I am trying to execute a swap on Pancakeswap using web3, but I get an error when calculating transaction cost

I am new at ethereum development and I am working on a simple script to execute swaps using Pancakeswap. Everything seems to be working well up to the point where I am building my transaction and calculate the tx-cost. I am using the UniswapRouterV02 abi create my Pancakeswap contract. The code:

const init = async () => {

    const [WBNB, BUSD] = await Promise.all(
        [addresses.WBNB, addresses.BUSD].map(tokenAddress => (
            new Token(
                ChainId.MAINNET,
                tokenAddress,
                18
            )
        )));


    const pair = await Fetcher.fetchPairData(WBNB, BUSD, provider)
    const route = await new Route([pair], WBNB)
    const trade = await new Trade(route, new TokenAmount(WBNB, tradeAmount), TradeType.EXACT_INPUT)
    const executionPrice = trade.executionPrice.toSignificant(12)

    // Correct prices; everything seems correct up until here

    const slippageTolerance = new Percent('50', '10000')

    const amountOutMin = trade.minimumAmountOut(slippageTolerance).raw
    const path = [WBNB.address, BUSD.address]
    const to = MY_ADDRESS
    const deadline = Math.floor(Date.now() / 1000) + 60 * 20
    const value = trade.inputAmount.raw

    // Correct prices everything seems correct up until here

    const pancakeSwap = new web3.eth.Contract(
        abis.uniswapRouter.abi,
        addresses.PANCAKE_ROUTER //'0x05fF2B0DB69458A0750badebc4f9e13aDd608C7F'
    );

    let tx = pancakeSwap.methods.swapExactTokensForTokens(
        tradeAmount,
        web3.utils.toBN(amountOutMin.toString()),
        path,
        to,
        deadline
    )

    const [gasPrice, gasCost] = await Promise.all([
        web3.eth.getGasPrice(),
        tx.estimateGas({from: admin}),
    ]);


    console.log(`gasPrice: ${gasPrice}`)
    console.log(`gasCost: ${gasCost}`)
}

init()

The price calculation for the swap returns correct prices. However when I try to calculate the transaction costs the following error is thrown: Error: Returned error: gas required exceeds allowance (44038122) or always failing transaction

Any help would be greatly appreciated, please let me know if more of my code should be clarified!

Answer

In turns out that with web3 it is not possible to interact with the Pancakeswap contract. I found a solution using ethers.js. Following code worked for me to execute a swap on Pancake on mainnet. Before executing the first transaction Pancakeswap needs to be allowed, this code is commented out. I had to play around with the gasprice and gasLimit a bit to make it work.

require("dotenv").config()
const ethers = require('ethers')
const {ChainId, Token, TokenAmount, Fetcher, Pair, Route, Trade, TradeType, Percent} = 
require('@pancakeswap-libs/sdk');
const Web3 = require('web3');
const web3 = new Web3('wss://apis.ankr.com/wss/c40792ffe3514537be9fb4109b32d257/946dd909d324e5a6caa2b72ba75c5799/binance/full/main');
const {JsonRpcProvider} = require("@ethersproject/providers");
const provider = new JsonRpcProvider('https://bsc-dataseed1.binance.org/');
const { address: admin } = web3.eth.accounts.wallet.add(process.env.PRIVATE_KEY)

const addresses = {
    WBNB: '0xbb4CdB9CBd36B01bD1cBaEBF2De08d9173bc095c',
    BUSD: '0xe9e7CEA3DedcA5984780Bafc599bD69ADd087D56',
    PANCAKE_ROUTER: '0x05fF2B0DB69458A0750badebc4f9e13aDd608C7F'
}

const ONE_ETH_IN_WEI = web3.utils.toBN(web3.utils.toWei('1'))
const tradeAmount = ONE_ETH_IN_WEI.div(web3.utils.toBN('1000'))

const init = async () => {

const [WBNB, BUSD] = await Promise.all(
    [addresses.WBNB, addresses.BUSD].map(tokenAddress => (
        new Token(
            ChainId.MAINNET,
            tokenAddress,
            18
        )
    )));

const pair = await Fetcher.fetchPairData(WBNB, BUSD, provider)
const route = await new Route([pair], WBNB)
const trade = await new Trade(route, new TokenAmount(WBNB, tradeAmount), TradeType.EXACT_INPUT)

const slippageTolerance = new Percent('50', '10000')

// create transaction parameters
const amountOutMin = trade.minimumAmountOut(slippageTolerance).raw
const path = [WBNB.address, BUSD.address]
const to = admin
const deadline = Math.floor(Date.now() / 1000) + 60 * 20

// Create signer
const wallet = new ethers.Wallet(
    Buffer.from(
    process.env.PRIVATE_KEY, // paste your private key from metamask here
    "hex"
    )
)
const signer = wallet.connect(provider)

// Create Pancakeswap ethers Contract
const pancakeswap = new ethers.Contract(
    addresses.PANCAKE_ROUTER,
    ['function swapExactTokensForTokens(uint amountIn, uint amountOutMin, address[] calldata path, address to, uint deadline) external returns (uint[] memory amounts)'],
    signer
)

// Allow Pancakeswap
// let abi = ["function approve(address _spender, uint256 _value) public returns (bool success)"]
// let contract = new ethers.Contract(WBNB.address, abi, signer)
// await contract.approve(addresses.PANCAKE_ROUTER, ethers.utils.parseUnits('1000.0', 18), {gasLimit: 100000, gasPrice: 5e9})

// Execute transaction
const tx = await pancakeswap.swapExactTokensForTokens(
    ethers.utils.parseUnits('0.001', 18),
    ethers.utils.parseUnits(web3.utils.fromWei(amountOutMin.toString()), 18),
    path,
    to,
    deadline,
    { gasLimit: ethers.utils.hexlify(200000), gasPrice: ethers.utils.parseUnits("10", "gwei") }
)

console.log(`Tx-hash: ${tx.hash}`)

const receipt = await tx.wait();

console.log(`Tx was mined in block: ${receipt.blockNumber}`)
}

init()