Hello and thank you for standing by. My name is Regina and I will your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the Hyster-Yale Second Quarter Earnings Conference Call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speakers' remarks, there will be a question-and-answer session. [Operator Instructions] I would now like to turn the conference over Christina Kmetko, Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thank you. Good morning everyone and thanks for joining us today. Welcome to our 2023 second quarter earnings call. I'm Christina Kmetko, and I'm responsible for Investor Relations at Hyster-Yale. Joining me on today's call are Al Rankin, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer; Rajiv Prasad, President; and Scott Minder, our Senior Vice President, Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer. Yesterday evening, we published our second quarter 2023 results and filed our 10-Q, both of which are available on our website. Today's call is being recorded and webcast. The webcast will be on our website later this afternoon and available for approximately 12 months. Our remarks that follow, including answers to your questions, contain forward-looking statements. These statements are subject to several risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed in the forward-looking statements made here today. These risks include, among others, matters that we've described in our earnings release and in our 10-Q and other filings with the SEC. We may not be update these forward-looking statements until our next quarterly earnings conference call. With the formalities out of the way, I'll turn the call over to Rajiv.

Thanks Christi and good morning, everyone. I'll start today by providing the operational perspective and some high level observations on our robust second quarter results and why they exceeded our expectations. I'll conclude with some color commentary on our markets. Scott will follow with our detailed financial results and outlook, and then Al will conclude our prepared remarks with his strategic perspective and open the call for any question. Second quarter consolidated revenue increased by 22%, or $195 million year-over-year, while operating profit advanced by almost $75 million from a prior year loss. This large profit improvement was driven by product margin increases above our initial estimates. A better-than-expected product margins had several drivers. First, we experienced a favorable mix shift towards higher margin sales channels. Second, material costs were lower than anticipated. And finally, as supply chain conditions in the Americas continue to improve, we eliminated the first week of the planned two-week plant shutdowns at the end of June. The North American plant used this extra time to reduce inventory and backlog units and ultimately shortened lead times. This extra production week helped Americas increase shipments by 14% over the first quarter. These positive factors were more than offset the negative impacts from the challenges in sourcing certain critical components. Third-party component shortages and related production impacts continued to be a headwind, but have moderated compared to the prior years. Globally, our second quarter unit shipments increased nearly 10% year-over-year and sequentially. This was principally due to Americas supply chain improvements, partially offset by production shortfalls in our EMEA factories. While the environment has improved, many of our factories still experience production complications due to ongoing skilled labor shortages and shortages of critical components. These challenges resulted in several production lines falling below their planned second quarter rate…

Thanks Rajiv. As noted, the overall business generated strong second quarter financial results well ahead of our expectations. These results added to our improving performance trend since returning to profitability in the fourth quarter of 2022. Starting with revenue, we reported $1.1 billion in second quarter sales. This marked an increase of 22% or $195 million over the prior year. This growth was driven by a 23% increase in lift truck sales, significantly outpacing the 10% shipment growth rate over the same period. We remain focused on selling a rich mix of trucks with pricing that reflects the value our products deliver to our customers. We're working toward increased production and shipping rates as supply chain constraints lessen. In the second quarter, we shipped 27,700 units, increasing 10% versus both the first quarter 2023 and the prior year. As Rajiv noted, improved component availability allowed our North American factories to work through a portion of their planned summer shutdowns, increasing production and shipments versus expectations for the quarter. Second quarter bookings remained at a healthy level of 21,300 units but decreased by roughly 9% year-over-year and 5% sequentially due to slowing market trends. As a result of our elevated production and lower bookings, our backlog declined to 92,800 units at the end of the second quarter. This favorable decrease helps to improve lead times on key products, some of which remain longer than 12 months. Moving to earnings, the company reported second quarter operating profit of roughly $60 million. This compares to an operating loss of nearly $60 million. This compares to an operating loss of nearly $16 million in the prior year. Since the company's return to profitability in late 2022, we've maintained cost discipline as we've steadily grown revenues. As a result, the second quarter's operating profit improvement…

Before I talk specifically about the business, I'd like to note the different executive titles Christi mentioned in her opening remarks. As part of our long-term succession planning, in May, Rajiv was appointed President and Chief Executive Officer of Hyster-Yale Materials Handling, our public company. In addition to this new role, he also continues to serve as President and CEO of one of our operating companies, Hyster-Yale Group. As part of this succession planning process, I have now moved to the role of Executive Chairman. Rajiv, in his new role, will lead the company's operating and strategy activities. And I will support him with a particular focus in strategic matters, joint oversight of key staff positions and board leadership. I'd like to congratulate Rajiv on this new role. Moving now to Hyster-Yale's earnings, you just heard from Rajiv and Scott that the first half of the year has gone very well and that we continue to make significant progress both operationally and financially, including working down our elevated inventory balances. Our second quarter earnings reflect the improvement profit quality of our robust backlog, and we continue to have reasonable bookings despite softening market conditions. Looking forward, we expect our second half 2023 operating profit and net income to be significantly higher than the second half of last year. However, seasonal plant shutdowns, ongoing production challenges in EMEA, and an anticipated shift in sales and channel mix are all expected to have an impact on the lower third quarter results Scott mentioned. That said, Rajiv did note that we've essentially completed the build out of the lower priced, lower margin backlog units held over from prior periods. As a result, we expect continued year-over-year margin expansion in the second half of 2023, particularly in the Americas and EMEA. This, in combination…

Okay. Looks like we do not have any questions, we'll close with a few final reminders. A replay of our call will be available online later this morning. We'll also post a transcript on the Investor Relations website when it becomes available. If you have any questions, please reach out to me. You can reach me at the phone number on the press release. I hope you enjoy the rest of your day, and I'll now turn the call back to Regina to conclude.

This call will be available for replay beginning today in approximately two hours after the completion and will run through 11:59 p.m. Eastern Time on August 9, 2023. The number to dial to access the replay is 800-770-2030, or 647-362-9199. The conference ID number to access the replay is 82174. That will conclude today's conference call. Thank you all for joining. You may now disconnect.