Hayward Holdings, Inc. (HAYW) Q2 2026 Earnings Report, Transcript and Summary

Welcome to Hayward Holdings Second Quarter 2026 Earnings Conference Call. My name is Robert, and I'll be your operator for today's call. [Operator Instructions] Please note that this conference is being recorded. I will now turn the call over to Kevin Maczka, Vice President, Investor Relations and FP&A. Mr. Maczka, you may begin.

Thank you, and good morning, everyone. We issued our second quarter 2026 earnings press release this morning, which has been posted to the Investor Relations section of our website at investor.hayward.com. There, you can also find the earnings slide presentation referenced during this call. I'm joined today by Kevin Holleran, President and Chief Executive Officer; and Eifion Jones, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Before we begin, I would like to remind everyone that during this call, the company may make certain statements that are considered forward-looking in nature, including management's outlook for 2026 and future periods. Such statements are subject to a variety of risks and uncertainties, including those discussed in our most recent Forms 10-K and subsequent Forms 10-Q filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission that could cause actual results to differ materially. The company does not undertake any duty to update such forward-looking statements. During today's call, the company will discuss non-GAAP measures. Reconciliations of historical non-GAAP measures discussed on this call to the comparable GAAP measures can be found in our earnings release and the appendix to the slide presentation. All comparisons will be made on a year-over-year basis unless otherwise indicated. I will now turn the call over to Kevin Holleran.

Thank you, Kevin, and good morning, everyone. It's my pleasure to welcome all of you to Hayward's second quarter earnings call. I'll begin on Slide 4 of our earnings presentation with today's key messages. I'm pleased to report another strong quarter. Net sales increased 6% in the second quarter and 9% through the first half with positive price realization and stable volume. This performance reflects the resilience of our installed base aftermarket business model, coupled with focused execution across the organization. Our teams are advancing strategic initiatives to strengthen our market position and drive profitable growth even as we navigate macroeconomic, geopolitical and inflationary challenges. We are clearly gaining traction, and I'm proud of the team's performance. During the quarter, we completed a comprehensive debt refinancing, extending our maturities, reducing our cost of capital by approximately $6 million on a full year basis and adding financial flexibility to support our strategic priorities. Eifion will provide further details on the refinancing in a moment. We also made further solid progress on the balance sheet, generating cash and reducing net leverage to 1.5x, the lowest level since our IPO in 2021. We achieved this while increasing share repurchases, demonstrating our confidence in the business and our commitment to disciplined capital allocation. Given the first half performance and our visibility into the second half, we are maintaining our guidance for full year 2026. We continue to expect net sales to increase approximately 5% and adjusted diluted EPS to increase approximately 9% to 13%. Turning now to Slide 5, highlighting our second quarter and first half results. Net sales increased 6% to $318 million in the second quarter. North America increased 9%, driven by positive contribution from both price and volume as demand remained resilient across our installed base aftermarket. Europe and Rest of World declined 8% as certain regions continued to be impacted by macroeconomic conditions and geopolitical disruption related to the ongoing conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East. We were pleased to see continued solid demand for some of our more discretionary product categories such as salt chlorine generators, automation and lighting. Commercial Pool and industrial flow control delivered solid growth again this quarter with net sales for both businesses up double digits in the first half. Gross profit margin declined modestly in the second quarter and was approximately flat to the first half, consistent with our expectations. As previously communicated, we anticipated second quarter pressure from incremental inflation in specialty metals, freight and resin costs before our mitigation actions are fully implemented. Importantly, margins remain near record levels. The second quarter 2025 represented Hayward's highest ever quarterly gross margin as a public company and second quarter 2026 was the second highest. I'm pleased with how our sales and operational teams maintained strong profitability despite these new pressures. Similarly, adjusted EBITDA margin in the first half remained healthy and consistent with the prior year as we continue to make targeted investments in product innovation and customer initiatives. Adjusted diluted EPS increased 8% to $0.26 in the second quarter. Combined with our outstanding first quarter performance, we delivered a strong first half with net sales up 9%, adjusted EBITDA also up 9% and adjusted diluted EPS up 18%. Our performance reflects the strength and execution of our strategy. Let me highlight some of the initiatives gaining traction and helping position Hayward for sustained profitability growth on Slide 6. The focus of our strategy is clear: support our customers with superior products and services to drive share gains while sharpening our operational excellence to enable profitable growth. Starting with the customer side. Innovation continues to be our engine. We've increased our RD&E investment and it's paying off with new product vitality now up to 23%. Our proprietary OmniX platform is leading the way, especially in the aftermarket, and we will introduce more OmniX-enabled product categories to expand the connected ecosystem. We're also deepening our reach with the trade through our Hayward hub training centers. These hubs are reinforcing our position in our strongest markets by further developing existing dealer capabilities while also supporting dealer conversions in targeted growth markets. We look forward to opening our sixth center in Atlanta in the fourth quarter. We're increasingly using AI to raise the bar across the organization. One use case in customer service resulted in 98% of our North America calls now being answered within 1 second by an AI agent and 80% of those calls resolved with no need for escalation to a live technical service representative. That's a better experience for our customers and greater efficiency for us. On the operational excellence side, we're staying disciplined and proactive. We're taking continued cost actions, investing in automation and productivity, nearshoring and increasingly dual sourcing to mitigate tariff and geopolitical risk and driving value engineering across our processes and products. Internally, we're managing our own inventory tightly across both finished goods and raw materials and accelerating SKU rationalization and product platforming. We maintain visibility in the inventory levels and sell-through across our primary North America channel partners through regular communication and reporting. Current channel inventory remains consistent with seasonal patterns, including the normal second quarter reduction and is aligned with our assumptions for end market sell-through and product availability. Finally, the Power of Us campaign reinforces all of this. This is a compelling message and is resonating across the industry. As a proud American company since 1925, approximately 90% of our products sold in the United States today are manufactured or assembled in our domestic centers of excellence. The takeaway is simple. We're driving both growth and productivity. The combination of customer intimacy and operational excellence driving market share and profitability is exactly how we intend to outperform our industry and create long-term value. And with that, I'd like to turn the call over to Eifion to discuss our financial results in more detail.

Thank you, Kevin, and good morning. Turning to Slide 7. I'll walk through our second quarter financial performance in more detail. We delivered another strong quarter of sales and earnings growth, with net sales increasing 6% to $318 million against a 5% growth comparison in the prior year period. Growth was primarily driven by price realization to offset inflation with volumes stable in the quarter. I am particularly pleased to see positive volume growth in our primary North American market, which reflects the impact of the investments we have made in our sales, marketing and customer care teams to strengthen customer engagement, improve execution and support sustainable demand generation. Gross profit increased 8% to $155 million, while gross profit margin declined 50 basis points to 48.7%. As communicated last quarter, we anticipated sequential second quarter gross margin increases to be more moderate than the prior year due to the timing of incremental inflation and the partial quarter benefit of our surcharges and other mitigation actions. As Kevin noted, we were pleased to deliver our second highest quarterly gross margin since the IPO, surpassed only by the prior year period despite facing challenges over the past 12 months, including tariffs, commodity inflation, higher transportation costs and the management effort required to nearshore production from China and established dual sourcing to continue to improve supply chain resilience. Adjusted EBITDA increased 5% to $93 million, with adjusted EBITDA margin increasing 700 basis points sequentially from the first quarter and declining 40 basis points year-over-year to 29.1%. We continue to make targeted investments in sales and marketing, advanced engineering and customer service. The effective tax rate was 23% and adjusted diluted EPS increased 8% to $0.26. Moving to Slide 8 to discuss our segment performance for the second quarter. North America net sales were up 9% to $278 million, driven by 7% price realization and 2% volume growth. Within the region, U.S. sales also increased 9% and Canada was up 2% given the weather-related slow start to the season. Gross margin reduced 90 basis points from the prior year to 50.4% due to inflationary pressures and timing of our mitigation actions. Similar to the consolidated result, the North American gross margin trailed only the segment record performance in the year ago period. Sales in Europe and Rest of World declined 8% to $41 million with positive contributions from price and FX, offset by reduced volume. Europe sales declined 4% and Rest of World declined 16% impacted primarily by the geopolitical disruption related to the ongoing conflict in the Middle East. That said, we were pleased to see continued margin improvement in the segment. Gross margin increased 50 basis points to 37.9% and adjusted segment income margin was consistent with the prior year at 18.1%, driven by improved operational execution. Moving to Slide 9. Our first half segment performance was strong. North American net sales increased 10%, driven by 8% price realization and 2% volume growth with both the U.S. and Canada delivering double-digit gains. Europe and Rest of World was flat overall as 5% growth in Europe offset a 9% decline in Rest of World, again, primarily reflecting the disruption from the Middle East conflict. Adjusted segment income margin remained consistent with strong prior year levels in North America and expanded 130 basis points in Europe and Rest of World. Overall, we are pleased with our first half performance. Turning to Slide 10. During the quarter, we successfully amended our existing Term Loan B, extending the maturity profile, reducing our interest rate and enhancing financial flexibility. The amended Term Loan B of $960 million now matures in 2033 compared to 2028 previously and carries a 61 basis point lower spread. This reduces annual run rate interest expense by approximately $6 million, leaving total debt substantially unchanged. We also replaced our $425 million ABL revolver due 2028 with a new undrawn $425 million 5-year cash flow revolver maturing in 2031, providing full availability without a borrowing base limitation. The refinancing was well received with Moody's upgrading our corporate family rating and S&P affirming its rating with a positive outlook. Together, these actions strengthen the balance sheet and support organic investment, strategic M&A and capital returns while maintaining disciplined leverage. Turning to Slide 11. Our financial position remains a source of strength and gives us meaningful flexibility to execute our plans. We continue to strengthen the balance sheet during the quarter, reducing net leverage to 1.5x, the lowest level since our IPO from 2.1x a year ago. We ended the quarter with a combined $483 million of cash, cash equivalents and short-term investments. Combined with availability under our credit facility, that's over $900 million of total liquidity. Cash flow from operations was strong in the second quarter, resulting in $172 million in the first half of 2026 compared to $188 million in the prior year period. Free cash flow was $154 million, and our outlook for the full year is unchanged at approximately $200 million. To sum it up, with low leverage, ample liquidity and strong cash flow, we are well positioned to support continued organic investment, pursue strategic M&A and return capital to shareholders. Turning to Slide 12, capital allocation. We balance strategic growth investment with stockholder returns while maintaining prudent leverage. As an OEM, we prioritize organic investment into our manufacturing and supply chain footprint, followed by strategic M&A while remaining opportunistic with respect to share repurchases. We accelerated our share repurchase activity in the first half, deploying approximately $64 million to repurchase 4.4 million shares. Turning to Slide 13. Given our strong half performance and current visibility into the second half, we are maintaining our guidance for full year 2026. We continue to expect net sales to increase approximately 5% with adjusted diluted EPS increasing approximately 9% to 13% to a range of $0.84 to $0.87. We continue to expect free cash flow in the region of $200 million, exceeding 100% of net income. This outlook includes net interest expense of approximately $45 million, a normalized effective tax rate of around 24% and increased CapEx of approximately $40 million as we continue to invest in upgrading our operational capabilities. Overall, we're confident in our ability to execute and remain positive on pool industry growth, supported by the strength and the resilience of the aftermarket. With that, I'll turn the call back to Kevin.

Thanks, Eifion. Before we open the line for questions, let me close by reinforcing the key messages from today's call. Hayward delivered another strong quarter and first half, underscoring the durability of our installed base aftermarket model, the strength of our brand and product portfolio and the consistency of our execution. We grew sales and protected profitability in a dynamic cost environment. At the same time, we continued advancing the initiatives to define Hayward's next phase of value creation, deepening customer relationships through innovation and service, expanding our connected product ecosystem and operating with even greater efficiency and discipline. We also reduced leverage to the lowest level since our IPO, accelerating our share repurchase activity and completed an important refinancing. Looking ahead, we remain confident in the long-term fundamentals of the pool industry and in Hayward's ability to deliver results through a range of market conditions. With that, we're now ready to open the line for questions.

[Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from Andrew Carter with Stifel.

Given the news in the industry with Pentair's declines and channel rightsizing, could you step back and, kind of, give us an estimate of what your readout is, like your sellout to customers, also potentially how much that sellout varies by customer? And then I guess the second part to build on that, how many days of inventory are in the channel now? Is that meaningfully different than what it was, say, pre-COVID because you've obviously got the quicker supply chain? And then what are your estimates for days inventory in the channel by the end of the year?

Andrew, Eifion might have some of those statistics you were asking about. I mean, overall, we feel really balanced with our inventory in the channel ending Q2. I would call it very normal. As expected, Q2 is a big sellout quarter for us, traditionally the biggest net reduction in inventory after the channel builds inventory in Q4 and Q1 get ready for the season. And as we move into Q3, we would expect another net reduction, although historically not normally at the same level that we see in Q2, all culminating with lower inventories than what we would expect to be a very normal participation from the channel come early by time. You mentioned COVID. There were certainly lessons learned coming through the COVID experience through supply chain disruption and demand profile. We embarked on a much improved process with our largest North American channel partners of sharing information around inventory levels, out-the-door sales, what we expect them to be moving forward. And I would say our conversations with our largest channel partners are very productive. They -- in general, we all feel very balanced. We're aligned on what we believe the go-forward sales out figures are in Q3 and Q4. We're not hearing any kind of divergent opinions on what we expect Hayward sales out to be, nor are we hearing from the channel partners any expectations to make step level reductions in their days on hand that they've had historically. So I think all of this is supported by the fact that we're proud of the reliable supply chain in the domestic centers of excellence with shorter lead times that really negates any reason for the channel to order ahead or to increase stocking levels. So we feel really good exiting Q2 and we feel -- we see very balanced inventories across our largest channel partners.

Yes. Andrew, if you look at the entirety of the channel across North America and take into consideration primary European markets, we typically operate at this time of the year just over 4 months' worth of inventory in the channel. And in aggregate, that's kind of where we're at exiting out of June. Some channel partners who have got stronger balance sheets may go a little bit higher, others lower. Between now and the end of the year, we typically start to see inventories climb as folks start to take in their positions for the early buy, particularly in Q4. As Kevin mentioned, normalized inventory across the channel coming out of Q2 and feel really good about how we're set up for Q3 stepping into Q4 as well.

Our next question comes from Jeff Hammond with KeyBanc Capital Markets.

So maybe sticking with the competitor news and dislocation. I'm just wondering maybe any color where you think you might be benefiting from some of that dislocation. I think they talked about some customer share loss around 80/20 implementation and then maybe like-for-like replacement on older pool pads. So just wondering what you're seeing there and any opportunities.

Yes. Jeff, as I've said for -- pretty consistently for several quarters running, we feel good about our share gains. We think that it's been over a longer period of time, perhaps than was seen by the market. I think that's a little bit more apparent maybe in the current period. I'd say our team is executing a playbook. We've had basically the grow greater than market has been a consistent theme in the organization since I joined in 2019. And I think it's multipronged. I think we're playing offense and that the investments that we've made around SG&A and RD&E are paying off. From a product and innovation standpoint, it's a steady pipeline of products that touch a number of different themes, Jeff, whether it's like-for-like replacement or bringing automation and upgrade to the established installed base or filling in some product gaps that we may have had historically like a 4 horsepower or bringing some products to market that can drop in on some competitive products. Those are kind of the prongs around products and the innovation. There's a long list around commercial excellence, whether it's brand building, making sure that our brand is resonating with all builders and servicers to some reorganization around our field organization, bringing sales and technical service together under common leadership, adding some business development folks to tell the Hayward story and to start recruiting into the family and then some dealer support, whether it's some education or whether it's the hubs, the OmniPro app, et cetera. So I think all of that is really wrapped up again with a comment I made to Andrew's question around supply chain capabilities. And I think having shorter lead times, manufactured in the U.S. in our centers of excellence, all supports a multipronged share playbook that we've been executing for several years, and we continue to see gains from it.

Okay. Great. And then just on gross margins. I know you guys telegraphed pretty well that you had a tough comp in the gross margin, you'd be down year-over-year, and there were some maybe some price cost transition issues. Can you just speak to how you see gross margins trending into 3Q, 4Q as you look year-on-year and maybe how you're working through those price cost issues and how price is translating?

Yes. Thanks. I'll kick off, and Kevin can correct me where needed. But you're exactly right. Stepping into Q2, we expected to have a lower sequential gain than we did in the prior year. I was actually more pleasantly surprised with the amount of gross margin gain that we actually achieved. But nonetheless, when the announcements on the war came through in Iran in February, that obviously accelerated inflation, came out as quickly at the end of Q1. We immediately reacted and announced a surcharge to be effective on orders mid-quarter and given the order to invoice lag to be effective on the invoice sometime later in the quarter. That played out. Maybe we got a little bit more on the invoice than we were originally expecting in terms of timing, but that played out exactly as expected. So at the end of Q2, we would say we're all caught up now on that particular inflationary pressure. As we look into the balance of the year, normally, we see margins decrease in Q3 as it's a lower leverage period for us. And then in Q4, margins open back up again as we get more leverage from volume in that particular quarter. Right now, as I said at Q1, we believe based on the activities that we have in place right now that we'll be able to maintain gross margins for the full year approximately in line with last year. The guys are doing an absolutely fantastic job in the operational and supply team, battling all these headwinds. And then with the assistance of the commercial team and pricing action, in some cases, discrete pricing action, we're able to hold our gross margins at last year's level, which is obviously a great position to be at. Last year was a record level. So feeling really good about the balance of the year and the ability to deliver another good margin year in '26.

Our next question comes from Brian Lee with Goldman Sachs.

This is Brian. Sorry for technical difficulty. I guess, first, just a follow-up to the prior question around kind of the price cost actions and gross margin trajectory that's helpful color for the balance of the year. How should we think about -- and I know you get this question every now and then, the ability to continue to leverage price here? Are you getting any flag pushback from the channel? I know it's been a good kind of tailwind for the past couple of years. How should we think about your ability to continue to capture price and then kind of what magnitude as you head into next year? I know it sounds like the second half, you're recalibrating pretty well there, and you're seeing good momentum. But beyond that, I guess, just big picture, how should we be thinking about the price here?

Yes. There certainly -- Brian, there certainly has been a lot of price pushed through the marketplace over the last several years due to inflationary or tariff pressures that we've all felt. And we're actually contemplating as we speak, what some of those inflationary assumptions are as we make the turn into the second half of this year, and it's always part of our early buy program where we announce what those impacts are heading into the next year. So we're going through that as we speak right now, Brian. But to your question, I feel confident in our ability to continue to pass along at least dollar for dollar what those impacts are. We're all hoping for a little bit more muted inflationary environment going forward. But we are confident that we can pass dollar for dollar. And what we have done more recently is we take it on ourselves to take on cost out and productivity and efficiency projects internally to protect that structural margin. We think that, that's the right thing to do given some of the pressures, pricing pressures that have been pushed into the market over the last 3-plus years. So that's our approach. Eifion, do you have anything to add around broad price cost?

No. I mean, as Kevin mentioned here, we have the ability at the beginning of each season here to adjust pricing in line with inflation. We have, for the last several periods here, tried to protect dollar for dollar and then use our manufacturing facilities and the supply chain to return structural gross margin, and that's played out as expected. So it's a disciplined industry with that ability, but we're conscious that a lot of price has gone in over the last several years, and we're doing our darndest here to make sure that we're limiting price increases as we continue to go forward, only those that are necessary to protect dollar for dollar and leveraging our facilities to return structural margin.

Absolutely. Helpful color, guys. Second question for me, and I'll pass it on. Just in terms of the market share gains, as you mentioned, Kevin, you've said that consistently over the past few quarters, I guess, kind of come to light that does seem to be playing out based on what we've seen from some of your peer group in the recent past. So when you think about the share gains you've seen, I'd imagine some of that's through technology, some of that's through innovation, but some of that may be just through kind of how you're interfacing with the dealers and the channel. How do you envision kind of being able to maintain those share gains, maybe even accelerate them? Kind of what are some levers you think you can put forth to kind of keep those sticky?

Yes. Thanks for the question. And I think they're very durable, very sticky. These share gains have been won by our commercial and operations team doing a better job of telling the Hayward story. We've been focused on this industry for decades, and we're bringing great products that resonate, that are dealer-driven, things that they're telling us that they would like to improve, we take to heart, and we work through our product management and our design teams. I think we really continue to focus and impress upon the dealers out there that we are looking to help them be successful, help them with as some small, some large business owner operators, what we can do from the OEM side to enable them to be more successful in the profession and in the business that they operate. So we -- given the fact it's multipronged, whether it's around the commercial side, around the supply chain side and listening to our dealers, bringing product innovation to life, I think we have a lot to offer, a lot to sell and the momentum is gaining. So our expectation is not to sit back but to continue the positive trajectory that we've been on over the last several years.

Our next question comes from Rafe Jadrosich with Bank of America.

It's Rafe. The first one is just on IEEPA refunds. Is there any benefit that you're seeing either in the second quarter or later this year? Or what's sort of embedded in guidance? Or what's your expectation there?

No, at this particular point, we're still in the process of substantially receiving IEEPA refunds as we stepped into Q3. I think the first tranche of IEEPA refunds are now in. Currently, we're evaluating what's the most appropriate way to return to customer. That will be our ambition. There's complexity to that. Obviously, whatever we would return would be net of cost we incur for those refunds. But right now, we're still in the process of claiming those refunds in the aggregate, they're less than $10 million for us. Some of that is a consequence of the great job that we did recalibrating the supply chain last year to get away from the impact of those IEEPA refunds. But right now, our line of sight is to approximately $8 million to $10 million worth of refunds. We have ambition to return to customers, still working through that complexity. We'll update you at the end of Q3 on how that played out.

Got it. Okay. So nothing in guidance or anything like that?

There isn't.

Okay. And then just in terms of sellout, there's an earlier question on that. Can you just tell what you think like industry sell-out was in 2Q? And if I were to go back 90 days ago to when you reported 1Q, like what's your full year expectation for the end markets? And have they changed at all? Like what are you expecting for new construction, R&R, international? Just how do we think about how the sellout has evolved and your outlook for the back half of the year?

I think the best proxy for what sellout was in the second quarter, Rafe, would be the largest distributor that reported last week, who I believe reported plus 3% in the equipment category over second quarter. We -- across our largest trade partners, Hayward sales out was a bit better than that. Actually, traditional distribution saw even a bit better than that of Hayward product as well. So we were encouraged with what we saw through our largest trade partners in Q2 in terms of Hayward sales out vis-a-vis the broader equipment category in general. In terms of first quarter, do you have that handy?

Yes. I mean we were up mid-single digits in the first quarter on the sellout. I mean we don't get perfect information across the wider channel. But based on the reporting distributors, we were up mid-single digits. Rafe, let me just also clarify an earlier point that I made that was asked by Andrew, which may be part of your question as well. I mean, typically, what we see in the channel inventory position is during Q2 and Q3, sales out exceed sell-in. So you see decreasing absolute inventories as we get to the end of Q3, you typically see days on hand start to increase even though those absolute dollar values are lower in terms of inventory. And then as you step into Q4, you see the absolute inventory climb as we get ready for the season, which then takes place, obviously, in the subsequent year. And typically, days on hand are going to be the highest at the end of the year, given that inventory pull in by the channel.

We have reached the end of the question-and-answer session. I'd like to turn the call back over to Kevin Holleran for closing comments.

Thanks, Robert. In closing, I want to thank our employees and partners around the world. Your dedication and hard work continues to be critical to the progress we're making across our business. We're encouraged by our strong first half of the year and remain confident in our strategy. If you have any follow-on questions, please reach out to our team. We appreciate your continued interest in Hayward and look forward to speaking with you again on our next earnings call. Robert, you may now end the call.

Thank you. This concludes today's conference. You may disconnect your lines at this time, and we thank you for your participation.