Waste Management - Earnings Call - Q2 2025

Executive Summary

• Q2 delivered clean beats with revenue $6.43B, adjusted EBITDA $1.923B, and adjusted EPS $1.92, all above consensus; GAAP EPS was $1.80 (beats driven by landfill volumes, collection & disposal (C&D) margin expansion, and sustainability project ramp). EPS $1.92 vs $1.89*; revenue $6.43B vs $6.35B*; EBITDA $1.923B vs $1.873B* (beats) (Values retrieved from S&P Global).
• Guidance pivot: WM affirmed the 2025 adj. EBITDA midpoint ($7.55B) and narrowed the range, raised FCF to $2.8–$2.9B, lifted adj. EBITDA margin to 29.6–29.9% (from 29.2–29.7%), and trimmed revenue to $25.275–$25.475B (commodity-driven brokerage headwinds; Q1 weather).
• Execution highlights: legacy business posted a “best‑ever operating expense margin”; core price 6.4%, C&D yield 4.1%, and volumes +1.6% YoY; sustainability EBITDA grew double‑digits; WM Healthcare Solutions delivered $110M adjusted EBITDA and synergies remain on track toward the high end of $80–$100M in 2025.
• Catalysts: higher full‑year margin/FCF outlook despite a modest revenue trim, visible RNG offtake (≈90% locked for 2025) and improving healthcare SG&A run‑rate; continued landfill volume/internalization strength and disciplined residential portfolio pruning.

What Went Well and What Went Wrong

• What Went Well

  • Best‑ever operating expense margin in the legacy business drove double‑digit EBITDA growth; adjusted EBITDA margin reached 31.3% in legacy and 29.9% total.
  • Landfill volume strength (including special waste) and price discipline (core price 6.4%) powered C&D margin to 37.9% (adjusted).
  • “We also grew operating EBITDA by double digits in both our Recycling Processing and Sales and WM Renewable Energy segments,” underscoring sustainability project returns, per CEO Jim Fish.

• What Went Wrong

  • Revenue guide trimmed (now $25.275–$25.475B) primarily due to a decline in recycled commodity prices impacting low‑margin brokerage and harsh Q1 winter weather volumes.
  • Healthcare remained margin dilutive to consolidated results (12.7% reported, 17.0% adjusted EBITDA margin), though sequential SG&A improved and synergies are ramping.
  • Residual headwinds: loss of a sizable residential contract weighed on C&D volumes mix; ongoing alternative fuel tax credit expiration is a 30 bps margin headwind discussed earlier in the year.

Transcript

Operator (participant)

The Daily Saint John, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the WM Second Quarter Earnings Conference call. At this time, all participants are on a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question-and-answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star 11 on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. To withdraw your question, please press star 11 again. Please note that today's conference is being recorded. I will now hand the conference over to your speaker host, Ed Egl, Vice President of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Edward Egl (VP of Investor Relations)

Thank you, Livia. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us for our Second Quarter 2025 Earnings Conference call. With me this morning are Jim Fish, Chief Executive Officer; John Morris, President and Chief Operating Officer; and Devina Rankin, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. You'll hear prepared comments from each of them today. Jim will cover high-level financials and provide a strategic update. John will cover an operating overview, and Devina will cover the details of the financials. Before we get started, please note that we have filed a Form 8-K that includes the earnings press release and is available on our website at www.WM.com. The Form 8-K, the press release, and the schedules of the press release include important information. During the call, you will hear forward-looking statements which are based on current expectations, projections, or opinions about future periods.

All forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially. Some of these risks and uncertainties are discussed in today's press release and in our filings with the SEC, including our most recent Form 10-K and Form 10-Qs. John will discuss our results in the areas of yield and volume, which, unless stated otherwise, or more specifically, references to internal revenue growth or IRG from yield or volume. During the call, Jim, John, and Devina will discuss operating EBITDA, which is income from operations before depreciation and amortization. References to the WM legacy business are total WM results, excluding the WM Healthcare Solutions segment. Any comparisons, unless otherwise stated, will be with the prior year period.

Net income, EPS, income from operations and margin, operating EBITDA and margin, operating expense and margin, and SG&A expense and margin have been adjusted to enhance comparability by excluding certain items that management believes do not reflect our fundamental business performance or results of operations. These adjusted measures, in addition to free cash flow, are non-GAAP measures. Please refer to the earnings press release and tables, which can be found on the company's website at www.WM.com, for reconciliations to the most comparable GAAP measures and additional information about our use of non-GAAP measures. This call is being recorded and will be available 24 hours a day, beginning approximately 1:00 P.M. Eastern Time today. If you hear a replay of the call, access the WM website at www.investors.WM.com.

Time-sensitive information provided during today's call, which is occurring on July 29th, 2025, may no longer be accurate at the time of a replay. Any redistribution, retransmission, or rebroadcast of this call in any form without the express written consent of WM is prohibited. Now I'll turn the call over to WM CEO, Jim Fish.

Jim Fish (CEO)

Thanks, Ed, and thank you all for joining us. Coming out of last month's Investor Day, we're energized by WM's strategy, which combines our unreplicable core business with new platforms for growth, generating consistent long-term value for years to come. It's our sustained, strong results across all market cycles that we believe makes us a forever stock, the type of stock you buy and hold indefinitely. We continue to deliver strong results quarter in and quarter out, year in and year out, driven by a disciplined strategy aligned with secular trends, a proven ability to further execute, and implementation of technology to both significantly lower our cost structure and differentiate us from our competition. There's no better evidence of our power, of our growth engine, than our 19% operating EBITDA growth in the second quarter.

Yet again, our collection and disposal business drove the growth, contributing more than half of the year-over-year increase in operating EBITDA. Within our collection and disposal business, our focus remains on growing customer lifetime value, utilizing technology to optimize our cost structure, and leveraging our unreplicable asset network. Landfill volumes were particularly strong in the quarter, demonstrating the value of our advantaged disposal network. This is best reflected in our MSW volume growth as we continue to capture solid waste volume in key markets across our network. We also saw growth in special waste volumes, which is largely related to wildfire cleanup in California, as we're uniquely positioned to be a dependable community partner during times of recovery and rebuilding. Additionally, we continue to identify opportunities to scale the core business through acquisitions.

In the quarter, we completed the acquisition of a regional solid waste player in the Washington, DC area, adding complementary operations in a key geography and adding a great team to our existing WM operations. We have a very robust pipeline of tuck-in opportunities and continue to expect acquisition spending to total more than $500 million for the year. The strength of our sustainability platform continues to distinguish the WM brand in the industry in ways that are difficult for others to replicate. For decades, we've been investing in recycling and renewable energy growth, and we accelerated that investment four years ago, aligning ourselves with key secular drivers of circularity and energy demand. The results we're generating clearly support our investment thesis as both our recycling and renewable energy segments delivered margin-enhanced growth in the quarter.

Even as recycled commodity prices declined by nearly 15% compared to last year, our recycling segment operating EBITDA grew by 17%. We believe in these high-return investments, and we continue to execute. On the remaining projects in our portfolio, having commenced operations on three new projects during the quarter: a renewable natural gas facility in Illinois, a recycling automation project in Pennsylvania, and a new market recycling facility in Oregon. Additionally, we're making significant progress in integrating WM Healthcare Solutions into WM. We've positioned ourselves to capitalize on the ongoing growth trends in healthcare and are utilizing our advanced reporting and analytics platform, along with our extensive asset network, to deliver enhanced value for our customers. We've known this is going to be a needle mover for us, and you're starting to see it in our results.

We're successfully identifying and capturing synergies and on track to achieve the upper end of targeted synergies of $80 million-$100 million in 2025. There's no doubt that our results to date support the strategic rationale of this acquisition, and we see significant opportunities ahead. In closing, WM is exceptionally well positioned for future success. We've deployed a long-term strategy that's delivering, and we're executing with discipline to extend our advantages. We're also investing in growth platforms that provide incremental growth, complement our scale, and widen our moat. That's what makes WM a forever stock, and that's what you see in our second quarter results. Now I'll turn the call over to John to discuss our operational results.

John Morris (President and COO)

Thanks, Jim.

Good morning, everyone. The second quarter of 2025 marked another period of strong, consistent performance for our business, continuing a multi-year trend of steady execution and standout results. The performance we're delivering is the direct result of long-term investments we've made in technology, in infrastructure, and most importantly, in our people. As we discussed at Investor Day last month, we are using the WM way, which is our framework to drive operational excellence to build a more modern, more connected WM, and the results we've delivered in Q2 continue to reflect that strategy. We saw solid margin expansion and revenue growth across nearly all lines of business, with particular strength in landfill, commercial collection, and transfer operations. Our second quarter collection and disposal operating EBITDA improved 60 basis points to 37.9%.

These results were driven by our strong landfill volumes, the team's focus on customer lifetime value, and the investments we've made in new trucks that help reduce downtime and maintenance costs. We continue to see strong pricing discipline across the board. Core price remained healthy in the second quarter at 6.4%, with collection and disposal yield improving sequentially to 4.1%. Regarding volume, second quarter collection and disposal volume increased by 1.6%, influenced by two notable events. Landfill volume benefited from peak contribution of wildfire cleanup, while the loss of a relatively large franchise contract had a negative effect on residential and commercial volumes. Overall, our full-year volume expectations remained between 0.25% and 0.75%. Turning to operating expenses, one of the clearest indicators of the progress we're making is our ability to consistently reduce operating costs as a percentage of revenue.

As we shared at Investor Day, structurally lowering our cost base isn't about temporary cuts. It's about using technology and process discipline to build a more efficient, scalable model for the long term, and our team delivered that in Q2. The second quarter marks a record period in which we achieved operating expenses below 60% of revenue. This reflects the significant progress we've made in connecting the full value chain of WM, from routing and fleet management to customer communication and maintenance. Our connected fleet continues to serve as a key differentiator. We achieved a 70 basis point improvement in repair and maintenance costs as a percentage of revenue in the second quarter, as real-time telematics are helping us anticipate and resolve vehicle issues faster, reduce downtime, and streamline maintenance scheduling.

This allows us to provide great service to our customers by helping to make sure each route is run as safely, efficiently, and predictably as possible. Looking ahead, we believe we're still in the early innings of what this integrated technology can do for our operations, and we're excited about what's to come. As always, none of this happens without our people. Turnover improved 370 basis points this quarter to 18.8% for drivers and technicians combined, and it's no coincidence that we're seeing parallel improvements in safety, service, and operational consistency. We focused on modernizing the work environment, whether it's upgrading maintenance shops to be digitally enabled, refining coaching programs for our drivers, or building pathways for new talent to grow in their careers with us. It's making a difference.

We're attracting the next generation of skilled workers by showing them that WM is a place where innovation and impact meet. To wrap up, our Q2 results reinforce the effectiveness of our long-term strategy. WM is not just operating from a position of strength; we're actively expanding our lead through focused execution and long-term thinking. I want to thank our team members for their dedication, their innovation, and their commitment to doing the job right every day. Their efforts are creating lasting value for customers, communities, and shareholders. With that, I'll turn the call over to Devina to walk through our financial results in more detail.

Devina Rankin (EVP and CFO)

Thanks, John, and good morning. In the second quarter, we drove profitable growth in each segment of our business and delivered total company operating EBITDA margin of almost 30%, quickly approaching historical best levels despite the known headwinds from the acquisition of the healthcare solutions business. This result was achieved because our legacy business continues to deliver margin expansion and because we are quickly improving the cost structure of healthcare solutions. WM's legacy business delivered 130 basis points of margin expansion in the quarter, resulting in operating EBITDA margin of 31.3%. The improvement was driven by strong landfill volumes, the growth of our sustainability business, and our continued focus on improving the price-to-cost spread in the collection and disposal business. These positives were slightly offset by the expiration of alternative fuel tax credits, which had a negative 30 basis point impact for the quarter.

The key takeaway from the margin bridge is that strong contributions from our core solid waste business and the results of our sustainability growth investments provided meaningful margin uplift. Turning to WM Healthcare Solutions, our focus on optimizing this business, including through synergy capture, has led to a 190 basis point improvement in operating EBITDA margin since the acquisition. This progress has been particularly swift in reducing SG&A costs as we work to optimize the sales and back office functions of the combined organization. We're pleased with our progress, and as Jim noted, we're on track to achieve the high end of our full-year synergy expectations of between $80 million and $100 million in 2025. Moving to our cash flow results, operating cash flow was $2.75 billion in the first half of 2025, an increase of 9% compared to the same period in 2024.

The increase was driven by our strong earnings growth, partially offset by higher cash interest, primarily due to the additional debt issued last year to fund the acquisition of Stericycle. Through the first six months of the year, capital expenditures totaled $1.56 billion. Capital spending to support the business and our sustainability growth investments are both tracking in line with our expectations. Our capital expenditures are typically more heavily weighted toward the back half of the year, but in 2025, we successfully pulled forward some of our track deliveries, which has provided benefits to the business and our operating expense margins. Putting this together, free cash flow in the first half of the year was $1.29 billion, and we're on track to achieve our upwardly revised free cash flow guidance for the year.

Through the first two quarters of 2025, we returned $669 million to shareholders in dividends and allocated $378 million to solid waste acquisitions. Our leverage ratio at the end of the quarter was 3.5 times. We remain focused on quickly getting back to targeted leverage levels through a combination of earnings growth and debt reduction, and we currently project we will achieve our target in the first half of 2026. With half of 2025 complete and confidence in our continued ability to deliver on strategic priorities, we're confirming and updating our 2025 guidance. We've always said that operating EBITDA and free cash flow are the two best measures of performance, and we're positioned to deliver results that meet or exceed our initial guidance for each of these measures in 2025.

We're affirming the midpoint of operating EBITDA guidance of $7.55 billion and increasing our expectations for 2025 free cash flow to between $2.8 billion and $2.9 billion. Revenue for the year will be about 1% below our initial expectations due to a couple of factors outside of our control: recycled commodity prices and the harsh winter weather of the first quarter. Our team's focus on optimizing what we control, delivering on our top strategic priorities, and reducing our cost to serve positioned us to overcome this small revenue headwind and deliver more than 15% EBITDA growth in the year. Our strong collection and disposal operating expense margin, SG&A synergy capture in the healthcare solutions business at the high end of our initial outlook, and lower recycled commodity prices are expected to position us to generate even stronger operating EBITDA margins in 2025 than we initially expected.

We are also increasing our full-year expectations for operating EBITDA margin by 40 basis points at the midpoint. We're pleased with our performance in the first half of the year, which positions us to achieve another year of strong earnings, margin, and cash flow growth. In closing, I want to extend my appreciation to the entire WM team. The strength of our results is a direct reflection of their commitment to our customers and our community, and it's their continued focus that positions us for success throughout the rest of the year. With that, Livia, let's open the line for questions.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. To answer questions at this time, you will need to press Star 11 on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, simply press Star 11 again. The same line will be compiled here on your roster. Our first question coming from the lineup, Bryan Burgmeier with Citi, your line is now open.

Bryan Burgmeier (Equity Research Analyst)

Good morning. Thank you for taking the questions. One for you, Devina, just kind of thinking about the cadence in the back half of the year. Last year, we talked about WM maybe striving for a 31% peak margin in 3Q. Is that sort of back on the table for this year, or should we think about margins being maybe closer to flattish year-on-year, similar to 2Q? I know the Stericycle synergies are going to continue to ramp, so just trying to think about that cadence in 3Q and 4Q.

Devina Rankin (EVP and CFO)

Yeah, it's a great question. What I would say is that when you normalize for the alternative fuel tax credits, margin expansion was 120 basis points in the first half in the legacy business, and that exceeds what we were expecting. We've always talked about 50-100 basis points of margin expansion in collection and disposal being the target, and to have exceeded that in the first half of the year really makes us bullish about margins for the back half of the year in the collection and disposal business. We're projecting that that will be about 110 basis points for the full year, and some of that has to do with the landfill volume impact in 2Q that doesn't repeat in the second half.

In terms of the specific margins, it's really important to focus in on the fact that the healthcare solutions business had a 140 basis point headwind to consolidated margins in the quarter. We think that that normalizes and starts to reduce as we ramp the synergy contributions to the business, as well as just the base business performance, which we are still optimistic about. All in all, I would say we're going to have less pressure from the healthcare solutions business in the second half of the year than in the first half of the year by probably 10-20 basis points, and then the collection and disposal business will be about 10 basis points less in the back half of the year than it was in the first half of the year.

Bryan Burgmeier (Equity Research Analyst)

Got it. Got it. Appreciate that detail. Maybe just a follow-up on your volume expectations for the year. Are we still kind of maybe looking in the range of 50 basis points growth year-on-year? I know 1Q was kind of weak, but 2Q had kind of a benefit from the wildfire cleanup, but you also shed a contract, and underlying construction activity probably is not great. Just curious what your updated expectations are there. Thank you. I'll turn it over.

Jim Fish (CEO)

Yeah, Brian, I think you're right. I mentioned that in my prepared remarks. There was a little bit of the headwind in Q1, and then obviously some of the landfill volumes in Q2, and then the one franchise agreement I mentioned in my prepared remarks. Netting that all out, we said between 0.25 and 0.75, so your number of 0.5 is right in the middle of where we expect to be.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. Our next question coming from the lineup, Toni Kaplan with Morgan Stanley, your line is now open.

Toni Kaplan (Executive Director, Equity Research Lead Analyst)

Thanks so much. I wanted to ask about volume as well. Really strong performance in the quarter. I know you called out wildfires, but outside of that. Maybe could you just give some incremental color on the strengths in volume that you're seeing? I know you mentioned on the flip side, the large RESI loss maybe sounded perhaps like a planned strategic exit. Just any more color on that loss as well.

Jim Fish (CEO)

Yeah, I'll let John touch on the RESI piece. I will tell you that the volume was encouraging for us. When you look at June, being the last month of the quarter, June was the strongest month of the quarter from a volume standpoint. Really kind of across the board, June was the strongest month of the quarter. Volume for the quarter was particularly strong in the MSW waste stream and C&D. When we talk about fire volume, that really was limited to our special waste waste stream, not MSW or C&D. When we look at MSW and C&D being strong, that's encouraging. When you look at the collection lines of business, we did have a bit of an impact in commercial from that contract that John will talk about.

Our roll-off industrial line of business has been weak on the volume front for quite some time, for probably a couple of years now, and it's improved pretty significantly. Still, it was negative for the quarter, but quite a bit less negative for the quarter than previous quarters. We're encouraged by that. All of that would start to tell us that 2025, I mean, first of all, we don't see a downturn in 2025. We see that the economy seems to be reasonable at this point. I wouldn't say it's a space shuttle, but it seems to be pretty reasonable. Those waste streams that are predictive of that are performing pretty well.

I think, Tony, specific on the franchise loss in Florida, which was fairly significant. To put in context, it was about 185 basis points of the volume loss in residential and about 35 basis points. You net those two out, and then you think about our commentary about us still being confident in our volume projection for the full year.

Toni Kaplan (Executive Director, Equity Research Lead Analyst)

Was that planned, or I guess what was the situation there?

Jim Fish (CEO)

What I would tell you is this particular franchise was not performing at a level we thought acceptable. So we positioned ourselves if we were going to retain it to do it at the right margins and returns, and that did not work out. I would sort of addition by subtraction, if you will.

Toni Kaplan (Executive Director, Equity Research Lead Analyst)

Yep. Understood. Just lastly, just hoping to get a little more color on the delta between core price and yield. Seemed like it widened again. Anything to call out on the yield side and how we should think about that going forward? Thanks.

Jim Fish (CEO)

When you look at core price, I mean, core price is right on track for us. Pretty much across the board, whether you look at collection or landfill. Core price was right on track. Yield was a little bit under the middle of that range, and we expected to finish under the middle of the range. The range I think we gave is 4-4.2%, and we'll probably end up in that 4% range. What that does tell you is that this is really a mixed issue between core price and yield. John's gone through a few of those kind of mixed components. We're pleased with how price performs, particularly as you look at core price.

Toni Kaplan (Executive Director, Equity Research Lead Analyst)

Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. Our next question coming from the lineup. Sabahat Khan with RBC Capital Markets, your line is now open.

Sabahat Khan (Managing Director of Global Research)

Great. Thanks. Good morning. Maybe if I could just follow up on the conversation about the residential, kind of the volume that was lost there. I think you've been on this journey to optimize the RESI business for a few years now, whether it's route optimization, trucks, getting the business at the right margin. Can you just maybe update us on where you are on the RESI improvement journey and maybe how much might be left there? Thanks.

John Morris (President and COO)

Yeah, sure. Good question. I think Jim commented a few quarters ago, we look at this business in a few different buckets to sort of what's performing at an acceptable level and then all the tranches down. We've made really good progress. About 70% of that business now is up at a margin that we see that's certainly one that we're pleased with. We've got a little bit of work to do, but the ratio of revenue that's really below that threshold now has improved a good bit. What I would tell you is we've talked about moderation in the residential losses, and I took a look at it in advance of the call. You look at about 3.7% this quarter, we think by the end of the year in 2025, that number will be somewhere south of 3, somewhere around the 2.7% range.

We are starting to hit the peak of that, and we're going to see some moderation in the back half of the year, which aligns with my earlier commentary about the margin of return improvement we're seeing in that line of business.

Sabahat Khan (Managing Director of Global Research)

Great. And then just maybe one on the EBITDA margin side. With the revenue guide update and the EBITDA margin maintained, can you just give us some of the puts and takes to get the EBITDA margin still back into that midpoint of the initial range? I'm assuming mix might have helped a little bit. Maybe if we could just get all the puts and takes on the EBITDA margin. Thank you.

Devina Rankin (EVP and CFO)

Sure. Just to clarify there, we actually had an update to reduce revenue and increase margin by 40 basis points at the midpoint. That increase of 40 basis points is about 30 basis points from collection and disposal and 10 basis points from recycling. That 10 basis points from recycling really is the commodity price impact that we have talked about because lower recycling commodity prices help the margin, particularly on the brokerage side. In terms of thinking about collection and disposal, as you mentioned, mix is a big contributor there with the landfill volume contribution exceeding our expectations slightly. Our sustainability businesses are also performing well. That has helped. Price-cost spread contributed about 25 basis points in the second quarter, which is a little above our initial expectation.

Sabahat Khan (Managing Director of Global Research)

Great. If I could just maybe squeeze in a quick one. Obviously, the industrial kind of the backdrop has been good, and I think Jim mentioned earlier it's been a drag for a few years. Maybe we could just look a little bit closely. Q2 is obviously a bit of a step down there just from a macro perspective. What are you seeing into Q3 and maybe expectations for the back half to your understanding? You're reiterating the guide, but just curious to what you're seeing on the ground level. Thanks.

Jim Fish (CEO)

All right. So talking about roll-off here, the industrial line of business, yeah, I mentioned June was the strongest volume month of the quarter. Roll-off was still negative for the month of June, but 310 basis points improved versus the second quarter and 300 basis points improved year to date. We are seeing a rebound in roll-off, kind of similar to what you just heard from John about RESI. I think you do get to a point where your year-over-year comparisons become easier, and I think we're starting to see that. At the same time, I think you actually are seeing a little bit of strength in the economy that we haven't had. We've talked about kind of an industrial recession over the last probably five or six quarters, and I think that's largely kind of dissipated. We're seeing it in roll-off and in C&D, by the way.

Our C&D was a positive 9.4%. As I mentioned, that has nothing to do with any of that fire volume. It was just 9.4%. That's been building incrementally, 4.9% last quarter, 2.6% the quarter before. We've seen C&D start to build incrementally, and that's a positive for us and a positive for the economy.

Bryan Burgmeier (Equity Research Analyst)

Thanks very much.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. Our next question coming from the lineup, Noah Kaye with Oppenheimer, your line is now open.

Noah Kaye (Senior Research Analyst)

Thank you for taking the questions. WMHS. Confident in the upper end of the $80 million-$100 million synergies capture for the year. Can you talk a little bit about what you got in the first half of the year, kind of the exit rate as we look at 4Q in terms of the run rate on synergies there, and then kind of how you square that up with the $250 million targeted over a longer period of time?

Rafa Carrasco (Senior VP, Operations)

Yeah, no, this is Rafa. I'll take a crack at that. You correctly addressed it, right? We're still targeting that upper range of $100 million. That seems to be coming in kind of pro rata evenly, maybe a little bit weighed heavily to the SG&A portion in the first half of the year. That'll continue to be the bigger contributor. If you remember when we first kind of laid out our expectations for synergies, we were going to have equal parts contributions from SG&A, from operating expense, and from internalization. Internalization is just going to start hitting in the back half of the year. SG&A has been hitting throughout the first half of the year, and then operating expense could have sort of scattered throughout.

Noah Kaye (Senior Research Analyst)

Thanks, Rafa. Just to follow up, you said this kind of coming in pro rata meaning sort of we're getting kind of growth in the run rate synergies each quarter of the year, right? The implication is that you're entering 2026 with a higher level of run rate synergies versus $100 million.

Rafa Carrasco (Senior VP, Operations)

That is correct.

Noah Kaye (Senior Research Analyst)

Should we just plus that up by 50%?

Devina Rankin (EVP and CFO)

That's a good estimate. Noah, we'll spend some more time giving you specific exit rate when we get to Q3 earnings. What I would tell you is, as Rafa mentioned, in terms of the internalization benefits really becoming more of a second half of 2025 impact, that's one of the things that will really amplify synergy capture going into 2026 from day one.

Noah Kaye (Senior Research Analyst)

Great. I want to ask a question on the sustainability side. It's great to see really the strong increase in margins in the renewable energy line of business. Maybe you can talk a little bit about expectations for margins there moving throughout the year and, in particular, kind of where you sit with contracting for perhaps even next year on the RNG optic.

Tara Hemmer (Senior VP, Chief Sustainability Officer)

Noah, as Tara Hemmer, we are really pleased with the performance of our sustainability-related businesses, and you can see that ramp very clearly in our Q2 results. I want to unpack your RNG question first. For 2025, we have 90% of our offtake locked up, and our team has done a fantastic job of selling forward. You can see what our RIN price for this quarter was, about $2.55, which is above market, and that's a direct result of us selling forward some of our RINs. Our team really does know how to contract in the marketplace. We expect margins to be similar throughout the balance of 2025 in the renewable energy business, primarily because we have 90% of our offtake locked up for this year.

As we look forward to 2026, we still are at about 30%, which is what we had outlined in investor day at roughly $26 for that contracted offtake. You have to remember, we have most of our RINs yet to sell, and we're able to tap into our fleet that we have, which is an incredible advantage for WM compared to anybody else in the marketplace. On the recycling side, despite the fact that commodity prices were down substantially year over year, you saw us drive EBITDA growth of 17%, and a lot of that has to do with our automation investments coming online. We're seeing volume growth related to those automation investments, and that clearly is us differentiating in the marketplace where we're able to add more customers in those key geographies.

Noah Kaye (Senior Research Analyst)

Great. Thanks, Tara. I'll pass it on.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. Our next question coming from the lineup, James Schumm, TD Cowen, your line is now open.

Jim Fish (CEO)

Hey, thanks, and good morning. I was wondering if you would be willing to provide the revenue split between medical waste and secure information destruction. How should we think about the longer-term EBITDA growth for WM Healthcare?

Rafa Carrasco (Senior VP, Operations)

Yeah. Jim, this is Rafa. That revenue split continues to hover right around two-thirds on the healthcare solution side and a third on the information destruction side. In terms of kind of revenue growth, we continue to look at that 5-6% as sort of a long-term aspirational growth on top line for both businesses. We think that right now, though, we're focused on the customer relationships. We're improving the quality of the revenue. As we renew agreements and we're ensuring that we prioritize the customer lifetime value right now. As I mentioned during the investor day, it's going to take a little bit of time to acclimate the customers to a more rigorous cadence of pricing, and they've not been seen or hadn't seen implemented, even though their contracts actually permitted it. I think the takeaway here is that we're very conscious about our customer relationships right now.

The initial phase, we're really focused on kind of building out our reporting suite also to adopt sort of the new WM revenue KPIs that we can then use to plan and execute long-term.

Devina Rankin (EVP and CFO)

In terms of EBITDA growth over the years, I think it's really important to note that we're still in a period where we're focused on a combination of optimizing the business and running the business and then realizing the tremendous value of synergies between the two organizations. Splitting those two becomes art versus science in some ways because they really do blend into one another. Specifically giving you a growth rate of the business right now becomes murky. What I would say is give us some time in terms of owning this business and optimizing this business to specifically give you what we think that long-term growth rate of the business is beyond 2027. I think looking to the information that we provided at investor day for 2025, 2026, and 2027 is a good benchmark for what we'll realize in the near term.

Jim Fish (CEO)

Jim, I think it's also worth—I want to mention one thing here. When we bought this business, there were some real problems with the interconnectivity of the systems, and not a surprise to anybody on this call, but whether it's Salesforce and SAP or whatever. That resulted in some issues with customer onboarding, with reporting and billing and routing, for instance. What we've done is put the right people on this and dedicated the right amount of resources to it, and we're making significant progress here on this front. That's why we're comfortable with this top-line growth that Rafa mentioned for the long term. We do have to get that ERP fixed, and we feel like we're in a good place as we make progress on that with the right people.

Once we do that, then I think you'll start to see us focus more on that top line and talk more about that top line on this call. Right now, we're talking about more of the bottom line for Stericycle because of the synergy capture.

Jim Schumm (Senior Analyst of Environmental Services and Energy Transition)

Right. Okay. Great. Thank you. And then just as a follow-up, with the top-line growth of 5-6%, how do we think about the price-volume mix within that?

John Morris (President and COO)

Yeah. Jim, long-term, as I said, I mean, the aspiration is to get to a really balanced top-line growth of 50% price, 50% volume. Is that what you were asking?

Jim Schumm (Senior Analyst of Environmental Services and Energy Transition)

Got it. Okay. Yes. Yeah. That's what I was asking. Okay. Great. Thank you very much.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. Our next question coming from the lineup, Tyler Brown with Raymond James, your line is now open.

Bryan Burgmeier (Equity Research Analyst)

Hey, good morning. Can y'all hear me?

Devina Rankin (EVP and CFO)

We can.

Jim Fish (CEO)

Yes, sir.

Tyler Brown (Associate VP)

Yeah. Hey, Jim, John. You guys mentioned lifetime customer value a couple of times in the script. I just want to understand what you're messaging there. Are you messaging that you're being a little more aggressive on price to hold churn? Are you saying that you're being a little more aggressive on price to improve lifetime economics? Am I just completely crazy, and there's just really no change? I just want to be clear on the messaging.

Jim Fish (CEO)

I cannot speak to the crazy thing. But here is what I would tell you, Tyler, about lifetime value. I mean, our focus is not related to price. Specifically, price is kind of the end result of that. I mean, our focus is on how do we differentiate ourselves versus our competition. I mentioned it kind of in the first paragraph of my prepared remarks that using technology, for example, to differentiate ourselves really helps set these customers up to be longer lifetime customers. And then price ends up being kind of a byproduct of that. I mean, you are able to—if you have a differentiated service offering, then you are able to charge more for it on the price line.

Tyler Brown (Associate VP)

Okay. Crazy seems like the right outcome. Okay. So. And then this one, again, for Jim or Rafa, and I kind of want to go back to Noah's question. And maybe I misread it, but did not you raise the 2027 Stericycle synergies to $300 million? And it sounds like some of that might be revenue cross-sell, which I surmise will be a gift that kind of keeps giving. But it also seems that there is maybe more cost opportunity. Is that correct? And then two, has there been any change in the CapEx profile of that business now that it is under your control? Are there proving to be some synergies there?

Rafa Carrasco (Senior VP, Operations)

Yeah. Tyler, maybe this is Rafa. I'll take the first part and then maybe hand it to Devina for the second part of the question. Yeah, you're correct. The $50 million on the cross-sell side, that's additive to $250 million in cost synergies primarily, and that is across the three-year horizon that we have for the synergies. I did say during investor day that those $50 million are heavily weighed towards year two and three of the horizon.

Devina Rankin (EVP and CFO)

On the capital side. I do think, Tyler, it's a good thought in terms of there being optimization opportunities between the two businesses for us to optimize their capital. I think it's important to point out that pre-acquisition, the business funded its capital largely through the P&L and that it leased its fleet. In WM, we've got the best cost of capital in the industry, and we are going to ensure that we acquire the fleet and that we have a really strong lifetime utilization approach to optimizing the fleet over the long term. Those are less complex assets and therefore less expensive, and they also have a different disposal cost to the business, which we all know the landfill capital intensity that is collection and disposal. What I would say is that long-term, we expect their capital probably to be in the 8.5% range versus our 10%-plus range.

That will be a return on invested capital benefit to the business that we anticipate over the long term.

John Morris (President and COO)

Yeah. Tyler, maybe one last thing because I think it speaks to the symbiosis between the capital deployment to the business and the synergies is when we own that fleet, we're going to be able to maintain and repair that fleet much more efficiently and effectively. We do anticipate synergies there on maintenance and repair.

Tyler Brown (Associate VP)

Okay. Okay. So 8.5 longer term, maybe it's actually hotter first and then cools off. We'll see about that. Okay. That's helpful. Then my last one here. Davina, I don't want to rehash the whole analyst day, but I do want to talk about the long-term free cash guidance because I want to just kind of make sure that I have it. I know that that free cash guide did not include bonus depreciation, but did that guidance also assume that the statutory tax rate would go back up? I'm just really trying to understand how tax policy has changed that number, basically.

Devina Rankin (EVP and CFO)

Yeah. It's a great question, Tyler. What I would tell you is that we were retaining the statutory rate in our guide, but we were not assuming the upside of bonus depreciation. The ballpark of the upside of bonus depreciation in 2027 is $200 million. We have about $120 million in 2025, and that ramps to $200 million by 2027.

Tyler Brown (Associate VP)

Okay. So the delta is the 200. Okay. All right. Very good. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. Our next question coming from the lineup, Trevor Romeo with William Blair, your line is now open.

Trevor Romeo (Research Analyst, Global Services)

Morning, everyone. Thanks for taking the questions. I just wanted to go back to, I guess, the landfill volume strength, even outside of the wildfire cleanup. Specifically, I wanted to ask about, I guess, internalization just because it was up, I think, another 120 basis points sequentially, just trying to dig in a bit more. I do not know if you had temporary volume benefits that boosted that, but it does not sound like you have done much on the medical waste side yet. I guess, what would you say about the drivers of that continuing to increase now nicely above 70, and then how much can you continue to increase it moving forward?

Jim Fish (CEO)

I think it's a great observation, Trevor. I think as Rafa mentioned, the internalization benefits are just starting to hit now, so you're not really seeing any meaningful amount in our landfill volumes. I think Jim made the comment in his prepared remarks. I mean, the MSW volume at 4.5% for the quarter and 4.1% year to date does not include any of the event work, right? I think that's worth highlighting. The internalization rate of 71% and change, which historically we were talking about that before the call was like 65%-66%, I think that really speaks to the value of the network that we've all been talking about for the last handful of years, quarter in and quarter out, because there is a level of complexity in moving this material that continues to increase.

I think the investments I mentioned in infrastructure in my prepared remarks, part of that's related to exactly what you picked up on. I think it's great momentum. I think we're going to continue to build on it. As Jim used the word differentiated, we see our post-collection network, including our T-stations and our recycling assets, etc., as all being something that's going to differentiate us over the long term.

Trevor Romeo (Research Analyst, Global Services)

Thanks, John. That's really helpful. Maybe a follow-up for Rafa, trying to keep you busy here. Just one from a human capital perspective on the healthcare solutions business. How much voluntary workforce turnover have you seen at healthcare solutions since the acquisition? Is that kind of more or less or in line with what you would have expected at this point?

Rafa Carrasco (Senior VP, Operations)

If you're talking about sort of the hourly workforce, actually, we've seen an improvement in turnover since the acquisition. I think that has a lot to do with sort of the human-centered approach to leadership that we're driving down throughout the organization. Obviously, sort of in the managerial corporate support ranks and all that, that's somewhat impacted by the attainment of some of our SG&A targets, etc. Overall, it's a good story. I think during investor day, I talked about the continued receptivity to sort of the qualitative approach and the accountability we're driving in the business. A lot of them are really eager for that. Integration into the areas that I spoke about as well, where we're going to then have a culture of ownership of the business much more at the site level.

Trevor Romeo (Research Analyst, Global Services)

Got it. All right. Thank you very much.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. Our next question coming from the lineup, Konark Gupta with Scotiabank, your line is now open.

Konark Gupta (Equity Research Analyst)

Thanks, and good morning. Just wanted to follow up on the volume side of things. The residential contract loss you talked about. I mean, I'm just wondering if there's a domino effect you would expect from these things in that market. Considering, obviously, the customer could be price-sensitive, perhaps. Do you expect any more follow-ons with this?

Jim Fish (CEO)

Oh, actually, I mentioned earlier what I've looked at. We're going to lap a handful of contracts in July and then later in the year in October, which is one of the reasons why I think we feel confident about the volume loss to moderate by the end of the year Q4. The exit rate will be sub-3%. The other comment I mentioned is worth repeating is when you look at the quality of the business we have, we've got about 70% of that revenue addressed at an EBITDA margin that's acceptable today. We've certainly shrunk the opportunity here while we're improving the overall business. I think over the next handful of quarters, as I mentioned, you're going to see moderation in the volume losses.

Konark Gupta (Equity Research Analyst)

Okay. Thanks for that.

Jim Fish (CEO)

There's a domino effect necessarily.

John Morris (President and COO)

No.

Konark Gupta (Equity Research Analyst)

Yeah.

Jim Fish (CEO)

I don't see that as, I think these are all kind of standalone contracts. This one, as John said earlier, is one that we bid at a certain price. It was not a positive for us. When it came out for RFP, we bid at a certain price. To the extent that it does not hit that price and we lose the contract, okay, as you said, John, it is kind of additioned by some trash.

John Morris (President and COO)

We really do not mention these individually, except for this one was fairly significant, and it really was what drove the difference between the historic revenue, excuse me, volume loss in residential and where we were. Again, we will see that return to normal and improve through the balance of the year.

Konark Gupta (Equity Research Analyst)

Again, I appreciate the call on that. And then just to follow up on the story, so the SG&A seems like it's tracked down further to about 20% and change. How do you see the bridge to the full $250 million synergy you expect over the next three years or two years, maybe now. From 20% to the guidance you had?

Rafa Carrasco (Senior VP, Operations)

Yeah. So again, Rafa here, Comarc. You're right. We hit, I think, 20.9% is the number that on an adjusted basis for the quarter. We're driving that number to continue to lower it and finish, hopefully, below 20% at the end of this year. The aspiration is to be at 17% at the end of the three-year horizon. If you think about that, just to kind of give you some perspective, the average in 2023 and 2024 for the legacy business was approaching 25%. What we're talking about here is a nearly 800 basis points reduction over that three-year horizon. We continue to think and be positive about the aspiration long term, beyond that three years, to lower it closer to the legacy business, that 10% or lower.

That's because by then, once we get past ERP issues, we're going to be able to leverage some of the platforms and self-service capabilities that we've leveraged for the WM business as a whole. A lot more runway there.

Konark Gupta (Equity Research Analyst)

Appreciate the time. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. Our next question coming from the lineup, Tobey Sommer with Truist, your line is now open.

Tobey Sommer (Managing Director)

Thank you very much. I wanted to ask sort of a follow-up on your investor day themes. One of them was related to the landfill advantage. Because of the useful life, when do you think that starts to manifest? How do you see the initial years impacting the company in terms of pricing and other financial impacts?

Jim Fish (CEO)

I think it's kind of manifesting itself already, which was part of my point earlier. I think that only continues. The chart we showed does show that as you get into 2025 and beyond, that landfill capacity for the industry really does start to get constrained. We're in a better position both geographically and also length of life than the rest of the industry. That's why we feel that that is a separator for us. I do think you're starting to see that already.

Tobey Sommer (Managing Director)

Is there a year in which you think that that sort of impact becomes most acute or most visible externally?

Jim Fish (CEO)

I think the—sorry, John. I forget what the one year was on the slide that showed the biggest reduction in capacity. It might have been 2030 or 2032, something like that. That may be—if I were to point to a year, and I'm not sure that it's easy to point to a year, but certainly the biggest year on the chart was kind of early 2030s.

John Morris (President and COO)

I think what I would point to is I mentioned the internalization rate kind of ticking up the last couple of years. There's a handful of markets on the West Coast, in Florida, in the Mid-Atlantic, and Northeast where we're actually moving volumes differently than we did a couple of years ago. It's because of the value of our network and, in a lot of cases, our intermodal capabilities. To Jim's point, while the peak might be 2033, we're investing in it now because it doesn't happen overnight. It's an incremental shift. That's why I think you're seeing us benefit on the volume and on the price side.

Tobey Sommer (Managing Director)

Understood. Last question for me on the WHS side. What's your current thinking about internalizing the fleet and other incremental things you can do for the business that aren't part of your synergy target presently?

Rafa Carrasco (Senior VP, Operations)

Devina kind of referenced kind of the internalization of the fleet, right? And then there's really no benefit in accelerating the payment of those leases. We would have had to basically pay full price anyway. So what we've done is kind of create a similar fleet strategy to what we have at WM Legacy Business, which is to smooth out the capital kind of intensity of that year over year. And then in the meantime, we're laying down the groundwork to be able to actually support the maintenance and repair at the local level of that fleet. That's going to start showing itself in the OpEx synergy sometimes towards the beginning of 2026.

Jim Fish (CEO)

Maybe the other place, Rafa, then—I do not know how much we have built in on this front—but if you think about real estate, I mean, all of these trucks sit on property. I look at Houston, for example, we are opening a new hauling company, a large facility that is replacing an old one here in town. That has a fair amount of open space to it. It is possible—I do not know that we have baked this in necessarily—but it is possible that you can relocate fleet from and save on real estate cost. That is not something I think we have spent a lot of time and effort on quantifying. I do think that is a second or third benefit that we could see.

Rafa Carrasco (Senior VP, Operations)

Yeah, that's fair, Jim. I think maybe just overarchingly, you can think about us beginning to put the WM way across every facility that we do consolidate. As we bring fleet forward, we're going to have that WM way approach also in maintenance and repairs.

Tobey Sommer (Managing Director)

Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. Our next question coming from the lineup, Stephanie Moore with Jefferies, your line is now open.

Stephanie Moore (Senior VP, Equity Research)

Hi, good morning. Thank you. Maybe just a follow-up to a question that was asked earlier, but as you think about maybe the puts and takes to normal seasonality in terms of the margin cadence in the second half of the year, I think there's a couple of things that we need to work through in terms of just ramping up synergies, the volume environment, and the like. To the best that you can, maybe Devina just talk through how you kind of expect the second half cadence to look in light of normal seasonality and the events of this year. Thanks.

Devina Rankin (EVP and CFO)

Sure. The way that I think you can think about it is usually we have a 70-100 basis point benefit going from first half into second half. I expect that to be slightly muted in the collection and disposal business because of landfill volumes that we have discussed. It should increase, as I mentioned earlier, on the WM Healthcare Solutions side. The drag associated with the acquisition of the business on the consolidated result should lessen. In the first half of the year, it has been about 145 basis points. We think that could improve to, call it, 125-135 basis points in the second half of the year. The recycling business, which I mentioned, you should have a 10 basis point help in the second half of the year from lower commodity prices. I think that will help you understand first half versus second half.

Jim Fish (CEO)

Davina, also the eight plants, the renewable energy plants, I mean, those are definitely margin accretive. I mean, we knew going in that these plants that we're building are pretty much backhand loaded. We still have eight plants. I think one of those might bleed into the first half, but it does not affect the EBITDA really. Eight plants that Terra is opening at the end of the year between third quarter and fourth quarter. Those will have a more so in 2026, but have a margin accretive impact.

Stephanie Moore (Senior VP, Equity Research)

Exactly. Got it. No, that's helpful. Lastly, again, clarification. If you could talk a little bit about the M&A environment in particular. Anything that you can speak to in terms of pipeline, and then just give us an update of what's embedded in the updated full year guidance based on M&A year to date. Thank you.

John Morris (President and COO)

Yeah, Stephanie, I'll address the pipeline. Jim talked and has prepared more. We've got about $500 million in for this year. We did a fairly significant-sized regional acquisition in Washington, DC last quarter. And we've done some other normal tuck-in acquisitions. We have one fairly sizable one that we're hopeful we're going to get closed probably between Q3 and Q4. As usual, we remain disciplined. To your question on pipeline, the pipeline remains strong. We've talked about last year being probably one of our strongest years, and a lot of that's carried over into this year. We feel good about where we're at at this point in the year. In terms of what's embedded, Devina, I'll let you maybe on the revenue.

Devina Rankin (EVP and CFO)

I don't have that number specifically, so. Heather, we'll get back to you.

Stephanie Moore (Senior VP, Equity Research)

Thank you, guys. Appreciate it.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. Our next question coming from the lineup, Faiza with Deutsche Bank, your line is now open.

Faiza Alwy (Managing Director of U.S. Company Research)

Yes, hi. Thank you. I wanted to follow up on the collection and disposal margins. I think you mentioned 110 basis points improvement year over year in those margins. I want to make sure I'm getting that right. That sort of suggests stronger margin growth in the back half than I would have thought considering you're saying that this was sort of the peak quarter for landfill volume. Could you talk about some of the, maybe if there's other drivers around better margin performance in the collection and disposal business?

Devina Rankin (EVP and CFO)

Sure. The collection and disposal business margin improvement was 110 basis points in the quarter. About 40 basis points of that is efficiency and price-cost spread. The remaining portion really is mix and landfill volumes in particular. That is before the impacts of the alternative fuel tax credit. The alternative fuel tax credit was a headwind to that of 30 basis points. You put all of that together, and you are at 80 basis points margin expansion for collection and disposal. I actually expect that to moderate in the second half because of the mix and landfill volume impact that I just mentioned being about 70 basis points in Q2. You will have some moderation of that into the second half. However, going from first half to second half, you normally have a 70-100 basis point improvement in collection and disposal volume just because of seasonality.

Hopefully that helps clarify what the bits and pieces are, but we are really happy because all of this pulls together to say that the traditional solid waste business is going to have 30 basis points better margin in 2025 than we expected coming into the year.

Faiza Alwy (Managing Director of U.S. Company Research)

Understood. When you initially gave the guide for 2025, you had given us a lot of color around your expectations for EBITDA for the various pieces of the business. I'm curious with the update today, just given the change in commodity prices, if you could perhaps update us on what you're expecting for EBITDA contribution from Stericycle specifically this year and maybe the sustainability projects. I think you said $270 million-$290 million previously. Any update on the other pieces would be really helpful.

Devina Rankin (EVP and CFO)

Sure. What I would tell you is that with us confirming $7.55 billion in EBITDA for the total company for the year, really the only take that we've had in the entire mix has been from the recycling part of our business. There's about a $15 million decrease expected in the EBITDA associated with commodity prices and another $10 million associated with some cost increases that we've had in that part of our business. That's really the only part of the business where there was any sort of decrease in the expectations. The increase is coming from the strength of collection and disposal and a little bit of benefit from higher-than-expected synergy realization. Going from the midpoint of $90 million to the high end of that of $100 million indicates incremental value that we're retaining.

Some of that shows up in the healthcare solutions business, but some of it also shows up in collection and disposal. I would say all of the pieces that come to the total are really in hand with the exception of the recycling business, which I mentioned at $25 million.

Faiza Alwy (Managing Director of U.S. Company Research)

All right. Thank you very much.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. I'm showing no further questions at this time. I'll now turn the call back over to Mr. Jim Fish, CEO, for any closing remarks.

Jim Fish (CEO)

Thank you so much for your questions this morning. Very good questions. We certainly look forward to next quarter and talking to you again after Q3.

Operator (participant)

This concludes today's conference. Thank you for your participation, and you may now disconnect.