O-I Glass - Earnings Call - Q2 2025

Executive Summary

• Adjusted EPS of $0.53 beat S&P Global consensus of $0.41; GAAP diluted EPS was $(0.03) due to $108M restructuring and impairment charges tied to halting MAGMA. Strong “Fit to Win” cost actions offset softer demand, with Americas strength and Europe weakness.*
• Revenue of $1.706B was essentially in line vs consensus $1.708B; segment operating profit was $225M, down modestly YoY, with Americas up and Europe down.*
• Guidance raised: FY25 adjusted EPS to $1.30–$1.55 (from $1.20–$1.50); free cash flow maintained at $150–$200M. Company expects volumes to be in line with prior year and tax rate ~33–36%.
• Strategic pivot: O-I halted further MAGMA development and will reconfigure Bowling Green to a “Best at Both” premium-focused operation; announced additional Americas capacity actions and expects ~$45M closure charges in Q3.

What Went Well and What Went Wrong

What Went Well

• Fit to Win momentum: $84M savings in Q2 (YTD $145M), on track for ≥$250M in 2025; inventory down ~$160M YoY, driving improved cash and competitiveness. “We are relentless on waste and inefficiency...”
• Americas operating improvement: Segment OP rose to $135M (+27% YoY) on cost reductions and ~4% volume growth; net price stable amid tight capacity.
• Raised FY25 adjusted EPS guidance to $1.30–$1.55 and reaffirmed free cash flow $150–$200M, despite $140–$150M cash restructuring.

What Went Wrong

• Europe softness: Segment OP fell to $90M (from $127M) on ~9% volume decline, unfavorable net price, and temporary curtailments; July shipments down mid-single digits.
• Reported EPS negative due to $108M restructuring/impairment (MAGMA discontinuation), reducing EBT to $7M vs $104M prior year.
• Ongoing curtailments likely to persist into Q4 while European restructuring timelines extend, elevating tax rate sensitivity when earnings are seasonally lower.

Transcript

Operator (participant)

Hello everyone, and thank you for joining the O-I Glass Second Quarter 2025 Earnings Conference Call. My name is Lucy, and I'll be coordinating your call today. During the presentation, you can register a question by pressing Star followed by one on your telephone keypad. If you change your mind, please press star followed by two. We kindly ask all participants to limit their questions to one main and one follow-up and requeue for any further questions. It is now my pleasure to hand over to your host, Chris Manuel, Vice President of Investor Relations, to begin. Please go ahead.

Chris Manuel (VP of Investor Relations)

Thank you, Lucy, and welcome everyone to the O-I Glass Second Quarter 2025 Earnings Conference Call. Our discussion today will be led by Gordon Hardie, our CEO, and John Haudrich, our CFO. Following prepared remarks, we will host a Q&A session. Presentation materials for this earnings call are available on the company's website. Please review the safe harbor comments and disclosure of our use of non-GAAP financial measures included in those materials. Now I'd like to turn the call over to Gordon, who will start in slide three.

Gordon Hardie (CEO)

Good morning, everyone, and thank you for

your interest in O-I Glass. Today we will walk you through our

second quarter performance, key market dynamics, and

our outlook for the remainder of the year.

Let me begin by expressing my thanks to all our colleagues across O-I.

Your dedication, agility, and focus are instrumental in driving the transformation we are undertaking.

Last night we reported second quarter adjusted earnings of $0.53 per share, exceeding our plans and outperforming the same period last year. This result reflects the meaningful progress we

are making towards a leaner and more competitive company.

We continue to navigate a complex environment, including softer consumer demand in certain markets and many macro uncertainties. While overall second quarter shipments declined approximately 3%, performance varied by region as volumes increased in the Americas with decline in Europe. On a year-to-date basis, shipments were up nearly 1%, and we continue to expect full year 2025 volumes will be stable with last year. Our Fit to Win program is delivering strong results. We achieved $84 million in savings this quarter, bringing our first half total to $145 million, well on track to meet or exceed our $250 million target for 2025. Fit to Win is foundational to renewed competitiveness by significantly reducing total enterprise costs to improve performance and enable future growth. We've had a strong start to the year in difficult market conditions and are effectively managing the factors within our control.

As a result, we are raising our full year guidance and now expect adjusted earnings to increase between 60% and 90% compared to 2024. John will provide more detail on our outlook and quarterly performance shortly. As announced last evening, following a comprehensive review, we have made the financially prudent decision to halt further MAGMA development and operations. While the earlier stages developed meaningful technical advancements, we have concluded the platform does not have the pathway to the operational or financial return requirements as most recently detailed at our March Investor Day. Through our "Best at Both" operations strategy as outlined at our I Day, we expect to drive significantly higher premium output at lower operating cost and capital intensity than MAGMA would have realized in the coming years. This decision aligns on our focus on driving competitiveness and economic profit.

Accordingly, we intend to reconfigure our Bowling Green facility into a best cost premium focused operation. We are confident this is the right path forward for our business, our customers, and our shareholders. Let's now turn to page four to review recent market trends. Overall, our shipments for the first half of 2025 were up nearly 1% compared to the prior year. Volumes increased mid-single-digits in the first quarter but declined approximately 3% in the second quarter. Lower glass shipments are consistent with softer consumer offtake, which is down low-to mid single digits in mainly European markets. Amid ongoing macroeconomic uncertainty, unseasonal weather this spring and summer across the Northern Hemisphere further impacted consumption patterns. Finally, we have started to exit some business with unfavorable economic profit consistent with our disciplined approach.

Despite recent softness, we have also had some notable wins as we leverage Fit to Win to drive future profitable growth. Likewise, we have seen a 35% increase in our new product development pipeline as brand owners look to spur growth. As previously noted, we are navigating mixed market conditions. Second quarter shipments increased in the Americas but softened in Europe. In the Americas, shipments were up approximately 4% in both the second quarter and year-to-date, driven by solid rebound in beer and spirits categories. Notably, both Andean and North American regions outperformed the segment average, with all geographies reporting positive growth despite continued soft consumption patterns, especially in the U.S. As we embed Fit to Win, we see our competitiveness improving in key markets, especially in North America.

In Europe, volumes were down 3% year-to-date and down nearly 9% in the second quarter, which we attribute to the following factors. About 3 percentage points were due to a supplier-related delay at a major plant reconfiguration project in Europe, which is now ramping up. We estimate another 3% of the decline was timing-related as increased beer and wine sales in the first quarter, likely in response to trade policy uncertainty, negatively impacted Q2 shipments. Finally, the balance of the decline pertained to macroeconomic uncertainty and unfavorable weather conditions, which is in line or favorable to broader consumption trends. Despite these challenges, there were bright spots as non-alcoholic beverages and food categories posted low-single-digit growth. To align supply with demand and manage inventory levels, temporary production curtailments remain in place across Europe with a continuing drag on our operating costs there.

We remain engaged in consultations with European and local works councils on long-term network optimization initiatives aimed at addressing excess capacity in the fleet. These actions, when finalized, are expected to strengthen our competitive position and support sustainable, profitable growth in Europe. In July, our global shipments were down mid-single-digits compared to July of last year, reflecting continued soft conditions, plus the rephasing of some specific customer order activity and the delayed ramp-up of a reconfiguration project at a European plant. We continue to expect full year 2025 volumes to be in line with the prior year, as shipment levels are projected to be stable across both the Americas and Europe. This outlook holds despite some intra-quarter fluctuations, which are primarily driven by comparisons to prior year performance.

Let's now turn to page five and review the progress of our Fit to Win program, which is focused on significantly reducing total enterprise costs while optimizing our network and value chain to drive competitiveness and growth. In the second quarter, we delivered $84 million in savings, bringing our first half total to $145 million, surpassing our initial plans. With momentum building, we remain confident in achieving our 2025 savings target of at least $250 million and at least $650 million cumulatively by 2027. Phase A centers on reshaping our SG&A structure and initial network optimization actions, and we remain on track to meet both our one-year and three-year goals. We have completed actions to secure our $100 million SG&A savings target for 2025, with more opportunity underway to drive additional savings next year.

Importantly, our network optimization efforts continue to progress, including the recently announced actions in the Americas. We continue to expect initial network optimization activities will be completed by mid-2026. Phase B focuses on transforming costs across the value chain, including the rollout of our Total Organization Effectiveness program to optimize system-wide capacity. Following a successful pilot at the Tijuana plant, the first wave of 15 facilities is nearing completion of the same rigorous process. Results are meeting or exceeding our expectations. Additionally, our cost transformation team is making meaningful progress in procurement and energy reduction initiatives. These efforts are contributing significantly to our overall savings and enhancing operational resilience. We are making significant progress on the end-to-end value chain efficiencies, with a number of significant agreements made with strategic suppliers to improve productivity and competitiveness over the next three years.

In summary, momentum is building and initial Fit to Win benefits have exceeded our expectations. We are on track to meet or exceed our 2025 objectives and unlock further

upside in the years ahead.

Now I will turn it over to John who will walk you through the second quarter performance and updated 2025 outlook, beginning on page six.

John Haudrich (Senior VP and CFO)

Thanks Gordon and good morning everyone. O-I Glass reported second quarter adjusted earnings of $0.53 per share, exceeding both our expectations and prior year results. The performance was primarily driven by strong contributions from our Fit to Win program and improved competitiveness. As shown on the left, adjusted earnings surpassed last year's figures. We faced expected headwinds from lower net price, lower sales volumes, and temporary production curtailments. Yet these factors were more than offset by substantial Fit to Win savings and favorable below-the-line items, including a moderately better-than-expected tax rate supported by favorable regional earnings mix. Looking to the right, segment operating profit increased in the Americas but declined in Europe. In the Americas, segment operating profit improved significantly, reflecting notably lower cost due to Fit to Win benefits, higher shipments, and fairly stable net price amid tight capacity utilization.

In Europe, segment operating profit declined due to lower net price and softer sales volumes. Operating costs rose slightly due to the impact of ongoing production curtailments, but these were largely offset by Fit to Win savings. We expect performance in the region to improve progressively as our downtime decreases, network optimization actions deliver a better cost position, and our cost competitiveness improves. As part of our focus on economic profit, we've made meaningful progress in reducing inventories across the enterprise, down approximately $160 million compared to the same period last year. We remain on track to meet or potentially beat our year-end 2025 target of fewer than 50 days of inventory supply. In summary, second quarter results exceeded both our plans and prior year levels, positioning us well for continued success through the rest of 2025. Now let's turn to page seven to review our business outlook.

Given our strong year-to-date performance and momentum of the Fit to Win program, we have raised our full year 2025 guidance. We now expect adjusted earnings to range between $1.30 and $1.55 per share, representing a 60% to 90% improvement over fiscal year 2024. We also anticipate about a $300 million year-over-year improvement in free cash flow driven by stronger operating results, reduced capital expenditures, and lower inventories, despite $140 to $150 million in cash restructuring costs. Additionally, we've refined our expectations for the quarterly cadence of earnings throughout the year. As you can see, we expect the third quarter will be generally consistent with trends noted in the first half of the year. The fourth quarter will be softer due to the typical seasonality of our business and the tax impact of lower earnings levels.

Please note that our outlook may not fully account for potential volatility stemming from evolving global trade policies and other external factors. For more details, please refer to the Appendix, which outlines the assumptions behind our updated guidance. Despite a soft macro environment, we are executing well and our self-help efforts are exceeding original expectations. As such, we are increasing our full year earnings guidance. Now I'll turn it back to Gordon to conclude on page eight.

Gordon Hardie (CEO)

Thanks John. In closing, O-I is executing well and delivered a strong first half of 2025 despite mixed market conditions and sluggish demand. We remain sharply focused on what we can control and are making excellent progress on all self-help fronts. We expect a meaningful rebound in performance, adjusted earnings, and cash flow this year and have increased our full year guidance accordingly. Executing Fit to Win and our long-term value creation roadmap, as illustrated on the right and discussed in detail during our March Investor Day, positions us well for the future. Importantly, these initiatives are largely within our control as we continue to execute our strategy. We are confident in our ability to meet our goals, including radically reducing the cost base, building a more premium business portfolio, and driving economic profit. This should deliver strong financial results, including sustainably higher EBITDA, and create long-term

value for our shareholders.

Thank you for your attention.

We look forward to your questions.

Operator (participant)

To ask a question, please press star followed by one on your telephone keypad. If you change your mind, please press star followed by two. When preparing to ask your question, please ensure your device is unmuted locally. We kindly ask all participants to limit their questions to one main and one follow up question and requeue for any further questions. First comes from Ghansham Panjabi of Baird. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.

Ghansham Panjabi (Senior Research Analyst)

Hey guys, good morning. Congrats on all the cost out progress.

I guess, you know, first off, in terms of

your volume assumptions for 2025, how does that break out by segment? I'm just curious as to your confidence as it relates to being able to hit flat volumes, and just given the uncertainty at this point.

John Haudrich (Senior VP and CFO)

I could.

kick off on that one, Ghansham.

Overall, if we take a look at our segments as we indicated, we believe both Europe and the Americas will be generally stable year-over-year. In the first half of the year, you saw a stronger Americas and a little bit softer Europe. We expect that to maybe kind of invert in the back half of the year, but it's only due to comps. Overall, what we're seeing over the course of the year is a generally stable environment with maybe the exceptions of some disruption due to the capital project that Gordon talked about, as well as maybe some fluctuation we saw between the first and second quarter associated with tariff concerns or uncertainties and trying to buy ahead. Other than that, if you take out the noise of kind of prior year comps and things like that, you're looking at a pretty stable environment.

Ghansham Panjabi (Senior Research Analyst)

Okay, got it.

My second question, as it relates to the Bowling Green plant, what exactly is that going to be pivoted towards?

What is the timeline associated with that, and what is the cash cost? Just rough cash cost as it relates to making that transition at that point.

Gordon Hardie (CEO)

Yeah, so.

That facility is focused, really,

on premium opportunities in spirits in the U.S., we still see a big opportunity in that category in those segments of the market. MAGMA was conceived to deliver against premium. When we look at our "Best at Both" strategy and we look at the cost we feel we would need to be to really grow significantly our premium volume and the capital intensity we required to deliver the target economic profit.

That was the right call for us.

We see a path to being able to reconfigure that plant to get lower operational cost, lower capital intensity, and to really grow the premium business in the U.S. We're working on that reconfiguration as we speak. At the next earnings call we'll give a further update on that. That's our focus for that facility right now

John Haudrich (Senior VP and CFO)

On the cost side, Ghansham,

the facility does have invested capital around the superstructure, around legacy assets and things like that, which obviously can be utilized in this. I think it's a little early to be able to give any specifics there.

Gordon Hardie (CEO)

Yeah, as we've laid out in the past, every project we undertake will have to be able to deliver a WACC + 2% minimum return for us going forward.

John Haudrich (Senior VP and CFO)

One final point, I want to reiterate that the outlook that we provided during I Day about the outlook for the business as well as the capital investment in the business still holds. We're going to fit this in within that. We're not going to change at this point in time our CapEx outlook for the business.

Ghansham Panjabi (Senior Research Analyst)

Okay, perfect. Thanks so much.

Operator (participant)

The next question comes from Arun Viswanathan of RBC. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.

Arun Viswanathan (Senior Equity Analyst)

Great for taking my question. Just wanted to ask about the Fit to Win benefits. You were able to accelerate those from $61 million-$84 million in Q2. Looks like you are guiding to $250 million+ now and then $650 million+ in long-term. Maybe you can just frame the upside opportunity there. Are you guys finding more as you peel back the layers a little bit more? Would those be mainly in SG&A? Related to this point, the corporate costs were also a little bit lower this quarter at, I think, $25 million. Is that the new level of corporate that we should kind of consider or was there something unusual in there? Is that really reflective of those lower SG&A costs?

Thanks.

Gordon Hardie (CEO)

Yeah, I'll take the first part of that question, Arun. As we've laid out over the last year or so, Fit to Win is designed to review the cost base of the business across the entire value chain, from the back end of our suppliers right through to our customers' warehouse. We've been systematically working through the value chain and peeling back where all the costs are, where the waste is, where the inefficiencies are, what's driving that. At every part of the chain, as we suspected and as our thesis held, there's opportunities to get more efficient and to strip out waste. That means us working differently with suppliers and with customers, and likewise they're changing some of the ways we work.

We're making tremendous progress on that and have already signed a number of agreements with suppliers that drive much greater productivity and competitiveness for us within our own footprint. We shared the results of Tijuana on previous calls and made great progress there. We are now in the first wave of 15 plants being rolled out. That's about 60%-65% through that program for those plants, and we're on or exceeding the targets we had set. Very happy with how that is going.

As we sit with customers and

we look for ways to improve order, forecast accuracy, logistics, warehousing, working through all of that and finding opportunities. As we set out at the beginning, this is an end-to-end review of the cost base of the business, stripping out the waste and inefficiencies and then reinvesting some of that back into the business or using that to be more competitive in the market, which we're already seeing signs of, particularly

in the Americas.

John Haudrich (Senior VP and CFO)

To build on that, and to answer your other corporate question, Arun, if you look at page five, the outperformance that we're seeing really is in the Phase B area. To Gordon's point, we're already above our full year target for that area. Just building off of that and taking out those productivity and efficiency opportunities and actually jumping ahead of the actual full rollout of the TOE project is driving the upside opportunities that we're seeing across the business. At the corporate levels, we would expect to be a reasonable range of $100 to $120 million a year is a logical place for the corporate cost.

Arun Viswanathan (Senior Equity Analyst)

Great, thanks.

If I could just ask a quick follow-up. As you look out into, I guess, the second half into next year, you're already at $145 million for the first half. Should we also assume that Fit to Win benefits should continue to grow, or is the second half kind of, have you already gotten more than 50% of the year's benefits, or do you still see continued sequential growth in those benefits?

John Haudrich (Senior VP and CFO)

I think we'll see sequential growth. Keep in mind, in the fourth quarter, we will start to lap the early phases of the activities. As you can see on the chart on Page five, we had $25 million of benefits already in the fourth quarter. While the core activity continues to drive momentum, there'll be a little bit of a comp element to the fourth quarter.

Gordon Hardie (CEO)

Yeah, I would say culturally as well, Arun. You know, we are relentless on waste and inefficiency coming out of the business. Even if we hit a number, there's no satisfaction in that. We drive on as long as there's waste and efficiency, you know, to be had, we're going after it.

Arun Viswanathan (Senior Equity Analyst)

Great, thanks a lot.

Operator (participant)

The next question comes from Mike Roxland of Truist Securities. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.

Mike Roxland (Managing Director)

Yeah, thank you, Gordon, John, Chris, for taking my questions.

Congratulations on all the progress.

Gordon Hardie (CEO)

Thank you, Mike.

Mike Roxland (Managing Director)

Gordon, you mentioned that in your comments that shipments were weaker in July and you cited rephasing of order activity and delayed ramp-up at a reconfigured plant. Do you have any sense where your order books look like for August?

Gordon Hardie (CEO)

Yeah, look, we have line-of-sight. I think the Americas are looking pretty strong and we're seeing some comeback in places like Northern Europe and in the U.K., and as John mentioned, we see Europe probably stabilizing in the second half of the year. There is still significant consumer weakness in all of the regions, probably except for Latin America. Whether it's wine or beer in Europe, spirits in Europe, still down compared to long-run averages in last year. Spirits and, say, wines driven by the macroeconomic kind of trade issues.

You know, 85% of all Scotch produced is exported, 65% of all French red wine is exported. The two major markets of the U.S. and China are still not back to where they were historically. In the U.S., we see beer still sort of sluggish, even imported beer.

So.

There are then pockets of growth in terms of non-alcoholic beverages, particularly waters. Food is, on the back of trends like anti-micro plastics, performing very well in most markets. Latin America is performing very well for us, particularly food, non-alcoholic beverages, spirits coming back strongly in Mexico, beer quite resilient, and going back to kind of first principles that we laid out last July. We, over the next two years, predicated kind of flat volumes. As we deliver savings, we will share some of that with our strategic customers and ultimately drive the value over the next two years by getting a much better return on the volume we have and getting fitter. That then puts us in a very strong position as the turn comes and consumers come back to these categories. Our story over the next two years is not a volume story per se.

We predicate sort of flat

volumes, getting much, much more efficient

and getting much higher returns on the volumes we have. I think for us, our thesis is that value will be increased through getting better returns rather than chasing volume at lower margins and lower prices in markets where demand is sluggish.

Mike Roxland (Managing Director)

That's very helpful.

I appreciate all the color.

Just one quick follow up. You mentioned the progress on TOE, if I heard you correctly, you said the

first wave of 15 facilities has been

meeting or exceeding your expectations, and you're about 50%-55% through those plants.

Is there any more color you can provide around the progress?

Maybe some of the cost savings or

the returns that you've generated thus far at those 15 facilities?

Gordon Hardie (CEO)

Yeah, you know, again, we go into those plants and we understand, obviously, the cost base and what's driving the cost, where the waste is, and where your kind of top five issues or losses are, and then working systematically through that. Everything we've seen in our pilot in Tijuana and indeed the initial study we did way back in June 2024 are coming to fruition. We have some tremendous talent in our plants, but with a fresh set of eyes and some new thinking from other industries that I've worked in, we're seeing opportunities to drive very significant productivity improvements and run these plants in a much more effective, efficient manner. I'm very happy with the alacrity with which our teams have taken on these new ways of working and going after the waste

and

you know, across the fleet. Very happy with that. Mike.

Mike Roxland (Managing Director)

Got it.

Thank you and good luck in 2H.

Gordon Hardie (CEO)

All right, thank you.

Operator (participant)

The next question comes from George Staphos of Bank of America. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.

George Staphos (Managing Director)

Thanks so much. Hi everyone. Good morning. Thanks for the details.

I wanted.

How are you, Gordon? Congratulations on the progress so far. I wanted to come back to MAGMA, not to necessarily do a post-mortem on it and the whys and wherefores, but really to understand how glass sits in customers' mix. When MAGMA was talked about a few years ago, the notion was you'd be able to drop in smaller facilities, you'd be able to be more nimble, you'd be able to then get into customers' new product launches more quickly. At least that was part of the story, as I recall. Correct me if I'm wrong on any of that. For whatever reason, MAGMA is no longer being utilized. Is it that the process itself didn't really live up to your expectations?

Is it that customers don't really look to glass for that sort of new-product, quick-on-the run type of product anymore, or type of package? Or TOE and all that you're doing in the organization now gives you that agility that you thought you were going to get from MAGMA, but you don't need to spend the capital there. How would you have us think about that? What's happened here and why

you don't need MAGMA anymore?

Gordon Hardie (CEO)

Great, thanks. Thanks, George. Let me start with the customer piece. You know, consumers love glass, right? All things being equal, they'll choose glass. I've been out, I've met about 70 of our customers over the last year and I would say,

without exception, all of them want to

put more glass into their portfolios for sustainability, you know, to help drive that premiumization trend that's still there, as strong as ever. Glass is absolutely fundamental to, you know, to the portfolios of all our major customers. In fact, our NPD pipeline this year is up about 35%, which is a massive increase. As you know, our customers look to spur growth. No question around glass in the portfolios, in my mind, with customers, and I've heard that firsthand so many times.

With regard to MAGMA,

yes, the idea was, you know, you could do maybe smaller batches of premium, but when I look at it, you know, there's two aspects. Did the technology work? Yes, the technology works, but, you know, can it deliver the returns we require? If we were looking at rolling out 10 or 12 or 15 of them.

What is the next best alternative?

As CEO, I feel two important aspects of my role are to face reality and to make good decisions around that. Secondly, it is to really allocate our precious capital as effectively as possible. When I look at, and you're right, and I look at the flexibility, I think the techniques can bring greater volumes at lower costs and lower capital intensity. For me, it was a clear decision. There is a better way for us to deliver on what customers are looking for, which is continued premiumization. They want premium products at affordable cost, right. We don't have small ambitions around premium. We have very big ambitions around premium. I need higher volumes of premium than a MAGMA furnace could deliver.

I think the way to do that is the path we have forward, which is the "Best at Both" model, which, by the way, we have a business in our portfolio that does exactly that and is making great returns, great margins, and is highly, highly flexible. What we're embarking on is not new to the world. It's there. We just need to get much, much better at it. I'm confident we're putting in place the operation and capabilities to do so. It is the correct decision for us, it's the correct decision for our customers, and it's the correct decision for our shareholders.

George Staphos (Managing Director)

Thanks, Gordon, for my second question, if possible. You talked about your current run rates and that things, you know,

get a little bit better in August.

Is there a way to parse the down mid-single-digits across the regions? As we shift into the fourth quarter, you talked a little bit about why it's maybe now a lesser piece of your earnings cadence for the year, but can you give us a bit more color there? I know fourth quarters are small. The numbers can move around a lot if we choose the midpoint versus one

end of the range or the other end of the range of the guidance.

We can come up with different conclusions. The fourth quarter seems a little bit weaker. Is any of it related to the volumes that we're seeing right now? Thank you guys and good luck in the quarter.

John Haudrich (Senior VP and CFO)

Yeah, George, I can jump in and take the second part of that to start with.

George Staphos (Managing Director)

Hey.

John Haudrich (Senior VP and CFO)

Hey, George. How are you doing? The seasonality of our business is such that we earn about 60%-65% of our EPS in the first half of the year and the remaining 35%-40% in the back half of the year. That's consistent with the average in the last five years. You know, after exiting the ANZ business a few years ago, we are more levered to the Northern Hemisphere. As a result, with our products being used in the summertime, the seasonality of that, we do have this tendency that I just mentioned. As we take a look at the fourth quarter guidance that we have this year, in addition to the normal seasonality, we have made a provision in our outlook for potentially more temporary downtime.

It is taking us a bit longer than originally anticipated to complete the restructuring and network optimization activities over in Europe. We're following all the rules and the processes accordingly, but it's just taking longer. As a result, if this slips into next year, we will probably take more temporary downtime in the fourth quarter as we keep our system balanced until we can complete that. That is a function of that. I just want to highlight also that our ETR tax rate is very sensitive to overall levels of earnings. As the earnings are lower in the fourth quarter, especially with making the provision for the potential temporary downtime, we also end up with a disproportionately higher tax rate. It just kind of swings things around a little bit more in the fourth quarter. Hopefully that gives you the perspective you're looking for.

It has nothing to do with the trends in the business and the volume has more to do, more to do with the downtime and managing the network optimization.

George Staphos (Managing Director)

Thank you.

Gordon Hardie (CEO)

Yeah. Maybe the first part of that, George, you know, if I do a quick run-through, maybe the segments or regions Beer in North America actually performed very strongly for us. We outperformed the category as the core spirits. Very, very strong momentum there. We see, as seasonality kicks in, we see that come off for beer certainly. Brown spirits particularly are weighted a bit more to the back half of the year. We see probably continued momentum there. Wine is weak across the board. I spent some time in California in the last couple of weeks, but the industry is looking at ways to figure out how to overcome that. The lesson I heard from people there is, hey, the wine industry has overcome many setbacks over the last 50 years and there was sort of a confidence there I picked up.

No doubt wine has been weakening in Q2. NAB/waters are going really well for us in North America and we see that continuing. We probably see food kind of soft in Q2, but picking up in Q3 and Q4, particularly towards the holidays. Europe, beer particularly in Central Europe, down, wine down and spirits down, and I think that's just a common picture, as I mentioned, but food and non-alcoholic beverages, very, very strong for us. We probably see spirits coming back a bit in the second half. White wine is doing better than red wine for sure. Other than that, Andean performing very strong for Brazil, doing very well for us, up 3%, 4% in Q2 order books. Very, very strong there.

The big surprise for us was in Mexico where beer actually has stabilized, particularly in the domestic market and tequilas are rebounded, remarkably, remarkably well as the tequila industry figures out other markets besides the U.S. Southwest Europe, impacted by red wine.

particularly.

Food, you know, going strongly and non-alcoholic beverages. We also see some upside in the back half of the year in the U.K., so that's sort of a run-around the business, George. I hope that gives you a bit of color.

George Staphos (Managing Director)

That's fantastic.

John Haudrich (Senior VP and CFO)

Thank you, Gordon. I'll turn it over. Thank you, guys.

Operator (participant)

The next question comes from Anthony Pettinari of Citigroup. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.

Bryan Burgmeier (Equity Research Analyst)

Good morning, this is Bryan Burgmeier sitting in for Anthony. Thanks for taking the question. Just maybe on net price, I noticed you're expecting a little bit less of a headwind now than originally. I think you raised the range by about $25 million maybe. What kind of drove that? Do you feel like prices for the second half are maybe locked in now? Do you have kind of line-of-sight to that and just maybe generally, how do you feel about sort of European operating rates at this point?

John Haudrich (Senior VP and CFO)

Yeah, sure. Bryan, thanks for the question. When we take a look at the drivers for net prices, as we had entered in the year, we had a higher expectation of that pressure point. It's obviously moderated.

I think the net price pressure for the first half of the year is about $70 million, and we're thinking right now it might be $100 million-$125 million down from our previous expectations. There are two factors going on: inflation has moderated, probably more so than we expected. Energy prices have moderated. That is definitely one of the drivers. We have seen probably reasonably stable net pricing, gross pricing in the business. If you take a look at our business year-to-date, our sales volumes are up about 1%. The gross price is down about 1%. It's not really fluctuating that much in the grand scheme of things. We thought it might be under a little bit more pressure. It's really kind of both levers moving.

I would say, if we take a look at the back half of the year, most of the year-over-year pressure point has been incurred in the first half with a little bit still dribbling into the back half.

Bryan Burgmeier (Equity Research Analyst)

Got it, got it. Appreciate that detail. Maybe just sort of broadly from a high-level, do you think that the U.S.-E.U. trade deal coming together this week provides maybe a level of clarity for customers that you and they have been looking for to maybe get orders going again? Or do you think maybe the industry needs time to sort of digest this and adjust to the tariffs? Anything you can share on maybe if a trade deal changes anything for you and your customers in 3Q and in the second half? Thank you. I'll turn it over.

Gordon Hardie (CEO)

Yeah. Look, any certainty is a good thing. There's been so much uncertainty and customers trying to figure out, you know, do they need to ship bottling operations to different regions and so on. No decisions in the industry that I've seen have been made around this. Anything that brings certainty is a good thing, then people can plan around that and we can work with customers accordingly. The headline number is 15% on everything coming into the U.S., but I still understand or, you know, from country that it's still not clear on where wine and spirits sit and all of that and whether that potentially is zero-for-zero or whether it's 15%. There's still not full clarity on that, I would say. The faster we get to that, the better and then we can work with customers accordingly. The more certainty, the better it is, I would say.

Operator (participant)

The next question is from Josh Spector of UBS. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.

Anojja Shah (Director of Equity Research)

Hi, good morning. It's Anojja Shah sitting in for Josh. I just wanted to go back to MAGMA quickly. Are there any cost savings associated with this decision that maybe weren't dialed in before but do need to be added now?

John Haudrich (Senior VP and CFO)

I'd say the primary savings is that we are overall reducing our D&E cost to the business. It's all part of our SG&A savings initiative. I think from an operational standpoint, obviously we're ceasing the operations and that, you know, there's a minor loss associated with this. I don't think it's a material aspect of the business for the Bowling Green element. I think the bigger element is the reduced SG&A cost that's embedded in our SG&A savings targets.

Anojja Shah (Director of Equity Research)

Thank you. Based on your comments on inventory earlier in the prepared comments, and I think your prior guidance for working capital and free cash flow was flat. It sounds like now you'd expect working capital to be a benefit to free cash flow this year. Can you just tell me what you're expecting in your guidance?

John Haudrich (Senior VP and CFO)

Yeah, that's correct. Earlier in the year we thought that, you know, working capital, probably a minor factor, and where we stand right now is something like up to $50 million working capital benefit this year, kind of zero to $50 million as we do better on the inventory. On the offset to that, we are having more restructuring costs, probably going to be the higher end. We updated that guidance range. We also increased the estimate for interest expense given where the forward curve has changed to. Overall, we think the free cash flow outlook that we had at the beginning of the year is still relatively consistent. Obviously, FX plays into this equation with a lot of moving pieces.

I also want to reiterate we're really focused on free cash flow, and with a $300 million year-over-year improvement despite, you know, call it $140-$150 million of restructuring charges, it is a major swing, major improvement in the performance of the business. Certainly, we look to drive that as we go to our I Day targets of moving up to 5% of sales and ultimately up to 7% of sales over the next few years.

Anojja Shah (Director of Equity Research)

Great. Thank you for that.

Arun Viswanathan (Senior Equity Analyst)

I'll turn it over.

Operator (participant)

The next question comes from Francisco Ruiz of BNP Paribas. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.

Francisco Ruiz (Senior Equity Analyst)

Hi, good morning. I have two questions.

The first one is if you could update us on how the negotiations with

French authorities are on the restructuring you

proposed a couple of months ago, and also follow up on this, what else is missing in terms of

restructuring or closing facilities in order to get to your faith savings on Fit to Win.

The second question is if you could help me to understand what is the bridge between your Fit to Win benefit and

the rest of the cost at operating cost, apart from the central cost, there is a gap of

$20-$30 million this quarter.

What is this coming from?

Thank you.

Gordon Hardie (CEO)

Hi, Francisco. Let me take the first question. We're engaged with our European Works Councils and our local Works Councils, and we're working through the process of consultation and listening to ideas as we move through to getting agreement on how we reconfigure the network to be as competitive as we can be in France. We see France as a very important market in our business, and we have plans to invest quite heavily in France, but we need the right network and those discussions are progressing to plan. As you know, there's a process, you work through the process, and we're committed to doing that fairly and squarely with our colleagues. Nothing more to add there other than it's going to plan in terms of timing of discussions.

John Haudrich (Senior VP and CFO)

Francisco, this is John. I'll address the other two questions you have as far as where do we stand in the whole network optimization process and what is left. We've announced so far about a total of 10 percentage point reduction in global capacity, of which as we stand here right now, maybe 5% or a little bit more is actually physically closed. The other component has to do with remaining elements that have been announced. One is what we just referenced in France and the other one is what we just referenced earlier today, I mean, last night in the Americas. That is what will be conducted over the next couple quarters and that would be completion of where we stand on the announced level of capacity restructuring. We would still then have a little bit, a couple percentage points of excess capacity.

We're going to monitor and see where the market trends go and see ultimately determine, hopefully we can grow into that. We'll have to determine whether additional decisions are required. Your last question is kind of, if Fit to Win was $84 million, where's the other cost movements? What I would point you to is on page six of our materials. There's actually a little chart in there that has the cost breakdown. As you can see with that, operating costs were favorable, $31 million, $63 million of that was Fit to Win in the operating line. We did have $27 million of temporary curtailments. That is as we referenced the continued downtime until we're able to get these permanent restructuring actions actually completed. Those are the major movers.

If you take a look on the corporate side, if you add up the whole thing, you have $84 million of Fit to Win. You got the temporary curtailments. You'll see an offset in corporate. A lot of that has to do with resetting management and census with zero last year. Take a look at that. That provides you the details I think you're looking for.

Francisco Ruiz (Senior Equity Analyst)

Okay, thank you very much.

Operator (participant)

The next question comes from Gabrial Hajde from Wells Fargo Securities. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.

Gabrial Hajde (Equity Research Analyst)

Gordon.

John.

Chris, good morning.

Gordon Hardie (CEO)

Good morning.

Hi, Jay.

Gabrial Hajde (Equity Research Analyst)

I apologize. Hello.

I joined a few minutes late, but I was curious if, John, you could kind of help us with the increase in the guidance range, $15 million. I think to your point, you talked about price-cost being actually a little bit more favorable, maybe by $25 million if I pick midpoints. FX, I think, is maybe a $25 million-$30 million tailwind as well. Volumes up 1% through the first half. We're sort of still targeting flattish, which I guess would suggest down 1% in the back half. You already gave us some color on the mix, Americas versus Europe. It seems like your Fit to Win and cost-outs are kind of running ahead of expectations. Is there something else that we're missing? I don't want to talk to the upper end of the range.

I'm just trying to understand if there are any other puts and takes in our logic there.

John Haudrich (Senior VP and CFO)

Gabe, the drivers that we have and maybe just thinking what are the factors that would drive you to the upper end of the range? Obviously, you got the FX as you referenced, net prices is better, Fit to Win probably has upside opportunities. The flip side that we have is interest expense will be higher because the rates haven't changed. You also have, and I'm sure you heard this, but we are making a provision later in the year for more temporary downtime in the event that the timing of, in particular, the European restructuring activity may kick into early part of next year. Those are the major factors. Anything in the variance between the high end of the range, midpoint, low end has probably to do more with macroeconomic trends and things like that, that we're just trying to make a general range for.

Gabrial Hajde (Equity Research Analyst)

Okay.

The follow-up question: I've seen a few announcements here in the past month or so, Heineken being one of them, I think talking about building a pretty meaningful new brewery in Yucatán and maybe some reorienting. Gordon, you alluded to some of their bottling if that were to occur. In North America there was an announcement on reformulation for Coca-Cola. I'd be curious if there's been any sort of early discussions or if you can talk about maybe the opportunity for beer in Mexico on new facilities coming in too. I think Heineken's bringing one online in 2026 and this new big facility would be operational in 2028. Thank you.

Gordon Hardie (CEO)

Yeah, look, we're talking to customers all the time. I'm spending 20% to 25% of my time out with customers, discussing what the opportunities and pain points are. If you look at the dynamics of Mexico, I think over the medium-to-long-term, it's a tremendous market for beer. We've got a fabulous suite of assets down there, and we're going to make sure we're in position to take the opportunities as they come.

Products taste better in glass.

What can I say? Whatever customers want to make more of their products in North American glass, we're with some of the efficiencies

and untrapped

capacity that we're finding in TOE, we'll be ready and willing to support anybody that wants to launch products and more products in glass as we move forward.

Gabrial Hajde (Equity Research Analyst)

Thank you.

Gordon Hardie (CEO)

Thanks, Keith.

Operator (participant)

We currently have no further questions. I'll hand back to Chris for any closing remarks.

Chris Manuel (VP of Investor Relations)

Thanks, Lucy. That concludes our earnings conference call. Please note that our third quarter call is presently scheduled for Wednesday, November 5. Remember, make it a memorable moment by choosing safe, sustainable glass. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

This concludes today's call. Thank you for joining. You may now disconnect your lines.