Ira Birns
Analyst · Stephens. Your line is open. Please go ahead
Thank you, Michael, and good evening everyone. Consolidated revenue for the forward quarter was $8.2 billion up 58% compared to the first quarter of 2016. The increase was due to the 55% increase in oil prices, as well as increased overall volume principally from the APP and PAPCO acquisitions that were not included in last year's first quarter results. Our aviation segment volume was 1.8 billion gallons in the first quarter, up 200 million gallons of 13% year-over-year. Volume growth at our aviation segment was derived principally from gains at our core resale operations in North America, Europe and Asia. Volume in our marine segment for the first quarter was 6.8 million metric tons down approximately 800,000 metric tons or 11% year-over-year. The largest driver of the volume decline came from a reduction in low margin, low return activity in Asia. Our land segment volume was 1.5 billion gallons during the first quarter, that’s up approximately 300 million gallons or 23% from the first quarter of 2016 again principally driven by the acquisitions of PAPCO and APP. Lastly, fully consolidated volume for the first quarter was 5.1 billion gallons, an increase of approximately 300 million gallons with 6% year-over-year. Consolidated gross profit in the first quarter was $231 million, an increase of $10 million or 5% compared to the first quarter of 2016. Our aviation segment contributed $100 million of gross profit in the first quarter, that’s an increase of $11 million or 13% compared to the first quarter of last year. The principal drivers of the gross profit increase came from our core resell business, as well as our government related business activities. In terms of the ExxonMobil transaction, while the transaction is now effectively complete, the integration process is continuing. While we expect this transaction to begin making profit contributions during the second quarter, we believe these opportunities will strengthen as we enter 2018, once we gain a few quarters of running these operations under our belt. The marine segment generated gross profit of $34 million, that’s down $6 million or 14% year-over-year. The gross profit decline in marine was principally driven by reduced volume in margins in our core business impacted by market conditions and lower profits from the sale of price risk management products to our marine customers. In the mean time, the actions that we took over the past few months to streamline our operations in the marine model by taking cost out of the business have been effectively completed which has improved the operating efficiencies of marine business going forward. Our land segment delivered gross profit of $98 million in first quarter, that’s an increase of $4 million or 5% year-over-year. The increase in land segment gross profit is principally attributed to recent acquisitions offset by a decline in our European land segment profitability driven by warm weather and also a 14% decline in currency rates compared to the prior year, as well as lower profitability related to supply and training activities in the United States. As a follow-up to last quarter's call, the Colonial Pipeline generally returned to normal in the first quarter reducing the global supply in the Midwest which returned to profitability, where our conditions in the Northeast didn’t improve materially as this market remain oversupply for much of the quarter. Non-fuel related gross profit associated with our multiservice payment solutions business was $14.1 million in the first quarter, that's an increase of 13% compared to the first quarter of last year. We continue to expect gross profit from this business to grow 20% year-over-year as we continue to find new opportunities by leveraging our growing payments platform. As I continue with the remainder of the financial review, please note that the following figures exclude the impact of $4.8 million of pretax non-recurring expenses in the first quarter, as well as non-recurring items incurred as previously reported as highlighted in our earnings release. This amount is principally comprised of acquisition related expenses and severance costs. To assist as all of in reconciling results published in our earnings release and 10-Q, the breakout of the $4.8 million is as follows; $2.7 million impacted the aviation segment, $600,000 impacted the land segment, $500,000 impacted the marine segment, $400,000 impacted unallocated corporate expenses, and $600,000 impacted non-operating expenses. Of the $4.2 million which impacted compensation and G&A, $1.4 million impacted compensation and $2.8 million impacted general and administrative expenses. The reconciliation of these amounts to be found on our website and rest live of the webcast presentation. Operating expenses in the first quarter excluding our provision for bad debt and one-time expenses were $174 million up $17 million or 11% year-over-year but a decrease of $7 million or 4% sequentially reflecting the impact of our continuing cost cutting initiatives. The year-over-year increase in operating expenses was principally related to expenses of acquire businesses. Total operating expenses excluding bad debt expense and any one-time cost should be in a range of approximately $174 million to $179 million in the second quarter which is effectively flat with the first quarter adjusted for incremental expenses associated with the recently completed ExxonMobil transaction in Australia, New Zealand, Germany and Italy. Our bad debt provision for the first quarter was $2.5 million up $1 million compared to the first quarter of 2016. Consolidated income for operations for the first quarter was $55 million down $8 million year-over-year but an increase of $21 million sequentially. Non-operating expenses principally comprised of interest expense in the first quarter was $13.7 million an increase of $7.4 million compared to the first quarter of 2016 principally related to increased borrowings associated with our increased volume higher fuel prices, the funding and acquisitions and higher average interest rates compared to last year. I would assume non-operating expenses to be approximately $13 million to $16 million in the second quarter. Our effective tax rate in the first quarter was 16% compared to 13.2% which excludes discrete tax item in the first quarter of last year. At this time we still estimate that our effective tax rate for the full year of 2017 should be between 15% and 18%. Adjusted net income was $34.6 million this quarter down $18.3 million year-over-year. Non-GAAP net income which excludes one-time expenses and also excludes intangible amortization and stock-based comp was $44.5 million in the first quarter a decrease of $18 million from the first quarter of last year. Adjusted diluted earnings per share was $0.50 in the first quarter down from $0.76 in the first quarter of 2016. And non-GAAP diluted earnings per share was $0.64 in the first quarter down from $0.90 in the first quarter of 2016. Our total accounts receivable balance was $2.2 billion at quarter end down $135 million compared to year-end 2016 and networking capital was approximately $940 million down approximately $90 million compared to December of 2016. Both down despite an increase in average fuel prices during the first quarter. After using a modest amount of cash in the fourth quarter we generated $137 million of cash flow from operations in the first quarter. That is the 18th at the less 19th less quarters where we have generated positive operating cash flow. Additionally we repurchased $11 million of shares of common stock in the first quarter and we expect to repurchase additional shares over the course of the year delivering incremental value to our shareholders. In closing we generally performed as expected in the first quarter rebounding from our refinished at 2016 and after using cash from the fourth quarter to the first time in four years we not only generated cash again this quarter but generated significant cash. All the corner where we saw fuel prices increasing. We remain confidence in our ability to deliver results for 2017 consistent with the guidance we provided when started the year. As previously stated last quarter such expectations remained attendant on continued strong contributions from our government related activities anticipated contributions from three recent acquisitions the start in normal winter weather patterns in the U.K. and U.S. and our ability to fully realize our previously announced cost saving initiatives. I would now like to turn the call over to Collin our operator to begin the Q&A session.