Thank you for standing by, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the EuroDry Limited Conference Call on the First Quarter 2024 Financial Results. We have Mr. Aristides Pittas, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer; and Mr. Tasos Aslidis, Chief Financial Officer of the company. [Operator Instructions] I must advise you that this conference is being recorded today. Please be reminded that the company announced its results with a press release that has been publicly distributed. Before passing the floor to Mr. Pittas, I would like to remind everyone that in today's presentation and conference call, EuroDry will be making forward-looking statements. These statements are within the meaning of the federal securities laws. Matters discussed may be forward-looking statements, which are based on current management expectations that involve risks and uncertainties that may result in such expectations not being realized. I kindly draw your attention to Slide #2 of the webcast presentation, which has the full forward-looking statement, and the same statement was also included in the press release. Please take a moment to go through the whole statement and read it. And now I'd like to pass the floor to Mr. Pittas. Please go ahead, sir.

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and thank you all for joining us today for our scheduled conference call. Together with me is Tasos Aslidis, our Chief Financial Officer. The purpose of today's call is to discuss our financial results for the 3-month period ended March 31, 2024. Please turn to Slide 3 of the presentation. Our financial highlights are shown here. For the first quarter of 2024, we reported total net revenues of $14.4 million and the net loss attributable to controlling shareholders of $1.8 million or $0.65 loss per basic and diluted share. Adjusted net loss attributable to controlling shareholders for the quarter was $3.2 million or $1.18 loss per basic and diluted shares. Adjusted EBITDA for the period was $2.1 million. Please turn to the press release for a reconciliation of adjusted net income and adjusted EBITDA. Our CFO, Tasos Aslidis will go over our financial highlights in more detail later on in the presentation. As of May 21, 2024, we had repurchased a total of about 300,000 shares of our common stock in the open market for a total of $4.7 million under our share repurchase program of up to $10 million announced in August 2022. The plan renewed in August 2023 for another year. Please turn to Slide 4 for an overview of our sales and purchase, chartering and drydocking highlights. On the chartering side, most of our vessels are employed in short-term charters, whilst motor vessel Ekaterini continues to be employed under an index-linked charter until March 2025 at the 105.5% of the average Baltic Kamsarmax index, the index based on the 5 Kamsarmax time charter routes. You can see the specifics of the various charters we fixed in the accompanying presentation. We plan to continue trading spot for the time being, but if charter…

Thank you very much, Aristides. Good morning from me as well, ladies and gentlemen. Over the next 4 slides, I will give you an overview of our financial highlights for the first quarter of 2024 and compare those results to the same period of last year. For that, let's turn to Slide 15. For the first quarter of 2024, the company reported total net revenues of $14.4 million, representing a 27.2% increase of our total net revenues of $11.3 million during the first quarter of last year. And this was the result of the increased time charter rates our vessels earned during the first quarter of this year plus the increased number of vessels we operated this quarter compared to the same quarter of the previous year. The company reported net loss for the period of $1.9 million and a net loss attributable to controlling shareholders for the period of $1.78 million, as compared to a net loss attributable to controlling shareholders of $1.54 million for the same period of 2023. The net loss attributable to the noncontrolling shareholders of $0.13 million in the first quarter of this year represents the loss that corresponds to the 39% ownership of the entities represented by the NRP investors, as Aristides explained earlier. Interest and other financing costs, including interest income, for the first quarter of 2024 increased to $2.04 million as compared to $1.23 million for the same period of last year. Interest expense during the first quarter of 2024 was higher, mainly due to the increased amount of debt and the increased benchmark rates that are [indiscernible] to pay, while interest income was lower due to lower cash balances we carried during the period as compared to the same period of 2023. Adjusted EBITDA for the first quarter of this year…

Thank you, Tasos. Let me now open up the floor for any questions we may have.

[Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from the line of Tate Sullivan with Maxim Group.

First, on the debt repayment profile on Slide 17. Tasos, is this debt, the existing loan repayment, something that you're looking to refinance before the end of the year, or will you use cash flow to -- or you prioritize using cash flow to pay down that debt?

I think we're -- I don't think we are planning to refinance any of our debt in the near future. I believe we are planning to repay the -- to make the payments that are due in the remaining of the year from the cash flow we are going to generate. And as you can see in the slide, the repayments drop significantly next year and the year after, reducing our cash flow breakeven. We have loan payments that are coming due in 2027, as you can see. And I suspect those we will be refinancing at the time.

And then on the Blessed Luck in the quarter and the boiler damage, did that happen while in dry dock, in voyage? And the expenses to repair, is that within dry docking costs? Can you go into more detail on that, please?

No. This damage happened when we left the shipyard, it was [indiscernible] of the crew and the shipyard was the cause that this happened. But it happened just after we had left the shipyard. It's an insurable cost and all the repairs are covered. Unfortunately, the loss of time is not covered. So we lost 17 days of employment.

Can you approximate or [indiscernible] sure that approximate cost to repair that should be insurable?

I think it's about $900,000. It's not a cheap repair. But as I said...

It is not included in the numbers because it's fully insured. So you will not find it, only the drydocking or operating expenses.

Okay. And then going forward, scheduled dry docks for the rest of the year, can you review that?

In this quarter, we only have one drydock, which has already taken place, which is the Starlight. And we have 3 drydocks in Q3, I haven't looked as far as Q4, but...

There's no drydocks. Nothing scheduled for Q4 of this year.

Nothing for Q4. So it's the 3 drydocks in Q3 really that are still to come.

[Operator Instructions] Our next question comes from the line of Poe Fratt with Alliance Global Partners.

I had a question, Aristides, about your 2025 outlook. If things, like you're trying to signal, less congestion next year, less disruption, a little bit more in supply growth and demand just slowing a little bit modestly, would potentially create a softer rate environment, would you categorize your outlook as conservative or do you think it's sort of a base case? Or do you think it's sort of a conservative case and that you potentially get, if some of these things linger, it's a little bit better than you think?

Yes. I think -- I mean, we generally try to be quite conservative. But in all honesty, it is extremely difficult to predict how the market will move under the current geopolitical situations because they affect the trade, they affect economic growth, and nobody can really say what that would be. There are a few positives. The low supply growth is a positive. The fact that vessels are growing slower due to the environmental regulations is a positive. These are strong positives. If demand turns out being quite strong in 2025, we can have a much better market. It's really difficult to decide. Having said that, the FFA market is also predicting a slightly lower market in 2025 than in 2024. So this is the information we currently have. Very, very difficult to decipher and decide what the actual move will be. It can be -- I mean, if there are geopolitical tensions but the global economy does well, i.e., we have longer trade routes but still the economy works well, we can have a very good market. But our base case is always quite conservative.

Yes. Understood. And then in that context, I'm not sure if I could -- anything about any FFA hedging for the rest of the year. Do you have any in place? And then secondly, with one time charter in the sort of the mid- to high teens, would that be something that might be attractive given your outlook for 2025 or sort of the latter half of '24 and the early part of '25?

Yes. Currently, as we said, all our ships are essentially on spot charters trading the market. If we see a strengthening in the next couple of months, we will probably fix a portion of our fleet at these higher numbers, either through normal time charters or through FFAs. We currently don't have any open FFA position. But if we see levels that are even more satisfactory than these levels -- these levels, today's market levels, are still profitable levels, overall. This quarter, we had the loss that we had due to dry docks and the off-hire of the Blessed Luck, mainly. Also, we took a loss on the FFAs that we have done. But next quarter, we are cautiously optimistic that we will return to profitability.

Understood. And then Tasos, could you just sort of give some guidance for OpEx? So just OpEx should be just slightly up for the rest of the year relative to what you've reported in the first quarter?

Yes. I think we're pretty much on budget for the first quarter. So I mean, we would be plus or minus 2% to 3%, I believe. It's hard to say. It's hard to say, but we haven't seen any surprises on the OpEx so far.

Our next question comes from the line of Lars Eide with Arctic Securities.

So I guess on the last quarter kind of touched upon my question. But as you noted in your report this morning, you're positioning your fleet for more market exposure moving forward. I guess in that context, your market view should be positive, I assume, as you strategize with this [indiscernible].

Sure. I mean our base case is that for the next few months, the market should be quite positive.

Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes our question-and-answer session. I'll turn the floor back to management for any final comments.

Well, thank you all for listening in, in today's presentation. We will be back to you with Q2 results in about 3 months' time. Thank you.

Bye, everybody.

Thank you. This concludes today's conference call. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation.