Earnings Labs

Brunswick Corporation (BC)

Q1 2015 Earnings Call· Wed, Apr 29, 2015

$79.72

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good morning, and welcome to Brunswick Corporation 2015 First Quarter Earnings Conference Call. All participants will be in a listen-only mode until the question-and-answer period. Today's meeting will be recorded. If you have any objections, you may disconnect at this time. I would now like to introduce Bruce Byots, Vice President, Investor Relations. Bruce J. Byots - Vice President-Corporate & Investor Relations: Good morning and thank you for joining us. On the call this morning is Dusty McCoy, Brunswick's Chairman and CEO; Mark Schwabero, President and Chief Operating Officer and Bill Metzger, CFO. Before we begin with our prepared remarks, I would like to remind everyone that during this call, our comments will include certain forward-looking statements about future results. Please keep in mind that our actual results could differ materially from these expectations. For the details on the factors to consider, please refer to our recent SEC filings and today's press release. All these documents are available on our website at brunswick.com. During our presentation, we're using certain non-GAAP financial information. Reconciliations of GAAP to non-GAAP financial measures are provided in this presentation, as well as in the supplemental information sections of the consolidated financial statements accompanying today's results. I would also like to remind you that the figures in this presentation reflect continuing operations only unless otherwise noted. I would now like to turn the call over to Dusty. Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Thanks, Bruce. Good morning, everyone. Our goal in 2015 is to continue to enhance and expand the growth we've been demonstrating now for several quarters. And as we finish the first quarter and are working our way through the second quarter, we're bullish about this goal. Our key end markets continue to be resilient and U.S. market provides us with…

Operator

Operator

Thank you. We will now begin the question-and-answer session. Our first question is from James Hardiman from Wedbush Securities. Your line is open.

James Hardiman - Wedbush Securities, Inc.

Analyst

Hi. Good morning. Thanks for taking my call, guys. Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Hi James.

James Hardiman - Wedbush Securities, Inc.

Analyst

How are you doing? Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Good.

James Hardiman - Wedbush Securities, Inc.

Analyst

So strong quarter given all the turbulent activity going on in the international markets. I guess a question on the guide. On an absolute basis, your sales guidance is unchanged, the midpoint of EPS is $0.025 higher. I guess when I sort of run through the math on what you've given us on the FX side, it sounds like an incremental 150 basis points of headwinds on the top-line and $0.04 to $0.07 roughly on the EPS line from FX. I guess the question there is, what's changed over the past three months, given those incremental headwinds that, in theories, some stuff must have gotten better given the constant currency increase in the guide? Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Well, the simple answer is, James, we've rolled up our sleeves and said, we're going to work our way through this currency impact. So we're working on costs; we're working on efficiencies. We're doing a little better in certain markets and with certain products than we thought we would. So when you roll all that up, as I began our comments with, we're bullish on our ability to handle the year that we predicted, 15% to 20% earnings before taxes growth, and we just see our way there. We're not very worried about it. We're just going to have to handle all this stuff.

James Hardiman - Wedbush Securities, Inc.

Analyst

Got it. And then sort of related question here. I guess first, is there any way you could split out the global boat unit growth number I think is 12%. What did that look like domestically versus Europe and rest of the world? And I guess, just bigger picture question, if you strip out all the translational impact of currency, sounds like the momentum in the U.S. is great, sounds like the momentum in Europe is pretty great. Rest of the world, which I guess for you guys is primarily a Canadian issue, is pretty bad. Can you just talk through some of the competitive issues going on in those different markets, some of which may have stemmed from currency and the impact that might have on European or Japanese manufacturers, but maybe walk us through some of the intricacies there so that we can better understand some of that? Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: I'll first let Bill do the arithmetic for you. William L. Metzger - Chief Financial Officer & Senior Vice President: Yeah, the international unit demand was flattish for us with the U.S. markets making up the difference.

James Hardiman - Wedbush Securities, Inc.

Analyst

Got it. Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Let's look at competition, et cetera. We clearly, just because as we look at the NMMA numbers and we've told you what our increase in retail was, we took a lot of share here in the U.S. market. And frankly, we plan to with all the new product introductions we have. Brazil is a place where we're taking share, but as we've said that overall market is down. Our advantage that permits us to take share is local manufacturing. So we're taking share in a down market. It's sort of with a policy from a (39:11) sister – kissing your sister. We're glad to have it, but it's not that exciting. As we look at Europe, we did really well in Europe. And the big reason there is our European boat companies have been introducing lots of new products. They keep winning awards over there every year with their product introductions. They're moving to some bigger products and that business is developing a little momentum along with – I think we said Europe will be flat to slightly up – so with our ability to take share and the momentum there, we feel good about that market. So really, really tough place is Canada. In general, the Canadian market is heavily supplied by U.S. based manufacturers. And with the Canadian-U.S. dollar relationship, the price of boats for most Canadians has now gone up say 20% in round numbers. What happened is, we saw January and February start out actually quite nicely at retail and that was not a surprise to us, because our view was that at boat shows and other places and dealerships that dealers were selling products they had purchased at exchange rates that were very different than the current exchange rates. Once those boats generally begin to sell out, March experienced a significant decline at retail. And in our view, it's going to be a tough place to be for the remainder of this year. Eventually, what's there at retail that's going to get sold out, eventually dealers are going to need to replenish and the market will settle down. But for 2015, it's just going to be a difficult place to be and that's the toughest outside United States market where we're dealing with. Is that helpful as an explanation?

James Hardiman - Wedbush Securities, Inc.

Analyst

That's very helpful. And just a quick clarification here. So the Canadian market for the most part, boats are bought in U.S. dollars, is that correct versus the European market, where you have the translational risk, but much less of a competitive risk, is that how we should be thinking about this? Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Here's the way to think of it. The Canadian market is supplied by boats manufactured in the U.S. In general, the European market is supplied by us, by boats manufactured in Europe.

James Hardiman - Wedbush Securities, Inc.

Analyst

Got it. But as in terms of the boats that you sell to both of those markets, are they both in the local currencies or is Canada and U.S. dollars to your dealers at least, and then, they have to sort of make those adjustments, is there a difference in sort of how that currency works from your perspective? William L. Metzger - Chief Financial Officer & Senior Vice President: I think about two-thirds of the boats that we make or about 70% of the boats that we sell in Canada are actually made in the U.S., because we've got a Princecraft brand that sits in Canada that manufactures in Canadian dollars and sells in Canadian dollars. And most every other boat that's sold up, there is something that's imported in from the U.S. It is a sale that's transacted in Canadian dollars, but dealers are generally buying in the U.S. dollars.

James Hardiman - Wedbush Securities, Inc.

Analyst

Okay. And it doesn't sound like they are then lowering the prices to the consumer in any way that would allow some of that FX headwind not to hit the consumer? Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Yeah, actually protect themselves. William L. Metzger - Chief Financial Officer & Senior Vice President: Correct. Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: They ought to be raising prices. William L. Metzger - Chief Financial Officer & Senior Vice President: Correct.

James Hardiman - Wedbush Securities, Inc.

Analyst

Right. Right. Okay. Good color. William L. Metzger - Chief Financial Officer & Senior Vice President: And just to clarify in Europe, about 70% of the boats that we sell in Europe are manufactured in Europe.

James Hardiman - Wedbush Securities, Inc.

Analyst

Got it. Very helpful. Thanks, guys. Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: You're welcome.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Joe Spak from RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open.

Joseph R. Spak - RBC Capital Markets LLC

Analyst

Good morning, everyone. Thanks for taking the question. The first one is the comment in your press release about FX being the competitive risk. And I realize you put that in last quarter as well, but I think many probably viewed it as sort of a boilerplate risk factor. And now, in light of some other events that I think investors have seen, it's probably getting a little bit more focused. So can you talk about what you're seeing I guess specifically on the engine side where we've seen Yamaha already act (43:55) in some other industries. Honda has a national TV campaign advertising deal on some marine engines. So maybe specifically how you're planning for that portion? Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: In the U.S., we're not really seeing anything. And the only impact we're seeing in the difference between the relationship in the yen and other currencies is in some relatively small markets with smaller horsepower engines. And even there, the smaller horsepower engines we put into the market are produced in Japan in a joint venture we have with the Hudson. So when you roll that all up and above, we're not seeing any significant or material impact on the engine side from the engine producers.

Joseph R. Spak - RBC Capital Markets LLC

Analyst

Okay. That's helpful. And then, just if I ran some numbers, I just want to make sure in the ballpark here. If I back out the FX impact on boats that you guys talked about and we were to assume, let's just call, the 25% incremental margin, it would have suggested operating income maybe about $3 million higher. So is that roughly the order of magnitude that the plant expansion and the production ramps have caused in the quarter and how do we think about that sort of progressing down over the rest of the year? Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: I think you're directionally correct, and the biggest improvement we will see in the Boat business will occur in the second half as these inefficiencies go away, efficiencies begin to take effect. So a way to think about our second half and while the second half is obviously going to be very strong from an operating margin standpoint and ordered in rank order, inefficiencies and operating issues will go away in the second half. Currency impact on it will be less in the second half, because we began to see currency changes in Q4 last year. And a lot of the one-items that were impacting second – first half will not reappear in second half. So when you add all that up, the half to half improvement is going to be quite significant.

Joseph R. Spak - RBC Capital Markets LLC

Analyst

Okay. And then, just one quick clarification on the guidance in follow-up to James' question, I mean is BLA in your guidance now, because that, by my numbers, would actually cover most of sort of the top-line – offset most of the top-line impact from the increase to FX headwind, and then, if you assume sort of a normal I guess P&A margin, most of the EPS impact as well, so is that in there? Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: The sales are in there, there's no earnings in there.

Joseph R. Spak - RBC Capital Markets LLC

Analyst

There's no earnings. Okay. Thanks a lot, guys. William L. Metzger - Chief Financial Officer & Senior Vice President: But that's because for the year, we're not anticipating a bigger earnings contribution. You got to remember that this is a distribution business, distribution margins tend to be relatively low, but this is a business that we feel combined with our existing presence in Australia that we're going to do real well with over time. Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: So I want to take just a minute and summarize with BLA where we are on our plan to grow our P&A business by $350 million top-line through acquisition, we said that could be up to a three-year process. So we're a little over a year into it. We're at about $110 million and are working on this – stay very relaxed everybody – to – we're working toward our goal of making them. And in fact, when we get to our November this year, meaning where we talk about our performance 2016, 2017 and 2018, it's highly likely that you'll see us increase the amount of sales growth we think we can get through from P&A acquisitions. We're incredibly happy with this process, with the results that we're going to get from it and what we think the long-term benefits will be.

Joseph R. Spak - RBC Capital Markets LLC

Analyst

Thanks a lot, guys. Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Tim Conder from Wells Fargo Securities. Your line is open.

Tim A. Conder - Wells Fargo Securities LLC

Analyst

Thank you, and gentlemen, congrats again on the execution in a tough environment with a lot of crosswinds. Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Thank you, Tim. We appreciate that.

Tim A. Conder - Wells Fargo Securities LLC

Analyst

Just a clarification question on Canada, if I may. Any color you can give us by region? If the root of the question comes from any preliminary fallout from demand in Western Canada, in particular, from the oil related businesses or is this fairly well spread evenly across Canada or – just any color there? And then, we're hearing from some of our industry sources that the saltwater business actually in boats is extremely strong. In fact, in some cases, the industry including yourselves, is having some difficulty supplying a sufficient quantity of outboard engines for that. And clearly, if the Japanese were so inclined, they wouldn't want to be giving away margin in that circumstance. So any additional color you could give from that perspective? Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Let's first do the Canadian region. The big markets in Canada are Québec and Ontario, and we have – Princecraft is primarily Québec based, as far as the rest of the market with our West (49:42) based brands and yes, a lot stuff are out West oil spending – oil related spending has gone down. And as we measure the overall impact, I would say it's not significantly moving the needle across all of Canada.

Tim A. Conder - Wells Fargo Securities LLC

Analyst

So it's really Québec, is that what you're saying, Dusty? Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Well, more Ontario.

Tim A. Conder - Wells Fargo Securities LLC

Analyst

Okay. Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Ontario is the (50:09) for us, because we have – Québec is served by Princecraft very well.

Tim A. Conder - Wells Fargo Securities LLC

Analyst

Okay. Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: ...compared to most of the rest of the (50:17). Yeah, Saltwater is strong. I'm not aware, and I'll let Mark speak to it, that we're not able to meet demand, except perhaps these 350-horsepower, 400-horsepower come out red hot and as we ramp-up production, we're sort of in that high-class problem sometimes. A few more people want them than we're able to get ramped-up for. Mark, do you have anything? Mark D. Schwabero - President, Chief Operating Officer & Director: Yeah, no, I would just add to that that we've put in metered capacity increases based upon our outlook of the market – been very pleased with the best of the 75-horsepower, 90-horsepower and 115-horsepower. The 150-horsepower we had launched, but capacity and anticipation of that demand – we have gotten a pretty strong response from our 350-horsepower and 400-horsepower we announced down in Miami. But our capabilities there and our supply lines and stuff are such that the folks up at Mercury are responding to the demands and I don't believe we would be part of that issue you're talking about, Tim.

Tim A. Conder - Wells Fargo Securities LLC

Analyst

Okay, okay. And then gentlemen, Bill or whoever wants to take this, as it relates to the capital allocation. Clearly, despite – you guys gave some caution at the Miami Boat Show regarding the Europeans potentially using the euro to be more competitive and the currency that's been out there. And then, also you gave some caution in early March at a conference saying that there wouldn't be a lot of upside. And yet, the fundamentals of the business excluding currency have done a little bit better, as you've already talked about and have increased your guidance here in the early part of the year, albeit minorly. But as things still look in capacity and borrowing rates, why would you maybe not look to forward buy that share repo? Is it related to maybe what you're alluding to on the opportunities on the P&A side? William L. Metzger - Chief Financial Officer & Senior Vice President: I just think, Tim, it's an approach where we want to dollar-cost average in and we think the right thing for us to do is to buy a set amount every quarter, flex it up and down based upon kind of where valuations are. And it leaves some flexibility that if we do get some investment opportunities, we haven't committed a significant amount of capital to share repurchase. We've got some dry powder to do some other things.

Tim A. Conder - Wells Fargo Securities LLC

Analyst

Okay, okay. Thank you, gentlemen. Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Thank you, Tim.

Operator

Operator

Our next question is from Mike Swartz from SunTrust. Your line is open.

Michael A. Swartz - SunTrust Robinson Humphrey

Analyst

Hey, good morning, guys. Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Good morning, Mike.

Michael A. Swartz - SunTrust Robinson Humphrey

Analyst

Just – and I know this is your favorite subject, but can we talk about the weather for a second. I know one of your largest dealers was talking about having some issues getting product into the New England region where there was a lot of weather issues earlier this year. Did you see any of that and did it impact wholesale shipments into some of those regions that we should start to see I guess in the second quarter? Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: No. Yeah, we obviously saw some of it, but I don't think it's material enough that it's going to see any big swing in the first quarter or second quarter. Frankly, the biggest impact – I hate that word, frankly – I just said it. Actually, the biggest impact was in our P&A business up there, which is very strong and Kellogg is our distribution base business up there. And it was pretty miserable through the winter there; they're based in the Boston area. Pretty miserable was really an understatement; it's actually quite miserable. And that's starting to come back nicely, but that's the only – the biggest impact we would have seen, Mike.

Michael A. Swartz - SunTrust Robinson Humphrey

Analyst

Okay, thanks, Dusty. And then, just on the Fitness side, I know that you kind of laid out that the government part of the business was a little weak in the first quarter. Is that something that we should expect going forward or was this something just kind of tied to the first quarter? Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Boy, if I knew how the government was going to allocate money, I'd be a lot smarter than I am right now, Mike. Frankly or actually, as we're thinking about it, we don't see them doing a lot more in the second quarter than they did in the first quarter. And if there's going to be any opportunity, it will be in Q3. And we tried to make our best view as to what they would do for the remainder of the year in our guidance about how the Fitness business is going to perform.

Michael A. Swartz - SunTrust Robinson Humphrey

Analyst

Okay. That's great. I'll leave it at that. Thank you. Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Welcome. Thanks.

Operator

Operator

Our next question is from David MacGregor from Longbow Research. Your line is open.

David S. MacGregor - Longbow Research LLC

Analyst

Yes. Good morning, everyone. Thanks for taking the questions. Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Hi, David.

David S. MacGregor - Longbow Research LLC

Analyst

Hi. Just a quick question on the free cash flow; you bumped up the guidance by $20 million, is that just working capital or what else might be happening there? William L. Metzger - Chief Financial Officer & Senior Vice President: It's working capital and taxes paid. Taxes paid are going to be a little bit lower than what we thought three months ago. And we've got a little bit more visibility into working capital and we feel comfortable that we can decrease the amount of working capital usage for it, so.

David S. MacGregor - Longbow Research LLC

Analyst

Okay. Thanks. And then just on the parts and accessories business, you talked, Dusty, about the growth initiative, the three-year plan – you're one year into it; it sounds like it's going well. But what should we expect in terms of margin progression as you build that out over the next couple of years? Do international acquisitions, do they bring an accretive or a dilutive effect to the percentage margins in that business? Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Overall, these acquisitions will be dilutive to P&A margin, because in the pecking order, David – and we try to talk about this as often as we can. Mercury branded parts are highest margin. We then have all of the boat parts we kind of take through our Attwood business or other types of parts and accessories. And then the lowest margin are in the distribution business. So two of the three that we've acquired are actually in the distribution business. When we do parts manufacturers, that will fall in line with average Mercury margins, but will be a bit dilutive to overall P&A margins. But the rate of return on these investments is really, really good and the competitive position that puts us in, we love. So we're quite comfortable having a little margin dilution in order to continue this activity.

David S. MacGregor - Longbow Research LLC

Analyst

Okay, great. Thanks very much. Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: You're welcome. Our next question is from Jimmy Baker from B. Riley & Company. Your line is open. Jimmy Baker - B. Riley & Co. LLC: Hi. Good morning. Thanks for my taking my questions. Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Welcome Jimmy. Jimmy Baker - B. Riley & Co. LLC: First, on the Boat side, great performance at retail up 12% versus wholesale up 4%. Can you just help us understand why that didn't translate to a decrease in weeks of channel inventory? I realize that's a trailing 12-month metric, but in each of the last three quarters of 2014, your retail performance was also in line or often quite stronger than your wholesale shipments. So can you just help us with the math there? Is there something that's distorting that or something else that we need to consider like dealer turnover? Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: No. It's non-effective by dealer turnover. Here is – will be my simplistic explanation. In general, what I think is going on in the boat market, it would be financing, pipelines everything, so that is wholesale financing. We have been really increasing the rate of new products. And generally, everybody knows when the modeling year ends. And dealers are getting very good at wanting the model year to end with a very few birthday boats sitting in their lot. So what's happening is, as we go through the – moving into the selling season, wholesale does not match retail, as they really pull their pipelines down. So that's sort of first quarter and second quarter. Then, we finish the heart of the retail selling season through a model year change, and…

Operator

Operator

At this time, I would like to turn the call back over to Dusty McCoy for some concluding remarks. Dustan E. McCoy - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: So thanks everybody for joining us today. I know for me the analysts who cover, this is a very difficult scheduling. Next couple of days, we try to adjust the call timing to accommodate as many of you as possible. As always, thanks for the great questions. We're out on the road a lot for the next month and I'm sure we'll be seeing many of you in the coming days and weeks. So thanks very much.