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spk05: Greetings and welcome to the LSB Industries Fourth Quarter 2022 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A question and answer session will follow the formal presentation. If anyone should require operator assistance during the conference, please press star zero on your cell phone keypad. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to your host, Fred Bonacore, Vice President of Investor Relations. Good morning, everyone.
spk17: Joining me today are Mark Bearman, our Chief Executive Officer, and Cheryl McGuire, our Chief Financial Officer. Please note that today's call will include forward-looking statements, and because the statements are based on the company's current intent, expectations, and projections, they are not guarantees of future performance, and a variety of factors could cause the actual results to differ materially. As this call will include references to non-GAAP results, Please see the press release in the investor section of our website, lsbindustries.com, for further information regarding forward-looking statements and reconciliations of non-GAAP results to GAAP results. At this time, I'd like to go ahead and turn the call over to Mark.
spk18: Thank you, Fred. We're happy to have the opportunity to speak with you today about our 2022 full year and fourth quarter results and our outlook for the first quarter and full year of 2023. 2022 was a pivotal year in our company's history. We delivered record financial results with year-over-year increases in sales and adjusted EBITDA of 62% and 117% respectively. We generated strong cash flow, a significant portion of which we returned to our shareholders through share of purchases, while at the same time substantially improving our balance sheet. Our strong performance reflects the favorable trends in selling prices across all of our products coupled with our ability to operate our facilities reliably and sell all of our production at attractive margins thanks to our strategic commercial efforts. Additionally, we completed major turnarounds at two of our facilities to further improve their safety and reliability. In a major step towards becoming a leader in the emerging clean energy industry, we signed agreements to begin development of low-carbon and no-carbon ammonia projects at two of our facilities. I'd like to thank all of our employees for making this another excellent quarter and for their commitment to developing a culture of excellence at LSB Industries. Our team put in a great deal of hard work and dedication in the years leading up to 2022, which put us in a position to have a successful year. While strong financial results are very important, our primary focus is safety. One of our core values is to protect what matters, where we strive consistently to protect the health and well-being of our employees, contractors, communities in which we operate, and the environment. We've set very high safety standards, policies, and procedures aimed at achieving our goal zero, that zero recordable incidents and injuries. While we have made progress towards this goal in recent years, we still have much work to do to get where we want to be. We expect that investments we've made in our facilities in 2022 and we will make in 2023 will help us make meaningful strides with respect to operating safely in the coming quarters and years. Looking at the 2022 fourth quarter, as summarized on page three of our presentation, we generated strong year-over-year growth aided by a continued favorable pricing environment and solid execution. Notably, we delivered these results despite having had prior turnaround during the early part of the quarter and the impact of freezing weather on our Cherokee and El Dorado facilities in the final week of December. On page four of our presentation, we provide an overview of our end markets. Corn prices remain above multi-year averages, driven by a variety of global factors, including drought conditions in the U.S. and parts of South America, and continued strong global demand. Domestic and worldwide stock-to-use ratios for corn remain at multi-year lows, leading us to believe that it will take two to three years of good corn growing seasons to bring the stock-to-use ratios back in line with historical averages. We expect corn prices will stay near current high levels through 2023, and that farm profitability will remain attractive, pointing to an increase in planted acres this spring versus last year. The USDA estimates that an approximately 89 million acres of corn were planted in 2022, and that approximately 92 to 93 million acres will be planted this year. This supports the view that nitrogen fertilizers will be in strong demand once the planting season gets underway in the coming weeks. It is also expected that there will be an increase in wheat acres planted in 2023, further increasing demand for nitrogen fertilizers. With respect to our industrial products, on the whole, demand remains stable. Domestic end-use markets continue to be stronger than those in Europe and Asia, which is supportive for our business. While inflation and other economic pressures are impacting some parts of the chemical manufacturing industry, mining activity remains strong. and we see that continuing throughout this year. Additionally, recent announcements from automotive manufacturers and suppliers indicate that some degree of improvement in auto production could unfold during 2023, further supporting demand for the nitric acid that we produce. While pricing for nitrogen products has come down in recent months, largely due to a decline in European natural gas prices, demand trends continue to be solid across our business and pricing remains above historical averages. With no turnaround scheduled at our facilities this year, we are well positioned for a strong year-over-year increase in production and sales volume. As such, we expect another year of robust profitability and cash flow. Now I'll turn over the call to Cheryl, who will discuss our Q4 results and outlook. Cheryl?
spk12: Thanks, Mark, and good morning. Our fourth quarter adjusted EBITDA of 105 million is a record performance for us in a fourth quarter. Additionally, we generated adjusted EPS of 90 cents in the quarter. Turning to page five, you'll see a summary of our key balance sheet and cash flow metrics. Our continued profitability enabled us to maintain a strong liquidity position. At the end of 2022, we had approximately 458 million of total liquidity including approximately 394 million in cash and short-term investments. This is after we repurchased approximately 13.2 million shares of our stock at an average price of approximately $13 per share, exhausting the 175 million share repurchase program that we began in May of 2022. Out of the 13.2 million shares, We bought back 9 million shares from our largest stockholder, who completed secondary offerings of a portion of their position in our stock in August and November of 2022. Through these transactions, we were able to reduce our shares outstanding by approximately 15%, while at the same time increasing the trading liquidity of our stock. During 2022, we generated cash flow from operations of $346 million and had capital expenditures of $46 million, translating into $300 million of free cash flow. For the year, we returned approximately 60% of our free cash flow to investors through our share repurchase program. Additionally, we ended the year with a net debt to trailing 12-month EBITDA leverage ratio of less than one time. well below our target leverage ratio in a mid-cycle or normalized pricing environment of below 2.5 times. Page 6 bridges our fourth quarter adjusted EBITDA of $105 million to adjusted EBITDA for the fourth quarter 2021 of $90 million. The positive selling price impact is shown net of increased variable costs versus the fourth quarter of 2021. Sales volumes were lower in the fourth quarter as a result of planned turnaround activity at our prior facility, which concluded in mid-October, and the loss of approximately one week of production in the fourth quarter at our Cherokee and El Dorado facilities due to the impact of freezing cold weather in late December. Page 7 illustrates the strong bottom line improvement we've delivered over the past several years. This is the result of favorable pricing trends, operational improvements, new customer contracts, and investments we've made to optimize our product distribution and mix. While we anticipate 2023 EBITDA will be lower than 2022 as a result of nitrogen pricing moderating off of peak levels, we still expect to generate substantial profit and cash flow, further positioning us to implement our growth strategy, which Mark will discuss later in the call. Looking at the first quarter, the NOLA UAN benchmark pricing is currently at approximately $265 a ton. Additionally, the Tampa ammonia benchmark price settled at $790 per metric ton in February versus $1,135 per metric ton last February. The year-over-year change largely reflects lower natural gas prices in Europe, which have come down from very high levels in 2022, and industrial demand softening in Europe and Asia. With that said, U.S. natural gas prices have also declined and currently stand at a fraction of the cost in Europe, keeping intact the competitive advantage that U.S. nitrogen producers enjoy. Relative to our natural gas feedstock cost, while U.S. gas costs have since moderated, we do have approximately 75% of our first quarter gas needs locked in at approximately $6.30 per MMBTU for Q1. With respect to sales volumes, as previously announced, our Cherokee facility resumed production with a phased restart on January 14, 2023. Despite lower production at that site in January and the delayed movement of fertilizer resulting in volumes moving to the second quarter, we expect overall higher sales volumes of ammonia and UAN as compared to the first quarter of 2022, assuming reasonable weather conditions. Additionally, nitric acid and AN volumes are expected to be in line with the healthy first quarter of 2022. So given our view on sales volumes and pricing, locked in natural gas costs and the approximately $10 million impact from the Cherokee freeze event that impacted production through mid-January, we would expect the first quarter adjusted EBITDA to be in the range of $55 million to $65 million. Please keep in mind our expected EBITDA range for the quarter is based on our current view of pricing. Looking forward to the balance of the year, we provide considerations for our full year 2023 on slides eight and nine. On slide 8, you can see our expected ammonia production and sales volumes for the full year of 2023. As a result of expected improvement in operating rates due in part to our turnarounds at El Dorado and prior in 2022 and the absence of any turnarounds in 2023, we expect meaningful year-over-year improvement in ammonia production as well as all of our downstream products. We expect to invest approximately 60 to 80 million of CapEx in our facilities during 2023. This includes approximately 50 to 60 million of investments related to plant reliability and safety with the balance earmarked for margin enhancement projects aimed at improving the efficiency of our operations, expanding our commercial footprint, and investing in storage and loading capabilities at our facilities. Slide nine covers a range of variable and fixed plant expenses, as well as SG&A for 2023. Our expectations for fixed costs reflect investments we've made in key talent to support our growth, as well as inflation and wages and other costs. Note that we expect our effective tax rate for the year to be approximately 25%. However, we do not expect to be a material cash taxpayer in 2023 as we continue to utilize our NOLs. And now I'll turn it back over to Mark.
spk18: Thank you, Cheryl. As Cheryl indicated, natural gas prices have come down significantly in recent months, which has led to lower, albeit still historically strong, selling prices for our products. Page 10 illustrates how the spread between U.S. and European natural gas prices widened over the course of 2021 and continued to be volatile throughout 2022. The spike in European natural gas costs during the third quarter of 2022 resulted in many European nitrogen facilities being taken offline. Much of this production has come back online as prices for European natural gas trended lower due to warmer than average winter temperatures and lower industrial demand. Still, natural gas prices in Europe remain well above 10-year averages and are currently fluctuating between $15 and $20, an MMBTU equivalent, which is a multiple of what we're paying for in the US. The current gas price level in Europe translates into an ammonia production cost on average of approximately $600 per ton, and European ammonia production costs will likely continue to be significantly above domestic costs, continuing to provide a substantial advantage to US nitrogen producers. For the year, we expect a continued favorable nitrogen pricing environment relative to the past decade. We also have several company-specific initiatives that are very much in our control, representing the opportunity to enhance our efficiency, increase our production capacity, and enter the emerging clean energy market. We expect these opportunities will allow us to increase our profitability, ultimately resulting in increased value for our shareholders. The actions we've taken with our balance sheet over the past 18 months coupled with a strong cash flow generated over the course of 2022 and expected to continue this year, will provide us with a liquidity position that enables us to pursue multiple growth initiatives. On page 11, we show a summary of our key growth initiatives. As I mentioned earlier, employee safety is our primary focus every single day, followed by being good stewards of the environment and the reliability of our facilities. We continue to make improvements on all these fronts and have significant opportunities for further progress. The work completed at our Eldorado and prior sites during 2022 will advance our safety, environmental, and reliability initiatives. Additionally, we believe that over the next two years, the capital investments we are making combined with the manufacturing initiatives we are pursuing should increase the operating rates at our facilities, translating into a meaningful incremental contribution to our profitability. On top of that, we believe we can increase the production capacity of our plants through various debottlenecking initiatives. We are currently evaluating multiple potential projects that could significantly increase our production and sales volumes and our profitability. The increase in nitrogen production capacity would also assist with the USDA's stated goal of increasing domestic fertilizer production to ensure that farmers have security of fertilizer supply and can meet their increasing demands. In that regard, At the end of December, we submitted our application for a federal grant under the USDA's $500 million fertilizer production expansion program. The maximum award under this program is $100 million. We believe we are a highly qualified applicant given our opportunity to increase our production capacity of our existing manufacturing assets in a more timely manner than any new build production facility. With respect to our clean energy initiatives, We continue to advance our blue and green ammonia strategy. The two broad projects we currently have underway represent compelling opportunities for us to emerge as a leader in decarbonizing in our industry. Not only do our blue and green ammonia projects have the potential to result in a substantial reduction to our carbon footprint, but additionally we believe the economics of both could be very attractive. Page 12 provides an overview and an update on our blue and green ammonia projects. With respect to our blue ammonia project in El Dorado, as we discussed in our third quarter call, the increase of the 45Q credit to $85 per ton of CO2 captured and sequestered has made the economics of this project very attractive. A critical step on our path towards commencing CCS and blue ammonia production is obtaining a permit to operate a Class VI injection well. I'm happy to say that earlier this week we achieved a milestone on this project as the application for the approval of a Class VI injection well was filed with the EPA. We have been told that the EPA review process could take between 18 and 24 months. Based on that timing, we continue to expect to begin capturing and sequestering CO2 at our El Dorado site in 2025. Our analysis indicates that once in operation, this project should reduce our company's Scope 1 carbon emissions by approximately 25%. Regarding our green ammonia project, we continue to expect that this project will qualify for the full $3 per kilogram of CO2 federal incentives for hydrogen production rolled out as part of the Inflation Reduction Act and enable us to produce approximately 30,000 tons of zero carbon ammonia to sell to our customers. We have completed extensive work on our feasibility study of this project and expect to announce our plans for it by the end of the second quarter. To the extent we proceed as anticipated, we expect to begin producing some green ammonia in late 2024, early 2025. To sum up 2022, it was a year of significant highlights for LSB Industries. We capitalized on the favorable market environment to materially strengthen our balance sheet while at the same time investing in our facilities to enhance our manufacturing capabilities. We entered 2023 with the expectation of a significant year-over-year increase in production volume given the absence of any turnarounds this year coupled with the opportunities we have to generate further volume improvements through the enhancements of our existing manufacturing footprint. At the same time, we will continue to position LSB Industries to be a leader in low-carbon, no-carbon ammonia production. We expect these initiatives to collectively lead to increased profitability and greater value for our shareholders in the years to come, and I look forward to discussing our progress with you as we reach critical milestones in the development of our projects. Before I hand the call back over to the operator for the Q&A session, I'd like to mention that we will be hosting an Investor Day in New York on March 14th, and we look forward to seeing many of you there. That concludes our prepared remarks, and we will now be happy to take any questions. Thanks.
spk05: Ladies and gentlemen, if you would like to ask a question, please press star 1 on your telephone keypad, and a confirmation tone will indicate your line is in the question queue. You may press star two if you would like to remove your question from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star keys. One moment, please, while we poll for questions. Our first question comes from the line of Adam Sandelson with Goldman Sachs. Please proceed. Thank you. Good morning, everyone.
spk03: Morning, Adam.
spk13: Morning.
spk03: Morning. So I guess the first question, relates to the current nitrogen market and I'd love to get your perspective on distributor kind of buying and inventory since the spring application kind of pretty rapidly approaches. It would seem like the channel in North America is pretty reminiscent of significant tonnage, so help me frame how your order book is shaping up going into spring and kind of where you might see pockets of of demand that would not be difficult for current kind of supply to meet.
spk18: Yeah, so you're right. It's been an interesting, you know, first few months of this year as pricing of natural gas in Europe is coming down, therefore cost of production in Europe is coming down, and that's obviously put pressure on prices. And so when that happens and you see prices falling, buyers generally tend to take a step back, thinking that prices continually will go lower. So I think it's been a bit of a standoff between producers wanting to sell the product at an opportune time, setting up for spring, and then retailers and distributors sort of sitting back, and ultimately the farmer sitting back as well. As we head into spring, though, I think the weather's really, at least at this point, been very helpful. We've had some really good weather patterns. We've had some rain, which has also helped. And I think we're just starting to see the beginning of buying for this spring. And I would expect that over the next two to three weeks, we'll really start to see this kick off as we head into the planting season.
spk03: Is there any differentiation there on ammonia versus UAN? I think it's been interesting how on an N-basis, certainly urea is actually cheaper than ammonia in some parts of the corn belt on an N-basis. Do you see any product switching resulting from that?
spk18: Well, we've seen some products switching to urea, given that urea has been so cheap relative to other products. I think, you know, India announced a tender yesterday, so I think that should give some support to urea prices. You know, I think there'll be more demand in general, and as we start to see prices increase in urea, I think we'll see support for other pricing of other fertilizer products. So I think... Again, I think we've been in kind of a funny period where there's not much liquidity in the market. And as we start to see the liquidity and we start to see a lot of buying in the marketplace, I think that will support higher prices. And you'll see urea prices, I believe, move up faster than both UAN and ammonia.
spk03: Okay. And if I could squeeze in one more, Mark. You talked in the prepared remarks about an 18- to 24-month timeline for the uh ccs class um plastics well permit at el dorado um i mean by understanding there's only one been one actual process or only one company's ever gotten classics well permits approved there's a whole slew of them ending so can you help us kind of think about kind of the confidence level that you're getting on um the timing of that of that approval process from from dps
spk18: Yeah, so you're right. To date, there is only one Class 6 permit that has been approved. It was, you know, numbers of years ago. It was back in 2014, and it's an ADM site. So there are, we're in Region 6, which is the EPA office out of Dallas. So that includes Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas. So there are a number of permit applications that have been filed. We have been told, and we took our time really developing the application, and our partner, Lapis Energy, did a lot of work on the geology. And we did a good job, I think, interacting with the EPA and really talking to them about what they really want to see. So I think we feel really good about the application that we submitted, and we've been told that it is the most comprehensive application to date. And whether that's true or not, I don't know, but at least that's what we've been told. I think, you know, there is, I believe there's going to be a lot of pressure from Washington on the EPA to start moving through some of these applications and getting some approvals through because it's a little bit, you know, it's kind of, it's kind of, odd to me that Washington has really incentivized folks to invest in carbon capture through the changes that they made in the IRA, yet they really haven't increased any budgetary allocations to the EPA to add more staff. So I think that's part of the problem, and I think the EPA is going to start to get a little pressure from Washington because without getting through these permit approvals, they're not going to see the results that they want from the incentives that they've put into the IRA. So I do think, you know, the 18 to 24 months is more an estimate by the EPA. So, you know, could it go faster than that? It's possible, but I think we're kind of planning really in that 18 to 24-month time frame.
spk03: Okay.
spk05: That's all really helpful. Thank you. Thanks, Adam. Our next question comes from the line of Josh Spector with UBS. Please proceed.
spk15: Yeah, thanks for taking my question. Actually, just a follow-up on the blue ammonia and the timeline there. So, I mean, you're reiterating your plan to start that up in 2025 if the permit takes two years. Should we think about LAPIS have built most of the infrastructure and sequestration equipment basically in parallel to that, so that's a relatively quick turn-on, or if it's two years, does that push out your timeline until you start to see some of the benefits of that?
spk18: It's a good question. I'm not going to say that they're going to build a facility and sit there and wait and hope that we get the permit approved, but there are, you know, engineering design is occurring as we speak, so there's investment in capital for that. long lead time items that are necessary. I would suspect that those will go on order. And so by the time the permit comes, I think we've shortened the period of, you know, waiting until we get the permit and then hitting the button to start the process. So I think some things are done in parallel, but I don't believe that they're going to build a facility and just sit there and wait, nor would I actually.
spk15: Okay, thanks. And just on your industrial demand, I mean, it's interesting that you're talking about it as more stable. I mean, even in North America, a lot of the chemical derivatives are seeing pretty significant capacity reductions. So I'm just curious how you could reconcile your demand for nitric and some of the other derivatives being stable versus industry utilizations declining. Are you placing those tons elsewhere, or is there something else going on that we're missing?
spk18: No, I mean, I think one of the key aspects of our commercial organization is really optimizing where our products go. So while we're seeing, we could see some slowdown in demand in nitric, we certainly have the ability to some degree to ramp up AN production and sell products both as industrial and even high density, which is fertilizer, should we start to see some softening in our nitric market. But To date, we haven't seen that.
spk04: Okay, thank you.
spk05: Our next question comes from the line of Andrew Wong with RBC Capital Markets. Please proceed.
spk03: Hey, good morning. Thanks for taking the questions. Just regarding the application to the USDA for some funding on capacity expansions, Can you just talk maybe a little bit more about what the USDA is looking for and what kind of criteria they're looking for? I know there's different limits on size and things like that. And then just the timing on the decision.
spk18: Well, I'll work backwards. Your guess is as good as mine on the timing. I don't think they've ever announced what timing would be. I would tell you that there were two submission periods The first one was, you know, the latter part of November, and after about two months, they chose a number of projects that qualified for funding, and then they opened up a comment period. The second window, which is what, you know, when we applied, was the end of December. So I would hope that, you know, it's the same two, two and a half months, and by the end of this month or middle of March, We're hearing back from the USDA positively that our project is approved, and we can go to the next steps. As far as what they were looking for, I think the basic focus of the USDA was to increase domestic fertilizer production and to diversify it away from the top four producers in the U.S. So we're small enough that we're not a top four. We're a number six producer in the U.S., so we qualify there. Our project is that we submitted is really to expand our ammonia production at El Dorado, our nitric acid production at El Dorado, and then to build a urea plant and UAN facility. So ultimately that would increase our UAN production by about 600,000 tons a year. So that would be an upgraded product for us. As we sit back, that is one path. that I think the team has come together and focused on. We've got a couple of other alternatives down at that site that we're evaluating as well, and so it'll be interesting to see if the USDA comes back and approves that project, and then we can have a conversation with them about that project and maybe some modifications to that project should we decide to do that.
spk14: Okay, and how does the funding...
spk03: work relative to a potential cost to LSB? Like, is it a percentage? Is it just something you negotiate with the USDA?
spk18: Well, their guideline says that they'll fund up to 25 percent of the total cost of the project with a maximum of $100 million per project. Our project is a bit north of $400 million, so that would be $100 million max funding from the USDA. So I don't know that there's a negotiation on the percentage because I think it's been stated up to. So that's what we're seeking.
spk03: Okay. Perfect. Thanks. And then just maybe a question on just the market in general. Looking at ammonium nitrate prices in the markets, it looks like they're holding up better than the other products, UAA and urea, ammonia even. Is that consistent with what you're seeing? And I'm talking the ag markets. And why might that be the case?
spk18: Yeah, we are. So it is a premium on a nitrogen equivalent basis to some of the other products. It is a specialty product here in the United States. It's always been a premium product. And so, you know, we're happy with where the pricing is today relative to other fertilizer products.
spk05: Okay, thanks.
spk01: Yep.
spk05: Our next question comes from the line of Vincent Anderson with Stiefel. Please proceed.
spk08: Yeah, thanks and good morning. I was hoping to kind of revisit that nitrate question one more time, if you could provide maybe a bit more detail on your flexibility there, because I know you've tried to de-emphasize your mining exposure. but the H-DAN product is pretty good from a margin perspective, if I recall. So could you just kind of quantify what you think is a realistic amount of nitric that could be redirected into those markets if you really had to to keep operating rates up?
spk18: Well, I mean, you know, so we've got the ability to produce – you know, about 150 to 160,000 tons a year of low-density ammonium nitrate. And we've got the ability to produce about 300 or 310,000 tons of high-density ammonium nitrate on an annual basis. And then, of course, and that's talking about our krilling or pelletized operations. I mean, before that, you've got ammonium nitrate solution, and we do sell some solution into the mining market as well. So, you know, I think we've got some flexibility should we see nitric demand drop off to upgrade that to ammonium nitrate, either in solution or prilled form. So we're not at those maximums. I mean, from a low density perspective, as I mentioned in my prepared comments, We are seeing really nice demand, so we are sold out there. We have some flexibility in our high density. And what we're also seeing, which is kind of interesting, is that mining clients are also gravitating to buying some high density as well and using that given the tightness in the low density market.
spk08: Okay, that's interesting and helpful. Thank you. And then I guess just kind of going into this year, if you don't mind maybe discussing any high-level changes to your commercial strategy for UAN, given this will be your first time in a while with a CVR partnership, and maybe more importantly, without CVR's logistics assets.
spk18: Yeah, so our chief commercial officer has done a really good job in recruiting quality folks to lead our UAN effort, so we're excited. about selling our product directly. I think most companies would rather sell their product directly than use a distributor to distribute their products. So we're actually developing a lot more relationships than we've had in the past. We're going farther than we have in the past. We're finding niches that maybe we hadn't sold into in the past. And so we think net-net that you know, the advantage that we're going to get by selling the product ourselves should result in a higher net back. Now, whether that materializes or not, we'll have to play it out and see at the end of the year if, you know, in some type of analysis, if we could, you know, kind of figure that out. But I think, you know, you mentioned CVR's logistics assets. You know, we've got our own logistics assets that we use in all other parts of our business. So we did have to to build a little bit and increase our rail car fleet to handle the additional UAN sales. But I think other than that, you know, we're really happy with the effort so far.
spk08: All right, excellent. Well, good luck on the rest of the year. I'll pass it along.
spk01: Thank you.
spk05: Our next question comes from the line of Charles Nievert with Piper Samer. Please proceed.
spk16: Yeah, I may have missed some of this. Have you guys, other than first quarter where you gave us what your gas price looks like, have you guys done any hedging beyond into 2Q through the end of the year? What price is that, or are we basically going to be spot market buyers going forward for the remainder of the year other than 1Q? And then as a follow-up, what is left in the share repurchase program that's currently outstanding, and I guess the intention given the way things are earning is that would probably get re-up, but where do we stand on both of those on that situation?
spk12: Good morning, Charlie. So we're about 25% locked in for gas for the second quarter, you know, around 550, and then 10% for the balance of the year for 2023 in that same kind of 550 to $6 range. Generally, we'll lock more gas in the winter months because that's when you have the highest risk of price volatility. So I think going forward over the next, call it six months, you'll just see us lock first of month gas just to take out any volatility over the month. So that's generally our strategy from a gas purchases perspective. And with respect to the share buyback, we fully exhausted that $175 million, and so that's kind of where we stand today.
spk18: Yeah, I would say that given the cash flow generation that we're anticipating for this year, you could see us implement another share buyback program, and that's in discussions now. Okay.
spk16: Thanks. Everything else has been answered for me. Thank you. Thanks, Charles.
spk05: Our next question comes from the line of Rob McGuire with Granite Research. Please proceed.
spk10: Good morning.
spk05: Hey, Rob.
spk12: Hey, Rob.
spk10: Would you discuss the drought that's been occurring in the U.S. the last couple of years and your expectation for an impact this year?
spk18: Well, there's been extreme droughts, I'd say in the plains in the United States, and that's pretty documented. Argentina's suffered from really bad drought conditions as well. So I think both of those persist, and I think we're seeing in Argentina crops really suffering from those drought conditions. Conversely, Brazil's had some really good crop conditions and should reach or is expected to reach record production, both in corn and soybean. You know, I think it could have an impact in more of an indirect way. So drought conditions have also resulted in increased hay usage for cattle during non-winter months, and that's especially possible in the northern and southern plans. So with U.S. cattle prices expected to continue kind of an upward trend, we should see an increase in the production of cattle and ultimately hay as inventories are historically low today. So that points towards an upwards of probably 10% increase in hay acres planted and the potential of probably another half a million tons of nitrogen demand from last year. So I think You know, I don't know that it's going to have a severe effect in acres planted for corn or soybeans. I suppose if we don't get any precipitation throughout the drought areas, that it could have an impact. But we have seen some rain over the last, you know, two weeks to a month. Not enough. But I do think it could have a positive impact. on nitrogen demand based on demand for hay.
spk10: I appreciate that. And you mentioned the repurchase program may get renewed here, but is it more attractive to reduce your debt or repurchase stock today?
spk18: Oh, that's a great question. It's something that I think we sit around the table and talk about. Ultimately, Um, you know, we'd like to reduce debt, um, some, and, um, you know, bonds are callable in 2024. So next year. Um, so it's September of next year. So, you know, I think either we build a cash balance, uh, to then call some of the bonds at the call price. Um, or, um, we repurchase additional shares of stock. or some combination of both. So I think those are the discussions that we're having.
spk09: That's it for me. Thank you for answering my questions.
spk04: Sure. Thanks, Rob. Our next question comes from the line of Brian DiRubio with Baird.
spk05: Please proceed.
spk07: Good morning. Just as I look at your key growth initiatives, can you give me a sense of your priority on organic versus creative acquisitions versus the low CO2 clean energy strategy?
spk18: Sure. So the way we think about the clean energy strategy and the way it's set up right now is the carbon capture project requires zero capital. So our partner is going to put up all the capital and then they're going to buy the CO2 from us and obviously we'll generate earnings from that. The green ammonia project will require capital, but I'd say relative to other capital projects or M&A activities, they would not be significant. From the organic side, we've talked about the de-bottlenecking on this call. I think it'll be interesting to see whether we get funds from the USDA for that project. As I mentioned, you know, it's approximately $400 million to do that project. And that's at a high level. We certainly haven't done, you know, a deep feasibility study or an engineering study. But, you know, the big difference between $300 million for us and $400 million for us. As far as M&A activity, you You know, in my experience, you could identify assets that you think would be good fit strategically, you know, for your company, but you never know when they become available. And so it's kind of hard to tell you, you know, from a capital standpoint how that fits in. I mean, if an acquisition came up that made sense for us, and we thought it was a good strategic fit and we could buy it at a price that was accretive for us, you know, that may trump something, you know, from an organic growth standpoint because those kind of projects, you know, we can put on the shelf and then, you know, relook at them a year or two down the road, whereas, you know, if something's for sale and you don't act on it, more than likely it doesn't come up for sale for some period of time or ever. I don't know if that gives you a flavor for that.
spk07: It does, and I guess I'm probably not going to comment directly on this, but there is an asset that is up for sale and just sort of want to maybe get an understanding of sort of pursuing the Dynanoa Bell plant in Wagamon versus some of these projects, just as you think about that.
spk18: Well, you're right. I'm not going to comment on a specific project. asset for sale or process. I would just say that between myself and our head of corporate development, our job is to go and look at assets strategically and see what's out there and if it would make sense for us. So if something's for sale, it's a good bet that we're taking a look at it.
spk07: Understood. And then just Final question for me is you talked about the ammonia expansion, $100 million maybe from the USDA and then the balance $300 million, possibly plus. How would you think about funding of that? I mean, you did raise additional debt last year in a top transaction. You're sitting on a fair amount of cash on the balance sheet today. Should we think about that cash as potentially funding that? Would you, you know, or is that something that you'd possibly fund down the road via the debt markets?
spk18: No, I think that all things being equal, you know, that the organic expansion, the de-bottlenecking that we want to do at Eldorado, we would use cash on our balance sheet. We would not raise any additional debt to do that.
spk06: Very good. Appreciate all the thoughts. Thank you.
spk05: Yeah. And our next question comes from the line of DeForest Hinman. Please proceed.
spk02: Hey, a couple questions. Can you talk about your expectation for cash taxes, either rate-wise or dollar-wise, in 2023? I still believe we have a pretty sizable amount of wells. I don't think that was discussed.
spk12: Good morning, DeForest. No, we have no material cash tax payments in 2023.
spk02: Okay, that's helpful. And then, you know, there's been a couple questions on the capital deployment, and maybe if you could just take a step back and just help people understand what's going on. You guys are kind of in a strange situation where you have a pretty sizable dollar balance of debt, but you at the same time have this pretty sizable cash balance simultaneously. You did a pretty sizable... share repurchase, authorization, seemingly pretty attractive pricing, but if you look at the context of going to the capital markets and raising $200 million of additional debt and really not using it for anything. You're kind of getting a negative arbitrage by putting that debt on the balance sheet. Can you just help us understand the context? Was there a deal that we thought was going to happen and then it didn't happen? If we're thinking about the cash balance going forward and the idea of debating share repurchases, organic investments, what's the appropriate level of dollar cash that should be on the balance sheet? So I'll pause there.
spk18: Sure. Good morning. So, yeah, we did raise $200 million in March of last year. I'll just say that we thought we had a use of proceeds for that $200 million, but It didn't materialize. As we sit here today, the negative spread on that as interest rates have moved up and we raised that additional debt at an opportune time is 3% or a little less than 3% given where we've invested it. So I think it was, you know, there was a a purpose to do it, but the fallback was we knew we had some internal projects, um, and we knew that interest rates were also going up at the time. I mean, I think the fed really indicated that. And if you look back now, um, I don't know how many times the feds raised rates, um, maybe five, six times. Um, so we would never be able to raise the debt at those levels today. Um, so I'm kinda, I'm kinda happy that we did it. Um, we, We're disciplined in how we thought about using it, but now we've got it available to us, and I think someone earlier asked a question about how we would fund an expansion or a de-bottlenecking, and that would be with cash on our balance sheet, which would include the $200 million that we raised. So, you know, I think, you know, we've got the capital now and the wherewithal to really fund a number of different projects You know, to me, that's kind of exciting. From a capital allocation standpoint and thinking about cash on the balance sheet versus, you know, debt versus stock buybacks, I mean, first off, I think when we think about, you know, we refer to our smaller projects, and Cheryl talks about margin enhancement projects. All of those projects that we've elected to move forward on all have minimum IRR, and many of them are higher than that. So there is a hurdle rate to investing in those projects. You know, I think we bought back about 13 million shares of stock. So we actually reduced our float by our outstanding shares by, you know, about 15%. So I think that was attractive for us last year. As we move forward, I think we just have to balance, you know, where do we think we're going to generate the highest ultimate shareholder return, whether it's investing in our internal projects, buying back stock, or ultimately reducing some debt. So I don't think it's anything different than most other companies go through, where they're really thinking about what's the best use of that cash and is going to give the best long-term returns to our shareholders.
spk02: Okay, that's helpful. And then just when we're thinking about the submission for the grant proposal, is there any sort of color inside of that document that says, you know, if we're going to get X amount of grant, you know, look at our balance sheet, you know, we already self-funded this other portion of it. you know, our project is better than someone else that, you know, maybe has, like, I'll use the word hypothetical. They have hypothetical funding from a third party. I mean, is that part of the submission? Does that mean, you know, for the next, you know, six months we have to have a certain amount of cash on the balance sheet?
spk18: So that's a great point, and, yes, it was actually a point that we stressed in our application that, unlike a lot of other projects that might seek funding in addition to the USDA grant, we've got the cash in our balance sheet. So if a project's $400 million and we need to invest $300 million of our own dollars, it's sitting there waiting to happen. So I think that is a differentiator. We believe it is. So I would hope that that really comes into play. So not only can we move faster because we're de-bottlenecking an existing facility rather than building brownfield or greenfield, but we don't have to worry about raising capital. It's sitting there ready to invest. So how long does it have to sit there? I would imagine that, you know, if we hear a positive feedback from the USDA that ultimately, you know, if we're lucky enough that they're going to grant us $100 million once the grant happens, I'm not sure that we have to keep cash on our balance sheet. I think cash is fungible. We're also generating a fair amount of free cash, so I don't really see that as an issue. I didn't address one question that you had asked earlier, and that was about minimum cash balance on our balance sheet. I think internally we've determined that ultimately we'd like to keep $100 million of cash on our balance sheet. I think it's prudent to do that, given price volatility, not only of... are selling prices, but also the price of natural gas. And so that could have an impact on margins.
spk02: Okay. Thank you so much for answering the questions.
spk05: Sure. Thank you. We have reached the end of the question and answer session. I'd like to turn the call back to Mark Berman for closing remarks.
spk18: I want to thank everyone for joining the conference call and for your interest in LSB Industries. Hopefully you see that we've accomplished a lot so far. We've got high expectations of what we're going to accomplish in 2023, and we've got a lot of opportunity for beyond 2023. Hope to see you all at our Investor Day. Thanks so much.
spk05: This concludes today's conference.
spk04: You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation, and have a great day. Hello. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. music music you
spk05: Greetings and welcome to the LSB Industries Fourth Quarter 2022 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A question and answer session will follow the formal presentation. If anyone should require operator assistance during the conference, please press star zero on your telephone keypad. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to your host, Fred Bonacore, Vice President of Investor Relations. Good morning, everyone.
spk17: Joining me today are Mark Behrman, our Chief Executive Officer, and Cheryl McGuire, our Chief Financial Officer. Please note that today's call will include forward-looking statements, and because the statements are based on the company's current intent, expectations, and projections, they are not guarantees of future performance, and a variety of factors could cause the actual results to differ materially. As this call will include references to non-GAAP results, Please see the press release in the investor section of our website, lsbindustries.com, for further information regarding forward-looking statements and reconciliations of non-GAAP results to GAAP results. At this time, I'd like to go ahead and turn the call over to Mark.
spk18: Thank you, Fred. We're happy to have the opportunity to speak with you today about our 2022 full year and fourth quarter results and our outlook for the first quarter and full year of 2023. 2022 was a pivotal year in our company's history. We delivered record financial results with year-over-year increases in sales and adjusted EBITDA of 62% and 117% respectively. We generated strong cash flow, a significant portion of which we returned to our shareholders through share of purchases, while at the same time substantially improving our balance sheet. Our strong performance reflects the favorable trends in selling prices across all of our products coupled with our ability to operate our facilities reliably and sell all of our production at attractive margins, thanks to our strategic commercial efforts. Additionally, we completed major turnarounds at two of our facilities to further improve their safety and reliability. In a major step towards becoming a leader in the emerging clean energy industry, we signed agreements to begin development of low-carbon and no-carbon ammonia projects at two of our facilities. I'd like to thank all of our employees for making this another excellent quarter and for their commitment to developing a culture of excellence at LSB Industries. Our team put in a great deal of hard work and dedication in the years leading up to 2022, which put us in a position to have a successful year. While strong financial results are very important, our primary focus is safety. One of our core values is to protect what matters, where we strive consistently to protect the health and well-being of our employees, contractors, communities in which we operate, and the environment. We've set very high safety standards, policies, and procedures aimed at achieving our goal zero, that zero recordable incidents and injuries. While we have made progress towards this goal in recent years, we still have much work to do to get where we want to be. We expect that investments we've made in our facilities in 2022 and we will make in 2023 will help us make meaningful strides with respect to operating safely in the coming quarters and years. Looking at the 2022 fourth quarter, as summarized on page three of our presentation, we generated strong year-over-year growth aided by a continued favorable pricing environment and solid execution. Notably, we delivered these results despite having had prior turnaround during the early part of the quarter and the impact of freezing weather on our Cherokee and El Dorado facilities in the final week of December. On page four of our presentation, we provide an overview of our end markets. Corn prices remain above multi-year averages, driven by a variety of global factors, including drought conditions in the U.S. and parts of South America, and continued strong global demand. Domestic and worldwide stock-to-use ratios for corn remain at multi-year lows, leading us to believe that it will take two to three years of good corn growing seasons to bring the stock-to-use ratios back in line with historical averages. We expect corn prices will stay near current high levels through 2023, and that farm profitability will remain attractive, pointing to an increase in planted acres this spring versus last year. The USDA estimates that an approximately 89 million acres of corn were planted in 2022, and that approximately 92 to 93 million acres will be planted this year. This supports the view that nitrogen fertilizers will be in strong demand once the planting season gets underway in the coming weeks. It is also expected that there will be an increase in wheat acres planted in 2023, further increasing demand for nitrogen fertilizers. With respect to our industrial products, on the whole, demand remains stable. Domestic end-use markets continue to be stronger than those in Europe and Asia, which is supportive for our business. While inflation and other economic pressures are impacting some parts of the chemical manufacturing industry, mining activity remains strong, and we see that continuing throughout this year. Additionally, recent announcements from automotive manufacturers and suppliers indicate that some degree of improvement in auto production could unfold during 2023, further supporting demand for the nitric acid that we produce. While pricing for nitrogen products has come down in recent months, largely due to a decline in European natural gas prices, demand trends continue to be solid across our business and pricing remains above historical averages. With no turnaround scheduled at our facilities this year, we are well positioned for a strong year-over-year increase in production and sales volume. As such, we expect another year of robust profitability and cash flow. Now I'll turn over the call to Cheryl, who will discuss our Q4 results and outlook. Cheryl?
spk12: Thanks, Mark, and good morning. Our fourth quarter adjusted EBITDA of 105 million is a record performance for us in a fourth quarter. Additionally, we generated adjusted EPS of 90 cents in the quarter. Turning to page five, you'll see a summary of our key balance sheet and cash flow metrics. Our continued profitability enabled us to maintain a strong liquidity position. At the end of 2022, we had approximately 458 million of total liquidity including approximately 394 million in cash and short-term investments. This is after we repurchased approximately 13.2 million shares of our stock at an average price of approximately $13 per share, exhausting the 175 million share repurchase program that we began in May of 2022. Out of the 13.2 million shares, We bought back 9 million shares from our largest stockholder, who completed secondary offerings of a portion of their position in our stock in August and November of 2022. Through these transactions, we were able to reduce our shares outstanding by approximately 15%, while at the same time increasing the trading liquidity of our stock. During 2022, we generated cash flow from operations of $346 million and had capital expenditures of $46 million, translating into $300 million of free cash flow. For the year, we returned approximately 60% of our free cash flow to investors through our share repurchase program. Additionally, we ended the year with a net debt to trailing 12-month EBITDA leverage ratio of less than one time, well below our target leverage ratio in a mid-cycle or normalized pricing environment of below 2.5 times. Page 6 bridges our fourth quarter adjusted EBITDA of $105 million to adjusted EBITDA for the fourth quarter 2021 of $90 million. The positive selling price impact is shown net of increased variable costs versus the fourth quarter of 2021. Sales volumes were lower in the fourth quarter as a result of planned turnaround activity at our prior facility, which concluded in mid-October, and the loss of approximately one week of production in the fourth quarter at our Cherokee and El Dorado facilities due to the impact of freezing cold weather in late December. Page 7 illustrates the strong bottom line improvement we've delivered over the past several years. This is the result of favorable pricing trends, operational improvements, new customer contracts, and investments we've made to optimize our product distribution and mix. While we anticipate 2023 EBITDA will be lower than 2022 as a result of nitrogen pricing moderating off of peak levels, we still expect to generate substantial profit and cash flow, further positioning us to implement our growth strategy, which Mark will discuss later in the call. Looking at the first quarter, the NOLA UAN benchmark pricing is currently at approximately $265 a ton. Additionally, the Tampa ammonia benchmark price settled at $790 per metric ton in February versus $1,135 per metric ton last February. The year-over-year change largely reflects lower natural gas prices in Europe, which have come down from very high levels in 2022, and industrial demand softening in Europe and Asia. With that said, U.S. natural gas prices have also declined and currently stand at a fraction of the cost in Europe, keeping intact the competitive advantage that U.S. nitrogen producers enjoy. Relative to our natural gas feedstock cost, while U.S. gas costs have since moderated, we do have approximately 75% of our first quarter gas needs locked in at approximately $6.30 per MMBTU for Q1. With respect to sales volumes, as previously announced, our Cherokee facility resumed production with a phased restart on January 14, 2023. Despite lower production at that site in January and the delayed movement of fertilizer resulting in volumes moving to the second quarter, we expect overall higher sales volumes of ammonia and UAN as compared to the first quarter of 2022, assuming reasonable weather conditions. Additionally, nitric acid and AN volumes are expected to be in line with the healthy first quarter of 2022. So given our view on sales volumes and pricing, locked in natural gas costs and the approximately $10 million impact from the Cherokee freeze event that impacted production through mid-January, we would expect the first quarter adjusted EBITDA to be in the range of $55 million to $65 million. Please keep in mind our expected EBITDA range for the quarter is based on our current view of pricing. Looking forward to the balance of the year, we provide considerations for our full year 2023 on slides eight and nine. On slide 8, you can see our expected ammonia production and sales volumes for the full year of 2023. As a result of expected improvement in operating rates due in part to our turnarounds at El Dorado and prior in 2022 and the absence of any turnarounds in 2023, we expect meaningful year-over-year improvement in ammonia production as well as all of our downstream products. We expect to invest approximately 60 to 80 million of CapEx in our facilities during 2023. This includes approximately 50 to 60 million of investments related to plant reliability and safety with the balance earmarked for margin enhancement projects aimed at improving the efficiency of our operations, expanding our commercial footprint, and investing in storage and loading capabilities at our facilities. Slide nine covers a range of variable and fixed plant expenses, as well as SG&A for 2023. Our expectations for fixed costs reflect investments we've made in key talent to support our growth, as well as inflation and wages and other costs. Note that we expect our effective tax rate for the year to be approximately 25%. However, we do not expect to be a material cash taxpayer in 2023 as we continue to utilize our NOLs. And now I'll turn it back over to Mark.
spk18: Thank you, Cheryl. As Cheryl indicated, natural gas prices have come down significantly in recent months, which has led to lower, albeit still historically strong, selling prices for our products. Page 10 illustrates how the spread between U.S. and European natural gas prices widened over the course of 2021 and continued to be volatile throughout 2022. The spike in European natural gas costs during the third quarter of 2022 resulted in many European nitrogen facilities being taken offline. Much of this production has come back online as prices for European natural gas trended lower due to warmer than average winter temperatures and lower industrial demand. Still, natural gas prices in Europe remain well above 10-year averages and are currently fluctuating between $15 and $20, an MMBTU equivalent. which is a multiple of what we're paying for in the U.S. The current gas price level in Europe translates into an ammonia production cost on average of approximately $600 per ton, and European ammonia production costs will likely continue to be significantly above domestic costs, continuing to provide a substantial advantage to U.S. nitrogen producers. For the year, we expect a continued favorable nitrogen pricing environment relative to the past decade. We also have several company-specific initiatives that are very much in our control, representing the opportunity to enhance our efficiency, increase our production capacity, and enter the emerging clean energy market. We expect these opportunities will allow us to increase our profitability, ultimately resulting in increased value for our shareholders. The actions we've taken with our balance sheet over the past 18 months coupled with a strong cash flow generated over the course of 2022 and expected to continue this year, will provide us with a liquidity position that enables us to pursue multiple growth initiatives. On page 11, we show a summary of our key growth initiatives. As I mentioned earlier, employee safety is our primary focus every single day, followed by being good stewards of the environment and the reliability of our facilities. We continue to make improvements on all these fronts and have significant opportunities for further progress. The work completed at our Eldorado and prior sites during 2022 will advance our safety, environmental, and reliability initiatives. Additionally, we believe that over the next two years, the capital investments we are making, combined with the manufacturing initiatives we are pursuing, should increase the operating rates at our facilities, translating into a meaningful incremental contribution to our profitability. On top of that, we believe we can increase the production capacity of our plants through various debottlenecking initiatives. We are currently evaluating multiple potential projects that could significantly increase our production and sales volumes and our profitability. The increase in nitrogen production capacity would also assist with the USDA's stated goal of increasing domestic fertilizer production to ensure that farmers have security of fertilizer supply and can meet their increasing demands. In that regard, At the end of December, we submitted our application for a federal grant under the USDA's $500 million fertilizer production expansion program. The maximum award under this program is $100 million. We believe we are a highly qualified applicant given our opportunity to increase our production capacity of our existing manufacturing assets in a more timely manner than any new build production facility. With respect to our clean energy initiatives, We continue to advance our blue and green ammonia strategy. The two broad projects we currently have underway represent compelling opportunities for us to emerge as a leader in decarbonizing in our industry. Not only do our blue and green ammonia projects have the potential to result in a substantial reduction to our carbon footprint, but additionally we believe the economics of both could be very attractive. Page 12 provides an overview and an update on our blue and green ammonia projects. With respect to our blue ammonia project in El Dorado, as we discussed in our third quarter call, the increase of the 45Q credit to $85 per ton of CO2 captured and sequestered has made the economics of this project very attractive. A critical step on our path towards commencing CCS and blue ammonia production is obtaining a permit to operate a Class VI injection well. I'm happy to say that earlier this week we achieved a milestone on this project as the application for the approval of a Class VI injection well was filed with the EPA. We have been told that the EPA review process could take between 18 and 24 months. Based on that timing, we continue to expect to begin capturing and sequestering CO2 at our El Dorado site in 2025. Our analysis indicates that once in operation, this project should reduce our company's Scope 1 carbon emissions by approximately 25%. Regarding our green ammonia project, we continue to expect that this project will qualify for the full $3 per kilogram of CO2 federal incentives for hydrogen production rolled out as part of the Inflation Reduction Act and enable us to produce approximately 30,000 tons of zero carbon ammonia to sell to our customers. We have completed extensive work on our feasibility study of this project and expect to announce our plans for it by the end of the second quarter. To the extent we proceed as anticipated, we expect to begin producing some green ammonia in late 2024, early 2025. To sum up 2022, it was a year of significant highlights for LSB Industries. We capitalized on the favorable market environment to materially strengthen our balance sheet while at the same time investing in our facilities to enhance our manufacturing capabilities. We entered 2023 with the expectation of a significant year-over-year increase in production volume given the absence of any turnarounds this year coupled with the opportunities we have to generate further volume improvements through the enhancements of our existing manufacturing footprint. At the same time, we will continue to position LSB Industries to be a leader in low-carbon, no-carbon ammonia production. We expect these initiatives to collectively lead to increased profitability and greater value for our shareholders in the years to come, and I look forward to discussing our progress with you as we reach critical milestones in the development of our projects. Before I hand the call back over to the operator for the Q&A session, I'd like to mention that we will be hosting an Investor Day in New York on March 14th, and we look forward to seeing many of you there. That concludes our prepared remarks, and we will now be happy to take any questions. Thanks.
spk05: Ladies and gentlemen, if you would like to ask a question, please press star 1 on your telephone keypad, and a confirmation tone will indicate your line is in the question queue. You may press star two if you would like to remove your question from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star keys. One moment, please, while we poll for questions. Our first question comes from the line of Adam Sandelson with Goldman Sachs. Please proceed. Thank you. Good morning, everyone.
spk03: Morning, Adam.
spk13: Morning.
spk03: Morning. So I guess the first question, relates to the kind of current nitrogen market and I'd love to get your perspective on distributor kind of buying and inventory since the spring application kind of pretty rapidly approaches. It would seem like the channel in North America has been pretty reticent to commit to significant tonnage, so help me frame how your order book is shaping up going into spring and kind of where you might see pockets of of demand that would not be difficult for a current kind of supply to meet.
spk18: Yeah, so you're right. It's been an interesting, you know, first few months of this year as pricing of natural gas in Europe is coming down. Therefore, cost of production in Europe is coming down, and that's obviously put pressure on prices. And so when that happens and you see prices falling, buyers generally tend to take a step back, thinking that prices continually will go lower. So I think it's been a bit of a standoff between producers wanting to sell the product at an opportune time, setting up for spring, and then retailers and distributors sort of sitting back, and ultimately the farmers sitting back as well. As we head into spring, though, I think the weather's really, at least at this point, been very helpful. We've had some really good weather patterns. We've had some rain, which has also helped. And I think we're just starting to see the beginning of buying for this spring. And I would expect that over the next two to three weeks, we'll really start to see this kick off as we head into the planting season.
spk03: Is there any differentiation there on ammonia versus UAN? I think it's been interesting how on an N-basis, certainly urea is actually cheaper than ammonia in some parts of the corn belt on an N-basis. Do you see any product switching resulting from that?
spk18: Well, we've seen some products switching to urea, given that urea has been so cheap relative to other products. I think, you know, India announced a tender yesterday, so I think that should give some support to urea prices. You know, I think there'll be more demand in general, and as we start to see prices increase in urea, I think we'll see support for other pricing of other fertilizer products. So I think... Again, I think we've been in kind of a funny period where there's not much liquidity in the market. And as we start to see the liquidity and we start to see a lot of buying in the marketplace, I think that will support higher prices. And you'll see urea prices, I believe, move up faster than both UAN and ammonia.
spk03: Okay. And if I could squeeze in one more, Mark. You talked in the prepared remarks about an 18- to 24-month timeline for the CCS Classics Well Permit at El Dorado. My understanding is there's only one company that ever got the Classics Well Permit approved. There's a whole slew of them pending. So can you just help us kind of think about kind of the confidence level that you're getting on the timing of that approval process from EPA?
spk18: Yeah, so you're right. To date, there is only one Class 6 permit that has been approved. It was, you know, numbers of years ago. It was back in 2014, and it's an ADM site. So there are, we're in Region 6, which is the EPA office out of Dallas. So that includes Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas. So there are a number of, permit applications that have been filed. We have been told, and we took our time really developing the application, and our partner, Lapis Energy, did a lot of work on the geology. And we did a good job, I think, interacting with the EPA and really talking to them about what they really want to see. So I think we feel really good about the application that we submitted, and we've been told that it is the most comprehensive application to date. And whether that's true or not, I don't know, but at least that's what we've been told. I think, you know, there is, I believe there's going to be a lot of pressure from Washington on the EPA to start moving through some of these applications and getting some approvals through because it's a little bit, you know, it's kind of, it's kind of, odd to me that Washington has really incentivized folks to invest in carbon capture through the changes that they made in the IRA, yet they really haven't increased any budgetary allocations to the EPA to add more staff. So I think that's part of the problem, and I think the EPA is going to start to get a little pressure from Washington because without getting through these permit approvals, they're not going to see the results that they want from the incentives that they've put into the IRA. So I do think, you know, the 18 to 24 months is more an estimate by the EPA. So, you know, could it go faster than that? It's possible, but I think we're kind of planning really in that 18 to 24-month time frame.
spk03: Okay.
spk05: That's all we have for now. Thank you. Thanks, Adam. Our next question comes from the line of Josh Spector with UBS. Please proceed.
spk15: Yeah, thanks for taking my question. Actually, just a follow-up on the blue ammonia and the timeline there. So, I mean, you're reiterating your plan to start that up in 2025 if the permit takes two years. Should we think about LAPIS had built most of the infrastructure and sequestration equipment basically in parallel to that, so that's a relatively quick turn-on, or if it's two years, does that push out your timeline until you start to see some of the benefits of that?
spk18: It's a good question. I'm not going to say that they're going to build a facility and sit there and wait and hope that we get the permit approved, but there are, you know, engineering design is occurring as we speak, so there's investment in capital for that. long lead time items that are necessary. I would suspect that those will go on order. And so by the time the permit comes, I think we've shortened the period of, you know, waiting until we get the permit and then hitting the button to start the process. So I think some things are done in parallel, but I don't believe that they're going to build a facility and just sit there and wait, nor would I actually.
spk15: Okay, thanks. And just on your industrial demand, I mean, it's interesting that you're talking about it as more stable. I mean, even in North America, a lot of the chemical derivatives are seeing pretty significant capacity reductions. So I'm just curious how you could reconcile your demand for nitric and some of the other derivatives being stable versus industry utilizations declining. Are you placing those tons elsewhere, or is there something else going on that we're missing?
spk18: No, I mean, I think one of the key aspects of our commercial organization is really optimizing where our products go. So while we're seeing, we could see some slowdown in demand in nitric, we certainly have the ability to some degree to ramp up AN production and sell products both as industrial and even high density, which is fertilizer, should we start to see some softening in our nitric market. But To date, we haven't seen that.
spk04: Okay, thank you.
spk05: Our next question comes from the line of Andrew Wong with RBC Capital Markets. Please proceed.
spk03: Hey, good morning. Thanks for taking the questions. Just regarding the application to the USDA for some funding on capacity expansions, Can you just talk maybe a little bit more about what the USDA is looking for and what kind of criteria they're looking for? I know there's different limits on size and things like that. And then just the timing on the decision.
spk18: Well, I'll work backwards. Your guess is as good as mine on the timing. I don't think they've ever announced what timing would be. I would tell you that there were two submission periods The first one was, you know, the latter part of November, and after about two months, they chose a number of projects that qualified for funding, and then they opened up a comment period. The second window, which is what, you know, when we applied, was the end of December. So I would hope that, you know, it's the same two, two and a half months, and by the end of this month or middle of March, we're hearing back from the USDA positively that our project is approved and we can go to the next steps. As far as what they were looking for, I think the basic focus of the USDA was to increase domestic fertilizer production and to diversify it away from the top four producers in the U.S. So we're small enough that we're not a top four. We're a number six producer in the U.S. So we qualify there. Our project is that we submitted is really to expand our ammonia production at El Dorado, our nitric acid production at El Dorado, and then to build a urea plant and UAN facility. So ultimately that would increase our UAN production by about 600,000 tons a year. So that would be an upgraded product for us. As we sit back, that is one path. that I think the team has come together and focused on. We've got a couple of other alternatives down at that site that we're evaluating as well, and so it'll be interesting to see if the USDA comes back and approves that project, and then we can have a conversation with them about that project and maybe some modifications to that project should we decide to do that.
spk14: Okay, and how does the funding...
spk03: work relative to a potential cost to LSB? Like, is it a percentage? Is it just something you negotiate with the USDA?
spk18: Well, their guideline says that they'll fund up to 25 percent of the total cost of the project with a maximum of $100 million per project. Our project is a bit north of $400 million, so that would be $100 million max funding from the USDA. So I don't know that there's a negotiation on the percentage because I think it's been stated up to. So that's what we're seeking.
spk03: Okay, perfect, thanks. And then just maybe a question on just the market in general. Looking at ammonium nitrate prices in the markets, it looks like they're holding up better than the other products, UEN, urea, ammonia even. Is that consistent with what you're seeing? And I'm talking the ag markets. And why might that be the case?
spk18: Yeah, we are. So it is a premium on a nitrogen equivalent basis to some of the other products. It is a specialty product here in the United States. It's always been a premium product. And so we're happy with where the pricing is today relative to other fertilizer products.
spk04: Okay, thanks.
spk01: Yep.
spk05: Our next question comes from the line of Vincent Anderson with Stiefel. Please proceed.
spk08: Yeah, thanks and good morning. I was hoping to kind of revisit that nitrate question one more time, if you could provide maybe a bit more detail on your flexibility there, because I know you've tried to de-emphasize your mining exposure. but the H-DAN product is pretty good from a margin perspective, if I recall. So could you just kind of quantify what you think is a realistic amount of nitric that could be redirected into those markets if you really had to to keep operating rates up?
spk18: Well, I mean, you know, so we've got the ability to produce – you know, about 150,000 to 160,000 tons a year of low-density ammonium nitrate. And we've got the ability to produce about 300,000 or 310,000 tons of high-density ammonium nitrate on an annual basis. And then, of course, and that's talking about our prilling or pelletized operations. I mean, before that, you've got ammonium nitrate solution, and we do sell some solution into the mining market as well. So, you know, I think we've got some flexibility should we see nitric demand drop off to upgrade that to ammonium nitrate, either in solution or prilled form. So we're not at those maximums. I mean, from a low density perspective, as I mentioned in my prepared comments, We are seeing really nice demand, so we are sold out there. We have some flexibility in our high density. And what we're also seeing, which is kind of interesting, is that mining clients are also gravitating to buying some high density as well and using that given the tightness in the low density market.
spk08: Okay, that's interesting and helpful. Thank you. And then I guess just kind of going into this year, if you don't mind maybe discussing any high-level changes to your commercial strategy for UAN, given this will be your first time in a while with a CVR partnership, and maybe more importantly, without CVR's logistics assets.
spk18: Yeah, so our chief commercial officer has done a really good job in recruiting quality folks to lead our UAN effort. So we're excited. about selling our product directly. I think most companies would rather sell their product directly than use a distributor to distribute their products. So we're actually developing a lot more relationships than we've had in the past. We're going farther than we have in the past. We're finding niches that, you know, maybe we hadn't sold into in the past. And so we think net-net that... you know, the advantage that we're going to get by selling the product ourselves should result in a higher net back. Now, whether that materializes or not, we'll have to play it out and see at the end of the year if, you know, in some type of analysis, if we could kind of figure that out. But I think, you know, you mentioned CVR's logistics assets. You know, we've got our own logistics assets that we use in all other parts of our business. So we did have to to build a little bit and increase our rail car fleet to handle the additional UAN sales. But I think other than that, you know, we're really happy with the effort so far.
spk08: All right. Excellent. Well, good luck on the rest of the year. I'll pass it along.
spk01: Thank you.
spk05: Our next question comes from the line of Charles Nievert with Piper Samer. Please proceed.
spk16: Yeah, I may have missed some of this. Have you guys, other than first quarter where you gave us what your gas price looks like, have you guys done any hedging beyond into 2Q through the end of the year? What price is that, or are we basically going to be spot market buyers going forward for the remainder of the year other than 1Q? And then as a follow-up, what is left in the share repurchase program that's currently outstanding, and I guess the intention given the way things are earning is that would probably get re-up, but where do we stand on both of those on that situation?
spk12: Good morning, Charlie. So we're about 25% locked in for gas for the second quarter, you know, around 550, and then 10% for the balance of the year for 2023 in that same kind of 550 to $6 range. Generally, we'll lock more gas in the winter months because that's when you have the highest risk of price volatility. So I think going forward over the next, call it six months, you'll just see us lock first of month gas just to take out any volatility over the month. So that's generally our strategy from a gas purchases perspective. And with respect to the share buyback, we fully exhausted that $175 million, and so that's kind of where we stand today.
spk18: Yeah, I would say that given the cash flow generation that we're anticipating for this year, you could see us implement another share buyback program, and that's in discussions now. Okay.
spk16: Thanks. Everything else has been answered for me. Thank you. Thanks, Charles.
spk05: Our next question comes from the line of Rob McGuire with Granite Research. Please proceed.
spk10: Good morning.
spk05: Hey, Rob.
spk12: Hey, Rob.
spk10: Would you discuss the drought that's been occurring in the U.S. the last couple of years and your expectation for an impact this year?
spk18: Well, you know, there's been extreme droughts, you know, I'd say in the plains in the United States, and that's pretty documented. Argentina's suffered from really bad drought conditions as well. So, you know, I think both of those persist, and I think, you know, we're seeing in Argentina crops really suffering from those drought conditions. Conversely, Brazil's had some really good crop conditions, and should reach or is expected to reach record production, both in corn and soybean. You know, I think it could have an impact in more of an indirect way. So drought conditions have also resulted in increased hay usage for cattle during non-winter months, and that's especially problematic. in the northern and southern plans. So with U.S. cattle prices expected to continue kind of an upward trend, we should see an increase in the production of cattle and ultimately hay as inventories are historically low today. So that points towards an upwards of probably 10% increase in hay acres planted and the potential of probably another half a million tons of nitrogen demand from last year. So I think I don't know that it's going to have a severe effect in acres planted for corn or soybeans. I suppose if we don't get any precipitation throughout the drought areas, that it could have an impact. But we have seen some rain over the last two weeks to a month. Not enough. But I do think it could have a positive impact on nitrogen demand based on demand for hay.
spk10: I appreciate that. And you mentioned the repurchase program may get renewed here, but is it more attractive to reduce your debt or repurchase stock today?
spk18: Oh, that's a great question. It's something that I think we sit around the table and talk about. Ultimately, Um, you know, we'd like to reduce debt, um, some, and, um, you know, bonds are callable in 2024. So next year. Um, so it's September of next year. So, you know, I think either we build a cash balance, uh, to then call some of the bonds at the call price, um, or, um, we repurchase additional shares of stock. or some combination of both. So I think those are the discussions that we're having.
spk09: That's it for me. Thank you for answering my questions.
spk04: Sure. Thanks, Rob.
spk05: Our next question comes from a line of Brian DiRubio with Baird. Please proceed.
spk07: Good morning. Just as I look at your key growth initiatives, can you give me a sense of your priority on organic versus organic? creative acquisitions versus the low CO2 clean energy strategy?
spk18: Sure. So the way we think about the clean energy strategy and the way it's set up right now is the carbon capture project requires zero capital. So our partner is going to put up all the capital and then they're going to buy the CO2 from us and obviously will generate earnings from that. The green ammonia project will require capital, but I'd say relative to other capital projects or M&A activities, they would not be significant. From the organic side, we've talked about the de-bottlenecking on this call. I think it'll be interesting to see whether we get funds from the USDA for that project. As I mentioned, you know, it's approximately $400 million to do that project, and that's at a high level. We certainly haven't done, you know, a deep feasibility study or an engineering study. But, you know, the big difference between $300 million for us and $400 million for us. As far as M&A activity, You know, in my experience, you could identify assets that you think would be good fit strategically, you know, for your company, but you never know when they become available. And so it's kind of hard to tell you, you know, from a capital standpoint how that fits in. I mean, if an acquisition came up that made sense for us, and we thought it was a good strategic fit and we could buy it at a price that was accretive for us, you know, that may trump something, you know, from an organic growth standpoint because those kind of projects, you know, we can put on the shelf and then, you know, relook at them a year or two down the road, whereas, you know, if something's for sale and you don't act on it, more than likely it doesn't come up for sale for some period of time or ever. I don't know if that gives you a flavor for that.
spk07: It does, and I guess I'm probably not going to comment directly on this, but there is an asset that is up for sale and just sort of want to maybe get an understanding of, you know, sort of pursuing, you know, the Dynamo Bell plant in Wagamon versus some of these projects as, you know, just as you think about that.
spk18: Well, you're right. I'm not going to comment on a specific project. asset for sale or a process. I would just say that between myself and our head of corporate development, our job is to go and look at assets strategically and see what's out there and if it would make sense for us. So if something's for sale, it's a good bet that we're taking a look at it.
spk07: Understood. And then just Final question for me is you talked about the money expansion, $100 million maybe from the USDA and then the balance $300 million, possibly plus. How would you think about funding of that? I mean, you did raise additional debt last year in a top transaction. You're sitting on a fair amount of cash on the balance sheet today. Should we think about that cash as potentially funding that? Would you, you know, or is that something that you'd possibly fund down the road via the debt markets?
spk18: No, I think that all things being equal, you know, that the organic expansion, the de-bottlenecking that we want to do at Eldorado, we would use cash on our balance sheet. We would not raise any additional debt to do that.
spk06: Very good. Appreciate all the thoughts. Thank you.
spk05: Yeah. And our next question comes from the line of DeForest Hinman. Please proceed.
spk02: Hey, a couple questions. Can you talk about your expectation for cash taxes, either rate-wise or dollar-wise, in 2023? I still believe we have a pretty sizable amount of wells. I don't think that was discussed.
spk12: Good morning, DeForest. No, we have no material cash tax payments in 2023.
spk02: Okay, that's helpful. And then, you know, there's been a couple questions on the capital deployment, and maybe if you could just take a step back and just help people understand what's going on. You guys are kind of in a strange situation where you have a pretty sizable dollar balance of debt, but you at the same time have this pretty sizable cash balance simultaneously. You did a pretty sizable... share repurchase, authorization, seemingly pretty attractive pricing, but if you look at the context of going to the capital markets and raising $200 million of additional debt and really not using it for anything you kind of getting a negative arbitrage by you know putting that debt on the balance sheet so can you just help us understand you know the context was there a deal that we thought was going to happen and then it didn't happen and if we're thinking about the the cash balance going forward and the idea of debating share repurchases, organic investments, what's the appropriate level of dollar cash that should be on the balance sheet? So I'll pause there.
spk18: Sure. Good morning. So, yeah, we did raise $200 million in March of last year. I'll just say that we thought we had a use of proceeds for that $200 million, but It didn't materialize. As we sit here today, the negative spread on that as interest rates have moved up and we raised that additional debt at an opportune time is 3% or a little less than 3% given where we've invested it. So I think it was, you know, there was a a purpose to do it, but the fallback was we knew we had some internal projects, and we knew that interest rates were also going up at the time. I mean, I think the Fed really indicated that, and if you look back now, I don't know how many times the Fed's raised rates, maybe five, six times. So we would never be able to raise the debt at those levels today. So I'm kind of happy that we did it. We're disciplined in how we thought about using it. But now we've got it available to us. And I think someone earlier asked a question about how we would fund an expansion or de-bottlenecking. And that would be with cash on our balance sheet, which would include the $200 million that we raised. So, you know, I think, you know, we've got the capital now and the wherewithal to really fund a number of different projects. You know, to me, that's kind of exciting. From a capital allocation standpoint and thinking about cash on the balance sheet versus, you know, debt versus stock buybacks, I mean, first off, I think when we think about, you know, we refer to our smaller projects, and Cheryl talks about margin enhancement projects. All of those projects that we've elected to move forward on all have minimum IRR, and many of them are higher than that. So there is a hurdle rate to investing in those projects. You know, I think we bought back about 13 million shares of stock. So we actually reduced our float by our outstanding shares by, you know, about 15%. So I think that was attractive for us last year. As we move forward, I think we just have to balance, you know, where do we think we're going to generate the highest ultimate shareholder return, whether it's investing in our internal projects, buying back stock, or ultimately reducing some debt. So I don't think it's anything different than most other companies go through, where they're really thinking about what's the best use of that cash and is going to give the best long-term returns to our shareholders.
spk02: Okay, that's helpful. And then just when we're thinking about the submission for the grant proposal, is there any sort of color inside of that document that says, you know, if we're going to get X amount of grant, you know, look at our balance sheet, you know, we already self-funded this other portion of it. you know, our project is better than someone else that, you know, maybe has like, I'll use the word hypothetical. They have hypothetical funding from a third party. I mean, is that part of the submission? Does that mean, you know, for the next, you know, six months, we have to have a certain amount of cash on the balance sheet?
spk18: So that's a great point. And yes, it was actually a point that we stressed in our application that, unlike a lot of other projects that might seek funding in addition to the USDA grant, we've got the cash in our balance sheet. So if a project's $400 million and we need to invest $300 million of our own dollars, it's sitting there waiting to happen. So I think that is a differentiator. We believe it is. So I would hope that that really comes into play. So not only can we move faster because we're de-bottlenecking an existing facility rather than building brownfield or greenfield, but we don't have to worry about raising capital. It's sitting there ready to invest. So how long does it have to sit there? I would imagine that, you know, if we hear a positive feedback from the USDA that ultimately, you know, if we're lucky enough that they're going to grant us $100 million once the grant happens, I'm not sure that we have to keep cash on our balance sheet. I think cash is fungible. We're also generating a fair amount of free cash, so I don't really see that as an issue. I didn't address one question that you had asked earlier, and that was about minimum cash balance on our balance sheet. I think internally we've determined that ultimately we'd like to keep $100 million of cash on our balance sheet. I think it's prudent to do that, given price volatility, none of which are selling prices, but also the price of natural gas. And so that could have an impact on margins.
spk02: Okay. Thank you so much for answering the questions.
spk04: Sure.
spk05: Thank you. We have reached the end of the question and answer session. I'd like to turn the call back to Mark Berman for closing remarks.
spk18: I want to thank everyone for joining the conference call and for your interest in LSB Industries. Hopefully you see that we've accomplished a lot so far. We've got high expectations of what we're going to accomplish in 2023, and we've got a lot of opportunity for beyond 2023. Hope to see you all at our Investor Day. Thanks so much.
spk05: This concludes today's conference. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation, and have a great day.
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