Ron Hundzinski
Analyst · Wells Fargo Securities. Your line is open
Thank you, James, and good day, everyone. Before I begin reviewing the financials, I also would like to commend all of our employees for their hard work in the quarter. Also as Ken mentioned I will be referring to supplemental financials slide deck and it is posted on our IR website. I do encourage you to follow along. Now, on to our financials. James already provided a detailed review our sales performance in the quarter. In summary as shown on Slide 2 of the slide deck, sales were down 7% from a year ago or 3% excluding the impact of foreign currencies. Working down the income statement, gross profit as a percentage of sales was 21.1% in the quarter or up 20 basis points from last year. During the same period SG&A as a percentage of sales was 7.9%, a 70 basis point improvement from a year ago. R&D spending, which is included in SG&A was 4%. You may have noticed that SG&A is nearly down $27 million year-over-year. Over half of this is related to currency. Of the remaining amount, corporate expenses were down $5 million and our [indiscernible] were down about $9 million. Operating income in the quarter was $237 million, excluding $9 million of restructuring charges and $4 million of M&A expenses related to the Remy transaction, operating income was $250 million or 13.3% of sales, up 80 basis points from a year ago as shown on Slide 3 of the slide deck. Excluding nonrecurring charges previously discussed, as well as the impact of foreign currencies, operating income was up $22 million on $66 million higher sales, giving us an incremental margin of 35%. As you look further down the income statement, equity and affiliate earnings was about $9 million in the quarter, down from $15 million last year. This line item represents the performance of NSK-Warner our 50/50 joint venture in Japan, which sell transmission components to our Japanese customers in Japan and China, as well as TEL, our turbocharger joint venture in India. Lower NSK-Warner sales in Japan and China was the primary reason for the decline in affiliate earnings. Interest expense and finance charges were $15 million in the quarter up from $9 million a year ago. The increase is primarily due to the $1 billion of fixed rate senior notes issued in the first quarter of 2015. Provision for income taxes in the quarter on a reported basis was $67 million. However, this included favorable tax adjustments of $6 million. You can read about each one of these adjustments in our 10-Q, which will be filed later today. Excluding, the adjustments the provision for income taxes was $73 million, which is an effective tax rate of 29.5% in the quarter. Our year-to-date effective tax rate is 29.5%, which is also our estimate for the full year. Net earnings attributable to non-controlling interest were about $9 million in the quarter up slightly from $6 million the third quarter of 2014. This line item reflects our minority partner's share in the earnings performance of our Korean and Chinese consolidated joint ventures. That brings us back to net earnings, which were $150 million in the quarter. Net earnings excluding nonrecurring items were $165 million or $0.73 per share. Now let's take a closer look at our operating units' segments in the quarter; beginning on Slide 4 of the slide deck. As James said earlier reported Engine segment net sales were about $1.3 billion in the quarter. Sales growth for the Engine segment excluding currency was 4% compared to same period a year ago. Turning to Slide 5, adjusted EBIT was $212 million for the Engine segment or 16.2% of sales. Despite inefficiencies related to investments in new plant construction and expansion and the Wahler restructuring, both of which are, for our emissions product family adjusted EBIT as a percentage of sales was up 40 basis points from a year ago. Excluding currency, the Engine segment's adjusted EBIT was up $10 million on $55 million of higher sales for an incremental margin of 17%. A very good performance given the level of investment activity within the segment. Plant construction and expansion currently in progress should be largely behind us by the end of 2015 and the restructuring plan for Wahler is on target after which we expect it to be a double-digit margin business. Now turning to Slide 6, Drivetrain segment net sales were $584 million in the quarter. Excluding currency, sales increased about 2% compared with the same period a year ago. On Slide 7, adjusted EBIT was $70 million for the Drivetrain segment or 12% of sales. Despite inefficiencies related to investments in the new DCT plant in China and restructuring plant in Europe, adjusted EBIT as a percentage of sales was up 120 basis points from a year ago. Excluding currency, the Drivetrain segment adjusted EBIT was up over $8 million on $10 million in higher sales for an incremental margin of nearly 90%. If you recall the third quarter of 2014 we had about $3 million of headwinds related to restructuring inefficiencies. We are beginning to see those headwinds dissipate as we get closer to completing the restructuring. This benefit is reflected in the higher incremental margin in this segment for the quarter. Drivetrain's European restructuring plant is on target and expected to be completed by the end of 2015. The ramp up of the new DCT plant in China which was expected to begin in early 2015 is under review considering the weaker than expected market conditions in China. The segment review highlights good progress on our restructuring and expansion plans, which will strengthen our competitive position and performance over the long-term. Now let's take a look at our balance sheet and cash flow. We generated $470 million of net cash from operating activities in the first nine months of 2015 down $76 million from $546 million a year ago. Weaker foreign currencies, higher cash outlays for restructuring and a few other miscellaneous items reduced net cash from operating activities in the first nine months of 2015 as compared with the same period a year ago. Capital spending was $419 million in the first nine months of 2015. This is up $21 million from a year ago. The increase was driven by capital required to support our backlog of net new business. Free cash flow, which we define as net cash from operating activities less capital spending was $51 million in the first nine months of 2015 down from $148 million in the first nine months of 2014. We expect to generate between $200 million and $250 million of free cash flow in 2015. Investments in restructuring and expansion that are driving elevated spending will soon be behind us. We expect spending to normalize beginning next year. Also our realignment plan which will provide increased treasury management flexibility will be complete. As a result we expect to see an increase in cash available for corporate initiatives beginning in 2016. We will quantify this improvement and clarify our intentions in our 2016 guidance call in January. Looking at the balance sheet itself; balance sheet debt increased by $469 million at the end of the third quarter in 2015 compared with the end of 2014. Cash increased by $236 million during the same period. The $233 million increase in net debt was primarily due to capital expenditures, dividend payments to shareholders and share repurchases. Our net debt to net capital ratio of 17% at the end of third quarter is up from 12.8% at the end of 2014. Net debt to EBITDA at the end of the year on a trailing 12 month basis is 0.6 times. Now I would like to discuss our updated guidance for 2015. James reviewed our guidance at a high-level, I will just discuss some of the finer points. We have narrowed our sales guidance to the low end of the previous range of minus 6% to minus 5% compared with the minus 5.5% to minus 2.5% previously. James described the weaker than expected market conditions that affected the change. Our business in China was the primary contributor. According to third-party sources light vehicle production in China was down 4% in the quarter. During that same period volumes at our four largest customers were down 12% in aggregate. And our sales growth in China for the quarter was flat. We expect our business in China to modestly improve to mid-single-digit growth in the fourth quarter. Our full year dollar-to-euro exchange rate assumption is $1.12, slightly higher than the previous assumed rate of $1.10. We have also narrowed our expected EPS within a range of $2.95 to $3 per share. The change in EPS guidance is primarily due to the impact of lower expected growth sales. Our share repurchase activity is gaining momentum. We spent $67 million on share repurchases in the third quarter and $130 million year-to-date. We still expect to spend $1 billion on share repurchases during the three-year period ending the first quarter of 2018. Our weighted average diluted share count is still expected to be approximately 226 million shares for 2015. Our operating income margin guidance is unchanged at approximately 13%. This implies a mid-teens incremental margin for the full year, incremental margins north of 20% in the fourth quarter. We continue to be confident in our ability to execute in any market. This company has demonstrated a heightened focus on efficiency and cost. This focus resulted in highly efficient growth and record margins in each of the last four years. With our solid growth and operations performing at a very high level 2015 should be another great year for BorgWarner. As we look beyond 2015 we intend to execute our growth plan yielding solid growth and to efficiently convert our sales growth to profits. The future is bright for BorgWarner. So with that I'd like to turn the call back over to Ken.