CVR Partners

Greetings and welcome to the CCR Partners LP First Quarter 2023 Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A brief 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. It is now my pleasure to introduce your host, Richard Roberts, Vice President of FP&A and Investor Relations. Thank you, Richard. You may begin.

Thank you, Paul. Good morning, everyone. We appreciate your participation in today's call. With me today are Mark Pytosh, our Chief Executive Officer, Dane Newman, our Chief Financial Officer, and other members of management. Prior to discussing our 2023 first quarter results, let me remind you that this conference call may contain forward-looking statements, as that term is defined under federal securities laws. For this purpose, any statements made during this call that are not statements of historical facts may be deemed to be forward-looking statements. Your caution of these statements may be affected by important factors set forth in our filing for the Securities and Exchange Commission and in our latest earnings release. As a result, actual operations or results may differ materially from the results discussed in the forward-looking statements. We undertake no obligation to publicly update any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise, except to the extent required by law. This call also includes various non-GAAP financial measures. Disclosures related to such non-GAAP measures including reconciliation to the most directly comparable GAAP financial measures, are included in our 2023 first quarter earnings release that we filed with the SEC for the period. Let me also remind you that we are a variable distribution NLP. We will review our previously established reserves, current cash usage, evaluate future anticipated cash needs, and may reserve amounts for other future cash needs as determined by our General Partners Board. As a result, our distributions, if any, will vary from quarter to quarter due to several factors, including, but not limited to, operating performance, fluctuations in the prices received for finished products, capital expenditures, and cash reserves seem necessary or appropriate by the Board of Directors of our general partner. With that said, I'll turn the call over to Mark Pytosh, our Chief Executive Officer.

Mark. Thank you, Richard. Good morning, everybody, and thanks for joining our call today. The summarized financial highlights for the first quarter of 2023 include net sales of $226 million, net income of $102 million, EBITDA of $124 million, and the Board of Directors declared a first quarter distribution of $10.43 per common unit, which will be paid on May 22nd to unit holders of record at the close of the market on May 15th. Our facilities ran well during the first quarter of 2023, with the combined plants achieving record production levels in the quarter. Consolidated ammonia plant utilization was 105%. This resulted in combined ammonia production at 224,000 gross tons of which 62,000 net tons were available for sale and UAN production of 366,000 tons. During the quarter, we sold approximately 359,000 tons of UAN at an average price of $457 per ton and approximately 42,000 tons of ammonia at an average price of $888 per ton. Relative to the first quarter of 2022, UAN and ammonia sales volumes were higher as a result of improved operations following the completion of the planned turnarounds at both facilities in the third quarter of 2022. Prices for the first quarter declined from the first quarter of last year with ammonia prices falling 16% and UAN prices falling 8%. Although first quarter benchmark prices for Corn Belt ammonia and UAN declined by approximately 30% from the fourth quarter, our realized price for UAN increased quarter over quarter and our realized ammonia price was down less than 10% as we sold more than half of our first quarter production in the fourth quarter of 2022 before prices began to decline. Looking ahead, we continue to expect healthy demand for fertilizer in the spring planting season due to strong grain prices and farmer economics, which I will discuss further in my closing remarks. I will now turn the call over to Dane to discuss our financial results.