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XPO, Inc.

Q32026

10/29/2026

speaker
Kerri
Conference Call Operator

Welcome to the XPO Q3 2026 Earnings Conference Call and Webcast. My name is Kerri, and I will be your operator for today's call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Later, we will conduct a question and answer session. If you have a question, please dial star 1 on your telephone keypad. Please limit yourself to one question when you come up in the queue. If you have additional questions, you're welcome to get back in the queue and we'll take as many as we can. Please note that this conference is being recorded. Before the call begins, let me read a brief statement on behalf of the company regarding forward-looking statements and the use of non-GAAP financial measures. During this call, the company will be making certain forward-looking statements within the meetings of applicable security laws, which by their nature involve a number of risks and other factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements. A discussion of factors that could cause actual results to differ materially is contained in the company's SEC filings as well as in its earnings release. The forward-looking statements in the company's earnings release, or made on this call, are made only as of today. and the company has no obligation to update any of these forward-looking statements except to the extent required by law. During this conference, the company may also refer to certain non-GAAP financial measures as defined under applicable SEC rules. Reconciliations of such non-GAAP financial measures to the most comparable GAAP measures is contained in the company's earnings release and the related financial tables or on its website. You can find a copy of the company's earnings release, which contains additional important information regarding forward-looking statements and non-GAAP financial measures, in the Investors section on the company's website. I will now turn the call over to XPO's Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Mario Harik. Mr. Harik, you may begin.

speaker
Mario Harik
Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, XPO

Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us. I'm here with Kyle Wismans, our Chief Financial Officer, and Ali Faghri, our Chief Strategy Officer. In the third quarter, we delivered strong growth and margin expansion as we continued to convert more business into higher earnings company-wide. Revenue increased by 12% year-over-year to $2.4 billion. Adjusted EBITDA grew by 27% to $433 million. And adjusted diluted EPS increased by 59% In our North American LTL segment, we reported 17% revenue growth and 35% growth in adjusted operating income to $293 million. This is the highest level of adjusted operating income in our history. Our adjusted operating ratio improved by 260 basis points year over year, significantly outperforming normal seasonality. We're executing a powerful strategy focused on service, investments in capacity, pricing, and cost efficiency. Each component reinforces the others, and together, they're driving an acceleration in our results. You can see these connections most clearly at the core of our strategy, which is world-class service. In the third quarter, we again delivered a damage claims ratio below 0.2%. For a shipper, damage-free delivery means fewer business disruptions, less time-resolving claims, and greater confidence that that freight will arrive as expected. This is especially important to customers with time-sensitive or high-value shipments who place a premium on working with a trusted provider. Our service record positions us to earn more of this freight and further improve our mix. We view every customer interaction as being central to our success. Service quality earns us the next shipment, and continuous improvement maintains our advantage. There's a strong connection between our network capacity and our ability to support customer relationships as they grow. We're continuing to expand our presence in high-growth freight markets, most recently in Phoenix and Kansas City, where we opened two new locations this quarter. Strategically, we've positioned our network to handle significantly more volume with more than 30% excess door capacity to support growth. We've also expanded and modernized our fleet and we continually invest in our workforce. Together, these investments strengthen our network and allow us to move freight more efficiently, benefiting both our customers and our bottom line. We're achieving a better balance of network density, utilizing more direct routes, and reducing unnecessary freight handling. and importantly, these investments lower our costs to serve and build significant operating leverage into the business. The same strategy informs our commercial initiatives, including pricing. We want to make sure the price we secure reflects both the quality of our service and the resources required to provide a world-class customer experience. Our service quality puts our team in a stronger position to have these conversations. It also opens the door with customers whose freight requires greater reliability, careful handling, or specialized support. This is true with our sales pipeline as well as with existing accounts. When customers see how consistently we deliver, we have an opportunity to serve more locations and handle more of their freight. Local accounts and premium services remain important drivers to improve our revenue quality. These are areas where we continue to build lasting relationships and earn attractive margins by meeting specific customer needs. As an example, in the local channel this quarter, we increased the number of new customers we onboarded by 30% versus last year. The result is a strategic approach that connects pricing, mix and share gains to the value we provide to shippers and the value we create for our shareholders. And we have a large opportunity to build on this momentum over time. The final component of our strategy is cost efficiency, driven by our proprietary technology. Our company has always had a technology focus, and now AI is accelerating that advantage. We're rolling out intelligent tools across our operations and seeing tangible results in how we route, handle, and deliver freight. Even in the early stages of these applications, we're moving more freight at lower cost and with improved service. In line haul, that means improving how we route freight and utilize trailer capacity. We're also running the network with fewer empty miles and freight re-handles. Since we rolled out a planning model that leverages AI, we've reduced re-handles by mid-single digits to the lowest level in over a decade. In our pickup and delivery operations, our proprietary AI-based route optimization tools are now being used on nearly two-thirds of routes. The stack factors in customer appointment windows, distance, and trailer capacity to arrive at the optimal route. Our drivers are making more stops per hour while reducing miles per shipment. And our workforce planning technology provided valuable support in the quarter, helping our service centers handle nearly 6% growth in shipment count with only a low single-digit increase in headcount. We're also using AI to give our dock workers real-time feedback on their trailer loading techniques before freight leaves the dock. This contributed to a 20% reduction in damages in the quarter versus last year. Overall, we see AI as having a long runway for ongoing efficiencies and margin improvement. And lastly, our insourcing initiative is working exactly as planned. reducing our exposure to rapidly rising rates from third-party carriers. We also have greater control over our line haul operations when we move this freight within our network. In summary, our third quarter results highlight the earnings power of our business, supported by a highly disciplined approach to both growth and margin expansion. We're building a business that can grow profitably, and we expect to achieve an annual LTL operating ratio in the low 70s or better over the long term. We expect our free cash flow to accelerate going forward, allowing us to continue repurchasing shares and reducing debt. These actions strengthen our balance sheet while further compounding our growth in earnings per share and enhancing shareholder value. Now, I'll turn the call over to Kyle for the financial results.

speaker
Kyle Wismans / Chris Weatherby
Chief Financial Officer, XPO / Analyst, Wells Fargo

Thank you, Mario, and good morning, everyone. I'll walk through our financial results, followed by our balance sheet, liquidity, and capital allocation. For the third quarter, we grew total company revenue 12% year-over-year to $2.4 billion. In our LTL segment, revenue improved to $1.5 billion, reflecting a 9% increase in revenue ex-fuel, with meaningful growth in both yield and volume. Turning to cost in LTL, we continue to drive efficiencies across our operations. helping to mitigate the impact of higher freight volumes, wage inflation, and increased incentive compensation tied to our strong performance. Our expense for salary, wage, and benefits increased 11% year-over-year, or $72 million. Our cost for fuel, operating expense, and supplies increased 29%, or $66 million, primarily due to higher fuel prices. And our purchase transportation cost increased by just $10 million, despite higher volume and rising truckload rates. Our insourcing strategy has significantly reduced our reliance on third-party carriers mitigating this cost. Appreciation expense increased 3%, or $3 million, reflecting our ongoing investments to expand network capacity and support long-term growth. Moving to profitability company-wide, we grew adjusted EBIT at 27% year-over-year to $433 million. Our LTL segment generated $389 million of adjusted EBITDA, up 26%, and we improved margin by 190 basis points to 26.4%. LTL adjusted operating income was up 35% to $293 million. And our European transportation segment increased adjusted EBITDA to $48 million. In our corporate segment, adjusted EBITDA was unchanged from the prior year at a $4 million loss. Returning to our consolidated results, operating income increased 76% year-over-year to $288 million. Net income was $181 million, representing diluted earnings per share of $1.53. On an adjusted basis, diluted EPS increased 59% year-over-year to $1.70. Turning to our third quarter cash performance, we generated $291 million of free cash flow. We ended the quarter with $260 million of cash on hand after completing $123 million of net capital expenditures, accelerating our common stock repurchases to $150 million, and making $100 million of debt repayments. Combined with available capacity under our committed borrowing facility, our total liquidity quarter end was approximately $860 million. Our net leverage ratio improved to 1.9 times trailing 12 months adjusted EBITDA compared with 2.1 times in the second quarter. We continue to drive meaningful growth in free cash flow for strong earnings performance and moderate in capital expenditures. We're on track to more than double our free cash flow this year compared to 2025, and we expect to continue increasing it in the years ahead. This gives us significant flexibility to return capital to shareholders while strengthening our balance sheet. In October, we paid down another $75 million on our term loan to start the fourth quarter, bringing our year-to-date debt pay down to $275 million. And with that, I'll hand it over to Ali to walk through our operating results.

Disclaimer

This conference call transcript was computer generated and almost certianly contains errors. This transcript is provided for information purposes only.EarningsCall, LLC makes no representation about the accuracy of the aforementioned transcript, and you are cautioned not to place undue reliance on the information provided by the transcript.

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