Smith & Wesson Brands Incorporated Q3 Fiscal 2026 Earnings Call - Handgun share surge lifts ASPs, margins and cash flow

Conference Call Operator: Good day, everybody, and welcome to Smith & Wesson Brands Incorporated third quarter fiscal 2026 financial release and conference call. This call is being recorded. At this time, I would like to turn the call over to Kevin Maxwell, Smith & Wesson’s General Counsel, who will give us some information about today’s call. Thank you. You may begin.

Kevin Maxwell, General Counsel, Smith & Wesson Brands Incorporated: Thank you and good afternoon. Our comments today may contain forward-looking statements. Our use of the words anticipate, project, estimate, expect, intend, believe, and other similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements may also include statements on topics such as our product development, strategies, market share, demand, consumer preferences, inventory conditions for our products, growth opportunities and trends, and industry conditions in general. Forward-looking statements represent our current judgment about the future and are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause our actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by our statements today. These risks and uncertainties are described in our SEC filings, which are available on our website along with a replay of today’s call. We have no obligation to update forward-looking statements. We reference certain non-GAAP financial results.

Reconciliations of GAAP financial measures to non-GAAP financial measures can be found in our SEC filings and in today’s earnings press release, each of which is available on our website. Also, when we reference EPS, we are always referencing fully diluted EPS, and any reference to EBITDA is to adjusted EBITDA. Before I hand the call over to our speakers, I would like to remind you that when we discuss NICS results, we are referring to adjusted NICS, a metric published by the National Shooting Sports Foundation based on FBI NICS data. Adjusted NICS removes those background checks conducted for purposes other than firearms purchases. Adjusted NICS is generally considered the best available proxy for consumer firearm demand at the retail counter.

Because we transfer firearms only to law enforcement agencies and federally licensed distributors and retailers and not to end consumers, NICS generally does not directly correlate to our shipments or market share in any given time period, we believe mostly due to inventory levels in the channel. Joining us on today’s call are Mark Smith, our President and CEO, and Dena McPherson, our CFO. With that, I will turn the call over to Mark.

Mark Smith, President and Chief Executive Officer, Smith & Wesson Brands Incorporated: Thank you, Kevin. Thanks everyone for joining us today. We are very pleased with our third quarter results, which demonstrated continued market share growth while simultaneously maintaining resiliency in our pricing power and profitability. This is a direct function of the entire team’s discipline in staying focused and executing against our long-term strategy. The strength of the iconic Smith & Wesson brand, along with our laser focus on innovating to keep ahead of market trends, once again drove impressive average selling prices in the quarter, which together with increased unit shipments, delivered not only solid top-line performance, but also translated into both strong profit margins and balance sheet performance. Our Q3 performance exceeded our expectations across the board. Net sales increased over 17% year-over-year to nearly $136 million.

EBITDA of $16.8 million was up nearly 21%. Adjusted EPS of $0.08 compared with $0.03 in the prior year period. Importantly, we also delivered another quarter of significant growth in operating cash flow, which is up more than $30 million year-over-year. We believe our purposeful deployment of capital will allow us to continue consistently delivering long-term value for our stockholders. Looking at our performance by category, our handgun results were exceptional. Our unit shipments of handguns into the sporting goods channel were up 28%, while NICS was down 2.2%. With distributor inventory weeks of supply remaining flat during the period, this indicates significant market share growth.

This outstanding performance was driven by several factors, including strong demand for our newer products, a favorable shift in product mix towards higher price models, robust consumer demand, and the benefit of a modest 2%-3% price increase that we implemented late in the quarter on January first. Notably, we saw this growth across our entire semi-auto pistol line, indicating that the hard work that the team has been putting in on marketing messaging, targeted promotions, and new product development execution across the line is paying dividends. Performance in long guns was consistent with our strategic positioning in the market. We were pleased with our performance in the categories where we actively compete. For the quarter, our long gun shipments into the sporting goods channel were down 25%, while overall NICS was down 5.6%.

We believe this is largely due to channel fill in the prior year period with several new caliber introductions on our higher-end Model 1854 lever-action rifle products, combined with the relative outperformance in the industry of the hunting segment versus the self-defense segment, where our product line is more heavily weighted. Diving a little deeper into innovation, new products represented 44% of handgun shipments and 28% of long gun shipments during the quarter. In handguns, while we continue to have success with the Bodyguard platform, as I just mentioned, the growth we experienced in Q3 was across the entire line of our semi-auto pistols, where we introduced several new models outside the subcompact space, most of which are positioned at higher price points.

Once again, I’m incredibly proud of our award-winning product management, engineering, design, and production teams who consistently deliver products that resonate with consumers while meeting their expectations of world-class quality and reliability associated with our legendary brand.Driven by this mix shift, as I mentioned earlier, we were again pleased to continue seeing strong overall average selling prices in the handgun category, with ASPs of 5.2% versus a year ago to over $419 and also above Q2 levels. On the long gun side, ASPs were also strong at $535, although down about 11% versus a year ago. Similarly, mix was the primary driver here, as I just mentioned, with the year ago period, including the channel fill of higher-priced new product introductions on the Model 1854 rifles.

For both categories, the strength of the Smith & Wesson brand and our ability to ensure our product assortment is aligned to market trends continues to allow us to maintain healthy pricing and profitability while only participating selectively in promotions. Turning now to our balance sheet. We continue to make significant progress reducing our debt and further strengthening our financial position. We ended Q3 with $75 million in debt versus $90 million at the end of Q2, and we paid down an additional $20 million subsequent to the end of Q3. We were pleased with our internal inventory position of $175 million, which was down $23 million versus last Q3, resulting in excellent cash generation in the period of over $20 million.

I’d like to once again commend the team for their hard work on our disciplined process for aligning production to sales expectations across the product portfolio, which drove these results. We’re also very pleased with our distributor inventory levels, which remained flat in terms of weeks of supply, maintaining at approximately nine weeks throughout the quarter, right in line with our target. With our strong sales in the period, this indicates solid sell-through of our products at the retail counter. Before I turn the call over to Deana, I want to touch on a couple of additional points. First, I attended the annual industry SHOT Show in Las Vegas at the end of the quarter, where we were very pleased with customer feedback on our performance, product portfolio, and forward strategy.

This feedback, combined with our recent results and strong outlook for the remainder of the fiscal year, which Deana will cover in a moment, indicates we are winning in the marketplace. Looking forward, we will continue to be laser-focused on execution across the business and sustaining these gains. Next, the Smith & Wesson Academy, which launched just six months ago, along with our focus on the professional channel, is already exceeding our expectations. Thanks to the hard work of our academy staff and law enforcement sales team and the ongoing success of our purpose-built, rugged, and reliable duty weapons, we are not only growing in the consumer channel, but also gaining significant momentum on the law enforcement side.

You may have seen that we were awarded a number of large agency orders recently, and as a matter of fact, have shipped to nearly 1,000 separate federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies just within the past 18 months. With a strong sales pipeline and growing momentum, we’re very pleased with the results to date and beyond proud and humbled to be trusted by these men and women with the tools they need to come home safe to their families every day as they put themselves in harm’s way to protect and serve our country and our communities. In summary, momentum is strong and building, and our brand and product assortment are driving continued healthy profitability. We remain confident in the direction and trajectory of our business against the backdrop of a healthy and stable market.

We continue to lead with a proven innovation strategy that consistently resonates with consumers. Backed by the powerful Smith & Wesson brand, along with our commitment to operational excellence and maintaining a strong balance sheet, we are well-positioned to continue winning in the marketplace and delivering long-term value to our stockholders. As always, I want to thank our entire team of talented Smith & Wesson employees for their tireless dedication and putting their skills to work each and every day to make us successful. With that, I’ll turn the call over to Deana to cover the financials.

Dena McPherson, Chief Financial Officer, Smith & Wesson Brands Incorporated: Thanks, Mark. Please note that all comparisons are between the third quarter of fiscal 2026 and the third quarter of fiscal 2025, unless stated otherwise. Net sales for our third quarter of $135.7 million were $19.8 million or 17.1% above the prior year on the strength of our new handgun products. During the quarter, distributor inventory in terms of actual units increased by approximately 20% over the end of the prior quarter, but only by about 4% compared with the end of January 2025, with weeks of supply remaining steady at approximately 9 weeks. We believe, based on feedback from our customers, that strong demand for our products will continue in the coming months.

Handgun ASPs were up slightly versus Q2 levels due to continued strong demand for certain premium products, offset by the strength of certain of our lower-priced products. Long gun ASPs decreased by about 11% due to lower overall volume of certain of our higher-priced products, driven by channel fill for new products in the prior year, as Mark covered earlier. Gross margin of 26.2% was up 210 basis points over the prior year on increased production volume, combined with lower promotion costs and lower Federal Excise Tax, partially offset by a 160 basis point negative impact from tariffs. Having focused on driving inventory levels down over the last 12 months, we are now turning our focus to increasing production to meet market demand, which should continue to have a positive impact on margins.

Operating expenses of $28.9 million were $5.7 million higher than the prior year, due primarily to a $2.3 million gain on the sale of real estate that was recorded last year. Increased profit-related and stock-based compensation expense contributed to the remaining increase. Higher revenue and related margin resulted in net income of $3.8 million, compared with $2.1 million in the prior year period. GAAP earnings per share in the third quarter was $0.08, compared with $0.05 a year ago. On a non-GAAP basis, earnings per share was $0.08 compared to $0.03 a year ago. Cash generated from operations during the third quarter was $20.5 million, compared with cash used from operations of $9.8 million in the prior year quarter.

This was due primarily to lower inventory, which decreased $7.9 million during this quarter versus an increase of $2.9 million in the prior year quarter. We spent $3.6 million in capital projects in the third quarter, compared with $6.3 million a year ago. We expect our capital spending for the year to be between $25 million and $30 million. We paid $5.8 million in dividends and ended the quarter with $23.5 million in cash and investments and $75 million in borrowings on our line of credit. Subsequent to the end of the quarter, we repaid $20 million on our line, bringing our outstanding borrowings down to $55 million.

Our board has authorized our $0.13 quarterly dividends to be paid to stockholders of record on March 19th, with payment to be made on April 2nd. Looking forward to the fourth quarter, we believe the strength of our brand, product assortment, and new product offerings are helping us drive growth and take share in an otherwise stable market. We expect our fourth quarter sales will be up 10%-12% over Q4 2025 sales, with a small reduction in channel inventory as distributors begin to plan for the slower summer months. With 8 additional operating days compared with Q3 and an increase in production to meet demand, we expect Q4 gross margin to increase by several percentage points over Q3 and a point or two over last year’s fourth quarter.

Operating expenses in Q4 will likely be about 10% higher than last year’s fourth quarter due to increases in research and development costs, stock compensation, profit sharing, and other profit-related costs. Additionally, we expect continued healthy cash generation during the fourth quarter. Our effective tax rate is expected to be approximately 29%. With that, operator, can we please open the call to questions from our analysts?

Conference Call Operator: Thank you. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad. A confirmation tone will indicate your line is in the question queue. You may press star two if you would like to remove your question from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star keys. Our first question is from Mark Smith with Lake Street Capital. Please proceed.

Mark Smith, Analyst, Lake Street Capital: Hi, guys. I want to ask first about kind of recent pricing changes. Can you talk about, you know, any price that’s been taken, whether that’s been across the board and anything that you can quantify?

Mark Smith, President and Chief Executive Officer, Smith & Wesson Brands Incorporated: Sure. Hey, Mark. The price increase we put in was effective January first, as I covered in the prepared remarks, it was largely across the board. It was, you know, there was some categories that took a little bit steeper increase and some categories took a little bit less so, just really driven on, you know, market demand and our position within each category. Overall, across the board, it was pretty close to 3%.

Mark Smith, Analyst, Lake Street Capital: Any feedback, you know, for as you look at distributors or as you think about kind of consumers on that? Does it seem like that’s gone through well, or has there been any pushback on the pricing?

Mark Smith, President and Chief Executive Officer, Smith & Wesson Brands Incorporated: No, it’s, no pushback whatsoever. It’s, you know, as you may recall, it’s been, you know, it’s been a little bit since we’ve taken a price increase, you know, and really has gone through smoothly. No impact whatsoever. I think as you saw from the results, you know, actually an uptick in demand, throughout the quarter, so.

Mark Smith, Analyst, Lake Street Capital: I wanted to look at just handgun sales, really strong results there, especially as we think about new products. I’m curious, you know, without giving out too much competitive, you know, details here, you know, anything that you can expand on what’s kind of helped drive some of that strength? You know, I’m curious, like, colorways, you know, some of your ported options or, are these things that have helped, or is there just, you know, having the right product for consumers right now?

Mark Smith, President and Chief Executive Officer, Smith & Wesson Brands Incorporated: Yeah. You know, you know we’ve had great success with the Bodyguard over the last, you know, really the last couple of years. You know, at that category, we kind of own it. You know, we’ve done a lot of work and, you know, that strategy I talk about a lot, long-range strategy is, you know, let’s make sure we’re refreshing the entire product line. You know, I think we’re starting to see the results of that. You know, and it’s really just, it’s across the board. It’s all of what you just talked about, markets. You know, obviously, we’re not gonna give too much detail for the reason you just covered.

It’s looking at the market trends and, you know, having a team that really understands, you know, the industry and, you know, what is trending out there. You know, where do we need to make some updates and changes? Making those changes. We’ve been really happy with the results that are coming out with that. Now that polymer pistol line across the board is really starting to gain a lot of profitable share. You know, obviously, as we start to move now into more of the, you know, out of the subcompact into the compact and full-size markets, you know, that’s obviously at the higher end of the pricing hierarchy, and that is really helping ASPs and, you know, the momentum continues.

Mark Smith, Analyst, Lake Street Capital: Perfect. Then just similar question shifting over to long guns. You know, I’m curious, anything that you guys can do today to kind of drive, you know, more strength in that long gun market? I realize there’s some things in the comparable that make this quarter tough, but, you know, as we think about, you know, the hunting category, is there interest in entering there? You know, is there more maybe on SBRs or anything that you can do to drive more long gun business?

Mark Smith, President and Chief Executive Officer, Smith & Wesson Brands Incorporated: The SBRs, as you’re well aware, the tax stamp changes that occurred on January 1st are helping a little bit there in that category. At the end of the day, it’s, as I covered in the prepared remarks, it really is, you know, it’s one of the difficult comps versus last year as we were introducing kind of the, you know, the last couple calibers on the lever action rifle, which obviously are at the very high end of our, of our pricing hierarchy on long guns. Our product portfolio is kind of more, you know, weighted towards that self-defense market and, you know, the hunting market. Obviously, we’re in it with the Model 1854 and very pleased with the performance there.

There’s, I’ll just leave it at this, is there’s a lot of white space there for us, and we’re always looking at long-term opportunities.

Mark Smith, Analyst, Lake Street Capital: Perfect. I think the last one for me, you called it out a bit in your commentary, just the law enforcement opportunity and improving sales there. You know, I’m curious just, you know, where you’re at in that process. It seems like, you know, that’s a big market and we’re maybe just scratching the surface. You know, is that something that is a big focus, and where you think you can really move the needle on revenue as there’s more drive in law enforcement? Then similarly, I’m curious as we think about maybe international within military, if there are similar opportunities.

Mark Smith, President and Chief Executive Officer, Smith & Wesson Brands Incorporated: Yeah, it’s definitely a focus area. As I think you’ve been around long enough now you know that’s a much longer sales cycle than on the consumer side. What I’m pleased about is the pipeline that we have, even with the, you know, strong results this quarter. You know, we’ve got a pretty healthy pipeline coming up behind it. You know, that is a direct result of, you know, all of the intangibles of, you know, the Academy and being able to service that law enforcement customer in a more meaningful way. Purpose-built products, you know, changes to the product. There’s innovation happening there as well. You know, that extends beyond just, you know, domestic law enforcement.

It, you know, moves into federal agencies, state, local, and federal, and then outside, you know, into foreign militaries as well. A lot of good things happening in that space. Still does remain kind of a smaller section of our business right now, but a lot of momentum there and a pretty healthy pipeline coming up behind it.

Mark Smith, Analyst, Lake Street Capital: Excellent. Thank you, guys.

Mark Smith, President and Chief Executive Officer, Smith & Wesson Brands Incorporated: Thanks, Mark.

Conference Call Operator: Our next question is from Rommel Dionisio with Aegis Capital. Please proceed. Rommel, please check and see if your line is muted. I believe he was having some technical difficulties. We do not have any further questions at this time. I would like to turn the conference back over to Mark for closing remarks.

Mark Smith, President and Chief Executive Officer, Smith & Wesson Brands Incorporated: Thank you, operator, and thanks, everyone, for joining us today and your interest in Smith & Wesson. We look forward to speaking with you all again next quarter.

Conference Call Operator: Thank you. This will conclude today’s conference. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation.