StealthGas, Inc.

Good day, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the StealthGas first quarter 2025 results conference call and webcast. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. Please be advised that today's conference has been recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Michael Jolliffe, Chairman of the Board. Please go ahead.

Thank you very much, Nadia. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to our first quarter 2025 earnings conference call and webcast. I'm Michael Jolliffe, for those who don't know me, Chairman of the Board of Directors. Joining me on our call today, as usual, is our CEO, Harry Vafias, to discuss the market and company outlook, and Konstantinos Sistovares to discuss the financial aspects. Before we commence our presentation, I would like to remind you that we will be discussing forward-looking statements which reflect current views with respect to future events and financial performance. So please take a moment to read our disclaimer on slide two of this presentation. Risks are further disclosed in SELFCAS filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. So let's proceed with the presentation, starting with some highlights on slide three. Today, we released our results for the first quarter of 2025. It was another successful quarter in what can be described as a tumultuous market. We generated $42 million in revenues during the first quarter compared to $41.6 million last year and $43.5 million in the previous quarter, demonstrating resilience in terms of commercial operations. Adjusted net income for the first quarter of 2025 was $16.1 million, similar to the fourth quarter of 2024, albeit somewhat lower than the first quarter of 2024, mostly due to increased expenses, as shall be discussed later on. In terms of earnings per share, on an adjusted basis, these were 44 cents for the quarter. In this volatile environment, our high period coverage allowed us to sustain the high profitability we have been experiencing over the past year for yet another quarter. In terms of our strategic objectives, we are close to completely deleveraging the company. We have reduced debt by $54 million this year, bringing the current debt level close to just $30 million currently, while maintaining a free cash balance of more than twice that figure. So the company is now debt-free. All the vessels in our fully-owned fleet of 31 ships are debt-free, except for just one vessel that currently has a mortgage. Deleveraging also means that going forward, we are accumulating cash much faster. With regards to our share repurchase programme, During the last call, we announced that we would be authorizing additional share repurchases. And since then, management has spent approximately $1.8 million in buying back shares in what we consider a sound use of our liquidity, given that the stock continues to trade at a steep discount to net asset value. We are further delivering on our strategic priorities by keeping a visible revenue stream. It was difficult commercially to expand on this strategic objective as the sentiment was not there, but we have managed to maintain period coverage for 2025 of 70% of our fleet days and have now secured over $165 million in future revenues. In terms of our fleet, the strategy which is to conservatively diversify and renew we saw some activity lately. During the first quarter, one joint venture vessel was sold, as previously discussed. In April, we found a buyer for another one of our vessels, the Gas Cerberus, that we expect to deliver in June. Then, last week, we came into an agreement with our joint venture partners to acquire their share in two vessels that we jointly own, the Gas Haralambos and the Echa Lucidity. And we also expect this to conclude in June so that our fleet will see a net increase by one vessel to 29. We will continue to look for opportunities to sell some older tonnage and possibly replace with newer tonnage. Let us move on to slide four for some more details on our fully owned fleet employment as it looks today. Just like in our previous call, period interest from charterers was relatively low and mostly focused in Europe. As a result, we only concluded three period charters, two of which were extensions. One was for six months and the other two for one year duration, all three related to trades in the West. That currently leaves us with five vessels operating in the spot market, two more vessels than in our previous call. Two of the vessels in the spot market are the larger handy sizes. The company's chartering strategy is to fix on period charters when possible and profitable, so we are looking to extend the duration of our charters. Although a couple of ships were re-delivered overall, we have managed to maintain the visibility of our earnings to a high 70% of available days for 2025 and have secured about $70 billion in revenues for the remainder of this year. One year forward, Coverage is at 60%. Total revenues secured for all future periods up to 2027 were reduced at $165 million. During the first quarter, one vessel entered dry dock towards the end of March, and we have scheduled dry dockings for three more vessels for the remainder of the year. It is a fairly light year in terms of dry dockings. In terms of our fleet geography presented in slide five, our vessels are mainly engaged in regional trades, short trips that can last just a couple of days from load port to destination, delivering gas to customers from major coastal ports down to draft restricted destinations inside rivers. We continue to focus the majority of our fleet over 55% west of Suez in Europe, particularly in the Northwest and in the Mediterranean. The remainder of our fleet is evenly scattered around the globe. Our larger vessels, that is the handy sizes and the MGCs, do intercontinental voyages. And for example, we have a couple more vessels in the US at this time that are set to load in the US Gulf and discharge their cargo in Europe. It is telling that in the first quarter of 2025, The US accounted for 63% of imports in Northern Europe, up from 55% in the previous quarter. We believe that in the short term, the market will continue to pay premium rates west of Suez, as there continues to be a shortage of suitable, well-maintained vessels in Europe. European ports and charters adhere to very strict regulations on vessel conditions and safety records. In addition, to recently imposed environmental regulations related mainly to carbon emissions, a situation favoring established owners or owners with good management records. As a result, older vessels that are actually a high percentage of the overall pressurized LPG fleet are not always suitable for European trades and can more easily find employment in the Far East or other places where regulations are not as demanding. In relation to the Red Sea situation, there have been no attacks recently, and things are getting back to normal, leading to more vessels crossing the Suez Canal. This could lead to an increase in Middle Eastern exports going to the Mediterranean. And in fact, we have recently been engaged in such a trade. We should also mention that over the last year, we have been increasingly engaged in ammonia trades that our HANDIS and MGC vessels can carry. We believe there is great potential in ammonia trading, although for the time being, it's still in relation to fertilizer production, and what volumes may be used for fuel production remains to be seen. Finally, I should mention, as far as it relates to the U.S. port city policies, that it has always been our policy to acquire assets that have been built in the most reputable and highest quality yards, even if we had to pay more for them. As such, the majority of our vessels are built in Japan and some of the larger ones in Korea. No vessel in our fleet was built in China. In slide six, I will update you on our joint venture investments. Starting in 2019, we have, through two joint ventures, invested in nine vessels four small gas carriers and five medium gas carriers. And through the course of the year, with the joint ventures being more opportunistic plays, sold most of these, including one that we took back in our own fully owned fleet last year. During the course of this year, one pressurized vessel was sold in January. The debt on the two remaining pressurized vessels was repaid in March. As of March 31st, our investment consisted of just three vessels. two pressurized LPG carriers and one medium gas carrier, with the book value of the investment being 27.3 million. Out of the three vessels, two of these are operating in the spot market, while the one pressurized vessel is on period charter until December, as announced during the previous call. There are no forthcoming dry dockings during 2025 for any of these vessels. During last week, we came into a principal agreement with one of our joint venture partners that since their investment after six years has come full circle. To acquire back their half ownership share in the two pressurized vessels, the Gas Hala Lambos and the Eco Lucidity, and we expect a cash flow outflow close to $10 million subject to final valuations. This agreement is subject to being formalized, but all going well. We expect to have it concluded and take delivery of the vessels within the next two weeks and before the end of the current quarter. From our standpoint, we are familiar with these vessels and their good condition, and we are taking them at a favourable price. This will leave a single vessel jointly owned, the medium gas carrier Echo Sorcerer, that was built in 2023. I will now turn the call over to Constantinos Sistovaris for our financial performance. Thank you.

Thank you, Michael. I will discuss the financial results that were released today, starting with slide 7, where we have a snapshot of the income statement for the first quarter of 2025 against the same period of 2024. Due to sale and purchase transactions that took place over the period, there was a very small increase in fleet days of 2%. TCE, or net revenues, that is the revenues after the voyage expenses, came in at 36.9 million for the quarter, a decrease of 1.8 million or 4.6%. This was due to the weakness in the spot market. And while most vessels on period performed well, there were at times between four and five vessels operating in the spot market, generating increased voyage costs due to bunkers. but not generating enough revenue to compensate for that. Two of the vessels were handy sizes, and they had the biggest variances. Operating expenses were $13.5 million for the quarter, a 17% increase, mainly due to higher crew costs and maintenance fees. It should, however, be noted that it is actually last year's number that was unusually low due to one-off items. Whereas this year's OPEX was more in line with our cost structure and actually slightly lower than in the fourth quarter of 2024. This quarter's results also included some dry docking expenses of 0.4 million, mainly relating to the dry docking of one vessel during the end of March. And there was no dry docking during the same period of last year. Similarly, the first quarter of 2025 results were also impacted by an impairment of 0.5 million for the vessel Gas Cerberus, bringing down its value to the value that was agreed later in April that it would be sold. The vessel is still in the fleet and it should be delivered to the buyers in June. There were no impairments for the first quarter of last year. Interest costs more than halved to 1.4 million, during the first quarter of 2025 as a result of the lower debt levels. This number also contains unamortized portions of finance expenses. We expect that interest costs will be further cut in half in the following quarters. Net income for the first quarter was 14.1 million compared to 17.7 million for the same quarter of last year, a 20% decrease On an adjusted basis, net income also marked a 15.7% decrease from 19.1 million to 16.1 million. Overall, 14 million in profits for the quarter is a high number, and although reduced compared to last year's record, it is actually on par with the fourth quarter of 2024. In terms of earnings per share, that was 38 cents, and on an adjusted basis, 44 cents. Looking at the balance sheet in the next slide, slide 8, given the relatively uneventful first quarter of 2025, the balance sheet as of March 31st is fairly similar to that of December 31st. Cash, including restricted cash, was at the end of the quarter $77.1 million, a 9% reduction as cash was used for debt repayments. but still very solid for a 28 vessel fleet with a very low debt. There were no vessels heard for sale as of March 31st as the gas server sale was agreed in April after the close of the quarter. In the liability side, the current portion of debt was 20.7 million and includes the 18.6 million facility that was due to mature in December of this year but was actually repaid early in April. While the long-term portion of the debt is where the big variance for this quarter was. It stood at $61.5 million as of December 31st and was reduced to $30.3 million as of March 31st. The other quarterly variance was that the shareholders' equity increased by 14.8 million over this three-month period as a result of improved profitability. Moving on to slide nine to reiterate the debt situation as this is where the strategy has been focused in the past couple of years. So for the past 15 years, the company's debt has been oscillating in the range of 300 to 500 million. Since the beginning of 2023, that interest rates rose significantly, and thanks to the improving cash flow generation, the company embarked in a massive debt reduction effort, initially aiming to reduce debt, but as things turned out, with the opportunity to eliminate debt altogether. In 2023, $154 million was repaid. In 2024, while the company took on $70 million for the two vessels that were acquired, then 108 million was repaid. Then in the first quarter of 2025, another 32 million was repaid, and during the current second quarter, another 22 million, bringing the total debt repaid during 2025 to 54 million, with just a single facility remaining, totaling 32 million, which matures in 2032, versus a free cash balance of more than double, making the company net debt-free. Debt amortization is now reduced to just 2.2 million per annum, compared to 28 million per annum just two years ago. That has allowed for significantly faster cash flow accumulation going forwards. If we manage to keep operating cash flow at current levels, we are looking at a run rate of close to 100 million per annum in cash flow generation. I will now hand you over to our CEO, Harry Vafias, who will discuss the market and the company outlook.