FPI Q3 2026 Earnings Call: Verluste, Risikovorsorge und gesenkte AFFO-Prognose

Kernaussagen

• Farmland Partners Inc. (NYSE: FPI) wies für das 3. Quartal 2026 einen Nettoverlust von 15,5 Mio. US-Dollar bzw. 0,36 US-Dollar je Aktie aus, verglichen mit einem Nettogewinn von 0,5 Mio. US-Dollar bzw. 0,00 US-Dollar je Aktie im 3. Quartal 2025.
• Das AFFO lag im 3. Quartal bei minus 2,1 Mio. US-Dollar bzw. minus 0,05 US-Dollar je gewichteter durchschnittlicher Aktie, verglichen mit plus 2,9 Mio. US-Dollar bzw. 0,07 US-Dollar je Aktie im Vorjahreszeitraum.
• Die Ergebnisse enthielten höhere Kreditausfallrückstellungen für einen Kreditnehmer, eine erhöhte Rückstellung für Prozessrisiken sowie eine Wertminderung von 12 Mio. US-Dollar auf landwirtschaftliche Flächen in Kalifornien, die zum Verkauf gehalten werden oder dafür vorgesehen sind.
• Das Management passte seine AFFO-Prognose für 2026 auf 8,9 Mio. bis 10,7 Mio. US-Dollar bzw. 0,21 bis 0,25 US-Dollar je Aktie an. Zwei einmalige Aufwendungen machten 0,095 US-Dollar der Senkung der Prognose je Aktie um 0,10 US-Dollar aus.
• FPI kaufte im Laufe des Quartals etwa 1,7 Mio. Aktien zu einem Durchschnittspreis von 10,32 US-Dollar zurück. Das Management erklärte, die Aktie werde mit einem deutlichen Abschlag auf den Nettoinventarwert (NAV) gehandelt, und deutete an, dass eine erneute Rückkaufermächtigung eine vernünftige Annahme sei.
• Etwa ein Drittel des auf den Mittleren Westen konzentrierten Verlängerungsprozesses für Pachtverträge war abgeschlossen. Die Verlängerungen fielen weitgehend unverändert bis leicht höher aus, wobei das Management betonte, dass sich der Prozess noch in einem frühen Stadium befinde.

Wichtigste Finanzdaten

In den ersten neun Monaten des Jahres 2026 verzeichnete FPI einen Nettoverlust von 11,7 Mio. US-Dollar bzw. 0,28 US-Dollar je Aktie, verglichen mit einem Nettogewinn von 10,4 Mio. US-Dollar bzw. 0,18 US-Dollar je Aktie im Vorjahreszeitraum. Das AFFO für die ersten neun Monate sank von 6,5 Mio. US-Dollar bzw. 0,14 US-Dollar je Aktie auf 1,7 Mio. US-Dollar bzw. 0,04 US-Dollar je Aktie.

Geschäfts- und operative Entwicklung

Höhere Einnahmen aus Öl- und Gas-Lizenzgebühren sowie gestiegene Zinserträge stützten den Umsatz. Die Zinserträge profitierten von einem höheren durchschnittlichen Bestand an Krediten im Rahmen des FPI-Kreditprogramms und von Finanzierungsforderungen.

Diese Zuwächse wurden durch geringere Mieteinnahmen infolge von Verkäufen von Vermögenswerten im Vorjahr und geringere Ernteverkäufe im Vergleich zum gleichen Zeitraum des Jahres 2025 ausgeglichen.

Das Management beschrieb das Kernportfolio, das sich zunehmend auf den Mittleren Westen konzentriert, als widerstandsfähig. Die Rentabilität der Landwirte blieb aufgrund erhöhter Kosten, insbesondere für Diesel während der Erntezeit, ungewiss. Trotz dieses Drucks fielen die frühzeitigen Pachtverlängerungen weitgehend unverändert bis leicht höher aus.

FPI identifizierte mehrere landwirtschaftliche Flächen in Kalifornien zum Verkauf, die Immobilien umfassen, die das Management nach eigenen Angaben nicht besonders bevorzugt. Die damit verbundene Wertminderung von 12 Mio. US-Dollar betraf Flächen, die bereits zum Verkauf gehalten werden, sowie Flächen, die das Unternehmen zu verkaufen beabsichtigt.

Prognose des Managements

FPI prognostiziert für 2026 ein AFFO von 8,9 Mio. bis 10,7 Mio. US-Dollar, was 0,21 bis 0,25 US-Dollar je Aktie entspricht.

Im Vergleich zum Ausblick vom Juli sank die AFFO-Prognose je Aktie um 0,10 US-Dollar. Die zusätzliche Kreditausfallrückstellung und die erhöhte Rückstellung für Prozessrisiken machten 0,095 US-Dollar dieser Senkung aus.

Das Management gab an, im vierten Quartal keine weitere Kreditausfallrückstellung zu erwarten, wies jedoch darauf hin, dass neue Tatsachen und Umstände die erforderliche bilanzielle Behandlung ändern könnten.

Risiken und Beobachtungspunkte

• Kreditrisiko: Das Gesamtrisiko gegenüber dem in der Konferenz besprochenen Kreditnehmer belief sich über Kredite und Finanzierungsforderungen hinweg auf 51 Mio. US-Dollar. Der Kreditnehmer leistete Zahlungen und glich einige Zinsrückstände aus, jedoch kam ein geplanter wesentlicher Verkauf von Vermögenswerten nicht zustande.
• Unsicherheit bei den Sicherheiten: Laut FPI verfügte der Kredit über erhebliche Sicherheiten, darunter traditionelle Immobilien. Andere Sicherheiten und persönliche Garantien waren jedoch schwerer zu bewerten und wurden in der Analyse des Unternehmens mit erheblichen Abschlägen versehen.
• Rechtsstreitigkeiten: Ein ungünstiges Ergebnis in Louisiana trug wesentlich zu den Rückstellungen des Quartals bei. Unabhängig davon erhielt FPI im Fall Sabrepoint ein günstiges Berufungsurteil, das Management rechnet jedoch mit weiteren Verzögerungen und betonte, dass die endgültige Durchsetzung ungewiss bleibe.
• Rentabilität der Landwirte: Hohe Betriebskosten, insbesondere die Dieselpreise, könnten die Wirtschaftlichkeit der Betriebe und die Pachtverhandlungen belasten, obwohl das Management günstige Erträge und Erntepreise anführte.
• Verkäufe in Kalifornien: Landwirtschaftliche Flächen, die zum Verkauf gehalten oder dafür vorgesehen sind, führten zu einer Wertminderung von 12 Mio. US-Dollar, was die Bewertungs- und Umsetzungsrisiken im Zusammenhang mit den geplanten Verkäufen unterstreicht.

Highlights der Analysten-Fragerunde

Das Management erklärte, das Unternehmen gehe auf Basis der aktuellen Informationen davon aus, ausreichend gegen das Kreditrisiko in Höhe von 51 Mio. US-Dollar abgesichert zu sein. Die Rückstellung wurde erhöht, nachdem ein erwarteter Verkauf von Vermögenswerten, der das Risiko von FPI erheblich verringern sollte, im letzten Moment scheiterte.

Zum Sabrepoint-Rechtsstreit erklärte das Management, dass die Ansprüche von FPI nach einem günstigen Urteil des Berufungsgerichts in Texas weiterverfolgt werden können. Das Unternehmen rechnet damit, dass Sabrepoint Berufung beim Supreme Court of Texas einlegen könnte, und deutete eine Bevorzugung einer außergerichtlichen Einigung an. Das Management schätzte den Schaden auf mehr als 100 Mio. US-Dollar, gab jedoch zu bedenken, dass die tatsächliche Erstattung aufgrund der Ungewissheit über die finanzielle Leistungsfähigkeit von Sabrepoint wahrscheinlich geringer ausfallen dürfte.

Was die Kapitalallokation betrifft, sah das Management den Rückkauf von FPI-Aktien aufgrund des genannten Abschlags auf den NAV als die attraktivste Gelegenheit zum Erwerb von Agrarland für das Unternehmen an. Executive Chairman Paul Pittman erklärte, es sei eine vernünftige Annahme, dass der Verwaltungsrat die bestehende Rückkaufermächtigung erneuern werde.

Vollständiges Transkript der Telefonkonferenz zu den Quartalszahlen

Vollständiges Transkript der Telefonkonferenz

Ausführungen des Managements

Operator

Hello, everyone. Thank you for joining us, and welcome to the Farmland Partners Inc. Q3 2026 Earnings Call. [Operator Instructions] I will now hand the conference over to Luca Fabbri, President and Chief Executive Officer. Luca, please go ahead.

Luca Fabbri

Thank you, Erica. Good morning, and welcome to Farmland Partners Third Quarter 2026 Earnings Conference Call and Webcast. We truly appreciate you taking the time to join us for these calls because we see them as a very important opportunity to share with you our thinking and our strategy in a format less formal and more interactive than public filings and press releases. I will now turn over the call to our General Counsel, Christine Garrison, for some customary preliminary remarks. Christine?

Christine Garrison

Thank you, Luca, and thank you to everyone on the call. The press release announcing our third quarter earnings was distributed after market closed yesterday. The supplemental package has been posted to the Investor Relations section of our website under the subheader Events and Presentations. For those who listen to the recording of this presentation, we remind you that the remarks made herein are as of today, October 29, 2026, and will not be updated subsequent to this call.

During this call, we will make forward-looking statements, including statements related to the future performance of our portfolio, our identified and potential acquisitions and dispositions, impact of acquisitions, dispositions and financing activities, business development opportunities as well as comments on our outlook for our business, rents and the broader agricultural markets. We will also discuss certain non-GAAP financial measures, including net operating income, FFO, adjusted FFO, EBITDAre and adjusted EBITDAre.

Definitions of these non-GAAP measures as well as reconciliations to the most comparable GAAP measures are included in the company's press release announcing third quarter 2026 earnings, which is available on our website, farmlandpartners.com, and is furnished as an exhibit to our current report on Form 8-K dated October 28, 2026. Listeners are cautioned that these statements are subject to certain risks and uncertainties, many of which are difficult to predict and generally beyond our control.

These risks and uncertainties can cause actual results to differ materially from our current expectations, and we advise listeners to review the risk factors discussed in our press release distributed yesterday and in documents we have filed with or furnished to the SEC. I would now like to turn the call to our Executive Chairman, Paul Pittman. Paul?

Paul Pittman

Thank you, Christine. Hello, everybody. So it was a tough quarter from the standpoint of our earnings due to some reserves and negative surprises we had along the way. The underlying core value of the portfolio, which today is gradually getting ever more concentrated in the Midwest is incredibly strong. Nothing negative going on there. Farm economy is pretty decent, but not perfect by any means. Costs are high. But the core portfolio continues to perform very, very well.

We got a surprising and negative result in a piece of litigation in Louisiana, which is a major piece of the reserves we took. And then we also have one loan situation that we continue to be worried about. And so we thought it prudent to take a reserve there, even though we will continue all efforts to collect the full amount. So with that, I will stop and turn it over to Luca, I believe, follows me here.

Luca Fabbri

Yes. Thank you, Paul. Just wanted to kind of strengthen a little bit Paul's comments about the strength of -- the resilience of the farm economy, especially the resilience of the asset class. This is not a great year for farmers because despite pretty good news on both yields and crop prices, the -- everybody is now reading headlines about the devastating impact of the cost items on their P&L, especially diesel prices. And this is especially negative at this time of the year when they are burning through a lot of diesel fuel for harvest.

So we are about 1/3 of the way into our lease renewal process for the renewing leases, very focused on the Midwest. And we are seeing that there is a lot of uncertainty regarding profitability among farmers. But it's -- and this is also a lease renewal cycle that is coming off a renewal about 3 years ago on average that was incredibly strong. So, so far, we are seeing relatively flat to slightly up lease renewals, but we are still very early to know exactly how it's going to end up in aggregate when we are done.

The other point I would like to make is that we are -- as always, we are incredibly strong believers in the asset class, especially for the core of our portfolio in the Midwest. We see the best farmland acquisition opportunity as being our own stock because we are trading at a significant discount to NAV. And to that effect, in the quarter, we purchased about 1.7 million shares at an average price of $10.32. And this is all the comments I wanted to make, and I will turn the call over to our CFO, Susan Landi, for her overview of the company's financial performance. Susan?

Susan Landi

Thank you, Luca. I'm going to cover a few items today, including a summary of the 3 and 9 months ended September 30, 2026, a review of our capital structure and updated guidance for 2026. I'll be referring to the supplemental package, which is available in the Investor Relations section of our website under the subheader Events and Presentations. First, I will share a few financial metrics that appear on Page 2. For the 3 months ended September 30, 2026, net loss was $15.5 million or $0.36 per share available to common stockholders versus a net income of $0.5 million or $0 per share available to common stockholders for the same period in 2025.

AFFO was negative $2.1 million or negative $0.05 per weighted average share compared to $2.9 million or $0.07 per weighted average share for the same period in 2025. For the 9 months ended September 30, 2026, net loss was $11.7 million or negative $0.28 per share available to common stockholders versus net income of $10.4 million or $0.18 a share available to common stockholders for the same period in 2025. AFFO was $1.7 million or $0.04 per weighted average share compared to $6.5 million or $0.14 per weighted average share for the same period in 2025.

Page 5 shows a more comprehensive look at the main drivers of these changes year-over-year. On the revenue side, we were positively impacted by higher receipts from oil and gas royalties and higher interest income due to a higher average balance on loans under the FPI loan program and financing receivables. These increases were offset by lower rental income due to asset dispositions that occurred in the prior year in addition to some lower crop sales in the current year versus the prior year. Operating expenses were higher on both a quarter-to-date and year-to-date basis over the prior year, and this was primarily due to an increase in the provision for credit loss reserve related to loans under the FPI loan program as well as an increase in the estimated loss contingency related to litigation that Paul had mentioned previously.

On Page 12, there are a few capital structure items to point out. We had undrawn capacity on our lines of credit of approximately $107 million at the end of Q3 2026. Page 15 is our updated outlook for 2026. The assumptions are listed at the bottom of the page. Changes from the July guidance primarily relate to 2 nonrecurring charges, the additional credit loss reserve and the increase in the loss contingency related to the litigation. Note that these 2 events account for $0.095 of the $0.10 decrease in AFFO per share. The forecasted range of AFFO $8.9 million to $10.7 million or $0.21 to $0.25 per share. This summarizes where we stand today. We will keep you updated as we progress through the year. This wraps up our comments this morning. Thank you all for participating. Operator, you can now begin the Q&A session.

Operator

[Operator Instructions] The first question comes from the line of Craig Kucera with Lucid Capital Markets.

Fragen und Antworten

Craig Kucera

With the impairment charges you had this quarter, were those affiliated with just the assets held for sale? Or was that just a more broad-based valuation adjustment in California?

Paul Pittman

Luca, do you want to take that one?

Luca Fabbri

Sure. And I'll have Susan chime in for some more details. Fundamentally, we have a few farms that we are either holding for sale or we have earmarked for sale in California. That is, frankly, the -- all the farms that we don't particularly like. So the $12 million impairment charge relates to both the ones held for sale and the one that we intend to sell. Susan, anything you want to add to that?

Susan Landi

No.

Craig Kucera

Okay. I guess with Sabrepoint and reading your SEC filings, it reads like you thought this was the final gating factor as far as the appellate decision that will allow you to pursue those claims. Is that your opinion? And can you give us a sense of what those damages might be you might be seeking?

Paul Pittman

Yes. Let me take this one and Christine, our General Counsel, will chime in after me if she wants to add something. So yes, the victory that we got at the appellate level in the Texas courts on the Sabrepoint case is incredibly strong. Sabrepoint, in our opinion, will continue to delay -- but that opinion, if you actually read the entire opinion, which is publicly available, was very, very strong. It says, look, it's an appellate court. So it says we're not the trier of fact, but it sure looks like there's a smoking gun here is paraphrasing what that opinion said. And so our claims will be allowed to proceed.

We assume Sabrepoint will appeal this to the Supreme Court of Texas, not because they think they can win, not because they think the court will probably even take it, but it's further delay. Our hope is that we will engage in a settlement at some point instead of having to try this. If I was on the Sabrepoint side, I would certainly not want to go all the way through the court process and have a court announce that I basically committed fraud on the market. And remember, these guys are "asset managers," and if they go all the way through this case and get another opinion like the one just written, I don't think they can be in the securities business anymore for the rest of their lives.

So I think their pressure on them to settle is going to get strong. But who knows. As far as the amount that we could recover, what we ought to recover is $100 million plus. Will we recover that? Probably not. I just don't think Sabrepoint has as much money as the damage they cost, but we're going to go get every penny we can from them. So I'll just leave it at that.

Craig Kucera

Fair enough. I'd like to circle back to the provision for credit loss allowance. Was the borrower who's given you some trouble in the past, that -- did that continue to be reserved against this quarter? And how much is still -- how much has not been reserved against if that is the case?

Paul Pittman

Let me answer the question generally, and then Susan or Luca, you look at specifics if we can share them. So the answer to the question is, yes, we've taken reserves in the last few quarters against potential loan loss risk. It is the same borrower. The borrower per se is not causing us trouble. They made some payments in this quarter. They caught up on a bunch of interest and things like that. So it is not a situation where it's dire. Although we're a public entity, we're bound by GAAP. When a guy is paying slow and paying late, the risk of that borrower is increasing even if they're saying and promising they're going to pay you. And so we continue to take these reserves.

I don't want to suggest for a second that they're purely driven by accounting considerations, and we believe the risk is increasing. That's why we're taking reserves. But we still will work diligently to collect all of this. It's just that you just got to be honest with yourself when things aren't going exactly per contract, so to speak, and you're the lender, you got to accept that, that is not a good fact and make some reserves. So that's what we're doing there. Luca or Susan, if you can disclose anything more specific, feel free.

Susan Landi

So I believe part of your question was what is our exposure. Our total exposure between the loans and the financing receivables in aggregate is $51 million. I don't know if you had any more specific questions.

Luca Fabbri

And we have -- there is significant -- of course, very significant collateral behind that loan. Some of the collateral is traditional real estate collateral, but there is significant kind of less other types of collaterals and guarantees that are harder to value. So we've taken an approach that we think we embraced the principle that our financials should be conservative, but in the realm of reality. And we opted in our analysis to pretty much discount significantly the non-real estate collateral that we have behind this loan, including personal guarantees and so on and so forth.

Craig Kucera

That's helpful. Just one more for me. I mean, given your comments regarding the attractiveness of buybacks, I think this quarter, you nearly topped out your existing repurchase authorization. Is it reasonable to assume that the Board will re-up the existing authorization?

Paul Pittman

I'm going to answer that. I think that's a reasonable assumption.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Buck Horne with Raymond James.

Buck Horne

I just kind of want to follow up on a credit loss reserve question a little bit. It looks like in the guidance, you're not anticipating having to take any additional reserves in the fourth quarter or maybe going forward. Correct me if I'm wrong on that. Just wondering, what are the other flags you guys are looking at in that portfolio, if there are any other indicators of issues or whether it's struggles with payments or profitability? How is the rest of the exposure looking going forward?

Paul Pittman

Yes. The -- so let me describe a little more granularity what kind of happened, which disappointed us this quarter. As I said, they made some payments and caught up on some interest and other things. There was supposed to be a relatively significant asset sale that was going to bring us capital, and that has been an asset sale that had been in the works, as you can imagine, for 4 to 6 months, maybe more. That at the last moment didn't close. That's never a good fact. We're not right in the middle of those negotiations ourselves because it's the borrower making the sale of the assets to repay us. But that's just not a good fact.

And when we were expecting an additional -- a substantial additional reduction in our exposure and then it doesn't happen, like I said, you have to take that as a bad fact even if it isn't just positive that things are going to go negative for you. So that's the kind of thing that's going on. We -- as Luca said, we think we're going to be covered here. But when you sit down and say, okay, things go to hell in a handbasket and you're going to fire sale these assets, are you going to get a full recovery? And the answer in our math is that we're concerned that we wouldn't. Therefore, we take a reserve. We think we're well reserved at this point. But next quarter, we'll reveal more facts and circumstances that may affect what we need to do next quarter, although we're not anticipating a further reserve.

Operator

[Operator Instructions] There are no further questions at this time. I will now turn the call back to Luca for closing remarks.

Luca Fabbri

Thank you, Erica, and thank you, everybody. We appreciate your interest in our company and look forward to updating you on our activities and results in the coming quarters. Have a great rest of your day.

Operator

This concludes today's call. Thank you for attending. You may now disconnect.