Earnings Labs

TORM plc (TRMD)

Q4 2017 Earnings Call· Fri, Mar 9, 2018

$32.09

+2.62%

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Thank you for standing by. And welcome to the TORM’s Annual Report 2017 webcast. At this time, all audio participants are on a listen-only mode. During the presentation, we will have a question-and-answer session [Operator Instructions]. Alternatively, you can submit question at any time via the webcast. I must advise you that this webcast is being recorded today, today, Thursday, the 8th of March, 2018. I would now like to hand the webcast over to your presenter, Mr. Christian Søgaard-Christ. Please go ahead. Christian Søgaard-Christensen: Thank you. And thank you for dialing in. And welcome to TORM’s conference call regarding the results for the full year of 2017. My name is Christian Søgaard, and I am the CFO of TORM. As usual, we will refer to the slide as we speak. And at the end of the presentation, we’ll open up for questions. Next slide please. Before commencing, I would like to draw your attention to our usual Safe Harbor statement on this slide. Next slide please. With me today is Executive Director, Jacob Meldgaard, who will also be presenting. Slide four please. As we turn to the presentation of the full year 2017 results on this slide, I will hand over to Executive Director, Jacob Meldgaard.

Jacob Meldgaard

Analyst

Thank you, Christian and thank you all for dialing in. Before I turn to our 2017 results, allow me to mention some of our main achievements here in 2017. First, during 2017, we have freed of carried total growth through new financing arrangements. Also in 2017, we have spent equivalent to $1.25 billion on vessel acquisitions. We bought six MR vessels of which two were already delivered in 2017 and the remaining four will be delivered next year in 2019. In December of ‘17, we listed TORM in New York and declared options for two LR1 newbuildings. And finally, in January of this year, we raised $100 million in new equity earmarked for additional growth on our platform. When I look at our industry in general, I can see that these are indeed outstanding achievements. And we are all proud to inform that we are in a position where we have the platform and the financial strengths to act on the right opportunities. I will now turn to our 2017 results. I am very satisfied that we were able to remain profitable in 2017 despite what everybody considered a challenging product tanker market. Over the past several quarters, TORM’s commercial performance has consistently been among the best in its peer group in terms of total TCE per day and also return on invested capital. In 2017, we realized a positive EBITDA of $158 million and a result before tax of $3 million. TORM’s return on invested capital was 2.8% and earnings per share was $0.04. Net loan-to-value was 56% at year end and available liquidity was $405 million. So it’s pretty clear that we have maintained a solid balance sheet even though we completed a number of vessel acquisitions over the course of 2017. At the beginning of 2017, global…

Operator

Operator

Thank you very much [Operator Instructions]. And the first question from the phone line comes from the line of Dan Togo from Handelsbanken. Please ask your question.

Dan Togo

Analyst

A few questions from my end. Just to understand the development and fleet values between -- in Q3 and in Q4. What lies behind the assumption and valuation of the value of a standard MR five year in Q3 to Q4 the value -- the asset value and peak value that you have there? That’s the first question.

Jacob Meldgaard

Analyst

So in general, what we do on all of our fleet is that it is on a quarterly basis evaluated by two brokerage firms, who independently value it and we use the average of the two companies as the base part. And what has happened between end Q3 and end Q4 in general is that there has been, as we point to a general upfront, which equates to about 4% if you blend our fleet. And it’s approximately the same for the MR.

Dan Togo

Analyst

And then on the CapEx side, I understand you have around 150 to come in two years here. What if we then look into 2020, what will come down to by then, what is -- just to understand, what is an underlying maintenance level that we could count on in the longer run for CapEx? Christian Søgaard-Christensen: So I guess your question is coming, so besides the ordinary dry-docking cost and then looking at if anything we need to factor in there. And I think it is a bit early to evaluate what exactly is going to be the right strategy for dealing with 2020 sulfur requirements. But if you look at our ordinary CapEx for dry docking, it will be similar to what you’ll see in the last couple of years.

Dan Togo

Analyst

And then you already mentioned that cushion around sulfur, because one is just stratifying right now you brought on the analysis et cetera. Are you looking at eco-friendly designs as prepared designs in order to accommodate 2020?

Jacob Meldgaard

Analyst

So as you point to there’s a couple of ways which basically if you have vessels that are being ordered to prepare yourself. One, you could obviously do nothing and see what happens then. Two, you could design the asset to be scoped and ready or you could go way the full way and say well let’s make this and let’s install this level. And so far we have decided on four of the newbuilds that we have delivering this year and next year that they will be in rich products and for the rest of the vessels so far we have made them to go already.

Dan Togo

Analyst

And how bigger investment is it to upgrade, so to say?

Jacob Meldgaard

Analyst

So it depends on the vessel size. I think rule of thumb will be that for an MR class vessel, I would estimate somewhere between $1.5 million to $2 million for larger vessels LR1, LR2 which probably to the tune of $2.5 million approx. A couple of different types of you can have them open loop, if you will. So it depends a bit on the design that you chose.

Dan Togo

Analyst

And that is tube with the vessels per pass so it’s ready for scrubbers?

Jacob Meldgaard

Analyst

Yes.

Dan Togo

Analyst

And then just a final question on the market side. You mentioned inventories have come down and fleet’s growth is also coming down, which is all very nice so to say. But what about other market drivers like the LPG ratio and refining margins. Are they so to say close at hands to come into play and expecting the demand side of equation?

Jacob Meldgaard

Analyst

So if you find to the spread between that in the plastics industry, in general, you can use it like LPT on asset as the input. Then currently LPT is the more favorable part because the price of LPT has directionally been falling more than that. And so at input into that subsector, there’s not been any tailwind so to say from that currently. Number two, on refinery markets, well they've also been coming down. But I am not sure that there is a strong correlation between underlying demand from consumers and therefore also demand for transportation and then the refinery margins. So refinery margins, they will be volatile and fluctuating. However, the underlying demand is probably what we are following more and as we point to also the stock built.

Operator

Operator

The next question from the phone line is from the line of Marcus [indiscernible]. Please ask your question.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Just a follow up question on the scrubber side. Talked to one of your competitors who suggested that didn't quite make sense to install scrubbers on smaller vessels such as MRs. Maybe you just elaborate a little bit about scrubber economics as you see it. What spread between MGO and HFO does it require? What are the payback times we're looking at, et cetera?

Jacob Meldgaard

Analyst

So I think in general what we would like to see if you have decisions for years that the payback time should be no more than five. I think for this type of investment that makes sense for us to evaluate whether it fits to build on that. And then you would want to see that even in a scenario where you move away from taking the average spread let's say over the past whatever two years, three years, five years that you would still want to stress test that to some degree. And so even though I think in general that the section and the forward curve illustrate that you'll have a wider spread, let's stress this investment by also narrowing the freight rather than widening it compared to the historic data. If it then fits the build with the CapEx and time out of service in case of a existing vessel, you would obviously have time out of service and dry bulk et cetera in case of a vessel that is being built, that’s not the case that you would have no time loss and you would basically also have only more or less installation cost and equipment cost to use. So obviously, the payback time irrespective of what spec you have will be longer for an existing vessel than for one where you fill it at the yard. So that’s our thinking.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

And then may be a second question if I may. I am just curious your U.S. listing, what’s the progress there, how many -- do you know how many shareholders have decided to move their shares from Demark to the U.S., for example? Christian Søgaard-Christensen: So I think if you look at it -- it’s actually spanning out as we expected is that there will be an illiquidity in the beginning but we are starting to see overall liquidity moving up. And if you look at it also the liquidity following our capital raise, it’s also been better. So I do think that the U.S. listing is a question of picking up pace during the course of 2018 just as we planned.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. The next question from the phone line is from the line of [indiscernible] from Jyske Bank. Please ask your question.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

I understand that the oversupply of crude tankers is having a spillover you take into the product market. Could you just describe how that works? And is there any way that we can predict or see how that might change over the next several quarters?

Jacob Meldgaard

Analyst

Yes. So as you pointed, it’s correct observation that crude tankers that come out of the yard have the ability to carry clean petroleum products at the first voyage. They’re obviously at that point not contaminated by having carried crude and the tanks are fully capable of then lifting, larger products or clean petroleum products. How you can follow the development on that is obviously what is the expected number of newbuilds that come out quarter-by-quarter, the particular type of vessel that makes sense to do this and it’s predominantly on the Suezmax, which is slightly -- is about 50% larger than an LR2. So it’s so much from a commercial and logistical point of view makes sense for trailers to operate the Suezmax on the first voyage. So a good way to gauge this is to simply follow the number of expected deliveries as we progress. Currently, there’s still a relatively high number of expected deliveries in this segment.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

And for the next how many quarters does that go on?

Jacob Meldgaard

Analyst

So as I see it, this is something that we could expect for the remainder of 2018.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Second question on the rate, I noticed that you have -- I think you had 12% coverage for '18 at $18,000 per day. Now you have 27% coverage at $15,800. What are the -- that suggests that you are fixing at an average rate of $13,000 and if that continues for the rest of the year, your average rate for the year might be, I don't know, roughly $14,000 or so. Is that the right way to look at it?

Jacob Meldgaard

Analyst

So actually the data that we have and that we also provided to the market is that our spot earning is just around 14. And then it's blended as you point to with the coverage that we already have from back in 2015. The markets as we see it right now is around this, let's say $14,000 and of course with volatility week-by-week. But that's what we've experienced to-date. Christian Søgaard-Christensen: And $14,000 is also correlating to our net income breakeven.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. At this time, we have no further questions from the phone lines or from the Web platform. Please continue.