In this episode of The Capital Compass, Ricki Lee sits down with leadership from Mullen Group Ltd (TSX:MTL), one of Canada’s largest logistics and transportation providers, to discuss the company’s 2025 annual results and its outlook for 2026.
Despite operating in a competitive freight environment, Mullen enters the new year with a strengthened balance sheet, long-term structured debt refinanced through 2034 and 2037, over $140 million in cash, and more than $500 million in undrawn credit capacity.
Looking ahead to 2026, Mullen has projected approximately $2.3 billion in revenue and $365 million in EBITDA, positioning the company for a potential record year. Read the full transcript below, or watch the full video above.
Ricki: So to start off, Mullen recently announced its 2025 annual results. Carson, I’ll start with you. If you could walk us through some of the key highlights from last year, particularly from a balance sheet perspective.
Carson: Yeah, Ricki, I’d say one of the main highlights obviously from my perspective, has to be what we’ve done with the balance sheet. All along our strategy has always been to match long-term investment decisions with long-term structured debt.
And this past year what we did was we finalized and refinanced our debt which now comes due and matures in 2034 and in 2037 we also redeemed 125 million of the debentures of which most of that converted to equity. So really what that’s done is it’s left us in a very enviable position at the end of the year.
We exited 2025 with in excess $140 million of cash on the balance sheet and undrawn bank lines of about $525 million. So really going into 2026, we’re in quite an enviable financial position here at Mullen Group.
Ricki: And Nick, if we could build upon that slightly, how did 2025 shape up from an operational and strategic standpoint, including acquisitions, diversification into new verticals and Mullin’s continued focus on dividends and shareholder returns?
Nik: Yeah, I think you touched on it there. The top highlight has to be the Cole Group. Acquisition Cole is a third party logistics provider with a focus on customs clearing. This is a new vertical to us and further adds to the diversity of our organization.
Through acquisitions like the Cole Group, we’ve been able to maintain our dividend, and recently we’ve been recognized for both the stability and the growth of our dividend by being added to the Canadian Dividend Aristocrats Index and the S&P TSX composite index.
Ricki: Amazing. Well, so turning to the year ahead then, Mullen has outlined its 2026 budget in January. Carson, how would you describe the current operating environment from a demand perspective, and how has that influenced your assumptions for 2026?
Carson: We came out earlier here in January with our 2026 budget with really the highlights were projecting approximately $2.3 billion in revenue and $365 million of EBITDA. And that budget’s really predicated on the performance of our existing business units that we have right now.
We haven’t built any acquisition or new acquisition related revenue into that as of yet. So when we compare our 2025 results to 2026, we’re projecting a record year next year. And really a lot of that growth is mainly due to the timing of the acquisition of Cole which was completed on June 1st of 2025.
We’ve also got some growth in some of our existing business units that we’ve also budgeted for next year as well.
Ricki: And so, Nick, on the supply side, what are you seeing across the industry in terms of competition capacity and Mullen’s diversified modal positions, the company in what remains a competitive freight environment?
Nik: Yeah on the supply side of the equation, we are seeing some competitive failures, but operating equipment is going to market it’s going through auction, it’s being purchased by other competitors and new entrance into the market. So this hasn’t led to the capacity tightening just yet.
Another area, full truckload tends to be very competitive. It’s a transaction based business, and the lowest bidder is always going to win the freight there. The good news for us is we’re not dabbling in full truckload very much. We’re very diversified as we serve niche markets, and overall we haven’t seen a significant impact from these trends.
Ricki: As you mentioned earlier, acquisitions remain a core part of Mullen’s long-term strategy. So Carson, can you tell us at a high level, how selective are you being right now when it comes to deploying capital into new acquisitions?
Carson: Yeah, Ricki acquisitions have always been kind of the backbone of our growth and have done us well over the past 30 plus years as a public company. Our view has always been that entrepreneurs eventually require a liquidity event, and we position Mullen to make sure that we are a viable option for them.
Now to do that, you need that strong balance sheet that we just talked about earlier in order to be that option for them. So to do acquisitions, you need a strong balance sheet. We’re very picky when it comes to who we took into our group.
The first thing we look at is the macro environment and the vertical in which the acquisition target is operating in. So if we don’t see growth potential in that vertical we typically take a pass. So that’s kind of it from how we look at acquisitions from a macro perspective.
Ricki: And in today’s market. Nick, how does your precision based approach help manage risk while continuing to grow the platform?
Nik: Yeah, I think the next step to build on what Carson’s saying the next step in our precision based acquisition strategy is to identify those strategic advantages. So there needs to be some sort of moat around the target, whether it’s the location of their real estate, strong customer relationships, or in the situation of a tuck in acquisition, whether they can add lane density to our existing business units.
All of these things are required and we don’t acquire businesses just to build our top line. There needs to be a clear path to improvement or a way that they can compliment an existing business.
Ricki: Well, Carson and Nick, thank you both so much for walking us through the latest at Mullen group.
Nik: Thanks, Ricki. Thanks for having us.
Ricki: For more information, investors can visit mullen-group.com. I’m Ricki Lee and this has been the Capital Compass. Thank you for watching, and we’ll see you again next time.
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