Schnitzer Steel CEO Discusses F1Q2011 Results - Earnings Call Transcript

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Schnitzer Steel Industries, Inc. (SCHN)

F1Q2011 (Qtr End 12/31/10) Earnings Call

January 6, 2011 5:00 p.m. ET

Executives

Alexandra Deignan – VP, IR

Tamara Lundgren – President and CEO

Richard Peach – SVP and CFO

Analysts

Torin Eastburn – CJS Securities

Eric Glover – Canaccord

Brent Thielman – D.A. Davidson

Luke Folta – Longbow Research

Sal Tharani – Goldman Sachs

Tim Hayes – Davenport and Company

Presentation

Operator

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to Schnitzer Steel’s First Quarter 2010 earnings release conference call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Later, we will conduct a question-and-answer session and instructions will be given at that time. (Operator Instructions)

If anyone requires operator assistance during today’s call, please press star then zero on your touch-tone phone. As a reminder, today’s call is being recorded. At this time, I would now like to turn the conference over to your host, Alexandra Deignan, Vice President of Investor Relations. You may begin.

Alexandra Deignan

Thank you, Joe, and good afternoon, everyone. I’d like to thank you all for taking time to join us today.

In addition to today’s audio comments, we have prepared a set of slides, which were made available concurrently with our earnings press release. You can access these slides through our website at www.schnitzersteel.com.

Before we get started, let me call your attention to the detailed Safe Harbor statements on slide two, which were also included in our press release of today and in the company’s Form 10-Q for the First Quarter ended November 30, 2010, which will be filed this afternoon.

These statements, in summary, say that in spite of management’s good faith, current opinions on various forward-looking matters, circumstances can change and not everything we think will happen always happens. In addition, we have guidance regarding our outlook for the second quarter of 2011 in our press release, in this presentation, and in our 10-Q, which will be filed later today. After this call, we will not be under any obligation to update our outlook.

Finally, please note that we will be discussing some non-GAAP measures during our presentation today. We have included a reconciliation of those metrics to GAAP in the appendix of this slide presentation.

Now, let me turn the call over to Tamara Lundgren, our Chief Executive Officer. She will host the call today with Richard Peach, our Chief Financial Officer.

Tamara Lundgren

Thanks, Ali, and good afternoon, everyone. Thank you for joining us as we present our first quarter earnings for Fiscal 2011. We have a fair amount to share with you today, including our strong first quarter performance and an update on our acquisition activities.

I’ll start us off with the review of consolidated results and an overview of our business performance. And then I’ll move to a summary of our capital investment program and our recent acquisitions.

Richard, will discuss the First Quarter performance of each of our segments, and review our cash flow, and capital structure, and then I’ll conclude with an outlook for our Second Quarter. So let’s get started by turning to slide four.

I’m pleased to announced that we delivered a very strong First Quarter. Consolidated revenues increased by more than 70% compared to the first quarter of 2010, which was a first quarter record in our 105-year history.

Our EBITDA also increased significantly to $45 million, an 80% increase versus last year. Operating income tripled to $28 million and our earnings per share of $0.64 was more than doubled last year’s first quarter.

We also exceeded our fourth quarter 2010 performance on all of these metrics, which continues our steady trend of improvement since the global financial crisis began in 2008.

This is a terrific start to Fiscal Year 2011, and I’d like to thank all of our employees whose hard work, dedication, and commitment to excellence made these results possible.

The primary driver behind our strong performance is that growth in the developing world continues to fuel demand for recycled metals. Our geographic alignment with the export markets enables us to serve this demand efficiently through our network of seven deep-water ports.

In tandem with our strong operational performance, we’ve continued to progress on our growth CapEx program and we announced a series of acquisitions that will be transformational to our platform on both coasts.

In Metals Recycling, we announced the acquisition of five new businesses, which extend our geographic footprints into Western Canada, and enhances our existing operations in the Northeast, the Southeast, and Hawaii.

In our Auto Parts Business, we announce the acquisition of a new facility in Waco, Texas, and expanded operations in California and in Oregon. Many of these deals have been in our pipeline for some time and all are consistent with our strategies for growth. As we integrate these complimentary assets with our existing operations, we will enhance our sources of supply as well as generate operational synergies.

During the quarter, we also commenced start-up operations of the new non-ferrous separation technology at our Metal Recycling Facilities in Washington and Oregon.

Now, let’s turn to slide five and we can dig a little deeper into the factors which drove our first quarter performance.

MRB shipped 1.2 million ferrous tons this quarter, achieving record first quarter sales volume. In fact, aggregate shipments in our last four quarters approximate the total process volume shipped during our peak year of Fiscal 2008. Our ability to capitalize on higher demand and prices from the export market enhance profitability in our metals recycling business.

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