Ray Silcock
Analyst · Cantor Fitzgerald. Please go ahead
Thank you, Murray, and good morning, everyone. I would now like to walk through the details of the Q2 P&L and balance sheet attached to this morning’s press release. I should note that there are also some explanatory financial charts on our website for additional clarity. Moving now to our second quarter results. Consolidated reported net sales were $1.15 billion in Q2, 3% lower than for the same quarter last year. Consolidated adjusted net sales were 1% higher in Q2 than in the same quarter last year after excluding adverse foreign currency movements, the Animal Health business held for sale in Q2 and then divested at the beginning of Q3, and the infant foods business that we exited at the end of last year. Consolidated reported net income for the quarter was $9 million, and reported EPS was $0.07 a share. Adjusted net income for the quarter was $117 million, and adjusted EPS was $0.86 a share. Total adjustments in the quarter amounted to $108 million. We had $74 million of amortization expense, primarily related to previously acquired intangible assets and a $28 million impairment charge of a certain definite-lived asset in our RX business. We also incurred $12 million in restructuring charges, primarily due to the reorganization of our sales force in France as well as an $8 million adjustment for a combination of accounting and operational expenses, primarily related to the planned separation of the RX business, plus $3 million of other smaller adjustments, all partially offset by a $17 million non-GAAP tax adjustment. These adjustments can be found delineated in more detail in the non-GAAP reconciliation table attached to this morning’s press release. Our reported effective tax rate was unusually high for this quarter at 67%, driven by the RX impairment charge of $28 million in the quarter that was not tax deductible. Adding this impairment charge back to our adjusted pretax income increased the denominator of the adjusted tax rate formula with no change to tax expense. This was the primary reason for the reduction on our adjusted effective tax rate to 23.1%. In Q2, Worldwide Consumer reported net sales of $910 million, 5% lower than for the same quarter last year. Worldwide Consumer adjusted net sales were flat as compared to the same quarter last year, excluding the impacts of adverse foreign currency movements, the held-for-sale Animal Health business and the infant foods business that we exited at the end of last year. Total new product sales of $38 million and strong volume in our core U.S. OTC business were more than offset by lower sales volumes in our International segment. CSCA reported net sales of $582 million in Q2, down 2.5% from the prior year. Adjusted net sales for Q2 were $559 million, 1% higher than for the same period last year when the held-for-sale Animal Health business and the infant foods business that we exited are excluded. Net sales from our market-leading U.S. OTC business increased by more than 4% compared to the same quarter prior year. But these increases were partially offset by lower sales of infant formula. International reported net sales of $328 million in the quarter, 8.5% lower than for the same quarter last year. Excluding adverse currency movements, sales were down 1.8% from Q2 last year. Strong new product sales of $30 million were more than offset by the impact of discontinued products, lower sales in certain categories and in France. Lower sales in France were primarily due to a lack of sales coverage there as a realignment of the sales force, part of a number of business optimization initiatives underway in CSCI, as we seek to increase productivity and achieve better profitability, resulted in temporary business disruption. In realigning the sales force, we offered early retirement packages to help us convince three sales forces into one to improve efficiency and effectiveness. More French sales employees took early retirement than have been anticipated resulting in a reduction of sales effectiveness in the quarter. We expect this disruption to be remedied by year-end as we hire, train and deploy new sales people. When the year-over-year decrease in net sales in France is excluded, in addition to the effect of currency movements, CSCI net sales would have grown 1% in the quarter. Moving on to gross profits. In Q2, Worldwide Consumer had adjusted gross profit of $366 million, down $42 million from the same quarter last year. Excluding businesses held for sale and adjusting for the impact of currency, second quarter adjusted gross profit was down 3% from Q2 last year. In the Americas segment, adjusted gross profit was a $190 million, down 10.7% compared to the same quarter last year. This decline was principally due to lower infant formula contract manufacturing as well as operational inefficiencies resulting from higher scrap and some raw materials price inflation. These were partially offset by improved business performance within the U.S. OTC business and by new products introductions. Sequentially, compared to our first quarter, Americas adjusted gross profit margin increased 150 basis points to 34%, primarily due to favorable product mix and higher volumes in our OTC category. In the International segment, adjusted gross profit was $179 million, down 10.1% compared to the same quarter last year. On a constant currency basis, adjusted gross profit was down 3.7% compared to prior year, primarily as a result of adverse product mix and the impact from that sales force realignment in France, partially offset by successful new products as we continue to reap the benefits of a healthy new product pipeline. Continuing on down to P&L, Worldwide Consumer adjusted operating expenses were flat to last year, excluding the impact of currency and held-for-sale business, adjusted operating expenses were up 8% as a result of: one, 13.5% increase in R&D investments compared to prior year; two, performance-based compensation plan accruals being returned to 100%; and three, the absence of a onetime insurance recovery that benefited the second quarter last year. Moving on to adjusted operating margin. Worldwide Consumer adjusted operating income in Q2 amounted to $118 million, down from $161 million last year and adjusted operating margin of 13.3% versus 16..8% in the prior year. CSCA’s adjusted operating of – operating margin of 20.3% was down 130 basis points from Q2 last year with lower SG&A expenses being partially offset by increased R&D spending when the $50 million upfront license fee for NASONEX, which was charged to R&D in Q2 last year is excluded. Sequentially, the Americas adjusted operating margin was up 200 basis points from prior quarter due to gross profit flow through and lower SG&A expenses. In the International segment, adjusted operating margin was stable at 15.3% versus 15.6% last year and 15.4% in this year’s first quarter. Turning now to the RX segment. Net sales for the quarter were $239 million, 3.4% higher as compared to prior year. New product sales of $27 million and improved customer service were partially offset by continued, although moderating, downward pricing pressure and by the impact of discontinued products. Adjusted gross profit of $100 million in the quarter was $16 million lower than in Q2 last year, primarily due to the continued downward pricing pressure and a less favorable product mix, including higher volumes this year of relatively lower margin authorized generic products. RX adjusted operating income of $66 million was down $13 million compared to last year as the gross margin shortfall was partially offset by lower administrative expenses as compared to the prior year. R&D expenses were at a similar to that of last year. In summary, Perrigo consolidated adjusted earnings per share in Q2 were $0.86, better than we had expected primarily due to improved business performance by both our Americas OTC business and the RX segment. And also as a result of timing differences versus our expectation in R&D and A&P expenditures that we now anticipate incurring in the second half of the year. A quick comment on the balance sheet. Our working capital levels were up in the second quarter as we built inventories in order to address some customer service issues and in anticipation of plant maintenance and other needs. As a result, cash flow from operations was significantly lower than normal in Q2 with cash flow as a percent – cash flow conversion, that is, as a percent of adjusted net income at 60% for the quarter. For the balance of the year, we anticipate the cash flow conversion, including from Ranir, will return to between 90% and 97% of adjusted net income. Following the Ranir acquisition, we are planning to refinance our existing term loan with a new $600 million facility, the proceeds of which we will use to repay our existing term loan and reduce the balance on our revolving credit facility. We expect that the refinancing will close by the end of this month, we’ll be leverage neutral, and we’ll lower interest expense by $2.5 million for the balance of 2019. Turning now to guidance for the balance of the current year. Our consolidated adjusted EPS guidance is unchanged for the year in the range of $3.75 to $4.05 a share with net sales in the range of $4.75 billion to $4.85 billion. Adjusted Worldwide Consumer net sales on a constant currency basis for 2019, excluding exited businesses are expected to grow by about 5% versus last year. We anticipate this sales growth being driven primarily by the acquisition of Ranir by better performance in our core U.S. OTC business and by – and from a strong pipeline of new product launches in International. The RX business continues to perform well in spite of the challenging generic marketplace, we continue to anticipate net sales growth this year as a result of a strong new product pipeline and moderation of the downward pricing pressure on this business. Please bear in mind this guidance does not include any impact in 2019 from generic ProAir. Potential upsides for the balance of 2019 are the launch of generic ProAir, which if achieved, could add as much as $0.10 per share per quarter and incremental cost savings from Project Momentum of up to $0.05 a share. With that, I’d like to turn the call back to Murray.