Earnings Labs

FMC Corporation (FMC)

Q4 2022 Earnings Call· Wed, Feb 8, 2023

$15.17

-2.57%

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good morning, and welcome to the Fourth Quarter 2022 Earnings Call for FMC Corporation. This event is being recorded and all participants are in listen-only mode. [Operator Instructions]. I would now like to turn the conference over to Mr. Zack Zaki, Director of Investor Relations for FMC Corporation. Please go ahead.

Zack Zaki

Analyst

Thank you, Emily, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to FMC Corporation's fourth quarter earnings call. Joining me today are Mark Douglas, President and Chief Executive Officer; and Andrew Sandifer, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Mark will review our fourth quarter and full year performance as well as provide an outlook for full year 2023 and the first quarter. Andrew will provide an overview of select financial results. Following the prepared remarks, we will take questions. Our earnings release and today's slide presentation are available on our website, and the prepared remarks from today's discussion will be made available after the call. Let me remind you that today's presentation and discussion will include forward-looking statements that are subject to various risks and uncertainties concerning specific factors, including, but not limited to, those factors identified in our earnings release and in our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Information presented represents our best judgment based on today's understanding. Actual results may vary based upon these risks and uncertainties. Today's discussion and the supporting materials will include references to adjusted EPS, adjusted EBITDA, adjusted cash from operations, free cash flow, net debt and organic revenue growth, all of which are non-GAAP financial measures. Please note that as used in today's discussion, earnings means adjusted earnings and EBITDA means adjusted EBITDA. A reconciliation and definition of these terms as well as other non-GAAP financial terms to which we may refer during today's conference call are provided on our website. With that, I will now turn the call over to Mark.

Mark Douglas

Analyst

Thank you, Zack, and good morning, everyone. FMC delivered record performance in the quarter, driven by a combination of robust volume growth and strong pricing actions. Sales of new products continue to accelerate nearly doubling year-over-year and representing 11% of the total sales in the quarter. We continue to make investments in expanding our market access in key geographies, including the U.S. and Brazil. Pricing actions in the quarter more than offset headwinds from both cost and FX, resulting in EBITDA margin expansion in excess of 40 basis points. This positive gap between price gains and headwinds from cost and FX and is expected to continue as we move forward through 2023. Agricultural markets remain robust with high commodity prices, increasing acreage for crops and positive grower sentiment, providing a solid backdrop for FMC. Our Q4 results are detailed on Slides 3, 4 and 5. Revenue was up 17% organically, EBITDA up 17% and EPS up 12%. The U. S. and Brazil were major contributors to the quarter's results, with volume and price driving the U.S. business, while price and FX drove Brazil's results. Adjusted earnings were $2.37 per diluted share in the quarter, $0. 07 above the midpoint of our guidance range. With this outperformance driven by higher EBITDA and lower-than-anticipated taxes. In North America, sales increased 35% year-over-year, driven by strong sentiment among growers and our distribution partners in the U.S. for the upcoming season. Selected herbicides for soybeans and other crops as well as fungicides for corn grew rapidly in the quarter. We have made great progress in revitalizing our North American product portfolio with almost 20% of the quarter's branded sales coming from products launched in the last 5 years. We have also invested in more sales and tech service resources, enabling us to reach more…

Andrew Sandifer

Analyst

Thanks, Mark. I'll start this morning with a review of some key income statement items. FX was a 2% headwind to revenue in the fourth quarter, with weakness in Asian and European currencies, partially offset by strength of the Brazilian real. For full year 2022, FX was a 3% headwind overall, with the most significant headwinds coming from the euro, Turkish lira and Indian rupee, offset in part by a strong Brazilian real. Looking ahead to 2023, we see continued modest FX headwinds on the horizon, consistent with the initial outlook for 2023 we provided on the November call. For the first quarter of 2023, these headwinds are across a range of Asian and European currencies. Interest expense for the fourth quarter was $44.8 million, up $11.8 million versus the prior year period. Interest expense for full year 2022 was $151.8 million, up $20.7 million versus the prior year. Rising U.S. interest rates were the primary driver of higher interest expense for both the quarter and the full year. Looking ahead to 2023, we expect full year interest expense to be in the range of $200 million to $210 million, an increase of more than $50 million at the midpoint versus 2022, driven primarily by higher U.S. interest rates. Our effective tax rate on adjusted earnings for full year 2022 came in slightly better than anticipated at 13.7%, driven by a modest shift in mix of earnings across principal operating companies. The fourth quarter effective tax rate of 13. 1% reflects the true-up to the full year rate relative to the 14% rate accrued through the third quarter. For 2023, we estimate that our tax rate should be in the range of 14% to 16% with the increase driven by anticipated higher foreign earnings subject to U. S. GILTI tax…

Mark Douglas

Analyst

Thank you, Andrew. FMC delivered a record performance in 2022 despite facing the largest input cost inflation headwinds in the company's history. Robust volumes driven by our market access initiatives and the continued accelerated growth of new products as well as strong pricing gains helped to overcome significant cost, supply and FX challenges in the year. We expect the broader economy to be volatile in 2023. However, agricultural market fundamentals are expected to remain solid. FMC's pricing momentum continues, and we should benefit from the potential deflation in the broader industrial supply chains. We continue to invest in our technology portfolio of synthetics, biologicals, precision ag and FMC Ventures. Our expanding market access initiatives are resulting in increased profitable growth, and we intend to continue the pace of these investments across more countries. Overall, there are fewer disruptive factors that we see today compared to the same time period last year, and this strengthens our confidence in the narrow guidance range we have provided. We expect to deliver another year of strong and profitable growth in 2023. Finally, as we are now in the final year of our current strategic plan, we are planning to host an Investor Day at our global headquarters in Philadelphia this November. At that time, we will share details of our new strategic plan and we look forward to seeing you here in person. We will, of course, announce the date for this Investor Day event soon.

Zack Zaki

Analyst

Thank you. Emily, you may now take questions.

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from Christopher Parkinson with Mizuho.

Christopher Parkinson

Analyst

Great. It does look like you have some cost benefit built into your -- just the midpoint of your EBITDA growth versus your projected revenues. I know you've been taking a prudent approach on the price cost in terms of the cost side and forecasting. But can you just talk a little bit more on how you see that progressing throughout the year, specifically in the second half and even potentially how you think it progresses throughout the year, which would even have implications on the first half of '24.

Mark Douglas

Analyst

Yes. Thanks, Chris. So let me take a step back on that one and just talk a little bit about -- I mentioned in the script where we were last year versus where we are this year. Last year at this time, we had a wave coming at as of inflationary costs. And truly, we did not understand the order of magnitude. We ended up with what -- $463 million of costs at the beginning of the year, our forecast had nothing like that number. I would say this year, we're in exactly the reverse position. We see cost receding, we just don't know exactly how much that will be. We know it will impact us in the second half of the year. And we have built what I would call a modest amount of cost reduction into the midpoint of our guidance. But what I really see is a time line here that gets us through the end of this year and into early 2024, where costs do become a meaningful tailwind for us. We do expect to see margin expansion as we go through the second half of the year. We did talk about the fact that we will continue to invest in SG&A and R&D, and I'll have Andrew add a couple of comments here at the end on details here. We are investing in those areas because frankly, we are seeing profitable growth from those investments, whether I think about the growth in Brazil or I think about the growth in the U.S. or other parts of Asia, those investments are paying off very quickly in terms of how we gather new sales from new customers and new parts of the value chain. R&D is growing very simply because we're investing not only in our synthetic…

Andrew Sandifer

Analyst

Yes. Let me just reiterate and expand on a couple of your thoughts there, Mark. I think certainly, input cost, the cost is at our COGS line, they are a significantly smaller headwind in 2023 than they were in 2022. And as Mark described, they remain a headwind in the first half, but we anticipate them becoming a tailwind in the second half. we will have growth in SG&A and R&D spending on a dollar basis. The SG&A should grow, as Mark described, generally in line with sales, R&D might grow a bit faster all of us to support growth, the addition of BioPhero, the investments in our Plant Health platform. We have moved another active ingredient from discovery into development in an active ingredient pipeline. So that SG&A and R&D dollar spending will continue to be a cost headwind as we go through the year. That said, on a percentage of sales basis, SG&A will stay relatively flat. R& D expand slightly. But this is against the contract where over the past 4 years, we've taken 300 basis points out of SG&A as a percentage of sales and over 100 basis points out of R&D as a percentage of sales. So while we might not get the same kind of leverage this year, more flat on SG&A and R&D as a percentage of sales, still a very, very competitive cost structure. The SG&A more than 500 basis points lower than our nearest competitor. So I think what you'll see through the year is that on a dollar EBITDA basis, SG&A and R&D continue to be a cost headwind, we will manage that carefully as we always have, and we'll adjust as we need to as we progress through the year.

Mark Douglas

Analyst

Very good. Thanks, Andrew.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Vincent Andrews with Morgan Stanley.

Vincent Andrews

Analyst · Morgan Stanley.

I just want to touch on the pricing environment a little bit. I think I heard you say, Mark, that you've already got 50% in place just sort of from a rollover of last year. Of the other 50%, how much have you already gone out with for the first half versus, I assume there's a fair amount that you need to go out with for the back half of the year. And just want to understand sort of what you're hearing from your channel partners in terms of continued receptivity for pricing at this point? Just thinking atmospherically, a lot of headlines about we're all entering into a deflationary environment. We're seeing fertilizer prices come down and glyphosate prices come down. I know those are very different products versus what you sell, but just we are sort of pivoting out of the inflationary or price increase environment. So what, if any, change in feedback are you getting from the channel partners?

Mark Douglas

Analyst · Morgan Stanley.

Yes. Thanks, Vincent. Well, listen, for pricing in the first half of the year, I mean, pretty much most of it, as I said, is already underway. The U.S. and Canada markets are active now, Europe is getting active right now. So those price increases are through. I think what you're referring to is probably in the fourth quarter as we roll into the Latin American market, where we will be. It's a valid question to ask. We don't know. We are planning price increases. At the end of the day, as Andrew just alluded to, input costs are still higher than they were last year. They are still increasing. They're just increasing at a much lower amount. Plus the fact that we're seeing significant labor cost inflation around the world, not only for SG&A, but within our manufacturing plants, et cetera. So for me, there is a cost environment that is still conducive to price increases. In Europe, you have high energy costs. Yes, they've come down off their peaks, but they're still meaningfully different to the average over the last few years. So we will continue to move price where we see fit. And of course, it's not a standard number around the world. We've talked about this before. It's different in different markets with different products. We continue to use that differentiation to move price. I think most of the value chains that we operate in really do see that inflationary environment. It's like any negotiation, they're always difficult. They're never easy. But overall, we are getting the price that we need to get to move us back to the EBITDA margins we want. You're right on the nonselective herbicides. You can look at all the metrics, you see them coming down. They went up very quickly. They come down very quickly. They truly are commoditized. We're not seeing that sort of curve for the more specialty products where you're really selling value not just on a cost basis through a contract. And that's a key differentiator for us. We don't have those nonselective herbicides. We don't operate in that type of environment.

Vincent Andrews

Analyst · Morgan Stanley.

Okay. And just as a follow-up, Mark, did I hear you say -- I believe last quarter, you thought the market overall would grow low to mid-single digits. I believe now you're thinking low single digits for this year. Is that just a function of last year for the market coming in better than you thought. So just a harder compare? Or is there anything at all different about sort of what you expect for this year globally?

Mark Douglas

Analyst · Morgan Stanley.

Yes. I think overall, when I look at the market, we are -- we do have a lower view of the overall market. But frankly, it's driven by Latin America. I mean we still expect North America to have a reasonable growth despite how strong it was in the past year. There is very good sentiment in the North American market right now for the coming year. Europe, we expect to be up. We do see increase in cereal acres, which will be positive. So we see Europe up. Asia will be slightly flat. There has been some weather issues in India, Indonesia and other parts of Southeast Asia, offset by a good market in Australia. I would say the reason we're going lower in the world today is because of Latin America. There are independent numbers that suggest the Latin American market may have grown $6 billion in 2022. Now the vast majority of that is with nonselective herbicides, mainly price and then pricing for other active ingredients. So I do think that people need to watch that nonselective herbicide market in Brazil and Argentina. That's the reason we're calling for a lower overall market, but it really is focused in that particular segment, which is so large, it does impact the rest. The rest of it is probably close to where we said it would be in November.

Operator

Operator

The next question comes from Adam Samuelson with Goldman Sachs. Adam Samuelson with Goldman Sachs, your line is open. If you'd like to please proceed with your question. Unfortunately, we're not receiving any audio from Adam's line, so we'll move on to our next question, which comes from Aleksey Yefremov with KeyBanc Capital Markets.

Adam Samuelson

Analyst

Just wanted to get back to your first quarter guidance, you had margin expansion in just reported fourth quarter '22 and you're guiding to some of lower margins and flat EBITDA in the first quarter. In what way are these quarters different? Could you just maybe provide some of the bridge items for Q1.

Mark Douglas

Analyst

Yes, Aleksey, I'll just give you a quick high-level view and then Andrew, please give some color commentary here. Very different markets in the sense of where you're selling into. Latin America, Brazil, Argentina, huge markets in Q4, still important in Q1 but to a lesser degree. And then obviously, in Q1, the European business is starting to kick in, which is very different. So you have a very different geographic mix across the world for how we see. And it's why we never ever talk about sequential quarters. It's almost impossible to look at the business on that light. But Andrew, if you want to make some comments on the revenue side and the cost side.

Andrew Sandifer

Analyst

Yes, certainly. I think, yes, to take Mark's comment, very, very challenging to look at our business on a sequential basis, given the different regional country mix for each quarter. I think what we're looking at is solid revenue growth and flat EBITDA, entirely due to cost headwinds in the first quarter, we're will be close to offsetting them with price increases in the first quarter, but we don't really get to that positive price cost comparison and for any strong way until we get into the following quarter. So we do see some EBITDA margin dilution from Q1 '22 to Q1 '23 which I would suggest is a better comparison period to be looking at and trying to understand the Q1 performance. Again, it's really driven by getting past this last part of the wave of cost inflation. Now as we move into the second half of the year, as input costs received as we're anticipating, that's when you start to really see margin improvement.

Adam Samuelson

Analyst

And as a follow-up, you mentioned diamide, mid-single-digit to high single-digit growth, sort of -- they -- did diamides dip to mid-single-digit territory going forward over the next 2, 3 years. Is this the level of growth that you see as fairly normal? Or could it be a little higher or lower?

Mark Douglas

Analyst

I think we've said in the past, sort of that mid- to high single digits is where we think it will pan out over time. I wouldn't change that view right now. We do continue to launch new diamide formulations around the world and Cyazypyr is growing very nicely as we get the new registration. So I think the mid- to high single digit is a perfectly good range of legacy.

Operator

Operator

The next question comes from Josh Spector with UBS.

Josh Spector

Analyst · UBS.

Yes. I guess just to follow up on some of the raws questions earlier. I mean, you've been pretty clear in the past, you have about 6 months of visibility to what you're buying. So I mean is this something where next quarter you'll have a stronger view on second half and would adjust your view, kind of aligned with what you're seeing there? And just curious on some of the near-term dynamics as well. Is China disruption impacting your view of what pricing can be. Does that have an impact there? And if you look at your buy now, is there any way to frame what your raws will be doing year-over-year in the second half then.

Mark Douglas

Analyst · UBS.

Yes. Listen, it's exactly what I talked about. I think as we go through the second quarter, we're going to have a much better view of, a, what have we bought and what are we buying in the second quarter, which will inform our raw material view in the second half. So I think at the May call, we'll be giving a lot more detail in that area. China has not impacted us at all through this latest round of COVID. We did have closures of some supply. But over the last 3 to 4 years, we've built up a really robust process and network of how to manage disruptions. So we didn't see any significant disruptions through the Chinese New Year and through the COVID wave that they had to deal with. China opening up is it's positive for us in the sense that, obviously, we get raw materials from China. It's not a huge market for us from a sales perspective. It's a nice market, but it's not one of our leading growth markets. So for us, it's a bit of a neutral event, China opening up. We've managed raw material as well out of China. We've been distributing our manufacturing network over the last 5 years to other countries. That continues at a pace. So overall, I think we feel pretty good from a supply position standpoint right now.

Josh Spector

Analyst · UBS.

Okay. And if I could just poke on your guide range on the high end specifically. I guess if I just take one of those variables and look at price and say you do high single digit versus mid-single digit, it's $150 million plus of EBITDA upside. Your scenario is $40 million higher and I guess you list a whole bunch of positives that could play out. So what are the negatives that we should be thinking about? Or is that higher upside potentially possible if you get more visibility there?

Mark Douglas

Analyst · UBS.

Well, I think on the negative side, I highlighted supply disruptions, which is the obvious one. Weather disruptions would be the next one, I would say. Outside of that, it would be a lack of pricing or something in the world that creates an inflationary environment for raw materials. We don't see that today. As I said, you look at the script, we mentioned 3 or 4 items that could move us from the midpoint to the upper end of the range. We mentioned basically one that would come the other way. So you can read into that what you will.

Operator

Operator

The next question comes from Stephen Byrne with Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

Stephen Byrne

Analyst · Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

The EPA recently came out with a draft risk assessment on Cyazypyr and they concluded this -- the terminology likely to adversely affect. Is this meaningful in your view? Could there be impacts from this on how Cyazypyr appear is used? And how would you compare this to other insecticides? Is this fairly normal? Or is this a concern?

Mark Douglas

Analyst · Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

Yes. Thanks, Steve. Top line, no, it's not a concern, and we've been following this for some time, as you can imagine. We're well clued into where the EPA is going. Cyazypyr is one of the -- what we call the softer chemistries, much more targeted. We don't see the EPA guidance has any impact on our business. We continue to see Cyazypyr grow at quite a fast rate around the world. It has numerous attributes that are very targeted. There are lots of old pesticides and insecticides that are more broad in nature that Cyazypyr would take share from and is taking share from. So we don't see any impact to our business from this ruling.

Stephen Byrne

Analyst · Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

Okay. And I wanted to just drill into your outlook on the biologicals. It's clearly an area that you're devoting a lot of focus on. Do you find that it has the potential to be, say, synergistic with your synthetics or is used in combination? I think that was view that Kathy Shelton had in prior years. Is that still the view that there's a synergy between the biologicals and synthetic chemistries.

Mark Douglas

Analyst · Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

Yes, very much so. When you look at the growth rate of our biologicals, we talk about our Plant Health business. This year, it will be pretty close to $300 million in size. Biologicals is now roughly half of that. It's getting close to the $150 million business. It's growing in excess of 20% top line per year. And that growth is coming from not only the new products but the synergistic effect that you talk about, which is twofold. First of all, we are developing products where biologicals and synthetics are in the same formulation. So you're getting different modes of action and different attributes from a biological and lowering the amount of synthetic material in the formulation. The second one is in spray programs where you will replace a synthetic spray with a biological spray. So you are using a pure biological but using it in a way that augments what the synthetics are doing and once again reduces the amount of synthetic material. So we see that growth coming from both aspects. We're launching, as I said, we launched 17 new products last year in the whole biological space. I continue to see that space growing rapidly. We are investing more in R&D. We are investing through ventures as well. So I think it's one of the bright spots in the portfolio in terms of overall growth and investment for the company.

Operator

Operator

The next question comes from Kevin McCarthy with Vertical Research Partners.

Kevin McCarthy

Analyst · Vertical Research Partners.

Mark, how would you characterize channel inventory levels in the U.S., Brazil and Argentina exclusive of the nonselective herbicides where you don't compete?

Mark Douglas

Analyst · Vertical Research Partners.

Yes. I think -- so from a North American perspective, U.S. in particular, I think channel inventories are a little bit elevated right now, but that's normal. I would say, as you enter the season, most of retail and distribution is stocked up for a very good year. When I think of inventory levels for FMC compared to our sales on a percent basis, we're about the same place we were the year before. So I think it's pretty normal. Brazil and Argentina, a different story. Forget the nonselective that we just talked about. I think because of the conditions that we saw in the south of Brazil and in Argentina, it was very dry in the fourth quarter. I have no doubt that there is elevated channel inventories in that area, would not be a surprise at all. If I run around the rest of the world, Europe, South of Europe is high again because of hangover from the last season. Northern Europe is pretty much okay, I think. In Asia, we've talked about India in the past. The weather didn't help again in 2022. So we see high channel inventories in India, which we'll be working through. Parts of Indonesia are similar, somewhat high. Rest of Asia is good. So overall, it's pretty much what you would expect. And don't forget, people are focused on what happened in Brazil in terms of growth. The vast majority of the growth in Brazil was price, it wasn't volume and that's important to recognize. So I think out of the weather patterns that we saw in the South and in Argentina, I think other parts of the country are fine.

Kevin McCarthy

Analyst · Vertical Research Partners.

That's helpful. And as a second question, if I may, you've owned BioPhero for roughly 6 months now and so I was wondering if you could provide an update on what you've seen so far. I think when you bought it, you talked about potentially launching 5 new pheromone over the next 3 to 5 years with an eye toward $1 billion of sales by 2030. Maybe you could just provide an update as to how that aspect of the biologicals pipeline is going here?

Mark Douglas

Analyst · Vertical Research Partners.

Yes. Thank you. Great question. We're very happy with the acquisition we made. In fact, I would say, when I think of the key metrics that we're looking at when we acquired the product, we had 5 new pheromones in the R&D pipeline. Today, that number is 9. So the accelerated rate of discovery and application of new pheromones is growing. We have made our first batches of products and move them into the marketplace. So that was a major milestone. The company that we acquired, BioPhero had not -- I was just at the very beginning of making commercial scale quantities. We've now got past that. We are looking to invest in our own manufacturing. We do use some toll manufacturers today, but we're looking at balancing that out across the world. And I would say the trial work, we have substantial trial work around the world on the pheromones that we already have in place. And those trial works are going very well. So from my perspective, the integration has gone very well. But more importantly, I see an accelerated rate of discovery and development coming out of that pipeline, which is very encouraging.

Operator

Operator

The next question comes from Richard Garchitorena with Wells Fargo.

Richard Garchitorena

Analyst · Wells Fargo.

First question on CapEx. It looks like for '23, a bit of a step up $140 million to $180 million versus 2022. Can you talk about where you're going to be adding capacity. What new products plan to increase? And where your operating rates are currently?

Mark Douglas

Analyst · Wells Fargo.

Andrew, why don't you talk about the overall CapEx.

Andrew Sandifer

Analyst · Wells Fargo.

Yes. So we spent about just under $120 million in CapEx in 2022. We're stepping up at the midpoint to about $160 million. So about a good-sized increment in CapEx. A lot of that additional CapEx is to support manufacturing capacity for our new active ingredients. So we're expanding production of Isoflex which is our serial [Averside] we introduced in Australia several a couple of years ago and are rolling out now more broadly around the world. We're expanding capacity for Fluindapyr, the fungicide that we've introduced in a couple of key countries and starts becoming much more material as we get into the next several years. That CapEx, I think, building on comments earlier, that CapEx is largely directed in places outside of China. We're expanding capacity in Europe. We're expanding capacity in other parts of Asia to complement the sourcing that we have today and the strong sourcing position that we have in China, helping just sort of balance that mix of sources that we have. And Mark, if you want to add anything to that?

Mark Douglas

Analyst · Wells Fargo.

Yes, I would say a couple of things on top of what Andrew just added. Formulation capacity is also important. Having the active ingredient is one thing, but expanding your formulation capacity is also a key attribute of where we spend capital. It's nowhere near the same scale of capital, but it is important. And we have, over the last year, expanded capacity here in the U.S., in Europe, and as we go into '23, we're expanding our formulating capacity in Brazil as well. So you won't see -- it doesn't become so apparent in terms of overall dollars of capacity expansion but that is an important attribute that we're focused on as well.

Richard Garchitorena

Analyst · Wells Fargo.

Okay. Great. And as a follow-up, in the slides you provided some details on your Precision Ag business, the Arc mobile solution. Maybe can you talk about how you're going to plan on monetizing this potentially in the future? What your expectations are for growth of that platform. And also, what would you say to folks who -- there's a thought out there that Precision Ag could be a negative to volumes longer term, given it could make farmers more efficient and they may be applying less volume of product. Maybe if you could touch on those.

Mark Douglas

Analyst · Wells Fargo.

Yes, sure. So I'll take the last one first. Listen, I think once you apply something from a precision methodology, you are going to de facto use less volume. I think what gets mixed and what gets missed in this area is the discussion around volume and value. Where are you bringing value and how do you capture that value? Obviously, there are some very large products used around the world, especially nonselective herbicides to go back to that topic. See & Spray technology, which has been developed is an area that is obviously of interest in that space. For us, when I look at how do we capture value from Arc, what are we doing? We're allowing the grower to very precisely time when they need to put the best products in the field to remove insects. That's great from a sustainability perspective. It is also something where you capture value from not only the products you're selling today but the broader portfolio that you sell to those growers. I don't see anywhere in the world where we charge for Arc. We provide it free of charge. It is an SG& A expense, but it does have tremendous uplift in terms of the portfolio mix that you sell. And also, don't forget, it has another attribute, it defends business for us. We're defending on 20 million acres, quite a few hundred million dollars of high-profit products that is very difficult to remove once somebody is using a process like that. That's a differentiator that we believe adds more value to the company than anything else. So we don't necessarily see it as a separate profit center, but we do see it as an important element of how we continue to grow the portfolio and defend the business we have today.

Operator

Operator

The final question comes from Arun Viswanathan with RBC.

Arun Viswanathan

Analyst

When you think about maybe ‘24 and ‘25, ‘23 and ‘22 have been impacted by FX as well as cost inflation. But when you look at ‘24 and ‘25, you expect to get back on to a 7% to 9% EBITDA growth rate? And maybe if you could give us a little bit of what you’re thinking strategy-wise longer term. Are you planning to have an Investor Day and maybe unveil the next 3 to 5 years of strategy and biologicals be a bigger part of that? Or maybe you can just explain maybe some of the longer-term strategy?

Mark Douglas

Analyst

Yes. Thanks for the question. As I just said in the script, we are going to have an Investor Day at the end of this year. We’ll give the dates coming. I don’t want to re-empt that because there’s a lot of work to do between now and then but we will be giving a view of the future, both, I would say, within the near-term few years and then a longer-term aspirational goal for the company. It is important that we feel that we have that longer-term view as we drive the company forward. We’ve been very good in managing the company through the last 5-year cycle, as Andrew has talked about before, we’re pretty much right now above our metric for revenue. But right on the bottom line of EBITDA despite well in excess of $1 billion so far of costs. So I would say you just have to hold that question until we get to the end of the year.

Zack Zaki

Analyst

All right. Thank you, Emily. That’s all the time that we have for questions. Thank you very much. Have a good day.

Operator

Operator

This concludes the FMC Corporation conference call. Thank you for attending. You may now disconnect.