Crane NXT Q4 2025 Earnings Call - Micro-optics momentum and Antares stake set up an accelerated 2026

Conference Operator: Good day, everyone, and welcome to Crane NXT fourth quarter and full year 2025 earnings call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the presentation, there will be a question-and-answer session. To participate, you will need to press star one one on your telephone. You will then hear a message advising your hand is raised. To withdraw your question, simply press star one one again. Please note, this conference is being recorded. Now it’s my pleasure to turn the call over to the Vice President of Investor Relations, Matt Roache. Please begin.

Matt Roache, Vice President of Investor Relations, Crane NXT: Thank you, operator, and good morning, everyone. I want to welcome you all to the fourth quarter and full year 2025 earnings call for Crane NXT. Before we begin, let me remind you that the slides we’ll reference during this presentation can be accessed via the Investor Relations section of our website at cranenxt.com, and a replay of today’s call will also be available on our website. Before we discuss our results, I encourage all participants to review the legal notice on slide 2, which explains the risk of forward-looking statements and the use of non-GAAP financial measures. Additionally, we refer you to the cautionary language at the bottom of our earnings release in our Form 10-K and subsequent filings pertaining to forward-looking statements.

During the call, we will also be using non-GAAP financial measures, which are reconciled to the comparable GAAP measures in the tables at the end of our press release and accompanying slide presentation, both of which are available on our website in the Investor Relations section. With me today are Aaron Saak, our President and Chief Executive Officer, and Christina Cristiano, our Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. On our call this morning, we’ll discuss our 2025 highlights, our financial and operational performance, and our 2026 financial guidance and outlook. After our prepared remarks, we’ll open the call to analysts for questions. With that, I’ll turn the call over to Aaron.

Aaron Saak, President and Chief Executive Officer, Crane NXT: Thank you, Matt, and good morning. I appreciate everyone joining the call today. I’d like to begin by thanking our Crane NXT team members around the world for their performance during Q4. We have an exceptional team, and I’m proud of our accomplishments throughout 2025. Starting with our financial results, we had a strong end to the year, executing our strategy of accelerating organic revenue growth while maintaining strong margins and free cash flow. Sales growth was approximately 20% in the fourth quarter and 11% for the full year. Adjusted EBITDA margin was approximately 25% in Q4 and 24% for the full year. Additionally, our strong free cash flow resulted in a conversion ratio of approximately 135% in the fourth quarter and 94% for the full year, in line with our expectations.

Finally, we delivered adjusted EPS of $1.27 in the fourth quarter and $4.06 for the full year. We continue to build momentum in executing our strategy to accelerate organic growth, and I’d like to highlight a few of our key achievements this year. We ended 2025 with a total of 20 new currency denomination wins, specifying our Micro-optics technology. This result exceeded our target range of 10-15 wins and is one reason why I’m so positive about the long-term outlook for the currency business. Notably, the new wins include 5 new denominations for the nation of Fiji, which unveiled a new series of currency in December, featuring Micro-optics integrated into polymer substrates.

With our currency team’s continued streak of wins and organic backlog up more than 30% year-over-year, we are highly confident in our sales outlook for this business in 2026. Also, in 2025, we successfully completed the final equipment upgrades to support the launch of the new U.S. currency series. With design and testing finalized, we’re preparing for the release of the new $10 bill later this year, and we’re excited, as I know many of you are, for the U.S. Treasury announcement of the new design, which we think will likely be in mid-2026. In 2025, we also secured significant contract renewals in our Crane Authentication business across major customers, including the world’s most recognized sports leagues.

As a reminder, earlier last year, we announced that we renewed our multiyear contract with the National Football League to provide physical product authentication and online brand protection services. And in Q4, we signed a multiyear agreement with Major League Baseball to provide security technology for their consumer products. We’re confident that these partnerships, together with other contracts we have with some of the world’s most recognized brands, will continue to drive growth. We also continue to build upon our market-leading positions in authentication and traceability technologies. In 2025, we further strengthened our leadership in global authentication through the creation of Crane Authentication, combining OpSec Security and De La Rue Authentication into one integrated business. We made significant progress executing on our synergies, including 80/20 initiatives, which will drive significant margin accretion in this business in 2026.

Additionally, in the fourth quarter, we closed our initial equity investment in Antares Vision, a global leader in providing advanced detection systems and track and trace software, expanding our presence in higher growth end markets, including life sciences and food and beverage. We’re on track to complete this acquisition and take the company private in mid-2026. Finally, to capitalize on increasing demand, we are investing in the future growth in our international currency business, and I’ll provide more details on this later in the call. In summary, throughout 2025, we continue to execute our strategy, accelerating revenue growth, building momentum in key strategic areas, and expanding our market-leading positions. We’re taking meaningful steps to position the company for success, and we’re in a strong position to deliver long-term shareholder value creation.

Thank you again to our entire Crane NXT team for your dedication in 2025 and commitment to continued success in 2026. Now, with that, let me hand the call over to Christina to review our fourth quarter and full year financial performance in detail, as well as our 2026 guidance. Christina?

Christina Cristiano, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, Crane NXT: Thank you, Aaron, and good morning, everyone. I’d also like to echo Aaron’s thanks to our associates for their continued hard work. We appreciate your contributions and your commitment to our customers and shareholders. Starting on slide four, sales were $477 million in the quarter, an increase of approximately 20% year-over-year, driven by acquisitions and continued strong performance in Crane Currency. Core sales increased approximately 5%, reflecting accelerating growth in SAT, partially offset by expected softness in CPI. Adjusted segment operating margin of approximately 26% declined approximately 120 basis points versus the prior year, reflecting additional costs and investments to support increased demand in international currency, as well as unfavorable FX, which I will speak more about in a few moments.

Adjusted free cash flow conversion was very strong at approximately 135%, underscoring our robust operating discipline, and we delivered adjusted EPS of $1.27. Moving to slide five, full-year sales were approximately $1.7 billion, an increase of approximately 11% year-over-year, with core sales growth of approximately 1%. Adjusted segment operating margin decreased approximately 260 basis points year-over-year, reflecting the expected impact of acquisitions and additional costs in international currency to deliver on increased demand. Finally, adjusted free cash flow conversion was approximately 94% for the full year, and we delivered adjusted EPS of $4.06.

Moving to our segments, and starting with CPI on slide 6, core sales were flat compared with the fourth quarter of 2024, with double-digit growth in gaming offset by expected softness in other end markets, including vending. Adjusted operating margin improved approximately 340 basis points to approximately 32%, reflecting the impact of disciplined cost management and productivity initiatives. Finally, there was a modest increase in backlog sequentially, and the book-to-bill ratio was above 1. Turning to slide 7, for the full year, CPI core sales were in line with expectations, decreasing by approximately 4% year-over-year, reflecting the indirect impact of tariffs on demand in our vending end market as pricing actions caused customers to delay orders. Results were also impacted by the final phase of the gaming destocking dynamic we experienced during the first half of 2025.

Through strong cost discipline and application of CBS to drive productivity, we maintained adjusted operating margin at approximately 29%. These results reflect excellent work by our CPI team. Moving to Security and Authentication Technologies on slide 8. In the fourth quarter, core sales were up approximately 11%, driven by strong performance in Crane Currency, where we achieved 11 new micro-optics denomination wins in Q4, bringing our full year total to 20 new wins. As a reminder, total sales growth of over 40% includes the acquisition of De La Rue Authentication, which closed in May. Adjusted segment operating margin decreased by approximately 420 basis points from the prior year. As shown on slide 9, we had strong volume growth year-over-year, increasing our margins. However, this impact was partially offset by several items.

First, we experienced unfavorable mix in our international business as compared to the fourth quarter of 2024, based on the specific shipments from our backlog to central banks. Second, we incurred additional costs to meet increased demand, including hiring and training of additional production staff, higher freight, procurement of substrates from third-party suppliers, and selected outsourcing of banknote printing. Additionally, there was an unfavorable FX impact on margin as we experienced higher operating costs to manufacture and print our international currency products in Sweden and Malta, incurring costs in Swedish krona and euro. We also made additional investments in Q4 to support anticipated future growth as we continue to execute the development of the next generation of micro-optic products with very high customer interest. Finally, the contribution from the acquisition of De La Rue and the execution of our synergies across Crane Authentication performed as expected in the quarter.

Turning to Slide 10, for the full year, SAT delivered core sales growth of approximately 7%, driven by strength in currency, which exceeded our expectations. Crane Authentication performed as expected, with results including 8 months of De La Rue Authentication in 2025. Adjusted operating margin decreased by approximately 380 basis points, driven by the expected impact of acquisitions, and as discussed earlier, the increased costs in international currency and the unfavorable impact of FX. Finally, backlog was up more than 50% year-over-year, which gives us high confidence in our growth outlook for SAT in 2026. Moving to our balance sheet on Slide 11, we ended the year with net leverage of approximately 2.3 times.

During the fourth quarter, we secured a term loan of roughly $500 million and drew approximately $130 million to fund the initial equity investment in Antares Vision. We expect to draw the remaining balance in the first half of 2026 to fund the rest of the Antares Vision transaction, which is on track to be fully completed in mid-2026. Looking ahead, we anticipate using our free cash flow to pay down our outstanding debt and end 2026 with net leverage of approximately 2.3 times. We have an excellent balance sheet, attractive fixed rate long-term debt, and substantial liquidity. Our strong free cash flow generation enables us to invest in organic growth, pursue M&A to build on our leadership positions, and maintain a competitive dividend.

Continuing our commitment to a disciplined and balanced capital allocation strategy, yesterday, we announced a 6% increase to our annual dividend while preserving ample capacity to deploy capital toward acquisitions in the future that meet our financial criteria. Moving now to 2026 guidance on Slide 12, I would like to highlight that this guidance only includes the interest expense associated with our initial approximately 32% investment in Antares Vision. We anticipate updating guidance in our first quarter earnings announcement after Crane NXT has a greater than 50% ownership stake in Antares Vision, at which time its results will be consolidated within Crane NXT. In 2026, we expect full-year sales growth of 4%-6%.

In SAT, we expect high single-digit growth, driven by high single-digit growth in U.S. currency from a favorable mix of banknote demand and low single-digit growth in international currency, even with a tough comparison to a very strong 2025. In Crane Authentication, we expect mid-single-digit core growth, including a full-year contribution from the De La Rue Authentication acquisition. In CPI, we expect sales to be flat year-over-year, reflecting mid-single-digit growth in service, where we are expanding our offerings, offset by approximately flat revenue year-over-year in our hardware businesses and a low single-digit decline in vending, as order softness continues following price increases to offset the impact of Chinese tariffs. Before I discuss our profit guidance, I’d like to note that we have changed our profitability metric to adjusted EBITDA from adjusted operating profit.

We believe Adjusted EBITDA is a more meaningful representation of our operating performance, as it eliminates non-cash expenses, including depreciation, and we will be using this metric going forward. We expect adjusted segment EBITDA margin to be approximately 28%, which is approximately flat year-over-year. This reflects continued high profitability in CPI and the benefit of synergy realization in Crane Authentication, partially offset by actions we are taking to expand capacity for international currency. Continuing with full year guidance, we expect corporate expenses of approximately $58 million. We also expect non-operating expenses of roughly $60 million, which includes a non-controlling interest associated with a Crane Authentication joint venture and interest expense associated with our initial stake in Antares Vision.

We will update our guidance to reflect the impact from Antares Vision once we consolidate the company into Crane NXT, and Aaron will be providing an update on this timing later in the presentation. For the full year, we expect our tax rate to be consistent versus 2025 at approximately 21.5%, and we expect to deliver full-year Adjusted EPS in the range of $4.10-$4.40. Finally, we expect adjusted free cash flow conversion in the range of approximately 90%-110%, recognizing that the specific timing of currency shipments can vary quarter by quarter. Turning to Slide 13, I want to point out that the phasing of revenue in 2026 will be slightly higher in the second half of the year.

In the first quarter, we expect to see revenue growth in the mid-teens, reflecting the impact of the acquisition of De La Rue Authentication and full operations in our U.S. currency business, which will drive 45%-50% growth in SAT year-over-year. This growth will be partially offset by a mid-single-digit decline in CPI, reflecting timing of hardware shipments based on the expected customer order pattern. Adjusted EBITDA margin of approximately 19% will be flat in the first quarter year-over-year, reflecting the realization of acquisition synergies in Crane Authentication, partially offset by the flow-through impact of lower CPI volume, mix impact of the De La Rue acquisition, and increased currency costs to meet the higher demand. For the full year, we expect Crane NXT sales to grow in the mid-single digits in 2026, with adjusted EBITDA of approximately 25%.

This reflects a continued high Adjusted EBITDA margin in CPI of approximately 30% and an approximate 120 basis points improvement year-over-year in SAT to an Adjusted EBITDA margin of approximately 25%. Now let me turn the call back to Aaron to provide further details about the actions we are taking to capture growth opportunities in international currency and an update on the Antares Vision transaction.

Aaron Saak, President and Chief Executive Officer, Crane NXT: Thanks, Christina. Turning to Slide 14, I’d like to take a few moments to discuss the investments we’re making to capture organic growth opportunities in international currency, where demand continues to be very strong, with 20 new Micro-optics wins in 2025 and organic backlog up over 30% year-over-year. This is a particularly exciting growth area for us, and we see tremendous potential for it to continue in the years ahead. Now, as a reminder, we deliver value to our international currency customers through four primary offerings, as shown on the slide. These offerings include the designing of banknotes, substrate manufacturing, production of our proprietary micro-optics technology, and banknote printing. To capitalize on rising demand, we’re taking a variety of actions to expand our capacity. First, we’re leveraging our CBS discipline, which we expect will continue to drive increased productivity annually from continuous improvement initiatives.

Second, to supplement these productivity initiatives, we’re adding resources to our design team and increasing staffing in our micro-optics and banknote printing facilities to increase capacity and move to 24/7 operations. Additionally, we are also increasing the amount of products and services we’re procuring from a select group of suppliers and partners. This includes purchasing additional substrates beyond our current capacity and partnering with select government print works for banknote printing. We significantly increased these activities in Q4 and expect them to continue into 2026 to meet the growing demand. For 2026 in total, we expect additional cost of approximately $4 million in SAT related to these actions, but reducing substantially in 2027 as our internal productivity programs are executed. Finally, we’re investing in capacity expansion with new micro-optics production lines in our Nashua, New Hampshire, facility and in our facility in Malta.

Based on these investments in organic growth, we expect CapEx to increase to approximately 7% of currency’s revenue in 2026. Even with these investments, we expect Crane NXT’s CapEx spending to continue to be in the range of 3%-5% of sales in total. Additionally, for 2026, we expect approximately $4 million of added OpEx to support micro-optic product development, design, and these capacity expansion programs. In total, we expect adjusted EBITDA margins to improve by approximately 120 basis points in SAT. And a more detailed bridge of the 2026 year-over-year SAT margins is provided in a slide in the appendix. In summary, we’re excited about the long-term growth opportunities these actions will drive, and we’ll share more about those programs at our upcoming Investor Day.

Moving to slide 15, I want to provide an update on the Antares Vision transaction. In Q4 2025, we completed the first step of the transaction, acquiring approximately 32% of the company from its largest shareholders. I’m happy to report that we’ve received approval from the Italian regulators to move forward with step two of the transaction, and we’ll launch a mandatory public tender offer to all remaining shareholders in February. We expect this process will be completed by the end of Q1, at which time we will own over 50% of the shares of Antares Vision and consolidate the results under Crane NXT. As Christina mentioned earlier, we’ll provide updated 2026 guidance based on the consolidation of Antares Vision during our Q1 earnings in May. Finally, in Q2, we will start step three of the transaction to take the company private.

As a reminder, Crane NXT has secured voting agreements with the largest shareholders of Antares Vision, which ensures our ability to take the company private after the completion of the mandatory tender process. We expect the take-private process will be completed in mid-2026. In closing, I want to reiterate a few key points from our call today. First, we’re continuing to execute our strategy of accelerating growth while maintaining strong margins and robust free cash flow. Second, we continue to build momentum in our strategic growth areas. Our team is ready for the launch of the U.S. new series of banknotes, starting with the $10 bill in 2026. International currency strong performance is exceeding our expectations, and we’re taking actions to drive further growth opportunities and expand our leadership in this market based on our technology.

In Crane Authentication, we took actions in 2025 to accelerate the realization of synergies, and we expect to see significant margin accretion in 2026 as a result. And finally, the Antares Vision acquisition is on track, and we look forward to welcoming the entire Antares Vision team to Crane NXT in 2026. With all of these actions, I believe we are well positioned to accelerate growth in 2026 and beyond and deliver significant value creation to our shareholders. I look forward to seeing many of you at our upcoming Investor Day on February 25 in New York City, where we’ll share more details on our strategy, growth opportunities, and financial priorities. We’ll also be showcasing some of our advanced technologies and solutions during the event.

Thank you again for your time this morning, and I would like to also thank our Crane NXT team members across the world for their commitment to our customers, our communities, and all of our stakeholders. Now, operator, we’re ready to take our first question.

Conference Operator: Thank you so much. As a reminder, to ask a question, press star one one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To remove yourself, press star one one again. We ask that you please keep your questions to one and one follow-up. One moment for our first question. Comes from the line of Matt Summerville with D.A. Davidson. Please proceed.

Matt Summerville, Analyst, D.A. Davidson: ... Thanks. Morning.

Aaron Saak, President and Chief Executive Officer, Crane NXT: Good morning, Matt.

Matt Summerville, Analyst, D.A. Davidson: Maybe, maybe just start with SAT. As I think about the margin performance in Q4, kind of sequentially, you got $30+ million of additional revenue, $2 million less OP dollars. And I realize you had the investments, you called that out in the waterfall chart. But I guess I’m wondering why this business, if demand is that strong, can’t do more to test price elasticity in the market, given the nature of what you’re selling and kind of the criticality, especially if this decisioning is being done through an 80/20 lens?

Aaron Saak, President and Chief Executive Officer, Crane NXT: Hey, thanks for that question, Matt, and good morning again. You know, I’d start by saying, as you see in our prepared remarks, and as you referenced the waterfall, we’re really encouraged by the growth and the backlog that we have in international currency. We strongly believe, and I’m highly confident, this is setting us up for sustainable growth, and that’s why we’re making these investments. Now, to your point on pricing and the flow-through of that, just to remind you, Matt, most, if not all, of these contracts that we’re delivering in any quarter have been put into our backlog well before. So we’re executing this backlog. That’s what gives us great visibility into 2026. This is not a book and ship business.

With that being said, as we’re looking forward here, as new contracts come into the backlog, we are very focused on ensuring we are maximizing our value and the pricing power we have with our leading technology. I feel confident that the team’s doing that.

Matt Summerville, Analyst, D.A. Davidson: And then as a follow-up, obviously, there’s a few moving pieces. Two things: One, can you talk a little more explicitly about the EPS cadence as we move throughout the year, particularly given some of the pluses and minuses we see you referenced in the first quarter? And then, you mentioned being able to see some cost recovery on some of these investments. If I look at it and say $12 million in 2025, that you call out in waterfall, another $4 million that you call out in the 2026 waterfall, that’s $16 million. How much of that do you think can ultimately be recouped looking out to next year? Thank you.

Christina Cristiano, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, Crane NXT: Well, maybe I’ll start with that one, and, and then Aaron can jump in if he, if he likes to. So, I mean, just in, in total, you know, we feel confidence in our confidence in our guidance for 2026 and the outlook that we set. And so our range of $4.10-$4.40 reflects continued strength in currency, and sales and authentication continuing at MSD, and softness in CPI, driven mostly by the hardware businesses and vending, which continues to experience softness as a result of the tariffs. In terms of the phasing, as we said, we’ll see accelerating growth throughout the year, and the results will be slightly skewed toward the second half from the first half.

So specific to your question, Matt, you know, EPS will accelerate through the first half and then level off a little bit in the back half of the year to get to that total of $4.10-$4.40. You know, overall, the guidance is balanced, and we think we’ve taken a prudent approach, particularly with CPI, with our flat guide on sales for the full year.

Aaron Saak, President and Chief Executive Officer, Crane NXT: Matt, hey, I’ll add in, too, on the recovery of some of the costs or the read-through of that on a go-forward basis. I think, you know, the right way to think about this, as you’ve seen, we’re going to increase adjusted EBITDA margins in the SAT segment by about 100 basis points in 2026. We should expect to see that kind of continued incremental improvement directionally on a go-forward basis inside of SAT. Obviously, there’s some mix there that will play, as you know, with our U.S. currency, and we’ll wait and see the volume distribution later in 2026. But I think that’s the kind of frame I would put on it.

We are gonna continue to be on this march now of increasing EBITDA margin and significant expansion in SAT on a go-forward basis. Highly confident of that.

Matt Summerville, Analyst, D.A. Davidson: Got it. Thank you, guys.

Aaron Saak, President and Chief Executive Officer, Crane NXT: Thanks.

Conference Operator: Thank you. Our next question is from Mike Holoran with Baird. Please proceed.

Mike Holoran, Analyst, Baird: Hey, good morning, everyone.

Aaron Saak, President and Chief Executive Officer, Crane NXT: Good morning, Mike.

Mike Holoran, Analyst, Baird: Hey, good morning. So a couple questions. You know, maybe you could just talk to about the sequential CPI dynamics, what’s happening in the first quarter, maybe specifically, and, and what type of recovery are you expecting? Seems a little light seasonally going into the first quarter. So, you know, obviously, the gaming commentary Christina highlighted earlier, but is there any other destocking going on in the broader piece there, and, and how do you expect that dynamic to trend out through the year?

Christina Cristiano, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, Crane NXT: Hey, Mike, thanks for that question, and I’ll just. It’s worth repeating that CPI is expected to be flat in 2026, with a 30% EBITDA margin and continued very strong free cash flow conversion. And so if we just go through CPI, overall, services will continue to grow at mid-single digits, and that’ll be consistent throughout the year. We expect vending to be down in the low single digits with that continued softness from tariffs, and that’ll improve in the second half based on the comp to 2025. If you remember, the tariff headwind that we experienced began really toward the back half of 2025, so we’ll get a better comp in 2026 as a result of that.

Now lastly, our hardware businesses will be approximately flat for the full year, and the phasing here is more skewed to the back half of the year, and that’s just based on customer order patterns. So you know, overall, we have high visibility into that hardware ordering pattern and, you know, feel confident in the full year guide. Q1 will be the lowest quarter, and we’ll see accelerating growth as the year progresses.

Mike Holoran, Analyst, Baird: ... Thank you. And then, what, what’s embedded in the expectations this year for the $10 bill onboarding? Is there an expectation for a second-half ramp on that business, specifically? And then secondarily and related, maybe could you just talk about how you’re expecting the international business to flow as you work through the year on the currency side, specifically, as you’re working with these outside vendors and you’re ramping your own capacity, is that a constraint at all in the short term in meeting demand? And does that accelerate as you work through the year? Or because of these arrangements, are you allowed to maybe more level load it and meet the needs?

Aaron Saak, President and Chief Executive Officer, Crane NXT: Yeah. Hey, thanks for that, Matt. Why don’t I take the US question, and Christina will jump in here on the international linearity question. We’re very highly, you know, very highly confident here, Mike, that the U.S. Treasury is going to make an announcement mid-year on the 10. We are ourselves already working on the 50 and feel we’re, you know, again, highly confident that that design will introduce, you know, sophisticated security features. And so when you think about our, our guide, then, you know, I think we’re just being prudent here on when they actually make the announcement. We look at it to be probably going into full consumer release more at the end of the year, call it Q4. And so that’s, that’s what we’ve kind of put in the guidance.

We think that that’s probably prudent for 2026.

Mike Holoran, Analyst, Baird: Thank you.

Christina Cristiano, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, Crane NXT: Yeah, and just in terms-

Aaron Saak, President and Chief Executive Officer, Crane NXT: Oh, sorry.

Christina Cristiano, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, Crane NXT: Sorry.

Aaron Saak, President and Chief Executive Officer, Crane NXT: We got a follow-up.

Christina Cristiano, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, Crane NXT: I was just going to follow up on the, on the international phasing. As you know, we’ll have a very tough comp in Q4 of 2026 based on the acceleration that we saw this year in Q4. So you’ll see that, you know, that international demand accelerating in the year, but a very tough comp in the end of the year. And then just on cost, just a reminder that, you know, Q1 will have the lowest profitability, just based on these incremental costs, which are more heavily phased toward the first half of the year. And we’ll see that profitability improving as the year progresses.

Aaron Saak, President and Chief Executive Officer, Crane NXT: Hey, I’ll just add as close out your question here, Mike. You know, with the actions we’re taking, both on productivity, the staffing, the capacity expansion, it’s not really a limit to us. You know, we’re going to see very nice growth in international currency. You know, just this Q4, which was exceptional for us, puts a pretty tough comp on the back half of next year. So, I think we’re in a really good position to continue to meet the customer demand, and we see a very healthy pipeline of opportunities going forward, and that’s what’s also giving us a lot of confidence here for the investments and, you know, many years of sustained growth in this business.

Conference Operator: Thank you so much. Our next question is from Bob Labik. Please go ahead, from CJS.

Bob Labik, Analyst, CJS: Thank you. Good morning, and thanks for taking our questions.

Aaron Saak, President and Chief Executive Officer, Crane NXT: Good morning, Bob.

Bob Labik, Analyst, CJS: Yeah, so thanks for the incremental information on the, you know, kind of international currency capacity. I wanted to, you know, stick on that theme. I think the demand or your results for international currency growth have been, you know, stronger than expected, probably a year or two ago, and, you know, that’s why you’re adding this capacity, and we’re talking about all this now. What are the drivers for the kind of faster growth in the international currency for Crane? I guess that’s question number one, how sustainable, and how does this impact your goal of 10-15 new Micro-optics per year? Was there a pull forward, or do you still think you can do that going forward? How are you seeing the market?

Aaron Saak, President and Chief Executive Officer, Crane NXT: Hey, thanks, Bob, for that question. Well, when you think about what’s driving this overperformance in our international currency business, it really comes down to three things. You know, number one is a market driver of increased counterfeiting is occurring in the market, particularly in the emerging markets and with some of our core customers. And so that’s forcing them, in many ways, to redesign their currency, and they’re always putting on higher security features, and we’re simply number one. We’ve got the best set of security features in the market, and we are a natural net winner when that occurs. Secondly, is simply the growth in emerging economies, coupled with the inflation that they’re seeing. And remember, our international currency business is predominantly operating in emerging markets. So again, we’re kind of a net beneficiary of that dynamic.

And then finally, third, the time to redesign that most governments typically go through is accelerating, and that’s a combination motivated by several factors. But in part of what’s happening is one country redesigns their currency, the neighboring countries then start the process to do that. And we think the U.S. redesign process helps that, as well, as new security features are going to get rolled out in the U.S. So we see all three of these, from increased counterfeiting, growth in emerging economies, and faster redesign times, as durable trends in this currency business, and it’s why we see very strong, sustainable growth over the long term. And I would expect we’ll continue to be in that range of 10-15 wins, Bob, and that’s what the target we would put out.

I think as you saw this year, you know, there’s momentum in our business, and certainly, this year, we exceeded that target.

Bob Labik, Analyst, CJS: Okay, super. I appreciate that. And then on last call, you discussed a international currency security only, I believe, contract win with a Latin American country that you’ll tell us more about, I think, in the future. I guess, any update there, and are there, you know, many more security-only opportunities that you’re bidding out on, or how does that play out?

Aaron Saak, President and Chief Executive Officer, Crane NXT: ... Hey, thanks again for that, Bob. I will be the first to tell you, I cannot wait to tell you what that country is, and we’re just in a position, given our contract with them, that we cannot announce that. But it’s a significant step forward for us, not only with the country, but with the security features that they’ve adopted, that we think will be an exceptional reference customer for us going forward. But we’re gonna have to wait for that. As we move forward, remember our core strategy inside of Crane Currency is to sell advanced security features, and those features are embedded in our Micro-optics. They’re the highest margin part of our business.

We’re out there pursuing several opportunities to sell those security features and get them into governments that may print their currency like we do here in the U.S., or print the currency for them, provided they incorporate our micro-optic features. The pipeline here is as strong as it’s ever been, and it’s why we’re making the investments that we have to make right now in our design capabilities and engineering capabilities to answer those tenders and win them in the future. So feel more positive, quite frankly, Bob, than we ever thought we would feel versus, as you referenced, two years ago, based on what we see in the market.

Conference Operator: Thank you. One moment for our next question. That comes from the line of Ian Zaffino with Oppenheimer. Please proceed.

Ian Zaffino, Analyst, Oppenheimer: Hi, thank you very much. Great quarter.

Aaron Saak, President and Chief Executive Officer, Crane NXT: Thank you, Ian. Good to hear about it.

Ian Zaffino, Analyst, Oppenheimer: So the question would be on SAT, if we look at the fourth quarter, is there a way you could give us a breakout of maybe what the currency piece grew and maybe what the non-currency piece grew? I don’t know if you have the exact number, but maybe just directionally, just trying to understand the different pieces in that segment. Thanks.

Aaron Saak, President and Chief Executive Officer, Crane NXT: Yeah, sure. Sure, Ian. If you look at it, you know, currency was up high double digits in the fourth quarter. That was based on, really, on the strength of international currency. And as I think you know, we’ve had headwinds on a comp basis with the U.S. just due to the volume in 2025. So the good news there is that obviously that corrects itself, and we’re gonna get to high single-digit growth next year on the full year for the U.S. currency. So, you know, very strong, high double-digit growth in currency. Our De La Rue acquisition performed just as we planned, and we saw lower growth, call it, in the legacy OpSec business. But that was really intentional because of the 80/20 work that we did, and we talked about in the third quarter.

So I would say it performed kind of on our plan, and with the synergy activities that you see in the bridge, we actually read through some nice, incremental margin, simply on the execution of the synergies, which are coming in, as Christina said, ahead of our schedule.

Ian Zaffino, Analyst, Oppenheimer: Okay, thanks. And then, you know, as a follow-up, on the $10 note, I know you talked a little bit about this or a lot about it, but, you know, how do we think about when it’s gonna reach run rate production? And I guess when you’re saying it’s gonna be back-end loaded, you know, is it based on when the government announces the launch? You know, so what are kind of the goalposts we need to look at as far as what’s being communicated by the government versus what’s going on with your business? And I’d imagine-

Aaron Saak, President and Chief Executive Officer, Crane NXT: Yeah

Ian Zaffino, Analyst, Oppenheimer: ... you might have a heads up on that because you would have to stock it, you know, pre-announcement, or am I not thinking about that right? Thanks.

Aaron Saak, President and Chief Executive Officer, Crane NXT: No, you’re, you’re—Ian, good question. You’re thinking about it exactly correctly. We are, you know, closely working with the Treasury on setting up the right levels of inventory ahead of the public launch. It does still depend on exactly when they decide to launch it. That’s where, to the prior question, I would say we’re being prudent to say we think that starts to really hit in Q4 of this year. That’s, you know, gonna get crystallized here, I would say, in the next three months, to be precise.

What I would say, Ian, to probably the broader question, and, you know, that I know you’re asking and others about the impact of the U.S. currency program and where it’s at, that’s something we’re obviously going to spend a little more time and dive deeper into during our Investor Day, and provide some more insights of how we see the impact of that playing out.

Conference Operator: Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Bobby Brooks with Northland Capital Markets. Please proceed.

Bobby Brooks, Analyst, Northland Capital Markets: Hey, guys. Thank you for taking my question. I first one I’ve got is just great to hear about the multiple professional sports leagues renewing secure, authentication and security contracts. But I was curious if we could try to get a sense on the financial benefit from that. And then secondly, did those renewals see additional tech or services layered on? I’m just trying to get a sense of maybe what the dollar-based net retention was of those, leagues re-upping their contracts.

Christina Cristiano, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, Crane NXT: Hey, Bobby, I’ll take that one. Hey, we’re super excited to continue a partnership with a flagship customer like the MLB, just like we announced with the NFL last year. These are great customers that we have long-standing relationships with. We can’t reveal too much of the details, as you can imagine, about their contract. But in this case, we’re providing product authentication and licensing management software, and it’s a great recurring revenue stream because, as you know, you know, once we get engaged with a customer, it’s very sticky. It’s a very sticky arrangement that drives future recurring revenues.

So, you know, we’re very excited about this and, you know, we’ll continue to work with them to partner on our offerings and what more we can offer them as part of the portfolio, and just continue our relationship with them.

Bobby Brooks, Analyst, Northland Capital Markets: Got it. Appreciate that color. And then could you remind us, so the 24-hour staffing for micro-optics productions and the banknote printing, that’s great to hear. But could you remind us, was that from, like, previously, were they just doing a 40-hour workweek, or was it more like an 80-hour workweek? And secondly, could you just remind us, like, when those transition to 24, 24/7 shifts?

Aaron Saak, President and Chief Executive Officer, Crane NXT: Yeah. So it varied a little bit, Bobby, based on each of the sites, quite frankly. You know, you could probably think of it as more of like 24/5 directionally. And we are in the process of ramping up to the 24/7, which we’ll be at here in Q1. You know, just a reminder, you know, these are very highly complex and secure operations, so ramping up is not just something that happens with the flip of the switch. You know, we’re hiring our direct labor. They have to go through a security clearance, as well as some fairly intense training to be operating on our Micro-optics and banknote printing lines. So there is, with that, you know, just a very natural ramp-up period to get us there.

Again, expect that to be completed here as we exit Q1 and feel very good we’re on the track to that. But you know, at that point then is why we’re making the investments to add another line in Nashua, and particularly excited about the expansion in Malta, which gives us more obvious capacity, creates redundancy in our operation, which is very good, and quite frankly, puts us closer to our customers with a flag planted now in Europe for Micro-optics and very close to our emerging market customers. All of which we see as an excellent setup for sustaining the growth of this business long term.

Conference Operator: Thank you so much, and this will conclude our Q&A session for today, and I will pass it back to Aaron Saak, President and CEO, for closing comments.

Aaron Saak, President and Chief Executive Officer, Crane NXT: Well, thank you, operator. As we conclude today’s call, I again just want to thank everyone on the Crane NXT team for their strong efforts in 2025. I’m excited about the direction of the company and the momentum we’re building to accelerate growth. And I look forward to seeing many of you at our upcoming Investor Day on February 25th in New York to tell you more about our plans for 2026 and beyond. And so until then, take care, and I hope you all have a great day.

Conference Operator: Closes our conference. Thank you all for participating. You may now disconnect.