Warrior Met Coal, Inc.

Good day and welcome to the Warrior Metco first quarter 2026 conference call. All participants will be in a listen only mode. Should you need assistance, please signal conference specialist by pressing the star key followed by zero. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To ask a question, you may press star then 1 on your touchtone phone. And to withdraw your question, please press star then 2. Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Mr. Brian Chopin. Please go ahead, sir.

Good afternoon and welcome, everyone, to Warrior's first quarter 2026 earnings conference call. Before we begin, let me remind you that certain statements made during this call including statements relating to our expected future business and financial performance, may be considered forward-looking statements, according to the private securities litigation reform act. Forward-looking statements, by their nature, address matters that are different degrees uncertain. These uncertainties, which are described in more detail in the company's annual and quarterly reports filed with the SEC, may cause our actual future results to be materially different from those expected in our forward-looking statements. We do not undertake to update our forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise, except this may be required by law. For more information regarding forward-looking statements, please refer to the company's press releases and SEC filings. We will also be discussing certain non-GAAP financial measures, which are defined and reconciled to comparable GAAP financial measures in our first quarter press release, Furnished to the SEC on Form 8K, which is also posted on our website. Additionally, we will be filing our Form 10Q for the quarter ended March 31st, 2026 with the SEC this afternoon. You can find additional information regarding the company on our website at www.warriormetcoal.com, which also includes a first quarter supplemental slide deck that was posted this afternoon. Today on the call with me are Mr. Walt Scheller, Chief Executive Officer, and Mr. Dale Boyles, Chief Financial Officer. After our formal remarks, we will be happy to answer any questions. With that, I will now turn the call over to Walt.

Thanks, Brian. Hello, everyone, and thank you for taking the time to join us today to discuss our first quarter 2026 results. I'll start by providing an overview of the quarter before Dale reviews our results in additional detail. The first quarter marked a defining milestone for Warrior as we completed the final construction and project spending associated with the development of our transformational Blue Creek Mines. delivering the project ahead of schedule and fully in line with our capital expenditure guidance. This achievement reflects years of planning, disciplined capital allocation, and exceptional execution by our team and concludes the construction and investment phase of Blue Creek. Our total project capital expenditures were a little over a billion dollars. As a reminder, this is on budget and fully paid out of cash from operations without incurring any funded debt. The new Blue Creek mine was a major contributor to higher volumes and profitability in the first quarter of 2026, which led to record quarterly sales and production volumes. Our first quarter volumes were higher than our internal plans and are expected to be higher for the remainder of the year to meet our full year outlook and guidance. As we look at the first quarter, still making cold market conditions, pricing remained notably strong in the premium quality segment and well above our original expectations, while the high vol A quality segment underperformed expectations. We believe the strength in premium quality pricing was driven by tightness in the segment resulting from supply constraints stemming from weather disruptions and mine production related challenges in Australia. These factors drove up premium quality pricing by 15% in January, leading to noticeably higher demand for our Mine 7 premium quality product. As Australian supply chains have begun to recover from these events, the emergence of a new conflict in the Middle East introduced additional cost pressures, specifically in freight markets, while increasing the uncertainty around global energy availability. Steelmaking coal prices have remained strong as inflationary cost pressures from the rise in oil and diesel prices have asserted a firmer floor despite soft seaborne demand, especially in the spot market. However, from a global seaborne demand perspective, India continues to be a key market supported by firm domestic steel prices, improving margins, and growing steel production, which has helped sustain demand for high-quality steelmaking coal. Global pig iron production decreased by 2.1% for the first two months of 2026, as compared to the same period last year. India continued to demonstrate strength, showing a 3.1% for the same period. China's pig iron production declined by 2.7% during the two-month period. Our primary index, the PLV FOB Australia, rose very quickly in the first quarter as a result of supply constraints stemming from previously discussed challenges in Australia, reaching a high of $229 in early February and averaged $213 per short-term. The index average was 17% or $31 per ton higher than the fourth quarter of 2025 and was 27% higher than the first quarter of 2025. As for Maine's second-tier indices, the Australian LVHCC index price experienced more modest gains and averaged $173 per short ton for the first quarter. This was $19 per ton, or 12% higher than the fourth quarter of 2025, and 30% higher than the first quarter of 2025. As a result, the relativity of the Australian LVHCC index price to the Australian PLV index price decreased from 85% for the fourth quarter of 2025 to 81% for the first quarter of 2026. In contrast to the Australian LVHCC index price, the average U.S. East Coast HVA index price only increased $8 per ton, or 6%, in the first quarter from the fourth quarter of 2025 and averaged $144 per short ton. As a result, the relativity decreased from 75% to the fourth quarter of 2025 to 68% for the first quarter of 2026. More importantly, this relativity dropped to an all-time low of 62% for a brief period during the first quarter and represents a significant spread difference with the Pacific Basin Relativity. We achieved a gross price realization of 72% for the first quarter compared to 75% in the fourth quarter of 2025. Our gross price realization was lower and driven by a combination of factors. First, while the average of both main pricing indices increased in the first quarter compared to the fourth quarter of 2025, the price spreads or relativities widened, reaching one of the lowest values ever recorded. Our sales mix of high vol A quality was 11% higher. Third, that higher sales mix was primarily sold in the Pacific Basin on a CFR basis with higher average freight rates due to the conflict in the Middle East. We sold 4% more volume into the Pacific Basin in the first quarter than in the fourth quarter of 2025. Warrior achieved a record high quarterly sales volume in the first quarter of 3 million short tons compared to 2.2 million tons in the same quarter of 2025. This represents a 38% increase primarily due to the additional sales volume from the new Blue Creek mine. Our first quarter sales volume mix was 61% high vol A, representing a 10% increase over the fourth quarter of 2025. As production from Blue Creek continues to increase, we expect our sales volume mix to become more weighted toward high vol A products and the Pacific Basin destinations over time. Our sales by geographies for the first quarter break down as follows, 51% into Asia, 25% into Europe, and 14% into South America. Our spot volume was 6% for the first quarter of 2026. Sales volumes in the Pacific Basin were 61% for the first quarter, which were 4% higher than the fourth quarter of 2025 and 18% higher than the first quarter of last year. Production volume in the first quarter of 2026 was a record high 3.5 million short tons compared to 2.3 million in the same quarter of last year, representing a 55% increase. This increase reflects a significant contribution of Blue Creek. Our coal inventory levels increased to 1.9 million short tons at the end of March of this year, compared to 1.6 million tons at the end of December of 2025. We expect to manage the excess inventory over the remainder of the year to maximize sales volume, profitability, and free cash flow. I'll now ask Dale to address our first quarter results in greater detail.