Tourism Holdings Limited

Tourism Holdings Limited

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Feb 25Next Earn

Q4 FY2026 · Earnings Call TranscriptAugust 25, 2026

Operator

I would now like to hand the conference over to Mr. Grant Webster, Chief Executive.

Please go ahead, sir.

Grant Webster

Thank you, Chuck. Welcome everybody.

It's a pleasure to have you join us. With me here in the office is Ollie Farnsworth and Amir Ansari.

We're looking forward to sharing with you the FY 2026 annual results. As always, we'll move through the material at a reasonable pace given that you've had a chance to absorb it.

We appreciate that there could well be a number of questions people will have, we're keen to get to those. Right, let's get into it.

No need to talk about the disclaimer, let's get to the executive summary. We are very content with the underlying net profit after tax from continuing operations of $46.1 million.

Not where we had wanted to be for the year, but given what happened with the Middle East situation, we are very pleased with the result. We're equally pleased with the progress made during the year on the strategic initiatives that we announced in August 2025.

Particularly, we're pleased for the year with the growth in rental revenue, which, as we always say, is the engine of this business. Fleet was up for the year to nearly 8,600 vehicles.

That's a little on the high side, but it's expected to right itself throughout FY 2027. We're also very pleased to have the balance sheet in a position where we can announce the full-year dividend of 10.5 cents per share made up of the final dividend of 7.5 cents and the earlier 3 cents.

That 7.5 cents will be 100% fully imputed in New Zealand, 10% franked in Australia. We are part of the tourism industry that had strong momentum in the first half of FY 2026.

Our initiatives and progress were definitely disrupted by the conflict, which created a gap in our forward booking intake. We'll talk more about that in our outlook slides.

That gap is unlikely to be fully recoverable as the vast majority of it impacts Q1 in FY 2027. It does impact the significance of earnings that we had expected for FY 2027.

However, as you've seen, we still stand by our $100 million underlying goal that we have for this business. The core drivers for that goal remain intact, and the indicators that we've seen before around rental growth, manufacturing and procurement benefits alongside our other cost reductions are all in play along with an expectation of improvement [unclear].

You'll see, and it should be no surprise to many, that the results today are on a continuing operations basis only. Following the divestment of the UK and Ireland business and in accordance with IFRS 5, we've restated the accounts in this presentation for FY 2025 and FY 2026 on a continuing basis only.

The balance sheet metrics, however, are reported on a total group basis and have not been restated unless we otherwise indicated in the reconciliation slide that we have at the back of the pack. The results summary, I think we've covered, we'll just skip that slide and move to the next slide with an update on takeover approaches.

Everyone, I'm have no doubt will be keen for an update here, and I've got no doubt that there are a number of questions you may have, which we may well not be able to answer, and I'm sure you understand that. The core update is the same as what we've been saying before.

We do have two bidders: the BGH consortium at $3.10 per share and another party, which the board considers to be a co-strategic of the bidder at $3.30 to $3.40 per share. With two bidders, you can imagine that we are very busy, still focused on driving the business forward, dealing with year-end, and two due diligence processes.

It's certainly been a busy time. We are very pleased that the current proposals are a substantial increase on the offer last year of $2.30 per share.

We right now are deep in due diligence. We've commenced many management sessions across the groups, and site visits have started as well with further site visits planned over the coming period.

Clear and obvious reminder that both proposals obviously remain non-binding. They are subject to a range of conditions, including completion of due diligence, financing approvals, and other internal approvals that the bidders may have.

We expect the process to continue for approximately a further four to six weeks, four weeks, six weeks, being around that period. The question has been raised, is due diligence taking a long period of time?

We don't believe that it is. We've got two bidders in play and we've got a lot going on in the business.

We're very happy that it's intense and progressing at a positive and good pace. Internally, I think the team at thl are doing a fantastic job.

Those that are working on due diligence are working extremely hard, and to Ollie and Amir in particular, thank you very much for all of the work that you've been doing. The finance team's been doing a fantastic job and a lot of other people across the business.

More importantly, the business itself continues to progress and focus on the outcomes that we're looking for in FY 2027. Moving on to return on funds employed.

Whilst we are still not where we need to be, but we're starting to head back in the right direction, up to 8.7% on a continuing business basis. The funds, as said, are slightly higher in some than they should be relative to the market situation we've had.

Let's move on to the strategic initiatives. As in August last year, we announced our growth roadmap and a number of strategic initiatives.

I think we've made really good progress the last 12 months. We sold the UK and Ireland businesses for around $57 million, including around $8 million of goodwill.

We exited two loss-making dealerships in Australia. We consolidated manufacturing back from Australia to New Zealand, and we achieved a number of cost initiatives in the North American business.

Top of that, we delivered around $5 million in underlying cost savings across labor, corporate, and digital costs. The full benefit of these initiatives will flow through into next year and subsequent years, particularly those that realize benefits in procurement on a fleet basis.

The realization of those procurement benefits obviously flows through in lower depreciation and through the real depreciation rate. Just a point on the factory in Brisbane.

We do have a sublease that we're in negotiations with at the moment, or sublessor, lessee, and we expect that to be executed in the next couple of months. The annualized costs of the lease are around $2.5 million NZD.

From a Waitomo perspective, we are still working with the stakeholders and the local hapu in regards to what the future may be beyond the expiry of the lease at the Waitomo Glowworm Caves. Pleased to say that those discussions remain positive and are going well.

Moving on to RV rental and sales. Look, the rentals business is in a good state.

Yes, our average rental fleet went up, we had 800 vehicles. RevPAR was an interesting one this year depending on if you look at it at a constant-currency basis, but in essence, pretty much flat to just on an improvement.

To be honest, that rental revenue is something that we're really pleased with. We increased fleet into a softer sales environment that we weren't anticipating.

We could certainly argue that we increased fleet a little bit too much, particularly in New Zealand, but then those disruptions that occurred globally were significant. Vehicle sales clearly have been down on the last year, reflecting the fact that the market's down.

Margins are holding up, it's not been an issue of price. What we've seen overall is a real opportunity for us to continue to drive the engine of this business: the rentals business.

I'll hand over to Ollie to talk about the balance sheet, the operating cash flows, and the dividend.

Ollie Farnsworth

Thank you, Grant. Net debt of $436 million is heading in the right direction, and debt-to-equity ratio is 16%.

Net capex was higher than we originally anticipated, and that's largely attributable to vehicle sales shortfall following the breakout of the conflict. Non-fleet capex has reduced significantly.

That reflects the fact that previous year had new branch investments in several areas, most notably Waitomo, KEA, our headquarters in Auckland. We're in a good funding position, and we're pleased with the balance sheet progress.

Moving on to operating cash flow. We've had another year of positive operating cash flows at $67 million.

Improved profitability is a key contributor to that together with inventory reduction. The inventory reduction is primarily driven by the strategic initiatives in Australia retail and Australia manufacturing.

From a dividend perspective, Grant covered the dividend situation well in the executive summary, a full-year dividend of 10.5 cents per share made up of a final dividend of 7.5 cents per share that's 100% imputed and 10% franked, and that is keeping with a 50% payout ratio that we've had in recent times, and we've maintained an approach of no dividend reinvestment plan. I'll pass back to Grant to talk through the outlook.

Grant Webster

Thanks, Ollie. Look, we've talked about rentals being the heart of the business.

We are a tourism business after all; rentals are at the core part of our revenue generation. To see the total services revenue increase by 11% to nearly $520 million was a pleasing result in the market environment.

It is indicative of the work that our sales and marketing teams have been doing alongside a more buoyant international tourism backdrop and all jurisdictions apart from the US. Let's just talk about the Southern Hemisphere.

Prior to the Middle East conflict, the Southern Hemisphere bookings were tracking really positively. As of February, New Zealand was up 25% and Australia was up over 20%.

Then clearly we had the Middle East conflict impact. By August, those bookings had dropped to being 15% ahead for New Zealand and 5% for Australia.

However, this is in a really interesting point: the last four weeks have shown that New Zealand has actually been up around 40% and Australia up 15%. We have seen a recovery in bookings in the last month.

Is that enough momentum to recover where we were at? Not for quarter one, potentially for the high season.

It is too soon to say. We are continuing to see volatility.

Northern Hemisphere: so the booking intake were obviously less impacted by the conflict because obviously there's less flight disruption. Canada is well on track to deliver a record rental revenue result in the 2026 summer season.

In February, it was up 30% or around 30%, with the actual rental revenue achieved during the June-July period around 25%. The US story is one we'll be about for some time.

Pleasingly, obviously for the summer, it's recovered from being down 35% to only 15%, and really importantly, we're seeing in recent weeks more than 45% improvements over the prior year's bookings. We do wonder and believe that the FIFA World Cup in the USA may have been a sentiment change.

Certainly, the increases in bookings that we have are very well aligned to that timing. Move on to RV sales.

It's clear we've still got pressure on the sales side of the market. We can see it around the world.

RV Industry Association wholesale shipment data in the US is a reduction of 11% since the start of the year. It's interesting that both Thor and Camping World have recently reduced their expectations for total shipments for the 2026 calendar year.

Overall, we do expect a recovery at some point. Long-term fundamentals of the RV industry remain strong.

People want to travel in RVs and they want this kind of holiday. More importantly, we still think that thl's focus on RV rentals provides even more [unclear] shifted away from people purchasing expensive, large RVs, then we're still in the right place.

People still want to travel in RVs. We've seen the number of trips occurring in people's RVs increasing.

We've seen the average age of people buying RVs decreasing. People still want to take these leisure holidays, and we're sitting there ready for them from a rental perspective.

Let's move on to the outlook. As we discussed earlier, when we entered the second half of the year, we had strong momentum across the rentals business.

Booking intakes were well ahead of the prior year in all markets, and apart from the US, we were expecting meaningful earnings growth in FY 2027. The disruption from the Middle East conflict created a gap, but it's a gap that we see possibly could recover into the high season, but is unlikely to in quarter one.

We are still expecting some level of growth in FY 2027, but we know with the level of volatility in the business today and in the industry today, it is too difficult to provide guidance at this point in time. In summary, we were on the right track, we did the right things, we initiated our strategic initiatives and executed them well.

We are well set for the future, we've got a positive balance sheet, and we've got the business in the right place to keep moving forward. I will end there and hand over back to Chuck to manage us through the Q&A.

Operator

Thank you. If you wish to ask a question, please press star then one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced.

If you wish to cancel your request, please press star then two. If you are on a speakerphone, please pick up the handset to ask your question.

The first question will come from Andy Bowley with Forsyth Barr. Please go ahead.

Andy Bowley

Thanks, operator. Good morning or good afternoon, guys.

A few questions from me. The first of which is around fleet development.

Fleet, I guess in the past year, has held pretty steady thanks to the UK divestment and the increases in fleet, particularly in New Zealand and Australia. How are you expecting the fleet to evolve over the next 12, 18, 24 months in terms of what you see today, particularly around the vehicle sales market challenges that you've got?

Grant Webster

Thanks, Andy. Thanks for joining the call.

Thanks in your note for acknowledging your part of our result this year with your Canadream holiday. It was great to see.

Thank you. Look, I think that significant fleet growth has occurred post-COVID lull, and so over the next 12 to 24 months, we'd see the growth rate in fleet very much diminishing relative to the last three years.

Still some growth, but we have room to move from a utilization perspective in most our markets.

Andy Bowley

If we look geographically, Grant, where are you expecting growth to be most directed?

Grant Webster

We're heading towards

Andy Bowley

Just to clarify that, just fleet growth. Oh,

Grant Webster

okay. Look, fleet growth is still going to be centered Southern Hemisphere at the moment because we've still got to prove out the North American model and make sure that that's working well.

It'll be Southern Hemisphere related. As we get any confidence in the US building and building, we could see more fleet growth there.

Canada does need a little bit more fleet growth, but Southern Hemisphere focused.

Andy Bowley

Great. Okay.

If we then translate that into balance sheet with fleet growth, what are we expecting over the next couple of years from a broader net debt perspective? Is this the low point and we start to see some reinvestment back into the broader business from a balance sheet point of view?

Grant Webster

I think we [unclear] No, I agree.

Andy Bowley

Sorry, Grant, I'm not sure if it's just me, but the call is cutting up intermittently here, it's quite difficult to hear what you're saying at times. Now I can't hear anything.

Andy,

Grant Webster

what about now, Andy?

Andy Bowley

I can hear you now, Grant. Yep.

Grant Webster

Okay. Sorry.

We just moved across to the secondary line. Apologies for that.

Look, net debt, I'll hand over to Ollie.

Ollie Farnsworth

Thanks. Look, we talked about a target of $400 million, which we've not reached this year with some of the circumstances around sales, but that ultimately we should be heading towards that kind of area still.

That's still our outlook. In terms of an actual target and timeframe, that's to be determined just based on the environment, but we should be managing around those levels.

Andy Bowley

Just to clarify, we're expecting net debt to fall further over the next couple of years, notwithstanding some lumpiness in light of I guess timing of vehicle sales.

Ollie Farnsworth

That's exactly right.

Andy Bowley

Great. Maybe lastly from me, just on slide 14, rental booking trends and the rental revenue intake, can we just kind of dive into some of the detail there, New Zealand, Australia, North America, in the context of where the growth is coming from in terms of yield versus booking days or RevPAR versus utilization, both in terms of most recent trends, say intakes for the last four weeks for New Zealand and Australia, but also where you're seeing the growth in Canada and most recently in terms of what you're saying about the US uptick, albeit in a short period of time and going into low season?

Grant Webster

Look, the short sort of answer, you probably want an incredibly detailed long answer, but the short answer is that van yield is pretty static around the world. Static doesn't mean going backwards, but we're certainly getting the inflationary lift that we would hope and sort of plan for within our core metrics, so that 2% to 3%.

That's fine on van yield. It is primarily a days-driven story.

Within that, we are getting some ancillary revenue benefits with the actions that we've taken, but predominantly a days story. From a utilization perspective, when you think about RevPAR, as we indicated, we think we've got some utilization opportunities in USA, Australia, and New Zealand.

Canada over the peak season is pretty well what is maxed out.

Andy Bowley

Great. Thank you, Grant.

Operator

Again, if you have a question, please press star then one. As there are no further questions at this time, I would like to hand the conference back over to Mr.

Webster for any closing remarks. Please go ahead, sir.

Grant Webster

Brilliant. Not sure what to read into the fact that that's probably one of our shortest year-end result presentations.

Thank you, Andy, for the questions. We know there's a few people away and obviously a couple of the analysts are conflicted as well at the moment given what's going on.

We look forward to catching up with people over the coming week, and thank you all very much for following thl. Thanks, Chuck.

Operator

You are welcome. That does conclude our conference for today.

Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.