MSA Safety Incorporated (NYSE:MSA) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Nish Vartanian: Yeah, the pipeline is really healthy. When you think about the fire service the municipal budgets and state budgets are really strong. We’ve got the AFG funding coming in again this year. So, there’s a number of orders in the pipeline, some fairly large business. And that’s just a matter of working through the municipalities, and getting their approvals, and pacing from that standpoint. But we’re optimistic about the fire service business. We’re competing well in the marketplace, with our products continue to enhance those products and optimistic about that business regardless as to what the economy does in 2023. That business, as you know is somewhat insulated from an economic recession that may occur in the back half of the year that, represents about 40% of our business. So we’re optimistic about the fire service here in 2023.

Stanley Elliott: Great, guys. That’s it for me. Thanks so much and best of luck.

Nish Vartanian: Thank you, Stanley.

Operator: And the next question is from Rob Mason from Baird. Please go ahead.

Rob Mason: Yes. Good morning, all. I had a question around €“ there was a commentary around your 2023 outlook, but also I think in the press release just aiming for mid-single-digit growth for the year. If that proved to be the case mid-single digit, how would that break down between contributions from price versus volume? And am I correct in thinking that FX is maybe neutral to even slightly positive for the year at this point?

Nish Vartanian: It’s a good question. We €“ as we laid out our scenario planning for 2023. We went through a number of different scenarios on demand price and there’s even some backlog there. So we went through various scenarios. And the pricing, we’re going to get some price, which is the overhang we’ll have from our fourth quarter 2022 price increase. So as we go through the first nine months of 2023, we’ll get some price there. And then, we’re looking at some demand unit volume increasing. We do think in some of those core markets that we have the fire service business, oil and gas business, we’ll probably see low-single-digit growth in those areas and then the price on top of that gets us to that mid-single-digit level.

So that’s how we come to that scenario. And we’ve worked through a number of different scenarios, based on a possible economic slowdown in the back half of the year. There’s the possibility of maybe obtaining some additional price in 2023. But we’re still working through those scenarios and we’ll see how the year plays out. And then obviously, backlog plays into all of this, and having an opportunity to possibly reduce backlog as supply chains improve for us. So there’s a lot of variables that could play out here in 2023 but we keep coming back to, regardless of the scenario we go through that we have a high degree of confidence in that mid-single-digit growth rate.

Rob Mason: Nish, how — go ahead.

Lee McChesney: Just going to add your FX question was, hey, you have — I think it’s a pretty good view. It will be a bit of a headwind in the first half of the year and then be a positive in the back half. It will be a slight negative based on the current FX, Rob, right now.

Rob Mason: For the year, okay. Nish or Lee, just how are you — you speak to orders. Just maybe dissect between your longer cycle and shorter cycle, longer cycle fire service may be set aside because it’s — on its own dynamic. But fixed gas and flame detection, I think are being longer cycle more potentially some project-based, and then shorter cycle obviously, industrial PPE. But can you speak to the two dynamics going on there?