Jim Kempton
Analyst · Alex Rygiel with B. Riley. Please proceed with your questions
Thank you, Operator. Good evening, everyone, and welcome to L.B. Foster’s Second Quarter Earnings Call. I am Jim Kempton, the Company’s Corporate Controller and Principal Accounting Officer. Also with me today is our President and CEO, Bob Bauer. I will be covering the Company’s second quarter financial highlights today following our previous CFO, Jim Maloney’s decision to leave the Company to pursue other opportunities. This evening, I will review the Company’s second quarter financial results. Afterward, Bob will review the Company’s second quarter performance and provide an update on significant business issues and market developments. Then, we will open up the session for questions. Today’s slide presentation along with our earnings release and financial disclosures were posted on our website earlier today and can be accessed on our Investor Relations page at lbfoster.com. Some statements that we are making are forward-looking and represent our current view of our markets and business today, including comments related to COVID-19. These forward-looking statements reflect our opinions only as of the date of this presentation. We undertake no obligation to revise or publicly release the results of any revisions to these statements in light of new information, except as required by security laws. For more detailed risks, uncertainties, and assumptions related to our forward-looking statements, please see the disclosures in our earnings release and presentation. We will also discuss non-GAAP financial metrics and encourage you to read our disclosures and reconciliation tables provided within today’s earnings release and within our accompanying earnings presentation carefully as you consider these metrics. I’m going to cover the second quarter results this evening. But before I do that, I would like to discuss several other items. At the end of June, we executed an amendment to our credit facility. The amendment provides for, among other changes, adjustments to the financial covenants and expands the definition of adjusted EBITDA in the agreement. We determined that given the uncertainty of the current environment due to the COVID-19 pandemic and our desire to take the appropriate restructuring actions to address related issues that this was the prudent course of action. While we’re cautiously optimistic about the Company’s near-term outlook, these changes will provide us with the necessary flexibility to fund actions intended to improve profitability and maintain the appropriate liquidity if difficult conditions persist. For further information regarding the amendments and the credit agreement, please reference our Form 8-K filed on July 1st and our 10-Q to be filed tomorrow. I also wanted to remind you of our relocation of our Precast Concrete facility from Spokane, Washington to Boise, Idaho. As you may recall, this relocation is part of an initiative focused on regional growth opportunities and logistical savings associated with a more centralized location that moves us closer to the Company’s existing and prospective customer base. While we incurred no further non-recurring costs related to this relocation and start-up, on a net basis during the quarter, the facility has not yet achieved full operational efficiency and significant start-up costs and inefficiencies are in the Construction segment’s six months result. Finally, as we’ve discussed on previous calls, in the fourth quarter of 2019, we took a number of actions aimed at reducing cost and risk in our Tubular and Energy Services segment by closing three service centers and reducing headcount in our Test, Inspection, and Threading Services division. During the quarter and year-to-date period, we had trailing costs totaling $67,000 and $271,000 respectively related to these actions. These measures are now completed and we do not anticipate any further charges to come through related to these activities. However, on May 4th, 2020 the company announced the closure of three additional Test, Inspection, and Threading Services facilities and other cost-cutting measures related to this business. These actions, coupled with other cost reduction measures taken in other parts of the Company resulted in approximately $7 million in non-recurring restructuring charges during the quarter, of which approximately $4.5 million were non-cash impairment charges. The operational results of the sites closed during the quarter negatively impacted adjusted EBITDA by approximately $400,000 for the quarter and by $1.2 million for the year-to-date period. We believe that these actions will help mitigate the negative impact that this division has been having on our company’s results and will better position the Tubular and Energy segment to navigate the current challenging dynamics in the oil and gas market caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. The Company is continuing to evaluate strategic alternatives for this business, including closing sites or idling operations at additional locations. Bob will be touching on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on our business, and specifically, the resulting effects on our operating segments later on in the presentation. So, with that, I will start my financial review. For the purposes of helping you understand the underlying business performance, many of our comments today will be based on the second quarter results, excluding the non-recurring restructuring charges of approximately $7 million that I just discussed and a $1.9 million benefit related to a non-recurring distribution associated with our interest in the non-consolidated partnership. As a result, I will refer to adjusted EBITDA, adjusted net income and adjusted diluted EPS during the presentation today. During the second quarter, our sales were $145.8 million compared to $200.9 million in Q2 2019, a $55.2 million or 27.5% decrease. Consolidated gross profit decreased by $10.1 million over the prior year quarter. Gross profit margin of 18.6% was an increase of 10 basis points from Q2 of 2019. The decreases in sales and gross profit in the quarter were due to several reasons. Even though the business was generally considered an essential business and allowed to operate during the pandemic, COVID-19 negatively affected our operating results in Q2. During this time, the company experienced disruptions in our supply chain and in customer acceptance of products and services as well as general weakness in demand as stay at home orders were enacted or remained in place. Our Rail Products and Services segment was primarily impacted in our Rail Products business and our Rail Technologies business in both North America and Europe. The Rail Products business declined by approximately $16 million, driven by lower demand quarter-over-quarter, resulting from declines in freight rail procurements and decreased transit rail deliveries. The Rail Technologies business had a decline of approximately $10.7 million in revenues. These results were driven by weakened demand for our solid consumable offerings in North America, due to the lower rail traffic volumes driven by the pandemic. In addition, the London Crossrail project was impacted by a work stoppage caused by stay-at-home orders in the U.K. We are anticipating on site services for the Crossrail project to resume in the third quarter. The declines in revenues drove the decline in gross profit quarter over quarter. However, I would note that gross profit margins for the Rail segment increased by approximately 130 basis points quarter-over-quarter based on higher margin product mix. From a Tubular and Energy segment perspective, the challenging dynamics in the oil and gas market caused by the COVID-19 pandemic have caused U.S. exploration and production companies to significantly decrease activity and implement spending cuts. These events have driven the 34.7% decrease in revenue volumes quarter-over-quarter. These decreases in sales, coupled with weakness in the upstream energy market and its impact on the Test, Inspection and Threading Services division drove the decline in gross profit in the Tubular and Energy segment of $4.4 million versus Q2 of 2019. During the quarter, the Construction Products segment was primarily impacted by reduced volumes in our piling business driven by the Q2, 2019 contributions of the Port Everglades project, what was completed in the fourth quarter of 2019. In addition, during Q2, our new Precast Concrete Boise facility had approximately $4.1 million less revenue when compared to its Spokane, Washington facility in the second quarter of 2019. We do expect this plant to reach full operational efficiency during the third quarter. While gross profit declined due to the decreases in revenue volume, gross margins for the segment were up approximately 30 basis points for the quarter, despite the impact of the Boise facility ramp up. Now, moving on to expenses. Our consolidated selling and administrative expenses decreased by over $3.3 million or 14.4% to approximately $19.6 million in the second quarter. Net interest expense was reduced by $507,000 or 31.7% for the second quarter due to a $35.5 million reduction in outstanding debt at June 30th, 2020 when compared to June 30th, 2019. Our income tax expense was $1.1 million in Q2 of 2020 resulting in an effective tax rate of 67.6%. Our provision for income taxes included $2.6 million of tax expense on $8.1 million of ordinary income generated in the quarter, offset by a $1.5 million discrete tax benefit related to the $6.5 million Test, Inspection and Threaded Services’ exit charges and asset impairments taken during the quarter. Our second quarter net income was $523,000 or $0.05 per diluted share compared to income of $9.6 million or $0.90 per diluted share last year. Excluding the impact of restructuring costs of approximately $7 million incurred during the quarter, the benefit of approximately $1.9 million for non-recurring distribution associated with our interests in an unconsolidated partnership, and the related tax effects associated with these adjustments resulted in adjusted net income for the quarter of $4.4 million or $0.41 per diluted -- adjusted diluted share. Adjusted EBITDA totaled $11.8 million in the second quarter, a decrease of $5.4 million compared to Q2 of 2019. However, it is an increase of approximately $8.7 million from the first quarter of 2020. Now, turning to the balance sheet. Our trade working capital decreased by $6.8 million compared to December 31st, 2019 due mainly to a decrease in inventory of $5.6 million. The decrease in inventory in 2020 was due to better inventory management in our Rail Distribution business. Our net debt was $48.2 million at June 30th, 2020 compared to $79.1 million at June 30th of 2019. Our leverage ratio for the trailing 12-month period is 1.5 times as of June 30th, 2020. Over the last several years, we have strengthened our balance sheet, which should help us manage through these challenging times and position us well to execute on our strategic initiatives. Our current ratio as of June 30th, 2020 is a very healthy 1.86. Our total available funding capacity; that is the available capacity under our revolving credit facility, plus our cash was approximately $71.1 million as of the end of the quarter. From a cash flow perspective, our cash provided by operating activities in the second quarter was $13 million compared to $4.1 million in 2019. The $8.9 million period-over-period improvement in operating cash flow was primarily related to our continued focus on trade working capital improvements. I’d also like to note that this reflects operating cash flow of approximately $44.9 million in the last 12-month period. Our capital expenditures during that time period were approximately $12.4 million which derives free cash flow of approximately $32.5 million. Based on our closing stock price of $12.77 per share as of June 30th, that would imply a free cash flow yield of approximately 24%. During the second quarter, our capital expenditures were $3 million. The second quarter expenditures primarily relate to the continuous weld railcar and unloader within our Rail segment and continued investments in our Precast Concrete Products business, including our Boise, Idaho facility as well as our existing Hillsboro, Texas plant. I would note that the continuous weld rail car and unloader is a very infrequent capital requirement for the company as these have a very long useful life associated with them. To date, we’ve spent $4.1 million on this railcar, of which $2.3 million has been spent year-to-date in 2020. We anticipate spending an additional $1.5 million in Q3 on this railcar which will be the final payment related to this asset at which time this railcar will be placed into service. We are anticipating our capital spend to be approximately $9 million to $11 million for the entire year. Now on to new orders and backlog. In Q2, overall orders were $138.3 million compared to $164.1 million last year with the decline primarily attributable to the Tubular and Energy segment. Order volume increased as the quarter progressed and certain pandemic related restriction orders were lifted or softened. Rail segment orders were marginally below first quarter by $1.5 million and Construction segment orders increased $12.9 million sequentially from the first quarter of 2020. Tubular and Energy segment orders declined $10.1 million sequentially from the first quarter of 2020. Backlog stood at $225.9 million at the end of the second quarter, an increase of $16.6 million or 7.9% compared to June 30th, 2019 backlog. Most notably, backlog increased by approximately $29.7 million in the Rail and Construction segments versus June 30th, 2019, which is a positive sign in these businesses as we move into the back half of the year. That concludes my comments on the second quarter results. So with that, I will now turn it over to Bob.