AltaGas Ltd.

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for standing by. Welcome to AltaGas first quarter 2023 financial results conference call. My name is Lara and I will be your operator for today's call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. If you have any difficulties hearing the conference, please press star then zero for operator assistance at any time. After the speaker's remarks, there will be a question and answer session. As a reminder, this conference call is being broadcast live on the internet and recorded. I would now like to turn the conference call over to Adam McKnight, Director, Investor Relations. Please go ahead, Mr. McKnight.

Thank you, Lara. And thanks, everyone, for joining us this morning for AltaGas' first quarter 2023 financial results conference call. Speaking on the call this morning will be Randy Crawford, President and Chief Executive Officer, and James Harbalis, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. We're also joined here this morning by Randy Toon, Executive Vice President and President of our Midstream Business, Blue Jenkins, Executive Vice President and President of our Utilities Business, and John Morrison, Senior Vice President, Investor Relations and Corporate Development. We'll proceed on the basis that everyone has taken the opportunity to review the press release and our financial results. And similar to previous quarters, We've published an earnings summary presentation that you can find on our website. The presentation walks through the quarter and highlights some of the key year-over-year variances and non-recurring items that we assume will be helpful for the market to understand. As always, today's prepared remarks will be followed by an analyst question and answer period, and I'll remind everyone that we will be available after the call for any follow-up or detailed modeling questions that you might have. As for the structure of the call, We'll start with Randy Crawford providing some comments on our financial performance and progress on our strategic priorities, followed by James Harbalis providing a more detailed walkthrough of our first quarter financial results, our near-term outlook, and 2023 guidance. And then we'll leave plenty of time at the end for Q&A. Before we begin, I'll also remind everyone that we will refer to forward-looking information on today's call. This information is subject to certain risks and uncertainties as outlined in our forward-looking information disclosure on slide two of our investor presentation, which can be found on our website, and more fully within our public disclosure filings on the CDAR filing system. And with that, I'll now turn the call over to Randy.

Thank you, Adam, and good morning, everyone. In the first quarter, the company delivered solid results with normalized EPS of 98 cents, AND NORMALIZED EBITDA OF $582 MILLION. THESE STRONG RESULTS AND THE CONTINUED EXECUTION OF OUR STRATEGIC PRIORITIES HAVE POSITIONED THE PLATFORM TO ACHIEVE THE COMPANY'S 2023 GUIDANCE RANGES, INCLUDING NORMALIZED EPS OF $1.85 TO $2.05 AND NORMALIZED EBITDA GUIDANCE OF $1.5 BILLION TO $1.6 BILLION. OUR OPERATING RESULTS BUILT UPON THE STRONG FOUNDATION OF GROWTH THAT WE DELIVERED THE PAST FOUR YEARS AND IS A TESTAMENT TO THE QUALITY AND STRATEGIC VALUE of our two businesses. Through ongoing investment and associated cost reductions, our regulated utilities were able to overcome the impact of warmer weather and the lost contribution from Alaska utilities in March to deliver solid first quarter earning results. We continue to make investments in our network on behalf of our customers and execute our regulatory strategy to update our rates on a timely basis to reflect the current operating cost environment, including cost of capital. We are optimistic in achieving successful resolution in our Virginia rate proceedings over the summer and our D.C. rate proceedings during the fourth quarter, positioning utility for continued profitable growth. In our midstream business, we continue to capitalize on the tremendous opportunity to export responsibly produced Canadian LPGs to Asia to meet the rising demand for lower carbon intensive products. We delivered strong results, which included the export of almost 100,000 barrels a day of LPGs to Asia, delivered across 16 BLGCs. As we look forward, having completed our annual LPG supply contracts at pricing levels, reflecting the inflationary impacts on logistics, a lower risk profile from increased tolling levels, and a significant hedge portfolio, we are well positioned to achieve our forecasted profitability. OUR NEWLY EXECUTED VLGC TIME CHARTER AGREEMENT CONTINUES TO EXTEND ALTAGAS VALUE TRAIN REACH INTO ASIA. IT WILL REDUCE MARITIME SHIPPING COSTS BY APPROXIMATELY 25% RELATIVE TO CURRENT BALTIC FREIGHT FORWARD PRICING AND LOWERS PRICING VOLATILITY ON A LONG-TERM BASIS. THE INCREMENTAL TIME CHARTER BUILDS ON THE DE-RISKING OF THE TWO DUAL FUEL VLGC'S THAT ALTAGAS WILL BE TAKING DELIVERY OF IN LATE 2023 AND EARLY 2024. PROACTIVE STEPS that we have taken during the first quarter have solidified our export platform. We are now positioned to take our export business to the next level. And therefore, we are excited to reach an agreement with BOPAC for the potential expansion of our energy export business off Ridley Island, subject to positive FID. The project has been granted the key federal and provincial permits and is designed to create increased LPG export capacity in measured phases, provide logistics cost synergies to our current export business, product optionality, and dedicated access to a newly constructed dock. In approximately four years since RIPPIT was first commissioned, we have steadily grown our global LPG export capabilities, which combined with Ferndale, AltaGas now connects more than 12% of Japan's annual propane and 12% South Korea's annual LPG imports. The newly Ridley Island Energy Export Facility, partnership in agreement with BOPAC, positions AltaGas to further expand this business and provide additional access for our valued upstream customers to key downstream markets in Asia. Of course, in order to fully capitalize on the strategic growth opportunities that surround us, we are fully aware in this higher interest rate environment that the absolute requirement that we possess a solid and investment-grade balance sheet. With the funds available from the closing of the Alaska utility sale at the beginning of March, we were able to pay down debt and are well-positioned to achieve our medium-term 5x net debt to normalized EBITDA targets. Now, with our balance sheet concerns firmly behind us, we are positioned with the flexibility to opportunistically invest in both organic and inorganic projects surrounding our strategically positioned utilities and midstream assets, such as reef expansion project upon favorable FID. So in closing, this is likely to be my last earnings call as CEO of AltaGas. And I want to take this opportunity to express my gratitude to the dedicated employees of AltaGas for their unwavering support, commitment and hard work during my tenure. Together, we have transformed ourselves from a highly leveraged low growth company into a premier integrated West Coast LPG export company and a standalone, highly efficient utility business. During this journey, we increased EBITDA by over 50%, doubled earnings per share and EBITDA at both the utility and midstream businesses from 2018 to 2022. Even more impressive, in my opinion, is that we were able to achieve these results despite the sale of 7.9 billion of EBITDA-producing assets, the reduction of leverage from 11x to 5x with no equity issuances. This was a monumental transformation and a testament to the enormous intrinsic value of our asset base and the dedication and hard work of our talented employees. Given the magnitude of our transformation and the enviable strategic positioning of the company, We are well positioned to continue to achieve our 5% to 7% continual annual growth rate through 2026. I'm proud of what we've accomplished together. I'm confident this management team will continue to drive value for our shareholders. And I'm pleased to transition to the next CEO, a company with a solid foundation and bright future. And with that, I will turn the call over to James to review the financial results in more detail.