Jacob Meldgaard
Analyst · Jon Chappell from Evercore
Thank you, Andreas, and good morning to all of you in the U.S., and good afternoon. Thank you for dialing in. It's truly a pleasure to be here. Today, we published our results for the first quarter of 2022. As you can see at the end of February 2022, TORM had fixed 85% of the open days in the first quarter of 2022 at $15,569 per day. And then due to a number of factors the market firmed during the remainder of the quarter, and we ended at $16,743 per day. Now that is then put it into perspective, the current market, we are trading our vessels above $40,000 per day for our fleet. Now since the demand recovery finally materialized in product tanker rates, we ended with an EBITDA of $60.4 million, and we had a profit before tax of $10.7 million. This equates a return on invested capital of 4.4%. Now in the largest segment, the MR, the rates we achieved were $16,462 per day whereas the LR vessel class obtained rates above $8,000. Now looking into the second quarter of 2022, changing traveling patterns, increase in supply of products and thereby meeting an increased demand, that mean that we've secured spot bookings at $28,348 per day. And we have again outperformed our peers in the largest segments in the MRs. Since the end of 2021, we've sold one vessel in each vessel class, and we've entered into an agreement to acquire a secondhand LR2 vessel on what we believe to be attractive terms. Here in the first quarter of the year, we increased our scrubber commitment to 60%, thereby increasing obviously, our access to lower fuel prices. We also invested in Flettner Rotors for the 2 new buildings we had delivered in the fourth quarter and here in the first quarter, respectively. And these Flettner Rotors, we are currently having them tested, and I expect them that they will be installed during the second half of the year. Here, please turn to Slide 5. And here, we'll talk -- no surprise, I think, to anyone will talk about geopolitics and the Russian invasion of Ukraine that has caused the greatest humanitarian crisis in Europe since the second world war. And my thoughts are with the people of Ukraine whose suffering is beyond anybody's imagination. This contract has also prompted a geopolitical awakening as this year in Europe with the ambition from here on to reduce Europe's energy dependency on Russia. The immediate effect of this has been felt on the product tanker market already as we speak, with official sanctions by the U.K. and also by the U.S., and there is self-sanctioning taking place by several Western market players that has led to a search in product flows from regions further afield. What we've seen on the ground is that U.S. and engine refiners, they were really quick to respond to this increase in demand for distillates which arose from the self sanctioning of the European receivers of -- primarily of Russian oil. U.S. Gulf refinery utilization responded and quickly increased to near maximum levels at around 95%, resulting in a significant increase in exports as the demand, both here in Europe but also in Latin America continued. Freight levels, as an example, in the U.S. Gulf went from lump-sum $800,000 in February 2022 to as high as $3 million during April 2022 for carrying diesel back to Europe. This increased MR earnings to close to $100,000 per day at the peak. In the Middle East, the increased demand for LR2 is to carry diesel, jet fuel back to the Atlantic Basin has also increased its port earnings. We experienced LR2 prior to the outbreak of the war at the range of around $10,000 per day at the end of February, which is currently, as we speak, trading up to $80,000 per day. The medium, the long-term implication on the product tanker market are yet to be seen. European Commission presented a plan last week to have a full ban of imports of Russian crude oil within 6 months and imports of Russian refined products by the end of the year. And effectively, this means that half of Europe's clean petroleum products import or 7% of the global clean petroleum product close would need to be replaced by other sources. As we have announced at the release of our fourth quarter release, TORM made the decision immediately after 24 Feb not to enter into any new business involving Russian port goals and also not taking on any new business for Russian accounts for whatever original destination it may be. Please turn to Slide 6. The need to recalibrate the whole oil product trade ecosystem will lengthen trade distances, hence, increasing the ton mile demand for tankers, given the obvious proximity of Russia to Europe, for example, if Northwest Europe imports diesel from the Middle East instead of from the Russian Baltic ports. It will increase the ton mile for the same amount of fuel by around 3x. So far, we've seen only a limited shift in the trading patterns, meaning that most of this effect will actually not be visible until the coming months. When we do our calculations and modeling, a total oil embargo by the EU on Russia and the corresponding trade recalibration would add a net of 7% to product tanker ton mile, purely based on changes in trade distances only. This would be a permanent effect, which will bring the fleet utilization rate to a new higher level as long as sanctions and self sanctions are in place. This trade recalibration effect comes on top of the 3% ton-mile growth we already forecasted for this year based on the continued oil demand recovery from the COVID-19 effect as well as the impact of the recent refinery closures and, as you all know, for example, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, where the import needs of all these regions have been increasing correspondingly. Further support is likely from the need to replenish both commercial and strategic oil inventories in many countries, which have been drawing for almost 2 years now. However, our opinion is that the timing of this effect is highly uncertain given the current backward dated oil price environment. Now on the tonnage supply side, we have seen low fleet growth this year and also expected in the next couple of years. The order book fleet ratio now standing at 5% for product tankers and contracting activity over the past 3 quarters being nettable. From this, you can easily deduct that also Russian-owned product tanker fleet will not be part of the active fleet due to sanctions and this is accounting for 2% of the total product tanker fleet. Since the start of the year, we've also seen a considerable number of LR tankers shifting into dirty trades, underpinned by the strong crude Aframax earnings as a result of Europe's search for alternative crude oil after Russia's invasion of Ukraine as well as subsequent crude strategic petroleum storage releases in the U.S. Here, please turn to our Slide #7. So far, we have only seen a small fraction of the potential trade recalibration effect with only 200 kilo barrels per day of European oil products import from Russia being replaced by supplies from the United States and the Middle East region, whereas this is from a high base in February 2022. However, the impact on the freight rates has been significant already. With a full ban on Russian oil products, we believe that the price incentives for these producers from the U.S. and the Middle East India will increase even further. The diesel market is currently very tight and a EU ban on Russian diesel would aggravate that tightness even further. However, the ramp-up of the Jazan refinery in Saudi Arabia and the start of Al Zour refinery in Kuwait, both scheduled for the coming months will facilitate the needed trade recalibration. We cannot disregard the fact that higher oil prices and high inflationary pressure on the global economy in general are likely to slow down the growth pace of global oil demand. Nevertheless, we believe that the positive demand effects of the redistribution of the energy supply chain will outweigh the negative effects caused by slower demand growth. This will be further supported by the need to refill commercial and strategic reserves once the oil price structure is supportive. I kindly ask you to turn to Slide 8. And here, if we look at medium and long-term drivers that go beyond the trade recalibration due to the political conflict we are facing in Europe right now. We're already seeing that more than 2 million barrels per day of refining capacity has been closed down permanently, and a further 0.6 million is scheduled to be closed down during this year and next year. On top of that, another 1 million barrels per day of capacity could risk being shut down. Most of the affected capacity is located in regions which are already largely importers of refined oil products such as Europe, U.S. West Coast, U.S., East Coast, Australia and New Zealand, South Africa. Even in the regions where refiners have already been closed down here in 2021 or 2020, we have not seen the full effect on import demand yet as oil demand has been negatively affected by COVID 19. At the same time, more than 4 million barrels per day of new capacity is scheduled to come online, mainly in the Middle East, China and India, regions which already today are large exporters of oil products. Both these developments are positive for trade flows and ton miles in the coming years with only a few projects that are less positive for trade. And here, please turn to our Slide #9. The positive outlook for the demand for product tankers in the next 3 to 5 years coincides with the supply side, which is the most supportive it has been for at least the last 25 years. With record high newbuilding prices, limited shipyard space, tanker ordering has, as I mentioned, been muted for the past 3 quarters. And here, consequently, the order book to fleet ratio for product tankers is now at a historically low level of 5% if we leave out chemical tankers. This is further supported by similar historically low 7% order book fleet ratio for crude tankers. So consequently, we are the fleet growth in the next 2 to 3 years will be hovering around 2% a year, only half the pace seen over the past 5 years. My concluding remarks here on the product tanker market, we do expect volatility on the market due to the current geopolitical tensions. That's considerable ton mile increases due to crude and all product tanker rerouting. This recalibration of the transport of refined oil products will take some time to settle. Once it is settled we are of the opinion that the average rate environment will be above the level we saw prior to the outbreak of the conflict in Ukraine. This will further be supported by increasing refinery dislocation effects as well as the need to rebuild depleted crude and product inventories further supported by this very positive supply side outlook. Please turn to Slide 10. And here, if we look at our commercial performance, we have again outperformed the peer average in almost all quarters during the past 6 years in the largest vessel class MR. And here, in the first quarter of 2022, we achieved rates of $16,462 per day in that segment. And I can say that I am, in general, very satisfied that the One TORM platform consistently deliver these superior results on a day-to-day basis. And here, kindly to Slide 11. These above-average TC units is driven by our continued focus on positioning our vessels in the basins with the highest earning potential. In the first quarter of 2022, we again had an overweight west of the Suez Canal, where we also saw an outperformance when looking at the full quarter. Now with that, let me hand it over to you, Kim, for a further elaboration on the cost structure, our liquidity position and the balance sheet.