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spk01: and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the third quarter 2022 SmartSan earnings conference call. At this time, all participants are in the listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during this session, you'll need to press star 1-1 on your telephone. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Chris Green, Corporate Controller. Please go ahead.
spk06: Good morning, and thank you for joining us for SmartSAN's third quarter 2022 earnings call. On the call today, we have Chuck Young, founder and chief executive officer, Lee Beckelman, chief financial officer, and John Young, chief operating officer. Before we begin, I would like to remind all participants that our comments made today will include forward-looking statements, which are subject to certain risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results or events to materially differ from those anticipated. For a complete discussion of such risks and uncertainties, please refer to the company's press release and our documents on file with the SEC. SmartSAN just claims any intention or obligation to update or revise financial projections or forward-looking statements, whether because of new information, future events, or otherwise. This conference call contains time-sensitive information and is accurate only as of the live broadcast today, November 9th, 2022. Additionally, we will refer to non-GAAP financial measures of contribution margin, adjusted EBITDA, and free cash flows during this call. These measures, when used in combination with our GAAP results, provide us and investors with useful information to better understand our business. Please refer to our most recent press release and our public filings for our reconciliations of gross profit contribution margin, net income to adjusted EBITDA, and cash flow provided by operating activities to free cash flow. would now like to turn the call over to our CEO, Chuck Young.
spk00: Thanks, Chris, and good morning. In the third quarter, SmartSand delivered sales volumes of 1.1 million tons, 17.8 million in contribution margin, and 11 million in adjusted EBITDA. This is our highest contribution margin in adjusted EBITDA since the second quarter of 2020. Year-to-date, through September, we have sold 3.2 million tons, We are on pace to sell record volumes in 2022. During the quarter, we generated positive free cash flow of $6.4 million. Our strong financial performance in the quarter continues to demonstrate the value of our business model to deliver high-quality northern white sand sustainably and efficiently from the mine to the well site. We also remain committed to maintaining a strong balance sheet that will provide us with the long-term durability to operate successfully through any operating cycle. In the third quarter, we saw strong activity in all the operating basins that we currently serve. Pricing in the quarter improved, and we expect to maintain current pricing levels based on expected continued strong market supply and demand fundamentals. Our unit train capable trans-loading terminals in Waynesburg, Pennsylvania, and Van Hook, North Dakota, continue to demonstrate the value of our long-term focus of delivering bulk commodities on rail in a sustainable and sufficient fashion to our customers. Sales volume into the Bakken Basin served by our Van Hook terminal increased by approximately 40% sequentially. We typically see a slowdown in activity in Van Hook in the fourth quarter due to weather and budget management by our clients. However, this seasonal slowdown looks to be balanced out this year with increased activity through our Waynesburg, terminal into the Marcellus. Having multiple terminals allows us greater flexibility to switch supply to meet changing market demands. Utilization of our smart systems last mile offering continues to improve. We are gaining momentum as we start to penetrate the market with our SmartPath technology. Year to date through September, our smart systems have generated positive contribution margin and going forward, we expect it to deliver improved financial performance. By using our SmartPath, our customers can reduce the number of trucks needed to deliver sand to the well site up to 30% versus our competitors' equipment, providing our customers with substantial cost savings for sand delivered to the wellhead. Additionally, by taking trucks off the road, we benefit our communities by reducing accidents, carbon emissions, noise, and dust. ESG goals are important to SmartSpan and its customers, and SmartSystems helps achieve those goals by improving efficiency and reducing impact. Our mine-to-well site, rail, terminal, and last-mile approach provides our customers a safer, cost-efficient, and more reliable supply chain. We continue to see improvements in our industrial product solutions divisions. with their industrial sales volume increasing 28% in the quarter. Industrial product solutions is a long-term commitment to diversify our business beyond oil and gas and to more effectively utilize our asset base. It will take time to build this business, but we're taking steps needed now to set us for strong growth in this business segment in 2023 and beyond. Our balance sheet remains strong. Today, we have approximately $5 million in cash in our balance sheet and approximately $20 million in liquidity. We will continue to remain disciplined with capital spending while pursuing projects that will generate long-term value. We are excited about our future for a number of reasons. Our high-quality asset base. We have over 400 million tons of northern white sand reserves and current annual processing capacity of 7.1 million tons. Over the last two years for the acquisition of Utica in 2020 and Blair earlier this year, we have developed the capability to flex our annual northern lake capacity from 5.5 million tons to 10 million tons, thus adding 4.5 million tons of capacity for a very low acquisition cost of approximately $9 million. We brought 1.6 million tons of that flex capacity online in late 2020 when we opened our Utica facility. We're actively evaluating the timing of opening the Blair facility and expect to have additional information on this on our year-end earnings call in March. This incremental capacity strategically positions SmartSands to take advantage of the growing market demand for Northern White Sand. Our reserve base is primarily finer mesh sands that meet the long-term needs of the market. Our facilities are low-cost, efficient operations that allow us to operate effectively through all market cycles. Our strategically located in-basin terminals Our terminals in Van Hook, North Dakota, and Waynesburg, Pennsylvania, are located in the heart of the Bakken and Marcellus basins, which gives us a competitive advantage to effectively compete in these basins for years to come. Our superior last mile offering. We believe our smart systems technology provides superior and sustainable well site stand storage management for our customers, and we expect this business to start delivering improved contribution margins going forward. our growing industrial sand solutions business. This business segment continues to grow rapidly, diversifying our business with strong margins. As always, we'll continue to keep our eye on the future, and we'll always keep our employee and shareholders' interests in mind in everything we do. And with that, I'll turn the call over to our CFO, Lee Beckleman.
spk03: Thanks, Chuck. Now I'll go through some of the highlights of the third quarter, starting with sales volumes. We sold approximately 1,110,000 tons in the third quarter, a 7% decrease over the second quarter volumes of 1,196,000 tons. Volumes during the third quarter were slightly lower sequentially due primarily to the timing of well completions by some of our customers. Overall, activity levels continue to be at high levels. Revenues for the third quarter 2022 were 71.6 million compared to 68.7 million in the second quarter. Total revenues were higher in the third quarter due primarily to continued improvement in average sales prices of our sand, increased utilization of our smart systems fleet, and $2.7 million in contractual shortfall revenue. Our cost of sales for the quarter was $60.2 million compared to $59.7 million last quarter, remaining relatively consistent period over period with nothing significant to call out. Total operating expenses were basically flat at 7.7 million in the third quarter, compared to 7.6 million last quarter. Net income was 2.7 million for the third quarter, or 6 cents per basic and diluted share, compared to a net loss of 90,000, or 0 cents per basic and diluted share for the second quarter of 2022. For the third quarter of 2022, contribution margin was 17.8 million, and adjusted EBITDA was 11.3 million. compared to second quarter contribution margin of 15.3 million and adjusted EBITDA of 9.2 million. The increase sequentially was primarily due to shortfall revenue recognized in the third quarter. For the third quarter contribution margin per ton was $16.01 per ton compared to $12.75 per ton last quarter. For the third quarter 2022, we generated 10.8 million in net cash provided by operating activities leading to $6.4 million in free cash flow after we spent $4.4 million on capital expenditures. During the third quarter, we drew an additional $3 million on our revolver and ended with $6 million outstanding on our facility. We ended the quarter with approximately $10.4 million in cash and cash equivalents. Between cash and our availability on our facilities, we currently have approximately $23 million in available liquidity. In terms of guidance for the fourth quarter, we expect sales volumes to be in the 1 million to 1.2 million range. Our sales volumes in the fourth quarter can be impacted by weather and customers managing year-end budgets, leading to completions activity potentially being delayed into 2023 and could result in lower sales volumes sequentially due primarily to timing of completions activity shifting from this year into 2023. We expected adjusted EBITDA to be positive in the fourth quarter, but it will likely be lower than third quarter results as we will not recognize any shortfall revenue in the fourth quarter. For the four year 2022, we expect to have record sales volumes for the company. We believe our contribution margin per ton will remain in the double digit range in the fourth quarter. We still expect capital expenditures for the year to be in the 20 million to 25 million range, which includes capital expenditures and the acquisition of the Blair facility earlier in the year. This concludes our prepared comments, and we will now open the call for questions.
spk01: Thank you. As a reminder, to ask a question, you'll need to press star 1-1 on your telephone. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. Our first question comes from Steven Jengaro from Stifo. Your line is open.
spk02: Thanks. Good morning, everybody. Good morning. Two questions for me. The first, can you just give us your perspective currently on the supply-demand fundamentals for frac sand as we look out into 2023? Sure.
spk05: Yeah, sure, Steve. So right now, northern white supply and demand fundamentals continue to be positive. Demand, you know, appears to be growing a little bit, particularly in the Appalachian Basins, primarily a gas drilling market. We expect the BAC and the western basins to remain steady other than seasonal fluctuations due to potential weather here in fourth quarter and first quarter. We're not seeing a lot of new northern white sand supply come back online, you know, there may be some pockets of incremental supply. But, you know, with some of the capital constraints out there and the course reserves of most of the idle mines with the inefficient processing that that yields, you know, we don't see much of any of that capacity returning at the current pricing and margin levels. You know, and the only other thing I'd add is, you know, this year has kind of been the first time in a long time, you know, for as long as I can remember, that we've seen both high commodity price on nat gas and oil. And so those two things are generating, you know, activity in both of those basins, high activity in both of those basins or types of basins. And we haven't seen that in the past. Generally, in the past, it would have been high oil, low gas, or vice versa. So that's kind of an interesting market demand that I don't know we've been talking about a lot.
spk02: Great. Thank you. And you mentioned, I believe, double-digit contribution margin per ton in the fourth quarter, and that's a pretty strong number given, I think, what is normally some winter cost of goods sold increases. Is that driven by just the efficiency of the system and the price dynamics you've seen over the last year that allows you to hold it at that level and what's typically a softer fourth quarter?
spk03: Yes, Steven, I think a couple of things are driving it. We're seeing, you know, we're going to volumes of being relatively consistent in the fourth quarter versus typically we have a little bit of a drop off. So it's allowing us to, you know, absorb our fixed cost a little better in the fourth quarter than we normally do. And so that's helping. And then also we're seeing pricing I think kind of stabilize the current level. So we see kind of pricing remaining at good levels. So the combination of having consistent volumes in the fourth quarter versus more of a drop off than we've seen the last couple of years, coupled with a good pricing environment, I think this leads us to feel confident that we'll be in and contribution margin per ton levels that you saw in the second quarter and the third quarter, even backing out the shortfall revenue for the third quarter number.
spk02: Great. No, that's helpful. Thank you for the color.
spk01: Thank you. And we have a question from, one moment, from Brian Shaley with Exploit Investing. Your line is open.
spk04: Hey there. Thank you for having me on. First question, do you sell next quarter sand in any given quarter? For example, do you sell like quarter four sand in quarter three?
spk03: Excuse me, do we sell what?
spk04: Next quarter sand in any given quarter. So, for example, like in quarter, do you sell quarter four sand in quarter three? And does it differ when you have contracts?
spk03: I'm not sure I understand your question. We sell sand based on the activity in each quarter, and those volumes get booked in that quarter. So whatever sales we have in Q3 are from volumes we sold in Q3, and whatever sales we have in Q4, et cetera, are from volumes we sold in Q4.
spk04: Okay, thanks. Well, the question was basically, like, do you actually sell the sand? Like, have you actually increased the number of people you have on contract? So, are you able to see into the next quarter how much volume you could possibly have? And have you actually increased the number of people you have on contract?
spk03: Yeah, we've added a couple of smaller contracts, and so we don't disclose actually the percent of contracts we have outstanding, but we have added a couple of smaller contracts that will have volumes associated with them starting in the fourth quarter and first quarter next year. But we have our current contracts in place, and then we do have pretty good visibility with our SPOC customers in terms of working with them to know kind of where their volumes are going to be on a monthly and quarterly basis.
spk04: Okay, thank you. Just one more. So your stock's currently trading at an enormous discount to net tangible asset value. Into next year, are you looking at possibly implementing an aggressive shareholder return program?
spk03: I think that's something we'll continue to evaluate. You know, right now, as you saw in our numbers, we got the positive free cash flow this quarter. And we anticipate being able to kind of continue on that trend. And once we see and are confident in terms of our cash flow being consistent and being positive cash flow, then we will evaluate the opportunities we have in terms of thinking about providing return to shareholders through dividends or other measures. So it's still a little early for that, but that's something we'll evaluate. And as we get into 2023, we'll We'll have more discussion on that depending on how overall activity is, what free cash flow we're generating, and the consistency of that cash flow. All right. Thank you.
spk04: Thanks, Ron. Thank you.
spk01: Thank you. And that's all the questions I've had. I'd like to turn the call back over to Chuck Young for any closing remarks.
spk00: Thank you for joining us today. We look forward to talking with you again in March.
spk01: This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.
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