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Capital Clean Energy Carriers Corp. (CCEC)

Q3 2012 Earnings Call· Wed, Oct 31, 2012

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Thank you for standing by and welcome to the Capital Product Partners Third Quarter 2012 Financial Results Conference Call. We have with us Mr. Ioannis Lazaridis, Chief Executive Officer and Chief Financial Officer of the Partnership; and Mr. Kalogiratos, Finance Director of Capital Maritime. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. There will be a presentation followed by a question and-answer session. (Operator Instructions) I must advise you that this conference is being recorded today, Wednesday, October 31, 2012. The statements in today’s conference call that are not historical facts, including our expectations regarding developments in the markets, our expected charter coverage ratio for 2012 and 2013, and expectations regarding our quarterly distribution may be forward-looking statements, such as defined in Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended. These forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties that could cause the stated or forecasted results to be materially different from those anticipated. Unless required by law, we expressly disclaim any obligation to update or revise any of these forward-looking statements, whether because of future events, new information, a change in our views or expectations to conform to actual results or otherwise. We assume no responsibility for the accuracy and completeness of the forward-looking statements. We make no prediction or statement about the performance of our common units. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Mr. Lazaridis. Please go ahead, sir.

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

Thank you, Laura, and thank you all for joining us today. I hope this call today finds you and everyone in the weather-affected areas safe and well. As a reminder, we will be referring to the supporting slides available on our website as we go through today’s presentation. Starting with slide one, I’m going to make some comparison on today’s call between the third quarter of 2012 and the third quarter of 2011, as this is the most meaningful analogy in our business. On October 23, 2012, our Board of Directors declared a cash distribution of $0.2325 per common unit for the third quarter of 2012 in line with the management’s annual distribution guidance. The third quarter common unit cash distribution will be paid on November 15, 2012, to unit holders on record on November 8, 2012. The partnership’s operating surplus for the quarter amounted to $21.9 million or $18.6 million adjusted for the payment of distribution to the Class B unit holders following the issuance of 15.6 million Class B Convertible Preferred Units during the second quarter of this year. Revenues for the third quarter include $1 million in profit-sharing revenues and by the modern tanker, Achilleas, as the crude tanker spot rates that our charters earned on this vessel were at levels higher than the base rate it is fixed at. The profit-sharing arrangements in the charters of a number of our crude vessels allow us to share our excess over the base rate on a 50/50 basis with our charterers and are settled biannually. We also benefited from lower interest – net interest expenses as we will discuss shortly. We are pleased to announce that we have a secured two-year floating storage employment for one of our Suezmaxes, the Motor Tanker Miltiadis M II, with PEMEX through…

Operator

Operator

Thank you. (Operator Instructions) Your first question comes from Justin Yagerman of Deutsche Bank. Please ask your question. Justin Yagerman – Deutsche Bank: Hey. Good afternoon, Ioannis. How are you?

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

Hi, Justin. I’m good. Yourself? Justin Yagerman – Deutsche Bank: I’m good. I was curious, and I may have missed it when you were commenting around OSG. But we already start double-hull take down their OSG exposure as a write-off. How come you guys have decided given the duration and the above-market nature of the charters right now to wait and see what’s happening as opposed to take the early step and write down the charters here?

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

There are two things there. First, we haven’t had anything on our books in terms of future revenues to write down. And as I understand from double-hull, and you should check with them beforehand, the reason why they took the write-off was because by bringing down the level of the charters in their impairment test, they had to take a write-off because they had an impairment problem. We don’t have that. Even if we take down our numbers, we don’t have an impairment problem. Therefore, we don’t have nothing to write down. Justin Yagerman – Deutsche Bank: Okay. All right. And on the PEMEX charter...

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

Tanker, you should check, if I may, with double-hull the exact reasons why they have written down there. Justin Yagerman – Deutsche Bank: Yeah, we’ll check that. And if we have many questions, we’ll follow up with you offline on that. In terms of the PEMEX charter, I think this is the first step as those charters that you guys have announced, is there anything different that we should be thinking about in terms of OpEx when it comes to a vessel that’s being used for FSO purposes as opposed to trading?

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

I gave you some guidance for the approximate OpEx per day in the fourth quarter between $8,000 and $9,000 for the crude vessels. And I believe that largely should reflect the trade, if something changes and we’ll see how it goes then we’ll look into these numbers again. Justin Yagerman – Deutsche Bank: Okay. So that should be incorporated into guidance. And then, I guess, the last question, I’ll turn it over to somebody else, there’s been a lot made in the – especially in the products around eco-type vessels. And you guys obviously haven’t been in an acquisition mode recently. Curious what your thoughts are about those types of vessels and any potential incorporation of them into your fleet over the next year or two.

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

Our fleet is a young fleet, and the speed consumption characteristics of our vessels are quite attractive. We follow with interest what is going on among eco-type, and certainly there are certain publications that show that these vessels perform well. But when these vessels actually come in to trade and they trade under different conditions over a longer time period, then we would be better – we would be in a better position to establish exactly what the real consumption is.

Jerry Kalogiratos

Analyst

Hi, Justin. This is Jerry. The only thing that I would like to add is that if there is an advantage with regard to eco-type ships, probably this advantage is in hand when it comes to spot trading for companies like CPLP, which trades more on the period charters. This advantage is less of an advantage as the charters are willing to pay at a discounted level in terms of what we say the consumption savings actually are. Justin Yagerman – Deutsche Bank: Fair enough. Okay. Thanks, guys. Appreciate the time.

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from Jon Chappell of Evercore Partners. Please ask your question. Jon Chappell – Evercore Partners: Thank you. Good afternoon, guys.

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

Hi, Jon. Jon Chappell – Evercore Partners: Ioannis, just a couple super quick follow-ups on OSG. Are they still current on the charters and have they approached you with any discussions as of yet?

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

OSG is current with all its payment slots and there’s no outstandings. We’re in regular contact with them the same way we have always been. And at this point, we cannot say that much more. Jon Chappell – Evercore Partners: Okay. And then, just you’ve been very clear since you did the convertible preferred of your commitment to the dividend now that you’ve been able to restructure your balance sheet. Obviously, if OSG were at default or if you needed to reemploy these ships into the spot market or into other charters, that would be a somewhat material change of your structure. Would you anticipate that you’d still be able to maintain the $0.93 cash distribution even if you had to mark the OSG charters down to the current market levels?

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

We remain committed to our $0.93 distribution. And as I’ve mentioned, there may be a restructuring. In case they file for Chapter 11, we have to wait and see the rates at which these vessels are haul higher than what the market is today. So that will have an adverse effect, but we are looking at other things. We are always, as I mentioned to you in my – as I mentioned in my closing comment, we pursue always different options and to build our financial flexibility. So we remain committed even in this scenario to our $0.93 distribution. Jon Chappell – Evercore Partners: Great. And then obviously the slowdown at the market and the kind of inability to do long-term charters is somewhat negative. But maybe on the positive side, you could also free up maybe some tonnage for you whether it be newbuild slots or secondhand modern tonnage. Have any opportunities come across your desk that you may be interested in? And then kind of as a secondary question to that, Capital Maritime has proven to be a very strong sponsor as far as taking tonnage on. Are there opportunities for you to work with them to grow the fleet and expand the distribution capacity?

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

I will answer both questions. Basically, the Partnership does not plan to invest in any newbuilding projects. Any newbuilding projects will be something that Capital Maritime will look at. Subject to the project’s merits and financing available, we look at a potential MR or any other type of projects that make sense. But as I mentioned to you earlier, at this point, we have been able to trade the vessels well, profitably. And we believe on the long-term fundamentals of the product tanker industry. I actually believe that the deliveries of the vessels, given the financing as well as charter environment, cannot be as high as the order books (indiscernible) so slippage will remain high in the future. Jon Chappell – Evercore Partners: Great. Thanks, Ioannis.

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

Thanks.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from Michael Webber of Wells Fargo. Please ask your questions. Mike Webber – Wells Fargo: Hey. Good morning, guys. How are you?

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

Hi, Mike. How are you? We’re good. Mike Webber – Wells Fargo: Good. Good. I wanted to jump in and talk a little bit about the crude charters you guys have. Obviously there’s a lot going on right now with OSG and the sustainability of the distribution. But if you just kind of rewind a little bit, those crude charters back, the capital are kind of at the (inaudible) $0.93 distribution. It looks like they’ll be included in your forward charter coverage, but to my knowledge we haven’t actually seen an actual extension or the extension on those options to exercise, yeah, by capital. When would we see that and I guess maybe why haven’t we seen an announcement to date and is there any chance that those could be renegotiated lower because there is a significant step up in those options?

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

The crude vessels charter of the Capital Maritime come up for renewal during later in the fourth quarter and in the first quarter of 2013. So we’re a bit early on that, but we will plan to announce this when the time is due later in the quarter, beginning of next. And the $0.93 distribution, as you mentioned, is underpinned by all our charters. Mike Webber – Wells Fargo: Right.

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

I think that it’s important to say further to announcement that I give earlier that we remain committed, and we feel very confident about our $0.93 even in the scenario that we discussed on OSG. Mike Webber – Wells Fargo: Sure. And just to be clear and the kind of indicated by the fact you are including, I mean, your forward charter coverage that the intention there is to exercise those options should a better rate not be available?

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

As I said, you’ll hear the announcement later in the quarter, beginning of 2013. Mike Webber – Wells Fargo: Right. That’s fair. With regards to the termination of these – the one charter to CMTC, were there any termination fees associated with that or were there just kind of clean break?

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

Clean break. Mike Webber – Wells Fargo: Clean break. Okay, good. And then just – in terms of thinking about ways to support the distribution assuming a worst-case scenario with OSG, you guys have a drive (inaudible) currently in your fleet. And as you mentioned, when you went through the CMTC fleet, which we’re grateful for the detail there, you did mention that there are a number of container assets there that are backed up by long-term charterers, is there – could you envision a scenario on which you have a container asset within capital just to support the distribution?

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

Any transaction between Capital Maritime and Capital Products has to be approved by the Conflicts Committee on the promise that these transactions will be accretive to the distribution. So it is very premature for me to talk about these things. Mike Webber – Wells Fargo: Okay.

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

But any transaction, container or non-container tanker or a motor or crude is subject to the Board – the Conflicts Committee in particular to decide. Mike Webber – Wells Fargo: Okay. But the asset class itself were not necessarily excluded from being within capital. It’s something that is least feasible?

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

As I said, it’s important to grow the distribution in the future. Mike Webber – Wells Fargo: Right. Okay. All right. That’s helpful. That’s all I’ve got. Thanks for the time, Ioannis.

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from Ken Hoexter of Merrill Lynch. Please ask your question. Ken Hoexter – Merrill Lynch: Hi, good morning. Can you just kind of review, Ioannis, the state of the Capital Maritime vessels as far as their charter out, so are they operating a spot market and how are they performing currently the vessel that you have chartered to Capital Maritime?

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

As I said earlier, Ken, and hello to you, by the way, we have been given limited information from Capital Maritime. As I mentioned, it’s a profitable, diversified company, and evidence of the crude market share, both in the third quarter and the second quarter. I think that’s a good way to suggest that they are making money. If the vessels that they have fixed and, as you know, the crude market was a little bit more problematic than the product spot market. And as I understand is that spot market (inaudible) has been a bit better. Ken Hoexter – Merrill Lynch: And can you just clarify your comments here, I just want to make sure I understood. You said you’re not yet writing down the OSG vessels, yet you’re still confident irrespective of that reduction in the dividend. I just want to clarify what you were saying there.

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

No, I didn’t say any of that. In the question why we did not write anything down, I said something else. I said we have never booked any revenues or we have not had any prepayments or anything received from OSG to write-down. And the write-down that you saw in double-hull, I understand that it was related to an impairment charge that they took on the back of OSG charters that they have to write down. As I understand, their vessels are much older than ours. And even if we do a similar impairment test in our vessels that are fixed with OSG at much lower rates, there’s no issue about impairment either. So for us there is nothing to write down. Ken Hoexter – Merrill Lynch: It was just a factor of where your future revenue streams would come from. And were you clarifying that irrespective of if you were to get lower rates on there, you would still be holding that $0.93 dividend or does that become at risk if those few vessels need to be put back to the market?

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

As I said earlier, I said we always pursue different projects. We always look at different things. And based on what we know today, notwithstanding what I said about OSG, we remain fairly committed on our distribution of $0.93. Ken Hoexter – Merrill Lynch: Okay. And I’ll just review again if you would for me, just as my final question, the state of the market as you see it in terms of I know you were reviewing it briefly before, but on your outlook currently for where you see pricing in the market right now.

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

I think that as we said about the product tanker market, and I think also the IEA supports that, the way that the rollout of the refineries is taking place. And also, given the demand/supply fundamentals, we’re optimistic about the future (inaudible) period rates. I have to say that slippage will remain high. I’m not sure if that is fully appreciated by certain (inaudible) reports. And on the crude market, I think that the supply is an issue, but at the same time demand has remained a little bit better than what’s forecasted earlier in the year.

Jerry Kalogiratos

Analyst

Overall – hi, Ken, it’s Jerry. Overall, the... Ken Hoexter – Merrill Lynch: Hi.

Jerry Kalogiratos

Analyst

Product tanker spot market has become more active as of the last couple of months after a seasonal weak quarter. The Mediterranean market is currently quite lively, especially for Handy tankers but also the TA, the transatlantic market, has seen better spot rates as of the last few weeks. We are yet to see how the Sandy storm will affect the rates going forward, but given the – at lower utilization of certain U.S. East Coast refineries and fairly high gasoline prices in the U.S. East Coast, we could see more inputs coming into the U.S. East Coast, which would be (inaudible) with product tankers. All in all, because of supply for product tanker fleet being almost non-existent, the fleet growth has been almost zero for the years with 26 new MRs delivered year-to-date and 27 scraped, 27 removed from the fleet. We need to see more stronger demand in the U.S. and Europe in order to also see the more lively spot rates going forward. On the crude side, we’re still facing an oversupply in the market and together with the weakness that we saw in terms of demand and in the summer, both seasonal and also because of the high inventories that were filed out in the first half. And we, of course, expect an improvement towards the fourth quarter and first quarter 2013, but it obviously (inaudible) in terms of spot rates going forward. Ken Hoexter – Merrill Lynch: Great, Ioannis. Jerry, thank you very much.

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

Thanks.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from Paul Jacob of Raymond James. Please ask your question. Paul Jacob – Raymond James: Good morning, Ioannis.

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

Hello. Paul Jacob – Raymond James: Just wanted to spend a little bit of time on product tanker markets. So recognizing the shift in dynamic as it relates to U.S. crude oil production and how that’s kind of mitigated import products into the U.S. How you see this shaping out over the next several years, particularly with the Panama Canal expansion set to open in the next couple of years? I mean, do you think that product tanker day rates could go up over the medium-term given that expansion?

Jerry Kalogiratos

Analyst

The change of the U.S. to a net oil product exporter has been positive so far for product tankers. As effectively in South America and their growing oil product demand has been served by that surplus of oil products that comes from the U.S. as they have been lagging behind in terms of their expansion plans for new refineries. The fact that the U.S. has access to cheaper crude as well as feedstock, it means that it can compete fairly well for exports. And it’s becoming the main export hub in this part of the world. So, so far we have positive tonne mile out of the U.S. The main shift that we expect to happen and has been described also very well in the medium-term outlook report of the IEA is the fact that the new refinery capacity coming online east of Suez, that is the Middle East and Gulf, India as well as the Asia-Pacific region, we’ll be exporting at very competitive prices, oil products that would be destined mainly to serve the middle distillate deficit in Europe as diesel and gas oil, despite the declining demand in Europe, will continue to have to be imported from the places where they can be exported more competitively. So, if anything, what we expect in terms of the longer-term fundamentals is that there will be longer quantities traveled as well as larger volumes transported on products from the East Europe as well as from the U.S. to South America as well as to Europe. Paul Jacob – Raymond James: Okay. So, given all of that, how do you think about these three vessels that are currently under contract with OSG, supposing that those vessels, that charter, those charters were to terminate, would you look at more short-term chartering until you think that those fundamentals start to improve or would you look for a longer-term charter?

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

As I’ve said earlier, there has been no communication yet on that. So we don’t really speculate. So we have to wait as I can’t really talk further. But as a general comment, be aware that the period market in products has been very active with close to150 pictures so far this year compared to 85 for the full year in 2011. So it’s quite a liquid market at this point. Paul Jacob – Raymond James: Okay. Thanks, Ioannis. That’s good color. And then, last question from me, recognizing that you’ve got $1 million profit-sharing on the Achilleas, do you think that you could see something similar on Alexander The Great?

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

Well, we booked something for the Alexander The Great in the previous quarter. We’ll have to wait and see how the market so far in this half has been much softer than in the first half of last year. Paul Jacob – Raymond James: Okay.

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

First half of 2012. Paul Jacob – Raymond James: Okay, great. Thank you.

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

(Operator Instructions) Your next question comes from Michael Webber of Wells Fargo. Please ask your question. Mike Webber – Wells Fargo: Hey, guys. Just wanted to hop and ask a couple of more modeling questions and, I guess, a detail around OSP. You mentioned that they were current. When do those charters pay you out? I guess, what date are they current as of?

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

They pay once a month. Mike Webber – Wells Fargo: All right. So they’re current as of the end of last month basically.

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

Yes. Mike Webber – Wells Fargo: Okay. So, that could...

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

As of the end of this month. Anyway, up to now, they are current. Mike Webber – Wells Fargo: Up to now, they’re current, but that could change starting within a day or so? Okay. And then the Panamax rate, I believe – just want to – I believe you gave that in your prepared remarks, so just see if you could reiterate it.

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

It’s not – was that – it’s 23, how much? I think 23 – hold on a second, we’re trying to figure. I think $23,185 gross Mike Webber – Wells Fargo: Great. All right. Thanks, guys.

Operator

Operator

There are no further questions at this time. Please continue.

Ioannis Lazaridis

Management

In case there are no more questions, I want to thank everyone of you, given the circumstances in the U.S., that they had the time to participate in the call. Thank you and stay safe. Bye-bye.