International Flavors & Fragrances Inc. (NYSE:IFF) Q3 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Operator: Our next question comes from the line of Andrew Keches with Barclays.

Andrew Keches: Congrats on the quarter. Just to confirm, in the past, you’ve mentioned the 3.0x net debt-to-EBITDA as a level you plan to hit in 2024. So I guess just based on where you are in the asset sale discussions, do you still have confidence and visibility into achieving that level next year? Or is there some risk that, that gets extended? I know the covenant horizon was pushed out about a year to early ’26. So any help on the time line would be great.

Glenn Richter: We are — great question, Andrew. We’re very confident that relative to our current M&A activity in the market, it will allow us to accomplish our goal of 3x or less. And it should be — we should be able to accomplish it by the end of next year. This is always a — there’s always, I’ll say, a timing element relative to closing transactions given the separation, legal entity changes, those sort of things. But barring sort of a normal path, we should be in good shape by the end of next year.

Operator: That will conclude the question-and-answer session. I will now turn the call over to Frank for closing remarks.

Frank Clyburn: So first, I want to start by thanking all of our IFF FERC colleagues around the world and all of the tremendous work that they are focused on to really help our customers and to continue to innovate. Our vision as a company is truly to be the innovative leader in essential solutions, and we’re very proud of the progress that we’re making through this quarter. And I also want to thank everyone for joining our call. We look forward to our fourth quarter update and full year guidance for ‘24 update in February, and I wish everyone well, and thanks for joining our call.

Operator: That concludes today’s conference call. Thank you for your participation. I hope you have a wonderful rest of your day.