Lamar Advertising Company - Earnings Call - Q4 2024

Executive Summary

• Solid Q4 finish with acquisition-adjusted revenue +4.1% and adjusted EBITDA +3.9% YoY; full-year diluted AFFO per share hit $7.99, above the top end of revised guidance, aided by strength in political, local and programmatic channels.
• GAAP EPS was noisy (Q4 diluted EPS of $(0.01)) due to a non-cash $159.7M asset retirement obligation (ARO) estimate revision that drove a 234% jump in D&A; core measures (EBITDA, AFFO, FCF) were healthy.
• 2025 guide: diluted AFFO/share $8.13–$8.28 and diluted EPS $6.01–$6.07; company raised the quarterly dividend to $1.55 and targets at least $6.20/share of regular dividends in 2025, with a possible year-end special tied to the Vistar gain distribution requirement.
• Strategic catalysts: accelerating digital conversions (≥350 units), improving national backdrop, programmatic scaling, Vistar stake monetization ($115.1M cash, up to $15.1M escrow) used to de-lever revolver—positioning M&A capacity “well over $1B” at ~2.8x net debt/EBITDA.

What Went Well and What Went Wrong

• What Went Well

  • Demand: Q4 acquisition-adjusted revenue +4.1% YoY with growth across billboards, logos, transit and airport; programmatic up ~30% YoY (~$3M) and same-store digital +3.7%.
  • Execution on core cash metrics: Adjusted EBITDA +3.9% YoY; AFFO/share +5.2% to $2.21; FCF +8.5% YoY in Q4.
  • Balance sheet and capital allocation: Sold Vistar stake to T-Mobile for $115.1M cash (up to $15.1M extra), applied to revolver (balance now $119M); 2025 regular dividend increased to at least $6.20/share.
  • Quote: “Revenue growth accelerated in the fourth quarter, aided by strength in political, local and programmatic. This allowed us to deliver full-year AFFO of $7.99 per share, above the top end of our revised guidance range.” — CEO Sean Reilly.

• What Went Wrong

  • GAAP optics: Net income fell 100.7% YoY to a $(1.0)M net loss in Q4 due to a non-cash ARO estimate revision adding $159.7M to D&A; without this, net income would have risen 6.3% YoY.
  • Corporate/OpEx: Reported corporate expense rose 15.2% YoY in Q4; management flagged peak ERP conversion costs as a 2025 headwind (declining after completion).
  • National mix still lagging peers given footprint (NY/LA) and category mix (entertainment skew), though tone is improving into 2025.

Transcript

Operator (participant)

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. To ask a question at that time, please press star one on your telephone. 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 4th quarter 2024 earnings release and its most recent annual report on Form 10-K. Lamar refers you to those documents. Lamar's 4th quarter 2024 earnings release, which contains information required by Regulation G regarding certain non-GAAP financial measures, was furnished to the SEC on a 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 Mr. Sean Reilly. Please go ahead, sir.

Sean Reilly (CEO)

Thank you, Bo. Good morning and welcome to Lamar's Q4 2024 Earnings Call. We ended 2024 on a positive note. Revenue growth accelerated from Q3, aided by political, with local and programmatic again leading the way. For the quarter, revenue was up 4.1% on an acquisition-adjusted basis compared to Q4 of 2023, with increases across all our lines of business, Outdoor, logos, transit, and airports. EBITDA grew 3.9% on the same acquisition-adjusted basis. As a result, we delivered full-year AFFO of $7.99 per share, $0.04 above the top end of the revised guidance range that we provided at the end of Q3 and $0.17 above the top end of our original guidance for 2024.

For the full year, AFFO per share increased 7%, bolstered by acquisition-adjusted revenue growth of 4.2%, EBITDA growth of 4.5%, and a slight improvement in our EBITDA margin to 46.8%, all of which allowed us to increase our distribution by 13%. As we think about 2025, we anticipate another year of growth. Local sales remain solid, and it feels like national is firming up after a couple of tough years. As you saw in the release, we are guiding to full-year AFFO per share in the range of $8.13-$8.28. Embedded within that guidance is an expectation for acquisition-adjusted revenue growth in the range of 3%, with a similar percentage increase in operating expenses. Year-over-year revenue growth will be more modest in the 1st quarter.

Recall that we had an extra sales day last year due to the leap year, but our pacing shows that growth is picking up as the year unfolds, and last night we announced another significant increase in our dividend for 2025 to a run rate of $6.20 per share. Back to Q4. In addition to political, categories of strength included service, buildings and constructions, and government and nonprofits, while healthcare and insurance were weaker. For the billboard business, both local and national/programmatic grew 3.5% for the quarter. Digital, of course, led the way in Q4, increasing nearly 8% versus the year earlier quarter, including a 3.7% same-store growth, with particular strength in programmatic, which was up nearly $3 million, or 30%.

That same-store growth, the best of any quarter in 2024, gives us confidence that it is the right decision to re-accelerate our rollout of new units, new digital units in 2025, with a goal of deploying at least 350 new displays organically. We will, of course, also add digital displays through M&A as well in 2025. As you know, the market was relatively quiet in 2024, and we tempered our own activity as we focused on further improving our already strong balance sheet. We ultimately spent about $45 million in acquisitions in 2024. We anticipate a more active year in 2025. If I had to call it now, I would say count on about $150 million in deals, though it could be even more than that.

Now, we're more accustomed to being a buyer, not a seller in the M&A world, but as noted in the release earlier this year, we divested our 20% interest in Vistar Media, the leading programmatic platform for out-of-home. We sold to T-Mobile as part of their acquisition of all of Vistar. It was a resoundingly successful investment for Lamar. We paid $30 million in 2021 for our 20% stake, and we received $115 million from T-Mobile earlier this month, with $15 million more due once escrows are released. I want to commend Ross Reilly, who led the Vistar investment for us.

Jay will have more to say about our plans for the Vistar proceeds, but I want to note that the decision by T-Mobile, one of the best-known consumer brands and most sophisticated marketers around, to acquire Vistar is a testament to their faith in out-of-home as a powerful communications medium with a promising future. We are confident that they can utilize their data and market insights to take Vistar and programmatic out-of-home to new heights. Finally, before I turn it over to Jay, I want to thank everyone across Lamar Land for their hard work and dedication in 2024. I can't say it enough. We have the best team in out-of-home, and I can't wait to see what more we will be able to accomplish together in 2025. Jay?

Jay Johnson (CFO)

Thanks, Sean. I couldn't agree with you more. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us. We had a solid 4th quarter and are pleased with our results, which exceeded internal expectations across revenue, adjusted EBITDA, and AFFO. Growth in AFFO continued in the 4th quarter. Diluted AFFO per share increased 5.2% to $2.21 versus $2.10 in the 4th quarter of 2023. In addition, the company ended the year above the high end of our revised AFFO outlook, which we increased following both the 1st quarter and 3rd quarter last year. Despite growth in operating expenses, adjusted EBITDA margin for the quarter held strong at 48.1% and continues to exceed pre-COVID levels. Adjusted EBITDA for the quarter was $278.5 million compared to $268.2 million in 2023, which was an increase of 3.9%. Free cash flow also improved in the quarter, growing 8.5% over Q4 2023.

In the quarter, depreciation and amortization expense increased $164.9 million, growing over 230%. This was primarily due to a revision in the cost estimate included in calculation of the company's asset retirement obligations, ARO. ARO accounts for Lamar's obligation to dismantle and remove over 71,000 billboard structures on leased land and restore the sites to original condition. We test our ARO estimate annually, and the cost to retire these assets has risen substantially, which led to an increase in our depreciation and amortization expense during the quarter. However, the expense is a non-cash item and does not impact the company's adjusted EBITDA or AFFO. For the full year, acquisition-adjusted revenue increased 4.2% to $2.21 billion compared to $2.11 billion the prior year. Operating expenses grew approximately 4% against a difficult 2023 comparison in which acquisition-adjusted expenses increased only 1%.

Adjusted EBITDA was $1.03 billion, which represents an increase of 4.5% on an acquisition-adjusted basis. Adjusted EBITDA margin was 46.8% for the full year, expanding 10 basis points versus a year ago. We were pleased to see margin hold steady given upward pressure on the expense side. The company ended 2024 with full-year diluted AFFO of $7.99 per share, which was above the top end of our revised guidance. For the 12 months ended December 31st, diluted AFFO per share increased 7% compared to full year 2023. The acceleration in AFFO growth was driven by a strong top line, and we also benefited from the pause in short-term interest rate hikes. We faced significant interest rate headwinds in both 2022 and 2023 that subsided last year, with cash interest remaining relatively flat in 2024.

Local and regional sales accounted for approximately 78% of billboard revenue in Q4, similar to the same period in 2023, and growing for the 15th consecutive quarter. In fact, the 1st quarter of 2021 was the last quarter in which we saw a year-over-year decline in local and regional sales, a COVID-impacted quarter in comparison to the pre-COVID period a year prior in 2020. This consistent performance exhibits the resilience of our core local advertising business and differentiates the company from our peer group. Moving to capital expenditures, total spend for the quarter was approximately $43 million, including $16.3 million of maintenance CapEx, and for the full year, CapEx totaled $125.3 million, with maintenance CapEx comprising $52 million. As for our balance sheet, we have a well-laddered debt maturity schedule with no maturities until the Term Loan B in 2027.

Last year, we used a substantial amount of our cash flow after distribution to repay outstandings under the Term Loan A and reduced overall debt by $136 million. We currently have approximately $3 billion in total consolidated debt, and our weighted average interest rate is 4.6%, with a weighted average debt maturity of 3.8 years. As defined under our credit facility, we ended the quarter with total leverage of 2.83x net debt to EBITDA, which remains among the lowest level ever for the company. Our secured debt leverage was 0.82x at quarter end, and we are comfortably in compliance with both our total debt incurrence and secured debt maintenance tests against covenants of 7x and 4.5x, respectively. As a result of the focus on our balance sheet, the company is well-positioned to resume more normal acquisition activity with an investment capacity well over $1 billion.

In addition, we have the ability to deploy this capital while remaining at or below the high end of our total leverage range of 3.5x-4x net debt to EBITDA. Our liquidity and access to capital remain strong as the company continues to enjoy access to both the debt and equity capital markets. As of December 31st, we had just over $500 million in total liquidity, comprised of $49.5 million of cash on hand and $457 million available under our revolver. As Sean mentioned, subsequent to quarter end, T-Mobile acquired 100% of Vistar Media, a company in which we had a 20% investment. Lamar received $115 million as consideration for the sale, and we may receive an additional $15 million from escrow following certain post-closing conditions.

Proceeds from the sale were used to repay outstandings under our revolving credit facility, and the current balance on our revolver is $119 million. The $130 million in total consideration is return of over 4x our initial investment, and the company will recognize a taxable gain of approximately $100 million on the transaction. The Vistar investment was held within our taxable REIT subsidiary, and the gain is subject to federal and state income taxes prior to distribution to the REIT. As part of distributing funds to the REIT, we plan to use a portion of the cash after taxes to repay intercompany loans from the REIT to the TRS. We also intend to utilize additional tax deductions at the REIT, which will further reduce our taxable income.

As a result, we currently estimate our distribution requirement associated with the Vistar sale to be in the $15 million-$20 million range and will likely be distributed in the form of a special dividend at year-end. In this morning's press release, we provided full-year AFFO guidance of $8.13-$8.28 per share, reflecting AFFO growth of 1.8%-3.6% over 2024. At the midpoint of guidance, we expect top-line growth of about 3%, and operating expenses should grow slower in 2024. As we did last year, we are assuming SOFR remains flat for purposes of cash interest and have included $152 million in our guidance. Our maintenance CapEx budget for the year is anticipated to be $60 million in 2025, which is $8 million more than last year, and finally, cash taxes are projected to come in at approximately $10 million.

Yesterday, our board of directors approved a 1st quarter dividend of $1.55 per share, and we expect to distribute a regular dividend of at least $6.20 per share in 2025. This excludes any required distribution resulting from the Vistar sale. On an annualized basis, the Q1 dividend represents a yield of 4.7% at yesterday's closing stock price. As a reminder, the company's dividend is based on taxable income, subject to board approval, and our dividend policy remains to distribute 100% of our taxable income. Again, we are pleased with our 4th quarter performance and the strong finish to 2024, and we look forward to executing on our strategy in 2025. I'll now turn the call back over to Sean.

Sean Reilly (CEO)

Thanks, Jay. I'll go through some of the familiar stats. I'll start with relative regional strength and weakness. Q4 was paced by our Northeast region, which came in at up 6.7% on the revenue side. Relative weakness: Gulf Coast came in at up 0.3%. Interestingly, that is the complete inverse of what happened last year when the Gulf Coast paced the company and the Northeast was struggling a tad. On to political. Q4 political represented $14.5 million in our book for Q4. That compares to $2.9 million in Q4 of 2023. For the full year, political came in at $29.2 million compared to 2023's $7.5 million. There's some unknowns as we think about replacing the impact of political, particularly in Q4. As I've said many times, political tends to break late. So we don't know how much of that 14.5 crowded out customers that otherwise would have bought the space.

We also don't know how strong political is going to be this year. So that's a stay tuned in terms of our guidance. On to number of digital units. We concluded the year with 4,994 digital units in the air as compared to last year's year-end number, which was 4,759, or an increase of 235. As I mentioned, we anticipate significantly ramping our digital deployment this year, and our stretch goal is something in the neighborhood of 375. Let's say at least 350. Same-store revenue was a good story in Q4, up 3.7%, again paced by programmatic, which was up a little north of 30%. For the year, same-store digital revenue was up 2.8%, and programmatic was up a little over 48%. For 2025, we're budgeting programmatic to be up, give or take mid-teens, and we're off to a very good start with programmatic.

Local national, Q4 national represented 22.1% of our book. Local regional was at 77.9%. That's 1% up for local over Q4 of 2023, 1% down for national. Q4, though, was a different story. National rebounded. Local regional was up 3.5%, and national/programmatic was up 3.5%. As we move into Q1, as I mentioned, Q1 got a difficult comp for us. It's not going to be up to the same degree as we anticipate the full year. And national is, give or take, flattish with sequential improvement, modest sequential improvement as we move through the year. Categories of relative strength, as I mentioned, service Q4 up 10.7%, public service/government up 13.7%, building and construction up 17.9%. And categories of relative weakness, healthcare down 6.6%, and insurance down 5%. That's it for our comments. We're happy to open it up for questions.

Operator (participant)

Certainly, Mr. Reilly, thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, at this time, if you would like to ask a question, please press star one. If you find your questions have been addressed, you can remove yourself from the queue by pressing star two. Once again, star one for questions, and we'll go first this morning to Cameron McVeigh of Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.

Cameron McVeigh (VP of Equity Research)

Hey, good morning, guys.

Jay Johnson (CFO)

Hey, Cameron.

Sean Reilly (CEO)

Hey, Cameron.

Cameron McVeigh (VP of Equity Research)

It's good to hear the national ad spend is firming up a bit. Curious if that's driven by any specific vertical or if it's more broad-based. And in your view, what may be driving the turnaround there? And then secondly, the 2025 AFFO guidance was a bit below street estimates. It seems to be a function of lower expected net income. And I believe you said you expect 3% acquisition-adjusted revenue growth in 2025. Is that driving most of this, or are you expecting higher costs anywhere, maybe ERP or corporate expenses? Any color there would be helpful. Thank you.

Sean Reilly (CEO)

Sure. So let's start with the AFFO question. So there were a couple of things that contributed last year that will not contribute this year. I would note we won't have the benefit of the Vistar net income this year that we had last year that contributed to AFFO growth. And we also have, as Jay mentioned, slightly higher maintenance CapEx that's going to be a slight headwind when it comes to AFFO growth. The elevated expenses, recall that we are in peak spend for our ERP conversion. So you're going to see, again, continued corporate growth and expenditures until we get through our conversion, which we anticipate around Q1 of next year. And as we move into 2026 and 2027, you're going to see corporate expenses decline pretty significantly. So yeah, I think those are the primary ingredients in what's going on with AFFO growth.

And of course, the revenue guide, Q1 is going to be a little softer for us, and then we're going to accelerate as we move through the year. And then, as I mentioned, Q4, right now, the pacing look quite nice, but we do have to work diligently to replace those political dollars.

Jay Johnson (CFO)

Cameron, just to add a little bit of color there, between CapEx and the loss of Vistar, it's about a $0.13 headwind. And then also, as you recall, we had some muted acquisition activity last year. So if you look at it on a pro forma or same-store basis, acquisitions are only adding about 20 basis points this year, and typical years would add a little more to AFFO.

Cameron McVeigh (VP of Equity Research)

Got it. That's helpful. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. We go next now to David Karnovsky at J.P. Morgan.

David Karnovsky (Managing Director)

Hey, thank you. Sean, you noted, I think, $150 million in potential M&A this year. I don't know if you could speak a bit to the pipeline right now. Should we assume that figure comprises mostly small deals, or is anything kind of more sizable assumed in there? And then I guess you touched upon it in your prepared remarks, but Vistar, T-Mobile, I don't know if you can talk to what that means for programmatic generally. Thanks.

Sean Reilly (CEO)

Sure. So yeah, the M&A pipeline, we put out the word last year that we wanted to focus on retiring the term A. And when that word gets out from Lamar, folks that are thinking about selling, they say, "Okay, I'll wait." So that is happening. Folks that now know that we're active again are coming to market. And it runs the gamut of deal sizes. There's some that are $2 million. There's many that are in the $5 million-$10 million. And then we've got a couple that are in that sort of $40 million or $50 million range that we hope to pry loose. So in that sense, it's a typical year of good Lamar tuck-in activity where we're being active and aggressive. And then Vistar and T-Mobile, I'm really excited about it. T-Mobile is a very entrepreneurial company. They have an incredible brand. They understand marketing. They love out-of-home.

They actually have a small position in an out-of-home business that actually has screens. And I think as they looked at the landscape of what's going on with digital out-of-home and saw Vistar as the clear global leader, they jumped in, and they were aggressive. And I think that only bodes well. They have unique insights into consumer behavior based on the data that they have access to by being one of the nation's premier cellular providers. And they also understand marketing. So I think it can only be good for the industry, which bodes well for us as the owner of the largest large-format digital network in the country.

David Karnovsky (Managing Director)

Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. We go next now to Daniel Ousley of Wells Fargo.

Daniel Ousley (VP and Analyst)

Thank you. When comparing your national growth to some of your peers, it looks like your recovery has lagged behind a bit. Can you help us unpack why that may be, and do you think there are any structural drivers behind the national weakness there?

Sean Reilly (CEO)

Yeah, Daniel, I think there's some truth to that. Part of it is the natural consequence of our footprint. National ad spend tends to be focused in the top three DMAs, particularly New York and L.A., where our footprint is not as robust as, say, Outfront or Clear Channel. So that has a little bit to do with it. It is also driven by categories and how they recover. In particular, when you look at the recovery of the entertainment category, movie category coming out of the strike in the prior year, they tend to get much more of that business than we do. The entertainment category in particular focuses on L.A. And when you look particularly at Outfront, they probably have the best distribution and outdoor footprint in L.A., and they tend to get more of those dollars.

Daniel Ousley (VP and Analyst)

That's helpful. And if I can sneak in a follow-up. On billboard yields, you've been running at a pretty high occupancy rate across your boards through the year. So I just wanted to hear how you view the pricing environment today and how you think about your ability to continue to drive price. Thank you.

Sean Reilly (CEO)

Sure. Yeah, that's the case, Daniel. Virtually all of the gains last year were driven by rate, and we anticipate that that's going to be the case this year. I would say basically we're at peak occupancy. And given that, we have to drive rate if we're going to hit our goals.

Daniel Ousley (VP and Analyst)

Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. And just a quick reminder, ladies and gentlemen, star one for questions today. We go next now to Lance Vitanza at TD Cowen.

Lance Vitanza (Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst)

Thanks, guys, for taking the questions. I have two. The first is on CapEx. Hi. Thanks. Can you hear me?

Sean Reilly (CEO)

Yep.

Lance Vitanza (Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst)

Yep. Great. First question on CapEx. I think you mentioned 350-375 digital conversions this year. Did I hear that right? In any case, could you give us a sense for the expected cadence of that spend? I noticed on the total CapEx line in 2024, we saw this big uptick in 4Q. Would you expect that pattern to repeat in 2025?

Sean Reilly (CEO)

I'm going to say that the cadence of spend on digital is probably going to be sort of ratable through the year. We don't see any sort of spikes in terms of that deployment. There are a few things that are going to cause our total CapEx to also increase this year. We've got some extraordinary CapEx in our logo division, which is hitting us this year. We are also. We own something in the neighborhood of 130 buildings out there, and we have a little bit of extraordinary CapEx in building some new buildings and refurbishing some old ones. If I had to highlight anything that was sort of extraordinary, that would be it. And maybe Q4's elevated CapEx was related to hurricanes in Q3. So that might explain a little bit of the uptick in Q4 of last year.

Lance Vitanza (Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst)

That's helpful. And then just back on the 2025 guidance, the revenue, 3%, I'm trying to square that with some industry and trade sources, which are talking about more like 5% domestic out-of-home ad revenue spend growth this year. And you talk about having the best team in out-of-home, and I tend to agree. And yet, if I compare your projected growth relative to what Magna Global and others are saying, it just seems very conservative. And I'm wondering how we square that circle. Do you think that just are the Magna estimates just too high?

Sean Reilly (CEO)

You could look to others, and they'll have a different number. You also need to keep in mind that they're looking at out-of-home very broadly defined, and there are some, for example, digital out-of-home screens that aren't in our portfolio that are being deployed very quickly. I would highlight the retail television networks that are popping up seemingly everywhere, so that's in their numbers. The recovery of cinema advertising is also in their number, which, again, that's not in our portfolio, so that explains some of it. It's sort of different portfolios, and then I would say also that, again, it depends on who you're looking at. The number that I've been circling around is total out-of-home up between 3.5 and 4, and again, there's some portfolio differences as smaller screens recover, particularly, again, in sort of the transit space as well.

Lance Vitanza (Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst)

Very good. Thank you for your help.

Sean Reilly (CEO)

Yeah.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. We go next now to Ally Yaseen at Wolfe Research.

Ally Yaseen (Equity Research Associate)

Hi. Thanks a lot for taking my question. This is just another follow-up on the deployment of new digital signs. So you gave kind of your goal of 350, stretch goal of 375. What would you guys think about as the largest number of digital signs that you could see rolling out in a year? And what do you kind of consider the limiting factor for the pace of static to digital conversions?

Sean Reilly (CEO)

Hey, Ally. Good question. We're pedal to the metal this year. So if we hit 375, we will have essentially deployed more in a given year than we have, I think, ever. The gating issues are, number one, regulatory, permitting. That takes time. It takes a lot of effort. We have to sit down with city leadership and make sure that they're comfortable with what we're doing and get fully permitted, and then these are construction projects. We have to retrofit the structure to make sure that it can hold the extra weight. We have to make sure there's no supply chain issues holding up getting digital units from our vendors, and then the crews have to be there on time. The power has to get hooked up, all that stuff that is engaged in a construction project.

And so when you add it all up, if we hit 375, we will have had a good year.

Ally Yaseen (Equity Research Associate)

Great. Thanks. That's helpful, and that's all for me.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. And there's no further questions at this time. So Mr. Reilly, I'd like to turn things back to you, sir, for any closing comments.

Sean Reilly (CEO)

Great. Thank you all for your interest in Lamar, and we will talk again next quarter.

Operator (participant)

Thank you, Mr. Reilly. Again, ladies and gentlemen, that does conclude today's conference call. We'd like to thank you all so much for joining us and wish you all a great day. Goodbye.