Operator
Operator
Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by and welcome to Babcock & Wilcox Company Fourth Quarter 2014 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Following the company's prepared remarks, we will conduct a question-and-answer session and instructions will be given at this time. I would now like to turn the call over to the host, Jenny Apker, B&W's Vice President, Treasurer and Investor Relations. Please go ahead. Jenny L. Apker - Treasurer & Vice President-Investor Relations: Thank you, Sandra, and good morning everyone. Welcome to the Babcock & Wilcox Company's fourth quarter 2014 earnings conference call. I'm Jenny Apker, Vice President, Treasurer and Investor Relations at B&W. Joining me this morning are Jim Ferland, B&W's President and Chief Executive Officer and Tony Colatrella, our Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Many of you have already seen a copy of our press release, which we issued late yesterday. For those of you who have not, it's available on First Call and on our website at babcock.com. During this call, certain statements we make will be forward-looking. I want to call your attention to our Safe Harbor provision for forward-looking statements that can be found at the end of our press releases. The Safe Harbor provision identifies risk factors that may cause actual results to differ materially from the content of our forward-looking statements. Our Annual Report on Form 10-K and Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q, on file with the SEC, provide further detail about the risk factors related to our business. Additionally, I want to remind you that, except as required by law, B&W undertakes no obligation to update any forward-looking statement to reflect events or circumstances that may arise after the date of this call. Also on today's call, the company may provide non-GAAP information regarding certain of its historical results and 2015 outlook to supplement the results provided in accordance with GAAP, and it should not be considered superior to or as a substitute for the comparable GAAP measures. B&W believes the non-GAAP measures provide meaningful insight into the company's operational performance and provides these measures to investors to help facilitate comparisons of operating results with prior periods and to assist them in understanding B&W's ongoing operations. A reconciliation of these non-GAAP measures can be found in our fourth quarter earnings release issued last night and in our company overview presentation posted on the Investor Relations website at babcock.com. Due to the numbers of participants on today's call, I would ask that you limit yourself to one question and perhaps one follow-up. You are, of course, welcome to get back into the queue. With that, I will turn the call over to Jim. E. James Ferland - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Thank you, Jenny. Good morning everyone. B&W concluded the year with a strong fourth quarter. Our Nuclear Operations group posted record revenue and operating income and our Power Generation group recorded quarter-over-quarter improvement in revenue as well as major bookings that will provide a platform for growth for the next few years. Non-GAAP operating income totaled $108 million for the period and adjusted earnings per share were $0.64 versus $0.52 in the fourth quarter of 2013. These results exceeded our fourth quarter and our full year EPS forecast in large part due to a contract adjustment with NOG's customer. This agreement provides improved allowable cost recovery on certain long term investments that we've made in support of the critical national defense programs we serve. The remainder of the positive variance came from stronger than expected operational performance from our core NOG and PGG business units. Including the impact of this contract change, the Nuclear Operations Group posted its highest quarter ever for revenue and operating income, completing another record year. Bookings in Q4 included the release of our annual award as well as new missile tube work we won through a competitive process. We will continue to seek adjacent growth opportunities like the missile tube work where we can use our precision manufacturing capabilities for other government applications. The Power Generation Group reported its strongest bookings quarter in almost three years, driven by new international coal and renewable waste energy projects awarded during the fourth quarter. We ended the year with a backlog of $2.2 billion. Further, we've announced one additional $200 million award in the UK for a renewable waste energy plant that will be booked in the first quarter of 2015. These plants will be constructed over the next two to three years. Given our superior technology and support from our expanded international business development team, we will continue to look for opportunities to expand our renewable waste energy business. PGG's bid pipeline remained strong at the end of the year at $2.6 billion. Going forward, we expect that the strength in U.S. dollar will have a limited impact on the bottom line at PGG, as most of our international contracts are denominated in the same currency as the costs are incurred and our international coal and new build projects are generally dollar denominated. Shifting to our other businesses, the Nuclear Energy segment reported its strongest annual bookings since 2010. During the quarter, we announced a long-term agreement with Bruce Power for the supply of outage services for steam generators and preheaters. We believe this business is positioned to consistently generate revenues of $150 million to $200 million per year. NE's restructuring continues on track to achieve a 10% operating margin by 2016. Fourth quarter results for this segment were impacted by a $16 million unfavorable jury verdict in a lawsuit with AREVA NP involving a dispute over potential royalties. We were surprised by and disagree with the jury verdict and believe the plaintiff's claims are without merit. Accordingly, we are pursuing a variety of post-trial remedies including, if required, an appeal to the Supreme Court of Virginia. In Technical Services, we continue efforts to rebuild our portfolio of high consequence nuclear and national security sites that we manage and operate for the U.S. government under long-term contracts. The TSG team is actively engaged in multiple bids for sites in the U.S. and UK, in addition to pursuing a major opportunity in Canada at the Chalk River National Lab. We believe our B&W led consortium is well positioned to complete for the Chalk River contract given the bid criteria and the strength of our team. Based on the Canadian government's timeline, we expect this contract will be awarded by mid-summer with the new contract commencing at the end of 2015. We also continued to pursue a number of attractive new business opportunities. However, these activities will have only a limited impact on TSG's operating results in 2015 given the long timeline for the bid review and award process. As previously discussed, the mPower program spend rate has been reduced to $15 million annually and is focused on technology development in preparation of a design certification application while we continue to pursue additional investors to support the program. Now Tony will discuss the segment results and other financial matters, after which I will share an update on our planned spin-off of the Power Generation group and our thoughts for 2015. Anthony S. Colatrella - Chief Financial Officer & Senior Vice President: Thanks Jim. The Nuclear Operation segment reported record fourth quarter revenues of $343.8 million, an increase of $50.4 million compared to $293.4 million in the same quarter of 2013, primarily attributable to a contract change order that impacted existing backlog contracts. Backlog in Nuclear Operations at the end of the fourth quarter of 2014 was $2.78 billion, $408 million greater than the same period last year due to early placement – earlier placement of annual awards that were delayed last year due to the government shutdown and sequestration concerns. Nuclear Operations segment operating income was $90.4 million in the fourth quarter of 2014, which was a record, compared to $53.6 million in the prior year period. In the fourth quarter of 2014, NOG completed the negotiation and execution of an agreement with its customer that resulted in an increase to the allowable costs and the resulting contract value of its existing backlog contracts. As a result of the contract changes, revenue increased by approximately $40 million and operating income increased by approximately $20 million in the quarter, reflecting the cumulative effect on a percentage of completion basis of the change in backlog value and margin of existing contracts. We expect a small positive impact as well on 2015 sales in operating margin, but on balance the year-over-year earnings impact will be about $15 million less in 2015 versus 2014. As expected, Power Generation bookings in the fourth quarter were $557 million, significantly more than the $278 million we booked a year ago. This increase reflects a new coal-fired boiler for a project in Vietnam and the booking of a waste energy project in Scotland. Backlog in power generation exceeded $2.2 billion at yearend 2014, reflecting our continuing focus on winning targeted international and renewable waste energy projects. Revenues in the power generation segment for the fourth quarter of 2014 were $444.6 million compared to $408 million in the fourth quarter of 2013, an increase of $36.6 million. This increase reflects the addition of $52.9 million in industrial environmental revenue from the MEGTEC acquisition this past June. New build environmental revenue was $57 million in the fourth quarter of 2014 compared to $68.3 million in the prior year period, a decline of $11.3 million reflecting the completion of several large scrubber projects that were ongoing during the fourth quarter of last year and continued uncertainty regarding future environmental regulations in the U.S. Revenues in the aftermarket services business remained stable in the quarter as compared to Q4 of 2013. Operating income in the Power Generation segment, including the equity income of our global joint ventures, was $37.5 million in the fourth quarter of 2014 compared to $53.6 million for the fourth quarter of 2013. Operating margins in the quarter were 8.4% compared to 13.1% in 2013. This difference is attributable to unusually strong contract performance and favorable contract mix in the fourth quarter of 2013 coupled with lower equity income in the fourth quarter of 2014. MEGTEC's contribution to operating income was $6.1 million in the quarter excluding $4.1 million of acquisition related amortization expenses and it was essentially on plan. We expect MEGTEC amortization to peak in 2015 at $9.5 million, which will be heavily weighed in the first quarter of the year and then decline significantly in future years. Nuclear Energy segment revenues were $40.5 million in the fourth quarter of 2014 as compared to revenues of $104.7 million in the corresponding period of 2013. This reduction in revenues is primarily due to management's decision, which we've reported on before, to exit the low-margin nuclear projects business this year. Operating income decreased by $17 million to a loss of $18.6 million in the three months ended December 31, 2014 compared to a loss of $1.6 million in the fourth quarter of 2013, reflecting a $16 million charge resulting from an unfavorable jury verdict on the AREVA NP lawsuit which, as Jim indicated earlier, we intend to appeal. Nuclear Energy backlog as of December 31, 2014, was $264.9 million, an increase of $123.2 million as compared to – sorry an increase of $123.2 million from $141.8 million a year ago reflecting several key contract awards, primarily in Canada. Technical Services segment operating income decreased $10 million to $0.4 million in the quarter compared to $10.4 million in the corresponding period of 2013 due to the loss of the Pantex and Y-12 contracts and lower fee income from various sites which were impacted by the waste isolation plant drum containment issue. mPower segment operating loss improved $22.5 million to a loss of $5.2 million in the quarter compared to a loss of $27.7 million in the fourth quarter of 2013 due to the slowing of pace of development related to the restructuring of the mPower program. For the fourth quarter of 2014, the company's effective non-GAAP tax rate was approximately 34.6% as compared to 37.2% for last year's fourth quarter. The non-GAAP effective rate for the full year was 31.9%, fully in line with our expectations. As of December 31, 2014, the company's cash and investments position net of restricted cash was $325.4 million, a decrease of $35.9 million compared to $361.3 million at the end of 2013. Fourth quarter cash flow reflected a net source of cash from operating activities of approximately $160 million net of federal and state tax payments of $22 million. There was no pension funding in the quarter. For the full year 2014, we utilized approximately $193.2 million of cash and term loan capacity to fund our share repurchase and dividend programs and contributed $61.7 million to our pension and post retirement plans. We also used cash and term loan capacity in 2014 to purchase MEGTEC for $142.8 million net of cash acquired. Now, let me turn the call back over to Jim for his final comments. E. James Ferland - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Thanks Tony. I'd like to conclude with an update on our planned spin-off of the Power Generation business and our outlook for 2015. Let's start with the spin. On our last earnings call, we announced our intention to spin-off the Power Generation business which will be named Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises Inc. at the holding company level and will continue to operate under the traditional B&W name. We've received significant positive feedback on this decision from investors, customers, and other stakeholders. To complete the spin, we must conclude two parallel path activities. The first is obtaining SEC approval of the Form-10 registration statement and the second is separating the two companies so they can operate as standalone entities. We plan to submit the SEC Form-10 by the end of March, which will allow us to include full year 2014 results in our initial filing. Presuming our review follows a typical schedule, we should be in a position to close the transaction on schedule by mid-summer. We're also working to separate the two companies into standalone businesses. This involves splitting corporate personnel into two teams, dividing intellectual property and IT infrastructure and a host of other contractual and legal items. We don't believe this will be the critical path item to complete the spin. The cash cost associated with the spin and separation activities remains in the range of $45 million to $55 million on a after-tax basis. Now let's shift our outlook to 2015. Given that we anticipate the spin will be complete by mid-year, we're not going to give full year EPS guidance for the combined company. We will provide segment guidance today and will provide additional detail for the individual businesses during the respective road shows in roughly three months, just after our Form 10 goes effective. So for 2015, revenue for NOG is expected to be consistent with the record levels achieved in the last two years with operating margins in the high teens. TSG operating income is expected to be in the $15 million to $20 million range during 2015 reflecting the full year impact of the Y-12 Pantex contract loss and costs related to increased bid and proposal activity. NE's revenues are expected to be in the range of $150 million to $175 million with margins in the low single digits. NE's margin improvement program remains on plan to achieve a 10% operating income target for the full year of 2016. mPower will remain on plan with a spend rate targeted at $15 million per year. We expect PTG's revenue will increase approximately 15% year-over-year through a combination of core growth and a full year of MEGTEC's contributions. While we've been very successful growing our renewable waste energy business, the impact of the strong dollar will have a small impact on revenue in the year. In addition, the price of natural gas in the U.S. has dropped over a dollar in the past three months to below to $3 per MMBtu, which will have a small impact on our aftermarket service and replacement parts sales. With these uncertainties in play, we're being cautious in our revenue projections for the core business. We are projecting 8% margins net of the MEGTEC amortization, which is a 20% plus improvement over 2014. We are also being careful with our margin estimates due to low natural gas prices and a slight shift in timing of our new contracts that will cause revenues to build later in the year than originally planned. Given the expected timing of the revenues from the Power Generation business plus the loading of renewables work through the year, we would expect margins to start low and build during the year with targets to exceed 9% and perhaps 10% by Q4. We have significant positive momentum in the Power Generation business as we move into 2015. Our restructuring efforts are on track and our international growth plans are showing results. We expect these deliberate actions to drive improved performance in 2015 and an even better 2016. For B&W on a consolidated basis, we'd expect approximately 60% of our full year operating income to be in the last half of the year. This is roughly in line with what we experienced in 2014. We also expect sequentially stronger quarters as we move through 2015. Given our commitment to stand up both post-spin businesses with strong balance sheets, we're not currently planning for additional share buybacks between now and the spin. When the spin is complete in approximately four months, the new boards for each company will determine capital allocation, including the possibility of a share buyback program as part of their individual strategies to enhance shareholder value. Despite the challenges of implementing the spin, we're keeping our business unit leadership focused on executing our work, delivering high quality goods and services to our customers and driving sales growth, and furthering our drive for efficiency across our businesses. I'll close by saying that it's an exciting time at B&W. Teams from each organization are finalizing strategies that will support and enhance growth plans and investment opportunities that may not be achieved in a combined entity. I'm more convinced today than even three months ago that the spin will enhance value for our shareholders and customers for BWX Technologies and B&W Enterprises. That concludes our prepared remarks. I will now turn the call back over to Sandra who will assist us in taking your questions.