Jerry Sheridan
Analyst · Wells Fargo. Your line is open
Okay. Thank you, Kirk. Yes, for AmeriGas, adjusted EBITDA for the second quarter was $342 million a record quarter for the company, $11 million above the $331 million earned last year. Volume for the quarter was 448 million gallons, or 6% below last year on weather that was 7% warmer than last year. The business performed quite well nationally with strong volumes in the Eastern and Midwest parts of the country, where weather was colder than normal, but slightly warmer than last year. And once again our operations in the West were faced with very warm weather in the quarter, weather averaged about 15% warmer than last year. Propane cost at Mont Belvieu averaged $0.53 in Q2, which was $0.23 below Q1 and $0.78 below the second quarter last year. We were also able to work through the high cost inventory that negatively affected our cost of gas in Q1 and spilled over into January and February. This lower price deck for propane allowed our customers to enjoy lower cost, as our average selling prices decreased over 20%. The decline in cost environment enabled slightly higher margins and we finished Q2 with margins $0.05 above last year’s Q2. Operating expenses were also a good story with expenses down 9%, or $24 million due primarily lower bad debt expense, reduced vehicle fuel and repair costs, and lower payroll and benefits costs, as our fuel teams managed over time quite well, overall, the good quarter. Now turning to our growth drivers, ACE, our AmeriGas Cylinder Exchange program increased volume by 3% in the quarter and we’re looking forward to the spring/summer drilling season. AmeriGas Cylinder Exchange markets from over 47,000 outlets nationwide. Our National Accounts program volume increased by 14%, which was very positive given the warmer weather relative to the prior year. The growth has been organic with National Accounts adding 29 new accounts this year. We also completed five small-scale acquisitions year-to-date and see a growing pipeline into the spring. Given our solid performance in the quarter and our expectations for the second-half, we’re maintaining our full-year guidance at $635 million to $665 million in adjusted EBITDA for fiscal 2015. Finally, we were pleased that our Board of Directors approved a 4.5% distribution increase to $0.92 per quarter, or $3.68 annualized. And this represents the 11th consecutive year that AmeriGas has increased the distribution and a compound average growth rate of distribution has averaged over 5% in the last five years. In addition to our distribution growth, we’ve also been consistent in providing solid returns to our unitholders with a compound average unitholder return for the last three-year, five-year, and 10-year periods of 14%, 11%, and 13% respectively. That concludes my comments. I’ll turn the call back over to John.