Vulcan Materials Company

Please stand by. We're about to begin. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the Vulcan Materials Company first quarter 2026 earnings call. My name is Jamie, and I will be your conference call coordinator today. Please be reminded that today's call is being recorded and will be available for replay later today at the company's website. All lines have been placed in a listen-only mode. After the company's prepared remarks, there will be a question-and-answer session. Now I will turn the call over to your host, Mr. Mark Warren, Vice President of Investor Relations for Volcan Materials. Mr. Warren, you may begin.

Thank you, Operator. I'm joined today by Ronnie Pruitt, Chief Executive Officer, and Mary Andrews Carlyle, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Before we begin our prepared remarks, please note that a press release and a supplemental presentation related to this call are available on our website, balkanmaterials.com. Today's discussion may include forward-looking statements which are subject to risks and uncertainties. Details on these risks, other legal disclaimers, and reconciliations of any non-GAAP financial measures are defined and described in our earnings release, supplemental presentation, and other filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. For the question and answer session, we kindly ask that you limit your participation to one question And this will allow us to address as many questions as possible during the time we have available. And with that, I'll turn the call over to Ronnie.

Thanks, Mark. We appreciate you all joining us for our call this morning. At Vulcan Materials, safety is a fundamental expectation of our employees each and every day. And I am proud of our industry-leading safety performance that we carried on from last year into our first quarter of this year. Another key expectation is driving continuous improvement in our underlying business. Our teams delivered a solid start to 2026 by executing well in the commercial and operational plans that we laid out for the year. We generated $447 million of adjusted EBITDA, a 9% increase over the prior year. Gross profit margin expanded in each segment. SAG expenses were lower than the prior year, and adjusted EBITDA margin grew. Trading 12 months aggregate cash gross profit per ton continues to move higher with strong realization of our January 1st price increases and our disciplined approach to operational execution. Currently sitting at $11.38 per ton, we are aligned across the company to drive this highly important metric to $20 per ton and win the future in aggregates. Aggregate shipments in the first quarter support the anticipated return to growth for 2026. Shipments increased 5% compared to the prior year due to both improving demand and fewer extreme weather days than in the prior year. On a mix-adjusted basis, aggregate freight adjusted price improved 4% over the prior year's first quarter, in line with our expectations. The sequential growth from the prior quarter demonstrates the success of our January 1st price increases, and discussions are already underway for midyear increases. Pricing continues to compound across our footprint. Aggregates freight adjusted unit cash cost of sales increased 4% compared to the prior year, also in line with our expectations. I am very pleased with our operators' ability to execute on the bulkway of operating to drive efficiency in our plants and help mitigate inflationary increases in our input cost. Better weather this year allowed us to make more progress on our annual plans for stripping and project work than we did last year's first quarter, impacting the total unit cash cost of sales year-over-year comparison. I am confident our teams are focused on the right things to continue to enhance our core and drive compounding improvements in our durable aggregates business, even as the macro environment continues to be very dynamic. We remain equally focused on opportunities to continue to expand our reach through acquisitions and greenfield projects, including several bolt-on acquisitions we expect to finalize in the coming months. From a demand perspective, we still expect strong public activity and improving private non-residential opportunities to drive year-over-year shipments growth in 2026 and mitigate the ongoing challenges facing residential construction. Trailing 12-month highway awards in our markets are up 12% from a year ago, and public infrastructure awards are up 17% over the same timeframe. These levels far outpace the U.S. as a whole. Our footprint is advantaged, and this public demand provides a solid foundation for shipment. and supports a healthy pricing environment. Legislators in D.C. are actively working on a reauthorization bill for future highway funding upon the expiration of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act later this year. We expect the new bill to provide higher levels of funding for highways and bridges than the current bill. We also anticipate a smooth transition between funding programs given the significant amount of IIJ funds that are yet to be spent. On the private side, non-res continues to benefit from accelerating data center activity. With approximately 650 million square feet under construction or announced, we anticipate data centers and other related investments to be a positive catalyst for future aggregates demand. We are especially encouraged to also now have active projects related to the energy build-out necessary to support rising data center power needs. Currently, 60% of all large projects, both public and private, are within 50 miles of a Vulcan facility, highlighting the advantage of our footprint. Our scale, quality, and customer service make us a supplier of choice on these large, complex projects. Residential construction continues to be impacted by affordability. Longer term, there remains a fundamental need for additional housing, and we are well positioned to benefit from an eventual recovery. As I said earlier, we continue to expect overall growth in aggregate shipments in 2026. The pricing environment remains healthy. And while we are currently facing geopolitical uncertainty and incremental near-term headwinds in terms of energy input cost, I am confident in our ability to remain focused on the things we can control and to drive durable growth in our aggregates-led business. We carry good momentum from our solid start to the year and continue to expect to deliver between $2.4 and $2.6 billion of adjusted EBITDA for the full year. Now I'll turn the call over to Mary Andrews to provide some additional commentary on our first quarter performance before we take your questions.