Reliance Steel & Aluminum Co. (NYSE:RS) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Phil Gibbs: Hi, there. I was curious on net working capital as you look out to 2023 versus maybe 2022. I think we are looking for it to be a pretty decent source, but you did bleed down a lot of net working capital in the fourth quarter. So I am just looking for some thoughts there.

Arthur Ajemyan: Sure. And I will speak to the first quarter guide, Phil. So based on our pricing and volume assumptions, the billed working capital billed in the first quarter should be seasonal and kind of an absolute number, it should come in below the levels of the release that we had in the fourth quarter.

Phil Gibbs: Okay. That’s helpful. And I think the rest of the year obviously will depend on, for the most part, on pricing as things progress. And then, Karla, just on the Infrastructure Bill, are you seeing anything in terms of asks or requirements for some of the stuff or is it largely still in bidding and design?

Karla Lewis: Yeah. So, Phil, the majority, we think is still in bidding and design. With our customer base, which is so diversified and we are going to get some of those projects. We are not really going to beat the main supplier of those, but we get a lot of good activity, infrastructure projects. We haven’t seen them really start to flow through the books yet. We are hearing more on the bidding and design phase right now. So we think that’s probably a little later in 2023 when we and others really start to see the benefit of those times.

Phil Gibbs: And then I appreciate that. And then lastly, can you just remind us where you all are on the buyback and if you were to increase the amount under authorization, when would you typically do that? Thanks.

Arthur Ajemyan: Yeah. So we just did that a few months ago, reset the authorization of $1 billion and we have $680 million or so remaining under our program. So I mean that authorization, the $1 billion that we had was roughly about 10%. So and we have been active since then. So, and as you know, we don’t necessarily provide forward-looking guidance, but in 2022, we were pretty active on that front. So in the last 12 months, we reduced our share count by about 6%.

Karla Lewis: Yeah. And we as management and our Board, Bank Reliance is a pretty good buy and so our Board is very supportive. If we do it opportunistically increase our activity under that we will certainly look to refresh as needed.

Phil Gibbs: Thanks, everyone.

Karla Lewis: Yeah.

Steve Koch: Thanks, Phil.

Operator: Our next question comes from the line of John Tumazos with John Tumazos Very Independent Research. Please proceed.

John Tumazos: Congratulations on everything, Karla.

Karla Lewis: Thanks, John.

John Tumazos: I am trying to understand the tremendous performance were adjusted for LIFO, the margins were the same in a falling steel price environment where average distributors have holding losses, which you managed to avoid. Did your inventory turnovers rise materially in the third or fourth quarters first, and for the 8% of your sales that were hot-rolled or 15% total flat-rolled steel, are those differentiated flat-rolled tons in particular ways?