Ball Corporation (BALL) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Okay. We'll go ahead and get started. Good afternoon, everybody. My name is Ghansham Panjabi. I guess it's still morning. It feels like afternoon. I'm the Packaging and Coatings Equity research analyst at Baird. It's a real pleasure to introduce Ball Corporation. Once again to our conference from Ball we have Dan Fisher, who's been CEO since April of 2022. He's been with Ball since the year 2000. And also Howard Yu. This is the first time I think you're actually up here with us. Howard became CFO late last year. So congrats on that new role. Dan, maybe we can sort of start off with an overview of Ball Corporation. This is meant to be a fireside chat format, [email protected] or you can simply raise your hand for questions. So once again, welcome, and I'll turn it over to you.

Thanks. Yes. I mean, for those that don't know us, we're a 145-year-old company. More known for mason jars here in the U.S. So we don't make those anymore. My mom still is unaware of that. But we're an aluminum packaging company, largest in the world. We're in personal care, heavy in beverage. We jettisoned or sold our Aerospace business back in February. That was actually our oldest business within our portfolio. Owned that for 60 years. Got that at a great price at a great time in the marketplace. Paid down a bunch of debt. Our balance sheet is really healthy, and we've started to return a lot of value back to our shareholders during the year. We'll come on to that in a minute, but we've continued to raise our share repurchase guidance, and we'll do that again here. Today, we have been operating, obviously, in three major markets that we participate in Europe, South America and North America. North America has probably had the biggest shock as it relates to supply/demand, capacity, inflation and consumer pressures. In the U.S., I think, Ghansham and I were talking just before, it's like we've got certainty now with an outcome of the election, but there's levels of uncertainty now that we'll have to grapple with as it relates to tariffs and taxes and things of this nature. The good news for us, I think, just at a very high level before we jump in here, Ghansham, is we've gone through the tariff awards. We were the poster children in '16, '17, aluminum, in particular. So we don't have any supply coming in from China at this point. We've navigated a number of different possibilities, bringing in bringing an aluminum from Saudi Arabia, bringing in aluminum from Korea, Thailand, on and on and on. So -- and then we've got two new mills coming online here. in the U.S., they'll be up and running. One of them will be in the next 2 years. So from a supply standpoint, as it relates to tariff, we've kind of played this game, but the devil is in the details and what's going to be proposed. And I think the other thing is we become really comfortable with how to deal with getting exceptions. It's a pretty involved process, but we've got a very -- unfortunately, we have a very efficient process to go about doing that. So that's where we're at right now. I think the rate cuts that have happened here in the last 60 to 90 days have been hugely important for our customer base, which sits kind of at the lower end of the economy. And so them getting relief, the extension of the tax rate or the tax breaks for the foreseeable future and some more disciplined pricing in and around our customers managing to CPI price is all going to be much more predictable environment for us to operate moving forward. So we're encouraged about 2025 at this point. And hopefully, the certainty at least coming out of the election provides our customers more certainty on how they want to operate, which allows us to be more efficient in how we operate.

Certainty of more uncertainty.

Right.

Howard, since it's our first time together on stage. Just your observations at Ball Corporation, opportunities to improve the finance function and so on and so forth.

Yes. I mean I would say that it's been a very great onboarding. It's been a little bit over a year now. Dan has taken me to quite a bit of different facilities. I've been impressed with -- really the, I think, the ambition to win overall. Whether you're talking about manufacturing plants, whether you're talking about corporate offices. And there's a journey here. We talked about the Ball business system and where we want to take this thing. I mean, obviously, I have some experience with those types of things as well. And we have a manufacturing leader who -- in Ron Lewis, who is fantastic at wanting to drive those things as well. So we have a team that wants to win, and we're getting after it. You're starting to see some of those things into the results already. Work that had been done even before I had gotten here, but certainly, things that we're going to continue on that path as well.

Yes. Dan, if you kind of think about the last few years because we kind of have to put things in context. Lots of ups and downs, if you will, mostly downs, more recently in terms of volumes. What is North America -- how would you classify the fundamentals in North America at this point? Because that seems to be the focus on...

For certain, right? I think heading -- this time a year ago, we were really optimistic that we would see -- I would say -- I would take a step back and say, I don't know that I've ever seen a more misdiagnosed economy than the one that it's -- the fallacy that 80% of the people are doing well, which they clearly weren't by virtue of the vote a week ago. Those are our customers. The people that are buying 24 packs of beer, the people that are buying, buy one get one free, they're looking for that. They have 10% less discretionary spend in their pocket than they did in 2019. And that's in aggregate. But when you compare it to the food and beverage aisles, it's a staggering dislocation of consumption. And so we've been winning relative to substrate shift, which had been heading into COVID, in and after the spike. So the fundamentals of the aluminum story are quite good, but you need the end consumer to have some purchasing power and getting it back fundamentally with rate cuts and a different energy, price point at the gas pump and the stabilization of the tax breaks that were put in place. All of those, I'm seeing a much more optimistic tone from our customers because of the end customer. And I think that bodes well for returning to growth. And maybe a little ahead of, historically, we grew 1%. There's opportunity to grow a little ahead of that for the next 2 to 3 years as you emerge out of the inflationary pressures and the end consumer underpinnings of a very weak end consumer that buys our products. And so I'm encouraged by that. We had a dislocation in volumes that was, to your point, unfortunate dislocation in the market for one major beer brand. We had actually shifted supply from one brewer to another, which would have had us increment up in volume this year. As it relates to that shift, it actually was a decrement to a pretty significant amount. And -- so we like the strategic direction of that portfolio shift because we stepped into one customer that had a 35% share in ready-to-drink cocktails, which will be the real challenge for beverage, beer, alcohol, is like how do you accumulate a position with that group, and it seems to be the higher caloric sugary offerings with higher alcohol content. So I like the portfolio that we have moving forward. It's been disruptive for the last 2 years because of a couple of those issues. But I'm encouraged for the direction of flight. And I think we're back fundamentally in North America to price elasticity that will be CPI-based. And by that, I mean, if you price higher than CPI, you're probably going to lose share and gain revenue. If you price at CPI, you'll maintain share, if you price below, you'll take share. But those fundamental traits seem to be reshaping now here in the fourth quarter.

Okay. So if we kind of build on that. So consumer affordability has been an iterative challenge all throughout -- really from the back half of the year into this year, right?

I'd say the last 2 years have been challenged. You saw the trade downs, then you saw absolute volume declines this year.

And so the natural offset if price is the issue, the most obvious solutions to is to adjust the price to boost velocity, right? And your customers seem to have been -- I think they've experimented with pricing, but it hasn't been to the extent that one would have expected. Have you -- just going with your comments on 4Q, has that changed to some extent?

So for the first time, we've seen CSD pricing behavior returned to pre-pandemic levels, so they're actually pushing volume. Energy is starting. Beer has been the laggard. Beer has not priced in line with pre-pandemic levels yet. But we saw it in CSD here for the first time. They have been, like you said, playing revenue mix games and pricing different, but they're not pricing to push volume below CPI. They're doing that now. And you saw an inflection in the latest scanner data for the first time in 2 years, we actually saw some pretty nice uplift. Those cans were sold last quarter. So we need to see a continuance of this in the scanner data. I'm very encouraged for Q1 and '25. We'll see how it plays out here in the back half of Q4. But a lot of those cans obviously were shipped last quarter that have pushed through the scanner data now.

Okay. So some improvement sequentially. Right?

Yes. you're seeing green arrows for the first time in...

If we look at your portfolio more broadly and you mentioned RTDs and so on and so forth, those are higher price point items right? Have you seen -- how would you classify the differential in terms of volume trends with the higher price portions of the portfolio versus, let's say, value?

The majority of the products that sit in the middle, and that's like we can break down beer, for instance, it's like it's the premium light beer brands. Those have been depressed. The discount brands are growing. The premium brands are growing. The large middle, so all the light beers, those are the ones across the board. Take a step, I'd say I would remove the imports from Mexico out of that equation. But the domestic beer, it looks like that. So certainly acknowledging the low-end consumer and a price point to get at and the higher end that can afford it, right, and pushing there. So I think you have to be -- if you have that -- those types of customers within your portfolio, you got to do both is really the answer.

Okay. And then if we go back to beer, which seems to be the pressure point at this point for the industry, including you. What is the catalyst to change that?

I think if you look at the two -- there are two brands that are winning -- sorry, three brands that are winning right now. One continues to be a Mexican import and two are with a large domestic brewer and they sit on both sides of that economic equation. And so they're figuring this out. You're also seeing a lot of rationalization, fewer SKUs. You're seeing innovation in a particular SKU, going in and out of higher alcohol content or different caloric counts or different carb counts or even non-alcohol. So they'll build assets and promotional activity on brands and they'll push brands, and they're all going to look pretty similar. So that helps us. That gives us a fighting chance on volume because that's how you gain volume in that sense. You'll continue to see cans taking share from glass. You'll continue to see in the beer segment. And then you'll also see real concentration of a couple of regional craft beers. Again, to push volume. To limit -- really one of the main drivers that I think has been dislocated coming out of COVID for the folks on the beer side. It's been -- you drive trial on-premise. And folks on-premise, when you've got end consumers that are stressed. You don't need 100 different tap handles. You need fewer, more efficient, to provide it a better cost to drive that trial back into at-home consumption. So that needs to get reconfigured back to pre-pandemic levels, and we're starting to see that. You saw the two major brewers in North America basically just get out of their craft beer portfolio. So that's a signal that we're going to spend money. We're going to spend money more intentionally on a few brands. And those brands you need to make sure that you have in your portfolio because those are the ones that are going to win.

And then if we stay with North America and focus on the capacity, supply-demand dynamics and so on, do you feel better about the backdrop at this point? Has there not been much change?

There's not a lot that's changed since last year because in aggregate, there's no growth in North America, right? So we've -- I think within our portfolio, we've addressed it. There is still elements of capacity in -- probably the upper Midwest, where they are curtailed lines and we need growth in the industry to help that and/or we need action to be taken to address that.

Okay. All right. And then if we sort of focus on the new entrants into the market, contractual renewal risk as we look ahead and so on, your customers. Again, the consumer is under pressure, your customers are under pressure to give back some price. I have to assume that, that ripples upstream towards you and others?

No, I think that's very real and how we're addressing it candidly over the last couple of years as we've taken out our high-cost, less-efficient facilities to address this. To make sure that we're fit for purpose and can help our partners address these disparate value propositions that they have to sell into the market. We can do both really well. But we had to address it, and I think it has a lot to do with our Ball business system and how we're moving forward there to gain efficiencies and to continue to provide that value. Net-net-net, we'll make more money as a result of all of that. But we do need to make sure that the -- whatever the health of the end consumer that we're matching that with our cost position. And I'm encouraged by what we've done and how we're ready to participate in those upcoming contract negotiations. Overwhelmingly, we're in a really good place out through 2027 and beyond. And there are elements of contracts that are certainly going to come due over the next 12 to 18 months within our portfolio, very little is going to come open. But in aggregate, there's -- I'd say there's 10% to 15% of the market that comes up for bid here in the next 12 to 18 months.

Okay. And then just kind of finishing up North America with the election last week. We're asking all the companies what benefit in theory, there could be, if any? Tariffs on your customers, you're shipping from Mexico into the U.S., other imports?

Yes, I would say, as Dan indicated, I mean, the tariff game and what's going to happen there is we're doing a lot of scenario planning around that. Certainly, it's not new for us. We will optimize our network of supply there, certainly. And then on the tax side, I mean, that's going to be an offset likely, right? And so as tax rates continue to go down or stay as they are or work their way down, that's going to be a benefit for us. So certainly thinking that way as well.

Okay. Actually, there's a question from the audience for you, Howard. As it relates to Ball with EVA, long history of implementing EVA and practicing it. You were at Danaher for a long time where DBS is well known. How would you compare the two philosophies, if you will, from a culture standpoint?

I think they're both very strong as it relates to thinking about total economic value and shareholder return. I think that EVA has been part and parcel of Ball. I think the return on invested capital has been central to Danaher, very similar concepts as well. And so -- and even as we go forward here at Ball, I think EVA will continue to be front and center. If you think about the compensation that Dan and his direct reports, including myself have, EVA is going to be central to that. I do think that as we move further down in the organization, we want to drive further accountability and what is it that they can influence. And so we want to be thoughtful about those items as well. Whether it be volume growth on the commercial side, whether it be efficiency, productivity, less scrap, safety, things like that in the manufacturing side as well.

Should we switch to Europe? Yes. So Europe has been a nice positive story, I think, for the industry relative to expectations coming into the year based on 4Q of last year. Yes, how would you characterize fundamentals there? Some of your peers in different -- across different industries that we also cover on the chemical side, including -- they've had a very different view of Europe in terms of a deterioration in the back half versus the first half. The consumer or the industrial economy. What are you seeing there?

The -- so for us, the end consumer, was that we entered the year thinking that we'd grow 1% to 2%, and we're going to grow kind of mid-single digits, a little bit higher than that. It's because there's been inflationary relief on energy for the end consumer. So it's almost the opposite effect that we've had here in the States. And so it's relative, right? They still have less money than they had 3 or 4 years ago. But there was a shift in many parts of Europe from on-premise to off-premise, and since that behavioral pattern kind of -- out of the public culture, yes, it's still the majority of the beer is consumed in that environment in a couple of locations, but it shifted a little bit more into off-premise and then you get an influx of discretionary spend. More disciplined pricing in the CSD category in particular. And now you're seeing an upswing in volume for us. There -- the thing that is most encouraging about Europe, medium and long term is it's got such a big glass portfolio from a substrate standpoint and that is not a good carbon footprint solution. And if anybody is going to regulate, it's going to be Europe. And so our customers continue to add can filling capacity. And so we're seeing the lift on glass in Mainland Europe, plastic shift in the U.K. and Ireland. And then we have -- our performance would actually be even better than it is right now because within our EMEA business, we have Egypt and Turkey and Egypt has had some real challenges, and that's a really nice business for us. So I think the numbers bode well even moving into next year. We've added capacity in '23. We can continue to add incremental lines well within our CapEx run rate. And so I'm very encouraged about Europe, and I think we'll continue to see us take advantage of that part of the world.

Supply demand in the region in Europe?

It's tight. It was very tight in the summer. I think a lot of folks got caught off guard by the influx. So some lines that may have been curtailed or some inventories that were probably running a little lower, those are all good signs. When we get shocked to the upside, that generally bodes well because our customers don't want to be in that position again. So then folks lessen the inventory controls on it. They they're more akin to leaning into the growth, making sure they don't miss the growth. So we were running the other way for a couple of years. It's like chasing the balance sheet, chasing the balance sheet, working capital, and now you're seeing the inflection in growth in both South America, Brazil for one and in Europe, which has been very positive. So that generally bodes well moving forward.

Okay. So if we flip to South America, which seems to be a tale of two large countries, what's going on there between Brazil and Argentina?

Yes. So I'll let you talk about Argentina, it's hyperinflation and all these things. But I would say the things that he needed to do in presidency to stabilize the -- he's done all the currency controls, all of that seem to be in a place where you're starting to see lower inflation and improved economics, but you're quite a ways off of where we were 18 months ago there. Chile has been also coming out of COVID, has been soft. Kind of flattish volumes in that country, which typically grows 3% to 5%. So I think we're returning to growth next year there. And then Paraguay has been a bit choppy because of the interdependence of that country with Argentina. So some of what makes us different. And when things are good, they're really good at all in that portfolio. When they're not, they drag on South America. It's not just about Brazil for us and certainly, the earnings mix is much more favorable in some of those other areas where it's hard to do business and to get rewarded for some of that. But I'm encouraged about Brazil. I think, heading into, again, peak season. November, December, heading into next year, I think Q1 will be very, very strong for us. We have a huge comp to lap. I think we're going to do well on the earnings side. I think growth will be moderate because of everything else in the region. But I know we've got a big Q4, hockey stick as it relates, to our earnings, and we're feeling good about it.

I'd say maybe on the -- just to add on the Argentina piece. From an operating earnings standpoint, we saw the administration put in some legislation last year. It was around the Q3 time frame. And so we've lapped those. And so I think that there isn't much of a headwind there. On the volume side, we saw the volume impacts probably in the second quarter of this year. And so there's still a couple of quarters of headwind associated with the volume and the growth there.

Got you. Okay. So how does this all net out for next year? What are we thinking?

Encouraged that we are able to deliver kind of our long-term algorithm and the components within that algorithm that we laid out at Investor Day. This year, we'll return between $1.5 billion and $1.6 billion back to the shareholders in terms of share repurchase, which is more than we acknowledged a couple of weeks ago. And so EPS will be -- historically, we gave out a range of 10% to 15%. Rarely did we achieve that without a major acquisition. We've laid out an algorithm, we think we can consistently deliver at the 10-plus range. We'll be well in the plus side of that equation heading into next year. And then if you look at '24, '25, '26 and '27, we're going to be returning $5 billion plus back to our shareholders in that time frame. $3 billion, by the end of next year, a little bit more at this rate is what we laid out post acquisition. We're going to return $1.5 billion, $1.6 billion this year. So you start building and accumulating that share return and return of value. And we can do what we need to do from a growth standpoint within our $650 million of D&A run rate. So we'll get back to historical algorithms. I think you even referenced it as old Ball. We have to be new Ball in order to deliver old Ball, and I think that's where we're well on our way to do that.

Okay. There's a follow-up question about the share buyback increase and what is that?

Yes. So I think what we said in the last earnings release is that we plan to do about $1.4 billion worth of share buyback. And as Dan just indicated, I think that -- we see this as an opportunity with the recent share price. And so we're going to take that up somewhere between $1.5 billion and $1.6 billion for this year and buyback alone.

Great. Great. Can we go to the -- in the last few minutes that we have the Investor Day targets. 30/30, $30 billion market cap by 2030. You have a very defined algorithm. And I want to go back to -- I think you started with 2% to 3% volume growth, maybe build as to why that's realistic? And then 2x operating leverage and how do we go from -- how do we get there? With Ron Lewis' initiatives and so on. Just highlight some of those.

Yes. So at a high level, I mean, we're like a year into this Ball business system, and this is lean discipline. And so we're rolling out modules that will take us 12 to 18 months. So leaning more into that, this is not uncommon to what you've seen at Danaher and other places. But we've changed our operating model so that we have an enterprise-wide view on compensation, with an enterprise-wide view on how we're going to run our operations in particular. It's not regional by nature, so it gives us a great opportunity to standardize, look similar and become efficient and take best practices across our regions, and we're seeing a lot of low-hanging fruit. And we've taken big actions, obviously, on the footprint side on the fixed cost side. So in and on top of that, we're gearing toward 2% to 3% of our controllable spend within our manufacturing footprint and raw materials to take that cost out each and every year, which then should provide you with some uplift in earnings in a consistent manner, and we're seeing that trajectory quarter-over-quarter-over-quarter. So I think it's really run the play, run the play. Give it some time to sink in and see the benefits of it once you standardize and start to benchmark and improve. And it will be 1,000 things, Ghansham, but you have to put the foundation and the building blocks in place to do it and be religious in that effort. So really encouraged about that. And then you should be -- we're still in our '25 planning, but Europe will grow. South America will grow. North America will grow for us. We'll be in line with market. There won't be a dislocation of contracts heading into next year. So -- and we should do a bit better moving forward.

Okay. All right. And then just in the last minute or so that we have the aluminum cups business. Yes take us -- give us a little bit more color in terms of what you were trying to get across when you reported last quarter?

Yes. So I think -- listen, I think that fundamentally, the business has not performed as we'd like it to. And so we're revisiting how we think about that business. We've indicated that it's losing about $40 million a year, and that can't continue. And so I think we're looking at a myriad of different options, ranging from scaling down and rightsizing that business, maybe working with the partner, joint venture type of arrangement as well, or ultimately looking at shuttering the business as well. And so I think all those things are or possibilities that we're thinking through with our board.

What do you think went wrong with that business? Is it consumer affordability, pricing? What was the issue there?

Consumer affordability for sure. Yes. I think there's a window or a tolerance that folks will pay up for sustainability, and it's not 200%. Yes. So the retail algorithm doesn't work, but it's not working for just about any product on the shelf these days. I think all the sports venues and the entertainment venues and all of that has been sort of in line with our expectations. It's been the retail presence and the affordability of it.

Okay. That is a good spot to end. Dan, Howard, thank you so much for being generous with your time.

Thank you.