GCC, S.A.B. de C.V. (GCC) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning, and welcome to GCC's Second Quarter 2024 Earnings Results Conference Call. Before we begin, I would like to remind you that this call is being recorded [Operator Instructions]. Please also note that a slide presentation accompanies today's webcast. The link is available on the company's IR website at gcc.com. I would now like to turn the call over to Sahory Ogushi, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining. With me today are Mr. Enrique Escalante, our Chief Executive Officer; and Maik Strecker, Chief Financial Officer. The earnings release detailing this quarter's results was released yesterday after market close and is available on GCC's IR website. This conference call is also being broadcast live within the Investors section at gcc.com and both the webcast replay of the call and transcripts will be available on the same slide approximately 1 hour after the end of today's call. Before we begin, I would like to remind you that our remarks today will include forward-looking statements. Actual results may differ materially from those contemplated by these forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause these results to differ materially are set forth in yesterday's press release and in our quarterly report filed with the Mexican Stock Exchange. Any forward-looking statements that we make on this call are based on assumptions as of today, and we undertake no obligation to update these statements as a result of new information or future events. With that, let me now turn the call over to Enrique.

Thank you, Sahory. Good morning, and thank you for joining today's call. We are pleased with our second quarter performance, particularly in light of what has become a dynamic and complex demand environment. Certain aspects of GCC's results were not in line with our expectations for the quarter. Our sales for the second quarter of 2024 decreased by 1%. However, thanks mostly to our flexible fuel mix strategy and cost and expense management, we were able to increase our year-on-year EBITDA by 1%. Importantly, we delivered a 37.1% EBITDA margin for the second quarter, with benefits of our continued cost discipline throughout the organization. This morning, I will begin my remarks with an update on GCC's progress related to our 3 strategic pillars: our people, profit and planet. I will then turn to our key markets before passing it over to Maik, who will go into more depth on our second quarter financial results. Starting with our people. We continue to strengthen safety throughout our organization, leveraging GCC's safety strategy plan. During the first half of 2024, our ongoing focus resulted in a 14% year-on-year decrease in last 12-month recordable injuries. Also, our teams increased participation in GCC's serious injury and fatality prevention system and improved focus on exposure controls. During the second quarter, we continued implementing the second phase of GCC's safety leadership training program, an ongoing campaign to increase awareness and empower our workforce with the insights and tools to drive progress in our company. We also implemented projects to further strengthen our world-class safety culture model. Turning to our profit pillar. As I have noted, we remain laser focused on cost control throughout GCC and the second quarter was no exception. During the quarter, we took proactive measures to manage and control costs and we're closely monitoring how things progress relative to our business to recalibrate accordingly as the year unfolds. With an eye towards ensuring we achieve our target to reach [ 26% ] EBITDA margin in 2025. Further, we continue to leverage our flexible fuel strategy as well as our renewable and natural gas-based power contracts as an important lever in our cost containment strategy. GCC will also continue to leverage our unique competitive advantage of [indiscernible] to low-cost routes whenever appropriate. Regarding GCC's planet pillar, we're making progress related to blended cement's production and commercialization as well as increased alternative fuel substitution capacity, especially at our Samalayuca plant, with the new pre-pulled system now reaching 40% substitution of coal and natural gas. Regarding GCC's first pilot solar project in the United States at our Trident Montana plant, we progressed on the projects Phase 2 during the second quarter of 2024 and anticipate this project will be completed in the second half of 2024, offsetting 22% of the plant's required electricity. We are analyzing how this can be scaled, aligned with our process to investing to install smaller-scope projects to then assess the feasibility to scale further. As to important closing comments, in May, we published our integral integrated report for the fiscal year 2023. This landmark report makes a significant milestone in GCC's sustainability journey, and highlight our financial success, meaningful progress on our ESG initiatives and GCC's alignment to international standard as we progress towards our 2030 reduction targets. Along these lines, our progress against our stated CO2 target continued in the second quarter, with 2.5% year-to-date decrease in CO2 gross intensity per ton of cementitious materials in comparison to 2023. Turning now to an update on our markets. During the second quarter, GCC took significant steps to secure and increase our footprint in South Lake City. We strengthened our position with one of the region's most significant concrete producer securing a base volume. Further, we secured a terminal agreement with a logistic distribution supplier of construction materials, enhancing GCC's distribution capabilities and enabling us to better serve customers throughout the greater South Lake City region, solidifying our growth and long-term presence in this important market. Moving to results. Second quarter U.S. cement and concrete volumes decreased by 7.1% and 14.3%, respectively. The current interest rate environment coupled with continued construction cost inflation is pressuring demand for residential and light commercial projects industry-wide. This was compounded by adverse weather effects in GCC's Northern region, specifically South Dakota, Iowa and Minnesota on our second quarter sales. This preliminary data also reflects a year-to-date 3% year-on-year decrease in overall U.S. cement consumption in May. Due warehouse market saturation, slowing commercial real estate and high mortgage rates, coupled with a more than 30% increase in construction material costs compared to 2019. However, this will be offset by GCC's continued progress on infrastructure projects, including ongoing work on the Denver Airport the next phase of the El Paso I-10 interstate as well as a paving project in Texas and the expected restart of the SunZia wind and transmission project the largest clean energy infrastructure project in the United States history. [indiscernible] for 2 months in the second quarter, further contributing to the quarter's volume shortfall but it is dated to resume in the third quarter of this year. Oil and gas-related cement demand remains strong, with GCC's client offsetting volume shortages in other segments during the second quarter. Along these lines, on July 1, we implemented a $15 per ton price increase for our oil well clients. As a brief update on the infrastructure investment and job side, related infrastructure demand remains consistent with normal levels for the quarter. To date, we are not seeing the jobs act driven delta the industry had initially expected. As part of these incremental funds appear to have been offset by the construction cost inflation to which I have referred. Turning to Mexico. Favorable fuel and power costs enabled solid second quarter margins. Results were influenced by reduced demand ahead of the Mexican elections also with deceleration in industrial projects in quarries due to continued power supply constraints. However, construction of the Terranova power substation in quarries continued during the second quarter and remains on track for completion in the second half of this year, noting that the final timing remains uncertain. As we have flagged in prior quarters, the mining segment contraction we have seen in Mexico since 2022 continues. In contrast, the housing construction segment continues at a strong pace. GCC's second quarter cement and concrete volume, therefore, decreased by 7.1% and 12.4%, respectively. To conclude, while our second quarter 2024 sales were below expectations, continued cost efficiency measures and our commercial strategy enabled us to deliver strong bottom line results for the first half of the year. With that, let me turn the call over to Maik for his financial review.

Thank you, Enrique, and good morning to everyone. Before I turn to our financial results for the second quarter of 2024, I would like to reiterate Enrique's comment that this quarter, we navigated a slow market environment with related headwinds on our financial results. However, and importantly, our results also reflect continued successful strategy execution through our focus on Brazilian markets and segments with the prudent cost management that Enrique noted. Consolidated sales for the second quarter decreased 1% year-over-year, reflecting decreased volumes. Revenue from our U.S. operations remained essentially flat despite cement and concrete volumes decreasing by 7.1% and 14.3% year-over-year, respectively. Further, this volume decrease was partially offset by our commercial excellence work and by the oil and gas segment, which remained robust during the quarter. Mexico sales decreased by 2.8% year-on-year. Volumes of cement and concrete sold decreased by 7.1% and 12.4% respectively, due to continued power supply constraints as we had flagged in our prior quarter's remarks. Second quarter cost of sales as a percentage of sales was 60.9%, a decrease of 1.1 percentage points compared to the second quarter of 2023. This reflects the increased fuel and production costs and the absence of the costs related to the debottlenecking project at our Samalayuca cement plant. These were partially offset by increased maintenance expenses. SG&A as a percentage of sales for the second quarter 2024 reached 8.7%, a 70 basis point year-over-year increase, driven by the exchange rate effect and investments in our corporate functions. As a result, EBITDA margin for the quarter increased 70 basis points compared to the prior year's quarter to 37.1%. Second quarter EBITDA increased by 1% year-over-year. Net financial income was $15.2 million, compared to $4.5 million reported for the second quarter of 2023, resulting from higher cash balance for the second quarter of this year. Consolidated net income for the quarter was $89.6 million, a 9% increase compared to the second quarter of 2023. Free cash flow for the quarter was $29 million, a reflection of decreased cash taxes and working capital needs during the quarter, higher financial income and increased EBITDA, as I had noted previously. This was partially offset by increased maintenance CapEx. GCC's general shareholder meeting held in April to declare an annual dividend of MXN 1.5369, which was paid on May 22. We ended the second quarter of 2024 with $879 million of cash and cash equivalents with a net debt-to-EBITDA ratio of negative 0.78x. We're executing against the following priorities that we set for the full year 2024. First, we're focusing on general maintenance and reinvesting in our plans; second, we're optimizing DTC's overall distribution network; and third, we're directing capital expenditures towards our sustainability initiatives. We continue executing on the Odessa plant expansion according to our schedule with related capital investments. During the quarter, we also made continued progress on GCC's sustainability focused projects, expanding our GCC's carbon capture dedicated project team, while actively working on alternative fuels initiatives. Turning to our progress related to M&A during the second quarter. Discussions with potential partners within the cement sector continues. Furthermore, we continue to build out our criteria for potential targets within the aggregate space. We're looking for targets that, a, are aggregates-led companies with substantial reserves, ensuring a sustainable business; b, companies which are located within GCC's footprint enabling us to leverage our existing network and resources; and c, businesses that are scalable and connectable with other potential markets for existing facilities, enabling us to create an interconnected network in the future. We have identified potential targets within these guidelines and remain actively engaged in discussions. I will now return the call to Enrique to share his closing remarks.

Thank you, Maik. In closing, while navigating a second quarter 2024 scenario characterized by pressure demand, GCC's streamline operations provided a considerable advantage from a competitive perspective, enabling the company to achieve strong profitability margin and cash generation. Given the details insights shared during this call, and the current dynamics and complex demand environment, we now anticipate that our U.S. cement and Mexico concrete volumes will finish the year either flat or with a slight decrease. However, our proactive measures and strategic initiatives position us well to navigate these challenges. We remain confident in our ability to adapt to market conditions and to continue delivering on our estimated EBITDA growth for the year and on the long-term value creation for our stakeholders. With that, I will now turn the call over to your questions. Operator, please begin with the first question.

[Operator Instructions] Our first question is from Pablo Ricalde with Santander Mexico.

I have 2 questions. The first one is on the guidance. If I understand correctly, do you now think the cement volumes in Mexico should be flattish for the year but EBITDA growth should continue around the mid-single digits? So I just want to double check on that. And the other question is on the maintenance CapEx line. How should we expect maintenance CapEx for the second half of the year?

Thank you, Pablo. Yes, let me reiterate exactly what we said for the guidance that we're giving for the second part of the year. We are only changing volumes of cement in the U.S. from our low single digit to flat or probably a slight decrease. In Mexico, we are only changing concrete volumes from a low single digit to flat or again, probably a slight decrease. Those are the only 2 aspects of our guidance that are being changed. Everything else remains, as you know, I mean, as we, I mean, announced in previous quarters. I want to reiterate that we still expect to achieve the EBITDA growth, I mean, that we talked about in previous conference.

Okay. Pablo, thanks for your question. This is Maik. On the maintenance CapEx, as we saw the second quarter, we executed against our plans and our targets with a good rate of maintenance CapEx implemented. We have installed some very strict and regular processes to review and to be able to execute on that. And therefore, I expect that we will continue in the third and fourth quarter according to our plan. And again, our guidance is to spend about $70 million in overall maintenance CapEx for the year. And nothing on that has changed. It's important to us to, again, reinvest in the assets and to be ready to take advantage of all the market opportunities that are to come.

Our next question is from Alejandra Obregon with Morgan Stanley.

First, on the strong EBITDA. I guess your unit profitability figures in the quarter are impressive. So I was just wondering what aspects, especially in Mexico have driven the strong performance? And how do you think of the sustainability of these levels of unit profitability? I guess, once the volumes come back and energy cash costs continue to drop, there is a big chance of this perhaps prevailing or even looking better ahead, right? So that is the first question here.

Alejandra, this is Enrique. Thanks for your question. Yes. Mexico. Basically, our -- I mean, cost efficient is derived from fuels and power at both plants. So obviously, I mean, we are benefiting from the low molecule cost from natural gas but we think it's going to stay at very reasonable levels in this year and the coming year according to the futures that we have been seeing. So most of those savings should remain in place for our operations. In volumes, as you will say, if volumes increase a little bit, then we'll have a much better absorption cost, further increasing our EBITDA up per ton. So we are -- I mean, we are cautiously optimistic that the Mexico operations could improve in the second half, especially with some projects that we are observing some of them in the quarries area that could materialize, I mean, by the second half of the year, more towards the fourth quarter.

Got you. That's fantastic. And then if you can elaborate a little bit on the volumes in the U.S. You were mentioning that some of the drop is linked to weather. If you can help us understand and separate how much of that drop is linked to weather? And how much of that is potentially witnessed in some of the different end markets in the volumes in the U.S?

Unfortunately, I cannot give you a specific answer at this moment as of how much was the impact of weather related. I mean delays, Alejandra, we're still working on that, and we can come back to you with that information. But again, I want to make clear that part of it is decrease in demand for the derived from the economic factors that we mentioned, like I mean, interest rates still being where they are expectations in the mortgage segment and so forth. And the other part that is weather related, of course, I mean, part of it is still, I mean, available for us during the second half of the year, depending, of course, when winter hits in the northern regions. And the other ones, for example, the SunZia project, I mean, we expect to also recover that volume given that, that was just a 2-month delay in the second quarter. So we'll come back to you with more specifics of how much was weather related and what would be the impact for the whole year.

Our next question is from Carlos Peyrelongue with Bank of America.

My question is related to cement price increases. You mentioned for oil well cement, a price increase. Could you comment on construction cement for both the U.S. and Mexico, is there any planned increases in prices in the second half of the year?

Carlos, thank you for your question. No, the answer is, I mean, no for construction cement. We don't have it today anything, and we don't see a price increase in the horizon for the second half of the year. Of course, I mean, we are working very diligently with customers all the time to continue understanding inflationary pressures and cost increases. But so far, we have decided that we are okay, I mean, at this level for the second half.

Excellent. And one more question on M&A. You talked about during the call about different potential targets that you're looking at. When you're thinking of M&A, should we be thinking about bolt-on acquisitions, there are a couple of $100 million? Or are you also potentially consider larger acquisitions that could be higher numbers just to get a sense of the magnitude of potential M&A?

Yes. Carlos, this is Maik. Thanks for the question. So 2 elements: Cement M&A, our focus is targets that are close to our network, which you could consider bolt-ons that we can plug into the existing network, list some immediate synergies and work for that. That's our first priority; second, in the cement space, we're, of course, now looking a little broader because U.S. is our key market. So we're starting to look a little broader. In that case, those would be a little bit more starting thinking about a new network that are not immediately connected to the existing network, but that are a start for a new network. And that, to be honest, would include looking at the whole country. So that's sort of the element on cement. On aggregates, as I explained, we are in a starting phase. Here it's within our footprint. It's smaller-sized companies, but with a good reserve position that we can then grow and that we can connect with other targets. So we have a couple in the works that we can connect to build a future network. So that's a little bit of the 2-way approach, a little bit differentiated between cement and aggregates.

Our next question is from Alberto Valerio with UBS.

I have 1 follow-up on Carlos' question on cement price. Historically, when you see volumes dropping, we also see pricing following the this momentum. This time around, it's different, I think [indiscernible] pricing has been more resilient than historically. So my question is you mentioned that you expect flattish prices for Mexico and the U.S. But looking further, do you think the price in [indiscernible]? And my other question is why your seasonal prices more resilient than in the past that you have in the industry?

Alberto, this is Enrique. We're having a little bit of problems to hear you well, but if I understood correctly your question on pricing, I mean, we are looking at price increases and in the presence of volume decreases or if those could be maintained, I mean, at the current level compared to the cycles in the past. If that's your question, I would say that we totally expect I mean, the price level to maintain at least where it is, we're still having some positive effects of the latest price increases that were, I mean, increase during the second quarter. And of course, we're going to benefit from the oil well cement price increase, too. But generally speaking, I mean, we completely expect, I mean, those prices to be maintained even in the presence of lower volumes. I guess there are 3 important factors in my opinion. One is obviously the industry has been -- continues to consolidate. I mean, it's a little bit smaller in terms of [indiscernible]. And on the other hand, I think that, I mean, we're very conscious about the inflation cost pressure that we have been experiencing and that I share the thought of some of the economies when they say it's still sticky, and so we are very, very aware of that and are very vigilant to, I mean, not to lose presently our margins. So we'll continue I mean, protecting our prices and our market share everywhere. We couldn't hear you well, Alberto.

No, wasn't about this, it was about the resilience of the market of cement at this moment that is I think in the industry, it's more resilient than in the past, mainly in terms of prices. We see sometimes weakens on volumes, but prices is always there. It was about this.

Okay. I think Alberto, we answered the question. Again, I would maybe add one element to Enrique's comments. We have also invested in our, what we call, commercial work, commercial excellence. And I think our teams are very focused, proactive working with the customer is communicating, how we see the demand coming in, making sure we align, supporting also from a technical service perspective, all these elements overall support our pricing level and the service levels that we give to customers. So that's why we're, like Enrique said, confident even in a month where we have a little bit slowdown or demand decrease that we're able to keep the proper pricing level.

Our next question is from [ Marcelo Furlan ] with Itaú.

My first question is related to Mexico, specifically with the mining segment. You guys mentioned that the mining segment remains weak throughout the year. So my question is related -- you could expect some improvement in the mining segment for the second half of this year and maybe for 2025, and then supporting some cement demand ahead. So it's my first question. And my second question is related to capital allocation. You guys mentioned that the main priority of the company will be allocating capital towards growth and also maintenance of plants, et cetera. But if you could elaborate a little bit more in terms of capital allocation to shareholders' return would be helpful also. These are my 2 questions.

Marcelo, thank you for the questions. This is Enrique. I'm going to tackle the first one and then pass it on to Maik for the second one. On the mining segment, no, we don't expect an improvement in the second half of the year as we have been, I mean, informing in past conferences, I mean, the mining sector is going to continue to decline this year based on that reserves, observe the mines have been depleted, and they are in the final mining stage. There are no new projects online, except for one that we know of coming online -- coming on construction at the end of 2025, which I mean additional cement demand would not be expected until 2026 more or less depending on the development of that mine. That's a very important project that will increase, I mean, demand way above what we experienced in past years, but we're still in this period of 2, 3 years with the lower volumes in this segment.

Regarding the CapEx, so or the capital allocation, again, the priorities were we want to grow the company and taking our opportunities in our own hands with you, that's a project specifically, that's our top priority, executing against that. And as we have stated, that's on target, on schedule and we're deploying that capital there. We also have a handful of other growth projects. However, we're very disciplined in how we invest in those. Some of those are related to our distribution network and terminal network. And some of those investments are related to the overall sustainability strategy, which we really believe will make us more profitable and stronger as a company including investments in alternative fuels. As we have stated, which, by the way, supports also the positive cost development that we have alternative fuels as a tool to manage the cost side. Secondly, as I mentioned, we have some ambitious targets to lower the clinker factor, so investing in the plants with growth capital for grinding enhancement, for distribution enhancements to really lower that clinker factor. Also along those lines, we're looking for opportunities on the cementitious materials side, so raw materials that can be introduced included in the planet cement, and those are very specific projects where we're allocating capital. And then finally, around the -- CapEx around energy projects, our solar projects, as we've mentioned, some of them still small today, but we're learning and we're experimenting and we see some real opportunities to grow those and to scale those up. And again, they will make us more stable when it comes to cost and also a large contribution on the sustainability journey. So that's our #1 focus. Then secondly, of course, as I mentioned, we're very active in the market to find the right acquisition opportunity, either in cement or in aggregate. And we're very optimistic. We have good conversations, clear engagement there. And that's going to be a priority to be ready, to be able to make those acquisitions, and that's a key element of our capital allocation. Regarding the dividends, I think we have been very consistent over the last few years. We have increased the dividends about 15% year-over-year. That's an important element to return back to the shareholders. And I think we have good alignment within the team, good guidance from the board that that's the goal to continue that. And then the last element I would mention we have a small but important buyback program to take advantage of -- if there are opportunities, again, to see how we can allocate capital to that. That's a small element but important to mention as well. So that's an overall summary how we see that capital allocation.

Our next question is from [ Andres Carboas ] with Citigroup.

I have 2 questions. The first one, from my talks, we defer in industry players, it seems like as of May the industry dynamics were relatively okay. So it seems that June saw some disruptions. I was interested on understanding. If you could share some early color about how July is going so far and how confident are you about the visibility you have for the second half of the year? And the second point is you have been mentioning how low gas prices are. I was wondering if you have the ability to hedge these cost towards 2025.

Yes. As we mentioned, I mean, we began seeing some decrease in volumes in May, again, part of it weather-related June was a more drastic drop. I would say July is better in terms of our expectations. I mean, it's improving compared to what we saw in June. So for the rest of the year, I mean, we think that, as I said in the guidance, we may end up flat with -- in comparison to last year. So that's what we're seeing in terms of volumes. In terms of gas, I mean, definitely, I mean, we're always looking at opportunities. I mean, to hedge our position. And obviously, we do it naturally, of course, with our own coal and reserves and mine. But on the market directly, yes, our energy team is always looking at opportunities to fix I mean, part of the consumption of gas at a certain price that we believe is going to be advantageous based on what we see in the future demand curve. So yes, we are very active and very dynamic in doing that all the time.

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes our question-and-answer session. I'd like to turn the floor back to Ms. Ogushi.

Thank you, everyone. We appreciate taking the time today to join us and for your interest in GCC. We look forward to speaking with all of you soon.

This concludes today's conference. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation.