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CNH Industrial N.V. (CNH)

Q4 2014 Earnings Call· Thu, Jan 29, 2015

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to today’s CNH Industrial Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2014 Results Conference Call. For your information, today’s conference call is being recorded. At this time, I would like to turn the call over to Mr. Federico Donati, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead, sir.

Federico Donati

Management

Thank you, Alex. Good afternoon, everyone. We would like to welcome you to the CNH Industrial fourth quarter and full year 2014 results webcast conference call. CNH Industrial Group CEO, Rich Tobin and Max Chiara, Group CFO, will host today’s call. They will use the material you should have downloaded from our website, www.cnhindustrial.com. After introductory remarks we will be available to answer the questions you may have. Before moving ahead, let me just remind you that any forward-looking statements we might be making during today’s call, are subject to the risks and uncertainties mentioned in the Safe Harbor statement included in the presentation material. I will now turn the call over to Mr. Rich Tobin.

Rich Tobin

Management

Thank you. Good afternoon. I’ll begin the presentation with some opening remarks and then I’ll hand it over to Max, who will begin going into the slides. So, overall, we had a satisfactory performance for the quarter and the year. Consolidated revenues were down 2% excluding adverse currency movements we held operating margin and industrial activities of 6.4% and EPS of $0.52 per share. We were able to increase earnings per share before restructuring other exceptional items by almost to $0.69 a share Cash flow has been positive in Q4 but not enough to bring us back in line. Our net industrial debt year-end target as demand contraction exacerbated further in the Ag space with an un-forecasted decline and EMEA retail activity do not allow us to liquidate our finished goods inventory position as much as we preferred despite the good performances in construction equipment and commercial vehicles. This we will take action on in Q1 of 2015. I’ll deal with the 2015 outlook further in the presentation, let me spend a few words to summarize this year in terms of business environment highlighting the positives and negatives we had to deal with during 2014. On the positive side, in the Ag segment we’ve demonstrated operating margin resilience despite a more severe industry drop in Q4 by maintaining price discipline, industrial efficiency and flexibility and tight cost controls and SG&A, allowing segments to minimize incremental operating margin. In construction equipment, solid profit recovery as a result of repositioning initiatives, disciplined pricing and product costs as a result of improved industrial efficiency. And commercial vehicles, they made a recovery and trucks continue to confirming margin recovery despite the tough comp due to Europe pre-buy activity in 2013. Also here, we should start to see the benefit of the efficiency program particularly…

Max Chiara

Management

Thank you, Rich. I’m on slide 5 now. In summary, consolidated revenues at $8.4 billion down 5% for the quarter in constant currency and a $32.6 billion for the year, down 2% in constant currency versus prior year. Consolidated net income stood at $87 million for the quarter and $708 million for the full year 2014. Net income before restructuring and other exceptional items for the quarter was $0.12 a share and $0.69 a share for the full year. Available liquidity at December end $8.9 billion inclusive of $2.7 billion in un-drawn committed facilities, this compares to a $7.9 billion available liquidity at the end of September. The company posted net sales of industrial activities of $8 billion for the quarter which is down 6 versus last year in constant currency and $31.2 billion for the year down 2.8 versus last year in constant currency gain for the full year with negative impact from currency translation approximating $600 million and this primarily relating to the Brazilian Real. Operating profit of industrial activities was $376 million in Q4 with an operating margin of 4.7%. The full year operating profit stood at $2 billion with margin of 6.4% in line with prior year. Net industrial debt of $2.7 billion at December end was $1.2 billion lower than September, with net industrial cash flow positive of $1.2 billion and negative $0.7 billion for the year. On slide 6 we have reconciliation from consolidated operating profit to net income for the quarter and full year. Consolidated operating profit stood was $4352 million for the quarter up $21 million versus Q4 ‘13. Restructuring expenses totaled $86 million in the quarter and $184 million for the year as part of the efficiency program announced in July 2014. This compares to $39 million and $71 million respectively…

Rich Tobin

Management

I’m on slide 13. It’s the industrial activities net sales growth composition and the full year 2014 regional split. As you can see, roughly 50% of the reduction in net sales for the quarter is related to foreign exchange impacts and translation. FX impact for the full year was $550 million. Net sales put by region is roughly in line with previous year with LATAM underway replaced by a stronger EMEA region. Agricultural net sales were $3.4 billion for the quarter down 18% from Q4 2013 or 14% at a constant currency basis due to negative volume of products mix partially offset by positive pricing. Construction equipment sales were down 4 or 0.5% or flat at constant currency to $800 million, with weakness in LATAM and APAC being offset by favorable trading conditions in NAFTA. Commercial net sales were down 1% in constant currency to $3.3 billion. Net sales increased in EMEA’s result of favorable mix with trucks despite lower volumes due to Euro V pre-buy effect in 2013. In APAC, commercial vehicles registered higher volumes mainly for buses, LATAM volumes were down due to protracted unfavorable market conditions and a result of inventory de-stocking actions completed in Q4. Powertrain sales were down 19% on a constant currency basis to $1 billion due to different quarterly cadence of engine production year-over-year. I won’t spend a lot of time here but what this gives you is operating performance by segments for the quarter and for the full year and the comparable margins of the quarter and the full year. I’ll deal with that in greater detail on the following slides for the quarter. So move to slide 16. Agricultural equipment performance for the quarter and the year, worldwide agricultural equipment units sales were down compared to 2013 with a more severe…

Federico Donati

Management

Thank you, Mr. Tobin. Now we are ready to start the Q&A session, Alex. Please take the first question.

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions]. We will take our first question from Ann Duignan of JPMorgan. Please go ahead.

Ann Duignan

Analyst

Thank you. Can you talk a little bit first off on the agricultural side, where are your early order programs today versus a year ago?

Rich Tobin

Management

Sure, we got you first in line this time Ann after missing you last quarter.

Ann Duignan

Analyst

Yes, thank you. I appreciate that.

Rich Tobin

Management

No problem. They are pretty much a reflection of what we forecasted the decline for the full year speaking mostly about NAFTA and EMEA. LATAM is weaker than we would expect, there is not a lot of pre-order activity in LATAM anyway. I think that the market is waiting to see how the FINAME rules pan out here in Q1. So, I think there is going to be a little bit of - I think it’s going to be a weak Q1 in terms of order backlog in LATAM until that gets resolved.

Ann Duignan

Analyst

Okay, thank you. That’s helpful. And on the credential services side, can you talk a little bit about any stress at your dealer level, any changes that you’re making to wholesale financing, we’re hearing about very, very aggressive financing particularly in agriculture, large agriculture? Can you talk about how the impact of the down-trend in agriculture is weighing on your financial services business? That will be great. Thanks.

Max Chiara

Management

I don’t think that we’ve changed anything in totality on the financial services. We’re cognizant of the fact that both our dealers and ourselves, have to reduce total inventories with out of the market, that’s why we’re cutting production. And we’re working on a dealer-to-dealer individual basis in terms of extended floor planning in a like. But extremely aggressive on our part, I don’t think that that would be true for us.

Ann Duignan

Analyst

But you are extending floor plans?

Rich Tobin

Management

Yes, I think that’s from - depending on the balance between new and used, I think that we’re being accommodative where we can, but on an individual dealer-by-dealer basis. But I don’t think that we’ve done anything overly aggressive.

Ann Duignan

Analyst

Okay. And just finally real quick, your five-year plan, your EPS target included stable demand for agricultural equipment from last year. Are you still sticking with your five-year plan?

Rich Tobin

Management

No, we don’t have any reason right now to change it. I mean I think that we’re obviously going to have from negative FX in ‘15 but whenever we do a Five-plan, we understand that we’re participating in a cyclical industry or industries if you will. So right now look, the Ag is weak, I think that the cycle being down to 2018 is a little bit over or aggressive. So right now I think we’re sticking to it.

Ann Duignan

Analyst

Okay, thank you. I appreciate you letting me get on the call.

Rich Tobin

Management

No problem, Ann.

Operator

Operator

We will take our next question from Sam Morton of Credit Suisse. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Sam Morton

Analyst

Good afternoon, good morning. First question on the balance sheet, so, in the presentation you reiterated the commitments towards getting an investment grade rating. But in the light of today’s update, I was just hoping that you could provide a little bit more detail on the steps that you think you need to take to get that? And then secondly, just on your associate holdings, I guess the valuation of those assets has increased substantially over the past couple of years reflecting the better growth prospects. And I just wanted to understand how you were thinking about these assets in the medium term, in the short-term, how do you think about these assets? Thanks a lot.

Max Chiara

Management

Okay, I’ll go back to the first one. We will continue taking the actions that we’ve been doing over the past three to four years in terms of the structure of the debt of the company and diversifying that. I don’t think that forecasted trading conditions change that in terms of our goal, in terms of improving the balance sheet of the company. In terms of the associate holdings, I mean, I think that we’re committed to all of them and we retain optionality on all of them, I mean, that’s really all I can say.

Sam Morton

Analyst

Okay, great. Thanks a lot.

Operator

Operator

We will take our next question from Martino De Ambroggi of Equita Sim. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Martino De Ambroggi

Analyst

Thank you. Good morning, good afternoon everybody. The first question is on the change in the guidance, probability for industrial activities. It was expected to be flatter when you released the Q3 results, now it’s a bit lower. Could you help us in try to understand what are the main variables for the bridges just the matter of currencies or is there any additional difference from what you expected one quarter ago?

Rich Tobin

Management

The majority is FX. The balance of it is some fine-tuning the expectations in terms of world crop equipment demand in Ag.

Martino De Ambroggi

Analyst

Okay. And over in the last - in your last presentation you made a lot of examples regarding cost cutting initiatives and so on. In your current updated guidance in 2015, how much is cost saving, so just to understand how things are progressing in terms of cost savings?

Rich Tobin

Management

Yes, I think that we need to separate what we had put in, in terms of the restructuring plan. I believe that the savings in 2015 is $80 million, is what the rollover of that is. Now there is still a remaining restructuring charge, it needs to be taken in 2015 to finish it. The balance of the savings, I think you got to look at the segmental of what we’ve done on both SG&A and R&D, that’s a portion of that is - was part of the restructuring plan, largely in Europe. The balance of it is tight cost control. So it’s not just the Ag, I think you can take a look at by segment what we’ve done below industrial activities and roll that forward depending on the timing of what you’re seeing.

Martino De Ambroggi

Analyst

Okay. If I may one more question on the pricing. If you can elaborate a bit on the trend you expect for the three main divisions?

Rich Tobin

Management

In terms of pricing?

Martino De Ambroggi

Analyst

Pricing, yes.

Rich Tobin

Management

Yes, we’re market leader in Ag. So, it’s dependent on us to maintain pricing discipline in the marketplace. And I think that despite Q4 in terms of volumes, if you go back to the slide, we show that we’re positive in pricing. So we’re maintaining our commitment for pricing discipline despite the fact that we’re heading into some pretty difficult market conditions. In commercial vehicles, we’re positive in pricing also. I think that that is the industry as a whole trying to recapture Euro VI related costs. And we’re not the leader, but we’ve demonstrated that we’re moving pricing up during the year and trying to improve profitability. And in LATAM it’s a little bit different, that’s more inflationary related pricing because of the environment there.

Martino De Ambroggi

Analyst

Okay, thank you.

Operator

Operator

We will take our next question from Ross Gilardi of Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Ross Gilardi

Analyst

Yes, good morning. Thanks very much. Richard, I’ve got some more balance sheet and cash flow questions. But really on the net debt to begin with, I mean, at the end of the third quarter you guys were guiding at $2.1 billion to $2.2 billion in net debt, you finished with $2.7 billion. You burned $700 million of industry cash flow in ‘14, and the Ag business has got a pretty uncertain outlook that could last a while. So, first question, how did you miss the net debt target by $500 million with only three months left in the year? And just more fundamentally why isn’t CNH generating any cash, I mean the outlook is tough but we’re not seeing negative free cash flow most of the other companies in the space? And then I just had a follow-up to that.

Rich Tobin

Management

Okay, I’ll deal with the $500 million and then I think Max really want to step in with the balance of it. Because I think it’s more of an even just working capital, so I’ll deal with the working capital piece of it. It’s approximately $350 million of home inventory that we had expected to retail primarily in Europe, that didn’t happen, we had a significant downturn. If you look at Q4 in Europe in terms of what we had seen in September versus what happened in the fourth quarter, I think that that’s the majority of the hang there in working capital and then the fact that we had cut production severely in Q4, so you have a corresponding reduction of payables which exacerbates it.

Max Chiara

Management

In terms of cash flow for the group, we’ve been going through a significant CapEx cycle I think that we’ve basically shown that we’ve cut CapEx approximately 20% this year. And we would expect to have that same kind of cut in CapEx next year, which would possibly impact cash flow. So we’re coming out of a relatively heavy CapEx cycle. And then about whatever we can get in terms of inventory liquidation we will let it flow through. And that’s just going to be based on market conditions predominantly in Ag.

Ross Gilardi

Analyst

Okay. Just somewhat related to this and given your longer term balance sheet goals, I mean, you guys get asked about potential divestitures quite a bit from time to time. I mean, do you feel like you’re in a position where you’ve got a more seriously considered divestitures to move you further towards your balance sheet objectives over the next three to five years? Obviously we’re in a tough environment and you’ve also got a $300 million dividend that you’ve - that the board is recommending again this year. That’s obviously you want to sustain, so thoughts on divestitures, given the balance sheet?

Rich Tobin

Management

I don’t think that we would be considering inorganic options based on balance sheet goals. I mean, it’s really the best way I can say it. I mean, I think that we’ve got all the tools we need to continue to improve the financial position of the company I don’t think that we would consider divestitures as part of reaching those goals. I mean, that’s a completely different headset.

Ross Gilardi

Analyst

Okay. Well, irrespective of just the balance sheet then just what is your latest view on, does that go into construction equipment business, are they still very much core to CNH?

Rich Tobin

Management

Yes.

Ross Gilardi

Analyst

Okay. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

We will take our next question from Michael Ralph [ph] of Kepler Cheuvreux. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Mike Ralph

Analyst

Yes, hi, Mike Ralph from Kepler Cheuvreux. Hi gentlemen, I have basically two questions. I mean, looking at your guidance for industrial sales this year and the apparent around about 8% drop you seem to be expecting. I presume this is chiefly combination of the negative outlook for Ag and ForEx. But in light of that, do you think you’re going to be able to basically reach again your double-digit margin in Ag this year? And then secondly, looking at the weak spot, which apparently is cash generation ability. At what point of this year should we expect your counter measures to basically take over and hence finally prevent the cash drain and then to see starting cash basically coming in positively again?

Max Chiara

Management

Okay. I don’t think that we gave a margin target for 2015 by segments, so we just gave group. So I’m not going to comment on what our expectation is in terms of Ag margins for 2015. I can only give you what we think that the range is for the consolidated industrial ops. In terms of cash flow, like I said, I mean I think that we’re looking to liquidate inventory on the Ag side because I think it’s pretty clear that the cycle is going down. I think that we have to preserve some optionality on construction equipment and the commercial vehicle segment depending on how those markets perform over the balance of the year. That coupled with the fact that I mentioned before that we can expect to be cutting CapEx in 2015 relative to 2014 which is positive to cash flow. So that would come over the 12-month cycle.

Mike Ralph

Analyst

But just for my understanding, if you still have excess inventory, how could pricing be positive in this year?

Rich Tobin

Management

How can pricing be positive this year?

Mike Ralph

Analyst

Yes, if you still have excess inventory that you need to get rid off?

Rich Tobin

Management

Yes.

Mike Ralph

Analyst

And you’re not the only one out there, so if I got you right, you mentioned earlier that you expect pricing to be positive or was it a misperception of mine?

Rich Tobin

Management

No, it’s not a misperception. We expect to maintain pricing discipline in the marketplace in 2014. There is part of pricing year-over-year is Tier 4 Final related depending on when those products were brought into the system.

Mike Ralph

Analyst

All right.

Rich Tobin

Management

We need to raise pricing in conjunction with that.

Mike Ralph

Analyst

All right. Thanks.

Rich Tobin

Management

Yes.

Operator

Operator

We will take our next question from Alessandro Foletti of Bank Bellevue. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Alessandro Foletti

Analyst

Yes, good afternoon gentlemen. I have a question on financial services. You quote in your press release that the sales there basically went up because of valuation of the portfolio. Does it mean the portfolio has been revaluated, there were like book games in it and as consequence of that could this trend also change going forward?

Max Chiara

Management

No, it’s the volume of the portfolio going up.

Alessandro Foletti

Analyst

I read value. I read value of the portfolio in your press release. So there is, no revaluations?

Rich Tobin

Management

Yes, now there has been no revaluation of the portfolio, its volume.

Alessandro Foletti

Analyst

All right, thank you.

Operator

Operator

We will take our next question from Larry De Maria from William Blair. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Larry De Maria

Analyst

Hi, good morning. Thank you. Couple of questions. I think Rich, you said that you’re going to under-produce retail and Ag by 30% versus year ago levels. Year ago we were up 27% over retail demand in productions. So I’m just curious why do we think that’s enough, it seems there could be downward pressure as we go through the year? And then, the one with price, if you’re going to maintain price at the corporate level, does that imply that the dealers would - if there is price concession to the dealers, they will feel the bigger impact in seeing each corporate?

Rich Tobin

Management

Yes, I won’t comment on dealer profitability. I think that, I know that there is a fear out there in terms of pricing. All I can do is demonstrate that we’ve been positive pricing through a downturn this year and our expectation is to maintain that discipline going forward. What was the other question Larry?

Larry De Maria

Analyst

Well, yes. Well, it sounds like obviously the price recession make come for the distribution but the production you said was going to be down 30% versus year ago levels?

Rich Tobin

Management

Okay. No I understand, it’s 30% down to Q1 of 2014.

Larry De Maria

Analyst

That was over-produced by.

Rich Tobin

Management

Yes, I mean, in a perfect world Larry, if you really wanted to clear, you’d go to zero. But you got to balance the economic impact of doing that over the years. So, we’re always balancing, getting the inventory right and matching demand inventory and production. The most economical way is to run it at a reduced level for a period of time. You can’t swing the industrial machine zero to 50 overnight. There is a significant amount of cost associated with doing that.

Larry De Maria

Analyst

Okay, no, I understand. That makes sense. And then just finally, [indiscernible] prices are lower. How comfortable with you on your flat forecast or do you think there is risk to that given that some of the prices in those segments are lower now?

Rich Tobin

Management

We’re as comfortable as we are making the forecast going into the year. I mean, I think that the relative, the prices have slipped some. But in terms of profitability it’s still in the black. So it’s just an area that we’ve got a brand, the New Orleans brand that’s been living in that space a long time. We think that we have a competitive advantage against some of our competitors that go in and out of dairy livestock. We’ve got a dedicated brand that’s the reason to exist to a certain extent. So we’re just going to have to get our fair share.

Larry De Maria

Analyst

Okay, thanks. Good luck, Rich.

Operator

Operator

We will take our next question from Monica Bosio of Banca IMI. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Monica Bosio

Analyst

Good afternoon, everyone. I would have two questions. The first is just a check. And maybe I love the part of the Q&A, is it on CapEx. Is it correct that the CapEx will be more or less in line with the 2014 level as for current year, just to be sure I have understood well? And the second question is regarding the oil price assumptions. What kind of oil price assumptions have you factored in your outlook? And could you please comment a little bit on positive, on potential impact of further decrease in oil price on the demand in Europe as for commercial vehicles? Thank you.

Rich Tobin

Management

Okay. The first one is, we did not it would be flat year-over-year. We said CapEx would be down 15% to 14%.

Monica Bosio

Analyst

Okay.

Rich Tobin

Management

In terms of oil price is positive to both - the reduction in oil prices are both positive to the both the commercial vehicle and the Ag segment because of the fact that that operating cost decline, so there is more available profitability to move towards equipment purchasing. So overall, we think its fine. But we don’t model that in a particular way and try to extrapolate something into unit volume demand. We just think that it’s constructive for both large fleet operators on the commercial vehicle side and for farming in general.

Monica Bosio

Analyst

Okay, thank you very much.

Operator

Operator

Our final question comes from Michael Tyndall of Barclays. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Michael Tyndall

Analyst

Yes, hi there, it’s Mike Tyndall from Barclays. Just two questions if I may. The first one, just thinking about your outlook to North American markets, you’ve got tractor down roughly 5%, you’ve got combined stand 25% to 30%. I mean, you probably know that one of your main competitors is significantly more bearish. Is that just a function of the mix, or are you seeing something different to what they’re seeing? I know you probably don’t want to comment about them. But I’m just trying to reconcile those two fairly diverse outlooks on the North American market? And then the second question, on a more positive note, looking at your market share in Europe, you seem to be taking share on the EVECO [ph] side in both the medium and the heavy truck side. Is that a geographic mix reflection, obviously you’re being strong in Club mid where we think demand recover or are you actually winning on a face-to-face basis against some of the other players there? Thanks.

Max Chiara

Management

Let me deal with the truck one. It’s not geographic because I think it’s a traditional stronghold of Southern Europe ex-Spain. Spain actually it was up quite a bit if my memory serves incorrectly for the year. So that’s a, we consider to be a home market for us, so that’s proactive to us gaining share in both of those segments, the balance of Southern Europe is down overall. So I don’t think that it’s overly as a result of geographic mix on the truck side.

Rich Tobin

Management

Your first question about, I think, that we’re pretty much aligned now. I mean, we came out first we tried to be helpful and set a forecast which everybody came and adjusted off. And I think that’s not a surprise that everybody came down off of our first line forecast back in October. I think we’re pretty much in-line right now between the two. I mean, they’re messy, they’re little bit messy numbers because we break tractors into segments I think we’re the only ones that do that. And then we have combines and there is other classification which are harvesting equipment which may have sprayers. And then so, there is never a completely directly correlation between the two bigger guys in the market. But I think that now we’re mostly aligned between the two of us. In terms of combined share, I think that was the third question that you had, I mean I think that overall we did reasonably well.

Michael Tyndall

Analyst

Can I just ask one, very quick follow-on, just in terms of flex in the machine? You’ve already talked about the fact and it’s in the EBIT walk in terms of you actually having flex. How much flex is left because we’re going further down in production by the sounds of that in Q1?

Rich Tobin

Management

Yes, I mean, we did a significant amount of work. I think we offset $100 million of absorbs, comparable absorption that none of it felt at the bottom line from the industrial side. So I think that, I think that we demonstrated that we can flex but we gave guidance on negative decremental margin for at least Q1 of being in the 30s that’s double what it was for the full year. So I mean, we’re going to have to take production down quite a bit now to level the inventories. And there is no amount of flex that you’re going to have to account for that.

Michael Tyndall

Analyst

Got it. Thank you very much. Cheers.

Rich Tobin

Management

Thanks.

Operator

Operator

That will conclude the question-and-answer session. I would now like to turn the call back over to Mr. Federico Donati for any additional or closing remarks.

Federico Donati

Management

Thank you, Alex. We would like to thank everyone for attending today’s call with us. Have a good evening.

Operator

Operator

That will conclude today’s conference call. Thank you for your participation, ladies and gentlemen. You may now disconnect.