Arturo Rodriguez
Analyst · Alliance Global Partners. Your line is open
Thanks, Joe. It's great to partner with you, too. Good evening, everyone. We continue to make progress on our path of focusing, simplifying and stabilizing Aterian. We continue to see certain results from these missions, especially on our balance sheet as it continues to get stronger. With inventory almost at normalized levels, a great accomplishment considering the levels we were just a year ago. Although our Q4 results are better than anticipated, we still have a long way to go on our path towards adjusted EBITDA profitability. With some more recent moves, such as aligning our fixed cost to our go-forward size and scale of our focused company and our extension and increased flexibility of our credit facility has further strengthened our balance sheet. We continue to grow more confident that we are on the right path to deliver 2024 second-half adjusted EBITDA profitability, and we have a balance sheet strength to deliver these results. Now moving to the Q4 results overall. As expected, we saw our revenue decline primarily due to our strategy of discontinuing sales of noncore SKUs, coupled with challenging consumer discretionary spending and competitive pricing pressures across our portfolio. Coupled with our previously action fixed cost savings, we believe we are starting to see our adjusted EBITDA losses narrowing. Now moving on to the details of the fourth quarter 2023 net revenue. Net revenue declined 40.3% to $32.8 million from $54.9 million in the year ago quarter. $32.8 million fourth quarter net revenue by phase as defined in our press release, broke down as follows: $25.2 million sustain, $0.4 million in launch and $7.2 million in liquidated inventory normalization. The year ago quarter net revenue of $54.9 million by phase broke down as follows: $40.8 million sustained, $1.0 million in launch and $13.1 million in liquidating inventory normalization. Our sustained net revenue decrease of $15.6 million is primarily as a result of our SKU rationalization efforts, which has discontinued poorly performing SKUs, coupled with reduced consumer discretionary spending and competitive pricing pressures. Our liquidation net revenue decreased by $5.9 million as the efforts of liquidating high-cost inventory has essentially reached its conclusion. A variations were launched late in the fourth quarter, and we are continuing to be thoughtful on the timing of our new product launches through 2024. Overall gross margin for the fourth quarter increased to 51.0% from 37.1% in the year ago quarter, an increase from 49.4% in Q3 2023. The improvement was driven by product mix and lower liquidation of higher cost inventory compared to the prior period. Our overall Q4 2023 contribution margin, as defined in our earnings release was negative 0.8%, which improved compared to a prior year's negative of 11.5% and decrease compared to a third quarter 2023 CM of 3%. The year-over-year increase in contribution margin was driven by product mix and the level of liquidation revenue of higher cost inventory, compared to the prior period offset by competitive pricing pressures on our core business. Q4 2023 saw our sustained product contribution margin declined slightly year-over-year to 6.9% versus 8.3% in Q4 of 2022. The decrease in contribution margin was driven by competitive pricing pressures and product mix and the completion of moving certain higher cost inventory. Looking deeper into our contribution margin for Q4 2023, our variable sales and distribution expenses as a percentage of net revenue increased to 52.8% as compared to 51.6% in the year ago quarter. The increase in sales and distribution expenses is predominantly due to product mix and an increase in fulfillment costs. Our operating losses of $8.2 million in the fourth quarter improved from a loss of $22.8 million compared to the year ago quarter, an improvement of approximately 63.8%, primarily driven by the improvement in CM and the reduction of fixed costs. Our fourth quarter 2023 operating loss includes $1.6 million of noncash stock compensation expense, a reserve for barter credits of $0.3 million and a noncash loss on impairment of intangible of $0.3 million. While our fourth quarter 2022 operating loss includes $2.7 million of noncash stock compensation expense, a reserve for barter credits of $1.6 million and a noncash loss on impairment of goodwill of $0.5 million. Our net loss for the quarter of $7.7 million improved from a loss of $20.3 million in the year ago quarter, an improvement of approximately 62%, primarily driven by the improvement in CM and the reduction of fixed costs. Our fourth quarter 2023 net loss includes $1.6 million in noncash stock compensation expenses, non-cash loss and impairment of intangible of $0.3 million and a reserve barter credit of $0.3 million, while our fourth quarter 2022 net loss includes $2.7 million of noncash stock compensation expenses, a reserve for barter credit of $1.6 million, non-cash loss and impairment of goodwill of $0.5 million and a gain on fair value of warrant liability of $2.8 million. Our adjusted EBITDA loss of $5.6 million as defined in our earnings release, improved by 65.4% from a loss of $16.2 million in the fourth quarter of 2022, primarily driven by the improvement in CM and the reduction of fixed costs. Moving on to the balance sheet. At December 31, 2023, we had cash of approximately $20 million compared with $28 million at the end of September 30, 2023. The decrease in cash as expected is primarily driven by our net loss in the period and our decision to build up inventory in advance of the 2024 season to avoid tariff impacts, specifically for our beverage cooler. This higher inventory balance should remain through Q3 of 2024. At December 31, our inventory level was at $20.4 million, down from $31.5 million at the end of the third quarter of 2023 and down from $43.7 million in the year ago quarter. We are happy to report that we believe that our current inventory of $20 million is almost at the appropriate levels and the high cost inventory normalization that we have been working on for many quarters is now behind us. As we mentioned, our inventory includes an additional $3 million of beverage coolers purchased in advance to mitigate tariff risks. Our credit facility balance at the end of the fourth quarter of 2023 was $11.1 million, down from $14.2 million at the end of the third quarter of 2023 and down almost 50% from $21.1 million in the comparable prior year period. We recently rightsized and extended our credit facility by two years to December 2026. Aterian now has access to 17 million in current commitments, which can be increased to 30 million, allowing sufficient flexibility for growth when needed. Also, the credit facility extension reduces the minimum liquidity financial covenant from a peak of $50 million down to $6.8 million of cash on hand and/or availability, providing further flexibility as the company focuses on adjusted EBITDA profitability and eventual growth. We believe today, based on our current forecast, our extended credit facility, coupled with our existing cash has further strengthened our balance sheet as we continue on our path towards adjusted EBITDA profitability in the second half of 2024. As we look at Q1 2024, considering the continued challenges in the consumer environment, we believe that net revenue will be between $18 million and $21 million. Using the middle of the range, this would be an approximately 45% decrease from last year's Q1, primarily driven from a reduction in SKUs from our strategic SKU rationalization and certain competitive pressures, and a 40% decrease from our sequential quarter of Q4 2023, primarily from our seasonality and our strategic SKU rationalization. As a reminder, our first quarter is our lowest quarter and we expect that Q1 will drive slightly lower seasonal split than previous years. As we have previously discussed, our decrease in net revenue is expected as we continue to focus on our go-forward business on our best brands and products. Our primary focus today continues to be getting to adjusted EBITDA profitability in the second half of 2024. For Q1 2024, we expect adjusted EBITDA loss to be in the range of $2.5 million to $3.5 million. The middle of this range represents an improvement of approximately 30% compared to Q1 2023 and a 48% improvement from a sequential quarter of Q4 2023. Again, we continue to be laser-focused on our target of turning adjusted EBITDA profitability in the second half of 2024. And with our Q1 guide, you can see we're starting to realize some of the results of all our hard work and initiatives. We also believe, based on our forecast, we have sufficient cash above our covenants to achieve our goal without raising additional equity. As previously stated, if we pursue additional financing, it will be predominantly for growth through M&A. We do expect a few housekeeping items in the coming weeks. We do expect to refile our S3 shelf to allow us to opportunistically raise capital as part of our M&A strategy over the coming year or two, if we decide to do so and if we decide to acquire any brand. We believe this is good corporate governance. Finally, as we do annually, we expect to file our SA shortly after the 10-K. In closing, we believe our products, our strong balance sheet, and with our cornerstone to focus, simplify and stabilized, we are turning the quarter and look forward with confidence as we continue on our path towards adjusted EBITDA profitability and ultimately to maximize shareholder value. With that, I'll turn it back to the operator to open the call to questions.