Pactiv Evergreen Inc. (NASDAQ:PTVE) Q1 2024 Earnings Call Transcript

Jon Baksht : In terms of some of the impact of kind of inflation impacts on resins, we are seeing some of that. I think we’re seeing, on a cost perspective, probably two places in resin, and then also on maybe on some transportation. I’ll take them in pieces. So from a resin standpoint, we largely have pass-throughs on the resin for the majority of the business. And so we do expect to recover that. We’ve made a lot of efforts to reduce the lag that we have for those recovery programs. And so really, on a year over — on this year basis, you really shouldn’t see much of an impact. Really where you might see it is if we have a big spike or a big decrease at the end of the year, kind of November, December, and we don’t recover that within year, that might have an impact on our annual results.

So really anything that you’re seeing coming in the near midterm really shouldn’t be an impact to the P&L. We do pass a lot of that through. I think, and then as it relates to the transportation, we’re relatively flat. We pass that through as well. We have some good passes as it relates to customers. Where it impacts us, it could see an impact is on our transfer freight as we move some products within our network, but we have other cost initiatives savings programs. We’re getting more efficient there, which will largely offset any impacts to the increase. So net-net, we’re really not factoring in anything for the year in terms of, we should be able to insulate the business from any type of volatility in material pricing.

Arun Viswanathan: And just lastly, sorry, just on the leverage, so it sounds like you guys are pretty committed and pretty confident that you will finish the year in the high-3s. Obviously, the deleveraging I imagine will continue, so what’s kind of the optimal target that you ultimately want to strive for over the next couple of years?

Jon Baksht : Yes, we’re continue to deleverage, we’ve only put out targets for this year, we haven’t put out multi-year targets, but I could just say that we’re not going to be satisfied in the high-3s, that’s where we can get to this year, and we’re going to keep going, and we’re looking to substantially improve. We feel like some of the actions we’ve undertaken to date have helped, and we’re continuing down that path. And even on top of that, we took a substantial action in increasing our liquidity and our available capacity under our revolving credit facility, I’ll just take a minute to point that out in terms of raising our borrowing capacity from $250 million to $1.1 billion. It is something that, from a liquidity standpoint, is a substantial improvement to our overall credit profile on top of the deleveraging that we’re undertaking.

Operator: And our next question will be coming from Adam Samuelson of Goldman Sachs.

Adam Samuelson: Yes. Thank you. Good morning, everyone. So, I guess the first question, Jon, maybe just to be clear and try to the point on the $20 million cost of the Pine Bluff, a turnaround, and the EBITDA cadence between the first and second half, you’re kind of implying second quarter EBITDA is plus or minus about $200 million, would be how that works if you’re at least tracking at the lower half of the full year range. Is that the right understanding?

Jon Baksht : You’re generally on the right track, Adam. I think if you take my comments, we’re not providing explicit guidance for Q2, but what I would tell you is when you look at my comments around second half improvements, it’s 30% plus at the midpoint of our guidance range, that would imply $206 million for Q2, roughly speaking, just the math. But we’re expecting a 30% plus improvement. So really, that would take you down to lower than the $206 million from the, over 30%. And so we’re tracking to that, I think the $20 million is the Pine Bluff is something that will impact Q2, that does factor into the results there or expectations there, I should say.

Adam Samuelson: Got it, that’s very helpful. And then as we think about the footprint optimization and the beverage merchandising restructuring, from a cash perspective, there was the beverage merchandising restructuring and the cash expenses are almost complete. There’s only a couple of million dollars left, if I’m doing what you had spent last year and what your cash expenses this year. I just want to confirm that. And then from a footprint optimization, there was $8 million spent. And so that’s still, most of that program is still to come, I presume, over the balance of this year, is that correct?

Jon Baksht : Yes, that’s correct. So we haven’t changed any of our guidance for the footprint optimization as that program is really just getting underway and maybe taking pieces. The food and beverage merchandising restructuring, as I mentioned on this call, we are largely complete with that program. And so our total cash charges did end up around the $160 million mark that we had guided to from a cash basis. And just to reiterate on the footprint optimization, how much of that we’re anticipating in this year, we’re anticipating 2024 cash charges in the $15 million to $20 million area for this year.

Adam Samuelson: Okay, that’s helpful. And then just one final one. I know seasonally working capital picks up in the first quarter and that’s what you saw. Do you think that there is room to get cash out of working capital this year, especially given the more muted volume environment that you’re seeing in the near term?

Jon Baksht : Yes, I think that is the right way to think about it. I think working capital, we do expect to get some benefits there despite the negative working capital in Q1. The big piece of that clearly was some of the timing of our accounts receivable. If you look back to last year, Q1 had a similar dynamic and we anticipate that should be worked through the remainder of the year. And we will get some benefit of working capital included in our $200 million plus guide for free cash flow for the year.

Operator: And our last question will come from George Staphos of Bank of America.

George Staphos: Hi, thanks very much. Good morning, guys. Thank you for the details. Can you hear me, okay? So two questions. One, can you give us a sort of deeper dive into perhaps how you’re integrating that where you stand in terms of the continuous improvement program there and what it could mean in terms of margin the next couple of quarters, the next couple years across the two segments. Second question, to the extent that freight and rail and trucking have been relatively benign, to some degree that creates a competitive disadvantage for you because of your logistics and distribution network. To the extent we saw reversal, and are you seeing that by any chance, how do you leverage your active distribution model and network to improve volume and share and competitive advantage versus your peers? Thank you. Good luck in the quarter.