Glen Ibbott
Analyst · ATB Capital Markets. Please go ahead
Thank you, Miguel, and good afternoon, everyone. We’re obviously very pleased with our Q2 performance and gratified that the substantial progress we have made in executing our business transformation continues to yield tangible results for our company. Our mission to further improve our financial condition is well on track, as highlighted by our commitment to deliver $40 million in annualized savings by the end of this fiscal year. Today, our total cash balance sits at over $200 million in cash and equivalents, which is more than sufficient to reach positive free cash flow in calendar 2024. And I’ll also highlight our progress in cleaning out debt. During Q2, we repurchased approximately $41 million of our convertible senior notes through the issuance of approximately 54 million common shares. Subsequent to Q2, we repurchased a further approximately $23 million of our convertible senior notes and that was with cash. Before the end of fiscal Q4, we’ll pay off the final US$53 million of these convertible senior notes. This is a monumental improvement to our balance sheet, where we have reduced debt by approximately $531 million over the last three years. That’s an achievement that we are very proud of. Now, looking to our Q2 revenue line, we delivered growth of 30% over the comparable year ago period. Specifically, we generated a sharp increase in sales from our higher margin global medical cannabis segment, which coupled with a larger contribution from plant propagation more than offset a slight decrease in consumer cannabis. On profitability, consolidated adjusted gross margin held steady at 51% and adjusted EBITDA rose to $3.4 million, reflecting a $9.6 million improvement from last year and our highest quarterly result in adjusted EBITDA to-date. Let’s now go into our Q2 results in greater depth. Net revenue rose to $63.4 million, up solidly compared to $48 million in the year ago period. Overall, medical cannabis generated $43.8 million in net revenue, up 42% from last year. By segment, International Medical revenue was $18.4 million, up 126% from last year. And Canadian medical cannabis was $25.4 million, up 11% year-over-year. The performance of our high margin medical channels was largely due to the positive market reaction to the launch of our new Canadian-grown high-potency cultivars in our key European markets and to the continued growth of the Australian medical market. Adjusted gross margin for medical cannabis was 63%, compared to 61% sequentially and 68% in the year ago quarter. The change from last year is a result of higher revenue from our exports to Australia, where we sell in bulk to our distributor partner, as opposed to Europe, where we own the sales and distribution chain and pick up that margin as well. As usual, driven by our focus and leadership in global medical markets, medical cannabis represented about 85% of our total cannabis adjusted gross profit, an increase of 31% at $27.4 million in Q2, compared to $20.9 million in the year ago period. Consumer net -- consumer cannabis net revenue was $12 million, down 8% from a year ago. The change is partially due to our exit from the U.S. CBD business, but predominantly driven by the timing of new innovation launches. Adjusted gross margin for consumer cannabis was 27%, compared to 25% in the prior year period, with the increasing margin due to higher cultivar yields and continued efficiency improvements in production that are driving unit costs lower. In plant propagation, you may recall from our last earnings call that the revenue in Q2 and Q3 would decrease relative to Q1, due to the seasonality of this business. Normally, Bevo earns about 25% to 35% of annual revenues in the second half of a calendar year. So, with this in mind, net revenue for Bevo in Q2 is $7.2 million. That’s up from $3.3 million last year at this time. But note that the year ago period is not a perfect comparison, as we acquired Bevo in August 2022, so it did not capture a quarter of revenue last year. But Bevo performed as we expected in Q2. Plant propagation adjusted gross margins were 22%, up from 16% last year. The increase was due to product mix between vegetable and ornamental plant sales. Our consolidated adjusted SG&A was well controlled at approximately $27.7 million, down from $29.8 million in the year ago period and reflecting our ongoing commitment to keeping SG&A below $30 million. So, taken together, the solid Q2 revenue performance and well-controlled costs combined to deliver an adjusted EBITDA of $3.4 million. That’s a record for Aurora and is our fourth consecutive quarter of positive adjusted EBITDA. Turning now to cash flow, we made progress in fiscal Q2 towards our goal of positive free cash flow. As our operations, excluding changes in working capital, used a net $13 million. This is down modestly sequentially and well down from the $37.3 million used in the year ago period. Fiscal Q2 met our expectations and keeps us on track to achieving the goal of generating positive free cash flow in calendar 2024. This is an important topic, so let me dive in a bit deeper. In our fiscal Q1 results, we explained that our target of $40 million in annualized expense reductions is expected to be realized mainly in fiscal Q3 and Q4. The efficiency initiatives and operations, including the shutdown of our Nordic production site and the sale of our Dutch assets, are now complete, and we expect to see these actions benefit us in fiscal Q3. In SG&A, we’ve already achieved some initial reductions year-to-date and many actions affecting corporate costs, which we’ve already taken, are expected to be fully realized in the second half of this fiscal year. We remain firmly on track to achieve the cost savings we’ve committed to and that support our drive to positive free cash flow. We are focused on balancing the working capital needs of both investing and growth, and executing disciplined financial management. We had a net working capital investment in fiscal Q2, due mainly to our payment of a number of annual and one-time cash items. In the quarter, annual payments totaled over $10 million for Health Canada fees, insurance expenses and employee incentive bonuses. We also paid one-time costs of approximately $3.4 million for severance and restructuring activities. Inventory and biological assets are quite stable, with demand and supply aligned and they contributed a net $2.5 million in fiscal Q2. Accounts receivable are in very good shape, but in line with the strong growth we’re seeing in international markets, we made the decision to invest about $7 million in Q2 accounts receivable. Looking forward, we expect working capital investment to improve significantly compared to fiscal Q2, as inventory remains in check, AR investment is thoughtful and annualized payments are normalized. For CapEx, we invested approximately $4 million this quarter, split evenly between maintenance and growth initiatives. Looking forward to our next quarter, fiscal Q3 2024, we expect cannabis net revenue to be similar to fiscal Q2, with the geographic mix slightly further toward the International Medical segment. For plant propagation, we expect to see seasonally reduced revenues and gross profit in Q3 that will be consistent with Q2 and in line with historical performance. To conclude my remarks, Aurora’s strong financial condition is directly related to all the hard work this team has done over the past several years and we’re pleased that our efforts are bearing fruit. We are leveraging our diversified global cannabis business with a plan to deliver dependable revenue growth and leading gross profit. We stand to benefit from a burgeoning plant propagation business and we remain committed to well-controlled SG&A. Even as we pursue M&A opportunities, we will thoroughly protect our balance sheet and continue to work towards our target of delivering positive free cash flow. Thanks very much for your interest. I’ll now turn the call back to Miguel.