Earnings Labs

Flexible Solutions International, Inc. (FSI)

Q3 2019 Earnings Call· Fri, Nov 15, 2019

$6.53

+0.31%

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Same-Day

-3.53%

1 Week

-3.53%

1 Month

-2.35%

vs S&P

-4.85%

Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good day, and welcome to the Flexible Solutions International Third Quarter 2019 Financial Results Conference Call. Today's conference is being recorded. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Dan O'Brien. Please go ahead, sir.

Dan O'Brien

Management

Thank you, Cassidy. Good morning. This is Dan O'Brien, CEO of Flexible Solutions. The safe harbor provision, the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 provides a Safe Harbor for forward-looking statements. Certain of the statements contained herein, which are not historical facts, are forward-looking statements with respect to events, the occurrence of which involve risks and uncertainties. These forward-looking statements may be impacted either positively or negatively by various factors.Information concerning the potential factors that could affect the company is detailed from time-to-time in the company's reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Welcome to the call. Prior to speaking about our financials, I'd like to talk about our corporate condition and product lines, plus what we think might occur over the next several quarters.Insurance compensation from the fire has been received in full, but the accounting and tax effects of the payments will continue to distort and complicate our financials until year-over-year comparisons that do not contain compensation or tax adjustments are available. The first quarter this will occur is Q1 2020. Our NanoChem division, NCS represents more than half the revenue of FSI. This division makes thermal polyaspartic acid called TPA for short, a biodegradablepolymer with many valuable uses.NCS also manufactures SUN 27 and N Savr 30, which are used to reduce nitrogen fertilizer loss from soil. TPA is used in agriculture to significantly increase crop yield. The method of action is by slowing crystal growth between fertilizer ions and other ions in the soil, resulting in the fertilizer remaining available longer for the plants to use. The attraction between the TPA and the fertilizer ions also retains the nutrients closer to the plant roots.Keeping fertilizer more easily available for crops to use, results in better yield with the same level of fertilization. We do not…

Operator

Operator

Yes sir. [Operator Instructions] First question comes from Raymond Howe of CFPI.

Raymond Howe

Analyst

Good morning, Dan. How are you?

Dan O'Brien

Management

I’m well Raymond, how are you?

Raymond Howe

Analyst

I’m good. Thanks, any idea of the timing of the receipt of your first tariff rebate?

Dan O'Brien

Management

Unfortunately, no. Maybe a little more explanation would be appropriate on this. You pay the tariffs when you bring the product in, and it goes into inventory tariff paid, when it's converted and then actually exported out of the United States to an international customer, and whereabouts 60% international, that is the time when you can begin to run the process of providing the government with the paperwork and asking for the rebates, so we have some rebate requests in already but we also have tariff-paid inventory in inventory that until it's converted and shipped offshore, we can't even start the process. So this is a, this is a lengthy thing, and it's a huge drag on business. But I would like to say that standing up to international countries that don't play fair is the right thing to do. So does that help you with that?

Raymond Howe

Analyst

Yes, you had mentioned that the receivables now was a substantial number, any color you can provide on that?

Dan O'Brien

Management

Because we don't know exactly what percent is going to go offshore and what percent stays onshore, I think I should probably stay out of the number area but let's say that it’s my opinion. It's greater than $0.03 a share and less than $0.03.

Raymond Howe

Analyst

Okay, perfect. And for 2020, are you still comfortable with the $0.15 payout?

Dan O'Brien

Management

Very much still, the cash inflow number shows that we're capable.

Raymond Howe

Analyst

Perfect. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Our next question comes from Taha (inaudible).

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Hi, Dan.

Dan O'Brien

Management

Good morning, Taha. How are you?

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Good, thank you. Just to kind of follow-up on that question, is there I know you kind of quantified the impact of the tariffs, the first two quarters, the first quarter was roughly $250,000, the pretax profits and then $200,000 in the second quarter, how much was it this quarter in terms of the tariff impact on pretax profit?

Dan O'Brien

Management

Well, I'm -- as I say, I'm not totally sure, because we're not sure how much of our production is going to go offshore and be available for the tariff rebates and how much will stay onshore and be subject to higher pricing to our onshore customers. So without really knowing that split and not having asked for it, it would be probably best, if I stay with what I told Raymond, which is our total exposure here is greater than $0.03 a share and less than $0.05 for the year.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Got it, for the year, yes. Got it. That's helpful. And just to -- I know you said that the charters should be smooth, in terms of the revenue kind of pattern in terms of the seasonality. Is there a reason why there was sort of a shortfall from the Q1 levels of close to $8.5 million of revenues? You guys did $7.4 million, was it more of a seasonal thing this quarter, relative to Q1 or something else going on?

Dan O'Brien

Management

No, let's be honest, smoothing is smoothing but it's not mirror surface smoothing. My opinion is going from $8.4 million to $7.4 million and then maybe, wherever we are in the $7 million, high $7 million, $8 million for Q4, compared to our historic behavior, this is extreme smoothing. And of course, second quarter was very poor because of the wet Spring that affected both ENP and NanoChem agriculture sales.So like all the big guys, Agrium and Simplot and so forth, we suffered at that point and we've recovered from it. I actually feel that -- and I know you're not supposed to argue with a shareholder, but I actually feel that we are smooth.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Got it, no, no, no that’s helpful. So it's just kind of a normal course of business is what you're saying. Got it.

Dan O'Brien

Management

Absolutely. And to point out, we often have shipments that it didn't happen this time. But in the past, we've had situations where say three container loads worth $150,000 each did not go out on the 30th. And they did go out on the second of the following quarter and that's a $1 million variation right there.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Got it. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

And at this time, we have no further questions in queue.

Dan O'Brien

Management

Cassidy, this ends the conference call. Would you do the duty of cutting everybody off, please. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Absolutely. At this time, we have no questions in queue and this conference has been concluded. You may now disconnect and have a great rest of your day.