Lamar Advertising Company - Q4 2022
February 24, 2023
Transcript
Operator (participant)
Please stand by. Your program is about to begin. If you need any assistance during your conference today, please press star zero. Excuse me, everyone. We now have Sean Reilly and Jay Johnson in conference. Please be aware that each of your lines is in a listen-only mode. At the conclusion of the company's presentation, we will open the floor for questions. You may register to ask a question at that time by pressing the star and one on your touchtone phone. You may withdraw yourself from the queue by pressing star and two.
In the course of this discussion, Lamar may make forward-looking statements regarding the company, including statements about its future financial performance, strategic goals, plans, and objectives, including with respect to the amount and timing of any distributions to stockholders and the impacts and effects of general economic conditions, including inflationary pressures on the company's business, financial condition, and results of operations. All forward-looking statements involve risks, uncertainties, and contingencies, many of which are beyond Lamar's control and which may cause actual results to differ materially from anticipated results. Lamar has identified important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those discussed in this call in the company's fourth quarter 2022 earnings release and its most recent annual report on Form 10-K. Lamar refers you to those documents.
Lamar's fourth quarter 2022 earnings release, which contains information required by Regulation G regarding certain non-GAAP financial measures, was furnished to the SEC on its Form 8-K this morning and is available on the investor section of Lamar's website, www.lamar.com. I would now like to turn the conference over to Sean Reilly. Mr. Reilly, you may begin.
Sean Reilly (President and CEO)
Thank you, Shelby, good morning, all, welcome to Lamar's Q4 2022 Earnings Call. 2022 was the most successful year in the company's history. On an acquisition-adjusted basis, revenues grew nearly 10%, topping $2 billion for the first time, we reached record levels of EBITDA and AFFO. Perhaps what I'm most proud of, our team delivered consolidated EBITDA margins north of 46% in the face of last year's inflationary pressures. This strong performance amidst the broader uncertainty in the media space demonstrated the continued confidence that businesses have in out-of-home and advertising's ability to deliver powerful messages to their customers in the right places at the right times. For the fourth quarter, revenue grew 8.3% over 2021 or 4.6% on an acquisition-adjusted basis, while expenses continued to moderate, increasing 3.2% on an acquisition-adjusted basis.
That combination translated into nice operating leverage, allowing us to exceed the top end of our guidance range for full year AFFO at $7.38 per share. For the quarter, strong local sales offset weakening demand from national advertisers in line with trends evident elsewhere in the media world. For the quarter, local sales were up 7.6%, while revenue from national and programmatic channels were down more than 7%. Categories of relative strength in Q4 included service, education, and amusement. Notably, auto and retail were each up approximately 5%. Categories which were relatively weak included healthcare, online gaming, and insurance, reflecting in part a pullback from some large national accounts. Turning to 2023, I'd like to highlight a few trends from Q4 that are carrying over into Q1 of this year.
Number one, local revenue remains solid as Main Street remains resilient. Number two, national weakness has persisted into Q1 of this year, and we anticipate it will be down approximately the same as in Q4. That said, activity is picking up, and we anticipate our national book of business will be modestly positive for the full year. Number three, the significant expense growth moderation we saw in Q4 of last year is also carrying over into this year. You saw our AFFO per share guidance of $7.40-$7.55 in our press release. The midpoint of that range re-reflects approximately 4% pro forma revenue growth for the year and approximately 3.5% expense growth for the year. That math would get us to consolidated EBITDA margins that once again exceed 46% in 2023.
Regarding our AFFO per share guidance, as Jay will explain in more detail, AFFO growth is being significantly affected by increased interest expense, resulting in only modest full-year AFFO growth. We intend in 2023 to continue to invest aggressively into digital, which now accounts for roughly 30% of our billboard revenue. On a same-store basis, our digital revenue was down slightly in Q4 of 2022, largely due to weakness in the programmatic channel. Our customers remain extremely enthusiastic about the product, and we are targeting another 300 organic conversions in 2023. Meanwhile, expect a quieter year on the M&A front.
We completed $480 million in acquisitions in 2022, bringing the two-year deal total to nearly $800 million over the course of 2021 and 2022. The focus for 2023 will largely be on digesting the new assets and ramping up new markets such as South Bend, Fort Wayne, which came to us in the Burkhart deal last spring, and Valdosta and Eastern Kentucky, which we picked up in the Fairway transaction we closed in December. In fact, about over 90% of our acquisition activity last year tilted towards Lamar's sweet spot of small and mid-sized, local-oriented markets and fill-in inventory. Before I turn it over to Jay, I wanna thank all of our employees for their contributions in 2022. Our success in 2022 was a testament to their hard work.
Whatever 2023 holds, I'm confident that our team will make the most of our opportunities. Jay.
Jay Johnson (EVP, CFO, and Treasurer)
Thanks, Sean. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us. We had another solid quarter and are pleased with our quarterly results, which exceeded internal expectations across revenue, adjusted EBITDA, and AFFO. The company achieved AFFO growth for the ninth consecutive quarter, improving 7.3% to $1.91 per share on a fully diluted basis. In addition, despite a challenging interest rate environment, the company ended the year above the high end of our AFFO outlook, which, as you may recall, was revised upwards in May. In the fourth quarter, acquisition-adjusted revenue increased 4.6% from the same period last year against a difficult comp in which pro forma revenue grew 14% in the fourth quarter of 2021. Acquisition-adjusted operating expenses increased 3.2% in the fourth quarter, continuing the trend of operating expense normalization.
As expected, expense growth continued to decelerate in the quarter with comparison against more normal operations not impacted by COVID. The company maintained a strong adjusted EBITDA margin of 47.1%, which continues to lead the out-of-home industry. Throughout 2022, our sales team did a good job managing rates across our portfolio. Rates on our large format traditional bulletins increased in each quarter last year, growing by almost 7% in the fourth quarter and by over 8% for the full year. In addition, our outdoor portfolio remains at historically high occupancy. Adjusted EBITDA for the quarter was $252.3 million compared to $230.7 million in 2021, which was an increase of 9.4%. On an acquisition-adjusted basis, the increase was 6.3%.
Free cash flow in the quarter also improved, increasing 6.9% over the same period last year. For the full year, acquisition-adjusted revenue increased 9.8% to $2.03 billion compared to $1.85 billion in 2021, exceeding $2 billion for the first time in the company's history. Adjusted EBITDA was $938.1 million, which represents an increase of 10.6% on an acquisition-adjusted basis following a strong 22.7% increase in 2021. Adjusted EBITDA margin was 46.2% for the full year, which was essentially flat year-over-year despite inflationary pressure and acquisition-adjusted operating expenses growing roughly 9% in 2022.
The company ended the year with full-year diluted AFFO of $7.38 per share, slightly above the $7.35, which was at the top end of our revised guidance. For the 12 months ended December 31st, diluted AFFO per share increased 12% compared to full year 2021. Local and regional sales accounted for approximately 78% of billboard revenue in the fourth quarter. While local and regional sales grew for the seventh consecutive quarter, increasing 7.6%, our national business, which includes programmatic, declined for the first time since Q1 2021 and decreased by over 7% in the fourth quarter of 2022. If soft demand from national advertisers persists, the structure of our portfolio should mitigate the impact with an operating model heavily concentrated in billboards focused on local markets.
On the capital expenditure front, total spend for the quarter was approximately $50.3 million, including $18 million of maintenance CapEx. For the full year, CapEx totaled $167 million, which included $63 million of maintenance CapEx. We experienced another active quarter on the acquisition front. The company closed $192 million of acquisitions in the quarter across 19 transactions. Acquisition activity has been robust over the past two years. For the full year 2022, acquisitions totaled $480 million, exceeding 2021 by over 50%. Over the past 24 months, our acquisitions have totaled almost $800 million. Given this heightened level of recent activity, we anticipate a more modest M&A landscape in 2023. Turning to our balance sheet.
During 2022, we took steps to improve liquidity as well as extend our maturity profile. In June, we increased the facility amount of the AR securitization from $175 million to $250 million and extended the maturity to July 2025. We further improved liquidity in Q3, closing on a new $350 million Term Loan A to support robust acquisition activity in 2022.
We have a well-laddered debt maturity schedule with no maturities until the revolving credit facility and Term Loan A in February 2025, followed by the AR securitization in July of that year, and we have no bond maturities until 2028. Most of our acquisition activity in 2022 was funded with proceeds from our revolver. We originated the Term Loan A in lieu of senior notes given fixed income coupons at the time. The high yield market has been more favorable for new issuance in 2023, despite the recent pullback over the past two weeks. We view the TLA as a bridge to a debt capital markets transaction. Should the high yield market continue to improve, we can issue bonds using proceeds to repay the Term Loan A in full.
Such a transaction would bring our fixed rate debt to approximately 75%, the midpoint of our target range of 70%-80% fixed rate debt in our capital structure. Based on current debt outstanding, our weighted average interest rate is 4.6% with a weighted average debt maturity of 5.3 years. As defined under our credit facility, we ended the quarter with total leverage of 3.18x net debt to EBITDA, which is amongst the lowest level ever for the company. Our secured debt leverage was 1x at quarter end, and we are comfortably in compliance with both our total debt incurrence and secured debt maintenance test against covenants of 7x and 4.5x, respectively.
Notably, despite the sharp rise in interest rates over the past year, based on today's guidance, our interest coverage should remain above 6x adjusted EBITDA to cash interest. While we do not have an interest coverage covenant in any of our debt agreements, we do monitor this important financial metric. The healthy coverage level exemplifies the strength of our balance sheet and the ability to service our debt. At December 31st, we had approximately $747 million in liquidity, comprised of $53 million in cash on hand and $694 million available under our revolver. As Sean mentioned, included in this morning's release, we provided full year AFFO guidance of $7.40-$7.55 per share.
Acquisition-adjusted revenue will grow for the third consecutive year post-COVID, though at a more modest rate following double-digit top line growth in each of the past two years. Operating expense growth will moderate as well, while cash interest will offset and impact AFFO growth. Full year interest in our guidance totals $163 million, which reflects a 25 basis point rate hike next month. The maintenance CapEx budget for the year is anticipated to be the same as last year, $63 million, and cash taxes are projected to come in at approximately $11 million. Furthermore, we are undertaking corporate initiatives which include modernizing and rationalizing our technology capabilities, most notably our financial information and customer relationship systems.
We began this business process transformation last year and will continue in 2023, launching the implementation of an enterprise resource planning system, or ERP, later this year, with the first phase scheduled to go live in 2024. We are excited about embarking on this journey to more efficiently scale our business, better serve our customers, and position Lamar well for the future. Moving to our dividend. Yesterday, our board of directors approved a first quarter dividend of $1.25 per share, and management anticipates a full year 2023 distribution of $5 per share. As a reminder, the company's quarterly dividend is subject to board approval, and our dividend policy remains to distribute 100% of our taxable income. At yesterday's board meeting, the company's directors approved extension of both our share and debt repurchase programs.
While we do not anticipate activity in the near term, we view it as part of our financial policy to maintain that flexibility. Once again, we are pleased with our fourth quarter performance and finishing 2022 slightly above the high end of our guidance range. I will now turn the call back over to Sean.
Sean Reilly (President and CEO)
Thanks, Jay. I'll hit some of the familiar operating metrics that we touch on quarterly. As, you know, as I mentioned on digital same board performance, it was slightly down in Q4, -1.9%. However, if you exclude programmatic, Q4 digital same board performance was up 0.5%. National, as we mentioned, was down. If you exclude programmatic, national for Q4 was down 5%. Regarding programmatic, as we mentioned on our last call, our programmatic channel was challenged by some broader white noise in the digital ecosystem. This year for 2023, we're budgeting programmatic to be up 10% over last year, and we seem to be off to a good start towards that goal.
We ended the year with 4,455 digital units up in the air. That represented net new conversions for 2022 of 274 units. Same board digital performance for the year was up 6.6%. Again, we're targeting 300 net new conversions this year, as we remain highly confident that our customers are very receptive to that product. Business mix, 78% local, 22% national for both Q4 of last year and the full year of last year. As Jay mentioned, we did $480 million in acquisitions for the full year last year. Again, we see a quieter year this year on the acquisition front. I already highlighted categories of strength. Local services were up 21%.
Amusements up 9%. Education up 15%. This was offset somewhat by gaming down 11% and insurance down 6%. With that, Shelby, happy to answer any questions anybody has.
Operator (participant)
At this time, if you would like to ask a question, please press the star and one on your touchtone phone. You may remove yourself from the queue at any time by pressing star two. Once again, that is star and one to ask a question. We will pause for a moment to allow questions to queue. We'll take our first question from Ben Swinburne with Morgan Stanley.
Ben Swinburne (Equity Research Analyst)
Thanks. Morning, Sean. Morning, Jay. You guys allow.
Sean Reilly (President and CEO)
Hey, Ben.
Jay Johnson (EVP, CFO, and Treasurer)
Morning, Ben.
Ben Swinburne (Equity Research Analyst)
Hello, hello. Sean, two for you, I had one for Jay. On Q1, you can made a comment about national, you know, staying a bit soft. What are you thinking about full form of growth in the first quarter or just, you know, any more color on sort of how the quarter is shaping up since we're here in late February? You know, your services category, which I think is your biggest in the book, but correct me if I'm wrong. You know, I think you said up 21%, maybe that was just local. Just can you unpack the services piece of your business? Because, you know, I think the market always debates sort of how cyclical Lamar is, certainly a big topic in the REIT world in particular.
That's a category that's probably less cyclical than others, and I think it's, you know, broadly speaking, your largest category. I was wondering if you could just unpack what's in there and why it seems to be so stable and frankly, so strong.
Sean Reilly (President and CEO)
Great. Thanks. When we think about the cadence of the year, Q1 is going to be probably our weakest quarter as we look into our pacings. You know, as I mentioned, the midpoint of the range that we guided to is up approximately 4% pro forma for the full year. Q1 is going to be a little softer than that. You know, let's call it, you know, low singles. That's primarily the drag that's being created by national, which we anticipate, again, will be down in Q1 about the same as it was in Q4 of last year. We are seeing enhanced activity through the year, we anticipate that the national book will actually end this year up modestly. Regarding services is a catch-all for many different local services.
However, it is predominantly attorneys. You know, I would argue that it's relatively recession-proof. You know, people still get in car wrecks, whether it's the economy is strong or whether the economy is soft. I think that was evidenced by, you know, the very, very strong growth that services represented in Q4, in the face of a softening ad environment. We feel good about it. We feel good about really where all of our verticals are looking. You know, last year, we had some softness in insurance. You know, I anticipate that they're gonna come back when they get some of their legs under them based on, you know, some of the actuarial challenges they had last year.
Healthcare is gonna, I believe, come back as well. Then, you know, the online gaming, it's gonna normalize into what I believe is just sort of a. You know, last year, at the beginning of the year, they were spending on drunken sailors, and, you know, I think that they're gonna just sort of normalize into a regular category for us. Solid, you know, not with the big beta that they've had the last 18, 24 months.
Ben Swinburne (Equity Research Analyst)
Is, just as a follow-up, is sports betting in, is that something you guys group in national? Is that part of why national is weak?
Sean Reilly (President and CEO)
Yes. You know.
Ben Swinburne (Equity Research Analyst)
Yeah.
Sean Reilly (President and CEO)
Think DraftKings, FanDuel.
Ben Swinburne (Equity Research Analyst)
Mm-hmm.
Sean Reilly (President and CEO)
You know, they tended to jump in where they were in states where they were legalized and try to grab share. As the landscape, as I said, kind of would normalize, then they would pull back in that state, and then they'd move on to another state. You know, we benefited from that in 2021 and early 2022.
Ben Swinburne (Equity Research Analyst)
Yeah. Got it. Okay. Jay, I know you probably weren't expecting an ERP question, not the most exciting topic in the world, but we've seen companies end up spending a lot of money on these things, more than they thought, and then taking longer to implement than they thought. I wonder if you could just talk about the benefits to Lamar once this is up and running in 2024. Is this something you think will manifest itself into better financial performance from, you know, what we look at externally over time?
Jay Johnson (EVP, CFO, and Treasurer)
I think ultimately, and we're on a, you know, a three to five year journey, and we've been at this now probably 18 to 24 months just getting to a point where we can prepare to implement the ERP. Ultimately, it's about efficiency for our business. It's really more about being able to grow at scale, and maintain sort of status quo in terms from an expense perspective. It's really about becoming more efficient. In terms of timing, as I said, we've been at this about 18 months. We're going very, very slow, very methodically. We feel like we have the right team in place with the right advisors. We've been very, very thoughtful about that.
We're just beginning the journey, but I think you'll really begin to see the impact in 2025. Our first go-live is mid-2024. And then our second go live is early 2025. We'll start to see the impacts in 2025 and for sure in full year 2026.
Sean Reilly (President and CEO)
Ben, let me give a little bit of color as well, 'cause this is, this is something that's really important for Lamar and our shareholders. For this year and next year, you will see elevated expense growth at corporate for that reason.
Ben Swinburne (Equity Research Analyst)
Mm-hmm.
Sean Reilly (President and CEO)
These things are complicated, and they are expensive. There is a payback, and there is an ROI attached to the effort. We will get more efficient up here at corporate. We'll push less paper with fewer people. You know, that's just we had never done this before.
Ben Swinburne (Equity Research Analyst)
Right.
Sean Reilly (President and CEO)
I kind of get embarrassed when I talk about our IT here because our customer-facing IT is definitely state-of-the-art. Our back-office IT hasn't been touched in probably two decades. It's time, and I'm excited about the project, and I know it's gonna pay dividends. Again, you're gonna see some elevated expense rate at the corporate level. As a matter of fact, you know, I mentioned that the midpoint of the range was, you know, represented about 3.5% expense rate for this year. That's consolidated. If you just took our outdoor division, our billboard operations, you know, their expense rate for this year is coming in sort of in the 2.5-ish range, we believe.
You know, that delta is that is what we're doing to modernize our back office.
Ben Swinburne (Equity Research Analyst)
Yep. Got it. That's helpful. Thanks, guys.
Operator (participant)
We'll take our next question from Jason Bazinet with Citi.
Jason Bazinet (Director)
I know it doesn't affect FFO, but I was a little surprised by the D&A number you guys put up in the quarter. I don't know if there's any color there, if I just sort of missed something. My second question is, if there was no organic growth for whatever reason sort of next year, if you just sort of took the benefit of the acquisitions that you did in 2022 and sort of got full year attribution in 2023, how much do you think that would help your top line? Thanks.
Sean Reilly (President and CEO)
Yeah. I'll hit the second question and let Jay hit the D&A question. The acquisition activity from last year will provide, you know, approximately 1.6% additional revenue growth over and above what would be organic.
Jason Bazinet (Director)
Okay.
Sean Reilly (President and CEO)
That's the sort of the arithmetic there. And, you know, when we do these things, they happen pretty much ratably throughout the year, right? Some of the benefit in your last year, and then, of course, you get the full benefit this year.
Jason Bazinet (Director)
That's perfect.
Jay Johnson (EVP, CFO, and Treasurer)
On the, on the D&A front, it really was just a change in estimates associated with our ARO, our asset retirement obligation, from a GAAP perspective and inflation as well, when you think about impacting our weighted average cost of capital.
Jason Bazinet (Director)
You think that's like a decent sort of runway going forward on the D&A side? There's no one-timers in there.
Jay Johnson (EVP, CFO, and Treasurer)
Right. It's a one-time adjustment.
Jason Bazinet (Director)
It is one time. Okay.
Jay Johnson (EVP, CFO, and Treasurer)
Mm-hmm.
Jason Bazinet (Director)
All right. Thank you.
Operator (participant)
Once again, if you would like to ask a question, please press star and one on your touch tone phone. We'll take our next question from Richard Choe with J.P. Morgan.
Richard Choe (VP)
Hi. I wanted to follow up on the programmatic side. Did you say you're budgeting a 10% increase this year, and kinda what gives you the confidence there?
Sean Reilly (President and CEO)
Good question. We are off to a good start. January, internally, actually exceeded that budgeted increase. You know, programmatic, if I go back a few years, a lot of fanfare, rapid growth, you know, we were doubling and tripling, and everybody was very excited. We turned the corner in the last year, and the broader digital ecosystem started showing some real weakness, and it carried over into the way programmatic digital buyers that buy our inventory, they pulled back a little bit. What we're sensing now is that there's a renewed interest in programmatic. You know, the customers that use that channel don't use our traditional channel. They don't pick up the phone and call account executives or work through traditional agencies.
They really only buy through this channel. What we're hearing from our programmatic partners, Vistar, Place Exchange, the enablers of that channel, is that they feel like this year is gonna be markedly better than last year, and that some of that disruption in the digital ecosystem has worked its way through.
Richard Choe (VP)
Then on the national side, you said that you expected to pick up a slow start. Anything particular you think is going on? I guess to follow up with that, in the past, you've talked about, you know, normal course recessions. Are you thinking this year as a normal course recession or not quite there yet?
Sean Reilly (President and CEO)
Yeah.
Richard Choe (VP)
Understand a little about.
Sean Reilly (President and CEO)
Sure. you know, you saw our press release and their relative strength on the national front, you know, in touching base, you know, with them and touching base with our own channel checks and our own touch points. We feel like there's a lot of activity. It's gonna land in the second quarter and the third quarter. Those quarters seem to be a lot stronger when it comes to the national book. you know, for us, we're only 22% national, and so a couple of big accounts can move that book around. you know, I sort of singled out the insurance accounts and online gaming accounts. you know, we feel confident that they're gonna come back in.
Again, we can see the activity. You know, we just need to get through February, and I think you're gonna see a nice pick up there.
Richard Choe (VP)
Got it. Then finally, local's very strong, and you mentioned the strength there. Any signs that maybe the rate increases, you know, are flowing through or maybe hurting some smaller businesses and some of the local exposure, given how fast rates have gone and everyone's adjusting to a higher kind of floating rate level?
Sean Reilly (President and CEO)
You know, we're not getting much pushback when we ask for rate. You know, I think it's a factor of a number of things. Number one, you know, the expectation for inflation, we lived with it all last year, and people expected us to ask. Number two, the, we went for a decade where, you know, we lived in a 2% world and we weren't really driving rate aggressively. So it was time. Then, number three, I would remind everybody that out-of-home is the lowest cost per thousand advertising medium that there is. When we, you know, we're $3-$5 cost per thousand impressions. When we drive rate, it's not quite the same as what they would see in other channels.
Richard Choe (VP)
Great. Thank you.
Operator (participant)
It appears that we have no further questions at this time. I will now turn the program back over to Sean Reilly for any additional or closing remarks.
Sean Reilly (President and CEO)
Thank you all for your interest in Lamar. We look forward to visiting next quarter.
Operator (participant)
Thank you. That concludes today's teleconference. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.