Fleetcor Technologies Inc (NYSE:CPAY) (2024)

Jim, thanks. Good afternoon everyone and thanks for joining our Q3 2022 earnings call. Up front here, I'll plan to cover four subjects; first, I'll provide my take on Q3 results; second, I'll provide updated full year 2022 guidance; third, provide just a brief preview of 2023 along with some of the factors that will affect our performance; and then lastly, I'll catch you up on a few recent developments.

Okay. Let me turn to our Q3 results, which were quite good and ahead of our expectations. We reported revenue of $893 million, that's up 18% and cash EPS of $4.24, that's up 21% . Our EBITDA for the quarter exceeded $450 million. Organic revenue growth, quite good, coming in at 13% , that was led by our corporate payments business at 21% and our lodging business at 28% .

Trends in the quarter are quite good also. Same store sales finished plus 2% , retention remaining steady at 92% and overall sales performance, just terrific, up 24% for the quarter, we on-boarded almost 60,000 new clients during Q3. So the fundamentals of the business remain very solid, obviously, selling a lot and retaining a lot.

Look, additionally, I want to point out that we're continuing to strengthen the setup, the positioning of the company which, obviously, improves our growth prospects going forward. Added some important EV assets and further refined our plan to go on offense. We added some pretty important AP automation software to front end our corporate payments solution set that really rounds out for us that AP solution set. And we continue to expand our fuel footprint in Brazil, driving transaction growth there. I think we're expecting an exit rate of about $10 million annual add on fueling transactions. So good progress.

Okay. Let me shift gears and turn to our updated full year 2022 guidance along with the assumptions behind it. So we're revising full year 2022 revenue guidance up to $3.410 billion at the midpoint. This includes absorbing about $8 million of macro headwind in the second half versus our August guide.

We're maintaining full year 2022 cash EPS guidance of $15.95 at the midpoint, same number we gave in August. This does include a bit of a flip flop. We pulled some revenue forward through gift orders into Q3 that we had out looked in Q4. We're also absorbing about $0.04 to $0.05 of dilution from the new Plugsurfing and Accrualify acquisitions. We're also incurring about $30 million of incremental bad debt and interest expense way above our August guide as the Fed has accelerated their interest rate increases. So if we achieved this $3.410 billion and $15.95 updated ’22 guidance, that would represent 20% revenue growth and 21% % earnings growth for the full year versus 2021.

Okay. Importantly, next up I'm going to share a brief preview of our early look into 2023. So like most companies we're expecting the ’23 setup to be quite challenging. We do run the business, plan the business on a macro neutral basis really so that we can operate through any kind of cycle, good or bad. Then we do overlay our spending and capital allocation decisions based on the environment we're seeing. So for ‘23, we're expecting organic revenue growth overall of about 10% , which is our target. That's based on our preliminary ’23 budget submissions. Inside of that, probably no surprise, global fleet out looking mid to high single digits, our lodging and Brazil businesses mid-teens and our corporate payment business for next year high teens. And by the way, closing in on almost $1 billion of overall revenue next year, so getting quite significant.

We'll bake in clearly less OpEx expense growth next year with a goal of delivering 200 basis points to 300 basis points of margin improvement. We're hopeful we can reach a ’23 cash EPS with a ‘17 handle, but that's ultimately going to turn on, one, the level of sales investment we make and then the corresponding bad debt that comes with that. Two, interest rates where they peak and if and when they start down. Three, FX rates, particular eye on the pound, does it recover? And then lastly, recession, do we get one, and if we do, what would the depth duration be?

So look, on the recession front, in particular, we wouldn't describe FLEETCOR is recession proof, but pretty recession resilient. Some of the reasons that we should be pretty recession resilient are: First, our solutions are essential, generally not discretionary. Demand for our services runs higher in inflationary or cost conscious times, think fuel this year and the demand that we see. And lastly, our businesses are really diverse geographically by client size from SMB to enterprise, lots of verticals we serve, obviously, lots of product or spending categories. We're by no means immune to some client segments, certain client segments being impacted by recession, for example, construction. And for sure we will reel in restrict credit in the event of a downturn. And that for sure pressures revenue. So, look, we plan to have a much clearer picture of 2023 when we speak again in 90 days and we'll offer up our formal ’23 guidance then.

Okay. Let me transition to my last subject, which is to catch you up on a few recent developments and let me begin with the FTC case. So the court held a two day hearing on the FTC matter that was on October 20 and 21. Importantly, the judge concluded that she would not enter the proposed FTC order and rather encouraged the parties to mediate to negotiate so that we've agreed to engage with the FTC and see what we can work out. We do think that the face to face court hearing was really quite helpful. It gave us a chance to summarize the various disclosure and process enhancements that we have voluntarily made really over the last four or five years. All of them aimed at enhancing our customer experience.

So some of the enhancements we called out were eliminating certain digital ad claims and the language around that. We ceased selling add on features via negative option and instead packaged up various features in the three packages and sell those affirmatively upfront. We designed and implemented much bigger, bolder [Ts and Cs] (ph) including a schemer like fee box that's front and center. And lastly, we collected express or what we call affirmative consent from 96% of our fuel card client base to the specific terms of their card program.

We've also proposed some new incremental enhancements going forward, that would include crediting client payments on the day we receive them versus the day they're posted along with some other items that comply with the CSPB consumer payment standards. Obviously, we're B2B, but are willing to do this. We've talked about combining our invoicing and reporting materials into a single consolidated package to make it easier for clients to review. And we said repeatedly, I think throughout this FTC case that we're trying to cooperate, trying to be transparent. We simply emphasize to the court that we need to know exactly what the practices are that we're being asked to implement. And if we can understand them, we'll implement, we'll comply with them.

We're also saying again today that we don't believe that the disclosure enhancements that we've already made which we can see nor the additional ones that we're contemplating will have a material impact on the company's go forward financial performance.

Okay. Let me turn to our situation in Russia. We've made the decision to explore selling the Russia business. We've retained a local investment bank, we have formally launched the sales process, it is underway. The business does generate meaningful free cash flow, so that can potentially support acquisition financing along with annual dividends. And we think that that should provide a reasonable floor on the valuation. Additionally, we've completed all of the isolation or separation steps necessary to carve the business away from FLEETCOR. This provides assurance that we can maintain compliance with the sanctions. And we do plan to move into this isolation or passive ownership phase beginning in early December. And obviously we will keep you updated on the sale process.

So lastly, on the acquisition and capital allocation front. We did complete three capability acquisitions since we spoke last. So corporate payments add on called the Accrualify on August 1, an important EV deal in Europe Plugsurfing on September 1, we closed literally yesterday an international workforce lodging deal called [Roomx] (ph). And finally, we expect to complete the cross border deal called Global Reach, which is a bolt-on around the end of the year.

So as you can see, we focused really on capability acquisitions in this environment, choosing to strengthen, again, the positioning and setup of the company over the mid-term. We do hope that M&A valuations reset a bit next year. Higher interest rates will, obviously, take hold and just maybe we can get back to larger accretive transactions. Additionally, we did repurchased $500 million of FLT in Q3 at what we think are quite attractive prices.

So look, in closing today, again, very good Q3 results. Earnings grew 21% , maintaining our full year ’22 cash EPS guidance at $15.95 despite a bit weakening macro that we're absorbing. This would represent a $0.70 higher number than the initial EPS guidance that we provide in February. We do expect ’23 to be a challenging year, but see, our overall organic growth rate in and around 10% are target, and again our earnings turning mostly on the interest rate and FX environment. The FTC case finally winding down, again, we do not expect a material impact going forward. We have decided to explore the sale of our Russia business again underway and delighted with these handful of capability acquisitions this quarter.

Lastly, many thanks to Alissa here for stepping in to the CFO role on an interim basis. So now over to you, Alissa.

Fleetcor Technologies Inc (NYSE:CPAY) (2024)

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