Earnings Labs

Golar LNG Limited (GLNG)

Q4 2013 Earnings Call· Fri, Feb 28, 2014

$52.89

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good day ladies and gentlemen and welcome to the Golar LNG Limited Q4 2013 Earnings conference. Today’s conference is being recorded. And at this time, I'd like to turn the conference over to Mr. Brian Tienzo, Chief Financial Officer. Please go ahead, sir.

Brian Tienzo

Management

Thank you, operator and hello everyone and welcome to Golar LNG's fourth quarter results presentation. My name is Brian Tienzo, as operator said. And as per usual, I'll be taking you through the main events of the quarter as well as the financial highlights. I am joined as usual today by our CEO, Doug Arnell, who will take you through the business updates and the summary announcement sections. So let’s now turn to Page 4 to go through the quarter highlights. Golar reports fourth quarter 2013 net income of $4.3 million, so we had negative impacts in operating vessels, but we also had positive mark-to-market returns on interest rate swaps. EBITDA during the quarter generated was a loss of $5.5 million and the company during the quarter takes delivery of the Golar Seal and Golar Celsius in October and earnings were negatively impacted also by the Golar Arctic completing its scheduled drydocking which took on 17.5 days of time. In December, Golar Partners completed its fourth follow-on equity offering and was able to raise net proceeds of approximately $150 million and concurrent to this, Golar sells 3.4 million of its common units in Golar Partners raising net proceeds of $99 million. : Furthermore, Golar agrees to sell its interest in FSRU Golar Igloo to Golar Partners for $310 million, subject to certain closing conditions. Of course, the Golar Partners following equity offering in December is in preparation for the finalization of the sale of the Golar Igloo. : We continue to see spot and short-term chartering market remain challenging and with increasing numbers of available vessels. Nevertheless, and despite the weak results during the quarter, the Board maintains dividend of $0.45. Turning over to Page 5, subsequent events. The FSRU Golar Igloo delivers from yard on February 5 and proceeds…

Doug Arnell

Management

Thank you very much Brian, and good morning and good afternoon everybody. I guess we will start out on Slide 11 with the current and short to medium term outlook in the carrier market. I guess from the last two years since we started our newbuild fleet expansion program, we have been giving guidance that certainly when you look out at supply/demand balance for shifting against production capacity, this period that we are in right now we are going to see shift capacity increasing at a greater pace than new production capacity and certainly I think it’s fair to say that, that period of time that we gave guidance is right. I guess the thing that’s different about the current market and what was unexpected and puts us in a rather downside scenario is that we’ve had production downside surprises. So in 2012, established that production volumes in the LNG space dropped by 2% which was unprecedented, never happened before in recent history and the LNG industry and unfortunately in 2013, I think we’ll see a further drop of 2% in liquefaction volumes. So that’s created a bit of perfect storm because at the same time as those volume reductions which are related to unplanned outages and political difficulties, we have these new billed vessels coming on. Adding to that the locations of the outages, particularly Egypt, Nigeria, Angola, due to their location they actually have the effect of losing those volume at the effect of pushing the tonne miles equivalents down as well as the total volume going down. So loosing that production on the market has two impacts; one, simply as there is less volume being shipped, so using less ships, but also from the standpoint of the independent ship owner, generally the portfolio players who were going…

Operator

Operator

Thank you (Operator Instructions) our first question comes from Jon Chappell of Evercore. Please go ahead, your line is open sir. Jonathan B. Chappell – Evercore Partners : Thank you, good afternoon guys.

Doug Arnell

Management

Hi Jon. Jonathan B. Chappell – Evercore Partners : Doug, you mentioned the FLNG conversion basically on budget, basically on schedule from what you thought when you started this whole process, can you just kind of remind us if you were to move forward in the second quarter, what the timeframe would be sort of conversion if you completed and start to generating revenue, was it total cost maybe the timing of the capital outlays and then maybe just a broad range of the returns of that type of projects relative to your traditional gas carrier business?

Doug Arnell

Management

Thanks Jon, I will answer some of that fully, other I’ll try my best, but generally from full notice to proceed on the contract, we are still looking at taking delivery of the vessel in approximately 30 months. There is probably some pluses and minuses on that, depending on some variables on exactly what we build, but that’s about where it is and then of course spending on the location and how much implementation and commissioning work that needs to go on at that location, there will be a couple of months beyond that maybe three, four months beyond that before we go into commercial operations. So that’s kind of the timeline. I guess what’ve been – what we are brining here to the market is something that we are going to create what the industry normally creates for a certain price, and we are going to do it for quite a bit cheaper. That’s our cost advantage and we expect to get value out of that advantage. What we say is that some of the benchmarks that you are seeing for tolling structure is no it’s not necessarily true that on all projects there would be a tolling capacity type structure. : Jonathan B. Chappell – Evercore Partners: Okay, it makes sense. I wanted to also ask about the chartering strategy for the fuel efficiencies in the newbuilds. I mean obviously you are not locking in anything long-term or medium-term at these current levels. But can you talk about that $30,000 to $40,000 spread on the fuel efficiencies? How selective are you being with the trade-off of just finding employment in a market that has over capacity versus trying to get what you perceive to be kind of premium returns because the fuel efficiencies in the vessel and how do we think about the utilization going forward on those, I guess in the next 18 months?

Doug Arnell

Management

: But that utilization number is key to us during these times. So keeping the utilization up is very critical because you get rid of that $6,000 or $7,000 a day deficit, which if you are trying to keep a vessel cold actually is a much higher number. So when you are on charter, you are turning that number alone. So you sort of, in fact have made $6,000 or $7,000 a day or more, net against what you were doing when you are idling. So I would say right now for those vessels were in utilization mode, but whenever going to charter rates that are less than they need to be. Jonathan B. Chappell – Evercore Partners: Okay I understand. Super quick one for Brian, and I’ll turn it over. Brian as the ships are to deliver, when is the interest expense actually starts showing up on the P&L again?

Brian Tienzo

Management

That’s a good point. Well, I mean, I think, the reason that they are on a period or moment Golar LNG is because of its deemed interest that we see hit interest in that for crediting against expense. I think it’s fair to say that we are close to actually seeing interest appearing there. I think we may attract on the couple of deliveries at which point you missed out seeing interest expense coming through. Jonathan B. Chappell – Evercore Partners : Okay. Could it be in the first quarter or is it kind of ramp or is it about show other ones?

Brian Tienzo

Management

No I think ramps up. You just basically start from a fresh, but of course the timing of which you are going to be very much dependent on, that discussions that we are having in respect of the delivery timing. Jonathan B. Chappell – Evercore Partners : Yes, true. All right. Thank you, Brian. Thanks Doug.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Fotis Giannakoulis of Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead. Your line is open. Fotis Giannakoulis – Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC: :

Brian Tienzo

Management

I think we revised in the press release Fotis that obviously dividend is a very important factor of how we look to returns, certain returns to general this. So to that extent although this stress test has essentially involved looking at the operational side of the company dividend to a certain extent remains constant in these stress tests. But where we have looked at ways of – as but Doug mentioned earlier ways of looking at how best to operate the vessels, the performance of those vessels against chattering et cetera. Those where were the majority of the components that were being tested. Fotis Giannakoulis – Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC: : : :

Doug Arnell

Management

Yes. There are some tenders going on for the U.S. projects. There is tenders going on for other projects as well and except in very specific circumstances we see all those tenders. The structures of the charters vary greatly. You still have some conservative charters who are all taking from – with 20 year commitments to volume and so they want a 20 year charter. So you still see some of that. I would say that the industry long-term in their LNG shipping industry has been reducing over the past few years where long-term like might be 12 years or 10 years. So I would say in general that the duration of those charters and the tenders going down. I don’t think that the tenders, I mean we’ll always participate and we’ll do, how we’ll do but I think what’s much more important to us is the fundamentals of how the supply of ships is pacing up to the production, because that’s really what drives how much leverage we are in the market to create value with our ships. The cycle that we are seeing now does have a lot in common with the last cycle that we went through where you have had a over supply of ships, largely because ships were arriving before production, its coming on exactly like now, in that case it happen to be dominated by Qatari ships coming in before Qatari production came on, when the production came up from Qatari, obviously they already had ships dedicated for their production, but that didn’t stop the rates from moving up $100,000 a day within six months. So that’s what’s probably more important to us than our relative success in specific tenders for specific project offerings. Fotis Giannakoulis – Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC: Thank you. Is it possible to elaborate a little bit on the supply and demand dynamics, at least some discussions about we had on our side, its seem that 18 of the newbuildings, does they come online this year and next year they are still open, if this number is correct, 10 of these 18 vessels are Golar controlled, how does this influence your competitive position to charter this vessel and at what levels do you see rates for this vessels in 2016 and onwards?

Doug Arnell

Management

Well obviously our proportion of the total vessels available, higher proportion is all that was being equal good news. Now again the targeting market is pretty soft. I talked about managing vessel deliveries and then I said that it’s not going to be anything dramatic in terms of doing that, but what the problem the industry has right now is there is no liquidity on cargos, there is directed cargo. So at the moment, controlling a majority of the open vessels isn’t all that helpful, because there in not enough cargos out there and that’s the situation we need to see improve, but as new production comes on, we get pass some of these outages, hopefully no more problems in Nigeria, hopefully Angola gets going. We are sitting in a very good spot. 10 out of 18 sounds about right. I think in the total order book, going all the way out, there are probably 30 odd open vessels at which we have 10. We feel good about that, we have the biggest open position, but at the end of the day, we got to create value for our charters and we have to operate these ships properly and bring these good efficiencies to bear to our customers. Rates in 2016 onwards, I don’t know, I think there is, again it will depend on if the spot rates, longer term rate, I think there will be – it looks like there could be the potential for some dislocation, short supplied something like what we saw coming through the last cycle out in that timeframe, but that’s hard to predict of course, but I think that long-term rates will and not too long had arrived at a place where we’ll lock-in very good deals that will create good dropdown value for the MLP at that point in time. Is that $85,000 a day, $90,000, the long-terms have been sitting in the high 70s and then to went to sort of low 80s through the last cycle, mid 80s, its all kind of range found in that area. Fotis Giannakoulis – Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC: Thank you Doug, I want to move to the FLNG right now. You mentioned earlier that its still open, I think its going to be a tolling agreement or if you’re going to be a producer, given the fact that this is a new technology would it to be fair to say that tolling agreement is more likely at least for the first unit? And my second question on that is, you mentioned that the cost is going to be very cheap, I think in the previous quarter you mentioned that it is going to be the lowest cost producer in the world. At what level do you estimate the cost on dollars per million tonnes per annum?

Doug Arnell

Management

Again Fotis, we’re not getting to that specific. I think if I gave you that number I guess there was pretty calculation towards what our CapEx is on the vessel and obviously in order to us for us to really maximize the value of the business, we want to have if we’re talking about total restructuring, we want to be getting paid the market rates or tolling capacity, which is not necessarily while definitely not going to be related to what our capital cost is, because we are not on the margin of liquefaction production cost. So in terms of the tolling structure, I guess what I would say is that and this could change, but I think its more likely that the first unit that we do will be of a larger size kind of in the range that we’re looking at. That might not be true, but if I had to guess, it would be more closer to the full 2.5 million tonne versus the smallest we could give which would be 0.6 million tonnes, 0.7 million tonnes. If that is the case, I would suspect that it not all of the plant, a portion of plant would be in some form of fashion something that looks like a tolling agreement, because just the size of that, the size of the associated trade, commodity trade that would be created by that kind of facility, it would be probably larger than we would want to take on, but it could be that first project is third-party tolling for a large portion of it and we create value in a different way for some part of the capacity, that’s hard to say. Tolling agreements will certainly be one part of our value proposition here in some one way or another though. Fotis Giannakoulis – Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC: : :

Doug Arnell

Management

Well, first of all it’s not a preliminary agreement that we’re looking to sign in the – commit to in the second quarter. It’s fully formed, fully termed out agreement. Second, clearly, we would anticipate that when we implement one of these FLNG projects that we would see Golar vessels shipping the product. But if we, obviously if we have a great deal with someone that we want to do and they are shipping already in their portfolio and that’s not going to work for the deal then we are not going to fall on our sword over it. But I would say, in the discussions that we’re having, we are feeling really good that a good portion of these would involve shipping on Golar vessels. So depending on where the production facility is and where the products going, and I’m not saying that our newbuild fleet would be the existing quarter book for us will be used this way but we would soak up the entire Golar newbuild order book with two projects. Fotis Giannakoulis – Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC: :

Doug Arnell

Management

Well, it’s 30 months delivery at the yard. So and then depending on where we are going to that transport, so there is some months after that. I mean for modeling purposes. If you put six months after that being in full commercial operations that’s fairly safe and obviously try and beat that but that's a conservative estimate. Fotis Giannakoulis – Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC: : Thank you, that’s very helpful. Thank you for your answers.

Doug Arnell

Management

Okay Fotis.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from [Indiscernible]. Please go ahead, your line is open.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Hi, this [Indiscernible].

Doug Arnell

Management

Hi, you are going to have speak out, we can hardily hear you.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Well sorry, I’ll speak a bit louder. Can you hear me now?

Doug Arnell

Management

Yeah.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

So, first question is, do you have any comments on who the bidders for Equatorial Guinea are? I mean there is some speculation that capital is in on [Indiscernible]. Are you affiliated with those?

Doug Arnell

Management

We don’t typically comment on rumors such as those so we know where the projects are and of course, we know we are working with capital FLNG project, so we rather not comment on those things.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Okay. Just to follow up on that, is anyone else working with capital FLNG?

Doug Arnell

Management

I have to check with that.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Okay. The next question, how do you plan to finance potential FLNG investment, if you move out for without a partner. Is that a pure equity play or how do you foresee financing something like this?

Doug Arnell

Management

So, I mean we had to look at modeling how best to do it. It’s of course, during certain of our discussions as you will have noted from our press release you know we are working with potential partners. So, and it could be that we develop a project jointly where they have interest in the project itself. So that could, that could essentially help to finance the project of course. As we have done in December, we monetize Golar LNG shareholding of partners. I think one justification for that is ultimately these FLNG vessels, FLNG vessels and related ships that get bundled down together eventually got down to Golar LNG Partner. So there is a potential for us to use that funny vehicle as well, but ultimately once you’ve got a contract that underpins the projects, of course we will go out there and actually seek a specific project finance for the project so. There is a gap that needs to be filled which is, if we go ahead and – if we go ahead and sign contracts that may have a speculative timing to it then during that period then it’s likely that Golar LNG limited would come in and step in and initially finance that period until such time as the underlying commercial agreements are done that we can use to finance the project.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Super. What’s the capacity for number of FLNG units builds, I mean – the number we have is roughly two by Keppel at any time? Does that sound feasible and would you have other yards able to build more if you should really build scale in a short time on this?

Doug Arnell

Management

Yes, well there is Keppel capacity in Singapore as far there is other yards they can do it as well. Two at a time is achievable. It’s not just Keppel that has to have the capacity but Golar has to as well. So I guess I’ve never really thought about it in terms of the pace of shipyard capacity to build FLNG units. I hope that becomes a issue. But I think it’s going to be more the pace at which opportunities can be commercially structured and financed which will determine how quickly FLNG units come out onto the water.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Thank you. Super. Another question what’s the fair assumption on your earnings. I mean on FLNG exports? What would be a good number to use per MMBtu export or in other word would a 3.8 per MMBtu this year high or lower?

Brian Tienzo

Management

Sorry, I – like an earnings number.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

An earnings number. What would be fair economics to Golar LNG in dollars per MMBtu please?

Doug Arnell

Management

Well, again we are going to – we’ll come out with a bit more specificity on things like operating costs and such. Again we see – I means you have to adjust for location and how the product nets back but a U.S. Gulf Coast equivalent of $3.50 is a good guidance figure for the tolling revenue of the plan. And then on the OpEx side, it’s not like operating a carrier or FSRU it’s quite a bit more, but it’s two to three times more than cost per days to operate these vessels. We are still working on refining that numbers, why we are not getting to specific about talking about it and we will come out with more guidance on those kind of costs at a later date.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

And also one final question, if I may; the cost per tonne for FLNG is both [indiscernible] are talking about roughly $500 per tonne for a barge unit, is that comparable to the numbers you are speaking about?

Doug Arnell

Management

Yes, we are not just not going to get drawn in on getting specific about numbers, but we feel comfortable on competing with $500 per tonne barge.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Thank you so much for your time and congrats on the results.

Doug Arnell

Management

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Michael Webber of Wells Fargo, please go ahead your line is now open. Michael Webber – Wells Fargo Securities, LLC: Hi good morning guys, how are you?

Doug Arnell

Management

Hi Michael, how are you? Michael Webber – Wells Fargo Securities, LLC: Right now, not very well, so I will keep it short; you have reiterated kind of the timeline for FLNG, can you maybe give us a little bit of color about what hurdles specifically you guys may have overcome in Q4 and Q1 or what aspects of the projects you kind of you got a bit closer on and then what gives you more comfort for Q2 FID and then also in terms of the projects you guys have been linked [indiscernible] FLNG projects would use a shift based conversion solution. They seemed to be kind of clustered around the Africa and South American side, central American region in terms of the first potential projects that you guys are kind of talking to, do you think it is more likely to come within the Western African region or the Americas? Hopefully I still think it’s too much your way, but if you can give any color there, that will be helpful?

Doug Arnell

Management

I’m only hesitating because I mean it’s sort of – it’s not clear to me which one is going to come in faster. I would say, completely different environment obviously in the Americas, generally the project timeline path can be well defined and you can see it and it’s kind of easy to predict timing. West Africa, where you kind of starting from a clean sheet of paper as to what kind of accruals and licensing have to happen before you can go ahead and how long that will take is a bit unknown. So I think that it could be easier, but there is different stages of the project that I think probably for sort of serious projects stuff going ahead like licenses being applied for and permitting and locations specific activities for the vessel that the Americas is possibly more likely, but the timeline to get in commercial operation in the Americas might be little longer than it would be, say that then in West Africa, we kicked off and got an actual time line going for licensing and putting shipping operation there. So the answer might be slightly different between where we begin to invest in a specific projects and versus which will come in first in commercial operations. So Michael, I forgot the second part of your question. Michael Webber – Wells Fargo Securities, LLC: [indiscernible] reiterated, so in terms of what’s changed kind of quarter-over-quarter over the last three or four months, what hurdles have you overcome? Is it pop pricing in project specific or was her structural issues of the projects that have been delaying FID I guess, what are you guys are being forced to do in last quarter or so?

Brian Tienzo

Management

Yes. I mean its been the nuts and bolts of the contracts between the three key parties here is Golar capital in Black & Veatch, usual kind of allocations shall we say of risk and reward. I wouldn’t characterize that we’ve been talking the time to drill down on pricing or anything like that. Of course we are always prudent about that and keep our CapEx in line, it hasn’t been that. It’s just getting the right execution structure together with the three parties that will take a little bit of time, not driving down cost. We are taking a new approach on this thing, the first thing is that this vessel needs to work and so this is an exercise of skinny and down as low as you really, really can. The economics are very strong, so we just, you can sort of loose your shirt [ph] if you try and save money in this business, so it has not been that. The costs have stayed relatively constant from what we’re seeing from [indiscernible] nearly getting the contract together. I would say that it’s helpful. We will probably, when we take a decision second quarter, in terms of firm specific project to point that where it is going probably won’t exist. So we’ll open up a little gap of risk there, we are comfortable with that seeing Golar conduct its businesses that way in the past, the FSRU businesses worked very well that way as we opened up a little bit of risk, but again what has changed on the project side is that we see a material and able partners stepping up to the plate and making real commitments to work on these project that we are involved in that and that makes us feel comfortable. We do need partners in one form and other and we’ve got good discussions going with them, take some time to solidify those relationships, but that’s another thing that changes, I am more optimistic on that side. Michael Webber – Wells Fargo Securities, LLC: Great. And I don’t want to blow away the point because I know you guys have talked around it, but just to be perfectly clear about it, so you are looking at kind of Q2 FID on moving quarter with this spec conversion from Keppel, because that gap you are talking about between that and a commercial agreement with one of these projects, how wide you expect that to be, is that measured in quarters or is that measured in months?

Brian Tienzo

Management

Well. I would say that, project should be crystallizing I mean before the end of the year. Michael Webber – Wells Fargo Securities, LLC: Okay.

Brian Tienzo

Management

So, I guess that’s more quarters than months. Michael Webber – Wells Fargo Securities, LLC: That’s helpful. It does look like there are no really projects, they seem to be kind of stacking up stepping up, so when you look at where you guys are allocating capital for the next two year and a half, two years and you look it kind of how your capital is put now between FSRUs and carriers, is it likely in your view that we see goal or kind of emerging from this [indiscernible] and spot rates with capital evenly split with gas and carriers or could it even be more heavily weighted towards the conversion given the size?

Brian Tienzo

Management

Total capital is likely for the next couple years to be weighted towards the conversion projects. Michael Webber – Wells Fargo Securities, LLC: Yes, okay. One last question and I will turn it over. GP value that you guys have in GMLP is to get overlooked quite a bit, because there are so many big variables, how do you think about recognizing that value with major CapEx they have been at this point, so given any of it is going on in terms of floating liquefaction and big spend there, you could see a significant GP growth, just how do you think you are going to hit the 50/50 split well before that cash flow actually delivers and how do you think about monetizing that and other via GP spend, do you need to acquire growth in this environment, that’s chartered growth that kind of provides the growth necessary to make that happen, just how do you address that and how did that falls in a timeframe of what you are looking at around FLNG?

Brian Tienzo

Management

I think Michael, this is Brain. I think it’s fair to say that, we have not been over-reliant in the value of the GP and trying to progress our FLNG project. I think you are right. I think there is some murky waters in respect of high duration in GP since because of the variability of the earnings of Golar at the moment, but I think we have demonstrated the willingness of, the strategy of the company to try and grow the MLP. I think certainly within the next year, we are looking to at least get to the highest split. It’s difficult to try and go out and put as much value to that to ideas to the GP prior to the sort of FLNG strategy becoming successfully affected, that’s simply because we have a demonstration of the success of the FLNG, delighted that it may have actually end-up valuing the GP, so. Michael Webber – Wells Fargo Securities, LLC: Right you need to know that you were out first I guess that the question is do you think you can monetize that before it is the actual FLNG delivery within the next 30 months?

Brian Tienzo

Management

There is that possibility. That’s certainly one of the potential of the financing the debt. Again one thing that we have tested also is willingness of searching of our investors to actually take that in risks in respect of FLNG and we see that there is willingness to do that also. Michael Webber – Wells Fargo Securities, LLC: Okay, great. It was nice guys, thanks for the time.

Brian Tienzo

Management

Thanks Mike,

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from Herman Hildan of RS Platou Markets. Please go ahead. Herman Hildan – RS Platou Markets: Good afternoon guys.

Doug Arnell

Management

Hi Hild. Herman Hildan – RS Platou Markets: Hi, just a quick question on the timing, I mean previously you indicated that in the last report that you will be able to potentially willing to do long lead items to reduce the correct startup plan, it seems like that didn’t happen, so could you maybe shed some color on why you chose not to do that to kind of secure the stockpile to project on the other states?

Doug Arnell

Management

Yes. Certainly, we had talked about long lead items and actually that’s still the case. The first real commitment and what establishes the 30 months timeline I have been talking about is the triggering of the long lead procurement. We could have I suppose triggered those orders prior to full contractual structure being done with Keppel and Black and Veatch. I guess in the end, the evaluation was done that really wasn’t necessary nor prudent. We will be much more comfortable when Keppel and Black & Veatch and ourselves commit to a project that everyone can look at and feel comfortable with the cost and scheduling before knocking our ordering of long lead item, because that wasn’t going to be small capital commitment that these long lead item of this vessel are expensive. So, and yet that is exactly what we will do as the first real trigger and what will be happening inside the project is the long lead item for us. Herman Hildan – RS Platou Markets: But is it a reason that you kind of decided not to do that because first project most likely will be a [indiscernible] I think you talked about the $200 million long lead item and initially but since you are kind of doing high onto the scale it means probably that long lead items has specialized on to this. Is that kind of the reason?

Doug Arnell

Management

Well again, I think we didn’t really change tracks on the long lead items. We’re going to order long lead items. What changed was the timing that we estimated to be ready to do so, and then that timing now is being driven by the getting to contracts completed and done with our contracting partner. Herman Hildan – RS Platou Markets : And on that I mean it compares a bit but it’s kind of an internally you’ve been delaying the project, it’s not necessarily been an external kind of – in fact you are delaying the decisions. Is that correct or …

Doug Arnell

Management

No, we definitely – there has been no internal delay. It’s taken longer than we’d hope, but it was just here getting the contract done. There has been no decision to delay this process at all. Herman Hildan – RS Platou Markets : Okay, and you sort of commented that there has been some serious enable partners making commitments. Is it possible to shed some light on that, comments?

Doug Arnell

Management

: Herman Hildan – RS Platou Markets : Okay, and just two more questions very quick, you didn’t mention anything about the BC project in this presentation kind of, is it possible to just give a quick update on the process there?

Doug Arnell

Management

Yes, the BC projects, I guess the story there is, it remains the bankruptcy, the CCAA bankruptcy proceeding in Canada which has put a stay over the material agreements. The bankruptcy is being claimed by one of the original partners to the project. Obviously, we’re somewhat frustrated with that, but this and again there is not much we can do to move that any quicker. We didn’t give guidance on that simply because it’s pretty unclear at the moment. The attractiveness of the project and the opportunities there are still very attractive to us. We prefer to talk about that when it clears up and there is the more clear path forward. Herman Hildan – RS Platou Markets: Okay, there is a final, its additional question throughout this company’s call. On the delivered cost basis, is it possible to say I mean when the most economical liquefaction solution and then also in other most efficient vessels, what’s the kind of delivered cost nature on MMbtu basis like roughly is it say $8 per MMbtu to $10 per MMbtu or $12 per MMbtu to $14 per MMbtu?

Doug Arnell

Management

Delivered cost assuming a market rate for vessel than a market rate for trolling through the facility, delivered cost of $9, $10 is a very good estimate. Herman Hildan – RS Platou Markets: Okay, and if you kind of with respect to the discussions that you have with your projects ongoing now. And compared to the Asian crisis, how much of that spread I guess you obviously want to do that with the low delivery costs?

Doug Arnell

Management

Yes, I guess I’d answer like this, on a pure tolling model, I guess I’ve laid out our expected term kind of a minimum expectation of how we do in terms of $1 per MMbtu that creates the revenue stream. In terms of the margin, the other margin that’s available say again that delivery cost against near-term or longer term LNG pricing in Asia, I mean our strategy is going to be to capture as much as that as we can within our ability. So we think there is some scope for us to do that and you do that by integrating your ships with the tolling deal for example. And you do that by in a measured way looking at keeping the commodity in your possession than shipping it all the way to Asia and structuring deals that way. I can’t predict exactly how these things are going to be structured. We think with this technology and our approach and our really good ability to finance these vessels and have them promptly available that we are creating a lot of value over and about the tolling model. We are opening up, but we expect to create monetization opportunities from reserves that wouldn’t have had otherwise. We expect to get LNG on stream more quickly than it would have otherwise, and we expect because of those kind of – and we won’t be labored with a traditional pre-construction project financing overlay that delays our project. So all of these things getting earlier volumes and getting volumes lifted that wouldn’t have otherwise all of those things should accrue more value to us than just the toll and we expect to do deals and structures that will achieve that. Herman Hildan – RS Platou Markets: So the $9 per MMbtu roughly that’s going to be including return on capital throughout the asset that you created to yes to deliver the cargos right?

Doug Arnell

Management

Yes. Herman Hildan – RS Platou Markets: :

Doug Arnell

Management

Looks like a business, yes. But of course to set up one of these projects, it’s not going to just operate now. It’s going to operate for the long-term and long-term commitments need to be made to the payment of the assets, payment for gas et cetera, et cetera. So yet the arbitrage is there. We believe the arbitrage is going to be strong for sometime, it is not going to be $9 dollars forever, but we think it’s a profitable long-term business. Herman Hildan – RS Platou Markets: And I am going to cut off my questions; just one point, I think you brought the nation and there is a major into that BC project, are you kind of able to bring that major into the other projects that you are looking up or is that company kind of commit which is the BC project?

Doug Arnell

Management

Well, I would answer it this way. I mean it’s possible that we have that we will have partnerships that will be leveraged on to multiple locations, but generally it’s not necessarily the case that I would say it tends to be project specific a little bit, but if we get a good fit going with the partner, we wouldn’t hesitate to bring them over to another project. I would say that that has not happened to-date with any of the people we are working with. Herman Hildan – RS Platou Markets: Okay, thank you very much for your time.

Doug Arnell

Management

Operator, can we take the last question please.

Operator

Operator

Yes, we will take our final question from Erik Stavseth of Arctic Securities. Please go ahead, your line is open. Erik N. Stavseth – Arctic Securities ASA: Hi guys.

Doug Arnell

Management

Hi Erik. Erik N. Stavseth – Arctic Securities ASA: So two quick questions, I will try to be shorter than my previous guys. So are you saying that you could be short vessels if you are going to do, you have three conversion candidates, of course that’s going to be in a standard manner I presume, but could you be looking at the were Golar is, it’s short LNG shipping from which let’s say in 2017?

Doug Arnell

Management

Well we did three large conversion vessels and depending on the location and we wanted to use all Golar ships we would run out of ships after two. So I guess the answer is yes. Erik N. Stavseth – Arctic Securities ASA: Thanks. Second question is, I mean it’s early days, but what kind of leverage would you be looking at FLNG and could that be either 50/50 equity or any preliminary results on that?

Doug Arnell

Management

I think that the numbers that are coming out of these projects are so depending, you can lever it up, closer to the 8%, maybe even higher than that, but as we have done with the vessels that we drop into LNG parts we got to be careful on how we leverage, because obviously we need to protect dividend capacity of these projects when they go to LNG Partners also, but to answer to your question, there is a potential to go higher than 8%, but we need to trend capital when we actually put those into place. Erik N. Stavseth – Arctic Securities ASA: And also what kind of I mean in terms of free cash flow, it sounds to be relatively compelling economics, what kind of percentage of free cash will you be able to payout here, any thoughts on that?

Brian Tienzo

Management

We can’t be too specific in the amount, I think its fair to say and we are looking at the numbers and remodeling them, but obviously of we need to model those even more to be able to come out with numbers as Doug said earlier, once certain agreements are signed, then we can be more specific about project cash flows. Erik N. Stavseth – Arctic Securities ASA: All right. Last question, is there any sort of link between leveraging of the various parts of the system that mainly shareholder asked you and I am thinking specifically about procedural reason to bid in Central America?

Doug Arnell

Management

Erik sorry, what’s the question? Erik N. Stavseth – Arctic Securities ASA: The question is what’s Golar’s ability to leverage of the various system values are within the framework of the main shareholder, I mean Seadrill recently did stuff in the Mexico with Pemex, is there any way you can leverage off what they are doing with regards to exploration in production?

Doug Arnell

Management

Always Erik, I mean our principle is pretty good at thinking about all the various businesses and making sure that any business relationships going on with Seadrill or Frontline, [indiscernible] commercial partner, this is an opportunity to build that relationship and benefit Golar absolutely and at the end of the day these are fairly big complicated projects. If you have a partner that you can work well together and you both want to go and there is common interest and we have done business together in Seadrill before than all the better to try the relationship on Golar profit. Erik N. Stavseth – Arctic Securities ASA: Excellent, thanks.

Doug Arnell

Management

Okay.

Operator

Operator

That concludes the question-and-answer-session for today. I will then hand back to our speakers for any additional or closing remarks.

Doug Arnell

Management

Thank you, operator. And thanks everyone for your participation in this quarters earnings result and then so we look forward to speaking to you again in the next quarter. Thank you and good bye.