Lorie L. Leeson
Management
Thank you, Shirley. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to our third fiscal quarter 2014 conference call. Today I’m joined by our Chairman and CEO, Bill Furman; and CFO, Mark Rittenbaum. Mark and I'll provide a few remarks about the quarter ended May 31, and our outlook for the balance of 2014. And then Bill will provide some comments on the overall industry. We'll then open-up the call for questions. In addition to the press release issued this morning, which includes supplemental data, additional financial information and key metrics can be found in the presentation posted today on the IR section of our Web site. As always, matters discussed in today’s conference call include forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Throughout our discussion today, we’ll describe some of the important factors that could cause Greenbrier's actual results in 2014 and beyond to differ materially from those expressed in any forward-looking statements made by or on behalf of Greenbrier. The third quarter of fiscal 2014 was a record quarter for Greenbrier in revenue, net earnings, diluted EPS, adjusted EBITDA and backlog. Highlights for the quarter include adjusted EBITDA of $78 million, net earnings of $33.6 million, or $1.03 per diluted share on record revenue of $593.3 million driven by deliveries of 4,300 railcars. Our tax rate for the quarter of 26.3% was driven by the geographic mix of earnings and specifically our GIMSA joint venture. Since 100% of GIMSA’s results are included in our pre-tax numbers, but we’re only taxed on our half of the earnings, the tax rate can be significantly impacted when GIMSA has an outstanding quarter as was the case this quarter. This is consistent methodology with prior quarters and our partner share of GIMSA’s earnings is reflected in non-controlling interest also known as minority interest on a pre-tax basis. Since the last earnings call we’ve made several orders announcement. Orders for the third quarter totaled 15,600 new railcars valued at $1.64 billion, bringing broad based backlog to a robust 26,400 units valued at $2.75 billion. Our book-to-bill for the quarter was 3.6 to 1 and since May 31, the end of the quarter, we’ve received additional orders for 2,700 units valued at approximately $320 million. In addition to the rail activity, Marine backlog grew to approximately $110 million this quarter. As part of our ongoing efforts to return capital to shareholders under our $50 million share repurchase plan, we repurchased 352,000 shares of common stock during the quarter at a cost of $16 million and average price $45.50 per share. Cumulative repurchases under the program totaled 641,000 shares at a cost of $26.3 million or an average price of $40.98 per share. The activity during the quarter was muted as our trading window was closed for much of the period prior to the announcement of our repair joint venture. We do expect these share repurchases to continue. Now I’ll turn it over to Mark for other highlights from the quarter.