Prepared remarks
Good day and welcome to the Ryerson Holding Corporation's second quarter 2026 conference call. Today's conference is being recorded. There will be a question and answer session later. If you'd like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad at any time. Again, that is star one to ask a question. At this time, I'd like to turn the conference over to Justine Carlson. Please go ahead.
Good morning and thank you all for joining Ryerson Holding Corporation's second quarter 2026 earnings call. On our call we have Eddie Lehner, Ryerson's Chief Executive Officer; Rick Marabito, our President and Chief Operating Officer; Jim Claussen, our Chief Financial Officer; and Molly Cannon, our Chief Accounting Officer and Corporate Controller. Mitch Manson, Ryerson's Senior Vice President of Finance and Chief Financial Officer of Olympic Steel; Andrew Greif, Executive Vice President of Ryerson and President of Olympic Steel; and Trent McFarland, our Senior Vice President of Supply Chain at Ryerson Process Metals, are joining us for Q&A. A recording of this call will be posted on our investor relations website at ir.ryerson.com. Please read the forward-looking statement disclosures included in our earnings release issued yesterday and note that it applies to all statements made during this call. In addition, our remarks today refer to several non-GAAP measures. Reconciliations of these adjusted numbers are also included in our earnings release.
I will now turn the call over to Eddie. Thank you, Justine. Good morning, everyone, and thank you all for joining us. In the second quarter of 2026, I am pleased to say that we made the most of our opportunities and continued to position Ryerson for higher quality earnings generation through the cycle as we further realized merger-related synergies while building an ever better customer experience engine. We delivered greater-than-expected shipments on a same-store and total company basis, achieved revenue and adjusted EBITDA excluding LIFO well above our guidance ranges, and generated higher net income sequentially and year over year. In our first full quarter together as Ryerson and Olympic Steel, we continued advancing our shared vision of the merger potential as we attained second quarter synergy realizations in line with our guidance. More importantly, we are finding additional opportunities for commercial growth, which we expect will continue to drive top-line performance and market share gains. Our results in the quarter were impacted by a unique amalgamation of puts and takes. On the positive side of the ledger, business investment-driven demand, quote activity, transactional order win rates, and spot transactional margins were outsized drivers for EBITDA generation, while program customer business volumes, program pricing and margins, and spot transactional volumes continued to lag, with inflationary delivery cost pressures building through the quarter as fuel prices rose and truck capacity tightened. In a supply-side tension market where extended mill lead times, distributor inventories, domestic capacity constraints, carbon steel plate and coil production issues, and heightened geopolitical turmoil are complicating customer backlog turnover and efficient resource allocation, we don't dwell on the imperfect; we get on with the business of creating consistently great customer experiences, which is a forever part of our strategy. On the demand side, the improved, though asymmetrical, manufacturing demand conditions are illustrated more broadly by a now six-month streak of expanding ISM manufacturing purchasing managers' index readings, and more narrowly by end-market strength skewing heavily to artificial intelligence, aerospace, defense, semiconductor, and electrification. We note that we should be well positioned through our network to take advantage of this demand upside while other verticals such as agriculture, consumer discretionary, and residential construction move further toward eventual recovery. On the price side of the ledger, average selling prices have been increasing; however, pricing and margin spreads widened in the quarter between transactional pricing and program pricing to their highest deltas in three years. With respect to commodity price drivers, carbon was the best performer in the quarter, followed by stainless and then aluminum, whereas non-ferrous commodity bellwethers saw an approximately 15% price reversion at the end of Q2 and into early Q3 before recently stabilizing within a lower trading range. Moving beyond the industry macro environment, what has been especially inspiring is the energy and shared purpose we are seeing across the unified enterprise as our teams combine strengths, share best practices, and scale customer solutions. We have achieved a great deal together in these first months, but we are just in the early stages of getting to escape velocity. The work is taking hold, the commercial and financial impacts are beginning to show, and we are progressing toward realizing the full potential and value this merger can create for our customers, teammates, shareholders, and one another. With that, I will turn the call over to Rick to discuss market conditions, industry trends, and how we are executing operationally across the business.
Thanks, Eddie, and good morning, everyone. On a year-to-date basis, Ryerson's North American tonship increased by 49% compared to the first half of 2025, or by 5.8% on a same-store basis, applying market share gains when compared to the industry's growth of 2.9% in the year-to-date period, according to the Metal Service Center Institute. Ryerson's year-to-date volume growth was led by solid double-digit growth in its transactional business. We also saw encouraging early third quarter indicators around improvement in our contractual business on a year-over-year basis for the first time since 2022. On a total company basis, Ryerson generated net sales of over $2 billion and tons shipped of over 800,000 in the second quarter. Our shipments increased 22.6% compared to the prior quarter, or 4% on a same-store basis, exceeding our guidance expectations. The improvement reflected broad sequential volume growth across the business supported by better market conditions, stronger customer activity, commercial collaboration, and continued execution by our teams. Second quarter results also continued to benefit from secular demand tied to data center and power generation projects, which we estimate represented approximately 7% of our second quarter revenues. Sales tied to these applications continued to accelerate during the quarter, increasing approximately 30% sequentially, and we expect opportunities in these markets to continue building in future periods. Ryerson is participating in this demand through customers' power, IT hardware, cooling, fabrication, and related project activity, with that demand showing up across a number of our traditional and market categories. Given our scale, processing capabilities, product breadth, and customer relationships, we believe Ryerson is well positioned to support continued growth in these areas and expand our participation. Within our Ryerson North American same-store end markets, commercial transportation and climate were notable areas of strength. In commercial transportation, we saw solid single-digit North American same-store volume growth quarter-over-quarter led by our truck cab subsector. We continue to view 2026 as a transition year for the class eight industry and remain cautiously optimistic about improving demand conditions as we move further into 2026 and into 2027. In climate, we delivered double-digit North American same-store volume growth quarter-over-quarter supported by stronger activity from larger HVAC customers serving both data center-related demand and traditional product lines. At the same time, recovery across more cyclical end markets remains selective. Ryerson North American same-store agriculture shipments improved modestly during the period, suggesting that some larger customers may have slightly increased production after an extended period of inventory destocking. However, the agriculture market remains recessed given current farming economics, and we expect demand to remain largely subdued in the near term. Same-store North American fabrication and welding also improved modestly, supported by data center-related projects and broader improvement in manufacturing activities. In consumer products, Ryerson's same-store North American volumes were flat quarter-over-quarter, although we saw solid single-digit growth among top appliance customers. Overall, consumer demand remains disciplined as higher-for-longer interest rates and inflation continue to influence purchasing behavior. Across all of our end markets, customers have increasingly valued product availability, reliability, processing capabilities, and speed of response — all areas where our expanded scale and combined footprint are enhancing our ability to service our customers. One example of our enhanced ability to serve customers is through the sharing of assets. Our Integrity Stainless business previously rented external storage due to space constraints at that location. Through coordination with our nearby Singer Steel facility, we moved Integrity Stainless product into available space within our own network, reducing external storage costs, lowering logistics costs, and improving turnaround times for our customers. We're also winning business through collaboration across geographies. For example, a customer in our Northeast market reached out to their Olympic representative in need of support for their new West Coast facility. Our Olympic representative connected with Ryerson Los Angeles, which fulfilled the customer's needs and delivered a successful customer experience. This is a good example of how the merger has opened doors for additional business opportunities for the combined enterprise. We're also beginning to coordinate order flow more strategically across the combined network. In certain cases, that means aligning contract business within Olympic facilities that are well positioned to support it, while creating additional capacity at Ryerson facilities for quicker-turn, higher-end, higher-margin transactional work. This is a synergistic example of how our combined footprint can improve customer service, facility utilization, and earnings quality. Across the business, we are seeing collaboration among commercial, procurement, operations, logistics, and leadership teams translate into practical execution. Our teams are identifying new ways to serve customers through the combined footprint, broader product access, shared inventory, increased in-house processing, and faster response in a market where availability and reliability matter. We continue to be encouraged by how naturally the organizations are integrating. The shared customer-first mindset is showing up in our everyday decisions: how we move material, move customers to new capabilities, and solve problems across our expanded network. From an operating standpoint, our focus remains straightforward: serve our customers well, execute on our synergies, and build a more cohesive, interconnected metal service center platform. The second quarter began to show the power of that model. We still have much work ahead, but we're already creating real value for our customers, our teammates, and our stakeholders.
Thank you, Rick, and good morning, everyone. As Rick mentioned, Ryerson generated a record $2 billion in revenue for the quarter on just over 800,000 tons shipped, exceeding guidance expectations on both a revenue and shipment basis. Our top-line performance reflects both stronger same-store and total company shipment performance, improved pricing, and effective execution across the organization. On the bottom line, our net income and earnings per share generation came in at $15.5 million and $0.30 per diluted share. Net income for the quarter was impacted by a $15.7 million purchase accounting adjustment to cost of materials sold, which reduced our gross margin and net income generation. Excluding the impact of purchase accounting and other one-time items, adjusted net income generation for the second quarter was $27.6 million, or $0.52 per diluted share. Adjusted EBITDA excluding LIFO was $101 million in the second quarter, which exceeded our guidance range of $88 to $92 million. Olympic Steel generated $23.5 million in adjusted EBITDA excluding LIFO, also exceeding our expectations. In the second quarter, we recorded LIFO expense of $17 million. Turning to our outlook for the third quarter, we expect that market demand will follow normal seasonal industry demand patterns, leading to volumes 3% to 5% lower compared to the second quarter. At the same time, we expect that average selling prices will be flat to up by 2% as we anticipate that carbon pricing will remain supported and offset recent corrections in stainless and aluminum prices. We therefore expect that our third quarter revenues will be in the range of $1.87 to $1.95 billion. We anticipate that rising material costs, ongoing program customer pricing lags, and continued inflationary pressures across labor and delivery will pressure margins, causing some compression in the third quarter. We also expect to recognize approximately $5 to $7 million of additional inventory purchase accounting adjustments through the end of the year as we sell through the remaining acquired inventory and get further distance from one-time merger closing events. Excluding these inventory purchase accounting adjustments, we anticipate net income generation in the range of $19 to $21 million, or $0.37 to $0.40 per diluted share in the third quarter. We expect to record LIFO expense in the range of $16 to $18 million in the third quarter, leading to adjusted EBITDA excluding LIFO in the range of $88 to $92 million, with $21 to $23 million of that generation contributed by Olympic Steel. At the same time, given that stainless and aluminum prices are reverting from recent highs, we expect working capital requirements to moderate in the third quarter, supporting free cash flow generation and net debt reduction. This working capital requirement moderation, coupled with higher trailing 12-month EBITDA generation, is expected to move us closer to a net leverage ratio of three times by the end of the year. Turning to our progress on synergies, our second quarter results included the realization of approximately $5 million of synergy attainment across our four synergy pillars. Based on the actions already implemented and those currently underway, we expect to realize approximately $13 to $14 million in synergies in the third quarter. This third quarter expectation would result in an annual run rate synergy amount of $52 to $56 million and exceed our first-year target of $40 million in annual run rate synergies ahead of schedule. Through the second quarter, we have spent approximately $1.2 million in one-time costs to achieve these synergies. Of our third quarter forecasted attainment, we expect that our procurement synergies will generate approximately $6.5 million as we continue to align purchasing programs and leverage the increased scale of the combined company. Efficiency and public company cost savings are progressing as expected, and we anticipate that this category will create approximately $3 million in savings in the third quarter through the elimination of duplicative public company costs, attrition, and related efficiency actions. Our commercial enhancement strategy is off to an even stronger start than anticipated, and Rick gave great examples of the wins we are seeing across our markets. As a reminder, we projected $20 million in annual run rate opportunities from this category. Our third quarter expectation includes approximately $2 million of synergy benefits generated by commercial strategies, approximately $8 million of annualized incremental EBITDA from new business opportunities enabled by the scale of our combined facilities, equipment, customer relationships, and geographic reach. And finally, our third quarter synergy outlook includes approximately $2 million of expected benefits from network optimization actions, or approximately $8 million on an annualized basis. This work includes practical actions such as bringing more processing in-house, reducing third-party costs, sharing inventory across the combined network, and consolidating facilities where we believe it will improve service and cost structure. Together, these actions are expected to support EBITDA performance while enhancing our ability to serve customers during a period of extended lead times and constrained availability. Within this network optimization strategy, we have already completed a consolidation project in Mexico that is generating approximately $1.3 million of annual run rate synergies, and we are advancing a Connecticut project that will consolidate Olympic Milford and Ryerson specialty alloys. The Connecticut project is expected to be completed in the first quarter of 2027 and create a stronger operating platform with improved workflow, expanded processing capabilities, better product availability, lower fixed costs, and enhanced logistics. In all, we are very pleased with how our synergy strategies are progressing. That progress is the direct reflection of our teams in the field — those serving on dedicated synergy councils to those in local markets reaching across offices, warehouses, and geographies to create solutions for customers. Looking ahead with our first-year target in sight, we remain confident in our ability to achieve our total two-year target of $120 million of annual run rate synergies. Turning to investments in the business, capital expenditures totaled $16 million in the quarter and included investments in the maintenance of our facilities, as well as projects supporting our transactional and value-add growth. Year-to-date, we have invested $29 million in CapEx. We still expect to invest approximately $75 million for the full year, with $50 million in same-store capital expenditures anticipated. During the second quarter, we returned approximately $800,000 to shareholders through the opportunistic repurchase of approximately 39,000 shares. These repurchases were completed prior to the effectiveness of the new authorization announced in May, and as a result, the full $100 million authorization remains available to us through April 2028. Our board has declared a quarterly dividend of $0.1875 per share, which is consistent with our prior quarter and will be paid on September 17th to shareholders of record as of September 3rd. Overall, our capital allocation strategy remains focused on enabling free cash flow generation and reducing debt. It means maintaining a disciplined approach to capital expenditures, being highly selective on M&A, continuing to support our dividend, and preserving the flexibility to prudently exercise our share repurchase authorization as conditions warrant. I'll now turn the call over to Molly Cannon to discuss our financial performance highlights for the second quarter.
Thanks, Jim, and good morning everyone. In the second quarter of 2026, Ryerson generated net sales of $2.01 billion, an increase of 28.1% compared to the prior quarter, with tonship 22.6% higher and average selling prices 4.5% higher. On a same-store basis, revenue was $1.44 billion, an increase of 11.5% sequentially, with average selling prices 7.2% higher and tons shipped 4% higher. Impacted by the one-time purchase accounting adjustment that Jim mentioned, gross margin contracted during the second quarter by 70 basis points to 17.7% compared to 18.4% in the prior period. Excluding our second quarter LIFO expense of $17 million and the impact of purchase accounting, adjusted gross margin excluding LIFO expanded by 20 basis points to 19.3% compared to gross margin excluding LIFO of 19.1% in the first quarter of 2026. Warehousing, delivery, selling, general, and administrative expenses, or WDSG&A, totaled $320.3 million in the second quarter, an increase of 20.8% compared to the first quarter. On a same-store basis, WDSG&A was relatively flat compared to the first quarter, up by just $1.1 million to $218.7 million and down as a percentage of sales from 16.8% to 15.2%. On a per-ton basis, total company WDSG&A decreased to $398 per ton in the second quarter from $404 per ton in the first quarter and decreased on a same-store basis to $402 per ton from $416 per ton in the first quarter, demonstrating operating leverage across the expanded platform as volumes increase. In all, we generated net income of $15.5 million, or $0.30 per diluted share, in the second quarter, compared to net income of $4.5 million, or $0.10 per share, in the first quarter. After removing the impact of purchase accounting adjustments and insurance settlement gains, advisory service fees, impairment charges on assets, and the related income tax benefits of these items, Ryerson's second quarter adjusted net income was $27.6 million, or $0.52 per diluted share. Our total company adjusted EBITDA excluding LIFO generation for the second quarter was $101 million, $23.5 million of which was contributed by Olympic Steel. This compares to $67.4 million generated in the first quarter, $12.5 million of which was contributed by Olympic Steel on the six-week sub-period. Turning to cash flow, Ryerson used $5.6 million in cash from operations in the second quarter as net income generation was offset by a higher-than-anticipated working capital bill supporting higher revenues. We anticipate the working capital bill to mitigate in Q3 as both stainless steel and aluminum products have come off their 2026 highs in June. Our inventory remained well managed in the second quarter as our days of supply decreased by one day to 73 days, which is within our target range of 70 to 75 days. Our cash conversion cycle increased to 71 days for the second quarter compared to 67 days in the first quarter as we took advantage of early payment discounts during the quarter, decreasing our payable cycle while our receivable cycle increased slightly. We ended the quarter with total debt of $955 million and net debt of $913 million, which represents sequential increases of $47 million and $30 million, respectively, due to higher working capital requirements. Our leverage ratio decreased from 5.1 times in the first quarter to four times in the second, driven by higher trailing 12-month adjusted EBITDA excluding LIFO as we recorded higher same-store achievement and a full quarter of Olympic Steel results. We expect our leverage ratio to continue its downward trend as we anticipate that our trailing 12-month adjusted EBITDA excluding LIFO will increase with the addition of Olympic Steel, expectations for higher year-over-year same-store generation, and our forecasted synergy attainment. Finally, total global liquidity increased from $618 million at the end of the first quarter to $757 million at the end of the second, as our borrowing base continued to expand with our working capital. Overall, the second quarter reflected strong revenue, adjusted net income, and adjusted EBITDA generation, improved operating leverage, and incremental progress on deleveraging with ample liquidity to support our growth strategies. With that, I will turn the call back to Eddie to conclude our prepared comments.
Thank you, Molly. Taking it all together, Ryerson succeeded in delivering revenue and adjusted EBITDA excluding LIFO results that exceeded expectations. We continue making meaningful synergy and operating model progress while navigating an improved but complex market. This quarter's achievements are a credit to our people and to the daily decisions they are making and actions they are taking to connect capabilities, solve problems, reduce friction, and create excellent customer experiences. We believed from the beginning that merging Ryerson and Olympic Steel together would act as a growth and enterprise value accelerant, giving us the scale, capabilities, and momentum to support the transformation of one of North America's largest metal service center platforms into a higher-performing, technologically enabled industrial metal solutions network with speed, joy, and operational excellence. After our first full quarter together, we are beginning to see tangible proof of what this was all about: great experiences all around for our customers, our employees, and our shareholders as Ryerson's results continue to rise. With that, we look forward to your questions.
Questions and answers
If you would like to ask a question, please signal by pressing star one on your telephone keypad. If you're using a speakerphone, please make sure your mute function is turned off to allow your signal to reach our equipment. Again, press star one to ask a question. We will pause for just a moment to allow everyone the opportunity to signal.
Hey, good morning, guys. The transactional business outperforming contract has been the trend at Ryerson for a while, but you also mentioned some transactional market share gains in the release. Maybe outline where you're seeing those wins right now.
Yes, Sam, it's really broad-based and it really depends on what we term service center fundamentals that we've referenced, where when we have service levels that are standard — which we peg at 95% for A1A items — when that inventory is in the network positioned locally in the right place at the right time, in addition to some of the technologies that we've developed to improve quoting bandwidth and quoting speed. When that inventory is available, we do better. And it's really that simple. Over the last two to three years, as we've talked about investments that we've made in the company that maybe weren't quite ready for prime time two, three, four years ago, those investments have really come to fruition in a market environment that is better on the whole. We're seeing transactional growth because we have a name and brand in the industry that gets us the quoting opportunity, but then we need to perform when we get that opportunity, increase win rates, and get that product positioned where it can do the most good.
Okay, and then if you could just level set us on the split between the transactional and the contract business today.
Yes. Where we are now as a combined enterprise is, I'd say, roughly a 40/60 split between transactional and program business when you look at the two enterprises. We're looking to improve both sides of the ledger. We can improve the program portfolio by lowering the cost to serve on program assets by moving that business to work centers that can accommodate higher volumes, which increases the margin spread. That frees up more space to grow the transactional side of the ledger. So as we move from 40/60, we're looking to get to that next benchmark of 45/55. Right now, as we referenced in the script, you have a margin differential between transactional and program of between 700 and 800 basis points, so there's ample opportunity to improve both parts of that commercial portfolio.
And once again, if you'd like to ask a question, please signal by pressing star one on your telephone keypad. We'll take our next question from Katia Jancic with BMO Capital Markets.
Hi, thank you for taking my questions. Maybe staying on the contractual and transactional business: Eddie, you just mentioned that the margin gap is between 700 to 800 basis points. How does that compare to typical historical gaps? And on the program side, what are the main factors that are driving the margin to lag so much? Are there steps within your control to reduce that?
That's a great question. In my time over the last roughly 14 years with Ryerson, I've seen the gap dialed into about 600 to 700 basis points difference between the transactional, spot bill-of-material order and the program order. There are unique circumstances around the program book coming out of Q4 2025 and into 2026. Some of it has to do with supply-side constraints around carbon sheet, carbon plate, and tube, for example, and some stainless dynamics. I'll ask Rick and Andrew to append to that.
Yes, Katia, this is Andrew. Many of the contract businesses, especially on the carbon side, are index-based. As we came out of 2025 going into 2026, the numbers were relatively fixed going up or down based on either monthly or quarterly contracts, where we have the opportunity, as Eddie and Rick described, to get better asset utilization. The more we're running contract business on Olympic assets and running full shifts, including a potential third shift, we'll see greater opportunities for profitability. That will also allow Ryerson assets to free up capacity to put more transactional items on the floor, targeting those A1A items and getting closer to the 95% inventory availability rate on the floor.
And to add, there's always a normal lag on the contract business, as Andrew described, because the preponderance of those contracts price a quarter in arrears based on the prior quarter's index. The good news is we continue, especially in carbon, to be in a rising price environment. That lag that we talk about hasn't yet fully equilibrated, but as pricing starts to level off over the subsequent one or two quarters, you start to really catch up on that plan. Timing and long lead times also create dynamics in matching customer demand with supply.
Perfect. And if I can just squeeze one more: you talked about cost pressures, including freight or transportation costs. I always thought those types of costs are passed through to customers. Are you not able to do that now?
Katja, I'll start and then ask the team to contribute. There's always a lag. When you look at the speed and rate at which fuel prices increase and flatbed trucking capacity tightens, there's an adjustment, especially on the program side where contracts have terms that dictate when you can introduce price increases. On the spot, transactional side we have a lot more flexibility to price alongside competitors when bidding for the next order. So those price pass-throughs are coming, but there is a lag. Despite some variable cost components surging faster than average selling price increases, the synergy work has been a strong offset for us. We have good cards to play from this merger; we just need to manage through the lag. I'll ask Jim and Rick to talk a little bit more about logistics and surcharges.
Thanks, Eddie. Katja, Eddie covered it well. There can be a lag, especially on fuel as fuel surcharges may index up over time. The spot market is also driven by supply and demand dynamics, so we've seen pressures on logistics costs across both platforms. We continue to work to moderate logistics costs by leveraging synergies and the combined network to reduce miles and trips.
All right, and we have a question from online. This one's regarding your FIFO gross margin outlook for the third quarter, given the noted price cost dynamics on contracts and the recent price declines.
Yes, I think following up on what we talked about in the prepared remarks and so far in the Q&A, we have a real opportunity within our commercial portfolio to drive margin accretion over time. Some of the headwinds from Q2 to Q3 are lags and transitional in nature. Aluminum and stainless on a three-month average stepped down between 10% and 15%, and you'll see that flow through in Q3 along with some supply chain disruptions where you have to incur additional network costs to maintain customer experience. Those are transitory costs. Over time, we'll continue to grow our margin profile and expand margins, but we need to cycle through about one inventory turn as we go from Q2 to Q3.
As a reminder, if you'd like to ask a question, please signal by pressing star one on your telephone keypad. It appears there are no further questions in the queue at this time. I'll turn it back to the speakers for any closing remarks.
So, we really appreciate your support of Ryerson, and we look forward to being with you to discuss Q3 results.
Sometime in early November. Thank you. And ladies and gentlemen, this concludes today's call. We thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect and have a great day.