Waste Connections, Inc.

Good morning and welcome to the Waste Connections, Inc. Second Quarter 2023 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 touchtone phone. To withdraw from the question queue, please press star then two. Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Ron Middlestad, President and CEO. Please go ahead.

Okay. Thank you, Operator, and good morning. I would like to welcome everyone to this conference call to discuss our second quarter results and updated outlook for 2023, as well as to provide a detailed outlook for the third quarter. I'm joined this morning by Mary Ann Whitney, our CFO. I'm also joined by Joe Box, our recently promoted Vice President of Investor Relations. Congratulations, Joe. As noted in our earnings release, we are extremely pleased by the strength of our operational execution during the quarter for a solid beat on revenue and adjusted EBITDA to deliver margins 30 basis points above our outlook. Solid waste core pricing growth of 9.8% positioned us to expand underlying solid waste collection, transfer, and disposal margins by 100 basis points in the period, largely overcoming the ongoing headwinds from year-over-year declines in recovered commodity values and continued inflationary pressures during the period. Our performance in the first half of 2023, along with recent acquisitions and reduced headwinds from fuel and other commodity-related impacts, positions us to increase our full-year outlook for adjusted EBITDA to approximately $2.525 billion, expanding our adjusted EBITDA margin to 31.5% for the full year up 40 basis points from our initial outlook and up 70 basis points as compared to the prior year. Most importantly, we are encouraged by improving trends in safety and employee retention as we double down on human capital in our decentralized operating model, including through the realignment of our organizational structure with the addition of a sixth region and refinements to our corporate operational structure. We look forward to driving outsized margin expansion in the second half of 2023 and into 2024. Before we get into much more detail, let me turn the call over to Mary Ann for our forward-looking disclaimer and other housekeeping items.

Thank you, Ron, and good morning. The discussion during today's call includes forward-looking statements made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, including forward-looking information within the meaning of applicable Canadian securities laws. Actual results could differ materially from those made in such forward-looking statements due to various risks and uncertainties. Factors that could cause actual results to differ are discussed both in the cautionary statement in our August 2nd earnings release and in greater detail in waste connections filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the securities commissions or similar regulatory authorities in Canada. You should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements as there may be additional risks of which we are not presently aware or that we currently believe are immaterial, which could have an adverse impact on our business. We make no commitment to revise or update any forward-looking statements in order to reflect events or circumstances that may change after today's date. On the call, we will discuss non-GAAP measures such as adjusted EBITDA, adjusted net income attributable to waste connections on both a dollar basis and per diluted share, and adjusted free cash flow. Please refer to our earnings releases for a reconciliation of such non-GAAP measures to the most comparable GAAP measures. Management uses certain non-GAAP measures to evaluate and monitor the ongoing financial performance of our operations. Other companies, they calculate these non-GAAP measures differently. I will now turn the call back over to Ron.