Morning. Welcome to the video conference of M. Dias Branco with reference to the results of the fourth quarter of 2024. We have with us Gustavo Lopes Theodozio, Vice President of Investments and Controllership, and Fábio Cefaly, Director of New Business and Investor Relations. We inform that this event is being recorded and that during the presentation of the company, all participants will be only listening to the video conference. Afterwards, we will begin the question and answer session for analysts and investors. The translation is available clicking on the interpretation button. For those listening to the conference in English, the original audio can be silenced by clicking on Mute Original Audio in the lower part of the screen. This session is also being done simultaneously on YouTube at www.youtube.ri.mdias.
We would like to also clarify that any declarations that may be made during this video conference relative to the perspectives for business of M. Dias Branco, projections and operational goals and financial goals constitute beliefs and premises of the management of the company, as well as, based on information currently available, involve risks, uncertainties, and premises as they refer to future events and depend on circumstances which may or may not occur. Investors should understand that economic conditions of the industry and other operational factors can affect the future performance of M. Dias and lead to results which differ materially from those expressed here. We would now like to pass the microphone to Gustavo, who will begin the presentation. Gustavo, please go ahead.
Good morning.
Thank you. Good morning to everyone. Welcome to our results call, earnings call. We count on the presence of all of you. Thank you for counting on all of your presence once again. I would like to start reinforcing the fact that at the same time that 2024 was a very challenging year, principally in relation to the macro issues, we made a series of measures to improve the company. We increased the volume and increased our margins. Listing a little bit of these actions, I think it's important to mention the consolidation of the commercial team. Now, under a single leadership, we have no more the division of defense and attack, and we're seeing already better dynamism between the teams with this unification, capturing synergies and negotiations with clients in a much more consolidated way.
The creation of a team of commercial excellence brought us new indicators and tools to better accompany our performance, and today, we know exactly what are the opportunities that we have at the point of sale and with the product mix, the number of stores, items per store, allocation of promoters, and commercial factors as well. The allocation of the team, the revenue management team, and the financial team, as well as unlocking the commercial team with the administrative team, has also improved the controls and pricing, as well as the management of the commercial budgets. The food service team, which has a giant market, was created with a strategy, with its own marketing strategy for trade and pricing, and is already contributing to the growth of our business in flours, margarines, and fats, as well as with the conquest of new clients.
It continues as an important pillar of growth. It increases the profitability. At this point in time, the idea is to focus on releases that are relevant. We have said internally that there are very few. We want to make few and good releases, more focus on quality than quantity. The international business is in a very good point in time. We have margins in relation to 20%-23%, as well as good news with the acquisition in Uruguay of Las Acacias, which continues to grow. We're also opening new channels, new sales channels, for example, in the U.S. with a business of our own brand. On other fronts, we have made important advances, which have helped us to increase profitability.
In October, you accompanied as we did a structuring with the reduction of 150 people, employees, and third-party workers in different levels of the company, trying to reduce fixed costs and transferring the production of pastas from Madureira in Rio to other units. In January of this year, we've already stopped the production of cookies in the Lençóis Paulista factory in interior São Paulo. Beyond that, since the beginning of 2024, we closed three distribution centers. All of this guaranteed improvements in our fixed costs and eventually in our SG&A. We continue strongly in the discipline of our cost management. In the fourth quarter of 2024, as you saw, we had the return of the level of 20% in net revenue in our SG&A. This has already been executed with items that have already been executed or are underway. We are continuing confident that we're on the right route.
We continue to be prepared and involved for the challenges of 2025. The results of the fourth quarter of 2024 improved in almost every line compared to the previous quarter. This reinforces that we're heading in the right direction. And we closed the year with a net debt of zero, which is very important at this moment of high interest rates. At the same time, as we are prepared for investments which contribute to the realization of our strategies of growth with profitability. And finally, always attentive to the needs of our stockholders, starting in April, we will pay dividends every month, BRL 0.03 per share as an anticipation. As different from the previous policy of BRL 0.06 per quarter, we will now pay BRL 0.09, which will be an additional 50% over the previous level. We're the only company in the sector with this practice.
I'd now like to pass this over to Fábio to go into the presentation and go into more detail on our results. And in sequence, I will be back for the Q&A session. Thank you very much.
Gustavo, thank you. Thank you all. It's a pleasure to be with you, to count on all of your participation in our fourth quarter call for the year of 2024. I'm going to start the presentation with the end of the introduction from Gustavo in relation to the changes that we've made to improve our policy of dividends. And it's important, I think, to share with everyone the history of this. By 2020, up until 2020, we paid 40% of the distributable profit in dividends or in interest on capital, remembering that the distributable profit is the total profit without not including fiscal incentives and reserves.
We maintain the same practice today in the definition of what is distributable net profit. In 2020, we increased the payout from 40%- 60% and created the quarterly payments of BRL 0.05 per share, which is in anticipation of that amount, which are paid during that same period of time, complementing to arrive at the 60% in the following year. In 2023, with another type of evolution, we went from 60%- 80% of the distributable payout, and we've corrected this BRL 0.05- BRL 0.06 per share. At this moment, we're making another structural change, which we're doing in our policy. We are maintaining the same 80% payout, starting in April of this year. The payments will be monthly, BRL 0.03 per share per month, which will be 9% per share per quarter, or 60% more than we paid in the previous policy.
All of this, since 2020, is looking at the investors, these different profiles, both institutional investors as well as individual investors, and seeks to attract and retain investors in our base with a policy of remuneration which is conducive to the balance of M. Dias and our perspective for results. Looking at the results of the quarter in the year, the principal highlight this year, as Gustavo mentioned in his speech, in line with all of our challenges, the challenges which we faced in 2024, but also all of the evolution that we've done in our company, execution, both from the point of view, commercial point of view, as well as logistics, industrial, the back office areas as well. We've seen part of these benefits in the last quarter when compared to the results of the third quarter.
There has been an improvement in all of the lines of results. The net revenue in the fourth quarter was 4% that registered in the third quarter. Remembering that historically, we have a seasonality, an unfavorable seasonality from the third to fourth quarter. At this point in time, we actually had growth in revenue of 4%. This growth in revenue came both through the growth of volume as well as the growth of average price. The highlight of the average price from the third to fourth quarter was principally in the product mix, which is something very important which we're working on for the improvement of the results in the medium and long term.
EBITDA was 55% above that registered in the third quarter, and the net revenue 42% above, and the generation of cash was BRL 160 million, 160% higher than what we saw in the third quarter. The numbers for the year are here in the lower boxes. There was a retraction in revenue, a little bit of retraction in volume, but basically, this retraction was due to the falloff in average prices up until the third quarter of the year, and the volume was retracted by 2%. These are the EBITDA numbers, net profit, and the BRL 592 million generation of cash in that period. Advancing to the chapter of market and net revenue, the first information that's important is in relation to the numbers of the market. Here, these are not numbers of M. Dias.
These are numbers of the two principal markets in which we operate, the cookies and the pasta market. In the cookie and pasta market, when we compare the fourth quarter of 2023 to the fourth quarter of 2024 and the full year of 2023 versus 2024, this market grew by revenue, total sales in the market in value. There was a growth in volume. Consumed 2% more in volume, measured in kilos or tons compared to 2023. And the units sold grew by 4% compared to the quarterly comparison and annual comparison. And the average price remained stable in relation to the annual comparison and grew by 3% in the fourth quarter of 2023 compared to the fourth quarter of 2024.
This growth of average price is related to the increase in the cost of palm oil in dollars this same period, and also with the devaluation of the real, things that we will approach in the next image. In the pasta market, we saw growth. It grew by 1%, and in the quarterly and in annually, 2%. The volumes grew by 3% in the quarter and 5% in the year. And the units sold grew by 3%, 10%, and average price fell off by 2% or 3% in both comparisons. We believe that this retraction has a direct relation with the falloff of the price of wheat in dollars, which happened over the length of 2024. And we'll be looking at this a little more closely in the rest of the presentation. Looking at net revenue, we open it by volume and average price.
Here we bring the evolution over the quarters from 2024. As I've mentioned here, in the comparison between the third and fourth quarter, there was a growth of 4% in net revenue. In the comparison of the fourth quarter to the fourth quarter of 2023, a contraction of 10%. This contraction in this quarter year- on- year is related directly to the fall in volume, which we see here in the graph, in the central part of the graph. Here, it's important to remember that in the fourth quarter of 2023, we supplied our clients, our retailers, for a change in the operating system, which occurred in January of 2024. We commented about this in the first quarter of 2024, which was a change in our system, a successful change.
We did not lose any market share, and we guaranteed the supplying of our clients. And this involved a sell-in by M. Dias to the retailers a little bit lower in the first quarter and a little bit lower in the fourth quarter, which created a base of comparison, which was a little more difficult for the volumes of the fourth quarter of 2024. The average price here sequentially improved in the third quarter, principally due to the mix of BRL 5.7 per kilo- BRL 5.8 per kilo from the third to the fourth quarter. Here's the revenue that we commented on the third quarter, the new model of release of our results, where we published the net revenue in three product categories. The first, remembering that involves the categories of cookies, pastas, and margarine. The second, which is the refining of oils, [Foreign language], and industrial oils.
This is a relevant part, which is the food service, as Gustavo mentioned. We created an area which is 100% dedicated to this channel and to these clients, and the third group, which is called adjacencies, items which have brands Jasmine, Fit Food, Frontera, and items of toasts, cake mixes, healthy cake mixes, sauces, and seasonings, which have an average price higher than the other categories and with potential growth, which is higher. From the third to the fourth quarter, we presented growth in net revenue in all three of these growths of these categories. The first was in the grinding and refining of oils, and in the adjacencies, which grew by 5%. These are numbers already passed. The volume grew, average price grew, and net revenue grew by 4%. Market share. Here's the market share for the year 2024 compared to 2023, so the consolidated for these two periods.
In cookies, which is our principal category in revenue, we presented growth of 0.2 percentage points. In pastas, small retraction of 0.1%. And flour, wheat flour, which has grown a great deal, had growth above 1 percentage point from 2023- 2024. Looking at the three principal categories of M. Dias, which are more than 70% of our business in terms of sales, we have gained market share in two of the three categories, and we had a small retraction in pastas. Here, we'd like to point out some of the launches, some of the releases that we've done in 2024, and with which we have expectations, which are very positive for the results of these items in 2025. The first in the category of pastas, which is a new Lamen, M. Dias Lamen, with zero unfried, with more flavor. It's less sodium.
It contains vitamins and is being sold in some of our brands. The principal is the Adria brand. This is a launch which involves great deal of CapEx over 2023 and 2024. We made important investments, and today is the moment to supply the retailers and gain traction in these items. Piraqué, which is our second largest brand, which was acquired in 2018, a product which is the head of the Piraqué, which is Goiabinha, this cookie which you see in the middle of the slide, and we last year, cookies, sample Goiabinha, with flavored Goiabinha, the only one in the market, sort of available in this point of sale, with a high price, an excellent price, an excellent product with a very good margin.
In the healthy foods category, we launched a product which is unique in the market, where it's called Fit Food, which is a cookie made out of rice, alfajor de arroz, bitter, chocolate milk, milk chocolate, and so forth. In the two extremities, we have on the left and right. These are chocolate bars also of the Fit Food brand, which were launched as well. There are several sweets, which are not on this slide, which are also excellent products which are already available in the points of sale, not only in supermarkets, but in other points of sale as well, and there's an expectation that there would be important sales of these items in other channels.
In the line of healthy foods, Jasmine, which is a brand, a company which we acquired in 2022, a brand which is very relevant in the Brazilian market of granolas, gluten-free products, cookies, and other items, always along the line of healthy foods. We launched these granolas in unique portions, which also attends a different type of consumer, another moment of consumption, and the premium granolas of Jasmine, both in salty as well as sweet. Here, one is based on cacao. It has a low carbohydrate corn, and these are products which converse with our strategy of sustainability. These are products which are carbon neutral by compensation. Before we're going into the session of costs, EBITDA, and profitability, and before getting to our cash position, it's important for us to share with everyone.
Since the quarter in which we've had several extraordinary items in our results of EBITDA and our quarterly EBITDA and also our annual EBITDA numbers. We talked about this in the release, which was filed on Friday, but it's important also to give visibility and recover these concepts, so beginning with this first line of the slide, in the fourth quarter, we had items which were very favorable and several unfavorable items. The favorable items improved our results, and the unfavorable reduced our results, and the balance of those two categories was BRL 79 million of increase in results in the fourth quarter. BRL 131 million is made up principally by two subjects, credits related to taxes and subsidies that we received since 2024, and the return of the provision for PLR due to not reaching the goals which had been established for 2024.
These are two events which were accounted for in the fourth quarter. These unfavorable events, we also, at the end of the third quarter, we communicated that in October, there was a process of restructuring involving the disconnection of 850 employees and some third-party workers. Normally, when this happens, we have the expenses related to the dislocation of these people, which fell in the month of October, and this generated an impact which was unfavorable of BRL 52 million for the year. Looking at the annual results of the same BRL 52 million, plus the stop during January, which we communicated in the call of the first quarter, which involved a shutdown for the loss of contribution margin of BRL 60 million. These were the events, extraordinary events, which happened in the quarter. These also had an impact in the results, on the annual results.
Looking at the section of costs and expenses, before we go into the EBITDA, the three principal variables which impact our costs, our variable costs. First, wheat, which shows the evolution of the price of wheat in dollars per ton from January 2023 until December 2024. The line below that shows palm oil, dollars per ton. And the third line, which is the actual exchange rate, the real to the dollar exchange rate. So what we see in wheat, which connects a little bit what we saw in that first slide, the dynamic of the cookie and pasta markets, the wheat fell in price over these months and ended the year at $223 per ton, below the $224 of December of 2023. However, there was a period, especially in the second quarter, where wheat went up. As we explained in the call of the third quarter, wheat went up.
We put a price on the market. The market did not accompany it in this, but an unfavorable impact on our volumes, our sell-in, which is the sale to retailers in the third quarter. And at this moment, at the third quarter, at the end of the year, it was stable for several months and fell off a little more in the fourth quarter. Palm oil showed stability from January up until mid-March or April. And then, due to climatic questions in Asia, as well as in South America, palm oil in dollars presented an important increase, but in closing the year at $1,497 per ton, a value well above the end of 2023, which was $1,129 per ton. These items are negotiated in dollars, so the exchange rate also had an important relevant effect on our costs and also our results.
This devaluation of the real began here between April and May, gradually increased, and also our costs until the exchange rate arrived at BRL 6.1 per $1 at the end of the year. When we translate these curves into what happened, the results in terms of gross margins, we closed the quarter with 33.5% of gross margin. This amount, this percentage, has an impact on extraordinary items, favorable items. When we remove those items, we get to a gross margin of 30.2%. Why did it go down compared to last year? Basically due to a lower dilution of costs, fixed costs due to lower volumes from the fourth quarter of 2023 to the fourth quarter of 2024. In terms of variable costs, it fell a little bit at the first quarter, and afterwards, it went up during the year.
As palm oil and the real went down in value, the other side of this equation, average price, had a retraction at the beginning of the year due to this, due to variable costs, but then it was recovered, and we saw that the entire industry, especially at the end of the fourth quarter, fell in the direction of doing gradual readjustments in prices. In relation to our logistics network, this was a point which we mentioned in the third quarter. This was one of the priorities for us. Looking at the year of 2024 and 2025, we increased the manufacture of pasta from Madureira to other units. We moved it to other units to obtain greater operational efficiency and greater agility in the logistics and delivery of these products.
All of the expenses related to this movement were accounted for in the month of October, which is also one of the extraordinary items which we mentioned. In January 2025, we deactivated the production of cookies in the Lençóis Paulista factory in the interior of São Paulo, reallocating that production to other units. This, from the standpoint of manufacturing, when we look at the logistics, which is the delivery of our items to our clients, in January 2024, we deactivated the distribution center in Belford Roxo in Rio de Janeiro and in this January 2025, we've deactivated these two DCs in Aracaju and one in São Luís, both with the focus on the optimization of the logistics network and reduction of costs. Going through the SG&A, which are expenses that are administrative and general expenses. In nominal terms, we had a total in the fourth quarter of BRL 480 million.
This number considers several extraordinary numbers, which are favorable, which added up to BRL 25 million. So even if we return this BRL 25 million to this value, we still have BRL 505 million of total SG&A in the quarter, below that which was registered in the third quarter and well below that which was registered in the fourth quarter of 2023. So this gave us 19.3% of net revenue, and adding that BRL 25 million would be a little bit above 20%, better than that which was presented in the first, second, and third quarters of 2024. And looking at the expenses for the year, in 2023, we had BRL 2,223,000 in expenses. In 2024, we had BRL 2,166,000 in expenses.
Even with inflation in that period, a large number of our line items in expenses are in a continuous process, a rigid continuous process of revisiting constantly and continuously all of our structure of expenses to be able to have a value, an expenses value, below that which was registered nominally in 2023. The return of the quarter was BRL 335 million. I passed over the non-recurring items in the accounting presentation to get the 14.3% as an EBITDA margin. We closed the year with BRL 1,198,000 a margin of 12.4%, a net revenue of BRL 177 million. In the quarter, better than the previous quarter, with a net margin of 7%, and the net profit of the margin was below that of the previous year, totaling BRL 646 million.
Going now to the chapter on cash generation, debt, and investments, we had a generation of cash, both in the quarter as well as in the year, and a cash consumption of working capital in the year as well, which is evident here looking at the three principal lines of our working capital graph: suppliers, clients, and stocks. Looking at the line of suppliers, as well we looked at in our expenses, had a lower amount of expenses. We also had a lower amount of purchases, and we financed a little bit less those suppliers in this comparison of these two periods. In the third quarter of 2024, the line of receivables is stable, 60 days last year in the third quarter and in this year, and our stocks represented a worsening result compared to the third quarter of 2023, but better compared to the third quarter of 2024.
The comparison with the fourth quarter is explained by the movement which we did, where we supplied our clients more in the third quarter and closed with a lower level of stocks, and the volumes sold in the third quarter of 2024 were below that which we wanted, and we wound up with that quarter with a higher level of stock, which was adjusted by the end of the fourth quarter with a positive evolution of volumes sold and consequently of volumes produced. With that in the perspective of leverage, we closed with a leveraging of practically zero in the fourth quarter, with a position of net debt of BRL 25 million. After the seventh year in a row, we have the highest rating available by Fitch Ratings, which is AAA with a stable perspective, which was reconfirmed.
Our gross debt, which is basically equal to our cash on hand, was BRL 2.3 billion, BRL 2,390 million, and more than half of that is in long-term debt, principally starting from 2028. Investments in the year in CapEx added up to BRL 304 million. Below that, which was registered in 2023, only 17%. Mentioning that the principal highlight were the investments for the changing of our ERP, switching over our ERP, which happened in January 2024, and a relevant part of the CapEx for this process happened during 2022 and 2023, which is the principal reduction of CapEx from 2023- 2024. Remembering that everyone heard our strategy, a strategy of growth with profitability, looking at three pillars of growth.
One is an up-to-date business, looking at Brazil as one whole commercial area, but this directorate has a team which goes all the way down to the details of each point of sale, from the macro to the micro in the smallest details. The other categories that we saw grew by 5% from the third to the fourth quarter in the healthy foods, snacks, and cake mixes and toasts, and international, as Gustavo mentioned, did very well in 2024 with growth in revenue, which was above 20%, and also with growth in volume. This is all supported by a continuous program of productivity and efficiency, which was evident when we saw the SG&A of the fourth quarter.
Reminding you that the actions underway, which were defined in the third quarter for the recovery of our results, both from the commercial standpoint as well as from the point of view of profitability and consolidation of the commercial team into one directorate, as Gustavo mentioned in his speech, the optimization of our structure, which brought some momentary expenses and non-recurring, as we've opened and also started to present several benefits, especially in the most recent months, the final months of 2024. The creation of the team focused totally on food service, the adjustments in the logistics network, as I've mentioned previously, the question of pastas in Madureira, the factory in Lençóis Paulista in the interior of São Paulo, and the DCs which were closed.
The allocation of the management team of the management of revenue, the vice presidency of investments and controllership, which involves principally the processes of revision of prices, price adjustments, and control of commercial budgets, as well as campaigns and other budgets. In exportations, we went more than 20%. Consolidation of commercial excellence, as Gustavo mentioned. We have brought excellent results for our day-to-day control, allocation of our budgets, and the coordinated efforts for the reduction of our SG&A. This part of the call, the chapter regarding ESG. These are our indicators, which are very detailed in the earnings release, caring for the planet, believing in people, and strengthening our alliances. We have a new indicator, which is in relation to the movement of 100% transparency, which is also detailed in the earnings release.
To close, we want to mention here and thank all of those investors, analysts who accompanied the company, other agents of the market as well, and principally our collaborators for recognition of all the hard work and dedication and all the challenge that they have given us going forward. These were some of the premiums and recognitions which we received during 2024. With that, we will close this part of the teleconference. Quick go over to the Q&A.
[Foreign language] Q&A session for investors and analysts. If you would like to make any questions, please hit the raise hand button. If your question has been answered already, please feel free to leave the list clicking on the same button. Please wait one moment while we collect questions. [Foreign language] Our first question comes from Guilherme Palhares, from Santander. Mr. Guilherme, your microphone is open.
Good morning, Gustavo and Fábio. Thank you for taking our questions. I wanted to hear from you a little about the reorganization, capacity, distribution centers that you commented. We've done a lot in the fourth quarter, and I wanted to hear a little bit about what we can expect going forward in terms of fixed costs, what is the impact of these changes, all these actions. I'm going to flip that a little bit because we're seeing investments which are being made and questions, and I'm trying to understand a little bit how you see the return on these investments. And the second question, I wanted to understand a little bit more when we look at 2025. You commented that a lot of internal adjustments. As I understand, Gustavo was speaking about having less launches, but launches that are more assertive.
You commented a little bit on investment and marketing and the portfolio of commercial expenses for 2025. What we can expect looking at this growth, these changes in exchange rate? We could speak a little bit about what you're seeing in the way of budgets for 2025 in the lines of commercial expenses.
Guilherme, thank you very much for your question. We start with marketing. At the beginning, the idea here is to focus more on the operations which are relevant. We started trying to do a lot of things all at once generates a distraction. So the prioritization is key in this process, especially in a moment, in a difficult and challenging moment which we're going through here in Brazil.
The same thing that we did in our strategic plan, Fábio presented the three main pillars to grow more in Brazil, entrance to new categories, and also the step towards internationalization. We focused a great deal on organic growth in Brazil because in 2021, 2023, we were basically working on these three pillars: growth in Brazil with the attack plan, investing in new categories, whether it be through research and development, but also through acquisitions, for example, Jasmine, Latinex, Fit Food, and Frontera, and going into the international markets, such as the purchase of Acacias in Uruguay. So it was a total attack which we had designed previously with several consultancies.
So it's good in the sense that we were able to amplify and advance in these areas, but you also end up not going ahead as much as you would have liked to in some of those levers, which was the case of the growth in Brazil. So the volumes were stable. What we're trying to do now is to [Foreign language] via M&A [Foreign language] Brazil and our vision where the biggest opportunities are. We're investing a little bit in our marketing. We spent a lot of time organizing these brands. We have a lot of brands in the company, and we divested several low-price brands. We had a lot of work. [Foreign language] grew a little bit.
This growth of brands did not convert into higher volumes, so the same size of investment in marketing and revenue, the company will continue to do in investing, however, focusing more on trade marketing from the point of sale, in detriment to those budgets which are more aimed at brand construction. Not that we want to end our project of construction, but we're trying to focus a little more on actions aimed at the point of sale, and therefore more connected to growth in volumes. The strategy of marketing, as you mentioned, the company is attacking all of the pillars that take us towards profitability.
If we look at revenue, this work that's more aimed at the point of sale, marketing, and commercial area, accompanying these changes, more aimed at the point of sale, and also in the revenue management, pricing, we unify these two regions, attack and defense, strengthening our negotiating power with our clients, and there's been an important change underway in the commercial areas that we are able to seek these additional volumes. While these volumes are not yet a reality, what we're doing is reorganizing the company, looking at our logistics network and our manufacturing network so that we wind up with large reserved capacity. Since the volume did not come, we're going to change our structure. We're going to modify our structure, not closing units, but deactivating some, but when we see that the volumes have come back, these factories will reopen.
In fact, our plan is to not close factories, but to build more factories. We have capacity for investment for this. However, the Brazilian market is stopped with growth of the GDP below 2%. So at a moment like this, we have two options: either wait for the volume to grow or seek an optimization while this doesn't change. So that's what we've done.
It's the fruit of this modification of our reserve capacity to make it more adequate for the needs. This also helps in the reduction of SG&A as well as in our costs. It increases the utilization of some factories to reduce our fixed costs. We're also doing a series of activities. There's no silver bullet here, but in SG&A restructuring, as Gustavo mentioned below the closing of our DCs, we're making more investments in marketing. We're freezing openings. We're reducing expenses with trips.
We have more than 30 different levers in the company. We have a team oriented towards accompanying and looking at all these levers for the control of SG&A expenses. So while the economy does not take off, we're doing our homework here at home, maintaining our costs and expenses under control. In terms of strategy, that's it. Looking forward, we perceive that the exchange rate hit us greatly in our second quarter of last year, going above six. But during a good deal of time, it was a little bit above or below six, but this gave a strong pressure on our costs for the entire market. So it hit us all. From what we've started to see in 2025, the growth of inflation picking up. Everyone has been pricing this change into their products. You can do this in the most recent readings of the IPCA.
These most recent readings, at the moment, we're looking at practically almost every category. So if I'm not mistaken, Porto Alegre, in the category of cookies, the biggest increases were in the regions in the northeast. So we see that the companies are advancing their prices. M. Dias is following the same route because it's fundamental for us to protect our profitability. So the market price movements, internal organizations, bigger investments in marketing and the trade, control of the optimization of our DCs and manufacturing plants, and the optimization of SG&A. Putting this all together, even in a more difficult market, the company is very optimistic in relation to 2025. We do not expect spikes in results. We don't see any spikes in results, either in volume nor in profitability. It's a process. However, it will be a lot of hard work.
But we do believe we're not able to foresee that evolution will stop. It will be sequential, but it will continue. We saw this in the fourth quarter, compared to the third quarter, and it should continue in 2025.
Gustavo, thank you for those [Foreign language]. If I could add just one quick follow-up. You spoke about 850 people computing these movements of 2025. Was that all in 2024?
This is Fábio. Good morning. Just to, as you commented here and complement what Gustavo said, in values, these movements which were done in the manufacturing plants, annualizing these costs and disconsidering the values amount needed for these movements, we get close to BRL 30 million of fixed costs in reductions. Looking at the question of manufacturing, Madureira and Lençóis Paulista, in relation to the DCs which were closed, we have another BRL 10 million in reduction of logistics costs.
So if this happens, starting from the moment that we no longer have these expenses for these changes. Independent of numbers, we have to maintain that relation of SG&A to net revenue of close to 20%. We had important growth last year. Our SG&A represented approximately 26% of our net revenue, which did not happen due to a lack of control, but happened due to a revenue in terms of prices since net revenue fell. But when you look at the absolute numbers, the absolute, which was in 2023, and the amount of SG&A for 2024, even with the inflation that we've seen in this month, which is why the interest rate is so high and inflation is high, the company reduced in absolute numbers, reduced its SG&A numbers. So it's very much connected to net revenue.
But even so, no matter what the scenario is, all of our efforts will be aimed at maintaining this level of close to 20% of our role in these costs of firings related to these 850 people, were accounted for in 2024, in the fourth quarter of 2024. They've already been included.
Thank you, Fábio.
[Foreign language] .
[Foreign language], Gustavo. Fábio, [Foreign language] . Thank you for your questions. I just wanted to add on to this question about the gradual improvement for 2025 and try to make this relative to your competitive capacity and capacity for pricing you've seen in the first quarter. And according to the IPCA, as was commented, we've seen increases in pastas and cookies. But how do you see these price increases in the competition and in yourselves?
Bring a relative analysis of how are your prices compared to the industry overall after there have been price increases, price list increases, and talk a little bit about this point and how has been the reaction on this line of these potential increases with competitors. This would be the first question. And the second question, talking about the efficiencies in SG&A. Efficiencies, looking at it from another angle, some years we talk a lot about the Multiplique problem, the problem of efficiency, which you delivered successfully two or three years ago. What it seems to me looking at this fourth quarter is that the nominal SG&A will be as relevant as the program which we saw a few years ago.
So with the same volume going up, so I wanted to understand from you, due to the cuts that were made in SG&A, where do you see any point of risk for the performance, the top-line performance, due to the magnitude of adjustments in such a short period of time? Or to understand if you see any point which demands more attention, looking at this efficiency, this general efficiency. Those are my questions.
[Foreign language], Gustavo. [Foreign language] . Okay, Gustavo, thank you. Good morning. In relation to the price increases, we put out a new price list by the end of last year. It went into effect in the end of January. We're doing it in a different way. We're trying to find a strategy, but we're not publishing. The channels will come first.
We're doing it in a way that is more structured and not just once, but not in all markets and not in all regions. It's very clear to us that our clients were expecting our movement. Since it's something that's more unified, looking at these increases that were lower, so we're trying to not publish too much the strategy of pricing, but there is a new price list. We haven't had any relevant pushback from the clients. We started with the principal channels, the most relevant channels for M. Dias, and we understand that the trade is understanding the clear understanding of the motives of these increases due to the numbers from the end of 2024 and beginning of 2025 that pressure our costs, and so now we see things have calmed down a little bit, but there's still strong pressures on costs. So I would say it's going well.
We haven't had any relevant pushback. The changes that we've done here of SG&A are various. We're talking about the factories. The effect on the top line has been zero on the contrary. Finally, we have a lot of capacity in other factories. What we've been able to do is rebalance this without any loss of volume, with the optimization of our production lines without loss of volume. So we haven't had any impact on our top line. The other evolutions that we've seen in our vision do not generate any impact on our top line growth, especially the DCs which were in markets that we were accompanying very closely in Maranhão. We were able to attend very well, even without these DCs. So we have the manufacturing plants very close to those regions, and so in our vision, all of those changes were made and discussed with our clients.
We haven't had any type of loss of level of service or that would affect our top line. It's a process which we're constantly analyzing. It doesn't end here. Eventually, these volumes will come back and the market will improve. These DCs can return to being reactivated. If there's any relative impact, which was not foreseen, we're not imagining that, we can reactivate these DCs. In my vision, no cost reduction has any impact on the top line. There are five agencies of sales promoters for trade. We made an important bid with them. We picked up the two best and closed with the best, one of the two best. They're getting a bigger contract on level Brazil-wide. We have better bargaining power and have been able to make a very good negotiation with them, both for M. Dias as well as for the agency.
Things like this have generated an effect and improvement of our expenses, SG&A, but in our vision, do not impact our top line because they don't generate any gap in work or investment for the commercial area. Basically, it's just renegotiation exchanges. We're very optimistic that it won't have any effect on our top line.
[Foreign language]. I just wanted to add one quick thing. The question of the manufacturing network and the distribution network, the investment, the heavy investments have been made in recent years in technology and systems and processes that have wound up permitting these movements which have occurred at the end of last year and the beginning of this year.
As Gustavo mentioned, we closed two DCs, but we've been able to attend the demand through other units.
There's an important evolution in the process of planning and demand, allocation of stocks in the different units, and S&OP improving the level of service. These movements will not compromise in any way our growth plan.
[Foreign language]. Leonardo, your microphone is now open.
Good morning, Fábio and Gustavo. Thank you for taking my question. I wanted to come back a little bit to one of the initial questions of Guilherme in relation to the question of operational efficiency, which you've discussed a great deal, or operation of the manufacturing plant. If you could comment a bit, these adjustments should all be positive from the standpoint of productivity and efficiency. Increasing volumes in a factory closing. Why factory Y, which was more expensive, perhaps.
When we put this in perspective with a dynamic of looking forward, the price of [Foreign language] has come down a little bit. Palm oil has gone up quite a bit. At the beginning, there's a lot of volatility, exchange rate volatility. However, it lowered a bit the pressure on prices from the exchange rate. These new factories in these conditions and the cost of [Foreign language] are all these being captured, all these in this work against you, do you think? For example, increasing your exposure to palm oil prices. This is all being done in the dynamic of innovations in the portfolio. If there's any lack of operational efficiency, innovation, which when we look at this in the most recent numbers, it could hurt your gross margin, but increase your EBITDA. This might appear in your results. These two points.
[Foreign language] .
Fábio can mention, okay? Leonardo, [Foreign language] discussed for years, something close to 150 launches. It's a lot of launches. Talking about all categories in pastas, cookies, and so forth. It could be even a change in packaging. However, there's an internal process. It's a lot of things, so a lot of these launches, we perceive that these did not go to the market as they should have, so it was a question of execution. It's very difficult to manage 150 launches at once during one year, so the change in this area has a lot to do with doing fewer and better launches and with our capacity to do a good introduction of these launches in the market. Because just doing it doesn't solve the problem.
Just to increase the number of SKUs, if the execution is not well done at the point of sale, we're not going to capture this in volume or results. So we started, we continued with these launches. The company is not doing any type of launches. It does not have added value that we've mentioned, better than the M. Dias averages, and we'll continue. The problem is we are going to try and reduce a little bit the number of launches so that this can be better. In terms of palm oil, as you mentioned, the exchange rate improved a little bit, which was unfavorable at the end of the year. Wheat was favorable, going up a little bit. Palm oil really has been the big offender in terms of several questions. We had the limitation of exports from Indonesia, Malaysia, the principal producers.
Latin America also, especially in Brazil, Colombia has pressured prices a bit. But all of these changes in DCs and factories do not impact the level of exposure of these commodities. We continue maintaining the same policies and capacities for storage. The company did not deactivate any silo or capacity for storage of commodities. It was basically the operation which was trimmed down due to logistics or in production line in some ways, in the case of Rio for pastas and in the case of São Paulo for cookies. So there hasn't been any impact on our commodities or the exposure to commodities. In terms of operational efficiency that you mentioned, we have monitored very well or very closely all of the indicators of services, OTIFs, to guarantee that these changes have not generated any type of trauma on our clients.
We've seen that this migration has been done in a way that was very, very soft, with no impact on our lines of attention.
Hi, this is Fábio. The BRL 30 million, talking about what Gustavo was talking about, the BRL 30 million I commented earlier, is directly related to labor costs, energy costs, and has no relation to the variable costs in terms of commodities. Wheat, cacao, palm oil, sugar, and more exchange rates. These are amounts, these are gains that are expected and to be annualized, which does not depend at all on the volatility of commodity prices, whether they go up or down.
Very well. Just one quick follow-up on the palm oil question. The capacity for arbitrage with margin, you have a restriction when you think about these segments of cookies.
When you think about 2025, with a higher level of palm oil due to the exchange rates and other items such as in Asia, as well as other factors that are mitigating, which has pressure on your costs.
[Foreign language] . This is the account of parity. We do this every day. We have capacity even also to use cotton oil, cotton seed oil, and palm oil. We are constantly making these calculations to see which commodity has the best relation of cost-benefit, and the production is done after that calculation being made. To mitigate this type of increase, we have no other beyond this question of this change or substitution in raw material.
When the price is so relevant, as it has been in the question of palm oil, which is very relevant and continues at a high level now, there's no way to mitigate 100% of this without pricing it into your prices. So leveraging your prices in this process can't be substituted. So we hang on to that, use that tool. Also, as we mentioned in the slide at the beginning of the presentation, that there was an increase in the average price in the market and a retraction of average prices in the pasta market. [Foreign language], the principal ingredient is wheat, wheat flour. And in cookies, we have wheat flour and the vegetable oils, especially for the fillings of those cookies.
Very well, thank you very much. Thank you, Gustavo and Fábio.
[Foreign language]. Lucas, your microphone is now open.
Thank you. Two questions. [Foreign language] ? Makes you believe [Foreign language] . Makes you believe [Foreign language] pushback on these prices. What makes you think that this time the price list will be able to be effectively complied with, considering that these prices last year, looking at the competitive market, and what happened in the third quarter? If I'm not mistaken, you talk about the price of wheat went down, but the exchange rate went up, and so what makes you believe that this time there won't be any more of the same effect?
And the second question is, if this price increase in the first quarter, is it more to maintain your level of profitability at the levels at which you're operating, or do you think that it will be an increase that will recompose your margins or some of your margins are below that which you would like to see?
[Foreign language] your cost lines, to your stocks, [Foreign language] four or five months, depending on the raw material. I imagine an exchange rate of BRL 6.620 at the end of the year must have had terrible results very strongly. So this increase in prices, are you able to imagine an increase in margins in the first half of the year, as you mentioned in the fourth quarter, or just a recomposition of the profitability to maintain your profitability at a similar level?
[Foreign language] . Hi, Lucas, good morning. [Foreign language] . What makes us think this is that this time we didn't come out first. The company, we accompanied the market, we weren't the first ones to jump in and raise prices . We looked at this price increase in 2025, we did market research, and we saw that it was a movement not just of M. Dias, but also of our competitors. There was this change in strategy, as I mentioned back in the beginning. We didn't want to just do a big bang where we're doing region by region, channel by channel, one channel at a time, in a way that is less linear. [Foreign language] expressed increase in the quarter is, in fact, to maintain our margins, current margins.
We're not looking at increasing margins in this first quarter. What we expect is to see an evolution [Foreign language] . Pricing of our price lists, but these changes, which will be done inside the company, whether it be the changes in our manufacturing plants, logistics, SG&A, that you're looking at, these two levers together should bring us to an increase, a sequential increase in the margin of the company, not just a price lever. So that's for sure.
Thank you.
[Foreign language]. Thiago Duarte of BTG Pactual. Thiago, your microphone is open.
[Foreign language]. Thank you. [Foreign language] . Good afternoon, Fábio Gustavo. I'd like to continue the discussion in the dynamic of revenue, volumes, and prices, and not in costs.
[Foreign language] : if you could help us to [Foreign language] . If you could talk a little bit about the dynamic of market share based on the data which you shared. When we look at this data of sell-out, sell-in, and share, when we look at the volumes, the added value that you made available in the company [Foreign language] . It becomes a little bit surprising the resilience of your market share reported by the company, especially looking at the second half of the year when volumes were smaller. It fell off a little bit more sensibly, in a more accentuated way.
I would like to ask you if this is a matter of the differential between sell-in and sell-out, if that would be good news, that would show that at some point the chain will have to restock with your products since the market share is resilient, or if you understand that the sell-out is falling off more quickly than those Nielsen numbers suggest with the deceleration of the company? I imagine that this has some relationship. So that's my first question.
The second question, following along this last comment that Gustavo made about the recomposition of prices for the preservation of margins, in recent years, we've seen a lot of the discussions that you've had a [Foreign language] we jumped a little bit in the perception that you had prioritized a little bit more the recovery of margins at some times and a little bit more the recovery of volumes or of market share in other points in time. I would like to know if you could situate us about where we are right now in that process. How happy are you with that market share compared to last year?
[Foreign language] make it possible to have an accentuated margin these years with all the initiatives that we are here discussing or if we should we should look more at volumes, [Foreign language] . In these discussions in recent years.
[Foreign language]. Let's start here with your first question. [Foreign language] . There were two options. You cited two options, and it was the first. There was a disconnect between sell-in and sell-out in two moments during 2024. [Foreign language] due to two events. The first was at the beginning of the year in January and the implementation of the SAP ERP when there was no loss in market share at that moment, but there was a certain slower sell-in in the month of January.
Why? Because the sell-in wound up happening in the third quarter of 2023 when M. Dias supplied our clients to avoid any type of stock-out or lack of products during the month of January. Hence, we were several weeks without making any sales or with a level of sales below that which would normally happen. So at that moment, there was an impact on sell-in, but there was no impact on the sell-out. Another moment was when, in the month of July, as I showed in the graph of the wheat prices in dollar, which fell. It showed a direction of fall from January 2023- December 2024. But at the same time, at the end of the first half of 2024, in which the price of wheat went up in dollars. And as Gustavo mentioned, we went ahead of the market.
The market did not accompany our price, and there was a retraction in our volumes sold to retailers, but the retailers were well stocked with M. Dias Branco's products, so that didn't have much impact on our market share. As things started to adjust, improvements in execution and pricing and recomposition of our stocks in retailers, our sell-in improved as we saw in the third to the fourth quarter. We're talking about cookies and pastas, and we didn't really have any important loss of share. Basically, it was two events in 2024 which did cause a change between sell-in and sell-out.
Hi, Thiago Duarte. I was going to say good morning, but actually, it's good afternoon now. I'm from the company in the BTG conference here. Are you satisfied in relation to market share? We have another level of market share.
We had a level of market share which was higher than that. But we've always been, as you mentioned, at the moment, a more challenging moment. We have to protect our profitability and the recomposition of prices. So this market share is close to 30. Look at the recomposition of margins. A comfortable position without not caring about these details. So our market share has been basically with cookies and pastas is stable and went down in an important way in flours. During the year and analyzing the year as a whole with all of these fluctuations, this price movement we did in June in ending with a stable market share, I would say that on this question, we're satisfied. As far as the dichotomy and the question between, wow, I think you're looking for profit. One time you're looking for profitability, one time you're looking for volume.
We do not really have this change in strategy because the market is dynamic and you make our prices to recover margins and you have to correct it afterwards to not lose market share. So it's a dynamic process. You have to be accompanying the process, looking at the market. I even posed in a recent meeting the same thing as asking. It's impossible to choose. There's no determination on the company's part or by its controllers or by its board to go, oh no, now we're only going to go after margin and forget about market share or vice versa. We're going to look for market share and increase margin. We don't have this dynamic. This is not our strategy. It's very clear. As Fábio mentioned, growth with profitability. It's not just growth and it's also not just profitability.
It would be good if we were able to have a mandate for look only for one or the other to be able to look at the internal goals. But it's not like that. These variations in market share and profitability that you've seen over the year due to the market dynamics, it's not a choice or option of the company.
Okay, that's very clear. Thank you, Fábio and Gustavo. I just make one quick question. In the last quarter, when you changed the opening of some information that you were discussing in the discussion about the lowering of volumes, fall in volumes, you said that fall in volumes was in the different categories with the principal products of flours and adjacencies, that these are all being reasonably similar to the consolidated volume.
So have you been able to, would you be able to qualify for us these variations looking at the fourth quarter?
[Foreign language] . Hi, Thiago. In general terms, yes. They were all in the same direction.
Okay. Thank you very much.
[Foreign language] . Questions and answers is now closed. We'd like to now pass the microphone back to Gustavo to make his final comments.
Thank you all for participating in our conference. We continue here of the IR team. We are at your service. Thank you all and have a good day.
[Foreign language]. The video conference of M. Dias Branco is now closed. We thank you all for your participation and please have a good day.