Morning, ladies and gentlemen. Good morning. Welcome to the video conference of results of Sequoia Logística, with reference to the results of the third quarter of 2023. We have with us today, Sir Armando Marchesan, the CEO, and Ian Andrade, CFO and Director of Investor Relations. We inform that the call is being recorded and transmitted simultaneously. The interpretation is available, clicking on the interpretation button. If you want to hear in English, you can silence the original audio in Portuguese and mute original audio. During the presentation of the company, all participants will be with their microphones turned off, and afterwards, we will start with the questions and answer session. To make a question, click on the icon Q&A, and type your name and company, and you will be announced. A solicitation to turn on your microphone will appear on the screen.
You should then start your microphone to ask your question. We clarify that any declarations may be made during this video conference with reference to the perspectives of business of Sequoia, operational goals, financial goals, constitute our projections of the directors of the company, which may or may not happen. Investors should understand that political factors, macroeconomic factors, and other operational factors may affect the future of the company and bring us to results which are materially different than those expressed in these future considerations. To open the video conference with our results for the third quarter of 2023, I will pass the microphone to Armando Marchesan. Sir Armando, please go ahead.
Good morning to everyone. We announce today the results with reference to the third quarter of 2023. Starting on page four, we bring the highlights of the period.
We could just start talking about important conquests reached during the closing of the quarter, but also reflect the work done during recent months. We focus on our efforts on the financial restructuring, strengthening the balance of the company, and so we can recover our operational results. The first part of the restructuring was done with success on the eighteenth of October, 2023, when we completed the offering of the fourth issue of debentures, which are convertible to stock. It had two very relevant effects on the capital structure of Sequoia. First, the reduction of 79% of the short-term debt balance, which is now only BRL 65 million, instead of BRL 300 million previously.
Secondly, the injection of BRL 100 million in the cash drawer of the company, which can be utilized exclusively for operational to permit us to grow. These two effects signify a reduction of almost 50% in the net debt of the company. We also concluded with them the repactuation of the third emission of debentures, with the lengthening of the remaining balance. The last part of the restructuring was the renegotiation of our debt, bank debt, which is done in a constructive way, as was the entire process with the debentureists. In the last quarter, together with the low point of our revenue in September, we had a growth of 7% in the net revenue compared to July.
Finally, the results of the efforts, the expenses with SG&A and building costs, were reduced by BRL 18 million, representing an economy of BRL 6 million per month, in comparison with the second quarter of 2023. Now, I would like to call Ian Andrade, our CFO of the company, who will present the financial highlights of the quarter. Ian, please.
Thank you, Armando, and good day to everyone. If you look at page five, you can see the principal financial aspects of the third quarter of 2023. Our revenue remains stable and in line with the best margins expressed in the middle mile, that registered a fall in the sector of deliveries and the restriction of working capital in the quarter.
But in the third quarter, we also captured cost reductions and expenses, which are already implemented in the structure and the return of our several bases. In line with the best accounting practice, we explained in more detail in the next slides, revising our expectation of receivables, and writing down a title of BRL 61 million and an increase of PDD in 31.5. These were on our results in the third quarter without cash effects. These were non-cash effects. The process of restructuring of our financial debt is going full steam, and we've already reached 47% of our net debt under the pro forma in the third quarter, and we'll explain it in more details in the next slides.
Going to slide six, we can see clearly that the impact on our working capital caused a restriction of 34% in the revenue of the company when compared to the previous quarter. At the slide, we can see the line of business in which we... The maintenance of the level of revenue and the businesses with the best margins. On page seven, we have a quarterly comparison of net profit and EBITDA, which we saw were absolutely both indicators. Improvement in both indicators, which are directly associated with the implementation of our cost reduction plan, and which we're executing with great dynamism and discipline. Our gross revenue, our gross profit went up by BRL 11 million, and our EBITDA, considering the adjustments, the accounting adjustments in the receivables, also increased by 17.7%.
On page eight, we can see the revisions on the provision policy of the company and also our expectation of the realization of receivables. The administration of the company has diligently, and adhering to the best accounting practices, take into consideration the following changes in context: The reduction of 70% in the sales of the company in the third quarter of 2023 compared to 2022, and the first quarter of 2023, and the increase in late payments by our clients with a better credit--bigger credit risk in the macro scenario in the retail sector, including the reduction of capital of these companies. In this context, we saw in the third quarter of 2023, we identified the increase of the provision of PDD of BRL 31 million and writing down titles in the round of BRL 61 million.
We say that this is a non-recurring and non-cash impact. On page nine, we present a summary of the process of restructuring of our debt. It is made up of four steps, three of which are already completed. One, a waiver and restructuring of the debentures, which happened in December, which made an approval of 90% of the debentures and a reduction in our cost of debentures for CDI flat with no spread, and three years, paying only interest and a financial covenant only in 2025, December of 2025. Subsequently, we issued BRL 342 million in the debentures, which are convertible, which will serve as a conduit to bring these next two steps of restructuring.
They are, A, migration of the debentures, simple debentures, to a new instrument convertible into stock of 78.70%, or BRL 242 million, to a new convertible debenture by December of 2024. Injection of new resources into the company, with a subscription of BRL 100 million of cash in our structure for, in the convertible debentures. And fourth and last step is the implementation, the full implementation of the restructuring of the bank debt. We have terms which are defined and approved, but are not yet obligatory. Banks tend to follow the same line as the restructuring of debentures. In other words, the combination of the conversion of stock and the lengthening of the remaining balance.
So we look at these three steps already implemented, with a reduction of 47% or BRL 342 million in our net debt, and a reduction in our level of leverage, measured by net debt to EBITDA 5.8-0.8. As we mentioned by Armando at the beginning of this presentation, we're focused on actions already concrete, already undertaken and with the strengthening of our balance, and as a beginning of a new cycle of sustainable growth in Sequoia. I'm going to pass it back over to Armando for the second part of our presentation.
Thank you, Ian. On slide 11, where we're talking about the Sequoia recovery plan, we divided the agenda into five steps.
One, restructuring, financial restructuring, as was mentioned by Ian, with a plan of a reduction of costs and expenses. Secondly, the revision of operations and reorganization of new business units, having as a base the technical particularities of each level of service which is demanded. Third, a focus on the commercial teams and operational teams for the recovery of our contracts and volumes previously operated by the company. The fourth operational step, the expansion of new contracts for each one of the units, each business units, and we chose as a focus for management in 2024, they are FTL. FTL, operations dedicated to first and last mile, logistics and fields and storage, field service, B2C Light and Express, providing autonomy and a greater agility in our decision-making process. And finally, involvement in strategic units opportunities, whose opportunity which will be mentioned opportunely.
On the right-hand side of the slide, we brought in an update on the initiatives for reduction of costs and expenses, which are already being implemented, and we have the expectation of concluding them by the end of the first quarter of 2024. It's worth mentioning that these initiatives that are reduction of costs and expenses have been happening since the first quarter of 2023. Nonetheless, we have frequently made revisions and identified new opportunities for gains in efficiency. Based on this plan, we look at page 12 at DRE, the financials, management financials of the company in the first nine months of 2023, looking at two effects. One, the reduction, which we just mentioned on the previous slide, and secondly, the reductions already done or realized over these nine months.
The result, pro forma, for the nine months, we reached 4.8% of the EBITDA margin, ex IFRS, adjusted IFRS, or an EBITDA of BRL 27.9 million. It's important to mention that this margin is still not yet at the level which we consider ideal. We have the potential for gains in scale and with future growth in revenue... Looking now at page 13, before we open for the question and answer period, I would like to conclude with a final message. In the third quarter, it was crucial to permit our recovery. We had important success in the financial restructuring of Sequoia.
Thanks to the efforts of our team and the collaboration of our lenders, investors, and partners, we have been able right now to focus on our core business, which is to realize deliveries, quality deliveries for our clients and cultivate a relationship with our partners and suppliers. We will continue working with focus on reduction of costs and expenses, and principally in the recovery of the volume, together with our clients, objectifying the return of profitability and the generation of cash as quickly as possible. I'd like to thank you all for your participation in our call, in our results call and our earnings call, and we're now open for the question and answer session. Thank you very much.
Thank you. We'll now start the question and answer session for investors and analysts. Remembering that to make a question, click on the Q&A icon and type your name and company. In other words, when your question is recognized, we will ask you to open your microphone and ask your question. Thank you. Excuse me. Our first question comes from Ricardo Machado, from Hedge Funds. What is the stage of negotiations with the banks? What is the status of negotiations with the banks?
Morning, Ricardo. Thank you for the question. This is Andrade, a helper of the assistant of the company. The negotiations with the banks is very well advanced, but more importantly than the stage in which these negotiations are, and an estimate of the term for the conclusion of these negotiations, without...
The principal subject in this restructuring with the banks is that it follows the same line and the same atmosphere, constructive atmosphere, of a negotiation which was concluded with the debentureists. If we stop to think about it, we have conversed with the debenture holders and the banks, which has been very constructive, and we also have a very constructive talk, which has been based and equal with the technicians. Because all the company's business, the foundation of the company, the operational and strategic aspects of the company, are unaltered. All of the lenders and the banks are being able to tangibilize this potential. They can see this potential, these foundational principles, which even though the financial circumstances that the company has been through, the operational foundation of the company, the fundamentals, are unaltered.
And this supports all of the discussions with the lenders, whether they be debentureists or banks, they have a common denominator, which is the business plan, a vision of the future, which is well-based, with an administration which is extremely focused on the recovery of growth in a sustainable and perennial way. I ask you for your forgiveness for not being able to answer more precisely at what stage these negotiations currently are, but I would like to ask you a question and say that this is more qualitative in all of the questions in this financial area. This has been happening very constructively, very transparently, based on data and future business, with high levels of credibility and high levels of assertiveness. Thank you very much for your question, Ricardo.
Remembering that to make a question, click on the Q&A icon and type your name and company. Please wait while we collect any more questions. The next question comes from Felipe Fonseca. He says, "What are the expectations for volumes for the Black Friday and Christmas period?"
Good morning, Felipe. This is Armando speaking. I think that the expectations are very good. However, there's a process of recovery. We don't expect any very accelerated growth at this time. Also, which had been previous to Black Friday and Christmas, in August and September, we took a lot of steps, so we don't have any dramatic change as we had in previous years. However, of course, demand always increases at this time of year, which is following the natural seasonality of the business.
We had this deceleration principally at the end of last year and the beginning of this year. But in general, in certain categories, this happened only in certain categories, and we can have some benefits in volumes in this sense. Remembering that all of the business units, the category which captures most growth is the B2C, Light B2C category, especially, e-commerce, part, end-to-end e-commerce deliveries. And this is the category, the business unit, which would capture the biggest volume at this time. It's a unit which we are making this ramp up after the recovery, operational recovery, that the company had in these last two or three months.
So we, we also have benefits at from the end of the year, which, compared to the previous months, will benefit, based on a base of costs that we have shown in the building costs and indirect costs, based on a lower base and more utilized, which will, help our margins at the end of the year. Okay, thank you for your question.
Once again, to make a question, click on the Q&A icon and type your name and company. Thank you. While we collect questions. The next question is from Arlindo Souza. Says, "Good morning. Can you explore a little bit more the perspectives of the administration for the stabilization of revenue, which presented a new falloff quarter-over-quarter for the fourth quarter of 2023? There are still a lot of costs and expenses related to the restructuring, the return of bases and so forth. Are there still many of these things to be realized?
Well, Arlindo, thank you for your question. I think that, as we mentioned in the previous call, June and July and August, we hit the low point of our revenue, of our sales and revenue. It was the lowest month that we have in this period of the year, and we already are seeing a recovery in August and September. So we don't expect any major acceleration due to cash generation and the maintenance of positive margins and working capital. However, we see growth September, July through September, and we hope that this slow, gradual increase to continue over the upcoming months.
The revenue should remain more or less stable, with growth of high single digits in the next few months, and the budget that we are now working on for 2024 should foresee growth in relation to this third quarter. When we analyze the results and the revenue, there will certainly be growth for 2024. So we understand that this third quarter is the low point of revenue. Of course, January, February, and March, and there's always a quarter of lowest volume due to the holidays period, and the fact that retailers also, it's not just Sequoia who's exposed to this, but all companies are exposed to this effect. But we see growth for the whole year of 2024 from the level of revenue that we've had.
Answering the second part of your question, we have executed 80%-85% of all of the reductions and savings that we have foreseen. There are still some things to do, but some investments which need to be executed. But I would say that the majority has already been done from the standpoint of bases, distribution centers, and as far as these building costs, occupancy costs, we've captured about 80%-85% of the demobilizations that we have foreseen. We will have other costs related to this demobilization, direct costs and indirect costs, both in contracts as well as personnel, and we hope that this will continue over the fourth quarter.
It's important to execute this for our margins, historic margins, so I still expect some costs in demobilization, but nothing on the building side, but only on the contracts with suppliers and reduction of personnel costs, whether it be direct or indirect, and SG&A. So we have continued looking at these revisions and identifying gains in efficiency and costs, cost cutting. This will be a continuing, ongoing focus of the company. Thank you for your question.
Once again, remembering that to make questions, please click on the Q&A icon and name your name with your name and company. The next question comes from Daniel Camargo: "With the new configuration of the units, of the business units, is there a necessity for additional CapEx?"
Good morning, Daniel. Thank you for your question. It's important to mention that the business units, which helped us in the reduction in the organization of the structure and in the way in which we look at our results and autonomy of each one of these units, it's more important to mention that these are units which we operate for some time already. If we evaluate logistics since the foundation of Sequoia in the food service area since 2015 to 2016. The unit since 2014, 2015, on the B2C, Light B2C, and we have several units which are more recently formed from 2020 until now, the express delivery, the first mile operation, and dedicated operations.
So it's important to see that these are units which we already operate, and which we have good knowledge of, and the expectations and probabilities, and the operational margins we have in each one of these operations. So we have this capacity, this installed capacity. These are units which we already operate, and we continue to operate, as you must have seen at the level of revenue in this quarter, was the lowest level in our history. So we have the capacity, installed capacity. We don't see any need for additional CapEx for to operationalize these units, unless there's some specific contract of a unit, which would... A new contract which we conquer, which may require some individual specific investment, but it will be tied to any new contract that we may come up with.
These are units that we already operate, we already have capacity, and the CapEx has already been made, especially in 2021 and 2022. So we don't see the need for any additional investments in operation of these units. Thank you for your question.
Remembering that to make a question, please click on the Q&A icon and type your name and company. Please wait while we collect these questions. Next question comes from Antonio Mazzari. He asks, "What is the situation of the assets that were sold? Is there interest in selling? Is there interest for these sold assets?"
Good morning. Thank you for your question. They were not only sold, but when we made the sale of these assets, we're going to make the we're gonna publish that as necessary.
What I can advance to you is that we have two assets for sale, two logtechs. One is in the process, which is well advanced, already in the final step of that process, and we expect and hope to be able to conclude this process in the market soon, definitively. And the other asset, which is for sale, which as you mentioned, is. We have an interest in, well, we have to sell it while there is interested parties. However, we have not yet reached the stage at which we have felt was worth to advance in the process of due diligence and conversing about contracts and the other steps. We're still in those initial stages of this process, debating and discussing alternatives and valuations, and all of the strategic aspects which involve a process like this.
But these processes are still going, they're still moving forward, and we have the expectation that they will be realized shortly. And we'll announce it as soon as we have, as soon as we'll have the authorization and all of the definitive documentation signed. However, we, this is expectation is that possibly it might go into next year to define the, the sale of this asset. Thank you for your question once again.
Remembering once again, to make questions, please click on the Q&A icon and type your name and company. Please wait while we collect any other questions. The session of questions and answers is now closed, and we pass this over to senhor Armando for his, for him to make his final considerations. Please go ahead, Armando. Thank you very much.
Thank you all for your participation, for your questions, and the company continues at your service through our RI channel. Have a good day, and thank you very much.
The video conference earnings call of Sequoia is now closed. If you have any questions, send your questions to the team of IR team through the email, ir, ri@sequoialog.com.br. We thank you for your participation. Have an excellent day. Thank you.