Darling Ingredients Inc. Q3 2026 Earnings Recap

The stock was roughly flat, down 0.6% after earnings. Results included substantial year-over-year improvement, but the quarter also had timing and accounting-related headwinds in core ingredients and operational, logistics, and hedging impacts at DGD.

Key Takeaways

• Combined adjusted EBITDA was $514 million, versus $245 million in Q3 2025; net income was $267 million, or $1.67 per diluted share, versus $19 million, or $0.12, a year earlier.
• Core ingredients EBITDA was approximately $340 million, at the high end of prior-quarter guidance, but declined sequentially. Management attributed about $30 million of the gap to expectations to incentive accruals and inventory/accounting adjustments, with the inventory items expected to reverse in Q4.
• DGD generated $204 million of EBITDA on 315 million gallons sold, at an average margin of about $1.30 per gallon. The quarter faced a hydrogen outage, delayed SAF shipment, feedstock timing, and hedging impacts; management expects Q4 production of approximately 325 million gallons.
• Net debt fell by approximately $420 million during the quarter. Darling also received $171 million in DGD cash distributions from dividends and PTC sales.