Grupo Argos S.A. (GRUPOARGOS) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning to you all. I want to thank you for your company today. This conference will be focused on presenting the financial results for Grupo Argos at the end of the Fourth Quarter 2024. This year, in this space, we have Jorge Mario  Velásquez, Alejandro Piedrahita Borrero [indiscernible] teams of Odinsa and the Real Estate business. I remind you all that in the website, you can find all the information regarding the quarter together with the presentation we will be following during this teleconference. To download it, you can access many financial information and then you can go into the report section. In addition, we are also broadcasting this conference via space of X. I want to invite you to move on to Slide #3, so we could start our meeting. And for this, I want to give the word to Jorge Mario  Velásquez, President of Grupo Argos.

Thank you, Juan Esteban. Good morning to you all. I want to greet to all the shareholders, investors, employees that are with us today. I want to thank you for being with us during this call. The course of 2024, our businesses kept generating slight operational results, which has reflected in a positive figures for Grupo Argos that we will be sharing up next with you all. Nevertheless, before presenting the summary of the financial results of the company and the data regarding each one of these businesses, we want to offer you an update in respect with the advancements in the split of agreement that has a purpose ending in an organized manner, the cross participations that Grupo Argos and Grupo Sura have. Last 30th January, the Grupo Argos Board asked, to whom speaks to you, to call upon an extraordinary meeting for its shareholder assembly that will be happening in the next 27th of March, in which we will submit under the consideration of the shareholders the partial split of project by absorption well, after which Grupo Argos shareholders will receive a direct participation in Grupo Sura, keeping their actual participation in Grupo Argos. And likewise, shareholders of Grupo Sura will receive a direct participation of up keeping their participation in Grupo Sura. After this transaction has been submitted, and we hope and approved to the shareholder assembly for Grupo Argos, Cementos Argos, Grupo Sura, we'll also carry out all the necessary government authorizations, including those that have to be implied by the Colombian Financial Superintendency. We want to emphasize that this operation will allow Grupo Argos to focus and specialize in the construction material infrastructure sector, while Grupo Sura consolidated its strategy in financial services aligned with the business plan that has been previously announced to the market by both companies. From inside, Cementos Argos shareholders, company that adhered to the agreement with the end of disposal with -- of its investment in Grupo Sura, who have a share that's exclusively focused in the construction materials sector, and at the end of this transaction, these shareholders will be able to access through a direct exposition both to Grupo Sura as well as to Grupo Argos. Like this transaction represents a key milestone that will strengthen the creation of a virtuous cycle that will benefit both companies, its shareholders and the capital market of the country starting like this, a new chapter for Grupo Sura, within which, as it has been constant during decades, the company will keep its a trajectory of profitable growth and its broad impact vision over all the groups of interest. Without no doubt, the main focalization in the infrastructure sector, driven by the end of this cross participation and supported by the developed capacity through more than 90 years, will allow Grupo Argos to keep on drilling deeper and broadening its scope in terms of restructuring, operation and platform management of infrastructure leveraged in an ambitious investment plan that has been executed with projects that, today, reach close to COP 4 trillion in the midterm. And I would also like to highlight some of these. Cementos Argos, we have a historic opportunity after the summit disinvestment that it implied the cash entry close to COP 12 trillion after the closure of this business, that was closed to this last 10th of February. Odinsa is advancing the execution of a broad project portfolio in Colombia, that includes the expansion of El Dorado Airport with El Dorado Max project, the new Cartagena airport, the expansion of the Oriente tunnel in Antioquia, the road plan that's known as connection center in the coffee region, the [indiscernible] in [indiscernible] between others. These projects, in case of being approved and awarded, would represent an investment that's close to COP 20 trillion. Celsia will keep executing its expansion in nonconventional renewable energies with more than 1,000 megawatts of solar energy in Colombia and close to 200 megawatts of wind energy in Peru, starting wind projects in the country, such as the wind park, Carreto, that is located in the Department of Atlantica. For midsize, we will keep working with the real estate business, advancing in tourism and real estate projects in the city of Barranquilla, in Cartagena and in the metropolitan area of the cities. From other side, we also want to highlight that BRC ratings, S&P Global confirmed the AAA rating of Grupo Argos as issued after the signature of the split of agreement with Sura. This ratification of the risk rating reassures the robust capital structure of Grupo Argos, a favorable perspective of the businesses where we participated and the benefits of the announced operation when we ended the cross participations with Grupo Sura. Our message for all our shareholders is clear. You get be easy on the fact that future of Grupo Argos once this transaction is executed, it's even more promising and vigorous. As I mentioned a couple of minutes ago, this decision will be submitted to the approval of the company's shareholders, the upcoming 27th of March, afterwards, we'll proceed with the regulatory authorizations in order to advance in the society split out, and we estimate that we'd be ending this operation at the end of 2025 or at the beginnings of 2026. The Grupo Argos portfolio today has already experimented a significant transformation, product of its most recent transactions, concentrating and infrastructure asset that will end with the specialization of 100% once the company is stops being a shareholder of Grupo Sura. On slide that you have your screen, we could see how the portfolio of Grupo Argos -- investment portfolio of Grupo Argos has transformed the last 12 months. Taking as reference, the later values in our nonlisted investments, such as Odinsa, the urban development business back and others, as the price of our shares in the Colombian Stock Exchange in terms of our listed investments such as Celsia, Cementos Argos, Grupo Sura, Sociedad Portafolio and previously Nutresa, we can see how, in respect to 2023, the Grupo Argos portfolio has valued close to COP 4.3 trillion, reaching COP 21.1 trillion. This increase is supported in the closure of the strategic transactions that we have previously mentioned as the healthy operational performance of our businesses. From another side, the disinvestment of Grupo Nutresa and the carried-out transactions in our infrastructure investments, have allowed for this segment to grow, representing more than 2/3 of the company's portfolio becoming like that a clear and defined strategic route for its specialization in the infrastructure sector. I speak about the share sale and the participation of materials; I want to invite you to move on to the upcoming slide. Noting the last 10th of February, the company confirmed the definite closure of the sale of Summit Materials to Quikrete Holdings. This new step is built over the entrepreneurial spirit that has led the company to export to North America, the decade of the '50s, start deepening of our presence in that country in the '80s, and increasing the direct persons in the United States in the decade of 2000. Besides strengthening a strategic focus, the perseverance capacity and conviction of deploying talent and human capital for almost 20 years, this has been key intents for the consolidation and integration of the concrete, cement and aggregate business in that geography. During this time, we have taken our green light to emblematic work sites such as the Mercedes-Benz stadium of the Atlanta Falcons in Atlanta, Georgia; the Coca-Cola plant in Houston, Texas; the Volcano Bay Aquatic Park in Universal Studios in Orlando, and we delivered our products and solutions in terms of concrete, cement and aggregates to different operational centers such as FedEx, Facebook, Amazon, Disney, in between many other clients, placing not just the name of Argos, but the name of Colombia up high and amidst professionals in the United States. The acquisition offer made by Quikrete and accepted by the Summit shareholders reached $52.5 per share, by which the sale of 55 million shares of Cementos Argos, that Cementos Argos owned in Summit, represented a cash value close to $2.8 billion. This amount constitutes the materialization of the investment in the United States to a value of share of close to COP 100 million. So this is higher than the price that we had at the moment of the announcement, that was approximately COP 8,500 per share of Grupo Argos product of this operation. Cementos Argos Board has started an exhaustive analysis to define the optimal destination of the resources with a range of opportunities that will allow to keep on tracing this history of growth and value generation that has a consolidated company as the largest Colombian investment in the first economy of the world. As a main shareholder of Cementos Argos, for Grupo Argos, the reinvestment of these resources that today represent the most valuable assets that have been managed by this holding is an absolute priority. Because of this, we are actively and decisively working with the administration and with the Board in order to ensure the best capital allocation in the construction materials sector in a process that has a strategic view that does not discard any alternative and might allow to complement the geographic footprint, but at the same time, should be made an intelligent fashion in order to guarantee these resources, in order to guarantee that these resources will generate profitability in the mid and long-term for all its shareholders, including Grupo Argos. This year of transformational transactions has been supported by an outstanding performance of all the shares of the Grupo Argos business group. During 2024, the preferential price in the stock exchange increased 82% and the ordinary share increased 66%, while the ordinary share of Cementos Argos grew at 67% and the sales this year grew 24%. This increases are over the MSCI COLCAP Index that recorded an increase close to 15% during the same period. These results respond, besides our slight operational performance, to the strategic milestones that we have previously mentioned. And to contient and decided effort in order to generate and transfer value to our shareholders, within these initiatives, we want to highlight the continuity of the repurchase share, share repurchase program of the companies belonging to Grupo Argos, considering that the shares are still under the fundamental value, which has led us to execute more than $150 million since the beginning of the program in 2023 as the successful split program carried out by Cementos Argos. Committed with closing the gap between the fundamental value of our shares and its market value, we will keep on making everything that's in our reach in order to potentiate the opportunities that this new stage of simplification comes with. In the consolidated results, the company recorded outstanding figures. Part of the transformation transactions such as the asset combination between Argos USA and Summit, that generated a profit of COP 5.3 trillion for the company. And the agreement to disinvest the Grupo Argos and Grupo Sura participation in Grupo Nutresa, which allowed larger economic rights for Grupo Sura, besides a net profit of COP 2.6 trillion that came from these operations. This, added to the positive performance of our business and businesses that we just went over, gave us result that Grupo Argos closed the year with consolidated revenues of COP 15.2 trillion and EBITDA COP 5.1 trillion, which represents a growth of 28% compared with the same period previous year. From its side, the net profit closed in COP 7.6 trillion and the controlled net profit closed in COP 4.5 trillion. Under the same line, looking at the financial results, the separated financial results, we could see that the year closed with revenues of COP 3.5 trillion, EBITDA at COP 3.2 trillion and the net profit of COP 2.5 trillion. All these figures double or triple whatever we have in 2023. Now I want to invite you to move on and look at the results of our businesses in a bit more detail. This is found in the upcoming slide, Slide #11. Cementos Argos closed the year with results that reflect the financial solidness of the company, and the reduced execution of the strategy focused in profitability, even with the reduction of 0.3% of the consolidated revenues, which reached COP 5.3 trillion in 2024. The company achieved an increase of 2% in the EBITDA, reaching COP 1.1 trillion and consolidated net profit that product of the combination of Argos U.S.A. and Summit Materials, and the positive operational performance closed in COP 5.6 trillion. The focus in operational efficiency allowed to optimize logistics and operational costs, strengthening margins in key markets and driving the growth of the EBITDA margin that at the end of the year reached 21%. During the quarter, Cementos Argos dispatched 2.1 million tons of cement and 687,000 cubic meters of concrete in its operations in Colombia, Central America and the Caribbean, which represents a drop of 8% in the case of cement and a growth of 7% in part of concrete in respect with the same period previous year in each one of these geographies. In Colombia, Cementos Argos consolidated its leadership with the market as the supplier of 80% of great work sites in the country with a market participation that's higher than 30%. In 2024, the dispatch volumes reached 5,349 metric tons, driven to its growth of 6% in the exports to Central America and the United States. Despite the fact that the total dispatches of cement in the country have deaccelerated mainly due to a lower activity in the residential sector, it's also important to highlight some signs of improvement in respect with 2024. These are small, but they are positive at the same time. This reenergizing, together with the moderation of inflation and with the reduction of mortgage rates, should lead to stabilization of the cement demand in the short term and to retake its positive trend in the future -- in a close by future. Also supported by the fundamental macroeconomic indicators of the country. Once the market starts its recovery, Argos will be a much more agile and efficient company, fully prepared in order to take advantage of this demand expansion in a business that's cyclic. In Central America and the Caribbean -- the Caribbean, the margins kept on strengthening thanks to the optimization of the local plants and focus in markets with a higher profitability. The revenues of this region reached $515 million with an EBITDA of $127 million. The implemented plans in the last years have proven their capacity of maximizing the value for our shareholders within those and Grupo Argos. The company has reached efficiencies in all its value chain. It has improved profitability, and it has advanced the gap close between the intrinsic value and the market price of the share. Cementos Argos will keep on developing initiatives in order to strengthen its attractiveness between global investors, growing in market participation and keep on strengthening its innovation and value generation capacity. Now I want to invite you to move on to the energy business results that you can find on Slide #12. Celsia closed 2024 with financial results that reflect its adaptation capacity. The consolidated revenues reached COP 6.8 trillion, which represents a growth of 9%, driven by the diversification of these electric generation sources and the operational stability the distribute and transmission assets. During the El Nina phenomenon that in Colombia, implied a reduction of the water contributions close to more than 50% during the first quarter 2024. And volatility in the contributions for the second semester of the year, the company, despite this phenomenon, was able to comply with all its contracts in terms of energy generation and to supply the service with no interruption to its residential and industrial clients, thanks to a solid contraction of policy support it with a portfolio of reliable and balanced energy generation. The U.S. EBITDA reached COP 1.5 trillion. This drop of 19% year-after-year given to this climatic condition, we hope this figure to be recovered in 2025 with the normalization of water conditions in the country. From its side, the net controlling profit of the company was of COP 222 billion, which proved a growth of 15%. Within the main milestones of 2024 for Celsia, we want to highlight the start of the first wind plant construction in Colombia, that's known as Carreto. This is located in the Department of Atlantico with 9.9 megawatts of capacity and will start operations the same year 2025. This project improves the potential of wind resource in regions further than La Guajira and reinforces the commitment that the company has with the development of renewables energies in the country. From another side, the company entered the Peruvian market with the acquisition of 2 wind projects and small hydroelectric center aligned with its regional expansion strategy in stable and -- with markets are stable and with high development potential. One of these projects is already operating and the other one is under construction. 2024 was also a year for Celsia to keep on consolidating its sole energy leadership, reaching generation installed capacity higher than 400 megawatts through its different operations in Colombia and Panama and Honduras. During the year, we included 3 new solar farms, and we advanced the construction of more than 300 additional megawatts that will start operations during this year, 2025. New technologies such as energy storage and batteries, we set a significant advancement in terms of stability and optimization of the solar farms. That's why we want to highlight the start of operations of the first -- of this system in Colombia. In Palmira 2, improving the efficiency of the energy supply and opening a window of profitable growth for the company. In the first -- in the fourth quarter, sorry, the consolidated revenues of Celsia closed in COP 2.1 trillion, which represented a growth of 27% compared with the same period 2023 from each side. The consolidated EBITDA was of COP 355 billion, which represents a drop of 19%. These results of [indiscernible] 39% increase in the generation revenues compared with the same period last year, driven by positive deviations in the charge by reliability that added COP 204 billion. This is an effect of the climate variability at the end of the year. Additionally, we also felt an increase in the energy sales, both in the stock exchange as well as in contract, which led to a higher commercialization price average. From other operational services, revenues reached COP 292 billion. This represents 110% over the fourth quarter of 2023. This is explained by higher sale of the assets under the BOT contract as described on the platforms of investment -- in the platform of the investments of Caoba and Laurel. In terms of the EBITDA, the company provision part of its outstanding loans with [indiscernible], which impacted the result in COP 21 billion. Celsia continues actively evaluating all the alternatives in order to guarantee the payment of this obligation in its favor. Odinsa. Now I want to invite you to move on to Slide #17, where we could look at the Odinsa results. In 2024, Odinsa airports mobilized close to 52 million passengers during the year, close to 47 million of this represented in El Dorado Airport, which traffic grew 15%, and it reached its maximum operational capacity, consolidating as the main connection hub of Latin America, with largest individual mobility even being higher over airports such as Mexico City and in Sao Paulo. The operational performance -- the extraordinary operational performance of these assets, which mobilizes around 73% of the Colombian air market, reflects the importance of this terminal for the connectivity, not just for the country but also for the region. The extraordinary performance clearly shows the need of broadening the capacity of the main air terminal in Colombia, because of this the company keeps on advancing investing in order to deliver the feasibility phase of the El Dorado Max project, the [indiscernible] product the capacity of the airport with more than 60 million passengers per year with an investment that we calculated close to COP 13 trillion and which development should happen in the midterm. From inside, Odinsa via as recorded an average daily traffic of 180,000 vehicles for 2024. With 3 of its assets were showing growth larger than the GDP. Autopistas del Cafe and [ Dune Liranda ] mobilized 13.8 million vehicles, each one with an increase of 5% and 1% compared with the same period last year. Pacífico 2 those reached 2.8 million vehicles, growing at 6%, while the [indiscernible] recorded 9 million vehicles. This is 3% more than the previous year. Likewise, the construction of the second phase of Túnel de Oriente Antioquia de Oriente Antioquia advances according to schedule. This new infrastructure, that's 100% double and will broaden the connectivity and the productivity of the country, with an investments of more than COP 2 trillion, will not just strengthening the regional road infrastructure, but also generating more than 2,000 direct employment during its construction. Now moving on to the Odinsa operational results that are found on Slide 17. The road platform closed quarter with an average of 106,000 vehicles, which represent a 6% growth compared with the same period last year. The concession revenues for the platform grew 13%, while the EBITDA for the quarter was still getting COP 145 billion. The IRR expected for -- the expected IRR for Cafe -- Autopistas del Cafe is 22%, [indiscernible] de renta, 18%. Once the expansion is concluded; and the entire concession, 15%; the Metro Road with 11%. In airports, which figures can be found on Slide #17, once again, the passenger traffic during the quarter reached 14 million passengers, representing a growth of 16%. During this period, Opain delivered to its shareholders through retribution and loans, COP 333 billion, from which the private capital fund has COP 217 billion of these. This at its same time were delivered to the investor of the company private fund, Odinsa there has 50% via contribution restitution, which strengthened the cash position of the company. This operation, which offers liquidity to Odinsa for future businesses developments, simultaneously impacted the set of results during this segment. Given that the Opain redistribution reduces the asset valuation, given that it's a final asset, this reduction affects negatively the net profit of the private capital fund. And at the same time, it's integrated in the set of results for Odinsa via participation method. Summarizing, this distribution due to the way it was carried out, privileges of the cash and placed the company in a very solid position in order to develop investments such as in the water business, but it simultaneously has an accounting effect that affects the Odinsa financial results. Now I want to invite you to move on to Pactia's results. The real estate business, the Pactia's gross revenue was COP 25 billion, which represented a drop of 19% year-after-year, and the EBITDA for the quarter was COP 34 billion, with a drop of 44%. During the quarter, Pactia carried out the total disinvestment of 103,000 square meters of net rentable area, which were represented in 3 logistical assets by which the company received COP 353 billion in cash. And simultaneously, implied the registration of an accounting loss of COP 27 billion. After executing this investment, the effective gross revenue and EBITDA grew was 5% and 1%, respectively. In terms of the same assets for the complete year, of the operational net revenue and the EBITDA grew 8% and 10% compared with the same period last year. Also, we recorded for 179,000 square meters, contracts were made for 65,000 square meters during 2024. At the end of the period, the fund closed with the Board with non-hotel portfolio occupation of 94.2%. This represents a drop of 286 basis points compared with the same period previous year. And compared with the fourth period -- fourth quarter of 2023, commercial areas represented the largest growth of 11% in comparison with the same period previous year, followed by the sector of offices and logistics. In the commercial area, we want to highlight the performance of [indiscernible] and San Antonio that reached increases of the gross -- of the effective gross revenues of more than 18%. In comparison period last year, the sales per square meter of this same brands received 10% and 1%, respectively, which is a very positive signal in terms of activity lever. Now I want to invite to move on to the urban development business that's found on Slide #19. The urban development cash flow business was COP 40 billion. We closed 2024 with a net cash flow of COP 61 billion, which is lower than what we saw in the previous year, but it's still stable compared with the average of the last 5 years. In terms of the recorded sales during the quarter, we sold 7 lots in Barranquilla and one in Puerto Colombia, with which we complete 14 lots that have been sold during the area -- in the metropolitan area in the city of Barranquilla. We also sold more than 100 hectares of rural land lots, that, together with what we sold in previous periods, represents a total annual saving of COP 1.6 billion for Grupo Argos. We want to heighten the investments of all the land lots of Grupo Argos in Magdalena, which implies one less failed locality to administrate with less cost, so this reinforces our strategic focus in the cities of Barranquilla and Cartagena. The EBITDA in 2024 was negative. This is because in the first quarter, we carried out a deterioration of Pavas and Baru land lots, where we adjusted the disposal of urbanism cost in order to reflect the increase that we've foreseen in construction costs. We do realize that the situation is just accounting-wise, this never affected the cash, and this will allow us to consider more uses and alternatives for this pieces of land. Now I want to invite you to move on to Slide #22 in order to analyze the evolution of the consolidated indebtment. In this area, net debt closed year 2024 in COP 9.3 trillion, this is a drop of 15% compared with the same period previous year. I would like to highlight this achievement from the peak close to COP 17 trillion of net debt that we reached in the first quarter 2020, in the middle of the pandemic, the organization has been able to reduce its consolidated indebtment close to half, deleveraging in approximately COP 8 trillion. With the cash entry coming from the disinvestment in the United States, the consolidated net indebtment of the company in February 2025, this is the negative. In other words, the company today has more cash and debt, which represents a clear example of the strength and financial flexibility that Grupo Argos comes with in order for its future strategy execution. The soundness in our capital structure allowed to reassure the AAA rating after the split of agreement. Net -- separate net debt of Grupo Argos as detailed on Slide 25, closed the quarter at COP 1.3 trillion. This is an increase in comparison with the same quarter last year, explained mainly by the disbursement effect during this joint OPA for the shares of Grupo Nutresa, and this has already been foreseen within this transaction. Just remember that for this operation, the company used COP 432 billion of its cash without the need of going into larger indebtment. Because of this, we analyzed the gross net of the company, we could see that it has just increased to 7% respect with the same period in 2023, going from COP 1.6 trillion to COP 1.7 trillion. Despite the increase of the net debt given to a lower cash, Grupo Argos keeps net debt over EBITDA indicator that's healthy, which offers the financial flexibility that the company requires. Of course, in the quarter, we indicated a level of 1.7x. Despite this disbursement for the OPA, the company keeps a solid cash position with investments in fixed rents of around COP 345 million. The results of the Grupo Argos business proves that the value generation for our shareholders is exponentially higher when it happens under the equilibrium with well-being of our collaborators, community development, when we care for the environment, when our suppliers grow and our customers grow and when we carry out a caution construction, and there was this decided view of a better country and region. This vision and this business management was once again recognized during February this year when we were included in the S&P Yearbook of 2025 as a result of our performance and the sustainability, corporate evaluation that this company carries on a yearly basis. This recognition that has been received by Grupo Argos was also received by our businesses in construction materials, energy and road concession and airport concessions. This fills us with pride, and proves once again that our business model generates value for all its groups of interests, aligning at the same time with the best practices in terms of environment, social related topics and corporate government around the world. Further than these recognitions, 2024, this focus was translated in tangible investments, such as compliant with the goals that the company has around climate change. In a consolidated level, Grupo Argos has been able to reduce in a 42% the CO2 emission intensity for each million pesos that has been generated based on the baseline of 2018, consolidating a positive trend and advancing fully towards the 2030 objectives. I want to thank you for your presence. And now I will give the word to Juan Esteban Mejia, so he can help us to coordinate any doubts, questions or queries that you might have. So let me say once again, that all our team is available to answer any questions that you might have. Furthermore, we'll be open and available after this conference in order to answer any doubts, questions or queries that you might have around our operational report.

[Operator Instructions] For the moment, we have the upcoming question from Katherine Ortiz from Davivienda. Could you detail the drop impact the assets where they sold with the discount compared with their ledger values? And if so, could we know what was the discount for? And bearing in mind this disinvestment from Conconcreto, what should we expect if the shareholder change towards the future with this business?

Let me give the word to Alejandro Piedrahita. So he can answer about the disinvestment, and we could make a joint comment about the shareholder change in the capital fund.

Of course, yes, Katherine, very much. As Jorge mentioned during the presentation, well, for the case of our results, Pactia's transaction represents a drop of close to COP 27 billion. The logistics assets that were sold were basically 3: the corrugated asset, the Unilever asset and the Siberia asset. The total by which we received a cash from Pactia was close to COP 354 billion total. From those COP 354 billion total to Grupo Argos due to repetition phase, we received a cash close to COP 96 billion. The value by which this transaction was carried out for was 7.6% under the value that we had in our financial ledgers. And that's why we get this effect. The total profitability of the asset sale was higher to an 8%, and that was basically the values that we obtained part of the logistics business investment -- the logistics business investment. Yes, I would summarize the market realities, obviously, sometimes lead, and this is common in these types of businesses, we also consider this in the urban development business, with the cash provision that was down for COP 100 billion. Sometimes these adjustments are recommended where we have a sale option for certain assets. This represents cash revenue that could be used for higher profitability businesses. It's advisable many times to do so. In terms of shareholder change, let's remember that in Pactia, we have a manager where there's no change in the shareholder presence. Here is where there's a change in some of the shareholders. Obviously, the shareholders come as a new IP for the capital fund and with protection and the others. But the company management, Andres Bejarano, that's with us does not change in its profitabilization focus. And one share goal -- and there's a swap of shareholders in the LP scheme. And this is a normal type of situation. And this also brings us to first-level institutions. So Katherine, I would say that there's no change in the strategy or in the change of orientation of Pactia. I don't know if maybe, Andres, would like to complement anything else.

Well, Jorge, all your answers were very complete in Alejandro's answers we're also very complete. So I think I wouldn't have anything else to add.

Perfect, we have an additional question from Katherine Ortiz, and it goes as follows. Cementos Argos proposed a high dividend for this year aligned with the Summit disinvestment. Nevertheless, the dividend proposed by Grupo Argos had very a moderate increase compared with the previous year. Can you tell us what is going to be the destination of the resources you would receive from this dividends in 2025? And why if we have a low indebtment, you proposed such a low increase? Yes. Let me give the word to Alejandro, so he could look over the cash flow of the proposal made by the Board. In the case of Grupo Argos, dividend has -- is considering the complete confirmation of the portfolio and the uses that the holding company needs to attend. To do something that has always been within our philosophy that is permanent and sustainable growth of our dividend for our shareholders. It's clearly promising the dividend that cement business is delivering. This has been done extraordinarily because this is also the recognition to its shareholders within those Grupo Argos to the value materialization of thesis that have been following for several decades in the United States business. This is not the case necessarily for other businesses. For example, Celsia's dividend, according to what the Board proposed, the increase is much more adjusted in terms of inflation and just plus a couple of additional points. Let's remember that Odinsa does not deliver dividends, because it's a growth company that's focusing on exploring new growth avenues of new projects. And so there's no dividend flow, not from Odinsa and nor from the concession business for Grupo Argos. And the real estate business, as we mentioned before, has some stable flows, but these are lower than previous years. So like this, the Board also considered that it's also important to keep certain initiatives for the use of resources. First, we are proposing an 8.2% increase in the dividend, this -- over inflation, but we also need to attend the payment of the corresponding taxes to the Nutresa transaction coming from previous year, which adds close to COP 430 billion. We will keep on following with this reacquisition and acquisition programs that we've had for the last years, and this is a way of redistributing capital to the shareholders that want to follow this avenue, and dropping even more and the leveraging of the company close to COP 100 billion. So the dividend, better than inflation, grows in real terms, but it does recognize as the realities of the revenues and the cash needs of the company in order to keep besides this stability and flexibility campaign or a policy towards the future. So this is like the philosophical region -- reasons, sorry, that we have behind this dividend allocation. I don't know, Alejandro, if you want to complement something else.

Well, no, Jorge, just to complement with a couple of figures that I believe that are important that are aligned with what you say. If we're starting with our forecast where we closed our gross indebtment last year, that was COP 1.7 trillion. This is a figure close to COP 1.3 trillion. The objective for 2025 is closing debt close to COP 1.5 trillion net debt -- of gross net, that's going to be very close to the net debt. So with this figure shows is that we are aligned with our net debt adjusted EBITDA indicator of 1.5x and gross net over adjusted EBITDA of COP 1.6 billion. So this allows us to have flexibility. So just mentioning a couple of more figures, in terms of dividends, including the extraordinary one from cements. The cash net that we'll be receiving from the urban business, our cash will be close to COP 1.1 trillion. And from there, there's 3 steps that are key. The first one. These are the dividends, that Jorge was mentioning, in cash are COP 567 billion being paid as dividends. The other important thing it has to do with tax payment that Jorge mentioned coming as product of the OPA transactions that we carried out in a certain moment, that represents close to COP 220-something billion. So what this proves is that we are also thinking on a dividend that's coherent with the capital structure in order to have that financial flexibility, in order to pay future dividends. But from a financial health point of view, we can keep being robust with a AAA rating.

Well, thank you, Alejandro. We received the upcoming question from Nicolas Gomez Peragos. Let me ask the following question. Could you give us a guide in terms of the expense behavior for the holding? And product of the split off, will we have not requiring costs? Or will this be more normalized? Oh, let me just make a comment that I believe that's key. Of this company has been doing a very disciplined systemic effort in order to reduce the functioning expenses of the holding company. When you look at the expense numbers, so we could even drill down much more in detail. These figures conjugate 2 main areas. The first is costs and expenses of the urban development business due to fiscal or taxation rises are within Grupo Argos. And because of this, we need to bear in mind that these expenses have a very important revenue associated to them. So that's why they should be analyzed separately as you analyze any other expenses for the business, both for cement, energy or concessions. If we subtract these figures, the expenses for the holding for the last 10 years, from 2015 to 2024, have had a drop of 4.3% in real terms. So this means if you had forecasted the expenses of 2015, due to inflation up to 2024, close of 2024, the value of the negative delta between both figures is equal to close to 50% of the current expense that we have today. So there is a constant and permanent effort that's showing drops in terms of costs and expenses for the organization. Now within the question, there is a very important chapter in terms of extraordinary expenses. Extraordinary expenses that Grupo Argos inquired in during the last years within different processes, such as public offering acquisitions, plus disinvestments of these assets, financial consultants, legal consultants and strategic consultancies are relevant. And effectively, we expect that in 2025 that are actually budgeted for, we could keep some expense levels that are close to COP 30 billion for the materialization of all the processes that are required for the disinvestment of the cross participation in Grupo Sura. In the previous year, these expenses reached COP 31 billion. With this, I want to give the word to Eduardo Sanchez, he is with us today, so he can drill a bit deeper in these figures.