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ATN International, Inc. (ATNI)

Q4 2014 Earnings Call· Thu, Feb 26, 2015

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Atlantic Tele-Network Q4 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. Later, we will conduct a question-and-answer sessions and instructions will follow at that time. [Operator Instructions]. As a reminder, this conference maybe recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to host of today’s call, Mr. Justin Benincasa. You may begin.

Justin Benincasa

Analyst

Thank you, Tania. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us on our call to review our fourth quarter and full year 2014 results. With me here is Michael Prior, ATN’s President and Chief Executive Officer. During the call, I’ll be covering the relevant financial information and certain operational data; and Michael will be providing an update on the business. Before I turn the call over to Michael for his comments, I’d like to point out that this call and our press release contain forward-looking statements concerning our current expectations, objectives and underlying assumptions regarding our future operating results and are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those described. Also, in an effort to provide useful information to investors, our comments today include non-GAAP financial measures. For detail on these measures and reconciliations to comparable GAAP measures, and for further information regarding the factors that may affect our future operating results, please refer to our earnings release on our website at atni.com or to the 8-K filing provided to the SEC. And I’ll turn the call over to Michael for his comments.

Michael Prior

Analyst

Thank you, Justin. Good morning everyone. I’ll start with some highlights for the quarter and for the year, first starting with the quarter. The fourth quarter was a fitting end to a very strong year and the trends behind the results were consistent with what we’ve seen in previous quarters. The main story of course was the growth in U.S. wireless revenue and EBITDA following a number of quarters of network expansion and upgrades. It is always rewarding to see investments payoff as forecast, but there was a lot of hard work behind that success. And we appreciate the efforts of our team and the trust placed in us by customers. The U.S. wireless business is our largest in terms of revenue and even more so in terms of profits because of our 100% equity interest. So, the strong year in that segment more than compensated for relatively stable operating revenues and our other businesses in the aggregate. That is not so there were not successes in other areas. Bermuda managed to hold steady and turned in another strong year following an excellent 2013. Broadband revenues in Guyana increased and U.S. Wireline completed its major fiber builds with strong momentum in bringing in new revenue and customers. While growth rate in some operations are expected to receive, we see 2015 as a year with great potential for enhancing value, both through improving profitability in a number of operations and in enhancing the long-term prospects and strategic value of others. Furthermore, we look forward to investing more of our substantial balance sheet capacity and opportunities that we believe have a good chance of delivering attractive risk-adjusted returns on our capital. That is a good position to be in. In other areas, we ended the year of active review of a number…

Justin Benincasa

Analyst

Thank you, Michael. Total company revenues for the quarter were $88.5 million and for the full year $336.3 million, up 15% for both periods from 2013. And as Michael had commented earlier, growth this quarter continued to be driven by our U.S. wireless segment. Revenues in Guyana were down this quarter compared to a year ago as growth in broadband revenues was offset by revenue declines in our wireless and local and long distance voice operations. Also impacting this comparison in Guyana was an out of period adjustment recorded in the fourth quarter of 2013 and local currency devaluation which amounted to approximately $1.4 million for the full year. Similar to last quarter, our island wireless segment, our roaming revenues declined this quarter due to overall lower wholesale roaming rates and a new retail roaming offering in Bermuda. Adjusted EBITDA for the quarter increased 26% to $35.7 million, and our adjusted EBITDA margin was 40%. For the full year, adjusted EBITDA increased 22% to a $139.8 million and our adjusted EBITDA margin was 42%. Moving down the income statement, this quarter’s operating income adjusted for transaction related charges was $22.2 million, up 38% from the same quarter last year and $88.5 million, up 33% over 2013 for the full year. The strong performance is driven by 95% increase in operating income from our U.S. wireless business this quarter which more than offset the lower operating income comparisons in our other businesses. As noted in our press release, we entered into distributed generation solar business late in the fourth quarter and show the stub period results of approximately eight days of operations from that acquisition in the renewable energy segment. The operating income for that segment was negatively impacted by approximately $2.5 million of transaction cost. Operating expenses this quarter included…

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions]. And our first question comes from Ric Prentiss of Raymond James. Your line is open.

Ric Prentiss

Analyst

Hi. Good morning, guys.

Michael Prior

Analyst

Good morning.

Ric Prentiss

Analyst

I want to bore down a little bit more on the Comnet U.S. wireless business. I’m just trying to frame the guidance or the thoughts. So, it sounds like first quarter 2015, the contract maybe won’t be fully effect. So, you’ll see continuing good volumes, not as much price cuts but then starting in 2Q revenues down year-over-year. If we kind of look at where levels were in 2013 versus 2014; are we going back towards 2013 levels, are we going in between 2013 and 2014 levels? Just trying to get a sense of where the recalibration is. I know you’re getting long-term contract and you want to earn a return on that but just trying to gauge what we’re looking at.

Michael Prior

Analyst

Yes. I don’t think -- we’re not talking about going back to 2013 but the answer on the first part of what you’re saying is it’s not necessary when the pricing taking effect, it’s that in the first quarter there are bigger comparisons from the point of view of network reach and upgrades and so translated collectively into volumes. So, I think the offset to the price decline is much more pronounced in the first quarter we expect, then in the next three quarters. And so that’s why we see it happening in that direction.

Ric Prentiss

Analyst

Okay. And then, in past quarters, you told us how much of your base stations were already with 3G. Where are you as far as of those 764, how many are 3G?

Michael Prior

Analyst

We’re about 75% 3G now, Ric.

Ric Prentiss

Analyst

Okay. And we were just on the call with nTelos, regional operator in the Virginia are, and they were somewhat bemoaning the fact they were late with 4G, LTE even in their more rural environments and West Virginia. Where are you guys at as far as deploying 4G? Every carrier we talk to is just talking about how fast 4G is ramping and how important to customers 4G is. So, as you look at the long-term six year contract with a customer, is there LTE commitments in it; could that help long-term revenues as well?

Michael Prior

Analyst

Yes. LTE is contemplated in that agreement and we have LTE -- we would expect to beginning to roll it out more seriously this year. We have some limited deployment now but that’s largely for some of the retail that we talked about. And I think that’s the distinction I would draw is important to retail customers. I think in a lot of the areas we’re in, they’re truly so remote that the expectations are a little bit different. So, it tends always to lag behind. I mean if you think about when we were deploying 3G, it’s many years after most would have done in a retail environment. And it’s really driven too by the customer, right? It’s pretty easy for us to do it, to roll it out when we think our carrier customers would like to see it. So, it’s really we don’t hold back.

Ric Prentiss

Analyst

Okay. And then on the renewable energy side, you guys -- it looks like an attractive offer towards the end of last year, probably because your ability to add quickly, partly because of your ability with the balance sheet area where to have cash ready. Are there other transactions where your special sauce which is I got cash, I can close quickly but I want a good deal; are there other of those deal types out there in the renewable energy space?

Justin Benincasa

Analyst

I hope so. I mean I think right now there is a lot of interest in the space. There is some asset value increase because of the YieldCo phenomenon. So, that kind of trickles down all the way through. Th0ey are buying up assets for these YieldCos and much like we’ve seen in the tower space. But I think there will be those opportunities. And I think when you look out at the 2016 ITC reduction from 30% to 10% that’s contemplated at the end of the year there that kind of has two effects right now. It has an effect of really a flurry of building, particularly in the utility scale area, so the much larger deployments. And what I also think we think will happen is that at some point, there is going to be a bit of a crush where people couldn’t quite get into that timeframe or overcommitted and there maybe opportunity there. Similarly I think an increase in the interest rate environment could start to trickle down too because financing cost is a huge component in this sector.

Ric Prentiss

Analyst

And as we think about possibly $30 million, probably it sounds like chunky acquisitions or chunky CapEx. What kind of multiples does that get you? I know for Ahana one, you paid about eight times I think enterprise value to EBITDA. How should we think about what $30 million in CapEx could actually produce in EBITDA and is that the right way to think about it?

Justin Benincasa

Analyst

Yes. It’s hard to think about it exactly that way. I mean of course we look at those considerations when we do it. But you can think about what is $30 million of equity value as an overall. But really you come down to what -- if you take the agreements you are going to get or you are buying the power purchase agreements, you run the numbers and you look at after tax levered returns that are really in the low double-digits these days, so the low teens, maybe to mid teens in a lot of the deals. And so, there is reasons for that. The risks are very low if it’s a high quality asset, high quality off-taker. But at the same time, we think there still maybe opportunities to be on the upper end of that. And that’s because that will tend to be where we’ll focus.

Ric Prentiss

Analyst

Okay. Thanks guys.

Operator

Operator

And our next question comes from Barry McCarver of Stephens, Inc. Your line is open.

Barry McCarver

Analyst

Good morning, guys. And thanks for taking my questions. I think you’ve got most of them answered. But just considering expectations for the U.S. wireless business and then obviously offset by margins from your new acquired business, kind of directionally how do you think EBITDA margin shake out for 2015?

Justin Benincasa

Analyst

I think EBITDA margin overall, I’m assuming you’re talking, right?

Barry McCarver

Analyst

Right.

Justin Benincasa

Analyst

Yes. I think overall -- any impact on the U.S. wireless business definitely impacts that margins. So, I think overall will come down slightly but not dramatically because there is a high margin. I mean like you said, it’s pretty high margin business on the solar business.

Barry McCarver

Analyst

Okay.

Justin Benincasa

Analyst

But somewhat offset by wireless.

Barry McCarver

Analyst

And then just continuing on that the question from Ric about the CapEx. Is that -- the CapEx spend this year kind of depending on level, I know it’s a little bit uncertainty for the renewable business but does that drive revenue pretty quickly and what would be kind of maintenance CapEx for that business, annually?

Justin Benincasa

Analyst

It really is very little to -- at many maintenance CapEx if you, it’s pretty small number. So, it’s really that would be…

Michael Prior

Analyst

Are you talking about renewables, Barry?

Barry McCarver

Analyst

Yes.

Justin Benincasa

Analyst

Okay, renewables. In terms of the CapEx, it depends where that money goes. If it buys a producing project, then it’s a media that it’s something where we’re building it from the ground up; it will take more time obviously to be revenue generating.

Michael Prior

Analyst

The way to think about it maybe is if it’s organic, if it’s truly CapEx probably won’t have a significant impact this year.

Justin Benincasa

Analyst

Right.

Michael Prior

Analyst

But if it’s not really CapEx but it’s the equity part of investment, it would be very quick.

Barry McCarver

Analyst

Okay. That’s helpful. Thanks guys.

Michael Prior

Analyst

Sure.

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions]. And our next question comes from Hamed Khorsand of BWS Financial. Your line is open.

Hamed Khorsand

Analyst

Good morning. I just want to start off on the U.S. wireless. And last year, you were making similar comments about rates declining and you were able to offset that with more base station increase in traffic. How much do you feel you could do that this year? Can you add more base stations and tack on more traffic?

Michael Prior

Analyst

Yes. We didn’t get it right last year. And part of that is timing of some things we saw and part of it was we did such a big build the year before and that year that the added volume was bigger than we have forecast. And that’s always a tricky thing to do. I think this year there are fewer moving parts and much more clear movement on prices. So, I think the opportunity to be wrong to the upside by the degree which were last year, seems very slim this year. Again, I think this is a good thing. And as you get the rates down to certain level, I think it just makes this really a nice log-term business because it just makes the long-term economics, not just the short-term economics attractive to the carrier customers.

Hamed Khorsand

Analyst

What kind of impact does this have on the EBITDA margin for the segment?

Michael Prior

Analyst

We haven’t given a number there. But when we lose revenue because of pricing, we still have a lot of the same cost. So, it definitely will reduce EBITDA margin.

Hamed Khorsand

Analyst

That was obvious, but I was just trying to figure out how much of impact are we talking about when business you use to run around 60% or 70% EBITDA margins; are we looking at half that rate or just slightly lower rate on the EBITDA margin line?

Michael Prior

Analyst

We just haven’t given a precise number there, Hamed.

Hamed Khorsand

Analyst

Okay, alright. And then, as far as on the island side where you’re talking about the roaming business going away, are you looking at opportunities as far as revenue -- opportunities in that area, maybe from Wi-Fi service or anything like that?

Michael Prior

Analyst

Yes, we have done some of that but the convenience factor is different. And there is a lot of the Wi-Fi that tourists will see in the kind of more tourist driven market. It will be driven by hotels; and from a business user, it can be businesses and hotels. So, the opportunities don’t equate to traffic that used to be there. And I just don’t think -- I think at this point, it’s going on so long, it’s a hard trend to reverse because it’s -- as I said, customers have been at their behavior condition.

Hamed Khorsand

Analyst

Okay. That’s it for me. Thank you.

Michael Prior

Analyst

Yes.

Operator

Operator

And our last question comes from Ric Prentiss of Raymond James. Your line is open.

Ric Prentiss

Analyst

Hey guys, a couple of quick follow-ups if I could. On the Comnet business, you talked about also how it makes sense for you guys, John Stanton long ago called it would be the end of roaming swizzle end of roaming, so where you can provide network from multiple people and be agnostic. What are you at as far as your revenue mix across the big four carriers? Because it would see as LTE becomes more prevalent rolled out, possibly you could see a growing number of carriers come to. So just trying to gauge how many really carrier customers do you have at your different sites?

Michael Prior

Analyst

We will most try to typically have all the national carriers but the big two to-date have been disproportionate share of it, not just because of size but because they seem to be more strategic about thinking that’s a worthwhile expense. I think there is opportunity to increase that and that helps us make it attractive for all.

Ric Prentiss

Analyst

Because when you think about Sprint repurposing the 800 item frequencies, do you have access with spectrum agreements with carriers that could help? T-Mobile’s rolling out 700, Sprint’s rolling out 800 and TELUS talked about rolling out 800. So, I am just trying to think you talked a little bit about how are you going to lock in some spectrum at the long-term contract, but do you have enough spectrum also to handle these multiple carriers and the right bands?

Michael Prior

Analyst

Yes, I think without speaking about any specific carriers, I think that there is -- spectrum should not be the problem. It’s always a very important consideration and we have to make sure to secure it. But I think there are ways to achieve that because the reality is there is a lot of available spectrum in terms of not being utilized in these areas. I mean they’re just so sparsely populated. It’s a very different situation than you have in the more dens areas where subscribers live. And I think the other point there is that you don’t have to tailor it quite so perfectly on the spectrum for carriers because most customers out there have multiband devices that have some common elements across all four.

Ric Prentiss

Analyst

Okay. And then minor question; there was a little bump up in the corporate cost in the fourth quarter. Was that somewhat related to the transaction; should we expect that to come back down in ‘15?

Justin Benincasa

Analyst

Yes. That was kind of just -- a lot of the items in there were more kind of more one-time in nature for the quarter.

Michael Prior

Analyst

Including legal.

Justin Benincasa

Analyst

Yes.

Ric Prentiss

Analyst

Okay. So, corporate back down to a more normal level in ‘15?

Michael Prior

Analyst

Lawyers and taxes Ric, you can’t avoid them.

Ric Prentiss

Analyst

Yes. Although hopefully the lawyers lead to an M&A environment that we can see that balance sheet. But it sounds like you are optimistic about 2015, being able to put some of that. And is the target leverage still something that you’d like to get back to positive and maybe one to two times?

Michael Prior

Analyst

Yes, sure. I mean we know it’s a very inefficient balance sheet. But as you pointed out, it also allows us to be very opportunistic. So, there is some strategic value to it but it’s surely not optimal.

Ric Prentiss

Analyst

Okay. Thanks guys.

Michael Prior

Analyst

Yes, thank you.

Operator

Operator

I’m showing no further questions at this time. I’d now like to turn the conference back over to management.

Michael Prior

Analyst

No further comments everybody. Thank you. And we’ll talk to you shortly on first quarter. Take care.

Operator

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes today’s conference. Thank you for your participation. And have a wonderful day.