Dana (NYSE:DAN) reported first-quarter financial results on Wednesday. The transcript from the company's first-quarter earnings call has been provided below.
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The full earnings call is available at https://events.q4inc.com/attendee/992392535
Summary
Dana reported strong first quarter results for 2026 with significant revenue growth and margin improvement, marking a year-over-year EBITDA margin increase of 400 basis points to 9.2%.
The company repurchased 4.4 million shares, totaling $125 million returned to shareholders, keeping it on track for its $300 million target for the year and $2 billion through 2030.
Dana announced a significant new business award with Stellantis on the Ram Dakota program, contributing to a secured growth backlog that supports its Dana 2030 strategy.
Full-year guidance remains unchanged, but Dana anticipates reaching the upper end of its sales and EBITDA ranges, driven by operational efficiencies, cost savings, and favorable currency effects.
CEO Bruce McDonald transitioned to Chairman, with Byron Foster taking over as CEO, highlighting leadership continuity amidst strategic execution towards the Dana 2030 growth plan.
Full Transcript
OPERATOR
Craig Barber (Senior Director of Investor Relations and Corporate Communications)
Bruce McDonald (Chairman)
Byron Foster (Senior Vice President and President of Light Vehicle Systems Group)
Timothy Krause (Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer)
OPERATOR
to execute strongly throughout this year and the years to come. Thank you and I will now turn the call back over to Regina for any questions. We will now begin the question and answer session. To ask a question, press Star, then the number one on your telephone keypad. We ask that you please limit your question to one and return to the queue for additional questions. Our first question comes from the line of Tom Narayan with RBC Capital Markets. Please go ahead.
Tom Narayan (Equity Analyst)
Timothy Krause (Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer)
Byron Foster (Senior Vice President and President of Light Vehicle Systems Group)
Timothy Krause (Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer)
we just laid out here with the, with the Dakota pickup truck when we'll keep updating the schedule in and moving those, those buckets from green to blue and showing you as we fill it up.
Tom Narayan (Equity Analyst)
Got it. If I could just do a quick follow up on the 26 guidance. I guess IHS numbers came down after you guys gave this guidance at the end of Q4 and now you're, you're raising your guidance effectively. So just curious like. So I mean, obviously your, your, your revised guidance incorporates the weaker light vehicle production, is that right?
Timothy Krause (Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer)
Tom Narayan (Equity Analyst)
Got it. Thanks. I'll turn it over.
OPERATOR
Our next question will come from the line of Emmanuel Rosner with Wolf Research. Please go ahead.
Emmanuel Rosner (Equity Analyst)
Great. Thank you so much. Curious if you could give us some sense of cadence for the earnings improvement throughout the year, you know, going from the 9.3% margin, you know, this quarter to like the, and 6 at midpoint for the full year. I think the, the biggest driver seems to be continued, you know, cost performance and cost savings. But just, you know, curious if there's any specific cadence or seasonality to that, yeah.
Timothy Krause (Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer)
Emmanuel Rosner (Equity Analyst)
Okay. And then on the light vehicle sales, so, you know, I guess another or I guess performance yet another quarter of sort of like negative volume mix, you know, at the top line, but obviously, you know, pretty solid sort of like at the, at the bottom line, I think you're. You flagged against sort of product mix. Can you just remind us what, what exactly is going on in there and as well as, you know, for the full year.
Timothy Krause (Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer)
Byron Foster (Senior Vice President and President of Light Vehicle Systems Group)
You hit it.
Emmanuel Rosner (Equity Analyst)
Great, thank you.
OPERATOR
Our next question will come from the line of James Picriello with BNP Paribas. Please go ahead.
James Picriello (Equity Analyst)
Hi, good morning, everybody. Just a clarification question first and I don't know if I only get one question or follow on, but operating cash flow is cited in the press release at a $156 million use of cash for the quarter. And then if we just bridge that against the adjusted free cash flow. Right. That would imply 39 million in CapEx, but the slide deck refers to 61 million in CapEx. So apologies if I missed the clarification on that.
Timothy Krause (Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer)
But yeah, it's just some of the adjustments and we'll, when we, when we file the Q, we'll give you the full breakdown, but some of it has to do with, you know, how we're classifying some of the, we still have some one time costs coming through from the transaction, but we can help you clean that up when we give you the walks.
James Picriello (Equity Analyst)
Okay. And then just any order of magnitude on the, on the operating lease buyouts that I think you said have a second quarter timeframe.
Timothy Krause (Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer)
James Picriello (Equity Analyst)
Okay, thank you.
Timothy Krause (Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer)
Yeah. It's probably also just worth noting this is like a one time catch up we've gone through and said, hey, our core manufacturing facilities we should own not least. And there's a handful that we lease and this is a one time adjustment using our cash to clean it up.
OPERATOR
Our next question will come from the line of Joe Spack with ubs. Please go ahead.
Joe Spack (Equity Analyst)
Timothy Krause (Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer)
Joe Spack (Equity Analyst)
Okay. And then just one quick one on the, on the guidance. I know, I'm just curious about your commercial, commercial vehicle market view actually, which is still flat, even though, you know, I think there's, there's views out there that, that could be up now this year. So I just want to be sure you're saying you're trending to the high end, even with a flattish commercial vehicle environment. And then Joe, that includes some thought
Timothy Krause (Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer)
Joe Spack (Equity Analyst)
Thank you.
OPERATOR
Our next question will come from the line of Colin Langen with Wells Fargo. Please go ahead.
Colin Langen (Equity Analyst)
Oh, great. Thanks for taking my questions. Just unusual question, I guess, but why not delay the earnings call until you have sort of more full financials? Usually it's sort of unusual that we don't have like, it's actually less information than the Q4 release. Yeah. What is the thought process there? Just seems unusual to me, I guess maybe as a former accountant.
Timothy Krause (Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer)
Colin Langen (Equity Analyst)
okay, if I look at slide 13 with the full year guidance, everything
Timothy Krause (Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer)
Colin Langen (Equity Analyst)
Okay, you mentioned tariff in there. So it's commercial vehicles better, currency's better. And then what is the tariff change? Like just, just some of the timing
Timothy Krause (Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer)
and the recoveries around, around tariff maybe a little bit bit higher than what we have here.
Colin Langen (Equity Analyst)
Okay. All right, thank you.
OPERATOR
Our next question will come from the line of James Mulholland with Deutsche Bank. Please go ahead.
James Mulholland (Equity Analyst)
Timothy Krause (Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer)
Yeah, no, I mean our European CD business is relatively modest. So we don't see it being overly impacted or any softness that are overly impacting, you know, our overall results or our view of the way the year will come out.
James Mulholland (Equity Analyst)
Okay. And then I guess just looking at your walk for the rest of the year as you think about, I guess the 125 million in performance and cost savings excluding the stranded cost elimination, do either segments have more room to run there or are the savings going to be generally proportional? And then from a cadence standpoint, should we think about it as relatively steady or really back half weighted?
Timothy Krause (Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer)
So on the performance it generally sized to the size of the business, you know, so you can, it'll follow generally that, that that split and then I'm
James Mulholland (Equity Analyst)
sorry, your second piece of that question. I was just on the cadence. I know. I think you mentioned when Emanuel asked earlier that there could be some a little bit more in third quarter. So should we think of it as more back half weighted just in general?
Timothy Krause (Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer)
James Mulholland (Equity Analyst)
Great, thank you guys.
OPERATOR
Our final question comes from the line of Dan Levy with Barclays. Please go ahead.
Dan Levy (Equity Analyst)
Timothy Krause (Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer)
Dan Levy (Equity Analyst)
Timothy Krause (Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer)
It's generally the latter. You know, for ongoing programs, we're getting pricing that comes through over the course of the program.
Dan Levy (Equity Analyst)
Great, thank you.
Timothy Krause (Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer)
OPERATOR
This concludes today's call. Thank you all for joining. You may now disconnect.
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