Michael Wilson
Analyst · Oppenheimer & Company. Please go ahead
Thanks, John. Since we will not provide forward guidance for 2020 until our fourth quarter earnings call in February, given the current business environment, I thought I’d take this opportunity to provide some preliminary, more general perspectives on next year. Sitting here today, global macroeconomic conditions, particularly in industrial production and outside of the U.S. remain challenging and the timing of any improvement is uncertain. Consequently, we are taking a conservative view in our 2020 planning, ensuring that we are placing sufficient focus on both cost control and growth, as well as a premium on execution. We expect to deliver strong performance again in our Performance Materials segment based on continued regulatory driven growth in China, North America and other regions of the world. Relatively speaking, growth should be the fastest in the first two quarters of the year as automakers complete the transition to 100% compliance with China 6. As we have previously communicated, we would also expect continued margin accretion in the segment, due to volume and mix benefits will continue to be tempered by the higher litigation costs. However, we expect performance across the Performance Chemicals segment to be mixed. Engineered Polymers should post solid year-over-year growth as monomer markets stabilize, the use of derivatives grow in targeted applications and with all transition related revenue impacts behind us. We also anticipate the sales to pavement technologies customers will return to more normalized growth, again led by North America and the continued adoption of our innovative Evotherm warm-mix asphalt technology. On the other hand, the outlook for oilfield drilling and production activity will be softer in the absence of some recovery in crude oil prices. This view should be consistent with what you are hearing from major oilfield players. And finally, sales to industrial specialties end use markets are going to remain challenged at least for a few more quarters as rosin markets remain weak and as we transition out of the European distribution arrangement we have previously disclosed. Our free cash flow will be stronger next year due to higher operating earnings and lower capital requirements. Our near term focus remains on delevering our balance sheet to targeted ranges. In sum, we believe that the diversity of our portfolio, combined with strong execution, will enable us to deliver solid revenue and earnings growth in 2020, albeit less robustly than in years past. I appreciate the work and efforts of our 1,750 employees worldwide. They are a distinct competitive advantage for us. We continue to be very strongly in the long-term potential for our company. We hope you share our enthusiasm for Ingevity. At this point, operator, we’ll open up the call to questions.