Dycom Industries, Inc. (NYSE:DY) Q3 2024 Earnings Call Transcript

Steven Nielsen: Yes, Alex. With respect to the change order, we’re not going to provide any detail by customer other than we’re pleased that we’re working through closing out projects on a large program. And I guess what I would focus on is if you exclude the effect of that activity, we’re still at, call it, 12.9% EBITDA margins, a place where we haven’t been in a long time, and we feel good about that trend continuing as we close that program out. And as I said earlier, I hope the results get better and less volatile. I think when we get into timing of CapEx by quarter or by year, I think every customer is a little bit different. They have different seasonality in their business, where we work for them seasonally can be a little bit different. And I’m not sure I would extend 1 customer’s comments to more broadly for the entire industry. We see plenty of things to do next year.

Operator: And our next question will come from Alex Rygiel from B. Riley Securities.

Alex Rygiel: Very nice quarter, Steve. A couple of quick questions. A lot of equipment vendors have seen, anticipated a notable decline in demand for fiber and conduit products. Some of it’s obviously likely due to channel inventory corrections. Are you seeing any kind of softness out there that kind of reconciles with what the equipment vendors are saying? And if not, sort of what’s your take on that?

Steven Nielsen: Alex, it’s a hard one. We certainly pay attention to what goes on on that space. I think your suspicion that it’s largely channel-related makes sense. I mean 1 of the interesting and notable numbers for this quarter is if you exclude a couple of customers who were more front half loaded this year and you pull them out of this quarter and the year ago quarter, everybody else was up 30% organically. That everybody else is $900 million, $950 million of revenue. So I think we’re seeing a pretty broad level of activity. Clearly, the pandemic changed order patterns for equipment, and I guess the good news for us is we don’t import labor so we don’t have to figure out what’s stuck in the logistics supply chain like they do.

Alex Rygiel: And then on a kind of apples-to-apples basis, comparable basis, sort of excluding maybe a large program that may have been completed now. How do you think about profit margins today? Obviously, your guidance is very strong in the upcoming quarter as it relates to profit margins year-over-year. Is that sustainable? And can we grow from that level?

Steven Nielsen: I think, Alex, another interesting number is if you look at our trailing 4 quarters EBITDA, it’s at 11.9%. We have talked for a number of years about getting back to what we had said is a long-term average. We’re through it, and I think as we’ve said before, we’re not aspiring to be average so we’re going to keep working on improving margins. There’s always things that we can do better. There’s always new opportunities. And I think that, again, if you look at the demand backdrop — and maybe take a longer view. It’s interesting that as a public company, sometimes we get lots of — and we, ourselves, think about the business a little bit short term. But if you take a longer view and go back 10 years ago to the 4 quarters ended October of 2013, the company had less than $1.8 billion of revenue and right at $200 million of EBITDA, and for this most recent 4 quarters, it’s over $4.1 billion of revenue and almost $500 million of EBITDA.

And the EBITDA grew faster than the revenue, which would tell you that margins can grow over time when we take a longer view.

Operator: And our next question will come from Eric Luebchow from Wells Fargo.

Eric Luebchow: Steve, you touched a little bit on this in the transcript and you talked about this. You had 2 of your large telco customers that had pulled forward CapEx in early calendar 2023, and you mentioned you saw some telcos that we’re starting to see some signs of them ramping. Maybe you could talk about the timing of that? Do you kind of see the Q3 numbers as effectively the bottom and you see activity levels picking up into next year? Or is it still a little bit tough to predict with those 2 customers that we’ve talked about the last couple of quarters?

Steven Nielsen: Yes. I won’t speak specifically to those 2 customers, but I would tell you that we see indicators of growth into next year already in the business. Now we’re only halfway through the quarter, but we’re seeing projects that are getting released that have been service dates next year, so I think we feel good about that. And again, I think in an environment where people may not like exactly the absolute level of what cost of capital is, but they have a pretty good idea of what it is and what it’s going to be and some hope that it may decline over the next 12 months, I think they’re feeling good about plans for next year.

Eric Luebchow: Okay. I appreciate that. And I also wanted to touch on — I know you don’t typically speak about specific customers, but you had a big increase in revenue from Charter. I assume the majority of that was from the Bigham Cable acquisition. But maybe you could talk about opportunities for that customer above and beyond acquired revenues in terms of they have a large [indiscernible] program that they’re building out in rural America over the next couple of years and they seem to be ramping up CapEx? Is that a customer that we think you have future growth opportunity with above and beyond the Bigham transaction?

Steven Nielsen: Yes. On an adjusted basis, Eric, so excluding the acquired revenues, the growth with Charter was just over 97%, so we’re certainly executing well in both the legacy business and the acquired business. We’re working hard to meet their expectations, and they have some big plans.

Operator: [Operator Instructions] And our next question will come from Avi Jaroslawicz from UBS.

Avi Jaroslawicz: On for Steve Fisher. So you said that as the cost of capital stops increasing so much that you’re expecting that the CapEx plans are going to fluctuate less, can you remind us if that’s something that you’re hearing from customers themselves or just based on your experience?