CRA International Inc (CRAI) 2016 Q3 法說會逐字稿

Good day, everyone, and welcome to Charles River Associates' third-quarter fiscal 2016 conference call. Today's call is being recorded. Today's earnings release and prepared remarks from CRA's Chief Financial Officer are posted on the Investor Relations section of CRA's website at CRAI.com.

With us today are CRA's President and Chief Executive Officer, Paul Maleh; and Chief Financial Officer, Chad Holmes.

At this time, I would like to turn the call over to Mr. Holmes for opening remarks. Please go ahead, sir.

Thank you, Rob. I would like to remind everyone that the statements made during this conference call concerning the future business, operating results, and financial condition of CRA, including those identified in our earnings release and statements regarding guidance or using the terms looking ahead, expect, believe, can, position, should, aim, estimate, anticipate, intend, or similar terms, are forward-looking statements as defined in Section 21 of the Exchange Act.

Information contained in these forward-looking statements is based on management's current expectations and is inherently uncertain, and actual performance and results may differ materially from those expressed or implied in these statements due to many important factors. Additional information regarding these factors is included in today's earnings release and in CRA's periodic reports with the SEC. CRA undertakes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements after the date of this call.

Additionally, we will refer to some non-GAAP financial measures on this call, including adjusted EBITDA and certain measures presented on a constant currency basis. Everyone is encouraged to refer to today's earnings release and prepared remarks for a reconciliation of these non-GAAP items to their GAAP equivalents, as well as the calculation of adjusted EBITDA and a description of the process for calculating the measures presented on a constant currency basis.

Let me now turn it over to Paul for his report. Paul.

Thanks, Chad, and good morning, everyone. Consistent with the first half of the year, CRA delivered strong financial results in the third quarter of fiscal 2016. Continued broad-based demand for our services provided CRA the opportunity to welcome more than 70 new colleagues, increasing quarter-end headcount by 7% compared with a year ago, while also achieving Company-wide utilization of 73%.

We grew non-GAAP revenue by 8.2% to $81.7 million. Our performance was led by double-digit revenue growth year-over-year in energy; finance, including legacy operations and forensic and cyber investigations; labor and employment; life sciences; and Marakon.

International operations experienced more than 20% revenue growth year-over-year, led by our antitrust and competition economics, life sciences, and Marakon practices. Our third-quarter results would have been even stronger if adjusted for foreign currency headwinds. On a constant currency basis relative to fiscal 2015, non-GAAP revenue would have increased by approximately $2.2 million to $83.9 million, or 11.2% year-over-year growth.

Non-GAAP net income increased by 11.2% to $3.2 million, and non-GAAP earnings per diluted share increased 21.9% to $0.39 per share, while non-GAAP adjusted EBITDA grew 16.7% year-over-year to $13.8 million or 16.8% of non-GAAP revenue. Foreign currency headwinds during the third quarter of fiscal 2016 relative to the third quarter of fiscal 2015 had a de minimis impact on non-GAAP net income, earnings per diluted share, and adjusted EBITDA.

Let me walk you through some highlights from the third quarter. Within management consulting, clients continued to turn to Marakon for expert advice on portfolio strategy, including aspects such as optimizing resources and identifying investment opportunities. In the third quarter, we were engaged by in large European-based consumer health company to help frame a strategy for accelerating profitable growth, which incorporated our recommendations for attracting and retaining customers and investing in emerging markets.

Marakon was also selected by a leading US insurance company to develop a long-term strategy for its annuity businesses, as sector facing challenges as a result of sustained low interest rates and regulatory changes in retirement accounts.

In legal/regulatory, the finance practice, setting aside the strong contributions from our forensic and cyber investigations practice, grew more than 25% year-over-year. Projects originated from disputes involving appraisal arbitrage, bankruptcy, breach of contract, and other valuation issues.

For example, we provided expert testimony in an appraisal action in Delaware Chancery Court, testifying on the fair value of shares of a company acquired by a strategic buyer. During the quarter, we also continued to be engaged in matters involving major financial services firm which focused on issues such as market manipulation and unauthorized trade.

Forensic and cyber investigation services saw substantial growth during the third quarter, amid new strains of malware leading to increased security threats. With all the regulatory pressures on companies to monitor and report fraud and cyber security incidents, are also leading to more project work, especially in the healthcare sector.

For example, in the third quarter we were engaged by a large publicly traded healthcare provider to investigate and quantify allegations of systematic overbilling of claims to federal payers.

Finally, the energy practice continued to perform well, as changing energy commodities and evolving regulatory oversight of mergers and competitive issues have resulted in growing litigation work for our consultants.

In addition, a pickup in the number of private equity firms looking for investment opportunities in the energy sector has enabled CRA to take on engagements with a business advisory role.

Given the strength of our firm and its ability to generate strong cash flows, we can both invest in the business and return capital to shareholders. Our profitable growth and the initiation of a quarterly dividend, combined with our stock repurchase activity, demonstrates CRA's continued commitment to deliver value to shareholders. During the third quarter, we repurchased approximately 111,000 shares of common stock for $2.9 million, lowering our shares outstanding for the year by 7.4% to 8.2 million shares.

Looking ahead, we are positioned to build on the strong momentum seen year to date across our portfolio. On a constant currency basis, relative to fiscal 2015, we expect to exceed our previously announced fiscal 2016 guidance for non-GAAP revenue of $312 million to $322 million, and to be in the upper half of our non-GAAP adjusted EBITDA margin range of 15.8% to 16.6%.

To summarize, year-to-date non-GAAP revenue on a constant currency basis relative to fiscal 2015 is $248.7 million, including a $4.3 million adjustment for currency headwinds. Similarly, year-to-date non-GAAP adjusted EBITDA is $41.7 million, including a $1 million adjustment for currency headwinds, or 16.8% of non-GAAP net revenue on a constant currency basis.

While we are encouraged by CRA's solid performance through the first three quarters of fiscal 2016, we remain mindful of short-term challenges arriving from integration of newly hired professionals, the potential impact of seasonality, and uncertainties around global economic conditions.

With that, I will turn the call over to Chad for the CFO remarks. Chad?

Thanks, Paul. Before we get to your questions, let me provide a few additional metrics related to our third-quarter 2016 performance. In terms of headcount, we ended the third quarter with 541 consulting staff, which consisted of 115 officers, 270 other senior staff, and 156 junior staff. This is a net increase of 34 consultants or 7% growth from the 507 total consulting head count that we reported at the end of the third quarter of fiscal 2015.

Non-GAAP selling, general, and administrative expenses as a percent of revenue, excluding the approximately 2.4% attributable to commissions to non-employee experts, was 17.9% for the third quarter of fiscal 2016 compared with 19.2% a year ago.

Turning to the balance sheet, we concluded the third quarter of fiscal 2016 with $25.2 million of cash and cash equivalents. DSO at the end of the third quarter was 108 days compared with 101 days at the end of the second quarter of 2016. DSO in the third quarter consisted of 67 days of billed and 41 days of unbilled, compared with 68 days of billed and 33 days of unbilled in the second quarter of fiscal 2016.

As discussed in prior earnings calls, we've been transitioning our real estate portfolio. With each location, we have strived to create a more efficient and cost-effective workplace. In London, the buildout of the office was completed, and we moved in September.

Total real estate investments during the third quarter were $4.3 million, with an offset of approximately $100,000 of tenant improvement allowances. For the fourth quarter of fiscal 2016, we estimate that the remainder of real estate cash outlays relating to our London office buildout will be approximately $1.1 million.

In the third quarter, temporary additional rent expense associated with the occupancy of our legacy office space, at the same time as building out new space, amounted to approximately $500,000. With the move of our London office completed, no further temporary additional rent expense is expected for the fourth quarter of fiscal 2016.

That concludes my prepared remarks. Rob, we would now like to open up the call for questions.

(Operator Instructions). Marc Riddick, Sidoti.

I wanted to go over a little bit of the focus on headcount in some of the areas of growth, and maybe what we can look for, going forward. The adding of 34 year-over-year during the quarter, but I was wondering if there were any particular areas that you were maybe a little more excited about, as far as near-term growth that you can share with us today.

Sure. As we tried to summarize on the press release and also our call here, we're thrilled with the strong performance across the entire portfolio. We have seen headcount growth pretty much distributed proportionally to the revenue contributions of those practices. The majority of those additions, thus, reside in our antitrust and competition economics; our finance, life sciences, and Marakon practices, which probably make up about three-quarters of our total Company revenue.

So, the historic additions are focused in those four areas. And it's probably pretty safe to assume, going forward, the additions of -- in from 2017, will also be across our four main practices.

Okay. Excellent, excellent. And I did want to mention, as far as the initiation of the dividend and returning capital to shareholders, that certainly seems to be fairly a clear way to show that. Wanted to get a sense of -- maybe if you could take us through -- should we think about that going forward as maybe any form of targeted percentage of free cash flow? Or generally speaking, are we looking at this as -- with this initial dividend, how we should be thinking about it, going forward.

Sure. For the last handful of years, we have returned approximately $15 million a year to our shareholders. Historically, it has been all focused on share repurchase activity. We expect to continue our commitment to returning capital to our shareholders. The dividend is just an avenue by which we could return that capital. So, it doesn't preclude share repurchase activity. And as we tried to highlight throughout our discussion, it also is not meant to preclude any kind of investment opportunity. So we are still looking to invest in the business. The cash flows are strong enough that we can do both.

With respect to setting a hard target, we don't have a hard target. That really depends on where the value opportunities lie across the portfolio. If we see disproportionate opportunities in reinvesting in the business, we will take those opportunities. So, thus, the dividend provides us with a minimum floor for redistribution to our shareholders.

Okay, great. Thank you. And one last thing: you'd touched on the strength that you had internationally and the -- that would have been even stronger, excluding the currency impact. I was wondering if you could maybe just share with us some general feedback that you've received, and some of the opportunities that you may be seeing post-Brexit, or any general feedback that you can share. Even whether it's from feedback internally as to what those -- what opportunities have been maybe created, post-Brexit, and that uncertainty that is sitting out there. Thank you.

Sure, thank you. I don't believe we have seen yet any specific post-Brexit opportunities. We were all looking to see if there would be a shift in the demand mix for our services in our European operations; and, to date, we haven't really seen that shift occur.

Okay.

What traditionally has been strengths for us in European operations continued to be strengths for us during the third quarter. We're all looking carefully as to what the ramifications are of Brexit in the quarters ahead. But, to date, I can't necessarily point to one particular shift in demand as a result of the vote.

Okay, great. I appreciate it. Thanks for the color.

(Operator Instructions). Tim McHugh, William Blair.

This is actually Trevor Romeo in for Tim today. Thanks for taking my question. Just a quick follow-up on the capital allocation, on the dividend. How do you see the priority between the repurchase and the dividend, going forward?

Well, the dividend takes priority, because it's the first allocation of capital back to the shareholders. So we are going to look to initiate the dividend. And we're, of course, as the quarters and years forward, we're going to look for opportunities to grow that distribution, to provide our shareholders a little more certainty with respect to what the allocation of capital will be. But proportionally, I don't expect to deviate that much from what has historically been our redistribution amounts.

Okay, great. Thank you. And then just one more quick one: I noticed in the press release that you mentioned some strength in the antitrust practice internationally. Could you give us an update on the trends and the outlook going forward in the US? Thanks.

Sure. So, internationally, a lot of our work has been focused on antitrust disputes. And our practice, which has the leadership position over there, has remained strong, and actually sees demand building. So we're very excited about that.

Here in North America, first half of the year has been a drop-off in general M&A activity relative to 2015, which is a sort of a long-time high. But we are starting to see a pick-up, as you saw with all the announcements in the past week or two of some very large, complex mergers being announced. So, hopefully it's a sign of things to come, and I expect us to be active in such engagements.

Okay. Thank you very much.

Thank you. At this time, I would like to turn the floor back to Mr. Paul Maleh for closing remarks.

Again, thank you to everyone for joining us today. We appreciate your time and interest in CRA. We'll be getting out to meet with investors in the coming months. And we look forward to updating you on our progress next quarter. With that, that concludes today's call. Thank you, everyone.

Thank you. Today's conference has concluded. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect your lines at this time.