MRC Global Stock Slides Pre-Market On Downbeat Q4: CEO’s Optimistic About 2025 But Retail’s On The Fence

Sales declined 10% year-over-year to $640 million and fell short of a Street estimate of $726.90 million.

Updated: Mar 17, 2025, 8:00 AM IST

Shares of MRC Global Inc (MRC) slid over 4% in pre-market trade on Friday after the company’s fourth-quarter earnings fell short of Wall Street expectations.

Sales declined 10% year-over-year (YoY) to $640 million, falling short of a Street estimate of $726.90 million. The decrease was driven by the Downstream, Industrial, and Energy Transition (DIET) sector, followed by the Production and transmission Infrastructure (PTI) sector.

The company reported an earnings loss of $0.40 compared to an estimated profit of $0.08.

MRC Global reported a net loss from continuing operations of $1 million compared to a profit of $78 million in the same quarter a year ago.

The firm had earlier announced the sale of its Canada business and noted that its results are reflected in discontinued operations for all periods presented.

Canada discontinued operational losses, including operating losses and the loss incurred on the sale, which stood at $22 million for the fourth quarter of 2024 and $23 million for 2024.

MRC Global said its Gas Utilities sector sales were consistent with the prior year's figures. At the same time, DIET sector sales fell 18% to $208 million, and PTI sector sales decreased 13% to $203 million due to lower customer activity and fewer projects.

The firm ended the year with a cash balance of $63 million, long-term debt (including the current portion) of $387 million, and net debt of $324 million.

CEO Rob Saltiel said the company is optimistic about its business outlook for 2025 due to the rebound of its gas utilities business, the return of inflation to its product pricing, the growth of U.S. natural gas infrastructure investment, and its penetration into chemicals, mining, and data center markets.

“We anticipate growth in all three business sectors in 2025 and for revenue to be up low to high-single digits. In addition, we expect to generate at least $100 million in cash from operations, achieve our target net debt leverage ratio of 1.5x by year-end, and to have ample cash to begin execution of our recently announced $125 million share buyback authorization,” he said.

On Stocktwits, retail sentiment continued to trend in the ‘neutral’ territory (50/100).