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Fortress Transportation and Infrastructure Investors LLC Common Shares
Q4 2021 Earnings Conference Call
2/25/2022
spk00: Good morning, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the fourth quarter 2021 Fortress Transportation and Infrastructure Investor LLC earnings conference call. 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 during this session, you'll need to press star 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, Alan Andretti. Please go ahead.
spk04: Thank you, Operator. I would like to welcome you all to the Fortress Transportation Infrastructure fourth quarter and full year 2021 earnings call. Joining me here today are Joe Adams, our Chief Executive Officer, and Scott Christopher, our Chief Financial Officer. We have posted an investor presentation and our press release on our website, which we encourage you to download if you have not already done so. Also, please note that this call is open to the public in listen-only mode and is being web will be discussing some non-GAAP financial measures during the call today, including FAB. The reconciliation of those measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures can be found in the earnings supplement. Before I turn the call over to Joe, I would like to point out that certain statements made today will be forward-looking statements, including regarding future earnings. These statements, by their nature, are uncertain and may differ materially from actual results. We encourage you an investor presentation regarding non-GAAP financial measures and forward-looking statements, and to review the risk factors contained in our quarterly report filed with the SEC. Now I would like to turn the call over to Joe.
spk06: Thank you, Alan. To start today, I'm pleased to announce our 27th dividend as a public company and our 42nd consecutive dividend since inception. The dividend of 33 cents per share will be paid on March 23rd, based on a shareholder record date of March 11th. Now let's turn to the numbers. The key metrics for us are adjusted EBITDA and FAD, or funds available for distribution. We ended the year strongly with adjusted EBITDA of 124.8 million in Q4 2021, which is up 29% compared to 96.4 million in Q3 2021. and up 170% compared to 46.2 million in Q4 2020. In a similar fashion, FAB was 120.1 million in Q4 2021, up 205% compared to 39.4 million in Q3 2021, and up 122% compared to 54.2 million in Q4 2020. During the fourth quarter, The 120.1 million FAB number was comprised of 161.2 million from our aviation leasing portfolio, 11.0 million from our infrastructure business, and negative 52.1 million from corporate and other. Now let's look at all of 2021 versus all of 2020. Adjusted EBITDA was 336.3 million in 2021, up 38% versus $243.3 million in 2020. FAD was $242.2 million in 2021, up 2% versus $237.4 million in 2020. Both our aviation portfolio and infrastructure businesses contributed positive FAD for the year, an overall 20% higher compared to 2020. Meanwhile, corporate expenses were higher compared to 2020, primarily due to higher interest expense resulting from higher average debt outstanding during the year. Turning down aviation, aviation had another up quarter with Q4 EBITDA of 103.7 million. While decreased flying due to Omicron dampened the recovery and leasing activity, we were able to grow our aerospace services EBITDA to 20.3 million for Q4, primarily due to an increasing number of sales and exchanges through our CFM56 module factory. We had approximately 10 active customers in the module factory and are seeing growing interest in the products from MROs, or maintenance and repair organizations, airlines, and lessors. And with our recently signed program with Lufthansa Technique covering the seven-year WestJet CFM56 engine maintenance program, we see growing validation and acceptance of the value proposition which will expand the active customer base across the entire engine ecosystem. Regarding aircraft and engine leasing, we see increased demand for additional equipment, starting in Q2, driving higher lease rates and asset prices, provided that strong forward travel bookings that we have today hold up. Overall, we see improving demand for assets and aftermarket maintenance services driving 2022 financial performance and strengthening our position in the commercial jet engine aftermarket. Now let's turn to infrastructure. Jefferson. The big story with Jefferson in 2021 was major advancements on multiple product fronts with the two largest refineries in the United States and our largest customers, Motiva and Exxon. We started the year with refined products by rail and added a 10-year contract to operate a 2 million barrel multi-product and refined products export hub. And on the crude side, we've been receiving ship cargoes, which we store, blend, and move now by pipe. And we see a good pickup in crude by rail from Utah and Canada, which brings additional services and values to the terminal. We're actively exploring multiple additional products for both refiners, which we expect to add in 2022, and at least one new pipeline connection as well. While throughput volumes are up over 25% in early 2022 versus Q4 2021, we still are only about 33% utilized. But with additional activity from Exxon and Motiva, we have a path to high utilization coming into focus. Rupano. Rupano had a terrific year in 2021 and is very well positioned for many years of significant growth. First, let me list the 2021 accomplishments. One, in the first year of operation, we loaded 31 ships with butane for export. Second, we imported our first cargo of polymer-grade propylene that has come to the East Coast in many years. Third, we began construction of a double-unit train rail loop. Fourth, we expanded the truck rack, which will allow direct rail-to-truck propane transloading. Fifth, we operated a new cavern chiller, which allows us for refrigerated LPG marine loading. And sixth, we completed a new bypass road providing direct highway truck access. In terms of volumes, in 2020, we moved 4.3 million gallons through the terminal. In 2021, we moved 130 million gallons. And in 2022, we expect to move 150 to 175 million gallons. And in 2023, with an additional cryogenic tank we plan to build, that number could triple. Rapano is finding its niche with customers to offer unique capabilities for storing and transloading a wide variety of liquid petroleum products and intermediate specialty chemicals for both import and export in a critically important and advantaged location. As such, we see upside over time in this terminal fee per gallon potential. Lastly, we've made significant progress on the Clean Planet joint venture and have begun the permitting process for the first plastics recycling plant at Rapano, which we expect to commence construction on in Q2 of 2022 and complete in Q2 of 2023. Turning to Longridge, Longridge had a good quarter and year due to an earlier than planned startup of a power plant. which allowed us to take advantage of elevated power prices in October and November before our long-term power sales agreements commenced. On a 100% basis, Longridge generated EBITDA of $37.4 million in Q4 and $58.8 million for all of 2021, well ahead of our budget. Starting in January and up until last week, Longridge took an unscheduled maintenance outage, fully covered by GE warranty for repairs to the steam turbine. The outage will reduce EBITDA and Q1 due to the loss of power revenue. We did, however, perform maintenance scheduled for later in the year, thus avoiding future outages, and we completed the hydrogen blending project, giving us the capability to become the first large frame power plant to be able to utilize zero carbon hydrogen as a fuel. Under the recently enacted infrastructure bill, the U.S. government will be designated four locations as hydrogen hubs. Long Ridge is ideally qualified, and we intend to apply for one of those. We also are in the final stages of negotiating to host a new biodegradable plastics manufacturer at Long Ridge. As part of that agreement, we would provide land, power, and natural gas under long-term supply agreements. Turning to Transtar, Transtar generated $16.7 million of adjusted EBITDA in the fourth quarter from continuing operations, and for the full year generated an annualized $68 million of adjusted EBITDA. In addition, Transtar generated $4.5 million of incremental cash flow from the sale of non-core equipment and excess land, which was more than offset maintenance capex in the quarter. This is a collection of railroads that have very low maintenance capex, and industry-leading cash conversion, which we expect to continue in 2022. In the fourth quarter, Transtar moved more than 55,000 carloads, slightly above fourth quarter of 2020, as steel production at Gary and Mon Valley remained stable despite supply chain downstream issues in the automotive and appliance sectors. Some loaded steel carloads in December were held at the origin until cars are offloaded downstream, but are expected to move in Q1 and Q2. This theme is carrying forward early into the first quarter of 2022, but we expect to see increased steel movements in Q2 and beyond as pent-up demand is released and the supply chain rationalizes. Looking forward to 2022, Transtar's goal is to grow its third-party businesses at the underutilized railroads. The team is executing on new transloading opportunities in Detroit and exploring large industrial customers for its 1,000-acre property in northeast Texas. As non-core rail cars are sold, more than 1,500 storage spots are opening up across the network, and the team has a pipeline of opportunities to fill those vacant spots. We're pleased to welcome Gary Long to the team as CEO of FTIE's Rail Investments. Gary brings more than 25 years of experience in the rail industry, including most recently as CEO of Genesee and Wyoming's European Operations. Gary is very well suited to leverage the TransStar platform to execute on the growth initiatives we have set forth, both organically and through acquisitions. In summary, we're very much looking forward to 2022 with aviation recovery gaining momentum accompanied with our advances in aerospace service revenues and EBITDA. And in infrastructure, the maturation of multiple projects, which now generate organic growth across all the platforms. And finally, the spin-off of infrastructure is moving ahead with expected completion in April, which will provide simplification of the business strategy combined with eliminating K-1s for investors. And with that, I'll turn the call back to Alan.
spk04: Thank you, Joe. Operator, you may now open the call to Q&A.
spk00: Thank you. As a reminder, to ask a question, you'll need to press star 1 on your telephone. To withdraw your question, press the pound key. Our first question comes from Justin Long with Stevens. Your line is open.
spk02: Thanks, and good morning. Joe, maybe to start, I was just curious if anything has changed in terms of your EBITDA outlook by business for 2022. And then thinking about the longer term, I know you've spoken recently about the aviation business getting to a billion of EBITDA by 2025. Given the split is on the near-term horizon, is there anything you can share around some of your longer-term targets for the infrastructure businesses as well?
spk06: Yes, so yeah, on the EBITDA for 2022, what we've been saying is it's our best guesstimate or estimate is about $550 million for aviation. And then, you know, with each one of the infrastructure business, I'll go down that. The Jefferson, we're looking at between $50 and $90 million of EBITDA. Approximately... For Longridge, our share roughly, the total EBITDA is probably around $90 million, given that the first quarter is going to be short. So our share is roughly about $45 million of EBITDA. Then Rapano is probably about $10 million. And Transtar, approximately $75 million, maybe $80 million, but $75 million is probably a good number.
spk02: Is that... That's great, and then I guess longer term for the infrastructure businesses?
spk06: Yeah, so we still believe Jefferson, as I said, was roughly a third utilized, and if you count on the fact that Exxon is about to go next year from 360,000 to 620,000 barrels a day, and Motiva is that today, it's the number one in two refiners, and we have multiple discussions. We have a bigger list of new product offerings to each of them that we've ever had before, given the pipeline connectivity. So we very much believe we'll fill the terminal. And if you fill the terminal, you're looking at 150 million or more of EBITDA per annum. So that's something that, you know, we've always said it's a question of when, not if. And, you know, we've had obviously, you know, a number of headwinds and things that the world seems to, you know, throw obstacles up, you know, regularly now, but We seem to be able to jump higher each time, so we're managing them. But the terminal is very well positioned, has a great product offering, great dialogue and relationships with those two customers, and now we have the benefit of a higher oil price, which all of that should help. So we still believe that that will fill up. In terms of Transtar, what I've indicated to people is if we got a business from US Steel is generating roughly 80 million of EBITDA, which we can grow right of way in storage business and transload and add maybe 15 to 20 million over three to four years from those types of activities. So you say you get it to 100 million. What we'd like to do is add 100 million from non-US Steel customers across A range of activities could be industrial development at one of the four railroads that we were basically given as part of the transaction. It could also be growing segments like repair and maintenance activities. Terminal operations is another one that we've been looking at. So there's a list of things that we're going to explore to try to sort of figure out how to create that $100 million. But if we're able to do that, I think that $100 million from a long-term customer such as U.S. Steel, it's basically got great downside protection and it's very stable, and then have $100 million of third-party business from other non-U.S. Steel customers in a really good economic industrial backdrop in the U.S. today, that would be a great company and a much higher multiple than what we paid going in. So that's kind of the business plan there. Rapano is another one that I think is amazing in that really there are only two terminals on the east coast of the United States that can handle these types of natural gas liquids. And really the other one is pipe to ship primarily. So we have rail, we have truck, And we have import and export capabilities, which really is, we're starting to find from the customer reactions, you know, people have been saying, God, I've been looking for this for years, and I finally found it. You know, we can bring in products like butadiene, which I didn't even know how to spell it, you know, a quarter ago. So there's things that we're learning about, you know, the location and the capabilities that are very exciting. But just the natural gas liquids business, as I mentioned, you know, we probably will get a long-term commitment and build a above-ground storage tank which would be in service next year and that would give us triple the capacity we have today and really allow us to load VLGCs which puts you in the rateable business of supplying PDH plants in Europe of natural gas liquid products. So that's a big jump and then beyond that We have the ability to build probably three to four million barrels of underground storage, which we could set up in multiple caverns to handle all these different products that I just mentioned. And it could be import and export, so that's truly unique. And it's also not on the Gulf Coast, which is a big advantage for many buyers. And that doesn't count. you know, the 200 acres we have above ground that has nothing, you know, built on it. We'll probably use 10 acres for this clean planet joint venture. So there's other industrial development that we could do there. So just, you know, an amazing property with lots of special attributes that I think is in scarcity value that, you know, nobody can replicate. So I've always, you know, felt that one was, you know, truly unique and extremely valuable. Then on Longridge, You know, we have the power plant contracted for the next eight and a half years. So really the main upside is two things. One is bringing a tenant to the property so that we can add additional services such as selling gas, and we can sell power at a higher price. And I think we're going to, you know, we have a good shot at one or two. I mentioned the one on the biodegradable plastics, which we're pretty far along on. be an ideal tenant because they use natural gas, microbes, and electricity, which we don't supply the microbes, but we supply the other two. And it's an ESG positive tenant to bring onto the site. So that, I think, would be a good development. And then the other one I mentioned is the hydrogen. We now are the first power plant that can blend hydrogen and use it as a fuel plant. large frame power plant. And when you look at the specs for the hydrogen hub that the government just published, one of them is one of the hubs has to be in a large gas producing region and have a proximity to a power plant. And so I can't, we can't think of like who else would that fit? You know, we have a power plant on the property. and there's gas underneath us, all in a radius of like 100 miles is Utica. So we're very excited about that. Don't know how to quantify what that means, but it sounds great to be a hydrogen hub, and it doesn't cost anything, so why not? So that was kind of a tour of, I don't know if that gives you what you were looking for.
spk02: That's great. I appreciate all that detail, and I'll keep my follow-up to a quick one. Earlier you mentioned $550 million from aviation this year. Does that include the $50 to $100 million that you've talked about from aerospace services?
spk06: Yes.
spk02: Okay. Great. I appreciate the time.
spk06: Thanks.
spk00: Thank you. Our next question comes from Devin Ryan with JMP Securities. Your line is open.
spk01: Hi, thanks. This is Brian McKenna for Devin. So just looking at aviation EBITDA returns, I know there were some timing dynamics in the fourth quarter, but returns declined sequentially to 16% from 20% in the third quarter. So could you talk about the outlook for returns in the business? Is 16% the floor in the near term? And then what do you see as some of the bigger drivers of getting returns back to the mid-20% level over time?
spk06: We think that, you know, as I mentioned, Omicron slowed down a lot of expansion activity. And we see it in particular, like if an airline was flying in, you know, pre-COVID era, 350 to 400 hours a month on an airplane, in the fourth quarter they might have flown 200 hours. And so that affects our revenue from maintenance and maintenance reserves that we take in. So that was an impact to the fourth quarter. So from that point of view, it was not a great quarter, given that we were hoping that people were going to, for the holidays, add capacity and fly. And unfortunately, Omicron changed the trajectory of a lot of that. But as I mentioned, and then the first quarter is better. We expect sequentially better, but it's never seasonally the greatest quarter because, you know, the winter months are not, you know, the busiest for air travel. It really starts to pick up scheduling in March and April. So our expectation is that Q2 and Q3 will return to our targeted EBITDA margin of 25% or close to that. And we have a pretty good, you know, we have reasonable visibility on that. And as I said, it's a function of the airlines are seeing right now pretty strong forward bookings of flights. And so we're getting requests, as are other people, I'm sure, for additional assets. And so the best sign that you can have is when an airline calls up and says, I need more aircraft, because they're the ones that, you know, have the best view on, you know, what's happening on the travel side. And And that's what's happening right now. So we see, you know, and I've also monitored, you know, the other maintenance shops are talking about being sold out in Q2 and Q3. And one of the big engine manufacturers just said they're seeing a, you know, return to pre-COVID levels by the end of this year. So there's a lot of other corroborating, you know, data that supports that. So that's our outlook. That's our expectation to get to the levels that we just talked about.
spk01: Great. Appreciate that. And then you also sold a number of non-core aviation assets in the quarter. This can be lumpy, but how should we think about related asset sales moving forward? You know, is some level of sales necessary to fund the pipeline of LOIs, or do you have ample liquidity and cash flow generation in the business to fund these investments throughout 2022?
spk06: Yeah, we have been talking about and we actually did, you know, take a step towards shifting the mix of the portfolio somewhat. And we expect, I think we have like 100 Pratt 4000 and CF680 engines. And over time and somewhat, you know, over this year, we'll probably reduce that number down. maybe by half. So we had about $10 million in gains from those types of sales in the fourth quarter. We'll see more of that this year, I think, as well. And at the same time, we're looking to increase the percentage of the portfolio in the CFM56 engine, which obviously makes sense. That's what we've been talking about for five years. So we're We're going to shift the mix, and I think that those assets, the Pratt 4000 CF680s, have been great returns for us, and we have very low basis, and there's a lot of demand given the freight market, so I think we'll continue to see some gains from those during the year. And then in terms of managing capital going forward, I think we're going to try to turn the portfolio more and have asset sales – replenish new investments. So one of the things you can do that we're focused on right now is if we buy off-lease assets and then put them on lease, you create quite a bit of value and could take a gain. And as part of that, we're also looking at the potential to sell some of those assets that are on longer-term leases and retain the engine management of those assets, which really is a win-win, and it opens the lessor market up to the whole ecosystem. If we can sell a long-term six- to eight-year lease, book a gain, and then keep what we think is the best part of the deal, which is the engine maintenance contract, that's another value for us that no one else can recognize, and it allows us to use that capital again to sort of do it all over again. So that's sort of a long way of saying that we have liquidity. We don't think we're going to be expanding the invested capital dramatically, and we're not trying to do that. We're trying to grow the service component so that, you know, someday in the future, we hope that aerospace services revenue EBITDA is equal to leasing activity EBITDA. Great. Thanks, Joe.
spk00: Thank you, and as a reminder, if you would like to ask a question, press the star, then the one key on your touch-tone telephone. Our next question comes from Giuliano Bologna with CompassPoint. Your line is open.
spk03: Good morning. Switching topics a little bit, you guys reported that you generated $20.3 million of aerospace services even out in the quarter, and I want to make sure I was thinking about this correctly. The components of that is mostly selling you serviceable materials and proceeds from the module factory. And if I think back to prior statements that you've made, Joe, you referenced selling or generating about $20 million of EBITDA for used serviceable materials, which would imply, roughly speaking, $5 million and a quarter. And if I back into that number, that implies that the module factory is probably running $15 million plus. It could obviously be higher than that or a larger contribution of the $20 million. which would have already put you at $60 million or so annualized run rate. Is that a good way of thinking of it, and is that kind of a ballpark of where the module factory is running?
spk06: It's close, but it's a little bit different. In the fourth quarter, most of that $20 million was from the module factory. More than 80% of it was module factory. So the USM was probably under $3 million, between $2 million and $3 million of contribution in Q4. And we do expect $20 million from USM this year in 2022. But again, USM is driven primarily off of shop visits. So in the fourth quarter and first quarter, there still are not a limited number of shop visits that are occurring. But if you look at what, like again, TU just announced the other day, they're sold out now for Q2 and Q3 in the shop. So it's happening that the shop, the engine green time has been burned off and people are going to need to put their engines to the shop. So that will drive USM sales is activity on the shop visit side, which will be more back-end loaded than what the number, it's not $5 million a quarter, it will ramp up to something. But we still believe $20 million is a good estimate for the year.
spk03: That's great. And I'm thinking about a little more accounting specific, but the module factory, you know, even on proceeds and also use certain material. Am I correct in assuming that both of those flow through gain on sale? Because obviously you had a large gain on sale and a profit quarter. I just wanted to make sure that, you know, those are both flowing through as gain on sale because that's really more recurring business from the module factory and potentially use serviceable material versus one time.
spk06: Well, right now we have a bit of a – the module factory is flowing through gain on sale, but USM is being booked as revenues and minus cost of good sales. So we have a different treatment, which is probably not great from long term. We need to spend some time and see if we can get that right. But it's because it's so new, the accountants want to have it classified differently right now. So that's not something I can totally understand, but that is what we did in the fourth quarter.
spk03: That's great. That's very helpful. I'm curious if there's any update on the second PMA part or potential approval timeline there.
spk06: Yes, a lot of very good progress on the part. They're very happy with it. It's performing well. There's a lot of back and forth on information, and it's progressing, and we're hopeful that that will be addressed soon. But as you know, it's very hard to put a specific date on it. But good progress.
spk03: That's right. And the only other thing is on Jefferson, obviously it's been here. All prices have been moving around, I'm sure. Most of us have seen it. I'm curious if that has potential to dial up, you know, crude by rail and, you know, how do you think about potential contribution there from crude by rail or how that contributes into your kind of $50 to $90 million guide?
spk06: Yeah, it's one of the products that we hope will come through this year, which is, you know, there's several proposals out now, and it does help with crude prices high because there's more spread and more volatility creates What the refiners are always looking at is optionality. They're trying to source the lowest-cost crude from wherever that comes from, and volatility and high prices help. So we do see the likelihood of that activity. We've already seen it coming from the Utah market, which is not a spread business because in Utah there's no other way to move it, so it has to go by rail. But in Canada, it is a spread and supply business, and so that market should open up.
spk03: That's great. Thank you for answering my questions, and I'll jump back in the queue. Thanks.
spk00: Thank you. Our next question comes from Josh Sullivan with the Mitch Benchmark Company. Your line is open.
spk05: Hey, good morning. Good morning. Good morning. Just given the new Lutonzo relationship, how do we frame your overall module capacity at this point? And then one of the advantages of the module factory, you know, was pitched as the faster turnarounds for airline maintenance. Can you give us any metrics there customers are seeing in the field on turns at this point?
spk06: Yes. So that's a great one. And so if you – If you think about the Lufthansa deal, we supply an overhauled LPT, low-pressure turbine, to Lufthansa, which gets installed in the WestJet engine when they're doing the shop visits. So Lufthansa doesn't have to do any of the maintenance on that, and it's immediate. We can install that in 30 days rather than have to wait for any parts and have any delays. So there's a benefit to them on that, and there's also a benefit just purely for an airline. If you need an LPT and it has to go into the shop, it could be anywhere from three to six months. And so we have a little chart that shows the total savings from using the module factory could be just time-wise could be a half a million dollars or more. And we don't charge for that, so that's just an added benefit. that people get, and I think that those numbers are going to get bigger, too, as you see the shops start to build up, to fill up, and then you factor on top of that what we haven't yet seen is supply chain issues in aviation components, but it's coming. It's happened in every other industry, and the only reason it didn't happen in aviation is because there wasn't a lot of activity, but it's definitely coming, and so as you see engine shop visits start to go back out to, you know, four to six to eight months, which is what happened pre-COVID, then the module factory benefits become even greater. So we're very, and then on top of that, I think you also have, you know, some inflation potential that hasn't, you know, you see the OEMs raise prices last year 7%, which is amazing given the state of the financial condition their client base is in, but they're able to raise prices in an In that environment, 7%, what would they do if they have like 7% inflation? So that actually is also another benefit for us on our side. So those are both factors. In terms of capacity, we use about, at the Montreal facility of Lockheed Martin, it's about 300,000 square feet, and we're using about 40,000 to 50,000 of those today. And there's plenty of room to build open that up. So we have plenty of capacity there, and every engine that we induct into that facility, we break it into modules. So as soon as it comes in, it's separated as a fan, a core, and a low-pressure turbine. So we always have inventory available is my point, and I think we can manage that very effectively to ramp that up. If we needed to expand the logical place for us to add additional capacity would be Europe, where we've looked at a couple of opportunities, but we don't have the need at the moment. But instead of having to fly engines across the Atlantic, that would make sense for us for future expansion. So really, the module factory has the ability, as I mentioned, to expand geometrically, and this is a huge, huge engine market area. that if we get a small percentage of that available business, it's an enormous amount to us and a small impact on the overall market.
spk05: Got it. And then when the split is complete, you know, as far as reporting metrics between the two entities, are you still going to be reporting Fed or reoccurring Fed under the aviation assets? And then how are you looking at the dividend and capital allocation between the two?
spk06: Yes, so FAD is probably on the list of things to think about, and it's probably lost some of its relevance and meaningfulness. So we will address that, I think, at the spin, but it's one of the things that we may not be doing going forward. And then in terms of capital allocations, as I mentioned, The plan is to, it's not necessarily every quarter try to grow the $2 billion invested capital in aviation, but to turn it more frequently and to shift more towards CFM56 engines. So given that, there should be, with the EBITDA contribution that we were looking at, there should be available cash flow to either pay down debt or increase the dividend. And if that comes to happen as we expect, then we could do both of those.
spk05: Got it. And just one last one on Jefferson. How does the EBITDA generation work relative to utilization? You know, if we're at 50% or 75% of utilization, how does that relate to the per annum EBITDA figure you provided?
spk06: Well, it's highly levered because, you know, the first – you know, 25%, you cover your fixed costs. And then after that, it's highly levered. And incrementally, you know, it has to do with certain products have a higher contribution, like crude by rail is probably our highest contributing asset because not only do you get the highest fee for unloading the rail cars, but then typically you're blending it, you know, two to one or three to one with some blend stock that you also bring in by pipe and store and then charge a blending fee, and then it goes out by pipe. So that's like number one product in terms of contribution. But every, you know, if you're able to utilize pipes, the obvious benefit there is you can ramp up volume and there's almost no incremental expense. You know, it's purely, it's already there. So So they each have their own differences. So it's not a linear, I can't just give you one number. It'll partly depend on the mix, but they're all positive contributions. Thank you for the time. Thanks.
spk00: Thank you. Our next question comes from Chris Weatherby with Citi. Your line is open.
spk04: Hey, thanks. Good morning, guys. Joe, I was hoping maybe you could help us with the Jefferson Bridge. So I'm sitting here looking at the last half of the year, running around $2 million of quarterly adjusted EBITDA. I know we have a target for 50 to 90 or a couple of months into the year. So can you give us either some near-term visibility on sort of what you're seeing in terms of the ramp-up, or how do we bridge this pretty substantial step up?
spk06: Well, it's just, it's exactly what I was just saying that, you know, it's higher utilization and higher volumes. So we have multiple, you know, projects underway, be it crude fuel oil coming in by ship, going out by pipe, additional crude by rail activity from both Lativa and from Exxon now. It is additional refined products activity. So it's really, it's just what I was talking about. It's additional volume. that we've seen some of that increase in Q1, but we expect to see more of it during the year.
spk04: So can you give us maybe some near-term numbers? I mean, what does Q1 sort of look like as it contributes to that full year number?
spk06: Well, I did indicate the volumes in Q1 were up 25% roughly over Q4.
spk04: Okay, so we can use that as a benchmark. Okay, that's super helpful. Appreciate the time. Thank you. Thanks.
spk00: Thank you. As a reminder, if you would like to ask a question, press the star, then the one key on your touchtone telephone. Our next question comes from Robert Dodd with Raymond James. Your line is open.
spk07: Hi, guys. A question on the dividend and the outlook. Obviously, in the past, you've said, you know, at 2x coverage, you'd review the dividend. 2x coverage is both bad. Bad sounds like, you know, it's becoming less useful now. there's a lot of macro geopolitical uncertainty and obviously a spin coming in or separation coming in April. So is, is that how we should think about it still on a combined basis? Or can you give us an outlook on, on what metrics or what expectations should be for potential combined or separate business dividend growth?
spk06: Yeah. So we, um, We expect that with the spin, roughly 75% of the current dividend will be paid by aviation and 25% by infrastructure. So that's how the new combined two shares would be split relative to the current dividend. In terms of increasing the dividend, as I mentioned with aviation, we expect probably to grow the asset base probably less and grow the EBITDA more. which means you'll have more free cash flow, which would allow us to potentially increase the dividend as one of the alternatives to that excess capital. So that's something that, you know, we could do. We didn't want to do it pre-spin because there's too many other things going on, obviously, and there's a lot of different – the world, you know, we've got a big project to get done with that, and then we'll look at it. In terms of infrastructure, it's a little harder for me because it's going to be a capital allocation discussion around growing that dividend relative to the investment opportunities that we would see in front of us. And so that would be something I would anticipate talking more about after the STEM once we get out and have visibility on the capital opportunities for new projects.
spk07: I appreciate that. Thank you. And if I can, one short one. Obviously, I mean, you said, you know, used serviceable material and all the other things that are driven more by shop visits may be more back-end loaded. Is that also true with the module factory, or does that, you know, that it's seasonal this year, more back-end loaded? And is that kind of a normal seasonality, or is that just a, kind of a COVID recovery seasonality that produces that back-end loading for certainly the USM?
spk06: Well, for USM, it's really COVID-related because when COVID started, the number of shop visits dropped. As we've talked about before, airlines did not want to put engines through a major overhaul when they had excess engines in the fleet. So the first thing they do is use up the excess hours and cycles That's happened now, and now that you have the recovery, then people are going to all of a sudden say, oh, my God, I'm out of engines, and I've got to put them through the shop. So that's what you're seeing with people saying that the shops are selling out for Q2 and Q3. So it's really that USM function is much more COVID-related than seasonally related. And actually, historically, a lot of maintenance is done in Q1 and because that's the slowest flying season. It's like the yellow flag in the car race. You go into the shop when everyone else is slowing down. So it's not seasonal from that point of view. And then module factory, I don't anticipate a lot of seasonality there. Again, it's a year-round activity, so it's not specifically tied to flying. And we did have a strong Q4. Obviously, we put the number out. We don't know exactly. We don't have enough history and data to say exactly how it's going to roll out, and it's a relatively new product, so I can't guarantee that it's going to be like a steadily increasing number every quarter, which everyone would want and I would want, but we don't have enough information yet to be able to say that. But obviously, we put it out there so we have some reasonable expectation and a number of customers that are they're using it is going to increase. So that's good. And I don't think it's going to be highly seasonal. Thank you. Thank you.
spk00: Thank you. I'm showing no further questions at this time. I'd like to turn the call back to Alan Andrini for closing comments.
spk04: Thank you all for participating in today's conference call. We look forward to updating you after Q1.
spk00: This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect, everyone. Have a great day.
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