EPR Properties

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by, and welcome to the Q3 2020 EPR Properties Training School. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question-and-answer session. To ask a question, you will need to press star 1 on your telephone keypad. If you require any further assistance, please press star 0. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Brian Moriarty. Thank you. Please go ahead.

Hi. Thanks, everybody, and thanks for joining us today on our third quarter 2020 earnings call. I'll start the call by informing you that this call may include forward-looking statements as identified in the Private Securities Litigation Act of 1995, identified by such words as will be, instead, continue, may, believe, expect, hope, anticipate, or other comparable terms. The company's actual financial condition and results of operations may vary materially from those contemplated by such forward-looking statements. Discussion of these factors that could cause results to differ materially from those forward-looking statements are contained in the company's SEC filings, including the company's reports on Form 10-K and 10-Q. Additionally, this call will contain references to certain non-GAAP measures, which we believe are useful in evaluating the company's performance. A reconciliation of these measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures are included in today's earnings release and supplemental information furnished to the SEC under Form 8K. If you wish to follow along with today's earnings release, supplemental and earnings call presentation are all available on the Investor Center page of the company's website, www.eprkc.com. Now I'll turn the call over to company president and CEO, Greg Silvers.

Thank you, Brian. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us on today's third quarter call. I'd like to start by continuing to offer our best wishes for the health and safety of everyone as we face the challenges of the ongoing pandemic. Joining me on the call today are company CIO Greg Zimmerman and company CFO Mark Peterson. I will start the call with an opening statement and then turn the call over to Greg and Mark, who will provide more detail. In this uniquely difficult environment, We have focused on the areas where we have control and allow us to successfully navigate the impacts of the pandemic. With this backdrop, I'd like to start today's call by highlighting our near-term priorities. Number one, people in process. During this period, there can be no greater priority than the health and wellbeing of our workforce. In response to the pandemic, we, like many, initiated a remote work environment to help mitigate employee risk. Additionally, we have put in place sound processes and technology to ensure employee engagement as our people work remotely. I'm extremely proud of the adaptability and dedication demonstrated by our organization. Number two, ensuring strong liquidity. Our top business objective since the onset of the pandemic has been ensuring the necessary liquidity to get to the other side. We may have near-term tenant disruption, However, the businesses that our properties support are not going away. The institutional quality of our properties gives us confidence in their resilience. The key to weathering the storm is financial stability, and our liquidity gives us that stability. Number three, stabilization and ramping up of our tenant businesses. Non-theater tenants continue to navigate the pandemic with solid performance as consumers get more comfortable with safety protocols. yet our theater tenants remain challenged by the lack of content. The positive news is that when consistent content is available, the consumer has returned. As evidence of this, China's box office has approached 2019 levels for August and September, supported with only local content. Number four, a return to growth. The goal of EPR is to acquire experiential properties that generate consistent content cash flows which translate into dividends for our shareholders. With an experiential focus that is anchored to communal activities, we have been in the crosshairs of this pandemic. However, this pandemic will end and consumers will return to the activities that our properties support. As this normalcy returns, EPR will likewise get back to normal. What does normal mean? It means we return to growing our portfolio and paying dividends to shareholders as we have done successfully for over 20 years. Now turning to the third quarter results. We continue to show steady improvement in our cash collections as over 90 percent of our non-theater properties are open. Our theater portfolio is challenged by a variety of factors making it difficult to regain momentum. Our theater property openings have been inconsistent and incomplete due to state and local mandates and new content has been extremely limited. While the current operating environment remains challenging for our theater properties, we do not see evidence of permanent structural change. Viable alternative for blockbuster titles, as it can't drive the volume required to replace theater exhibition, even with a captive audience. Additionally, research shows that when consumers are aware of the significant precautions that operators are taking, 82% say they would feel very or somewhat safe going back to the theaters. With attendance surpassing 1.2 billion in 2019, we are confident that the theater exhibition industry will return as the dominant out-of-home entertainment experience. Lastly, with our focus on controlling what we can to get to the other side of this pandemic, we extended our debt covenant waivers on our bank credit facilities to the end of 2021. While this places restrictions on our use of capital, this extension is important as it recognizes the significantly dislocated environment we are in and provides additional flexibility through the end of 2021. Now I'll turn the call over to Greg Zimmerman for a more deep look at our portfolio.