Primo Water Corporation (NYSE:PRMW) Q3 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Key initiatives to be funded from our CapEx plan include driving organic growth, including investments in digital capabilities, leading dispenser innovation, building a more environmentally friendly fleet, as well as investing in our private fleet, which will allow for a more efficient distribution of our products, installing more efficient water production lines, which will reduce water usage and increase productivity, and driving growth in refill and filtration with refreshed signage and branding of our existing units, the development of our on-the-go units, and new filtration innovations. For the full year 2023, we continue to expect interest expense of approximately $70 million to $75 million. Most of our interest expense is tied to our two senior note debt facilities with very low interest rates of approximately 4%, with maturity dates of 2028 and 2029.

The balance of our interest expense is tied to our cash flow revolver that we are actively managing lower with excess cash, while rates remain at approximately 7%. Due to the increased cash generation from the business and the management of CapEx and working capital items, we’ve been able to prioritize reducing our cash flow revolver by $76 million in the third quarter alone. Full year 2023 cash taxes are expected to be approximately $25 million. This anticipates utilization of US net operating losses, or NOLs. We still have a substantial amount of US NOLs available in the balance of 2023 and 2024. As a reminder, our Water Dispenser category was previously under a 25% import tariff, but was reclassified last year and a refund process was initiated.

We have recorded the refunds in the same manner as the original transactions. Through Q3, we have received approximately $5.1 million of tariff refunds, a slight increase since last quarter. Approximately $2.4 million of the $5.1 million is reflected in year-to-date adjusted EBITDA related to water dispensers sold to retail. A similar $2.4 million is related to the water dispensers that we rent as CapEx, with the residual value approximately $326,000 related to interest income for the year-to-date tariff balance paid to Primo. Through Q3, $5.1 million is reflected in our adjusted free cash flow guidance that we’ll discuss in a moment. We have not included any additional refund amounts in our updated guidance through the uncertain timing of the refund process.

As we look at our performance in the first three quarters of the year, we are confident in our ability to raise our annual adjusted free cash flow guidance to $160 million, an increase of $10 million. The $10 million increase from prior guidance is attributable to the slight increase in tariff receipts since last quarter, with the balance related mainly to the benefits in working capital actions across the quarter and anticipated into year-end. We are pleased to report that we have achieved our targeted adjusted net leverage ratio with the latest quarter coming in at 2.9 times, which is below our 3.0 time target for the end of 2023, and we remain committed to achieve a targeted net leverage ratio of less than 2.5 times after the completion of the transaction.

Our year-to-date tuck-in M&A activity, along with potential acquisitions for the remainder of the year, positions us to achieve the high end of our 2023 tuck-in purchase guidance of $20 million to $30 million. Acquisitions remain a complementary source of customer acquisition. Whether we acquire organically or through the acquisition of the customer base of tuck-ins, both are means of scaling our customer base. The cost per customer acquired through acquisition is typically similar to other means of acquisition. However, the difference lies in the stickiness of the customer. Customers acquired through tuck-in acquisitions are already users of the service and understand the benefits and annual costs of Water Direct service. We remain committed to Water Direct tuck-ins to accelerate density in our operating regions and provide operating scale.

Our cash flow and balance sheet enable us to simultaneously return value to shareholders through regular quarterly dividends and opportunistic share repurchases, while continuing to invest in internal and external opportunities that will further strengthen our operations and drive long-term growth. Our Board of Directors has authorized a quarterly dividend of $0.08 per common share, which continues our path to the multi-year dividend step-up with an increase in our quarterly dividend per share of $0.01 in each of the last two years. As it relates to the transaction announced this morning, we are very excited about Primo Water’s financial profile on a go-forward basis. We remain confident in our ability to achieve previously communicated 2024 financial targets, and this transaction will allow us to accelerate several of these targets by up to a year sooner than anticipated.

The transaction will also allow Primo Water to focus on the North American business that contributes most of the financial benefits to the company. Across the board, the transaction yields greater financial outcomes across margin and adjusted free cash flow conversion metrics. While the notional value of adjusted EBITDA and free cash flow declines, the conversion of each future dollar increases significantly. This reflects the scale present in the North American business. When you take our updated 2023 full-year adjusted free cash flow guidance of $160 million, the new Primo Water will deliver approximately $140 million of that benefit. As we right-size the company across 2024, we expect to replace nearly all of the $20 million of adjusted free cash flow by optimizing the cost structure of the company.

This is prior to the additional organic and acquired free cash flow growth that will occur in normal course throughout the year. Immediately upon close, we intend to repay the outstanding balance on our cash flow revolver, as well as increase and fulfill the newly authorized $75 million share repurchase program. The additional proceeds will provide financial flexibility to pursue organic growth, accelerate accretive Water Direct tuck-in acquisitions, and engage in acquisition opportunities complementary and adjacent to our core North American water businesses. To achieve the $20 million in business optimization previously discussed, we intend to engage outside consultants to support initiatives to drive efficiencies as we shift from a global organization to one focused solely on the North American market.