Operator
Operator
Good morning, everyone, and thank you for waiting. Welcome to the Cogna Education conference call to discuss the second quarter 2026 results. [Operator Instructions] Please note that this conference call is being recorded and will be made available on the company's website, www.ri.cogna.com.br, where the complete materials for our earnings release are also available. [Operator Instructions] Before proceeding, we would like to clarify that any statements made during the conference call regarding Cogna's business outlook projections and operational and financial goals constitute the beliefs and assumptions of the company's management as well as information currently available to Cogna. Forward-looking statements are not guarantees of performance and involve risks and uncertainties and assumptions as they refer to future events and therefore, depend on circumstances that may or may not occur. Investors and analysts should understand that general conditions, industry conditions and other operational factors may affect Cogna's future and may lead to results that differ materially from those expressed in such forward-looking statements. I would like now to turn the floor to Mr. Roberto Valério, CEO of Cogna, who will begin the presentation. Please, Mr. Roberto, you may proceed. Roberto Valério: Good morning, everyone. I would like to thank you all for joining the conference call to discuss our first quarter 2026 results. So joining me on this call are Frederico Villa, our Chief Financial Officer; Guilherme Melega, our Vice President of K-12 Education; and Jeferson Ortiz, our Vice President of Higher Education; and Rodrigo Cavalcanti as well. So this call is expected from the last -- different from the last call. So we have some introductions from the market, and we will do it a little bit differently. So it will last about 1 hour composed of 20 minutes of presentation and 40 minutes for Q&A. Therefore, you have more opportunities to ask questions, and then we can have a fire chat. So be welcome. I would like to begin highlighting that this semester, this quarter of 2026 was very good results, very positive results with the 2 BUs really growing, obviously, with highlight to the BU of Basic Education, which is growing along all its business lines. So the B2B and B2G -- but reinforcing, and I always like to say that this quarter is a very good example that shows the quality of our strategy to act in a very diverse segment, not only with higher education, but also in basic education and the diversification of the portfolio within all these different segments and no doubt the quality of its execution since we began the turnaround of the company in 2021. So I believe that the whole market recognized. So the consistency of all deliveries in some quarters, one BU performing a little bit better than the others. So we have the seasonality of all the different businesses, but showing a very strong strength. So last year, the higher education was very good in this quarter and obviously, the second quarter, the basic education performing really well. So the composition made the company to grow at a very high rate. So talking a little bit about the financial highlights. So our net revenue grew almost 18%, boosted by the basic education. And the semester is even stronger. We grew almost 25% year-over-year. So the EBITDA is growing 6.8% on the quarter and almost 14% in the semester. So I'd like to highlight the semester because in the business of higher education, the semester brings a neutrality that may be not a big difference between semester, including the enrollment. I also highlight the margin pressures in relation to the new regulatory framework, we would have a pressure on the margins. And that wouldn't mean the reduction of growth in EBITDA and generation of cash because we replaced EAD with a percent of margin with insight and hybrid courses that have a higher percent of margin, but the growth is steady. And this is very clear, even though we are losing 3 points in the margin in the quarter and 2.7 in the semester. So the EBITDA, both for the higher education and also Cogna as a whole keeps growing in the semester, almost 15%. So in relation of the free cash flow, so we are considering the free cash flow with almost 88% of growth. So we generated a free cash flow of BRL 504 million. So as a reference, last year, the whole entire year, we generated BRL 716 million. So in the first semester, we reached [ BRL 4 million ] which is a very important growth. And the net profit also 23% in the quarter and 35% in the semester. So once again, this quarter was a quarter of reducing debt. We reduced it, BRL 21 million in debt. So I will explore this a little bit more in the specific slide that we talk about capital allocation and how -- what we are thinking and what we've been executing in a very constant fashion in terms of capital allocation. So moving to the next slide, the one that talks about the revenues. So I believe that this is very clear the diversity of our business. And I would like to highlight the growth of basic education. You see that we are growing 50% in the quarter and 60% in the semester. And for those who had the opportunity to read our report, so you see that all lines are growing if we get basic education and segmented B2B and B2G, so within B2B, so the subscription grew 22% in the quarter and 18% in the semester. So the non-subscription, so in refer to the textbooks, 33% in the semester and 17% in the semester as much as our language that we have Red Balloon and others that have important growth, growing 31% in the quarter and 20% in the semester, meaning that the lines of B2B growing in a very strong way and steady way. So I know that B2G and the solutions for the government had an extraordinary growth in the semester, but I would like to highlight that was not only due to the B2G that we grew strongly and the revenue in the basic education. So our lines and our products, B2B meeting the demand to schools, partners and franchise and growing very steadily. And talking about basic education, so an important highlight to the PNLD growing 450%. So it's important to highlight the 3 things. So there is a displacement in the revenue from the PNLD that generally is in the fourth quarter and the first semester. Everybody knows and had this information, there was a displacement on the revenue to the first and the second quarters. So this is one of the reasons of the PNLD growing so much. But it's important to highlight as well that the program of mid education, it was bigger than the initial expectation. And then so that's why we had more revenue. And the company achieved 8 points of market share. So we moved from 22% in the last program to 30% in the textbooks. So the program was much bigger, and we achieved more market share. Also, there was a displacement for the second cycle and that benefit the results for the second semester on PNLD, but a strong result even without the displacement. So in the B2G, our line of solutions, specific solutions with the Secretariat of Education in the states and municipalities, we follow the growth, 45% of the growth in the quarter and 35% in the semester. It's a line of business that's not too far away less than BRL 41 million of revenue 4 years ago and last year. So we -- the revenue was BRL 100 million, and we still have a lot of opportunities to grow. Speaking briefly about the higher education, it grew 6.3% in the quarter and more in the semester. So our business B2C 6.3% and 8.5% in the semester. And then there was a transitional moment and the change of the regulation with the change in the profile of more insight than hybrid, but continues growing in a consistent way. And as I say, I'd like to look at the semester because it's more stable and a growth of 8.5% on revenue. So moving to the next slide, I'm talking about EBITDA and margin. So it wouldn't be different like stronger education -- strong growth in the basic education brings results in the EBITDA of the basic education growing 62.7% in the quarter and 6.5% (sic) [ 65.6% ] in the semester, and we have an expansion in the margin. We are achieving a better margin. And it's important to remind you that the PNLD has less mean growth than the B2B. So it ends up pulling our margin a little bit downwards even with concentrated growth on the PNLD, our margin grew and shows the quality of the basic education in terms of portfolio and also services offered to our clients. So basic education, actually higher education. So the EBITDA grew a little bit less, but 1.8% in the quarter and 2.5% in the semester. So we are losing margin, as we've mentioned, due to the mix. However, we understand that this is a transitional moment and it's natural that it occurs. And we are continually looking at a growth in terms of nominal and absolute both in the revenue and EBITDA looking ahead. So when we move to the net profit, so we grew 18% in the quarter and 23% in the semester. I think that the highlight here is due to the operational results, vary -- financial discipline. I'm talking about the GCL. It's a highlight in the company like our capacity of making important investments that we have been investing in CapEx and making our investments, both in expansion and also related to technology use. And so following this investment, we are still growing with the GCL. So the leverage -- so we got to 1.63 in EBITDA. And I would like to highlight that it's the smallest leverage since 2017, but it did not fall more because we had other levels that we are going to explore, and then I can clarify some of your questions. Otherwise, the leverage would have fallen even more. And then on the chart, the yellow line, you see the cost of the debt. There was an increase of the mean cost. And then in the second quarter, so we have the incorporation of the Educbank that we have credit lines that are more expensive than the Cogna average. We understand that there is this mean cost, this is going to reflect in the numbers. So moving to the last slide before the questions and answers, I'm talking about the allocation of capital. So it's noticeable, and we've been talking for the past 3, 4 years that our priorities in terms of capital allocation are financial expenses, the reduction of financial expenses and the reduction of debt. And in our case of basic education, reducing the withdrawn that has a risk above our mean average. So the risk is BRL 36.7 million, and we have the responsibility to reduce our expenses in the line and also the reduction of the net debt, BRL 21.8 million. So fully aligned with everything that we've been saying, looking to reduce the debt, not only through leverage since we have this optimum leverage, but to reduce the financial expenses, which is quite heavy due to the interest rate in the market. So we did it, but not -- so we are still giving a good return to our shareholders. So we pay BRL 28.5 million in dividends, adding to the BRL 120 million paid in February and distributed BRL 148 million in dividends to our shareholders. And as we always say, so M&As -- strategic M&As are part of our strategy. So last year, we had an acquisition of a medical school at a cost per seat, very positive. So around BRL 750 million, and we bought an EdTech to strengthen our other business Instituto Mauá and many other clients. And now in this quarter, we have the acquisition. We were already investors in the Educbank. We had 43% of the start-up, and now we bought 47% for BRL 46 million. So you see that this is an important and well-balanced capital allocation, looking for the reduction of financial expenses, but we have small and important strategy acquisitions that are important to generate value. The same thing that we did when we created our B2G business. It began small and now it's quite important. And the same thing for Start-Anglo, and now we have 70 contracts celebrated with schools already working. So we move on with this vision of balancing capital allocation, but without giving up the future of the company. So having said that, I would now want to pass on to Q&A. And as your request, we left more room for questions and clarify the questions that you may have.