Alan J. Haughie
Analyst · Matthew Bouley from Barclays
Thanks, Jason. Slide 7 of the presentation shows the fourth quarter year-over-year waterfall for Siding. Revenue increased by 6% with prices, including mix effects, up 8% on a 2% volume decline. And while these price increases added $24 million to sales and EBITDA year-over-year, some of that benefit came from volume rebate thresholds not being met. But within this modest volume decline, ExpertFinish jumped 35%, while Primed volumes fell by 5%. And this creates a slight adverse mix effect within EBITDA because ExpertFinish still has a lower margin than Primed products. Having said that, ExpertFinish margins have improved by about 8 points year-over-year, thanks to leverage on increased volume and manufacturing efficiencies. The only other items to note for Siding in the fourth quarter chart are the absence of tariffs on the ExpertFinish we're importing into Canada and the nonrecurrence of last year's effects from production and cost timing due to the delayed maintenance project last fall. As a result, the EBITDA margin for the quarter was 25%, up 5 points year-over-year. For the full year, on Slide 8, net sales were up 8%, evenly split between price and volume, as Jason said, adding $131 million to revenue and $91 million to EBITDA. Selling and marketing expenses increased by about $11 million, while raw material cost tailwinds mostly offset freight and labor cost headwinds. SG&A increases, tariffs and other factors totaled about $23 million. As a result, Siding finished 2025 with $444 million in EBITDA, which is $54 million higher than 2024 with a 1 percentage point rise in the EBITDA margin to 26%. The OSB charts on Pages 9 and 10 are dominated by price as they so often are, sadly, this time to the negative. In the fourth quarter, unfavorable supply-demand dynamics resulted in multiyear price lows and volume reductions across the OSB portfolio. Now volume and price movements are harder to pass in OSB than they are in Siding, given its commodity nature, and they combined for a year-over-year decrease of $129 million in revenue and $95 million in EBITDA. Given these headwinds, the OSB operations team made the best of a very difficult market and found every opportunity for savings and efficiency. Their efforts and diligence allowed the segment to achieve $7 million of EBITDA for the year as detailed on Slide 10. So to summarize the financial results for the full year, we had $2.7 billion in net sales, $436 million of EBITDA and adjusted earnings per share of $2.65. These were the net effect of Siding growth and margin expansion, offset by lower OSB prices. As you can see on Slide 11, we consistently executed our capital allocation strategy. Adjusted EBITDA of $436 million generated $382 million of operating cash flow after $42 million in cash taxes and a small increase in working capital. We invested $291 million in sustaining maintenance and growth capital, and this was about $25 million less than we anticipated spending on the last call, made possible by the deferral of some of the nonessential projects in OSB as well as the decision to slow down capacity investments in Siding. We returned $139 million to investors through $78 million in quarterly dividends and $61 million in share repurchases. And at year-end, LP's cash balance was $292 million. And with an undrawn revolver of $750 million, LP has over $1 billion in liquidity. And just for the sake of housekeeping, we have $177 million of Board authorization remaining to repurchase shares, which finally brings us to guidance. LP's OSB guidance is algorithmic and relatively straightforward. So let me dispense with that first. Random Lengths prices have climbed recently to levels that are near enough to OSB breakeven that should we extrapolate current prices for the full year, OSB results will be very similar to 2025. I should also note, just for sensitivity modeling purposes, that we currently anticipate LP's utilization rate for the OSB to be a few points below our longer-term average rate of 85%. For the first quarter of 2026, LP's realization has lagged the rising market price, which is typical. So assuming prices hold at current levels, OSB EBITDA in the first quarter should be a loss of between $25 million and $30 million. Unlike OSB, our Siding guidance is not algorithmic. Rather, it is informed in the near term by our order file and in the longer term by macroeconomic data and customer sentiment. As Jason said in his remarks, an acute lack of that data, particularly housing starts, added uncertainty to our planning for volume allocations following the announcement of our 2026 price increase last October. So despite our best intentions, we overshot, resulting in some pull forward of demand from the first quarter of this year into the fourth quarter of last year, especially with our shed customers. Now to be fair, it's difficult to precisely separate this impact from that of a severe winter storm that hit the Southeast in late January. But suffice to say, as a result, our order file is weaker today and inventories are higher. So far in the first quarter, our order files contained significantly weaker shed activity than we experienced this time last year, with demand in the new residential construction and repair and remodel sectors roughly in line with the year-over-year decline in single-family housing starts, but exacerbated by our current inventory position. Accordingly, we currently anticipate total volumes in the first quarter will be down 15% to 20%, with shed volumes down 25% to 30% and new res construction and R&R volumes down about 10% to 15%, consistent with single-family starts. However, we expect average selling prices in the first quarter to be up 6 to 8 points as a result of list price increases and the positive mix effect of ongoing ExpertFinish. This would result in a first quarter year-over-year decline in net sales of 11% to 13% with the EBITDA margin coming in at between 23% and 25%. Now given the exit rate from Q4 of last year, flat housing consensus for 2026 implies meaningful improvement after a difficult first quarter. So presuming the consensus is correct and that starts do indeed end the year flat to 2025, we would expect to see demand improve sequentially, especially as shed demand returns to prior year cadence as inventories normalize. As such, by the year-end, we would expect Siding volumes to be down low single digits, selling prices to be up mid-single digits and a result, net sales to be up low single digits for an EBITDA margin of around 25% to 26%. With regard to capital expenditures, consistent with the same general market assumptions I just mentioned, we currently anticipate investing about $400 million, split equally between sustaining maintenance and strategic growth. The spending will probably be back-end loaded with about 60% of the investments occurring in the second half. Now should the market demand environment diverge meaningfully for better or worse, we have significant flexibility in our plans such that we could accelerate investments somewhat or reduce them substantially. And as I said a moment ago, LP certainly has the balance sheet to weather further market weakening or support accelerated investment as needed. We're facing a very uncertain market backdrop at the moment. However, rather than dwelling on what we do not know, LP's teams will focus on what we do know. LP SmartSide has consistently gained share with innovative products that expand the addressable market. That growth, coupled with the pricing power that comes with a premium specialty product brings leverage and margin expansion. And while not linear, that growth has, over time, outperformed the underlying markets we serve. We are confident that these fundamentals remain intact and that we have a long runway ahead of us and the right strategy to guide us. And with that, we'll be happy to take a round of questions, after which we look forward to seeing you at LP's booth at the International Builders' Show.