Thank you for joining us for Navios Maritime Partners Second Quarter 2024 Earnings Conference Call. With us today from the company are Chairwoman and CEO, Ms. Angeliki Frangou; Chief Operating Officer, Mr. Stratos Desypris; and Chief Financial Officer, Ms. Eri Tsironi; and Vice Chairman, Mr. Ted Petrone. As a reminder, this conference call is being webcast. To access the webcast, please go to the Investors section of Navios Partners' website at www.navios-mlp.com. You'll see the webcasting link in the middle of the page, and a copy of the presentation referenced in today's earnings conference call will also be found there. Now I will review the safe harbor statement. This conference call could contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 about Navios Partners. Forward-looking statements are statements that are not historical facts. Such forward-looking statements are based upon the current beliefs and expectations of Navios Partners' management, and are subject to risks and uncertainties, which could cause actual results to differ materially from the forward-looking statements. Such risks are more fully discussed in Navios Partners’ filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The information set forth herein should be understood in light of such risks. Navios Partners does not assume any obligation to update the information contained in this conference call. The agenda for today's call is as follows: First, Ms. Frangou will offer opening remarks. Next, Mr. Desypris will give an overview of Navios Partners' segment data. Next, Ms. Tsironi will give an overview on Navios Partners' financial results. Then Mr. Petrone will provide an industry overview. And lastly, we'll open the call to take questions. Now I turn the call over to Navios Partners' Chairwoman and CEO, Ms. Angeliki Frangou. Angeliki?

Good morning to all of you and thank you for joining us on today's call. I am pleased with the results for the second quarter of 2024. We reported revenue $342.2 million and net income of $101.5 million for the quarter. Earnings per common unit was $3.30. In the second quarter, regional conflict, particularly in the Red Sea, continue to impact marine transportation. The net result has been longer per mile for the similar volume of goods as people are avoiding the Red Sea and taking the route around Africa. It seems that the global inflation we all experienced post-pandemic is subsiding. And while the U.S. and European economies are generally healthy. China's economy is challenged by a troubled real estate sector and fading domestic consumption. We are working carefully to determine whether China's economic woes weakened its otherwise voracious appetite for commodities. As you can imagine, with China's economic [stalling] (ph), we have a cautious view. But we are also cautious because of geopolitical considerations. The conflict in Ukraine continues with no resolution in sight. The Middle East is on the edge and things can go badly quickly, if some sort of new equilibrium is not established. Accordingly, we continue to execute on our strategic initiative by focusing on things that we can control, such as reducing leverage and modernizing our energy efficient fleet. Please turn to slide seven. Navios Partner is a leading publicly listed shipping company with 179 vessels diversified in 15 asset classes in three sectors. We have $318.4 million of cash on our balance sheet. I mentioned last quarter that we believe that we're in a gliding path to our target net leverage range of 20%, 25%. As you can see, our net LTV as of the end of the second quarter was 31.6%. Consequently,…

Thank you, Angeliki, and good morning, all. Please turn to slide 10. In August, Navios Partners’ renewed its management and administrative services agreements with Navios Ship Management Inc. The current agreements were lastly renewed in 2019 and are expiring at the end of 2024. Based on the new agreements, Navios Ship Management will continue to provide administrative services based on allocable cost with no extra fees. Additionally, Navios Ship Management will provide technical, commercial, and other services based on the following fee structure: $950 per day technical management fee for owned vessels; 1.25% commercial fee on gross revenues; S&P fee of 1% on purchase or sale price and fees for other specialized services for example supervision of newbuilding vessels. The new management and administrative services agreements will commence on January 1, 2025 for a term of 10-years renewing annually and is subject to a fee for termination or change of control. The agreements were negotiated and approved by the Conflicts Committee of the Board of Directors of Navios Partners. The Conflicts Committee used Watson Farley & Williams as their legal advisors and KPMG as their financial advisors, who issued the firm's opinion. Please turn to slide 11, which details our operating free cash flow potential for the second-half of 2024. We fixed 73% of available days at the net average rate of $26,245 per day. In short, contracted revenue exceeds total cash expense by $87 million. And we have 7,395 remaining open/index lease days that should provide substantial additional free cash flow. On the right side of the slide, we provide our 27,878 available days by vessel type, so that you can perform your own sensitivity analysis. Please turn to slide 12. We are always renewing the fleet, so that we maintain a young profile. It is part of our…

Thank you, Stratos, and good morning, all. I will briefly review our unaudited financial results for the second quarter and first-half of 2024. The financial information is included in the press release and is summarized in the slide presentation available on the company's website. Moving to the earnings highlights on slide 14, total revenue for the second quarter of 2024 slightly decreased to $342 million, compared to $347 million for the same period in 2023, due to lower combined time charter equivalent rate and available days. Our combined time charter equivalent rate for the second quarter of 2024 stood at 23,384 per day. In terms of sector performance, the TCE for our dry bulk fleet increased by 14% to 17,959 per day, compared to the same period in 2023. In contrast, our container and tanker TCE rates were approximately 15% and 10% lower respectively. TCE rates for our containers stood at 30,239 per day and for our tankers at 27,816 per day for the second quarter of 2024. EBITDA, net income and EPU were adjusted, as explained in the slide footnote. Excluding these amounts, adjusted EBITDA for Q2 2024 decreased by $1.7 million to $190 million, compared to Q2 2023. Adjusted net income for Q2 2024 decreased by $8 million to $94 million, compared to Q2 2023. The decrease was normally due to the decrease in net debt to EBITDA and the $10.6 million negative effects from depreciation and amortization, despite the $4.3 million positive effects from the reduction in interest rate expense and the increase in interest income. Total revenue for the first-half of 2024 increased by $4.2 million to $661 million, compared to the same period in 2023. The increase in revenue was mainly a result of higher combined PCE rate, despite lower available days. Our combined PCE…

Thank you, Eri. Please turn to slide 19, for a review of current trade disruptions. The Red Sea entrance leading to the Suez Canal, a strategic maritime transport point, continues to operate at restricted transit levels. Red Sea disruptions have caused a rerouting of ships via the Cape of Good Hope, increasing costs and ton miles. Since first-half of December, transits have reduced 61% for containers, 60% for dry bulk vessels, and 53% for tankers. Panama Canal daily transit restrictions continue to ease on the back of returning seasonal rains with transit anticipated to be new normal by month end. Please turn to slide 21 for a review of the tanker industry. World GDP expected to grow by 3.2% in 2024 based on the IMF's July forecast. The IEA projects 0.9 million barrels per day increase in world oil demand for 2024 and a 1 million barrel per day increase in 2025. Chinese crude imports continue at healthy levels averaging about 11.1 million barrels per day in Q2, although imports are down about 5% from the same period last year. After a seasonally strong Q1, rates moderated slightly in Q2, but remained above long-term averages with product tankers showing the most resilience. The OPEC crude exports cuts have been somewhat mitigated by an increased Atlantic Far East exports, causing high volatility to VLCC rates in Q2. Turning to slide 22, as previously mentioned, both crude and product rates remain strong across the board, due to healthy supply and demand fundamentals and shifting trading patterns. Crude ton miles are expected to grow by 3.3% in 2024 and a further 2.2% in 2025. Product tanker ton miles are expected to grow by 7.5% in 2024, but are expected to decline by 2.4% in ‘25. These percentages increases incorporated continued canal restrictions in…

Thank you, Ted. This completes our formal presentation. We open the call for questions.

Our first question will come from Omar Nokta with Jefferies. Please go ahead.

Thank you. Hi, guys. Good afternoon. Obviously, nice quarter, good amount of free cash flow generation and you continue to focus on fine tuning the fleet, selling ships and bringing in some new ones with contract cover. Obviously, a big highlight is the buyback. You spent nearly $10 million, which is nice. Just kind of thinking about that, is there anything that triggered you putting that capital to work? Obviously, you highlight the disconnect between the share price and NAV, but is there anything that maybe instigated the buyback here recently? Is it comfort with the outlook? Is it the buildup of the backlog? What would you say kind of drove the decision to go after the buyback?

Good morning, Omar. I think basically we focus on our target. We are driving NAV by reinvesting in our business. You have seen that is clear from day one. We bought over $0.5 billion of our vessels and we contracted them out about $560 million, over $560 million of contracted revenue. But at the same time, we managed to achieve our goals or we are achieving our goals. Meaning we brought down our leverage to towards 31%. Our target is 20%, 25%. But our cash position is very close to what we have stated. So basically, we're driving NAV, which was like that by investing, but we are also reaching our target. We were able to implement on a strategy we have articulated. And we start a repurchase program, having a good firepower on that, and having an additional benefit for our investors by -- being additionally incremental accretion by repurchasing capturing about $0.59, when we acquire our shares. So this is a net-net good result.

Yes, certainly. Well, thanks Angeliki for that. And just a couple more follow-ups from me just kind of on the orders. The LR2s that you just ordered, you're continuing to pay somewhere around that $66 million. And that compares to every market valuation that suggests newbuilding’s are closer to high ‘70s or close to $80 million. Are these options that you've been able to exercise? Is that what's driving the cheaper price relative to what perception is about a newbuilding cost?

You are exactly right. I mean, one of the things we do, we are disciplined on purchasing. We like to focus on a quality shipyard, build on the quality vessel and create options for us. And I think you have seen that we have been implementing on this strategy for quite some time, giving us an advantage. Also, we are able to -- we must, when your derivative is actually getting, you have an obligation. So marking the -- to become an asset, we need to fix it and have that balance. And I think we are trying to be very focused on that.

Yes, yes, and obviously the charters now, you know, looks like a little over half, maybe over half a 50% payback over the term of the five-year charters? What's interesting, I guess, is the two 7,900 TEU newbuilding’s that you just ordered, those are delivering in ‘26 and seem to have almost a 50% payback over just the first, or basically the four-year charter. So, a pretty attractive payback. I guess when we think about that, you know, you've been very busy being able to acquire tonnage, put it on contract, but these container newbuilds kind of stand out as having a sooner payback over just that four-year term? What do you think is -- any color you can give on what's driving that? I guess one, do those numbers make sense? I referenced that quick of a payback. But two, you know, is this a repeatable type of transaction in containers, or was this one of those one-offs where we had an opportunity to take advantage of some ‘26 slots at a good rate?

We build on our relationship with the yard. So this is not a repeatable, not only on the particular deal, but we are repeatable deals, if you see, over different shipyards and over different asset classes. We care about where we order. We care about creating the relationships and the designs of the vessel. If you remember, we order on the same kind of type of vessel. We have done the LNG fuel vessel. And we repeat on the knowledge we have on the shipyard, on the type of vessel with an opportunity to match with the right charting opportunity. So this is a continuous effort we have. And a lot of deals, you may never see them. I mean, this is not a one-off. By the way, also the aframax’s, the LR2s, our payback is quite significant. So we are very careful on both sides, because at the end of the story you need to go at historical averages. We’d like to make sure that with the charter we have we bring the value, the residual value down.

Thank you. Thanks, Angelika. That's helpful. I Appreciate the color. I'll turn it over.

Thank you. At this time, we have no further questions. I will turn the call back to Angeliki for any closing remarks.

Thank you. This completes our quarterly results. Thank you.