Earnings Labs

Hub Group, Inc. (HUBG)

Q1 2016 Earnings Call· Tue, Apr 26, 2016

$42.63

-3.07%

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Hello, and welcome to the Hub Group First Quarter 2016 Earnings Conference Call. I am joined on the call by Dave Yeager, Hub's CEO; Don Maltby, our President and Chief Operating Officer; and Terri Pizzuto, our CFO. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A brief question-and-answer session will follow the formal presentation. In order for everyone to have an opportunity to participate, please limit your inquiries to one primary and one follow-up question. Any forward-looking statements made during the course of the call represent our best good faith judgment as to what may happen in the future. Statements that are forward-looking can be identified by the use of the words such as believe, expect, anticipate and project. Actual results may differ materially from those projected in these forward-looking statements. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. It is now my pleasure to turn the call over to your host, Dave Yeager. You may now begin. David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Thank you, and good afternoon, and thank everyone here for participating in Hub Group's first quarter earnings call. I'm joined today by Don Maltby, Hub's President and Chief Operating Officer, and Terri Pizzuto, our Chief Financial Officer. We had a strong first quarter with slight declines in volume in January and March and solid increases in February. Historically, we've seen a spike in business out of the southeastern part of the U.S. each spring. That did not occur this year as our customers' inventories continue to be larger than normal and truck load demand remains muted. On our last call, we talked about the internal changes within Hub as we realigned Intermodal operations to be managed by our Account Management team. This change has already reaped benefits as Hub's on-time performance…

Operator

Operator

Thank you. We will now begin the question-and-answer session. And the first question comes from John Barnes from RBC. Please go ahead.

John Barnes - RBC Capital Markets LLC

Analyst · RBC. Please go ahead

Hey. Good afternoon, guys. Nice quarter. Just two questions. Number one, can you just elaborate a little bit as to what you're seeing in terms of Intermodal pricing to your customer base, how receptive there you are to rate increases and just the competition you are seeing either from intermodal players or in the truckload market as well? David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Sure, John, this is Dave. There's no question that it's a soft market out there. We're seeing the over-the-road carriers being very aggressive even on what has been traditionally a lot of short haul intermodal lanes, i.e. the local East in particular was where we see most of the aggression. And so with the soft demand right now, the choppy economy, high inventory levels, we're certainly seeing the over-the-road motor carriers (20:42). And as I have said in my formal remarks, we have actually seen greater amounts of conversion back to over-the-road from intermodal than we've seen in many, many years. From an Intermodal perspective, we're also seeing a very competitive environment with the most recent bids. As usual, we're not reacting either downward or upward as quickly or as dramatically as what the truckload sector's doing but there's no question that there is price competition. But we believe that over the course of the year, it'll be up slightly to flattish from an Intermodal perspective. So competitive, yes. But again, we're not feeling the pinch, I don't think, quite as much as the motor carrier industry is.

John Barnes - RBC Capital Markets LLC

Analyst · RBC. Please go ahead

Was the pricing strong enough to offset the rail increases that you experienced in the quarter? David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: You know, it was to a degree. A part of it is, probably about 50% of it is enough. But we're also, as some of Terri's remarks and Don's remarks had indicated, we're working a lot on internal efficiencies as well, whether it's accessorial reductions, speeding up the transit of the overall box. And so, with that, we feel as though we'll still be able to minimally maintain margins and probably more than likely be able to continue to enhance them. So we feel pretty good about the environment and where we are with our rail partners at this point.

John Barnes - RBC Capital Markets LLC

Analyst · RBC. Please go ahead

All right. So you're saying that 50% of the rail rate increase you were able to cover with your own pricing initiatives, and 50% you were able to cover with the other efficiencies, box turns, drayage, and the like? David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Right. And it's still early. I would point that out. It's still early in the bid cycle. But yes, that is our plan right now. We're not going to be able to cover the entire rail increase with price increases to our clients. It's just not going to happen. Donald G. Maltby - President & Chief Operating Officer: Yeah. David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Not and maintain our overall volume levels.

John Barnes - RBC Capital Markets LLC

Analyst · RBC. Please go ahead

And is that 50/50, should we think about it – that split covering the rail increases for the balance of the year or does the internal initiatives on box turn and drayage and that kind of thing become more important as the year progresses? David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: That's very important, and I think it will become more so important over the course of the year as – again, many of these initiatives are still very young in their infancy but we've seen very strong results very quickly. I'm very, very happy with the excellent progress we've seen in a relatively short time. Donald G. Maltby - President & Chief Operating Officer: Still in the early stages of it. So I think your observation is correct.

John Barnes - RBC Capital Markets LLC

Analyst · RBC. Please go ahead

Okay. All right. Again, nice quarter. Thanks for the time. David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Thanks, John.

Operator

Operator

And our next question comes from Ben Hartford from Robert W. Baird. Please go ahead. Ben J. Hartford - Robert W. Baird & Co., Inc. (Broker): Yeah, good afternoon. Thanks. Terri, I'm just curious about the guidance. You're including the share repurchase activity done to date in that number. You had said $2.15 to $2.30, is that right? Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: That's correct. Ben J. Hartford - Robert W. Baird & Co., Inc. (Broker): Okay. So the way that you're looking at it, is the outlook here for the balance of the year weaker than expected because of the competitiveness in the environment, which is more than offsetting the upside in the first quarter? Is that a fair way to think about the guidance? It looks pretty straight forward. I just wanted to confirm that. Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: Yeah. Let me give you a little more information on it, John. First, we changed the guidance to include the share repurchases because we've now repurchased $60 million worth of stock and we intend to aggressively execute on the remaining $40 million authorization. So the impact of the share repurchases included in our guidance is about $0.11. We're also bringing guidance down by $0.08 because we've seen a more challenging environment for Intermodal pricing and volume. We're in the middle of this season and in March we saw volume decline and more pricing pressure and we're trying to be realistic about our expectations and will have more insight when we report on the second quarter in July. Ben J. Hartford - Robert W. Baird & Co., Inc. (Broker): Okay. That's helpful. Thanks. And then, Dave, and maybe Don as well, I mean, given the competitiveness on…

Operator

Operator

And our next question comes from Justin Long with Stephens, Incorporated. Please go ahead.

Justin Long - Stephens, Inc.

Analyst · Stephens, Incorporated. Please go ahead

Thanks, and good afternoon. So, Terri, correct me if I'm wrong. But I think you talked about gross margins this year being somewhere between 11.7% and 12.7%, which implied a sequential decline in margins versus what we saw in the first quarter. So I was just wondering if you could provide some more color on the areas of the business that you expect to be the key drivers to that sequential decline. Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: Sure. You're right on exactly what I said and we – let me talk a little bit about the Hub segment first. We hope to improve gross margins from where we were in 2015. In 2015, we ended up with 11% margins at the Hub segment. So we hope to improve on that and have margins of between, say, between 11.5% and 12% in 2016 for the year. We're not going to provide quarterly guidance but as we lapped the 2015 price increases and assuming we don't get as much price in 2016, as we did in 2015, we expect the yields to go down as the year progresses. And then, for the Mode segment, we also expect yields to go down as the year progresses because of the same pressures in the macro environment.

Justin Long - Stephens, Inc.

Analyst · Stephens, Incorporated. Please go ahead

Okay. Great. And is there any more color you can provide looking at that consolidated gross margin guidance in terms of the quarterly cadence? And what do you expect in 2Q versus the back half of the year? Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: Well it will go down progressively as each – the yield will go down progressively each quarter and in Q2 we have some. We've seen already pricing declines somewhat from March and April, and we have also got rail cost increases from our Western partner and our Eastern partner going in on June 1. So that will bring the margin down a bit in the second quarter from the first quarter. And then it just goes on down the line from there as we lap the price increase that we got in 2015 midyear of 2016.

Justin Long - Stephens, Inc.

Analyst · Stephens, Incorporated. Please go ahead

Okay. Great. And maybe for a last question. So there are a lot of internal initiatives you have going on to improve margins. And I was wondering if you are able to summarize the expected impact from all of these items in 2016? If you just combine the benefit of all these what I would classify as kind of self-help items, all else being equal, what's the dollar amount of savings you expect this year? Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: Well, we can tell you that we hope to improve utilization by one day. That's one initiative. That's $6 million annually. We have several levers to pull there, including improved operations on the street, improved rail service and our satellite tracking unit. We do expect to realize dray cost savings by using the best carrier from a cost and service perspective, and by improving loaded miles. Our external dray spend last year was about $200 million. So, just saving a small portion of that goes a long way. And for every 100 basis point improvement in loaded miles it's about $3 million annually. Donald G. Maltby - President & Chief Operating Officer: Right. Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: And then we expect accessorial improvement, we'll do that by reducing costs through improved operational processes and collaborating with our customers. Donald G. Maltby - President & Chief Operating Officer: And we have seen that already and again, we are back – we are in the third inning of that game. So we are early in that process, and we have already started to see the cost takeouts. So you take the combination of the rail increases with the efficiencies that we are gaining, we figure it's around 50%. Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: Yeah. I would also add to what Dave had mentioned earlier. The realignment of our operations really helped us achieve our cost savings in the first quarter, and we expect that to continue for the rest of the year.

Justin Long - Stephens, Inc.

Analyst · Stephens, Incorporated. Please go ahead

Okay, that's all really helpful. Thanks so much for the time.

Operator

Operator

And our next question comes from Todd Fowler from KeyBanc Capital Markets. Please go ahead.

Todd C. Fowler - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.

Analyst · KeyBanc Capital Markets. Please go ahead

Great, thanks. Good afternoon. I guess just a follow-up on the guidance and maybe this is overly simplistic but when I think about the $0.58 here in the first quarter, and I annualize that, it puts me at the high end, a little bit above the high end of the guidance range. And I understand in response to Justin's question, some the gross margin pressure that's going to be coming throughout the year. But is it really all just – I mean, the price competition that you're seeing within the market and the rail cost increases or is there something else that has a very different seasonal pattern, I guess, to earnings than what you've experienced in the past? David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Todd, this is Dave. It's really not. It is those two items. It is the rail increases and it's just the competitive environment that we are currently in. Just those two factors alone are enough to drive that.

Todd C. Fowler - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.

Analyst · KeyBanc Capital Markets. Please go ahead

And between the two, Dave, I mean, have the rail cost increases been a higher magnitude than what you were anticipating back at the beginning of the year? Or have those been in line and it's really just the pricing pressure within the market? David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: No, the rails are pretty much in line with what we anticipated. It's really looking at the price competitive nature of today's market. We candidly, if you recall in the fourth quarter, we actually did not – although many people did not see a peak, we did. We also – we had very strong volumes and I think we were a little bit insulated from what was occurring for last year. And certainly in the light of the day, as we're seeing 2016, it's just, it's a very soft freight economy right now. And so we have to react accordingly to what our competitive position is.

Todd C. Fowler - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.

Analyst · KeyBanc Capital Markets. Please go ahead

Okay. And is some of that the need to maintain the network balance as well and to make sure that you have – it's not just going after share of growth, it's just to make sure that you got the balance within the network. Is that part of the equation? David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Absolutely. That is critical to – whenever you have as many assets as we do, you need to have your balance. You need to continue to grow, enhance your network and certainly to maintain the balance. That's critical importance.

Todd C. Fowler - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.

Analyst · KeyBanc Capital Markets. Please go ahead

Okay. And then just for my follow-up, can you give us just an idea on the acquisition front? I am sure that you probably don't want to talk about specific companies, but just a broad brush of areas that you're looking at and kind of sizing that sort of thing where you're at in the process? I think that would be helpful. David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Sure. We've been looking at a dedicated operation in some length. We also are currently looking at a logistics company that is both – some of it actually is air freight but a great deal of it also is transportation management related. And so they are all pretty much within the line of what we had outlined previously that, again, we are very interested in dedicated, we are very interested in outsourced logistics of various type, whether it's transportation management, cross docking, all those types of operations or whatever of particular interest, and we've maintained that focus. We're not suddenly looking to purchase a large international freight forwarder or a small international freight forwarder, even worse. We're keeping very focused on the areas we think that are going to be very sellable business lines to our clients.

Todd C. Fowler - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.

Analyst · KeyBanc Capital Markets. Please go ahead

Okay. That helps. Thanks again for the time and congratulations. Donald G. Maltby - President & Chief Operating Officer: Thanks, Todd. David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Thank you, Todd.

Operator

Operator

And our next question comes from Kelly Dougherty from Macquarie. Please go ahead. Kelly Dougherty - Macquarie Capital (USA), Inc.: Hey, everybody. Thanks for taking the question. Just a quick one. Am I right that you were previously expecting to grow Intermodal volumes kind of 1% to 3% in 2016? Because it now looks like you are saying (35:15) 2% to 4%, but at the same time the pricing and the volume is more challenging. So, just wondering if the first quarter was a lot better than you had expected or maybe what might explain that increase? Donald G. Maltby - President & Chief Operating Officer: Yeah. Kelly, this is Don. What we feel is that we've been working on our operational efficiencies in the company and getting our service levels up to where we'd be more attractive to gain new customers, and we feel that we're there and our focus now is growing through target accounts, cross-selling opportunities, and we're positioned better now, and we think that the 2% to 4% is in line with what we think in a tough market. Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: And you're right, Kelly. You have that right. We did say 1% to 3% last quarter. Kelly Dougherty - Macquarie Capital (USA), Inc.: Okay. So you think – I guess, I am just trying to get my head around – you think the volume can be stronger, which I understand from a service and that perspective, but the margins look like they're also going to be a little bit higher than you were saying before, even though it looks like pricing is more difficult. So, I guess, the upside comes on – Don, maybe when you were talking about some of the operational efficiencies are just…

Operator

Operator

And the next question comes from Kevin Sterling from BB&T. Please go ahead. Kevin Wallance Sterling - BB&T Capital Markets: Thank you. Good evening and congratulations on a nice quarter in a challenging environment. David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Thanks, Kevin. Donald G. Maltby - President & Chief Operating Officer: Thank you. Kevin Wallance Sterling - BB&T Capital Markets: Dave or Terri or Don, did you guys tell us what your box turns were in the quarter? David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: They were 15 days. Kevin Wallance Sterling - BB&T Capital Markets: 15 days. How does that compare to – if you don't mind, how does that compare to last quarter and a year ago? I know it's up, but just maybe for comparison purposes. David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: If I'm not mistaken, year-over-year, it's up six-tenths of a day? Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: Better by six-tenths of a day. David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Yeah. Better by six-tenths of a day. It was 15.6 days before. And sequentially, Terri? Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: In Q4, it was 15.4 days, so better than that, too. Kevin Wallance Sterling - BB&T Capital Markets: Okay. David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Yeah. So that's something we certainly believe that we can continue to get better and better at as the rail service is now back to a good competitive level that was at 2013 and so, I think at the low point, we were at about 13.6 days or so? Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: Yeah. Yeah. 13.375 days. David P.…

Operator

Operator

And your next question comes from Scott Group from Wolfe Research. Please go ahead.

Scott H. Group - Wolfe Research LLC

Analyst · Wolfe Research. Please go ahead

Hey. Thanks. Good afternoon, guys. David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Hey, Scott.

Scott H. Group - Wolfe Research LLC

Analyst · Wolfe Research. Please go ahead

So, I am not sure. Did you tell us or can you tell us what you think intermodal and truckload pricing are going to be this year? Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: We think that for the whole year they'll be up low single-digits.

Scott H. Group - Wolfe Research LLC

Analyst · Wolfe Research. Please go ahead

Okay. And then within the sequential gross margin compression you are expecting from the first quarter, is that weighted more towards intermodal or brokerage, Terri? Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: It's weighted more towards Intermodal.

Scott H. Group - Wolfe Research LLC

Analyst · Wolfe Research. Please go ahead

Yeah. I guess, that's much bigger. So, I guess, what I'm struggling with is we've been in pricing environments that are worse than – certainly worse than low single-digits. We've never seen such a sharp – we've never even seen close to such a sharp drop in gross margins from the first quarter to the rest of the year like you are talking about. So, I guess, I'm just struggling with what's really changing here. Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: It's a challenging pricing environment and the price pressure we're seeing as well as the demand being not what – it's pretty soft. David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Yeah, Scott, and I would – I'm not so sure that this is – this is a very competitive pricing environment right now, so I would not undersell that at all. And so I don't know that that's necessarily the direction. We're just reacting to the market, making sure that we maintain or grow share and service our clients effectively. And we just feel as though the margins are going to be compressed somewhat as we go through this cycle.

Scott H. Group - Wolfe Research LLC

Analyst · Wolfe Research. Please go ahead

Okay. That makes sense. I was just – I guess, I am surprised, then, you still think you can get slightly positive pricing there? Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: It's our best guess, right? Donald G. Maltby - President & Chief Operating Officer: Exactly. We're still very early in the overall bid cycle and 70% of our overall business is bid. David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: That's right. Donald G. Maltby - President & Chief Operating Officer: So as Terri had said earlier in her remarks, we will have a much better insight when we report in July, but that right now is our best guesstimate. Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: Yeah. And we're only 30% done with bids that are effective right now, so it's hard for us to know what the remaining 70%. David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Hopefully we see inventory levels get drastically reduced and demand pick up, and then we're completely wrong. We would love to be wrong in that direction.

Scott H. Group - Wolfe Research LLC

Analyst · Wolfe Research. Please go ahead

Sounds good. And just last question, Terri, on the guidance for operating expenses, assuming a pretty meaningful pickup, can you just talk about the puts and takes there? Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: Yeah. Our operating and expense guidance was lower than we projected for a couple of reasons in this first quarter. IT costs were lower than we projected, and we think that IT costs are going to catch up to projected levels for the rest of the year. In addition, our bonus was lower than we originally projected. Bonus is lower because our outlook for our Intermodal business for the rest of the year isn't as optimistic as it was at the time of our Q4 call because we've seen the challenging environment for Intermodal pricing and volume. And so, as a result of that, we lowered our bonus projection for the year, and that's why we brought our cost expense guidance down by $1 million a quarter.

Scott H. Group - Wolfe Research LLC

Analyst · Wolfe Research. Please go ahead

Okay. Perfect. Thank you, guys. Appreciate it. David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Thanks, Scott.

Operator

Operator

And your next question comes from Tom Wadewitz from UBS. Please go ahead.

Thomas Wadewitz - UBS Securities LLC

Analyst · UBS. Please go ahead

Yeah. Good afternoon and congratulations on the strong quarter. It looks like very good results. Can you review the timing of the rail rate increases? Did you start paying higher rates on January 1 or is all of the rate increase on the June 1 that you talked about? Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: This year, we had some rail cost increases go in in January and another portion will go in June 1.

Thomas Wadewitz - UBS Securities LLC

Analyst · UBS. Please go ahead

So part of the rail pressure might have already been in the first quarter or is that the wrong way to look at it? Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: A piece of it is, but not – the majority of it goes in June 1.

Thomas Wadewitz - UBS Securities LLC

Analyst · UBS. Please go ahead

Okay. And I think this has come through in some of the questions before, but it just seems that with such a strong first quarter and even if the market's weak, it's kind of hard to see the numbers come in and deteriorate as much as you're talking about. So, I mean, is it fair to say that maybe you're being a little conservative with the full-year guidance or is it just that pricing maybe ends up being down and that's just so tough in terms of rail costs up and rail prices up and your pricing maybe down? Or how do you – it still seems like it's a little hard to match it together unless you're just saying, well, maybe it is a little conservative on the guidance. Donald G. Maltby - President & Chief Operating Officer: Well, Tom, you've covered us for a long time. We are always a little bit conservative on the guidance. But again, we're early in the bid cycle and so we are being on the conservative side here as far as what we believe the remainder of the year will play out. But again, it's a soft rate economy, it's an aggressive priced economy, and so we're going to react accordingly and make sure that we protect share and protect our clients.

Thomas Wadewitz - UBS Securities LLC

Analyst · UBS. Please go ahead

Okay. I've got just one more, if I can sneak it in. What's the timing on the drayage? I mean, I guess, from a truck brokerage perspective in a weak market, you benefit on your buy of capacity. Do you have some of that dynamic in your drayage where it's not all contractually fixed and as the trucking market gets weaker and maybe dray costs go down, you can benefit near term on that? Or does that tend to be one-year contractual that you wouldn't see the benefit on the Intermodal dray? David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Well, from a drayage perspective, first of all, we will see a benefit from closing our Los Angeles terminal throughout the year. That was a drag on all of 2015, and I would say not an inconsequential drag at that. As far as our pricing actions, as Terri had indicated, we're at 59% hub dray. We intend to continue to grow Hub Group Trucking where appropriate, as it is a very important part of our business from a strategic perspective, but we have had outsourcing events that will occur all the way through July. You don't want to go too much beyond that just because you get into peak season, you can get into capacity shortages, it's hard to execute, but we do believe we may see some, but very nominal cost. I think the biggest benefit you'll see in dray in 2016 versus 2015 is the closure of the LA terminal.

Thomas Wadewitz - UBS Securities LLC

Analyst · UBS. Please go ahead

Right. Okay. Thank you for the time. Appreciate it. David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Thank you.

Operator

Operator

And our next question comes from Alex Vecchio from Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead. Alexander Vecchio - Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC: Good afternoon, and thanks for taking the questions. In terms of the competitive pricing environment, to the extent you could kind of force rank where you're seeing the greatest pressure from and maybe kind of characterizing it in three buckets. One, the major intermodal player out there, two, other smaller IMCs, or three, the truckload market and the situation there with capacity and pricing, how would you kind of rank the pressures to Intermodal pricing between those three? David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: I think that if we looked at this, it's got to be kind of by region. If you look at local East, I would suggest to you that our largest competitor and the truckloads carriers are probably equally weighted at this point with the smaller weighting on the smaller IMCs. If you get to the longer lengths of haul, it's certainly your first question with our large competitor and not just them, though, but there is some other asset-based players which are being more aggressive in the market. So, I would say that our largest competitor would probably be one in the longer lengths of haul, but a not too distant second would be the smaller asset-based players and as well as we're seeing some of the smaller IMCs. But, we never really focus on them as much just simply because, from a competitive perspective, they're usually not quite in the same game as us just due to some of the efficiencies we have with the equipment and with the in-house drayage. Alexander Vecchio - Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC: Okay. That's helpful. And in terms of the large competitor, would…

Operator

Operator

And our next question comes from Van Kegel from Barclays. Please go ahead.

Eric Morgan - Barclays Capital, Inc.

Analyst · Barclays. Please go ahead

Hi. This is Eric Morgan on from Barclays. I just wanted to come back to rail pricing real quick. Can you just talk about what willingness or flexibility you have with the contracts to adjust for cost increases, especially in what's clearly a weaker freight environment with rail volumes trending down 7% in Intermodal right now? David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: I would say that for the most part, our rail prices, while there may be some room for negotiation, it's very limited, and so for the most part, they're set. And so I think that the estimates that we have in our outlook for the year are going to be pretty accurate. So I don't see a whole lot of flexibility with that. Again, the railroads, I think that you'll find in all cases they have a certain amount of capital that they require in order to maintain their track, maintain their service, and so their fixed costs are something that we will have to contend with for many years to come whether it's a good market such as last year or a poor pricing environment such as we have this year.

Eric Morgan - Barclays Capital, Inc.

Analyst · Barclays. Please go ahead

Okay. And then maybe just one quick one on the cash priority discussion. Given where you are with the share repurchase program, just can you comment on potentially ramping that up even further? Or is that kind of off the table with the M&A you're looking at? Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: We're going to execute on the $40 million that remains on our share repurchase authorization and we hope to do that in Q2 and Q3. And we had $200 million in cash at the end of March and so we have ample ability to do both share repurchases and an acquisition. And we'd look to next year before we'd do another share repurchase and see where we're are at in the acquisition market.

Eric Morgan - Barclays Capital, Inc.

Analyst · Barclays. Please go ahead

Got it. Okay. Thank you. David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: You're welcome.

Operator

Operator

And our next question comes from Matt Brooklier from Longbow Research. Please go ahead.

Matt S. Brooklier - Longbow Research LLC

Analyst · Longbow Research. Please go ahead

Hey. Thanks. Good afternoon. Wanted to get some commentary in terms of Intermodal volume growth, how it progressed through first quarter? If you have the month-by-months, that would be great. And then I think you did mention that things are getting a little bit softer. And the second quarter thus far, April, if you're able to talk to maybe magnitude of that softness relative to 1Q, just trying to get a feel for what 2Q looks like right now versus what you put up in first quarter? David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Yeah. Q1, it was a little bit choppy, January, and oddly enough, March were actually down. And I don't know the specific numbers. Terri, I don't know if we... Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: Yeah. David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: But February was very strong and, which again is not necessarily historically the way you would expect it to follow. April, it's less than 1% we're down, so it's a de minimis amount. And so it's not something that we're overly concerned with. We really believe that the 2% to 4% volume increase for the year is a very fair estimate.

Matt S. Brooklier - Longbow Research LLC

Analyst · Longbow Research. Please go ahead

Okay. So down less than 1% in April, and it sounds like you're down a little bit in March as well. So it sounds like things are falling off a cliff here? David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: No. It's not falling off by any stretch of the imagination.

Matt S. Brooklier - Longbow Research LLC

Analyst · Longbow Research. Please go ahead

Okay. And then my second question. Is there any way to quantify or at least provide some incremental color in terms of how much Intermodal to over the road truck conversions were potentially a headwind for your volume growth this quarter? Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: Dave, I think they've said Local East was down 7% for the quarter. David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Right. Terri A. Pizzuto - Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer & Executive VP: And you could say maybe half of that business went to truck. David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Yeah. I think that's probably a fair assessment, Terri.

Matt S. Brooklier - Longbow Research LLC

Analyst · Longbow Research. Please go ahead

Has that changed it all in April? Do you have a sense for that? David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: We still see the trucking market very, very aggressive on their pricing in the Local East and that's something we don't think is going to change until we see demand increase pretty dramatically. So at this point in time, no. We're seeing the truckers very aggressive on pricing. So we would expect for that to continue in Local East business. Donald G. Maltby - President & Chief Operating Officer: Yeah. Anywhere from 350- to 700-mile range is the trucks have been very aggressive.

Matt S. Brooklier - Longbow Research LLC

Analyst · Longbow Research. Please go ahead

Okay. That's helpful. Appreciate the time.

Operator

Operator

And the next question comes from Matt Young from Morningstar. Please go ahead.

Matthew Young - Morningstar, Inc.

Analyst · Morningstar. Please go ahead

Good afternoon, and thanks for taking my question. If I could, I just wanted to go back real quick to the acquisition topic. You guys did mention transportation management is a focus. I just wanted to clarify if by saying that you were implying Highway Brokerage, I know that that can mean several different niches, so I just wanted to clarify that. David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Yeah. With transportation, we would list out separately truck brokerage. Truck brokerage is kind of an – it's an interesting potential acquisition target, but it depends upon what it's going to do for us. Is it going to bring us technology we may not possess or processes? The cultures of so many of these startups are very foreign to Hub's culture, and so not all of them would be something that we could assimilate. You'd almost have to kind of let it go by itself. But transportation management, we really view transportation management as bringing technology to clients that allows them to better manage their supply chain. We have a strong offering with Unyson, but there may be other transportation management companies that possibly specialize in a vertical, a chemical vertical, a steel vertical, other areas such as that that that could be of great interest for us.

Matthew Young - Morningstar, Inc.

Analyst · Morningstar. Please go ahead

Okay. That makes sense. David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: So that's kind of how we define transportation management.

Matthew Young - Morningstar, Inc.

Analyst · Morningstar. Please go ahead

Okay. Thanks for the clarity on that. And then I guess one more question along those lines. Would you be looking for -- if you did look at truck brokerage, would you look at a Mode like model or would it be more of the company store, company employee model? David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: We have the best agent network right now out there in our minds, anyway, and so I think that it would be more company store focused. The pay could be different than us, but that is much more variable compensation as many of the models are. But, no, it would be a company store. Again, we really think that we've got the best agent model and we wouldn't be interested in expanding through acquisition in that area.

Matthew Young - Morningstar, Inc.

Analyst · Morningstar. Please go ahead

Fair enough. I appreciate it. Thanks.

Operator

Operator

We have no further questions at this time. I'll now turn the call back over to Dave Yeager for closing comments. David P. Yeager - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Great. Well again thank you, everyone, for joining us on our first quarter earnings call. As always, Terri, Don, and I are available if, in fact, you have further questions. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. This concludes today's conference. Thank you for participating and you may now disconnect.