Western Forest Products Q2 2026 Earnings Report

Western Forest Products EPS Results

• Actual EPS: C$1.10
• Consensus EPS: N/A
• Beat/Miss: N/A
• One Year Ago EPS: N/A

Western Forest Products Revenue Results

• Actual Revenue: $239.60 million
• Expected Revenue: N/A
• Beat/Miss: N/A
• YoY Revenue Growth: N/A

Western Forest Products Announcement Details

• Quarter: Q2 2026
• Date: 8/12/2026
• Time: After Market Closes
• Conference Call Date: Thursday, August 13, 2026
• Conference Call Time: 12:00PM ET

Western Forest Products (TSE:WEF) Inc is a Canada-based softwood forest products company. The company's principal business activities include timber harvesting, reforestation, forest management, sawmilling logs into lumber and wood chips, and value-added lumber remanufacturing. Its operating business segment comprised of Timber harvesting, Log sales, and Lumber manufacturing and sales. The firm purchases and harvests logs which are then manufactured into lumber products at its sawmills, or sold. Canada and the United States, represent the company's largest markets and contribute the vast majority of its total revenue.

Western Forest Products Q2 2026 Earnings Call Transcript

Key Takeaways

• Positive Sentiment: Balance sheet improved significantly: Q2 net debt declined by CAD 14.4 million, and proceeds from the Columbia Vista site sale and anticipated CAD 80 million Stillwater transaction are expected to leave Western in a net cash position by year-end.
• Positive Sentiment: Operational and product-mix trends strengthened, with timber harvest volumes up 35% year over year, manufacturing uptime reaching a company record of 88%, and specialty products rising to 57% of sales from 52%.
• Positive Sentiment: Value-added investments are progressing: New continuous and thermal kilns are designed to lower drying costs and improve product outturns, while management said the kiln projects are expected to generate returns well above internal hurdle rates.
• Negative Sentiment: Near-term market conditions remain challenging: Lumber shipments fell 25% year over year, combined duties and tariffs increased to 45% from 14%, and weak demand led the company to curtail its Cowichan Bay sawmill for the remainder of 2026.

Presentation

[Operator]

During this conference call, Western's representatives may make forward-looking statements within the meaning of applicable securities laws. These statements can be identified by words like "anticipate," "plan," "estimate," "will," and other references to future periods. Although these forward-looking statements reflect management's reasonable beliefs, expectations, and assumptions, they are subject to inherent uncertainties and actual results may differ materially. There are many factors that could cause actual outcomes to be different, including those factors described under risks and uncertainties in the company's annual MD&A, which can be accessed on SEDAR and is supplemented by the company's quarterly MD&A. Forward-looking statements are based only on information currently available to Western and speak only as of the date on which they are made. Except as required by law, Western undertakes no obligation to update forward-looking statements. Accordingly, listeners should exercise caution in relying upon forward-looking statements.

[Operator]

I would now like to turn the meeting over to Mr. Steven Hofer, President and CEO of Western Forest Products. Mr. Hofer, please go ahead.

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

Thank you, Gary, and good morning, everyone. I would like to welcome you to Western Forest Products 2026 second quarter conference call. Joining me on the call today is Glen Nontell, our Chief Financial Officer, and Bruce Alexander, our Senior Vice President of Sales, Marketing, and Manufacturing. We issued our 2026 second-quarter results yesterday. I will provide you with some introductory comments and then ask Glen to take you through our financial results. Bruce will follow with our market outlook section before we open the call to your questions. We saw modest improvements in lumber pricing and seasonal demand in the second quarter. We continue to demonstrate clear progress in advancing our strategic priorities while also solidifying a strong balance sheet to manage through near-term volatility.

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

Since our last call, this has included completing our strategic kiln-drying investments at our value-added division with the commissioning of the second continuous dry kiln and our thermal kiln. With three highly modern, low-cost continuous dry kilns operating on the B.C. coast with a capacity of 206 million board feet, Western's investment will support higher-margin, value-added kiln-dried lumber production and enable the expansion of our global customer base. In addition, we are also upgrading our auto-grader technology at our Duke Point planer facility. The new auto-grader uses AI technology to grade each piece of lumber, resulting in more precision grading than manual grading, leading to higher margin potential. The CAD 4.1 million investment is anticipated to be commissioned in early 2027. This will complement the auto-grader technology previously deployed in the Duke Point sawmill facility.

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

From an operational perspective, our Timberlands group continued to focus on managing costs and log margin opportunities. Harvest volume increased by 35% compared to the same quarter last year due to improved permit approvals and more favorable weather conditions. In manufacturing, we improved our operational uptime to 88% in the second quarter of 2026, compared to 87% in both the first quarter of 2026 and the second quarter of 2025. This is an all-time high for Western Forest Products manufacturing sector. In sales and marketing, we continued our customer focus, developing value-added products and programs targeted with the end user in mind. Specialty products comprised 57% of sales in the second quarter of 2026, compared to 52% in the same quarter last year.

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

From a cash flow and balance sheet perspective, we collected the Columbia Vista property insurance proceeds of $22.8 million in the second quarter and completed the sale of the sawmill site for $14.7 million in July. We look to finalize the Columbia Vista business interruption insurance process in the third quarter, and we continue to advance the $80 million sale of our Stillwater Forest Operations, which is anticipated to close in the second half of 2026. Assuming the completion of all these items, we expect to end the year with a pristine balance sheet, which will be in a net cash position. Looking ahead, we remain focused on executing our strategy and maintaining a strong balance sheet. We see gradual improvements to lumber markets over the midterm.

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

However, in the near term, due to persistently weak market conditions, high softwood lumber duties and tariffs, and factors relating to the B.C. operating environment, we plan to curtail our Cowichan Bay sawmill for the remainder of 2026. I will now turn it over to Glen to review our key financial results.

[Glen Nontell, CFO at Western Forest Products]

Thanks, Steven. Second quarter adjusted EBITDA was CAD 0.4 million as compared to CAD 0.5 million in the same period last year. Second quarter EBITDA in 2026 included CAD 2.3 million in share-based compensation due to a 20% increase in our share price. As compared to the prior year, results in the second quarter benefit from improved lumber pricing across many product lines, a strong specialty lumber sales mix, more favorable harvesting conditions, and a strong external log sale mix. This was primarily offset by a 25% reduction in lumber shipments due to softer demand and loss of sales from our Columbia Vista division, and higher softwood lumber duties and tariffs, with a combined duty and tariff rate of 45% compared to 14% in the same period last year. We closed the second quarter with approximately 67 million board feet of lumber inventory and 622,000 cu m of log inventory.

[Glen Nontell, CFO at Western Forest Products]

Turning to CapEx, our 2026 total CapEx spending is expected to be between CAD 45 million-CAD 50 million, which includes approximately CAD 20 million related to two previously announced continuous kilns and one thermal kiln at our value-added division and the auto-grader at Duke Point.

[Glen Nontell, CFO at Western Forest Products]

From a balance sheet perspective, our Q2 ending net debt declined by CAD 14.4 million and liquidity improved compared to the end of the first quarter. We ended the second quarter with a net debt to capitalization ratio of 6%, compared to 9% at the end of the first quarter. After the end of the second quarter, we completed the sale of the Columbia Vista sawmill site for $14.7 million. With the planned sale of our Stillwater Forest operations, which is anticipated to close in the second half of 2026, we expect to be in a net cash position at the end of the year.

[Glen Nontell, CFO at Western Forest Products]

Turning to third quarter seasonality, typical third quarters can be challenging operationally, as hot, dry weather can restrict logging activity, reducing harvest volumes and impacting costs. While we have yet to experience any significant forest fires in our areas of operation, hot and dry conditions may impact harvest levels through the summer. I will now turn it over to Bruce to go through the market outlook.

[Bruce Alexander, SVP of Sales, Marketing, and Manufacturing at Western Forest Products]

Thanks, Glen. Turning to our market outlook, North American lumber markets are expected to be relatively stable through most of the third quarter of 2026. Housing affordability continues to be the most significant issue, leading to reduced housing demand. Elevated interest rates, higher fuel costs, and broader economic uncertainty are contributing to subdued consumer confidence and the reduced housing demand. Despite these headwinds, reduced lumber supply across North America has helped to offset weaker demand and support price stability across key product categories and market segments. Lumber demand in Japan has improved as housing starts gained momentum through the second quarter of 2026, while lumber inventories at the ports decreased. The Japanese lumber market is expected to be stable through the third quarter of 2026. Demand for softwood lumber in China is anticipated to soften in the third quarter of 2026 as seasonal weather and high temperatures reduce construction activities.

[Bruce Alexander, SVP of Sales, Marketing, and Manufacturing at Western Forest Products]

Overall, we currently have a third quarter order file of approximately 118 million board feet. Steven, that concludes my remarks.

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

Thanks, Bruce. With that, Gary, we can open the call up to questions.

[Operator]

Thank you. We will now take questions from telephone lines. If you have a question, please press star one. You may cancel your question at any time by pressing star two. Please press star one at this time if you have a question. We will pause for a moment as callers join the queue. The first question today comes from Sean Steuart with TD Cowen. Please go ahead.

[Sean Steuart, Analyst at TD Cowen]

Thanks. Hi, everyone. Steven, I want to start with the log harvest volume gain you saw this quarter. You referenced better weather, but also improved permit approvals, and I am wondering if you can give some more context on the latter point and the sustainability of that change going forward.

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

Thanks, Sean. We have had a pretty good start overall in our timberlands operation. Starting in Q1, where early on in January and February, we were able to get into higher elevation areas and more old growth, and that has just continued through Q2. Weather has been very favorable to our operating environment on the B.C. coast. We have only lost a couple of days related to temperatures that put us in a safety watch zone. From a permitting standpoint, I am really pleased at where we are at. It just speaks to our team's engagement and the investment we have made in developing long-term partnerships and long-term relations related to the First Nations in the traditional territories that we operate. So it has taken us some time, but I am really pleased at the forward look that we now have on permitting.

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

Lots of work left to do, but through our planning group, through our First Nations relations group, through our timberlands operating group, all the work we have been doing around integrated resource management plans, the first forest landscape planning plan that was completed here in British Columbia, we are starting to reap the rewards of that investment. It really speaks to the work that has been going on for the last couple of years, and now we are starting to see the benefits of that.

[Sean Steuart, Analyst at TD Cowen]

That is great to hear. Thanks for that detail. You give some context around your order file headed into the third quarter on the lumber side. Given all the puts and takes you have talked about here, can you give us perspective on the lumber production profile through the second half of the year and how that might translate into the shipment trend in Q3 and Q4?

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

Yeah. We have had the Chemainus sawmill curtailed since the beginning of the year. That started actually in 2025. We have had Cowichan Bay curtailed for the majority of Q2. I think the lumber shipments are going to be fairly similar for Q3, Q4 as what we had here for the first two quarters. What we are doing is that if we see opportunities to increase our volumes, we have the opportunity to restart quickly or to add some incremental hours at our existing facilities that are running. Directionally, I would say they will be fairly consistent here for the next couple of quarters.

[Sean Steuart, Analyst at TD Cowen]

Okay. One last one for me, Steven. We asked the same question last quarter, but you've got really good visibility on balance sheet transitioning due to net cash and lots of flexibility. Have management team and the board given updated thoughts to bigger picture growth ambitions, whether it's specific discretionary CapEx projects or acquisition opportunities? Any evolution in the thinking on your appetite on that front?

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

Yeah, I would say today that we've worked incredibly hard to put our balance sheet in this position. We're going to continue to be very disciplined as we assess opportunities, whether they're here in British Columbia or in different geographic jurisdictions. We know we have a very clear strategic plan with strategic priorities. We know that our cost structure inside of our manufacturing facilities is too high, and everything that we're doing is focused on reducing that. So when I think about the next phase of strategic capital that we would look to deploy, it would really be around addressing some of these inherent cost structure challenges that we have on the manufacturing side. So, we have a modest investment plan that we've previously talked about inside of our engineered wood facilities in Washington State.

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

We continue to be encouraged by the results we're seeing on the mass timber side in North America and the adoption of that building system, and we plan to move forward with that investment as we go into 2027. So I would say directionally, we continue to look at opportunities as they present themselves, but we're very much aware of some of the internal challenges that we have and that will need to get addressed. So I would view that as our initial priority, Sean.

[Sean Steuart, Analyst at TD Cowen]

That's great detail. Okay, that's all I have. Thanks very much, guys.

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

Thanks, Sean.

[Operator]

The next question is from Ben Isaacson with Scotiabank. Please go ahead.

[Ben Isaacson, Analyst at Scotiabank]

Thank you very much, and good morning, everyone. Just two questions from me. The first one is on Cowichan Bay. You've curtailed for the balance of 2026. What exactly do you need to see to restart that mill? Can you talk about risk of permanent closure?

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

I won't comment on the second question.

[Ben Isaacson, Analyst at Scotiabank]

Okay.

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

I will comment, though, on the first question. The Cowichan Bay sawmill is primarily focused on Western Red Cedar, and the log profile that we consume there is a combination of both small diameter chip-n-saw and then kind of medium diameter gang cedar. Clearly, the key and largest market for knotty cedar that that mill produces is in the United States. What would we need to see? We've run into, I would call it a ceiling in our ability to increase prices to compensate for the current 45% tariffs. What we would need to see is a meaningful reduction in duty and tariff that allows us to be competitive in that key market to sell knotty finished product for Western Red Cedar decking and soffit and sidings and those type of product lines.

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

I guess the short answer is a negotiated settlement to the current Softwood Lumber Agreement and the Section 232 tariffs that we currently face.

[Ben Isaacson, Analyst at Scotiabank]

That's super helpful. I appreciate that. Next question is on these kiln investments, these value-added investments. Can you just talk about the EBITDA uplift or margin improvement or IRR? How should we think about what you're seeking to earn on the capital deployment?

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

Sure. Maybe I'll speak to it at a very high level, and then I'll turn it over to Glen and Bruce. Directionally, what we're doing here is we're increasing our overall kiln capacity, and then we're lowering the cost structure of the go forward cost to kiln-dry lumber. These new continuous dry kilns are much more efficient from a natural gas utilization standpoint. They dry lumber faster. At a high level, that's what we're doing, and then we essentially have shut down all of our high-cost batch kilns that were currently being used. But Glen and Bruce, maybe some additional color from you gentlemen.

[Bruce Alexander, SVP of Sales, Marketing, and Manufacturing at Western Forest Products]

Yeah, sure. On the CDKs, as Steven mentioned, not only is it a cost reduction ploy, but we now have enough capacity to dry 100% of our dryable fiber, which we did not have prior to this investment. We are now in that position. The other thing that we have seen with this new technology and the control on the drying process is a significant uptick in the outturns of the products coming out of the mill, which is adding significant value to our product mix as well.

[Glen Nontell, CFO at Western Forest Products]

And maybe, Ben, just from a return perspective, obviously internally, we set return thresholds at greater than 20% IRRs. I would say that all these kiln projects are well in excess of that, probably well in excess of 40% overall, relative to the capital cost.

[Ben Isaacson, Analyst at Scotiabank]

That is great. Thank you guys for that. Then if I can, just one last one. I am not very familiar with how these title claims work on your tenure. Can you just explain, are there more claims that could pose a risk versus the one that you guys talked about, or how do we think about that?

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

Well, we do not have any specific title claims being litigated with any of our existing Tree Farm Licenses. We have a forest license out in Nootka Sound. It is relatively small, and that is part of the Nuu-chah-nulth litigation. But that is the only impact at this point in time that we have on any of our volume coming off of TFLs and/or forest licenses.

[Ben Isaacson, Analyst at Scotiabank]

I understand. That makes sense. Just to be clear, you don't see any risk right now to anything else being challenged?

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

I don't.

[Ben Isaacson, Analyst at Scotiabank]

Okay. That's great. Thanks so much. Appreciate it.

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

Great. Thanks, Ben.

[Operator]

The next question is from Matthew McKellar with RBC. Please go ahead.

[Matthew McKellar, Analyst at RBC]

Good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. I would like to follow up a bit on your comments in response to Sean's question and just ask if there is any more detail you can share around your plans at Fruit Valley. I think you talked about new fabrication machines, laminated glulam beams, but also evaluating opportunities to modernize and consolidate glulam facilities in the region at Fruit Valley. Can you just give a bit more color on how these initiatives are progressing and maybe what demand signals you are seeing from the mass timber market at this point, please?

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

Yeah. Thanks, Matt. This is a pretty exciting area of our business, but it is relatively small in the grand scheme of things. But we do view it as a strategic and a core piece of our business as we go forward. When we bought the Calvert Company, Calvert had two facilities that they manufactured glulam beams at. As part of the Columbia Vista manufacturing footprint, there were two separate locations. There was the Columbia Vista sawmill and then the Columbia Vista kilns and planer. That is called Fruit Valley. Our strategic plan has us consolidating the two facilities that we currently are at, one in Washougal, Washington, one in Vancouver, Washington, to the Fruit Valley facility that is in Vancouver, Washington. We will utilize some of the existing kilns that are there to purchase rough green lamstock. Those are state-of-the-art, low-cost kilns.

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

We will utilize the planer in the manufacturing process as well, and we own the facility free and clear. It is really an opportunity for us to move from two facilities to one, no longer on leased property, and leverage a really nice manufacturing complex that is there. We have the Hundegger fabrication machine on order that allows us to start fabricating our glulam beams, and that will happen in the first quarter of 2027. We have added some additional sales engineering resources as well as technical design resources, and we continue to participate in that mass timber building segment for the glulam mass timber beams, so columns and headers that are complementary to others providing CLT.

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

We do not envision ourselves being in the CLT business, but we do want to be in the mass timber glulam business that requires us to participate in design, engineering, fabrication, including all the hardware that goes with it. We are pretty excited about the growth prospects, especially in the Pacific Northwest. If you think about where the subject matter expertise resides with respect to mass timber architecture and design and specification, between Seattle and Portland, it is heavily concentrated in that region. We are developing relationships with large general contractors, with specifiers, and we are winning some jobs, which is pretty exciting. It is an area of our business, again, that is not huge, but we see it as an opportunity for us to continue to learn and grow and ideally, strategically grow that in perhaps a couple of different geographic jurisdictions.

[Matthew McKellar, Analyst at RBC]

That is great. Thanks for all the detail there. If I could ask one more on capital projects. Would be curious also to hear a bit more detail on the auto-grader upgrade at Duke Point. I think that MSR grader dates to just a few years back. Is this upgrade using technology that was not available a few years ago? Could you help us understand how it complements what you have already and maybe what kind of returns you would expect on that upgrade as well? Thank you.

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

Sure. As you know, the auto-grading technology has been around for a number of years. When we put the first auto-grader in the Duke Point sawmill, it really allowed us to start separating out rough green specialty grades inside the sawmill, and that had an immediate payback, and I think it significantly exceeded our expectations, both from a grade recovery, productivity, lower costs, and has just been a great project. The planer mill does have an older, outdated auto-grading technology, but it is at end of life, and it still required us to have a significant amount of our team members manually grading lumber. The new platform we are putting in, again, it is proven, it is tested. We are working with the market leader in North America.

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

It has the most advanced AI platform that sits on top of the software, and we expect it to be very complementary to the previous investment on the MSR capability and essentially is. I am not trying to simplify it, but it is a plug-and-play operating platform that is very complementary to the one we already have in the sawmill. So it leverages all the investment we have previously made, both on hardware, software, and people, and we are pretty optimistic that this will again exceed our internal return hurdles. Pretty excited about the project.

[Matthew McKellar, Analyst at RBC]

Great. Very helpful. Thanks very much. Just one quick modeling one for me. Apologies if I missed it, but on the Columbia Vista site sale, do you expect much of a tax impact? What do you expect net proceeds to look like? Thank you.

[Glen Nontell, CFO at Western Forest Products]

Yeah, sure. Matt, it's Glen. Between the property insurance proceeds and the sale of the property, we expect the tax impact to be about CAD 5 million, which would not be payable until 2027.

[Matthew McKellar, Analyst at RBC]

Okay. Thanks very much for all the help. I'll turn it back.

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

Thanks, Matt.

[Operator]

This concludes our Q&A session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Mr. Hofer for any closing remarks.

[Steven Hofer, President and CEO at Western Forest Products]

Well, thanks everyone for joining our call today. We appreciate your continued interest in our company, and we will look forward to our next call in November. Have a great day.

[Operator]

The conference is now concluded. Please disconnect your lines at this time, and we thank you for your participation.

Participants

Executives

• Steven Hofer, President and CEO
• Glen Nontell, CFO
• Bruce Alexander, SVP of Sales, Marketing, and Manufacturing

Analysts

• Sean Steuart, Analyst at TD Cowen
• Ben Isaacson, Analyst at Scotiabank
• Matthew McKellar, Analyst at RBC