That’s according to Jill Evanko, Chart’s President and CEO who today (18th Feb) unveiled the company’s Q4 and full year 2020 financial results, highlighting great successes for the business.
For the year, Chart celebrated a number of records, including backlog of $810m, gross margin as a percent of sales of 28.2%, operating income dollars of $108m and operating income as a percent of sales of 9.2%.
“The combination of strong free cash flow, strategic investments, record backlog and operational execution resulted in multiple full year 2020 and fourth quarter 2020 records, but more importantly, puts us in position to make 2021 a breakthrough year for our business as we serve our global energy and industrial gas customers’ growing and changing needs,” Evanko said.
“We finished the full year of 2020 with record backlog of $810m driven by strength in the second half of 2020 orders. Second half 2020 orders of $679.7m was a 28% increase compared to the first half of the year reflecting broad-based order strength heading into 2021.”
Reflecting on the hot topic of hydrogen, Evanko said continued growth in the segment is expected to continue. “We expect over 70% in hydrogen sales growth in 2021 when compared to 2020,” she explained.
However, it’s not just the company’s hydrogen segment that saw great growth in the year. Chart’s repair, service and leasing business is also accelerating, with 28 new leases signed in Q4 2020.
Repair, service and leasing closed the year with record backlog, after full year record orders of $197m. Already in the January of this year (2021), 78 new leases were quoted and there have been 37 signed already.
Q4
Arguably the busiest 2020 for Chart, Q4 saw the US-based company book orders with 65 new customers, resulting in record full year 2020 new customers of 472.
Further to that, the company completed four acquisitions and one investment related to carbon capture, water treatment and hydrogen in the fourth quarter 2020.
Q4 2020 reported diluted earnings per share (EPS) of $1.28 contributed to full year 2020 reported earnings per diluted share of $2.22 (+149% compared to full year 2019); when adjusted for one-time costs, adjusted diluted EPS for the fourth quarter 2020 was $1.27 and full year 2020 adjusted diluted EPS was $2.73, the highest in the company’s history.
The strength in the quarter contributed to multiple full year 2020 records, and in combination with our strategic investments and acquisitions completed in the fourth quarter of 2020 and year-to-date 2021, sets us up for expected double digit revenue growth in 2021.
Commenting on the quarter, Evanko, said, ““The fourth quarter of 2020 capped a strong year in unprecedented times, thanks to the entire Chart team.”
“In 2020, we made significant progress in penetrating the global high growth markets of clean energy, specialty and repair and service as evidenced by 472 new customers and 33 long-term agreement.”