Conagra Brands, Inc. (NYSE:CAG) Q4 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Steve Powers: Okay. Yes. Fair enough. Thank you very much.

Dave Marberger: Thanks.

Operator: Our next question is from Bryan Spillane with Bank of America. Please go ahead with your question.

Bryan Spillane: Good morning guys. Peter actually asked part of my working capital questions. That was helpful. I guess a follow-on to that is just thinking longer term about deleveraging and the 3x by the end of fiscal ‘26. That’s probably a year behind what we thought. Is there anything that you see now impacting free cash flow conversion or maybe how you will need to manage the maturity pay-down that sort of takes you a little bit longer to get to 3x?

Dave Marberger: Yes. No. I – first of all, we put that out there. This is the first time we have actually put a date on the 30. No, we don’t see anything material that should impact free cash flow. I tried to give some good color on kind of how we are seeing ‘24. Paying down debt is our priority. So, I will be crystal clear on that. Given where interest rates are, we are about 88% of our debt is fixed, so we still have that 12% that’s variable. And obviously, with interest rates going up, it’s pushing 6% on the cost of that debt. So, paying that down is going to have a real cash financial benefit to us. So, we are very motivated to generate the discretionary cash flow and pay down debt. That’s our priority for ‘24 and really beyond.

Bryan Spillane: And then is there anything on the working capital side from an inventory management perspective, I guess that’s the key source of the slight tailwind you mentioned? Is there anything we should be thinking about with pacing of working capital through the year, just as an extension on the working capital comment before?

Dave Marberger: So generally, we finished ‘23 at the days on hand that we are very comfortable with, but we do have a seasonality to the business, too, right. So, when you look at the flow, we usually build inventory as we go through our first quarter into our second quarter. So, during the course of the year, you will see sort of an inventory build work capital build and then it comes back as the year progresses. But that’s our normal seasonality for Conagra.

Bryan Spillane: Got it. Thanks Dave.

Dave Marberger: Thank you.

Operator: And our last question today will come from Matt Smith with Stifel. Please go ahead with your question.

Matt Smith: Hi. Good morning. Wanted to ask a follow-up question on elasticities, I know that in the fourth quarter, your elasticities overall were in line with peers and below the historical level, but part of the consumer softening that we have seen has led to softer elasticities overall for Conagra and the total store. And more fiscally Conagra’s elasticity relative to peers has weakened and moved more towards the historical 1:1 level. So, when we think about the first half of the year and some of the comments you have answered to other questions, is that more in line with how you are thinking about guidance elasticity is holding near what we have seen more recently, or was some of the Americold and other disruptions in the fourth quarter impacting the current trends?

Sean Connolly: No, I think you are looking at what you are calling elasticity is in far too simplistic a manner. You can’t calculate in elasticity by looking at total volume change, looking at total price change and saying that’s your elasticity because there are many factors that go into what happens with volumes. So, not to get too technical here, but elasticity analytics measure a consumer demand response to a change in pricing at a brand level and in a time period following that pricing action. And those analyses have consistently, including recently shown consumer response to brand level pricing actions has been benign compared to historical norms. That remains true for Conagra. It remains true for our peer set. As I mentioned in my prepared remarks, our elasticities, they softened a little in Q4, but they remain benign versus historical norms, and they are directionally ahead of the peer groups.