NASDAQ:PSMT PriceSmart Q2 2024 Earnings Report $100.35 -0.08 (-0.08%) As of 12:34 PM Eastern This is a fair market value price provided by Polygon.io. Learn more. Earnings History PriceSmart EPS ResultsActual EPS$1.31Consensus EPS $1.24Beat/MissBeat by +$0.07One Year Ago EPS$1.25PriceSmart Revenue ResultsActual Revenue$1.29 billionExpected Revenue$1.28 billionBeat/MissBeat by +$14.31 millionYoY Revenue Growth+13.10%PriceSmart Announcement DetailsQuarterQ2 2024Date4/10/2024TimeAfter Market ClosesConference Call DateWednesday, April 10, 2024Conference Call Time12:00PM ETUpcoming EarningsPriceSmart's Q3 2025 earnings is scheduled for Wednesday, July 9, 2025, with a conference call scheduled on Thursday, July 10, 2025 at 12:00 PM ET. Check back for transcripts, audio, and key financial metrics as they become available.Conference Call ResourcesConference Call AudioConference Call TranscriptPress Release (8-K)Quarterly Report (10-Q)Earnings HistoryCompany ProfilePowered by PriceSmart Q2 2024 Earnings Call TranscriptProvided by QuartrApril 10, 2024 ShareLink copied to clipboard.There are 5 speakers on the call. Operator00:00:00Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to PriceSmart Incorporated's Earnings Release Conference Call for the Q2 of Fiscal Year 2024, which ended on February 29, 2024. After remarks from our company's representatives, Robert Price, Interim Chief Executive Officer and Michael McCleary, Chief Financial Officer, you will be given an opportunity to ask questions as time permits. As a reminder, this conference call is limited to 1 hour and is being recorded today, Wednesday, April 10, 2024. A digital replay will be available following the conclusion of today's conference call through April 17, 2024 by dialing 1-eight eighty eight-six 660-6264 for domestic callers or 1-six forty six-five seventeen 3,975 for international callers and by entering the replay access code 5,9,511. For opening remarks, I'd like to turn the call over to PriceSmart's Chief Financial Officer, Michael McCleary. Operator00:01:04Please proceed, sir. Speaker 100:01:09Thank you, operator, and welcome to PriceSmart Inc. Earnings call for the Q2 of fiscal year 2024, which ended on February 29, 2024. We will be discussing the information that we provided in our earnings press release and our 10 Q, which were both released yesterday afternoon, April 9, 2024. Also in these remarks, we refer to non GAAP financial measures. You can find a reconciliation of our non GAAP financial measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures in our earnings press release and our 10 Q. Speaker 100:01:41These documents are available on our Investor Relations website at investors. Pricemart.com, where you can also sign up for e mail alerts. As a reminder, all statements made on this conference call other than statements of historical fact are forward looking statements concerning the company's anticipated plans, revenues and related matters. Forward looking statements include, but are not limited to, statements containing the words expect, believe, plan, will, may, should, estimate and some other expressions. All forward looking statements are based on current expectations and assumptions as of today, April 10, 2024. Speaker 100:02:19These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially, including the risks detailed in the company's most recent annual report on Form 10 ks, the quarterly report on Form 10 Q filed yesterday and other filings with the SEC, which are accessible on the SEC's website at www.sec.gov. These risks may be updated from time to time. The company undertakes no obligation to update forward looking statements made during this call. Now I will turn the call over to Robert Price, PriceSmart's Interim Chief Executive Officer. Speaker 200:02:55Thank you, Michael. I want to extend my appreciation to everyone at PriceSmart for contributing so much to a very successful second quarter. I especially want to acknowledge a few of our warehouse club managers whose locations were challenged operationally because of the very high sales volumes during December. I also want to thank our merchandising teams in the U. S. Speaker 200:03:25And in our countries for their outstanding management of inventory flow during the holidays, resulting in strong sales, low markdowns and excellent inventory churn. Now, I will ask Michael to continue with his presentation. Speaker 100:03:44Thank you, Robert. We had a strong second quarter as both total revenues and net merchandise sales reached almost $1,300,000,000 During the first half of our fiscal year, total revenues and net merchandise sales reached almost $2,500,000,000 and $2,400,000,000 respectively. During the 2nd quarter, net merchandise sales increased by 13% or 9% in constant currency and comparable net merchandise sales increased 8.8% or 5.2% in constant currency. For the first half of the fiscal year, net merchandise sales increased by 11.9% or 8% in constant currency and comparable net merchandise sales increased by 8.4% or 4.7% in constant currency. By segment, in Central America, where we had 30 clubs at quarter end, net merchandise sales increased 12.4% or 8.8% in constant currency with an 8.1% increase in comparable net merchandise sales or 4.6% in constant currency. Speaker 100:04:42All of our markets in Central America had positive comparable net merchandise sales growth. Our Central America segment contributed approximately 500 basis points of positive impact to the growth in consolidated comparable net merchandise sales for the quarter. We opened our 6th warehouse club in Guatemala in November 2023 and our 4th warehouse club in El Salvador in February 2024. In the Caribbean, where we had 14 clubs at quarter end, net merchandise sales increased 7.2% or 8.9% in constant currency, and comparable net merchandise sales increased 6.3% or 8% in constant currency. All of our markets in this segment had positive comparable net merchandise sales growth. Speaker 100:05:24Our Caribbean region contributed approximately 180 basis points of positive impact to the growth in consolidated comparable net merchandise sales for the Q2. In Colombia, where we had 10 clubs opened at the end of our Q2, net merchandise sales increased 34.5% or 11% in constant currency and comparable net merchandise sales increased 20.7%, but decreased 40 basis points in constant currency. Columbia contributed approximately 200 basis points of positive impact to the growth in consolidated comparable net merchandise sales for the quarter. In terms of merchandise categories, when comparing our 2nd quarter sales to the same period in the prior year, our foods category grew approximately 7%, our non foods category increased approximately 13%, our food services and bakery categories increased approximately 24% and our health services including optical, audiology and pharmacy increased approximately 48%. Membership accounts grew 5% versus the prior year to almost 1,900,000 accounts with a strong 12 month renewal rate of 88.3% at the end of our 2nd quarter. Speaker 100:06:33Membership income for the Q2 was $18,500,000 an increase of 14.6% over the same period last year. In the 1st 6 months of fiscal year 2024, we raised the annual membership fee for 2 cards by $5 for all membership types in both markets. Platinum membership accounts were 9.6 percent of our total membership base as of the end of our 2nd quarter, an increase from 8.2% as of the end of our prior year Q2. Total gross margin for the Q2 of fiscal year 2024 as a percentage of net merchandise sales decreased 30 basis points to 15.7% versus 16% in the Q2 of fiscal year 2023. The 30 basis point decrease in rate was primarily due to the removal of a COVID premium from merchandise pricing and a reduction in liquidity premiums for items sold in Trinidad. Speaker 100:07:26Total gross margin increased $19,700,000 or approximately 11% versus the same quarter of the prior fiscal year. Total revenue margins decreased 20 basis points to 17.1% of total revenue when compared to the same period last year, primarily due to the decrease in total gross margin as a percent of net merchandise sales. During the Q2, our average sales ticket grew by 2.7% and transactions grew 10% versus the same period in the prior year. For the 6 month period, our average ticket grew by 2.5% and transactions grew 9.1% versus the same prior year period. The average price per item increased approximately 3.9% year over year with average items per basket decreasing approximately 1.4% compared to the same period of the prior year. Speaker 100:08:15Total SG and A expenses decreased to 12.2 percent of total revenues for the Q2 of fiscal year 2024 compared to 12.6% for the Q2 of fiscal year 2023. This 40 basis point decrease is largely due to $7,700,000 of separation costs associated with the Chief Executive Officer departure recorded in the prior year period. General and administrative expenses increased 3% of total revenues for the Q2 of fiscal year 2024 compared to 2.8% for the Q2 of fiscal 2023. The 20 basis point increase is primarily due to increased compensation costs and travel along with certain non recurring professional fees. Following our Q2 purchase of our formerly leased Via Brazil Club in Panama, we expect annualized after tax savings of approximately $1,100,000 from reduced rent and depreciation due to the longer useful lives expected from this property as a result of its acquisition. Speaker 100:09:12However, this will initially be largely offset by approximately $1,000,000 in related annualized after tax financing costs. Operating income for the quarter increased 18.2% from the same period last year to CAD 63,600,000 Operating income for the 1st 6 months of fiscal year 2024 increased 11.4% from the same period last year to CAD 121,800,000 In the Q2 of fiscal year 2024, we recorded a $7,100,000 net loss in total other expense compared to a $6,200,000 net loss in the same period last year. This increase is primarily due to increased foreign currency revaluation losses of CAD1,200,000 which were primarily related to the impact of the strengthening of the Costa Rica cologne on our U. S. Dollar cash balances and an increase in transaction costs for conversion of currencies of $400,000 These expenses were partially offset by higher interest income of $1,300,000 from significantly more investments of surplus cash at higher yields. Speaker 100:10:16Our effective tax rate for the Q2 of fiscal 2024 came in lower than last year at 30.5% versus 34% a year ago. The decrease in the effective tax rate is primarily due to non recurrence of the separation costs associated with the CEO departure in the prior year and the discrete impacts related to foreign currency transactions during the quarter. On a go forward basis, we estimate an annualized effective tax rate of about 31% to 32%. Net income for the Q2 of fiscal year 2024 was $39,300,000 or $1.31 per diluted share compared to $31,300,000 or $1.02 per diluted share in the Q2 of fiscal 2023. Net income for the 1st 6 months of fiscal 2024 was $77,300,000 or $2.54 per diluted share compared to $64,300,000 or $2.07 per diluted share in the comparable prior year period. Speaker 100:11:13Adjusted net income for the Q2 of fiscal 2024 was $39,300,000 or an adjusted $1.31 per diluted share compared to adjusted net income of $38,500,000 or an adjusted $1.25 per diluted share in the comparable prior year period. Adjusted EBITDA for the Q2 of fiscal 2024 was $84,100,000 compared to $79,400,000 in the same period last year. Adjusted net income for the 1st 6 months of fiscal year 2024 was $77,300,000 or an adjusted $2.54 per diluted share compared to adjusted net income of $73,600,000 or an adjusted $2.37 per diluted share in the comparable prior year period. Adjusted EBITDA for the 1st 6 months of fiscal 2024 was $161,900,000 compared to $154,600,000 in the same period last year. Moving on to our strong balance sheet. Speaker 100:12:12We ended the quarter with cash, cash equivalents and restricted cash totaling $182,600,000 From a cash flow perspective, net cash provided by operating activities totaled $127,700,000 for the 1st 6 months of fiscal year 2024 compared to $116,700,000 for the same prior year period. Shifts in working capital generated from changes in our merchandise inventory and accounts payable positions for the 1st 6 months of the fiscal year contributed $8,700,000 of additional cash flow compared to the same prior year period. Net cash used in investing activities increased by $9,200,000 for the first half of fiscal 2024 compared to the same prior year period, primarily as a result of an increase in purchases of short term investments and additions to property and equipment. Net cash used in financing activities during the 1st 6 months increased by $89,300,000 primarily from the result of the share buyback program we completed during the quarter and lower proceeds from long term bank borrowings compared to the same period a year ago. When reviewing our cash balances, it is important to note that as of the end of our Q2, we had $63,800,000 of cash, cash equivalents and short term investments denominated in local currency in Trinidad and Honduras, which we cannot readily convert to U. Speaker 100:13:30S. Dollars. On February 1, 2024, the company's Board of Directors declared its annual cash dividend in the total amount of $1.16 per share, with $0.58 paid in February and $0.58 payable in August. This represents a 26% increase over last year's $0.92 per share dividend. The decision to increase the annual dividend by 26% by the Board of Directors reflects the Board's confidence in PriceSmart and the strength of its cash generating activities. Speaker 100:14:01Additionally, the company has decided to distribute excess cash to stockholders in the form of a special dividend. On April 3, 2024, our Board of Directors declared a one time $1 per share special dividend payable on April 30, 2024 to stockholders of record on April 19, 2024. Now on to our growth drivers. Starting with real estate, we are thrilled to have opened our Santa Ana Club in El Salvador on February 15, 2024. The Santa Ana Club is our 4th club in El Salvador and our 54th warehouse club overall. Speaker 100:14:34We have also purchased land and plan to open our 9th warehouse club in Costa Rica located in Cartagro, approximately 10 miles east from the nearest clubs in the Greater San Jose Metropolitan area. This club will be built on a 6 acre property and is anticipated to open in early 2025. Once this new club is open, we will operate 55 warehouse clubs in total. Additionally, we are currently remodeling several of our high volume clubs, which are in San Pedro Sur Honduras, Santoro Dominican Republic and Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, as well as expanding one of our clubs in San Salvador, El Salvador. As mentioned previously, we have completed the purchase of our Via Brazil Club in Panama from our previous landlord. Speaker 100:15:15Our Via Brazil Club is the club with the highest sales volume in our Panama market, and we are very happy that through this acquisition we can lock in long term certainty as to our access to this key location in Panama. Finally, we continue to actively seek ways to improve our distribution infrastructure to better serve our members, lower the net landed cost of our merchandise and enhance operating efficiencies. In this respect, we have made significant progress towards consolidating deliveries of merchandise purchased from local vendors directly to our new distribution center in Panama. We have also recently signed a lease agreement for a distribution center in Guatemala and approved plans to build a distribution center in Trinidad on lease plan. Turning now to membership site. Speaker 100:16:00As we've highlighted in previous calls, our private label members selection brand continues to be a significant area of focus based on the great value it brings to our members. During the 1st 6 months of fiscal year 2024, our private label sales represented 27.1 percent of our total net merchandise sales. That's up 120 basis points from 25.9% in the comparable period of fiscal year 2023. We also continue to focus on health services. We currently have 52 locations with optical centers and expect to have 53 open by the end of our fiscal year. Speaker 100:16:35Our optical program provides 4 free eye exams with every membership and we performed over 38,000 eye exams during the quarter. We currently have pharmacy centers in all 8 of our warehouse clubs in Costa Rica and 3 warehouse clubs in Panama. We expect to open 2 more pharmacies in Panama and 4 in Guatemala during the fiscal year. With respect to Audiology Centers, we currently have 26 centers open. We expect to open 2 additional centers in Panama and 1 center in each of Jamaica and Trinidad in fiscal year 2024. Speaker 100:17:09Optical services are also an important component of our contributions to the communities in which our clubs are located. In partnership with Price Philanthropy's Opendiary Crecera vision program, Price Smart optometrists perform eye exams and Price Philanthropies purchases the glasses from our optical centers. We recently expanded our Opendery Crecera Vision program to Guatemala, where 40% of the children who participated in this program needed an eye exam and 90% of the children who received glasses received them for the first time. Our annual Juntos Pro la Educacion or Together for Education campaign is an important funding source for the Aprendare Recercera program. More than that is a prime example of PriceSmart, its members and the PriceSmart and Price Philanthropies Foundation coming together to support education. Speaker 100:17:55Our most recent campaign took place in the fall of 2023 and set a new record of more than $2,200,000 in donations collected from members both in club and through pricemart.com. Price Philanthropies Foundation matched these donations dollar for dollar up to a maximum amount for each country yielding an additional $850,000 bringing the grand total raised to nearly $3,100,000 Our third growth driver is to drive sales by providing omni channel shopping options for our members. These sales are primarily generated through pricemart.com and our mobile app and are complemented by other third party last mile delivery services. During the Q2, total net merchandise sales through digital channels increased 31% versus the same period in the prior year and represented a record $63,700,000 or 5.1 percent of total net merchandise sales. Total orders placed directly on pricemart.com and our app increased 26.6 percent and the average transaction value increased 1.8% versus the prior year period. Speaker 100:18:59As of February 29, 2024, approximately 64% of our members had created an online profile with price smart.com or our app, and 16.5% of our total membership base has made a purchase on pricemod.com or our app. We believe that there are significant growth opportunities in our digital channel, and we will continue to invest in this part of our business to provide an enhanced omni channel experience and additional value to our members. Additionally, we are implementing a new tool called RELX to modernize our supply chain management. We started this project in 2023 and it should be completed in 2025. Reedex is positioned to become an integral part of our strategy to enhance our inventory planning process, making it more efficient by making our operations data driven, autonomous and adaptive. Speaker 100:19:48This partnership with RELAX is crucial as it resonates with our strategy to grow sales by offering high quality goods at competitive prices driven through supply chain efficiency and back office productivity. We plan to use RELX to automate and increase the accuracy of our inventory forecasting, as well as for pricing and promotion management. Switching gears slightly, environmental and social responsibility continues to be an important component of how we approach our business and add value to the membership. We do our best to incorporate practices that use natural resources responsibly. Just to give a quick update, we currently have 7 recycling centers open with 2 in El Salvador, 3 in Honduras and 2 in Guatemala. Speaker 100:20:31On average, around £15,000 of recycled material is being collected monthly in each location. We are on track to open 4 recycling centers in the Dominican Republic and 1 more in Guatemala by the end of fiscal year 2024. You can find more information about PriceSmart's philanthropic and corporate social responsibility efforts on pricemart.org. Looking forward a little into our current Q3, our comparable net merchandise sales for the 4 weeks ended March 31, 2024 were up 5.6% or 2.9% in constant currency, with both Costa Rica and Colombia contributing positively from a foreign currency exchange rate perspective. It is important to note that this year on year comparison is impacted by the timing of the Easter holiday period. Speaker 100:21:13This year, Good Friday, when we close all our clubs and Easter Sunday, when we close our clubs in Aruba and Arvitos, fell in March, whereas last year they fell in April. In closing, we are proud of another successful quarter, a great start to our Q3 and our team members who make it all possible. Thank you for joining our call today. I will now turn the call over to the operator to take your questions. Operator, you may now start taking our caller's questions. Operator00:21:41Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, we will now begin the question and answer Your first question comes from Mr. John Branch from Oppenheimer. Please go ahead. Speaker 300:22:39Robert, you mentioned in your opening comments that obviously December was a pretty good month, but you said there were some challenges in meeting that demand. Can you speak a little bit about those challenges and did it impact the did you incur some additional costs? Speaker 200:23:01Thanks for the question. I maybe didn't explain it very well. We have some locations. First of all, we did volumes in certain locations that really went beyond anything I think I would have thought they were capable of doing just based on the physical limitations of some of our locations. I really was trying to complement managers who were under tremendous stress just to move that volume through those locations on various days during December. Speaker 200:23:42I don't think per se that it resulted in additional expense, but I think it was very, very tough on our management team in a number of places just to deal with what was the throughput in sales and inventory on hand. But I think they handle it really well and the expenses seem to be well in line. But it was tough. I mean, I don't know if I personally had to run one of those locations if I could do it. Speaker 300:24:18Okay. Thank you. Turning to Colombia, the Colombia, the currency has strengthened there. Your comp store sales there were flattish in the quarter. It seems like the impression I'm getting is the overall market in Colombia is getting better. Speaker 300:24:41Can you speak maybe a little bit about the Colombian market and how you see it generally speaking in terms of the economic environment? Speaker 200:24:54I think that politically as well as financially, there's been a lot of improvements in Colombia in the last year. And we're certainly reaping the benefits of those improvements. From my knowledge, I haven't been in Colombia in a while and I'm planning a trip. I think we're running our business well. And I think our reputation there is really, really good from what we hear and the way our members seem to feel about us. Speaker 200:25:29There's been a lot of turnaround in Colombia and I think the other thing to mention in Colombia is that we made a decision probably close to a year ago to become to reduce margins a bit and to change our pack sizes on some of the items that just had become too expensive under the large tax sizes. And I think both of those actions have really strengthened our market position. I think we're in a pretty good place in Colombia. Unfortunately, it's still challenging to find locations in the big cities, Medellin and Bogota and we continue to work on that because we think there's more opportunity. I feel pretty good about Columbia. Speaker 200:26:20I think we've got a good management team there. We have been buying there and things are really improving. Speaker 300:26:28Okay. And then lastly, Robert and Michael, the new Costa Rican store, I think you noted it was 10 miles from the nearest store. When you open a new store in Colombia and other places, there is a little bit of cannibalization. Would you expect anything more or less from this new store opening versus what you've seen in the past? Speaker 200:26:54As far as the transfer of sales, there will be some transfer of sales. And I think it will be more or less the way we would have had another Costa Rica's locations where we're opening not too far away. On the other hand, our track record in Costa Rica has been that we backfill pretty quickly in terms of recovering those sales that had been transferred. And I think overall, because we're building our sales volume and market position in Costa Rica. We're going to buy better, distribute better and probably overall it's going to help all the clubs just to have that extra club in the market. Operator00:27:45Your next question comes from the line of Mr. Hector Maya from Scotiabank. Please go ahead. Speaker 400:27:53Hi. Thank you, Robert and Michael, for taking my questions. The first one would be regarding the kind of wide potential that you see for new openings down the road. And aside from Colombia, where else would you be seeing the most opportunity? And what would be the long term potential for countries like El Salvador, Guatemala or others in the Caribbean like Jamaica where potentially minimum wages could be a factor? Speaker 200:28:22I mean, to make sure I understand your question, are you was your question about opportunity in countries other than Colombia? Speaker 400:28:32Yes. Aside from Colombia in markets like El Salvador, Guatemala or even Jamaica in the Caribbean, the wide space potential that you see there? Speaker 200:28:46I think that without getting too specific, there continue to be opportunities in some of those countries and we're we continue to identify the right properties to take advantage of those opportunities. I don't want to be too specific. I think I could say regarding Jamaica, however you want to say it, that it's been a good market for us and we think there is additional opportunity there. And I'd say the same thing about Guatemala and maybe El Salvador as well. I mean, I think also I feel really pretty good about those regions because with the change in our approach to sourcing in terms of the big picture macro moving more production out of Asia to the region we're in, I feel that there is a very positive sign for the region and also for us. Speaker 200:29:58That would include all the countries you mentioned. Speaker 400:30:06Got it. Thank you. Very, very clear. And could you also please talk a bit more about the increase in general and administrative expenses with compensation and travel costs? And if you could give us also a sense of what happened in the non recurring expenses there too? Speaker 100:30:28Hi, Hector. Yes, just basically overall, we're continuing to review our compensation levels at all levels of management. And so there's some year on year increases there. And the non recurring expenses were just some professional fees we incurred from some special projects that won't have an impact going forward. So mean, G and A in general, remember, we're investing in IT and we're investing in the management team. Speaker 100:30:56So, it's going to fluctuate quarter on quarter based on sales increases and where we're going and it can fluctuate up and down a little bit as a percentage of sales. Obviously, our goal in the long run is to leverage G and A as a percentage of sales because that helps us deliver better value to our member. Speaker 200:31:13One thing I'd add to that though, which certainly I agree with everything Michael has said. I think the real fundamental nature of the club business is to continue to find ways to be more efficient in the delivery of merchandise the ultimate consumer. And Michael had mentioned, I believe that we had recently opened a Panama distribution center. We are soon to open a Guatemala distribution center and we're building a distribution center for Trinidad. All those are very strategic decisions that we believe can leverage and improve expense ratios and inventory turns because of the fact that we can flow merchandise in a much more efficient way we believe and we've kind of proven it in Costa Rica where we already have a distribution center. Speaker 200:32:16And those distribution centers have many other possibilities beyond just the flow of merchandise to our clubs as we get more into online shopping and dealing more with business to business members, we think these distribution centers will become quite strategic. The way I think of the distribution center is going back to the early days of Price Club in 1976. In a sense, we were a distribution center. And so, in a way, it's going back to our roots and especially as we focus more and more on the business to business segment in our business and our operation. Speaker 400:33:10Excellent. Thank you very much. That was a very, very good color. And on the last one too, if you could also share some further details on the performance seen in the other income and expenses, Speaker 100:33:32and I called out 2 things in particular. We have this unique situation where we're sitting on a lot. I think we've talked about this in prior calls, we're sitting on a good amount of cash in U. S. Dollars that we convert into U. Speaker 100:33:44S. Dollars from local currency. We hold that in our bank accounts in Costa Rica and strengthening of the colon has had the unusual effects of hitting us from a P and L perspective. So that's essentially unrealized losses on our U. S. Speaker 100:33:59Dollar balances. We're a U. S. Dollar based company in the whole and we think from a long term perspective, it's the right thing to do to transfer our convert our local currency balances into U. S. Speaker 100:34:12Dollars and that's what we generally do in all of our markets as long as we're able to. And we generally hold that because then we can redeploy it easier within the company. So we have some unusual fluctuations from foreign currency sometimes in some of the countries. In the past, you may recall, we've had similar issues with Jamaica. So hopefully that's a transitional issue. Speaker 100:34:32And then I also mentioned the that we continue to pay extra cost to convert the illiquid currencies that we have such as Honduras and Trinidad into U. S. Dollars and that's also impacting that line. Speaker 400:34:51Got it. I understand. Thank you. Thank you very much, Robert and Michael for taking my questions. Thank you. Speaker 100:34:58Thank you, Hector. Operator00:35:03Your next question comes from the line of Jon Braatz from Oppenheimer. Please go ahead. Speaker 300:35:09Michael, just a follow-up. Given the currency issues in Honduras, have you implemented any pricing actions in that country similar to what you did in Trinidad? Speaker 100:35:24We've taken some pricing actions in Honduras, and that's something that we're continuing to review. So, yes, obviously, our goal is to hopefully be able to pay for those extra any extra costs we're incurring in countries where the currencies are really liquid. It may not kind of like the I mentioned for Costa Rica, it may not always match on an accounting basis, but from an economic where the line was up. Speaker 200:35:58I'd add one thing too. This is very top of the agenda for Michael and myself. We've spent a lot of time talking about Honduras and trying to identify a variety of ways to balance the challenge we have with illiquidity, but also making sure that don't harm the business long term. Right. Balancing act and I think we're on top of it, but this is part of the nature of where we do business. Speaker 200:36:35These are countries that have a lot of challenges. We've gotten pretty good at it, but the reality is we go through these periods where it costs us money, reserve a business, pretty good business. And so we're looking at a lot of alternatives for how to deal with the Honduras situation, but it is a significant challenge. And we're on it. Speaker 300:37:03Okay, good. And then lastly, Michael, are all the membership increases fully in place as of this time or do you have some more to go? Speaker 100:37:13Most of them are in place, substantially all of them, but not quite all of them. We haven't given any details about countries or volume, but most of them are. Speaker 300:37:21Okay. All right. Thank you. Speaker 100:37:24Okay. Operator00:37:28There are no further questions at this time. I'll hand the call over back to Michael McCleary. Please go ahead. Speaker 100:37:35Okay. Thank you, everybody. That wraps up our call today. I hope you all have a great day. Bye.Read morePowered by Conference Call Audio Live Call not available Earnings Conference CallPriceSmart Q2 202400:00 / 00:00Speed:1x1.25x1.5x2x Earnings DocumentsPress Release(8-K)Quarterly report(10-Q) PriceSmart Earnings HeadlinesPriceSmart Announces the Release of its Fiscal Year 2024 Sustainability Report Highlighting Key ...April 30, 2025 | gurufocus.comPriceSmart Announces the Release of its Fiscal Year 2024 Sustainability Report Highlighting Key ...April 30, 2025 | gurufocus.comMost traders are panicking. We’re cashing inMost traders are panicking right now. Bitcoin’s dropping. Altcoins are bleeding. The stock market’s a mess. The news is screaming fear. But while most traders watch their portfolios tank…May 6, 2025 | Crypto Swap Profits (Ad)PriceSmart Announces the Release of its Fiscal Year 2024 Sustainability Report Highlighting Key Achievements on SustainabilityApril 30, 2025 | investing.comPriceSmart Announces the Release of its Fiscal Year 2024 Sustainability Report Highlighting Key Achievements on SustainabilityApril 30, 2025 | prnewswire.comPriceSmart, Inc. (PSMT): A Bull Case TheoryApril 28, 2025 | insidermonkey.comSee More PriceSmart Headlines Get Earnings Announcements in your inboxWant to stay updated on the latest earnings announcements and upcoming reports for companies like PriceSmart? Sign up for Earnings360's daily newsletter to receive timely earnings updates on PriceSmart and other key companies, straight to your email. Email Address About PriceSmartPriceSmart (NASDAQ:PSMT) owns and operates U.S.-style membership shopping warehouse clubs in the United States, Central America, the Caribbean, and Colombia. The company provides basic and private label consumer products under the Member's Selection brand, including groceries, cleaning supplies, health and beauty aids, meat, produce, deli, seafood, and poultry. It offers electronics, large and small appliances, automotive, hardware, sporting goods, seasonal products, clothing, domestics, and home furnishing products. In addition, the company offers food and bakery services, as well as health services, such as optical, audiology, and pharmacy. Further, it operates an e-commerce platform for online ordering, curbside pickup, and delivery services. PriceSmart, Inc. was incorporated in 1994 and is headquartered in San Diego, California.View PriceSmart ProfileRead more More Earnings Resources from MarketBeat Earnings Tools Today's Earnings Tomorrow's Earnings Next Week's Earnings Upcoming Earnings Calls Earnings Newsletter Earnings Call Transcripts Earnings Beats & Misses Corporate Guidance Earnings Screener Earnings By Country U.S. Earnings Reports Canadian Earnings Reports U.K. Earnings Reports Latest Articles Palantir Stock Drops Despite Stellar Earnings: What's Next?Is Reddit Stock a Buy, Sell, or Hold After Earnings Release?Warning or Opportunity After Super Micro Computer's EarningsAmazon Earnings: 2 Reasons to Love It, 1 Reason to Be CautiousRocket Lab Braces for Q1 Earnings Amid Soaring ExpectationsMeta Takes A Bow With Q1 Earnings - Watch For Tariff Impact in Q2Palantir Earnings: 1 Bullish Signal and 1 Area of Concern Upcoming Earnings ARM (5/7/2025)AppLovin (5/7/2025)Fortinet (5/7/2025)MercadoLibre (5/7/2025)Cencora (5/7/2025)Carvana (5/7/2025)Walt Disney (5/7/2025)Emerson Electric (5/7/2025)Johnson Controls International (5/7/2025)Lloyds Banking Group (5/7/2025) Get 30 Days of MarketBeat All Access for Free Sign up for MarketBeat All Access to gain access to MarketBeat's full suite of research tools. 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There are 5 speakers on the call. Operator00:00:00Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to PriceSmart Incorporated's Earnings Release Conference Call for the Q2 of Fiscal Year 2024, which ended on February 29, 2024. After remarks from our company's representatives, Robert Price, Interim Chief Executive Officer and Michael McCleary, Chief Financial Officer, you will be given an opportunity to ask questions as time permits. As a reminder, this conference call is limited to 1 hour and is being recorded today, Wednesday, April 10, 2024. A digital replay will be available following the conclusion of today's conference call through April 17, 2024 by dialing 1-eight eighty eight-six 660-6264 for domestic callers or 1-six forty six-five seventeen 3,975 for international callers and by entering the replay access code 5,9,511. For opening remarks, I'd like to turn the call over to PriceSmart's Chief Financial Officer, Michael McCleary. Operator00:01:04Please proceed, sir. Speaker 100:01:09Thank you, operator, and welcome to PriceSmart Inc. Earnings call for the Q2 of fiscal year 2024, which ended on February 29, 2024. We will be discussing the information that we provided in our earnings press release and our 10 Q, which were both released yesterday afternoon, April 9, 2024. Also in these remarks, we refer to non GAAP financial measures. You can find a reconciliation of our non GAAP financial measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures in our earnings press release and our 10 Q. Speaker 100:01:41These documents are available on our Investor Relations website at investors. Pricemart.com, where you can also sign up for e mail alerts. As a reminder, all statements made on this conference call other than statements of historical fact are forward looking statements concerning the company's anticipated plans, revenues and related matters. Forward looking statements include, but are not limited to, statements containing the words expect, believe, plan, will, may, should, estimate and some other expressions. All forward looking statements are based on current expectations and assumptions as of today, April 10, 2024. Speaker 100:02:19These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially, including the risks detailed in the company's most recent annual report on Form 10 ks, the quarterly report on Form 10 Q filed yesterday and other filings with the SEC, which are accessible on the SEC's website at www.sec.gov. These risks may be updated from time to time. The company undertakes no obligation to update forward looking statements made during this call. Now I will turn the call over to Robert Price, PriceSmart's Interim Chief Executive Officer. Speaker 200:02:55Thank you, Michael. I want to extend my appreciation to everyone at PriceSmart for contributing so much to a very successful second quarter. I especially want to acknowledge a few of our warehouse club managers whose locations were challenged operationally because of the very high sales volumes during December. I also want to thank our merchandising teams in the U. S. Speaker 200:03:25And in our countries for their outstanding management of inventory flow during the holidays, resulting in strong sales, low markdowns and excellent inventory churn. Now, I will ask Michael to continue with his presentation. Speaker 100:03:44Thank you, Robert. We had a strong second quarter as both total revenues and net merchandise sales reached almost $1,300,000,000 During the first half of our fiscal year, total revenues and net merchandise sales reached almost $2,500,000,000 and $2,400,000,000 respectively. During the 2nd quarter, net merchandise sales increased by 13% or 9% in constant currency and comparable net merchandise sales increased 8.8% or 5.2% in constant currency. For the first half of the fiscal year, net merchandise sales increased by 11.9% or 8% in constant currency and comparable net merchandise sales increased by 8.4% or 4.7% in constant currency. By segment, in Central America, where we had 30 clubs at quarter end, net merchandise sales increased 12.4% or 8.8% in constant currency with an 8.1% increase in comparable net merchandise sales or 4.6% in constant currency. Speaker 100:04:42All of our markets in Central America had positive comparable net merchandise sales growth. Our Central America segment contributed approximately 500 basis points of positive impact to the growth in consolidated comparable net merchandise sales for the quarter. We opened our 6th warehouse club in Guatemala in November 2023 and our 4th warehouse club in El Salvador in February 2024. In the Caribbean, where we had 14 clubs at quarter end, net merchandise sales increased 7.2% or 8.9% in constant currency, and comparable net merchandise sales increased 6.3% or 8% in constant currency. All of our markets in this segment had positive comparable net merchandise sales growth. Speaker 100:05:24Our Caribbean region contributed approximately 180 basis points of positive impact to the growth in consolidated comparable net merchandise sales for the Q2. In Colombia, where we had 10 clubs opened at the end of our Q2, net merchandise sales increased 34.5% or 11% in constant currency and comparable net merchandise sales increased 20.7%, but decreased 40 basis points in constant currency. Columbia contributed approximately 200 basis points of positive impact to the growth in consolidated comparable net merchandise sales for the quarter. In terms of merchandise categories, when comparing our 2nd quarter sales to the same period in the prior year, our foods category grew approximately 7%, our non foods category increased approximately 13%, our food services and bakery categories increased approximately 24% and our health services including optical, audiology and pharmacy increased approximately 48%. Membership accounts grew 5% versus the prior year to almost 1,900,000 accounts with a strong 12 month renewal rate of 88.3% at the end of our 2nd quarter. Speaker 100:06:33Membership income for the Q2 was $18,500,000 an increase of 14.6% over the same period last year. In the 1st 6 months of fiscal year 2024, we raised the annual membership fee for 2 cards by $5 for all membership types in both markets. Platinum membership accounts were 9.6 percent of our total membership base as of the end of our 2nd quarter, an increase from 8.2% as of the end of our prior year Q2. Total gross margin for the Q2 of fiscal year 2024 as a percentage of net merchandise sales decreased 30 basis points to 15.7% versus 16% in the Q2 of fiscal year 2023. The 30 basis point decrease in rate was primarily due to the removal of a COVID premium from merchandise pricing and a reduction in liquidity premiums for items sold in Trinidad. Speaker 100:07:26Total gross margin increased $19,700,000 or approximately 11% versus the same quarter of the prior fiscal year. Total revenue margins decreased 20 basis points to 17.1% of total revenue when compared to the same period last year, primarily due to the decrease in total gross margin as a percent of net merchandise sales. During the Q2, our average sales ticket grew by 2.7% and transactions grew 10% versus the same period in the prior year. For the 6 month period, our average ticket grew by 2.5% and transactions grew 9.1% versus the same prior year period. The average price per item increased approximately 3.9% year over year with average items per basket decreasing approximately 1.4% compared to the same period of the prior year. Speaker 100:08:15Total SG and A expenses decreased to 12.2 percent of total revenues for the Q2 of fiscal year 2024 compared to 12.6% for the Q2 of fiscal year 2023. This 40 basis point decrease is largely due to $7,700,000 of separation costs associated with the Chief Executive Officer departure recorded in the prior year period. General and administrative expenses increased 3% of total revenues for the Q2 of fiscal year 2024 compared to 2.8% for the Q2 of fiscal 2023. The 20 basis point increase is primarily due to increased compensation costs and travel along with certain non recurring professional fees. Following our Q2 purchase of our formerly leased Via Brazil Club in Panama, we expect annualized after tax savings of approximately $1,100,000 from reduced rent and depreciation due to the longer useful lives expected from this property as a result of its acquisition. Speaker 100:09:12However, this will initially be largely offset by approximately $1,000,000 in related annualized after tax financing costs. Operating income for the quarter increased 18.2% from the same period last year to CAD 63,600,000 Operating income for the 1st 6 months of fiscal year 2024 increased 11.4% from the same period last year to CAD 121,800,000 In the Q2 of fiscal year 2024, we recorded a $7,100,000 net loss in total other expense compared to a $6,200,000 net loss in the same period last year. This increase is primarily due to increased foreign currency revaluation losses of CAD1,200,000 which were primarily related to the impact of the strengthening of the Costa Rica cologne on our U. S. Dollar cash balances and an increase in transaction costs for conversion of currencies of $400,000 These expenses were partially offset by higher interest income of $1,300,000 from significantly more investments of surplus cash at higher yields. Speaker 100:10:16Our effective tax rate for the Q2 of fiscal 2024 came in lower than last year at 30.5% versus 34% a year ago. The decrease in the effective tax rate is primarily due to non recurrence of the separation costs associated with the CEO departure in the prior year and the discrete impacts related to foreign currency transactions during the quarter. On a go forward basis, we estimate an annualized effective tax rate of about 31% to 32%. Net income for the Q2 of fiscal year 2024 was $39,300,000 or $1.31 per diluted share compared to $31,300,000 or $1.02 per diluted share in the Q2 of fiscal 2023. Net income for the 1st 6 months of fiscal 2024 was $77,300,000 or $2.54 per diluted share compared to $64,300,000 or $2.07 per diluted share in the comparable prior year period. Speaker 100:11:13Adjusted net income for the Q2 of fiscal 2024 was $39,300,000 or an adjusted $1.31 per diluted share compared to adjusted net income of $38,500,000 or an adjusted $1.25 per diluted share in the comparable prior year period. Adjusted EBITDA for the Q2 of fiscal 2024 was $84,100,000 compared to $79,400,000 in the same period last year. Adjusted net income for the 1st 6 months of fiscal year 2024 was $77,300,000 or an adjusted $2.54 per diluted share compared to adjusted net income of $73,600,000 or an adjusted $2.37 per diluted share in the comparable prior year period. Adjusted EBITDA for the 1st 6 months of fiscal 2024 was $161,900,000 compared to $154,600,000 in the same period last year. Moving on to our strong balance sheet. Speaker 100:12:12We ended the quarter with cash, cash equivalents and restricted cash totaling $182,600,000 From a cash flow perspective, net cash provided by operating activities totaled $127,700,000 for the 1st 6 months of fiscal year 2024 compared to $116,700,000 for the same prior year period. Shifts in working capital generated from changes in our merchandise inventory and accounts payable positions for the 1st 6 months of the fiscal year contributed $8,700,000 of additional cash flow compared to the same prior year period. Net cash used in investing activities increased by $9,200,000 for the first half of fiscal 2024 compared to the same prior year period, primarily as a result of an increase in purchases of short term investments and additions to property and equipment. Net cash used in financing activities during the 1st 6 months increased by $89,300,000 primarily from the result of the share buyback program we completed during the quarter and lower proceeds from long term bank borrowings compared to the same period a year ago. When reviewing our cash balances, it is important to note that as of the end of our Q2, we had $63,800,000 of cash, cash equivalents and short term investments denominated in local currency in Trinidad and Honduras, which we cannot readily convert to U. Speaker 100:13:30S. Dollars. On February 1, 2024, the company's Board of Directors declared its annual cash dividend in the total amount of $1.16 per share, with $0.58 paid in February and $0.58 payable in August. This represents a 26% increase over last year's $0.92 per share dividend. The decision to increase the annual dividend by 26% by the Board of Directors reflects the Board's confidence in PriceSmart and the strength of its cash generating activities. Speaker 100:14:01Additionally, the company has decided to distribute excess cash to stockholders in the form of a special dividend. On April 3, 2024, our Board of Directors declared a one time $1 per share special dividend payable on April 30, 2024 to stockholders of record on April 19, 2024. Now on to our growth drivers. Starting with real estate, we are thrilled to have opened our Santa Ana Club in El Salvador on February 15, 2024. The Santa Ana Club is our 4th club in El Salvador and our 54th warehouse club overall. Speaker 100:14:34We have also purchased land and plan to open our 9th warehouse club in Costa Rica located in Cartagro, approximately 10 miles east from the nearest clubs in the Greater San Jose Metropolitan area. This club will be built on a 6 acre property and is anticipated to open in early 2025. Once this new club is open, we will operate 55 warehouse clubs in total. Additionally, we are currently remodeling several of our high volume clubs, which are in San Pedro Sur Honduras, Santoro Dominican Republic and Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, as well as expanding one of our clubs in San Salvador, El Salvador. As mentioned previously, we have completed the purchase of our Via Brazil Club in Panama from our previous landlord. Speaker 100:15:15Our Via Brazil Club is the club with the highest sales volume in our Panama market, and we are very happy that through this acquisition we can lock in long term certainty as to our access to this key location in Panama. Finally, we continue to actively seek ways to improve our distribution infrastructure to better serve our members, lower the net landed cost of our merchandise and enhance operating efficiencies. In this respect, we have made significant progress towards consolidating deliveries of merchandise purchased from local vendors directly to our new distribution center in Panama. We have also recently signed a lease agreement for a distribution center in Guatemala and approved plans to build a distribution center in Trinidad on lease plan. Turning now to membership site. Speaker 100:16:00As we've highlighted in previous calls, our private label members selection brand continues to be a significant area of focus based on the great value it brings to our members. During the 1st 6 months of fiscal year 2024, our private label sales represented 27.1 percent of our total net merchandise sales. That's up 120 basis points from 25.9% in the comparable period of fiscal year 2023. We also continue to focus on health services. We currently have 52 locations with optical centers and expect to have 53 open by the end of our fiscal year. Speaker 100:16:35Our optical program provides 4 free eye exams with every membership and we performed over 38,000 eye exams during the quarter. We currently have pharmacy centers in all 8 of our warehouse clubs in Costa Rica and 3 warehouse clubs in Panama. We expect to open 2 more pharmacies in Panama and 4 in Guatemala during the fiscal year. With respect to Audiology Centers, we currently have 26 centers open. We expect to open 2 additional centers in Panama and 1 center in each of Jamaica and Trinidad in fiscal year 2024. Speaker 100:17:09Optical services are also an important component of our contributions to the communities in which our clubs are located. In partnership with Price Philanthropy's Opendiary Crecera vision program, Price Smart optometrists perform eye exams and Price Philanthropies purchases the glasses from our optical centers. We recently expanded our Opendery Crecera Vision program to Guatemala, where 40% of the children who participated in this program needed an eye exam and 90% of the children who received glasses received them for the first time. Our annual Juntos Pro la Educacion or Together for Education campaign is an important funding source for the Aprendare Recercera program. More than that is a prime example of PriceSmart, its members and the PriceSmart and Price Philanthropies Foundation coming together to support education. Speaker 100:17:55Our most recent campaign took place in the fall of 2023 and set a new record of more than $2,200,000 in donations collected from members both in club and through pricemart.com. Price Philanthropies Foundation matched these donations dollar for dollar up to a maximum amount for each country yielding an additional $850,000 bringing the grand total raised to nearly $3,100,000 Our third growth driver is to drive sales by providing omni channel shopping options for our members. These sales are primarily generated through pricemart.com and our mobile app and are complemented by other third party last mile delivery services. During the Q2, total net merchandise sales through digital channels increased 31% versus the same period in the prior year and represented a record $63,700,000 or 5.1 percent of total net merchandise sales. Total orders placed directly on pricemart.com and our app increased 26.6 percent and the average transaction value increased 1.8% versus the prior year period. Speaker 100:18:59As of February 29, 2024, approximately 64% of our members had created an online profile with price smart.com or our app, and 16.5% of our total membership base has made a purchase on pricemod.com or our app. We believe that there are significant growth opportunities in our digital channel, and we will continue to invest in this part of our business to provide an enhanced omni channel experience and additional value to our members. Additionally, we are implementing a new tool called RELX to modernize our supply chain management. We started this project in 2023 and it should be completed in 2025. Reedex is positioned to become an integral part of our strategy to enhance our inventory planning process, making it more efficient by making our operations data driven, autonomous and adaptive. Speaker 100:19:48This partnership with RELAX is crucial as it resonates with our strategy to grow sales by offering high quality goods at competitive prices driven through supply chain efficiency and back office productivity. We plan to use RELX to automate and increase the accuracy of our inventory forecasting, as well as for pricing and promotion management. Switching gears slightly, environmental and social responsibility continues to be an important component of how we approach our business and add value to the membership. We do our best to incorporate practices that use natural resources responsibly. Just to give a quick update, we currently have 7 recycling centers open with 2 in El Salvador, 3 in Honduras and 2 in Guatemala. Speaker 100:20:31On average, around £15,000 of recycled material is being collected monthly in each location. We are on track to open 4 recycling centers in the Dominican Republic and 1 more in Guatemala by the end of fiscal year 2024. You can find more information about PriceSmart's philanthropic and corporate social responsibility efforts on pricemart.org. Looking forward a little into our current Q3, our comparable net merchandise sales for the 4 weeks ended March 31, 2024 were up 5.6% or 2.9% in constant currency, with both Costa Rica and Colombia contributing positively from a foreign currency exchange rate perspective. It is important to note that this year on year comparison is impacted by the timing of the Easter holiday period. Speaker 100:21:13This year, Good Friday, when we close all our clubs and Easter Sunday, when we close our clubs in Aruba and Arvitos, fell in March, whereas last year they fell in April. In closing, we are proud of another successful quarter, a great start to our Q3 and our team members who make it all possible. Thank you for joining our call today. I will now turn the call over to the operator to take your questions. Operator, you may now start taking our caller's questions. Operator00:21:41Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, we will now begin the question and answer Your first question comes from Mr. John Branch from Oppenheimer. Please go ahead. Speaker 300:22:39Robert, you mentioned in your opening comments that obviously December was a pretty good month, but you said there were some challenges in meeting that demand. Can you speak a little bit about those challenges and did it impact the did you incur some additional costs? Speaker 200:23:01Thanks for the question. I maybe didn't explain it very well. We have some locations. First of all, we did volumes in certain locations that really went beyond anything I think I would have thought they were capable of doing just based on the physical limitations of some of our locations. I really was trying to complement managers who were under tremendous stress just to move that volume through those locations on various days during December. Speaker 200:23:42I don't think per se that it resulted in additional expense, but I think it was very, very tough on our management team in a number of places just to deal with what was the throughput in sales and inventory on hand. But I think they handle it really well and the expenses seem to be well in line. But it was tough. I mean, I don't know if I personally had to run one of those locations if I could do it. Speaker 300:24:18Okay. Thank you. Turning to Colombia, the Colombia, the currency has strengthened there. Your comp store sales there were flattish in the quarter. It seems like the impression I'm getting is the overall market in Colombia is getting better. Speaker 300:24:41Can you speak maybe a little bit about the Colombian market and how you see it generally speaking in terms of the economic environment? Speaker 200:24:54I think that politically as well as financially, there's been a lot of improvements in Colombia in the last year. And we're certainly reaping the benefits of those improvements. From my knowledge, I haven't been in Colombia in a while and I'm planning a trip. I think we're running our business well. And I think our reputation there is really, really good from what we hear and the way our members seem to feel about us. Speaker 200:25:29There's been a lot of turnaround in Colombia and I think the other thing to mention in Colombia is that we made a decision probably close to a year ago to become to reduce margins a bit and to change our pack sizes on some of the items that just had become too expensive under the large tax sizes. And I think both of those actions have really strengthened our market position. I think we're in a pretty good place in Colombia. Unfortunately, it's still challenging to find locations in the big cities, Medellin and Bogota and we continue to work on that because we think there's more opportunity. I feel pretty good about Columbia. Speaker 200:26:20I think we've got a good management team there. We have been buying there and things are really improving. Speaker 300:26:28Okay. And then lastly, Robert and Michael, the new Costa Rican store, I think you noted it was 10 miles from the nearest store. When you open a new store in Colombia and other places, there is a little bit of cannibalization. Would you expect anything more or less from this new store opening versus what you've seen in the past? Speaker 200:26:54As far as the transfer of sales, there will be some transfer of sales. And I think it will be more or less the way we would have had another Costa Rica's locations where we're opening not too far away. On the other hand, our track record in Costa Rica has been that we backfill pretty quickly in terms of recovering those sales that had been transferred. And I think overall, because we're building our sales volume and market position in Costa Rica. We're going to buy better, distribute better and probably overall it's going to help all the clubs just to have that extra club in the market. Operator00:27:45Your next question comes from the line of Mr. Hector Maya from Scotiabank. Please go ahead. Speaker 400:27:53Hi. Thank you, Robert and Michael, for taking my questions. The first one would be regarding the kind of wide potential that you see for new openings down the road. And aside from Colombia, where else would you be seeing the most opportunity? And what would be the long term potential for countries like El Salvador, Guatemala or others in the Caribbean like Jamaica where potentially minimum wages could be a factor? Speaker 200:28:22I mean, to make sure I understand your question, are you was your question about opportunity in countries other than Colombia? Speaker 400:28:32Yes. Aside from Colombia in markets like El Salvador, Guatemala or even Jamaica in the Caribbean, the wide space potential that you see there? Speaker 200:28:46I think that without getting too specific, there continue to be opportunities in some of those countries and we're we continue to identify the right properties to take advantage of those opportunities. I don't want to be too specific. I think I could say regarding Jamaica, however you want to say it, that it's been a good market for us and we think there is additional opportunity there. And I'd say the same thing about Guatemala and maybe El Salvador as well. I mean, I think also I feel really pretty good about those regions because with the change in our approach to sourcing in terms of the big picture macro moving more production out of Asia to the region we're in, I feel that there is a very positive sign for the region and also for us. Speaker 200:29:58That would include all the countries you mentioned. Speaker 400:30:06Got it. Thank you. Very, very clear. And could you also please talk a bit more about the increase in general and administrative expenses with compensation and travel costs? And if you could give us also a sense of what happened in the non recurring expenses there too? Speaker 100:30:28Hi, Hector. Yes, just basically overall, we're continuing to review our compensation levels at all levels of management. And so there's some year on year increases there. And the non recurring expenses were just some professional fees we incurred from some special projects that won't have an impact going forward. So mean, G and A in general, remember, we're investing in IT and we're investing in the management team. Speaker 100:30:56So, it's going to fluctuate quarter on quarter based on sales increases and where we're going and it can fluctuate up and down a little bit as a percentage of sales. Obviously, our goal in the long run is to leverage G and A as a percentage of sales because that helps us deliver better value to our member. Speaker 200:31:13One thing I'd add to that though, which certainly I agree with everything Michael has said. I think the real fundamental nature of the club business is to continue to find ways to be more efficient in the delivery of merchandise the ultimate consumer. And Michael had mentioned, I believe that we had recently opened a Panama distribution center. We are soon to open a Guatemala distribution center and we're building a distribution center for Trinidad. All those are very strategic decisions that we believe can leverage and improve expense ratios and inventory turns because of the fact that we can flow merchandise in a much more efficient way we believe and we've kind of proven it in Costa Rica where we already have a distribution center. Speaker 200:32:16And those distribution centers have many other possibilities beyond just the flow of merchandise to our clubs as we get more into online shopping and dealing more with business to business members, we think these distribution centers will become quite strategic. The way I think of the distribution center is going back to the early days of Price Club in 1976. In a sense, we were a distribution center. And so, in a way, it's going back to our roots and especially as we focus more and more on the business to business segment in our business and our operation. Speaker 400:33:10Excellent. Thank you very much. That was a very, very good color. And on the last one too, if you could also share some further details on the performance seen in the other income and expenses, Speaker 100:33:32and I called out 2 things in particular. We have this unique situation where we're sitting on a lot. I think we've talked about this in prior calls, we're sitting on a good amount of cash in U. S. Dollars that we convert into U. Speaker 100:33:44S. Dollars from local currency. We hold that in our bank accounts in Costa Rica and strengthening of the colon has had the unusual effects of hitting us from a P and L perspective. So that's essentially unrealized losses on our U. S. Speaker 100:33:59Dollar balances. We're a U. S. Dollar based company in the whole and we think from a long term perspective, it's the right thing to do to transfer our convert our local currency balances into U. S. Speaker 100:34:12Dollars and that's what we generally do in all of our markets as long as we're able to. And we generally hold that because then we can redeploy it easier within the company. So we have some unusual fluctuations from foreign currency sometimes in some of the countries. In the past, you may recall, we've had similar issues with Jamaica. So hopefully that's a transitional issue. Speaker 100:34:32And then I also mentioned the that we continue to pay extra cost to convert the illiquid currencies that we have such as Honduras and Trinidad into U. S. Dollars and that's also impacting that line. Speaker 400:34:51Got it. I understand. Thank you. Thank you very much, Robert and Michael for taking my questions. Thank you. Speaker 100:34:58Thank you, Hector. Operator00:35:03Your next question comes from the line of Jon Braatz from Oppenheimer. Please go ahead. Speaker 300:35:09Michael, just a follow-up. Given the currency issues in Honduras, have you implemented any pricing actions in that country similar to what you did in Trinidad? Speaker 100:35:24We've taken some pricing actions in Honduras, and that's something that we're continuing to review. So, yes, obviously, our goal is to hopefully be able to pay for those extra any extra costs we're incurring in countries where the currencies are really liquid. It may not kind of like the I mentioned for Costa Rica, it may not always match on an accounting basis, but from an economic where the line was up. Speaker 200:35:58I'd add one thing too. This is very top of the agenda for Michael and myself. We've spent a lot of time talking about Honduras and trying to identify a variety of ways to balance the challenge we have with illiquidity, but also making sure that don't harm the business long term. Right. Balancing act and I think we're on top of it, but this is part of the nature of where we do business. Speaker 200:36:35These are countries that have a lot of challenges. We've gotten pretty good at it, but the reality is we go through these periods where it costs us money, reserve a business, pretty good business. And so we're looking at a lot of alternatives for how to deal with the Honduras situation, but it is a significant challenge. And we're on it. Speaker 300:37:03Okay, good. And then lastly, Michael, are all the membership increases fully in place as of this time or do you have some more to go? Speaker 100:37:13Most of them are in place, substantially all of them, but not quite all of them. We haven't given any details about countries or volume, but most of them are. Speaker 300:37:21Okay. All right. Thank you. Speaker 100:37:24Okay. Operator00:37:28There are no further questions at this time. I'll hand the call over back to Michael McCleary. Please go ahead. Speaker 100:37:35Okay. Thank you, everybody. That wraps up our call today. I hope you all have a great day. Bye.Read morePowered by