Operator
Operator
Good day and welcome to the Quanta Services' Fourth Quarter and Year-End 2015 Earnings Conference Call. Today's conference is being recorded. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Kip Rupp. Please go ahead.
Quanta Services, Inc. (PWR)
Q4 2015 Earnings Call· Thu, Feb 25, 2016
$635.05
-0.35%
Same-Day
+1.46%
1 Week
+7.98%
1 Month
+13.35%
vs S&P
+8.45%
Operator
Operator
Good day and welcome to the Quanta Services' Fourth Quarter and Year-End 2015 Earnings Conference Call. Today's conference is being recorded. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Kip Rupp. Please go ahead.
Kip A. Rupp - Vice President-Investor Relations
Management
Thank you, Sabrina, and welcome, everyone, to Quanta's conference call to review fourth quarter and full-year 2015 results. Before I turn the call over to management, I have the normal housekeeping details to run through. If you would like to have Quanta news releases and other information e-mailed to you when they occur, please sign up for e-mail information alerts by going to the Investors and Media section of the Quanta Services website at quantaservices.com. You can also access Quanta's latest earnings releases and other investor materials such as press releases, SEC filings, presentations, videos, audiocasts, conference calls, and stock price information with the Quanta Services Investor Relations app, which is available for iPhone, iPad, and Android mobile devices for free at Apple's App Store and at Google Play. Additionally investors and others should note that while we announce material financial information and make other public disclosures of information regarding Quanta through SEC filings, press releases and public conference calls, we may also utilize social media to communicate this information. It's possible that the information we post on social media could be deemed material. Accordingly, we encourage investors and media and others interested in our company to follow Quanta and review the information we post on the social media channels listed on our website in the investors and media section. A replay of today's call will be available on Quanta's website at quantaservices.com. In addition, a telephonic recorded instant replay will be available for the next seven days, 24 hours a day, that can be accessed as set forth in the press release. Please remember that information reported on this call speaks only as of today, February 24, 2016. And therefore, you are advised that any time-sensitive information may no longer be accurate as of the time of any replay…
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Thank you, Kip, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to the Quanta Services' fourth quarter and full-year 2015 earnings conference call. I will start the call with a strategic and operational overview before turning it over to Derrick Jensen, Quanta's Chief Financial Officer, who will provide a detailed review of our fourth quarter results. Following Derrick's comments we welcome your questions. Our fourth quarter results, excluding unusual financial items, met our expectations, which I believe set the positive tempo as we close out what was a challenging year for the company and the overall industry. Many of the challenges we faced in 2015 resulted from factors outside of our control; such as the collapse in oil prices, and in particular its effect on the Canadian economy, several severe weather events, project delays due to a challenging permitting environment and a sudden shift in small transmission market dynamics, all of which impacted our topline margins and profitability. However, there were things we should have done better. For example, the unusual occurrence of a significant project loss we incurred on the combined cycle gas power plant we are building in Alaska. That said, we've booked significant mainline pipe backlog in 2015 and expect additional mainline awards this year, which should be a catalyst for profitable growth for Quanta in 2016. As we transition from a challenging 2015 into 2016, I believe, it is an appropriate time to review our strategies for long-term growth and competitive differentiation as well as discuss the near-term and longer-term drivers of the markets we serve. Though our end markets are experiencing some near-term challenges that create uncertainty, we believe uncertainty creates opportunity and we are actively pursuing strategic initiatives that we believe will lay the groundwork for success in the upcoming years. A unique, but critical driver of…
Derrick A. Jensen - Chief Financial Officer
Management
Thanks, Jim, and good morning, everyone. Today, we announced revenues of $1.9 billion for the fourth quarter of 2015 compared to $2.03 billion in the prior year's fourth quarter. Net loss from continuing operations attributable to common stock was $2.6 million or a loss of $0.02 per diluted share. These results compared to net income from continuing operations attributable to common stock of $60.4 million or $0.27 per diluted share in the fourth quarter of 2014. Adjusted diluted earnings per share from continuing operations, as presented in today's press release, was $0.30 for the fourth quarter of 2015 as compared to $0.48 for the fourth quarter of 2014. Our fourth quarter results were impacted by approximately $0.25 per diluted share of net impairment charges. These charges included asset impairments of $58.5 million or $0.27 per diluted share, primarily associated with goodwill and intangible asset impairment charges associated with lower forecasted oil and gas services revenues for our Gulf of Mexico operations and certain Australian operations, due to the extended low commodity price environment. These charges were partially offset by tax benefits of $4.2 million or $0.02 per diluted share, associated with the realization of a previously unrecognized deferred tax assets related to our investment in a foreign subsidiary. Also, net income from continuing operations attributable to common stock for the fourth quarter of 2014 was negatively impacted by a $30.3 million net of tax charge, or $0.14 per diluted share for a provision for long-term contract receivable associated with change orders on a 2012 electric power transmission project that were ultimately settled earlier this year. Net loss attributable to common stock for the fourth quarter of 2015 was $5.1 million, or a $0.03 loss per diluted share. This compares to net income attributable to common stock of $66.6 million, or…
Operator
Operator
Thank you. We'll now take the first question from Dan Mannes from Avondale Partners. Please go ahead.
Daniel Mannes - Avondale Partners LLC
Analyst
Hello. Can you hear me?
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Yeah, good morning, Dan.
Daniel Mannes - Avondale Partners LLC
Analyst
Great. The first question relates to backlog in the Oil and Gas segment. Backlog obviously down sequential, if I rewind to the Q3 call, you guys talked about $1 billion worth of mainline opportunities that were in discussions. Now, you're talking about $400 million in backlog is down, so I'm wondering either did something – how material was the project that you removed alternatively were some of the things you were negotiating before they have been pushed out?
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
I would characterize the environment, Dan, continues to be robust. There's still billions of dollars of pipe mainline opportunities that are out there that we're bidding. The project that we removed from backlog was sizable. I'm not going to quantify it, but it was a sizable project. And that did impact the fourth quarter backlog decline obviously in oil and gas. But with that said, I think it's just a short-term dynamic and I think backlog in that segment and quite frankly in both segments will continue to be strong going forward. We're going to have some seasonality baked in and some fluctuations that do occur, but some of the contracts are taking a little bit longer to negotiate, but we do expect the mainline backlog to continue to increase over time.
Daniel Mannes - Avondale Partners LLC
Analyst
Got it. And then just switching over to the Electric segment, you talked about – maybe hope for an improvement in the second half. Is that based on large projects actually moving into construction in the second half? Or is that more a better bidding environment in the second half of 2016 on large projects leading to revenue in 2017?
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
It's a little bit of both, Dan. We do expect to see more large project activity as we move into the second half of this year. We anticipate that. Although our visibility still isn't crystal clear. But, we do expect both backlog – the margin environment to improve and backlog – opportunities for backlog in large projects to improve as well.
Daniel Mannes - Avondale Partners LLC
Analyst
Sounds good. Thanks for the color.
Operator
Operator
Okay. We'll now take the following question from Tahira Afzal from KeyBanc Capital Markets. Please go ahead.
Tahira Afzal - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.
Analyst
Thank you and congrats on a good quarter in a difficult environment.
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Thank you, Tahira.
Tahira Afzal - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.
Analyst
Jim, first question is, can you give us an idea of how much you're expecting the shale business to fall-off. We are estimating in the model that we built for you something fairly dramatic. I would love to get a sense to just see how conservative or how balanced you're being there?
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Most of our shale activity was in the Northeast in the Marcellus and in the Utica. The problem is, because the gas is trapped there is not enough takeaway capacity. There have been fewer wells being drilled, because they can't get the gas out. And so, subsequently there is less gathering work to be done. I do think that problem will take care of itself, once we start building takeaway capacity. But, we are expecting levels of gathering to be down significantly this year compared to what we've seen in the past few years. I would guess probably half the volume. But, the segment revenues should still grow, because we do think our LDC markets and our mainline markets will grow and make-up for that downturn. But, it does create some volatility and earnings in particular, when you haven't ramped up significantly in mainline...
Tahira Afzal - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.
Analyst
Right.
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
...so we were using – that was a good stable baseline of work that we were doing on gathering that was recurring revenue year-round. That's now at a lower level. So, it's going to have some impact on margins until we ramp-up on mainline in a meaningful way.
Tahira Afzal - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.
Analyst
Got it, okay. And then on the transmission side Jim, you know, the optimism again and maybe I'm asking same question as Dan in a sense. But the ramp you expect potentially in the second half, let's say you don't see it. What would the variations from your current forecast be, if you assume no ramp, or no new large projects in the second half?
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Well, let me just be clear, we have very little uncommitted for large transmission projects at the midpoint of our guidance.
Tahira Afzal - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.
Analyst
Perfect.
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
So, I mean, I think that's enough said there. I mean, I don't think we're getting too optimistic in our transmission forecast. When we say we expect it to ramp, qualitatively, that really isn't baked in at the midpoint of our guidance, because I don't have the visibility. If it does begin to ramp in, we do better than we expect. It'd be more toward the upper end of our guidance, but we're not betting on it right now...
Tahira Afzal - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.
Analyst
Perfect.
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
...because of our past history and trying to predict transmission. It's just difficult with the permitting challenges and so forth at this point in time to try to predict what's going to happen in the second half of the year.
Tahira Afzal - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.
Analyst
Got it. Okay. That's helpful. And then Derrick congrats again, Jim.
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Okay. Thanks, Tahira.
Operator
Operator
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, please limit yourself to asking one question. The next question will come from Matt Duncan from Stephens, Inc. Please go ahead.
Matt Duncan - Stephens, Inc.
Analyst
Hey, good morning, guys.
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Morning, Matt.
Matt Duncan - Stephens, Inc.
Analyst
So, Jim, the first question, I want to go back to the question about the project that was taken at backlog. I appreciate you guys don't want to size that for obvious reasons. So, let me ask you a little bit differently, would that segment's backlog has been down, had you not remove that project?
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Yes. It would have been down.
Matt Duncan - Stephens, Inc.
Analyst
Okay. And then in terms of the funding constraints that we're all hearing and seeing on the MLP side, can you quantify the impact on you guys that you're anticipating within your guidance from some of the funding issues that may crop up in that midstream segment?
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Yeah. I don't know if it's necessarily a funding issue. I think that the low price of oil has obviously been a headwind to – there is not as many wells being drilled. I mean, the rig count is down 75% throughout North America. And we've taken that into account on our guidance that we'll be doing less gathering going forward.
Matt Duncan - Stephens, Inc.
Analyst
Okay.
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Matt, maybe, you should re-ask the question. I just didn't – I don't understand when you say funding.
Matt Duncan - Stephens, Inc.
Analyst
Well, I mean, there is – the potential at MLP is just not going to have the money to spend. So...
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
I see.
Matt Duncan - Stephens, Inc.
Analyst
...if you have money to spend on this kind of stuff, how much are you...
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Matt Duncan - Stephens, Inc.
Analyst
(46:54)?
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
No, I understand. I think we've baked that in. I mean, obviously, that's something we're watching very closely. And most of our customers fortunately are well capitalized that have committed contracts, and these are larger pipeline players. But, no, that is certainly something that we are watching – credit risk on some of the MLPs – and we have certainly baked that into our guidance.
Matt Duncan - Stephens, Inc.
Analyst
Okay.
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Thank you for that clarification.
Matt Duncan - Stephens, Inc.
Analyst
And then a last thing, and I'll hop back into queue. Just on the Oil and Gas segment margin guide, I mean, you normally anticipate 9% to 12% there. Mainline work is the highest margin work you do there. That's the piece that's growing. Yet, the margin guide is 5.5% to 7%. So, I'm trying to better understand the drag on segment margins from the underutilization of people in other parts of your Oil and Gas segment versus how much you're anticipating the mainline margins to maybe be below what they normally are, as you ramp on some of these larger projects. And due to the uncertainty of permitting and timing and the carrying cost of your people and equipment in that mainline segment, can you just better help us understand how come we're seeing so much of a margin drag there?
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
That's a good question. And because we don't have the level of gathering work going on at this point in time in the Canadian pipelines that we typically would see the level – I mean, we are building some pipeline in Canada right now, but the level of activity isn't – what it has been in the past – we're not at a ramp level now on mainline. So, the first half of the year will be a drag on margins. When we do have a full complement of mainline going in the second quarter or, particularly, in the third quarter, we should see us moving into that 9% to 12% range, if we execute. But for the full-year, we expect it to be a drag, primarily, because of the lack of gathering work that we've done over the last several years. And also, we've got about 15% of our business that has been impacted directly by oil prices where we have operations that will be generating – we expect them to generate positive margins, but certainly nowhere near that 9% to 12% range. And the area is impacted by oil and gas. So, when you look at the entire segment and the dynamics that are occurring today, we feel like it will be challenging to be in that 9% range. But that is our expectation long-term, and we're going to continue to make adjustments and certainly if mainline takes off like we expect in the next several years, we do think it's possible to get into that range at some point in time. But this year is going to be challenging.
Matt Duncan - Stephens, Inc.
Analyst
Yeah. Thanks for the color, Jim. That helps.
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Yeah.
Operator
Operator
Right. Ladies and gentlemen, please limit yourself to one question and one follow-up. The next question will come from (sic) Noelle Dilts, Stifel, Nicolaus. Please go ahead. Noelle Dilts - Stifel, Nicolaus & Co., Inc.: Hi. Thanks. Good morning.
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Good morning, Noelle. Noelle Dilts - Stifel, Nicolaus & Co., Inc.: Good morning. You talked about moving into adjacent markets and taking advantage of the turmoil in the markets to some extent. Just want to understand, is this a meaningful shift in your acquisition strategy? That's one question. Are you looking at staying within these energy-focused industries or do you look to move outside of that? Just give us a feel for what you're thinking and then also maybe touch on, if you're still looking at smaller bolt-on acquisitions or would maybe look at doing something larger?
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Right now, our strategy is to do the bolt-ons in adjacent markets in our energy segments. That's what we've been focused on the last couple of years, building, for example, our engineering and material management capabilities in the both Oil and Gas and in the Electric segments. We've moved into areas like storage, made a small bolt-on acquisition in the storage space. So, those are more adjacencies to help expand our customer solutions across the spectrum of what we can do. We're concentrating on our base business and execution right now. That's the most important thing. And then certainly, we've done some bolt-on acquisitions in the last couple of years. I expect that to continue. But, I wouldn't count out doing – and again this is not our focus right now, but we do continue to look at opportunities in other areas, if that makes sense. And we're not going to make any big bad acquisition that's not my intent, but certainly if there's opportunities to move into other areas, we will. For example, in Latin America, we've been focused on expanding our telecom operations. And we should do about $300 million there this year. And so, that's an important growth opportunity for us and that's an example of branching out into new areas.
Operator
Operator
And we'll now take the next question from William Bremer from Maxim Group. Please go ahead.
William Bremer - Maxim Group LLC
Analyst
Good morning, gentlemen.
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Morning, Bill.
Derrick A. Jensen - Chief Financial Officer
Management
Morning, Bill.
William Bremer - Maxim Group LLC
Analyst
Hey, Jim, can you give us maybe an update on what you're seeing on the downstream market? You touched upon midstream, what do you see in there in downstream? And secondly one for you Derrick, you called out $3 million to $4 million of restructuring for the first quarter, what's the game plan for full 2016? And how do you right-size, I guess, Quanta overall here as, if we stay in this stagnantation type of level for quite some time now?
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Yeah, I'll go first. I mean the downstream market right now is extremely bullish – we're extremely bullish on them. I mean we've been green-fielding operations in the Houston ship channel and the refinery and petro-chem area and that business has been growing nicely for us. It's not anything material to the total company, but it's certainly a nice growth area for us. And the business is going very strong right now. Obviously, with the refineries many of them operating at peak capacity and having expansion plans and at a very minimum, they are refurbishing and upgrading their existing facilities. So, we're doing really well there and we continue to see that as a growth area for us.
Derrick A. Jensen - Chief Financial Officer
Management
Relative to the cost, I mean, our efforts to right size costs are generally continuous, and so you rarely see us come through and have an aggregate restructuring type item. We've called that out relative to the first quarter. Not having any other forecast of other restructuring through the end of the year, doesn't mean that we're not trying to look at it from addressing those costs, but we're not looking at as it stands here today as having something that is a sizable overall restructuring. We still are positioning ourselves relative to our multiyear outlook. We have a number of initiatives that's going on, in our mind that are to support the long-term growth of the company. And from a timing perspective, as it stands, as Jim mentioned, from what we see relative to the contributions of mainline in the third quarter and fourth quarter as well as the potential dynamics of evaluating what the market looks like in the last half of the year for a large transmission, we're still situating ourselves to support those aspects of the market as it stands today.
William Bremer - Maxim Group LLC
Analyst
Okay, gentlemen. Thank you.
Operator
Operator
Okay. We'll now take the next question from Andrew Kaplowitz from (sic) Citigroup. Please go ahead.
Andrew Kaplowitz - Citigroup Global Markets, Inc.
Analyst
Hi. Good morning, guys.
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Morning.
Derrick A. Jensen - Chief Financial Officer
Management
Morning.
Andrew Kaplowitz - Citigroup Global Markets, Inc.
Analyst
Jim, you've talked about the expectation for low-teens to mid-teens revenue growth in 2015 in the Oil and Gas business. And while your total Oil and Gas backlog is still up in double-digit nicely, your 12-month backlog given. So, could you talk about your conviction in this kind of growth in 2016? And how dependent is your revenue forecast I mean on projects that aren't booked yet?
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
We had a hard time with the caller here. It's breaking up. I think the question was my conviction on Oil and Gas segment in the backlog and I would – go ahead, I can hear you better now. Please repeat the question.
Andrew Kaplowitz - Citigroup Global Markets, Inc.
Analyst
Okay. It's very simply that how dependent is your revenue forecast in Oil and Gas based on mainline projects that aren't in backlog yet?
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
We've got – in our forecast on mainline, I would say, that with the projects that we have at backlog at year-end, plus the projects that I mentioned that we have either signed or that we are negotiating – in the final stages of negotiating right now, that that would be the midpoint of our guidance and we have put some hedge in there for some project slippage as well.
Andrew Kaplowitz - Citigroup Global Markets, Inc.
Analyst
Okay. That's helpful.
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
If that was your question?
Andrew Kaplowitz - Citigroup Global Markets, Inc.
Analyst
Yeah, that was the question. And so, let me just ask you about the pricing environment, especially in Canada. One of the concerns we have is that, even the competitive environment has been leading to contractors bidding on projects with less favorable terms. How, Jim, is that a concern, again, especially in Canada right now?
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Yeah. I would say that on the – the pipeline side right now, nothing has changed if anything, it's a better environment for us, because we are still in the strategic alliances that are more risk sharing agreements that are longer-term, where the customer is wanting us to meet their resource needs over a multi-year period. And that tends to be a more teaming type approach on the contracts and not a bid and buy situation at year-end when it's a one-off project. So, I would say, there's been no change in the overall approach to contract and all the risks that we're willing to take in this environment, even in Canada, because there's so much pipeline work to be built going forward.
Andrew Kaplowitz - Citigroup Global Markets, Inc.
Analyst
And the same, electric transmission, Jim?
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Electric transmission, I would say, there's – yeah, I mean, it's more challenging in Canada right now, because there's fewer projects out there. So, it just is a more challenging environment. Canada is a challenge right now, but we do think that it will recover, but it's going to be a difficult 2016 in Canada.
Andrew Kaplowitz - Citigroup Global Markets, Inc.
Analyst
Thank you.
Operator
Operator
We'll now take our next question from John Rogers from D.A. Davidson. Please go ahead. John Bergstrom Rogers - D.A. Davidson & Co.: Hi. Good morning.
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Morning, John.
Derrick A. Jensen - Chief Financial Officer
Management
Morning, John. John Bergstrom Rogers - D.A. Davidson & Co.: Good morning. Jim, just back on the pipeline business for a second, the improvement that you're expecting, both in bookings and margins into the second half, how much oil work is in those assumptions, or is it all gas? And give us a little color there.
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
It's not all gas, but it certainly predominantly gas. And most of it frankly is moving gas in the Midwest and Northeast markets and in Eastern Canada. And we're also in the – we're along the eastern seaboard, in general. So, not to say, there's projects in the Southeast as well. So, it's mostly natural gas, I would say probably two-thirds to maybe three-quarters. I think that would probably the breakdown. John Bergstrom Rogers - D.A. Davidson & Co.: Okay. And the – I mean, there's a lot of reports about a number of these big projects going forward. But, we haven't yet seen a lot of contract awards, but we're seeing schedules that they're expected to start up by May, June of this year. When do these projects have to go into contract to meet those schedules?
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Well, I mean, when the projects can move quickly to construction once contracts are signed. Projects can move quickly to construction once contracts are signed. And I don't think you're going to get a lot of pre-notification. It's just, I think – I mean, I just don't think there's going to be a lot of talk about what projects we're looking at and what the opportunity is, until we actually sign a contract and move to construction. So, it's not unusual, I've been hearing about a lot of projects moving, but you don't hear a lot from contractors about those projects until they move to construction. That's the approach we're going to take. But, certainly there are several projects that we are working on, that we've been awarded, that we plan on moving to construction on in the second quarter and third quarter, in particular. John Bergstrom Rogers - D.A. Davidson & Co.: Okay. Great. Thank you.
Operator
Operator
We'll now take the next question from Jeff Volshteyn from JPMorgan. Please go ahead.
Sangita Jain - JPMorgan Securities LLC
Analyst
This is Sangita for Jeff. My question is about the Gulf of Mexico impairment charge that you took in the fourth quarter. Can you tell us, if you would need to take another charge in 2016, let's say, if oil prices stayed at $30? And also about your Alaska power project, if you think you booked most of the loss that you need to or can we see more of it in 2016? Thanks.
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
I'll tell you that when we looked at our forecast in the area – for the companies in the areas that are impacted by oil and gas. At our midpoint, we took oil prices that are in the current environment, we didn't take the models from any of these third-party firms, let's say, oil is going to be at $40 by the end of the year. So, we're saying our base case is, this current environment extended. So, I hope we don't have to take – I think we're hopefully done with the impairments, because we feel like we're right sized in our forecast or geared toward the current environment that we live in today extended over a longer period of time. And then the second question?
Derrick A. Jensen - Chief Financial Officer
Management
Yeah, relative to the MLP, I'll add just a bit of color also to Jim's comment that is, when we evaluated our impairments, we didn't look at it as a base case; but at the same time, we looked at various scenarios including low cases and we waited those things accordingly to ensure that we had adequately taken into consideration potential volatility in this space. And then as well as relative to MLP, we have gone through and like we do at every period when it comes to looking at revenue recognition and try to go through and look at what our estimates to complete are based upon what we believe is the probable outcome. And so, as we sit here today, we have gone through and done a bottoms-up approach; and from that end, we believe that as we sit here that we have booked everything, it was a probable loss on that project as of year-end.
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
A little more color on MLP, I mean if there was some unforeseen conditions that required some engineering and scope changes, and we do feel that we have a good case to pursue, we are covered for a significant amount of that. Certainly, the most important thing right now is to get that project completed and it's scheduled to complete in the second quarter of this year.
Sangita Jain - JPMorgan Securities LLC
Analyst
Okay. That's great. Can I ask a follow-up on free cash flow and your potential use for that? If you plan, if you have a share buyback program beyond your ASR for the rest of the year, or if you plan to hold on to your free cash flow for acquisitions?
Derrick A. Jensen - Chief Financial Officer
Management
Yeah, actually, we have a fairly limited amount available under our current program based upon stock repurchases we made for 2015, we only have about $50 million remaining under our current program. If we were to pursue anything relative to additional repurchases, we will need to have further board authorization which we do not have as we stand here today. When we look at free cash flow for 2016, I do expect to have a fair amount of draws of working capital to support the growth as we go into the second quarter and third quarter that Jim has spoken to. So, I actually would tell you that I would expect to have a very limited free cash flow into the first portion of this year and it all basically dependent upon how the fourth quarter goes from seasonality, because again, most of it would be there to support the overall growth.
Sangita Jain - JPMorgan Securities LLC
Analyst
That's great. Thank you.
Operator
Operator
We'll now take our next question from Jamie Cook from Credit Suisse. Please go ahead. Jamie L. Cook - Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC (Broker): Hi. Good morning. I guess a couple questions. One, I guess, I'm still trying to reconcile the margin guidance for E&P for 2016 versus 2015. If you take out the noise that you had in 2015 and assume a more normalized margin, 2016 I guess, just seems late to me. So, can you just help me understand what you're assuming in terms of large transmission mix in 2016 versus 2015, or is it more competitive pressures? And then, I guess, the follow-up would be, Derrick, I think or Jim, last quarter you guys talked about, if you didn't see business picking up, you could take a – you would be a little more assertive on the cost cutting front; and in a sub-optimal topline market, you could sort of get to the 10% margin, what would you need to see to be more aggressive on the cost cutting side to improve margins? Like if those large transmission projects don't pick up in the back half of the year like you are expecting, should we expect restructuring? And at what point would you take those projects out of backlog?
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Jamie, that's a good question. And we will continue, we have and we'll continue to make adjustments. And yeah, I mean, if transmission doesn't materialize in the second half, we expect margins to continue over time to get back to the 10% range. I mean Canada is a big issue right now. Canada is challenged. We do have less big projects going on right now, especially compared to the first half of last year. And in the mix of smaller projects, the larger projects are certainly back to levels that we had in 2010. With that said, we have significant amount of transmission in backlog that we will need to execute on in 2017. We have to maintain some of our core capabilities and not be shortsighted. We've got that large project, the (67:15) project that we've got to execute on, the concession move we won in Alberta; and again, we're very early still on the (67:26) and we expect other awards to come out that will be sizable in the coming years. And so, I don't want to be shortsighted and cut all of our capabilities, but we do have a sense of urgency to return margins to historical levels. And we'll continue to make necessary adjustments, we have, and we'll continue to make necessary adjustments to improve margins over time. Jamie L. Cook - Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC (Broker): Okay. Thanks. I'll get back in queue.
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Thank you.
Operator
Operator
We'll now take the following question from Vishal Shah from Deutsche Bank. Please go ahead.
Chad Dillard - Deutsche Bank Securities, Inc.
Analyst
Hi. This is Chad Dillard on for Vishal.
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Good morning.
Chad Dillard - Deutsche Bank Securities, Inc.
Analyst
Good morning. So, if I take your 12 months backlog and compare it to the midpoint where you've got to get about $2.5 billion that needs to be booked. So, I was just curious to get your sense on like what sort of – like when would you need to actually book these projects to hit your guidance?
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Well, I mean, I don't think there's any one answer to that. I mean I think we book backlog every day. And we've taken that into account when we evaluate our own committed business and everything that we do. The day-to-day book and burn work and the large spot project environment. I think one of the key things that I mentioned today is that on your more volatile projects, where backlog is – you have the less visibility on backlog or your larger projects and we've assumed very little uncommitted electric transmission large projects at the midpoint of our guidance and we're comfortable that we have on the mainline guidance at the midpoint that we have the work booked or either in 12-month backlog, recently booked in the first quarter or that we're in final negotiations on projects and that's your midpoint. And so, I think the other work is really book and burn work in areas of our business that have been accelerating over the last several years and we don't expect any change in the sub-transmission business or electric distribution and our LDC business. All of that, it equates to probably half of our consolidated revenues and that businesses continues to accelerate and that's your day-to-day work that you probably have less committed, but you book that every day and that momentum continues as well.
Chad Dillard - Deutsche Bank Securities, Inc.
Analyst
Got it. And how should we think about operating cash flow in 2016? Can you just talk about what contributions from working capital you do expect as well as any advanced payments that we should be aware of?
Derrick A. Jensen - Chief Financial Officer
Management
Yeah, my earlier commentary I think was that based upon the fact that we do have such a seasonable ramp; we do think we'll have the draw of capital out of the business to support that growth. I think that you'll see the levels of debt continuing to increase on average balances between the first quarter into the second quarter, and into the third quarter, as we set up to fund the working capital that would be required to maintain that growth. Fourth quarter is going to be highly dependent. I mean, it's normal seasonality that sets the fourth quarter would roll down some and would, therefore, be a strong cash flow period much like you saw in the fourth quarter of this year. But the timing of when that can happen is very difficult to predict. I do believe that ultimately we'll have free cash flow, but I think you'll see most of it being very backend loaded and highly seasonality dependent.
Chad Dillard - Deutsche Bank Securities, Inc.
Analyst
Okay. Thank you.
Operator
Operator
We'll now take the last question from Justin Hauke from Robert W. Baird. Please go ahead. Justin P. Hauke - Robert W. Baird & Co., Inc. (Broker): Yeah. Thanks for squeezing me in here. I guess, the parting question would be – the commentary on oil and gas, I mean, we've talked a lot about 2016. It sounds like the guidance is mostly supported by the backlog you already have plus the bookings in the first quarter. I guess, I'm thinking, longer-term, as we look into 2017, I mean, how dependent is growth in that business on production levels? And the reason why I ask is, we see a lot of reports that show at the current production levels that there is not a lot of need for incremental pipeline in most of the shales, and we've got natural gas storage kind of at-capacity here. So, I mean, is that a business that can continue to grow after 2016?
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
Yes. I mean, I think, we will continue to book backlog. The takeaway capacity is needed, whether it's oil or natural gas. There's some markets that you hear that they don't need pipeline, I can certainly understand that in some of your liquid play shales. But we have customers that have a need to move liquids out of regions to either refining centers or load centers. And in this environment, it actually reduces the cost, because they cannot move enough product by pipe, it's stranded, they're having to move it by rail, and rail looks really costly right now in this environment. So, both liquid – there's a need for liquid and natural gas takeaway capacity and you will continue to see backlog grow in those areas. Justin P. Hauke - Robert W. Baird & Co., Inc. (Broker): So, I guess the takeaway is, even if we see aggregate production levels come down, pipeline capacity can still grow?
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
In certain regions you'll see pipeline capacity grow... Justin P. Hauke - Robert W. Baird & Co., Inc. (Broker): Thank you.
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
...or the needs for pipeline capacity, right from the Canadian oil sands, there is a desperate need to build takeaway capacity by our customers.
James F. O'Neil - Chief Executive Officer and President
Management
All right. Well, thank you. I'd like to thank you all for participating in our fourth quarter 2015 conference call. We appreciate your questions and your ongoing interest in Quanta Services. Thank you. And this concludes our call for today.
Operator
Operator
Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes our conference call for today. Thank you.