Good afternoon. I'm John Baker, Chairman and CEO of FRP Holdings, Inc. and with me today are David deVilliers, our President; John Milton, our CFO; and John Klopfenstein, our Chief Accounting Officer.
Before we begin, let me remind you that any statements on this conference call which relate to the future are by their nature subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results and events to differ materially from those indicated in such forward-looking statements.
These include risks listed from time to time in our SEC filings including but not limited to our annual and quarterly reports.
Net income for the fourth quarter of 2017 was $13,203,000 or $1.31 per share versus $1,682,000 or $0.17 per share in 2016.
Fourth quarter numbers include $12,043,000 or $1.20 per share after taxes due to a reduction in the provision for income taxes, resulting from the company’s net deferred tax liabilities and reduction in corporate tax rates by the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017.
Revenue for the quarter were $12,455,000, up 30.9% from last year, primarily because of the addition of rental revenues from our new D.C. apartment building, Dock 79.
Net income for the full year 2017 was $41,750,000 or $4.16 per share versus $12,024,000 or $1.22 per share a year ago.
The majority of this uptick in income is the result of our partnership interest in a pretax gain on remeasurement of investment of $39.7 million in our Dock 79 real estate partnership and the $12,043,000 gain I mentioned earlier as a result of the tax cuts.
The increase in net income was also augmented by $1 million environmental charge in 2016 but mitigated by a $620,000 increase in a loss of joint ventures, primarily driven by the $5 million increase in depreciation, resulting from the write-up of Dock 79.
As the numbers indicate, 2017 was a game changer for FRP Holdings. In addition to the swift run-up of Dock 79, we gained approval for Phase 2 of that project, which will also be an apartment building.
We also received approvals allowing mining on our property that is leased to Vulcan Materials at Fort Myers, Florida, and the property leased to Cemex near Lake Louisa in Central Florida. These 2 projects will have a significant effect on the future growth of our royalties, and both will have development or potential when the mining reserves are exhausted.
Finally, given the lower tax rates, we have decided not to proceed with the REIT election that we have discussed in previous conversations.
Now if I could, let me turn it over to our President, David deVilliers, to walk you through to our segments.