MRC Global - Q2 2023

Transcript

Operator (participant)

Greetings, and welcome to the MRC Global second quarter 2023 earnings conference call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A brief question-and-answer session will follow the formal presentation. If anyone should require operator assistance during the conference, please press Star zero on your telephone keypad. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. It is now my pleasure to introduce your host, Monica Broughton, Vice President, Investor Relations and Treasury. Please go ahead.

Monica Broughton (VP of Investor Relations and Treasury)

Thank you, and good morning. Welcome to the MRC Global second quarter 2023 earnings conference call and webcast. We appreciate you joining us. On the call today, we have Rob Saltiel, President and CEO, and Kelly Youngblood, Executive Vice President and CFO. There will be a replay of today's call available by webcast on our website, mrcglobal.com, as well as by phone until August 22nd, 2023. The dial-in information is in yesterday's release. We expect to file our quarterly report on Form 10-Q later today, and it will also be available on our website. Please note that the information reported on this call speaks only as of today, August 8th, and therefore, you are advised that information may no longer be accurate as of the time of replay. In our call today, we will discuss various non-GAAP measures.

You are encouraged to read our earnings release and securities filing to learn more about our use of these non-GAAP measures and to see a reconciliation of these measures to the related GAAP items, all of which can be found on our website. Unless we specifically state otherwise, references in this call to EBITDA refer to adjusted EBITDA. In addition, the comments made by the management of MRC Global during this call may contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the United States Federal Securities laws. These forward-looking statements reflect the current views of the management of MRC Global. However, actual results could differ materially from those expressed today. You are encouraged to read the company's SEC filings for a more in-depth review of the risk factors concerning these forward-looking statements. Now, I would like to turn the call over to our CEO, Mr. Rob Saltiel.

Rob Saltiel (President and CEO)

Thank you, Monica. Good morning, and welcome to everyone joining today's call. I will begin with a high-level overview of our second quarter results and sector performance, followed by our 2023 outlook. Kelly will provide a detailed review of the second quarter results and 2023 guidance before I end our prepared remarks with a brief recap. Moving on to our financial results, I am pleased with our performance in the first half of this year, with overall revenue growing 10% over the first half of 2022. All three of our sectors demonstrated healthy year-on-year revenue growth over the first six months, with production and transmission infrastructure, or PTI, up 16% and both Gas Utilities and our downstream industrial and energy transition sector, or DIET, each up approximately 8%.

Our profitability in the first half of the year also improved over the same period last year, with a 17% increase in EBITDA and a 40 basis point improvement in EBITDA margins. Clearly, our business is in great shape as we head into the second half of 2023, as we continue to improve top and bottom-line performance and execute our sector-focused strategies. Specific to the second quarter, our top line came in a little lighter than anticipated, with revenue of $871 million, representing a 2% sequential decline versus the first quarter, but an improvement of 3% over the second quarter of 2022. Both sequentially and compared to the same quarter last year, two of our three sectors, gas, utilities, and PTI, experienced revenue growth, with DIET taking a pause in project and turnaround activity this quarter.

Other key highlights for the quarter are that we produced strong adjusted gross margins of 21.5%, grew our International segment backlog by 12% compared to the first quarter, and generated positive cash flow from operations of $20 million. Our adjusted gross margins continue to be robust, even as the supply chain has normalized and inflation has stabilized. Improving 30 basis points in the second quarter over the first quarter, we benefited from updated contracts that have taken effect, which reflect current product cost levels. While gross margins are often sensitive to both geographic and product mix and project activity, we expect our average adjusted gross margins to remain at the 21% level, well above pre-pandemic levels.

As I mentioned earlier, we generated $20 million in operating cash flow this quarter, and in the back half of the year, we expect cash flow generation will accelerate due to declines in inventory levels for the remainder of the year. Cash flow generation remains an important metric for this leadership team, and we are focused on generating cash through the business cycle. We realized EBITDA of $63 million, with margins of 7.2%, lower than anticipated, primarily due to the lower revenue for the quarter. Kelly will cover the details later. However, we expect our EBITDA margins to improve next quarter on higher revenue as we enter into what is typically our strongest quarter of the year. Our return on invested capital, or ROIC, was 11.3% after adjusting for the impact of LIFO on a trailing 12-month basis.

We expect this metric to continue to increase in future years, and we see it as a key driver for shareholder value creation. Turning now to our sector performance. Our PTI business continues to benefit from improving fundamentals. This business experienced a 10% revenue improvement over the second quarter of 2022 as our customers expanded their production facilities and pipeline infrastructure across all three geographic segments. In particular, our Permian PTI business continues to thrive as we have solidified strong business relationships with the larger operators whose capital budgets are less sensitive to oil price moves than those of smaller players. On the flip side, our California PTI business has been hampered by difficulties that our customers have had in securing drilling permits and a general regulatory climate that is not favorable to the oil and gas industry.

While sequential growth for PTI in the second quarter was modest, we expect the PTI sector to strengthen in the second half of this year as we see our customers' CapEx budgets remaining healthy and oil prices remaining supportive. Our DIET sector experienced a 5% decline in revenue compared to the same quarter last year due to the timing of projects and turnaround activity. The larger projects in this sector can be lumpy between quarters, as evidenced by the 12% sequential improvement we experienced in the first quarter, followed by a similar decline in the second quarter. We expect that the second quarter revenue for DIET will be the low watermark for this year, and for our DIET business to improve significantly from here.

Our DIET backlog increased 12% sequentially in the second quarter, we are modeling strong double-digit revenue growth in the third quarter, followed by a seasonally strong fourth quarter as project activity resumes and we head into the fall and winter turnaround season. Many of the U.S. biofuels projects are winding down, several LNG projects are ramping up and will drive higher activity over the next several quarters. Our Gas Utilities business had 5% sales growth versus the first quarter, 3% growth over the second quarter of 2022, as customers implemented meter upgrade and pipeline integrity projects, as well as other system reliability and environmental activities. As we move into the second half of the year, we expect our Gas Utilities revenue to moderate over the next couple of quarters.

Several customers built large inventory balances over the last year and are now working to reduce their stock levels, given that we have a much more reliable supply chain and an associated reduction in product lead times. We need to keep in mind that our Gas Utilities revenue grew 21% in 2021 and 25% in 2022. Phenomenal growth rates that were fueled in part by customer advanced purchases of critical products that were in high demand and short supply. Now, some of these customers have too much product inventory in their systems. Due to this inventory rebalancing, we expect Gas Utilities revenue levels in the second half of the year to be about even with the first half of the year, lower than originally anticipated. However, I want to be clear that this does not negatively impact the longer-term growth fundamentals of this business.

Discussions with our key customers indicate that their anticipated multi-year CapEx budgets, averaging in the 5%-7% annual growth range, remain intact over the next few years. In the second quarter, we entered into contractual agreements with two new Gas Utilities, and we expanded our product offerings with two other utility customers. We continue to gain both market share and wallet share in this sector. Despite this bump in the road, we believe our Gas Utilities business will return to more typical growth levels in 2024 and maintain its strong long-term growth trajectory. I want to make a few comments about our International segment, which has shown impressive performance this year, including 21% revenue growth for the first half of 2023 compared to the first half of 2022, with strong double-digit improvement in both the PTI and PVF sectors.

Several countries are leading the uptick in customer activity, including the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Singapore, and Australia. International backlog has returned to pre-pandemic levels, positioning this segment well for double-digit revenue growth in 2023 and a strong start going into 2024. International is also leading the way for our energy transition business this year, with more than half of MRC Global's energy transition revenue to date, and the majority of our backlog in this subsector. This activity has been led by renewable fuels and wind power projects, primarily in Europe. In fact, we recently won our first valve supply order for a green hydrogen plant in Europe with a long-standing customer. I want to provide a few summary comments on our 2023 business outlook before turning it over to Kelly.

Our revenue expectations for the full-year 2023 are now calling for upper single-digit growth over 2022, as we are seeing some softening around the timing of our customer spending in the back half of the year, primarily in the Gas Utility sector, as I mentioned earlier. We continue to expect double-digit growth in our PTI sector and high single-digit growth in our DIET sector for the full-year. We expect to generate strong cash flow from operations this year, especially in the remaining 2 quarters, and to deliver higher annual adjusted EBITDA than we did in 2022. This new guidance is lower than our previous expectations, we remain bullish on the multi-year outlook for our company and our many growth opportunities ahead. With that, I'll now turn the call over to Kelly.

Kelly Youngblood (EVP and CFO)

Thanks, Rob. Good morning, everyone. My comments today will primarily be focused on sequential results, comparing the second quarter of 2023 to the first quarter of 2023, unless otherwise stated. Total company sales for the second quarter were $871 million, a 2% sequential decrease, but a 3% year-over-year increase. From a sector perspective, Gas Utility sales were $323 million in the second quarter, a $16 million, or 5% increase, due to the typical seasonal increase related to the construction ramp-up period for integrity upgrade projects. compared to the same quarter last year, the Gas Utility sector grew 3%, primarily driven by increased CapEx spending for modernization and replacement activity.

As mentioned by Rob, as we move into the second half of the year, we expect our Gas Utilities revenue to moderate for the next couple of quarters, but then return to more similar growth levels as we have experienced historically. The DIET sector's second quarter revenue was $245 million, a decrease of $33 million or 12%, due to the timing of projects and turnaround activity. As a reminder, this sector had a very strong first quarter, which contributed to the sequential decline seen this quarter. For the third quarter, we expect a very strong rebound in activity with a robust double-digit level of growth. Notably, this sector has a significant amount of project activity, which can create substantial variability between quarters.

The PTI sector revenue for the second quarter was $303 million, an increase of $3 million or 1% sequentially, as we experienced an increase in gathering and processing projects this quarter. Compared to the same period last year, our PTI backlog has grown 20% for the company and 54% for our international segment. From a geographic segment perspective, U.S. revenue was $727 million in the second quarter, a $13 million or 2% decline from the previous quarter due to the DIET sector, which was down $31 million or 15%, partially offset by growth in our Gas Utilities and PTI sectors, which were up $15 million and $3 million, respectively. Canada revenue was $38 million in the second quarter, sequentially down $4 million or 10%, due to nonrecurring project orders in the PTI sector.

International revenue was $106 million in the second quarter, up $3 million or 3%, driven by the PTI sector. We remain very optimistic about the outlook for our International segment, which has seen a 30% increase in backlog since the beginning of the year, led by the PTI sector. Now, turning to margins. Adjusted gross profit for the second quarter was $187 million or 21.5%, a 30 basis point improvement over the first quarter. Although we have seen deflation in our Line Pipe business this year, along with inflation stabilization across most other product lines, we have been successful increasing margins due to a higher margin product mix, improved contract terms, and a higher contribution of revenue from our International segment that is accretive to overall company gross margins.

Reported SG&A for the second quarter was $130 million or 14.9% of sales, as compared to $122 million or 13.8% for the first quarter. The primary driver of the increase relates to higher employee-related costs, including hiring additional resources to support business growth, along with associated benefit costs. The second quarter results also include nonrecurring IT-related professional fees. Normalizing for this expense, adjusted SG&A for the quarter was $129 million. We believe SG&A, as a percent of revenue, will average around 14% for the second half of the year, excluding any unusual items. EBITDA for the second quarter was $63 million or 7.2% of sales, a 60 basis point decline from the first quarter, primarily a result of the lower revenue this quarter.

Tax expense in the second quarter was $10 million, with an effective tax rate of 29%, as compared to $13 million of expense in the first quarter. The difference in the effective rate and the statutory rate is due to state income taxes, nondeductible expenses, and differing foreign income tax rates. For the second quarter, we had net income attributable to common stockholders of $18 million or $0.21 per diluted share, and our adjusted net income attributable to common stockholders on an average cost basis, normalizing for LIFO expense and other items, was $22 million or $0.25 per diluted share. In the second quarter, we generated $20 million in cash from operations as inventory levels peaked during the quarter.

We expect inventory levels to decline from second quarter levels for the remainder of the year, resulting in strong cash flow generation in the second half of the year. Our revised target is to generate net cash flow from operations of approximately $90 million for the full-year. Turning to liquidity and capital structure, our current availability on the ABL is $599 million, and including cash, our total liquidity is $630 million. Due to the anticipated cash generation in the second half of 2023 and in 2024, we expect our available liquidity to continue to grow. In the event that we do not refinance our term loan B that matures in September of 2024, we expect to have plenty of capacity under our ABL to use, if needed, to address payment of the balance before maturity.

I'd also want to address the presentation of our term loan on the balance sheet at the end of next quarter, when the term loan will technically mature within one year. Given our ability to repay the term loan using the ABL with no impact to current assets, we will continue to classify the term loan as long-term debt. This designation on the balance sheet will continue throughout 2024, as long as the existing term loan remains outstanding. To finish off our 2023 outlook, given our current outlook on the business, we expect 2023 revenue to increase in upper single-digit percent over 2022. With EBITDA margins in the mid-7% range.

From a sector revenue perspective, we continue to expect the PTI sector to have the highest growth rate in the low double-digit percentage range, followed by DIET with an upper single-digit percentage, and finally, Gas Utilities that we now expect to be at approximately the same revenue level as last year. From a segment view, this translates to a mid-teens percent increase for international, an upper single-digit % increase for the U.S., and a mid-single-digit percentage decline for Canada. Our normalized effective tax rate for the year is projected to be between 27% and 29%, but could fluctuate from quarter-to-quarter due to discrete items. Regarding our capital expenditures, there is no change to our previous guidance and expected to be in line with historical averages in the $10 million-$15 million range.

Finally, as we look at the cadence of revenue the next two quarters, we expect the third quarter to increase sequentially in the upper single-digits, driven by our DIET business, before a seasonal decline in the fourth quarter. With that, I would like to turn it back to Rob for closing comments.

Rob Saltiel (President and CEO)

Thanks, Kelly. Our performance for the first half of the year continues to demonstrate progress toward our goals of revenue growth, improved profitability, and cash flow generation. These are some of the key highlights I want to summarize before opening for Q&A. Revenue growth in 2023 is projected to be up over 2022 in the upper single-digit range. Our International segment continues to outperform with multiple opportunities for growth. We expect adjusted gross margins to remain in the 21% range for the year, while adjusted EBITDA margins should be in the mid-7% range. We are targeting $90 million in operating cash flow in 2023 as we reduce inventories over the next two quarters. Finally, our diversification strategy is paying off with approximately two-thirds of our revenue generated outside the traditional oil field.

Our Gas Utilities and DIET sectors thrive largely independent of commodity prices, and they each offer attractive growth prospects over the longer-term. With that, we will now take your questions. Operator?

Operator (participant)

Thank you. We will now be conducting a question-and-answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press Star one on your telephone keypad. A confirmation tone will indicate your line is in the question queue. You may press Star two if you would like to remove your question from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star keys. Your first question comes from Tommy Moll with Stephens. Please go ahead.

Tommy Moll (Managing Director)

Good morning, thanks for taking my questions.

Rob Saltiel (President and CEO)

Yeah, good morning, Tommy.

Tommy Moll (Managing Director)

Rob, I wanted to start on the revised revenue outlook. You mentioned for the Gas Utilities business, there's this customer destocking dynamic, but anything you can give us on the visibility and when that changed would be helpful. Then similar question just around PTI and DIET, both guided to grow this year, but at lower rates than previous. If you could just frame what's changed versus last quarter there, that'd be helpful, too. Thank you.

Rob Saltiel (President and CEO)

Sure. Sure. Thanks, Tommy. I think as, as everyone knows, we had a really strong first quarter, pretty much across the board. Typically what we see, and we saw this certainly last year, that when we go from the end of the first quarter to the end of the second quarter, we build backlog in that Gas Utility space. What happens is, that really translates into really a strong third quarter and kind of early fourth quarter, which is really a peak of the, the construction season for the Gas Utility space. This year was different. We came out of a strong first quarter expecting this backlog to build, and in fact, the backlog basically was, was reasonably flat, in fact, declined just a little bit.

As we looked at those numbers, it was pretty clear to us that the Gas Utilities spend for the second half of the year wasn't going to be what we had forecasted at the beginning of the year. Our team, obviously, we had given our market share and our coverage of all, if not most, of the major utilities here in the U.S.

We maintained a steady dialogue with our customers. Our customers were basically telling us that they were pulling back on some of the spending on our products because they had inventory in their systems, either their own inventory or some of the fabricators that they work with, that given the supply chains orderly operation now versus what we had as we were coming out of the pandemic, that with lead time shorter, there was no need for the higher levels of inventory that were being held. The customers are going to be working off this inventory. We think it's a one to two quarter kind of thing, that temporal thing that we'll work through for the remainder of this year.

It really doesn't impact what we see as the major fundamentals of the business. Our utilities continue to have strong CapEx budgets over the multi-year cycle. In fact, we've had major customers raise their CapEx recently. We continue to increase our market share, as I mentioned in the prepared comments, picking up a couple of new utilities, picking up some new products with existing utilities. I know it's a, it's a stark contrast to the 20%+ growth we had in 2021 and 2022. It's not what we had forecast come into 2023, but really, this Gas Utilities issue manifested itself really clearly just in this past quarter. Commenting on your other question about PTI and DIET. Look, both of these businesses are on really, really solid footing.

Our PTI business has benefited significantly from our focus on the Permian Basin, and the major players there, the IOCs and the large independents. These are the ones that continue to drill and produce oil and gas through some vagaries in the price of oil. We're really well positioned with those customers. They all have multi-year investment programs, and we've increased our market share significantly in our business as a whole in the Permian Basin. That's a big driver. Keep in mind, the kind of double-digit growth we're projecting for PTI, that's even coming as we're seeing our California business suffer from some of the regulatory challenges that are being faced out there. The PTI business is in really good position.

It's also benefiting from some overseas investments in the North Sea, in particular. Then on the Downstream Industrial and Energy Transition, or DIET space, as Kelly said, you know, we're seeing high single-digit growth in that business for this year. That's aided a lot by a turnaround in project activity. Keep in mind, that that's can be lumpy, right? We had a really good first quarter. Second quarter was light, as especially the refineries were running for maximum gasoline production, and jet fuel during the travel season. We're seeing a really strong third and fourth quarter pickup in orders for the fourth quarter and first quarter turnaround season, and that's why we're bullish on DIET, you know, between now and the end of the year. Hopefully, that gives you a sense.

Kelly, you wanna add to that?

Kelly Youngblood (EVP and CFO)

Yeah, Tommy, I was just gonna add a little more color. We said some of this in the script. You know, we talked about robust or very strong growth for DIET in the third quarter. Just to maybe give you a little more color around that, when we say robust, that's like a 20% or more type growth that we think we're gonna get here in the third quarter. As Rob said, Q4 should be, you know, very solid as well. Maybe not that, you know, that kind of growth, but still a very solid fourth quarter. On the guidance, you know, I think coming into the year, when we did, you know, our initial call, giving guidance coming into the year, we said, DIET, double digit growth... I'm sorry, high single-digit level growth.

Last quarter, we said low double-digit growth. Let me tell you, even though we're saying now high single, we're, we're really pushing up on that kind of 9%-10% range for the full-year. As Rob said, it really just depend on the timing and the lumpiness of some of that work. It's either gonna be high single or that, you know, you know, very close to that double or a low double-digit number as we complete the year.

Tommy Moll (Managing Director)

Thank you both. That's helpful. I wanted to follow up with a, a capital structure question. I believe it was Kelly who mentioned that given the cash flow generation you expect, plus your capacity on the ABL, that potentially you could retire the, the term loan without the need to refinance. What's the preferred outcome here? What is the preferred path forward, no pun intended here, with the preferred shareholder? Is there a scenario where some, some or all of that ends up being converted into common? Is there something else? Certainly, we appreciate the art of the possible to address the term loan, but what do you hope to achieve?

Rob Saltiel (President and CEO)

Well, it's a great question, Tommy. I, I think what we would hope to achieve would be an amicable settlement of what I described and will continue to describe as a business disagreement with our preferred shareholder. Look, we feel really good about our, our balance sheet and our, our potential for the ABL to be used in the event that we don't refinance the term loan. As Kelly said, we have $630 million of current liquidity. A year from now, that number could easily be over $700 million. Keep in mind that the term loan comes due in September of 2024. The amount on that is under $300 million.

about, a $350 million-$400 million potential cushion a year from now that the ABL would provide. Again, that's not typically what ABLs are for. We take that point. But we've got to be really focused here on making sure we make the right call for our shareholders. First of all, our shareholders don't want a lot of dilution, and secondly, our shareholders don't want us to see us over-lever this company. We've spent a lot of time over the past few years getting our leverage position where it is today, and we think that gives us financial flexibility and certainly gives us a lot more comfort as business as you go through a business cycle that we're not getting over our skis.

Again, we would hope to resolve this in an amicable way over the next few quarters. I think, the shareholder base will just have to stay tuned and trust that this management team isn't gonna do anything that impairs this company's long-term prospects.

Tommy Moll (Managing Director)

I appreciate the answers, and I'll turn it back.

Rob Saltiel (President and CEO)

Thanks, Tommy.

Operator (participant)

Next question, Nathan Jones with Stifel. Please go ahead.

Nathan Jones (Head of Industrials Research)

Good morning, everyone.

Rob Saltiel (President and CEO)

Morning.

Kelly Youngblood (EVP and CFO)

Morning.

Nathan Jones (Head of Industrials Research)

Just wanted to start off, maybe I missed it in the prepared comments on the cash flow from operations guidance, down from $120+ million-$90 million. Typically, in lower revenue, scenarios where you're bringing down your own inventories, you would typically see that move up rather than down. Just any color on the shortfall there on CFO for the year?

Rob Saltiel (President and CEO)

Yeah, I'll, I'll offer comments here and let Kelly jump in. You know, the biggest part of that is just the decline in the top line at 20% adjusted gross margin. We're gonna lose about $20 million, you know, that would have flowed through just on that basis. The other part of it is, given the slower growth in the Gas Utility space than we would have forecasted, some of our inventory projections for reduction, are not gonna be met. We're gonna be running with a little more inventory than we had anticipated, and that's probably about a third of the difference. Yep.

Kelly Youngblood (EVP and CFO)

Yeah, not a lot to add. Not a lot to add. I mean, if this was a more, you know, kind of longer-term decline in the business, we would certainly be pulling back hard on inventory and generating more cash. As Rob said, this is a temporary blip in our mind, just kind of a speed bump. No reason to do that.

Nathan Jones (Head of Industrials Research)

Got it. Then I just wanted to follow-up on the, the destocking in the Gas Utility business, and if there's any destocking in any other parts of the business. This is not an uncommon theme, right? I mean, we've seen across a lot of businesses, customers and, you know, distributors and manufacturers stocking up on inventory, ordering a lot in 2022, 'cause supply chains were extremely unreliable, and, and, you know, now that lead times have gone back to normal, people are getting it out of the system. I just wanted to, to get your degree of confidence, given how rapidly the outlook has changed for the Gas Utility business, your degree of confidence that the Gas Utility inventories are going to be right-sized by the end of the year, and we can return to a more normal outlook.

Then what the kind of right base level of Gas Utility revenue to grow that, you know, 5%-7%+ share gain from going forward is?

Rob Saltiel (President and CEO)

Yeah, well, I think, I think we all understand that Gas Utilities, by their nature, are conservative, in the sense that they, they serve a public service, and they've got to make sure that they've got their equipment when they need it for these projects. Obviously, you know, being conservative with the concerns that we had a year or so ago around supply chains, there was a natural tendency to, to overorder. I think that we're just, we're just seeing that in, in this space even more than our other two sectors. In fact, we really don't anticipate that the DIET sector, or PTI really has the same inventory issues that we're, that we're seeing in the Gas Utility space.

I think going forward, your question about, you know, what's our confidence level that the destocking is one or two quarters? Basically, that's what we're hearing from our customers today, that this is not a long-term, a long-term trend, that this is a temporal thing that will, will work itself off. Again, the fact that the budgets themselves are still intact is really supportive. If the Gas Utilities were cutting budgets and saying, Hey, we're not gonna spend money in this environment," I'd be much more concerned. You know, what we're being told and what we believe is, you know, as we say, is a couple of quarters of taking a pause.

Going forward, you know, we, we really think that this business grows in that, you know, 6%-10% range, going forward with the kind of CapEx growth that's being anticipated, coupled with the gains in our market share and product reach. That's typically what we've been averaging over the last decade, and there's no reason to believe we won't get back to those levels in 2024.

Nathan Jones (Head of Industrials Research)

Should we use 2023 as the base level? I mean, in 2023, you're seeing some inventory destocking by utilities, which would imply, you know, the run rate level of installations and work that they're doing is a little bit higher than that. I mean, is 23 the right base to, to grow that 6%-10% off, or is the right base really a little bit higher than where it is in 23?

Rob Saltiel (President and CEO)

Well, I'm not sure we can be any more precise than what we've been. You know, we, we do think that this, this is it's clearly an anomalous year for our Gas Utility space. Again, coming off two really monster years, right? I mean, the business grew almost 50% over the last two years, if you look at the 21% and 25% compound rate. It's natural that it was gonna take a pause. We had forecasted single-digit growth. Obviously, we're forecasting flattish growth. You know, I think the important thing is that we're gonna get on a more normal cadence in 2024, and that we'll look back at 2023 and say it was an anomaly.

Nathan Jones (Head of Industrials Research)

Great. Thanks very much for taking my questions.

Rob Saltiel (President and CEO)

You're welcome.

Kelly Youngblood (EVP and CFO)

Next question, Ken Newman with KeyBanc Capital Markets. Please go ahead.

Ken Newman (VP and Equity Research Analyst)

Hey, good morning, guys.

Rob Saltiel (President and CEO)

Hey, morning, Ken.

Ken Newman (VP and Equity Research Analyst)

Morning. Rob, you know, with, with the shift back on the revenue growth this year, you know, I know you, you maintain the gross margin guidance at current levels. Just curious, you know, can you walk us through that? What's, what's the biggest contributor to gross margins in the back half, whether that's price, cost, or mix?

Rob Saltiel (President and CEO)

Well, it's, it's a bit of both, as it always is. I think our team has done an excellent job of implementing price updates to reflect the cost inflation that we've seen over, call it the last, you know, year, year or 2. Of course, we've said before that there's always a lag between, you know, when the price, prices go up, and then we get those into our contracts with our key customers. I think our team's done a great job of that, and so that's certainly supportive of, of healthy adjusted gross margins. I, I think we should talk about the mix as well, both geographic and product. First of all, geographically, we talked about our international business being on a higher growth trajectory, really, than the other 2 segments.

Our International business is heavily valve-based, and that tends to be accretive to our margins. When we look at the second half of the year, we're expecting significant growth in our VAMI business, which is our valve actuation measurement instrumentation business. We're expecting double-digit growth in that, and we're actually looking at declines in our Line Pipe business of almost a similar nature. The line pipe business has gotten very competitive. The margins have been compressed. As you, as you've seen, less demand for OCTG products. A lot of that pipe is now finding its way into industrial applications, and folks are competing for that business, you know, more vigorously.

We're gonna see less line pipe sales, lower line pipe sales in the second half, primarily than we had in the first half. We think that that's gonna be, you know, that's obviously supportive of adjusted gross margins being high because that tends to be dilutive. Increase in VAMI, decrease in line pipe, increase in international, and then the price updates. Those are all supportive of adjusted gross margins at the 21% or better level.

Ken Newman (VP and Equity Research Analyst)

Is there a risk that as the supply chain continues to improve, that there is an increased level of price pressure into the back half? Do you think that's adequately reflected in the updated guide?

Rob Saltiel (President and CEO)

We're not expecting that. We think it's reflected in the guidance.

Ken Newman (VP and Equity Research Analyst)

Okay. Then, you know, obviously, we've talked a little bit about customer inventories within the Gas Utility sector a decent bit here. I'm curious if you could just talk about what customer inventories or, you know, what your view of customer inventories outside of that business, whether it's in the traditional oil and gas markets or the DIET sector, what they look like and what your confidence level that there's not gonna be a similar response going into the third and fourth quarters.

Rob Saltiel (President and CEO)

Well, when we look at our PTI space, you know, the activity is increasing pretty, pretty strongly, and so is the backlog. We're, we're really not expecting to see any of that there. Of course, the DIET space covers a lot of different things. It's refining chemicals, and of course, the energy transition, LNG is in there as well. We, we really don't see, in any of those areas, opportunities for what we would call an extraordinary build of inventory that we've got to work off. I just wanna continue to remind that the Gas Utility space is really conservative.

You know, these folks were very concerned about their ability to have supplies for products for their key projects, and frankly, they probably got a bit over their skis, and they overordered, and now they're working their way through that inventory. It's fully logical. You, you certainly wanna have too much inventory rather than too little inventory when you're in a public service business. We're gonna work our way through that, as we say, over the next couple of quarters. We don't think any of our other businesses are gonna be impacted by this, and as I say, it's a speed bump in the road on our way to a good 2024.

Kelly Youngblood (EVP and CFO)

Ken, just to.

Rob Saltiel (President and CEO)

Yeah.

Kelly Youngblood (EVP and CFO)

put some data behind. Ken, just to put some data behind that, if you look at our backlog year to date, PTI is up 9% and DIET's up 11%. The only decline we've really had is in the Gas Utility space, which we're talking about. We're not seeing any of this in the other two sectors.

Rob Saltiel (President and CEO)

If you really think about it, you know, we're, we're much more in much more competitive markets, frankly, in PTI and DIET. Those businesses are doing extremely well. We, we have a, a very, very solid franchise in Gas Utilities. This is, this is a pause for us, obviously, that we didn't see coming. As a practical matter, this business is on very solid foundations. We will, we will continue to see the benefits of spending from our customers and return to a more normal cadence as we, as we round the corner into 2024.

Ken Newman (VP and Equity Research Analyst)

Right. If I could just squeeze one more in. Kelly-

Rob Saltiel (President and CEO)

Sure.

Ken Newman (VP and Equity Research Analyst)

Sorry if I missed this. Did you give any color on what you expect for the LIFO expense for the full year, this year?

Kelly Youngblood (EVP and CFO)

Yeah, you know, with, with the inflation stabilizing, Ken, I think, you know, for the full year, it's not gonna be a material number. We're, we're modeling it just kind of, you know, zero at this point. You know, Q1 and Q2, you know, were very small numbers. For the full year, you know, very minimal impact to the overall GAAP financial statements.

Ken Newman (VP and Equity Research Analyst)

Very helpful. Thanks.

Kelly Youngblood (EVP and CFO)

You bet.

Operator (participant)

Next question.

Rob Saltiel (President and CEO)

Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Doug, Doug Becker with Capital One, please go ahead.

Doug Becker (Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst)

Thank you. You're projecting some sequential, robust sequential growth in the third quarter. Could you provide a little more color on how the July things looked?

Rob Saltiel (President and CEO)

Yeah, you know, July is, is typically not that representative of the of the third quarter. You know, it tends to be fewer billing days and, and the holiday season, with the Fourth of July starting on Tuesday. Look, I would say that that the quarter really gets down to August and September for us, and we're seeing August stronger than than July, as you would expect, coming into here. I, I don't want to make any predictions at this point, Doug. We're seeing kind of normal seasonal patterns, and, and our guidance is consistent with that.

Doug Becker (Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst)

Okay. Well, that's encouraging. The full year guidance seems to imply that the 4Q seasonal revenue decline will be toward the mild side, say, closer to 5% decline than, say, 10%. Is that a reasonable assumption right now based on what you're seeing?

Kelly Youngblood (EVP and CFO)

It, it, it is, Doug. Yeah, I think, you know, we've seen the last couple of years be pretty mild, and we've kind of built that into our modeling right now. You're exactly right. It'll be, you know, closer to that 5% level than that higher end level.

Doug Becker (Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst)

Okay, thank you.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. There are no further questions, I would like to turn the floor over to Monica for closing remarks.

Monica Broughton (VP of Investor Relations and Treasury)

Thank you for joining us today, for your interest in MRC Global. We look forward to having you join us on our third quarter conference call in November. Have a great day.

Operator (participant)

This teleconference, you may disconnect your lines at this time, and thank you for your participation.