Americanas S.A. (AMER3) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good afternoon, and welcome to Americanas S.A. conference call in Lojas Americanas to release the earnings of the second quarter of 2021. Today, we have Miguel Gutierrez, CEO of Americanas S.A.; Anna Saicali; Timotheo Barros; Marcio Cruz, CEOs of the Digital Platforms; and Fabien Picavet and Raoni, who are Investor Relations Officer. This conference is being recorded. [Operator Instructions] You should remember that this conference has a supporting presentation that can be accessed in ri.americanas.com. Statements that may be made during this conference call relative to business perspectives, projections and operating and financial targets are based on beliefs and premises of the Executive Board of the company as well as currently available information. Future considerations do not ensure performance. They involve risks, uncertainties and premises as they refer to future events and therefore, depend on circumstances that may or may not occur. Investors should understand that general economic conditions, industrial conditions and other operating factors may affect future performance of Americanas and may lead to results that are materially different from those that are expressed in these future considerations. The companies clarify that the accounting information that is the base for these comments are presented according to International Financial Reporting Standards and the rules of the Brazilian Securities and Exchange Commission and in Brazilian reals. I'd now like to turn it over to Mr. Miguel Gutierrez, who will start the presentation. Mr. Gutierrez, over to you.

Good afternoon, everyone. We're really happy to have you in the first earnings release of Americanas S.A., our company that was born a giant. The idea is to add up to the world what it has to improve people's lives. So Americanas combines unique assets, people with a strong culture of ownership, a customer base of 49 active customers and powerful business platforms. We are strongly convinced in increasing our customer base and also improving their purchasing experience by expanding our digital channel. In this respect, since our last meeting, we'd like to highlight the following points. First, with the beginning combining our old companies, this has relevant synergy. Then the approval of the CAD of the acquisition of Uni.co, we have started the new growth vertical franchises. Then I like also to highlight the acquisition of hortifruti Natural da Terra, which depends on still waiting for CAD approval. Once this is granted, we will have an important avenue of growth for new clients and recurrence. We are now offering this with an increasing digital channel. With the union of our platform, services and brands, we are present in the day-to-day of Brazilian families, all Brazilian families. We're really excited about this new phase. And we really trust our long-term strategy, and we're proud the social role that we play. I invite you to learn more about this new company. Our Directors, Fabien and Raoni, will conduct our presentation. And subsequently, we will have our Q&A session. Fabien, Raoni, thank you.

Thank you, Miguel. I'm Fabien Picavet, and I'll start sn Slide 4, in which we present our view of who we are. We are a technological platform that can deliver an omnichannel consumption experience that's increasingly fluid and surprising with infinite possibilities that makes us more agile. We are more joint with people at the center. We have over 49 active customers and 34,000 associates. We serve 100% of Brazilian homes with millions of deliveries every month. On our platforms, we over 111 million items. We have over 3 million partners, including providers, sellers and merchants. Today, we have over 2.5 million square meters in sales and storage areas, including 2,155 physical brick-and-mortar store, 24 distribution center and 204 hubs, the new company is huge, 100% integrated, fully integrated and ready to evolve even faster. In the next session, we will explore the aspect of our strategic model. on the birth of Americanas S.A., we have set out the different initiatives that are connected with a single strategic model based on 3 growth horizons, which together expand our growth and reach core, represented by our platforms -- commerce platform focuses on growth with profitability, and this is the base of Americanas S.A. Growth initiatives, H2, they have the goal of having accelerated growth and entry into new markets. Future, H3, the goal is to encourage the use of new technologies and to develop disruptive business and is leaded by our innovation engine. On Slide 8, we present our strategic vision of our initiative -- business initiatives that are linked to these 3 growth horizons. In the core, we have our commerce brands, Americanas, Submarino, Shoptime and Sou Barato. In the growth initiatives, we have our organic growth initiatives like marketplace and adds in addition to inorganic growth with acquisitions and partnerships that will let us enter into new markets and increase our reach. On the third horizon, we have the future led by IF with many disruptive initiatives that encourage the use of new technologies on all platforms and boost the development of new business. Our strategic model led us continuous expansion, increasing our reach and our addressable market in line with the goal of being increasingly more relevant in our customers' day-to-day. Our goal is to meet the needs of all consumer profiles with more customized journeys, more convenience and experiences that are increasingly better. In the next section, we will present our unique assets. Boosted by the use of our unique assets to optimize our customer experience, we follow with the commitment of generating value in the long run. [Foreign Language] and business platforms. These are great competitive advantages. The company is built by a team with a strong culture of ownership with a history of efficient execution, discipline and constant innovation. As people develop and grow with us, they become de facto owners. We have over 300 partners that are formed with a differentiated process to develop talent. Our customer base is huge. We serve over 49 million active customers. And we have a unique value proposal with sorting national popularity and business platforms that are very powerful. We have 4 platforms, the physical platform and has over 2,000 different stores in different formats present in all Brazilian states and the digital platform, delivering to 100% of Brazilian homes in the logistics platform that speeds up our deliveries, it leads to increasing operating gains. And then Fintech, which multiplies the possibility of transforming people's lives and making access to finance more democratic. They're all boosted by innovation engine that leverages our platform with proprietary continuous development and also strategic acquisitions. As of Slide 12, we will show the combination of business and what is changing. Our view is that the creation of Americanas S.A., organic and inorganic growth of our platforms will be boosted. Our strategy includes organic growth and inorganic growth. Organic growth is boosted by development and expansion of our 4 platforms set up by our innovation engine with well-defined targets and goals. Some examples. The physical platform to improve the experience with new technologies and new layout, the digital platform accelerated growth of our advertising business, the fulfillment platform to expand our ultrafast delivery. Fintech, to develop credit-as-a-service with financial solutions for individuals and companies. Innovation engine lead to entry into new verticals and business. Inorganic growth involves the use of our assets to boost expansion of new business and new brands. Americanas S.A. generates power to attract sellers and partners making integration easier, increasing our reach and expanding our addressable market. In the last 18 months, we have made important acquisitions as well as strategic partnerships in line with our goal of being increasingly more relevant to our customers day to day. We started this journey with the acquisition of Supermercado Now, the greatest marketplace in Brazil for supermarkets. The creation of the joint venture with BR Distributor, we sped up our convenience business and our franchise platform. In the scope of building this new platform, we acquired the Grupo Uni.co retail specializes in franchises and is the owner of Puket, Imaginarium, MinD and Lovebrands. To speed delivery in minutes, we acquired Shipp, a start-up on-demand delivery that offers convenience to customers with ultrafast delivery of supermarkets, drug stores, restaurants, pet shops and others. The partnership to launch an innovative live commerce platform OOOOO will speed up our different social commerce fronts. At Fintech, we have made 3 acquisitions to speed up our platform road map. Bit Capital, an open banking platform based on blockchain and open APIs, offers native integration to our financial ecosystem. Parati, which acts as bank-as-a-service and regtech integrates fintechs to the financial system. And Nexoos is the society of loans between people, which makes a structure of credit-as-a-service possible. And a novelty, the acquisition of hortifruti Natural da Terra. Yesterday, we announced the acquisition of the largest special -- network specializing in fresh produce in Brazil with fruit, vegetables and legumes. So we have more convenience to our clients with a greater offer of healthy products in line with the new consumption habits. This market has been growing strongly and that increases purchase recurrence significantly. hortifruti has a very high frequency in the clients of its loyalty program by an average 34 time a year in the omnichannel customers by 37 times a year. This is the largest retail category, but it's the most analog with online participation that is less than 1%. hortifruti has an omnichannel operation, which is a benchmark in the sector with a 16% share in sales and 100% of its stores are integrated to its digital platform. With this operation, which is integrated natively to our Software as a Service platform. In other words, Supermercado Now, we will speed up our digitization process. On Slide 16, we present some opportunities of synergies that have already been identified. Complementarity of assortment of fresh and healthy produce in our Americanas stores, including convenience stores and the rollout of drugstore to speed up the expansion of Americans Mercado with ultrafast delivery. And hortifruti has a highly qualified team with ample experience in the sector. hortifruti will be boosted by Americanas single or unique assets, our people culture, our customer base and all the platforms, the physical, the digital, the logistical, the fintech and the engine or innovation engine, native integration in the platform, digital platform that's already operated by Supermercado Now. Then the use of Americanas expertise in the expansion of stores going beyond Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paolo and becoming [indiscernible]. And then the integration with [ Amais ], increasing the offer of products and services, including our credit card. I'll now turn it over to Raoni who will continue the presentation.

Thank you, Fabien. Let me start on Slide 18. These are the initial synergies. The combined operations allow us to benefit from additional opportunities with operational efficiency, our initial analysis take into account 2 fronts: operational, freight games, marketing technology, shared services and the financial front, reducing the level of debt and credit cards based on these initial analyses, the gross amount of synergies was BRL 2.3 billion by 2024. And the VPL, the net present value is BRL 1.6 billion by 2024. These estimates may be conservative because they do not take into account the sales of better services, which is key to the synergy. And it does not take into account impact of using tax credits registered in the company's balance sheet. On Slide 19, these are the opportunities that are already being captured. We've already integrated our data lake and we can learn more about the customer as they interact with our platforms, providing us to have a holistic point of view. On September 1, all stores and DCs will have new corporate numbers or names connected to Americanas S.A, 1,700 changes so that we are going to abide by the current legislation. We are going to unify our inventories, providing better services and better and more availability. And dark stores, we have 300,000 square meters for backroom stores converted to this model. We'll have products available from these stores. On to Slide 20 now. We're now developing a new layout for our stores to improve the O2O, online-to-offline experience. Stores will also be an experimentation center and distribution center on top of being a purchase center, reflecting customer behavior. As far as logistics go, we'll have an advanced distribution centers, accelerating the initiatives of returns of online orders, drop-off of seller products also on the stores and also ship from store. We have 2 new DCs this year, one in Rio and another one in the state of Minas Gerais. Four other centers will be open will have a total of 28 DCs overall. We're also integrated shared service centers to optimize costs, simplify processes and provide swift integration and acceleration of new businesses. On to Slide 21. This is the implementation of new universities to attract new talent. We'll be able to improve the economy and the social development of our country. We're now drafting a new model for the org structure. We are hiring consulting services that are specialized in this field. The goal is to combine better global practices and adapt them to our needs. to optimize platforms and having even more agility and efficiency. As far as communication goes, we are strategically aligning our goals on the short and long terms, generating consistency and trust to every stakeholder. We also have an integrated financial management, reducing our gross debt by up to BRL 5 billion. On Slide 23, these are the ESG goals. We are aligned with the 2030 agenda with the UN sustainable development goals. Out of the 17 goals, we selected the top 5 priorities: Number 4, quality education. Goal Number 5, gender equality. Eight, decent work and economic growth. And Goal Number 10, reducing inequalities and 13 action against global warming. For the seventh year in a row, we are part of the ISE, the Sustainability Index of B3. On top of that, as of 2010, we're part of the ICO2 Index. This goal is very important, which is to neutralize carbon emissions of all Americanas S.A. by 2025. We believe that we can and will contribute to a better world, being a more inclusive, more sustainable and better goals for the future. On to the next session. These are the top operational and financial indicators of Americanas S.A. in the second quarter. On Slide 25, these are our operational metrics. Our active customer bases, the number of transactions and the number of assortment and the number of sellers keep on growing, which states that we are heading in the right direction. Second quarter of 2021, we have reached 49 million active customers, accounting for a 21% growth when compared to Q2 of last year. We're adding another 9 million new customers. Number of transactions were up when compared to the same period last year, reaching 381 million transactions in the past 12 months. As to the assortment, we keep on growing. We have reached 111 million items available in our platforms, a 171% growth when compared to last year. We have also grown the number of sellers connected in our marketplace. We now have 104,000 in the second half of the year, a 50% increase when compared to last year number. On Slide 26, we have the financial highlights of the second quarter. The company chose to present results starting January 1, so that we can have comparable results in 2020. We did that to improve the analysis. The total GMV has reached BRL 12.6 billion, a 33% increase, driven by the growth of our digital platform and the acceleration of the physical platform. Net revenues reached BRL 6.9 billion, a 46% increase when compared to last year. Our adjusted EBITDA was BRL 1.1 billion, an EBITDA margin of 15.5%. Net income reached BRL 225 million in the quarter. On Slide 27, this is our GMV composition amongst different platforms. The total GMV of BRL 12.6 billion was made up of -- from partners, BRL 5.1 billion, a 30% increase. Gross net revenues from digital, BRL 4.8 billion, up 46%. And gross revenue from the physical of $2.8 million, an 18.2% increase. Let me highlight that the total GMV, GMV from partners and with the gross revenue reached BRL 9.8 billion in the quarter, up by 37% when compared to the accelerated growth of 72% of the previous year. Even in a difficult comparison basis, the growth we have seen in this quarter is 10 percentage points above the growth before the pandemics, when we grew by 27% in the first quarter of 2020. In the physical arena, the 18% increase was an important achievement. We had 31% of our sales stores operating with some sort of restrictions. In the same-store concept, the physical growth was 17.6%. On Slide 28, we show the nonrecurring effects in the quarter. As described in our release and detailed in our explanation note. The sum of the events of the no pro forma result had a positive effect of 200.9 -- BRL 209.3 million in our net income according to the reconciliation made available. As announced yesterday, the AMER3 buyback program was approved. The goal is to maximize value generation for our shareholders through efficient allocation of capital, and the limit is up to 17.5 million shares of Americanas S.A. in the next 18 months. This concludes our first quarterly presentation of Americanas S.A. We can now move on to the Q&A session.

[Operator Instructions] Our first question, Luiz Poli Guanais, BTG Pactual.

Two questions on our side. I'd like to understand how you have seen the effect of growth initiatives you have commented about the conversion of the online platform. So how could we think about the evolution of this conversion from now on? And a second question. The combination of the 2 business and online policies, can you talk about the evolution of on in the next quarters?

Thank you for your question, Guanais. Let me start with the online -- let me talk about the online growth. We have seen things are progressing. As of the fourth quarter, I can give you some color on the numbers, but we're not pleased with it. We still see many opportunities out there. There are several initiatives underway that are already impacting that conversion and improving sales, and they will reflect even more substantially in the quarters to come. In Q4 of last year, we grew 38% along the lines of market growth, but there was a gap for stock players. There were about 100 so there was that 60-point gap. In Q1, we sped up that growth. We grew by 9%. So we brought that gap down to 13 points as to the top players. We grew 37%, and we have brought that gap down. We closed that gap even further. That's according to the overall performance. There are several initiatives going on. They will improve conversion. Let me just highlight a few. If we take marketplace, fast deliveries is one of the pillars we have been pursuing, and we have been improving. When we look at fulfillment, for example, we have implemented several improvements. They help performance substantially, D-zero shipping. So they purchase and they ask questions from 70%, we're now at 97%. This is for 1P and fulfillment, sellers that are in the fulfillment. We can service customers very quickly. That involves several process improvements, our recommendation engines, prioritizing fast levers. These sellers in fulfillment have multiplied their GMV by 4 when compared to performance they had before, a very important pillar, therefore, to keep on moving forward with the fulfillment. For some long-tail categories, we started out fulfillment in electronics, but we have been moving on in the long tail. Penetration moved from 5% to 25% in the fulfillment. So a very important improvement. So we remain very confident that it will continue to grow, Another important front for fast delivery, which is to collect from sellers on the same day. We have over 1,000 sellers within that category. And the sellers that are, we can multiply that by 3 the number of deliveries -- the same-day deliveries. So it will impact conversion. It has to do with your question. And there's another front, which is the seller's acquisition to expand on our seller basis. There are some important initiatives away from São Paulo, Rio. There are 3 cities in which we are focusing on the seller's expansion. It's a sixfold increase in these 3 cities. That has to do with the combination. We are physically present in over 700 cities. It can be scaled. And it's important to have a local seller. When we bring them in, we can improve delivery times and freight conditions that can be brought down by 50%. And there are several other initiatives, we talked about that in the press release. Sellers that are in the ads platform that are growing above average, and ads have been improving. And there are combination strategies, inventory, dark stores, changing layout, benefiting O2O. They'll bring in way more growth looking forward. And in conclusion, 3P ended up being impacted by some electronics. They did not have such a good performance when compared to the same quarter in the previous year. And the long-tail categories that can bring in recurs, they are doing well. So we remain confident on their growth. Timotheo will be talking about O2.

Thank you for your participation in our call. So when we look at the evolution of O2O in the last 3 years, we have increased our share or order volumes. So in the last 12 months, what we have released, we have 4.4 million in GMV -- in O2O. When you look at the first quarter of '20 -- of this year, we have over 6 million orders with all types combined, takeaway or store pick-up today, so this number has been growing. And we see many opportunities. We should remember that this level has only been reached because when we talk about stock unification. This is something we've already been doing in the last 3 years. So from a customer perspective, our inventories already integrate both physical and digital through our O2O operations. So with this new combination of companies, the natural way to go is to speed up growth of O2O. We have many opportunities with the stock unification, and this will speed up our business, and then expansion of assortment to our stores. So when we take some categories, we have a very detailed level of information in some categories. In some of them, we know that 80% to 90% of sales are made in about 7 to 10 kilometers away from our stores. So when we have a large physical footprint, we can take that assortment and take it to a closer -- take it closer to the end point. And this leverage will, of course, affect our marketplace assortment. What is sold the most, and we can go to the end through our clarity. And when we consider digital and physical integration, we have many challenges. It's -- the inventory is shared by the customers who are buying from our stores and through our website, too. And that's a great challenge to be increasingly more accurate in our stores.

Perfect. Thank you, Timotheo. Thank you, Marcio.

The next question comes from Robert Ford from Bank of America.

How are you going to integrate that in your platform, including BR Mania, how soon will we be able to leverage those assets? Are you being able to hire the necessary talent?

Thank you for your question. Well, that's a very important question. So in terms of for Hortifruti, in this case, we believe we have a different value proposal. And the idea is to have fresh products produced in 24 hours from the field to your home. So there is a whole expansion program that's really well defined and they focus on this very special service with a digital service base. So as soon as CAD approves this transaction, our CAD, our teams will work together to see what kind of synergy can be worked on and what kind of value can be added to this transaction. We already have a view of this. It has already been discussed with their team, which is made up of highly qualified professionals, and we will be creating an expansion plan that will be more accelerated. So how will this work? How will these teams interact? This can only happen after CADE approves the transaction, then we'll be finding ways and how the strategy will be designed, this general strategy of exchanging earnings and results and information and synergy. So we're creating this concept. And as we like -- we had the approval of the Uni.co Group by the CADE. So the acquisition of Uni.co. We already had an expansion proposal. Now our teams are working together to see what will happen, April will do what was predicted and what kind of speeding out can be done and also including capital allocation analysis, which is okay for a company as large as ours. So these relationships are being built. And as you build relationship like this, you also end up to -- you go to other relations and all these relationships. They have a highly -- a high tech focus in the digital world. And as we build this, we will feel increasingly more motivated to build new initiatives. A classical example is BR, we have series of ideas, but the CADE hasn't approved this yet. And this, of course, restricts the building of this relationship, okay? We believe this will grow. So we have a first phase, that's about a 3-month period. So we're designing the integration process. Then in parallel, in our business front, as we explained, we are developing the shared services part improving them, and that will make integration easier. So there are many fronts and they -- and these fronts will help each other out in a way, creating a continuous value generation cycle to we estimate about 3 to 6 months, but that will depend on -- the proposal will be developing together.

Gabriel Simoes from Itau BBA asks the next question.

I have 2 questions. Pre-shipping, you have 54% of orders, right? What is the expected penetration of free shipping in the quarters to come? What is the threshold? How many more sellers can we expect to adhere to the fulfillment? And my second question is about Ame, you have been increasing that a lot. What is the potential for each of these products and services? And what are the initiatives for these activities? What is the expected impact of these new acquisitions?

Thank you for your question. This is Marcio. So I'll start my answer with free freight. So free freight, as you said, we have 54%. that's 1P and 3P. So when we look at the market, we see about 70%, that's the level that they operate in, and that's what we expect to reach. We're evolving towards this. We started at 20% with our free freight policies. So this is a level we can reach, but there's always this evolution curve we need to go. Our free freight policy includes what the subsidies that we give for our digital and then the sellers and then customers, depending on where they are. They pay part of the freight fee. So you need to strike a balance between all these 3 elements. And we see many opportunities to develop and evolve in this -- on this level. We're now in the third version of our free freight platform. In the last -- we have the flash -- you should remember that free freight is always linked to improving service levels. So this is a new initiative of this new version. And it also contributes to shorter delivery term deadlines and especially with low tickets, that's a great challenge for us to strike a balance there. But then they're again linked to recurrence. So we look to ship from store and fulfillment in these lower ticket products -- you still need -- you have room for improvement still. And with this new combination and unified inventory, we will continue with 1P and 3P and the stores will be closer to our customers. And this includes this free shipping. So we can ship from the dark store to the -- to our clients' home. So this is our free shipping platform.

And also, I'd like to tell Gabriel that we are in a process of evolution, a true evolution of our supply chain overall today. As soon as we have a single inventory, we will have a distribution network that is unprecedented in our history. So we will create innovative solutions. So free shipping can be expanded based on a completely different cost dynamics. So we're really excited about this front, as Marcio said, it needs managing, of course, we need to go deeper into the stock of the end customers or clients, and we will need help from all our suppliers overall. And I'd also like to stress this point that Marcio had said. I believe it's very important. Thank you, Gabriel. Anna will talk about Ame.

Gabriel, as for Ame, we have many developments here. When we look at our super app, we have many fronts. So when you look at Ame, Ame has 3 main businesses. Superapp is one of them. That's where our marketplace is. that's where the marketplace is, and its evolution is includes the credit card and partnerships, omni-shopping, Carrefour, driving mobility. And then we have a Software as a Service, Banking as a Service, Credit as a Service and PIX as a Service. And this is a platform business. It's being constructed. It's underway. And then our banking card, and that's about credit. So with the acquisition of Nexus, which was made last May, that's another very important element. So those that borrow are small companies in this credit platform, Nexus credit platform. It will foster entrepreneurship in this country, generating jobs, creating jobs and providing alternatives, options for those that want to invest. So we have 3 main businesses in Ame. So our marketplace for services and products, financial services and products, it's being developed. And this involves engagement. We're also building our platform of Banking as a Service, Software as a Service with the acquisition of Bid Capital and Parati. And we're waiting for Brazil Central Bank to approve the transfer of control, both of Parati and Nexus, so we're just in line with what was programmed, and there's many more to come.

João Soares asks the next question.

What is the take rate dynamics? It's difficult to understand that after the consolidation. Can you explain what is the expected evolution of the metrics as sellers move on to the fulfillment category. What is the take rate expected growth? My second question. Can you talk about the P&L of Ame? How much investment is expected there? My question is about OpEx. What would be the organic EBITDA excluding these effects of Ame investments? And the last thing, the discussion about Hortifruti Natural da Terra. Let me talk about the national expansion that includes several suppliers in southeastern Brazil. What's that relationship like? What is your estimated -- how do you think this dynamic will play out nationwide? But I'm looking at other operations as well, not the prices at Hortifruti has Natural da Terra.

Okay. João, this is Miguel. So great questions. In terms of take rate, we need to look at this in terms of stability. In other words, we believe that you need some discipline, right, with this approach for the company to strike a balance in the long run. And when you're excited about seeking increasingly more sales. There's always this pressure. [Audio Gap] This is about BRL 100-odd-million of EBITDA. I think that would draw attention because of the accomplishments. And we are very excited, not only because of the response of customers but also because of the team that we were able to put that team together to face those challenges. Let me talk about Hortifruti. This is something different. A produce store is different. That's why we're so excited. The approach is to offer products that are either or rather fresh. It's 24 hours from the field all the way to the end user with a very strongly digital approach. We have about 16% in that area. Today, they do have a growth plan, and we ended up acquiring that plan. or embracing it, everything we do on top of it, given our internal discipline. We're still waiting for the approval. That's what we do. That's what we have to do. And then we'll be able to start implementing a couple of things. For example, next Tuesday, we've been invited, they're opening up a new store here in a district called Botafogo in Rio. There's an expansion plan, and we believe it's a good expansion plan. What we can do on top of that? We'll just have to wait for the approval of the authorities. And we respect that, of course. We like to offer something that is good, healthy products, fresh produce, and we want recurrence. That's what we're looking for. It has to do with our overall strategy. We'll have new customers from them, and there's a whole new assortment, which is very interesting. But it does not mean that we'll be a major food supplier. That's not it. When you think about a nationwide point of view, these concepts are part of our business model. These things will have to be monitored for new cities that we may stop we're operating in the future. But let's not forget that where we operate today, there are still many opportunities for improvement there. That's Rio, São Paulo, Minas and Spirito Santo. I don't know whether I answered the question, the rationale behind our excitement. I hope I did.

That was very clear, Miguel. I believe that you can update on the possible synergies that you can extract, right?

Yes, of course. Let me emphasize that before we show that combination synergy, this is a completely new dynamics. We'll be updating everyone as these new synergies arise, but let me be more specific about the regulation. We have to wait for the approval from the authorities. They take the time they need before we get that final approval.

Danniela Eiger asks the next question.

I have 2 questions actually. The first one is about an update about the next steps of the merger. I'd like to know whether there's some updates along those lines? Let me just ask for a follow-up on the take rate dynamics. I would like to know your take on this competitive environment. I know you operate in a very competitive industry, and that's part and parcel of the business. But we have the impression that everyone is upping their game. They're focusing on some of your peers are becoming more capitalized, take rates coming down for some. What you take on that dynamics? What are the main strategies and pillars that you expect to focus on to guarantee the better performance in the future?

Danniela, this is Fabien. Thank you for your questions. Let's start with the first is for listing of Lojas Americanas in the United States. We released on April 28 about the structure that we proposed in 2 phases. Phase 1 has been completed. So we have combined the -- all the operational aspects of our business, so we create Americanas S.A. Now Phase II, there are some steps that still need to be taken defining jurisdictions and stock exchange matters that still -- that need to be taken and studied and defined for us to update the market about. This will be done as soon as the studies in the efforts move forward. So after Phase II all the funding sources, reducing of capital costs and all the transactions and aligning -- long-term alignment and exposure to the new analyst coverage, increasing our global visibility. So we will keep the market updated. Now for the second question, Danniela, well, this is one of the tools that the new market is working on of which we are part. So it's really aggressive in commercial terms. It's similar -- very similar to higher purchase like 2 installments or even more, but now with the focus and our sellers. So we believe there's a lot of room for improvement in this respect, and we're working really hard to improve our chain as a whole. We have this national footprint. We have expanded our chain in order to have a more efficient supply chain, the most efficient of all, making the most of our stores that are everywhere. So we are working on improving efficiency. On the other hand, we have also invested in long-tail assortment. So competition may not -- it may not be a priority for us. Now the higher competition items, there's been a lot of pressure in integrity in general. Now our view is always a mid- and long-term view. So our approach is to look at the future. And to achieve this, we need an operation that's profitable, that can stand on its legs. That's what we are seeking. And that, of course, we may also need to make isolated adjustments on the way, right? We need to try to balance between all the stakeholders of this dynamic seeking stability in the mid and long term, but there is very fierce competition, you're very right.

This concludes the Q&A session. I would like to turn over to Miguel for his final remarks. You can proceed now sir.

Thank you for participating in our first conference call of Americanas S.A. We're really excited about this new phase. It's time to head out. Our Investor Relations team is at your disposal to clarify any additional questions. Thank you, everyone. Have a great afternoon.

This concludes the earnings call. Thank you for attending. Have a great afternoon. [Statements in English on this transcript were spoken by an interpreter present on the live call.]