Old Dominion Freight Line, Inc.

Good day, and welcome to the Old Dominion Freight Line fourth quarter 2022 earnings conference call. All participants will be in listen-only mode. Should you need assistance, please signal a conference specialist by pressing the star key followed by zero. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To ask a question, you may press star and one on your touchtone phone. To withdraw from the question queue, please press star then two. Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Drew Anderson. Please go ahead.

Thank you. Good morning and welcome to the fourth quarter and full year 2022 conference call for Old Dominion Freight Line. Today's call is being recorded and will be available for replay beginning today and through February 8th, 2023 by dialing 1-877-344-7529, access code 2673176. The replay of the webcast may also be accessed for 30 days at the company's website. This conference call may contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. including statements, among others, regarding Old Dominion's expected financial and operating performance. For this purpose, any statements made during this call that are not statements of historical fact may be deemed to be forward-looking statements. Without limiting the foregoing, the words believes, anticipates, plans, expects, and similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements. You are hereby cautioned that these statements may be affected by the important factors, among others, set forth in Old Dominion's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission and in this morning's news release. And consequently, actual operations and results may differ materially from the results discussed in the forward-looking statements. The company undertakes no obligation to publicly update any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise. As a final note before we begin today, we welcome your questions, but we ask in fairness to all that you limit yourselves to just one question at a time before returning to the queue. Thank you for your cooperation. At this time for opening remarks, I would like to turn the conference over to the company's president and chief executive officer, Mr. Greg Gant. Please go ahead, sir.

Good morning and welcome to our fourth quarter conference call. With me on the call today is Marty Freeman, our COO, and Adam Satterfield, our CFO. After some brief remarks, we'll be glad to take your questions. The Old Dominion team produced fourth quarter financial results that allowed us to finish the year with company records for annual revenue and profitability. We extended our track record of success and delivered the 10th straight quarter with both an increase in revenue and improvement in our operating ratio. As a result, the fourth quarter of 2022 was also the 10th straight quarter where we produced double-digit growth in earnings per diluted share. Our team produced these results while facing many challenges during 2022, which were primarily related to the unexpected slowdown in the domestic economy. We entered the year anticipating growth in our volumes that didn't ultimately meet our initial expectations, but we made the necessary adjustments throughout the year that once again showed the flexibility and resiliency of our long-term strategic plan. We also maintained a watchful eye on the efficiency of our operations and continued with our disciplined approach to managing discretionary spending. Due to our confidence and our ability to win market share over the long term, the one thing that did not change in 2022 was our commitment to investing for the future. Capital expenditures totaling $775.1 million in 2022 were a new company record, and we invested $299.5 million in real estate projects that further expanded the capacity of our service center network. We also continue to invest heavily in our OD family of employees with improvements in pay and benefits, as well as a company record contribution to our 401 retirement plan for employees. In dealing with the reality of slower than anticipated business volumes, we also work diligently to protect the significant investment that we made over the past two years in our new employees. Speaking of new employees, I'm proud to share that there have been over 1,300 new drivers that graduated from our internal truck driving school over the past two years. In some cases, these driver school graduates that now have their CDLs are temporarily working in non-driving roles. While this comes at an increased cost to the company, we believe this bigger pool of licensed drivers will provide us with a strategic advantage once the freight cycle turns and additional volume opportunities become available to us. We said in our third quarter earnings call that we anticipated volumes could start increasing in the spring of this year, and we continue to remain cautiously optimistic that this will occur despite ongoing risk with the domestic economy. Regardless of the economic environment, I believe our 2022 results provide yet another example of why our long-term strategic plan will remain our focus for the foreseeable future. Consistent execution of this plan has helped us create an unmatched value proposition in our industry that led to over $1 billion of revenue growth for the second straight year in 2022. I am confident that this commitment to our strategic plan will also continue after my retirement at the end of June this year. Our long-term success is the result of a strong team and their combined commitment to maintaining a strong company culture. After working with Marty for most of my career, I can tell you that he lives and breathes the OD family spirit and will help take the company to new heights. I think the best is yet to come for Old Dominion, and I look forward to watching OD extend its long-term record of success. Thank you for joining us this morning, and now here is Marty Freeman to provide some more details on the fourth quarter.