Participants

Gary Maier; Vice President - Corporate Communications and Investor Relations; Motorcar Parts of America Inc

Selwyn Joffe; Chairman of the Board, President, Chief Executive Officer; Motorcar Parts of America Inc

David Lee; Chief Financial Officer; Motorcar Parts of America Inc

Derek Soderberg; Analyst; Cantor Fitzgerald & Co.

William Dezellem; Analyst; Tieton Capital Management

Presentation

Operator

Hello, and thank you for standing by. My name is Regina, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the Motorcar Parts of America, Inc. Fiscal 2025 Third Quarter Conference Call and Webcast. (Operator Instructions)
I would now like to turn the conference over to Gary Maier, Vice President, Corporate Communications and Investor Relations at Motorcar Parts of America. Please go ahead.

Gary Maier

Thank you, Regina, and thanks, everyone, for joining us for our call this morning. Before I begin, I turn the call over to Selwyn Joffe, Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer; and David Lee, the company's Chief Financial Officer, let me remind everyone of the safe harbor statement included in today's press release.
Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 provides a safe harbor for certain forward-looking statements, including statements made during today's conference call. Such forward-looking statements are based on the company's current expectations and beliefs concerning future developments and their potential effects on the company. There can be no assurance that future developments affecting the company will be those anticipated by Motorcar Parts of America. Actual results may differ from those projected in the forward-looking statements.
These forward-looking statements involve significant risks and uncertainties, some of which are beyond the control of the company and are subject to change based upon various factors. In particular, expectations about anticipated future growth and opportunities with customers may not be achieved. The company undertakes no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. For a more detailed discussion of some of the ongoing risks and uncertainties of the company's business, I refer you to the various SEC filings.
With that, I'd like to begin the call and turn it over to Selwyn.

Selwyn Joffe

Thank you, Gary. I appreciate everyone joining us today. We are certainly encouraged by our record sales, gross margin improvement and solid cash flow generation for the fiscal '25 third quarter. Our initiatives to enhance profitability are gaining traction. Our team continues to be focused on continuous improvements, and we are excited by the opportunities for the balance of fiscal 2025 and beyond.
We generated approximately $34.4 million of cash from operating activities during the fiscal third quarter, primarily due to strong operating profits. We remain focused on initiatives to enhance profitability, including gross margin expansion and neutralizing working capital, which should continue to result in strong cash flow generation.
With regard to our balance sheet, our positive cash flow and related initiatives enabled us to reduce net debt by $30.3 million for the fiscal third quarter, resulting in a 26% reduction to $84 million from $114 million. In addition, as highlighted in our earnings press release this morning, we repurchased 268,130 shares for $2.1 million at an average price of $7.82 under our current repurchase authorization program. We anticipate further opportunities to enhance shareholder value through strong cash generation and the neutralization of working capital.
I should mention that rotating electrical, a 50-plus year old flagship category continues to generate solid performance, and we expect further opportunities to add retail and traditional customers despite some recent market softness.
As I've mentioned many times, the replacement of alternators and starters cannot be deferred. If these products are broken, your car is not drivable. And the aging car park remains a favorable tailwind with multiple replacement opportunities for the life of vehicles.
We are also particularly excited by the continued success of our emerging and second largest category, brake-related products. We expect continued success in this category based on our quality, customer service and capacity to meet demand, and we anticipate strong demand as we enter the important spring repair season. Equally important, these accelerating brake-related product sales support purchasing and production efficiencies, which contribute to gross margin improvement. Our team is doing an exceptional job to further enhance performance metrics, and we look forward to continued sales growth for this important nondiscretionary product category.
As I've previously mentioned and as referenced in the exhibits to our earnings release, there are various factors relating to our financial performance that are noncash and beyond our control, particularly the current sharply unfavorable noncash mark-to-market foreign exchange loss from Mexican lease liabilities and forward contracts. A strengthening dollar versus the peso results in large noncash mark-to-market expenses, which we internally eliminate when evaluating our underlying results.
We are continuing to look at opportunities to minimize these noncash expenses, including funding our Mexico operations with pesos from sales in Mexico. As our sales in Mexico continue to grow, we will purchase fewer forward contracts to meet our peso obligations, which will lessen the impact of noncash foreign exchange expense fluctuations.
Obviously, interest rates, particularly applicable to vendor finance programs utilized by our customers, are a headwind. On a positive note, interest rates have decreased. If this trend continues, this should benefit profitability. Utilizing our low-cost global footprint will facilitate further operating efficiencies. We are actively implementing additional initiatives to further enhance gross margins.
Let me take a moment to highlight a few key near-term strategic initiatives that support our favorable outlook. With respect to our diagnostic business, as I've previously mentioned, we are experiencing great success with our JBT-1 Bench Top test, and we remain focused on achieving the $100 million milestone for diagnostic equipment. Additional service-related revenues expected as more testers are deployed, which includes repair software and database updates. These contributions will increase as the installed base matures.
We also expect more opportunities outside North America as the business evolves. With regard to our heavy-duty business, we continue to leverage our reputation and industry position in this market, particularly with regard to supplying alternators and starters to our channel partners who are leaders in the heavy-duty aftermarket segments.
Our growth opportunities continue to gain momentum across multiple platforms such as agriculture, Class 8 trucks, refrigeration, construction, material handling and transit and motor coach. Our Dixie brand is also evolving as an important supplier to the heavy-duty original equipment manufacturers. We will remain focused on sales growth, profitability and neutralizing working capital.
As I noted earlier, we expect our sales and profitability will continue to grow organically. From a strategic standpoint, we are continuing to leverage our strengths, including great products manufactured at state-of-the-art facilities, solid customer relationships, industry-leading SKU coverage and auto fill, not to mention our value-added merchandising and marketing support.
Our hard part sales in Mexico continue to gain momentum as we experienced increased demand for our aftermarket parts. The rate of growth in this market is exciting and we are well positioned to utilize our footprint to meet the growing demand. We are focused on increasing share in this region. We continue to benefit and grow sales via our relationships with U.S.-based retailers warehouse distributors who are gaining a presence in this emerging market as well as through Mexican distributors.
Favorable long-term dynamics continue to bode well for the company, and we are extremely well positioned for suitable top and bottom line growth in our hard parts business as well as testing solutions.
We are focused on growth across all product lines, including our quality built brand, which is gaining market share within the professional installer market, this includes our most recent additions to our portfolio of brake calipers, brake pads and rotors. I reiterate that as we grow these product lines, we expect overall gross margin accretion. We are beginning to see the benefits.
It is worth reiterating that 98.8% of the U.S. car park is comprised of internal combustion engines and hybrid engine vehicles. Nondiscretionary aftermarket parts for the internal combustion engine market will be here for decades, an outlook supported by recently updated industry data showing that the average age of vehicles is now 12.8 years plus.
One of our key competitive advantage is the ability to offer a broad range of applications for all makes and models. We remain focused on newer model applications and our ability to meet expected demand as these vehicles enter the replacement market.
I'll now turn the call over to David to review our results in greater detail.

David Lee

Thank you, Selwyn, and good morning, everyone. I encourage everyone to read the earnings press release issued this morning as well as a 10-Q that will be filed later today.
Let me first reiterate key financial performance metrics for the fiscal '25 third quarter that we highlighted in this morning's news release. Net sales increased 8.3% to a fiscal third quarter record $186.2 million. Gross profit increased 49.4% to a record $44.9 million. Net income for the quarter was $2.3 million, generated cash from operating activities of $34.4 million and reduced net bank debt by $30.3 million. Repurchased 268,130 shares for $2.1 million. Noncash items reduced net income by $5 million and gross profit by $3.4 million for the quarter, as detailed in the exhibits.
Net sales for the fiscal '25 third quarter increased 8.3% to a third quarter record $186.2 million from $171.9 million in the prior year. Gross profit for the fiscal '25 third quarter increased 49.4% to a record $44.9 million from $30 million a year earlier. I should mention that gross profit for the quarter was impacted by noncash expenses.
The noncash expenses reflect core and finished good premium amortization and revaluation of cores on customer shelves, which are unique to certain of our products and required by GAAP. The total for these noncash expenses in the quarter was approximately $3.4 million or a 1.8% impact to gross margin. Gross margin for the fiscal '25 third quarter was 24.1% compared with 17.5% a year earlier.
Aside from higher sales volume, particularly from certain of our newer product offerings, which supports increased absorption of cost, we are also focused on other initiatives to enhance gross margin, predominantly due to a $2.5 million noncash mark-to-market foreign exchange loss compared with a $3.1 million noncash mark-to-market foreign exchange gain in the prior year and a $1.8 million increased expense resulting from currency exchange rates compared with a year ago compared with $20.5 million last year. I should note that excluding these items above, operating expense decreased by $627,000 to $23.6 million compared with $24.2 million a year earlier.
For those of you who are not familiar with our operations, our leases in Mexico are U.S. dollar-denominated leases. However, the leases are recorded in pesos at our Mexico subsidiary. As a result, the fixed U.S. dollar leases, which are paid in U.S. dollars, are remeasured at the end of every period to reflect the current exchange rate resulting in a $1.9 million noncash foreign exchange impact of lease liabilities for the third quarter.
Additionally, the company purchases forward peso contracts, which are also remeasured at the end of every period to reflect the current exchange rate, which resulted in a $585,000 noncash foreign exchange impact of forward contracts for the fiscal third quarter. I might add that we are starting to reduce the purchase of peso forward contracts by utilizing pesos generated through our Mexican sales subsidiary to fund our operations there, which will reduce the impact of gains and losses from the remeasurement at the end of each period to reflect the current exchange rate. We are continuing to analyze opportunities to reduce exposure to the foreign exchange impact of lease liabilities and the impact of foreign currency forward contracts.
Interest expense for the fiscal third quarter decreased by $3.9 million to $14.4 million from $18.3 million a year ago, impacted by lower average outstanding balances under the company's credit facility and lower interest rates.
For the third quarter, income tax expense was $1.1 million compared with $37.3 million income tax expense for the prior year, primarily due to a $37.5 million U.S. federal and state deferred tax asset valuation allowance under U.S. GAAP for the prior year, which is noncash and does not impact any operating metrics.
The effective tax rate for the fiscal third quarter was due in part to the inability to recognize the benefit of losses at specific jurisdictions. However, we expect these losses will be utilized against future profits, which will benefit future tax rates. Obviously, there are various factors impacting the tax effect.
Net income for the fiscal '25 third quarter was $2.3 million or $0.11 per diluted share, including the impact of noncash expenses of $5 million or $0.24 per diluted share as detailed in Exhibit 1 in this morning's earnings press release. Net loss for the prior year was $47.2 million or $2.40 per share including the impact of noncash expenses of $40.4 million or $2.06 per share and cash expenses of $1.4 million or $0.07 per share as detailed in Exhibit 1. As previously explained, higher sales volume and operating efficiencies will further improve results.
EBITDA for the fiscal third quarter was $20.4 million, reflecting the $6.6 million impact of noncash expenses detailed on Exhibit 5 of this morning's earnings press release. EBITDA before the impact of noncash expenses mentioned above, was $27 million for the third quarter.
Now let me discuss the 9-month results. Net sales for the fiscal '25 9-month period increased 6.8% to a record $564.2 million from $528.2 million a year ago. Gross profit for the fiscal '25 9-month period increased 18% to a record $115.3 million from $97.8 million a year earlier.
Gross margin for the fiscal '25 9-month period was 20.4% compared with 18.5% a year earlier. Gross margin for the fiscal '25 9-month period was impacted by $10.3 million or 1.8% of noncash expenses, and $1.3 million or 0.2% of onetime cash expenses, as detailed in Exhibit 4 in this morning's earnings press release. In addition to the items detailed on Exhibit 4, gross profit for the current 9-month period was also impacted by $4 million or 0.7% of certain onetime expenses for onboarding new business.
Net loss for the fiscal '25 9-month period was $18.7 million or $0.95 per share, including the impact of noncash expenses of $22.4 million or $1.13 per share and onetime cash expenses of $3.3 million or $0.17 per share as detailed in Exhibit 2 in this morning's earnings press release.
Net loss for the prior 9-month period was $50.6 million or $2.58 per share, including the impact of noncash expenses of $49.5 million or $2.53 per share and cash expenses of $5.8 million or $0.30 per share as detailed in Exhibit 2. In addition to the items detailed in Exhibit 2, as previously noted, results for the current 9-month period were also impacted by $4 million or $0.15 per share of certain onetime expenses for onboarding new business.
EBITDA for the fiscal '25 9-month period was $34 million. EBITDA was impacted by $29.8 million of noncash expenses as well as $4.4 million in onetime cash expenses detailed in Exhibit 5 of this morning's earnings press release. EBITDA before the impact of noncash and cash expenses mentioned above, was $68.2 million for the current period despite the impact of certain onetime $4 million of expenses for onboarding new business.
Now we will move on to cash flow and key corporate items. The company generated cash of approximately $34.4 million and operating activities during the fiscal '25 third quarter. We anticipate an increase in operating profit and gross margin on a year-over-year basis for fiscal '25 and the generation of positive cash flow for the year, supported by organic growth from customer demand and operating efficiencies from our global footprint expansion.
In addition to our goal of generating increased operating profits, we are diligently focused on opportunities to neutralize working capital, including customer product demand planning, enhanced inventory management and further extending our vendor payment terms. We expect increasing financial performance from both the new and existing product lines, including our emerging brake categories.
Net bank debt decreased by $30.3 million during the fiscal third quarter to $84 million from $114.3 million. Total cash and availability was approximately $138.8 million. I should mention that for every one point reduction in interest rates, interest expense for accounts receivable discount programs offered by customers, is reduced by approximately $6 million. For further explanation on the reconciliation of items that impacted results and non-GAAP financial measures, please refer to Exhibit 1 through 5 in this morning's earnings press release.
I would now like to open the line for questions.

Question and Answer Session

Operator

(Operator Instructions)
Derek Soderberg, Cantor Fitzgerald.

Derek Soderberg

Yeah, good morning, guys. Thanks for taking my questions. Just wanted to start with the tariff environment quick. Selwyn, you've sort of been through a similar tariff environment before, can you sort of clue us in on what conversations you're having with suppliers and customers? How we should think about the potential impact of tariffs on the business? And then given your fairly global manufacturing footprint, is there a scenario where you shift around manufacturing at all?

Selwyn Joffe

Okay. So let me -- there's a lot there. And obviously, it's very fast evolving and a lot going on. Just start with the general environment is that there are hundreds of suppliers that are implementing tariff surcharges for the Chinese tariffs, and we're one of them. So we have implemented tariff surcharges. And I'm sure -- and again, this is speculation, but I've listened to various public forums where our customers are talking about passing these tariffs on to the consumer.
We have been somewhat fortunate in that -- over the last number of years, we've become less dependent on China even though we still do have a relatively decent sized tariff base that we'd have to pay tariffs [off]. We don't believe that our out-of-pocket will be material. And so at this point, again, we're managing through it, but we think we're going to be fine.

Derek Soderberg

Got it. That's helpful. And then just on the gross margins, it looks like the story is playing out really nicely here. Is there any way you could maybe quantify some of the gross margin expansion quite a big step-up year-over-year? It sounds like you've gotten some favorable scale pricing accretion. Is there any way to quantify those buckets that drove that expansion? And then --

Selwyn Joffe

Let me deal with that one. We can only talk about the segments, and we don't -- we have limited -- but I think the story is on a simplistic basis, which nothing is simple is wherever we have product revenue, we have initiatives going to implement more and more efficiencies. And as our revenue continues to grow -- that the overhead absorption is a natural, and we talked about production and purchasing efficiencies. It all comes naturally as well as us working through it and various automation initiatives and all sorts of initiatives to continue and they're paying off.
And we relocated a Torrance facility, and that is essentially, there's no more production or distribution there. So that's all into Mexico right now. As far as changing our footprint, I think you had asked that, I don't think we're any worse off than anybody, but -- and I will comment is I think we're better off than the general competitive space. It seems that there's a floor of 25% tariffs on Chinese goods right now. And now there is extra 10% surcharge, so it is 35%.
And if we look at our other main operating menus, Mexico, obviously, we came close to having tariffs there. But it looks like -- I don't -- and again, I don't know, but my -- from my reading, it looks like the Mexican U.S. government would cooperated. Canada is relatively minor for us. So I don't see us moving right now any production or anything from that respect.

Derek Soderberg

Got it. That's helpful. And David, just looking at cash generation, been pretty strong here, paying down debt. It looks like interest expense is going to come down. I guess, looking ahead, how do you plan on using cash? You bought back some shares here. Is that the expectation to continue that? Can you just talk about use of cash going forward?

David Lee

Yes, you hit it on the nail. So we're going to continue to generate good cash flow, pay down debt, be opportunistic with share repurchase and do all the right things to increase shareholder value.

Derek Soderberg

Got it, that's helpful. It's all for me. Thanks, guys.

Selwyn Joffe

Thank you, appreciate.

Operator

Bill Dezellem, Tieton Capital Management.

William Dezellem

Thank you. I also want to follow up on gross margin and hoping you can provide a bit more perspective. In this context, your gross -- or pardon me, your sales in December were lower than they were in September. I think that's the normal seasonal pattern. And yet your gross profit dollars were higher in December at nearly $45 million versus about $41 million in the December quarter -- or pardon me, September quarter. So you had lower sales and higher gross profit dollars. Would you talk in more detail about kind of that specific swing and the success there?

David Lee

We continue to be focused on every quarter being more efficient in our operating model. So in the December quarter, we were even more efficient than the September quarter. So all those initiatives we have to expand gross margin -- dollars and percentage are really paying off, and we will continue to be focused on expanding margins.

William Dezellem

And following up on that, what initiative or initiatives were most impactful sequentially?

Selwyn Joffe

People used to asking us about the restaurant business, what does it take to have a successful business -- in the restaurant business? And I use to -- the answer, I used to quote -- a famous restaurant, it's not one thing, it's a 1,000 little things. And so I mean, it's focused around build production efficiencies is really where there's a lot of activity as we scale the production facility.
So when you have economies of scale and you're able to reallocate and allocate production volume in the most -- in a more efficient manner, I mean that's why you get these results. It's sort of like you're able to fill each of the channels of need for production, the different production arena.
So -- volume, and we've been talking about this volume is definitely a part of that. And then the ability of us to have a seasoned workforce. We have a great workforce, a very knowledgeable workforce. And as they grow and get more seasoned on the new product lines, and we're seeing tremendous inroads and great innovation in terms of, again, becoming more efficient. So there's no one thing. I mean I think that our strategy is eliminate waste wherever we can and neutralize working capital. And at the same time, we need to keep growing our sales because that makes it easier to do [all those].

William Dezellem

I think that's where my favorable surprise was, is that your sales sequentially were down even if seasonally the norm and yet your gross profit was up, that seemed extraordinary.

Selwyn Joffe

Yes. Then it also relates to how much production you've got in the quarter. We had new business coming on for production. So the volume is not -- for manufacturing activities, volume for us is not directly related to sales always. I mean we have -- we're ramping up for new business. So -- and again, the different initiatives take effect, our purchasing initiatives take effect, and that applies to volume and no volume, but having overall volume allows you to get those concessions.

William Dezellem

And I think you all have talked to -- on the last call or 2, how you have additional brake business that would be ramping in calendar 2025, so this calendar year. So are we seeing the production benefits flow-through margin of that business that will then see the sales benefits in the March and the following quarters?

Selwyn Joffe

We're actually seeing a little bit of it. It's true. We do have new business that's being ramped up. But in the beginning, as you're building inventory for this new business, there's some inefficiencies because you're building some lower volume items, we should see those margins get better as we roll this business out and that's going quite well. Thank you.

William Dezellem

All right. That's helpful. And relative to the brake caliper ramp up to whatever normalized volumes are, where are we at in that ramp process?

Selwyn Joffe

I would say it's hard to tell that to give you a number. I will give you a number in a moment. But the one thing is you set out to begin a new category, you design a facility that you think can hit a certain benchmark. And as you become -- as you operate it, you learn from it and I'm happy to say that I think that our capacity is -- will end up being greater than we anticipated to be. So our expansion opportunities in that facility will be greater.
But -- so it's a moving target as to what the denominator is, the numerator, we know what we're doing. But there's a lot of opportunity for growth that I -- so I don't want to I mean I can give you a percentage, but it's not a helpful percentage because we're more efficient at a lower percentage of capacity today than we thought we would ever be. And so -- and what that means is that the factory opportunity has grown without additional CapEx or we were able to produce more units, and then we'll even get more efficient out of that facility as time goes on. But we are a major player. I mean, I don't know if we're the second largest brake caliper provider in the U.S. today or not, but we're certainly up there.

William Dezellem

And just to make sure I'm clear on all that, that's really helpful that you mentioned in your opening remarks that the rotating electrical business is operating efficiency -- efficiently and that continues to be the case. And then historically, the brake caliper business has not been running efficiently simply because of the low volumes as you start to ramp that business. But as you're growing towards #2 or #1 in the country, you are having better margins or better efficiency even at the lower volumes than you anticipated as your staff as employees have learned how to simply do things better. And this happens to be the quarter where a lot of that culminated and becomes more visible. Is that a fair characterization before I step off line?

Selwyn Joffe

No. No. Let me just clarify one thing is that we're still doing higher volumes, but what I'm -- the point I'm trying to make is that capacity has actually grown from what our initial anticipation is. So yes, we're getting these efficiencies. These efficiencies are still evolving. They're not culminated. I mean this is definitely an evolving program that we're doing. And again, as new product lines get more mature, they perform that. So it's mostly accurate, but we are producing higher volumes already. But we have -- what I would say is additional opportunity to take that capacity up even higher than we thought it could go.

William Dezellem

Great, thank you for the clarification and congratulations.

Selwyn Joffe

Thank you. I appreciate the questions.

Operator

And that will conclude our question-and-answer session. And I will now turn the meeting back over to Selwyn Joffe for closing remarks.

Selwyn Joffe

Okay. Well, in summary, we remain bullish about our outlook. We remain laser-focused on further efficiencies and fully benefiting from a not easily duplicated global platform to meet demand for nondiscretionary products as well as from our diagnostic testing capabilities.
Recent proposals by the Trump administration about tariffs continue to make headlines. At this point, there's a lot of speculation we will take appropriate action as necessary, including customer surcharges to offset the tariffs and goods from Mexico and Canada should they be imposed.
With regard to China, we have notified our customers that we are implementing a surcharge to offset China's recently announced tariffs. We continue to leverage our expertise and solid customer and supplier partnerships. This includes our supply chain [of] program that benefits our suppliers. Our liquidity is strong, and we have the resources, capacity and capability to enhance shareholder value.
In closing, I must recognize the contributions of all our team members who are continuously focused on providing the highest level of servers. We are all committed to being the industry leader for parts and solutions that move our world today and tomorrow. We also appreciate the continued support of our shareholders, and thank everyone again for joining us for the call. We look forward to speaking to you with you when we host our fiscal 2025 4th quarter call in June and at various investor conferences and meetings. Thank you.

Operator

That will conclude today's meeting. Thank you all for joining. You may now disconnect.