Howmet Aerospace Inc.

Good morning and welcome to the HowMet Aerospace first quarter 2025 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 then one on your telephone keypad. To withdraw your question, please press star then two. Please note, this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Paul Luther, Vice President, Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Gary. Good morning and welcome to the HowMet Aerospace first quarter 2025 results conference call. I'm joined by John Plant, Executive Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, and Ken Giacobi, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. After comments by John and Ken, we will have a question and answer session. I would like to remind you that today's discussion will contain forward-looking statements relating to future events and expectations. You can find factors that could cause the company's actual results to differ materially from these projections listed in today's presentation and earnings press release and in our most recent SEC filings. In today's presentation, references to EBITDA, operating income, and EPS, mean adjusted EBITDA excluding special items, adjusted operating income excluding special items, and adjusted EPS excluding special items. These measures are among the non-GAAP financial measures that we've included in our discussion. Reconciliation to the most directly comparable GAAP financial measures can be found in today's press release and in the appendix in today's presentation. And with that, I'd like to turn the call over to John.

Thanks, BT, and good morning, everyone. I'll make my remarks at the outset fairly brief and then spend more time talking about the outlook after Ken has provided his commentary on market and BU commentary. So, first of all, Q1 was a solid start to the year. Revenue was a record and increased 6%. while EBITDA margin was 28.8%. Operating margin was 25.3% and up 500 basis points year over year. Free cash flow was a positive 134 million. All segments grew revenue and EBITDA compared to Q4 of 2024. Of the segments, the most notable margin progression was within fastening systems and structures. Free cash flow was deployed with a 25% increase in dividends, plus $125 million of share buyback in the first quarter, which was continued in Q2 with a further $100 million in April. We had strong performance on all fronts. My comment on the outlook will be after Ken, so over to yourself, Ken.