MarineMax, Inc. ($HZO)

Good day, and welcome to the MarineMax, Inc. Fiscal 2026 Second Quarter Conference Call. Today's call is being recorded. [Operator Instructions] I would now like to turn the call over to Scott Solomon of the company's Investor Relations firm, Sharon Merrill Advisors. Please go ahead, sir.

Thank you, operator, and good morning, everyone. Hosting today's call are Brett McGill, MarineMax's Chief Executive Officer and President; and Mike McLamb, the company's Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Brett will begin the call by discussing MarineMax's operating performance, strategic priorities and recent highlights. Mike will review the financial results and the company's fiscal 2026 financial guidance. Brett will make some concluding comments, and then management will be happy to take your questions. The earnings release and supplemental presentation associated with today's announcement can be found at investor.marinemax.com. And with that, I'll turn the call over to Mike. Mike?

Thank you, Scott. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining this call. I'd like to start by reminding you that certain of our comments are forward-looking statements as defined by the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Any forward-looking statements speak only as of today. These statements involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from expectations. These risks include, but are not limited to, the impact of seasonality and weather, global economic conditions and the level of consumer spending, the company's ability to capitalize on opportunities or grow its market share and numerous other factors identified in the company's most recently filed 10-K and 10-Q and other filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The company disclaims any intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. On today's call, we will make comments referring to non-GAAP financial measures. We believe that the inclusion of these financial measures helps investors gain a meaningful understanding of the changes in the company's core operating results. These measures can also help investors who wish to make comparisons between MarineMax and other companies on both a GAAP and a non-GAAP basis. The reconciliation of non-GAAP financial measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures is available in today's earnings release. With that, let me turn the call over to Brett. Brett?

Thank you, Mike. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today to discuss our second quarter performance. Before getting into the quarter, I want to thank our MarineMax teams across our organization. Their focus, discipline and commitment to our customers is unwavering even in what remains a more challenging and dynamic retail operating environment. Our second quarter results demonstrate the benefits and durability of MarineMax's diversified integrated business model and the progress we've made in reshaping the operations to perform across a range of environments. While retail demand and margins for new and used boats remained pressured during the quarter, we delivered gross margin of 34.4%, expanding 440 basis points year-over-year, driven by continued strength across our higher-margin businesses. Macroeconomic uncertainty and geopolitical dynamics continue to weigh on consumer confidence throughout the quarter, and that pressure was evident in double-digit unit declines for the industry. Due to the strength of our leading customer-focused approach, our team was again able to outperform the industry. However, we certainly were not immune from the impact. As expected, revenue in the quarter was down given the difficult comparison with last year, but the softness was more pronounced than anticipated. Having said that, our higher-margin revenue streams continue to benefit our consolidated operations, finance and insurance, parts and service, brokerage, superyacht services and our vast marina portfolio, including IGY, once again provided balance and margin stability, helping to offset cyclicality of retail boat sales. This quarter further validates the strategic intent behind our diversification. Over time, we've deliberately expanded MarineMax beyond traditional boat retail to build a more resilient and higher-quality business model, and that mix shift is increasingly evident in our gross margin performance. Today, MarineMax is uniquely positioned in the industry as an integrated model that others simply can't replicate. Each of our higher-margin businesses generally performed at or above our expectations. IGY is performing well and continues to benefit from its outstanding reputation as the only world-class operator of luxury marinas from the Caribbean to the United States and across the Mediterranean. IGY recently renewed its relationship with St. Katharine Docks in London, a highly visible strategic marina. IGY was also recently appointed Marina Advisor for the Il Monte Galala Marina Towers project on Egypt's Red Sea Coast. This engagement is part of a broader strategic partnership and is a capital-light, advisory-driven way to deploy IGY's expertise, operating standards and global brand. Technology is also becoming an increasingly important differentiator for MarineMax. Through New Wave Innovations, we continue to invest in digital platforms designed to enhance the customer experience, increase efficiency and support long-term growth. Our technology portfolio now includes multiple products across the enterprise, including Boatyard, our all-in-one platform for marine service management. Boatyard continues to gain traction with subscribers up 47%, demonstrating how our digital tools can strengthen customer engagement and deepen loyalty. More broadly, New Wave Innovations is steadily increasing the technology and data content of our business, which we view as a key driver of long-term value creation. Both Cruisers and Intrepid have launched new models, which are being well received. While all manufacturers are clearly impacted by the soft environment, developing and launching new models is a proven way for brands to gain share, especially in tough times. From a market standpoint, we are navigating a challenging near-term environment, but we continue to see resilience in the recreational marine consumer, particularly in premium segments. Recent boat shows, including the Palm Beach International Boat Show, produced strong results, reinforcing the demand in our premium categories. We continue to see healthy engagement with premium brands, which is also reflected in the continued strength in our superyacht service operations. Months ago, it was widely expected that the industry would return to positive new unit sales during the spring or summer. Industry inventory continues to normalize, but added uncertainty due to geopolitical concerns throws into question the timing of when unit sales turn positive. Regardless, we did see very modest boat margin improvement in the March quarter and are optimistic that similar improvement could be in store for the summer. While a small step, the boat margin improvement is important for us as well as for the industry. Additionally, our balance sheet remains very strong and is a competitive advantage in this environment. Disciplined inventory management, lower floor plan exposure and solid liquidity provides us with meaningful flexibility as we move into the summer selling season. That financial strength allows us to better protect margins, manage inventory proactively and remain highly selective in how we allocate capital through the cycle with a focus on returns and flexibility. Taken together, the quarter highlights the value of the diversified model we have built, one that is designed not only to perform in favorable conditions, but also to remain resilient during periods of uncertainty. With that, I'll turn the call over to Mike to walk through the financial results in more detail. Mike?

Thank you, Brett. I also want to recognize our teams across the globe for their strong performance in a tough environment. It's great to see the success of our diversified business model. For the quarter, revenue was $527 million. We expected revenue to be down given the comparison, but it was softer than expected due to the increased global uncertainty. Most of the decline was due to a 15% decrease in same-store sales, driven by lower new and used boat revenue. Overall, our comparable units were down in the mid-single digits, which is much better than the industry overall. Our average unit selling price declined due to mix. Last year's March quarter had the benefit of delayed hurricane closings from Florida, which increased last year's mix of larger boats. Turning to margins. As Brett noted, gross margin expanded 440 basis points to 34.4%, driven by strength in our higher-margin businesses. Higher-margin businesses, including our service and parts, finance and insurance, superyacht services and marinas, including IGY, all performed well in the quarter, growing as a percentage of revenue and importantly, year-over-year in absolute dollars. SG&A expenses, excluding changes in contingent consideration, transaction-related costs, weather-related impacts and other items noted in the press release increased slightly year-over-year. Many of the higher-margin businesses, while more profitable than traditional boat sales have a higher expense structure. This, combined with more aggressive marketing in a tough environment, drove the modest expense growth. Interest expense declined by more than $3.5 million, driven by lower inventory and lower rates. Adjusted EBITDA was $23.9 million compared with $30.9 million, reflecting the impact of lower new and used boat sales, partially offset by our stronger margin mix. Adjusted earnings per diluted share were $0.04 compared with $0.24 last year. Turning to the balance sheet. Cash was a very healthy $189 million at the end of the quarter. Inventories declined roughly $130 million from a year ago to $845 million and were also down from our fiscal year-end. This is encouraging given that inventories typically grow seasonally from September through March. Customer deposits increased sequentially and year-over-year to about $62 million, which is also good to see. Through our disciplined approach, we improved both our current ratio and our total liabilities to tangible net worth ratio. At the same time, we maintained a healthy net debt to adjusted EBITDA ratio of just over 2x at quarter end. Before turning to guidance, it's important to remember that last year, in the first 6 months ending March, even in a challenging environment, MarineMax delivered flat year-over-year revenue and EBITDA. Our performance and that of the industry dramatically weakened following Liberation Day. As we entered fiscal 2026, we expected and guided that the first half will be more difficult given those elevated prior year comparisons. As we move into the second half, we are now beginning to lap the Liberation Day weaker periods, which should result in more favorable year-over-year comparisons. This context is important to remember from a guidance and expectation perspective. After considering operating conditions, recent industry registration trends, retail performance and other relevant factors, we are reaffirming our fiscal 2026 outlook for adjusted EBITDA for the year to be in the range of $110 million to $125 million, and adjusted net income to be in the range of approximately $0.40 to $0.95 per diluted share. Our guidance reflects our disciplined approach to the current environment alongside continued progress in expanding the mix of our business toward higher-margin reoccurring and service-oriented revenue streams. With the first half of the fiscal year behind us, our full year outlook continues to assume industry unit volumes will range from modestly down to modestly up, reflecting ongoing demand dynamics. Same-store sales for fiscal 2026 are still expected to be flattish, primarily driven by a favorable product and segment mix and improvements in the back half summer selling season. While retail margin pressure persisted through the first half, we expect industry conditions to modestly improve in the back half of the year alongside more meaningful progress in industry inventory levels compared with the second half of fiscal 2025. Driven by continued growth in our higher-margin segments, we remain confident in our ability to sustain consolidated gross margins in the low 30% range for the year. Our guidance continues to incorporate interest rate reductions announced to date and assumes an effective annual tax rate of 26.5%, along with an average diluted share count of approximately 22.8 million shares. These estimates exclude the impact of any material acquisitions or other unexpected events, including changes in broader global economic environment. April trends generally have been up versus last year, which is what we anticipated versus the softness following Liberation Day. Since early March, we have seen periods of very strong retail trends followed by weaker periods, but overall trends have been improving. We do realize that world events and other factors can change consumer behavior quickly in one direction or another, but today, trends would result in positive same-store sales for April as expected. Now I'll turn the call back over to Brett for closing comments. Brett?

Thanks, Mike. Looking ahead, we recognize that geopolitical uncertainty and broader macroeconomic conditions may continue to influence consumer behavior over the coming quarters. Against that backdrop, our outlook reflects a balanced assessment of the operating environment and a disciplined approach to execution. Continued growth in our higher-margin businesses provides us both flexibility and resilience as we navigate near-term variability while positioning MarineMax to drive attractive long-term value creation for our shareholders. Over the long term, we remain confident in the strength of the recreational marine market, particularly in premium segments and in our ability to drive sustainable long-term value creation. Now Mike and I would be happy to take your questions. So operator, please open up the line for Q&A.

[Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from the line of Joe Altobello with Raymond James.

I want to talk about the guidance for a second. You mentioned on the call earlier that the industry was a little bit softer and your own revenue was a little bit softer than you anticipated for the fiscal second quarter, but you maintained the full year. Is it just that the quarter is really just too small to matter all that much and the second half is much larger? I'm just curious why maintain guidance when 2Q was a little bit below expectations?

Yes. Joe, I can answer that. Good question. So Q2 -- so I think I'll give you some color on the quarter. So January was doing reasonably well, as we had said on our January call. February is a little lighter. And then when the war started in late February, early March, March started soft, but finished pretty well. And we commented about the Palm Beach Boat Show doing pretty well. And we talk about current trends being strong or being pretty good, which is what we expected with April being -- looking like it's going to be up. And so that's playing to what we expected when this fiscal year started, which was the first half was going to be the tougher comparisons. The second half was going to be the easier comparison. So we still feel generally pretty good about that. And so we're still comfortable with the unit thoughts, with the revenue thought with the same-store sales range, all of that within the guidance. The quarter's EBITDA was kind of around where we expected. We always try to do better, but the revenue was a little lighter because of how March started primarily.

Okay. That's helpful. Maybe just a follow-up on that. I think the expectation was, as you mentioned, the second half with the easier compares, we start to see some better top line plus better margins as promotional intensity ease. Are you starting to see that level off here in April?

Yes. I'd comment that in the March quarter, we did comment that overall boat margins did modestly improve. And I got to stress the word modestly. They modestly improved. I think everybody is still kind of aggressive in the wintertime. I would expect that as we go through the summer, as inventory levels continue to normalize, we will continue to see modest improvement in margins, which is what we had anticipated.

Our next question comes from the line of James Hardiman with Citi.

So to the margin question, I've been following you guys a long time. I can never quite nail down the margins ahead of time. I think last quarter, gross margins were down, call it, 440 basis points. This quarter, up about 440 basis points. Maybe help us think through the back half of the year, 3Q versus 4Q. I'm assuming we won't see swings that large in either direction during either of those quarters, but maybe help us think through sort of back half margins and what you expect? Obviously, a bunch of moving parts, not just sort of what's happening in the underlying boat business, sort of the mix effect of the non-boat businesses seems like it's a big factor at least here or was here in the second quarter. So maybe how to think through those items going forward?

Yes. I'll address some of the swings you mentioned. When -- clearly, when same-store sales are strong or weak, it could impact the consolidated gross margins because -- like in this quarter, when same-store sales were weak, then all of your higher-margin businesses, everything from service parts, F&I, marinas, superyachts, it all -- those are all being steady or growing. So they grow as a percentage of the business, which will definitely skew the margin higher, which happened this quarter to a degree. But my point was they all grew in absolute dollars also. If you go to the December quarter, we had stronger same-store sales growth on top of the previous year's hurricane. So that kind of helps to explain some of the swings. In this June quarter, we're now up against a minus 9% comp from last year. For us to achieve the -- our guidance, which is about flattish same-store sales growth, we pretty much need to see growth this quarter. And if you have -- depending on the strength of the growth, it could drive margins -- consolidated margins down from the 34% as an example. But when you work your way through the whole year, our margins should be at or above kind of where we finished last year, partly because of this -- well, two reasons, the strength of the higher-margin businesses growing and then the modest improvement in boat margins.

That is -- that's really helpful. And then I guess maybe dig into the inventory side of things. I think on the last call, you had hoped to be in a pretty good place coming out of the first half. Just looking at your balance sheet, it looks like inventories are down about 13%. I guess, a, is that a clean number? There sometimes there are some sort of one-off offsets there that we should be factoring in. But if so, sort of are you in a good place from an inventory perspective, both in terms of aggregate amounts and aging of inventory, but anything to note there?

Yes. I'll comment real quick. Yes, we worked hard to manage our inventory. I think even in light of light boat sales this quarter, still got our inventory in check and managed it properly. And so that obviously puts us in good shape. And I feel good about the quality of our inventory. The aging of inventory is in a good place. We're always obviously working on that, continue to work on it. So heading into the back half of the year here, we set ourselves up in a great inventory position.

Our next question comes from the line of Gregory Miller with Truist Securities.

I'd like to ask on the international front. And maybe starting off with the quarter itself, I'm curious what you saw from consumer sentiment, particularly in Europe and the Middle East over the course of the quarter? And to what extent that consumer sentiment changed with the Iran conflict?

Yes, Greg, I'll comment. I think I'll speak globally, our consumer, even here in the U.S., when you have conflict going on over there, it creates uncertainty, which we've talked about so many times on these calls that uncertainty in our consumer just causes them to wait and pause. That's part of what we saw. So it did affect us. As it relates to consumer sentiment exactly in those areas of the world, we don't really operate retail boat business there. So it's not applicable. But marinas and the operations all, as we noted, are operating according to their budgets. Our superyacht businesses there do have done very well as we put in our earnings. So I think, however, anything going on in the Middle East that is right now is creating uncertainty for consumers worldwide.

Okay. And you mentioned adding in Egypt. I'm curious, would you expect any degree of slowdown in terms of your pipeline of growth as a consequence of Iran at least in the next couple of quarters? Or is it more of all systems go in terms of landing contracts in that part of the world?

Yes. I think all of these types of things we engage in are kind of long-term thinking and take a while to develop anyway. And so I think that -- yes, this is a moment in time when it's not ideal, but that's that project and our services are more of a long-term process.

Our next question comes from the line of Eric Wold with Texas Capital Securities.

I want to kind of go to the comment on customer deposits. I know that's geared towards larger boats. The rate of sequential growth was more than double what you've seen over the past couple of years. How should we read further into that in terms of what you're seeing from that customer and then kind of how that strength might have been kind of throughout the quarter?

Eric, I think that's a great question. I commented on it on the call that it grew sequentially and also year-over-year, which is probably maybe the first time that's happened in a little while. I think it speaks to the -- what we commented about how the month of March kind of played out. It started soft and it gained momentum, and we finished with a pretty good boat show. Some of that growth is deposits and deals that we wrote in the month of March. But I think overall, it just speaks to the consistency and passion that people have for boating and why we think that the back half is going to be better than last year's back half.

Got it. And then a follow-up, taking that, I guess, to the other side of the equation, away from kind of premium larger boats. I know the general read coming out of the boat shows was improving demand around premium larger. Maybe kind of talk about what you're seeing from the lower-priced boats or kind of the other kind of buyer demographic in terms of traffic, leads sentiment, that will be helpful.

I'll comment on -- I'll classify it as good strength in leads and consumer demand, and I'm going to use premium segment, so not just the larger boats. I think that's holding up in our premium product that's, call it, smaller boats. They're not inexpensive, but smaller product is premium. So I think generally, it's not just in the larger boats. It's -- we've seen good strength. And we're hearing good reports lately of product maybe that we don't carry that's lower priced is starting to accelerate, too. So -- yes, good feedback.

Our next question comes from the line of Anna Glaessgen with B. Riley.

I'd like to dig into the progression through the quarter a little bit more. Nice to hear the strong performance at the Palm Beach Boat Show. Should we be taking that as a sign of building momentum through March? Or is there something within that of just better show performance versus performance back home at the dealerships?

I can comment on March and just how the quarter kind of played out. As I mentioned, January was -- as we articulated back then, it was a decent month versus the prior year, not a great month, but a decent month. February was weaker. March started off weaker than we were anticipating. And this way -- this quarter, the way it falls, March is usually as big as January and February combined. So you kind of need March to start like it should, which is strong, and it was weaker because of the war. And then it just gained momentum as the month went on. And the Palm Beach boat show was near the end of the month, which was a very good boat show as we commented. Brett, do you want to comment on...

And the Palm Beach show signifies what we've seen in a lot of shows this year that we've performed very well. You kind of mentioned that, but the show performance was outstanding. And much of that business is -- wasn't captured in our March number and some of it's kind of giving you an indication of how things are looking for April.

Got it. And then just as we contemplate gas prices being high, I guess, historically, to what extent has that affected your customer? And how should we be contemplating that risk to demand?

If you set aside the uncertainty that I spoke about, gas prices, they get extremely high. It does affect the entry-level buyer a little bit more. The premium, premium buyer, they might go a little less and boat a little -- they're still going to go boating, but maybe not go as far. But we have been monitoring our gallons sold over a period of time here. And we -- in some cases, Mike could comment a little further, but we're up in gallons sold.

Yes. Through March, we're up in gallons sold at our marinas, which is something that we do watch just to see. But I think in the past, periods of rising fuel prices, people have just boated for different distances, quite frankly.

And we're so focused on the experience of boating and getting people out on the water and our getaways events continue to be full. People are boating. They're out there on the water. So that's always a positive sign.

Our next question comes from the line of Greg Badishkanian with Wolfe Research.

This is Scott Stringer on for Greg. There's some positive commentary on your inventory positioning at this time. Wondering what your expectations are for the industry and when industry inventories could normalize?

Yes, I can comment. I think in general, the expectation for the industry to normalize was probably supposed to be by now. But given the softness that we've seen in the last 6 months -- or actually the last year following Liberation Day, the expectations are sometime in the June quarter, which could be the end of April, it could be the end of May. What normalizing means is that weeks on hand actually dropped below where they were pre-COVID. So I think today, the industry is still -- maybe it's a week above or something like that. It's not near as bad as it was when the last summer. I think last summer ended, we probably had 3 weeks or maybe a whole month's worth of extra inventory in the channel. It's been cleaning up because manufacturers are not building as much. And then we are -- the industry is selling boats, which is good. But seasonally, it should happen this quarter, which will be a welcome news for the entire industry.

Great. That's helpful. And then just to piggyback off of that, what are your expectations for the promo environment? It sort of sounds like that gets better as these industry inventories improve. Is that a fair characterization?

Clearly, the better shape the inventory for the industry comes in, the promo activity kind of brings -- comes down a little bit. But I will say our manufacturers continue to work with us to get our inventory levels right. They continue to work with us at retail, for example, at all the boat shows to really move through inventory. The more we can sell boats, the more they can keep their pipeline and build products. So we're still having great partnerships with all the manufacturers.

Our next question comes from the line of [ Mike Albanese ] with StoneX.

I think most questions have been asked and answered here, but I just have a clarifying question on these ancillary, I guess, higher-margin businesses for lack of a better term, but there's a lot within there, F&I, brokerage, marina storage, IGY, et cetera. Did you say that they're all comping positive or at the consolidated level, they're comping positive in dollar terms?

No, that's a good question, Mike. No, they're all positive in the March quarter, I specifically referred to and probably even year-to-date in absolute dollars year-over-year, all the different services that we're in.

Our next question comes from the line of David MacGregor with Longbow Research.

This is Joe Nolan on for David. You guys have a nice performance from the higher-margin businesses. Can you just talk about how scalable these businesses are if you continue to see softness in new and used boat sales and just how you're thinking about that in this type of environment?

It is good to see, as you point out, we -- unfortunately, we didn't like having less boat sales for new and used, but it was nice to see all those high-margin businesses perform. If you separate them out and you say superyachts and IGY continue to grow and perform on its own, but so did service and parts within our boat dealerships and at our marinas at the MarineMax stores. So they -- they're all scalable to a degree, but there's some limit on that. The flow of boat sales in most of the MarineMax stores is a critical part to the growth.

Okay. Got it. And then also, can you just bridge the gross margin performance for us? I assume a lot of that was mix, but just talk about some of the other moving parts as well.

Yes. It's almost all mix, Joe. It's -- I commented that boat margins made -- were modestly up, and I do want to underline the word modestly. They did increase, but it was a slight increase year-over-year. The rest of it is all strength in these other businesses that were in these other revenue streams that drove the overall improvement in gross margin.

Our next question comes from the line of Gerrick Johnson with Seaport Research Partners.

Congratulations on your Palm Beach performance. I was there -- I was there and it was clear that your brands, the brands you represent were greatly outperforming. And I want to dig into that a little bit further, you -- some boat trends. I want to ask about center console and offshore fishing. The numbers haven't been good and some of the commentary has been wishy-washy. Can you talk about what's going on in that segment of the market in particular?

Yes. I'll just give some general comments. There's a lot of manufacturers, a lot of product out there in the marketplace. There's a lot of models, and there's brands ranging from the lower value orientation to the upper, maybe even custom side of that. So when things -- when consumers start pausing and waiting and then when they start coming back into it, I mean, it's a lot of product out in the market, and it's kind of an inventory comment as well as just a lot of brands to choose from.

It's -- but I think what you probably saw at Palm Beach, Gerrick, is that the more premium brands definitely performed better. That was our experience at Palm Beach and really it's always our experience that the premium end of the market tends to hold up better almost regardless of the cycle.

Okay. And the recreational fiberglass look very strong. And touching on that, are the European brands with the tariff implication, I realize they're all high-end brands, but has that had any impact on demand or pricing even?

I think some of the softness in our numbers reflects that some of the foreign product has been slow and has been affected. The really large stuff is kind of a little bit immune to that because of the foreign flagging and whatnot, but it is reflected in some of our softness.

And we have reached the end of the question-and-answer session. Now I'll turn the call back over to Mr. McGill for closing remarks.

Well, thank you for all the great questions this morning, and thank you for joining us. We'll keep you -- we look forward to keeping you posted on our progress. Talk to you on the next call.

Thank you. This concludes today's conference, and you may disconnect your lines at this time. We thank you for your participation.