BrasilAgro – Companhia Brasileira de Propriedades Agrícolas

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What it is

BrasilAgro’s core business is the acquisition, development, operation, and sale of rural properties suitable for agricultural activities. Think of it less as a farmer and more as a land developer: buy undervalued ground in Brazil, Paraguay, and Bolivia, clear and certify it, grow crops to generate cash flow while the land matures, then sell to institutional buyers at a multiple of the purchase price.

It operates through six segments — Real Estate, Grains, Sugarcane, Cattle Raising, Cotton, and Other — and cultivates soybean, corn, sugarcane, sesame, sorghum, beans, and cotton, while also producing and selling beef calves. The land-sale segment is the profit engine that makes the farming operations look almost secondary.

BrasilAgro was the first agribusiness company to list on B3’s Novo Mercado — Brazil’s highest governance tier — and in 2012 became the first Brazilian agribusiness company listed on the New York Stock Exchange. It was founded in 2006.

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Who owns it

The largest shareholder is Cresud S.A.C.I.F. y A., an Argentine land-and-real-estate group that holds a substantial controlling stake and exercises significant influence over major strategic decisions.

EODHD data shows insiders controlling about 40% of shares, with institutional investors holding a further 23%.

Eduardo S. Elsztain — founder of Consultores Asset Management and Chairman of the Board of Directors of Cresud — chairs BrasilAgro’s board and is also a member of its Executive Committee, giving the Argentine holding group direct boardroom presence.

The remaining roughly 37% of shares trade freely on B3 and the NYSE.

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Who runs it

André Guillaumon has been BrasilAgro’s CEO since 2017 and holds a degree in Agricultural Engineering from ESALQ/USP; he is also a member of the Superior Council of Agribusiness of the Industry Federation of São Paulo State.

Gustavo Javier Lopez — a graduate in Accounting from the Universidad de Buenos Aires who began his career at Cresud in 1999 — serves as CFO and Investor Relations Officer, and was a participant in BrasilAgro’s founding in 2006, initially as Administrative Director and since 2016 also as Financial and IR Director.

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The money, in plain words

In its fiscal year ended June 2025 (FY2025), BrasilAgro brought in R$869 million (US$167 mn) (~$167m) in sales — down 14.6% from R$1.02 billion (US$196 mn) the prior year (our calculation) — because fewer farms were sold in that cycle. It kept about 16 cents of profit from every real of revenue — a net margin of 15.9% (our calculation) — reasonable for an operation that mixes volatile commodity farming with lumpy real-estate gains.

The balance sheet carries R$1.15 billion (US$221 mn) (~$221m) of net debt — borrowings of R$1.31 billion (US$252 mn) less cash of R$160 million (US$31 mn) (our calculation) — against total assets of R$3.84 billion (US$738 mn) (~$738m), most of it farmland held at fair value. The company’s “buy-develop-sell” model has generated BRL 1.9 billion (US$365 mn) (~$346m) in asset sales since 2020, proving that the recurring farm-sale program is not opportunistic but structural.

Brazilian corporate law and BrasilAgro’s own by-laws require a minimum dividend equal to 25% of net income, which at the current share price translates to a dividend yield of 4.1% — a meaningful cash return even in a down crop year.

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What it is doing now

In June 2025, BrasilAgro sold the entirety of Fazenda Preferência in Baianópolis, Bahia, for R$141.4 million (US$27 mn) — a farm acquired back in 2008 for just R$10.7 million (US$2 mn) that sat in a low-liquidity region for 17 years before finally finding its moment. The company’s property portfolio now spans 252,796 hectares across six Brazilian states as well as Paraguay and Bolivia.

In August 2025, BrasilAgro signed a 13-cycle lease on 3,000 new arable hectares in Comodoro, Mato Grosso, expanding an existing regional operation there — adding planted area without deploying scarce capital to buy land outright. For the 2025/26 crop year, management projects more stable weather and meaningful productivity gains after a difficult year hit by adverse weather and crop-management setbacks.

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What to watch

• Farm-sale pipeline. Annual land sales averaging R$380m (US$73 mn) over five years are the primary profit driver; the pace and price of future disposals will determine returns more than any harvest.
• Commodity prices and weather. Grain and cotton production in FY2025 came in 9% below initial estimates due to weather disruptions — a reminder that the farming side can swing sharply.
• Leverage. Net debt of R$1.15bn (US$221 mn) (~$221m) against equity of R$2.18bn (US$419 mn) means the company is meaningfully geared; rising Brazilian interest rates tighten that constraint.
• Cresud relationship. The controlling Argentine shareholder sets strategic direction; any change in Cresud’s own financial position or ownership appetite flows directly through to BrasilAgro.
• Portfolio valuation. An independent appraisal put the land portfolio at R$3.5 billion (US$672 mn), an 18% compound annual growth rate over five years — the gap between that figure and the R$1.81 billion (US$348 mn) market cap is the valuation question every investor must answer.

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This is news, not investment advice.