WKRCF (WKRCF) Q2 2026 Earnings Report, Transcript and Summary

Good afternoon, everybody, and welcome to the H1 2026 earnings call of the Wacker Neuson Group. My name is Peer Schlinkmann, Head of Investor Relations and Corporate Communications. Thank you for joining today on the occasion of the release of our half year 2026 results. As usual, we will first start with the operational and financial results of the first half year 2026 and give additional insights on the recent developments as well as our outlook for 2026. Following this, we are happy to answer your questions in a Q&A session. If you are not able to follow today's call via the webcast, the presentation slides are also available for download at wackerneusongroup.com/investor-relations. Please note that the entire call, including the Q&A session, will be recorded and a replay will be made available on our corporate website by the end of the day. And now I would like to hand over to our executives, Karl Tragl and Christoph Burkhard, who will, as usual, lead you through this call.

Thank you, Peer. This is Christoph Burkhard, CFO of the Wacker Neuson Group. Welcome, everybody, to our earnings call, and thank you for joining.

Dear all, a warm welcome from my side, too, and thanks again for joining today's conference call. I'm Karl Tragl, CEO of Wacker Neuson Group. I would like to start the presentation today with a brief overview of our key financials for the first half of 2026. The first 6 months of this year clearly show that the Wacker Neuson Group has made significant operational progress compared to the previous year. After a strong first quarter, we were able to continue this positive trend in the second quarter. Group revenue reached EUR 591 million in quarter 1 and increased further to EUR 665 million in the second quarter. This resulted in a revenue of EUR 1.26 billion for the first half of 2026, which is up 17% compared to previous year. Even more importantly, we translated this revenue growth into a strong improvement in profitability. Our EBIT in the first half year nearly doubled and reached approximately EUR 105 million. The EBIT margin improved to 8.3%. Looking at quarter 2, 2026 stand-alone, we achieved an even higher EBIT margin of 9.5%. Key drivers were profitable revenue growth and improved coverage as well as discipline in our cost management. While revenue increased significantly, operating costs remained essentially at the same level of the previous year. This allowed us to realize scale effects and substantially increased profitability. Order intake in the first half of the year 2026 was above revenue, resulting in a book-to-bill ratio of 1.1 as per June year-to-date. However, order momentum weakened noticeably during the second quarter, particularly in Europe. Therefore, we remain realistic and are looking forward cautiously optimistic at the second half of the year. As we do not expect the remainder of this year to be as strong as the first 6 months, we raised our guidance only moderately. Now let's have a look at our regions. The significant volume improvement in our business were driven by both Europe and the Americas. Europe remained our largest region. Revenue increased significantly compared to the previous year, supported by recovery in our core markets, higher volume and better utilization of our production capacities. Demand in France and the United Kingdom increased in the mid-2-digit percentage range compared to previous year, followed by the positive development in the DACH region. Also, Southern Europe grew compared to previous year, driven by Spain, Italy and Portugal. In the Americas region, which is one of the growth levers of our Strategy 2030, we also saw clear improvement compared to previous year. Revenue increased strongly and the U.S. market developed positively. Demand in Canada as well as large parts of Latin America also increased compared to the previous year. In the region as a whole, our focus lies on the future ramp-up of our John Deere cooperation and the continued expansion of our local footprint. Asia Pacific was an exception, looking at the revenue development. Here, revenue declined slightly compared to previous year due to weak demand. How did the regional development translate into our business segments? The strongest growth momentum came from compact, accounting for 59% of group revenue. In the first half of this year, revenue in this business segment increased by 26% to EUR 743 million. Compact equipment was, therefore, again the most important growth driver to the group. This is due to strong order intake at the end of 2025 and in the first quarter of 2026. In construction, demand was particularly strong for excavators and dumpers. We also saw higher sales of telehandlers and wheel loaders, in Europe. By contrast, demand for skid steers in North America remained below previous year. Light equipment accounting for 20% of group revenue also developed positively in the first half year. Revenue increased by 9% to EUR 260 million. This growth was mainly driven by North America, with higher demand for compaction, concrete and especially worksite technology. Particularly the strong demand for light towers and generators stood out to the booming construction activity of AI data centers. After a slow start into the year, our Services segment accounting for 21% of group revenues, clearly recovered in the second quarter. For the first half year, services revenue increased by 3% to EUR 263 million. This was supported by stronger demand for spare parts, rental machines as well as maintenance and repair services. To summarize, all of our business segments grew in the first 6 months of this fiscal year with compact equipment as the most dynamic one. Now I'll hand over to you, Christoph, for more insights into our financials.

Thank you, Karl. Let me continue with some insights concerning our working capital development. As you already saw, our net working capital ratio stood at 28.7% at the end of June, which is 4.1 percentage points below previous year's level. And contrary to developments in the past during periods of increasing revenue, we could achieve this reduction despite the revenue growth during the first half year. Hence, we were able to support higher business activity without seeing working capital growing disproportionately. After a brief increase of our inventories to EUR 647 million in Q1, we reduced them again by EUR 44 million by the end of Q2. My take on this development is that our efforts over the previous 2 years around the implementation and improvement of the end-to-end S&OP process, I believe I've mentioned this previously, are paying off. It is all about a sound system-based planning and alignment process from sales forecasting to production planning. So having the right products at the right time at the right place, obviously leads to optimized inventory. Of course, not everything is perfect yet, but we are looking at constant and measurable improvements. And this is what counts when driving structural working capital improvements. At the same time, trade receivables as well as trade payables have increased in parallel, reflecting higher purchasing activities in our plants as well as higher demand during the first half of the year. Now let's have a look at our cash flow performance. The free cash flow development during the second quarter was strong. In Q2 alone, we generated EUR 78 million. This was driven by the strong operating performance, but also supported by the continued discipline in working capital management, which I've just highlighted. So for the first half year, free cash flow increased to EUR 76 million compared to EUR 68 million in H1 2025. And behind those numbers, there is another positive message. We are on the road for a more stable cash flow performance than previously. And I do expect again after financial year 2025, a triple-digit free cash flow number by the end of this year. As a consequence, we can report another positive number. Our net financial debt at the end of June stood at EUR 173 million. This means we decreased our net debt by 42% compared with last year, leading to an actual leverage of 0.5, the lowest level since Q1 2022. And to summarize, all financial KPIs do support the ongoing implementation and execution of our plans and measures around our Strategy 2030. And with this, back to you, Karl.

Thank you, Christoph. I would like to conclude with the outlook for 2026. First half of 2026 confirmed the operational improvement of the Wacker Neuson Group. Based on positive development of group revenue and EBIT, we raised our guidance for the fiscal year 2026 on the 17th of July. We now expect group revenue in a range between EUR 2.3 billion and EUR 2.4 billion compared with the previous range of EUR 2.2 billion to EUR 2.4 billion. And we also raised our EBIT margin guidance by 50 basis points to a range of 7.0% to 8.0% compared with the previous range of 6.5% to 7.5%. This reflects the fact that we remain cautiously optimistic for the second half of the year. Order momentum weakened during second quarter and geopolitical as well as macroeconomic risks remain, in particular, in connection with the Middle East war and U.S. tariff policies. We see a higher capital investment volume in the second half of the year in our business. Therefore, we continue to expect a range of EUR 70 million to EUR 90 million for the full year. With regards to the net working capital ratio, we expect to stay below the strategic target of 30%. Let me summarize the key takeaways of today's presentation. We delivered a strong first half year 2026 and carried on the positive momentum from quarter 1 into quarter 2. We significantly improved profitability, showing our operating leverage in the business. Net working capital ratio and free cash flow developed strongly, underlining the quality of our operational S&OP steering. We raised our full year guidance for 2026 while remaining cautiously optimistic for the second half due to weaker order momentum and continued market uncertainty. Strategy 2030 remains our North Star, with a clear focus on profitable growth, cost efficiency, capital discipline and customer productivity. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for your continued trust and for joining our earnings call today. Before we now open the floor to our questions, I want to express my sincere gratitude to the employees of the Wacker Neuson Group. Their dedication and their hard work remains the true engine behind our value creation for our customers and our shareholders. So therefore, let me please repeat. Nobody is perfect, but a team can be. Thank you for listening. Operator, we are now ready to start the Q&A session, and we are very much looking forward to answering the questions.

The first question is from Stefan Augustin from Warburg Research.

I'll try again. I hope you can hear me right now.

Yes, we can hear you.

Okay. I have a couple of questions. So the first one would be actually to the ramp-up in the U.S. Is that, currently given, let's say, U.S. strength on the construction side, let's say, in budget or a bit ahead of budget? And how much more volume would you expect currently roughly in the second half versus the first half from that? The second question I have is actually on the outlook in the second half and the connected margin expansion. I understand the top line development from the book-to-bill. It seems that there is a bit more emphasis on the EBIT margin development in the second half. So can you explain a bit how much rising input costs, respectively, price pressure on certain elements are baked in there? And the last one is actually, there has been a small allowance in Asia. Can you elaborate on that? That would be my questions.

Christoph here, Stefan. Let me maybe start with -- from the end, so to say. I start with the allowance in Asia. That has been around one of our dealers who basically went into insolvency, and we had basically to write off a receivable here. And to be more specific here, it has been -- it is a dealer that basically reduced -- had to reduce his setup in Australia. And I think during 2024, 2025, simply took too much on his book and on his platter, so to say. So that is the correction there. And as you also might know, in Australia is generally depressed market right now. And so we have this casualty here.

Okay. Stefan. Karl speaking. I'll take the other 2. Questions. Concerning, if I understood it correctly, EBIT development or effects in the second half. In the second half, we always have the weak August where we have closure of plants. So we always have every year a low margin and low profitability, especially in August and then also half of December. So this is one effect on that one. And yes, the increase in transportation cost, a little bit increase in energy as well and pressure on supply chain, this might increase also the input cost on the material side in the second half. So those are those effects. And as far as your question is concerned on the ramp-up of John Deere in U.S. I just want to repeat that the first 2 models for John Deere are manufactured in Linz, Austria. They are already in production. They are delivering the revenue this year in this cooperation. And I would rather phrase it as the good news is that there is not a major revenue impact in U.S. on the John Deere 2026 because currently, we introduce the biggest machine there. And beginning of next quarter, the start of production is for the second machine. And those 2 are the volume drivers in the whole cooperation, and those 2 will start to give us revenue for next year. So everything as planned so far, but no major volumes for the ramp-up in U.S. here. We are currently benefiting in U.S. from the data center trends where we are delivering lots of light towers, generators and other stuff, what we call worksite utility worksite and this is giving us the growth part of the growth in [ North America ].

And just a quick follow-up on that one. How confident would you feel at this point in time that there would be higher logistics costs that you would be able to pass them on, on the price side?

Okay. I phrase the question in this way, because how confident can somebody be is a very tricky question, as you know. I rephrase the question the way, how do we behave on pricing in the second half of the year? So we have made progress in pricing in 2026 in North America, where we reacted on the tariffs. And therefore, for this year, we have increased pricing in the middle of 2026 especially in Europe and in spare parts to compensate possible future negative effects on the material side. How this is balancing out, that's something, many factors are influencing that. But that's the way how we are reacting.

Thank you very much. Currently, we don't have any further questions. We are good in time. Please feel free to ask your questions. So I'm checking again the queue for further questions. There seem to be none at this point. So I would like to then turn over to Mr. Tragl.

Ladies and gentlemen, as we can see, there are no further questions in the line. But before we close today's conference call, I would like to take the opportunity to say a few words to you, Christoph, because this is our last joint earnings call with you as our CFO of the Wacker Neuson Group. Christoph, over the past 5 years, you have made important contributions to the development of our company, to our financial discipline and especially to our transparent dialogue with the capital market. On behalf of the entire Executive Board, I would like to sincerely thank you for your commitment, your professionalism and your teamwork, and we will definitely keep in touch, Christoph. And with that, the final stage is yours, Christoph.

Thanks very much, Karl. I do appreciate a lot your very warm and kind words. And with this, ladies and gentlemen, this is indeed my last earnings call with and for Wacker Neuson. And looking back, I'm very grateful for more than 5 very dynamic and rewarding years with the company. And the Wacker Neuson Group is a great company. And this I really mean from the bottom of my heart here. And the group is displaying excellent products, strong financials and a clear strategy. But most importantly, Wacker Neuson consists of a brilliant team of really committed people. And this spirit, combining pride and technical expertise with modesty and dedication is what makes Wacker Neuson a successful company despite heavy competition we are all confronted with. I believe the company is very well positioned for the future, and I'm personally happy that all financial KPIs are pointing in the right direction. I would like to thank all my colleagues in the group for the excellent collaboration, and I would particularly thank you today for the always trustful, open and constructive dialogue over the past years. Personally, it has always been a pleasure and intellectually, it has always been inspiring and stimulating. Thank you again and all the best.

Yes. Thank you, Christoph and Karl. It is me Peer speaking again. This brings us to the end of the conference call. As usual, if you have any further questions, please do not hesitate to contact me or the entire Investor Relations team via phone or e-mail. If you would like to meet in person, please let us know or check our website and financial calendar for all relevant roadshow days in the coming months. Thank you again for joining our call. Thank you, Christoph. It was a great pleasure working with you over the last 2.5 years. We wish all of you a pleasant rest of the summer. Thank you for joining today and listening to our call. Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

Thank you. Bye-bye.