Hello, everyone, and welcome to Bladex's Third Quarter 2019 Conference Call on this 18th day of October 2019. This call is being recorded and is for investors and analysts only. If you are a member of the media, you are invited to listen-only. Bladex has prepared a PowerPoint presentation to accompany their discussion. It is available through the webcast and on the bank's corporate website at www.bladex.com.Joining us today are Mr. Gabriel Tolchinsky, Chief Executive Officer; and Mrs. Ana Graciela de Mendez, Chief Financial Officer. Their comments will be based on the earnings release, which was issued earlier today and is available on the corporate website.The following statement is made pursuant to the Safe Harbor for forward-looking statements described in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. In these communications, we make certain statements that are forward-looking such as statements regarding Bladex's future results, plans and anticipated trends and the markets affecting its results and financial condition.These forward-looking statements are Bladex's expectations on the day of the initial broadcast of this conference call, and Bladex does not undertake to update these expectations based on subsequent events or knowledge.Various risks, uncertainties and assumptions are detailed in the bank's press releases and filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Should one or more of these risks or uncertainties materialize or should any of our underlying assumptions prove incorrect, actual results may differ significantly from results expressed or implied in these communications.And with that, I'm pleased to turn the call over to Mr. Tolchinsky for his presentation.

Thanks Chantelle. Good morning everyone. Thank you for joining us today. Before Ana Graciela delves into key aspects of our earnings results for the third quarter, I would like to discuss with you important developments that took place during the quarter and the impact of these recent developments on our perception of risk and financial results. I will address the global macroeconomic context, the economic and business environment in Latin America, and relevant country and industry-specific developments affecting our portfolio.During our last four quarters' conference calls, we mentioned that the credit quality of our portfolio, cost structure, and allowances for expected credit losses set the base for our earnings generation capacity. Our third quarter 2019 results are another step in that direction. The global economy in 2019 is on course for its weakest year of growth since the financial crisis, weighed down by tensions that have significantly slowed international trade.Global growth is now expected to fall 3% this year according to new estimates from the International Monetary Fund, down from an estimated 3.2% in July. The IMF attributed the slowdown primarily to rising trade barriers that have impacted manufacturing and investment around the world. The IMF now forecast that world trade volumes will expand by just 1.1% this year, less than half of the growth rate of a July estimate of 2.5%.For 2019, forecast for U.S. economic growth were cut by 0.2% to 2.4%. Forecast for the Euro area were cut by 0.1% to 1.2%, and China's economic growth was lowered by 0.1% to 6.1% from their last July report. Shockingly, the IMF expects slower economic growth in 90% of the world.Given this macroeconomic context, we are once again downgraded our economic and trade growth expectations for Latin America for 2019. Today, we are expecting only a 0.2% economic growth…

Thank you, Gabriel. Good morning. I will now go over the third quarter and year-to-date 2019 results into more detail making reference to the presentation uploaded on our website.So on page four, profit for the third quarter of 2019 totaled $20.4 million or $0.52 per share compared to a $40.7 million loss in the third quarter of 2018 when the bank recorded impairment losses on financial and nonfinancial instruments totaling $60 million, mostly related to impaired credits. Third quarter 2019 profits were down 8% on a quarter-on-quarter basis on account of decreased structuring and syndication fees and lower net interest income.Profit for the first nine months of 2019 totaled $64 million compared to a $9.6 million loss a year ago. During the first nine months of 2019, the bank has maintained a relatively stable level of topline revenues, which increased by 2% with respect to the same period of 2018, improved efficiency with a 20% reduction in operating expenses, achieving a 31% efficiency ratio and sustained high-quality portfolio origination evidenced by a substantial decrease of credit provisions, which totaled $2.4 million for the period.On page five, net interest income for the third quarter of 2019 was down 2% year-on-year and 5% quarter-on-quarter on lower average loan portfolio balances, which decreased by 3% quarter-on-quarter and by 5% year-on-year to $5.3 billion.Lower average portfolio balances during the quarter reflect reduced exposure in Argentina, coupled with lower credit demand from certain countries in the Central America and Caribbean region, partly offset by increased high quality loan origination in countries like Chile and Colombia toward the end of the quarter.The quarter-on-quarter decrease in net interest income was also impacted by a four basis point decrease in net interest margin to 1.77%, mostly related to the effect of decreasing LIBOR-based market rates on the bank's…

Thank you, Ana Graciela. Chantelle, why don't we open up the Q&A session? Thank you.

Thank you very much. [Operator Instructions]Our first question will come from Robert Tate, Global Rational Capital.

Hi Gabriel and thank you very much. I was just wondering if you could just elaborate on what factors you think may lead to an improvement in the net interest spread over time.

Yes, thank you, Robert, for the question. What we see from -- and I'm going to go approach this from a top-down perspective -- is a very challenging global and regional environment in which we have to be very diligent and careful with respect to our credit underwriting. And we are in a happy position to be able to maintain our credit spreads where they are. We are looking for value-added transactions with key customers.And that is essentially what should be able to make us sustain those credit spreads on a go-forward basis. We are identifying some opportunities, as we mentioned, in the Andean region, in Chile, in Colombia, in Peru.And I think that we are about to see more opportunities, particularly in Brazil. It's very difficult as of yet to determine the potential there, but we see very good signs starting with the fact that they are opening up their economy with an aggressive privatization program.And very importantly as it relates to the impact on overall credit demand is the fact that this administration is not keen on maintaining the subsidy that previous administrations had with respect to the involvement of national development banks in lending to industry as a whole.So, as we see the privatization program progressing, we should see credit demand go up. And if the private sector is the one that needs to fulfill this credit demand that should be a good sign in terms of margin improvement, particularly given that short-term rates in Brazil have come down to a very low historical levels.The stelic rate right now is about 5.5%, and we believe that, that should stimulate credit demand growth. And we could see a pickup in margins as the private sector banks start fulfilling that demand for credit.

Right. Thank you very much. And just noting that your Tier 1 Basel III capital ratio is quite high at 21%. Do you see the opportunity to make use of more leverage over time? And you mentioned that you're optimistic for business over the remainder of 2019. Do you think that a return on equity of closer to 10% is achievable in say the next 12 months in light of your optimism?

12% continues to be our goal on a long-term basis, but we will grow exposure, portfolio, leverage on what we consider to be a prudent and solid credit underwriting strategy. And as such, we will approach it opportunity-by-opportunity. And as you've well known, we don't give projections on how our different ratios will evolve over time.But we are very happy with our portfolio. We're very happy with our capacity to maintain relatively stable margins and we continue to find good opportunities to deploy our capital. If it's okay, we should open it up for more questions if there are any.

Thank you.

Thank you very much. [Operator Instructions]Our next question will come from Robert Maltbie, Singular Research.

Hello Gabriel, I'm here for Jim Marrone today. I wanted to ask you a little bit about the impact of the rate cuts in the U.S. in the short-term Fed funds, et cetera, and the trends there. And how you see that impacting your forward margins?

Thank you, Robert. That is a very good question, and let me start with saying that, of course, lower U.S. dollar interest rate will have an impact on our margins. That said we believe that we will be able to maintain our margins with incremental origination exposure on a go-forward basis and be able to counteract that. Now, for a more granular perspective, let me turn it over to Ana Graciela to answer.

Thank you, Gabriel. Hi Robert. Yes, as we have mentioned before, with respect to our interest rate gap position, like I mentioned in this particular quarter, we were negatively impacted because of the decreasing rate environment, but that should correct because we are usually able to -- I mean we have a very short tenor both in our asset and liability side.So, with respect to the repricing, we don't see a continuous deterioration there. On the contrary, we should benefit from also lowering rates on our funding side, which eventually what happened in this particular quarter is that because of the way we were positioned our lending book repriced a little quicker, but that should correct itself in the coming quarter.So, with that perspective, we -- in the overall even in increasing or decreasing rate environment, the bank is able to reprice its assets and liabilities within a short period of time. And yes, I mean, the lower rates at the end of the day with the high capital balance that we have, obviously, has an impact on the return of that capital invested in our assets.

Thank you. A follow-up question on operating expenses. It looks you've done a very good job reducing your operating expenses. And I'm wondering in terms of that trend over the next 12 months, do you see that ability to continue or remain about even or just a little bit of color around on that.

Well, as Gabi mentioned, we don't necessarily give prospects of our figures. Going forward, what I can tell you is we are seeing the average trends in the recent quarters at about $10 million, $10.2 million, $10.5 million. And that is what we call today the run rate of expenses understanding that during the fourth quarter we may see some cyclical impacts on expenses. But if you see the year overall, we should be around $10.5 million in quarterly expenses on average.

Thank you.

Thank you very much. [Operator Instructions]Thank you. At this time, we have no further questions in the queue. So, I'd like to turn the conference back over to management for any final remarks.

Thank you very much, Chantelle and thank you everyone, for joining us today. We look forward to talking to you guys again when we issue results for the fourth quarter and the full year 2019. In the meantime, for any questions, we always remain open and available. Thank you very much and have a good day.

Good day. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Ladies and gentlemen, at this time, this now concludes today's conference. You may disconnect your phone lines and have a great rest of week. Thank you.