Canadian Pacific Kansas City

Good afternoon. My name is Marjorie, and I'll be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to CPKC's third quarter 2024 conference call. The slides accompanying today's call are available at investor.cpkcr.com. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker's remarks, there will be a question and answer session. If you'd like to ask a question, simply press star, then the number one on your telephone keypad. If you'd like to withdraw your question, press the pound key. I would now like to introduce Ashley Thorne, AVP, Investor Relations, to begin the conference call.

Thank you, Marjorie. Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. Before we begin, I want to remind you this presentation contains forward-looking information. Actual results may differ materially. The risks, uncertainties, and other factors that could influence actual results are described on slide two in the press release, and in the MD&A filed with Canadian and U.S. regulators. This presentation also contains non-GAAP measures outlined on slide three. Please note, in addition to our regular quarterly financials, there's supplemental Q3-confined revenue and operating performance data available at investor.cpkcr.com. With me here today is Keith Creel, our President and Chief Executive Officer, Nadine Balani, our Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, John Brooks, our Executive Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer, and Mark Redd, our Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer. The formal remarks will be followed by Q&A. In the interest of time, we would appreciate it if you limit your questions to one. It is now my pleasure to introduce our President and CEO, Mr. Keith Creel.

Thank you, and good afternoon. Thanks for being with us today to discuss and review our third quarter 24 results. I'm pleased to share the results of our 20,000 strong CPKC family, I can tell you the body of work in what was a very challenging operational quarter with the significant derailment that Mark and the team faced in early July and the strike in August, both of which they did an exceptional job doing it. They bounced back and the network responded well as a result, following up and getting back in sync. In spite of the challenges, I'm proud to say we remain on track to deliver full-year guidance, double-digit earnings growth, including volume growth, which is better than what we had projected earlier in the year. So specific to the results of the quarter, the CPTC family delivered revenues of $3.5 billion, which is up 6%, strong volume growth, an increase of over 4%, an operating ratio of 62.9, earnings per share of $0.99, which is an increase of 8%. Most importantly, from a safety perspective, continuing improvement, the train accidents decreased by 17%, personal injuries decreased by On the operating front, continued strong performance across the network, which Mark will provide a bit of color to, but I'd like to specifically recognize the operating team specific to those challenges with the strike. They did an exceptional job in preparing for and bouncing back from the audits that we experienced as a result of the strike. Commercially, John and his team, as well, continued to generate industry best, sustainable, profitable growth. We're delivering unique products to the market with a strong service offering to our customers that's reflected in the results that we're going to share with you today. The NBNR, that's another exciting development over the quarter. I'm pleased that we received approval last week from the SDB for our new direct connection with the CSX in Mexico, Texas, and the U.S. Southeast over the NBNR corridor. I'd like to specifically again thank the SDB for their thorough review and approval of this competitive transaction. The new interchange that we're establishing with the CSX is going to provide a new competitive rail service to rapidly grow markets. It's going to bring new solutions to our customers and take trucks off the road. It's another example, again, of this unique growth story that the CPKHC franchise is delivering. On the hydrogen locomotive front, another milestone reached in the quarter. When it comes to our hydrogen locomotive program in early September, I'm very pleased to say that our first high horsepower hydrogen locomotive, along with the fuel sensor, joined the contest of three diesel locomotives in pulling a fully loaded bulk train in our Western Canada corridor. Certainly an impressive achievement. It's a demonstration again of this company's commitment to leadership and sustainability. But let me say in closing, I'm proud of the results the team's produced. We're off to a strong start in the fourth quarter. We're in a great position for a strong finish to 24 and an even more exciting transition into 2025 and momentum. With that, I'm going to hand it over to Mark to provide some comments on the operating performance. John, I'll provide color on the markets, and then Dean will wrap up, elaborating on the numbers.