Summit Materials, Inc.

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. My name is Brent and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the Summit Materials second quarter 2022 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 at that time, simply press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, again, press star 1. Thank you. It is now my pleasure to turn today's call over to Carly Anderson, EVP.

Hello and welcome to Summit Materials' second quarter 2022 results conference call. Yesterday afternoon, we issued a press release detailing our financial and operating results. Today's call is accompanied by an investor presentation and a supplemental workbook highlighting key financial and operating data. All of these materials can be found on our Investor Relations website. Management's commentary and responses to questions on today's call may include forward-looking statements, which by their nature are uncertain and outside of summit materials control. Although these forward-looking statements are based on management's current expectations and beliefs, actual results may differ in a material way. For a discussion of some of the factors that could cause actual results to differ, Please see the risk factor section of Summit Materials' latest annual report on Form 10-K, which is filed with the SEC. You can find reconciliations of the historical non-GAAP financial measures discussed on today's call in our press release. Ann Noonan, our CEO, will begin today's discussion with a business update. Brian Harris, our CFO, will review our financial performance. Ann will return to discuss the path ahead, and then we will open the line for questions. Please limit your asks to one question and then return to the queue so we can accommodate as many analysts as possible in the time we have available. With that, I'll turn the call over to Ann.

Thank you, Carly, and good morning, everyone. Let's first start with our progress on safety. Through June, we are tracking ahead on most of our safety KPIs on both the year-over-year basis and versus our internal expectations. This includes our year-to-date reportable incident rate. which is down 55% versus the comparable prior year period. And although our journey to zero harm is ongoing, I would like to thank our safety leadership and Summit employees everywhere for the collective progress we've made and for their commitment to living our safety first value. Now let's turn to slide four for a look at our second quarter performance, where today we are reporting record quarterly earnings. Our team overcame challenging operating conditions and divestiture impacts to deliver growth across net revenue, adjusted gross profit, and adjusted EBITDA. In fact, if you exclude the impact of acquisitions and divestitures, second quarter adjusted gross profit would have increased more than 7%, and adjusted EBITDA would have increased nearly 6% versus Q2 2021. At a high level, our quarter was characterized by three overarching factors. First, continued pricing growth with gains across all lines of business, and led by our downstream businesses, as we moved swiftly to pass through higher input costs. Second, volumes that were held back by divestiture impacts, as well as cement shortages in certain markets. Despite this, we view underlying near-term demand conditions in each of our end markets as relatively healthy, albeit at varying levels. And the third factor impacting results is a challenging cost environment, coupled with continued supply chain constraints that continue to face the industry and our business. In light of these conditions, I am pleased that we've been able to navigate these challenges, grow our business while protecting margins through a continued focus on self-help initiatives in both commercial and operational excellence. With a solid second quarter under our belts, the takeaway from the quarter is that we are in a position of strength heading into the second half and are well positioned to deliver on our adjusted EBITDA outlook for the year. Slide 5 covers segment results, where growth was led by our West segment and our cement business. West net revenue was up 12.4%, driven by robust pricing across all lines of business, and led by high single-digit aggregates pricing growth in Utah. Aggregates volumes in the West segment increased 7.3%, fueled by growth in Texas and British Columbia. Pricing flow-through and aggregates volume growth more than offset lower downstream volumes and inflationary conditions to drive adjusted EBITDA of 7.5% in the second quarter. Staying with the West segment for a second, if you recall from our investor day, we had flagged issues with cement availability in Salt Lake City, one of our largest residential markets, where a supplier cement operation experienced downtime. Our team moved quickly to collaborate, and for the first time in Summit's history, we began railing in cement from our Davenport cement plant. Those actions helped triage the situation, and I'm happy to share that the cement situation in Utah has improved. We are still receiving about 10 real cars from Davenport per week, but we believe we have successfully navigated through the more difficult supply challenges. In fact, June was a record EBITDA month for our Kilgore business in Utah, and we remain encouraged by the momentum we've built out west. In our east segment, net revenue and adjusted EBITDA were lower versus the prior year, due mainly to our 2022 divestitures. Setting those impacts aside, we saw lower aggregates volumes in Kansas due to wet weather that was mostly offset by aggregates volume growth in Georgia. Aggregates pricing in the East segment was up 6.6% in Q2 and is up 6.7% year-to-date. Unpacking this further, pricing differs by geographic market within the segment. For example, in Virginia, Georgia, the Carolinas, and the Kansas City metro area, we can expect high single to low double digit pricing growth on a consistent basis. In contrast, the more rural areas in Kansas and Missouri command low to mid single digit pricing growth, which is why we are actively working to tilt our central region sales exposure towards a higher growth Kansas City metro area. That being said, demand conditions and cost pressures continue to warrant a more aggressive pricing posture. We therefore have more back half pricing planned and believe the East should ultimately be firmly within that high single digit to low double digit territory in this demand environment. East segment adjusted EBITDA was adversely impacted by higher repair and maintenance costs, as well as higher subcontractor costs as sourcing capital equipment in certain markets has been difficult, resulted in higher, albeit necessary, operating costs to extend the life of our assets. Turning lastly to our cement results, where we are seeing significant momentum. In June, we realized a record monthly EBITDA and a very strong revenue month as well. For the quarter, net revenue increased 9.1% to $93.7 million, driven by pricing growth of 7.5%. As expected, pricing growth moderated versus first quarter 2022 levels as we lapped April 2021 pricing That said, the pricing environment remains very constructive, and we have moved forward with an $8 per ton price increase as of July 1st. And so far, we are witnessing higher-than-normal price realization as our sales team continues to implement and execute our customer segmentation and value pricing principles. Cement volumes were slightly lower year-on-year in the second quarter. Despite this, demand conditions in cement remain very strong, as our customers continue to express concerns over cement supply and ability to meet high seasonal demand. EBITDA margins for cement in Q2 were 46.2% as pricing gains combined with favorable demurrage costs relative to the prior year period drove margins roughly 25 basis points higher versus the prior year period. In the long run, through a combination of commercial and operational excellence initiatives, successful completion of the Davenport cement storage dome investment, as well as the full recovery and expansion of the Green America recycling facility, we have a credible and fair path to drive cement margins sustainably above 40%, which is our North Star objective for that business. Now let's turn to slide six for our Elevate Summit scorecard. There you'll see that we reached two summit records. First, on net leverage, we once again set a new low. At 2.4 times net debt to adjusted EBITDA, we are down 0.4 times from Q1 2022 and remains firmly below our three times Elevate Summit target. Armed with much enhanced financial flexibility, Summit is in a strong position to pursue a broad array of value-creative capital allocation priorities, including investments to drive organic growth, aggressive pursuit of high return M&A opportunities, and opportunistically repurchasing shares when they represent compelling value. And the second record was ROIC of 8.8%, which matches a previous high watermark for Summit. ROIC increased 40 basis points sequentially, 30 basis points year on year, and as our divestitures flow through results, we expect that ROIC should continue this upward trajectory. Adjusted EBITDA margin on an LTM basis decreased 10 basis points sequentially, and reflects the challenges in this operating environment as the realization of our price increases lagged cost inflation, particularly in early 2022. Having said that, our centers of excellence are relentlessly focused on improving operation and commercial excellence in each of our lines of business. We have efficiency projects underway to optimize our cement mixes, reduce washout times in ready mix, and improve tons per hour in aggregates. Each of these initiatives is designed to drive out costs and improve margins. These, together with our commercial excellence initiatives, are self-help margin opportunities unique to Summit as we drive best-in-class practices enterprise-wide and are critical to reaching our greater than 30% EBITDA margin target. Slide 7 displays the four strategic priorities and enabling capabilities that are foundational to the Elevate Summit strategy. As we move each of these forward, I'd like to highlight two recent areas of progress. First, on slide eight, we are proud to announce that as of tomorrow, August 5th, we will have fully converted both cement plants to 100% Portland limestone cement. As you know, we converted Davenport in the first quarter, and our continental team worked diligently to successfully convert Hannibal on time and on budget. The benefits of this conversion are worth reiterating. First, PLC reduces concrete and body carbon by approximately 10% without compromising resiliency or quality. Second, by replacing plinker with PLC, it unlocks additional capacity. And finally, PLC carries a lower cost and therefore has positive margin implications for our cement business. These benefits are more quickly realized thanks to the rapid adoption of PLC by our customers, including state DOTs. The bars on the right show our 2022 planned sales volume for PLC, and the gold line indicates that we are tracking well ahead of our internal forecast of PLC sales for 2022. What a finer point on market acceptance. In 2022, we expect to sell approximately 1.25 million tons of PLC, which will be up from 25,000 tons in 2021, a tremendous accomplishment for our continental team. and proof that Summit is taking aggressive steps towards being the most socially responsible construction materials provider in the industry. The second item I'd like to highlight is on slide 9, and that centers on portfolio optimization. In Horizon 1, we moved through no-regret portfolio moves, investing 10 mostly downstream businesses, generating $470 million in proceeds, and delivering considerable value for our shareholders, at more than 10 times EBITDA across all divestitures. Now, in Horizon 2, our goal is to invest to grow priority markets. What does that mean exactly? It means three things. First, it's about richening the mix to be more materials-led. We are targeting high-quality assets in aggregates and cement, and we'll be very selective about anything in the downstream. Second, portfolio optimization is about sourcing bolt-ons, both large and small, that will deliver higher margin higher return, and less earnings volatility to our portfolio. Everything we do is through the lens of bringing increased value to our shareholders. And finally, it's about entering or building our leadership position in high-growth strategic markets. We want to expand our market presence in both geographic adjacencies as well as targeted rural and ex-urban markets where we see an achievable path to being the number one or number two player. Summit is pursuing opportunities to lead in key markets from a position of strength. We are in the best financial shape in the company's history, with ample liquidity and the lowest net leverage ever. While there is a universe of about 5,000 targets in aggregate cement and related businesses, we have prioritized about 60 opportunities in our current M&A pipeline. And within those priority targets, we are in active discussions with several of them and have many LOIs in place. While we are eager to grow, we are also disciplined and structured in our approach, and our team is intensely focused on our Horizon 2 portfolio optimization principles. In other words, we will pursue opportunities that we believe will help us grow and that will move the needle towards our Elevate Summit goals while transforming the portfolio to be more materials-led. Which leads me to slide 10, where we want to emphasize just how much change the portfolio has undergone. Year-to-date, approximately 72% of our 2022 adjusted EBITDA has been generated by aggregates and cement. This is a major step up from 2020 levels, a roughly 4 percentage point increase from 2021, and significant progress towards our Horizon 2 goal of at least 75% of EBITDA sourced from materials. This is proof that we are no longer yesterday's summit. We are transforming into a higher-margin, materials-led business and we believe we should be valued commensurately. Now, before passing to Brian, let me wrap up on slide 11, where we lay out the three horizons of our Elevate Summit strategy alongside our financial targets. As we said at our investor day, we are fully in horizon two with respect to our portfolio transformation and our sustainability agenda. Meanwhile, we are still in the early innings of our innovation priorities, and we will update you as we make progress against that strategic initiative. Overall, we are making progress, improving leverage and ROIC, while maintaining adjusted EBITDA margins despite stiff cost headwinds. We are confident in our strategy, staying focused on controlling what we can control, and driving continuous improvement throughout the enterprise. This approach will ultimately set the stage for margin expansion, assisted by self-help commercial and operational excellence, and the compounding effects of additional July price increase. as we move into our biggest volume quarter of the year. I'll now pass it to Brian for a financial review before coming back to discuss our second half outlook. Brian.

Thank you, Anne. And I'll begin on slide 13 with our second quarter volume and price performance by line of business. Second quarter aggregate volumes decreased 1.6% as solid organic volume growth in Texas and other markets was offset by volume decreases in the East segment due to the impact of divestitures. Excluding acquisitions and divestitures, aggregate volumes would have increased by approximately 1.6% versus Q2 of the prior year. Q2 aggregates pricing was up 4.7%, led by the strongest gains in our East segment, and more specifically, double-digit pricing growth in Virginia and Georgia followed by high single-digit growth in the Carolinas and northern Kansas. In our west segment, aggregates pricing was up high single digits in Utah and low to mid-single digits in Texas and British Columbia. In cement, continued favorable supply-demand conditions in our key markets drove Q2 pricing up 7.5 percent, culminating in June with the best monthly EBITDA performance in continental cement's history. However, we continue to operate within a very tight supply environment, and when you couple that with ongoing cost inflation, including high energy costs, we will need to work with our customers to pass price along the value chain. Second quarter cement volumes were essentially flat to the prior year, as our plants are sold out for the year, as was the case last year as well. In our downstream businesses, the higher cement price has been incorporated in our ready mix prices, which increased 9.7% in the second quarter on strong residential demand, particularly in Texas. Year-on-year volumes for ready mix were down 9.1% due to divestitures, as well as production constraints resulting from limited cement availability. Excluding the impact of divestitures, ready mix volumes would have been virtually unchanged versus the prior year period. And in asphalt, average selling price increased 18.9% in Q2, as we passed through much higher liquid asphalt costs relative to a year ago. Asphalt volumes were down 15.2%, reflecting the impact of divestitures. On slide 14, we provide an adjusted cash gross profit margin comparison by line of business for the second quarter. In the face of significant inflationary pressure, we experienced moderate impacts to our aggregates, products, and services margins, while expanding cement margins. On aggregates, cost inflation, including higher fuel, repair and maintenance, and subcontractor costs, ran slightly ahead of aggregate price increases, some of which went into effect in April and June. However, the preventative maintenance that we undertook in Q1 helped us to prepare for a strong upcoming construction season. So the impact was limited to a reduction of 220 basis points of aggregates margin for the quarter. Cement segment adjusted cash gross margins were 48.6%, up 140 basis points from the year ago as pricing gains outpaced increases in our variable costs. Our products and services gross profit margins declined versus the year ago period. as pricing slightly lagged higher labor and energy costs, primarily on asphalt. In fact, ready mix gross margins were up year on year to reflect strong and swift price realization in Salt Lake City and Houston. As we told you on our last earnings call in May, our teams are focused on executing cost mitigation initiatives across the organization. We continue to implement our flexible energy model by hedging diesel and coal, locking in prices for natural gas, and swiftly implementing fuel surcharges across the business. Our focus on preventative maintenance to extend the life of our assets, as well as sharing equipment across our markets, has helped summit blunt the impact of inflation and only experience minor degradation in margins during a period of exceptional volatility. We believe these proactive measures position us for future margin expansion potential as we fast-track operational excellence initiatives, all in an effort to improve performance, offset inflation, and upgrade the consistency of our operations. Now moving on to slide 15 for a look at additional non-GAAP metrics. Adjusted EBITDA margin of 26% was down from 26.5% in 2Q21. driven primarily by higher cost inflation net of pricing gains. Second quarter adjusted diluted earnings per share of 60 cents was 11 cents ahead of prior year levels, reflecting in part lower DD&A resulting from divestitures. I'll close with capital structure on slide 16. As I mentioned, our Q2 2022 leverage ratio of 2.4 times net debt to adjusted EBITDA is the lowest in Summit's history and is down 0.6 times versus Q2 2021. And in the second quarter, we repaid $72.4 million of our term loan under provisions related to the divestitures of businesses. As a result, we have further reduced our interest burden, helping to offset impacts from a higher rate environment. And as we said in May, based on the midpoint of our 2022 guidance, Our current debt levels and cash flow generation, we are on a glide path to get to two times or below by the end of the year. This provides for significant optionality, including further repurchase activity. As a reminder, in March, our board approved a three-year, $250 million share repurchase authorization. To date, we have repurchased approximately 1.5 million shares, and we have approximately $200 million remaining under the program, which we'll use opportunistically to return capital to shareholders. We closed Q2 with roughly $465 million of cash on hand, and together with an undrawn revolver, we have nearly $800 million of available liquidity at our disposal. This, together with our low leverage position, means Summit has the firepower and flexibility to pursue the highest return capital allocation priorities with the intention of growing our existing business, pursuing attractive M&A opportunities, and ultimately delivering superior value creation for Summit shareholders. And lastly, for the purposes of calculating adjusted diluted earnings per share, please use a share count of 119.4 million, which includes 118.1 million Class A shares and 1.3 million LP units. And with that, I'll pass back to Anne for a look ahead.

Thanks, Brian. Slide 18 has a key component of the organic growth strategy, our organic greenfields. For our greenfields, we use a proprietary playbook developed by our east region to identify promising greenfield opportunities. Our playbook triangulates geological, market, and economic data to determine site feasibility and probability of successful greenfield development. So far, we have completed eight greenfields, with three more currently under development in our east segment. Collectively, we expect these 11 sites to produce roughly 6.4 million tons of aggregates in 2022, up more than 7% from 2021 production levels. And by 2025, we forecast nearly 8 million tons of aggregates annually from these sites. We view consistent and significant investment in greenfields as critical to sustaining the purest form of organic growth. With that in mind, we will use a disciplined approach and a deep understanding of returns to prospect and develop new green fields in high-growth, attractive markets. These green fields will play a key role in driving margin growth and advancing our market leadership strategic priority. On slide 19, our perspective for our end markets is that supply-demand fundamentals support healthy demand conditions in both public and private markets. I'm residential. Demand may level off near term, but the long-term growth trajectory remains solid. The truth is that the U.S. has been underbuilding since the Great Recession. Since 2009, housing starts have lagged household formation by roughly 100,000 per year. This chronically underbuilt environment necessitates further single-family supply and community development. Together with record rent inflation and resilient affordability in some of its top markets, We are bullish on residential markets in the long run, even if near-term demand enters a temporary air pocket. Looking at non-residential, both the ABI and Dodge Momentum Index remain in positive territory and largely reflect what we're seeing on the ground. In our cement business, we are seeing multiple LNG projects, particularly in Louisiana. In Kansas, Panasonic is planning the largest private investment in the state's history. with a 4 billion mega battery factory near our quarry in Eudora. And pending federal legislation could further fuel non-residential investments. The bipartisan CHIPS bill passed by the Senate last week and the tentative agreement on climate change initiatives has potential to catalyze investments in aggregates and cement intensive onshore manufacturing and green energy projects with direct and indirect benefits to our business for years to come. And with respect to public spend, we view this end market as the most steady, reliable, and the least influenced by economic cycles. Today, with state DOTs being very well funded, we are seeing year-to-day lettings in our top eight states accelerate faster than the national trend. And we believe that when infrastructure spending gets fully underway, we will be in for a multi-year period of strong public infrastructure growth. Overall, our end market outlook has been altered, but not materially changed since we released our 2022 outlook in February. We are steadfast in our view that we are in attractive markets and an industry poised for long-term profitable growth. Bringing it all together on slide 20, where we are reiterating the full-year adjusted EBITDA guidance we issued at our May investor day. For 2022, we continue to expect adjusted EBITDA between $500 million and $530 million, which implies high single-digit EBITDA growth on 2021 pro forma levels. And while the environment, particularly on the cost side, remains dynamic, we believe that we have levers available to both offset cost inflation and be in a position to hold or grow second-half adjusted EBITDA margins. Let me quickly walk through the assumptions that underpin our outlook. First, we still forecast mid- to high single-digit pricing growth on a full-year basis. And within that is the expectation that aggregates pricing will accelerate of run rate levels as further pricing is implemented. Notably, this outlook does not incorporate a late summer, early fall pricing action in aggregates or cement, which we have not taken off the table. Second, we are confident that excluding the impact of divestitures, volumes will be supportive to our outlook. This view is supported by strong backdrop for public spending new opportunities we are seeing in the non-residential and market, and backlogs in residential that should sustain 2022 volumes. Finally, we still forecast high single-digit cost inflation in 2022, as energy costs remain elevated, and we take on higher repair and maintenance costs, as well as higher labor and subcontracting costs. That said, we had taken a prudent approach to our cost outlook when we last updated markets in May. And that proved to be the appropriate decision. On a year-to-go basis, we assume that cost pressures will continue. So we will rely on pricing and self-help productivity initiatives to offset costs and hold or grow EBITDA margins in the back half. In terms of second half pacing, I will highlight that nearly half of the full year foregone adjusted EBITDA contribution from Hinkle, or approximately $14 million, will hit in the third quarter. Our full year forecast for GNA has not changed, as we expect between $200 million and $210 million in GNA spend on the full year and approximately $200 million in DDNA in 2022. Finally, our CAPEX forecast is also unchanged at between $270 million and $290 million, and I'm happy to report that Selma's largest 2022 capital project, the Davenport Cement Storage Dome, is on track for completion in Q4. and will drive immediate savings for our cement business. Before opening the lines for questions, I'd like to close my prepared remarks with a few takeaways. First and foremost, I want to acknowledge and thank all Summit employees. You are our greatest assets. Your commitment to our vision and strategy is inspiring, and thanks to your tireless focus on execution, we delivered record safety performance and earnings in Q2 and have a lot to be proud of. Secondly, I'd like to thank Summit shareholders for their continued support of the Elevate Summit strategy. We have accomplished a lot today, and today's summit is a higher performing, materials-led organization. But we aren't done. As we pursue our four strategic priorities, we will continue to move the needle and close in on our Elevate Summit targets. We aim to drive superior shareholder returns through further materials-led portfolio transformation and sharper execution on commercial and operational As always, we appreciate the candid feedback of our investors, and we are relentlessly working to improve our business and deliver superior returns. And finally, it bears repeating what you've heard from us before. We continue to believe it's a tremendous time to be in this industry and a better time to be at Summit. Pricing and volume trends are favorable, and as we make progress against each of our Elevate Summit initiatives, we plan to emerge as a better, stronger, more highly valued public company built to tackle tomorrow's challenges and opportunities. Thank you for your continued support of summit materials. I will now take your questions.

At this time, I would like to remind everyone, in order to ask a question, press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. Your first question comes from the line of Stanley Elliott with Stifel. Your line is open.

Good morning, everyone. Thank you all for taking the question and congratulations in a tough environment. Anne, I guess starting off, can you talk a little bit more about the M&A opportunity? It's nice to see the leverage coming down. It sounds like you've got a lot on the table. How quickly can you put something together? I mean, is this something we should think about maybe this year? Is it into next year? Just curious given the, you know, it sounds like there's a lot of activity out there right now.

Yes, Stanley, and thanks for the question. We are very focused and in Horizon 2 and very happy to be in a position to be there. following all the hard work the team's done in Horizon 1 on the divestitures, which gives us great optionality. And that's why we have said all along we've had an active M&A pipeline. You can see that we've got 60 priority ones in there that we're focusing on. We have some very active LOIs. It's hard to give exact timing on when we might actually close an acquisition, but I will tell you there's two or three that were pretty far along right now that will blend probably into 23, but expect much more on the M&A side from us and much less on the divestitures as we move forward.

The pricing environment has been very good. The inflation environment has been tough as well. How do you all think about the hedging part of the business that you guys have typically done a very good job with, especially given it looks like some of the input costs may be trending down here in the back half of the year?

Yeah, I'll let Brian address that. Yeah, thanks, Stanley. Yeah, we've continued to pursue our hedging strategy for diesel, albeit that we've been a little bit more cautious in the pace at which we've put those hedges in place this year. Right now, we're about 21% hedged for our estimated diesel consumption for 2023. The price is higher, and we're watching that on a daily, weekly basis so that we can opportunistically step in and layer in a little bit more for 2023. as those prices come down. So the policy is still in place, very much intact, but it's been a little bit more of a cautious approach, given oil was up in the $120 range. It's now come back to 90-ish, low 90s, and it may drop further yet. So watching it very closely, as we are with all of our other energy input costs. Great. Thanks for the time, and best of luck.

Your next question comes from the line of Trey Grooms with Stevens. Your line is open.

Thanks, and good morning, everyone. So with the aggregates increases that you have announced for July or put in place for July, can you give us some idea of how you're thinking about pricing gains in the back half? And I think you mentioned something about the E. Sorry if I missed it, but... you know, in the details there, but more kind of looking for just the overall aggregates. And you also mentioned that these, you know, increases are coming at a seasonally strong period for aggregate shipment. So, you know, with that, can you give us some more color on how we should be thinking about aggregates profit per ton as we move through the back half?

Yeah, so as you correctly pointed out, you know, year to date our total combined aggregates pricing is 4.7% and in the quarter is the same. We have called for on an overall basis high single digit pricing. In my prepared remarks, I talked to some of the variations we see amongst our regions. So if you look at Georgia and Virginia, they have produced already 13.4% aggregates pricing. Utah 9.7, Carolina's 9.2, Kansas City is up in that high single digit. But the one area that we did point out was that Texas, for example, did not go as fast on pricing. So in April, they had their first price increase in April and have another one now in July. So that's really a key factor that we're watching, and it's a swing factor for us as we go into the second half. to get Texas caught back up and have compounding effects of those two price increases in our highest volume quarter of the year. And also the other regions are also still continuing to do price increases in July. So we've had it across all lines of business and particularly aggregate strong execution. I think you can expect those margins to expand as we go throughout the year. The teams controlling costs as they can, but the pricing environment is very strong. And candidly, Trey, while it's not in our 2022 guidance, we wouldn't rule out a fourth quarter price increase in aggregates either.

And that's all very helpful. With that fourth quarter, just to touch on that, is that market specific? Is it widespread or any details there?

Generally, we price market specific, but widespread inflation will drive widespread pricing. In my prepared comments, I even talked about the differential we have in our central region where some more rural areas, but even they have accelerated on pricing because inflation is not, you know, it's not isolated to one region or the other, unfortunately. So we will continue with that aggressive pricing stance.

Got it. Thank you for the color. I'll pass it on. Good luck. Thanks, Ray.

Your next question is from the line of Philip Ng with Jefferies. Your line is open.

Hey, Ann. Congrats on a great quarter and a choppy backdrop. Certainly a lot of questions around how RISD could look like next year. I'm curious, what kind of order trends are you seeing heading into August between different end markets? And then any color on how to think about backlogs as of today across the board?

Yeah, so let me kind of go through each one, starting with Rezzy, as you correctly point out. So there's a lot of, we're watching that very carefully. Look, long-term, we believe that Rezzy is still going to be very strong, purely because we're so underbuilt in our rural, exurban areas and single-family homes. We have, since 2009, starts have basically lagged home ownership by 100,000 per year. We've got these millennials coming out, a very high population that are in prime bind home buying format. And then you've got on top of that a number of migration factors that are driven to the affordable states that we have. So we're bullish on residential in the long term. If we look at 2022 as we're finishing out the year, our backlogs are still very strong and we believe that will continue through the end of the year. Are we seeing single family permits slow in some of the regions? Absolutely yes. But honestly, looking as we look at residential, we think it will decelerate going into 2023. We're not thinking there's going to be an abrupt stop just because the rents are so high, mortgage interest rates, when you compare it to historical highs, are at like about 5%. Many of us used to pay double-digit mortgage interest rates. So home buying is still an option. So bottom line, as we go into 2023, think about it as a deceleration. And we believe that if it could settle around an equilibrium, of about 1 million starts per year. That's going to be a healthy amount that the supply chain can handle. So residential, some deceleration, but not a complete stop. Non-res, we are seeing a considerable acceleration right now, and we have seen that in the indices. So you see private non-res construction up 9% year-to-date. Your Dodge is at a 14-year high in June. ABI has been over 50 for the last 17 months. We're seeing this in a lot of post-pandemic verticals, such as energy, onshore warehousing, and data centers. So a lot of pent-up demand. And we're actually seeing it in our projects. So if we talk about our Kansas area alone, if we look at DeSoto, Kansas, I said in my prepared remarks, there's a Panasonic $4 billion investment in batteries. In North Kansas City, there's an investment in the KCI 29 Logistics Park that's $1.3 billion. In Northeastern Kansas, there's a North Point Industrial Park that's a $1 billion investment. Then our cement business has opportunities in LNG. And we're still seeing some warehouses go up in around the Charleston area that's particularly advantage to our Jefferson Quarry. So very bullish on non-residential. Public, very strong, very steady. If you just look at our state funding alone going into 23, our top eight states are in really good shape. Texas is at $11 billion. Utah, $2.7 billion. Kansas, one. Missouri, 3.5 with another $500 million in tax revenue per year. Virginia is up to $7.9 billion, which is a $400 million increase. So we're really seeing that state funding stay very robust going into 23. And also, this is playing out in the lettings, which is what we watch on a regular basis. And when you ask about backlogs, I would refer you to that. So lettings are up year over year. Our top eight states are at 16% up on our pavement and highway contract awards. And that's four points above the national average. And just to give you some color around that, Texas is running at about 24.6%. We have a number of others like Missouri's at 50% increase, Colorado at 20%. So very strong increase in all of our markets across the public side. And then we haven't really impacted anything on the infrastructure bill into our estimates at this point in time. As we said before, we don't believe 2022 will be an impact. We do believe 2023 will have impact. Now the one thing we are watching is how fast that volume will come in based on inflation. And so we're watching that very closely. We don't think it's a matter of if we will have extra volume in 2023. It's the magnitude of the volume as inflation impacts. Now, I will say when you look at Summit's footprint, we do a lot of repair and rebuild, and we do a lot of smaller jobs. So that impact of inflation may not be as big on Summit's type of business from the infrastructure bill as you might compare to others.

Okay, super. Thanks a lot. Appreciate the call.

Thank you, Phil.

Your next question comes from David McGregor with Longbow Research. Your line is open.

Yes, good morning, everyone. And wondering on cost inflation, if you could just walk us through, Brian, maybe the individual buckets within your cost structure and what kind of inflation you're seeing in any of those. You talked about fuel and maintenance and repair and contractor increases, but If you could just break out those individual buckets and help us understand what you're seeing in each would be a big help. And then just secondly, is there any way of talking about cement capacity for 2023 and what incremental volume opportunity you might have with the PLC and the Dome and everything else that's coming into play there? Thank you.

Yeah, sure, David. Thanks for the question. So cost buckets, as you know, energy is about 6% year-to-date of our total. That's all energy inclusive of diesel, coal, electricity. fuel oil, and everything that really goes into our energy is about 6% of our total cost of goods sold. Materials is by far and away our biggest input cost. That's primarily going to be cement that we buy for our ready mix business. That's a much larger portion and is by far the biggest input cost. Labor, of course, is another fairly large one. We're seeing cost inflation there in the mid single digit level. Obviously, again, we have to be mindful of specific market circumstances and labor shortages. So it varies a little bit depending on exactly where we are. But reality is, you know, wages and salaries have increased across the board and we're doing what we can to stay competitive as we compete to retain our talent.

Brian, I was hoping you could quantify each of these buckets for us, if that's at all possible, or even give us a range or any kind of magnitude.

No, we're not going to go into details on every single cost bucket, David. That would take up a lot of time on this call. Those are the bigger percentages that we have at this point. We can follow up with you on a later call. As for the cement capacity, we're basically sold out. The PLC will give us approximately 5 to 10% increase in our capacity capability as we go into the end of this year and into 2023.

The only thing I'd add to cement capacity, as Brian said, is very, very tight right now. We continue to see very strong demand dynamics from our customers. We are very focused, as Brian said, the PLC. The team's done a great job. That frees us up a little bit. We are very judicious with our imports to add to our capacity, usually about 5% level. But the other thing we're very focused on is getting investment economics through our pricing. because to add any additional capacity into this market, we really need to get to that North Star objective at a minimum of 40% EBITDA. So very focused on richening the quality of our earnings so we can reinvest back into this business on an ongoing basis. Thanks, Anne.

Your next question is from the line of Garrick Schmois with Lube Capital. Your line is open.

Oh, hi. Thanks for taking my question. Wanted to follow up on the point around Texas aggregates pricing. Is there anything structural impacting the level of price growth in your Texas markets or is it really just timing related given the April increase versus perhaps earlier increases in other markets? And then I wanted to follow up on the comment in Salt Lake with the improvement of cement supply there. Is that specific to your shipping of cement from Davenport or has the supply from external suppliers improved in Salt Lake as well?

Okay, thanks for the question, Garrett. So Texas, it was just a matter of timing based on the market. We do price to market, so it was just an April price increase versus January, but then quickly followed by July. So we continue to see strong pricing support in our Texas markets. It's one of our highest growth markets. So I wouldn't call it structural, I'd call it more timing, because we have the strongest leadership position in Houston in Ag, so we will continue to take that leadership position and value price over time. Salt Lake City, the cement supply, we did have that temporary where we were basically triaging with our own cement, but that's not ideal. It is improved with our suppliers in Salt Lake City, which the team did a great job managing through this, but it was pretty hectic through the quarter. I'm very pleased to say that that's starting to ease up for our Salt Lake City team. Got it. Thanks, man. Thanks, Eric.

Your next question is from the line of Mike Dahl with RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open.

Thanks for taking our questions. Just shifting over to aggregate volumes, you said this quarter organic growth was up 1%. I believe I heard correctly. I just wanted to get your sense on what organic volumes are expected to look like for the full year, and then, if you can, the total volumes, including divestitures.

Yeah, I'll give you the ag volumes within the quarter, if you exclude the impact of divestitures, was 1.6% growth. As we go through the remainder of the year, we see continued support for ag volumes because of all of our private and public end markets. So I would expect us to meet the overall ag volumes that we've given in our guide over time, which will be that low to mid single digit growth. And we're pretty confident with that based on support from the end markets that we serve at this point in time.

Understood. That's helpful. And just for my follow-up, looking at price-cost trends on a consolidated basis, I was hoping you could help us understand the cadence of price-cost towards the back half of the year. And to the extent possible, I know you guys mentioned some price variability by region, so if there's any notable variations in price-cost, if you want to call it out, that would be helpful.

Yeah, I'll answer the latter part first. I wouldn't say there's any notable variations by region. It's just more what the market will bear. I will tell you, as we go through the remainder of the year, we continue to be, we're assuming continued high inflation and costs right through the second half of the year, which means we've got to continue to drive our pricing in that regard, which is why I said we wouldn't rule out a Q4 price increase either. I think as you go through Q3, we'll continue to try and push that price ahead of cost. I would expect margin sequentially to improve. Now, Q4, we might see some margin expansion because we had some one-time costs in Q4 of 2021, so you might see that. That would be the one area where we're looking to see if we can expand those margins through pricing.

Understood. Appreciate the call, and good luck. Thank you.

Your next question comes from the line of Jerry Revich with Goldman Sachs. Your line is open.

Yes, hi. Good morning, everyone. I'm wondering if you could talk about, as you think about the new Summit portfolio as it stands today, what level of operating leverage do you think the business would see in an eventual downturn given the meaningful improvement in the mix? market share that you folks outlined earlier in the presentation?

Well, I believe our portfolio today, we feel that we're very close to getting to that 75% of materials, which gives us a stronger quality of earnings, a stronger portfolio with less volatility, and it gives us more operational leverage as we move forward. We're obviously in a much better position with those portfolio changes to weather any storms that are ahead of us, sitting at $800 million in liquidity. So we feel that the portfolio movements, Jerry, have really are a key part to why we were able to successfully navigate through this Q2 with only a difference of 40 and 50 basis points on our margin. So between the materials, the price, and operational excellence, we'll continue that through the second half. But this stronger portfolio, it's going to lead us into 2023 in a better position. Brian, anything you'd add to that?

No, I don't think so. Obviously, there's a number of levers that you can pull in the event of a downturn, one of which would be to reduce the pace of your capex, and that would obviously help throw off a little bit more cash. So I wouldn't see a meaningful fluctuation in the leverage ratio in a downturn.

And, you know, given the cadence of pricing actions over the course of this year compared to diesel inflation earlier in the year, what sort of carryover margin benefit should we be thinking about 2023? I know you're not providing guidance yet, but it seems like from an exit rate standpoint, we're going to be coming out of the year with pricing about a point, maybe two points ahead of costs as we enter the early part of 2023 if current diesel prices hold. I'm wondering if you're willing to comment on that.

Well, it's a very dynamic situation on diesel pricing, so we will continue to. The one thing I can say, Jerry, is we'll be very agile in our pricing. What we had planned in July was a very strong price increase, and I think with respect to our energy, we've been doing a pretty good job of covering that between our flexible energy program and our pricing. I will tell you the one thing that's more of a price, more of a cost impact to us that hits us within the quarter, we do catch up, is the subcontractor cost that Brian talked about because we've got to keep our plants running in our highest volume quarters. And it's the repair and maintenance because we have delayed capital equipment coming in and we've got to extend the lifetime of our equipment. So they're the two that we probably feel is more variable than our actual diesel because of our strong hedging position as we move through. Now, I do think we are going, I know we're going to end with strong pricing momentum and exit momentum into 2023. With what's in the guide today, our July price increases because that price will compound now in our highest volume quarter. And as Q4 continues to grow, we will continue to have strong pricing entering 2023. And as you know, aggregates pricing, even as inflation abates, we will hold our aggregates pricing, and that's when we look forward to further margin expansion and really continuing towards our 30% EBITDA goal.

Okay. I appreciate the discussion.

Thanks.

Thanks, Jerry.

Your next question is from Brent Thielman with DA Davidson. Your line is open.

Great. Thank you. Good morning. Hey, Ann, you've got a pretty large Houston position. I'm just curious, sort of any indirect implications of the suspension of Vulcan's assets in Mexico and sort of ability to serve that market? What have you seen? Has that caused any disruptions to project flow or any impacts to your business?

Yeah, you know, we've looked at that, and our team has looked at it pretty closely. We play in different parts of Houston than where that is impacted, so we would not see a significant uptick. Now, around some of our geographies, there may be some additional opportunity for volume, but honestly, I don't see it being an impact on Summit's business. Our Houston position is very clear where we play from a rural and exurban area and in our locations that don't impact where Vulcan has played. Okay.

Okay. Um, and then, yeah, I was interested in your comments just around, um, cement availability, your ability to, to address Utah by continental, as you said, that that wasn't ideal, but, um, you know, some might say these availability issues are transitory. Others might argue it's going to be a going issue, just given how tight the market is. I mean, how are you, how are you exploring initiatives to kind of combat that, uh, you know, relationships with the cement suppliers? I'm just curious. in the instance that these issues continue? How do you address it?

Yeah, we're very active looking at that, and it's very timely you asking that question, Brent. I mean, our team's taken a complete step back and look at constantly optimizing our terminal positions and all our tight geographies. Clearly, we do not choose on a regular basis to move cement from Iowa into Salt Lake City. Our team did a great job of passing that, but it's not what you would optimize your supply chain. And so we are undergoing a complete cement supply chain look right now around our support. And because we have leading positions in our markets, we tend to be able to weather cement shortages. I'll give you an example. Houston, we're such a leading position there in ready mix. We tend to get preferential cement supply. So We are at a good position, but you can always optimize it to your point moving forward. And also, as we talked about, looking at imports and how we will optimize those in the future. The other thing around supply that we didn't mention, Brian alluded to, is our Davenport cement storage dome. That will help us to better security of supply to our northern customers by having that in place as we go into 2023.

And I assume that thought process, keeping these leading positions, plays into... kind of the M&A trail that you're looking at, too, here.

It does. It absolutely is all part of the M&A trail, and each geography is a little different, as you might imagine.

Okay, great. Thank you. Thanks, Brent.

Your next question is from Anthony Pettinari with Citigroup. Your line is open.

Hi, this is Asher Sonnen on for Anthony. Thanks for taking my question. You mentioned that you wouldn't rule out a Q4 price increase, and I guess I'm just wondering, what would we need to see happen for that to materialize? Is it just cost inflation accelerates further from what you currently expect, or maybe demand gets a little bit stronger?

Yeah, I think it's both of the above. I think cost inflation is the thing we're watching because, you know, the swing factor for us as we go through the second half is price over cost. And so costs, we're constantly trying to stay ahead of that. And as I mentioned in some prior Q&A there, the thing that is probably surprises us within a month or within a quarter is this subcontractor and RNM costs. Because the more our capital equipment continues to get delayed through supply chain constraints, the more we have to extend the life of our equipment. And we're going to keep running our quarries. So that's a good business decision no matter what to spend more there within the month or quarter. but then we have to go for increased pricing. And when demand gets stronger, we're also stripping more of our plants. So a lot of factors go into that, but we do eventually get ahead on the pricing. So Q4 would take more inflation. We have strong demand across all our markets already, so I don't see that changing a lot.

Great. And then I guess, you know, switching gears, you took a pause on buybacks this quarter sort of after establishing your first the purchase authorization. So how should we think about your cap allocation outlook on the current macro environment? Should we expect, you know, repurchase to maybe resume in the second half, possibly more opportunistically, or maybe share repurchases, you know, pause as Horizon 2 starts up and, you know, reengage with M&A more earnestly?

Yeah, Anthony, I think we're going to balance that out, really a little bit more opportunistic on the share buybacks, but obviously balanced with that M&A activity. And we'll look to buy back where we think it represents a compelling opportunity, but probably fairly opportunistic based on other priorities.

All right, thanks. That's really helpful. I'll turn it over.

Thank you. Your next question is from the line of Adam Selheimer with Thompson Davis. Your line is open.

Hey, good morning. What's the outlook for aggregates margins in the back half?

Well, as we go into the back half of the year, we'll have additional pricing in July here in Q3, and we should have volume. So that compounding effect of price, we would expect to see some improvement in our aggregates margin. As we said, overall for the business, as we go into Q4, there's some one-time costs that I would expect more margin expansion in Q4.

More in Q4, got it. And then, you know, some clients are stressed about the fact that you guys are a little bit more housing exposed. I'm just curious, though, as the demand rotates towards things like infrastructure, can you rotate as well?

Yeah, we do have the ability to pivot between our end markets. That's a nice thing about this business. So, you know, we can do 40% public or non-res. We can switch, you know, from private commercial businesses developments into commercial, you know, they call them light commercial projects. And we're doing that already in Houston. The team's been doing a good job of pivoting. If they see some slowdown in residential, they'll pivot over into the non-res and into the public. And we can do that in Utah, too, which are our two biggest exposed housing markets. Right. Okay. Thanks, Anne. Thank you.

Your final question comes from the line of Kath Thompson with the Thompson Research Group. Your line is open.

Hey, good morning. This is Brian Barros. I'm for Catherine. Thank you for taking my question. I'll stick to the one question as requested. Can you touch further on the infrastructure and market? I know you talked about it before on the call. There seems to be strong tailwinds of record funding, strong bidding activity. We're hearing inflation playing a bigger part in how DOTs are addressing their lettings currently. Just what are you hearing from your public customers on how they're approaching public projects in today's environment, and are you seeing any risks on the edges there?

Yeah, it's a good question, Brian. We are watching the inflate. We're seeing, as I said, very strong backdrop, to your point, a lot of tailwinds coming on public, and we're very bullish on it in the long term. The thing we are watching is the impact of inflation. I will say that just as a data point, in Georgia alone, there were 12 bids that were basically refused because of high pricing, which the bids are all going in high because no one's going to price below where we're currently seeing inflation. Now, as I also made my comments earlier, I do think when you look at Summit and where we play, we play in that repair and rebuild. The states are going to put some dollars onto the ground, so that's important. So that will benefit us. I don't think inflation will have as big an impact on that, and we do tend to do smaller projects where you don't see the inflationary impact as much. But we are watching very much As we go into 23, how that volume growth will occur. So if it was normal funding, we would have expected 2023 to have 25% of the funding and 2020-2040, the big year, at about 40%. Now, how inflation impacts that historical level of funding to the states is what, and how the jobs will actually play out, is what we're watching closely. So more to come on that as we work through this each state.

Thank you. Good luck.

Thank you.

There are no further questions at this time. I will now turn the call back over to Ann Noonan.

Okay, a few closing comments here. First, we are starting from a position of strength. We just reported record earnings and have demonstrated that we can successfully navigate challenging operating conditions to grow adjusted cash gross profit and adjusted EBITDA. And in the process, we are actively and intentionally shifting our mix towards a higher margin materials-led portfolio. Second, Our second half outlook is supported by strong pricing and demand fundamentals. July 1st pricing actions are gaining traction in the marketplace, and we think resilient private markets alongside strong public spend will continue to support a very healthy demand environment. Finally, we are in the strongest financial position in Summit's history, with record low leverage, ample liquidity, and above all, significant optionality to pursue the highest return capital allocation priorities. We will balance organic growth investments and acquisitions with opportunistic share repurchases, all in an effort to drive towards our Elevate Summit goals and superior shareholder returns. With that, I want to thank you for your time and attention today and your continued support of Summit materials.

Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes today's conference call. You may now disconnect.