Tutor Perini - Q4 2025
February 26, 2026
Transcript
Operator (participant)
Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Tutor Perini Corporation's fourth quarter 2025 earnings conference call. My name is Latonya, and I will be your coordinator for today. All participants are currently in a listen-only mode. Following management's prepared remarks, we'll be opening the call for a question-and-answer session. As a reminder, this call is being recorded for replay purposes. If anyone should require operator assistance, please press star zero on your telephone keypad. I will now turn the conference over to your host today, Jorge Casado, Senior Vice President of Investor Relations. Thank you. You may proceed.
Jorge Casado (SVP of Investor Relations)
Hello, everyone, and thank you for joining us. With us today are Gary Smalley, CEO and President, Ronald Tutor, Executive Chairman, and Ryan Soroka, Executive Vice President and CFO. Before we discuss our results, I will remind everyone that during this call, we will be making forward-looking statements, which are based on management's current assessment of existing trends and information. There is an inherent risk that our actual results could differ materially. You can find our disclosures about risk factors that could contribute to such differences in our Form 10-K, which we are filing today. The company assumes no obligation to update forward-looking statements, whether due to new information, future events, or otherwise, other than as required by law. In addition, during today's call, management will be referring to certain non-GAAP financial measures.
You can find information and a reconciliation of these non-GAAP financial measures in the earnings release that we issued today and in the Form 10-K being filed today, both of which can be found in the Investors section of our website. Thank you. With that, I will turn the call over to Gary Smalley.
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Thanks, Jorge. Hello, everyone, and thank you for joining us. Tutor Perini had a tremendous year in 2025, perhaps our best year ever. Our results were highlighted by a record $5.5 billion of revenue, a return to strong profitability that produced $4.29 of adjusted earnings per share, a fourth consecutive year of record operating cash flow with $748 million of cash that shattered last year's record. This enormous cash generation was largely due to the contributions from new and ongoing projects. Our record revenue is driven by double-digit backlog growth that we expect will fuel even higher revenue and earnings, increased profitability, and continued strong cash flow in 2026 and beyond.
A year ago on our earnings call, I shared some of my top priorities as Tutor Perini's then newly appointed CEO, which included a sustained focus on cash, the return to profitability, and providing ambitious yet reasonable earnings goals, all with the goal of significantly increasing short and long-term shareholder value. I'm pleased to report that we have delivered on each of these priorities, which together have helped us to achieve unprecedented share price performance and record returns for our shareholders. There's a lot of enthusiasm here at Tutor Perini and among investors and other business partners about the progress we have made and especially about what the future holds. It continues to be an exciting time to be a Tutor Perini shareholder, and we want to thank those of you who are shareholders for your support.
Our revenue growth accelerated progressively throughout each quarter of 2025, and our record revenue was primarily driven by contributions from various larger, higher-margin projects. As many of these projects continue to ramp up, we expect they will generate further double-digit revenue and earnings growth over the next two years. The Civil segment, our highest margin segment, generated more than $2.8 billion of our total revenue in 2025, the highest ever annual revenue for the segment. Consolidated operating income was up significantly in 2025, driven by our larger, higher-margin projects, as well as significantly less negative impacts on earnings from legacy dispute resolutions as compared to 2024. In addition to generating record annual revenue, the Civil segment produced its highest ever annual operating income and operating margin in 2025.
The Building segment's operating income for 2025 was its highest since 2011. Importantly, the Specialty Contractor segment returned to profitability in the second half of 2025 ahead of expectations. We see higher margins ahead for the Building and Specialty Contractor segments and sustainably strong margins for the Civil segment as many newer large projects continue to ramp up. We concluded 2025 with a robust backlog of $20.6 billion, up 10% year-over-year, and had a solid book-to-burn ratio of 1.34x for the year.
Our backlog growth was driven by $7.4 billion of new awards and contract adjustments that we booked during the year, the largest of which included the $1.87 billion Midtown Bus Terminal Replacement Phase I project in New York, the $1.18 billion Manhattan Tunnel project, also in New York, the UCSF Benioff New Children's Hospital in California, valued at approximately $1 billion, a $538 million healthcare project in California, $241 million of additional funding for the Apra Harbor Waterfront Repairs project in Guam, a $182 million military defense project in Guam, the $155 million Diego Rivera Performing Arts Center at City College of San Francisco, $131 million of additional funding for an electrical project in Texas.
An electrical project at Cook Children's Medical Center in Texas, valued at more than $100 million. Looking back a bit further, over the past three years, we have won nine mega projects totaling approximately $16 billion, each valued at approximately $1 billion or more.
Three of these were among our major awards of 2025, all but one were awarded since the summer of 2024. These projects all have very healthy margins, more favorable contractual terms, and longer durations than many other large projects we have booked in the past. They also provide us with excellent visibility into our future revenue and earnings over the next several years. We believe our backlog will remain strong in 2026 and beyond. We anticipate booking approximately $1 billion into backlog later this year for the finished trade scope of work for Phase I of the Midtown Bus Terminal project in New York City. Earlier this month, we received $204 million of funding for the Eagle Mountain Casino Phase II expansion project in California, a project that was originally awarded, announced last summer.
Our subsidiary, Rudolph and Sletten, was recently selected for a large, new multibillion-dollar healthcare project in California, which is currently in the pre-construction phase. We expect to book significant additional backlog as this and several other Building segment projects, also currently in the pre-construction phase, advance to the construction phase over the next several years. We continue to see numerous major bidding opportunities for our Civil and Building segments, many of which should include significant work for our electrical and mechanical business units within the Specialty Contractors segment.
Our most significant bidding opportunities over the next 12 to 18 months include a program believed to be valued at approximately $12 billion for the Sepulveda Transit Corridor, the $3.8 billion Southeast Gateway Line, and the $700 million Metro Gold Line Foothill Extension, all three of which are in California, as well as the multibillion-dollar Penn Station transformation project in New York, the $3 billion Newark Liberty International Airport Terminal B project in New Jersey, very similar to the award-winning Terminal A project that we recently completed. The $1.4 billion I-535 Blatnik Bridge project in Minnesota, and the $1 billion I-69 ORX Section 2 project connecting Indiana and Kentucky. There are also several large hospitality and gaming opportunities we are pursuing, mostly in the Southwest of the United States.
In addition, we continue to have significant Indo-Pacific opportunities driven by the federal government's Pacific Deterrence Initiative. Black Construction, our Guam-based subsidiary, has been tremendously successful in winning various new projects throughout the region and continues to be well-positioned to capture additional major projects over the coming years. We remain highly selective as to which opportunities we will pursue with a continued focus on bidding projects with favorable contractual terms, limited competition, and higher margins. Due to the timing of our significant prospective opportunities, most of which start bidding around the middle of 2026 and continue through the first half of next year, and because of the significantly higher revenue we expect to recognize for work already in backlog, we anticipate a modest backlog reduction in the near term, followed by resumed backlog growth as we capture our share of major new projects.
Expect a bit more lumpiness in our backlog as we move forward with growth still expected over the medium to longer term, rather than the steady backlog increases we have seen virtually every quarter over the past two years. That said, growth remains a priority for us in this environment, and we believe we can scale up resources as necessary. While our Civil business is expected to continue to drive most of our future growth and profitability as it typically does, a substantial proportion of our Building segment backlog is operating at significantly higher margins than what we have seen historically. For example, our two New York City jail mega projects carry margins that are consistent with large, complex building projects of a fixed-price nature.
In addition, today's large healthcare campus projects are more technically complex than more traditional commercial office building projects of the past and therefore also command higher margins. Last November, our board of directors authorized our first-ever quarterly cash dividend of six cents per share, as well as a share repurchase program totaling $200 million. Today, the board declared another six cent quarterly dividend, which we paid on March 26th. Next, let's turn to our outlook and guidance. Tutor Perini continues to benefit from favorable macroeconomic tailwinds that are driving strong, sustained market demand for construction services across all segments. We believe these tailwinds will persist due to the substantial amount of funding that is in place and because our country has, for decades and until recently, inadequately funded and prioritized the types of substantial infrastructure investments being made today.
Based on our assessment of the current market and business outlook, we anticipate double-digit revenue growth and strong earnings in 2026, with even higher earnings expected in 2027, by which time newer large projects should be in the construction phase. For 2026, we expect adjusted EPS in the range of $4.90-$5.30. As we did last year, we have factored into our guidance a significant amount of contingency for unknown or unexpected outcomes and developments in 2026, including the possibility of a lower-than-anticipated success rate for future project pursuits, potential for project delays, slower ramp ups for newer projects, and any unexpected settlements and or adverse legal decisions associated with the resolution of disputes.
We also continue to expect strong operating cash generation in 2026 and beyond due to increased project execution activities and the anticipated resolution of remaining legacy disputes. We have continued to chisel away at our remaining legacy disputes and made excellent progress in 2025 resolving certain long-standing matters. We are already off to a strong start this year, having recently reached an agreement in principle regarding one of our larger disputes related to a long-completed project. We believe that we will finalize a settlement agreement in the coming days, which will not have a material impact on our earnings. However, the settlement is expected to result in the collection of approximately $40 million for Tutor Perini in the near-term. Because of our tremendous backlog and ample bidding opportunities, the outlook for Tutor Perini remains incredibly positive even beyond 2026. Thank you.
With that, I will now turn the call over to Ryan to discuss the details of our financial results.
Ryan Soroka (EVP and CFO)
Thanks, Gary. Good day, everyone. I will start by discussing our results for the year, after which I will review the 4th quarter and then provide some commentary on our balance sheet and our 2026 guidance assumptions. All comparative references will be against the same period of last year, unless otherwise stated. Operating cash flow was certainly one of the most noteworthy highlights of 2025. As Gary mentioned, we generated a new record operating cash flow of $748 million for the year, up 49% compared to the previous record of $504 million for 2024.
This was our fourth straight year of record operating cash. It was driven by strong collections on newer and ongoing projects, reflecting a significant increase in project execution and improved working capital management, with less contribution from dispute resolutions in 2025 compared to previous years. We expect that we will continue to generate strong cash flow in 2026 and beyond, with most of our cash to be generated from organic operations. That is, from new and existing projects and occasionally enhanced by dispute resolutions. Revenue for 2025 was $5.5 billion, up 28%, with the robust growth primarily due to the increased project execution activities on certain large, newer Civil segment and Building segment projects in the Northeast, Hawaii and Guam.
This included, among others, the AirTrain Newark replacement, the Midtown Bus Terminal Phase I project, the Brooklyn and Manhattan Jails, the Honolulu Rail Project, and the Apra Harbor Waterfront Repairs Project in Guam. Civil segment revenue was $2.8 billion, up a solid 34% due to increased project execution activities on certain large, higher margin projects in the regions I just mentioned, all of which have substantial scope of work remaining. It was the Civil segment's highest annual revenue ever, reflective of the robust, sustained demand that Gary noted we are seeing for our services. Building segment revenue was $1.9 billion, up 15%, primarily due to increased activities on the Brooklyn and Manhattan Jail projects in New York and a large healthcare campus project in California, all of which also have substantial scope of work remaining.
The Building segment delivered its highest annual revenue since 2020. Specialty Contractors segment revenue was $844 million, up a strong 43%, with the growth primarily driven by increased activities on various electrical and mechanical components of some of the large Civil and Building segment projects I mentioned. The Specialty Contractors segment revenue really started to show strong growth in the second half of 2025, and we expect this growth to continue this year and next year as these and other newer projects advance. Our operating income was driven by higher margin contributions from various Civil and Building segment projects, as well as the absence of certain net unfavorable adjustments that impacted our results last year.
Operating income was up significantly despite a $110 million increase in share-based compensation expense tied to the near tripling of our stock price in 2025, which affected the fair value of liability-classified awards. Our share-based compensation expense is expected to decrease in 2026 and decline much more significantly in 2027, as some of these liability-classified awards have now vested, and most of the remaining awards will vest by the end of 2026. We are no longer issuing liability-classified awards, which should meaningfully reduce earnings volatility. Civil segment operating income for 2025 nearly tripled to $391 million compared to $138 million in 2024, with a segment operating margin of 13.7% for the year, within the range of 12%-15% that we expected.
It was the segment's highest ever operating income and operating margin of any year. The strong increase was primarily due to contributions related to the segment's increased project activities that I mentioned and the absence of certain prior year net unfavorable adjustments. Earlier in 2025, we recorded favorable adjustments that resulted from the settlement of certain change orders and changes in estimates due to improved performance and a favorable project closeout on a domestic mass transit project. These were mostly offset by an unfavorable adjustment in the fourth quarter, which was mostly non-cash and associated with the settlement of a legacy dispute on a tunneling project in Canada. Building segment operating income was $58 million, a substantial turnaround compared to the operating loss of $24 million in 2024.
The segment's margin for 2025 was 3.1% compared to a negative 1.5% last year. The significant improvement was driven by contributions related to the increased higher margin project activity, as I mentioned, in the absence of certain prior year unfavorable adjustments. We anticipate Building segment margins in the range of 3%-6%, fueled by contributions from certain higher margin projects. The Specialty Contractors segment returned to profitability in the second half of 2025, ahead of expectations, but posted a slight operating loss of $7 million for 2025 compared to a loss of $103 million in 2024. The significant improvement was primarily due to contributions related to the increased activities I mentioned on the electrical and mechanical components of certain civil and Building segment projects.
Many of these projects are in the early stages and are expected to ramp up considerably over the next several years. The improvement was also driven by the absence of certain prior year unfavorable adjustments on several completed projects. Corporate G&A expense was $211 million in 2025 compared to $110 million in 2024, with the increase primarily due to the substantially higher share-based compensation expense that we had in 2025, as discussed earlier. Income tax expense was $61 million in 2025, with an effective tax rate of 30% for the year, compared to a tax benefit of $51 million with an effective tax rate of 29.3% in 2024.
Net income attributable to Tutor Perini for 2025 was $80 million, or $1.51 of GAAP earnings per share, compared to a net loss attributable to Tutor Perini of $164 million or a loss of $3.13 per share in 2024. Excluding the impact of share-based compensation expense, net of the associated tax benefit, adjusted net income attributable to Tutor Perini for 2025 was $229 million or $4.29 of adjusted earnings per share, compared to an adjusted net loss attributable to Tutor Perini of $124 million or an adjusted loss of $2.37 per share in 2024. Let's turn to the fourth quarter results.
We had a solid turnaround performance across all segments in the fourth quarter in terms of revenue, operating income, and margins. As Gary mentioned, our revenue growth accelerated sequentially throughout 2025, with particularly strong growth in the second half of the year that is continuing into 2026. Revenue was $1.5 billion, up 41% compared to $1.1 billion for the fourth quarter of 2024. Civil segment revenue for the quarter was $732 million, up 32%. Building segment revenue was $512 million, up 45%. Specialty Contractors segment revenue was $263 million, up 63%. The strong growth was due to the increased project activity, as I mentioned earlier, on various projects that are ramping up and have significant scope of work remaining.
Civil segment operating income was $72 million for the fourth quarter of 2025, up very substantially compared to $4 million of operating income for the fourth quarter of 2024. The significantly lower than normal operating income and margin in the 2024 period was due primarily to a temporary earnings reduction of $32 million that resulted from the successful negotiation of significant lower margin and lower risk change orders on a West Coast project. The Civil segment's operating income and margin for the fourth quarter of 2025 would have been substantially higher had it not been for the unfavorable adjustment I mentioned earlier. Building segment operating income was $11 million for the fourth quarter of 2025, compared to a loss from construction operations of $41 million for the fourth quarter of 2024.
The improvement was driven by contributions from certain higher margin projects, as well as the absence of prior year unfavorable adjustment on a government building project in Florida. Specialty Contractors segment operating income was $11 million for the quarter, with a margin of 4.4%, compared to a loss of $20 million in the fourth quarter of 2024. The segment's performance has continued to improve significantly as their involvement in our large civil and building projects grow. We expect the segment to eventually and consistently generate margins in the 5%-8% range.
For the fourth quarter of 2025, net income attributable to Tutor Perini was $29 million or $0.54 of GAAP EPS, compared to a net loss attributable to Tutor Perini of $79 million or a GAAP loss of $1.51 per share in last year's fourth quarter. Adjusted net income attributable to Tutor Perini for the fourth quarter of 2025 was $58 million or $1.07 of adjusted earnings per share, compared to an adjusted net loss attributable to Tutor Perini of $78 million or an adjusted loss of $1.49 per share in the fourth quarter of 2024. Now I'll address the balance sheet. In 2025, we paid down our total debt by 24% and reduced our CIE by 13%.
The CIE reduction was mostly driven by billings and collections, including those associated with the resolution of various previously disputed matters. Our CIE is expected to continue to decrease over time as we resolve the remaining legacy disputes. Due to our record cash generation, we ended the year in a healthy net cash position, with cash and cash equivalents exceeding total debt by $327 million as compared to our $79 million net debt position at the end of 2024. Cash available for general corporate purposes was $271 million at the end of 2025. Overall, our balance sheet is healthier than it's ever been, and our solid net cash position provides us with excellent capital allocation flexibility. Lastly, I'll provide some assumptions regarding our guidance for modeling purposes.
G&A expense for 2026 is expected to be between $400 million and $410 million. Depreciation and amortization expense is anticipated to be approximately $50 million in 2026, with depreciation at $48 million and amortization at $2 million. Interest expense for 2026 is expected to be between $40 million and $50 million, of which about $3 million will be non-cash. Our effective income tax rate for 2026 is expected to be approximately 27%-30%. We anticipate noncontrolling interest to be between $75 million and $85 million. We expect approximately 54 million weighted average diluted shares outstanding for 2026.
Capital expenditures are anticipated to be approximately $125 million to $135 million, with the vast majority of the CapEx in 2026, approximately $75 million to $85 million being owner-funded for large equipment items on certain large new projects. Thank you. With that, I will turn the call back over to Gary.
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Thank you, Ryan. In summary, we had our best year ever in 2025, marked by record operating cash flow, record revenue that grew 28% year-over-year, strong operating income and profitability with record annual results for our high margin Civil segment, as well as robust year-end backlog of $20.6 billion, that was up 10% year-over-year. With this tremendous backlog, we are confident in our ability to produce double-digit revenue and earnings growth and continued strong annual cash flow in 2026 as our newer projects progress through design and into construction. The outlook for Tutor Perini remains very bright over the next several years as we continue to benefit from favorable macroeconomic tailwinds and strong public and private customer funding that is fueling sustained market demand and numerous major bidding opportunities.
As I mentioned earlier, it's an exciting time to be with Tutor Perini, whether as an employee, an investor or other business partner. Thank you. With that, I will turn the call over to the operator for your questions.
Operator (participant)
Thank you. We will now conduct 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 a question queue. You may press star two to remove yourself from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star keys. Once again, that's star one at this time. One moment while we poll for the first question. The first question comes from Steven Fisher with UBS. Please proceed.
Steven Fisher (Managing Director)
Thanks. Good afternoon, and sorry for the background noise here. Congratulations on a very strong 2025. Just a couple of questions to start off on the guidance. Wondering if you could just talk about the coverage you have in your backlog on the outlook. I would think it would be pretty strong in light of all the bookings that you have, but just curious if there's any particular things you need to see still happen and get booked to hit the numbers. From a cadence perspective, first quarter tends to be, you know, fairly light relative to the full year due to seasonality, and we've obviously had some pretty tough weather here in parts of the country in the first quarter.
I'm just curious if there are any expectations you want to set there.
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Yeah, Steve, thanks for the congrats. This is Gary. First of all, we've got great visibility into the results for 2026 and really beyond. There's not much that has to happen for us to hit the numbers that we've, you know, represented. There are gonna be some additional awards that could enhance things, and there's some you know, built-in awards that we're expecting that, you know, technically we'd need to hit the numbers, but it is gonna happen. It's not, it's not like we're expecting, you know, some large projects to come our way in order to be able to hit 2026. As far as the seasonality, you're right. Q1 is usually light for us. It's typically the way it goes. It'll be the same this year.
What's happened, you know, primarily in New York with the large snowstorm, that hasn't really, it's not gonna have much of an impact. We've got contingency for that. We've also budgeted expecting Q1 to be light. I might as well throw in, you know, Manhattan Tunnel. You know, we're back working after about a two-week suspension, and that's all accounted for in the guidance as well, you know, accounted for by, you know, with contingency. So we feel good.
Steven Fisher (Managing Director)
That's great. Then just from a backlog perspective, it sounds like you expect some, I think lumpiness was the word that you used, but you did cite some potential larger awards in the second half of the year. Just curious, should we be expecting some net burn this year on the backlog? Or do you think there's still enough opportunity to kinda keep it steady? At the levels kind of where we are now, and then maybe the bigger picture question is just on, maybe on the Civil segment side, is there any kind of view you have on and kind of where we are in the cycle of bigger projects? I know this is an area where you've had relatively limited competition recently.
I'm just kind of curious where you think we are in sort of the bigger picture cycle there. Thank you.
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Yeah. Sure, Steve. Look, you know, taking the last part first, we've got good visibility again on, you know, a lot of these larger projects for civil. We think that they're, you know, on pace to what we are expecting and making good progress on things. You know, we don't disclose every large project that's out there, just the biggest ones and ones that are most likely to happen in the near-term. We've got the first part of your question again, just remind me.
Steven Fisher (Managing Director)
Yeah. Do you think it'll be net burn in the backlog this year?
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Yeah. Look, we think at the end of the year, we should be, Our plan shows us a little north of where we are, you know, currently. I want to introduce the lumpiness concept because we've kind of spoiled everyone, I think, to some extent because over the last two years, almost every quarter we've grown backlog. It didn't happen, you know, this particular quarter with, you know, a modest adjustment, you know, on a percentage basis. Just wanted everyone to know that it could be lumpier than it has been over the last couple of years, where every quarter we seem like we're hitting a new record. The pipeline is rich. There's a lot of really strong work out there.
Look, we won 9 out of 11 of the large awards, you know, over the last 1.5 years or so. Don't know if we'll continue that win rate, but we should have a good win rate because we target those projects that we think suit us best and where we think we have a good chance of winning. I think it all adds up to backlog growth, and whether it's by the end of the year or into next year, you know, it's coming. You know, I can say that, but it's hard to predict exactly when those projects are gonna hit backlog. I wanted just to emphasize that it could be a little bit lumpier than it has been, but we're gonna see growth.
You know, I guess the last factor is, we're gonna be generating revenue at an all-time high. 2025 was a record, 2026 and 2027 as we go forward, even gonna be higher. It just means that to sustain backlog, you have to have significant awards. Again, that's the reason for the words of caution.
Steven Fisher (Managing Director)
Sounds good. Thanks a lot.
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Thank you.
Operator (participant)
The next question comes from Alex Rygiel with Texas Capital. Please proceed.
Alex Rygiel (Managing Director)
Thank you, Gary and Ryan. Very nice quarter. Congratulations.
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Thanks.
Alex Rygiel (Managing Director)
Couple questions. Gary, can you go a little bit deeper on sort of the improvement in contract terms on new awards and talk about what that means longer-term for Tutor Perini?
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Yes, will do. Look, in the past when the competition was heavier for these projects that we pursue, the larger projects, you know, we wanted to change contractual terms, but we were unable to because there's always somebody else that would have accepted the terms and taken the contract. Now what we've been able to do with the limited competition is to work with our customers, our owners, in order to drive, you know, better payment terms, better terms with respect to, you know, no damages for delay, especially New York. You know, just damages provisions, also on differing site conditions, things that in the past could and sometimes did impact us in a negative way.
Things that, you know, like, no damages for delay is something that, is just the way the statute is written. It's tough to work around in court if you happen to go to court. Now eliminating that provision in the contract is certainly beneficial. I think what you'll see is less disputes as we go forward. Then, and part of that is, just because it's really a clarification of terms. Also, I think that, we'll less likely end up in court because, the pendulum is more, swung more toward our side, more in the middle, so that I think you'll get, negotiations and meaningful negotiations, before you go to court, preventing you from having to go to court.
Alex Rygiel (Managing Director)
secondly, I believe as it relates to Rudolph and Sletten, just from a clarity standpoint, did you say it was looking at a multi-billion dollar healthcare facility? Maybe expand upon that. Any commentary about opportunities over the next 10, 12 years as it relates to high tech manufacturing and reshoring?
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Yeah. First on the multi-billion dollar project, it's a confidential project, so we can't say a whole lot about it. The multi-billion dollar side, you know, it's closer to two than, you know, anything above that. We really can't offer much on that other than we're in pre-construction. Usually when something's in pre-construction, our history shows it's a 90% plus chance of, you know, heading to construction down the road. That's what we expect that when we think that will end up as a construction contract for us. The timing of which, you know, some of that will come in this year, but probably the majority of it's gonna be in 2027.
Could you elaborate on your second question? Are you seeing developing opportunities from large manufacturing facilities, fat plants and whatnot, and how that might play out over the next handful of years? No, not really. You know, of course, that doesn't hit us on the Civil segment, but on the Building segment, the focus right now is on healthcare, some educational facilities and some multipurpose facilities, hotels, casinos, things like that. That's really where our focus is. Helpful. Thank you. You're welcome.
Operator (participant)
The next question comes from Adam Thalhimer with Thompson Davis. Please proceed.
Adam Thalhimer (Director of Research)
Hey, good afternoon, guys. Congrats on the strong year.
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Yeah.
Adam Thalhimer (Director of Research)
Can you give more color on the Canadian project? How much was the negative impact to civil in Q4?
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Yeah. In Q4, I think it was $42 million, as I recall. Joint venture. You know, that's a consolidated joint venture. That's the joint venture portion of it. There was, call it 12, $12 million or $13 million earlier in the year. That's behind us. You know, it's roughly offset by a Midwest project that, really of the same magnitude, maybe a little bit more that we recognized over, you know, probably the last three quarters of the year. Anyway, it's one of our larger disputed items. We just felt that it was better to resolve that one than to proceed, you know, down the path of litigation.
Adam Thalhimer (Director of Research)
Yeah, absolutely. How many legacy jobs are left to settle?
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Yeah. Let's just say about 12. You know, it's... You know, there's some 50. Yeah, we've got, you know, around 12. You know, there's. Those are of some significance. There are some, you know, cats and dogs out there that are smaller amounts that are less meaningful. As Ron was just noting here, you know, he's right. We started with about 50. We've gone from about 4 dozen to 12 and we're making progress on some of the others. As you heard, one was just cleared within the last, you know, week and a half, so.
Adam Thalhimer (Director of Research)
Okay.
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
We'll continue that focus. You know, we're optimistic that, you know, some, you know, turn favorably for us, right? You know, some are writeups, not writedowns, and we hope that's the case with what we have left. You know, time will tell. In the meantime, we've tried to put away, you know, put aside contingency, not just for that, but a lot of other unknowns. You know, we think that we have enough contingency to cover, you know, any unexpected delays, anything that is just not forecasted, including, you know, the potential for any writedowns due to litigation outcomes.
Adam Thalhimer (Director of Research)
Okay. It really was a great quarter if you strip that out. Then,
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Yes, it was. Thanks.
Adam Thalhimer (Director of Research)
Yeah. I wanted to ask, so you brought up, you made a comment about 2027 construction starts. I don't expect you to give 2027 guidance, but just hoped you could expand on that and you know, what you are trying to say about the 2027 visibility.
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Yeah. Adam, you know, you just said, it was a great quarter, you know, given, you know that. Well, look, even with that writedown, it was a, it's a great quarter. I think that shows the strength of what we're building here with this new work that we have, and that new work carries us past 2026 into 2027. You're right, we don't guide, you know, multi-year, but 2027 is gonna be better than 2026. I think that's clear. You know, we've said, you know, last year around this time we were saying, you know, 2025 is gonna be good, 2026 is gonna be better, and 2027 is gonna be better yet, there's nothing that's changed from that, for that guidance.
Adam Thalhimer (Director of Research)
Great. Thanks, guys.
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Thanks again.
Operator (participant)
The next question comes from Liam Burke with B. Riley. Please proceed.
Liam Burke (Managing Director)
Yes. Thank you. Ryan, you are bidding on larger and larger, more complex projects. Is there any risk of being resource-constrained, and how would that affect your bidding process? I think at this point, we certainly haven't seen any of the constraints on resources. It's probably important to point out that the majority of our labor is sourced from the union halls. We've got agreements in place, whether project-specific or with the union itself, for that labor to be supplied. From our perspective, the day-to-day craft workers, we don't see any constraints, and we don't really see that going forward.
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
From a management standpoint, I think we've talked in the past about, you know, that's really where our focus has been because the unions have always done a great job providing us skilled labor when we needed it. As we've grown, we've been very aggressive and, in fact, in a constant recruiting mode to bring in, you know, the project managers, project executives that are needed to manage this work, and we feel that we're well equipped there. We're always looking. Anyone out there listening, if you want to apply, we're always looking. At the same time, we think that we're already staffed at an appropriate level for future growth.
Adam Thalhimer (Director of Research)
Great. You mentioned in your earlier comments that the specialty margins could be in the, we'll call it, mid-single digit range.
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Yeah.
Adam Thalhimer (Director of Research)
It's a business that's traditionally been marginally profitable at best. Is it the same game plan as Building and Civil, or is there something different about that business where you're gonna have a pretty meaningful change in profitability?
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Look, I think what's happened is we have been able to weed out some of the poor contracts that we've had with the poor contractual terms, in, you know, lower margin work. Now we have higher margin work, better terms. A lot of the litigation, you know, a lot of the disputes, are behind us there, most of them. Look, if you look at the last, you know, two quarters of 2025, I think, what it was a 2.7% operating segment margin, and then 4.4% operating margin for the segment in just those last two quarters. That's the trend we're on right now. That's what the current work is producing. Our 1%-3%, it's really, it's got contingency in there.
We know that the work that we have in hand is going to, you know, be in that mid-single digit range. We want to make sure that we hedge it a little bit with, you know, any unexpected outcomes. We feel real good as we clear 26 that we're gonna see that 5%-8% range that we've talked about for some time. Great. Thank you. You're welcome.
Operator (participant)
The next question comes from Michael Dudas with Vertical Research. Thank you.
Michael Dudas (Partner and Equity Research Analyst)
Thank you, and good afternoon, gentlemen.
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Hi, Mike.
Michael Dudas (Partner and Equity Research Analyst)
Hello. Gary, just so as we enter into 2026, you talked about the nine mega projects, $16 billion in backlog. As we move forward through 2026 to 2027, how do we assume that the project, the revenue conversion you'll be seeing over the next couple of years will be coming from the enhanced T&C, you know, better backlog, or better margin backlog that has been booked? Certainly on the targets that you have out in, out into the market, I'm assuming there's similar targets relative to the margin expectations you have currently, or is there some range or some opportunities there elsewhere going forward?
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Yeah, look, I think that margin will only build over time, and that's probably with all segments as these nine, the big nine, as we'll say, continue to move into full production. I think that will certainly have a positive impact on earnings, but also on revenue generation. As those projects continue to mature and continue to progress, we'll see I think some margin enhancement. You know, look, the new work that we're looking for, you know, we, you know, as you get more work and this has been our strategy, we have been, we'll say, I don't know if I guess it's more aggressive a margin, but expecting larger margin.
You know, you start to fill your coffers and, you know, every time we'd get another project, we'd raise margins next time, and it depends a little bit on competition. Can't say that there's a limit on that or there's no limit on that and that will continue to grow margins for forever. Right now that's the world we're living in where, and that's what our focus is.
Michael Dudas (Partner and Equity Research Analyst)
The clients are getting more, maybe they don't like it, but getting more comfortable with that environment given the tightness in the market.
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Yeah, I guess that's one way to say it, Mike. I'd say another way is they like what we do. They like us. They like the performance that we provide. They like the quality. They like the timeliness of the work. Then you combine that where the competition in some cases is not bidding or some cases we're clearly the best product and whether that's on the quality of the work or quality end price. So I think those factors, it's, you know, we're bidding on work. It's not that they're just handed away, handed out, and they're giving it to us, and they don't want to. I think, you know, we've got a good future here.
We're the past is driving the future and the past is, you know, just solid execution. Yes, we're raising margins, but that's the market that we're in. You know, we'd be foolish not to, with, you know, as we survey the competition and look at what's in front of us.
Michael Dudas (Partner and Equity Research Analyst)
Well said, Gary. Ryan, you with the tremendous job you've executed here with the balance sheet over the last several years, how is it, how's that gonna help with business and opportunities going forward in the size of projects and maybe, being more sole source versus potential partners? How do you look at a more, the optimal size of balance sheet or what kind of recapitalization can we see given where you are with the debt, the maturities and the cash we're gonna have and even further that you're gonna be generating in the next few years?
Ryan Soroka (EVP and CFO)
Yeah. All good questions. I'll try to answer them in order. Just starting with the balance sheet and looking at the debt that we have out there today, eleven and seven eighths is a tough coupon to swallow obviously. Certainly something that we're looking to refinance, probably mid-year or so is the expectation for some significant interest savings. We're, you know, hopeful for a 500 basis point reduction. As far as the level of debt, you know, we're comfortable at that, you know, 400-ish mark, in particular if we extend that out longer-term, so we have that liquidity certainty and also that longer-term liquidity view.
As it relates to, you know, obviously the operating cash and free cash that we've kicked off over the three years at record pace, obviously having that cash on hand also gives a better long-term liquidity view and for other stakeholders like the sureties, giving them confidence to, as we look at some of these future opportunities to bid that sole source as opposed to, you know, having to get a JV partner. You know, in 2026 alone, we're talking about. What, what did we say? $75 million-$85 million of noncontrolling interest. We'd sure like to keep that in-house.
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
I think that's a great answer. Let me just throw something else out there that we haven't really talked a whole lot about. Earlier in the call, we talked about better contractual terms. I mentioned less litigation. Look, there's We spent a lot of money over the last several years on litigation expense. As we have progressed the last couple of years, we're seeing that amount come down. We expect to see that come down even further. Legal expenses are something that, you know, of course, are necessary in business and certainly in this in this industry. I think you'll see less and less legal expenses from us, and that's only gonna drive, you know, profit improvements.
That's not a terrible thing, is it? Less legal expenses.
Ryan Soroka (EVP and CFO)
No, it's not.
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
unless you're one of our attorneys.
Ryan Soroka (EVP and CFO)
Of course.
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Just to clarify, Ryan, your interest expense guidance doesn't assume any re-financing recapitalization, correct?
Ryan Soroka (EVP and CFO)
We did broaden the range.
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Okay.
Ryan Soroka (EVP and CFO)
Yeah. Sorry.
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Half a year, is that it?
Ryan Soroka (EVP and CFO)
Yeah, yeah. I mean, what we've assumed.
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Half a year.
Ryan Soroka (EVP and CFO)
a refinancing call roughly mid-year.
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Okay, good. Okay. Just wanted to clarify that. Perfect. Thanks, gentlemen.
Ryan Soroka (EVP and CFO)
Thank you.
Operator (participant)
Thank you. At this time, I would like to turn the floor back to Gary Smalley for closing remarks.
Gary Smalley (CEO and President)
Thank you all again for your interest and participation today. We look forward to continuing to deliver strong results as we go forward. We'll talk to you again next quarter. Thank you.
Operator (participant)
Thank you. This does conclude today's teleconference. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation, and have a great day.