Amer Sports, Inc.

Thank you for standing by. My name is Jael and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the Amerisports fourth quarter full year fiscal earnings call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker's remarks, there will be a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question in this time, simply press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, simply press star one again. I would now like to send the conference over to Omar Saad, and Head of Investor Relations. You may begin.

Hello, everyone. Thanks for joining Omersport's earnings call for the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2025. Earlier this morning, we announced our financial results for the quarter and year ended December 31st, 2025, and the release can be found on our IR website, investors.omersports.com. A quick reminder to everyone that today's call will contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the federal securities laws. These forward-looking statements reflect our current expectations and beliefs only, and are subject to certain risks and uncertainty that could cause actual results to differ materially. Please see the Safe Harbor Statement in our earnings release and SEC filings. We will also discuss certain non-IFRS financial measures. Please refer to our earnings release for important information regarding such non-IFRS financial measures, including reconciliations to the most comparable IFRS financial measures. We will begin with prepared remarks from our CEO, James Zhang, and CFO Andrew Page, followed by a Q&A session until approximately 9 a.m. Eastern. James will cover key operational and brand highlights, then Andrew will provide a financial review at both the group and segment level, and also walk through our guidance for the first quarter and full year of 2026. Arc'teryx CEO Stuart Hazelden and Salomon CEO Guillaume Mazank will join for the Q&A session. With that, I'll turn the call over to James.

Thanks, Omar. Fourth quarter was a great finish to a breakout year for Amer Sports. Our growth was led by our flagship Arcturus RAM and the rising star, Solomon, which recently surpassed the $2 billion US dollar sales file. In 2025, we generated 27% revenue growth to $6.6 billion and a 170 basis point of adjusted operating margin expansion to 12.8% with double-digit growth across all segments, regions, and channels. In the fourth quarter, We grow sales 28%, and the strong momentum continues into Q1. Our performance was led by technical apparel and outdoor performance, with solid contribution from winter sports equipment and the ball and the racket. All four regions achieved solid double-digit revenue growth. Although we generate solid growth margin expansion in Q4, our just operating margin declined 110 base points. This was entirely due to accelerate SG&A investment to support key growth opportunities, particularly for Solomon. Looking forward, we believe we are well positioned for strong and profitable growth within the premium sports and outdoor markets, which continues to be one of the healthiest segments in all of consumer. Several factors gave me confidence in our outlook. First, We own a unique portfolio of premium innovation-driven sports and outdoor brands. Second, Actelix is a breakout brand with leading growth and profitability for the outdoor industry, driven by its disruptive direct-to-consumer model. Third, Salomon Footwear has a comparing and a unique brand position, but still only a small share of the global sneaker market. Fourth, our Wilson and Winter Sports Equipment franchises already have leading market position, will deliver slower long-term growth, except for Western soft goods, which has significant growth potential. And fifth, we have a strong differentiated platform in Great China, where we continue to deliver best-in-class performance across brands. Before I turn it over to Andrew, I will briefly recap key highlights from our three segments, starting with technical apparel. Apparels deliver another excellent quarter of floor-based trends across regions, channels, and categories, especially for women and women. Technical apparel generates a very solid 16% omnicom driven by strong full price growth and also healthy segment margin expansion year over year. Technical apparel sales plus 34% was our highest growth quarter of the year. We continue to envision Acterix as a truly global brand with significant runway in all major markets, and we're encouraged that the brand is generating double-digit omnicomps across all four regions. Women was Acterix's fastest-growing category in Q4, with over 40% growth. We continue to enjoy rising brand awareness with women across regions. as we improve fit, style, color, function, and the newness. We created a significant amount of newness in women's this past fall, which drove notable incremental growth in key product categories. We saw especially strong momentum in ski and acceleration with the Serum Atom SE, and also the new Endesa Down Jacket, which is a warm waterproof ski jacket at a pinnacle price point. Women's bottoms also continue to be popular following the successful launch of the Clarkier, Luthier, and the Neopens in 2035. Moving to footwear, which grows nearly 40%, driven by strong growth in all markets. Top performing models were the Northern ALT4 Trail shoes, our most successful launch to date, followed by the Kopec Cortex hiking shoes. Looking forward, Arc'teryx has an exciting pipeline of shoe launches for 2026, as we continue to believe footwear will be a large and profitable growth avenue for Arc'teryx. Our Valence sub-brand is still small, but it grows strong double digits in Q4, and we are very excited for the future of this unique brand. Valence stirs a lot of interest at the Paris Fashion Week, with shoe room a point tripling from last year. We expect a strong double-digit growth from Valence in 2026 as we further develop our collections and expand distribution. Secularity and rebirth continue to be at the heart of our brand. We opened eight new rebirth centers in Q4, bringing the total to 43. In Q4, we increased the credit that guests receive when they trade and use a character product to 30% from 30% privacy. which has driven a notable jump in trading activity. I would also like to highlight recent leadership announcement at Acterys. First, we welcome Avery Baker, our first ever Chief Brand Officer, who joined most recently from Palm Beach Helfiger. Avery is stepping into a newly created enterprise-wide load that will bring together global marketing strategy, as well as consumer experience, insights, and the analytics team. We also welcome Tobia Prevedero, our new head of EMEA. Tobia brings more than 20 years of international leadership experience across EMEA and APEC, most recent at Cilin and Gucci. I would also like to mention Peak Performance, our other technical apparel brand, which delivered solid growth in Q4. 2025 marked the brand's return to growth, with sales increasing across all regions and channels. The brand also continued to improve profitability, driven by our concentrated efforts to reduce promotions and increase full price selling. Moving to the outdoor performance segment, which was led by another outstanding quarter from Salomon Footwear and Apparel, and a solid performance from Winter Sports Equipment. 2025 was a breakout year for the 79-year-old Salomon brand, which grows 35% to more than $2 billion of sales. Salomon footwear momentum continues across all regions, especially Asia, with a high demand for sports style and performance. There are several ongoing factors that give us confidence that Salomon footwear is well positioned for significant profitable growth in the years ahead. Number one, global sports style momentum continues. One of Salomon's unique strengths as an outdoor brand is that we are connecting with women and the younger consumer in a way traditional outdoor brands haven't. Sports style is critical to Salomon's position as a modern outdoor sneaker brand. And the success of XT Whisper is the first example of how we can successfully expand sports style beyond the XT6 franchise. Second, our performance and the running lines are also having great success. We continue to believe our new Gravo franchise is helping to unlock the run category for Salomon like never before. Salomon is gaining traction in the run specialty channel in North America and the EMEA, and even China, which has been a sports-style-centric market, is seeing strong traction in performance products. Third is Salomon's amazing brand in Great China and Asia, where we believe we operate the most productive and profitable sneaker shops in the industry. In 2025, Salomon's growth sells very strong double digits in Great China, driven by both sports style and performance, as well as strong growth in apparel. Beyond Great China, Salomon is experiencing surging demand in Korea and Japan, both large sneaker markets. Fourth, our epicenter strategy is working. Our strategy to open a handful of brand stores alongside strategic elevated wholesale distribution in key metro markets is critical to elevate Salomon's presence and awareness globally. Epicenter cities include Paris, London, Shanghai, Beijing, New York, LA, Milan, and more to come. Fifth is a strong pool demand we are seeing from consumers in Europe, Solomon's Home Market, driving strong reorders, preorders, and the sales. Both styles continue to be the close driver, but we have also seen a real inflection in in Europe, support by marketing campaigns, in-store events, and the running event activations. We are seeing especially strong performance in European epicenter like Paris and London, with strong double-digit army pounds. Also, Salomon opened its first-ever office and showroom in Paris, which is designed to elevate our brand presence in the city, strengthen our connection with buyers and the community, as well as support top talent acquisition. Sixth is North America, which is still a much smaller sneaker market for us compared to Europe or Asia. North America grows accelerated in q4 driven by sports star we remain focused on wrapping up our north america direct to consumer footprint and the wholesale expansion with the key strategic partners early signs are positive as our north america audible is experiencing strong growth solomon is also making key investment in leadership in january we appoint our first ever creative director hackie solomon Hege arrives following tenure at Diesel and most recently MM6 and will lead both product design and brand creative direction. Lastly, I also want to mention our winter sports equipment franchise, which had a very strong Q4 despite challenging weather conditions. The market remains healthy despite the low snow in certain regions. Participations and enthusiasm for ski and snowboard are at record levels this winter. The recent Milano Cortina Winter Olympics Games were a big moment for Amherst Sports Group, especially Salomon, who outfitted all 27,000 official staff and volunteers, head to toe. Between Salomon, Akteric's peak performance, Hamada, and also Atomic, which is already one of the most successful aquaski racing brands in history, our brands sponsored more than 200 athletes at the games, winning an incredible 59 medals, a dominant performance. Congratulations to our athletes and the teams. Moving to ball and racket, which had a strong Q4, sales growth 14% driven by continued strength in soft goods. a return to growth in baseball and acceleration in golf. Werson Soft Goods continued its explosive growth, doubling in 2025, including very strong double-digit growth in Q4. Our Werson Soft Goods offering is resonating with consumers in both wholesale and direct-to-consumer channels and across all major regions. Werson is unique in its ability to outfit tennis athletes from head to toe, including rackets and accessories. And we are excited to have signed six new Western Tennis 360 athletes on tour, including World Top 10 player, Eric Stamina, bringing our total account to 16 players. Beyond tennis, we also saw our return to growth in baseball, driven by strong best selves led by the Louisville Slug Supra and the five other best among the top 10 this season. Lastly, before I turn over to Andrew, I'm pleased to announce Cary Art as the next president and the CEO of Western Brand, effective March 1st. Cary is a proven brand CEO and a C-suite executive with great experience in the global soft goods, sports, and outdoor industries, including Harry Hansen, Levi's, and Nike. She began her career as an officer in the United States Navy, serving both in the U.S. and abroad. We are excited to welcome Carrie to the Wilson and Amos sports team. With that, I will turn it over to Andrew.

Thanks, James. We had another strong performance in Q4 with healthy sales growth, gross margin expansion, and EPS, despite our decision to accelerate investment behind Solomon. The strong sales and profitability of the Amherst Sports portfolio allows us to accelerate resources behind the large Solomon sneaker opportunity, while still delivering great results at the group level. Let's first take a moment to reflect on the key highlights of 2025. Amherst Sports Group delivered 27% growth in 2025, with broad-based strength across brand segments, regions, channels, and categories. Arcturus continued its very strong trajectory Solomon Soft Goods entered rapid growth mode, and Wilson Tennis 360 moved the needle in our ball and racket segment. We delivered meaningful adjusted operating margin expansion from 11.1% in 2024 to 12.8% in 2025. We also continued to reduce our leverage ratio, effective tax rate, and annual interest expense, leading to strong operating and free cash flow generation. Now turning to our Q4 results. Amerisports grew sales 28% in Q4 on a reported basis and 26% in constant currency. The strong group sales performance was led by technical apparel and outdoor performance, while Ball & Racket also delivered solid growth in the quarter. By channel, the group continued to be led by D2C, which grew 38% led by Solomon Soft Goods. Wholesale grew 18% globally, which was led by Arcteryx. Regional growth was led by Asian Pacific, which grew 53%, followed by Greater China, which increased 42%. AMEA grew 21%, and the Americas generated 18% growth. Moving down the P&L, adjusted gross margin increased 140 basis points to 57.8% in Q4, primarily driven by positive segment, regional, and channel mix shift. Adjusted SG&A expense as a percentage of revenue deleveraged by 220 basis points and represented 45.5% of revenues in Q4 versus 43.3% of revenues last year. The deleverage was primarily driven by outdoor performance, as Solomon made the decision in Q4 to accelerate investments to support healthy long-term growth. Also, the strong growth of Wilson's soft goods continues to drive elevated SG&A investment within Ball and Racket. These factors were partially offset by technical apparel, which achieved SG&A leverage in Q4. Driven by the higher SG&A investments, as well as lower other operating income, our adjusted operating margin declined 110 basis points from 13.6% last year to 12.5% in Q4. Corporate expenses were $40 million, up from $12 million in Q4 last year, driven by higher share-based compensation. In addition, last year in Q4, corporate expenses benefited from certain one-time accounting reclassifications related to net finance costs. DNA was $106 million, which includes $48 million of ROU depreciation. Adjusted net finance costs in the quarter was $21 million, which comprised primarily of $20 million of interest expense. In the quarter, our adjusted income tax expense was $65 million. which equates to an adjusted effective tax rate of 27%. Adjusted net income was $176 million in Q4 compared to $90 million in the prior year period. Adjusted diluted earnings per share was 31 cents compared to 17 cents last year. Turning to segment results. Technical apparel revenues increased 34% to $1 billion led by Arc'teryx. Growth was fueled by both 37% wholesale growth and 34% D2C expansion. Technical apparel generated a strong 16% Omnicomps, led by full price selling as we intentionally pulled back our participation in key promotional events, including Black Friday and Double 11. Regionally, the technical apparel growth rate was led by Asia Pacific, Greater China, the Americas, and EMEA. All regions grew strong double digits. Q4 was the first full quarter post the career distributor acquisition, which contributed a low to mid single digit percentage to Technical Apparel's growth rate in Q4. In Q4, Arc'teryx opened 15 net new stores with 21 openings offset by the closure of six legacy locations as part of our ongoing strategy to optimize the quality and productivity of our store fleet. New store openings included the new Arc'teryx Outfit store in Rockefeller Center in New York City and Mountain Town stores in Aspen and Park City. Arc'teryx also opened stores in Canada, Japan, Australia, and China in the quarter. Looking back at full year 2025, we opened 24 net new stores, excluding the Korea acquisition. And we plan to open 25 to 30 net new arteric stores in 2026, with the largest number coming in North America and also China. Our store opening plan incorporates a similar level of gross new stores as in 2025, partially offset by the continued closure of certain outlets and other suboptimal locations. In Greater China, as planned, we had slight net store closures in 2025, which includes partner stores. However, we still grew our own store count and overall square footage in China by opening larger format, higher quality, more productive locations. In North America, I want to highlight our second New York City Alpha store, which opened in October on Fifth Avenue at Rockefeller Center. The store is the most pinnacle expression of the brand in the U.S., and we are encouraged by the strong sales this winter. The newly open Mountain Town stores in Aspen and Park City are also off to great starts. We were very pleased by Technical Apparel's strong operating margin expansion in Q4. Adjusted operating margin expanded 160 basis points to 25.9%, driven by strong flow-through of revenue upside in the form of SG&A leverage. This is a great proof point behind our confidence in the scalability of Arcteryx's highly productive store model as they comp positively over time. Moving to our outdoor performance segment, which saw revenues increase 29% to $764 million, driven by very strong performance in Solomon footwear, apparel, bags, and socks, and also supported by strong double-digit growth in winter sports equipment. By channel, outdoor performance D2C grew 55%, led by new doors and higher productivity across markets, especially in APAC and Greater China. Outdoor performance generated a 28% omnicom with strength in both stores and online. Wholesale grew 17% driven, especially by strong results in Greater China and EMEA. Regionally, the outdoor performance growth rate was led by APAC and Greater China, followed by EMEA and the Americas. The popularity of Solomon Footwear continues to inflect globally, and we are doing everything we can to ensure we are well positioned to fully develop this large opportunity over time. Solomon is positioned for significant growth in all three major consumer regions, and we are working hard to build the right team, operational, go to market, and brand building functions to support our growth. In Asia, DTC continues to be the critical growth channel for Salomon, led by our highly productive Salomon Compact Shop format. We opened 33 net new Salomon shops in Greater China this quarter, including both owned stores and partner stores, bringing our total count a year into 286 stores, adding nearly 100 new doors in 2025. In 2026, We expect to continue store expansion in greater China, but at a more moderate rate, adding approximately 35 net stores to the fleet. In December, we reopened the Salomon flagship store in Chengdu. The store design is inspired by local Sichuan Mountain scenery, and it is the first flagship store combining winter sports and trail running. In APAC, we opened net eight new Salomon stores in Q4, including Japan, Australia, and Korea. The region finished the year with 113 Solomon stores, including partner stores, with 44 net new openings in 2025. Overall brand awareness and demand for Solomon footwear is growing rapidly across Asia. In the Americas, Solomon's soft goods growth further accelerated as we continue to lay the groundwork to support significant future growth. We are excited to see very strong order books for both spring, summer, and fall, winter for 2026. with growing demand across a variety of high-quality retail partners, including RAI, Nordstrom, JD Sports, RUN Specialty Shops, and other specialty retailers. We also have improved our inventory position to answer the growing demand. Our brand awareness continues to rise across the greater New York area as our shop in SoHo continues to show great traction with consumers, and we opened our second New York store in Williamsburg, Brooklyn in Q4. The Williamsburg location strengthens our presence in the core New York epicenter, forming very well out the gate. Globally, and in North America, we will continue to focus on our epicenter strategy in 2026 and beyond, particularly New York, Los Angeles, and Miami. We currently plan to open 7 to 10 new Salomon shops in the U.S. this year. In EMEA, we continue to expand our store fleet and key epicenters, including a third brand store in Milan and a fourth in London. And we will further develop our Europe epicenters into Spain, Germany, and other key UK cities in 2026. For our winter sports equipment brands, Q4 is a strong quarter with double-digit growth despite lower snow levels in the Alps and the Rockies. In addition to strong market share in our core ski, boot, and binding franchises, we continue to see incremental growth opportunities in areas such as snowboarding and protective equipment. Moving to outdoor performance P&L, adjusted operating profit margin contracted 490 basis points to 6.2% as Salomon made the decision to accelerate SG&A investments to support its significant growth opportunity in the global soft goods market. Outdoor performance gross margin continued to expand driven by positive mix shift across product, region, and channel. This was more than offset by higher SG&A in Q4, driven by key investments to fuel Salomon's long-term global growth. These investments include impactful marketing campaigns to drive long-term brand awareness, including XT Whispering Gravel, the MECO Olympics-related marketing, Also, we accelerated retail expansion, especially in China, where we opened 25 net new brand stores in Q4. Lastly, we increased investment in talent and operations, including higher incentive compensation given Solomon's performance versus plan, new talent acquisitions such as our new creative director and his team, and opening Solomon's new Paris hubs. I want to emphasize that we're seeing tangible benefits and high returns from our accelerated investments, including meaningful uplifts in Solomon's brand awareness since 2023, which has increased 15 points globally, including plus 15 points in Paris and plus 10 points in London. Moving to ball and racket. Revenue increased 14% to $337 million, driven by soft goods, baseball, and golf. we continue to see very strong momentum in Tennis 360 globally. By category, the growth was led by soft goods, up very strong double digits with continued momentum in all regions. Soft goods now represent approximately 15% of segment revenue. Rackets had slower growth than a quarter due to timing of product launches and wholesale shipments, while underlining demand remained strong. With double digit growth, 2025 was a great year for rackets and we have exciting performance racket launches in 2026. Baseball returned to growth driven by strong performance in bats, driven by successful product launches in fall of 2025, and golf ended the year with improved margins and solid growth, especially in EMEA and APAC, driven by a strong product offering. In other categories, We saw inflatables stabilizing in Q4 and returning to slight growth following a challenging first nine months. Regionally, the ball and racket growth rate was led by China, followed by meaningfully accelerating growth in Americas, EMEA, and partially offset by slight decline in APAC. We had 10 new owned Wilson branch stores opening globally in Q4, split between Greater China and APAC. Wilson Tennis 360 shops are performing well in China, and we opened 13 new shops in Q4, including partner doors. This brings the total owned and partner store count to 77. And in 2026, we plan to open approximately 30 Wilson Tennis 360 shops in China between owned and partner doors. APAC also continues to drive meaningful Wilson SoftWits growth. Our first store in Japan, and Tokyo's Marunouchi District and two stores in Melbourne, Australia are off to great starts. In North America, improving ball and racket growth was led by baseball and soft goods. In soft goods, we saw strong e-commerce comp growth in the region. Our expansion into warmer southern markets is continuing to drive strong results. Our Dallas North Park Mall continues to perform very well, and we continue to expand our new Tennis 360 concept store into more southern and coastal locations, including our new shops in Beverly Hills and Miami. We also continue to expand our Tennis 360 offering into more Dick's Sporting Goods locations, including House of Sports. Ball and racket segment adjusted operating profit margin improved 110 basis points to negative 2.6% driven by solid growth margin expansion related to less promotional activity and better regional and channel mix. This was partially offset by SG&AD leverage due to investments in soft goods. Now turning to the group balance sheet. Ending 2025 with $291 million in net debt and only .3 times net leverage, our financial foundation has never been stronger. We generated $730 million of operating cash flow in 2025 compared to $425 million last year driven by strong profit growth and disciplined working capital management. Additionally, given our strong financial position, post-year end in January, we announced a redemption of $80 million of our outstanding $800 million, 6.75% senior secured notes at a redemption price of $103 million. We ended 2025 with inventories up 33% year-over-year, slightly elevated compared to our 27% sales growth, as expected. We remain very comfortable with the level and quality of our inventory. The higher inventory growth is primarily related to four factors. Number one, earlier receipt of seasonal Arcteryx merchandise to prepare for better in-stock position. Two, higher Arcteryx goods in transit resulting from the greater use of ocean shipping versus air freight. FX translations from the weaker U.S. dollar. And four, the addition of the Arcteryx Korea inventory following the recent acquisition. We expect inventory growth rates to normalize beginning in the second half of 2026, when we start to cycle our improved in-stock positions and the higher use of ocean freight. A quick housekeeping item as we turn to guidance. Beginning in Q1, 2026, we would discontinue allocating certain corporate expenses that are not directly attributable to the operating performance of our reportable segments. There will be no impact to our overall group adjusted operating profit margin. It is simply reallocating certain costs from segments to corporate. For the full year of 2026, we expect group corporate expenses to increase by approximately 60 basis points or approximately $50 million. related to cost reallocated from the segments. These cost reallocations to corporate will most benefit the outdoor performance and ball and racket segment margins and have a much more muted benefit to technical apparel. Now turning to guidance. Guidance assumes the latest tariff rates on all countries will stay in place for the remainder of 2026 and beyond. 2026 is off to a strong start, and given the continued momentum from our highest margin Arcteryx franchise, Accelerating Solomon's Soft Goods, plus the solid foundation of our equipment franchises, we are confident in our ability to deliver another very strong financial performance in 2026. For the full year, we expect reported group revenue growth between 16 and 18%, which assumes a 200 basis point benefit from favorable FX impact at current exchange rates. We expect group adjusted gross margin of approximately 59% for the full year. with the margin expansion continuing to be driven by mixed-shift benefits. As we've said in the past, we are confident in our position to manage through a variety of tariff scenarios given our relatively low exposure to the U.S., strong brand portfolio with pricing power, and clean balance sheet. We continue to expect an immaterial impact on our group P&L from higher tariffs in 2026. We expect adjusted operating margin of 13.1% to 13.3%. towards the low end of our long-term guidance of 30 to 70 bps of improvement, primarily due to the accelerating Solomon investment, opting for long-duration profitable growth over near-term profit flow through. We are committed to investing behind the large growth opportunities in front of Arcteryx, Solomon, and Wilson Tennis 360, while still delivering against our long-term financial algorithms. Arcteryx's size and profitability and our strong sales growth and gross margin expansion at the group level allow us the flexibility to invest behind Solomon and Wilson-Tennant 360 in a way they could not as standalone entities. We believe this is a unique advantage of our portfolio. Corporate expense is expected to be approximately $225 million, which includes approximately $50 million of cost previously allocated to the segments that I mentioned above. We assume full-year net finance costs of $105 to $110 million, higher than 2025 due to a normalizing FX impact on the revaluation of certain non-monetary assets, as well as higher imputed interest expense on store leases as our retail network grows. The effective tax rate is expected to be approximately 28%. This is an increase from 2025 as we generate a higher percentage of our taxable income in higher tax jurisdictions. and also as we cycle a one-time discrete tax benefit in the second quarter of 2025. We expect adjusted diluted EPS of $1.10 to $1.15, which is based on approximately 564 million fully diluted shares. Also, we are assuming depreciation and amortization of approximately $400 million, including approximately $170 million of RU depreciation. CapEx is expected to be approximately $400 million versus $310 million in 2025. The increase is mainly driven by increasing key investments in IT infrastructure and retail expansion. Turning to the segments, our full-year sales forecast incorporates 18% to 20% growth in technical apparel, 18% to 20% growth in outdoor performance, and 7% to 9% growth in ball and racket. For technical apparel, we expect adjusted operating margin of approximately 22%. We expect outdoor performance segment margin of 14.5% to 14.8%, and we expect ball and racket margin of 4.7% to 5%. All three segments should generate gross margin expansion driven by mixed shift, partially offset by higher SG&A reinvestment. While we don't usually provide quarterly segment guidance, Given the Q4 2025 margin fluctuation in outdoor performance resulting from accelerated Solomon investments, I want to provide a little extra margin color for Q1 2026. Although we will continue to invest heavily to support Solomon's growth, we do expect outdoor performance to return to modest year-over-year margin expansion in Q1. Turning to first quarter guidance. We expect reported revenue growth for the group in the range of 22 to 24%, which assumes a 500 basis point benefit from favorable FX impact at current exchange rates. We expect adjusted gross margin to be approximately 59% in 1Q2026 and adjusted operating profit margin to be 14 to 14.5%. Our net finance cost for the quarter will be approximately $27 million, and the effective tax rate will be approximately 28%. We expect adjusted diluted earnings per share of 28 to 30 cents. Lastly, I would note that should strong trends continue and better than anticipated demand materialize, we believe we are well positioned to deliver financial performance ahead of our expectations. With that, I'll turn it back to the operator for Q&A.

Thank you. The floor is now open for questions. If you have dialed in and would like to ask a question, please press star 1 on your telephone keypad to raise your hand and join the queue. If you would like to withdraw a question, simply press star 1 again. If you are called upon to ask a question and are listening via loudspeaker on your device, please pick up your handset and ensure that your phone is not on mute when asking your question. And we do request for today's session that you please lend yourself to one question and one follow-up. Your first question comes from the line of Michael Benetti of Evercore ISI. Your line is open.

Oh, hey, guys. Thanks for taking our question here. Appreciate all the help. A couple of technical ones for the model here. The fourth quarter gross margin is usually a little bit above third quarter in the past. I'm just curious because there's a lot of moving parts here. Is there something structural that we should consider going forward in fourth quarter with any one-timers in one of the segments that we should consider as we model going forward? And then I guess Andrew, the Solomon investments in 4Q, it sounds like those are the reason for the operating margin guidance in 2026 to be at the lower end of the long-term algorithm. So those investments from 4Q continue in the first quarter. Just curious if maybe you could walk us through what some of the investments are in the first quarter. And then bigger picture, as you think about the Solomon investments, and the incremental growth to the algorithm you presented. Are the investments incremental to the algorithm that you've talked about with us? Or it sounds like there's at least an element of it being pulled forward. And I'm wondering if you're stepping up these investments, if that means there's an element of gating the margin expansion today because you can imagine a bigger brand revenue level for Solomon than what you've kind of talked about with us in the past.

Yep. A lot to unpack there, Michael. Happy to address a bunch of these. Yeah, happy to address a bunch of these. So as I think, as you think about the fourth quarter growth, one of the things that you talked about was the trend from third quarter to fourth quarter. Keep in mind that the fourth quarter, as you think about outdoor performance, is our largest quarter for wind sports equipment. when a sports equipment actually outperformed as well in the fourth quarter. And so that is going to create a bit of a drag on gross margin. Obviously strong business, but the fact is, is it's a lower gross margin business and when it outperforms, it affects it. The other thing that you also want to think about is on a comparative basis, recall that in 2023, we set up a cost optimization program and you started to see the impact that cost optimization in an outdoor performance in the back half of 2024. And so when you as you get through an anniversary of this, so you stop you in the fourth quarter of 2025, you saw that you saw the anniversary of that cost optimization. So if you think about all 2025, you saw material margin expansion and outdoor performance and an anniversary of itself, because now you know you're you kind of reset the gross margin to its new going forward perspective. As you think about your first question really around the Solomon investments, in the fourth quarter, given that we opportunistically made key investments behind strong momentum of Solomon, over the recent years, we've had one big brand. Arterix has been on fire, and we've made key investments behind that growth. Now we have multiple high return opportunities to invest in, especially as you think about the Solomon really inflecting right now. Also keep in mind in Q1, you will see Solomon margins return to moderate growth. Again, Q4, we opportunistically made the right investments behind that accelerated momentum. The other thing is that this is the power of our portfolio. We run this, what we call our brand direct offense. And because of that, we can get behind accelerating momentum in our brands in ways that these brands can't do on an individual standalone basis. We continue to be committed to investing appropriately behind large growth opportunities in front of Arcteryx, Salomon, Wilson Tennis 360, And we'll continue prioritizing long duration opportunities over near-term profit flow through. The last thing I want to say about that is that the gross margin mix, including outdoor performance, that continues. That mixed benefit continues. Q4, including Q4, Q4 had healthy gross margin mix shift at the product region and the channel levels. Full year op margin for the portfolio, just recall those 160 basis points expansion for the full year. And this is after consideration of the key investments that we made in fourth quarter. So to wrap it up before I turn it over to Guillaume to give you some real color on it, long term, we still expect that SG&A leverage. So I'll turn it over to Guillaume. He'll give you some real key points on some of the discrete investments we made.

Good morning, everybody. Yes, maybe if we can go a little bit more into details, we take this opportunistic decision to choose Salomon long-term expansion in Q4. I have really few strong examples where we decide proactively to accelerate our positioning in the market. The first one is we are driving a few marketing campaigns in some key areas, supporting XT Whisper, which is, as James explained, we need to build a portfolio of key franchise products. And on the top of XT6, we need to have a kind of variety of products. And XT Whisper looks like really a very promising opportunity. So this is why we are pushing. The same for gravel running, which is also our point of difference in the market. And finally, also, we were preparing the Milan-Cortina Olympic Games. So now you see the results. Certainly, you have seen the momentum we have been able to create during these Olympic Games. And of course, it was kind of preparation of it in Q4. On the top of that, we continue to have this retail expansion. We opened 30 stores in China. In the quarter, you certainly mentioned what was happening in Los Angeles, where we opened this store in Melrose. And at the same time, we were building a campaign. So it's how much we are building this ecosystem in every city where We open a store, we partner with our B2B partners, so I think about Shoe Palace, for example, which has strong presence in Los Angeles, and then we are driving, you know, media and campaigns to attract this consumer, and it was really successful. So this type of model requires also some resources at the beginning, just where the kit starts, in the epicenter. The last one is about talent and operation investment. You just hear that Salomon was growing by 35% in 2025. And, of course, we need to structure the company for a new scale. And we had to support, of course, incentive compensation. But also, we were starting to acquire some new talent acquisition. The example of Eki Salonen is a very good example of the level of ambition we put into into Salomon. Another one was the opening of the Salomon Paris Hub. So we have a new office. You know that we are based in Annecy, which is a kind of small city in the middle of the Alps, a gorgeous one. But of course, you know, the scale of the company requires a little bit more facility in different places. And Paris is very obvious. We are a company, a French-based company, so Paris was kind of obvious opportunity for us and of course it was requiring also this type of uh investment uh it's also a place where we can capture capture trend we can capture also um world-class talents uh in the future okay thanks for that michael i'll just uh i'll just wrap one on the one point because i think the last one we talked about was the was was there something structurally different about our algo

It's not. Like I said, we delivered 160 basis points to the bottom line after that investment. Algo does and has consistently been 30 to 70 basis points plus on the bottom line. We opened this year with our guide at 30 bits. We believe that that's responsible. It does not reflect a structural change in our investment. Our investment, as Gil just highlighted, We will opportunistically get behind growth momentum while still continuing to maintain our earnings algo. It's early in the year, and should strong trends continue and greater demand materialize, we see no reason why we can't outperform our guide as presented. I just want to clarify, 30 to 50 pips is the range.

30 to 50, yep, heard it. Okay, thanks, everybody, for all the help, a lot of detail. Appreciate it.

Your next question comes from Matthew Boss of JP Morgan. Your line is open.

Great, thanks, and congrats on another nice quarter. So, James, following the breakout year that you cited for the portfolio, could you elaborate on the current momentum entering the first quarter? Maybe what opportunities do you see for the Salomon brand to accelerate market share further in 26? And Stuart, have you seen any change in top-line momentum at Arc'teryx relative to the fourth quarter? Or what's embedded to moderate within the 18% to 20% full-year forecast relative to mid-30s that we just see here exiting 25?

Matt, we're going to have Guillaume answer your question on Solomon. James will talk kind of global outlook for the space, including China. And then Stuart will finish. He's remote on Arc'teryx.

So when we think about the momentum itself, of course, we see a very strong outcome. So 25 was really the year we confirmed that we are doing in all regions. You see the traction in China and Asia-Pacific, but our domestic market, which is Europe, was really coming back strongly. All the investment we have been doing in epicenter strategy with Paris, with London, and now we are looking for Milano, which is part of it, of course. But we see that we have the right strategy in order to drive momentum in both sports style and performance. And lately, we see also that U.S. is becoming a new place of growth. Of course, we are still quite small compared to the market, which is on one hand a challenge, but also a great opportunity for us. But we see that we have early momentum here. In the sports style category, you will see that this epicenter strategy, New York, LA, we opened a store in Chicago as well, which is performing very well. And we see also that through data that there is a good city where we start to pop up. And the last one is we have also in U.S. early signal of positive trend for running, thanks to gravel running. And you can imagine that if we are able to combine sports style and running in U.S., then Salomon could have very promising growth.

Yeah, good morning, Matt. Thank you for your questions. As I mentioned, I still believe strong trends have continued each Q1 cross-border, and you already gave out the guidance for our Q1, and the top line will grow between 22% to 24%. So our three segments, basically, they all have a very good forecast to achieve the target we set for them. So it's a pretty good trend for time being. And specifically, I just want to specifically mention about the performance in China during the Chinese New Year. So we see a very positive consumer trends during the Chinese New Year in our brands. And also, okay, not in our brands, and also for the whole sports market overall. Okay, so the consumption is very, very strong. And I think later on, you also will get a certain color from the other brands and your report. Okay, so I think it's a quite good moment for us. However, I still want to say, okay, it's still a bit too early. for us to say, okay, this is a very bullish situation in China market. Okay, so, but at least we offer a good start in 2026.

Okay, and then Stuart.

Yeah, hey Matt, it's Stuart. So off to a fast start in the first quarter, really pleased with the trends that we're seeing across all our regions. And we're seeing especially strong momentum in North America over the last few weeks. So that's contemplated in the guidance that Andrew shared. And then your question versus the 18% to 20% guide, what I would say is this is consistent with our prior practices. We view this as responsible in terms of the guidance we're offering investors. And there's nothing structural that would prevent us from capturing higher sales should demand materialize or We're well positioned, strong inventory position, as Andrew noted, to really convert upside should it materialize. So we're happy with the trends we're seeing and confident for the outlook for 2026.

Great, Colin. Best of luck. Next question.

Great. Your next question comes from the line of Paul Lejouet of Citigroup. Your line is open.

Thank you, guys. I'm curious if you could talk a little bit more about the wholesale expansion opportunity in the U.S. within the Solomon business. What sort of growth should we expect with Solomon wholesale versus DTC this year? And then, Stuart, also curious if you're thinking about adding any new wholesale partner doors for ArcTeryx this year. How should we think about growth there?

Okay, first Guillaume, then Stuart.

Yeah, thanks, Paul, for asking. So clearly, our strategy is about omnichannel. So we know that if we want to become a large sneaker and footwear brand in the U.S., we absolutely need to partner with the key players. So we speak a lot about our D2C. We speak a lot about e-commerce because we think that this is where we can express the best expression of Salomon. But of course, you know, the strategy is really becoming omnichannel and partner with the key player. We have a new support with REI, which used to be our historical partner in the US when we were very focused on winter sport equipment and outdoor. And now we see that we are back on track with them. And then in parallel, we have Nordstrom, GT Sport and most of the running specialists, which are today our current targets in order to drive the growth. What we try to do is not building a very big push, but things door by door, city by city, having close partnerships, make sure that we have a very close partner, good foundation of business. We are driving demand with them. And then we think that this is the best way to, first of all, win the shelf share battle in the market, but as well as expansion in terms of number of doors. So we have this type of very accurate strategy in North America. The key driver at the end is really the consumer demand and how we partner with them to drive this consumer demand.

Stuart? Yeah, thanks, Paul. From an architect standpoint, wholesale is emerging as an important channel for us across three of our regions. key name strategies, footwear, valence, and women's. And footwear, you know, this is an important channel of distribution, different than apparel. So we see the need to have a stronger strategy here. We've been building a sales team as part of our footwear business unit in Portland. And we're engaging with specialty run accounts, big box retailers as well. All on the premium high end, I would say very technical positioning and but that'll be an evolution within our footwear business. For valence, premium wholesale, tier zero, as we call it, will help create higher brand awareness for valence and just drive the business there. And for women's, we see it as an interesting expansion of our distribution footprint just to be relevant where she shops or a female guest shop. So Across those three strategies, we continue to evolve our wholesale strategy. So I hope that helps. Thanks.

Thanks.

Your next question comes from the line of Brooke Roach of Goldman Sachs. Your line is open.

Good morning, and thank you for taking the question. At Solomon, I was hoping that you could unpack the proportion of growth that you expect to realize by region for the brand in 2026, and then if there are any specific regions that will receive an outsized SG&A investment this year. As a follow-up, how much of the growth at Solomon do you expect to come from existing distribution partners versus new distribution partners in 2026? Thank you.

So we expect to have growth in all regions in the world, so clearly the very good and positive sign today is Asia-Pacific and Greater China continue to show very strong momentum, but now EMEA is really back on track, where I feel very proud of EMEA is also that we also qualify high-quality cells, so you know that sometimes In Europe, the price point is sometimes an issue, but we feel very good on what we have been able to build in the long run, so keeping quite premium positioning. And the last one, which is good news, is North America, where definitely small scale today, but very high growth and high demand, and especially from the last quarter, and we see that this momentum is really engaging for 2016. Maybe the second one? Yeah, existing version. Yeah, so once again, there is two areas where we can look at. So the existing distribution is growing with the momentum. We have, of course, you know, a new kind of... strategy in europe and in u.s because we enter also the the sneaker market with sport style and of course it requires some new type of doors i just can name you know in europe gt sport for example which was not a customer of salomon five years ago and now it's becoming one of the strategic partners so we have as well new distribution and in europe despite the fact that our numeric distribution is already very strong And, of course, in the U.S., but I will reply the same as I did for the previous. We are building distribution right now in the U.S.

Thanks, Brooke.

Thank you.

Your next question comes from the line of Ike Burachow of West Fargo. Your line is open.

Hey, thanks. Congrats, everyone. So, obviously, revenue is solid. Some questions this morning on the margin. Andrew, can we just dive in a little bit just on the cadence of the investment? You've got about 200 basis points plus of deleverage in Q1, but based on the full year, it does seem like you should start to be scaling the investments, especially in the ones you kind of talked to for 4Q. Can you just comment on that? Does it seem like the business should be scaling and leveraging the expense base in the back half of the year, specifically in Q4? And does that kind of give us some visibility to scale in the out years and beyond. Thanks.

Also, one of the things that is probably embedded that's not easily seen is that Q1, some of the deleverage is driven on a comparable basis, driven by the fact that Q1 last year in ball and racket was a quarter with meaningful call forward uh because of the the threat of tariffs that was on the horizon so q1 last year compared to q1 this year q1 this year is more normal q1 latches level full forward so you saw a lot more probability so it looks like it'd be leveraged but underneath that you know as we talked about both our carrots and um and um uh outdoor performers are performing well you can see my and i talked about you'll see margin expansion outdoor performance uh it is a it's much more of a quarter one of a quarter one comp issue related to fall and racket in the prior year. Is that helpful?

No, it is. But I guess my bigger question is about the pacing of the expenses into the back half. And are you planning to start scaling those as you exit the year? Because that might give us some better visibility into the SG&A and leverage potential as you're kind of exiting into fiscal 27.

Yeah, I mean, like I said, in Q4 of 2025, we invested a lot. We invested opportunistically a lot in Q4 of 2025. So, you know, empirically, it would suggest that the Q4 to be pretty easy.

Your next question comes from Jay Sol of UBS. Your line is open.

Great. Thank you so much. My question is for Stuart. Stuart, just give us a little bit of update on how some of the initiatives around, say, the women's and footwear has gone for Arc'teryx, you know, in the fourth quarter, in which I look for this year. And also, just with all the news on tariffs over the last few weeks, How has the landscape changed and how might impact the company? Thank you.

Yeah, thanks, Jay. It's Stuart. On your second point there, Taros, you know, it's more of a modest impact on Arc'teryx. It's not nothing, but it is not influencing in any way how we're pricing our products or operating the company. And we see it as an opportunity to take share from companies that might respond in that manner. So feel we're in a good spot from a managing the tariff situation. And then your other question, women's and footwear, as James mentioned in the prepared remarks, saw really healthy growth across both of those categories, both growing 40% in the fourth quarter. Um, women's, uh, you know, continued strength, um, across, uh, some of the new products that we introduced, uh, the women's only products, uh, the pant, uh, category in particular has been really strong. The Clarkia, the Lucia and the Nia pant, uh, offering us a new, uh, sort of lever of growth, uh, within the women's business also saw strength in our, our ski and insulation, uh, the Adam SV, uh, and the Endesa down. Two new products that we introduced in the quarter performed really well. And we're just excited to see women's continue to grow faster than the overall company. You know, we expect to see it exceeding 30% of the total sales of the company by 2030. And footwear, you know, 40% growth in the fourth quarter as well. Top models included the Norvan LD4. That's our top seller. And fast sales in our Kopec Hike Shoe. Um, you know, also just mentioned, we're going to launch the new silent two on March the sixth. This is our pinnacle, uh, trail running, uh, shoe really excited about the evolution and the, and the feature set there and the performance of that shoe. Um, a lot of great feedback from it already from our athletes. Um, and then, you know, within footwear, uh, the business unit we've stood up in Portland, uh, we're excited for, uh, uh, how that's coming together, the sales team, the marketing capabilities we're building. So, Very bullish on footwear. We see this as an important pillar of growth for us for some time. Hope that helps, Jay.

Hey, definitely. Hey, Jay, how you doing? Jay, this is Andrew. Just to wrap up a little bit on tariffs, at the group level, you know, we're confident, as I said, we're confident in our position to manage through a variety of tariff scenarios. You know, given a couple of things, just remember, our low level of U.S. exposure, our CBRONG exposure, brand portfolio and pricing power and our clean balance sheet. I did the two, obviously the two businesses that are most impacted would be, you know, ball and racket and I went to sports equipment. And yes, you know, while I mean, we are aware of the recent Supreme Court decision and follow up decision by by president to oppose the 15 percent. You know, looking at high level scenarios, our position has not changed.

We have time for one more question. I know it's the fourth quarter, so we're taking a little bit longer time this call. Thanks.

Your last question comes from the line of Lorraine Hutchinson of Bank of America. Your line is open.

Thanks. Good morning. Andrew, now that the leverage is down to 0.3 times, can you talk a little bit about your expectations for the capital structure and uses of cash going forward?

Yeah, I mean, you know, and you can see, you saw in 2025, you heard my guy, we're talking about CapEx being approximately $400 billion in 2026. So we still believe a high return use of our cash and allocation is to grow our business. From a, you know, to the point that we still believe that it is, an efficient use of our cash to pay down the inefficient debt as it does not provide the requisite tax shield. But we are, you know, we'll continue to focus on that. We'll continue to focus on the growth of our business. We'll continue to focus on paying down the inefficient debt. And we, you know, we like our leverage position as it stands right now being, you know, close to zero.

Thank you.

That concludes our Q&A session. I'll now turn the conference back over to management for closing remarks.

Thanks, everyone, for joining. We'll see you in three months. Have a great spring. This concludes today's conference call. You may now disconnect.