Crown Holdings, Inc.

Good morning and welcome to Crown Holdings' third quarter 2021 conference call. Your lines have been placed on listen-only mode until the question and answer session. Please be advised that this conference is being recorded. I would now like to turn the call over to Mr. Thomas Kelly, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Sir, you may begin.

Thank you, Annie, and good morning. With me on today's call is Tim Donahue, President and Chief Executive Officer. If you don't already have the earnings release, it is available on our website at crowncorp.com. On this call, as in the earnings release, we will be making a number of forward-looking statements. Actual results could vary materially from such statements. Additional information concerning factors that could cause actual results to vary is contained in the press release and in our SEC filings, including in our Form 10-K for 2020 and subsequent filings. Earnings for the quarter were $0.79 per share compared to $1.59 in the prior year quarter. Adjusted earnings per share increased to $2.03 in the quarter compared to $1.96 in 2020. Net sales in the quarter were up 17 percent from the prior year, primarily due to the pass-through of higher material costs and increased beverage can and transit packaging volumes. Segment income improved to $379 million in the quarter, compared to $367 million in the prior year, primarily due to higher sales unit volumes. As outlined in the release, we currently estimate fourth quarter 2021 adjusted earnings of between $1.50 and $1.55 per share, and full year adjusted earnings of $7.50 to $7.55 per share. Our expected adjusted tax rate for the year is between 23% and 24%, consistent with our nine-month rate. I'll now turn the call over to Tim.

Thanks, Tom. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. Our continued best wishes for the continued health and safety of you and your families. Before reviewing the third quarter results, we want to, again, express our sincere appreciation to our global associates for their continued efforts during the ongoing pandemic. With many of us now vaccinated, we're moving in the right direction, but we should expect the next several months to remain challenging as COVID variants make their way through various populations. Again, we ask all of you to remain vigilant in protecting yourselves, your family members, your associates, and your communities. Demand remains strong across all product lines and geographies with the exception of Vietnam. where hard lockdown measures by the government essentially curtailed all business and consumer activity for much of the third quarter. We expect Vietnam will slowly reopen during the fourth quarter. Reported revenues increased 17% during the quarter as higher beverage and transit volumes coupled with the pass-through of raw material cost increases offset supply chain challenges. In the face of these challenges, we continue to grow earnings. And in July, we discussed with you the step change in earnings that we have experienced beginning with last year's third quarter, in which EBITDA over the last five quarters averages approximately $100 million more than the previous six quarters. Our teams continue to do a great job commercializing new capacity, converting that capacity into income growth, and we look forward to more capacity coming online over the next several quarters. We're also pleased to report that our efforts related to the environment and sustainability have not gone unnoticed. In September, ESG ratings provider Sustainalytics again ranked Crown in the top position for mitigating ESG risk within the metal and glass packaging sector. Also during the quarter, the company joined the climate pledge where we have committed to be net zero carbon by the year 2040. The sale of the European tin plate businesses was completed on August 31st, and going forward, our share of net profits will be reflected in equity earnings. As discussed previously, we continue to experience inflationary pressure across all businesses. Many of our businesses contractually pass through higher costs, including steel and aluminum, but some businesses will have a timing lag to recovery. As costs are passed through, revenues will increase. However, percentage margins will decline due to the denominator effect of one-to-one pass-throughs. Before reviewing the operating segments, we remind you that delivered aluminum here in North America is approximately 75 to 80 percent higher today than at this time last year. LME and delivery premiums are contractual pass-throughs, so reported beverage revenues reflect both the volume increase and the higher aluminum cost. After reading the various analyst reports on magnesium and related aluminum supply, I would say that many of you have a very good understanding of the situation. The concerns related to magnesium, as many of you have noted, relate to energy curtailments in China. China has restarted some production recently, so hopefully that eases some of the concerns recently voiced in Europe. There is magnesium production here in the United States, so we have less concern on domestic supply. And in the near term, we do not believe we have any supply concerns over the next six months, although we continue to monitor our suppliers' supply. In America's beverage, overall unit volumes advanced 4% in the quarter, as continued strong demand in North America and Mexico offset a difficult third quarter comparison in Brazil. Our third quarter 2021 volumes in Brazil were more than 10% higher than the third quarter of 2019. However, third quarter 2020 volumes were up 30% over the third quarter of 19 as that country rebounded sharply from the second quarter 2020 pandemic lockdowns. A combination of we were never going to have enough cans in our inventories compared to the prior year and a pullback in consumer spending related to inflation concerns led to the lower sales this year. We have seen consumer slowdowns in the past in Brazil. However, the market has always recovered to even higher levels. Late in the third quarter, we began commercial shipments from the second line in the Bowling Green, Kentucky plant, with the third line in Olympia, Washington now operational here in early fourth quarter. Next month, we will begin operations on the second line in Rio Verde, Brazil, followed by a late first quarter 2022 startup on the second line in Monterey, Mexico. New two-line plants in Ubaraba, Brazil, and Martinsville, Virginia will come online late in 2022, followed by the new two-line plant in Mesquite, Nevada, scheduled for a mid-2023 startup. A lot of activity, but the team is fully committed to continue our growth with a well-balanced customer portfolio. Unit volumes in European beverage advanced 5% over the prior year with strong volumes across most operations in the segment. Inflation offset unit volume growth with freight, utilities, and labor being most notable. And with inflation expected to remain elevated across Europe, we project income will decline in the European segment in the fourth quarter and during 2022. In Asia Pacific, unit volumes declined 8% in the quarter, owing entirely to a 55% contraction in Vietnam. Excluding Vietnam, unit volumes grew 20% in the quarter. The Vietnamese government instituted hard lockdown measures to curb the spread of COVID and its variants. And for example, a hard lockdown means that you're not allowed to leave your house and the army will deliver to you all food and essentials. And while we expect Vietnam will slowly reopen during the fourth quarter, we do expect that from time to time we will be subject to various lockdowns or movement control orders as the various countries look to prevent the spread of COVID. Our new plant in Vung Tau, Vietnam is now qualified to begin commercial shipments to customers. As expected, transit packaging had another strong quarter, recording double-digit gains in revenues and segment income. Volume growth and steel-strap tooling and across protective packaging offset inflationary headwinds, notably freight. The business continues to navigate supply shortages, transportation delays, and inflation, and remains well-positioned to continue to grow earnings in the fourth quarter and through next year as these conditions ease over time. Performance in our North American food and beverage can making equipment businesses remain firm throughout the third quarter. And earlier in the year, we commenced operations at a new food can plant in Dubuque, Iowa. And during the third quarter, we began commercial shipments from a new two-piece food can line in our Hanover, Pennsylvania plant. These line additions provide much needed capacity to our domestic supply footprint, allowing us to eliminate imports. And we expect significant improvement earnings from food in 2022 as these new lines come through their learning curves. So in summary, a very strong first nine months of 2021 with EBITDA up 26%. As described earlier, we have several capacity projects recently completed and are underway and are pleased to reconfirm the 2025 EBITDA estimate of $2.5 billion first provided during the May Virtual Investor Day. In near term, while we may experience inflation and supply chain-related headwinds over the next few quarters, we currently expect 2022 will be another strong year of earnings growth, with EBITDA estimated to be approximately $2 billion. In addition to North American food, our beverage can businesses in North America and Brazil and our transit packaging business are all expected to have strong years in 2022, allowing us to earn through the dilution related to the European asset sale and headwinds from a persistent inflationary environment. Before opening the call to questions, there are a number of you in the queue, so we ask that you please limit yourselves to no more than two questions so that others will have a chance to ask their question. And without any, I think we're now ready to take questions.