Welcome back, everybody. Again, we're very pleased to welcome to the stage, Huntsman. We've got Phil and Peter, CEO, CFO, both longtime chemical guys, know the space well. I mean, I think Peter, you've probably since, what, 2000, 2001? I forget when you took over the role. But a lot of.
Somewhere in that time period.
Yeah. Just to date ourselves, but a lot of water under the bridge, so again, thank you guys both for coming up and spending some time with us today. I think maybe the first thing is, we just had Lyondell up here who, you know, I know you guys aren't giving guidance for the quarter, kinda updating it, but they did. You know, with their numbers, it looks like sequentially they're gonna be down almost 40%-45% from Q3 to Q4. Now, again, they've got some more commodity stuff. Polyethylene prices fell off. MTBE, which you have a tiny bit of, they've got a lot more of, has been pretty weak. But just, you know, maybe take, if you would, a few minutes, just kinda, you know, each of your businesses or key businesses and kinda go around the world geographically. You know, what are you seeing?
You know, what's getting better? Maybe what's not getting better? Where there's still challenges? And we can kinda level set with that if that's okay.
Yeah. Duffy, first of all, thank you very much for the opportunity we have to be here. It's always good to see you. And, yes, if I had to sit here today, typically this conference, which is typically timed a few weeks after an earnings call, I could give some sort of update from the earnings call.
Mm-hmm.
We're seeing a little bit better, a little bit less. I literally would repeat verbatim what.
Okay.
We said on the earnings call. I don't think we're seeing things get any worse.
Mm-hmm.
or, unfortunately, getting any better. I do think that from a macro point of view, if I kinda chop the world up into three regions: North America or the Americas, Asia, read that as the vast majority of that's gonna be China.
Mm-hmm.
And then Europe, which would include the Middle East, in my comments. If I look at that, I do believe that in early in the first quarter of next year, there's gonna be some potentially real material changes that could impact our business.
Mm-hmm.
I think impact the industry in general.
Mm-hmm.
those would include if the Fed continues to cut.
Mm-hmm.
Rates, what does that do for housing? I think you'll have a very good read on housing. Well, I should say very good read. I think you'll have a read on housing.
Mm-hmm.
Probably late February, early March, as far as what are pre-orders coming in for OSB insulation.
Right.
Building materials, and so forth. And what does the impact have on falling interest rates on a re-inventorying.
Mm-hmm.
Of that entire supply chain.
Right.
Also some confidence. I think today builders are just buying enough materials to tie them over to the next project sort of thing. I don't get a sense that OSB producers and so forth, they're really restocking. North America for us, the majority of that improvement's gotta come around through an improvement in the housing market.
Mm-hmm.
Second would be automotive. Automotive in North America feels like it's weak and getting perhaps weaker.
Mm-hmm.
which again is the guidance that we gave on our most recent call, so what in the U.S. side are we going to be seeing on interest rates between now and the end of the first quarter? What impact does that have on housing? What impact does that have on consumer confidence, and I would say that the third area is going to be tariffs.
Mm-hmm.
And that, how quickly that hits.
Mm-hmm.
And to what degree is that a 10%, 20%, 30%? Is it doubling of the existing tariffs? I take a product like MDI, 20% of the MDI coming into the United States comes in from China.
Mm-hmm.
That's about, figure $250 in freight, give or take a couple dollars depending on freight availability, shipping, and so forth. Today there's a around 30%, 29-point-something percent tariffs coming in on MDI.
Mm-hmm.
You figure a cash cost of around $2,000 a ton, that's $600 a ton on tariffs. That's $250 a ton. That's $850 per ton on MDI.
Mm-hmm.
If those tariffs were to double.
Right.
which has been said, they may well do that. That's gonna add $600 roughly.
Mm-hmm.
Of additional tariffs, and you're talking around $1,500.
Mm-hmm.
Now, I think that our large Chinese competitor has some cost advantages. They have scale. They've got an excellent technology. They run a good business. They probably have some utilities, coal-based, economics on raw materials and so forth.
Mm-hmm.
I'm not sure you get over $1,500 worth of tariffs.
Right.
I don't think you come anywhere close to that.
Okay.
So what does that mean for U.S. pricing? In our case in particular, virtually all of the product we produce in the Americas stays in the Americas.
Mm-hmm.
Same with Europe.
Mm-hmm.
Same with Asia. We don't move MDI for that matter. We don't move much of any of our products around.
Okay.
Globally. So I would say those are gonna be some of the major factors in North America that will impact all of our divisions, but particularly around MDI.
Mm-hmm.
Going to Asia, particularly China, consumer confidence.
Mm-hmm.
I think has been lackluster. GDP growth, real GDP growth within China, aside from a lot of overcapacity that's been built. I'm not sure the global markets need it right now. But when we look at that, consumer confidence really has been dead and flatlined in China for about three to four years.
Mm-hmm.
A 40-year housing bubble has burst. That's left a lot of people's savings. I'm always shocked by the number of people that work in our company. They don't have stock accounts. They don't have 401s.
Mm-hmm.
They don't have retirements. They own two homes somewhere.
Yeah.
They put all their money into some outer area, real estate. I think when we talk about this real estate bubble bursting in China, that's just not a real estate bubble. That's a savings bubble.
Right.
And that's what that does for confidence in the government decisions and so forth by policymakers. I think it rattles a lot of people's confidence, and so they have a tendency to say, "How will the Chinese government respond to that?" There's a lot of talk that there's going to be some response to that.
Mm-hmm.
Sometime around Chinese New Year's, early part of January. And there's also gonna be a Chinese response potentially to tariffs. And what does that do?
Right.
And again, that's an early Q1 sort of, potentially.
Mm-hmm.
Sort of a response. Europe, they've been amazingly successful in outsourcing CO2s to dirtier economies than themselves, deindustrializing, and following all but this cultish behavior of banning a war on CO2. I'm not sure they're really eliminating as much as they're just exporting it to another country.
Mm-hmm.
and I think you're seeing the consequences of that and of a failed energy policy in Europe that.
Mm-hmm.
Goes down through the industries. I'm more optimistic on North America than I am any place else, followed by China. With Europe, Europe needs more than just a catalyst or a rate drop.
Right.
They need to really examine if they wanna manufacture or is Europe just gonna be a museum, a very large museum for geriatric tourists.
Right. Fair. That's pretty blunt.
All right. That works. So then when you look at it, if you could pick one area to get better, is it U.S. construction? Is that what that would have the most leverage, or is it China? Because that would sop up most of your biggest competitors' oversupply, or what is it that you would like to see get better, would have the biggest leverage, do you think, for your company?
Oh, if I could pick any one area, it would be U.S. construction.
Okay.
Coming back because that's such a catalyst, not just for building materials, but all the materials that it takes to fill a home when you buy it.
Okay. Yeah.
And I think that's one of the great catalysts for economic growth across the board.
Mm-hmm.
Is when you can get affordable housing and reliable.
Okay.
housing. So I would say that's number one. Number two would be Chinese consumers.
Okay.
Going back in the market.
Okay. If you think about our revenue, Duffy.
Yeah.
About 40% is U.S.-related.
Yeah.
And therefore it has a disproportionate impact, particularly with the leverage.
Mm-hmm.
Towards construction in the United States.
Fair enough. And then if things stayed roughly where they're at, I mean, if we go through another bad year in 2025 and things don't get better, do you have the footprint you want, or would you need to, you know, take some more significant actions at that point if it looked like things weren't gonna improve? Or are you just, are we kind of in a wait till things improve and we got the right footprint for that? Or is there another program or something more that you would wanna do self-help-wise?
Duffy, I believe that the worst thing a management team can ever do is say, there's nothing we can do, so therefore our strategy is just wait for something to happen that we don't know what's gonna happen or when it's going to happen or what the impact that's going to be.
Mm-hmm.
Look, we've been in two years where both years we've said the second half's gonna look better than the first half.
Yeah.
I believe that, again, will be the case in 2025, but we cannot run the business around that.
Right.
I wanna be very clear on that. We're not sitting here waiting, and hoping. We have publicly said that we go to work every morning and we look at our asset base, and we have to be disciplined and we have to be creative in that area, and we have a board that is very well focused on that. There is no emotional attachment to any division or any asset. I will say that we've also publicly said that we wanna look more like Advanced Materials.
Mm-hmm.
Getting into aerospace, getting into composites, getting into formulated products that are more downstream, getting into the electrical grid, getting into adhesives and so forth, and less of the commodity side exposure that you would see in a product like MDI.
Mm-hmm.
Now, does that mean that we just go out tomorrow and sell our MDI? No, it does not. But it does mean that we have to look at, are we the best owner of these assets?
Mm-hmm.
and are we prepared and are we running the divisions in the manner that when the time comes or when a potential buyer would come, that we have a place to deploy the capital?
Mm-hmm.
That we have targeted potential opportunities. I don't think we're gonna shrink our way to prosperity and so we've this may be a time when perhaps you're gonna take a discount on an asset should you decide to sell it.
Mm-hmm.
But you're also going to be able to buy an asset probably at a discount relative to where that asset was a few years ago. So our board looks very closely at that strategy. That's something that we talk about on a quarterly basis, and it's something that we're not. We simply can't wait for the chemical industry. What if it's two, three, four years away?
Mm-hmm.
We can't wait for that. We've gotta continue to push the envelope on looking at our assets and where the value can be realized and what we can and should be doing there.
Okay. Fair enough. And you touched on the specifics of potential tariffs and MDI in your big competitor in China. But more broadly, you know, when you look back to kinda Trump 1.0 and some of the stuff that they've said this time, where else in your business do you think you would either see tariffs, you know, maybe helping you in some regions or maybe counter tariffs where you would export something that, you know, again, might be a surplus in another country where you might get hurt? You know, when you kinda walk around your businesses in the world, how do you see that playing out?
It's an excellent question. And just answering it very broadly, and Phil can probably give some better specificity. We don't have any product or any division that moves a material. When I say material, I'm talking about high single-digit.
Mm-hmm.
percentages that moves any material product overseas.
Okay.
And the vast majority of what we produce stays within those geographic regions that I talked about earlier. I don't see tariffs impacting our business. In some cases, I would probably see it as a net positive.
Okay.
On the short term, the problem with tariffs is if there's a tariff that we put towards country C over here.
Right.
and country C suffers because of that, do our domestic businesses within country C.
Right.
have a knock-on effect because of the tariff? That's a more challenging until we really know what the impact is going to be. I remember when Trump raised the tariffs the first time, everybody said it would be inflationary. It wasn't.
Yeah.
And everybody said that it would cause these massive trade wars. It wasn't. And then it would be reversed by Biden. That's tariffs are about the only thing that both sides of the aisle.
Right.
The only thing that both Biden and Trump agreed on.
Mm-hmm.
And so I don't think they're going anywhere fast as far as.
Yeah.
We're eliminating them. So we probably ought to be factoring that high into our planning as to what impact that's gonna have. But again, the direct tariffs, I think, will.
Okay.
Would have a greater impact of a positive with Huntsman.
Okay. And then just because it is so big for the world if you do put a bigger tariff, you know, on China or whatever, where do they take their product? If that 20% doesn't come to the U.S., you know, usually chemicals are ubiquitous, right? So it's kinda like poking on a balloon. They'll pop up somewhere else. Would you expect more of that to flow to Europe or, you know, how would you see the, you know, 'cause the global balance of trade has to get reset somehow. So where does that go if it's not to the U.S.?
It does, Duffy. That's a great question 'cause I again, I'll take a product just like MDI.
Yeah.
For example, if you were to take and say that 20% of the MDI that's consumed in the U.S. is coming in from China, and you were to take that, what would that be? 400,000 tons.
Mm-hmm.
Or something thereabouts. If you were to take 400,000 tons and go dump it in China or excuse me, in Europe, can Europe absorb that? No.
Yeah.
I mean, that's a world-scale plant that just.
Right.
Overnight pops up in Europe in a market that's not growing in MDI.
Mm-hmm.
A market that doesn't have any margins to speak of. Does that mean margins get actually worse? I don't think so. And that probably forces the Europeans to retaliate.
Right.
In some form or another. So the real question is, how resilient is that product?
Right.
In the country of its origin?
Mm-hmm.
And if that product is that producer either gonna flood their own market. Now if you have a predominantly greater than 50% market share of one player there.
Mm-hmm.
I'm not sure that person's gonna wanna shoot themselves in the foot.
Right.
Right? It's gonna hurt them more than it does anybody else. Or do they just cut back on production? And that's.
Right.
That's the unknown of any of these sort of trade.
Right.
Disputes that take place.
Okay. And again, just because it's so sizable for you as a company, when you look at MDI where we're at today, you know, kinda market behavior, just given the macro demand, how healthy do you think the underlying is in MDI? If we start to get some demand coming back, can that inflect rapidly, or is it, you know, kinda best case more of a longer grind higher over a couple of years, would you guess?
I think that the market scenarios are in place today, I think, for a quicker comeback.
Mm-hmm.
I'm not sure that the actual sellers will see that instantaneously. A lot of us have contracts that are pass-through pricing, and you have contracts that are locking in margins for six months.
Mm-hmm.
Or multi-quarters and so forth. Not in all cases, but some cases. So if you were to see, hypothetically, margins double overnight because all of a sudden prices go up that amount, that doesn't mean you're going to see that fall to the bottom line the next morning.
Okay.
There's just a lot of throughputs to go through that. But it directionally does mean it's the right direction to take. Now, there you do have to have a couple of variables in place. I believe many of those macro variables, such as very low inventories in the supply chain.
Mm-hmm.
Right now, I think with uncertainty, with the cost of capital, with carrying inventory, and the lack of visibility of any growth in the next quarter or two, inventories are extremely low in all the supply chains. Raw materials are very competitive today.
Mm-hmm.
Compared to where they've been, price of benzene and other raw materials compared to where they've been over the last couple of years. So you've got customers out here that are saying, "Product's relatively cheap. I've got low inventory." And I think if you see any sort of a tick up in demand that's unexpected.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah, you start getting panic buying, and that's not something that we've seen even with the threat of tariffs.
Mm-hmm.
People have asked if we've seen pre-buying ahead of the tariffs.
Right.
We haven't seen that.
Okay.
in any of our products yet, but I.
Okay.
Just anecdotally, there's a feeling of uncertainty that's out there.
Okay. And clearly, Duffy, the MDI industry this year off of a low base has clearly improved, right?
Right.
Probably between five and 10% this year. As long as that continues, then you start to get a clear tightening of utilization rates throughout the entire industry.
Fair.
Okay.
Yeah. We have to have that growth come back before we get pricing. And that growth is coming back.
Okay. And then you'd touched on it, Peter, a little bit, M&A, which over the years you guys have done some selling, some buying. You've talked about wanting to get, you know, look more like your Advanced Materials business. When you look out over the next one or two years, just given the macro, what does the opportunity look like, you know, to add some assets, you know, that are sizable enough to kinda move the needle for Huntsman? And are multiples coming down after, you know, kind of a number of years being, you know, subsidized by very low interest rates, or are you starting to see, you know, prices come to an area that, that look interesting?
Yeah. To answer that question in reverse, I think multiples are gradually coming down.
Mm-hmm.
Valuations are coming down just 'cause earnings are falling. Multiples even come down just one term.
Okay.
A combination of earnings going down. Asset values are dropping with that.
Mm-hmm.
So that makes for more of a target-rich environment. On the flip side, when there's uncertainty like there is today, this is not a time to stretch your balance sheet.
Mm-hmm.
Therefore, I think this is when you've gotta get creative.
Mm-hmm.
You've gotta be able to look at anything. I think there's a time where you're probably going to be hearing about more talks about mergers.
Mm-hmm.
You know, asset, perhaps exchanges and so forth, but you look just in Europe.
Mm-hmm.
I can't. I've struggled to think of four or five major chemical companies in Europe that are not going through a strategic review of their assets.
Right.
Now, he's selling them. The core problem is many of the companies that traditionally are the buyers' consolidators of.
Mm-hmm.
Lyondell and INEOS companies like that.
Mm-hmm.
They're also out there looking at their assets as well.
Mm-hmm.
So I don't see any buyers out there.
Right.
Or even private equity on some of these. Now, I may be shocked, and there might be, you know, a whole slug of them that come in, once these reviews are over. But, it's, I think, it might leave a number of companies kinda scratching their heads wondering what to do. I'm just glad we kinda as a company went through that.
Mm-hmm.
Some years ago, got rid of TiO2, got rid of.
Right.
Our base chemicals, aromatics, olefins, polyolefins, our textile businesses in Europe and kind of.
Right.
Washed all that out, some years ago.
Fair.
But it's a quandary. And everybody's trying to sell assets. I've never seen a time when you've seen all three regions in a state that they are today during the Great Recession.
Right.
China was booming.
Right.
You see so many people trying to get out the door, if you will, of Europe at the same time.
Okay. Interesting. And again, it's not your business model, but do you think that would be a successful business model if you could get some capital and roll up a bunch of, you know, kind of lower-quality assets in Europe, make it big enough that you could, you know, restructure it somehow? Or do you think that's a losing?
I'm reluctant to say, so I wouldn't put my money in that.
Okay.
I think that so long as Europe literally is as hostile as they are through their energy policy, their environmental policies, their regulatory policies, and their taxing policies towards industry.
Mm-hmm.
Size is not going to overcome all of those things.
Fair enough.
Europe has fundamentally gotta decide, do we wanna be making things or not?
Yeah. Okay. Okay. Fair enough. You've talked a lot. You like the aerospace industry with your business. You know, your call kinda coincided with Boeing's strike ending. You know, when y so there's been a lot of noise around the aerospace industry over the last where does that sit for you today? How is that business? Is Boeing's strike ending? Does that improve that business for you, or it wasn't that big of an issue in the first place? And so it's just kinda business as usual at this point, or how would you handicap the aerospace industry for you guys?
Assuming we don't see any more work stoppages and so forth in 2025.
Mm-hmm.
We certainly ought to see a better 2025 than 2024. We did see, in our aerospace business, about an 8% growth.
8% growth.
This year or over the last. And you know, that will continue. These supply chain issues that both Airbus and Boeing are facing have been formidable. Take away the.
Right.
Work stoppages and the government actions with Boeing. You know, you would think that Airbus would've doubled its output.
Right.
With Boeing stumbling ahead.
Yeah.
Airbus has got its. It's probably its fair share of problems as well.
Mm-hmm.
You're relying on more parts suppliers from more areas of the world to build an airplane than ever before.
Mm-hmm.
One of those suppliers, if there's a delay in any one of them, it's gonna stop the whole process, and I, I'm always surprised at our aerospace business. I don't say this through ignorance of the business, but just you've got, you're building one product.
Right.
You've got an eight-year backlog on orders for one product.
Right.
The specs don't change on that product.
Right.
From year to year, it's a very consistent business. From quarter to quarter, it's wavy.
Right.
From month to month.
Right.
You know, you go by Airbus or Boeing, they'll have a whole yard of just wings out there.
Right.
Waiting to be attached and waiting for the part to attach.
Right.
Or wings or something. And it's surprisingly volatile. But when I look at it, again, in aerospace specifically, this is our Advanced Materials. Europe's our largest area of Advanced Materials.
Mm-hmm.
It's one of our most profitable.
Right.
So it's not just aerospace.
Right.
Also adhesion and.
Right.
Building out the electrical.
Right.
Infrastructure and grid systems and so forth. So I also don't wanna say that all European applications and businesses are bad. I think it's more the heavy energy-intensive side.
Mm-hmm.
That's gonna be problematic.
Fair enough, and just because our first presenter had a bigger issue, you guys got a smaller MTBE business.
Mm-hmm.
In a joint venture, right? So just, I guess, what's your view on that? You know, it's had a couple good years where it feels like it's over-earned. It's kinda fallen off a little bit now. You know, how would you peg the next three or four? Is it does it go back to something where, you know, it's kinda like it was two or three years ago, or do you think that really was over-earning kinda the run rate we're at now, even though it's seasonal is a better way to kinda peg it for the next couple of years?
I think we're probably on the lower end of that. But MTBE, just anecdotally, since we've been in it since the mid-1990s, when crude prices are high.
Yeah.
It typically, it's a favorable octane, but Phil's on the board of that joint venture.
Okay.
You know, quote.
Yeah. So, MTBE is obviously, like, margins today are negligible in China.
Mm-hmm.
As a reminder, that's a 51-49 JV. We've got 49%, Sinopec 51%.
Yeah.
We take it as equity income. We peaked at about $130 million of equity income with the.
Okay.
The dynamics that you talked about. We're more now into sort of 35-40, and I think we guided for this quarter to be lower than quarter three.
Yeah.
Quarter three was only $5 million. Struggling right now. I don't imagine that it'll stay down at those levels. Duffy,
Fair enough.
You've got some seasonality there as well. But to Peter's point, we're probably at the lower end of the range that we've seen over the last sort of four to five years.
Okay.
Maybe just a couple comments on Maleic Anhydride, what you're seeing there, what you expect from that market?
Maleic is incredibly overbuilt in China, largely around environmentally friendly, biodegradable plastic.
Mm-hmm.
Bag that was supposed to be plastic product that was supposed to be mandated for use in China. Maleic was gonna be one of the major raw materials for this. And the plastic application, I'm not sure, has turned out to be as strong as they had hoped. There's a tremendous amount of oversupply of maleic coming out of China.
Mm-hmm.
Most of that's going into Europe.
Okay.
We have a very strong market position. I think we have a good market position in Europe. We have a very strong market position in North America. There's about a high 20% tariff.
Okay.
protection around the U.S. And the U.S. also has some of the lowest raw material butane pricing and so forth. So we've got very good cost in the U.S. We have a very good market position. And but it's right now, I'd say that it particularly in Europe and in China, specifically, it's oversupplied.
Okay. And the 'cause we've seen a lot of anti-dumping across our entire space, right? You think TiO2, epoxy, and even some countries that have kinda shocked me, Brazil and India, where they're actually protecting fairly small indigenous industries and they're big importers. So to me, it seems counterintuitive, but the countries seem to be moving down that path on some. Do you have some other you know, is maleic a candidate for that, for, like, some anti-dumping in other areas? Or, you know, when you look through your portfolio, where might you get some help other than just Trump coming in with kinda broad-based?
I would think that maleic probably would top the list of.
Okay.
I'm not a big fan of dumping litigation. But there are some very clear cases when you have to be aggressive and you have to go after these sort of things. And I think that the world is moving. I think we, you know, a decade ago, we were all talking about globalization.
Mm-hmm.
All coming together to sing Kumbaya. And now, there certainly is a fracturing that's taking place.
Yeah.
I think there's a mood of protectionism, not just in the United States. This isn't just a phenomenon with Trump. I mean, you look at what Europe's doing.
Right.
You look at it as you start looking at what are the industries that countries really value and that they want to protect, and what are the products that they want to protect.
Right.
These are fundamental questions that I think are being asked in a different light today than they have been perhaps in the past, and I think there's probably gonna be more dumping.
Mm-hmm.
Allegations, litigation, so forth, that will be coming up over the next year or two.
Okay. Then, I guess, one more for me, or I've certainly got more, but if we can go to the audience for a question or two, if anybody's got one. But when you think about Q4, where we're at, and you kinda talked about what could get better, you know, as we get into next year. But again, your crystal ball, where you sit today, what, you know, January, February look like? Is Q4 kind of a good baseline to extrapolate, or does Q4 feel kind of abnormally low just given some of the dynamics of this year? So it's not a fair extrapolation point into Q1 in your view.
Typically in Q1, we see a bit more of a pickup. I mean, the Q4 directionally is heading south. December.
Mm-hmm.
We always have this phenomenon at the end of December. It seems to shock everybody called Christmas, where people.
Yeah.
Don't go to work for a week. And Q1, while the numbers may be a little bit better in Q1, it's more the direction that I'm looking for.
Right.
Q4 always, seasonally and so forth, it's heading south. Q1's usually heading up.
Mm-hmm.
Especially by the time you get to the end of Q1 in March.
Mm-hmm.
You know, usually March is your strong month as you start getting into the second quarter. I don't, I mean, I'm very hopeful that's.
Yeah.
But as I've said earlier, between interest rates, construction, tariffs, new administration coming in, taxing policies, spending policies, and so forth, I think it's gonna be an incredibly volatile.
Yeah.
first quarter.
Okay.
Key element's gonna be post-Chinese New Year, but.
Yeah.
Right, for China, China customer.
Fair enough.
And confidence.
Okay, so I've certainly got a couple more, but if anybody in the audience has a question, I'd be happy to take it.
Thanks very much for taking the question. Just wanted to ask on capital allocation. I know you all have kinda target net leverage below two times, and maybe you're closer to four today. You're targeting investment grade balance sheet, but you've got some negative outlooks. Just how should we think about capital allocation into 2025, kinda given those, you know, kinda guideposts?
Go ahead. Okay. So you're right opposite the net leverage target that we have. If you look over the last five years, and I'm not saying this is a cycle average, but if you look over the last five years, it's about $800 million of EBITDA. We've got about $1.5 billion of long-term debt, once we retire our bonds next year. So we'll have debt due in 2029, 2031, 2034. 1.5 divided by 0.8, that gets you on a cycle average to below that two times, and that's the focus from a capital management perspective. Dividend, that'll be to the board. We've got a pretty competitive dividend right now in terms of distribution, about 5%, overall. We have paused our share buybacks.
And honestly, on share buybacks, I think it's incumbent upon us to get significantly above free cash flow above dividends before we continue with share buybacks.
Anything else from the audience? Maybe just a bigger picture, Peter. You do a lot of socializing with your peers, other CEOs in the industry. You've known them for a long time. If you got them all into a room where do they see the world similar to you? Where do they see the world different than you do, do you think?
I probably would be a bit more optimistic, maybe than the general sentiment around the U.S. economy. Not vastly different, but I mean I think that if you really unleash U.S. energy, you get energy prices come down, that's gonna be, it's gonna stifle a lot of the inflationary pressures we've seen in the past. I'm not a big fan of tariffs, but look, there are very clear examples as to where you need to protect industry.
Mm-hmm.
I think we've seen how vital supply chains can be and everything from rare earth going into weaponry, going into EVs, even basic petrochemicals. You know, we need to start looking at these global supply chains, just how secure they are.
Mm-hmm.
Russia's proven that and so forth, and I probably am a little more optimistic on North America. I'm probably a little more pessimistic on Europe.
Okay.
I think that Europe, when you see industry like the steel industry, chemicals, refining, the basic industry, these are the basic building blocks of any country's economy.
Mm-hmm.
You just can't be a massive service economy. When you start losing that, I'm trying to think back as a precedent in history where you lose that and it comes back.
Mm-hmm.
If you lose it because you're uncompetitive, because people have gone elsewhere, and you've pushed them out, not through an act of war, I can't find a time where so when people think about, well, what, what's it gonna take to get industry to go back to Europe? I don't think it goes back. I don't think these are permanent. When the automotive industry leaves Germany for whatever reason, you're not gonna see it come back in 10 years.
Right.
This is a century-long.
Yeah.
buildup, and when it's gone, it goes somewhere else, and companies invest for 20, 30 years and next generation somewhere else. I, I think there's some I personally have some real concerns around Europe, but I think that's gonna come in as a gain in the U.S. It's gonna come in a gain to China, and I think you're going to see more and more of a gain coming out of the Middle East.
Okay.
The world's energy, to manufacture, to build, whether it's AI, whether it's data processing systems, whether it's petrochemicals, still, you'll see China based on coal, Middle East based on oil, U.S. based on gas. That's a very broad view. I recognize that. But that, that's those are going to be the basic powers of manufacturing, and whether it's IT or manufacturing chemical steel or AI, that's where you're gonna see the epicenters.
True.
Unfortunately, I think an economy like Europe's probably gonna miss out more than people are expecting.
Fair. Listen, Peter, Phil, thank you guys so much for coming to spend some time with us. Great chat today and thanks everybody for joining us.
Thank you. Thank you.