Earnings Labs

Global Industrial Company (GIC)

Q4 2012 Earnings Call· Tue, Mar 5, 2013

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to Systemax Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2012 Earnings Teleconference Call. [Operator Instructions] As a reminder, this conference call is being recorded today, March 5, 2013. At this time, I would like to turn the call over to Mike Smargiassi of Brainerd Communicators. Please go ahead.

Michael Smargiassi

Analyst

Thank you, operator. Welcome to the Systemax Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2012 Earnings Conference Call. I'm here today with Richard Leeds, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Systemax; and Larry Reinhold, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. This discussion may include certain forward-looking statements. It should be understood that actual results could differ materially from those projected due to a number of factors, including those described under the caption Forward-Looking Statements in the company's annual report on Form 10-K and quarterly report on Form 10-Q. I would like to highlight the non-GAAP metrics that are included in today's press release. Given the impact of recent strategic activities, the company has expanded its disclosure to include non-GAAP metrics. The company believes that by excluding certain recurring and nonrecurring adjustments from comparable GAAP measures, investors have an additional meaningful measurement of the company's performance. As a result, this call will include a discussion of certain non-GAAP financial measures. The company has provided a reconciliation of these non-GAAP financial measures to their most directly comparable GAAP measures in today's press release. The press release is available in the company's website and will be filed with the SEC in a Form 8-K. This call is a property of and is copyrighted by Systemax Inc. I will now turn the call over to Mr. Richard Leeds.

Richard Leeds

Analyst

Good afternoon, and thank you for joining us today. For the quarter and full year, we had a solid performance from our B2B operations, specifically our Industrial Products Group and our European business. However, this was more than offset by continued weakness in our consumer focused operations. Overall, we remain pleased with the performance of our B2B operations with consolidated sales up moderately for the quarter and full year. Our Industrial Products Group delivered strong results, posting its third consecutive year with more than 25% revenue growth. Since 2009, we've doubled the size of this business in both revenue and profitability. And that is all organically driven as we gain market share in core categories and have significantly expanded our products and category offerings. Industrial Products revenue in the quarter was up 18% and was historically our slowest quarter of the year. Industrial's bottom line performance continue to reflect increased drop shipping in support of our rapid SKU expansion and the need to further optimize our freight performance where we are just starting to recognize some of the benefits from recent initiatives. Our outlook for Industrial remains strong, and we are focused on aggressively driving the growth of this business in the year ahead, continuing to take steps to improve our distribution operation and strengthening our sales team. Looking at B2B tech on a constant currency basis, our European B2B tech business grew revenue 6% in the quarter and 10% for the full year as we continue to gain market share in our largest markets. We have made a number of investments in this business as we position ourselves to better capitalize on the opportunities we see in existing markets and the region overall. We have built out our European team to support our growth and pursue a broader and…

Lawrence P. Reinhold

Analyst

Thank you, Richard. Before turning to our results, I would note again that we have begun incorporating non-GAAP performance measures in this press release. The narrative that follows includes non-GAAP results as we believe these are very relevant to understanding the underlying performance of the business. Nonrecurring and recurring items that have been excluded in determining non-GAAP results include asset impairments, reorganization of severance, new facility start-ups, litigation settlements, intangible asset amortization and stock-based compensation, which, in aggregate, impacted results by $41.2 million and $51.9 million for the quarter and full year, respectively. Turning first to our consolidated revenue. The fourth quarter 2012 consolidated sales were $935.2 million, a decline of 4.4% and off 3.6% on a constant currency basis compared to the fourth quarter of 2011. Sales for the quarter reflect solid growth in our B2B operations, which was more than offset by weakness in our consumer business. Looking at our revenue by channel. Fourth quarter B2B channel sales were $526.7 million, an increase of 2.5% or 3.4% on a constant currency and same-store basis. Our consumer sales are $408.5 million, a decrease of 12.1% or 11.3% on a constant currency and same-store basis. Turning to our reporting segments. The Industrial Products Group had another outstanding quarter, with revenue increasing 18.0% year-over-year to $98.3 million with growth across most product categories in all channels. Gross profit increased during the quarter, however, gross margin as a percent of sales decreased due to greater volume of drop ship products, freight pressure and incremental cost related to our new distribution center in New Jersey. We feel confident that each of these items can be effectively mitigated and will not have a long-term effect on our operating results. On the bottom line, Industrial's non-GAAP operating income declined by $1.6 million to $7.0 million.…

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from Anthony Lebiedzinski from Sidoti & Company. Anthony C. Lebiedzinski - Sidoti & Company, LLC: Wanted to get a little bit more insight on the 2 different segments, the Technology and Industrial Product segments. So looking at the operating incomes, clearly, I can see those metrics. I was wondering if you could provide the gross margin numbers by each segment.

Lawrence P. Reinhold

Analyst

Well, Anthony, we don't typically disclose the specific gross margin rate segment but what we saw is a continuation of what we have forever, which is the tech business is much lower gross margin than the industrial business. The industrial business gross margin in the quarter did -- was lower than it was in the fourth quarter of last year due to the items that we mentioned a moment ago. The tech business also have recorded a lower gross margin in the quarter due primarily to -- in the North American -- performance of our North American part of the business. Anthony C. Lebiedzinski - Sidoti & Company, LLC: Okay. And as far as the factors affecting the Industrial Product segment profitability, we've seen 3 quarters in a row where you've been able to increase your sales in that segment be at the operating income is down, at what point do you think we can start to see actually a profitability improvement in that segment?

Richard Leeds

Analyst

This is Richard. We continue to invest in that business. We have a lot of exciting things that's going on with that. One is we're continuing to grow our headcount of our sales reps so we invested in them as that takes place. Two, we're investing in personnel for increasing the SKU count that we support on the Web. As we mentioned -- as I mentioned in my prepared remarks, SKU count is up dramatically in the year. It was huge numbers in 2, 3 years. And we are quite focused on the bottom line and getting that growing as well, but we like to invest in that business. It's a great business. So I would like to say, shortly, but we're continuing to invest in that. Anthony C. Lebiedzinski - Sidoti & Company, LLC: As far as your retail store base, you mentioned that you recently closed 1 store. Going forward, do you anticipate any additional store closings?

Richard Leeds

Analyst

So like any retailer, we're constantly evaluating our footprint of stores and seeing which ones are underperforming. And as we make those decisions, we'll be letting you guys know. But right now, we have not made any decisions for -- regarding those. Anthony C. Lebiedzinski - Sidoti & Company, LLC: Okay. And I think, Larry, you mentioned that you recently did some changes to your website. You have seen some increased conversion just recently so I was wondering if you could just give us a little bit more insight as to what you've done.

Lawrence P. Reinhold

Analyst

We've got different partners who were helping us with e-mail campaigns, third parties and so we've got -- done a number of initiatives and recent changes, and I think we're seeing the beginning of some, hopefully, very positive long-term results. Anthony C. Lebiedzinski - Sidoti & Company, LLC: Got it. Okay. And lastly, just a housekeeping question. Do you have the CapEx number for 2012? And any projection for 2013?

Lawrence P. Reinhold

Analyst

I have the former, not the latter. The CapEx for the year is a little over $12 million. In 2013, I think we -- it will be a substantial -- you have substantial CapEx, the result of mostly the changes that we're making in Europe, so to say that our Hungary shared service center and a number of IT initiatives that will be ongoing there. But it was $12 million for 2012, which I think was around the same number as last year's 2011 for the full year.

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions] I'm showing no questions. I'd like to hand the conference back over to management for any closing remarks.

Richard Leeds

Analyst

Thank you, everybody. We look forward to announcing our next quarter's results with you. Goodbye.