Jeff Finnin
Analyst · KeyBanc Capital Markets, please state your question
Thank Steve, and hello everyone. My remarks today will begin with a review of our Q1 financial results followed by an update on our development CapEx and our leverage in liquidity capacity. I will then conclude my remarks with an update on our 2017 guidance. Q1 financial performance resulted in total operating revenues $114.9 million a 4% increase on the sequential quarter basis and 24.3% increase year-over-year. Q1 operating revenue consisted of $95.1 million in rental and power revenue from data center space up 3.6% on a sequential quarter basis and 25.2% year-over-year. In our connection services revenue contributed $14.5 million to operating revenues in Q1 an increase of 3.8% on a sequential quarter basis and 13.9% year-over-year, in tenant reimbursement and other revenues were $2.3 million. Office and light industrial revenue was $3 million, which includes revenue associated with the rest and campus expansion. Q1 FFO was a $1.13 per diluted share in unit, an increase of 6.6% on a sequential quarter basis and a 31.4% increase year-over-year. The strength in FFO was due in part to better than expected rental revenue following a year of record commencements in 2016 and better than expected flow through to adjusted EBITDA resulting in better margins. Adjusted EBITDA $64.4 million increase to 6.2% on a sequential quarter basis and 32.8% over the same quarter last year. We continue to expand our margins with our adjusted EBITDA margin expanding to 54% measured over the trailing four quarters ending with and including Q1 2017. This represents an increase of 260 basis points over the comparable year ago period. Related trailing 12 months revenue flow through to adjusted EBITDA and FFO was 67% and 60% respectively. Sales and marketing expenses in the first quarter totaled $4.5 million or 3.9% of total operating revenues down 70 basis points year-over-year. In general and administrative expenses were $8.1 million in Q1 correlating to 7.1 % of total operating revenues, a decrease of 230 basis points year-over-year, reflecting a benefit of approximately $0.01 per share related to annual compensation true ups [ph]. Now turning to our same store metrics. Q1 same store turnkey data center occupancy increased 430 basis points to 90.9% from 86.6% in the first quarter of 2016. Additionally, same store monthly recurring revenue per cabinet equivalent increased 7.3% year-over-year and 0.5% sequentially to $1,439. On a per unit basis, the largest contributor to the year-over-year growth in our MRR per cabinet growth in power revenue, followed by interconnection and rent growth. Keep in mind that our same store pool is redefined annually in the first quarter, and the 2017 pool only includes turnkey datacenter space that was leased or available to be leased to our co-location customers as of December 31, 2015, at each of our properties and excludes powered shell datacenter space. We commence a 37,000 net rental square feet of new and expansion leases at an annualized GAAP rent of $244 per square foot, which represents $9.1 million of annualized GAAP rent. We ended the first quarter with our stabilized data center occupancy at 94.7% an increase of 20 basis points compared to the fourth quarter and an increase of 410 basis points compared to the first quarter of 2016, reflecting the record level of leases that commenced during 2016. Turning now the backlog. Projected annualized GAAP rent from signed but not yet commenced leases was 5.6 million as of March 31, 2017 fairly consistent with where we ended the year and $15.7 million on a cash basis. We expect substantially all of the GAAP backlog to commence during the remainder of 2017. Turning to our development activity. We had a total of 116,000 square feet of turnkey data center capacity under construction as of March 31, 2017. With development and expansion projects Northern Virginia, Washington D.C, Los Angeles, Denver and Boston. As of the end of the first quarter, we had spent $16.9 million of the estimated $106.9 million required to complete the project. As shown on Page 21 of the supplemental, the percentage of interest capitalized in Q1 was 9.9%, for 2017, we continue to expect the percentage of interest capitalized to be in the range of 10% to 15%. Turning to our balance sheet. As of March 31, 2017 our ratio of net principal debt to Q1 analyze adjusted EBITDA was 2.8 times, including preferred stock the ratio was 3.2 times slightly below where we ended the year. Including preferred stock the Q1 leverage in adjusted EBITDA levels provide capacity for an additional $195 million of debt assuming a four times debt to adjusted EBITDA ratio. With that in mind, last week we closed two separate financing transactions, resulting in additional liquidity of $275 million modestly above the amount we targeted given the lender demand in economics. The first transaction results in an incremental $100 million of liquidity by expanding in existing senior unsecured term loans, originally scheduled to mature in 2019 to a total of $200 million. The expanded term loan has a new five-year term maturing in April of 2022. In addition, we successfully raised $175 million through a private placement bond offering, priced with a 3.91% coupon. The execution of the expanded term loan and private placement offering allows us to improve our overall liquidity position, manage our debt maturity profile and maintain both financial flexibility and a balance between fixed and variable price instruments in our capital structure. The proceeds of both transactions were used to pay down all outstanding amounts on the revolving portion of our existing credit facility providing approximately $362 million of available liquidity to fund our growth and development plan. Now in closing, I would like to address our updated guidance for 2017. I would remind you that our guidance reflects our current view of supply and demand dynamics in our markets, as well as the health of the broader economy. We do not factor in changes in our portfolio resulting from acquisitions, dispositions or capital markets activity other than what we have discussed today. As detailed on Page 23 of our Q1 earning supplemental, our guidance for 2017 is as followed. Total operating revenue is now estimated to be $472 million to $482 million, compared to the previous range of $470 to $480mmillion based on the midpoint of guidance this implies 90.1% year-over-year revenue growth. Keep in mind that our revenue guidance is dependent upon the power product composition of deployments within our portfolio, and how quickly the larger, metered power deployments install their infrastructure and ramp into their associated power requirements. As relates to interconnection revenue growth, we continue to expect the 2017 revenue growth rate to be between 13% and 16%. General and administrative expenses are now expected to be $35 million to $37 million or approximately 7.5% of total operating revenue. This correlates to an approximate 2% increase in G&A expenses over 2016. Adjusted EBITDA is now estimated to be $256.5 million to $260.5 million up from the prior range of $253 million to $258 million. This correlates to 22% year-over-year growth based on the midpoint of the range and adjusted EBITDA margin of approximately 54.3% and revenue flow through to adjusted EBITDA of approximately 61%. FFO was estimated to be $4.35 to $4.45 per share and OP unit compared to the previous guidance of $4.25 to $4.35 per share, an increase of 2.3% at the midpoint. This implies 18.6% year-over-year FFO growth, based on the midpoint of the range and the $3.71 per share we reported in 2016. In addition, due to the completed financings we expect FFO per share result to be fairly balanced in the first and second halves of the year, and therefore FFO growth to be weighted toward the first half of the year. We also anticipate this to result in a decreased revenue flow through to FFO, which we estimate at approximately 45% based on the midpoint of our updated 2017 FFO guidance. As relates to our guidance for capital expenditures in 2017. We are increasing the total expected investment to a range of $280 million to $310 million from the previous range of $243 to $271 million, the biggest drivers of this increase are increased data center expansion investment, which we now anticipate to be $241 million to $259 million, compared to the prior range of $212 to 228 million. As Paul mentioned this updated range includes the first two phases of expansion in Reston, additional turnkey data center capacity at L.A-2 to support demand in that market and the acquisition costs associated with the land under contract in Santa Clara for our build out of S.B8. In addition, we are increasing our expected investment in recurring capital expenditures to a range of $21 million to $25 million from the prior range of $13 million to $17 million, this represents a significant increase from the 2016 level and a substantially higher level than we expect to spend in subsequent years on average. The increase in 2017 is largely driven by the opportunity we had to replace our chiller plant that existed when we originally purchased L.A2 upon deciding to commence the build out of incremental capacity on our fourth floor. The new equipment is more energy efficient and with the economies of scale from the new construction, it made sense to combine the replacement of the older equipment in this project. The older equipment was originally scheduled to be replaced in 2019, and was accelerated due to the cost savings and our continuing pursuit of improved PUE. This incremental capital investment will also provide a return on investment that is substantially higher than our overall stated return objectives in criteria. Now we'd like to open the call to questions, operator.