American Axle & Manufacturing Holdings, Inc.

Good morning. My name is Nick, and I will be your conference facilitator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the American Axle and Manufacturing third quarter 2025 earnings conference 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 period. If you would like to ask a question during this time, simply press the star key, then the number one on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, please press the star key, then the number two. As a reminder, today's call is being recorded. I would now like to turn the call over to Mr. David Lim, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead, Mr. Lim.

Thank you, and good morning. I'd like to welcome everyone who is joining us on AAM's third quarter earnings call. Earlier this morning, we released our third quarter of 2025 earnings announcement. You can access that on the investor relations page on our website, www.aem.com, and through the PR Newswire services. You can also find supplemental slides for this conference call on the investor page of our website as well. Now, to listen to a replay of this call, you can dial 877-344-7529, replay access code 434-6240. This replay will be available through November 14th. As for upcoming investor conferences, we'll be at the Barclay 16th Annual Global Automotive and Mobility Tech Conference later this month. We'll also attend Bank of America Leverage Finance Conference and the UBS Global Industrials Transportation Conference in December. We look forward to seeing you there. Now, before we begin, I'd like to remind everyone that the matters discussed in this call may contain comments and forward-looking statements that are subject to risks and uncertainties which cannot be predicted or quantified and which may cause future activities and results of operations to differ materially from those discussed. For additional information, please reference slide two of our investor presentation or the press release that was issued today. Also, during this call, we may refer to certain non-GAAP financial measures. Information regarding these non-GAAP measures, as well as a reconciliation of the non-GAAP measures to GAAP financial information, is available in the presentation. With that, let me turn things over to AM's Chairman and CEO, David Dowk. Thank you, David, and good morning, everyone.

Thank you for joining us today to discuss AM's financial results for the third quarter of 2025. Joining me on the call today is Chris May, AM's Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. To begin, I'll review the highlights of our third quarter financial performance. Then I will touch on some commentary about AM's recent business developments, After Chris covers the details of our financial results, we will open up the call for any questions that you all may have. So let's begin. AM's third quarter 2025 sales were 1.51 billion. AM's adjusted earnings per share was 16 cents per share. Operating cash flow was 143.3 million, and adjusted free cash flow was approximately 98.1 million. From a profitability perspective, AM delivered strong year-over-year margin growth driven by performance. AM's adjusted EBIT in the third quarter was 195 million, or 12.9% of sales, a robust 130 basis point improvement versus last year on flat sales. This was led by our driveline business unit, which achieved adjusted EBIT margins of 14.9%, the highest third quarter margin since 2020. The performance was supported by a focus on operational efficiency, continuous improvement, quality, and managing factors under our control. On the metal forming side, we still have additional work to do to reach our full margin potential. Let's talk about the operating environment. In the near term, we are seeing onshoring opportunities within our metal forming group, and we continue to assess our footprint to optimize to support our customers' needs as we're all dealing with the tariff environment. With the discontinuation of EV tax credit in the U.S., changes to emission regulations and trade policies, OEMs are assessing their long-range product plans and the market, especially trying to determine electric vehicle natural demand. Currently, bidding activity leans more towards ICE than EV, and an extended ICE tail is good for AM as we can further leverage our installed asset base with our core products. We continue to believe that large truck and SUV demand appear to be very healthy, both sweet spots for AEM. With that said, we also have a strong foundational technology in electrification with our components, electric drive units, and electric beam axles. Our portfolio will only strengthen and expand as we complete the DALY acquisition. As we have communicated earlier, our goal is to have a propulsion-agnostic product portfolio that adjusts with the market demands. Let me talk about some business updates on slide four. From a deal transaction standpoint, both shareholder approvals were completed in July. In October, we completed the permanent financing for the transaction by securing $850 million of senior secured notes. 1.25 billion of senior unsecured notes, and 835 million of term loans. Additionally, we redeemed all of our 2027 senior notes and a portion of our 2028 senior notes with the financing mentioned. On the regulatory front, we continue to make great progress. The European Commission clearance decision was issued on October the 1st, meaning that the EU antitrust condition has been completely satisfied. We also recently cleared regulatory approval in Brazil this Thursday on November the 6th. The combination has now been cleared and the related conditions to the combination satisfied under the antitrust laws in eight of the 10 required jurisdictions where antitrust filings were made, namely in the United States, India, the UK, Korea, Taiwan, Turkey, the EU, and most recently, Brazil. The clearances that remain outstanding under antitrust laws are Mexico and China. We expect Mexico to be cleared here in the fourth quarter of 2025. In China, the parties are actively engaged with the State Administration for Market Regulation, otherwise known as SAMR, with respect to its review of the combination, and AM remains highly competent on obtaining antitrust clearance in late 2025 or early 2026. Regarding the deal closing timing, we now expect the deal to close in the first quarter of next year as we communicated in a press release on October the 27th. As such, we are very excited to close on this transformational combination. From a product win perspective, AMOs want new and replacement programs as well as volume extensions in both business units. One win in particular is a meaningful volume uplift for a popular heavy-duty truck program. We supply critical transmission products for that platform. These wins in general support a broad spectrum of powertrains signifying AM's agnostic approach. Transitioning to our guidance, we have updated our 2025 guidance ranges on the strength of our results through the first three quarters of the year. AM is now targeting sales in the range of 5.8 to 5.9 billion, adjusted EBITDA of approximately 710 to 745 million, and adjusted free cash flow of approximately 180 to 210 million. Our guidance ranges are supported by an assumed North American production volume of approximately 15.1 million units and assumptions on certain platforms that we support. Chris will provide additional details on the assumptions underpinning our guidance. In summary, AM continues to deliver solid performance while successfully navigating market volatility and policy uncertainties. We remain extremely focused on managing our business and driving efficiency regardless of the operating environment. Meanwhile, we continue to make excellent progress for the regulatory bodies to close our combination with Dow Lane. We are excited about the combination's potential and the long-term vision of the new company. This deal is truly transformational, benefiting our customers, suppliers, employees, and most importantly, our shareholders. Let me now turn the call over to our Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, Chris May, for the third quarter financial details.