Good morning, everyone, and thank you for holding. Welcome to Viveo's Fourth Quarter 2024 Earnings Release Video Conference. I would like to point out that for those who need simultaneous translation, we have that tool available on the platform. To access it, just click on the Interpretation button at the bottom of the screen and choose your preferred language: Portuguese or English. For those listening to the video conference in English, there is the option to mute the original audio. We inform you that this video conference is being recorded and will be made available on the company's IR website, www.viveo.com.br/ir, where the complete material of our earnings announcement is available. You can also download the presentation from the chat icon, even in English. During the company's presentation, all participants will have their microphone disabled. In suing this, we will go on to the question and answer session.
To post questions, click on the Q&A icon at the bottom of the screen and write your question and join the queue. Upon being announced, a request to activate your microphone will appear on the screen, and then you must activate your microphone to ask questions. We advise you that the questions be asked all at once. Please bear in mind that the information contained in this presentation and any statements that may be made during the video conference related to the business perspective, projections, and operational and financial goals of Viveo constitute beliefs and assumptions of the company management, as well as on information currently available. Forward-looking statements are not guarantees of performance. They involve risks, uncertainties, and assumptions, as they refer to future events and therefore depend on circumstances that may or may not occur.
Investors should understand that overall economic conditions, market conditions, and other operating factors may affect the future performance of Viveo. Today, we have the presence of Mr. Leonardo Bido, the CEO of Viveo, Federico Dani, Vice President, Financial Administrator, and other directors. I will now give the floor to Mr. Bido, who will begin the presentation. You may proceed. Good morning to everybody. Thank you for your presence at our conference for the earnings result of the fourth quarter and full year. I'm going to begin talking about our journey up to present, refer to some strategic projects. I will give the floor to Federico Dani, and we are at your disposal for the questions. We began our journey in 2017, building a unique and differentiated and robust ecosystem in the health area, and our metrics increased sevenfold. At least all the operational metrics increased sevenfold.
We went from a business of distribution and medication to private hospitals. This is what we did in 2017, to a broader platform, expanding channel service, product portfolio, and creating a unique platform to add more value to the product delivery to customers along the way. We had a great deal of organic growth, more than 15% a year, and many acquisitions, more than 25 acquisitions during the period. Our last acquisition, NEVI, took place in May of 2023, and from then onward, we entered an agenda of integration, incorporation of the assets we had acquired. This agenda was intensified as of the second half of 2023. We had 18 incorporations of companies, systemic simplification in CRM, ERP, and several other company systems, and an evolution of our infrastructure systems and logistics processes, which is the core of our business.
We put together several operations throughout 2023, as well as in 2024. We know, and we knew it was fundamental for the sustainable growth of the company for the long term. We did a great deal in a very short period since the third quarter of 2023 until the end of 2024, but this construction was necessary for the long term to have an integrated sound company with the necessary controls we all want. What did we see in 2024? While we were working on this integration process, now in-house, we had accelerated growth much faster than we had in the initial six years. This is a process that we learned from. We're not the only ones who went through this, but things came out differently.
The complexity of the integration of that large number of companies, several systems, and different dynamics, the need to evolve the visibility of indicators, policies, process controls simultaneously as we were putting together operations and ending others, complexity and operational challenges that did impact our results considerably in 2024, beyond what we had imagined. Along with this, on the outside, the external scenario posed specific difficulties while we were dealing with internal difficulties. Fiscal changes, default, brought about that vast need of readjusting our logistics network, changing our operational model while we were fostering all of the integrations. In the macro part, an increase of interest rate and unfavorable macro scenario causing financial pressure on our balance.
In the health sector, after the pandemic and after 2023 and 2024, what we call the hangover of the health sector, with a deterioration in the working capital scenario, margins deteriorating in all of the links in the chain, and a surge for efficiency. Several companies working on integration after the expansion and acquisitions, and of course, this posed more outside challenges besides the internal challenges. Nevertheless, the year 2024 was fundamental to focus on operational indicators, carry out a clear diagnosis of the point of evolution, the priorities we had to devote time to throughout 2024 and 2025. We learned a great deal. We learned with the failures during the process, and we are now ready to go into execution mode. This is what we did in 2024.
Between the third and fourth quarter, we began to execute each of these transformation fronts, and this is our agenda for 2025. We put aside the part of growth, diagnosis, and much more. In 2025, it's all about execution and the evolution of our company throughout the year. I would like to highlight some of these projects and the fronts that we ended in 2025. Beginning 2025, focus on execution in operations, planning, and inventory. This is one of the fronts where operational integration showed us a lack of visibility and disconnection of some processes. This clearly impacted our working capital. We have a process of planning, control, procurement, and inventory running since mid-2024, and we have begun to see some of the results of this new distribution centers.
We carried out a large CapEx investment in the company in 2023 of BRL 300 million; in 2024, BRL 185 million, reformulating all of our distribution centers. We have a highly streamlined infrastructure, one of the best in Brazil, and we use WMS in all of our distribution centers since January of 2025. This will allow us more control and productivity throughout the year. Evolution of our freight model, this was one of the main impacts on SG&A, and we're looking for an evolution of this model because of internal challenges and because we're reformulating the logistics network because of tax changes. Throughout this year, we will have a change in contracting and hiring of freight with new technologies, and we have integrated a freight partner. We're seeking an enhancement in service level and a reduction in our freight account, which is the highest account in SG&A.
Finally, the industrial consolidation. We invested heavily in 2023-2024 for a new plant for wet wipes. We began the integration for the two plants we acquired to begin in March. This migration ends in May, and from there onwards, we hope to have new gains in synergy. Once again, investments made in 2023-2024, and we will harvest results in 2025. Now, to speak about our commercial changes, which are important because of our understanding of the business and the market dynamic change we had throughout that period. We have a more austere policy. We're revising the contracts in the company and all the plant units. We're reviewing the contracts and eliminating contracts that don't have a minimum contribution. We bet on those contracts when the sector was undergoing important terms. Our reception terms were much too long, and we had a compensation of those terms through accounts to pay.
Some of them happened. Most of them did not materialize, and we're going to redress this in the year 2025, in the coming months. A significant reduction in lead times. We will have an offer of lead times for customers that is very different from previous years, and we're sure that this will bring an impact on accounts receivable in coming months. We have great clarity in terms of which businesses have a better ROIC, for example, in SUMA and units where we will focus more for future growth. We also have a more robust area and category management that understands the ROIC of each unit, each of our categories, and along with a commercial team, they offer recommendations and clear directions of where we are to grow. Expenses, another important agenda we acted on throughout 2024.
We ended the diagnosis process and definition of the plan at the end of the third quarter, and we started executing this throughout the fourth quarter 2024. This will continue in the first half of this year. Some of the changes are CSC and the reduction of back office and reduction of fixed expenses. A freight cost reduction, as I already mentioned, very important for SG&A and the closure of operations that, although they had a very good evolution in 2024, and although we do believe in the long-term thesis, we decided to close them down to have an evolution of G&A. These are FADMI and DOCTIPHARMA. Working capital is doubtlessly a focus for 2025, accounts payable and inventory. At the end of 2023, we had high inventories, and we carried them throughout 2024. We now have adjustments.
We're financing our inventory, as you could see in 2024, six days of funding. Now, we had an imbalance of this throughout the year, but we work significantly to adjust our stocks, reduce excesses, and renegotiate terms to once again have that funding. What still isn't what we would like it to be are our policies for accounts receivable and terms with the customers. We will focus on that process throughout the coming months, and we hope to see the benefits of all this as of the second half of the year, once again adjusting accounts receivable. Governance, we had important changes in 2024. New additions of independent members to the board. They bring experience that is relevant to contribute to the other counselors on the board. A change in the management model based on the rapid expansion to several different companies and many acquisitions.
We used to have a decentralized management and oftentimes took the correct and important decisions, but we did not have visibility of the impact on the whole. We have changed the focus and the main processes in the company, not all of them. We do preserve the necessary autonomy for businesses to run differently because of their different characteristics, but the main decisions have been centralized since 2024. This allows us to prioritize the whole and not the parts. Throughout 2024, we had an evolution of my direct team with the new people that came in. Along with the team we already had, they will take the company to another level. Now, it's important to show you the new structure, the new reporting team, my team at the company.
I would also like to thank those who have left the company and had a fundamental role in building the ecosystem that has brought us so far. I wish them luck in their new challenges, and we welcome those that are now part of this leadership team. The arrival of Luis at the end of 2023 for operations, the arrival of Fred in the second half of last year to lead not only the financial area, but also the legal and M&A area that report directly to me. I had 17 people reporting to me at the end of 2023. I now have seven. The arrival of Ricardo, who leads categories, strategy, pricing, and market intelligence, and Nelson, more recently, who will lead the Insuma business, very important in service rendering.
This business has characteristics that differ from the others, and we have Nelson now to lead it, and the Vice Presidents of Human Resources, and we continue to count on the leadership and experience of Vilso in all the distribution businesses and Hennan in retail and consumption products. This is the team that has led the diagnostics, the understanding, and the definition of the action plan we will execute throughout 2025. We have the route foundation, a clear understanding, and the plan set forth to execute them during the year. Now, with this, I would like to show you initial results of the execution of the plan that began at the end of 2024, pre-cash generation. In 2023, we had large cash burn of almost BRL 900 million. In 2024, we have cash generation of BRL 206 million and the beginning of the work on each of these projects.
That will be our focus this year to increase our cash generation, a reduction of 11 days compared to the fourth quarter 2023 because of inventories and accounts to pay. We want to evolve more this year because of our accounts receivable and the new policies that have been put in place. Reduction of expenses that also took place during the fourth quarter, general and administrative expenses dropping 12.5% vis-à-vis the previous year, and a sequential improvement of EBITDA with a growth of practically 12% in the fourth quarter. Alongside this, at the end of the year, we renegotiated the covenants of our debentures with mass support of our creditors without increasing the rate, guaranteeing the stability. We leave that process with the confidence that our creditors do believe in the operational plan we have put in place for 2025.
With this, I give the floor to Fred to offer you the details of our financial results. Fred, you have the floor. Thank you, Leonardo. I'm going to begin on slide number 11. First of all, speaking about non-recurring adjustments of the fourth quarter. All of these have had a nil impact on the company cash, and they come from the changes we had in the management judgment. First of all, regarding default. Default is a topic that is well known in the sector, not only for medication, but also retail sectors. Based on the opinion of our advisors and regarding the forecast of the payment to the states, we came up with a provision of BRL 390 million between principal and interest rate. Of these BRL 390 million, the cash impact was BRL 38 million.
These are the cases that we decided to pay through installments and, of course, once again, through payments in installments. Despite this, we have also created a provision because we have some pending issues at the STB modulation. We have changed the forecast that we will follow in the near future. There are some issues referring to some local issues state by state. Of course, we are interested in recovering all of the values that are due to us. This is more in accounting retressing and does not mean a significant cash disbursement for the company. Another two points I would like to highlight: the provision and the write-off of OLs. OLs are funds that we have in the pharmaceutical industry. We reviewed the expectation of recovering all of the funds that we had recorded for the company.
We remind you that we sold some incorporations, different systems, different management models. When we finished these incorporations, we put everything under the same management and control model. By applying the more reasonable rules for the recovery of these funds, we have now understood that this parcel has a very low probability of being recovered by the company. We have written off those values, BRL 260 million. We have several other factors that relate to M&As, the conciliation of acquisitions, the write-down of assets. We assess the recoverability of all of these, and we have BRL 350 million with a low probability of recovering this. Now, when we put all of this together, we are speaking of a write-down of approximately BRL 1 billion once again. Our cash is quite limited.
These are non-recurring events that help us to clean out the company balance, and we do not foresee additional adjustments going forward. All of the estimates that were carried out were done so in the fourth quarter of 2024. 2025 should be a year free of these non-recurring effects in the company. Now, to continue on to slide number 12, I would like to speak about the financial highlights for the fourth quarter. First of all, our net revenue reaching BRL 2.936 million, ending the year with 11.5% of 4.5% growth vis-à-vis 2023. Gross profit, BRL 386.4 million, with a margin of -8.2%, a contraction compared to last year, but stability in terms of what we have been presenting in the last quarters because of a worsening of mix that we mentioned and segments that are structurally working with lower figures.
At the end of the year, we stabilized the company margins, and we should continue in this trajectory throughout 2025 to recover margins. Adjusted EBITDA, BRL 164 million in the quarter, totaling BRL 652 million for the year with a margin of 5.6%. Our free cash flow, we ended the year with BRL 206 million of cash generation. Perhaps this is the most important change we had during the year because in 2023, our cash consumption was approximately BRL 900 million. Now, BRL 206 million is below our potential of normalized cash generation, but it shows the company has adopted measures in the right direction, and we should have a substantial cash flow during 2025. Our cash cycle, we were at 52 days in the fourth quarter. I will speak in more detail about the details of this. Finally, ROIC of 10.9%, still low. The minimum is 15%.
This is what the company pursues, but we're on that path to recover ROIC in mid-year 2025. Now, to continue, I'll speak about the net revenue and our different segments. First of all, the hospital and clinic segment. It's worthwhile underscoring here the growth of high-cost drug specialties and the reduction in the sale of some material. We had 11.3% in the 4.3%, I'm sorry. It is a segment that no longer has a focus on growth. Our focus presently is on profitability and releasing working capital. We began to make adjustments throughout the second half of 2024, but major adjustments will be made during 2025 as we renegotiate contracts in the mid between March and April, for example, and we will privilege operations with a higher ROIC.
It should be a year with a shyer growth this year, but with a substantial improvement in working capital indicators and growth margin. Now, to speak about laboratories and vaccines. This is the highlight of performance in the company. Substantial growth throughout the year. It grew and it continued to grow at 24% growth. Here, the dynamic is very important happening, especially in vaccines associated in vaccines for adults. Historically, the vaccine department was focused on children. We have several launches in industry, Brizio for bronchiolitis, pneumo, and dengue, and they have been leading the growth in the vaccine segment, and this should continue throughout the coming years. It is very important, and we have a sound position in that segment. That is a segment where we operate with healthy margins, but of course, there are opportunities to optimize the working capital that we will implement throughout 2024.
Now, the retail segment here, we had stability throughout the year, a slight contraction in the fourth quarter. We do have to highlight an important issue, which is mix in categories such as tissues. We had a relevant change in the sales composition. We have increased sales in our private label in detriment of direct sales through the channel. We also had significant growth in new categories and the expansion of the portfolio in several segments. This is a segment that throughout 2025 has a focus to recover margins. It's a segment that should have a more timid growth throughout 2025 with significant improvement in gross profit and margins through the year. Finally, the service category. This is the category that showed a very frustrating performance during 2024. We had several factors impacting this.
We had the impact of the flooding in Rio Grande do Sul, and this is a segment that is very important for dialysis. Of course, this extended throughout the second quarter and operated way below our expectation. In handling of chemotherapy, we had the loss of some contracts because some relevant customers decided to bring these services in-house. We did have important changes, as Leo mentioned. We brought in a new VP focused on handlers with broad experience in the sector, and he should give a different dynamic to this segment throughout 2025. Finally, we remark, as Leo mentioned, we took the decision in December to discontinue Pharmy activities, and we closed this operation in the first quarter of this year. Adjusted gross profit with a slight contraction vis-à-vis last year, but as we mentioned, we have maintained stable margins compared to previous quarters.
For the year, we see a drop because of the performance of the year 2023 that was much stronger. Now, as we enter 2025, we have positive expectations for growth in gross profit and recovery of gross margin. In the next slide, I'll speak about our adjusted expenses. We said that throughout the second half of last year, we spoke about the adjustment of the structure, the review of contracts, and we are already beginning to see some of these impacts on the fourth quarter. Not all, of course. The first quarter had important effects. The second quarter will have important effects, but there was a sequential drop of SG&A in the fourth quarter compared to the third quarter of 2024. We still have important milestones in expense reductions that we will incorporate in 2025. The freight, of course, is the main cause of expenses throughout the year.
As Leo mentioned, we have a series of actions focused on improving freight efficiency during 2025. We brought in-house one of our main freight partners, as well as having other initiatives, the use of systems. Freight is something we have to work on throughout the year. As Leo said, it is the highest expense we have, and we will have an enormous focus on optimizing that line item. Finally, adjusted EBITDA of BRL 164 million in the first quarter. We had a sequential improvement vis-à-vis the third quarter. We already see some of the impacts of this, although they're shy, and they begin to point towards a different direction for EBITDA. With this, we end the year with BRL 652 million in EBITDA.
In the comparison with 2023, we see a small drop, but when we look at the forecast, it is our understanding that the figures will improve beginning with the year 2025. Very well. Let's go on to our financial results. We had a financial expense of around BRL 543 million, an increase of 9% vis-à-vis the previous year, very much aligned because of the increase in interest rates and because our financial cost is aligned with the CDI plus 1.6. Now, the highest cost problem was the increase in the interest rate. When we bring together all of these effects, the results for the year 2024 is a net adjusted loss of BRL 90 million. On slide number 18, we'll speak about our free cash generation.
Now, perhaps this is the main change that we can show you: the direction of 2024 vis-à-vis 2023, a cash burn of approximately BRL 900 million highs, a generation of BRL 206 million for 2024, still below our structural generation. It's worthwhile mentioning the effects that we mentioned: non-cash effects in the company and non-cash items of BRL 1.25 billion. The adjustments, therefore, did not have a relevant impact on the company cash. A last comment that I would like to make is about the performance of our cash generation in the fourth quarter. There's a difference compared to the third quarter. Given the negotiation of covenants we put in place, we had a lower level of anticipation of receivables that we had done in 2023. This has an important effect in explaining the negative cash generation.
is also the issue of seasonality with all of the adjustments that we made in the management of working capital and in procurement. Historically, we have a supplier's account that tends to be very favorable in the fourth quarter, but negative in the first quarter. With the changes implemented in procurement management and working capital, this should become more normalized as of the first quarter of 2025. We should not have a negative effect in the supplier's account as we used to have in previous years. The situation should be more stable throughout quarters vis-à-vis the previous years. The fourth quarter here still has significant impact because of the changes we had in working capital throughout 2025. You should see more adjusted figures and figures that are easier to understand compared to the previous years. Now, finally, on slide number 19, we will speak about the cash cycle.
We do have a significant improvement in cash cycle. We have reached 52 days. Now, the main highlight here is that we have an inventory that is moving towards appropriate levels of funding. We have a six-day gap between inventory and suppliers. We still have room to enhance this difference. The inventory has the potential of falling below 60 days in 2024, and accounts payable should remain stable or perhaps increase somewhat vis-à-vis what we see presently. In accounts receivable, we have 59 days. Clean of anticipation of receivables, we stand at 53 days, and this does not include the impacts of the changes in policy, in term policy that we are implementing in 2025.
This is the account where we will have the largest variation throughout 2025, especially in the second half of the year when all of the negotiations and terms will be changed, and we should run accounts receivable below 60 days. Very well. We go on to the next slide. Our levels of indebtedness, as Leo mentioned, we renegotiated the covenants in the fourth quarter. In a temporary way, in the fourth quarter of 2024 until the first half of 2026, we have covenants for the fourth quarter. We took the leverage level to five times. We have a falling curve, and we need to go back to the previous levels of 3.5 times only in June of 2026.
At the end of the year now, we had leverage at 4.3 times, and this period of renegotiation will be sufficient so that we end up implementing our adjustment plans and to have the company leverage returning to previous levels. At the UCR amortization schedule at the bottom of the screen, we have BRL 500 million this year, and we will not need to raise capital this year. We can deal with these maturity dates with the volume we have in cash and with the cash generation we expect for the year. We will only have to raise funds again in 2026. Very well. These are the main points regarding the close of the year 2024. We will now go on to the Q&A session. Thank you very much for your attention. We will now go on to the question and answer session.
Should you wish to pose a question, please click on the Q&A icon at the bottom of the screen and type in your question, or click on the icon raise hand to become part of the queue. There will be a prompt for you to activate your microphone, and you will have to activate your microphone to pose questions. We request that you ask all the questions together. Our first question comes from Felipe Amancio from Itaú BBA. You may activate your microphone. Good morning, everybody. We have two questions at our end. The first about the adjustments made during the half of the year. Please correct me if I'm wrong. In the presentation, you said these adjustments did not have a cash impact. Now, in terms of the file which will be the disbursement of that amount, will there be an impact of that in 2025?
The second question refers to the dynamic of hospital clinics. There was a lower growth of that BU that quarter, and you spoke about a new policy for terms for customers. Which will be the impact of that strategy on the growth of your revenue thinking of 2025? I'll answer the first question, and then Leo can answer the second part of the question regarding the fall. The provision is for the fall 2022. This has been finalized. We still have some embargoes because of modulation. Of course, we're holding discussions state by state. Once again, this is still at a very early phase of discussion. This is the more relevant point. We don't see any outcome for that volume in the short term. The volume are those BRL 38 million referred to 2021.
We still have BRL 100 million highs for 2021 that may have a result and outcome in 2025. We will lose some. We will win others. We say 2021, those BRL 38 million that we lost, we gain important figures in some states like São Paulo as an example. Even in the cases where we lose this, most of these states have a program for installments that is ongoing, and part of the debt would come back in installments with a diluted cash disbursement. Now, these installments that we carried out, the highest, I believe, was in 35 years. Each state sets forth a specific condition, but we do not expect that the file will generate relevant disbursements throughout 2025. Now, to answer your second question, Felipe, the sector continues to grow, and in our vision, it will grow with a lower double digit.
There is growth even when we were faced with operational challenges and challenges in the DC. We were always able to grow because of our capillarity. Now, for the year 2025, for the company, our growth goal is quite small in that channel, hospitals and clinics, so that we can act on all of the operational processes that I mentioned previously and focus on the revision of working capital and our lead time for that channel. We will grow less, but in that lower growth, there's an exchange of businesses, contracts, and growth. We will no longer pursue this year, and we have the base of results of last year. We're going to reduce our presence and sale in several businesses, and at the same time, we're going to occupy that space with new sales that have a better working capital ROIC and margin dynamic.
There will be a minor growth in the channel, but we're changing the sales profile significantly, and that will release working capital during the year and an enhancement of growth margin in the channel. Thank you very much. Thank you for the answers. Our next question comes from Gustavo Tizio from Bank of America. Your microphone has been activated. Thank you. Thank you for taking the questions. We have two. The first is a macro question, trying to understand what Viveo expects after all of these processes and how can we look upon competition in this logic, margins as well. Another point is cash generation. You spoke of an improvement of BRL 200 million in cash versus a loss of BRL 900 million the previous year. Which is the company expectation? Will it be higher than that?
You have also had the advance of receivables, BRL 750 million, if I'm not mistaken, -BRL 500 million for 2024. Does that make sense? Are you going towards zero, or will this anticipation of receivables be something frequent going forward? Thank you for the attendance and for your questions regarding the macro situation. What to expect in terms of future competition? Because of our new execution discipline, we expect higher gross margin, the release of cash and working capital, with a cycle improving in accounts receivable after the enhancement in inventory. In fact, we are going to push the queue for significant changes in the sector for two years. The distribution sector has funded the growth of the sector, extending terms for the customers. We're no longer going to extend those terms.
Now, based on that, we hope that the sector and competition itself can adjust its terms and rebalance something that became imbalanced in the last two years. We expect to grow with profitability, with cash generation, recovering margins, and going back to our cycle throughout this year. While cash generation, although we had BRL 750 million during the year, that was very much at the beginning of the year, the open balance is of approximately BRL 160 million. If we add this to the cash flow of the company, an important part of that is that we have credit. We have some operations where we offer credit to liberal professionals using credit cards. We transform this in cash automatically, and we will continue to do this with receivables at the same volumes we have done. The deadline for this is very short.
When I anticipate in December, I'm anticipating revenues for the first quarter. These anticipations change from one quarter to the other. It's not correct to imagine that the sum of the balance would be a high cash generation for 2025. We expect to have higher cash generation compared to 2024. The expectation is to generate sufficient cash to tackle all of this. That's the expectation of management for cash generation this year, and I think it's feasible to attain this even with the interest rates that we are facing presently. Thank you very much, Fred and Leo, for the answers. Our next question comes from Yan Sisking from EPG Pacto. You can activate your microphone. Good morning, Leo, Fred, and other directors. We have a single question. I'm asking about your disinvestment agenda.
If this is a priority agenda for the turnaround of the company, and how much time does this take in terms of the executive agenda? Thank you very much. Hello, Ian. Thank you for the question and for your attendance. Yes, we are discussing potential disinvestments. Our operational plan was presented with the presence of all creditors. We want to resume our level that is within the leverage level of the company. This does not contemplate disinvestments. Operationally, we would not need disinvestments until the end of the year, but we're always open to opportunities. Things that did not have the strategic fit we imagined in the ecosystem. We had several movements, several expansions. Some had the right fit. Others, of course, did not. We are open to good opportunities, but they're not part of our execution plan. We're going to work with the initiatives that I described here.
This is my focus, the focus of my team, and most of our time is devoted to assessing opportunities that may arise. Thank you, Leo. Thank you very much. Our next question comes from Leandro Bastos from Citi. You can activate your microphone. Good morning, Leo, Fred, and thank you. We have two questions. The first about cash generation. I'd like to hear a reference on seasonality. Historically, the company has a first quarter that is more intense in consumption, but you said that suppliers will work in a more stable way. Now, I'm asking about cash for the first quarter. What can we imagine? The second question, the freight efficiency, you have reiterated important plans for the year. Now, which is the timing for those enhancements, and which is the magnitude we can expect this year? Thank you very well. Let me speak about cash flow first.
The first quarter, we're going to continue to consume working capital because in March, we have that change of Cemegi. It's a period of distortion. We have a change of pricing, and there's that normal anticipation of purchases. This will not change. In the first quarter, I always have a higher accounts receivable to deal with that dynamic. What will change? We had consumption of working capital in the account of suppliers. Normally, this will no longer happen. This account will be more stable. In previous years, we had a strong consumption of working capital. It should now be normalized. Now, that impact of increases should perhaps lead to a somewhat negative cash in the first half of the year, offset by the cash generation in the second quarter because we're normalizing working capital. With the sales of March, that tend to be stronger.
In the first quarter, the cash generation is quite different from what we saw in the first quarter of 2024. This will tend to be the normal seasonality for the business after the first second quarter. The effects become normalized. A high consumption of working capital in the first quarter because of cement and normalization in the other quarters of the year. Now, regarding the freight efficiency, we do have a schedule for everything we're doing. We began in the fourth quarter with back office, CSC, general, and administrative expenses, where we have already had a drop. Now, bringing together the fixed operations of distribution centers with a reduction in cost. Along with this, the closing of some operations like FADMI that reduce our expenses in the first quarter. Freight efficiency will begin in the second quarter.
We will see a greater capture of all of this throughout the year and the first quarter of next year. It begins now. We will go all the way to the third and fourth quarter in terms of magnitude, a reduction of 10%-15%. The full benefit of this we should see in the first half of the coming year, and we will begin to see this in the second half of this year. The question and answer session ends here. We would now like to return the floor for the closing remarks of the company. Once again, we would like to thank all of you for your attendance, your participation, and the questions. We reinforce the confidence for the plan we designed in 2024.
We are initially capturing some of the results, but we will have sequential results improving throughout the year, and the team will be fully focused on execution. Myself, Fred, and the entire team continue at your entire disposal. Have a good Friday. Now, the video conference for earnings results for the fourth quarter 2024 ends here. The IR department is at your disposal to answer any other questions you may have. We thank all of the attendance and have a very good day.