Thomas Burke
Analyst · Gabelli. Your line is now open
Thank you, Kathy, and good morning, everyone. Our top line momentum continued this quarter, as our global team drove record second quarter sales and overall double-digit top line growth on a constant currency basis. In particular, our CIS segment made a solid contribution with significant increases in both sales and earnings. However, we were not able to convert on sales as planned in our VTS segment in part due to continued cost pressures driven by the direct and indirect impact of tariffs as well as isolated operational inefficiencies we are continuing to work through. Overall, sales increased 8% or 10% on a constant-currency basis. Each of our segments reported sales growth and all of our major end markets showed positive top line growth. Our first quarter adjusted operating income was $26.5 million, down slightly from the prior year. Mick and I will provide more details on the drivers, but growth in the CIS segment was offset by lack of earnings conversion in the VTS segment, which came in well below our expectations. Although our second quarter earnings were somewhat below our expectations, we are still planning to have a record year with solid sales and earnings growth. Before moving on to the segment results, I also wanted to mention that our Board of Directors recently approved a 2-year, $50 million share repurchase program. The last time we had an authorization in place was in 2015 prior to the Luvata acquisition. This authorization demonstrates our Board's confidence in the future of our business and in our ability to continue to execute on our strategic initiatives. Now I would like to briefly review the segment results for the second quarter. Turning to Page 5, sales for the VTS segment increased 8% or 10% on a constant-currency basis to $335 million. This increase was driven primarily by a 24% increase in sales to off-highway customers primarily in North America and in Asia. We also benefited from a 6% increase in sales to automotive customers despite declining sales in Europe. Commercial vehicle sales were up 2% with increases in the Americas more than offsetting a decline in Europe. We continue to have a significant sales growth in Asia, where sales were up 26% from the prior year, driven by multiple program launches. In addition, sales in the Americas were up 15%, driven by improvements across all end markets and again, multiple new programs. Europe, sales were down 4%, driven primarily by lower sales of power-train cooling products to automotive customers in line with the market. Adjusted operating income for the VTS segment was $16 million, $4 million lower than the prior year. And adjusted operating margin was down 160 basis points to 4.8 -- down to 4.8%. As I mentioned, we were not able to convert on the higher sales volume in this segment due to a number of factors, some of which were within our control and others that were outside of our control. Like many industrials this quarter, we are still experiencing the year-over-year impact of higher material costs. Although we continue to benefit from the pricing provisions in our contractual material pass-through agreements, this only covers the LME component of the cost. Much of the impact of our cost has been driven by other factors, including fabrication and freight. This resulted in a net impact in the quarter being negative. A big driver of these increased costs were the direct and indirect impact of tariffs that are being imposed on our raw materials. These tariffs are not only increasing the cost of the components that we import, but are also disrupting our domestic supply base. Domestic aluminum and steel suppliers are continuing to leverage their positions related to import tariffs and have raised prices as expected. As we renew our supply contracts, we're receiving significant increases in fabrication costs. In some cases, we're even being asked to find other sources. In addition to fabrication costs, the Midwest transaction premium has doubled from the prior year and is adding to our increased cost. As you may recall, this premium covers freight and warehousing cost that historically have been relatively stable. In addition, we're continuing to file for exclusion requests on imported components that are now subject to tariffs. The requests that have been submitted so far are pending without comment. Although there have not been any objections raised, we do not know when or if we will receive an exemption. For those imported components where we do not believe we'll receive an exemption, we are working diligently with our customers to pass along the cost, but this is a complicated and time-consuming process. We are invoicing these costs, but in most cases, the customers are requesting more information and have not paid. We are working through this process and are together evaluating whether there are alternative sources for these materials. Second, we are still experiencing operating inefficiencies at a few of our VTS plants as a result of the many new program launches. We are disappointed that the inefficiencies have dragged on longer than we expected, and are working to address these issues that are within our control. We have deployed some of our most experienced operational leaders to these sites, and I am pleased by the improvements we have seen over the recent weeks, and I am confident that we will achieve our expected improvements in the second half of the fiscal year. Please turn to Page 7. Sales for our CIS segment increased 9%, or 10% on a constant-currency basis, to $178 million, primarily due to a 65% increase in sales to data center customers in North America and Europe, partially offset by a 30% decrease in sales to the industrial markets. As I mentioned last quarter, the decline in industrial market sales relates to the lower sales of transformer oil coolers in China, based on the government's recent pullback in the development of high-voltage, direct-current power grid systems. This was expected and was also the cost that dropped in Asia. Sales in the Americas were up 24% and sales in Europe were up 1%. In Europe, higher data center sales were partially offset by the lower industrial sales. Excluding the impact of the data center sales, growth in the Americas is low-single-digits driven by higher commercial HVAC and refrigeration sales. From a product standpoint, sales increased for coils and coolers, while sales of coatings were flat. Coolers increased by 19%, driven by the sales to data center customers, in line with the ongoing expansion of data center capacity. This segment reported operating income of $12.9 million, a $3.9 million or 43% improvement over the prior year. The operating income margin was up 170 basis points from the prior year to 7.2%. This improvement was due to the higher sales volume, favorable sales mix and lower SG&A as a percent of sales. Overall, I am very pleased with the performance of the CIS segment. When we completed this acquisition nearly 2 years ago, we knew it was the right move for Modine. Now we're seeing the benefits to our diversification strategy as we continue to serve the growing global opportunities such as data center market where countries are increasingly demanding additional capacity. Turning to Page 9. Sales for our Building HVAC segment increased 4% on a constant-currency basis to $50.7 million. From an end-market perspective, sales to the commercial HVAC customers increased 4% and sales to data center customers increased 3%. From a product standpoint, the increase in sales was primarily driven by a 4% increase in heating products in North America and an 18% increase in aftermarket and service sales primarily in the U.K. Sales in North America were up 3%, driven by higher sales of heating products, partially offset by lower ventilation product sales. Sales in Europe increased 6%, driven by higher data center and aftermarket and service sales. Adjusted operating income increased 3% from the prior year to $6.5 million. This increase was driven by higher sales volume along with a light increase in SG&A expense. Adjusted operating income margin was down slightly to 12.8%, compared to 13% last year. We also continue to see strong order activity in our Building HVAC segment in both North America and in the U.K. We continue to grow our leading market share for gas unit heaters in North America and have seen -- in particular have seen strong sales in Canada. In the U.K., we have recently had several large data center orders for both our chiller and precision air conditioning lines. We also continue to focus on the Greenhouse segment where our high-efficiency products are some of the first in the industry to connect to the building management systems in line for greater energy efficiency. With that, I'd like to turn it over to Mick for an overview of our consolidated financial results as well as to provide an update on our outlook for the remainder of fiscal 2019.