ManpowerGroup Inc. (NYSE:MAN) Q2 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

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Josh Chan: Okay, that’s great. And then I guess for my follow-up, I wanted to ask about the Manpower business within the U.S. I think you guys mentioned that it saw some improvement and then seemingly softened again in Q2. Could you just talk about what you’re seeing there. We’re a little surprised by kind of that trajectory compared to kind of the data points that, that might be out there. So curious any color on that business?

Jack McGinnis: Josh, yes, I’d be happy to talk to that. And maybe just to talk about that trend. So as we exited Q1, we talked about Manpower in the U.S. running at about minus 12%. And the first quarter was the big quarter where we talked about the catch-up that the U.S. was seeing compared to what Europe was seeing much earlier in 2022. So that definitely came through very strong in the first quarter, aligned with exactly what we were seeing in manufacturing PMIs that we talked about in our prepared remarks as well. So what’s happened since then? So ending the first quarter with manufacturing PMIs in the high-40s, we continue to take down and we’re ending here June with a 46.0%. So the manufacturing environment continues to worsen into Q2 and we see that in those trends.

And we did expect to see Manpower to reflect that into the second quarter. So we did expect to see that minus 12%, to see some additional decrease and that’s how we ended up at the minus 17%. Now with that being said, we did highlight the fact that when you look at that minus 17%, it was most heaviest at the beginning of the quarter. And as we ended the quarter, we were starting to see some improvement in that rate of decline. So we’ll see as we look forward to the third quarter, you can see from the guide for the U.S. overall. We’re seeing for the most part, a continuation of the current trends. It might be a bit better, so we might see that on the Manpower side. But that’s the way we’re looking at it right now. And as we did say, we are being cautious for all the reasons that Jonas talked about with some of the dynamics that are playing out in the U.S. market right now, that does reflect our cautious stance going into the third quarter.

Operator: Our next question comes from Jeff Silber with BMO Capital Markets.

Jeff Silber: You talked a little bit about intra-quarter trends in the U.S. Can we get some similar comments on intra-quarter trends in some of your other major markets?

Jack McGinnis: Sure, Jeff. I’d be happy to talk to that. So if you look at France, I’d say the story is that our biggest revenue country, relatively stable during the quarter. So — and that reflects a stable trend from quarter 1 to quarter 2 as well. And intra-quarter, it was about similar about that 1% organic days adjusted rate. May is always a tricky month, particularly in Europe due to the holidays. So a little lower but I wouldn’t read too much into that. I think it’s mostly the holiday effect. But other than that, pretty stable. I’d say with Italy, I’d say similar, we saw maybe a little bit the year-over-year is coming into play a little bit, where maybe May and June were a tad, softer than on a days adjusted basis than what we saw in April.

But overall, I’d say generally pretty consistent. Talked about the U.S. and I’d say on the U.K., the U.K. on an overall basis, we’re coming in on a quarter-over-quarter, very similar at that minus 12% versus Q1. During the course of the second quarter, we did see a little bit more of a pullback in the month of June compared to that overall rate. But days had a big impact which I think once you adjust for the days element there, generally running pretty consistent, I’d say. So — and when you look at our guidance to Q3, it’s really predicting more of the same for the U.K. So there could be and again, a bit of a cautious view. It could be a slight bit better and we’ll just have to see how that turns out.

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