Excelerate Energy, Inc.

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Accelerate Energy First Quarter 2020 Free Earnings Conference Call. My name is Glenn, and I'll be the operator of today's call. After today's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question, you may press star followed by one or tap on keypad. To withdraw your question, please press star, then two. I would now like to turn the conference over to our host, Craig Higgs, Vice President of Investor Relations and ESG. Please go ahead.

Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining Accelerate Energy's second quarter 2023 financial results call. Participating on the call today are Stephen Kobos, President and Chief Executive Officer, and Dana Armstrong, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Also joining the call today is Daniel Bustos, Executive Vice President and Chief Commercial Officer. Our second quarter 2023 results press release and presentation were released yesterday afternoon and can be found on our website at ir.accelerateenergy.com. I would like to remind everyone that we will be making forward-looking statements on this call that involve a number of risks and uncertainties. Our actual results may differ materially from those expressed in these forward-looking statements, and we make no obligation to update or revise them. Today's remarks will also refer to certain non-GAAP financial measures We have provided a reconciliation to the most directly comparable GAAP financial measures at the back of the presentation. With that, I'd like to now turn the call over to Stephen Kobos, Chief Executive Officer of Accelerate Energy.

Thanks, Craig, and thank you to everyone for joining us today for our second quarter 2023 earnings conference call. Today, my remarks will touch on our financial performance during the quarter an outlook for the global LNG market for the remainder of 23, and a review of our strategic objectives. I'll then pass the call over to Dana, who will provide more detail on our financial results for the quarter. Accelerate reported strong financial results in the second quarter, with adjusted EBITDA coming in at $89 million and net income close to $30 million. Our financial results were underpinned by the stable revenues and predictable margins that we see from our FSRU internal services business. Our consistent earnings performance during periods of volatility in the LNG market underscores the attractiveness of Accelerate Energy as an investment opportunity. In addition to delivering strong financial results, we also have several other notable highlights. During Q2, we secured additional LNG sales in Bangladesh through spot tenders run by Petro Bangla. Year-to-date, we have secured contracts for the sale of four spot LNG cargoes in Bangladesh. These cargoes are in addition to the gas sales activities we had in Finland earlier this year. Our ability to secure opportunistic LNG and gas sales while taking limited price risk provides us with revenue upside potential that complements the stability of our base business. In Argentina, the FSRU Excelsior is providing regasification services at the Bahia Blanca gas port terminal. Following the Argentine winter, the Excelsior will return to the Germany charter in the third quarter of 23. Our team continued to demonstrate its technical expertise and commitment to operational excellence during the quarter. Whether it was repositioning the FSRU Excelsior from Europe to Bahia Blanca or navigating successfully a severe weather event like Cyclone Mocha in Bangladesh, I cannot be more proud of the Global Accelerate team. To provide some additional context on the scale of our operations, As of June 30th, our fleet represented 29% of global send-out capacity for FSRE-based terminals. Finally, on August 3rd, the Accelerate Board of Directors declared another 2.5-cent dividend per share to shareholders of record as of August 23rd. With that, let's turn to a brief update on the global LNG market. In the first half of 23, mild weather in Europe and the continued buildup of EU natural gas storage contributed to inventories ending the quarter 77% full. Currently, EU storage is approximately 87% full. This is roughly three months in advance of the EU mandated target for storage levels to reach 90% of capacity by November 1st. In the Asia Pacific region, there was muted demand in the LNG market due to improving nuclear availability in Japan and Korea and healthy LNG supply. This contributed to a more liquid market in the second quarter, which allowed South Asian countries to reenter the spot market. EU and APAC countries are focused on the coming winter. According to the IEA, a cold European winter could increase natural gas consumption by about 30 billion cubic meters or 22 million tons of LNG compared to last year's heating season. In Asia, China's LNG imports could fluctuate with an uncertainty range of over 10 billion cubic meters or 7.2 million tons through the winter. The potential return of a colder winter in Europe should continue to drive the need for incremental, flexible LNG regasification capacity in the regions. On the supply front, LNG markets are expected to remain tight in the near term. The global supply and demand balance should improve after 2024, when approximately 200 million tons per annum of incremental LNG capacity begins to come online. This significant market dynamic is expected to create new opportunities for Accelerate to connect LNG to downstream customers, primarily in the Global South. U.S. Gulf Coast liquefaction projects are of particular interest to Accelerate as they represent potential sources of FOB, destination-free volumes, that are an ideal fit for our LNG portfolio. While we continue to pursue downstream integrated opportunities, in the near term, we are focused on strategically investing in the LNG value chain. This includes developing our diversified portfolio of LNG supply, evaluating opportunities to grow our fleet, and establishing an LNG and gas marketing platform. In addition to the 20-year LNG sales and purchase agreement we announced earlier this year with Venture Global, we're also considering additional SPAs with other LNG producers. As we execute our plan to scale the business, having a diversified portfolio of LNG supply will allow us to offer more flexible and cost-effective products to both existing and new customers. Accelerate is in a strong position today. with our existing FSRUs fully utilized and contributing to the business. That said, additional infrastructure is needed to drive growth and maintain fleet flexibility. This remains a top priority for the Accelerate team. Last fall, we announced our new build FSRU with Hyundai Heavy Industries. This state-of-the-art FSRU will be delivered in June 2026 and we look forward to welcoming it to our fleet. We're also looking at conventional LNG carriers for managing our supply volumes, and we are evaluating opportunities to acquire new FSREs to support our integrated offerings. Finally, we're taking a deliberate approach to increase our marketing presence with the strategic goals of driving incremental margin growth and creating a bridge to some of the longer-term actions we're taking with regard to LNG supply. We plan to achieve this by pursuing a combination of gas sales agreements downstream of our FSRUs, opportunistic LNG marketing, and strategic partnerships with LNG producers. In summary, putting these important building blocks of our strategy in place will enhance our ability to develop and deploy integrated LNG infrastructure at attractive rates of return. Now let's turn to Bangladesh for a brief update. We continue to advance our PIRA LNG project in our SPA with PetroBangla. We've completed negotiations with the government of Bangladesh for a term sheet for PIRA, which details the broad commercial parameters and framework for the deal. As is typical in the Government of Bangladesh approval system, the term sheet is going through its final round of approvals with various ministries within the government. We've also completed negotiations with the government for a proposed LNG SPA and are awaiting final approval. Once complete, this SPA will complement our portfolio of short-term spot LNG sales, which will continue to play an important role in the market. I'll now turn the call over to Dana, who will walk you through the details of our financial results.