Operator
Operator
Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Sally, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the Cheniere Energy, Inc. Second Quarter 2016 Earnings Conference Call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speakers' remarks, there will be a question-and-answer session. Thank you. I will now turn the conference over to Randy Bhatia, Director of Finance and Investor Relations. Please go ahead, sir. Randy Bhatia - Director-Finance & Investor Relations, Cheniere Energy Partners LP: Good morning, everyone. I'd like to welcome you to Cheniere Energy's second quarter 2016 earnings conference call. The slide presentation and access to the webcast for today's call can be found on our website located at cheniere.com. Participating on the call this morning are Jack Fusco, Cheniere's President and Chief Executive Officer; Anatol Feygin, Senior Vice President of Strategy and Corporate Development; and Michael Wortley, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Before we begin, I would like to remind all listeners that our remarks, including answers to your questions, may contain forward-looking statements. Actual results could differ materially from what is described in these statements. Slide two of our presentation contains a discussion of those forward-looking statements and associated risks. In addition, we may include references to non-GAAP financial measures, such as adjusted EBITDA, net loss as adjusted, and net loss per share as adjusted. A reconciliation of these non-GAAP financial measures to the most comparable GAAP financial measure can be found in the appendix of the slide deck. As part of our discussion of Cheniere Energy, Inc.'s results, the call may also include selected financial information and results for Cheniere Energy Partners L.P., or CQP, and Cheniere Energy Partners LP Holdings, or CQH. On this call we do not intend to cover CQP or CQH's results separately from those of Cheniere Energy, Inc. After prepared remarks from each of the participating executives, we will open the call for Q&A. As shown in the agenda on slide three, Jack will begin with an overview of the quarter and then give an update on construction and operating progress at our liquefaction projects. Following Jack's comments, we will hear from Anatol on the market and then from Michael, who will review financial results. I will now turn the call over to Jack. Jack A. Fusco - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Thank you, Randy, and good morning to everyone. I'm pleased to be here today for Cheniere's quarterly earnings call. Since being appointed President and CEO of Cheniere several months ago, I've had the opportunity to meet with many of Cheniere's employees, customers, project partners, investors, regulators and other stakeholders around the world. The caliber of the people associated with this organization is world-class and only reinforces my confidence in the future success of the company. It's truly an exciting time at Cheniere. We are firing on all cylinders and are beginning to see the impact our company is having on the global energy marketplace. I am eager to build upon the positive momentum of the past several years, improving our operational efficiencies, and implementing a strategy for sustainable, long-term shareholder value creation. Slide five contains a few highlights from the quarter. The second quarter of 2016 is a significant one for the company as it marks the first quarter of operations from one our liquefaction projects. After approximately 45 months of construction, Train 1 at Sabine Pass is now operational. The substantial completion date when we take over care, custody and control of the Train was May 26. I would like to once again recognize both Cheniere's professionals and those of our EPC partner Bechtel, all of whom who have worked tirelessly since 2012 to complete this milestone. What I've highlighted on slide five are three metrics which I believe are important to watch as we track the business going forward. With the start-up of operations of Train 1, we have begun reporting revenues from LNG sales from liquefaction. Revenues for the second quarter were $177 million and $246 million year-to-date, of which $111 million and $113 million respectively were related to LNG sales. Adjusted EBITDA was a loss of $4 million for the quarter and $48 million year-to-date. However, our earnings and cash flow from liquefaction have just begun. Our ramp-up in earnings, performance, and cash flow generation is tied to construction completion of the Trains over the next several years. I've asked Michael to cover in detail our financial performance for the quarter as well as our balance sheet management later on this call. Our third metric is volumes. To date we've exported a total of 22 cargoes from Sabine Pass with LNG produced at our facility in Louisiana being delivered to destinations around the globe, including South America, Europe, Asia and the Middle East. I've asked Anatol to cover our marketing efforts and global demand outlook on this call. Slide six provides an update on construction at Sabine Pass and Corpus Christi. Overall, we are very pleased with the progress of construction at both facilities. Our number one priority is to execute on the construction of our LNG platform safely, timely and on budget. As I noted earlier, substantial completion for Sabine Pass Train 1 was achieved on May 26, 2016, after nearly 45 months of construction and commissioning. Sabine Pass Train 2 began producing LNG on July 28. Commissioning is proceeding well and we expect substantial completion this fall. On all Trains, Bechtel continues to progress construction efforts against aggressive schedules and contractual guarantees. In consideration of lagging construction progress realized these past months for Train 3, we recently revised the forecasted substantial completion date from April to June 2017, representing a construction and commissioning duration of approximately 49 months. This forecast adjustment results simply from an accumulation of weather delays and various construction challenges encountered over the three-plus years of construction and not any one particular issue. Train 4 progress will be monitored over the coming months for any potential impact to the August 2017 substantial completion target. It is important to note that Bechtel is still expected to deliver by the guaranteed contractual date and we at Cheniere are focused on transitioning the Trains from construction management to operations management safely, efficiently and effectively. Furthermore, as there seems to be significant interest in the day to day operation of our Trains, I would like to mention that there is a planned maintenance outage scheduled to begin during September for a duration of approximately four weeks. This outage is necessary to facilitate a design change with our process flares at Sabine Pass. In addition, we will utilize this opportunity to complete additional routine maintenance. Turning to slide seven, we are transitioning from a development company to an operating one. These near term operational, financial, commercial and organizational goals will help us manage that transition and help take Cheniere to the next level. Foremost, we must ensure our construction and operations continue safely, on time and on budget. We expect to incorporate lessons learned from previous Trains to improve on commissioning efforts, as we continue to bring the Trains online. Financially, you should expect us to pull all levers to create long-term shareholder value. We will increase our transparency for the investment community, starting with today's call. We won't be providing guidance today, but guidance is something you can look forward to in the future. We will initiate a budget process with a focus on financial discipline and looking for ways to do our jobs faster and cheaper. We will look to identify opportunities to simplify our complex corporate structure. In addition, we expect our ratings momentum at SPL to continue and look to achieve an investment grade rating in the near term. And finally, we are working on defining a sustainable, long-term financial strategy, and we'll be communicating it in the due course. On the commercial front, we will continue to monetize cargoes produced during the commissioning of our Trains. Our commercial team did an outstanding job on Train 1 commissioning cargoes, and we expect that success to continue. As Trains enter into commercial operations, we expect to fulfill our contractual obligations to our long-term foundation customers. Cheniere will continue to optimize our excess cargoes, and our marketing efforts are focused on building a portfolio of short, mid and long-term contracts. And we will continue to pursue long-term contracts necessary to support the financing of our next Trains, Corpus Christi 3 and Sabine Pass Train 6. Finally, we will make some changes organizationally to align ourselves with our shareholders. We will strive to have an organizational structure that provides clarity to our professionals' roles and responsibilities, provides clear succession and developmental opportunities, and drives out unnecessary G&A expenses. Our vision is simple, to be recognized by all stakeholders as a premier LNG provider to the marketplace, and the achievement of these goals are critical to that effort. Turning to slide eight, our investment thesis is clear. First, the world is shifting to a cleaner energy source and reliable natural gas is a leading solution. Global gas demand is growing for both economic and environmental reasons, and LNG demand continues to grow faster than global gas demand. Second, Cheniere is well positioned to retain and grow its share of the U.S. LNG market. Many companies talk about developing an LNG export project, but Cheniere is the only company to have delivered an LNG export project on time and on budget in the Lower 48. We have the proven track record across all elements of project execution and finance. We're also unique in offering our customers a comprehensive service option, from natural gas procurement, transport, processing, storage and shipping. Third, as I noted earlier, Cheniere's cash flows from liquefaction have just begun with excellent visibility for long-term growth. Fourth, we will remain financially disciplined while pursuing accretive growth opportunities. Cheniere is well-positioned with additional existing LNG to bring to market with two fully permitted, shovel-ready liquefaction Trains and two more in the development pipeline. I'm confident that we'll be able to build incremental LNG capacity better, faster and cheaper than anyone else. In addition to building out our existing liquefaction projects, our strategic focus is to leverage our core capabilities on the LNG platform by developing projects within the LNG value chain. We will remain targeted and focused on our core competencies and not stray with your investment. Slide nine highlights one of those projects in the development pipeline, our project in Chile. This is one of the most creative projects I've seen in my career. We are participating in the development of a Chilean gas-to-power solution. The project is a joint venture to build, own and operate a new power plant with a 15-year power purchase agreement in a floating regasification facility. Cheniere will have the exclusive rights to deliver LNG to the FSRU for the power station for 15 years. While our competitors are talking about developing integrated LNG-to-power projects, Cheniere is once again leading the development of commercially innovative solutions. We expect a final investment decision to take place in the second half of 2016 after all the necessary Chilean regulatory approvals are received. This project is one example of how the Cheniere team is developing creative ways to enter new and growing markets. We have a long-term focus on marketing and market development. With that, I will now turn the call over to Anatol. Anatol Feygin - Senior VP-Strategy & Corporate Development: Thanks, Jack, and good morning, everyone. Turning to slide 11, I'd like to shift our focus to LNG marketing. In a volatile commodity environment, it's easy to lose sight of the solid long-term supply-demand fundamentals which underpin long-term global growth prospects for LNG. LNG prices have moderated along with the rest of the energy complex due to a combination of oil market volatility, LNG supply additions and some modestly slower than expected economic growth. However, we're beginning to see evidence of price elasticity of demand. China and India for example, key long-term LNG growth markets, have imported approximately 30% more LNG over the first half of 2016 compared to 2015. Our differentiated business model as a comprehensive LNG provider positions us well to compete in today's LNG market. The market continues to evolve at a fairly rapid pace. LNG suppliers need to move closer to the end-use customers, and you're seeing us do that most visibly with our project in Chile, which Jack discussed earlier. While the market for LNG is loose at the moment, we expect it to start tightening between late this and early next decade and for LNG demands to nearly double between now and 2030. Production declines in legacy markets, markets switching to clearer burning natural gas, contract roll-offs and the emergence of new LNG markets primarily enabled by floating re-gas facilities, will continue to offer us attractive opportunities. While traditional LNG buyers like Japan and Korea have been importing less, the rapid emergence of new market entrants – such as Egypt, Jordan, Pakistan – has more than made up the difference, and there are currently about 30 new markets considering LNG import projects. At Cheniere, our global marketing and origination teams continue to build long-term relationships helping customers identify long-term LNG needs and develop cost-effective and flexible solutions. Another aspect of the evolving LNG market is that buyers are increasingly seeking nontraditional or nonstandard contracts. We approach these discussions with a competitive advantage given our track record of execution, comprehensive product and flexible contract terms. Slide 12 is a very busy one but exciting for us, as it represents the scale of existing and potential LNG import projects globally. New LNG importers continue to emerge, and are relying on the growing liquidity in the short-term market to procure LNG supply. In 2015, four new import markets started up: Jordan, Egypt, Pakistan and Poland. Three of the four new markets began importing without long-term supply contracts, and together Jordan, Egypt and Pakistan imported nearly 6 million tons on a spot or short-term basis. These three importers also employed floating re-gas facilities as receiving terminals. These FSRUs have become the import terminal technology of choice for new markets. They require less capital, provide more flexibility and can be brought online much faster than traditional onshore terminals. The rise in FSRU projects is staggering, as new importers are able to start importing LNG in less than 12 months. The first FSRU was delivered in 2005. Now, there are 24 vessels, representing about 90 million tons of import capacity. Currently, there are another six vessels on order, representing an additional 30 million tons of import capacity. With more than 30 new markets spread across the world considering LNG imports, gas is becoming a more attractive fuel source. LNG is attractively priced, clean and increased supply will ensure demand is able to access supply. Turning to slide 13, as I mentioned earlier, there is a secular shift to cleaner-burning natural gas for power generation worldwide. Natural gas is becoming the fossil fuel of choice to reduce air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions while still being a reliable and economic supply source. U.S. LNG imports will help markets shift to cleaner-burning natural gas to reach their environmental goals. In December 2015, 195 countries pledged to address climate change at COP21 in Paris. While the commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the Paris agreement are voluntary, the agreement signals a shift towards less carbon intensive energy sources is already underway. In 2015, we saw the largest recorded year-on-year drop, down 1.8% for coal use, while gas increased by 1.7% globally year-on-year, taking market share away from coal. The drop was enabled by affordable gas supply, which allowed switching from coal to natural gas in power generation. In addition to moderate prices driving global demand, a number of countries are looking at natural gas as a policy solution. Natural gas-fired power generation emits about 50% less greenhouse emissions compared to coal, but even more importantly, it emits significantly less traditional pollutants like NOx, SOx, and PMs. For developing countries, dealing with harmful air pollution and increased per capita energy demands, switching from coal to gas can help achieve multiple environmental goals. Indeed, affordable, reliable U.S. gas supplies have already resulted in coal displacement in power generation and dramatic CO2 reductions. Due in part to cleaner-burning natural gas, total CO2 emissions from the U.S. power stack during 2015 dropped to the lowest level since 1992 and reduced total emissions 20% from the 2007 peak. As part of a wider policy initiative to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the UK set a carbon price floor which almost immediately resulted in a dramatic increase in gas dispatch versus coal in the power sector. In summary, natural gas is expected to have a key role in policy options to reduce emission, and, therefore, we expect to see a continued increase in natural gas demand worldwide. Tying the previous two slides back to the LNG market and Cheniere, slide 14 is a look ahead into the near-term LNG market where liquefaction capacity from projects under construction will continue to be built, supply will come on through the balance of the decade. We have already begun to see that supply availability and an increasingly liquid LNG market will stimulate price-elastic demand and attract new importers. A potential supply-demand gap is setting up for the start of next decade. There's been a dramatic slowdown in liquefaction FIDs since mid-2015 and emerging Asian markets are expected to continue to drive incremental LNG demand. Now, liquefaction costs have to be compressed to remain competitive and keep the momentum of the global secular transition to natural gas. With that, I'll now turn the call over Michael to review our financial results. Michael J. Wortley - Chief Financial Officer & Senior Vice President: Thank you, Anatol, and good morning, everyone. I'm pleased to announce our financial results for the second quarter of 2016, a summary of which can be found on slide 16. Before I get into the details, I'd like to say that I've been with the company for over a decade now and this truly is an exciting quarter as we have begun to recognize revenue from LNG sales from liquefaction and that this couldn't have been possible without the many years of hard work by many dedicated people. This is a pivotal time for the company as we move into operations and expect to ramp up our cash flow generation in the upcoming years as we continue to complete construction of the Trains. We are also excited about moving the company forward and articulating our financial strategy with the long-term goal of value creation through a disciplined capital allocation philosophy. As a reminder, Cheniere Energy consolidates the results of Cheniere Partners, CQP, and Cheniere Partners Holdings, CQH. For the second quarter 2016, we reported consolidated revenue of $177 million compared to $68 million in the corresponding 2015 period. Revenue recognized from LNG sales for the second quarter 2016 was $111 million. Before moving on, I'd like to update some information about our cargo sales during the second quarter as it relates to revenue recognition. During the second quarter we loaded eleven cargoes and sold over $200 million worth of LNG produced at Sabine Pass Liquefaction or SPL. Six of the eleven cargoes were loaded prior to substantial completion and those proceeds are not reflected on the income statement. Rather, they are recorded as an offset to construction in process on the balance sheet because these amounts were earned prior to our taking over care, custody and control of Train 1. LNG cargoes on future Trains will be treated in the same manner, so it may be difficult to model our revenue accurately and tie out our reported revenue to production in upcoming quarters as we continue to commission Trains at Sabine Pass. Post substantial completion of Train 1, we loaded five cargoes during the second quarter which are reflected on the income statement. Those commercial cargoes were lifted by BG Shell under their contract that gives them access to early volumes produced prior to DFCD at the contract price of 115% of Henry Hub plus 225 (sic) [$2.25]. In addition to revenue, several other line items were impacted during the quarter as a result of substantial completion of Train 1. Certain operating expense line items previously capitalized during construction have begun to be expensed. Depreciation and amortization expense increased during the period as we began depreciating assets related to Train 1 upon reaching substantial completion. In addition, G&A expense decreased by approximately 30% quarter-over-quarter partially due to some reallocation of resources from G&A to O&M after the commencement of operations. Furthermore, included in the G&A and marketing line items are aggregate share based compensation expenses for the three and six months ended June 30, 2016, of $32 million and $46 million respectively. Amounts remaining under these legacy grants will be recognized over the next two years, and thereafter we expect more normalized run rate levels to prevail. Consistent with the reporting change we made in the first quarter, we have broken out marketing expense from G&A. Marketing expenses include costs directly associated with our long-term LNG contract origination efforts and the sale and optimization of CMI portfolio volumes. These costs include payroll, benefits and stock compensation costs of marketing and origination personnel, professional services and other support costs. Net loss attributable to common stockholders was $298 million or $1.31 per share compared to the corresponding 2015 period of $119 million or $0.52 per share. Impacting earnings during the second quarter were significant items totaling approximately $158 million or approximately $0.70 per share. These significant items related to derivative losses primarily due to changes in LIBOR over the period, loss on early extinguishment of debt related to refinancing activities at both liquefaction project entities, and changes in fair value of our commodity derivatives. The management of our consolidated balance sheet is driving much of the impact to EPS, and investors should expect EPS results to continue to be influenced by such financing related items for the foreseeable future. As such, we plan to report adjusted EBITDA and net income as adjusted, which excludes these items. Additional detail on the impact of these items can be found in the reconciliation tables in the appendix of the slide deck. Adjusted EBITDA for the three and six months ended June 30, 2016, was a loss of $4 million and $48 million compared to a loss of $61 million and $86 million for the comparable 2015 periods. With regard to liquidity, as of June 30, 2016, we had unrestricted cash and cash equivalents at Cheniere of approximately $1.05 billion. In addition we had current and non-current restricted cash of $756 million designated for the following purposes: $223 million for the Corpus Christi project; $263 million for the Sabine Pass project; $110 million restricted under the CQP credit facilities; $91 million for interest payments on SPLNG bonds; and $69 million for other restricted purposes. As mentioned earlier, we won't be providing any financial guidance on this call, but it is something we expect to begin providing in the near future as we continue to move into operations at our projects. We expect to host an Analyst Investor Day in the first half of next year, and we'll provide you with more information on that in the coming months. On slide 17, we highlight some key points of our financial philosophy. We are open to exploring opportunities to simplify our corporate structure to reduce complexity for our debt and equity investors. However, we will transact only to the extent it makes economic sense for our shareholders. As well, we will strive to maximize levered cash returns while maintaining a long-term sustainable balance sheet. Over the long term, embedded returns in our equity security will be the benchmark against which capital allocation decisions will be made. We aim to optimize the allocation of capital to growth opportunities, balance sheet management and capital returns to shareholders with a goal of maximizing equity returns. Next, we will continue to mitigate financial execution risk by utilizing our deep access to capital across the complex in multiple markets. In the first quarter, we raised a $2.8 billion bank facility at CQP to refinance debt related to our SPLNG regasification terminal and our Creole Trail Pipeline. During the second quarter, we continued to proactively manage our debt maturity profile by issuing bonds at both our liquefaction projects to refinance bank debt. In May, Corpus Christi Holdings, LLC, or CCH, completed its inaugural bond offering with the closing of $1.25 billion of senior secured notes due 2024 which priced at par to yield 7%. CCH used the net proceeds from the offering to repay a portion of the outstanding borrowings under the CCH credit facility. As a result, the CCH bank facility was reduced to $7.35 billion with approximately $2.7 billion drawn as of June 30. A few weeks after the closing of the CCH notes, SPL completed a bond offering of $1.5 billion of senior secured notes due 2026 which priced at par to yield 5.875%. Following the bond offering, the SPL bank facility was reduced to approximately $3.3 billion with a little over $800 million drawn as of June 30. To-date, we've placed a total of $10 billion of SPL notes in the market with a volume-weighted average coupon inside 6%. At both projects, we plan to continue to be opportunistic in terming out our bank facilities to better align our maturity profile with projected EBITDA levels. A summary of our current consolidated debt maturity profile can be found on slide 18. Pro forma the repayment of the SPLNG project bonds later this year with proceeds from the CQP bank facility, there will be no maturities in the Cheniere complex until 2020. And finally, we remain focused on execution, which we believe will lead to further positive rating agency actions across the complex. We maintain an active dialogue with the agencies and expect to, over time, achieve investment-grade ratings, first at SPL and later at CCH. Our two projects have been financed from the outset with investment-grade credit metrics. Evidencing our progress to-date, in April, Moody's upgraded the credit rating of SPL from Ba3 to Ba2 due to derisking of the project and construction milestones achieved. This action was on the heels of S&P upgrading Cheniere's rating to BB- from B+ back in Q1. With that, we would like to thank you for your time today and your interest in Cheniere. We look forward to updating you on our third quarter call in November. Operator, we are now ready to open the line for questions.