Good day and welcome to the Valaris First Quarter 2025 Results Conference Call. Today all participants will be in a listen-only mode. [Operator Instructions] Please note that today's event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Nick Georgas, Vice President, Treasurer, Investor Relations. Please go ahead, sir.

Welcome everyone to the Valaris first quarter 2025 conference call. With me today our President and CEO, Anton Dibowitz; Senior Vice President and CFO, Chris Weber; Senior Vice President and CCO, Matt Lyne and other members of our executive management team. We issued our press release, which is available on our website at valaris.com. Any comments we make today about expectations are forward-looking statements and are subject to risks and uncertainties. Many factors could cause actual results to differ materially from our expectations. Please refer to our press release and SEC filings on our website that define forward-looking statements and list risk factors and other events that could impact future results. Also, please note that the company undertakes no duty to update forward-looking statements. During this call we will refer to GAAP and non-GAAP financial measures. Please see the press release on our website for additional information and required reconciliations. Earlier this week, we issued our most recent Fleet Status Report, which provides details on our rig fleet including new contract awards. Now I'll turn the call over to Anton Dibowitz, President and CEO.

Thanks, Nick, and good morning, and afternoon to everyone. During today's call, I'll begin with a review of our performance for the quarter and highlight some of our recent commercial successes. I'll then provide an update on the offshore drilling market before discussing our approach to contracting and prudent fleet management, which are focused on driving long term value creation for our shareholders. I'll then hand the call over to Matt, who will provide a more detailed perspective on our recently awarded contracts and the broader floater and jackup markets along with additional color on our contracting outlook. After that, Chris will walk through our financial results and guidance and then I'll finish with some closing remarks. To begin, I want to highlight a few key points. First, we delivered another strong quarter to start the year continuing our track record of providing safe and efficient operations for our customers and we generated meaningful EBITDA and free cash flow. Second, we are successfully executing our commercial strategy by securing attractive long-term contracts for our high specification fleet. Since our last conference call just two months ago, we've added more than a $1 billion in new contract backlog, including work for drill ships offshore West Africa and across all of the major shallow water markets where our rigs operate. While macroeconomic uncertainty has increased recently, we remain actively engaged with customers for additional contracting opportunities in 2026 and beyond. Third, we continue to expect that offshore production will play a vital role in meeting the world's energy needs and will remain a core component of our customers' portfolios. Given our high-quality fleet and operational performance, we are well positioned to secure additional contracts that along with our prudent fleet management will further support our earnings and cash flow. Starting with operations…

Thanks, Anton, and good morning and afternoon, everyone. I'm going to start with an overview of our recent contracting success, then provide commentary on our major floater and jackup regions where we operate and finish with an update on our outlook for rigs that have availability in 2025. Since our last conference call, we've signed new contracts and extensions that have increased our total backlog to more than $4.2 billion, a nearly 20% increase from our previously reported backlog of $3.6 billion. These awards included backlog additions of approximately $400 million for our floaters and $600 million for our jackups. As Anton mentioned, we secured a new contract for one of our high-specification drillships, VALARIS DS-10 that contributed to these additions. Further, the customer for the DS-9 recently exercised an option to extend the rig's contract another six months, and this contract is now expected to run to mid-2026. Turning to jackups, offshore Australia and Trinidad, we continue to secure work for our rigs at solid day rates, reflecting customers' preference for established drilling contractors with high-spec assets in these attractive niche markets. In Trinidad, we are set to grow our presence following a recent multiyear contract award for VALARIS 117 that is expected to commence in the third quarter of 2026. This will bring our footprint in the region to three jackups joining the VALARIS 118 and 249. Notably, the 118 recently drilled a successful exploration well at the Frangipani field, highlighting Trinidad's renewed focus on boosting gas production as a cornerstone of the country's long-term economic growth. In our North Sea operating region, we added two years of work commencing in late 2025 for VALARIS 248. Lastly, as Anton noted, we were successful in extending bareboat charters for five of our jackups offshore Saudi Arabia. We look forward…

Thanks, Matt, and good morning and afternoon, everyone. In my prepared remarks today, I'll begin with an overview of our first quarter results. Then, I'll walk you through our outlook for the second quarter followed by an update on our full year guidance for 2025. Starting with our first quarter results, total revenues were $621 million, up from $584 million in the prior quarter, and adjusted EBITDA was $181 million, up from $142 million in the prior quarter. Adjusted EBITDA increased in the first quarter, primarily due to more operating days and higher average daily revenue for the floater fleet. The increase in operating days was primarily due to VALARIS DS-4 commencing a new contract offshore Brazil late in the fourth quarter partially offset by DS-12 completing a contract offshore Egypt in mid-March. The increase in average daily revenue was primarily driven by DS-15 commencing a new higher day rate contract offshore Brazil late in the fourth quarter. EBITDA exceeded our guidance, primarily due to strong operating performance and fewer out of service days than anticipated. Our first quarter results included an $8 million non-cash loss on impairment associated with our decision to retire three semi-submersibles VALARIS DPS-3, DPS-5 and DPS-6 during the quarter. We also incurred tax expense of $194 million. Our first quarter tax provision included $167 million of discrete tax expense, primarily attributable to the establishment of a valuation allowance on deferred tax assets in connection with our decision to retire the three semis. As a result of these items, we reported a net loss of $39 million in the first quarter. Adjusted for discrete tax expense, net income was $128 million. Finally, first quarter CapEx totaled $100 million, coming in below guidance due to timing, as certain spend shifted to later in the year. During the…

Thanks Chris. Before we open the line for questions, I'd like to recap a few key points from today's prepared remarks. First, we delivered another strong quarter to start the year, continuing our track record of providing safe and efficient operations for our customers and we generated meaningful EBITDA and free cash flow. Second, we are successfully executing our commercial strategy by securing attractive long-term contracts for our high specification fleet. Over the past two months we've added more than $1 billion in backlog, including new work for drill ships offshore West Africa and across all our major shallow water markets. While macroeconomic uncertainty has increased recently, we remain actively engaged with customers for additional contracting opportunities in 2026 and beyond. And third, we continue to expect that offshore production will play a vital role in meeting the world's energy needs and will remain a core component of our customers' portfolios. Given our high-quality fleet and operational performance, we are well-positioned to secure additional contracts that along with our prudent fleet management will further support our earnings and cash flow. We thank our employees for their focus and dedication and our customers and investors for their continued support. That concludes our prepared remarks. Operator, please open the line for questions.

Thank you. We will now begin the question-and-answer session. [Operator Instructions] And today's first question comes from David Smith with Pickering Energy Partners. Please proceed.

Hey, good morning. Thank you for taking my question.

Morning David

Morning David

Just regarding the 2025 floater opportunities that you're tracking with the 2026 and 2027 start dates, could you wager a guess on the percentage that require seven gen drill ships? And how do you think operators evaluate the relative pricing for the performance difference of an average 7th gen ship relative to the average 6th gen, and yeah is there a natural pricing premium that we expect should persist regardless of the overall market rate structure.

Absolutely I can start and then maybe Matt can add if he has anything to add. Look. I think there's one part of it is where are 7th gens preferred or needed on the program, but as much as that you can see a clear differentiation between the utilization of 7th and 6th gen rigs. So they do provide efficiency. What amount of efficiency depends on what program are they drilling, especially important for long-term development programs where you're drilling multiple wells. You're going to really get the benefit out of it, but clearly the benefit that we see is that 7th gens are going to have an advantage. 7th gens operated by drillers that can deliver complex drilling solutions increasingly MPD or similar operations are going to be advantaged as we go through those opportunities. Matt, I don't know if you have any?

Yeah, I think an example. You could probably spend quite a bit of time working through it and not all 6th gens are the same but hook load is a big difference, which allows customers to design their wells with either fewer or longer casing strings, which certainly cuts down on their cost and those are some of the benefits that you get from the 7th gen fleet things like dual BOPs more common on -- far more common on 7th gens than you would find on 6th gens but not entirely exclusive.

So I think the overwhelming thing that that cuts through it all is and everything but a completely under supplied market where there's a lack of available capacity, customers are given the choice are going to choose the highest spec asset because it gives them more optionality and efficiency.

I just want to answer your last question. You asked at the very beginning of your question, what the proportionality of the 2025 opportunities we're tracking, and I would say the overwhelming majority are drill ship related. There are some we described it as floater opportunities. There are some that aren't necessarily drill ship related but the overwhelming majority are drillship related. There are some -- we described it as floater opportunities. So there are some that aren't necessarily drillship related, but the overwhelming majority are drillship. And you would find that of those opportunities, customers would be likely to prefer 7th gen assets.

Perfect. I appreciate the color. And a follow-up, if I may. We've seen some large contract awards recently with very significant performance bonus elements. I wanted to ask if you're seeing interest from customers and similar incentive structures. And if so, how are you thinking about balancing the risk and reward of efficiency-linked pricing?

Absolutely. It's a great question. The first thing I'll say is, yeah, absolutely. This is part of drilling contracts. We have bonus schemes in our current contract portfolio. We've done them in the past, although not at the scale that the last two awards that you've seen. We're open to these type of arrangements. The performance incentives, they generally trend -- the different ways to do the performance scheme, but they're generally targeted to drilling the well ahead of the customers' AFE or reducing the number of days. And sometimes these are difficult to negotiate because it can cut both ways. I mean we have a certain amount of control over how we execute our operational efficiency. And of course, we're very proud of that, delivering 96% plus uptime and great operational efficiency for our customers. But there's a lot that goes into drilling a well in a lot of other services. So it can get complicated. This becomes an all-in-one. So what you actually realize from a bonus may not be directly relational to the work that you're doing on the well. That being said, they work best in long-term development programs where you're drilling a number of wells. So you start to understand the geology and the wells get progressively more efficient as you go along. Not every customer likes them. Some customers are -- would like to entertain this kind of structure. I don't see this becoming the norm. I think some customers will -- and you've seen some who have done it and they continue to do it will look for these. We're very open to that and some customers just aren't interested in based on how they run their business. But there's an opportunity to do it, we're absolutely open to it, and it can make sense in certain circumstances.

Great. Really appreciate it. And great quarter. Great all additions. I'll turn it over. Thank you.

Thanks.

And our next question comes from Greg Lewis with BTIG. Please go ahead.

Yeah. Thank you and good morning. And thanks for taking my question. And I appreciate there may be things you can and cannot say about the contracts that are out there that are going to come in 2026 and 2027. But just as broadly as we look across those opportunities, any sense for kind of how many of those, and you mentioned to David's question around the hook load making a difference. Any kind of sense for how many of these potential 2025 opportunities may require rig upgrades?

I think it's -- as you said -- I think you called it right, difficult to provide specifics on individual opportunities. What we are seeing is -- and this kind of fits well with our fleet, given the number of rigs that we have with MPD and dual BOPs is that you're looking for customers who want maximum flexibility to design their well and change as they go. So a lot of opportunities are having MPD as the base. So for contractors like us where we have those assets and existing assets, it can become a real benefit. And so as those systems continue to evolve, we continue to evolve our technology to match that. So that would be one example that you're seeing as potential upgrades. I think the question is generally before you start -- a lot of times, a good percentage of the time before you start a new contract, the customer will want some kind of upgrade, some kind of stuff. And that's great for us because they often pay the CapEx associated with it, and we get a better rig out of it. And that's certainly the kind of deal that we try to see. The number of contracts, if you're making a reference to the recent awards, the number of contracts that require significant CapEx upgrades, I don't think that's the norm either. There are plenty of contracts, and we're customers and part of the reason why we're very -- we're fortunate to have a high-spec 7th gen fleet is that these rigs can drill a lot of the programs that are out there without needing significant upgrades. So, it does depend on what market you're in. It does depend on the customer, but from a commercial perspective, we certainly seek to get reimbursement from that in the contracts that we can do.

Okay great. And then my other question is around the subsea tie-back market. I mean clearly in Gulf of Mexico is not a huge market for Valaris, but just as we think about the move lower in day rates where it was a tie-back well where the drilling -- the cost of drilling the well can be upwards of 50% or higher of the cost of getting the oil out of the well given the pullback and day rates and in some of this white space, has that kind of generated any maybe increased interest on the surface as we kind of look at this the next few quarters are going to be kind of spotty and in the U.S. Gulf. Has -- could we see some subsea tie-back opportunities kind of pop-up here over the next few quarters or is it the move lower rates has really generated any increased drilling demand.

I'm not sure I link the two. I mean coming into the over the last couple of quarters I think the -- our view has consistently been that there's going to be some white space in 2025 across the industry that needs to be worked through and that the predominance of the programs Gulf of Mexico and internationally are in 2026 and beyond. And we don't think that's changed and we don't think that recent changes although there's been an increase in macro uncertainty. We certainly haven't seen any change in behavior from our customers generally. The programs that we're tracking on that timeline still continue to be there. There will always be opportunistic operator and I mean that in a in a positive sense where a well may pop up potentially during 2025. I don't think that's directly rate-driven because I we've talked about going into this white space area where there would be a wide variety of rates as we work through this white space and I don't think there's been a significant or material change in those rates because you know the term contracts that are being fixed are generally starting with a four. There is going to be some variety in those programs, but no, I don't see that.

Okay, super helpful. Thank you very much.

The next question is from Eddie Kim with Barclays. Please proceed.

Hi good morning. Just wanted to ask about the five-year extensions on five of your jack ups in Saudi. Could you comment at all on the pricing levels on these extensions? We were they sort of in line with the prior contracts or were they at a discount to prior levels just given the more challenged environment today in light of the Saudi rigged suspensions over the past year and a half? And separately, do you think these contracts are an indication from Saudi that the period of rigged suspensions is now behind us or do you expect there could still be more to come?

To your first question I think based on the way you asked it you realize that unfortunately we're not able to disclose day rates on these contracts as we don't have customer approval. What I say is the rates are above the historic rates and I would describe them some people have done the back calculation based on the backlog and I think you know those folks are pretty smart and kind of narrowing in on where it is, but I would describe these as solid contracts and then we're very proud of the job that Arrow's done and we've done with them to secure 25 years of backlog on those rigs, so very comfortable with them. As far as the future Aramco and their plans, I look -- I can't -- what I can say is Arrow is an integral part of the infrastructure in a key partner for Aramco. We'll continue with our building program at IMI to bring new capacity to market we're very pleased to have a JV with Saudi Aramco and now with this with these fixtures from a Valaris perspective we have one lease rig rolling in 2027 and the rest of the fleet rolling into 2030 and we're very pleased about that.

Got it. Thanks for the color. My second question is just kind of a bigger picture question on offshore FIDs. I mean to date I don't think we've seen and based on your comments, you haven't seen or heard of offshore FIDs or programs getting pushed back, but I mean rent today as we sit here is at $61. Is there a rent price level at which you think some offshore FIDs could start to get pushed back? Is that 55, 50, just any thoughts there?

The first, you're going to be clear. We have not and we are in ongoing discussions with our customers. We're in tender processes. Yes, you are absolutely correct. We have not seen today any programs getting pushed based on the programs we're looking at especially the long term opportunities of '26, '27 and beyond. These are long cycle developments about production to be delivered ongoing towards the end of the decade and we have not seen a pushback. Obviously there is increased in macro uncertainty, but that's how we see it today. What I will say about pricing is the programs that we drill offshore are large resources and the economics are compelling. They're compelling well below current where the five year strip is on brands and where it's trading today and offshore is advantage versus other sources of production particularly for that reason. And I think that's why you haven't seen you haven't seen a significant change in our customer behavior.

Got it, understood. That's very helpful. Thank you. I'll turn it back.

Thank you. This does conclude today's question and answer session. I would now like to turn the conference back over to Nick Georgas for any closing remarks.

Thanks, Chris and thank you to everyone on today's call for your interest in Valaris. We look forward to speaking with you again when we report our second quarter 2025 results. Have a great rest of your day.

The conference is now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation and you may now disconnect.