Ladies and gentlemen, and thank you for waiting. Welcome to LPS conference call to discuss the results regarding the third quarter of 2019. Here with us, we have Marcos Lopes, CEO, Francisco Lopes Neto, Vice President, Robson Paim, CFO and New Business Officer, Beatriz Lavieri, Investor Relations Officer. We inform that this event is being recorded, and all participants will be only listening to the conference call during the presentation of LPS Brasil. After that, we will start the Q&A session, when further instructions will be given. Should any of you need assistance during this call, please ask the request of an operator by pressing star zero. This event is also being conveyed simultaneously via web, at the internet via webcast. It can be accessed at www.lopes.com.br/ri, where the presentation is available. Slides will be controlled by you.
The replay of this event will be available shortly after it is ended. We remind you that participants via webcast can record via website their questions to LPS that will be answered after the conference call ends. Before proceeding, we would like to clarify that comments that may be made during this conference regarding the business prospects of the company, projections, operating and financial goals are based on assumptions of the company's management. Future considerations are not a guarantee of performance since they involve risks, uncertainties, and assumptions, and refer to future events that depend on circumstances which may or may not occur. Investors and analysts should understand that general conditions, industry conditions, and operating factors may affect the results of the company in the future and lead to results that differ materially from those future statements.
First, Marcos Lopes will make the presentation of the operating results. Francisco Lopes will present the CrediPronto. Beatriz Lavieri will present the financial results. Then we will have the Q&A session. Now, I would like to turn the floor over to Mr. Marcos Lopes. You may start.
Good morning, everyone. Thank you for attending one more conference call for LPS Brasil. Here with us in this presentation, we will have our Vice President, Francisco Lopes Neto, our Investor Relations Officer, Beatriz Lavieri, and our CFO, Robson Paim. Before we start the presentation with the operating and financial results of the third quarter of this year, as usual, I will make a brief comment about our positioning in the current moment of the real estate market. During the first nine months of this year, especially starting in March, the recovery signs of this industry became more evident, especially when we look at the state of São Paulo. Looking at the data from the metropolitan area posted by Secovi, we see that the total units launched was 64% higher than the first nine months of 2018 and 47% higher when compared to the number of units sold.
In the same period, Lopes has shown its preparedness and capacity to generate new business, exceeding the performance of the market with an increase of 66% in units launched and 53% in sold units, also in the metropolitan area. Now, speaking of the third quarter, the company has had a growth both in launched volume as well as PSV of units sold with regard to 2018, especially in metropolitan area, growing more than the market in both. Even with the impact of July vacation, which is bad for the supply as well as for the demand in this period, we had a notable performance considering the segment we operate in. And I reinforce that we continue to be sure that the best is yet to come and the economy shows the first signs of recovery.
When we look at the success of fundings that have been held recently with a capital injection in the real estate market, there are signs of optimism on the supply side as well as on other agents of the market that by investing in this industry, show confidence that a new cycle of upward trend is starting. Now, combining these macroeconomic incentives and industry incentives with the lowest interest rates in historical levels, inflation under control and increase in the cap value of real estate properties that qualify for SFH to BRL 1.5 million, there is a generation of a favorable environment to boost demand, creating new opportunities for the real estate market. With that, both Lopes as well as all its stakeholders will be benefited.
Finally, I would like to take this opportunity to make a brief comment about the recent initiative, which was very successful. As already disclosed in October, we announced and completed the public offering with restricted efforts with funding of BRL 147 million. With this movement, Lopes prepares to accelerate its development in the digital market, which will be part of all the business segments we operate in, always aiming at offering an excellent experience for all those involved in the process of purchasing and selling a real estate property. Currently, many of the issues related to these topics are strategic and therefore still confidential.
We would like to say that we are working with full dedication on this project, and its development will be presented by us in a timely manner. Now, I would like to start the presentation with slide number four, with the highlights of the third quarter of 2019. On slide four, in the first chart, we see the main operating highlights. In this period, Lopes participated in the launch of 40 new developments, which account for a growth of 26% of the PSV launched when compared to the third quarter of 2018. Looking at transactions closed in the same period, we had a growth of 43% when compared to the third quarter of 2018, closing the period with BRL 1.3 billion.
Considering our operations in the city of São Paulo, Lopes reached the growth of 59% in the volume launched and 146% in intermediations compared to the third quarter of 2018 for both. Once more, CrediPronto continued to present solid results, financing BRL 416 million in the third quarter, which is 32% higher than the same period in 2018. Now looking at the financial highlights, we have a growth of 58% in net revenues, which added to BRL 38 million in the period, a reduction of 14% in the operating costs and expenses, which reinforces the good leverage of the company. As a result, we closed the third quarter of 2019 with an EBITDA of BRL 14.2 million and a margin of 37%.
In the quarter, we had a net income of controlling shareholders before IFRS of BRL 3.2 million compared to a loss of BRL 9.3 million in the third quarter of 2018. There was an improvement of 134%. Now moving on to slide number six. Let's look at the operating results in the state of São Paulo, segmented between the capital of São Paulo and the other cities. On the left of the screen, we have the results of the capital. Starting with launches, we see a growth of 59% in this quarter when compared to the previous year, totaling BRL 2 billion. Looking at transactions closed in the same period, the result is 146% higher over the same basis of comparison.
We reinforced in one more quarter the solid recovery of this area, which, because it's one of the highest economies of the country, tends to be more responsive to improvements in the macroeconomic scenario. When looking at the results of operations from other cities in the metropolitan area and the interior of São Paulo state, we see the launches were 23% lower in this quarter than compared to the same period in 2018. But still, there was a stable result in terms of demand. The recovery of these areas will be higher when the improvements in the economic scenario really have a real impact in the population income, which is not so easy to perceive now.
As a consequence, they consolidated the launches and the transactions closed in the state of São Paulo, we have a concentration of 84% and 81% in the capital, respectively. To complete, I would like to say that considering the units launched only in the metropolitan area of São Paulo in the third quarter 2019, we had a growth of 83% when compared to the third Q of 2018, with a growth of 45% in the market, according to Secovi. This data shows a growth of 9 percentage points in the market share of the company in this period when compared to the previous year, reaching 41%. Now, continue on slide eight.
We can see the total PSV launched by Lopes in the period. On the chart on the left side, we see a comparison of PSV launched between the third quarter of this year and the third quarter of last year, where we see an improvement of 26%, totaling BRL 2.6 billion distributed in 40 different projects that together add up to 7,974 units launched. Looking at the regional distribution, we have 92% concentrated in the state of São Paulo, which can be segmented between capital and other cities of the metropolitan area and the interior of the state, which had respectively 84%, 11% and 6% of share. The remaining 8% was shared between the states of Paraná and Ceará. Now continuing on slide nine . We'll talk about the total transactions closed by Lopes in the period.
Looking at the first chart, we see a growth of 26% in the business conducted by the company in this third quarter when compared to the third quarter of 2018, totaling BRL 2.1 billion, of which 61% refer to our own operations and 39% came from franchises. Considering only our own operations, the transacted PSV was 43% higher than the third quarter of 2018, adding up to BRL 1.3 billion. As we discussed already, most of this development come from the growing of the market in the capital of São Paulo, as seen on slide six. However, some regions, as Rio de Janeiro, Paraná, and Espírito Santo, should evolve more gradually because each of these regions have their own socioeconomic characteristics that influence the impacts generated by the economic crisis.
Looking at the franchise segment, we had transactions of BRL 799 million in the third quarter of this year's close, 5% higher than the same period of last year. The difference between this variation and those presented in previous periods is due to new franchisees. There is recent members of Rede Lopes that are adapting to the model and haven't yet fully obtained the benefits of selling in a network model. On slide 10, we'll see the results of sales by region. Looking at the geographic distribution of our own operations, we see a concentration of 68% of transactions in the state of São Paulo, followed by Paraná and Rio de Janeiro with 17% and 6% respectively. Other operations, such as in the states of Espírito Santo and Ceará, add up to the 9% remaining.
What's more, we can see that São Paulo has an important share of the results of the company, with an increase of 16 percentage points in this quarter when compared to the same period of 2018. Currently, our own operations are represented by 15 stores distributed in the cities we commented on. On the chart on the right, we see the geographic segmentation of franchises that confirms the importance of the state of São Paulo for the real estate market, which represented 59% of transactions closed among the 59 franchise stores. After São Paulo, we have the second largest economy of the country, Rio de Janeiro, that was responsible for 25% of the business conducted by Rede Lopes in its seven franchise stores.
As mentioned again, the highest representativeness of Rio in PSV, but not in the number of stores, is due to the fact that one of the stores also closed sales launches that adds to the potential of its result and reinforces the influence of Lopes brand in other markets in addition to São Paulo. The southern region closed the quarter with 15 stores and 7% of transactions, and other locations with 10% distributed in nine different stores. Before moving on to the next slide, I would like to say that we ended this quarter with a new store in Goiás, in Goiânia, and it's the first franchisee in a new state since we started this new type of business.
I reinforce therefore that we continue to grow Rede Lopes network, focused on creating a network that is more solid and has high added value for franchisees and for the brand, and of course, for the end customer. Therefore, our value chain will be translated in the results obtained by the company. Now continuing the presentation, we will move on to slide 11, where we will see the results of the sales over supply and sales over launches speed. Let us start with the analysis of indicators of sales over supply in the city of São Paulo. There has been an increase in 4.8 percentage points in sales over supply in São Paulo. In the third quarter, 20%, closing the period at 17%. This is due to the increase in transactions closed in the primary region, primary market in this region.
The second chart, we see a reduction of 3.2 percentage points in the speed of sales over supply in the capital, which totaled 15.8%. This is due to the fact that most transactions closed in this period also included sales of launches of previous periods due to the high volume of launches in the second quarter of 2019. Now looking at the results of the company as a whole, we have a sales over supply of 10.8% in this quarter, 1.6% higher than the same period of last year. This variation is due to the fact that, a lthough we have a significant growth in transactions in this period, there is also an increase in the total supply, which is a reflection of the improvement in launches observed recently, which has an impact in the calculation of this indicator.
Looking at the speed of sales over launches, we see a negative variation of 8 percentage points, totaling 15.1% at the end of the third quarter. This reduction is a result of the same factor observed in the capital, but higher because of a more gradual recovery of launches in other markets. Still in this slide, we can see the distribution of transactions of Lopes, closed by Lopes. We see that in São Paulo, 73% of transactions closed refer to the second and third quarter of this year. This is as expected already because in addition to being a market in which the know-how of the company is concentrated, it is always also a segment that more in tune with the consumption patterns of upper middle and middle upper class, given the different payment and financing conditions.
Looking at the distribution for the group as a whole, we see a more balanced division, 56% from recent launches, and 44% from launches over 180 days. This is explained by the reduced level of recent launches in other areas in the fourth quarter of 2018, which continue to generate new business. These were my comments about the operating results of the company and highlights. And now I turn the floor over to Francisco, that will talk about CrediPronto results, and then Beatriz will speak about the financial results of the company. Thank you.
Good morning. Thank you, Marcos. Now speaking a bit about CrediPronto. It is important to see that we maintain a significant growth in origins, originated businesses. In this first nine months, we had a growth of 46%. Also we see a growth of new contracts. We see an average of 460 new financings per month. This is due to the services we rendered that is differentiated. It adds value in terms of time to the customer. And we have the trend of evolution, which has the BRL 460 million of contracts that started in the third quarter of this year, the highest volume we reached. It is also important to mention that the net income of CrediPronto in these first nine months has been very high, and the operation generated BRL 233 million, of which BRL 14 million is referring to Lopes in the joint venture, Lopes share.
The net income amounted to BRL 32 million. The portfolio where the profit comes from remains growing at BRL 5.91 billion, as you can see in the lower chart. These contracts are added every month, and they offset the prepayments that are growing due to the increase in the portfolio. These were my comments about CrediPronto. Now turn the floor over to Beatriz, our IRO, Investor Relations Officer, to talk about the financial highlights. Thank you.
Thank you, Francisco. Good afternoon, everyone. Now let us talk about the financial highlights of the company on slide 16 with the reconciliation of gross revenue. Currently, there are three main sources of revenue: revenue from brokerage fees in the segment of transactions and royalties paid by franchises, and CrediPronto revenue that is divided between the commissions of finance volume and profit sharing of JV. As shown on the chart on the left, the gross revenue from transactions closed are calculated by multiplying the PSV by net commissions. This was 2.10% with a revenue of BRL 26.6 million.
I would like to highlight the improvement in the net commissions when compared to last year, especially due to the increase in commissions in the São Paulo capital, which closed the quarter at 2.35%. This is a result of increase in the average ticket of units sold in this region, which shows the improvement in confidence in sales of middle and upper middle income launches. Now looking at the chart on the left, we see the upfront recognition of Itaú of BRL 3.6 million, which is recognized throughout 20 years of CrediPronto contract with no cash effect on the company. And finally, we have commissions of 1% on the volume financed by CrediPronto that, together with the profit sharing of JV, added BRL 9 million in addition to royalties from franchisees totaling BRL 12.4 million in the quarter.
In the following slide, we see net revenue and the costs and expenses of the company. Looking at the net revenue, we can see a growth of 58% when compared to the third quarter of 2018, totaling BRL 38 million in the period, of which 70% referred to revenues from transactions closed, 22% from CrediPronto, 8% by franchises, which is an important channel to obtain real estate financing, which has a strategic contribution to other business segments. On the chart below, we can see that all segments had a considerable growth in revenue. We highlight CrediPronto with an improvement of 214%, mainly due to the receipt of profit sharing of JV, something that did not happen in previous years due to the accumulated losses as we saw on slide 14.
On the right, we see operating costs and expenses for the quarter, which total BRL 24.2 million, in line with the projection of the company and 14% lower than the third quarter 2018. This shows the good leverage of Lopes that despite the increase of 58% in revenue, had a reduction in cost and expenses. After talking about revenues and expenses on the following slide, we see a comparison of EBITDA and the net income for controlling shareholders in the quarter. The company's EBITDA went from a - BRL 3.9 million to + BRL 14.2 million with an EBITDA margin of 37% in the period, which naturally reflects the operating efficiency of all our segments as we'll see in the following slide.
Likewise, the net income from controlling shareholders before IFRS and the second quarter, BRL 3.2 million, reverting the loss of BRL 9.3 million and an improvement of 134% when compared to the same period in 2018 with a net margin of 8%. This is the result of the combination of factors that I just mentioned. Slide 19, we see the results of the quarter by segment before IFRS effects. We can see the contribution of the several businesses of the company. As I mentioned before, in addition to the improvement in transactions closed and operations from franchises, we had a strong contribution from the revenue coming from CrediPronto that now becomes a recurring revenue from profit sharing. This, combined to the adequate level of cost and expenses, resulted in a positive operating margin in all segments of the company and 37% consolidated EBITDA margin.
Looking at the results of the income line, bottom line, we had a negative contribution from transactions closed, that ended the quarter at BRL 1.6 million of losses, but it was offset by other segments, which allowed us to end the quarter with a net income before minority shareholders of BRL 6.5 million, 17% net margin, and after minority shareholders of BRL 3.2 million income in the period. On slide 20, we see that in this quarter, we had a small variation of BRL 511,000, mainly composed of accounting effects of variations in records of calls and puts in the period, as highlighted in the slide and shown in previous quarters' calls. Again, it's worth remembering that the effect of combination of business observed in IFRS 3 do not have a cash effect on the company. We recommend analyzing our results without these effects.
Finally, on slide 21, we have the cash variation in the period and the total cash available for the company at the end of the quarter. On the left side, we have the cash generated from operations, which was - BRL 177,000 due to the payment of higher taxes in the period due to the improvement in revenues of the company and a reduction of tax benefits because losses had been reduced. In addition to taxes paid, we also had a cash disbursement to pay expenses already provisioned by Patrimóvel that this quarter amounted to BRL 3.2 million and were already foreseen in the negotiation concluded at the end of the second quarter. Now looking at investment activities, we see a cash burn of BRL 2.8 million due to the development of digital initiatives of the company that demand investment in technology.
Finally, we have cash generated by financing, which totaled BRL 4.2 million at the end of the quarter. In this line, it is included the credit loan, signed with Itaú Bank with an additional amount of BRL 7 million in August and payment of dividends to our shareholders and partners of CrediPronto. The amount to be paid of this loan is BRL 12 million at the end of the quarter and will be paid in monthly installments until September 2020. Combining everything, we ended the quarter with a cash of BRL 19.8 million with an increase of 7% when compared to the second quarter. As to trade receivables, we totaled BRL 25.2 million, with total cash in banks and trade receivables adding up to BRL 45 million.
To end, I will announce that we completed our public offering, which allowed us to increase our available funds at BRL 147 million, and allow the company to advance in digital initiatives and technology investments. These were the starting remarks, and now we will move on to the Q&A session. Thank you.
Ladies and gentlemen, we will now start the Q&A session. To ask a question, please press star one. To remove your question from the queue, press star two. Please wait while we collect the questions. We have a question from Mário Galvão of Tork Capital.
Please talk about the pipeline of launches outside of São Paulo.
As I told you, Mário , the pipeline is growing. It is still not at the pace of São Paulo, but of course, influenced by the low interest rates and the improvement in economic indicators in terms of macroeconomic indicators. We believe this pipeline will grow even more. It still presents a modest growth, but we have an upward curve. We know that the wave always starts in São Paulo, the first wave, and the second wave happens in other cities and towns. So the signs are all favorable. This is what I can say right now.
Excuse me. This ends the Q&A session. We would now like to turn the floor over to the CEO of the company, Mr. Marcos Lopes, for his final remarks.
Thank you all very much for attending this conference call for the third quarter of 2019. This has been a very important quarter for us because it confirms the growth of the company that was announced and confirmed. And the first half of this year, t he third quarter is usually lower than the second quarter, but it confirmed an improvement when compared to 2018, which confirms that we are on the right track and our initiatives have been fruitful, and we are very optimistic about the economy and the growth of Brazil. Every day here, we wake up thinking that the future is bright. Thank you very much and have a good day.
The conference call of LPS Brasil has now ended. We thank you all for attending. Have a good day.