Earnings Labs

Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. (CVGI)

Q1 2008 Earnings Call· Tue, May 27, 2008

$4.27

-0.70%

Key Takeaways · AI generated
AI summary not yet generated for this transcript. Generation in progress for older transcripts; check back soon, or browse the full transcript below.

Same-Day

+1.11%

1 Week

-0.82%

1 Month

-20.94%

vs S&P

-13.41%

Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Q1 2008 Commercial Vehicle Group Earnings Call. My name is Tony, and I will be your coordinator for today. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode and we will conduct a question-and-answer session towards the end of this conference. (Operator Instructions). I'd now like to turn the call over to your host for today's conference, Mr. Chad Utrup. Please proceed, sir.

Chad Utrup

Management

Thanks, Tony, and thanks, everybody for joining us on the conference call today. As usual before we begin the formal portion of the call, I'll first read through our Safe Harbor language. And Merv actually has a bit of a voice problem today, so I will then turn the call over to Kevin Frailey, our Executive Vice President of Business Development, for a brief company update. And then I will take you through our results for the first quarter and our revised outlook for the balance of 2008, the full year 2008. And then we will take time to answer your questions. I would now like to remind you that the conference call contains forward-looking statements. Actual results may differ from anticipated results because of certain risks and uncertainties. These may include but are not limited to the economic conditions in the markets in which CVG operates, fluctuations in the production volumes of vehicles for which CVG is a supplier, risks associated with conducting business in foreign countries and currencies, and other risks detailed in our SEC filings. And with that, I will turn the call over to Kevin.

Kevin Frailey

Management

Thanks, Chad. I'm not a particularly gifted impersonator, but today I will act as Merv's voice box. Thanks also to everybody who has joining the call today. We're pleased to report that during the first quarter of 2008, we were able to perform better than we had expected. This is based on the fact that during the first quarter, the number of Class 8 units produced came in slightly better than we had anticipated, and our construction, military, and specialty product markets were stronger than we had expected. Obviously, that is welcome news. Still, we are not yet ready to call this improvement or trend and our outlook for the remainder of '08 remains basically the same. In response to the slightly higher truck build rate during the quarter, we are making a positive adjustment in our expectations for the North American Class 8 build level. We now believe that Class 8 builds will be between 180,000 and 220,000 units which is up from earlier estimates of the 175,000 to 215,000 units. In previous guidance, we also said, we thought our construction related markets would continue to improve. We are pleased to report today that this has been the case. As you know part of our strategy has been to decrease our dependence on the North American Class 8 market, which is and shall remain an important market for us. But the continuing trend in our global construction markets is welcome news that demonstrates the growth potential we had anticipated, and confirms the soundness of our diversification strategy. During the first quarter, we reorganized our global truck division to better adapt to recent growth patterns in our overall strategy as it has evolved. Accordingly, we established the CVG Specialty Products Group, which will be headed by Ken Bush as Vice…

Chad Utrup

Management

As Kevin said, overall this quarter we are very pleased with our first quarter results. Our revenues for the quarter were strong at $197 million, which is only down about $1.8 million from the first quarter of last year, due mostly to our acquisitions, organic growth, and especially a strong construction, military and specialty markets for this quarter. So despite a near 25,000 unit, or 33% decline in the Class 8 market from the first quarter of last year, we've been able to maintain our top line, which really says a lot about our strategy on growth and diversification. Operating income was approximately $11.5 million, although as you saw from the press release that includes about $6.1 million gain from the sale of our Seattle facility during the quarter. Excluding this onetime impact, operating income was obviously around $5.4 million for the quarter and slightly higher than our lower end estimates for the quarter. SG&A for the quarter was approximately $15 million and generally in line with where we would expect it to be. Depreciation and amortization was $4.7 million and capital spending was about $3.6 million for the quarter. Our estimates for the full year for both of these are about $20 million again for D&A and $20 million for capital spending. We recorded a pretax expense of approximately $9.7 million from marking to market our forward foreign currency contracts and as previously mentioned, our methodology is changing for the valuation of these contracts, but we will continue to see these valuation adjustments, positive or negative, until each of our preexisting contracts expire. Interest expense increased to $3.9 million for the first quarter of 2008, compared to $3.6 million from the same period last year. Mostly as a result of our average outstanding debt during the period, which increased…

Operator

Operator

(Operator Instructions) With Robert W. Baird, your first question comes from the line of David Leiker. Please proceed.

David Leiker - Robert W. Baird

Analyst

Good morning.

Chad Utrup

Management

Good morning, David.

David Leiker - Robert W. Baird

Analyst

A couple number of questions here first. If you take your guidance, the $3.5 million or so roughly that's a function of market performance, how much of that do you think is a result of the first quarter as opposed to the next three quarters?

Chad Utrup

Management

A good portion of it, Dave, we really looked at the last three quarters and kept it for the most part unchanged from our initial thoughts. So a lot of that's coming from what we saw in the first quarter.

David Leiker - Robert W. Baird

Analyst

Okay. And where do you think your tax rate is for the year?

Chad Utrup

Management

I'm using a 25% to 35% range and 25% at the low end and 35% at the high end. By that I mean if you use our range of $0.10 to $0.50, and use about 25% on the low end and 35% at the high end. And that's just because of currently known fixed impacts that we have.

David Leiker - Robert W. Baird

Analyst

Okay. And then a broader question if you look at, maybe you just kind of give us an update for current activities or wins, potential wins as it relates to cross-sell opportunities across the business and across different geographic regions?

Chad Utrup

Management

Well, I think the biggest example is really the first quarter. We saw a lot of positive adjustments to at least our initial expectations in construction, marine, and some specialty vehicle. But really construction and marine was up considerably for us. And that is a product of some of the market, but it is really a product of cross-selling too. So when I say earlier, a majority of our adjustment upward for the year is related to the first quarter, it's really from that. So military product, we may not see that every quarter. But certainly was a favorable impact for us, so that's a perfect example of a recent win and some recent activity.

David Leiker - Robert W. Baird

Analyst

Okay, great. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from Alan Weber with Robotti & Co. Please proceed. Alan Weber - Robotti & Co: Yes, good morning.

Chad Utrup

Management

Good morning, Alan. Alan Weber - Robotti & Co: Hi, there. Did you have for the first quarter of last year, what the revenues were from a heavy truck side compared to this quarter?

Chad Utrup

Management

I do not have it handy with me, Alan. Obviously last year, the full year, we have reported but I do not have it handy with me the first quarter, no. Alan Weber - Robotti & Co: Okay. And then I noticed in the annual report that it appeared that your aftermarket revenues in '07 were down, or maybe about flat with '06. Is that correct?

Chad Utrup

Management

It could be. If you're including all other, it may not just be aftermarket, but probably a big portion of that would be specialty vehicle like the Ford GT, which ran out in '07, at the end of '06 really. So that was a considerable program that would have went away. Alan Weber - Robotti & Co: Okay. I guess one other question was, are you still looking to grow the aftermarket business?

Chad Utrup

Management

No. Alan Weber - Robotti & Co: You really didn't mention that in the annual report you really didn't talk about that in your letters.

Chad Utrup

Management

No, definitely, I think Kevin went through in what he just discussed, we made some structural changes to our business in the first quarter and what he went through was our specialty products division being led by Ken Bush. We have actually now dedicated a VP and GM role and other functions to specifically to the aftermarket and the specialty products division. So that's really what he was referring to. Alan Weber - Robotti & Co: Okay, and then Kevin.

Chad Utrup

Management

Yeah. But we continue to focus on it and we put some more emphasis to it by really making it part of our business with that new role. Alan Weber - Robotti & Co: And my last question for now is, Kevin, when you talked about the products at the Kentucky show, what is typically the timeframe till showing the products turns into orders and actually turns into revenue for the company?

Kevin Frailey

Management

It certainly varies. Some of these are concepts that we want to roll out to check the market for customer acceptance, so those are tough to make a call on. But we have one product, over-molded wiring harness that could certainly within the year, we could be into a small trial program with a real customer. But others are really concepts to be out there to be checking acceptance in the market. We had a hive of activity around the aero-molded mirror and the soy-based foam for the seat and the green seat. And that is really an opportunity for us to see whether people -- we're talking to actual users of the product, as well as our OE customers. Alan Weber - Robotti & Co: Okay, great. Thank you.

Kevin Frailey

Management

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

(Operator Instructions). And gentlemen, there are currently no questions in queue.

Chad Utrup

Management

Okay. I want to thank everybody for joining us for the quarter. Obviously, as always if you have any follow-up questions, feel free. And hopefully, we look forward to talking to you in another quarter. Thanks everybody.

Kevin Frailey

Management

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Thank you for your attendance in today's conference. This concludes your presentation. You may now disconnect. Have a nice day.