Earnings Labs

StealthGas Inc. (GASS)

Q3 2012 Earnings Call· Tue, Nov 27, 2012

$9.68

+0.10%

Key Takeaways · AI generated
AI summary not yet generated for this transcript. Generation in progress for older transcripts; check back soon, or browse the full transcript below.

Same-Day

+2.22%

1 Week

+4.57%

1 Month

+8.17%

vs S&P

+8.39%

Transcript

Operator

Operator

Thank you for standing by and welcome to the StealthGas Inc. Third Quarter 2012 Results call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. There will be a presentation followed by a question and answer session, at which time if you wish to ask a question you will need to press star, one on your telephone. I must advise you that this conference is being recorded today on Tuesday, the 27th of November, 2012. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Mr. Harry Vafias. Please go ahead.

Harry Vafias

Management

Thank you and good morning everyone. Welcome to our conference call and webcast to discuss the results for the third quarter and nine months 2012. I’m Harry Vafias, CEO of StealthGas, and I would like to remind you that we’ll be discussing forward-looking statements in today’s call and presentation. Regarding the Safe Harbor language, please refer to Slide No. 1 of the presentation as well as to our press release on our third quarter and nine months results. With me today is Konstantinos Sistovaris, our CFO, and if you need any further information on the call or the presentation, please contact Konstantinos or myself. Before I start with the slides, I would like to comment on the third quarter results released which, as we had expected, highlight a considerable year-on-year improvement. Our adjusted net income went from about 2 million last year for the same period to about 6 million this year, representing 180% increase. On a per-share basis, our adjusted figures show a huge increase year-on-year from $0.10 last year to $0.28 this year, and on a nine-month basis an increase from $0.39 in 2011 to $0.85 in 2012. That’s approximately a 120% increase year-on-year. That excludes the losses and gains on the vessel sales and hedging. This shows once again significant improvement in the LPG market in contrast to the continuing difficult environment for more shipping companies whereby few are reporting earnings at all, if not filing for Chapter 11. Although in the summer there is a typically seasonal weakness, this quarter’s results were again very satisfactory and we expect activity to pick up as we enter into the winter season. As a result of our focus on the (inaudible) LPG market, we continue to operate profitably and we are confident that the fundamentals in our core segment…

Konstantinos Sistovaris

Management

Thank you, Harry. Good morning everyone. Let me continue the presentation with Slide No. 5 to give you the financial highlights for the third quarter and nine months of 2012. With an average 37 vessels owned and operated in the third quarter, we realized net income of 6.6 million from voyage revenues of 30.4 million. This was the first quarter this year and the third time over the past two years that with roughly the same number of ships, our revenue surpassed the 30 million mark. EBITDA was 16.4 million and earnings per share for the quarter were $0.32. Our adjusted net income for the quarter was 5.8 million or $0.28 per share, the adjustment being deducting from our reported net income 0.8 million as the gain from the fair value changes in our interest rate derivatives. The free cash balance at the end of the quarter was approximately 41 million. We also had about 6.1 million in restricted cash as part of our loan agreements. For the nine months of 2012, with an average of 37 vessels our net income for the nine months was 21.2 million or $1.03 per share compared to net income of 4.1 million or $0.20 per share for the same period last year. Voyage revenues were 88.6 million and EBITDA was almost 50 million. Adjusted net income for the nine month period was 17.5 million or $0.85 per share. We adjust our net income figure by deducting the gains we had from the sales of two of our vessels and the changes in the fair value of our derivatives. We now turn to Slide No. 6 for a summary of our income statement in order to compare results for the third quarter versus the previous quarter and the third quarter of last year. Compared…

Harry Vafias

Management

Let’s move to Slide 10. As we have said in the past, one of the key drivers in the LPG market is the supply of the product. LPG is a byproduct of natural gas, and with all the ongoing gas projects being developed, we expect that as more natural gas producing facilities are being built there will be more LPG available for shipment, particularly because it’s too costly to store. The Middle East is a main exporter of LPG and usually VLGCs are used to carry the product from the Middle East to hubs in Asia, such as Singapore, where our vessels take care of the local distribution. We can see the growth in seaborne LPG trades has been relatively strong in 2012, not too far from 2011 levels. It’s being predominantly driven by the rise of emerging economies in Asia, and the combination of increasing consumption and limited production capacity in these countries is expected to still drive demand for the remainder of 2012 and of course beyond as people are gradually improving their living standards as well. Moreover, LPG products at low prices lead to almost all importer nations to fill up stocks, making Asian imports expected to rise by 12% in 2012 and thereby contribute to 90% of the growth rate in the LPG ship borne trade. On Slide 11, we can see that in 2012, the Middle East remains the main supplier and the single largest contributor to growth in total LPG exports with LPG supply from Middle East exports expected to increase by 12% this year. On the other side of the equation demand, especially for propane, is steadily increasing in developing nations, especially in the Far East where two-thirds of our fleet is trading, while some usually operate in the Middle East, the Mediterranean,…

Operator

Operator

Thank you. That’s star then one if you wish to ask a question. Your first question comes from Jim Fronda of Sidoti & Co. Please go ahead. Jim Fronda – Sidoti & Co.: Good morning. I just have one question. With your plan to expand your fleet, do you have a specific strategy you follow with respect to new buildings versus acquiring secondhand vessels, and how do you evaluate that?

Harry Vafias

Management

Unfortunately it’s not a very liquid market where you can find lots of new building berths and lots of secondhand modern ships in order to be able to compare and decide; therefore, we have our eyes open for both options, i.e. modern secondhand ships and new buildings. And when it’s time to decide, we obviously weigh the pros and cons – for example, the waiting time on a new building versus the prompt delivery of a secondhand ship, and also not forgetting the new eco-type fuel efficiency of a new building versus the older technology of a secondhand ship, and obviously decide what’s best. Jim Fronda – Sidoti & Co.: Great, thank you.

Operator

Operator

Once again, it’s star, one to ask a question. The next question is from George Berman of JP Turner & Co. Please go ahead. George Berman – JP Turner & Co.: Morning gentlemen. Thank you for taking my call. Congratulations, first of all – great quarter. I have a quick question on Slide No. 9. At the bottom, you have given some EBITDA guidance on various day rates, which range from 11 up to 12 to $13,000. No comment was made. Is this sort of the direction you think day rates are moving over the next couple of years?

Harry Vafias

Management

I made a comment in the end where I said that for every $1,000, the EBITDA rises by 15 million. We are very conservative on our forecasts. At the moment, we are slightly below the first box, the 11,000. Nobody knows what the future holds, but we are saying if the analysts are right and there’s a shortage of new ships and demand keeps rising, I’m sure we can get to the second or even the third box; but I wouldn’t like to guarantee that, of course. George Berman – JP Turner & Co.: Obviously. So on those numbers and on the fact that the four new builds to be delivered in 2014 are basically financed already, you would be increasing your cash flow tremendously. And there’s two ways of having shareholders in the company participate. One would be through either stock buybacks to continue, or through the re-initiation of a cash dividend. I believe you did at one time pay a cash dividend. How is your view on those two items?

Harry Vafias

Management

George, you probably don’t remember the previous call. We said on the previous call that we will examine these options at Christmas and revert with some decisions in the first quarter. George Berman – JP Turner & Co.: Okay, thank you.

Operator

Operator

The next question is from Ben Sexson of First Wilshire Securities. Please go ahead. Ben Sexson – First Wilshire Securities : Good afternoon. The question was already asked, but I was wondering on Slide 12, you gave us the fourth quarter forecast for some of the various vessel types. Do you have any more long-term forecasts that you can give us, or--?

Harry Vafias

Management

As I said before, we don’t give forecasts. This was not our forecast; this was from an independent source. I guess there are a lot of brokers both in the U.S. and the Europe that would give forecasts. We don’t like to forecast because in shipping, you never know what will happen; so we prefer for our own internal numbers and internal calculations to use always the current TC rate in order to be on the safe side. And if obviously rates go up, it’s going to be better for us and our shareholders. So we don’t give out nor we ask from our brokers for long-term estimates. Ben Sexson – First Wilshire Securities: Okay. Can you talk a little bit about just why the rate went down a little bit this quarter versus last quarter, what some of the macro factors were?

Harry Vafias

Management

Nothing in reality serious. Some of the vessels that are on dedicated trades for some of the oil majors and traders were not used for their specific trades because some of the terminals and the gas plants were under maintenance. These vessels were obviously then re-let in the open market, thus competing with all the other vessels, and that pushed slightly the rates down. But the rates are still very firm and we are not worried for the short term, medium term. Ben Sexson – First Wilshire Securities: Okay, thank you.

Operator

Operator

The next question is from Jeff Gogin of (inaudible). Please go ahead.

Jeff Gogin

Analyst

Morning, Harry. Two questions – number one, with respect to the new build ships that you intend to take delivery of, the eco-type, how much of a premium do these ships command in the market that would warrant the premium price that you’ll pay for those?

Harry Vafias

Management

Number one, we are not paying a premium price, so that answers half your question Number two – how much premium? Again, I don’t know because these are prototype vessels. There are no sister ships or similar vessels there, so I hope we can get not only a high rate but you will also be able to trade them in a bigger variety of ports because except from the fuel efficiency, they have ice class so they can go to ice-infected regions, and they are also shorter in LOA which means they are accessible in smaller ports. So I think the combination of these three factors will make them quite appealing to the charterers.

Jeff Gogin

Analyst

All right, thank you. And second question relates to the rolling off of your interest rate hedges, as mentioned earlier in the presentation by Konstantinos. What is your attitude about reapplying interest rate hedges, and based on that answer, what does that imply about your outlook for interest rates?

Harry Vafias

Management

I’m not an economist, but my personal view is that we’re not going to see high interest rates very soon, at least. The hedges we had were on the expenses side, therefore the more that finish, the better for the company. We’ve discussed with the Board maybe next year to do some, but we are not going to jump on the opportunity because we don’t think that the interest rates will go up soon, so we prefer to have less hedges for now.

Jeff Gogin

Analyst

Thank you, and congratulations on a very nice quarter.

Operator

Operator

The next question is from George Berman of JP Turner & Co. Please go ahead. George Berman – JP Turner & Co.: Sorry, gentlemen, I’ve got a quick follow-up. You mentioned in your presentation the possibility of the U.S. starting to export LPG into the Caribbean. How soon would this be feasible, and how are you positioned to take advantage of this possibility?

Harry Vafias

Management

Probably George you know this better than us. Number two, we’ve been told that this will happen in the next two to three years, and how we are positioned depends all on the location of our ships. At the moment, the biggest demand is in the Far East. That’s why the majority of the ships are actually there. If we see this trade really developing and there’s a demand, obviously we’re going to take some of the ships from the Far East or from Europe and relocate them in the U.S. George Berman – JP Turner & Co.: Or possibly some of the new builds?

Harry Vafias

Management

Maybe. George Berman – JP Turner & Co.: Okay. So this will all coincide with the LNG terminal developed here by Tierney energy for natural gas, and that would also participate then with LPG, yes?

Harry Vafias

Management

All the natural gas projects have LPG as a byproduct, so all the completion of natural gas projects is very positive for our business. George Berman – JP Turner & Co.: Okay, brilliant. Thank you very much.

Operator

Operator

There are no more questions at this time. Please continue.

Harry Vafias

Management

We would like to thank everybody for joining us for our conference call today and for your interest and trust in our company. We look forward to having you with us again on our next conference call for our fourth quarter results in February 2013. Thank you very much.

Operator

Operator

That does conclude our conference for today. Thank you for participating. You may now all disconnect.