I would now like to hand the conference over to Gavin Street, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer. Please go ahead.
Thank you, everyone, for joining the call for the FY 2026 results for Vulcan. On the call today, we have our CFO, Kar Yue Yeo; Adrian Casey, our COO; and Lou Cadman, our New Zealand leader; and myself, Gavin Street. If we turn to the agenda on page eight. In this call this morning, we will cover the overview of results, financial operations, priorities and outlook, and we will also leave some time for Q&A. If we go to the overview on page six.
To cover off a few points on the performance of our business for the FY 2026, revenue was NZD 1.159 billion, up 22% on the prior year, and included nine months of sales from our acquisition of Roofing Industries. Underlying business growth with momentum building in the second half. Adjusted EBITDA was up 16% to NZD 130 million and included the impact of Roofing Industries from October 1.
Underlying business was steady compared to prior year. Gross margin was down 1% to 33.2%, reflecting the impact of mix and addition of Roofing Industries and gross profit over time was relatively flat. The Vulcan board has approved interim dividend of NZD 0.045 per share, taking the full-year dividend to NZD 0.07, up 16%. If we turn to page seven, the key strategic and operational highlights. The final payment for Roofing Industries in January 2026. The integration of the business has gone very well. We are very pleased with the performance of the business. There is a strong culture and alignment to the Vulcan values. Improvement in underlying volume with year-on-year growth, and we also saw increased momentum into the second half of the year.
The team has continued to focus on our delivery in full on time, our DIFOT metric, ensuring we have the right stock, the right location at the right time. We are continuing to execute on our hybrid locations with a new location added in Queensland in the second half of FY 2026. Costs have continued to be closely monitored. Underlying costs have been impacted by inflation, investment into hybrid site, and increasing capacity to support growth and customer service levels. We have continued to generate cash flow and manage working capital to support the investment in our business and are focused on reducing debt cover to 2.9 x. If we turn to page eight, we will cover the half yearly volume and financial trends. The graph here provides the half year trends in revenue, tons per day and EBITDA. All graphs include the impact of Roofing Industries.
Improvement in revenue year-on-year underlying business increased momentum in the second half. Total sales or tons per day increased year-on-year with underlying sales revenue up on the prior year. Adjusted EBITDA reflects the inclusion of Roofing Industries and an improvement in the underlying performance of the business in the second half. If we go to page nine, we will go to Vulcan business highlights. With the purchase of Roofing Industries, we now operate in seven verticals. Four divisions under our Steel segment, which now includes Roofing Industries and Roll Forming and Bolting, and three existing divisions under Metals. New Zealand represented 40% of our sales and Australia at 60%. Importantly, as we look at some of the growth opportunities into Australia, Queensland is the largest state, representing 23% of total group sales. If we turn to page 10, we have the map of our current footprint in ANZ.
With the addition of Roofing Industries, we now have 82 sites across Australia, up from 81 with the addition of our new site in Toowoomba. We are supported by over 1,660 employees, serving over 26,000 customers. On page 11, we have our growth strategy, and under here we have some very clear principles that we have had in place for a long time on how we grow our business and we will continue to look for opportunities to improve and expand further.
If we turn to page 13 and the operating backdrop during FY 2026. In Australia, we have seen increased interest rates, geopolitical risk and domestic fiscal policies have provided some uncertainty with moderating activity in some segments. Importantly, activity on our East Coast of Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria has continued to be positive year-on-year. FY 2026 tons a day increased with strong improvements in the second half.
In New Zealand, interest rates supporting our improved economic activity from a low base. Some uncertainty remains with the impact of geopolitical activity. FY 2026 tons a day increased year-on-year with more pronounced impact in the second half of FY 2026. From a global and economic perspective, there is still some uncertainty in the geopolitical environment. Metals product prices have increased in FY 2026 with more significant impact in the second half of FY 2026, driven by aluminum and nickel increases. From a cost pressure perspective, we are continuing to focus on cost and the inflation impact across ANZ. I will now hand over to Kar Yue, who will take you through financial performance.
Thank you, Gavin. Good morning to everyone on the call. I would like to spend the next couple of minutes on slide 14. Our 22% year-on-year revenue growth in financial year 2026 was a combination of two things. First, nine months of contribution from the addition of Roofing Industries. Second, an improvement in our underlying business volume, of which the vast majority started to come through in the June half. Our 18% increase in volume is a combination of Roofing Industries acquisition and significant improvement in our underlying business in June half. Underlying business margin in 2026 was steady year-on-year. Although gross margin, as Gavin mentioned, was down 1%, this was due to the percentage mix between our underlying business and Roofing Industries. Encouragingly, gross profit NZD per ton was up slightly.
The result of better underlying steel and metals dollar profitability, higher dollar per ton profit for Roofing Industries, and some currency translation impact from our Australian operations. Our earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, and amortization, or EBITDA, for the year increased 16%, with profit contribution from Roofing Industries as well as underlying improvement in our underlying business in the June half, which helped offset the declines that we recorded in the first half of our financial year just completed. Operating cash flow decreased 30% in the year. This reflected benefits to operating cash flow in the previous year from significant reduction in working capital in FY 2025. Our return on capital employed, while respectful relative to industry peers, is well below our internal expectations.
As shown on the next slide, virtually all of our EBITDA improvement in the year was a result of volume growth, including the acquisition of Roofing Industries and improvement in underlying steel segments. Higher volume contributed NZD 61 million to profitability. Operating expenditure, or OpEx, increased NZD 44 million during the year. This reflected a combination of the acquisition of Roofing Industries, currency translation of Australian operations, and investment in additional employees to support growth, not just during FY 2026, but also from beyond.
At the segment level on the next slide, our steel results benefited from the Roofing Industries acquisition, as well as improvement in underlying volumes, especially in the June half. A 19% lift in gross profit dollar per ton in 2026 contributed to EBITDA improvement, as I mentioned earlier on, driven by the acquisition of Roofing Industries as well as improvement in underlying business in the June half.
Turning to our metals segment, the performance was mixed across Australia and New Zealand. EBITDA in aggregate for this segment fell 10% in the year. Volume in the metal segment was broadly steady. Gross margin declined in the year, but this showed improvement in the June half on a year-on-year basis. On the next slide, as mentioned earlier, our operating expenditure increased NZD 44 million in 2026 financial year. This reflected the acquisition of Roofing Industries, the increase in underlying business volume, currency translation impact of a stronger Australian dollar into New Zealand dollar, as well as unit cost inflation. Excluding Roofing Industries and the currency translation impact, our underlying OpEx increased 9% year-on-year. The majority of those coming in people costs to support growth in 2026 and beyond. Now turning to our cash flow on the next slide.
Our business generated NZD 73 million in cash from operations, from which NZD 26 million was recycled into capital expenditure and NZD 31 million used for repayment of lease liabilities. The NZD 94 million capital raised in the first half of our financial year was used substantially for the purchase of Roofing Industries as well as paying for related transaction costs. Including further investment into Roofing Industries as well as spend carryover projects from 2026, we expect to spend between NZD 30 million -NZD 35 million in 2027 financial year in capital expenditure. Finally, on our 2026 financials on slide 19, as Gavin mentioned earlier on, our final dividend has been set at NZD 0.045 per share, up a cent from a year ago, bringing total dividends for the year to NZD 0.07 per share. Our final dividend will be fully franked.
Net debt finished at NZD 227 million, which translated to 2.9 x net debt to post rent EBITDA cover. An improvement from 3.4 x from a year ago. Turning this back to you, Gavin.
Thanks, Kar Yue. Now turning to page 21, we will go through the priorities. We will continue to focus on driving our organic growth with a focus on customer service and margin improvements, capitalizing opportunities across ANZ for improvement across the business cycle and in growth segments. Continue to support the integration and invest in Roofing Industries to build on a solid base. Develop our people and leverage investment in our hybrid site and explore opportunities to further grow our business across ANZ. We now turn to page 22. Whilst conditions are still challenging in both countries, we are beginning to see some signs of recovery. In New Zealand, supportive interest rate environment with some segments already showing signs of improved activity. Building and construction activity has stabilized. Commercial activities may take a little bit longer. But overall, the recovery momentum is anticipated to strengthen throughout 2027.
In Australia, the high interest rates potentially could cap the rate of economic growth. The Olympic build will start to impact Queensland, where we have 23% of our business. Safeguard measures for fabricated steel currently being considered by the Australian government in FY 2027. If introduced, likely to have a positive impact. We will continue to focus on driving our hybrid site initiative to deliver some volume benefit. That is our presentation. I will now open up for any Q&A.
Thank you. If you wish to ask a question, please press star 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 using a speakerphone, please pick up the handset to ask your question. The first question today comes from Grant Swanepoel from Jarden. Please go ahead.
Good morning, team. That was an impressive 12-minute presentation. I love your brevity. Roofing EBITDA. Look, this result is meaningless without you guys giving some color on that acquisition. Can you supply some volume statistics, EBITDA, and anything else relating to Roofing that is within this result?
Yeah. So in our interim report, we actually gave the volume that we have got for the nine months revenue. We have got for the five months for the Roofing Industries, so it is NZD 135 million for the nine months. So I think, Grant, that should give you the ability to backfill some of your numbers.
Not really.
Yeah. I will
You guys indicated that EBITDA was NZD 5 million for Roofing Industries, and it was on track to about NZD 14 million-NZD 15 million for the year. Did it come out about NZD 14 million-NZD 15 million on a post-EBITDA basis?
Right. Grant, obviously, there are some commercial sensitivity in regards to talking specifically about margins and EBITDA. What I can help you bridge that analytics that you're looking for is if you look at one of the acquisition note in our Note 7 account. As Gavin mentioned, that's NZD 155 million in revenue for the nine-month contribution. Obviously, most of it as a net profit after tax relating to Roofing Industries that came from Roofing Industries for the nine months was just a little bit over NZD 8 million. That's net profit after tax basis. What I can share with you also is that there are some funding costs associated with that net profit after tax of just over NZD 8 million. That's for nine months.
We did also say in the same note that had we owned the whole business for the whole 12 months, the net profit after tax would be closer to NZD 10 million. If I draw your attention back to when we first acquired it back in September of 2025, the depreciation on a post-rent basis, depreciation amortization on a post-rent basis was the tune of between NZD 6 million-NZD 7 million. So if you can rework the net profit after tax back to EBITDA, given there's no funding cost, you can get a number that's pretty close to what you're looking for in terms of helping to bridge those numbers for you.
Very helpful. Thanks, Kar Yue. Was there any inventory benefit in the final quarter? That was a really good half year-on-year. Is there anything that comes out of the wash in terms of extra costs that were passed on to customers in that half?
No, there wasn't really any major inventory benefit that came from the second half. You see the impact of volume has built over the quarter. There has been some impact of inflation of our metals distribution business. But no, there was no major impact of any inventory adjustments for that for the second half, particularly the last half.
Thank you. My final question, just on the fairly conservative dividend payout of 47%. Are we going to move back to mid that range as things continue to pick up of 40%-80% payout of NPAT?
Yeah. I think we've kept it at 47% for the year. We think that's the right level for the company, given where we're managing our debt profile, our earnings and returns. And as we've indicated to the market, it depends on where we are. We'll range between 40% and 80% throughout the next period of time. And obviously, as we continue to improve, we'll see opportunities to change that dividend range.
Thanks for answering my questions.
Thank you. The next question comes from Harry Saunders from E&P. Please go ahead.
Good morning, Gavin and Kar Yue. Thanks for taking my questions. Firstly, just on strong second half momentum. Can you just talk through the anticipated seasonality benefit in the first half 2027 versus the second half 2026, alongside the extra three months of roll forming before we then look at layering on any end market improvement? Is it fair your outlook comments in aggregate are calling for end market pick up across both segments and geographies?
Sorry, Harry, it is breaking up a little bit. Can you just run that through again?
Yeah, sure. Just on the strong second half momentum, can you talk through the anticipated seasonality benefits in the first half 2027 versus second half 2026, alongside the extra three months of roll forming before we look at end market improvement? Is it fair your outlook comments in aggregate are calling for end market pickup in both segments and both geographies?
Yeah, look, I think from us, I think the key point we saw in FY 2026 results is momentum is building for the second half. We'll have five extra days into first half FY 2027 over the second half. So that's the seasonal impact and the adjustment we will see. I do think we're going to have an extra three months of digital roof industry coming to another.
I think you'll need to take that into account when you contemplate what year five might look like. But for us, the momentum is building, and the intent is to continue to work through that improvement in both metals and steel across both countries, and build that into the second half, which, as I've mentioned, has five surveys.
Thanks. Then just even though this is non-cash, could you just talk through the drivers behind the increased D&A that we saw in the guides just to help us to model it?
Sorry, I just picked up your question, referenced student cash. Is that right?
No, I am just asking in reference to the increased depreciation and amortization in the result and the guides, even though this is non-cash. Could you just talk through the drivers for us all, please?
Yeah, sure. Thanks for that question. Harry, what happened is obviously as rates continue to rise in some cases, both in AU and the U.S., we obviously have got an obligation to rework our capitalized lease obligation requirement, and that effectively then led to some increases coming through from in terms of interest expense side. And obviously, as terms and condition changes for our leases, we continue to roll forward with renewals with some of our landlords and across the portfolio. That then requires us to reassess the right of use asset value, which then finds its way into depreciation and amortization for the rights of use component.
In a sense, the old convention of looking at EBITDA post-rent basis in terms of how we have measured it, but us providing that guidance range relating to FY 2027 is to make life a little bit easier for people that do not necessarily have the same level of detail as the company including.
Understood. And sorry, it was a bit of a bad line, but were you indicating that negotiation was leading to higher rent costs or was this just purely rate-driving the right of use reassessment?
It's a combination of the two. As when we roll forward with our rent, we obviously have to reassess whether the right of use asset is stated as an asset.
Got it. Just a final one. I know you've highlighted this and we discussed on the last call, just if you could give a bit more of an update on the Productivity Commission. So you've got an inquiry into imported fabricated steel. I think the interim report is due in September. Just what protection could be implemented, what do you see as a benefit to the industry and yourselves? Thanks.
Yeah. The Productivity Commission's been in contact with key players in the marketplace early this year. They've got, as you mentioned, Harry, they've got an interim report that's due out in the next couple of weeks in September. They'll update on what they're finding, what their intent is going to be, and then they'll expect to announce in November. As we've stated before, we see that the volume, imported volume coming in fabricated steel is basically doubling in the last couple of years. The intent is that I think they'll put some sort of a safeguard metric, which could be some sort of an additional charge or cost on top to bring steel in from overseas locations, which will then put more capability and price back into our customers, which are the fabricators.
I think that has a very good chance of being an uplift for our customers, but also for us if that gets delivered into the end of the year, into early second half FY 2027.
Great. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from Tom Peyton from RBC Capital Markets. Please go ahead.
Hi, Gavin. How are you? Thank you very much for the question. Just a quick one. If you could just offer some greater commentary around the grounds on the Melbourne market, especially with the coming state election, and more broadly, the Australian market as well. I think you called out Queensland, New South Wales, and Victoria were all seeing positive signs. Thank you.
Yeah. The Melbourne market, good question. Thanks, Tom, for asking that. I am obviously based in Melbourne, I am experiencing that activity in that space. Look, for us, the market has actually come from quite a low the last 12 months to stabilizing, and I think we have had some solid results in our locations in Melbourne and we are seeing some improvement. Activity has actually continued to be reasonably solid in Victoria. We are expecting a state election, as we know, in November. There has been a change, as everyone knows, with the premier. That has probably given them a little bit of a bounce in polls, but the expectation is going to be pretty close to a change in government. I think that is going to be positive overall for the state. But we are still expecting activity to be pretty solid for us.
Bearing in mind, we only have three locations in Victoria, so we have plenty of opportunity to get market share and market capability in that space. But it has been reasonably consistent for the last 12 months in Victoria. I think we have had some competitive pressures down there, which have eased a little bit. We have had some consolidation of one of our competitors in that marketplace, which has been positive. Likewise, across the East Coast, we have also had a consolidation of a competitor in sites in Sydney and Brisbane, which I think has been beneficial for the market. And we have, as I said, 23% of our business is in Queensland, and we are starting to see reasonably strong activity start to pick up here in Queensland. But saying that, we have not seen any major projects being released for the Olympic Village.
And we know that demand is going to be coming pretty strong and hard at us
in the next couple of months, and I think for Australia in general and for trade in general in Australia, that is going to be a high demand activity that needs to be taken into account around all the other pressure points that are hitting Australia at the moment around under builds and data center builds and so forth.
Awesome. Thank you. A follow-up from the, you called out the engineering steel and commenting on the resources sector and maintenance spend.
Yeah.
Can you offer any indication of that? I guess how significant things are as a portion of Australian EBITDA?
Any indication as to, sorry the
Break it down.
No, we don't break it down, but just give you an indication of where we see from the engineering field is it has been a slightly tougher market, and that's really the maintenance spend that's coming through the market at this stage has been on the lower end of the scale. We are expecting that to gradually pick up as maintenance cycles will need to be invested back into. But we haven't seen major signs of that really accelerating to a point we think it's going to be. We obviously know our market share in that space. There's a couple of key or one key competitor, we know where they sit, we know where we sit.
I think our position is we've held market share reasonably well in that space, and we are expecting other miners to start investing more in the capital expenditure, as equipment starts to wear. I think there's an opportunity that will come into probably calendar year 2027 for that investment.
Okay, great. Then one final one, and then I'll jump back into queue. Just around the comments earlier around momentum, and maybe this is hard for you to exactly put a finger on. But are you able to speak to, I guess, that balance between is it market lifting or is it market share gains? Can you be any more specific around that?
Yeah. So it's a good question. I think there's a couple of points. If I talk about New Zealand, I think there is some opportunity for us to get We have been getting some market share in that space. I think if you look at some of our competitors who have obviously announced either given their interim amounts or will have announcements tomorrow, I think from one of our other competitors, which will show where they sit. So, we'll get a very good idea of where we sit from a market share perspective. I think generally from what we've seen and heard, I think we've got some market share and opportunity in New Zealand. So I think that helps. Plus, I think we've also seen some recovery in activity of the economy in general.
In Australia, I think there's a bit of a combination of, again, one of the major competitors has been winding down their sites. Two to seven sites have been closed across the East Coast of Australia, and that's been beneficial, I think, for the market and I think for us. Then I think there has been some solid activity in various segments that we've been able to capitalize on. So I think there's, look, without knowing the, or without being able to break down the detail, I think there's a combination of both just across that front.
Appreciate that, Gavin Street. Thanks very much.
Thank you once again. To ask a question, please press star one on your phone. The next question comes from Rohan Koreman-Smit from Forsyth Barr. Please go ahead.
Morning, guys. Just on the underlying OpEx. I think, it has been a bit higher than expected. I know there is some FX in there, but when you look at that and maybe working capital, do you need to invest further in FY 2027 as the volumes pick up, or is this kind of a base to leverage off?
I think it is a pretty solid base for us to leverage off. Look, if I talk about the people cost, you are right there, Rohan. We have got inflation impact that comes through that number, which is a reasonable size number as we have consolidated costs across into NZD. What we see is we have had a headcount increase, and I think we have stated about a 14% increase in headcount from year-on-year. That headcount has been focused on basically four main areas. One is in an increased capability, particularly in our processing area. As our volumes increase, that is a good part of our business. We want to make sure we can service that capability, so we have invested headcount into there.
We have invested headcount into the stainless, and as we have rolled out our hybrid site in our presence in Australia, we wanted to make sure we have got the right resource and the capability. For me, that is an investment upfront. I am not expecting that to grow substantially, in the next 12 months. The other thing we have invested in is basically we have talked about in our annual report, we have got a graduate program which will continue to invest in our future and our future capability. We put seven grads on this year. We will also continue to invest in our leadership capability across both AU and NZ. I think it has been a lot of that investment is building for the future, and it is important we have taken that position in FY 2026 to set ourselves up for FY 2027 and beyond.
I think as volume increases, we expect to be able to absorb a lot of that volume increase in current infrastructure.
Thanks. Then maybe coming back to the question about what the underlying steel business was doing ex Roofing Industries. If you look at the second half, you had revenue growth of, what was it? Looks like, sorry, one second. 22% percent year-on-year, 23% year-on-year. That kind of suggests if average selling price is only up low single digits, then you had double-digit volume growth, almost 20% volume growth, in steel. Is that kind of the ballpark? Then when you go further down the P&L, if you back out Roofing Industries as per your suggestions before, gross profit margins may be back above 30%. Is that kind of close to where we exited 2026?
Yeah. So definitely, if you talk about steel, total steel, so across A set, that will be your +20 that you mentioned. So a very strong second half for steel. That is a mix of obviously New Zealand and Australia and growth in both those locations in the double digits. So, it has been, I think, a solid second half, particularly around steel, in both countries and both locations has been able to drive some of our second-half performance.
Dropping down to margins as well. From my calculation
Yeah
it feels like margins improved in the second half.
Definitely have.
Have we?
Yes, margins have improved in the second half. We have seen a lot of work done in that space from the team and making sure that we continue to provide the discipline around margin management, which, to be honest, we really have not seen a lot of that from our competitive landscape perspective. But, we focus on what we do, and we focus on our capabilities.
Excellent. That is all from me at the moment. I will let someone else have a go.
Thanks, Rohan.
Thank you. The next question is a follow-up from Harry Saunders from E&P. Please go ahead.
Hi. Thanks for taking my follow-ups. Just firstly, working capital requirements in FY 2027, given, I guess, the positive outlook commentary, the strong run rate, would you anticipate some builds in 2017, but then I think you are calling for a lower net debt through the D&A as well?
Yeah. We will expect inventory builds to continue as we go through an improved environment in both AU and NZ. The one thing that we see as being critical is that we need to make sure we have got the right stock for our location at the right time. That is a real mandate for us. It has been a mandate and focus for us for a period of time. Actually, we are seeing some of the stock shortages and outages are being a bit of an issue, particularly here in New Zealand. I think that is an opportunity for us to continue to show our service and our capability, which will help us continue to grow the top line. So, yeah, big focus for us, understanding the customer needs, what they require.
When they expect it for the future is something that any distributor wants to make sure they understand in quite a significant and growing environment.
Thanks. The last one from me, just given the continued investment in hybrid sites this year, the new site and converting four locations, can you just talk through the benefit you would expect from this in 2027, and would you expect to continue to invest in these next year?
Yeah, we do. We've got a couple of sites again, planned for FY 2027. We see this as a natural fit for us as we continue to grow our hybrid positioning. But it takes time, right? You need to build customer presence, customer capability, product understanding, and then we need to grow that into the marketplace. We'll continue on the journey. We know that where we've put it in place and got it working well, it works very well for us. We think it's a good fit from a customer base perspective, and we think it's great from a regional perspective as well.
Yeah, we've got site-ready plans in order to add hybrid capability across our business, and I think that's something that we see as being an opportunity for us to continue to get better at and continue to drive that service and capability for our customers.
Thank you.
Thank you. At this time, we're showing no further questions. I'll hand the conference back to Gavin Street for any closing remarks.
I just wanted to thank everybody for dialing in this morning and appreciate taking the call and the interest in our business. Look forward to catching up with various parts, various members over the next couple of days and next couple of months. Appreciate your time and thank you for joining the call today.