered low 20s volume growth, strengthening our leadership position in the segment. In Europe, volumes grew by low single digits as market share gains and premiumization offset the soft industry to deliver both top and bottom line growth. In South Africa, our momentum continued, with record high volumes driving mid-single digit top line growth. Our performance was driven by our premium and super premium VR brands, which grew volumes by mid-20s. Now, moving to APAC. In China, our volume trend improved as we increased the investments to rebuild momentum. Volumes declined by 1.5%, estimated to have underperformed a slightly growing industry. While we have seen some initial signs of improved performance, we still have work to do to strengthen our execution, expand our in-home channel presence, and increase our participation in the growing segments of the industry. Now, I would like to give you an update on the industry and the beer category, and progress we have made in executing our strategy. First, I will start with the industry and the beer category. According to IWSR, the beer category gained 60 base points in share of alcohol beverages in 2025. and an additional 10 basis points when including the fast-growing beyond beer category. Combined, beer and beyond beer have now gained more than 300 basis points of share since 2019. The number of consumers participating in the alcohol category remains stable year over year, and with our data, we estimate that beer participation has also remained broadly stable. Beer plays an important role in bringing people together and creating moments of celebration, and we believe beer has a long runway for future volume growth across our footprint, supported by favorable demographics, economic growth, and opportunities to increase the category participation. Turning now to the first pillar of our strategy, lead and grow the category. Our mega brands continue to outperform. with net revenue increasing by 8.2%. Corona continued to drive premiumization across our markets, growing revenue by 16% outside of Mexico and growing volumes by double digits in 32 markets. The combination of our leading mega brands and platforms is a powerful opportunity to lead and grow the category. In quarter one, we shared golden moments with consumers at the Winter Olympics. and we are ready to celebrate the shared passion of beer and football during the FIFA World Cup. The consistent execution of our category expansion levers are driving momentum across our key initiatives as we continue to offer superior core brands, innovate in balanced choices, and expand our premium and beyond beer portfolios. Led by the growth of Corona Zero globally and Nickelob Ultra Zero in the U.S., our non-alcohol beer portfolio outperformed the industry and delivered a 27% revenue increase. With an estimated 60% of volume coming from new occasions and new consumers, we believe non-alcohol beer is a key opportunity to develop the category and drive incremental volume growth. Let's turn now to our second strategic pillar, digitize and monetize our ecosystem. The customer behavior and purchase trends captured by this enable us to leverage AI capabilities to execute our commercial strategy. On an annualized basis, we have over 20 billion AI-driven touchpoints. Each one is an opportunity to use AI to provide superior service progress our revenue management agenda, and supply leading brands and innovations. In the first quarter, this captured $14.6 billion in gross merchandising value, a 15% increase versus last year. This marketplace continues to scale, with GMV from sales of third-party products increasing by 55% versus last year to reach $1.1 billion. Our D2C business continues to grow and is enabling us to monetize our ecosystem. Our digital platforms served 12 million consumers and generated $139 million in revenue. As we continue to digitize and monetize our ecosystem, we have started to commercialize third-party products on our D2C platforms. While we are in the early stages of exploring this opportunity, we're now having a growing D2C marketplace with annualized GMV of $160 million. With that, I would like to hand it over to Fernando to discuss the third pillar of our strategy, optimize our business.

Thank you, Michel. Hello, everyone. I'll take a few minutes to discuss the progress we have made on four key areas in optimizing our business. superior profitability, compounding dollar EPS growth, capital allocation flexibility, and the sustainability and resilience of our supply chain. Through disciplined resource allocation and overhead management, we were able to offset transactional effects headwinds to maintain our superior margins while increasing our sales and market investments to accelerate momentum. While each year has unique dynamics, we are confident that the combination of our leadership advantages, disciplined revenue management, continued premiumization, and efficient operating model creates an opportunity for further margin expansion over time. Moving on to EPS. Top-line growth, effective cost management, and translational effects tailings drove underlying ETS of $0.97 per share, a 20.8% increase in dollars. Evita growth accounted for an $0.11 per share increase, partially offset by below-the-line IT. our bond portfolio remains well distributed with no relevant medium-term refinancing needs. We have no bonds maturing in 2026, a weighted average maturity of 13 years and no financial confidence. In recognition of our consistent financial performance and the strength of our balance sheet, Moody's recently upgraded our credit rating from A3 to A2. As we continue to strengthen the sustainability and resilience of our supply chain, we remain focused on improving operational efficiency in the following key areas, agriculture, water, and energy and emissions. Please refer to our website for further details of our goals. Our results in the first quarter, the strength of the gear category, and the continued momentum of our business, all reinforce our confidence in our ability to deliver on our 2026 outlook of 48% ELISA growth. With that, I'll hand it back to Michel for some final comments.