Barry Golsen
Analyst · Avondale Partners
Thanks, Tony. I’m going to focus on our sales activity, product backlogs where pertinent, and market drivers as we see them. I’ll also review upcoming key initiatives and our strategies for each business. To start, please turn to page nine in the presentation which shows our 2012 sales mix by the markets we serve. The overall mix was approximately the same as 2011. Chemical products were a higher percentage of total sales than in the years before 2011 due primarily to increased volume and sales prices of our products in our Chemical business and the addition of meaningful revenues from Pryor. A higher percentage of the Chemical business sales were derived from agricultural products than in the years before 2011 as well, the result of the addition of sales from the Pryor facility and higher prices for ag products. But for the downtime at our chemical plants that we have discussed, the mix would have been even more heavily weighted toward the Chemical business. We expect that will be the case in 2013. Focusing first on the Chemical business, please go to page 10. Total sales in the fourth quarter were $105 million compared to $142 million in the 2011 quarter. Sales in both our ag and mining products were dramatically lower than 2011 due to plant downtime and, as a result, comparison from period to period is not really meaningful. Industrial acid sales were up slightly because most of those sales are related to production at the Baytown, Texas facility which was not impacted by downtime during the quarter. Turn to page 11 for sales of our key ag products. Again, comparison of sales from the fourth quarter of ’11 to the fourth quarter of ’12 is not particularly meaningful due to downtime at our plants in 2012. Turning to our industrial and mining products on page 12, both sales dollars and tons shipped of industrial grade ammonium nitrate were lower than the fourth quarter 2011 levels, reflecting decreased demand for our mining products. Sales in tons shipped of nitric acid were 16% and 15% higher, respectively, compared to 2011 fourth quarter due to higher acid demand. Turning to market trends on page 13, are some price trends for both feedstocks we use and the key ag products we sell. The cost of natural gas continues to be low. This is benefitting production cost at our Cherokee, Alabama and Pryor, Oklahoma facilities which has natural gas as their primary feedstock. The conventional wisdom is that natural gas will remain low for some time. The cost of anhydrous ammonia, the feedstock we use at our El Dorado, Arkansas and Baytown, Texas facilities, is much higher than it was a year ago and continues to be high compared to past years. February 2012 and 2013 Tampa prices were $472 per metric ton and $655 per metric ton, respectively. Our current read on the market is that ammonia is about $625 per metric ton. This compares to prices in 2009 that range from about $125 per ton to $355 per ton. The increase has impacted production cost at our facilities that use ammonia as a feedstock. Most of the products we produce at Baytown and most of the industrial mining products produced at El Dorado are sold on cost plus basis, so high ammonia costs did not impact our profitability on those sales. However, agricultural grade AN produced at El Dorado is sold at spot market prices. Turning to ag products, prices for UAN fluctuated over the past year and are slightly higher at this time than they were a year ago. If you look at the chart on the lower left, you can see that the Southern Plains price of UAN increased from $335 per ton in February 2012 to $345 per ton in February 2013. Based on our current -- on current market indicators, we believe that this pricing will remain somewhat stable throughout the upcoming season. We do not expect UAN prices to significantly increase during the 2013 season as they did in 2012 as a result of higher levels of imported urea in North America this year than last year. In February 2013, Southern Plains prices for ammonium nitrate were $385 per ton compared to $395 per ton 12 months earlier. Our outlook for AN this season is more or less the same as UAN. We expect stable selling prices at about the current level. Currently, Southern Plains ammonia is trading at approximately $100 per ton higher than a year ago. This should benefit Pryor as its ammonia production resumes. Focus on the outlook for the chemical markets we serve, page 14 lists several indicators for agricultural products which all continue to be favorable. Grain stock-to-use ratios both worldwide and the US continue to be low. As a result, planting levels are generally high. Market prices for corn and wheat remain high. So, farmers have an incentive to plant and sell more. All of this is creating strong continuing demand for fertilizers. Finally, low natural gas prices have reduced the cost to manufacture many of our ag products. North American-produced nitrogen fertilizers are currently the lowest cost factoring in total cost of production, rate and distribution. The industry consensus is that the positive fundamentals of the ag business should continue in the near to mid term. Despite general industry drivers, weather can have a significant impact on the fertilizer part of our business. Although many of the markets we serve have generally suffered drought conditions, recent rain and snow have improved the outlook, but may cause a delay in the start of the next season. Overall, we continue to be optimistic about our ag business. Please turn to page 15. Our industrial products are sold primarily to large customers pursuant to contractual cost plus and/or minimum take arrangements. The two charts on this page indicate the shift that has occurred in our sales mix from 2011 to 2012. In fact, very little change has occurred and the shift from mining to industrial acids was primarily driven by plant downtime at Cherokee and high demand for acid. A very significant part of our business continues to be industrial and mining. Page 16 contains some market indicators for this area of the business. Most of these indicators forecast growth for the next few years. On page 17, we’ve listed our Chemical business strategies and some of key initiatives for 2013. In addition to increased emphasis on operational excellence and plant reliability discussed in detail by Jack, we continue to emphasize safety and environmental responsibility. We will continue to expand our industrial business by adding new customers and perhaps new products. We will also continue to enhance our agricultural distribution channel. We will work on several projects aimed at optimizing production rates at all of our plants that are currently online. The most ambitious and potentially impactful capital project we are working on is an ammonia plant that we are planning to build at our El Dorado facility, mentioned by both Jack and Tony. This should increase El Dorado’s capacity and lower its production cost since the cost spread between purchased and manufactured ammonia is substantial. El Dorado currently purchases the ammonia that it requires for feedstock from a pipeline at a much higher cost than estimated cost of production with an ammonia plant. We are well into the planning stage and have filed for our permits to start building the plant. We expect that we will use most of the new ammonia that we produce to satisfy our current customers. The addition of the ammonia plant is subject to us receiving permits, adequate financing, reasonable expectations that our customers will continue to take our products, and finally, Board approval. If approved, we hope to have an ammonia plant constructed and operation during 2015. Solving the problems associated with downtime at Pryor diverted us from completing our plan to bring Pryor's two smaller ammonia plants to their full potential production capacity of 60,000 tons per year during 2012. However, we should resume this project in 2013, and as we previously reported, permits are in hand. Whether or not we operate those smaller plants at their full capacity will depend on the output of the new primary ammonia converter at Pryor and the market conditions at that time. We also have several other capital projects on the drawing board including, among others, NOx abatement in El Dorado and control system upgrade at various locations. Turning to our Climate Control business, please go to page 18. As you can see, sales by major -- you can see sales by major products -- product categories on this page. Total sales for the fourth quarter were approximately $68 million, the same as the third quarter and a slight decrease from the fourth quarter of 2011. Sales of heat pumps for the quarter were down 17% to last year where sales of inflow products and large customer handlers increased. This resulted in a small overall decline for the quarter. For the year, sales were $266 million, a decline of 5% from the prior year, with sales of heat pumps down 11%, partially offset by an increase in sales of our fan coils and large custom air handlers. Large custom air handlers are included in other [HPFC] products category. From a product market perspective, the shortfall in sales during 2012 was due primarily to lower residential product sales down 21% while sales of our commercial products declined only 1%. On page 19 you can see that sales of products sold for use in commercial and institutional buildings improved 9% in the fourth quarter and new product orders increased by 24%. As mentioned previously, sales of our residential products, all geothermal heat pumps, were down 21% from 2011, reflecting lower order levels during the year. In aggregate, bookings in the fourth quarter were 10% higher than the prior year, bringing new product orders to $262 million in 2012, on par with 2011. The backlog at 12/31 was $55 million, a 25% increase year over year. During 2012 we maintained our leading market share positions in geothermal and water source heat pumps and hydronic fan coils. Our January 2013 new product orders were $25 million, a 16% increase over January 2012. However, we do not believe that any single month's orders indicate a trend. During 2012, the gross margin of our Climate Control business was $30.4 million, declining from $31.3 million -- excuse me, let me make sure I stated that correctly. It was 30.4%, declining from 31.3% in 2011. The principal reasons for the decline were lower sales mix of residential products which generally carry a higher gross margin than our commercial products and also it was contributed too by the lower volume. Moving on to the indicators related to commercial and institutional construction, on page 20, we show that McGraw-Hill has increased their projection for 2013, although the recovery is still slower than previously projected. It should be noted that, over the past 12 months, McGraw-Hill has made significant adjustments to the short-term forecast. Their most recent thinking is that the key markets we serve are expected to grow 68% from 2012 to 2017. Further supporting this projection is the most recent release of the Architectural Billings Index by the American Institute of Architects, which is shown on page 21. This is showing the strongest growth since November of 2007 and it's now been several months that this has been in positive category -- in the positive territory. Moving on to sales of geothermal heat pumps used in single-family residential applications, page 22 shows McGraw-Hill's forecast for single-family residential construction starts. These products accounted for approximately 18% of all Climate Control sales during 2012. McGraw-Hill is currently forecasting that housing starts will continue to grow and more than double between 2012 and 2017. If this future growth occurs, it should benefit our residential geothermal business, although we believe this is also influenced by the cost of energy. The continuing low cost of natural gas, which is used as a fuel for heating about 60% of the homes in the United States, has reduced the savings for geothermal heat pumps compared to gas furnaces and extended the payback period for our residential geothermal products in those markets that use natural gas. Also, we've experienced a reduction in the sale of geothermal heat pumps for replacement applications during 2012 as compared to 2010 and 2011. Finally, we believe that the specific market we serve, which focuses on higher-end housing, has not performed as well as the entry-level and lower-priced housing sectors. We believe that these factors have impacted our sales of residential heat pumps. However, we continue to maintain our market share leadership position with these geothermal heat pump products. In summary, the general consensus in most economists and construction industry experts is that the recovery will be forthcoming, albeit at a slower pace than previously forecast. One bright spot is that there appears to be a strengthening in all major sectors we serve, especially multi-family housing, which historically has been one of our strongest markets. Another positive trend is the increase in green construction that has occurred the past few years and is expected to continue. The 2013 green construction outlook, which is also published by McGraw-Hill, forecasts that the green construction market will grow from approximately $85 million in 2012 to between 204 -- excuse me, $85 billion in 2012, to between $204 billion and $248 billion in 2016. This should benefit the sale of our highly energy-efficient products. Turning to page 23, we've listed our Climate Control business strategies and some key initiatives. One significant item of note is our focus on LEAN initiatives. This is an aggressive program to identify cost savings and process improvements throughout all functions of the organization. During 2012 we developed and released several new products including the following, which is not a comprehensive list. The rollout of new digital controls and features on most of our water-source and geothermal heat pumps, many new heat pump models inside this, including our Tranquility 22, a low-cost two-stage product targeted for commercial applications, this was a Dealer Design Gold Winner, launch of our award-winning ultra-high efficiency, Trilogy two-mode geothermal products, fan coils with improved efficiency DCM or electrically commutated motors. A major expand monitoring system for our large air handlers, a new line of air coil modular chillers. We extended our offering of simultaneous heating and cooling modular chillers and we introduced a new line of package make-up air units at the AHR Expo in January of 2013. We will continue to develop and introduce new products into 2013 and future years. Also during 2012 we substantially completed construction on an expansion of our air coil manufacturing facility. One last point, on March 18, Tony and I will be presenting at the Sidoti Emerging Growth Research Conference in New York. We hope to seeing many of you there. Before opening this up for questions, I'd like to thank you for listening today and would like to request that each of you please limit yourself to three or maybe four questions so that others will have a chance to ask some questions as well. If you have more questions, you can get back in the queue and ask them later on during the session. Operator, please poll for questions.