Daseke, Inc. (NASDAQ:DSKE) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

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We’ve demonstrated continued strategic execution, we’ve delivered consistently on our financial performance. We’ve affected a massive share repurchase. And now we look at this and go, look its leverage and margins. We think we’re going to continue through transformational initiatives, re-shifting drivers from LP to company, that will improve margins. Certainly on the next cycle, you’re going to really see more of the benefit of that. And now it’s really focusing on leverage. So that’s the plan.

Greg Gibas: Great, very helpful. Wondering if you could just discuss kind of the outlook on the supply side of the market and maybe update on the timing of your new equipment purchases?

Jonathan Shepko: Sure, so, look — are you referring to our — specifically with respect to our supply or just industry supply, plus on industry supply?

Greg Gibas: part of the first question and then just the update on the timing, maybe this year of new equipment purchases?

Jonathan Shepko: Yeah, so I’ll hit the first, the ladder first. So new equipment purchases for us our front end loaded. We’re looking to make sure that we have that new equipment so we can mobilize it, utilize it, during our kind of peak season, which is Q2 and Q3. So a lot of the CAPEX spend is disproportionately slanted to Q1 and Q2 versus the drive in guys who are focused on having that equipment in front of Q4, their busy season. So it’s a little bit different for us. I mean, typically, we see 75% or so of our CAPEX going out the door in Q1 and Q2. We’re trying to smooth that a little bit this year, so it might be 60 to 65 in Q1 and Q2. That said, we also if you noticed on the slide, we also had about 22 million in rollover CAPEX.

So our Q4 2022 CAPEX number was projected to be 55 million, which is a massive spin in Q4 2022 because of supply chain issues and delivery delays, by the OEMs. We didn’t get all that out the door. So that’s spilling over into mostly Q1 and a part of Q2. So we have an extra $22 million going out the door in Q1 and Q2 on top of our normal cycle, normal replacement cycle CAPEX that is baked into the 145 to 155 of total 2023 CAPEX though. And then supply, look, I mean, I mentioned it to Bert, we’re seeing massive net relocations of carrier authorities based on FMCSA data, 6000 to 8000 carriers per week. If you look at some of the data that orders for January, they’re sequentially down 40%, which is a little higher than normal year-over-year. So January to January, they’re down 12%.

Doesn’t quite jive with the increase in 2023 CAPEX guides that a lot of our peers are giving. So I think people are just being cautiously optimistic. They’re making sure they have the allocations from the OEMs. But they’re not signing up to anything until there’s a little bit more visibility into what Q1 is going to look like. But again, I think we’re already seeing already seeing demand destruction — I am sorry, I keep saying demand destruction, supply destruction, capacity destruction. We’re seeing LP drivers, owner operator drivers leave the market. We do think that that rates are at the bottom or closer to the bottom. And there’s more upside than the downside at this point. I think, a few people have acknowledged this that look on an inflation adjusted basis we’re probably flat if you look at kind of peak 2019 rates to peak 2022 rates, where you look at trough kind of offseason peak, I’ll say that say definitely, offseason peak 2019 rates to offseason peak 2022 rates, both of those are up about 35%.

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