Trinseo Q2 2025 Earnings Call Transcript

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Provided by Quartr
August 7, 2025

Key Takeaways

  • Negative Sentiment: Our core business delivered Q2 adjusted EBITDA of $42 million, falling short of guidance due to weaker demand, unfavorable feedstock timing, and order cancellations tied to trade uncertainty.
  • Positive Sentiment: Management’s self-help actions are expected to yield $105 million in EBITDA benefits from cost savings, mix improvements, and a new polycarbonate business model.
  • Positive Sentiment: The 4th generation Voltabond Anode Binder launch and a 63% five-year volume CAGR position the battery binder platform for continued double-digit growth amid rising EV demand.
  • Positive Sentiment: Sales of recycled plastic–containing products rose 7% in H1 2025, capturing premium margins as sustainability initiatives gain traction.
  • Positive Sentiment: Structural improvements have cut working capital by $560 million over three years, including a 17-day reduction in the cash conversion cycle.
AI Generated. May Contain Errors.
Earnings Conference Call
Trinseo Q2 2025
00:00 / 00:00

There are 7 speakers on the call.

Speaker 6

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Trinseo Second Quarter 2025 Financial Results Conference Call. We welcome the Trinseo Management Team, Frank Bozich, President and CEO, David Stasse, Executive Vice President and CFO, and Bregje Roseboom-Van Kessel, Senior Vice President, Corporate Finance and Investor Relations. Today's conference call will include brief remarks by the management team, followed by a question and answer session. The company distributed its press release along with its presentation slides after the close of market on Wednesday, August 6. These documents are posted on the company's Investor Relations website and furnished on a Form 8-K filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. If anyone should require operator assistance during this call, please press star, then the number zero on your telephone keypad. I will now turn the call over to Bregje Roseboom-Van Kessel. Please go ahead.

Speaker 4

Thank you, Amy, and hello everyone. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. After our brief remarks, instructions will follow to participate in the question and answer session. Our disclosure rules and cautionary notes on forward-looking statements are noted on Slide 2. During this presentation, we may make certain forward-looking statements, including issuing guidance and describing our future expectations. We must caution you that actual results could differ materially from what is discussed, described, or implied in these statements. Factors that could cause actual results to differ include, but are not limited to, risk factors set forth in Item 1A of our Annual Reports on Form 10-K or in our other filings made with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The company undertakes no obligation to update or revise its forward-looking statements. Today's presentation includes certain non-GAAP financial measurements.

Speaker 4

A reconciliation of these measurements to corresponding GAAP measures is provided in our earnings release and in the appendix of our investor presentation. A replay of the conference call and transcript will be archived on the company's Investor Relations website shortly following the conference call. The replay will be available until August 7, 2026. Now, I would like to turn the call over to Frank Bozich.

Speaker 5

Thanks, B, and welcome to our Second Quarter 2025 Earnings Call. Our core business results in the second quarter were slightly below the expectations we had due to weaker than expected demand across most applications and unfavorable net timing associated with falling feedstock prices. The seasonally higher volumes that we normally see in the second quarter were dampened by trade uncertainty after the April tariff announcements in the U.S. We experienced high order cancellations early in the quarter, which we believe was linked to increased geopolitical and trade uncertainty, but saw the magnitude of cancellations dropping significantly during the quarter. In this environment, it's critical that we remain intensely focused on two things: controlling the things we can control, which are fixed cost and working capital, and cultivating our key growth and sustainability platforms. In 2025, we expect to realize $105 million of EBITDA benefits from self-help actions.

Speaker 5

Specifically, we expect to see $35 million in fixed cost savings from previously announced restructuring initiatives, $30 million in mixed improvement and commercial initiatives, and $40 million associated with our change in the polycarbonate business model. We expect these actions to offset most of the incremental demand weakness and margin degradation we've seen so far in 2025, resulting in roughly flat year-over-year adjusted EBITDA. On working capital, I'm very proud of the work our team has done over the past three years to drive structural improvement through systems and processes. Over this period, we've reduced working capital by $560 million, with about half of that coming from a 17-day reduction in our cash conversion cycle. We've also made outstanding progress in our transformation strategy by driving growth in higher value applications, recycled plastic containing products grew 7% in the first half of 2025, and commanded premium margins.

Speaker 5

For binders, CASE and battery binders were two bright spots this quarter, with year-over-year volume growth of 3% and 19% respectively. I'll elaborate more on a relatively new battery binder technology later in the call. I'm also pleased to report that we released our 15th annual Sustainability and Corporate Social Responsibility Report. We continue to make progress on our 2030 sustainability goals as we remain committed to our investments in advancing recycling technology and sustainable product offerings. Before I turn the call over to Dave, I'd like to elaborate more on our new and unique battery binder platform. Trinseo opened its global battery application lab in Shanghai in 2017 and started selling our first generation high-performance binders for lithium-ion EV battery and energy storage solution applications in 2020.

Speaker 5

Our latex binder's function in the lithium-ion battery is to bind the anode active materials, which are predominantly graphite and silicon, into the current collector, which is a copper foil. The polymer needs to provide strength, ionic conductivity, and formulation compatibility, while at the same time having the ability to withstand a harsh battery cell operational environment to ensure long battery life. To do this, it must resist mechanical, thermal, chemical, and electrochemical stress. Consequently, despite the binder typically accounting for less than 2% of the total battery cost, it holds a critical, a highly critical role in enabling both strong battery performance and efficient battery manufacturing. This year, we're launching our fourth generation anode binder, which enables long-lasting, fast-charging, and high energy density batteries. This advancement, as well as our global footprint with plants in each region, are key advantages we have to serve these applications.

Speaker 5

Additionally, we have our first generation water-soluble binder prototypes available for testing at key players after demonstrating strong performance in our own labs. Our volume compound annual growth rate over the past five years has been 63%, and we expect this highly profitable platform to continue double-digit growth over the next five years. For these reasons, battery binders represent one of our top strategic growth platforms. Now, I'd like to turn the call over to Dave.

Speaker 1

Thanks, Frank. We ended the second quarter with $42 million of adjusted EBITDA, which was below our guidance, driven by a larger unfavorable impact from raw material timing, the lack of seasonal demand pickup that Frank spoke about earlier, and lower equity affiliate earnings at Americas Styrenics. First half 2025 volumes were 13% below prior year, with the largest decreases coming in latex binders, paper and board applications, automotive applications in North America and Europe, and polystyrene, where we've passed on economic volumes. Of the volume decline we've seen in the first half, about two-thirds is what we considered transactional volume, meaning it's generally lower margin with spot-based pricing and not formulated in nature. At the segment level, engineered materials adjusted EBITDA was $1 million below prior year, despite lower volumes sold into automotive and building and construction applications.

Speaker 1

Lower volumes were offset by lower fixed cost and mix improvements from higher recycled content sales into consumer products applications. Latex binders adjusted EBITDA was $9 million below prior year, mainly driven by lower volume in Europe and Asia, as well as significant pricing pressure across all regions. This volume decline is most acute in paper and board applications in China, where we've seen demand weaken considerably since the tariff announcements, leading to temporary mill closures. On a positive note, our higher margin targeted growth platforms in CASE and battery binders continue to outperform the market. Lastly, polymer solutions adjusted EBITDA was $11 million below prior year, driven by lower volumes into building and construction and automotive applications and increased Asian imports into the European market.

Speaker 1

We are therefore pleased to see that the European Commission recognizes the ABS dumping activity from both South Korea and Taiwan in their pre-disclosure in July. Second quarter free cash flow was negative $3 million in line with guidance, and we ended the second quarter with $399 million of total liquidity. I'll turn the call back over to Frank.

Speaker 5

Thanks, Dave. As previously mentioned, we expect full-year 2025 adjusted EBITDA of roughly $200 million. While the current demand level is disappointing, we believe there are five triggers for improvement of the demand environment. First, trade certainty in any form should improve consumer confidence and provide a landscape for new investments. Second, an enactment of the anticipated Federal Reserve interest rate cuts, which will lower our own interest expense and improve consumer confidence. Third, a resolution of the various military conflicts we see in Europe and the Middle East. Fourth, our positive regulatory reforms in the chemical space in China, which could result in the closure of older non-competitive assets and reduce destructive industry pricing. Lastly, the stronger support for the EU chemical industry as outlined in the EU Chemical Industry Action Plan.

Speaker 5

While each of these items are uncertain, we're encouraged by the dialogue related to each of these that is being reported. Now we're happy to take your questions.

Speaker 6

Thank you. The line is now open for questions. If you have dialed in and would like to ask a question, please press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad to raise your hand and join the queue. If you would like to withdraw your question, again, simply press star and the number one. We do request for today's session that you please limit to one question and one follow-up. Again, please press star and the number one to join the queue. We'll pause for just a moment to compile the Q&A roster. Your first question comes from the line of David Begleiter with Deutsche Bank. Your line is now open.

Speaker 2

Good morning, Frank and Dave. You've done a good job in Europe closing some older non-economic capacity in styrene and polycarbonate. Can you talk to your MMA production in Europe and why you haven't taken similar action there, given their also challenged economics? Thank you.

Speaker 5

Yeah, David, thanks. Look, we continually evaluate each of our assets. We prioritized taking action basically on three dimensions: the speed of execution, the magnitude of the benefit, and the cost to achieve. We continue to look at various opportunities and we'll evaluate that asset appropriately. If we make the decision or work with our works councils, we'll come to a decision that's appropriate.

Speaker 2

Understood. I know it's early for next year, but in terms of what's in your control for next year versus what's not, can you help us bridge some of the items that could help lead to maybe a higher EBITDA outcome in 2026? Thank you.

Speaker 5

Yeah, so look, I mean, let me back up a little bit and give you some context for what we're currently seeing. As we started 2025, our expectation was for demand levels that were similar to 2024, which we believe was low by historical standards with some pent-up demand. However, the impact of trade uncertainty in particular has been an incremental headwind. The resolution of any of the trade uncertainty, you know, in whatever form that takes, as well as lower interest rates, we think unlocks demand and gets us back to a level that we expected and possibly greater. Remember, 10% volume increase for us is about $100 million of EBITDA improvement. I'll go back to what I've said on previous calls.

Speaker 5

We believe even last year that there's been pent-up demand in building and construction and automotive, both in Europe and North America, where we have a significant exposure. If we think about housing, I want, I believe the number off the top of my head is there's 6 million unit shortfall versus household formation over the past decade. The automotive industry, the car park right now is at historic age. We think that, you know, interest rates and tariff certainty get us back to reasonable, you know, prior, at least prior year demand levels and sort of stimulate demand, you know, recovery from the pent-up demand that's out there.

Speaker 6

Thank you. Your next question comes from the line of Matthew Blair with TPH. Your line is now open.

Speaker 2

Great. Thank you. Good morning. I was hoping you could talk a little bit more about the Americas Styrenics business. We understand there were some polystyrene outages in Q2. How much of a headwind was that to last quarter? Are there some repair costs in Q3? If so, how much of a headwind will that be to the Q3 number?

Speaker 5

There was a mechanical outage in one of the styrene assets in Americas Styrenics last quarter, and it had approximately a $5 million impact. There will be increased repair costs in the coming quarter that's reflected in the current forecast or current outlook.

Speaker 2

Yeah, Matthew, I think Frank's great. Is it a $5 million impact to us, to add to the equity income we recognize from Americas Styrenics in the second quarter? I mean, looking forward to the back half of the year, there will be an impact. By the way, it was a styrene plant. It was not a polystyrene. There will be a similar impact, I would say, to the third quarter. I would expect the progression of Americas Styrenics' earnings to us over the back half of the year, Q3, there'll be a similar number to Q2, and then higher in the fourth quarter as we expect better operational reliability. Sounds good. Regarding your 2025 full-year guidance, the implied figure for the back half of the year, does that incorporate any of the net timing headwinds in Q2 being reversed?

Speaker 5

No, it does not.

Speaker 2

Matthew, it's, you know, for us, timing is fairly hard to predict. I mean, it's really, you know, it's a function of what happens, you know, largely to styrene prices, frankly, over the next six months. It's hard to predict. Standing here today, you know, the guidance we've given assumes flat net timing for the back half of the year.

Speaker 6

Thank you. Your next question comes from the line of Frank Mitsch with Fermium Research. Your line is now open.

Speaker 2

Hey, good morning. Frank, I was intrigued by your comments that the pace of cancellations due to the trade issues was slowing down as you progressed through the quarter. I was wondering if you could elaborate on that. If that's the case, should we not start to see the pace of business match underlying demand here in the third quarter?

Speaker 5

I think what we saw, I guess what I read into what we saw happening in Q2 was that the order book that we began the quarter with reflected a normal seasonal uptick in demand. Because of the, you know, as a result of the trade announcements in early April, that uptick was taken off the table. I think that's how I read what we saw occur during the quarter.

Speaker 2

You don't anticipate that those pent-up orders flowing through in 3Q?

Speaker 5

As I said, if we see trade certainty and improvements in interest rates or any of the five factors that we mentioned, we believe that's a trigger for an improvement in demand and a recovery of those lost orders. I don't, it's impossible to predict. Sitting here today, it's impossible to predict the timing for that or have any certainty for when that would occur. Yes, I believe that would be a trigger.

Speaker 2

Okay. Terrific. Interesting comments regarding battery technology. On the latex binder side, roughly how much is the battery business of that segment today? I believe, David, you also mentioned that there was significant pricing pressure in latex in 2Q. Actually, it was positive price in 1Q, but it flipped to negative price in 2Q. Any elaboration or any color on that would be helpful. Thank you.

Speaker 5

Yeah. I'm going to give you a number. By memory, of our latex binders, CASE and battery represent approximately 20% of the volume of last year's volume, but a significantly higher share of our margin. I believe that because of the pressure that we've seen in paper and board this year, it's a significantly higher portion this year, but I don't have an exact figure, and we can get that to you. Your second question, yeah, maybe could you repeat it, Frank? Sorry.

Speaker 2

Yeah. It was a significant pricing pressure. You know, prices in latex were up in 1Q and then obviously down 6% in 2Q. David indicated significant pricing pressures, and I was just curious if you could elaborate on where that's coming from.

Speaker 5

Yeah. What we saw, you know, you can imagine a lot of our latex goes into paper board packaging. In particular, in China, with the beginning of the tariff announcements, you just look at the 35% reduction in container shipments out of China. Those are mostly packaged goods, right? There was a significant reduction in demand in China in paper and board in Q2 as a result of that, and, as a consequence, mill closure. As a consequence, a lot of the industry was scrambling to fill their, to keep volumes and were very aggressive with price. Some of that we declined to. A lot of that is transactional and transitory, and we chose not to participate in some of that volume. That's why we saw the volume decrease in the second quarter. Again, we believe that's transactional and transitory activity that we can get back.

Speaker 2

Thank you.

Speaker 6

All right. Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Hassan Ahmed with Alembic Global Partners. Your line is now open.

Speaker 3

Morning, Frank and Dave. I wanted to revisit, and I obviously understand that it's early days to give any 2026 guidance. As I take a look at what you guys are guiding to for 2025, it seems for the back half of the year, which typically is a seasonally weaker sort of period, you'd be at a quarterly run rate EBITDA of around $50 million a quarter, right? You sort of annualize that. Again, this is a seasonally weak period. You're at least at $200 million in a sort of well below normal demand environment, right? Now, let's assume demand doesn't really improve materially next year, but seasonality maybe kicks in further, benefits from your cost-cutting drive and the like. What's sort of like the minimum benchmark to think about? Would you guys do at least $250 million in that environment in EBITDA in 2026?

Speaker 3

What would that mean at least for free cash flow next year?

Speaker 5

Yeah. Look, I think that, you know, this goes back to the question that was, I give the same answer I gave earlier, you know, that we believe that right now we're seeing transitory headwinds that affect depressed demand in the business and suppress it significantly from prior year, which was already low with pent-up demand. I believe that we will see a resolution of one or more of the five items that I mentioned, and that will have a significant impact on our end demand in most of our end markets. It'd be very difficult. I believe that we have significant leverage to the upside with volume, and that would come with some more certainty regarding trade, interest rates, and the various regulatory activities around the world.

Speaker 1

Hassan, I'll add a couple of points related more to the key free cash flow side. We have a slide in our deck on slide 14 where we outline the cash flow components for 2025. If I were to bridge these things to 2026, the restructuring cost of $55 million, that will be a much lower number in 2026 than $55 million this year. The other is interest expense. Cash interest this year is $200 million. Clearly, since the last call we had, I think there's been a bias. There's been a market consensus view that there will be, given the employment statistics, probably more rapid succession of rate cuts than we previously thought. 100 basis points of rate cuts is worth $19 million a year to us.

Speaker 1

I think it's obviously too early to put numbers on 2026, but certainly, I think the numbers that are listed on this page will be much lower than $365 million of cash outflows next year.

Speaker 3

That's definitely very helpful. Now, as a follow-up, obviously, all sort of fairly recent with regards to the whole sort of anti-dumping measures in the EU as it relates to ABS. How do you see this playing out? How do you see China, the Chinese reacting to it, and how does it all drill down back to you guys?

Speaker 5

Yeah, there's a lot of uncertainty with regard to that, but I know that the EU Commission outlined a chemical industry action plan that includes some protectionism and also an anti-dumping protection to ensure that there is fair competition with imports into Europe. We're encouraged by that. We're waiting to see how that takes place. At the same time, what you see happening in China, the regulatory discussions in China related to the anti-involution policy there, which would rationalize the non-competitive or older non-integrated assets in China, again, make us optimistic that that will be addressed. I want to spend a second on this because there's some discussion about it, but the statistics that I've seen is that 21% of the Chinese chemical industry capacity is older than 15 years old. Now, those assets would be the ones that would be most likely subject to the anti-involution policies.

Speaker 5

If that capacity comes off the table, it would help the industry broadly, not only in China, but in the rest of the world. The other thing I do want to point out is that while there's uncertainty with regard to the trade policies and the tariff policies that have been introduced in the U.S., on balance, we would benefit from tariffs because we produce locally. In particular, we understand that the U.S. government or the policymakers are focused on transshipment of Chinese products into Mexico that would be compounded and then brought into the U.S. as USMCA compliant. If that is addressed, that's a significant upside for not only us, but everybody in the chemical industry. I think there's a lot of, it's too early to tell, but the discussions and the ideas that are being floated are very encouraging.

Speaker 3

Thank you so much.

Speaker 5

Thank you.

Speaker 6

Thank you. Your final question comes from the line of Lawrence Alexander with Jefferies. Your line is now open.

Operator

Good morning. It's Dan Rizzo from Lawrence. I was just wondering with the guidance you give for 2025 and why now, you're finally giving, you're giving yearly guidance, but you're kind of not giving Q3 guidance. I mean, is visibility improved or just why the change in policy from last quarter?

Speaker 5

Yeah, I think it's simply, you know, it's been a very dynamic and volatile environment from a policy standpoint that's affected the industry. At this point in time, we've seen what those impacts that were in Q2. I would say starting Q3, we see it in a similar, you know, sort of a similar market dynamic that we had in Q2. We believe absent certainty around any of those five things that we can anticipate a similar environment to Q2 for the remainder of the year. Clearly, we expect that resolution of any of those five items will change that to the positive.

Speaker 1

I think that from a policy perspective, you're right. We gave quarterly guidance earlier in the year because we had limited visibility. I don't think anything has really changed, frankly, on our visibility. We still have the same limited visibility, but we chose to give annual guidance just because of where we are in the year. I mean, we're kind of approaching two-thirds of the way through the year, and we thought it was appropriate to give annual versus quarterly guidance. That's really the only reason why.

Operator

Thank you. That's helpful. Just a little more granular, with corporate costs, I think it's running roughly $20 to $25 million a quarter. Is that kind of how we should think about it over the long term, given all the moves you made, the costs you've taken out? That seems to be a decent run rate, or will it be a little more volatile than that?

Speaker 5

No, I think the current run rate is, we're at our current run rate reflects the actions that we've taken to date, and that would be, you know, that's appropriate to use in our forecast.

Speaker 1

Just one other, just minor point on that, due to kind of the accounting treatment of stock compensation, our Q1 corporate costs are always going to be higher than the other three quarters of the year. We've mentioned that in prior calls, but I just want to make sure you're aware of that. Annualizing the first half of the year probably is not a good approach.

Operator

All right, thank you very much.

Speaker 6

Thank you. There are no further questions at this time. This does conclude today's conference call. You may now disconnect.

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