Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Westlake Chemical Corporation's Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2014 Earnings Conference Call. During the presentation, all participants will be in a listen-only mode. After the speakers' remarks, you will be invited to participate in a question-and-answer session. As a reminder, ladies and gentlemen, this conference is being recorded today, February 24, 2015. I would now like to turn the call over to today's host, Dave Hansen, Westlake Chemical Corporation's Senior Vice President of Administration. Sir, you may now begin. David R. Hansen - Senior VP-Administration & Head-Media Relations: Thank you very much. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the Westlake Chemical Corporation's fourth quarter and full year 2014 conference call. I am joined today by Albert Chao, our President and CEO; Steve Bender, our Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer; and other members of our management team. The conference call agenda will begin with Albert, who will open with a few comments regarding Westlake's performance in the fourth quarter and full year 2014, followed by a current perspective on the industry. Steve will then provide a more detailed look at our financial and operating results. Finally, Albert will add a few comments regarding – Albert will add a few concluding comments, and then we'll open up the call for discussion questions. At times we may refer to ourselves as Westlake Chemical, reference to Westlake Partners refers to the master limited partnership Westlake Chemical Partners LP. References to OpCo refer to Westlake Chemical OpCo LP, whose assets consist of two ethylene production facilities located in Lake Charles, Louisiana and ethylene production facility located in Calvert City, Kentucky and an ethylene pipeline that runs from Mont Belvieu, Texas to Longview, Texas chemical sites. Today management is going to…

Thank you, Albert, and good morning everyone. I will begin with our consolidated financial results, followed by a detailed review of our Olefins and Vinyls segment results. In this morning's press release, Westlake reported net income for the fourth quarter of 2014 of $183 million, or $1.37 per diluted share, compared to a $171 million, or $1.27 per diluted share, reported in the fourth quarter of 2013. Net income in the fourth quarter of 2014 was negatively impacted by $4.4 million or $0.03 per diluted share as a result of an impairment of an equity investment in China. Net sales for the fourth quarter of 2014 of $1.1 billion increased $184 million compared to the same period of 2013, primarily due to sales attributable to the acquisition of Vinnolit, partially offset by lower styrene and ethylene co-products sales volumes. Income from operations was $302 million in the fourth quarter of 2014, an increase of $44 million over the fourth quarter of 2013, which was primarily the result of higher integrated Vinyls' margins, largely due to lower feedstock cost resulting from the ethylene expansion and feedstock conversion of our Calvert City ethylene unit. Westlake's net sales for the fourth quarter of 2014 of $1.1 billion decreased $117 million from net sales in the third quarter, primarily due to lower sales prices for most of our major products and lower sales volumes for polyethylene, PVC resin and building products, partially offset by incremental sales attributable to the acquisition of Vinnolit, which closed in the third quarter of 2014. Fourth quarter income from operations of $302 million decreased by $5 million, as compared to the third quarter, which was primarily the result of lower sales prices for most of our major products and the impact of a planned maintenance turnaround at our Gendorf,…

Please stand by for your first question, which comes from the line of Arun Viswanathan of RBC Capital Markets. Please proceed.

Hi. Thanks. Yes, so I just wanted to understand the expansion project, was there something that happened that had you guys push it out a little bit? And I guess beyond this, are there any further projects that you are contemplating to increase your capacity? Thanks.

Good morning, Arun. It's Steve. The timing for this expansion has always been, as we've guided, to be late 2015 or early 2016 as we've said in our detailed planning, our thinking now still has remained just as we said, would be in that first half of 2016, so nothing more than the detailed planning. And as we look at and assess projects, we'll talk about those, but we have nothing new to announce at this stage.

Okay, great. And maybe just help me understand what you're seeing in both Olefins and Vinyls. Currently, have you noticed any increased customer de-stocking in polyethylene? And then has there been a flattening of the cost curve in PVC, making North American exports less viable? And then also, maybe if you can just talk about recent conditions in caustic? There's been some price increases. Are you seeing any traction in those markets? Thanks. Albert Yuan Chao - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Sure. As you know, the recent past few weeks, oil price has stabilized and has come up a little bit. As a result, the Asian market price of both polyethylene and PVC is trending up, especially now that this week the Chinese New Year holidays will be over. People will get back to business and we believe that the demand will improve. So even though some industry consultants are forecasting prices to drop further, it's yet to be seen, because the consultants are looking at the oil price to be lower in second quarter with the future markets for oil price actually trending upwards. So we don't know yet until we see how the oil price behaves. The fundamental demand for petrochemical products are quite good as we hear that economies in Europe tend to be improving and the economies in Europe also forecast that this year will be better than last year; economic growth. So we see the fundamental demand with oil prices in the world will be better and we expect the business to improve further. From the competitive position for PVC from the U.S., as you may know that China is the largest PVC market, about 80% of that production is from coal-based and because of dropping oil prices and without beginning to drop (23:55) coal prices, the Chinese coal-based PVC manufacturing become less competitive. So actually the potential for U.S. to export in the global market has actually improved with lower oil prices. Coming to the caustic market, there has been announced price increases in the caustic market for this year. There has been some give and take. On the other hand, the demand for chlorine, as we're coming into the building season in the spring, would increase. And with increased production of chlorine, there will be increased production in caustic as well. So depending how the U.S. economy goes, whether the caustic price increases can be pushed through or not, are yet to be seen.

I'm sorry. Thanks for that detail. And then just one last follow-up, given that your CapEx now is $400 million to $450 million, would you be deploying cash towards your newly announced buyback program? Or where do you see increased cash being used? Thanks.

Certainly, the program that we've had authorized by the board is an opportunistic program and certainly we'll continue to look for ways to deploy capital as we see opportunities. And as you know we've looked at deploying it on projects, but also returning it to investors. So that's certainly one of the opportunities.

Great. Thanks a lot. David R. Hansen - Senior VP-Administration & Head-Media Relations: You're welcome.

Your next question comes from the line of Edlain Rodriguez of UBS. Please go ahead.

Thank you. Good morning, guys.

Good morning.

Albert, quick question, I mean one of your competitors was trying to see if they can MLP, it's chlor-alkali business. Would your assets be eligible for that? And also, is this something you would contemplate doing, especially given your experience in the ethylene MLP world?

Edlain, it's Steve. I guess, what I would say is, we always look for opportunities to grow Westlake Partners and things that qualify, we'll continue to assess.

Okay. And the other question is like in terms of your cash, you have a lot of cash on the balance sheet. You're going to generate a lot of cash. There are many assets probably would be available in the Chemical sector, I mean would Westlake be interested in further consolidation in the space or in opportunistic assets?

Well, as we've consistently said, we assess opportunities that are in our space or those that we think we can bring value to and that's continuing – and we continue to look at those opportunities that we think we can bring value to.

Okay. Thank you. David R. Hansen - Senior VP-Administration & Head-Media Relations: You're welcome.

The next question comes from the line of Brian Maguire of Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead. Brian P. Maguire - Goldman Sachs & Co.: Hey, good morning, guys.

Good morning, Brian. Albert Yuan Chao - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Good morning. Brian P. Maguire - Goldman Sachs & Co.: It seems like the industry built a lot of inventory for polyethylene in the fourth quarter and into January, looks some consultants reporting, it's in the 40-day, 45-day range versus 30-day, 35-day historically. Can you just comment on your own sort of inventory levels versus normal for this time of year? And how you'd assess the inventory build that you saw the experience in the fourth quarter? Albert Yuan Chao - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yes. With the falling oil prices and the falling polyethylene price as announced by industry consultants, suddenly our customers are trying to buy as little as possible, they speak, what they need. And eventually polyethylene during the last quarter has built up somewhat, one the other hand there are certain grades, certain polymers in polyethylene still quite short. Now the inventory levels in customer side are quite low. So I think on balance the inventory is quite normal, if you balance between customers and producers. So as oil prices, if it cease falling, and actually reversing, there could be a reversal of the inventory build rather than inventory destocking. Brian P. Maguire - Goldman Sachs & Co.: Great. Thanks. That's helpful. And one of the phenomena we saw in 2014 for ethylene was, a lot of industry outages drove spot prices materially higher than where contract prices were even relative to where polyethylene was, pricing was almost at parity with polyethylene at some point. Looking ahead to 2015 we're now in a different environment, it looks like spot price is at or below, where contract was, just if you could help us frame, what kind of impact that might have on 2015 versus 2014, trying to get a sense of how much spot might have benefited you in 2014; and with something like the one we have in 2015, what kind of impact that might have? Albert Yuan Chao - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Certainly. Since we are more or less fully integrated and actually we're net buyers of ethylene. The price of ethylene does not have that much impact on our business. And as we finished our next expansion by the first half of 2016 then we'll be more or less fully integrated. So we totally insulated from the swings in ethylene price. So what's important is really polyethylene price and PVC price and the feedstock, which is I think rather than ethylene price. Brian P. Maguire - Goldman Sachs & Co.: Okay. Great. One last one if I could Steve, any guidance on the FIFO impact for the first quarter? Or is it still too early to tell?

Well, it's still early, but certainly we've continued to see feedstocks remain lower if you were going back from December and so certainly we could continue to see some impact on that, but as we get further into the year you'll be able to see whether we're seeing prices improve or decreasing to get a good sense of that. Brian P. Maguire - Goldman Sachs & Co.: Great. Thanks very much.

You're welcome.

Next question comes from the line of Frank Mitsch of Wells Fargo Securities. Please go ahead.

Good morning, gentlemen. I've got a couple of follow-ups here. Steve, you mentioned you'd be interested in MLP, things into Westlake Partners for assets that qualify, what's your take? Does chlor-alkali qualify for MLP status?

Well, I think we're going to have to assess the opportunities as we see them, Frank. And as AKSA (30:42) goes through their PLR [private letter ruling] process, we'll just have to see what the service rules.

All right. And just as a reminder, how long did it take when you guys applied for your PLR to actually receive it?

It was three months to five months.

All right. Great. And Albert you mentioned that there are certain grades of polyethylene that are sure. How does the overall low density market look? Albert Yuan Chao - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Our low density as you know it has a premium value and price to the other polyethylene. And they have some inventory build over the year-end, but I think as the economy improves and the holidays are over in Asia, I think the demand should come back or the demand from the price swing should come back.

Okay, great. And I guess it's been about nine months, since you acquired Vinnolit, what are your thoughts this far into the deal, and I believe there was an expectation of it being about $0.20 accretive on an annual basis. How would you say it's tracking relative to that metric? Albert Yuan Chao - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: From the business side, it's tracking pretty much as we've expected. From the financial side, as Steve mentioned earlier, because of inventory adjustments and acquisition costs, it has a negative impact for a while. But we believe as the euro has devalued with the ethylene price much lower in Europe than it was before, the industry should be much more competitive.

And then, post the initial expenses of the start-up cost and so forth, we get back to that $0.20 run rate you believe.

Yeah, Frank, as I said those expenses that we had were fully expected as well as the turnaround that we had in Gendorf, Germany was also expected. So you know as I say, none of these were unexpected items in our understanding of the Vinnolit business plan.

All right. Thank you so much. David R. Hansen - Senior VP-Administration & Head-Media Relations: You're welcome.

The next question comes from the line of James Sheehan of SunTrust Robinson Humphrey. Please go ahead.

Good morning, Albert. Albert Yuan Chao - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Good morning.

I was wondering if you could just comment on your impression of how ethylene operating rates will trend over the next couple of years. Do you see them moving higher as global demand grows and tightens the supply-demand balance further? Albert Yuan Chao - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yes, ethylene business in the U.S. which is primarily ethane based. It still is on the lowest cost producer in the world, and has still very good margin. And until the first wave of new expansion comes along, which probably is 2017, 2018, I think the U.S. ethylene business will be doing quite well.

How were your ethylene margins tracking so far in the first quarter relative to the fourth quarter? Albert Yuan Chao - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Well, as I said earlier, we are integrated to our downstream products, polyethylene and PVC. And actually we are a net ethylene buyer, so as an earlier speaker/questioner has said, suddenly the spot ethylene price has come down, and so it has made U.S. polymer producers more competitive, especially on the vinyls side.

Thank you. And could you comment on your building products volumes during the quarter and what your outlook is for the first quarter? Albert Yuan Chao - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yes, the fourth quarter generally is a slow quarter, seasonally, for building products. And so far, especially last couple of weeks, the weather has been quite bad in the Northeast/Midwest area. But we hope that the warm weather will come back soon and I think with the U.S. economy growing faster than last year, it should be good for the building business this year.

You've listed your vinyls volumes as up 87% for the fourth quarter, could you just give us some color on what that was excluding the Vinnolit acquisition?

Well, the great majority of that was the Vinnolit acquisition. Remember we only had a portion of that in Q3 when we closed Vinnolit, so the great majority of that was Vinnolit volume. As Albert noted, fourth quarter is a seasonally soft period in the North American building markets and so the majority of that was Vinnolit.

Thank you very much. David R. Hansen - Senior VP-Administration & Head-Media Relations: You're welcome.

Your next question comes from the line of Hassan Ahmed of Alembic Global. Please go ahead.

Morning, Albert and Steve.

Good morning. Albert Yuan Chao - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Good morning, Hassan.

Quick question around – I know you've touched on this and talked about the nearer term volume side of things. But just wanted a follow-up, obviously volumes weak in Q4, I guess, oil prices all over the place, destocking and the like. Just directionally, just what are you seeing in Q1? And I obviously know Chinese New Year and the like, but sequentially are you seeing volumes up, flat, down? Any directional guidance would be appreciated? Albert Yuan Chao - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: We see that volume in general is as expected and the first few months, when the industry consultants are forecasting monthly price drops, suddenly the customers are very cautious and they only buy what they need. But I think as soon as they see that the prices bottomed and they will get back to normal and, I said earlier, most of the customers' inventory are quite low.

Fair enough. Now the other question on feedstock flexibility: obviously we've seen ethane versus propane-based margins competing with each other, where propane-based margins for several months were superior to ethane-based ones. So what's your thought process in terms of toggling between the two feedstocks? And how quickly – a) what's the maximum amount of propane you could potentially use? And how quickly could you toggle back and forth? Albert Yuan Chao - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Certainly. As you know that, our Lake Charles ethylene plants, one is purely ethane and the other one was a 50/50 E/P [ethane/propane] that we convert to a 100% capability for ethane. And certainly we can add the propane back, as matter of days. We can go back and forth. Our Calvert City was a propane cracker that we converted to ethane. And because of that we also add 180 million pounds additional ethylene capacity. Certainly we can go back to propane, but that will reduce our ethylene production, and we calculated based on the benefits of propane, which today propane, according to IHS, is still higher in cost than ethane. So it's better for us to run ethane and also have 180 million pounds of increased capacity with its margin along with it.

Super. And one final one if I may; obviously there was a lot of chatter around ethane exports and how supply/demand fundamentals may tighten for ethane going forward on the back of these exports. What's your thought process now? Albert Yuan Chao - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yes, that's a good question. Certainly with today's view that ethane exports, with all the extra costs and compared with a naphtha or LPG cracker in Europe or Asia, the ethane exports will be not economical. I guess in the people's view is, in the future, what future naphtha and ethane export will be, but even with naphtha prices very high, it's very expensive to export ethane, especially if you're (38:43) to convert a naphtha cracker to an ethane cracker and put in all the infrastructure to receive ethane.

Very helpful. Thanks so much, Albert. Albert Yuan Chao - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: You're welcome.

Your next question comes from the line of John Roberts of UBS. Please go ahead. I think that call has dropped out. The next question comes from the line of Brian Maguire, Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead. Brian P. Maguire - Goldman Sachs & Co.: Yeah, just some housekeeping follow-ups. Steve, the $4.4 million equity impairment, was that in corporate or the Vinyls segment and then on the consolidated statement, was that in SG&A or other just where that would be located?

Ladies and gentlemen, I'm afraid, it appears that the speakers' line has disconnected. We will try and get them rejoin as soon as we can. In the meantime, we will re-put the music. (40:05 – 40:59)

Hello sir, you're back in the main call now.

All right. Thank you. Are we live on the call?

You are currently live.

Thank you very much. Ladies and gentlemen, we apologize for the technical interruption for just a moment. And we return back to the questions-and-answers. I believe Mr. Maguire was asking a question and that we can resume that now. Brian P. Maguire - Goldman Sachs & Co.: Can you guys hear me? Albert Yuan Chao - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yes. We can. Brian P. Maguire - Goldman Sachs & Co.: Okay. Yeah. My question was just a housekeeping one on the equity income impairment, the $4.4 million just where to find that on the income statement and then, also between the segments where that got allocated?

It's in the corporate piece, and it hasn't allocated, remains in the corporate piece, Brian. Brian P. Maguire - Goldman Sachs & Co.: Okay. And then just on the income statement would it be SG&A or kind of the other buckets?

It's in – you'll see it in other income and expense. Brian P. Maguire - Goldman Sachs & Co.: Okay. And then, any guidance on turnaround activity in 2015. How it would shake out between the quarters, any planned turnarounds?

There are none planned at this stage. Brian P. Maguire - Goldman Sachs & Co.: Okay. Thanks very much. Albert Yuan Chao - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: You're welcome. David R. Hansen - Senior VP-Administration & Head-Media Relations: Operator, we're going to have time for just one more call. We apologize for the audio disruption, but one more call please?

One more question and that comes from the line of James Sheehan of SunTrust Robinson Humphrey. Please go ahead.

Thank you. There has been some price increases in the market for chlorine that have been nominated. I was just wondering, if you could comment on the outcome of those, if you think that those will be accepted in the market? Thank you. Albert Yuan Chao - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yes, there's been announcement of chlorine increase by the merchant chlorine producers. And as I said earlier, this spring time is the season when the demand for choline increases and it's time that will tell whether that chlorine increase will be pushed through or not?

Thanks a lot. Albert Yuan Chao - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: You're welcome. David R. Hansen - Senior VP-Administration & Head-Media Relations: Operator?

The time to Q&A session is now ended. Are there any closing remarks? David R. Hansen - Senior VP-Administration & Head-Media Relations: Thank you very much. We appreciate your participation in today's call. We look forward to you joining us again for our next conference call to discuss our first quarter 2015 results. Thank you very much and have a wonderful day.