Okay. Well, welcome, everyone. So, my name is Kevin Astak. I'm with the U.S. Chemicals team. I think if you were here before, you saw my boss, Lawrence, here today with Ananta Desi Khan, and from ICL, the CTO from ICL.

Thank you, Kevin. Yeah.

So, just to kick off, I guess I was wondering if you could talk a little bit about what you're seeing in your end markets, and, you know, I guess what you think it could take to see a cyclical turn in some of those end markets. Sure.

I think thanks for the opportunity. And in general, what we have seen and what we have also said in our Q2 earnings is market pricing trends are, you know, are gradually improving for us in majority of end markets. and then we see consistent trends in these end markets. Agriculture fundamentals are relatively stable and, of course, sentiment varies between regions in agriculture. We'll talk about it maybe a little bit later. But our specialties businesses kind of support the overall stability, if you will. 70% of our revenue is coming from specialties now And so that gives us stability. And going to our specialties, we're looking at industrial products, our business that is bromine and bromine derivatives, that is looking at construction, electronics. We see construction being soft. Again, this is the cyclical thing that we might see, but maybe the end is near. And we also sell into the oil and gas market in the U.S., clear-bind fluids. The U.S. market has been strong, but, again, it is cyclical in some ways. Electronics, it's been a long cycle of recovery, but we see maybe the light at the end of the tunnel in that market. In terms of our phosphate specialties, ICL being a diverse company, I wanted to talk about the industrial product segment. phosphate specialties we've seen excess supply providing or driving down prices or giving pricing pressure until the second quarter of this year but we see an uptick in pricing in the second half of the year and and I think it's all mainly driven by excess capacity coming online over the last couple of years and then in the growing solutions business a crop nutrition business we see strong demand and good supply-demand balance, I think. In the area, the third quarter is where Brazil starts planting, and so we should see a business planting season starting. And so that also balances our, you know, the growing seasons and things like that for our business.

Got it. And so you touched on, you began touching on it a little bit, but so I guess, you know, one of the things that we've seen is, you know, fertilizer prices remain quite elevated. And then, you know, at least in the U.S. and in the corn side in particular, you know, you have some farmer economics sort of deteriorating. And I guess I was wondering, you know, we've heard from some places, you know, that there's been some signs of demand destruction or at least kind of substituting down to cheaper alternatives. And I guess I was wondering if you've seen that on the ag side. And if you haven't, I guess, how are you guys thinking about maybe the near-term risk associated with that? Is that something that you, you know, are expecting could happen in near term?

So it can always happen. I'm not the right person to talk about, you know, the farmer pricing, things like that. But what we have done, you know, in terms of our balance, in terms of products, we've looked at also the specialty side of things where we are looking at nutrient use efficiency and supporting the farmer in different ways, also looking at specialty crops. So kind of to balance this, the pricing pressure, if you will, and the farmer side economics, as you mentioned, right? So that's kind of our take on the situation. Also, it depends on regions as well. So that's kind of a little bit of that balance and that mix of region and specialty versus commodity is what we are trying to – what we see, I think. Sure.

Okay. Understood. And I guess maybe a little bit of a different topic, but I guess in terms of, you know, new tariff policies, which are sort of on again, off again, sort of changing quite a bit. I guess, are you seeing any kind of shift in trade flows, you know, maybe potentially affecting something like fertilizers at all? And I guess, what are your expectations around that?

I think we are a true global company with about 40 production sites across the world. We are located in all regions, China, U.S., Israel, of course, Europe, Brazil. So we're kind of insulated from the tariff issues, if you will. So we have local productions in many of the markets we serve. So we could produce locally and serve the markets locally. And so we don't see that much. Of course, we have to be cognizant of all the things that are happening, but we don't see that much of an impact on the tariffs on our businesses. There are some minor impacts, but not significant. And we do have a true local approach, right, like in terms of – and we've done some acquisitions to kind of further strengthen that aspect of things. In the U.S., we've made a small acquisition in the fertilizer market where then we can have local production instead of being impacted by tariffs and things like that, yeah.

Okay, great. Now, just on the potash side, you know, I guess what are the current demand trends like? And I guess what is the company's view on not just a near-term outlook but a longer-term outlook?

Yeah, I think demand is strong this year, and it's going to be strong, I think, for the near term. And I think, you know, seeing this engagement in all markets, I think that's what we're seeing. We did have – we started out this first half a bit slow in terms of, you know, getting the impact of the pricing because we had our contracts with China and India impacting us in the first half. Those contracts have ended. We have a small carryover into the third quarter, but we see an uptick, and our new contracts are at a higher price, so we see an upside potential there. We had an impact in Israel in terms of our production because of the war in Israel. The war itself had the two-week conflict with Iran had an impact. Also, some of our employees were called into reserve, so that had an impact. But I think, so we kind of adjusted our volume projections for the year from 4.5 to 4.7 to 4.3 to 4.5. But we are catching up in terms of our production. And so the second half should be good. And the 2026 projections are also pretty positive in terms of pricing and production capacity and things like that. So, and I think that's the trend. I think that's the sentiment all across the analysts from different analysts as well, I think. Yeah.

And I guess to shift gears a little bit on the phosphate side. So just wondering if you could share any update on sort of how ICL thinks about sort of the evolution of the battery materials market. Are you making any commitments there? You know, interested in becoming a large Western, you know, LFP supplier? And I guess if so, what do you, when do you think you would need to start investing to sort of reach that scale?

So I think I want to kind of talk about our phosphate business itself a little bit. So we are a global specialty phosphate company. So we are present in all regions, have production capacities in all regions. So the phosphate specialties are salts of phosphoric acid and things like that that go into different applications. So we've been looking at the battery material space for a while. We are pretty heavily supplying in the Chinese market, for example, raw materials that go into the battery space. So that's something that we are following a trend. And in the U.S. and Europe, we are kind of monitoring what's happening with the environment of EV and storage. And we will look at capital allocation based on customer demand. And that's something that we are closely monitoring, but quite interested in this space, like in terms of supplying into the EV market and electrical vehicle and storage market. But in terms of becoming downstream integration into LFP capital allocation, I think we're closely monitoring the situation and also looking at customer demand before we do significant allocation in capital.

Sure, right. Yeah, there's some shifts in demand there, I know, at least, you know, in the Western markets, less so in China. But now I just, I guess, now on bromine, I mean, are you guys seeing some higher cost capacity exit the market? And, you know, I guess what are you seeing in terms of global electronics and construction demand for bromine? I know you said construction is obviously on the weak side, but just, yeah, curious to get your thoughts around that.

Yeah, so I think most of our bromine is with long-term contracts, so we have the ability to kind of come in and, you know, participate in the broader market growth as, you know, if the prices are right and things like that. So we have quite a bit of supply production capacity that we can leverage. We are seeing prices stabilizing. I don't think, I don't know whether the, you know, the high cost bromine is exiting, but, you know, but the market is also slowly, you know, stable and growing in terms of demand. Construction is slow, but I think it's stable. You know, we have flame retardants that go into the brominated flame retardants that go into the construction market in Europe, U.S., that is, and also some parts of Asia. And electronics is, again, as I said, the cycle is turning to the positive side, but it's a slow cycle in terms of general consumer electronic growth. But also we are seeing, you know, how can we participate and what is the growth aspects from the AI market in terms of servers and, you know, those aspects of things. So that's something that we are looking at and following, right? I think that's the main reason, main takeaways from the bromine market.

Now, I know we talked a little bit about specialties before, and I guess I was wondering, I guess, what are ICL's top priorities in terms of specialty products portfolio, let's say, in the near term, so 2026, and beyond, so maybe you've also, from the longer-term perspective as well, maybe there's a little bit of difference there, and I guess wondering how ICL is positioning itself against competitors.

So I think on the specialty side, we've been focused on, I think I would say, four areas, right? Like in crop nutrition or growing solutions business, our focus has been to develop specialty solutions in the market, be it biologicals or enhanced efficiency fertilizers that has embedded solutions in the fertilizers itself, of water-soluble with different micronutrients, for example, or chelates. So I think biologicals has been a focus in terms of growth. We've made small acquisitions to kind of get into the biological market. It's a pretty fragmented market. We want to make sure that we make the right investments, both organic and inorganic, in terms of the biologicals. So we've made a couple of acquisitions in Brazil, which is a pretty important market for biologicals. So it gives us technology access, production capability, but it's a small acquisition. We just made an acquisition in a company called Lavi Bio in Israel, which is actually in the front end of developing biological fertilizers. That also accelerates our portfolio there. So that's kind of the focus there. In terms of the food and other areas, we are making investments in functional ingredients and and that's that's kind of the focus in terms of um functionality is that's where we have our foundation so clean label ingredients functional ingredients that go into both the traditional meat poultry seafood market but also into the alternative space both alternative meat and alternative dairy in terms of functional ingredients and that's where some of the investments are and and the focus will be future. And bromine, again, the investment in other specialty solutions, we are looking at specific investments where we can leverage our backward integration in the market. So we are doing acquisitions, smaller acquisitions that are adjacent and bolt-on acquisitions for us, but also making investments in R&D. We started a biological R&D center in Israel to kind of doubled down on our biological crop nutrition space. We started a pilot center in the U.S. for battery materials. So we are also investing in the specialties in terms of R&D capabilities as well.

And I guess just of those sort of, let's say, pipeline innovations, I guess how close are the ones, how close are the commercialization, the ones that sort of are in the pipeline but not?

So I think ICL is a very, it's a diverse company. So I have to start by saying I go division by division a little bit. And if you look at growing solutions, as I mentioned, our focus has been nutrient use efficiency. In Brazil, for example, which is a pretty big specialty fertilizer market, we're looking at several innovations that we have developed and commercializing, for example, for coffee, for example, improving the nutrition uptake in coffee plants, for example. That's an innovation that we've brought into the market recently and is commercial as we speak. We're also looking at nitrogen. We are not a nitrogen player, but we're looking at how can we improve the nitrogen use efficiency for broadcast applications in Brazil. So kind of improving nitrogen efficiency because 50% of nitrogen is now, you know, goes as emissions. How can we improve it and bring a differentiated solution in the market? Biodegradable coated fertilizers is something that we are developing and commercializing in Europe. And water-soluble fertilizers with biodegradable chelating capabilities and things like that. So that's in the crop nutrition business. In the food space, as I mentioned, we are looking at functional ingredients in the alternative protein space, but not only, right? So we have a collaboration, and here we are leveraging external collaboration to bring products to market. So Sproutex is an example where we are bringing a collaboration from Japan, a Japanese company, but building this capability in Europe and producing products in Europe for the alternative protein space. Another example is a collaboration with a company called, startup called Plantable, where it's looking at bringing emulsification, emulsions, which are plant-based solutions in the market. And so that's kind of where we are. And in the industrial product space, we are looking at specific solutions in terms of leveraging our backward integration. For example, a textile innovation that uses magnesia as an odor reduction thing for functional fabrics is an example. A product called Textimag is something that we are commercializing in the market. And flame retardants, we are constantly innovating to bring next generation solutions in building and construction and electronics. So this is kind of – and these are examples of things that are close to commercial or already commercial in the commercial stages. Thank you for that.

And now just, I guess, sort of free cash flow. I guess curious about how you guys think about your free cash flow baseline and, I guess, where you could potentially deploy capital, say, over the next three to five years, so in the medium to longer term.

I think we have a pretty healthy balance sheet, and we want to continue to maintain that investment-grade balance sheet. So we have our CapEx allocation will be dependent on what we need for maintenance in terms of our large production sites, mainly in Israel, to keep up with some of the expansions that we're talking about, and also growth CapEx to kind of support some of the initiatives that I mentioned, like in terms of organic innovation activities and, of course, M&A activities as well. So I think our message is to stay with our healthy balance sheet, with leveraging between maintenance CapEx and growth CapEx and M&A CapEx, and so that maintain the debt to EBITDA ratios and things like that, where we are today in that range, yeah.

Okay, so I guess safe to say more, if M&A more bolt on, nothing, let's say, hugely transformational?

Yes, I think we are in that space. We are looking at M&A that is bolt-on to our existing businesses. That's kind of our focus, and that's where we are today also, yeah.

Okay, and so I guess anything that you'd really like us to take away from today? Maybe something we haven't discussed that you'd like to touch on a little bit? Happy to sort of open.

I think we talked about different things. It's, I'm excited about the portfolio, what we've done in the last five years to transform our company from, you know, I think a more commodity-based company into where we are now today, 70% of our revenue is coming from specialties. We continue to put investments in the specialty space to improve our margins, to improve the value that we bring to our customers. So that's pretty exciting. Some of these innovations that I talked about that are coming closer to commercialization is also pretty rewarding, and we want to grow and build on that. And I think the M&A aspects of things is to see how do you balance organic versus inorganic growth. And so I think, you know, but providing top-line and bottom-line growth for the company, I think that's kind of where our management is focused. I think our divisions are focused. how do you balance both organic and inorganic growth, I think. But not only, not just pick one, but have a balanced approach. Right, exactly.

Well, so those are all the specific questions I had. You know, we're done a little bit early today. I guess we were very efficient. But I really appreciate you coming today and speaking with us. And yeah, I appreciate everyone coming in and joining us. Thank you.

Yeah.