Earnings Labs

Expro Group Holdings N.V. (XPRO)

Q3 2025 Earnings Call· Thu, Oct 23, 2025

$18.11

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good morning all, and thank you for joining us for the Expro Q3 2025 Earnings Presentation. My name is Carly, and I'll be coordinating the call today. [Operator Instructions] I'd now like to hand over to our host, Sergio Maiworm, Chief Financial Officer. Please go ahead.

Sergio Maiworm

Analyst

Thank you, operator. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to Expro's Third Quarter 2025 Call. I'm joined today by Expro's CEO, Mike Jardon. First, Mike and I will have some prepared remarks, then we will open it up for questions. We have an accompanying presentation on the third quarter results that is posted on the Expro website, expro.com, under the Investors section. In addition, supplemental financial information for the third quarter results is downloadable on Expro website, likewise under the Investors section. I'd like to remind everyone that some of today's comments may refer to or contain forward-looking statements. Such remarks are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such statements. Such statements speak only as of today's date, and the company assumes no responsibility to update forward-looking statements as of any future date. The company has included in its SEC filings cautionary language identifying important factors that could cause actual results to be materially different from those set forth in any forward-looking statements. A more complete discussion of these risks is included in the company's SEC filings, which may be accessed on the SEC website, sec.gov, or on our website, again at expro.com. Please note that any non-GAAP financial measures discussed during this call are defined and reconciled to the most directly comparable GAAP financial measure in our third quarter 2025 earnings release, which can also be found on our website. With that, I'd like to turn the call over to Mike.

Michael Jardon

Analyst

Thank you, Sergio. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to Expro's third quarter call. I'll begin by reviewing the third quarter 2025 financial results from today's press release. Expro achieved its highest quarterly free cash flow ever and continued to improve its EBITDA margin. We expect a strong fourth quarter and have raised our annual guidance. Next, I'll cover operational highlights, macro trends, a preliminary 2026 outlook and key strategic themes. Sergio will provide further details on financials, updated 2025 guidance and our overall capital allocation framework. Let's begin on Slide 1. Expro reported quarterly revenue of $411 million and EBITDA of $94 million, representing a 22.8% margin. Adjusted free cash flow was $46 million or 11% of revenue, which was the highest recorded by the company to date. The financial results reflect ongoing operational efficiency gains relating to margins and free cash flow. This record-breaking free cash flow generation marks a significant milestone for Expro, highlighting the company's successful strategy in improving operational efficiency and maximizing cash conversion. Achieving the highest adjusted free cash flow in the company's history underscores our commitment to financial discipline, creating and returning value to shareholders. Such performance sets a new benchmark and demonstrates our focus on increasing performance amidst dynamic market conditions. In the third quarter, Expro also repurchased around 2 million shares for roughly $25 million, achieving our annual target of $40 million ahead of schedule. We are also raising the 2025 annual guidance for EBITDA and free cash flow to reflect anticipated performance to date and for the rest of the year. Further details will be provided by Sergio later in the call. Moving to Slide 2. Expro's $2.3 billion backlog provides solid revenue visibility and demonstrates the company's diverse portfolio and operations across regions. Securing long-term contracts and delivering cost-effective solutions…

Sergio Maiworm

Analyst

Thank you, Mike, and good morning again to everybody on the call. As Mike noted, Expro continues to deliver consistent and above expectations financial results. In the third quarter, we reported revenue of $411 million. EBITDA for Q3 reached $94 million with a margin of 22.8%, up about 50 basis points from last quarter and 270 basis points year-over-year. Slide 7 illustrates our quarterly and annual margin growth. We are confident in further margin expansions in 2025 and 2026, with the latter being driven by the full impact of Drive 25, increased customer wallet share at higher margins, international growth from acquisitions like Coretrax and ongoing cost optimization and efficiency improvements. EBITDA margin expansion is not the goal in itself on Slide 8, but a means to increase free cash flow generation. And in the third quarter, Expro posted its highest quarterly free cash flow in the company's history, generating over $46 million on an adjusted basis. We aim to further reduce the capital intensity of the business and expect even stronger free cash flow in 2026, both as a percentage of revenue and in absolute terms. We have increased our 2025 guidance for free cash flow, though we're cautious about Q4 due to potential working capital effects. The Q4 guidance is conservative and already accounts for these factors. Expro also bought back $25 million in shares in the third quarter, achieving our $40 million goal ahead of time, and we still have another $36 million available under the current $100 million repurchase plan. Turning to liquidity. The company closed the quarter with $532 million in total liquidity. That includes $199 million in cash on the balance sheet after accounting for the revolving credit facility repayments and the share repurchases during the quarter. During the third quarter, the company completed…

Michael Jardon

Analyst

Sergio, thank you. As we conclude our prepared remarks and before opening up for questions, I'd like to conclude with the following thoughts. Despite the softer commodity market backdrop in the near-term, we continue to see resilient, if not robust, investment in upstream oil and gas in the international markets. We also expect the offshore sector to further recover starting in the second half of 2026 and into 2027 and beyond. Looking ahead, we remain confident in Expro's ability to deliver resilient performance even as we navigate softer market backdrops. Our diversified business mix, disciplined capital allocation and relentless focus on operational excellence position us to weather industry cycles and continue creating value for our stakeholders. We expect to finish 2025 on a strong note with a robust fourth quarter that reflects both the strength of our customer relationships and the successful execution of our strategic initiatives. As we move into 2026, we are well positioned to further expand our EBITDA margin driven by ongoing cost efficiencies, margin-accretive growth and the maturation of our production solutions business into a significant free cash flow generator. Moreover, we anticipate continued growth in our free cash flow generation in 2026, supported by our balanced approach to capital allocation and our commitment to maximizing returns across all areas of the business. We believe these strengths will enable Expro to deliver sustainable long-term value for our shareholders regardless of the broader market environment. We thank our employees, customers and shareholders for their continued support and look forward to building on our momentum in the quarters and years ahead. With that, I'd like to open up the call for questions.

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from Ati Modak from Goldman Sachs.

Ati Modak

Analyst

Just a quick question on the margin expansion comment for '26 on flat to slightly lower revenue. Can you help us understand what the drivers there are? Is it largely the Drive 25 initiative? Are there other factors that are driving that expectation?

Michael Jardon

Analyst

So, Ati, thanks for the question. Thanks for joining us today. I guess a couple of things I try to highlight is, yes, it will be the full year effect of our Drive 25 initiative. If you recall, although we've changed the total target throughout the year as we've expanded and increased it, we've really targeted taking out about 50% of that benefit in 2025. So we'll have the natural margin expansion from that in 2026, which will help us offset some of the inflationary cost pressures and those kind of things. Additionally, we'll continue to internationalize some of the M&As that we've made, Coretrax in particular. And then the third element really is, as we continue to roll out new technologies, and I think I've highlighted this to you and to others before, but just keep an eye on the number of new technologies you see us continue to roll out. We'll continue to get market uptake that helps us expand our wallet share, really helps us position ourselves. It's really a combination of all those. And frankly, what we have the organization focused on today is, we can't control the activity, the overall activity. We're going to continue to get our fair share. We're going to continue to position ourselves with customers globally. But we're going to stay focused on the things that we can really affect, which is operational efficiency, execution, rolling out new technology, those type of things.

Ati Modak

Analyst

And then on the comment that offshore activity could pick up in the second half, what are you keeping an eye on? And can you give us any additional sort of regional color in terms of how you're seeing activity play out at the moment?

Michael Jardon

Analyst

Sure. And I'll start with the one that I think is going to be the laggard. And I think the laggard is probably going to be Asia Pacific. I think it's the one in 2026 that is -- we're seeing some softness here in Q3 and even in Q4 in Asia Pacific. So I think it's going to be the one that's going to be a little bit of a laggard. That's not altogether different than how we foresaw 2025 overall. We kind of highlighted early in the year that we felt like Australia was going to be a bit soft overall. But I do think going into '26, and I think we'll start to see some activity ramp up in the second half is really it's going to be the Golden Triangle. It's going to be West Africa. It's going to be Gulf of Mexico, those type areas. I also think that 2 others to keep in mind is, we're starting to see some positive sentiments and some positive commentary in Saudi, in particular, with the jack-up activity. Although we don't generate a lot of activity in the jack-up market in Saudi, I think it kind of goes to the tone and the tenor that's going on in the Kingdom, I think that's going to be more constructive. And then I think some of the things we're starting to see out of Mexico is going to be helpful for us as an industry overall. So those are the ones I would really highlight. Sergio, anything I missed?

Sergio Maiworm

Analyst

No, Mike, I think that's it.

Ati Modak

Analyst

Maybe if I can squeeze in one more. The share repurchases, you mentioned you reached ahead of schedule. What does that mean for repurchase for the rest of the year? Will you not do anything? And then what's reasonable to think for '26?

Sergio Maiworm

Analyst

Yes, Ati, that's a great question. We'll continue to evaluate, as we always do in line with the capital allocation framework that we laid out on this call as well. We'll continue to look for opportunities to return more capital to shareholders. We adjusted our free cash flow guidance to $110 million to $120 million. So the $40 million that we've already repurchased represent at least 1/3 of that already. So as we continue to see more free cash flow generation, we will continue to evaluate opportunities to repurchase shares. So that is a continuous effort for us. So we'll continue to do that.

Michael Jardon

Analyst

And we still have plenty of room in the -- still have plenty of headroom in the preauthorized amount. So we'll continue to be thoughtful about that here just as we kind of see what are the market dynamics and how we see things playing out for Q4.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Eddie Kim from Barclays.

Edward Kim

Analyst

Just wanted to circle back on your comments on '26 activity levels being consistent, if not slightly lower than '25 levels. You mentioned activity is likely going to increase in the second half of next year, which implies that first half of next year could be a little softer than normal, even considering typical seasonality. So could you talk about maybe what's driving that softness in the first half of next year? Is it all being driven by Asia Pac? Or is there something else going on there?

Michael Jardon

Analyst

Sure. No, Eddie, thanks for joining us. I appreciate the question. I guess how I would frame it up is, this is -- we're just now in the early stages. We're kind of in the first, maybe the -- if not the top, maybe the bottom of the first inning right now in terms of our budget preparation process. So we're going out to kind of start that bottoms-up exercise with our customers and literally look at kind of project by project. Fundamentally, this is my sense from customer conversations and customer discussions that I've had with kind of trying to understand how do they see their spend for the rest of '25 and how it goes into 2026. I think they are thoughtful and mindful of some of the things going on today, commodity pricing, what's happening in the geopolitical sphere, does the peace agreement in the Middle East hold? Something happen more meaningfully with Russia and Ukraine. All those kind of things, I think, are kind of causing a little bit of a cautious sentiment for them to kind of wait and see how this is. And then fundamentally, how we see kind of going into next year, yes, you're right, there's some softness in Asia Pacific. And we -- as much as I would like to wish it away, we always have a Q1 effect. Northern Hemisphere is slow because of the winter season. Our NOC customers are always historically over the last 30-plus years in my career, they're always a little bit slow getting out of the gate in Q1. That's really kind of what we're seeing. But as we -- we'll get a better sense here over the next 8 weeks or so as we go through the budget process. But my sense is, we're probably talking about a flattish to slightly down 2026. And fundamentally, as I said in the earlier question, what we've got the organization focused on is, we're going to control what we can control, and we can't control how much activity there is, but we can control our service delivery, our agency performance, the rollout of our technology, continue to enhance efficiencies. That's what I want the team really focused on. And if we see a ramp-up in activity in the middle of Q2, we'll take it and we'll be ready to be positioned. If it's more like the end of Q2, then we'll deal with it that way as well.

Edward Kim

Analyst

Understood. My follow-up, just tailing on those comments. I understand you'll provide more detailed guidance during the fourth quarter earnings call. But yes, you mentioned activity levels flat or slightly lower next year. At the same time, you said you expect continued margin expansion. So just putting those 2 things together, is it fair to assume that EBITDA for next year should be at least similar to '25 levels? Or how should we think about that just directionally?

Michael Jardon

Analyst

Yes, I think that's a good way to think about it directionally. We will -- I will be very disappointed if we don't expand EBITDA margins in 2026. And what is the overall activity set look like to determine an absolute number, but kind of in the range where I think flat to slightly down going into next year, I would think we'd see similar EBITDA numbers. And quite frankly, what we're -- I would say, we're more focused on, but what we have a real sense of urgency around is better conversion of that into cash generation.

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Our next question comes from Derek Podhaizer from Piper Sandler.

Derek Podhaizer

Analyst

I just have a couple of education questions. Maybe we could first start on the production solutions opportunity that you mentioned a number of times on the call. Can you help us understand what types of services you're talking about the technologies and maybe which regions are best suited for production solutions?

Michael Jardon

Analyst

Sure. Derek, thanks for joining us, and thanks for the question. So it is -- fundamentally, these are -- a great example of it is the early pretreatment facility that we put together that we collaborated with ENI on in the Congo. And that really was a facility that helped treat gas to ensure it met the export spec, which meant they could actually load it on an FLNG vessel. So that was an enhancement to an existing facility. We can also have production optimization or production enhancement where we're actually providing some places like Algeria, where we're providing gas recompression, gas reinjection, helping to reduce the flaring opportunities that those things have. So really it is existing infrastructure. It can be production facility type things. We don't pursue the big massive [ epic ] type projects. What we're really focused on is smaller modular kind of accelerated monetization of existing assets. And those are predominantly for us, very strong presence in the Middle East, strong opportunities for us in in West Africa and then also some that we see here in South America as well. So a good geographic spread that's more brownfield-type activity than it is greenfield activity.

Derek Podhaizer

Analyst

And then I know you mentioned those were big consumers of cash, but now you believe this is going to flip to cash generation. So can you maybe help us frame the magnitude of these projects that were consuming cash, but now what it can be when it's generating cash?

Sergio Maiworm

Analyst

Yes, Derek. No, that's a good question. So we actually embarked on a bunch of these projects over the last few years. So this is just the construction of those facilities, as Mike pointed out, and the investments that we had to make, and we had a few of those projects back to back. So we consumed a bit of capital. But now that a lot of these projects are already online, like the OPT project for ENI and the Congo, basically, that just becomes an annuity for us. There's a very low operating cost to continue to operate those facilities. And there's just a consistent stream of cash. It's very visible. It's very predictable for us. So as we stack up some of these projects that have been concluded and as those projects go from the construction phase into the operations and maintain phase of that, it just becomes an annuity and you just start stacking one on top of the other. So that actually contributes a lot for the free cash flow generation of the business. Does that make sense?

Derek Podhaizer

Analyst

No, it does. That's very helpful. And then just kind of a follow-up to the follow-up. Back to 2026, what Ati and Eddie were talking about on the margin expansion story, maybe could you help us provide a little bit more color on where we'll see the most impact, whether that's from a region line perspective or a product line perspective? Just want to start thinking about kind of the shape of '26 from either the product lines or the regions how you report it.

Michael Jardon

Analyst

Yes. I mean it's -- and again, it's kind of early for me to give too much granularity on what 2026 is going to look like. I think we're going to -- Gulf of Mexico, Gulf of America, I guess, I'm supposed to call it now, is probably going to be similar, flattish kind of year-on-year. We don't see a massive change and kind of what's going to happen with the rig count, those type of things. I think they'll continue to move from magically on Wednesday, the rig frees up, it's going to move to another operator on Thursday, so to speak. So I think the Gulf is going to be pretty consistent. I think South America will have some -- can have some particular strength. I think MENA is going to, again, be solid and probably have a little bit of upside in there. There has been some softness here for us in the last couple of months just because of some of the Saudi activity. They had some operational issues with a vendor that created some slowness there. So I think it will be solid. And I think West Africa will be kind of consistent year-on-year. I don't think we'll start to see some of the impact of some of the new FIDs, that's what we'll start to see in kind of the second half of 2026. That's kind of how I would frame it up. And then Asia Pacific is the one in which I think it's going to continue to be a little bit softer than what we would like to see it, but I think that's just kind of how the customer activity sets are going to be really until Australia, in particular, kind of gets kicked back off into more of a drilling phase.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Joshua Jayne from Daniel Energy Partners.

Joshua Jayne

Analyst

I just wanted to dig into the margin question that Derek just asked a little bit incrementally. So when I think about looking into '26, one of the regions you highlighted is for potential strength is the Middle East. And just when we think about the margin difference between that region and something like Asia Pac, for example, which you expect to be, I guess, a bit on the softer side in '26. Is that part of what's ultimately driving the margin uplift? Or could that -- or if you have a higher contribution there moving into '26, is that -- could that lead margins to expand further than what you're projecting outside of Drive 25?

Michael Jardon

Analyst

No, Josh, it's a really good question. It's a perceptive question. It really is going to be -- so for us, a lot of the driver is going to be the mix. And the mix can be what's the geographic mix. If we actually see a -- what's the impact of the Middle East? Is it flat year-on-year? Is there -- historically, we've kind of had some single-digit growth in the Middle East. And obviously, when there's growth in the Middle East for us, it really moves the needle because it has such a high margin profile. But also what's the impact of -- as we roll out new technologies or we continue to expand our customer wallet, those generally come with higher margins or more accretive. It really is the mix that has an impact on us that it is a little bit more difficult for us at this point in time to really kind of predict what's going to happen there. And then the other element, I know we've kind of been cautious on Mexico activity because we don't have a massive amount of Mexico activity. With Pemex, we're actually going to see some -- we'll start to see some activity in 2026 with non-Pemex operations, and that will be a positive as well. So long answer to say, it depends -- a lot of it depends on the mix, and we'll try to continue to accelerate technology rollout and those types of things, and we'll try to continue to expand our presence in places like the Middle East.

Joshua Jayne

Analyst

Okay. And then one technology question, one release that I thought was pretty interesting over the course of Q3. You highlighted the launch of your Remote Clamp Installation System. So it was deployed in Q4 of last year and then deployed again in Q2 of '25. Maybe just use that as an example of like when I think about a technology like that, how ultimately scalable do you see something like that and when you could really see acceleration of a product like that taking hold in the market? Is that something that happens in '26, more in '27? Maybe just a time line when we see announcements of successful deployment once and then a second one and just moving forward.

Michael Jardon

Analyst

And again, Josh, it's a good perception question. The Remote Clamp Installation simplistically, this allows us to robotically install clamps on completions. When you're running completion stream, you don't -- you have no hands on. You have no personnel, nobody is in the red zone, no hands are in there. And as we have moved from concept to field trials to commercial installations, our operators are extremely pleased with this. We increase the speed at which we can run completions and install control lines and [ install ] clamps on those. More importantly, if you don't have people with their hands in the red zone or their physically in the red zone, it reduces or almost completely eliminates the risk of having an HSE incident. So I think this is one that we'll continue to get more and more uptake from customers on it. We've had really, really good support in the North Sea. I think it's one we'll be able to continue to accelerate. So we'll start to see that more installations in 2026 and really ramp up as we go into 2027.

Operator

Operator

Thank you very much. We currently have no further questions, and this will conclude the Q&A, and this will conclude today's call. We'd like to thank everyone for joining. You may now disconnect your lines.