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Grupo Aeroportuario del Centro Norte, S.A.B. de C.V. (OMAB)

Q1 2013 Earnings Call· Mon, Apr 29, 2013

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Grupo Aeroportuario del Centro Nort OMA First Quarter 2013 Earnings Results Conference Call. During today's presentation the lines will in a listen-only mode. Following the presentation, the conference will be opened for questions. (Operator Instructions). I would now like to turn the call over to host, Luis Guerrero. Please go ahead.

Luis Guerrero

Management

Good morning. Welcome to OMA’s first quarter 2013 earnings conference call. My name is Jose Luis Guerrero, OMA’s Chief Financial Officer. Joining me this morning is Israel Magana, our Investor Relations Officer. I will start with an overview of some of the major business developments in the first quarter. Then I will go over our outlook for 2013. We will then open the call up to questions. OMA had another solid quarter with good performance from our aeronautical activities, commercial activities and our diversification initiatives. The first quarter was (inaudible) by business development that will benefit OMA going forward. I want to highlight one of these development. The first quarter in the first time that we see the check the baggage screening service fully operational. While the service was partially operational last year, we have not yet reached an agreement with our airline clients on compensation. That has now been done and as a reminder, OMA gets compensated for check baggage screening in two ways, the cost of maintenance for the equipment is included in our maximum rate agreement. The SEC authorized the rate increase last year to reflect this. The rest of the operating costs are recovered through service fees charged to the airlines. The check baggage screening service provides a better passenger experience as well as higher security. Turning to our first quarter operational developments, passenger traffic volumes increased 4.6% with domestic traffic growing 5.1% and international traffic up 2.6%. Seven of our airlines increased passenger volumes and this is the eight quarter in a row of increasing passenger traffic for OMA. In terms of route development and connectivity, we introduced to cover the Monterrey-Las Vegas route and AeromexicoConnect opened three new domestic routes. Aeromexico added one plane to each fleet and now has 116 planes in operations,…

Operator

Operator

Yes, thank you. (Operator Instructions). And our first question comes from the line of Marco Montanez with Vector. Please go ahead.

Marco Montanez - Vector

Analyst · Vector. Please go ahead

Could you give more details about the drivers for the slowing down in the growth in traffic that you also seen for 2013. In particular, could you give more color about the non-aeronautical revenue estimates including diversification activities? On the other side, what’s driving the lower adjusted EBITDA margins for this year compared with the last year?

Luis Guerrero

Management

Sure, thank you for your question. Regarding the drivers for slowdown in passenger traffic growth compared to last year’s growth of 7%. First of all one is the comparison of last year was the strong year. This year it will all depend on when the airlines start bringing the new planes that they have forecasted. As you know, Mexico has plans of around 110 new planes. Ten of them are Embraer 190s that will be replacing the 145. Some of them have already arrived. I believe three of them arrived this quarter, so they expecting more 190s to arrive. Also they were expecting 100 more planes obviously in the next year. One of them is the Dreamliner, which they could get this year in the second semester, one of those planes. So, it will depend on when these planes arrive. Volaris and Interjet, they both have plans, very strong plans. For examples Interjet has an order of 60 planes. 20 of them are Sukhoi Superjets, the other ones are Airbus 320s and also Volaris has an order of 44 new Airbus 320s as well. So, there are very strong plans but it would depend on when they arrive. So for these reasons we’re seeing growth expected to be between the ranges that I explained. Also we’re seeing the first quarter a little bit slower in terms of government spending compared to last year. So as new projects start to pick, we might see some more people flying in our airports. Regarding the non-aeronautical outlook we are seeing strong growth for OMA. This quarter was quite solid in terms of non-aeronautical revenues. We are looking for new initiatives and new opportunities to successfully deliver the services that the passengers are looking for in our airports. Today we have an application and…

Marco Montanez - Vector

Analyst · Vector. Please go ahead

Another question, what effective tax rate are you expecting for this year?

Luis Guerrero

Management

The effective tax rates, we are still having benefits of some of the tax credits that we had in our airports since the beginning of their concession. Monterrey no longer has that tax benefit and that is why see a slight increase in the tax that we paid this year in the ESR (ph) tax and so we are going to see going forward maybe higher taxes from Monterrey but we are still having the benefit of the other airports that are still having those tax benefits in those airports. So we will probably see something below this 30% tax rate.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from the line of Stephen Trent with Citi. Please go ahead.

Stephen Trent - Citi

Analyst · Stephen Trent with Citi. Please go ahead

Just two questions from me. The first is, I noticed in page three of your release that three domestic routes were opened and six were closed. I happened to notice that VivaAerobus seems to be responsible for at least a good chunk of the routes that are closing. And what’s your view as to what might be going on with that carrier?

Luis Guerrero

Management

Sure, as you know VivaAerobus is very active in our airports. We have seen very strong growth from their passenger traffic in this quarter and in past quarters. And so they open and close routes quite frequently. In this quarter, yes, what we see is that they are closing four routes and they are not opening any new ones. But the other routes that are existing should be in healthy conditions. So for them, VivaAerobus needs a higher level of occupancy rate than the rest of the airlines, because they are charging lower tariffs. So they need to have their planes more with a higher occupancy. Therefore if their route is not reaching that level of occupancy that they need, they usually immediately close it. So that’s why we sees the close-ons in VivaAerobus but they have been growing passenger traffic with us and those two are a very strong airline today for us.

Stephen Trent - Citi

Analyst · Stephen Trent with Citi. Please go ahead

So the four routes they closed in the quarter, would you say this is average or above average or below average in terms of the number of routes they open and close on a periodic basis?

Luis Guerrero

Management

The traffic volumes have been growing. So I believe this is part their strategy of finding the most profitable routes that they can operate and putting their 18 planes in the best routes that they could find. So the airline is very strong today and they are doing well. So it is underlined that for us is very important and I believe this is part of their business plan of finding the routes that are more convenient and important for them.

Stephen Trent - Citi

Analyst · Stephen Trent with Citi. Please go ahead

And just one last question for me, I happened to notice on page 14 of your release in the cash flow statement, for the first quarter of 2012, you had net flow for operating activities of 250 million pesos but when I look back at your original 1/2/2012, release you reported. 300 million pesos in net operating cash flow and I was wondering what you changed from, if anything?

Luis Guerrero

Management

Yes, thank you Stephen and that’s something that we will mention also on the 20th that we are expecting to release today. What shall we request from our accounting firm to change a land investment that we paid in 2010 and the transaction took place in 2010 but the payment actually took place in 2011. We registered that operation as an operating activity in the cash flows and the recommendation from our accounting auditors was that we should change that to an investment activity. So, that’s why we’re seeing that reclassification of the cash flow.

Operator

Operator

(Operator Instruction). Our next question comes from the line of Bernardo Villas with GBM. Please go ahead.

Bernardo Villas - GBM

Analyst · Bernardo Villas with GBM. Please go ahead

I was wondering regarding the gas station in Monterrey, if you could give us a bit more numbers on sales and EBITDA margin expense. And then are you considering these revenues as part of Monterrey’s non-aeronautical revenues?

Luis Guerrero

Management

The gas station started operating in December of 2012. So it’s been in operation for a little bit more than four months now. It’s doing quite well. We have a lot of clients coming into the gas station. It’s on the exit of the airport, basically on the exit of Terminal A and Terminal C. So, we are capturing the passengers that leave those terminals and its paying us rent. We do not operate it. It’s the company that operates that gas station is Sorsan (ph). So, we only receive the rent payments. So it’s doing well. And it is an important project for our diversification initiatives in Monterrey. As you know we’re looking forward to grow our real estate projects that we have at the airport, this is one of them. The old corporate building that we use to have in the Monterrey Airport that is now almost fully leased. We also have the Strathmore that has, basically the first floor also leased and we're remodeling the second floor to have office spaces up there and we also, as we announced signed agreement with VYNMSA which is one of the most important industrial park operators in the northern region, who helped us develop industrial park in Monterrey. So the gas station; it’s a small project but it’s an important one for us because it’s our first gas station that we have in one of our airports and we look forward to developing more of these projects in other airports around us.

Bernardo Villas - GBM

Analyst · Bernardo Villas with GBM. Please go ahead

And is this considered in Monterrey’s revenue?

Luis Guerrero

Management

Yes, that is correct.

Bernardo Villas - GBM

Analyst · Bernardo Villas with GBM. Please go ahead

Okay and I was wondering if regarding the guidance, you just released the planned CapEx, 100 million to 200 (ph) million in diversification activities. What are you planning on investing?

Luis Guerrero

Management

Most of that investment will probably take place for the development of the first industrial park in Monterrey. The industrial park in Monterrey, the plan is to have 10 slots for an industrial warehouse. We are planning to develop the first one and also to organize the road to the access to the industrial park. That’s the part of the investment in new strategic project. The other one could also be part of the hotel investments that could take place this year for the Monterrey airport. We haven’t announced yet who would be operator of that hotel but we are in talks with the hotel operators also maybe investors as well. So, that’s what we are considering as the most important part of the diversification or strategic CapEx.

Bernardo Villas - GBM

Analyst · Bernardo Villas with GBM. Please go ahead

Okay and lastly, just to be clear, the 50.5% to 52% EBITDA margin, is it considering construction revenues?

Luis Guerrero

Management

No, this is the adjusted EBITDA margin.

Operator

Operator

(Operator instructions). And I'm not showing any further questions at this time, please continue with any closing remarks.

Luis Guerrero

Management

Thank you, on behalf of OMA I want to thank all of you again for your participation in this call. Israel Magana and I always available to answer your questions and hope to see you soon at our office in Monterrey or in future events. Thank you and have a good day.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, that does conclude our conference call for today. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.