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Tsakos Energy Navigation Limited (TEN)

Q2 2014 Earnings Call· Mon, Aug 4, 2014

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Thank you for standing by, ladies and gentlemen. And welcome to Tsakos Energy Navigation Conference Call on the Second Quarter 2014 Financial Results. We have with us Mr. Takis Arapoglou, Chairman of the Board; Mr. Nikolas Tsakos, President and CEO; Mr. Paul Durham, Chief Financial Officer; and Mr. George Saroglou, Chief Operating Officer of the company. At this time all participants are in a listen-only mode. There will be a presentation followed by a question-and-answer session. (Operator Instructions) I must advice you that conference is being recorded today, Monday, August 04, 2014. And I now pass the floor to Mr. Nicolas Bornozis, President of Capital Link, Investor Relation Advisor of Tsakos Energy Navigation. Please go ahead Sir?

Nicolas Bornozis

Management

Thank you very much, and good morning to all of our participants. This is Nicolas Bornozis of Capital Link, Investor Relations Advisor to Tsakos Energy Navigation. The company released its financial results for the second quarter of 2014, this morning. The press release has been distributed publicly. In case if you do not have a copy of it, please call us at 212-661-7566 or email us at ten@capitallink.com and we will email a copy to you right away. Please note, that parallel to today's conference call, there is also a live audio and slide webcast, which can be accessed on the company's website on the front page at www.tenn.gr. The conference call will follow the presentation slides, so please, we urge you to access our presentation on the webcast. Please note that the slides of webcast will be available at an archive on the company's website after the conference call. Also please note that the slides of the webcast presentation are user controlled and that means that by clicking on the proper button you can move to the next or to the previous slide on your own. At this time, I would like to read the Safe Harbor statement. This conference call and slide presentation of the webcast contain certain forward-looking statements, within the meaning of the Safe Harbor provision of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Investors are cautioned that such forward-looking statements, involve risks and uncertainties, which may affect TEN's business prospects and results of operations. Such risks are more fully disclosed in TEN's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Ladies and gentlemen, at this point, I would like to turn the floor -- I would like to turn the call over to Mr. Takis Arapoglou, the Chairman of Board of Tsakos Energy Navigation. Mr. Arapoglou, please go ahead, sir?

Takis Arapoglou

Management

Thank you, Nicolas. Good morning, everyone. It's really a great pleasure and honor to have been elected Chairman of TEN proceeding John Stavropoulos. I would like to thank the Tsakos family, the Board of TEN and Mr. Stavropoulos for their support and confidence. In the midst of Stavropoulos' Chairmanship, during the past 20 years and with the close cooperation and leadership of COO and strategic investor Niko Tsakos, TEN has established itself as one of the leading and highly trusted oil tanker companies in the world. Going forward, we commit to perfect further our model of operational excellence, capital efficiency and revenue growth in order to continue to offer value to our investors and customers, while adhering to the higher standards of corporate governance. In doing so, we'll maintain our dynamic asset allocation philosophy with a modern and ever evolving technologically advanced fleet, ready to cover the diverse needs of our customer base, which as you all know, is of the highest caliber. During the last few years, the market has fully supported us in raising new growth capital which resulted in the broadening of our investor base and the results of which can be clearly visible now in our financials. A few words on our stock. Our stock has outperformed year-to-date all our peers; however, we still believe that it continues being undervalued. We're committed to rectify this going forward by committing to deliver superior financial performance for the benefit of our shareholders. So I would like to thank you and pass the floor to Niko Tsakos.

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

Thank you, Mr. Chairman and welcome on Board. Everybody is proud and happy to have you and to continue our growth [technical difficulty] prospects. We are very glad to report six months and second quarter results going towards the right direction. It seems that what we have discussed in previous quarters that we like that the end of the tunnel is more visible today than it was, it's true. We've seen very strong first quarter. We've seen the seasonal correction of the second quarter and we have been surprised by the strength of the beginning in the first 40-so days of the third quarter, the strength of that market. Together also we're surprised to see the appetite of the major end users for the operational performance from companies like ours. We have good news to report. We hope to be reporting quite a few items of good news going forward. Within this quarter as things develop and the things fall in line, before we get I think in the future, I will ask our COO, Mr. George Saroglou to give us a little key story of the last six months and the last quarter where we are and where we've been and where we're going. So George? George Saroglou Thank you, Nikolas. It is my pleasure to speak with all of you today and provide you the details of the operations of the second quarter and six months of 2014. For those of you connected to the internet, and our website, there is an online slide presentation whose format we'll follow during the call. Turning to Slide number three, where we have a snapshot of the diverse pressure by fleet and current reforms, which enables the company to take advantage of market opportunities and spikes. We have 44 tankers that…

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

Thank you, Paul for your really analytical description of what has happened in the last six months and specifically in the last quarter. I think that we are optimistic looking forward the beginning of the third quarter started very well. I think the supply and demand characteristics that George spoke about for the areas where we specialize and in the crude carrier specifically, the Suezmaxs and Aframaxs are very positive for the owners for the first time after a very, very long time more than a decade. We have not heard of negative growth as it is in the Aframaxs and almost breakeven growth on the Suezmaxs and an all in tanker newbuilding order book of 14%, of which most of it has to do with unfortunate orders of product carriers that happened in the last couple of years. So I think we are looking forward to finally well-balanced market. We can see this coming also because the majority of our clients are looking to take ships on long term employments, so the longer, the better. 2014 so far is going to be the year will be biggest demand for long-term employment, which means business for six months and over six months to 10 years and over by the major oil companies. So far this year, we have close to 280 long term charters signed in the whole -- those 350, the whole of 2013 and there has not been a year that it exceeded 250 in the last 10 years. So we are seeing the clients who know forward the requirements looking to cover themselves because they can see that the supply and demand care is finally towards the owner's benefit. So without trying we have to be conservative and be optimistic, but I think we are looking forward at a good year. We believe 2014 will be a positive and hopefully substantially positive year and we are looking to come back to the market and talk to you about the opportunities that we are going to be looking. As George said there is a lot of interest for long-term employment, accretive employment and our aim is get our share price not to the $7.50 that we went public in 2002, but significantly above that, we really believe that right the whole segment is at very low point. And with this thought, we would like to open the floor and would be happy to answer any questions about the company and the market. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Thank you very much indeed sir. (Operator Instructions) And from Stifel, your first question comes from the line of Ben Nolan. Your line is now open.

Ben Nolan - Stifel

Analyst

Yeah, thanks a lot. Nick you were just mentioning some increased activity on the long-term charter side. I know you guys have done some of that specifically with some of the Suezmax's that you got. I guess with respect to the two vessels, the two Suezmaxs that you just recently acquired, is that something you consider doing with those and what type of tenure are you looking at? Are we talking two years, are we talking ten years with respect to what your interest would be in someone marking down charters on your assets.

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

Well, right now we have to say that we are fighting and it's been a while to fill this work. We are fighting business away. We would not charter a long-term without either a significant profit earnings arrangement because we expect that the market is going to be strong. We have geopolitical events right now but we have the whole Ukrainian situation, we have the problems in Iraq, the crude oil coming out, we have longer -- longer halts, longer and more top miles happening. The Russian oil that Europe was absorbing, it’s huge market for Suezmaxs and Aframaxs, the Black Sea. Any part of that will lead us to get more ton miles and start getting oil from either West Africa or Venezuela or the U.S. Gulf. So I think that is going to increase the pressure on the rates. On that I think we described a very tight supply and demand situation and I am pointing this out because our industry really has suffered for the last six or seven years from the oversupply. Demand in 2009, which was a year of big literally tightened their belts even in energy was always there. So I think what we have been trying to achieve is get owners more responsible start ordering ships. It has happened I hope it won't last for long, but we’re going to enjoy as long as it lasts. So we are not looking to charter at a fix rate. We are there to do business anywhere between two to five years with an accretive minimum end profit sharing and there’s a lot of that type of business which is coming our way by the major oil companies.

Ben Nolan - Stifel

Analyst

Okay. Very helpful and then my next question actually goes with the crude side. I did notice that when you split out your -- the percentage of your fleet that’s in the product market versus the crude market, it only looked to be 14 vessels I believe in the product tray. Have you have guys been actively moving or rotating your product fleet into the crude market as a function of better rates in that area and would you categorize that as sort of a longer term move or just opportunistic making betters rates when available?

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

We carry anything -- any form of energy. So we’ll not have any, I would say preference. We have the luxury to run a very versatile modern fleet and a good operation team but can actually turn around those vessels in a matter of a week from crude to clean little bit harder but going from clean to dirty. So it has been a very easy process having the right vessels with the right equipment to do it. We are client-driven. So we’re seeing our client and the rates being on the crude and we have sold our three Aframax product carriers are trading fuel and crude right now. The same with all our Panamax and a big part of our small handle size vessels other than 14 fleet ships as you said. So we have the type of fleet that is able to turn around and carry the energy that pays more.

Ben Nolan - Stifel

Analyst

Okay. That’s helpful and could you just maybe for me categorize what the differential is that you’re seeing right now, crude or dirty versus clean, how much on average more profitable do you think it is on the dirty side?

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

I think it’s 70-30 as we speak today, but still we're not -- we've seen the product carrier if we see more and more of the condensate coming up in the United States and as they come down, turn right and go through the Panama Canal to the far east, I think that's going to balance it. So we're ready for that. As I said we have nine Panama and that’s what they do and they will be there to take advantage of that market if they have to.

Ben Nolan - Stifel

Analyst

Okay. Perfect and then my last question and it relates to the potential for you guys doing an MLPs -- has the timeline changed on that at all or are you still maybe thinking that the first part or the first half of 2015 is the target.

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

That’s correct. Exactly.

Ben Nolan - Stifel

Analyst

Okay. All right, that does it for me. Thanks a lot guys.

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Now from Morgan Stanley, you have a question from the line of Fotis Giannakoulis. Your line is now open.

Fotis Giannakoulis - Morgan Stanley

Analyst

Yes. Good morning gentleman and thank you. I would like to follow-up on the last question on Ben. I think it’s the third time in the last three quarters I am asking about that, have you started drafting the prospectus for the MLP and when shall we be expecting the first filing over what type of vessels and see what type of vessels you’re going to include in this MLP?

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

Yes. Thank you. As I think we discussed yes, we’re -- we have I would say done two-thirds of the expenses and the work being required for the MLP. So this is -- it has gone down.

Fotis Giannakoulis - Morgan Stanley

Analyst

And you can remind us which are the vessels that you are considering of including in this MLP and what type of growth you see that the MLP is going to be having?

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

Well, it will be -- initially any vessel with five years period or longer, which of course includes some of our Suezmax, some of our -- the two shuttle tankers and the LNGs as they come on long term charters and of course the growth will be almost of that at least a vessel per quarter from beginning of 2016 as the long term chartered shuttled vessels would be dropping in. So we have a good -- but there is quite a lot of business that we might be announcing of new vessels with very long employments from within this quarter. We are actually right now negotiating business at a range from again 5 to 15 years with first charters are pushing at to go hand in hand with profit sharing arrangements.

Fotis Giannakoulis - Morgan Stanley

Analyst

So you’re mentioning that there are more deals to be done and I think in the last quarter you said that there are probably more similar deals to what you executed with Statoil. Is there any progress on that -- on the other oil majors or producers that are looking to employ vessels long term or even give you a contract for new building assets that will allow you to order more vessels?

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

It’s true. I think we’re looking at least at half a dozen of these transactions, but we will be able to announce within -- most probably within this quarter.

Fotis Giannakoulis - Morgan Stanley

Analyst

And is it also for similar type of vessels Aframax vessels? And if you have to make an estimate or give us proper ability, how many vessels are we talking here?

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

I believe that we could be talking about for now and the end of the year about another six vessels.

Fotis Giannakoulis - Morgan Stanley

Analyst

Again Aframax?

George Saroglou

Analyst

No, well within -- within both, the crude and the ranging from VLCC, which is a segment of the market, but we are not -- as you know, we have sold all these assets and we are looking to renew, so it will start from VLCC, down to our Suezmaxs, Aframaxs and other ones.

Fotis Giannakoulis - Morgan Stanley

Analyst

That looks very exciting.

George Saroglou

Analyst

We are excited and we are awaiting the -- as I said I think in September we'll be announcing some very interesting transactions.

Fotis Giannakoulis - Morgan Stanley

Analyst

Despite that and all this good news that you are delivering right now, we see the stock price for some reason is dropping. It could be the very thin liquidity of the stock. You mentioned about the MLP earlier. Of course that should help bridge the gap between your NAV and your stock price, what other steps are you willing to take? Are there any thoughts of potential share buybacks? You have plenty of cash in your balance sheet. Have you thought that your stock might be an interesting investment in addition to buying ships?

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

We believe our share is I would say a very interesting transaction. We consider it very good. So I think the major shareholders have always been buyers and I think at this level of course it's a very good buy. I think after we said that that settles down about what is the new requirements from the new business of the growth capital. I think our next step will also look -- we'll be looking to look how attractive the share price of the buyback. As you know we are paying a dividend -- I think we have dividend coming this month and then November and so on and so forth.

Fotis Giannakoulis - Morgan Stanley

Analyst

And apart from that, obviously you have the capital requirements for your potentially new business, are there any thoughts of issuing any preferred -- we saw that some of your peers they issued high yield or preferred -- or convertible in order to fund buyback programs. Is this something that you have been also considering?

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

I would say high yield, we like to receive it our charters, not to pay it out. So I think we will speak -- I think we will speak to the cash that we are generating as we speak today. We always have our eyes open in the market and as soon as we know the transactions that we're negotiating, we will have a very good view what we are looking for, but I think all the transactions are going to be very attractive. So there will be -- hopefully we will reverse the trend in the market.

Fotis Giannakoulis - Morgan Stanley

Analyst

Thank you, Nick. One last question, you mentioned earlier about the orders that they were -- that took place during the last couple of years in the product tanker market, I understand that you are only interested in ordering new buildings with long term contracts, but in hypothetical scenario that you would be buying vessels without any contracts, what type of vessels would these be, product carriers or crude or even expanding further in the LNG space?

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

As I said I am very strong advocate, but no one should be ordering ships that they do not need at this stage. So I think I should stick to that because we've been preaching that for a while and tell what, the crude market seems to have reached the stage and I hope we will find the appetite. We'll get a lot of U.S. exports to take care of all the product carriers that have been ordered in that and to projected 2012, 2013 period. But I think right now, there are more than enough ships out there to move the oil and allow the owners to make a respectable repayment at the same time.

Fotis Giannakoulis - Morgan Stanley

Analyst

Thank you very much for your answers.

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Thank you very much sir. Your next question from Canaccord comes from the Noah Parquette. Your line is now open.

Noah Parquette - Canaccord Genuity

Analyst

Thank, Good morning. A lot of my questions have been answered but I thought you could just go into more detail you mentioned obviously your VLCC fleet, there’s only one ship left as you’re looking at new contracts. Is this -- can you talk about -- a little bit about your outlook for VLLCs? Why you avoid the sector now and will we expect more new builds with long term contracts or how do you plan to get back really into that space?

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

Well yes, I think it’s a very good question, but in order to be a significant player in the spot markets and the VLCC you need half a dozen ships. I think we have more than half a dozen ships in many other sectors. The VLCC market is very important market and we’re client driven. Being client driven, it’s when a client needs our services in VLCCs it makes sense and plus the addition that we have a very small presence in this market makes it easier for us to decide and when we talk to the Board to move in that direction. We will only move when we have a contract that will amortize the ships to scrap of to zero and we will still left with the modern ten year old ship that has no obligations and hopefully will make a good return between that time and going forward.

Noah Parquette - Canaccord Genuity

Analyst

Okay and then you mentioned -- you talked a little bit about the condensate potential for the condensate cargos out of the U.S. we saw I think two maybe three cargos last few weeks another ones, can you talk a little bit about what you see, how that new trade plays out? Is that going to all go to Asia and broader implications for how the crude export ban in the U.S., how do you see that developing over the next couple of years?

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

Well I think the first step has been made and it’s a very important first step. Even if it goes to the Far East that's a significant ton mile, if it comes to Europe to balance some of the Russian crude that’s perhaps Europe will not be importing and that’s also a very good volume so I think it is very positive and I would say an expected trip for ship owners -- the opening up of the American exports.

Noah Parquette - Canaccord Genuity

Analyst

All right. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Thank you very much indeed sir. Now from Euro Pacific Capital, you have a question from the line of Mark Suarez. Your line is now open.

Mark Suarez - Euro Pacific Capital

Analyst

Yeah. Good morning, gentleman and thanks for taking my call. Nick, you thought in the beginning of the Q&A here that for those charters that maybe come up for renewal and given the improvements that we’ve seen in the tanker space, especially in some of the Suezmax and Aframax and all the VLCCs are being improve now and getting some momentum. Should we start thinking about maybe those charters coming out for renewal in the next 12 to 18 months? By that I mean 2014 or 2015 and maybe as they come up, you’ll put them into shorter charters with profit-sharing arrangements and maybe expand your fleet or expose to the spot market a little bit more than the long term employment. Is that a better way of thinking about it?

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

I think in general it’s the correct sense and I think it’s the first time that you the charters is willing to take profit-sharing, which we’ve always said it has been a very good arrangement for both parties together. You are correct in that.

Mark Suarez - Euro Pacific Capital

Analyst

And do you think that market is now behaving to move into the profit -- is that like a big -- has the market significantly moved into those profit-sharing arrangements, something that we haven’t seen in the past? Has that been material in your view?

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

Well I think, it has been like pulling things in most cases to get the end users to accept of corning this it’s a bit easier I would say right now.

Mark Suarez - Euro Pacific Capital

Analyst

Okay. And now going back to that, I know you have an LNG option, maybe I missed it in the comment, I don’t know if you talked about it. But are you still thinking about maybe replacing that contract with construction over the two VLCCs, if you have a charter attached to it or how are you thinking about it? Do you think that could be a good entry point expanding your VLCC fleet?

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

I hope you are not reading my emails. Yes I think that it could be a good alternative.

Mark Suarez - Euro Pacific Capital

Analyst

Okay. And then lastly, I know you do some second hand tonnage acquisitions with Suezmax, should we expect maybe to see similar transactions obviously charter attached you don’t want to just buy something for the sake of buying over the 6 to 12 months or should we be thinking more about the transactions like you did in Statoil. I think you commented and maybe you’re thinking of doing something like that and you’re going to be announcing it soon.

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

I think we’ll not exclude but it will be a smaller percentage of probability of buying ships in the open market unless it is for a strategic purpose let's say the generic company that forms those ships and they would like someone to operate and for them we'll be happy to do that. So in that case, you will see us doing something like that.

Mark Suarez - Euro Pacific Capital

Analyst

Right, right. Okay that makes sense. And then lastly on, seeing your contracted cash flow continues to rise, you have raised your earnings capacity now especially with the future delivery of the nine Aframaxe's at what point do you think the Board could consider raising dividend again? Is that something you see happening? What sort of metrics you will have to see before that happens?

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

We have to ask my Chairman here. No, I think we always -- we are a dividend friendly company and I am sure the Board -- when we see that the market environment has stabilized in 2014, I think we will be happy to consider something like that.

Mark Suarez - Euro Pacific Capital

Analyst

Okay great. That’s all I have for now. Thanks. Thanks for your time as always.

Operator

Operator

Thank you very much indeed sir. [Operator instructions] As there are no further questions at this time, I will now pass the floor back to Mr. Nikolas Tsakos for closing remarks.

Nikolas Tsakos

Management

Well, again thank you very much for following the company. As we said, I think we are optimistic of going forward. All you have to do is look back in our COOs presentation on the income statement and see that in 2005 ten years ago, the company was half the size of what it is today and we had an EBITDA of $215 million and a market cap of in excess of $1 billion and something that at the time. So I think today the company is not only double the size, but double the size in quality. So I think the prospects are strong. So we are looking to take advantage of that. We believe we have weathered the very difficult years of 2008 to 2015 and we came on the other side stronger with a stronger and larger company with a stellar banking record having all of our obligations met without any renegotiation and we're happy we've done that because we have support of our shareholders and our banks and of course our clients in going forward. So we are very excited in welcoming our new Chairman and we are looking forward to come the company and the share price to where it has to go. So with that we wish you a very good and peaceful and restful summer. Make sure, we’ll not be resting because we need to get the share price up at, least not all of us at the same time and with that, I will ask our Chairman with this wise words.

Takis Arapoglou

Management

Well, thank you, Nikol. I think if you look as I mentioned earlier the last six months, our stock has outperformed our peers, which means that the market is beginning to realize the attractiveness of our share. I think the broadening of the investor base and the increase in the liquidity of the stock in the last six months have been phenomenal. Together with the stellar operational efficiency of the company, I think we will see going forward this correction that we mentioned on the valuation of the company for the benefit of everyone. So with that, I would like to wish you a happy and enjoyable summer and talk to you again in the fall. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Thank you very much indeed sir. And with thanks to our speakers today, that does conclude the conference. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect. Thank you, gentlemen.