Investor Update

Sep 10, 2020

Good morning and welcome. My name is Lucy Rodriguez and I am the Head of Investor Relations for CEMEX. We are pleased to be with you today for a dialogue with our CEO, Fernando Gonzalez, in what is essentially a virtual slimmed down version of our annual CEMEX Day. We hope that in the not too distant future, we can all get together in one place for full Analyst Day in which we do a deep dive into market performance and outlook with our regional presidents. So why are we here today? In a world that has been disrupted by COVID-nineteen, we would like to share with you what we have been seeing in our markets and to introduce now with some increased visibility into the future, our new strategy, Operation Resilience, that incorporates the challenges of COVID-nineteen as well as a plan to achieve our medium term objectives by 2023. We have with us today, of course, Fernando Gonzalez, our CEO as well as our CFO, Maher Al Farr and our Executive Vice President of Strategic Planning and Corporate Development, Jose Antonio Gonzalez. Fernando will begin with some brief comments on the challenges of recent months, an update on our markets and then an introduction to the goals and pillars of operation resilience. Our management team will then be available for your questions. You may submit a question using the Q and A option at the bottom of your screen. We ask that you identify yourself and your company along with your question. We also request that you limit yourself to one question. We will do our best to address as many submissions as possible within the constraints of the time available. I would like to remind you that any forward looking statements we make today are based on our current knowledge of the markets in which we operate and could change in the future due to a variety of factors beyond our control. In addition, unless the context indicates otherwise, all references to pricing initiatives, price increases or decreases refer to prices for our product. Without further ado, I am pleased to introduce Fernando Gonzalez, our CEO. Thanks, Lucy. And as you mentioned, the reason we are here is to present our medium term strategy, which we are calling Operation Resilience. The term is very appropriate given the unprecedented industry challenges that we have faced in the last months. But more importantly, it will address the changes in our medium term due to the coronavirus pandemic and the decisive action plan that we have developed to meet these new circumstances. I will give a brief update on how things have evolved during these last two months and our outlook for the remainder of the year. But I will mostly focus on our strategy and targets from now until 2023. Let me start by explaining in general terms what is operational resilience, our strategy for the next three years and then I will elaborate with more detail on each of these points in the next slides. It is about growing the profitability of our existing business through cost reduction measures and other commercial and operational initiatives. The U. S. Business is a good example of this and I will highlight this region later in the presentation. It is about optimizing our portfolio for EBITDA growth through strategic divestments that we plan to execute over the next three years. And simultaneous with these divestments, we will look to redeploy a portion of our asset sales proceeds towards bolt on investments in our core businesses. It is about achieving an investment grade capital structure to lay the foundation for future growth. As you know, this has been a top priority and it will continue to be so. And finally, to pursue sustainability of our business as we believe this will be a competitive advantage in our industry as well as the right thing to do. Now, before I go into detail into our medium term strategy, I would like to explain to you very briefly about how we responded to the immediate COVID-nineteen challenges and where we stand today. Back in mid February, when the threat of COVID-nineteen was imminent on a global scale, we asked ourselves the following questions: how deep will the impact be, how long will it last, and if it will be recurring. With a high level of uncertainty, we'll roll out three priorities that we believe would be appropriate in all possible scenarios: one, to protect the health and safety of our employees, customers and suppliers two, to improve customer experience and three, to minimize financial risks. Execution on all three of these priorities will assure business continuity. I'm happy to report that we have executed on all three of these. We have experienced much lower levels of infection rates than the national averages of the countries in which we operate. Our existing digital platforms allow our customers and us to work seamlessly in a low touch environment, while our distribution network enabled us to meet surprisingly strong bagged cement demand into most markets. These efforts were recognized by our customers as we obtained the highest Net Promoter Score ever in second quarter twenty twenty. And we nailed down available funding sources, initiated a hard stop on non essential expenditures, deferred CapEx and tightened working capital control, which resulted in 2,800,000,000 of liquidity at the end of second quarter. And finally, we renegotiated our leverage covenants under our main bank agreements to give us ample compliance room in the event of severe market disruptions. Now talking about where we stand today. As you can see, we have experienced a V shaped recovery in most of our markets. This is a result of a combination of market conditions, actions taken by governments as well as by CEMEX. We saw the most significant drop in volumes in April and May due to strong government responses to COVID-nineteen in particular markets. As government actions eased, our volumes recovered. We have been surprised by the speed of volume recovery, the growth in pricing, the strength of bagged cement in emerging markets as well as the momentum in The U. S. Residential sector. Despite double digit drop year over year in consolidated volumes in second quarter, prices for our three products rose between 14% in the first half and increased sequentially from first to second quarter. This pricing performance was due to our successful commercial strategies as well as healthy supply demand dynamics. We currently do not expect a W shaped recovery, but we do expect volumes to bump along in connection with COVID-nineteen resurgence in certain markets. The experience curve of governments, companies and societies to deal with resurgence has improved significantly. So today, we do not expect the sharp declines in volumes that we experienced in second quarter to repeat. The impact should be more localized and should not be occurring at the same time in all our markets. Today, we are more comfortable with the visibility for the second half. July and office volumes were strong as you saw in the previous slide, while pricing continues to grow. We have a healthy order book in most markets going out ninety to one hundred and twenty days. In light of this, we believe that today we can guide to third quarter and full year performance. On a like to like basis, adjusting for FX, we expect third quarter twenty twenty to be 12% higher than the prior year, while full year is expected to be up 4%. We can now unwind some of the precautionary actions we took to deal with COVID-nineteen, specifically to release our excess cash position to pay down approximately $3,000,000,000 of debt in the second half. We are currently working with the banks to amend our $20.17 $4,000,000,000 facilities agreement. We expect to reduce the committed amount by approximately $600,000,000 In addition, we will use some of our liquidity to pay down 1,000,000,000 of the revolving credit facility, which will continue to be available to us and $350,000,000 of short term working capital loans. Finally, this week we called approximately $900,000,000 of bonds maturing in 2024. As usual, given the seasonality of our working capital cycle, we do expect free cash flow generation as well as potential asset sales proceeds to replenish our cash position by year end. We expect the banks to extend the maturity of $1,100,000,000 of term loans to 2025. In addition, the 1,100,000,000 revolver is expected to be extended to 2023. Terms will remain substantially the same. Importantly, sustainability metrics will be embedded in the Facilities Agreement. This will result in one of the largest ESG sustainability linked loans in the world. In addition, we are re denominating $300,000,000 of previous U. S. Dollar exposure under the term loans to Mexican peso as well as €80,000,000 to euros. This will better align the currency of our debt with our EBITDA. This should result in no significant debt maturities until mid-twenty twenty three. The leverage covenant will decline from 7% to 6.25% for the next three quarters. Despite the unprecedented challenges of COVID-nineteen on our 2020 performance, we expect to end the year with a leverage ratio slightly higher than the ratio of point one seven times that we reported in fourth quarter of twenty nineteen. As we guided earlier, we expect fairly flat EBITDA year on year, while net reduction of debt should decline by 200,000,000 to $300 year on year. With increased visibility and higher EBITDA expectations, we also feel more comfortable in rolling out a medium term strategy that takes into account this new COVID-nineteen landscape. Operational resilience is about repositioning our company for higher growth on a risk adjusted basis. The four pillars or elements are about enhancing profitability and EBITDA growth rate of our business, constructing our portfolio around businesses that win growth and achieving an investment grade capital structure while advancing on our sustainability agenda. Now let me go into detail on each of these. Regarding our actions to enhance our profitability, for 2020 we have identified $280,000,000 of cost reductions and upgrading to our previously July '2 '30 million dollars program. We expect most of the cost savings to be recurring. The most significant sources of cost reductions are from SG and A and operations. We will continue to review our cost base over the next three years and identify further cost reduction initiatives. We are targeting an EBITDA margin of at least 20% on East portfolio basis by 2023. I would like to highlight a region, The U. S, where the strategy to enhance profitability has already been put in place and is showing results as evidenced by the increase of 23% in EBITDA and two forty basis points margin expansion in first half of twenty twenty. While some of these improvements are due to the healthy demand conditions that we have experienced and expected to continue, the residential market in particular has shown significant momentum while infrastructure has exhibited healthy growth and pricing continues to remain attractive. But it also reflects the turnaround program in The U. S. That we introduced in 2019. Jaime Mugilo was appointed as Head of our U. S. Business in third quarter twenty nineteen and has been instrumental in enhancing this program. Some of the things we have done are reinforcing our vertical integration, particularly in aggregates and admixtures within our strong footprint, expanding product offerings such as admixtures and direct work, investing in logistics and import facilities in sold out markets, switching to low cost fuels, utilizing low cost country sourcing for spare parts and increasing SG and A efficiency. Finally, we have been incrementally investing in CapEx in high growth markets. We believe these initiatives will continue to pay off in the future. The next pillar has to do with fortifying our portfolio and optimizing it for higher growth and lower risk. As a consequence of COVID-nineteen, we expect the best near term growth in developed markets driven by the unprecedented fiscal and monetary stimulus from governments like The U. S. And Europe. We want to capitalize on this opportunity as much as possible. As I mentioned earlier, we will also be executing some strategic divestments over the next three years. Optimizing this time is not only about deleveraging, but also building a lower risk and faster growing business. We have a strong track record achieving our asset sales programs and we believe there is a significant liquidity in the market today for the right assets. Simultaneous with these divestments, we will look to redeploy a portion of asset sale proceeds towards bolt on investments in our core businesses. I do not anticipate that these investments will represent a material portion of our overall asset sales. We are looking for our portfolio to be more heavily weighted towards The U. S. And Europe. To be clear, I envision a modest adjustment in our emerging market exposure. We will concentrate on vertically integrated positions near growing metropolises as these metropolitan areas are expected to experience the fastest growth rates and will drive our growth strategy. In line with the Metropolis strategy, we will focus on organization solutions, products and services that are all connected to ecosystems of cities like admixtures, concrete products, waste management, prestressed concretes, logistics and transportation among others. Urbanization Solutions will now become our fourth core business. We are in fact already executing on this optimization strategy today. As you can see from this slide, the majority of our recent investments are occurring in developed markets and are focused on growing metropolises. These investments cover our four core products. They include sustainable solutions that increases green energy usage in our Poland and UK cement plants. In addition, we have been developing urbanization solutions such as sub niches in The U. S, fully integrated prefabricated panels in Europe, a waste recycling facility in France and mobile modular hospitals in Mexico to meet COVID-nineteen needs. Currently, approximately 8% of total revenues are generated by urbanization solutions. We expect this business to continue to grow over the next decade. The next pillar is about de risking our capital structure, reducing our cost of funding and ultimately achieving investment grade metrics. We are targeting to be at or below three times net leverage by December of twenty twenty three. EBITDA growth, free cash flow and divestiture proceeds will be important confidence towards achieving this goal. We will also continue to monitor the markets for liability management opportunities. We are pleased with the recent tightening of our yield curve since the last time we tapped the markets because of improved conditions in the capital markets and our own actions. As discussed earlier, we will continue to push out maturities and construct a more attractive debt profile while reducing our cost of funding. We will also look to raise funds in local currency to better align our EBITDA and debt. The remaining of a portion of term loans in the facilities agreement to pesos and euros is an important step. Commitment to climate action is part of our DNA. We are a founding member of the Cement Sustainability Initiative established in 1999 and became signatories to the United Nations Global Compact in 02/2004. We were recently recognized as an A rated listed company by carbon disclosure project, reflecting our disclosure and climate initiatives. Besides being the right thing to do, we believe that climate action will be an important differentiating factor in the future in our industry. Our efforts today have had significant impact. We have achieved more than a 22% reduction in our CO2 emissions from the 1990 baseline, but we need to do more. That is why we defined more ambitious targets for 02/1930 and an aggressive ambition for 02/1950. To reach our 02/1930 target, we have a detailed CO2 road map on a plant by plant basis. On this slide, we have included some of the main levers to reach the goal. I would like to highlight in particular the increase in alternative fuels and reduction of clinker factor as key contributors. Achieving our 02/1930 goal depends on technologies that exist today and that we are in the process of deploying throughout our footprint. We have previously announced our 02/1950 ambition to deliver net zero CO2 concrete. While we currently sell Victoire, a net zero CO2 concrete product line sold in France and The UK, our ambition is to extend it to all our concrete products and applications globally by 02/1950. This will require new products, technologies and global scaling. On the slide, we have listed some of the technologies to achieve this ambition. Some are still in the early stages of development like carbon capture, storage and utilization. The success of these technologies will require innovators to cooperate and share advancements. Operation on climate change has already begun. For instance, we are part of a pilot project, Leyla, working with other industry players and technology providers to develop low cost carbon capture technology for the cement and lime industries in Europe. We are working with our industry, governments, multilateral agencies among others to develop the means to achieve the ambition of net zero concrete. For example, we are founding member of InnoBanding, our research network to accelerate collaboration and innovation on cement and concrete. While we are in a unique position of being fully funded in terms of carbon credits for the next decade, this provides us with a competitive advantage which can fund our climate action agenda. To summarize, we are committed to targeting an EBITDA margin for an at least business of at least 20% by 2023. We will optimize our portfolio for growth by executing strategic divestments while simultaneously redeploying a portion of asset sale proceeds towards bolt on investments in our core businesses. And we will move forward on achieving our 2,030 carbon emission goals. We are confident that operations resilience will lead us to an investment grade capital structure by 2023 and a portfolio with higher growth and lower risks. To finalize, this is how we envision CEMEX by 2023 after we fully execute operation resilience. We will be a heavy building materials company where U. S, Europe and Mexico will constitute a large part of our footprint. We will concentrate on vertically integrated positions near growing metropolises. We will focus on our four core businesses, cement, ready mix, aggregates and urbanization solutions. Digital platforms and a more sustainable business will be important competitive advantages and will engage our clients and increase customer loyalty over the medium term. These initiatives will be complemented by a simplified investment grade capital structure and a competitive cost of funding. All of these of course will create the most important outcome, value creation for shareholders. Thank you all. Now, we are moving to our Q and A session. So back to you, Lucy. Thank you, Fernando. Let me remind you that when you submit your question, please be sure to include your name and company name along with your question. You can can use the q and a option that's available at the bottom of the screen. Fernando, since you made the decision to give me the mic today, I will take full advantage of that and kick start this process, if that's all right with you. My first question would be, could you talk about the sustainability of the cost reduction initiatives that you have laid out? Thank you. Are we listening to Fernando? On the savings we communicated of $140,000,000 for the first half and $280,000,000 for the total year, there might be one offs equivalent to about 20% of that. This is just an estimate. But at the same time, we have had some one offs on the cost side, obviously, still to see what would be the exact balance, but I do believe that it's going to be most of it. On the other hand, we will be through time communicating. But on the other hand, we continue looking for ways to reduce cost and expenses. So I believe there are additional actions to be taken from now to December that will positively impact our cost structure or our expenses, particularly our SG and A for next year. So once we have more detailed info, not only for the rest of the year, but for next year, we will be communicating that part. Because of the concepts we included in our €280,000,000 I think these savings are have already happened, they are quite solid. Thank you. An additional one is that you have laid out a very aggressive plan today. And if you could maybe explain to us how you would balance optimization for growth and achieving investment grade metrics? Sure. Well, maybe we should comment a little bit because you all know you're familiar with the company. You knew our previous plans. So how can we connect one thing with the other? Perhaps the simplest way for me to put it is that we were on our way to obtain or to be back to investment grade parameters. And you know we used to use the December 20, the year, as our date or the base for us for that to happen. It didn't happen. There might be a number of reasons, but for sure, COVID is the most important one. We are very pleased that even with COVID, our EBITDA this year is going to be very similar to last year as you saw in the presentation. And like to like even a little bit higher. But you know what? I do think that COVID took away 200,000,000 to $300,000,000 of EBITDA. And at the same time, as you can imagine, it has postponed most of our M and A activity, particularly divestments. So I think that from now on, even though we have not get the or we are not in investment grade parameters. I think our position is pretty good, and we will continue the process. So that will be kind of delayed because of COVID. It's been very hard to try to define a date or a period of time because we're still in very early stages of the COVID era or the post COVID. We can hardly define this as a post COVID phase that we're about to get there. But the other way I see it, fortunately, we were not negatively impacted in terms of a negative comparison to last year. Now we know that, yes, we were impacted in our EBITDA growth. But I'm sure that will come. So I'm it continues being a priority, but it perhaps is not one of my main concerns because it was happening. It will happen. And on growth, I think on growth, what we are commenting is that is the part that has been missing for value creation in CEMEX for several years now. And that's what we want primarily to address. And I think we can do it. EBITDA growth through margin improvement, as we mentioned. We are not thinking on a target that came out of the blue. Within there, I think we can repeat that with our current portfolio. And on the other hand, it is time for us to take advantage of several business opportunities around our core businesses or the businesses around our positions. I'm referring to additional positions in aggregates, for instance a better integration, particularly in U. S. And Europe, which are the markets that are the most integrated between ready mix aggregates and cement, additional integration in some of those markets and for sure expanding our urban solution for the rest of businesses. I think we have lots of opportunities to explore in products, services as we know in markets that we are in. I'm referring to mortars, screeds, waste management, modular construction units, array of a variety of businesses that we can develop with marginal investments, marginal additional efforts from management because they are in the same market that we are already interested. So that's what I I comment on that. Thank you, Fernando. One last question for me, and then we will go to our audience. But I know visibility is still not great as we move out to 2021 and beyond, but you do now have a medium term plan. And I was wondering if you could comment more on what you expect CEMEX will look like in 2023. Well, I think that by 2023, CEMEX will be a heavy construction materials company, more oriented into developed markets. I mean this is perhaps not new. We've been in developed markets already for ages, but more oriented to those types of markets. Better profitability on a risk adjusted basis. And a portfolio with a much more powerful position in The U. S. And Europe by developing further integration in our businesses an investment grade company with the opportunity to continue growing and developing value for our shareholders, A company that is much more agile, that is managed with a lower investment by applying technology and schemes that we have been trying and from which we are learning. For instance, the recent scheme of managing Europe as a region instead of a group of different units country per country. We have learned a lot from that experience. So I think through time, that's what we can expect. Thank you. And now we will move to the audience. Our first question comes from Ben Thurr at Barclays. Could you elaborate on where demand is coming from that gives you such confidence in the short term? I am looking for countries contributing in segments: infrastructure, residential, industrial and commercial. I'm going to comment a little bit in the case of The U. S. And Mexico as a measure. I mean, the question is referred to relevant business units and those two are the most relevant ones. So in the case of The U. S, as you have seen, the sector that is growing, maybe I should say booming, is the housing sector. Construction is still below the number of houses requested because of the demography issues. Rates are in the low side and seems that they will continue being in the low side. Inventories are between nonexistent to a low level. I learned last week I didn't have that much info, but in the case of Arizona, inventories of houses is one month. So I find that already under the definition of scarcity, not just inventories. But on the other hand, industrial and commercial is impacted because of COVID. And infrastructure that has been growing is kind of stable nowadays. As you saw, we are not providing specific guidance for 2021. That has to wait. The same way we decided not to give guidance in the second quarter of this year because of the lack of visibility. Same story for 2021. Of course, when we have more additional info and in due time, perhaps when we communicate the fourth quarter, we will be more specific on that part. But that's The U. S. And in the case of Mexico, we are very pleased with the way the demand is working. It's evolving. The large projects from the federal government, I'm referring to the refinery, those bocas, to the airport and to the mine train and some others. I mean, I'm just mentioning the big one, but there are some other federal projects in execution. They are providing activity to the bulk and ready mix part of the business. And we are participating in those projects in a significant manner as we always do in the case of large infrastructure projects. On the other hand, if you remember, I think we reported in previous months or last year that different governmental programs were suspended as a natural process. Natural process meaning whenever there is a change in the federal government, there is an adjustment in the market because of different reasons. And then it comes back. And it seems like in this time, it has not been the exception. So we have significant programs on rural roads being built. We are participating in those. Sales construction programs incentivized by Serato, we are participating in those. Building or refurbishing or rebuilding schools, hospitals and other infrastructure elements. And that has been increasing our volumes. Yes, there is a negative impact, same way than in The U. S. No doubt, the economies this year are falling, you name it, from 4% to 10% during the year. That's the range of the estimates in the countries that we participate in. But in both countries, The U. S. And Mexico, our sector is healthy. And that's why we can we have been making the I think the emphasis on why you see that even in the COVID years, we have managed to get good results. And we have mentioned these markets, volumes in markets like Mexico and The U. S, meaning the two of the most important ones is performing prices, solid prices. We are increasing 1% to 4% depending on the product, even though The situation was not necessarily conducive to us being able to get resiliency from prices. And then I think our own reaction was we started calling last March, February, March, the hard stop. Again, if we position ourselves back to February or March, we didn't know exactly what was going to happen. We did know it was not it was not going to be nice, but we didn't know. Remember the three questions. How deep? How long? And is it going to be recurring? So we took very tough decisions in March in March. Now we know that, you know, because of the way the markets evolved and everything, now we know that the result was perhaps we made a mistake. We exceeded certain decisions. But I think it was the right mistake to make, meaning now we are much better off. And the for instance, as you saw, and and the excess cash now we believe is excess cash. In March, we thought it was cash necessary to assure that we were not going to have an issue through through time. Now we consider that excess cash, and we are using it, and we are reducing debt as we already mentioned. So that's what I can comment. Strong markets even with the data in August in Mexico is the bagged cement market is booming. Remittances from The U. S. Are like a lot errors. So all in all, we have a very positive view on these two markets. As you show in the volume chart, the markets that were most affected were our markets in Central, South America and The Caribbean. And then in EMEA, we are combining Europe and other markets, Egypt, Philippines, I think emerging markets like The Philippines were also affected. Now we in all markets, mid and large, markets are coming back, some faster than others. But I think this is the first time that I see a V shaped recovery measured in terms of from last February to August, which is the info that you saw. And it happened, and we are very pleased for it. Thank you, Fernando. We have another question from Alejandro Azar from KBMA. And Jose Antonio, please feel free to jump in on this, but maybe Fernando wants to lead off. Would you give us more color on the sudden change in strategy with a bias towards The U. S. And Europe? Those regions are where most of your divestments came from in the past five years, while you mentioned before a focus on profitable growth regions in emerging markets. Markets? Sure. Happy to jump in. Fernando, do you want to make some comments? Okay. Well, look, first of all, there's a number of factors that is basically that calls for a continuation in our strategy, right? So I mean we have been working towards, let's say, repositioning our portfolio. And yes, it is true that over the last cycles where we have put forward asset sales programs, most of the asset sales have come from developed markets. That is true. And what we've always prioritized when we're thinking about asset sales is the opportunistic nature of the transactions, right? I mean, try to find situations where, number one, our asset is not necessarily at the core of our strategic footprint, for example, but most importantly also that there's potentially a buyer where the fix with regards to its footprint is better or their synergies such that value assigned to those assets by our counterparty is something that is attractive to us. I and we think that we to a certain extent, we have optimized the asset base, let's say, in developed markets such that what remains is something we would like to keep. There will be still some exceptions, fine tuning, but in very minor way. We look forward, the other factor that we have taken into account is the outlook, right, because things are evolving. And of course, we have this big phenomenon or big event, COVID. And as we look forward, we also think that our presence in developed markets will benefit from increased stimulus, fiscal spending, infrastructure development, etcetera. And that, again, reinforces the notion that we are happy with the footprint that we have in developed markets. So as we think about CEMEX going into 2023, we would aim to keep this balance, right? I mean we, as Fernando mentioned, I mean we imagine a company that over time has a higher weighting relative to today in developed markets and Mexico, which is our home market. And all of that suggests that this is the right way to see our strategy or our focus evolving, taking into account sort of recent changes, recent phenomenon. That's what I would say. Thank you. We have a bit of a follow-up on this question. So Fernando, maybe this is for you or for Jose Antonio. Would you consider selling operations in Asia and Latin America? This is from Carlos Ferre Long from Bank of America. Would you consider selling operations in Asia and LatAm? And if this is so, your focus on Europe and The U. S. Would mean lower growth and more stable cash flows going forward? Yes. Well, I don't think when I check and analyze growth of our businesses in different countries in different emerging countries as well as in different developed countries, I do not find pretty significant differences, meaning the level at which our products, the consumption of our products grows in emerging than the other in the markets we are in is not necessarily a differentiator on the one hand. On the other hand, I would like to of repeat of what I already said. We have a portfolio. We have divested some businesses in developed markets like Latvia, like The U. S, like Europe cement and businesses that were not necessarily our core businesses but profitable businesses. So we got a larger position in our emerging markets. We are trying to balance again that situation. Now are we open to divest businesses in either Latin America or in The Mediterranean or in Asia? Yes, are. But remember, if we didn't get to our leverage ratio or if we are not going to get to our target of leverage ratio by December year, At least the way I see it, the part that is missing is the $500,000,000 of EBITDA we lost to COVID that we believe will recover. It will take time. I don't see 2021 already as the exit year for the negative COVID impact, but it will come. And I mean, if you make some basic numbers, dollars 300,000,000 of additional EBITDA plus 1,000,000,000 or $2,000,000,000 of divestments will take us to more or less investment grade parameters. So are we going or planning to divest? Yes, we already mentioned it. To be honest, we never stopped the effort. It is not something that you stop and stop every quarter or every six months. But again, due to COVID, things are paused or delayed, we need to adjust to that segment. We are not close to divesting the markets that were mentioned. Great. Thank you very much. And I said I was done with questions, but I think I'm going to interject one just to bring into the discussion. Maher, could you perhaps just give us an update on where you stand in terms of discussions with the banks? Yes. Thank you, Lucie. As Fernando mentioned in his remarks, in his early remarks, we're quite pleased. The process officially has kind of started. And we're very pleased that today we have, you know, we have very strong indications for close to 90% participation. Know, virtually, you know, everybody has given us an indication that they're likely to go ahead with the proposed financing. As you know, we're extending maturities for our revolving credit facility, which is 1,100,000,000.0 We expect a substantial portion of that, as Fernando said, to be pushed out to 23 by one year. And then, you know, we're expecting close to $1,100,000,000 under the term loan tranche that is coming due to be extended in a bullet format to January and July 2025. We're very pleased by the support that the banks have given us. But also, we are quite pleased with some innovative components of the new facility. Number one, of course, Fernando said, we're reducing the exposure, which is positive. But also more importantly, I think having the sustainability of linkage is a very important feature. It's as we said, it's going to be one of the biggest loans of that nature in the market. The negative impact or the positive impact is not material. I think what's really important is ensuring that the company is hardwiring a level of discipline towards climate change and sustainability. So we've incorporated, you know, we've incorporated items such as, you know, reductions in net CO2 emissions. We've incorporated we're choosing essentially five KPIs, one on net CO2 reduction, you know, power consumption from low carbon energy, quarry rehabilitation, water management and clinker factor. These are very critical components and drivers and enablers of becoming a greener company. And we think it's extremely important to be sending the message, you know, to the market in doing that. The impact in terms of pricing is not material. The issue was really to make the commitments and to keep having this dialogue with the market. The other component that is very important from our perspective and we will continue to make take steps towards is a better alignment between our funding sources in terms of currencies and denomination of our operating cash flows. And in this facility, we're taking advantage of in a positive sense, of course, of some of our banks having greater comfort and willingness to provide us with funding in pesos, for instance, or in euros at attractive spreads compared to what we could get in dollar terms. So we are availing ourselves of a little bit of that. And so the percentage of dollar funding under the facilities agreement, which is going to be around $3,500,000,000 after the reduction, about 10% is going to be shifted away from dollars into mostly Mexican pesos and euros. Of course, in the on a consolidated basis, we need to, of course, add some of the local currency funding that we have elsewhere, such as in The Philippines, for instance, where we have a big amount. And so we're very pleased by those two elements. The other, frankly, is that, yes, we have had to agree or in the process of agreeing on a slightly tighter covenants for the next three quarters. But frankly, the level of covenants that we requested back in May were with a COVID state of mind. Not that COVID has gone away, but as Fernando said, the greater visibility and the both terms of the markets and in terms of our order book is giving us comfort to be comfortable with slightly tighter covenants. The covenants that we're agreeing with are pretty much beyond the three quarters, they're pretty much the same. I mean, we haven't changed anything. So we expect to be very comfortably, you know, within these covenants as the next three years unfold. So we're very happy with that. I hope that answers the question, Lucy. Thank you, Maher. Maybe just following up on that ESG theme, Fernando, we have a question from Francisco Chavez from BBVA. My question is regarding the aggressive goals for reduction in CO2 emissions. Will these goals imply higher CapEx since starting in what year? Well, thanks for the question. Let me start by saying that the reason why we decided to speed up the reduction of our CO2 emissions is because, as we said, it's the right thing to do and society is demanding for that to happen as fast as possible. I think I mentioned that the reduction of 35% of CO2 emissions by 02/1930, which is an improvement from the previous target of reducing 30%, That's a program that has been developed already in previous years. The program itself is not a new program. And every year, we make additional investments in order to increase, for instance, the use of alternative fuels with high contents of biomass or we update some equipment with better efficiencies or we invest in ways for us to use more fillers or more more or or in order to lower our clinker factor, slack, fly ash, tucelance and others, introducing new products to the market. So that's an activity we have been doing and we continue doing. We are just speeding up a little bit those projects. Investments in related on all our investments that we normally communicate, in average, think we have investments for these purposes in the range of 50,000,000 to $70,000,000 That can change from year to year, but that's the range of the idea that I can provide. Again, all projects we are developing for this purpose are on practices or technologies that do exist and that are proven, meaning there are no technological risks to these investments. For instance, we are doing two investments in increasing even further the use of alternative fuels in two plants in Europe, in Rudolf and in Grotby, in order to take that to the range of 60 to 70 to a range of 80 to 90. And another comment I can make is that we shouldn't think on all these investments as investments without return because that is not the case. One of the most profitable investments we make is precisely the type of investments I just described. You know the story in the case of Europe and because of the European waste directives, there is a whole sector related to recovering the energy that remains in waste, household and industrial waste. So in that case, we can use household or industrial waste at very low cost or even at an income in certain conditions. So that is more or less what we are doing. And then on our targets to 02/1950, there is a component of a technology that needs to be developed. The most important one is the technology for the cement industry to capture, to concentrate, to clean and to use CO2. That has to be developed. In our targets for the reduction of 35% to 02/1930, we are not including any reduction for, let's say, a sizable use or a very material use of this type of technology because we are not sure if they will be available and executed already in our plans. We are participating in a number of projects as we speak specific to our industry. And for sure, in the next few years, we will start seeing results from those. Thank you again, Fernando. Jose Antonio, I think I have two back to back questions for you. The first one and Fernando, of course, you'll first check-in. The first one is from Mike Betts at Database Analysis. Please, could you give us further details on what you mean by urbanization solutions? Look, think traditionally, CEMEX has been a company with a main focus in cement, aggregates and ready mix. Over the last years, we have found we have observed a couple of things. One is our interest to focus on main urban areas, metropolis around the world in our footprint and the opportunity to satisfy complementary needs in the markets where we can leverage our presence, our assets, of course, our talent, our resources and take advantage of opportunities that because of the nature of how they are complementary, they are attractive, right? I mean they are low risk because these are markets where we are already present and already have a good handle on market practices, etcetera. We can leverage lever our resources. And therefore, these potential opportunities, which are not super large, can but are many, can yield interesting returns. What are they? I mean, you can think of things that are adjacent or related to our core businesses. You can think of materials. You can you can think of industrialized construction solutions or construction products, and you can also think of, you know, circular economy related activities. No? I mean, some examples, for example, mortars, concrete products, waste management, landfilling, recycled aggregates, all kinds of investments to take advantage of, for example, alternative fuels, waste to energy, etcetera. This is not new for us. If you look at our revenues, for example, I mean, we have over the last year, around 10% of our revenues is in these kinds of adjacent or related activities. And we intend to or we have, as Fernando mentioned, we have incorporated this as a fourth component of our strategy. And you might have recall, we spoke briefly about this in prior events over the last couple of years. And our intention is to have these opportunities, these projects compete in our growth pipeline with hand in hand with other kinds of projects that we have in our, let's say, in our traditional businesses. So we the way we see it is we have cement aggregates complemented when it makes sense for vertical integration purposes with Ready Mix. That's three core businesses. And the fourth one is this umbrella that we are characterizing or naming organization solutions. I think you mentioned two back to back questions, Lucia. I think this was one, right? That is the first one. And the second one comes from Adrian Huerta from JPMorgan. The question is how do you see your revenue mix by product by 2023 versus where it is now given the planned divestments and bolt on acquisitions? That's a good question. Where is it now? And you mentioned revenue and product mix. I think it's probably more illustrative if we focus on EBITDA. When you look at our EBITDA generation right now, around 70% is cement, a little bit under 20% is aggregates, a little bit under 10% is ready mix, and around 5% is urbanization solutions, not this fourth component. Where do we plan on taking this? I think you asked a good question, and I'm afraid I'm not going to be able to pinpoint a particular target when it comes to mix. Why? Because, of course, if we think first, there's many variables here. One of the variables is growth, the growth that each one of these product segments will take between now and 43. The other variable has to do with investments. And I did mention right now, I mean, we see this as hand in hand, meaning we're going to be evaluating these opportunities hand in hand with aggregate cement and ready mix. And of course, we have a very thorough framework, but one of the elements in the framework has to do with potential IRR payback periods, etcetera. So how many of these projects we find over time and which ones have the best metrics will also influence that kind of mix. And the last one, the last variable, which I think is another relevant one is divestments, right? I mean depending on what kind of assets in our portfolio we end up divesting between now and 2023, that can move the needle, right, because we might divest a cement plant or we can divest an integrated business in concrete aggregates. Depending on the region, as you know very well, Adrian, I mean, some regions are only cement, some regions are integrated. So what ends up happening will also play a role in terms of but that's all. In summary, I think all of these businesses, if we set aside I mean all of those things equal, right? If we set aside the divestment variable, all of these businesses, our businesses were interested very interested in evaluating opportunities, compete against each other and then on that basis move forward. Thank you, Jose Antonio. Maher, I think we also have two back to back questions for you. The first is from Vanessa Quiroga from Credit Suisse. You seem to expect fourth quarter twenty twenty EBITDA to be flattish from your guidance, even with the strong margin improvement seen in second quarter and third quarter. Is that explained by anything in particular? First, I was getting worried that I wasn't getting any questions because I thought maybe everybody was like super comfortable with the finance side. So I'm very happy about that. But Vanessa, I'm very happy to, know, you know, we we debated a lot, frankly. I mean, we just remember where we're coming from. We're coming from a situation where, you know, COVID put us into kind of a we had we went through kind of a shock and awe process. And we saw not only the market's expectations, but our own internal expectations for the outcome of this year dropped materially and then correct materially. And as Fernando said, even frankly against our own expectations, I mean, were quite surprised positively every month that results came, how those months were much better than we had expected, which was great. And that was not because of the trading dynamics in our markets, but also because of all of the things that the team put together both on the cost cutting side, pushing delaying expenses and also commercial strategies that have proved to be very successful at the end of the day. So we're very happy with that. And frankly, you know, it took a lot of debate to go from that mindset to a mindset of, you know, giving guidance for the third quarter and for the whole year. The third quarter was easy because we pretty much know, you know, the first two months of the year and we have, you know, an inclination of what average daily volumes in our products are beginning to kind of tick to in September. But we also wanted to maintain caution. I mean, the outlook is still although we have greater visibility, although we feel very good about order books going out ninety to one hundred and twenty days in our major markets, we want to be cautious frankly. So we'll have to wait and see. We do know that last year fourth quarter was a weak quarter. So it is going to be an easy comp. So we'll have to wait and see. I mean, at the end of the day, but we don't believe that there's any kind of structural changes or trend changes that are taking place in the fourth quarter. I mean, there's certain seasonality, you know about that. I mean, I think that's nothing new. So it's really, I would say, just caution and we'll just wait and see how that evolves. Lucy, I don't know I hope that addresses it. I don't know if you have any I think from my perspective, it does. I have another question for you. This comes from Jacob Steinfeld from Ashmore. After paying down $3,000,000,000 in debt in second half twenty twenty, how much cash does the company expect to have as of year end 2020? Well, thank you very much, Jacob, for that question. As Fernando said in his remarks, we're looking at paying slightly more than $3,000,000,000 Remember that you know, we sold several assets. Two of them have closed. One is pending to close towards the end of the year. We also made some small investments. So the net proceeds from investments and I'm sorry, divestments and investments is close to a little bit shy of $800,000,000 So that plus what we did in adding to our cash position, you know, we're looking at mostly unwinding all of that. Now on average, the business requires around $3 to $400,000,000 of cash. This is treasury cash, which is probably about 150,000,000 to $200,000,000 depending on the quarter in end of year accounting cash. So when I talk about cash, we're talking about real treasury ready to spend money. We need about 3 to $40,000,000,350,000,000 And that has been the case for the last two to two point five years. So with the kind of target of unwinding most of the increase in debt and using most of the proceeds from asset sales and assuming that we closed the last transaction that is expected to happen by the end of the year, we should end the year, I don't know, probably 20%, thirty % more than what we need. But it's important to note that we will do so with the majority of the revolving credit facility becoming or being available to us. So effectively between the facility and the cash position, we should have, I don't know, somewhere close to about 1,000,000,000 of cash capacity, you will. A little bit less, maybe a little bit more, but that's roughly the same. Now that is a little bit different than where we started this year. If you recall, we started the year with a balance sheet cash position of close to 800,000,000 And then we had the revolver, which was $1,100,000,000 fully undrawn when we started the year. And that was on the back of having issued a big bond in November. Now the reason we had that level of excess cash, let's say, know, power was because we were expecting the not only the seasonality of the first quarter and first half of this year, but also we were expecting to pay down the convertible 05/21. So I hope I didn't take too long of a kind of detail for the answer, but we do expect to continue to maintain above normal cash requirements. In addition, we expect to have pretty much the full amount of the revolver available, giving us a very good cushion for liquidity going into 2021. I hope that answers the question. Thank you, Maher. And Fernando and Jose Antonio, I think this next one probably makes sense for the two of you. It comes from Ann Millney at Bank of America. Regarding the strategy to shift more towards developed markets, how do you reconcile this with the much higher margins in emerging markets such as Mexico and other countries? Well, two comments from my side, maybe Jose Antonio can complement. First, it will take time for us to make a material change in the composition of developed and emerging. So don't expect for that to happen in six months or a year. Second, I think we commented that we believe that on a risk adjusted basis, our portfolio will be more resilient and prone to create value. That's what we believe. And that's what we will be reporting as long as we make progress in this process. I don't know if you want to comment anything on that. No. I agree with you, Fernando, of course. Okay. And moving on, on the and I think it's more or less a little bit the same. This next question comes from Gordon Lee at BTG Pactual. Why to tilt away from emerging markets where specifically in the decision to buy CLH minorities would at the surface look to be a move in the opposite direction? Should this be seen as a first step in a broader reorganization of CEMEX's emerging market portfolio? Well, I think buying the position in CLH makes sense economically, makes sense on us simplifying the managerial structure. It reduces some cost and expenses by not having those assets as public assets. And it simplifies our capital structure. So it makes sense. Does this mean something else? Well, again, I think in the previous question, I said we are not we are open on divestments. Although, I also mentioned an amount, meaning, yes, we need to do more, but which is not necessarily, you know, that relevant. But we are open to different assets. It's very challenging for us to be more specific because, as you know, we do believe that pieces in of assets in our portfolio are very valuable. And at the end, we will do what opportunistically it's better in order to create value through those investments. But it's open. Okay. Thank you. Next, we have a question from Antonella Rapuano from Santander. We saw a surprisingly resilient retail segment in emerging markets, mainly in Mexico. Which were what were the drivers behind this good performance? Do you see any risk of a lag COVID economic impact on this segment yet to be seen? Well, it's still precisely still to be seen. I think because of we commented, I think we have gone through the worst, although COVID although we are getting into a phase or we are already in a phase in which we are going to be living and doing business coexisting with the virus because of how much governments, health, especially sort of how much we have learned, what we don't see is a repetition of second quarter somewhere in next year. So there might be delay effects in some sectors in some markets. Don't believe that they will be synchronized and they will not be as deep as they were in the second quarter of this year. I already mentioned, for instance, in the case of Mexico, I did mention the type of projects or incentives for bank cement, rural roads, schools, self construction and others. That I already mentioned. But what I didn't mention, maybe I should clarify that, is just for you to remember that in Mexico, the lockdown of the construction activity didn't impacting the retail part of the business, meaning selling back cement in material stores was not interrupted in general terms. So that did help during the worst part of the COVID crisis in the second quarter. Fernando, you aren't off the hook yet, and maybe either Jose Antonio or Maher want to join. But continuing on the same theme, we have a question from Rodolfo Ramos from Bradesco. Strong double digit volume growth seen year over year seen in Mexico in August. Can you talk about the main drivers, the sustainability of this growth? And how does the government's stance towards infrastructure projects play into your view? I think you've covered the first part maybe a bit, but if you could expand on the infrastructure piece. Well, I'm going to risk being repetitive. But again, remember that in Mexico, at least, mean, the industry is cyclical everywhere. But in Mexico, when there are changes from one federal government to their successors, particularly when the new federal government is from a different political party, transition tends to be tougher than normal times. So we saw that. I mean, last year was the first full year of a new government. So remember, we well, you have the info. You saw the info, and we did comment on governmental programs suspended. For instance, the housing the regular annual housing program from the federal government was not announced, not as far as I remember. So there is a factor which is the government already taking control and being more in charge of what they have to do. So what we see now is those housing programs being developed, rebuilding schools program being developed, the new rural roads building in the South being developed, plus the large infrastructure projects that are being executed at speed. Most probably have that info because that's communicated once a week, think, at least once a week. And the projects are really advancing at a speed, all of them. So I think that plus remittances that every time I see a dozen remittances is that they are higher than the previous record they are setting. So I think all of those reasons are completely offsetting the negative part, meaning the formal economy dropping 2017, '20 '18 in a quarter, almost probably around 89% during the year. And again, as I mentioned, during the second quarter, the distribution of bagged cement was not locked down. That's also very important. And to some extent, at least in the first two months, March, April, I'm sure of May, we saw an effect of some construction companies buying bags because bulk cement was not available. So that supported the bag cement during those two, perhaps three months. Thank you, Fernando. And now we have a question on The U. S. That perhaps you or Maher, whichever would like to take. The question is from Adam Thalhsimer from Thompson Davis. Can you please comment on U. S. Cement pricing? Comment on U. S. Cement pricing. Well, the question is too open. So whenever I get an open question on prices in The U. S, what I can tell you is that we have already sold out The industry I I don't have the data per, you know, per per per per or per plan, but just the the regular numbers. The industry should be very close to being sold out. Sold out in some markets and still not sold out in others, but getting closer to it. So I think additional growth, it has happened in the last few years. There are always inputs. But additional growth has to be served with additional inputs. And inputs are more expensive than locally produced demand. And of course, on inputs, you need to pay for transportation to inland markets. So I think just the dynamics of the market do suggest a better probability of prices gaining the rain that we the prices in nominal terms in The U. S. Are record prices, but that's nominal terms. But I think perhaps same than Europe. The industry still needs higher prices to assure proper profitability. So, these years in particular, I should mention also, plans for price increases were impacted. Some of them were suspended. Some of them were delayed. But even even with with that impact, I think we are in in good shape. If activity continues, which again, I think we already mentioned infrastructure being stable, housing booming and industrial and commercial affected, I think next year also will be a positive year for pricing. Fernando, maybe, Lucy, before maybe the next question, I'd like to complement Fernando's comments on the pricing. I mean, in The U. S, you know, seeing kind of a level of timidity primarily driven because of, you know, lack of visibility on demand in terms of pricing that was supposed to happen earlier in the year, you know, many players including ourselves did go ahead with mid to high single digit percentage price increases in several markets. I mean in Texas, in Arizona, in Colorado. And those markets are experiencing those pricing dynamics gradually. And we're seeing reasonably good absorption given, you know, given what we expected and given the backdrop. I think what's really to complement what Fernando said about, you know, sold out markets, California is a perfect example. California is the supply demand dynamics are very tight. Logistics, because of COVID, have added another layer of complexity. Nothing peculiar. I think logistics have suffered challenges in every business, frankly. And so as a consequence, as they say, the most expensive cement is the cement you don't have. And so the market definitely reacted with because of the sourcing dynamics and difficulty and all of that has translated to probably a more successful pricing dynamic in California. And that the expectation honestly is that if we continue to see the tightness that we're seeing is that it should be a good positive impactor as the year progresses for pricing in The U. S. Markets. And the same is true for aggregates. And probably the same is true also for ready mix because the construction activity continues to tick along. And housing is coming back very, very strongly. I mean, think we're running at peak level of starts and I think there's probably three to four months worth of new home inventory, single family new home inventories in the market and the demand is very strong. And as mortgage rates continue to work their way through the system, we're seeing more demand. And so all of these dynamics, I think are likely to bode very bode well, let's say, for pricing environment in The U. S. Business. Great. Thank you both. And now we have a question, a little more global, from Bruno Amarin from Goldman Sachs. To what extent was the resilience seen in second quarter driven by one off factors such as government support to the company and also to consumers in the countries where you operate? Those could fade out in upcoming quarters, while the macro picture is expected to improve globally. Which force will be the strongest in your opinion? Fernando, would you like me to take a stab at that? Or would you like to Go ahead, Meyer. No, I think, Bruno, it's a very, very good question and we struggle with that ourselves. I mean, right, you can imagine after thinking things were going to be so bad, now feeling like we're going to be closing the year kind of flattish to last year, I think it's a little bit better. Of course, we need to bear in mind what Fernando said in his remarks. I forget it was in the remarks or the Q and A. But we came into year, if you recall, giving any numbers from our side, we started this year with consensus for EBITDA for CEMEX close to $2,600,000,000 And just to remind the audience, last year's EBITDA was 2.3 percent and a fraction. So there was an expectation by the market, which probably also reflects our expectations starting the year. And then we had COVID and we thought it was going to be much worse and now we're coming flat. So, you know, we don't think that growth has disappeared. I mean, if anything, it's being augmented. And while, you know, we're not providing, you know, outlook for 2021 and it's very early, I think we need to kind of take a look at the fundamentals, right? Think when we take a look at the world around us, albeit from lower levels, I mean, The U. S. Is expected to grow next year from a historic drop in EBITDA. Mexico is expected to grow from a very deep drop in economic activity. Europe is probably going to recover. There's a debate on what that will do. And then very importantly, we need to also take a look at China. Because China this year is probably going to grow somewhere in the low single digits and the consensus for next year is that it's probably going to be growing at high single digits. So on a global basis, the there are some big overarching demand dynamics there that cannot they're not all going to be not happening and they're not all going to have a negative or neutral impact on consumers. The other thing is when we talk to our bankers frankly, especially the guys that are the part of the banks that are keeping the checking accounts for people in The U. S, for instance, what we're hearing is that a very sizable portion of the fiscal stimulus monies that have been injected into the economies, both in The U. S. And in Europe, have not made it out of the banks. So we do think the consumer is being very cautious still because worries about employment, because of worries about COVID, because of a number of things. So while we have seen reasonably good behavior on the consumer side, there's definitely a cautious behavior, which, you know, which of course, if the economy start growing as even slightly, and if we see that governments and countries and citizens are able to deal with COVID better, which we are seeing. I mean, you take a look at what's happening in The U. S, for instance, we're seeing cases rise, but when you take a look at hospitalization and fatalities are actually going down. And that is probably because of the learning curve. Virtually everybody around the world is getting a better learning curve of how to deal with this virus. So the comfort level complementing these dynamics is also gonna be helpful. So I don't know. I mean, it's too early to tell. I would like to maybe ask Fernando to help me out here. I think it's too early to tell. But, you know, when you put the pieces together, it gives us room to be a little bit, you know, cautiously, let's say, optimistic. But beyond that, Fernando, I No, I don't have nothing to add to what you just said, Marco. Thank you. Thank you, both. I know we've gone over a little bit to designate time, but if it's all right, we do still have some questions. So I would like to continue if that is all right. We have the, I guess, the next question from Silvia Bihio from Itau. And the question is, are you considering at this point an IPO of The U. S. Business? I realize the intention to shift the portfolio to developed markets, but a U. S. IPO can provide attractive currency to make further acquisition in developed markets in The U. S? Well, no. I mean, the answer is no. We are as of today or we not have any specific plan on IPOs, additional IPOs. And if I can comment if I can just add a little bit to Fernando. I mean, I think the philosophically, I think Fernando commented about a simpler capital structure. And I think the transaction that was announced CLH is taking us the other direction, right? I mean, we're if anything, we're going to more simplification rather than complexity in capital structure. So and again, as Fernando said, I think the focus is on bolt on acquisitions or investments in core businesses that have proven track record. I mean, are businesses that we've been operating successfully. And sure Jose Antonio and his team are have their calculators ready to make sure that the internal rates of return are value creative and fairly rapidly in that order, adding to EBITDA to the business. Thank you very much. Maher, we have another question, I think, that falls into your toolbox. This comes from Andrew Belton at CreditSites. How much confidence do you have that once you have reached investment grade credit metrics, you will actually be upgraded by the rating agencies? Is there a feeling from the company that an IG rating might prove constraining from a portfolio optimization point of view? Well, I mean, first, would like to say that for many, many years, we've had a terrific relationship with the rating agencies. It has been open, transparent, frequent and they're privy to all of our thinking, frankly. And we feel good about that relationship and we understand the actions that have taken recently. Having said all of that, we have no idea once we get to what we consider to be investment grade metrics, when that will happen. I mean, are many obviously rating agencies are their decision process is much more complex than a couple of metrics. There's a whole environmental framework that they look at, very holistic depending on what's happening in the cycle and all of that. I mean, we feel, you know, we don't see any major divergence. So that's why we're not focusing on actually getting the rating, we're actually achieving the capital structure. And we think the rating will follow on at some time. Now what is important is that the capital markets, which have the impact on cost of funding and availability of funding, We feel that especially in The U. S. Market, in the dollar U. S. Market, we feel that the efficiency of price discovery for our credit risk is very efficient. And it is it rapidly reflects the either the deterioration or the improvement of our credit metrics and the environments in which we operate. So I think from a natural impact on CEMEX, the rating, of course, is super important, absolutely. But I also think that from an access to the capital markets at attractive rates as we improve our capital structure, I think the capital markets will reward us and have rewarded us in the past. And as you've seen even in the last two, three months, I mean, our yield curve has rallied materially from the last time that we issued our bond in early June until now. Mean, obviously, because of the markets, but also because of perception of improvement of our business. So I hope that answers that question. Lucy, what was the other I forgot the other piece of the question. It is that, is there a feeling from the company that an IG rating, if it was achieved, might prove constraining from a portfolio optimization point of view? I would like to ask Fernando, I don't if you want me to address that or would you like to address it, Jose Antonio? Go ahead, Michael. I mean, I don't think those two things are mutually exclusive. I mean, I think that, you know, and let's not forget that, you know, for a very long time, we, you know, we achieved the investment grade and we were conducting our business, as well as one could do. So we don't see those two things as mutually exclusive, frankly. And frankly, I mean, when you think about it, I mean, I don't want to throw any numbers, but just food for thought. You know, you can run the numbers and figure out the sensitivity of our leverage for every $100,000,000 of EBITDA up or down. It's, you know, every $100,000,000 up is a little bit, you know, like 0.2 of a turn in terms of leverage. And then, you know, you could kind of work your way around it and you realize that really there's not a lot of, you know, mutual exclusiveness between getting to investment grade and, you know, optimizing our portfolio in the next two to three years. And that optimization that is that may have to be driven by the journey towards investment grade is actually fairly narrow. I mean, it's fairly small. So that gives us a lot of flexibility, frankly, on portfolio optimization. I don't know, Jose Antonio, if you want to add to that. No, Maher, I agree with you. Great. Thank you. Thank you. Great. Well, I think that unfortunately we have run out of time. So I would like to thank everyone for their attention and their time today. And I would like to remind you that a replay of this event will be available later this afternoon via a new link on semix.com. Thank you all. Yep. Thank you. Thank you very much. Goodbye.