Minerals Technologies Inc. (NYSE:MTX) Q2 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Doug Dietrich: Yes, Dan, I’ll just – I’ll add to that. My comments were a positive second half to the year, and the reason we have that view is because going into the third quarter, we see a lot of the destocking actions that we saw in the first and second ending, right? So, we see a positive third quarter. And then even further out, some of the areas like in personal care and some of the other areas that are very profitable for the company, we see those order books or expect to see those order books turning north. So, we’ve got a number of positive items coming at us in the second half, and that’s what gives us the confidence to kind of make the statements we did.

Daniel Moore: Very helpful. It sounds like if there is a little bit of a seasonal dip, it’ll be lighter than what we’ve seen previously given all those factors that you just described. Maybe the last question for me would be from a capital allocation perspective, what you laid out at the Investor Day was EBITDA above $500 million, free cashflow conversion of 7% of revenue. By our estimates, that could be $700 million, $750 million plus of cashflow over the kind of planning period. Talk about, I guess, near term is a focus to maybe pay down a little bit of debt. But how far would you want to push your leverage down before maybe thinking about being more aggressive, be it M&A, or even wrapping up on buybacks? Thanks.

Doug Dietrich: Yes. I think in the near-term, given what we see as savings in terms of interest and making sure our balance sheet is in good shape around that two times leverage, that’s where our focus is going to be. And like Erik said, we think just with the cashflow generation in the back half of the year, we should be able to hit that target. As we go forward, we’ll look at the environment. We’ll look at where interest rates are, but we’re always looking for growth and potential acquisitions that fit the company. And short of those, we’ll allocate that capital to shareholders. And we usually do that through share repurchases, although we’re looking at all different ways to make sure that our allocation to shareholders is appropriate.

So, right now, I think for the rest of the year, we’re going to be looking at debt paydown, getting the balance sheet to our target levels, see how things pan out next year with acquisitions. If not, that excess cashflow that you noted that we’ll be generating, we’ll be steering that to shareholders. We do tend to keep some on the balance sheet opportunistically, so we’ll do that. But usually at least 50% of our excess free cashflow goes to shareholders, 50% of the balance sheet so that we make sure that we have some money for small acquisitions here and there that may pop up.

Daniel Moore: Perfect. Appreciate it. I’ll jump back with any follow-up. Thanks.

Operator: Our next question comes from the line of Mike Harrison with Seaport Research Partners.

Mike Harrison: Hi. Good morning. Looking at the PC&H subsegment, and that up 6% year-on-year number, I believe you said that pet care was up 15%. It would kind of imply that the other piece, I believe pet care is 75% of that business or so. So, it would imply that the other non-pet care piece was down like 20%, and it sounded like edible oil was up, animal health was up. So, maybe just help me understand kind of how pronounced that destocking impact was as you look at some of those other pieces of consumer, particularly the personal care piece.