FutureFuel Corp. (FF) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Greetings, and welcome to the FutureFuel Second Quarter Results Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. It is now my pleasure to introduce Rose Sparks, Chief Financial Officer. Please go ahead.

Thank you. Good morning, and welcome to the FutureFuel Second Quarter 2026 Results Conference Call. Leading the call today are our Chairman and CEO, Roeland Polet; and I'm Rose Sparks, the company's Chief Financial Officer. After the close of U.S. trading yesterday, we issued a press release detailing our second quarter operational and financial results. This release is publicly available in the Investor Relations section of our corporate website at www.futurefuelcorporation.com. I would like to remind you that management's commentary and responses to questions on today's conference call may include forward-looking statements, which, by their nature, are uncertain and outside the company's control. Although these forward-looking statements are based on management's current expectations and beliefs, actual results could differ materially. For a discussion of some of the factors that could cause actual results to differ, please refer to the Risk Factors section of our latest reports filed with the SEC. Additionally, please note that you can find reconciliations of all historical non-GAAP financial measures mentioned on this call in the press release issued this morning. Today's call will begin with prepared remarks from Roeland Polet, who will provide a business update, followed by my review of our second quarter financial performance. At the conclusion of these prepared remarks, we will open the line for questions. With that, I'll turn the call over to Roeland.

Thank you, Rose, and good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining our call today. Again, I am Roeland Polet, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of FutureFuel. I joined the company nearly 2 years ago following more than 35 years in the specialty chemicals industry, including senior leadership roles at global manufacturing companies such as Valspar, Celanese and DSM Firmenich. Since joining Future Fuel in the late 2024, I've had the privilege of working alongside a more than 500 dedicated employees to position the business for a new chapter of profitable growth and long-term value creation. Over that period, we have strengthened the foundation of the company, sharpened our strategic priorities and developed with a clear road map for the future, which I will be discussing in greater detail today. This is FutureFuel's quarterly results conference call with investors in more than a decade. With that in mind, my remarks today will serve as a reintroduction of the company. who we are, what we do, how we are competitively differentiated and the opportunities we see to create meaningful shareholder value over time. Going forward, our leadership team is committed to providing shareholders with greater access, transparency and insight into our business. The resumption of quarterly investor conference calls is an important step in that commitment and reflects our intention to engage more consistently with the investment community. With that introduction and given that this is our first conference call together, let's begin with a high-level overview of our business for those less acquainted with us. FutureFuel is a 100% U.S.-based manufacturer operating through 2 distinct businesses: Specialty chemicals and biofuels, both are supported by our approximately 2,200-acre manufacturing complex in Basile, Arkansas, where we combine product development, engineering, and commercial production on one integrated campus. The Batesville site has supported complex chemical manufacturing for approximately 50 years and represents an established operating platform that will be difficult to replicate where it built today, given factors of scale, permitting and production unit complexity. Our Chemicals business has 2 primary areas of focus: custom chemicals manufacturing for third parties together with propriety specialty chemicals manufacturing. In custom manufacturing, we work closely with customers to develop scale and commercially produce specialized products under long-term production agreements. Our proprietary portfolio involves the production of our formulations using our own IP, which are then sold into a variety of different applications. The total production capacity of our chemicals operations is approximately 250 million pounds annually. Our biofuel business manufactures biodiesel from the same Batesville complex, which has approximately 60 million gallons of annual biodiesel production capacity. The business benefits from significant feedstock optionality, which allows us to optimize production economics. While biodiesel economics differ from those of our Specialty Chemicals segments, and are more influenced by commodity and regulatory conditions, the biofuel segment serves as a complementary business to our core specialty chemicals focus serving the future, optimize the Batesville complex, while facilitating economies of scale. Next, let's walk through our unique value proposition and why we win in the markets we serve. Our primary competitive advantage is a scale, integration and technical depth of our Batesville complex. When a chemical customer comes to us, we provide them with one integrated site that includes state-of-the-art laboratories, engineering resources, flexible manufacturing units, wastewater treatment, logistic infrastructure, formats and experienced technical teams. Our platform allows customers to move from development to commercial production with fewer handoffs, lower execution risk and more capital-efficient production options. We offer a one-stop shop solution that is difficult to replicate within the continental United States, positioning us as an attractive [indiscernible] play for chemicals customers who want to avoid supply chain risk associated with sourcing key formulations from overseas partners. While the integration of the Batesville asset is itself a major draw for customers, our deep technical expertise and experience skilled workforce are another integral piece of our overall value proposition. In Batesville, our teams managed production, raw material procurement, production quality and formulation consistency across batch and continuous processes. We have built a strong reputation for being the go-to production partner on complex technical demanding programs that customers may not be able to manufacture efficiently themselves. In regard to our value proposition, it centers on reducing technical, operational and supply chain risk for the customer. A typical relationship begins with customer bringing us molecule, process or manufacturing challenge. We then evaluate the chemistry, safety requirements, production economics and equipment needs, then work through development and scale up before entering commercial production. As we demonstrate value, the relationship may expand through additional volumes, longer contracts, new products or customer-funded capacity because changing manufacturers can require requalifications, audits, process transfer and production risk. Customer programs are often multiyear engagements, creating long-term stickiness within the customer base. To that end, the average relationship of our top customers in 2025 was more than 15 to 20 years, highlighting the long-term nature and stickiness of our customer relationships. Before I walk us through what's next for FutureFuel, it is important to provide some perspective around the challenges we faced over the last several years. How we've responded to those challenges and why we were excited about what comes next for the organization. In the years leading up to 2026, there were 3 primary factors that impacted our operation and financial performance: Planned and production reliability, regulatory certainty around biofuels economics, and elevated raw material input costs. Beginning with planned liability. Over the past 2 years, we have made strides to improve the plant process, enhancing the site safety and driving higher site utilization through executing on a number of high-impact capital projects. As I'll discuss shortly, we are encouraged by the improvement utilization of Batesville in the first half of the year. Second, with respect to the regulatory environment, we -- together with the broader biofuels industry were granted much needed relief with a new set of 2 RFS volume mandates issued by the EPA in March of 2026. Under the new mandates, the EPA established the highest blending mandates in the program's history, targeting a 60% increase over 2025. To meet the 2027 volume targets existing U.S. domestic biofuels production levels are expected to reach peak capacity, which we expect will benefit us. Further, also during the first quarter of 2026, the U.S. Treasury Department and Internal Revenue Service issued regulations providing expanded guidance on a 45Z credit integrating changes from the budget Reconciliation Act of 2025. The rule is expected to help level the competitive environment for biodiesel by reducing the tax credit for SAF from $1.75 per gallon to $1 per gallon effective January 1, 2026. Requiring that all feedstocks be sourced from North America and requiring for biomass-based diesel and extending the 45Z credit for additional 2 years through year end 2029. Rose will speak more on how this benefits our business model shortly. Finally, while both plant reliability and regulatory environment has improved meaningfully for us, raw material input costs remain elevated, which remains an area of focus for us. Looking ahead, our value-creation road map centers on 3 key pillars, including commercial growth, operational excellence and a return-centric approach to capital allocation. Within our commercial growth pillar, our first priority is to increase penetration of key existing accounts as well as scale production volumes across the Batesville complex. We are focused on expanding the specialty chemicals pipeline, converting development products into commercial production and securing additional volumes from existing customers. We will also pursue new customer manufacturing contracts and expand our proprietary chemicals portfolio into adjacent products and end markets for our technical capabilities and our existing infrastructure provide a clear advantage. However, our objective is not simply to add volume. We intend to pursue programs that accelerate our shift towards higher value-add sales mix, whereby we capture ratable growth in margin realization within durable reoccurring revenue streams. By applying greater commercial discipline, we can concentrate our resources on the customers and opportunities which strongest potential to deliver profitable growth through the cycle. Within our operational excellence pillar, we will seek to improve cost efficiency, utilization, safety, reliability across the Batesville complex. Higher sales volumes create value only when we can manufacture those volumes safely, consistently and an appropriate unit cost. We are therefore focused on plant reliability, production, scheduling, procurement, energy efficiency, maintenance practices and process productivity. We also intend to make operating performance more measurable and transparent by tracking metrics such as capacity utilization, plant uptime, safety performance and unit product costs, we can and will identify opportunities for improvement and hold the organization accountable for those improving results. Finally, with respect to our capital allocation pillar, organic reinvestment will remain the top priority where products are supported by identifiable customer demand, including contractual commitments. Where appropriate, we will continue to see customer-funded capacity expansions, while strengthening long-term commercial relationships. We will also evaluate complementary acquisition, particularly opportunities to add intellectual property, proprietary products or specialized capabilities that can be integrated into our Batesville platform. Any acquisition will strengthen our competitive position and meet disciplined financial return requirements. Beyond reinvestment and acquisitions, we will continue to evaluate cash dividends and opportunistic share repurchases as part of a balanced approach to returning capital to shareholders. Taken together, each of the pillars of our strategic roadmap are designed to drive higher sales volumes, more efficient operations and stronger returns on invested capital. By growing selectively, operating more efficiently and allocating capital with discipline, we intend to produce more consistent earnings, cash generation and long-term shareholder value. Turning now to a review of our second quarter results. The second quarter marked a return to profitable growth for FutureFuel, a performance driven by strengthening end market demand, improved production economics, continued cost discipline and enhanced optimization of our Batesville plant. At a strategic level, we remain highly focused on driving safe, reliable operations across the organization, while continuing to pursue customer co-investment in new capacity and capabilities. As we seek to further accelerate growth within our core specialty chemical contract manufacturing markets. As before, we remain on pace to deliver positive, adjusted EBITDA for the full year in 2026. At an operational level, total production increased 26% on a year-over-year basis in the second quarter, supported by broad-based demand growth across our specialty chemicals and biofuels end markets. Both segments generated positive gross profit per unit sold in the period and continue to exhibit strong operational momentum entering the second half of 2026. Total Chemical segment production increased 34% year-over-year in the second quarter as increased demand across the energy and industrial end markets drove broad-based strength in both performance and custom chemical manufacturing. Chemicals gross profit was $5 million in the second quarter versus $1.1 million in the year ago period, reflecting improved volume throughput and stronger margin realization. Fire Fuel segment production increased 21% year-over-year in the second quarter despite the impact of a more than 3-week biodiesel plant outage during the period as improved regulatory clarity and mandated renewable fuel production targets for 2026 and 2027 incentivized domestic production. Biofuels gross profit was $10.1 million in the second quarter versus a gross loss of $13.5 million in the year ago period, reflecting improved plant reliability, higher throughput, better production economics, including a timing benefit related to ongoing biofuel hedging activities. Our biodiesel production continues to ramp higher with third quarter production rates expected to exceed second quarter levels. Looking ahead, demand continues to remain robust across our chemicals and biofuel segment. While elevated input costs may continue to represent a near-term headwind for our business, we believe that our 100% domestic production footprint, deep technical expertise within specialty chemical manufacturing, capital-light approach to growth and long-term collaborations with world-class customer position our business for continued positive momentum. With that, I'd like to hand the call over to Rose for her prepared remarks.

Thank you, Roeland, and good morning again to all those joining us. Today, I will provide a high-level overview of our second quarter financial performance, including a discussion of our balance sheet and liquidity profile at quarter end. Please note that the prior year comparisons have been adjusted to conform to the weighted average method of inventory costing adopted by the company January 1, 2026. Total revenue was $78.7 million in the second quarter of 2026, an increase of 120.7% compared to $35.7 million in the second quarter of 2025. The increase in revenue was driven by higher throughput and improved revenue volume mix and higher average pricing in both the chemical and biofuel segments. Total volume growth was 40.4% during the second quarter of 2026, while average blended price increased by 80.2%. Total gross profit was $15 million during the second quarter of 2026 versus a gross loss of $12.4 million during the second quarter of 2025. Second quarter gross profit benefited by $9.1 million related to the sale of physical inventory at prices above hedge levels, which fully offset realized derivative losses of $9.1 million recognized during the first quarter of 2026. Gross profit was benefited by unrealized derivative gains of $3.2 million during the second quarter of 2026. Excluding the derivative impacts, the year-over-year improvement in gross profit was driven by higher throughputs, improved price realization in both chemicals and biofuel segments. We reported net income of $11.4 million during the second quarter of 2026 versus a net loss of $14.2 million in the second quarter of 2025. Adjusted EBITDA was $11.8 million during the second quarter of 2026 versus a loss of $11.4 million during the second quarter of 2025. Turning to the Chemical segment. Chemical segment revenue increased $25.8 million during the second quarter of 2026 compared to $16.6 million in the second quarter of 2025. The increase was primarily driven by a 49% increase in volume product mix effects and a 6% benefit from higher average prices. Custom Chemical revenue increased $18.5 million during the second quarter, up 30% from $14.3 million last year, primarily due to higher volumes of products sold to energy customers. Performance Chemical revenue of $7.3 million during the second quarter was up from $2.4 million last year, primarily due to increased volumes for a new customer that began production during the fourth quarter of 2025. Chemical segment gross profit was $5 million during the second quarter of 2026, an improvement from $1.1 million in the second quarter of 2025. The improvement was driven by increased sales volumes in the energy market, including the new product revenue brought online in the fourth quarter of 2025 as well as increased fixed price absorption driven by the improved biofuel volumes. Market conditions within the Chemicals segment continued to improve during the second quarter as demonstrated by improved capacity utilization, higher pricing and a growing pipeline of project activity. During the last 12 months, we've increased total chemical production capacity by 12% and expect to achieve continued improved operating leverage as production scales from current levels. Chemical segment capacity utilization improved to 65% during the second quarter of 2026, up from 54% in the prior year period. Biofuel segment revenue increased $52.9 million during the second quarter of 2026 compared to $19.1 million in the same period last year. The increase was primarily driven by increased regulatory clarity, surrounding the clean fuel production credit and record high RVO levels. Biofuel segment gross profit for the second quarter of 2026 was $10.1 million compared to a gross loss of $13.5 million in the prior year period, reflecting meaningful improvement driven by higher sales volumes and stronger price realization, while we continue to benefit from significant feedstock optionality, elevated input costs to partially offset the favorable pricing environment for finished products. As previously disclosed, we recognized a $9 million hedging loss in the first quarter of 2026, and second quarter results reflect corresponding benefit of a similar magnitude as the underlying physical inventory was sold, and those previously recognized hedging costs were recovered. Market conditions within the Biofuel segment continued to improve during the second quarter of 2026, given a favorable regulatory environment. Biofuel capacity utilization improved to 56% during the second quarter and sales volumes are expected to further improve during the second half of 2026, given improved regulatory clarity. Input costs for soybean oil and other raw materials used in the production of biofuels remain elevated, which is expected to have a continued near-term impact on Biofuels gross profit per gallon sold. Turning the discussion to cash flow, balance sheet and liquidity. Net cash flow from operations was $18.8 million in the second quarter of 2026 compared to $5.2 million in the prior year period. Capital expenditures were $8 million in the second quarter, including $2.9 million of maintenance-related expenditures and $5.1 million of discretionary programs. In the first 6 months of 2026, capital expenditures were $13.4 million, including $4.1 million and $9.3 million related to maintenance and discretionary programs, respectively. Of the discretionary capital expenditures in the second quarter and the first 6 months of 2026, approximately $1.9 million and $3.5 million, respectively, were customer-funded investments related to capacity expansions and new customer programs. As of June 30, 2026, the company had total cash and cash equivalents of $34.3 million up from $22.4 million at March 31, 2026, and a $35 million revolving credit facility with no outstanding borrowing. The increase in total cash between the first quarter of 2026 and the second quarter of 2026, was related to the reported operating profit in the second quarter of 2026 and customer funding related to custom chemical contract, partially offset by increased working capital requirements related to new program activity and capital expenditures to support growth. During the second quarter, we secured a 4-year agreement with a third party to monetize Section 45Z clean fuel production and small producer tax credits consistent with our continued focus on balance sheet optimization. During the second half of 2026, we expect to receive $22 million in gross proceeds from the monetization of credits including approximately $3 million in the third quarter and $19 million in the fourth quarter. That concludes our prepared remarks. Operator, we are now ready for the question-and-answer portion of our call.

[Operator Instructions] Our first question is from Jeffrey Grampp with Northland Capital Markets.

Roeland, I was curious -- sure. I was curious to circle back on some of the comments you made about the improvements to plant performance and that being kind of a focus over the last couple of years for you guys. I'm curious if you could kind of contextualized things, I don't know, from the innings in a baseball game standpoint, maybe or whatever analogy you prefer, like where are we at in that kind of improvement cycle? Are we at where you guys want to be at today? Is there more optimization initiatives to go? Just any context there would be helpful.

Yes. Very good. Yes, Jeff, I'm a soccer guy. So we're kind of at the first half in injury time with the second half still need to be played. So we've made significant improvements in the last -- let me take a step back. We have about $1 billion of invested replacement value assets here in Batesville. So we have a significant site with significant capabilities, significant infrastructure that support those capabilities. So we've chosen to invest in the infrastructure around our site, wastewater treatment, the chemical incineration, all the assets that we need, nitrogen that we need to keep the plant running, the site running. And then our site contains a lot of manufacturing cells that are put here by our customers that need to be supported. So I think we're -- I'm not a baseball guy, so I'm not sure about innings, but I'd say we're about 60% of the way -- 60% to 70% of the way there on really going after the most important infrastructure to make sure it's secure, to make sure it's dependable. And then our next step will be driving investment into efficiency. So we have a number of projects that we rank based on the payback that we can get on them where we will deploy capital against those projects to gain further efficiencies, operational efficiencies in the plant.

Got it. It was helpful details. And for my follow-up, with respect to 45Z monetization I wanted to clarify, does that -- the agreement that you guys discussed in the release, does that cover essentially all of your expected 45Z generation through 2029? Is there additional monetization to do? And any clarity, I guess, on the quantum of monetization throughout that contract period?

Amount that we have quoted is for 2026 and 2025. So there's approximately $3 million that we were able to cash in Q3 and. And then there will be an additional $19 million on a gross basis that we will cash in December of this year. So that's an annual monetization that will occur each year as we produce product and sell it.

Our next question is from Jason Tilchen with Canaccord Genuity.

Congrats on the strong results and for hosting the first call in quite some time. It's an honor to participate. One thing I was curious about, you mentioned focus on some of these very niche complex, dangerous chemistries that others maybe don't want to or can't produce on-site. Can you elaborate on some of those core competencies that allow you to take on these projects in a safe and compliant manner? And what are some of the ways either through pricing or long-term relationships that you're able to extract value from those capabilities?

Yes. And again, thank you very much for calling in. Our history dates back to and not date you back too far, but dates back to the codec days. And this plant made photographic chemicals as well as was set up to make sort of precursors to the pharmaceutical industry. So it has a long history, and it was permitted to operate very complex chemistries and in certain instances, dangerous chemistries. This was also the site that all chemistries for later on Eastman and all chemistries were proven at this site and were tested at this site to make sure that they can be run and we have extensive facilities to do that, to be run in the Eastman plant and now in the future fuel plant. So it has a history that it's permitted to run complex dangerous chemistries. There's a lot of permit head space. The equipment that was installed and then we have since then reinvested in a lot of this equipment was installed to handle those complex chemistries. And we're sitting on 2,200 acres in the middle of Arkansas, where we have the permit capability, and we have the capability to expand even further to drive it. But it really goes back to our history as a plant that was purpose-built to make complex chemistries. And then I'll add one point to that, because we're in the middle of Arkansas, we are very self-contained. So we have everything that we need here. We also have the R&D department, the testing department. We have everything that we need in order to support that production.

Great. That's very helpful review. And in the release in the prepared remarks, you mentioned an agreement with one of your customers to fund an investment of more than $40 million over the next 3 years to support incremental capacity. Just wondering if you could maybe share a little more about how that relationship has evolved? And if that's one of those 15, 20 relationships or maybe it's a bit on the newer side? And then more broadly, are there other opportunities like this that you're currently evaluating? And if so, do those have to sort of happen consecutively -- can there be multiple projects similar to this that you're pursuing at once? Any color would be really appreciated.