Saturn Oil & Gas Inc.

Thank you for standing by. This is the conference operator. Welcome to the Saturn Oil and Gas Q3 2024 conference call and webcast. As a reminder, all participants are in the listen-only mode and the conference is being recorded. After the presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To join the question queue, you may press star then one on your telephone keypad. Should you need assistance during the conference call, you may signal an operator by pressing star and then zero. I would now like to turn the conference over to Cindy Gray, Vice President, Investor Relations with Saturn Oil and Gas. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Dorgan. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us for Saturn's Q3 24 earnings conference call. Please note that the company's financial statements, MD&A, and press release are available on our website and have been filed on CDAR+. Our corporate presentation will be updated shortly and will be available on our website as well. Some of the statements on today's call may contain forward-looking information, references to non-IFRS and other financial measures, and as such, listeners are encouraged to review the associated risks outlined in our most recent MD&A. Listeners are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, since a number of factors could cause the actual future results to differ materially from the targets and expectations expressed. The company undertakes no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statement, whether as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise, unless expressly required by applicable securities law. For further information on risk factors, please view the company's annual information form, filed on CDAR+, and available on our website. All amounts discussed today are in Canadian dollars, unless otherwise stated. Today's call features remarks from members of Saturn's executive team, including John Jeffrey, Chief Executive Officer, Justin Kaufman, Chief Development Officer, and Scott Sanborn, Chief Financial Officer. Following the team's prepared remarks, we'll be conducting a Q&A and we'll open the line to questions from participants. I'll now turn it over to John Jeffrey.

Thank you, Cindy, and good morning, everyone. I'm proud to share Saturn's Q3 results, which show how our strategic blueprint for value creation continues to drive successful execution. By effectively managing the factors within our control, the company is exceeding expectations and steadily growing adjusted funds flow. We are safely and responsibly delivering results that surpass market expectations. The third quarter was our first full period integrating the Saskatchewan acquisition of Badrum and Flat Lake assets, which were acquired in mid-June for less than two times cash flow. Although we have only managed the assets for a short time, we have already begun reducing operating costs and deploying capital. Early results are exciting, and we should be able to share those in the coming months with you. Not only did we achieve several corporate records for production, adjusted EBITDA, and AFF, we also exceeded consensus estimates on a number of fronts. Saturn delivered our highest ever average production, surpassing 39,000 BOE a day. During the quarter, Saturn was able to make the best out of a falling oil price by monetizing some older hedge positions required by a prior lender. We believe oil to be range bound between 70 and 90 USD. So we purchased approximately $20 million of these hedges, which, if we are correct, could have impacted future cash flows by close to $40 million. Our record adjusted EBITDA of $136 million also came in above consensus, while AFF was highest in our history at $94 million. When normalized for these one-off hedge costs, adjusted funds flow was over ahead of consensus estimates. When oil price jumped back during the quarter, we acted quickly and layered in new oil callers that are in line with our future oil outlook. As Scott will expand upon, we were also able to lock in favorable foreign exchange rates on principal and interest payments for our senior nodes over the next three years. Our nimble capital allocation strategy and the nature of our asset base enable Saturn to target locations or production optimization that offer robust returns. We intend to continue growing per share value by pursuing strategic tuck-in acquisitions that bolster our footprint in high-performing areas, offer cost synergies, and expand our drilling inventory. For example, we've seen solid well outperformance in our development of the Brazzo Dam Cardium area of central Alberta. Subsequent to quarter end, we closed a $20 million token acquisition in Brazil that significantly increased our drilling inventory, production, and land base in that area, much of which is adjacent to Saturn's four best performing wells. Such strategic and creative acquisitions are an integral part of that blueprint for value creation. Concurrent with the South Saskatchewan acquisition, Saturn also reshaped the balance sheet with the issuance of nine and five eighths senior notes, which are free from punitive hedge requirements or limitations on capital and have effectively reduced the company's interest rate by about 40%. While debt reduction continues to be a priority along with strategic tuck-in acquisitions, Saturn launched the first phase of our return of capital framework on August 27th with the implementation of a share buyback or an NCIP. Since inception of the NCIP, we have maxed out our daily purchase limits of approximately 46,000 shares. And to date, we have returned over 4.7 million to shareholders through the purchase and cancellation of 1.9 million shares in the open market. Longer term and in a more favorable commodity environment, our return of capital framework could evolve to include a dividend. However, until we see a tightening of Saturn's valuation gap relative to our peers, we believe buying back our shares lets us acquire the lowest cost barrels possible. while generating value for shareholders without drilling up our acreage. It is a testament to the skill, experience, and entrepreneurial attitude of our teams that Saturn is able to see things differently, do things differently, and disrupt tradition, and often inefficient practices operationally and corporately. I'm very proud of our team's commitment to innovation, safety, and responsible development, and for their unwavering support of the communities in which we live and work. Right at the end of the year, we expect to release Saturn's 2025 budget and guidance, building on our 2024 capital expenditure program and targeting continued AFF optimization. Given the steady growth and evolution we have achieved over the past few years, I believe now is an ideal time to take a first look or even a closer look at the Saturn opportunity. With that, I'll turn it over to Justin Kaufman to speak to our operational performance. Justin.

Thanks, John. As mentioned earlier on the call, Southern achieved a new production record in the quarter, averaging over 39,000 barrels a day, which exceeds expectations, comprised of 83% higher value oil and liquids. This aligns with our previous forecast following the South Saskatchewan acquisition, as average volumes for the last half of 2024 are expected to range between 38,000 to 40,000 barrels a day. Capital expenditures in the quarter totaled $84.4 million, including capitalized G&A, With that, Saturn drills 48 gross wells that contributed to volume increases, along with investments in capital-efficient production optimization initiatives that I'll expand on shortly. Saturn's asset portfolio features diverse development potential that contributes to our long-term sustainability. Today, we are largely oil-weighted from a production reserves and revenue perspective, but we also have gas-rich assets in Alberta that offer longer-term development targets as natural gas prices rebound. Being able to quickly pivot depending on commodity prices, availability of services, or a shifting macro landscape underscores the value of our strategy and diverse asset base. We can drill open-hole Mississippian wells, exploit the Balkan with a combination of fracked and conventional open-hole approach, or focus on quick payback returns in West Saskatchewan biking. CITRUS Blueprint involves applying proven operating strategies from one asset or area within the portfolio to other areas in an effort to improve capital efficiencies, payouts, and returns. In addition, it includes our core out strategy of pursuing tuck-in acquisitions in areas where we are generating the highest rates of return. The 20.5 million Brazil Cardian tuck-in acquisition that John mentioned earlier demonstrates our strategy in action. The transaction closed October 1 and added 63 net locations and approximately 700 barrels a day of production. along with expanding land in an area where a new cardium development has shown material production outperformance relative to type curves. The acquisition also features land in locations adjacent to where our four best cardium wells were drilled earlier in 2024. Recent cardium wells have been drilled longer and used higher stage counts in the practice, resulting in a significant uplift in oil production and increasing rate of return expectations. In the past couple of weeks, we've successfully drilled the longest carding well in Canada out of a sample set of over 6,000 wells, having a total length of 7,570 meters measured depth. The achievement demonstrates SIDEM's technical ability to roll outside the norm and create opportunities in areas overlooked by other producers. In our KBOB Monty area, our team continued to unlock value through highly capital efficient production optimization projects, converting six wells from gas lit to conventional pump jacks at KBOB, This low-cost, high-value exercise resulted in more than 500 barrels a day of new volumes coming on stream at a cost of just over $3,000 per barrel, representing some of the highest rate-of-return barrels in our portfolio. In southeast Saskatchewan, incorporating an expanded use of seismic has increased confidence in well placement and resulted in improved production across several regions targeting Mississippian and Balkan development. Our teams are currently processing and evaluating seismic to use and rosary and success to map out drilling location targets for next year. Our open-hole multi-leg development deployed in the Balkan, where we have performed well above our peers on a length-normalized basis, is now being tested in the Spearfish Outmatter, demonstrating how bringing proven technologies to new areas can change cost parameters and open up new inventory. Saturday is also continuing to invest in our pre-pressurized Balkan program with 10 Torquay conversions planned for Q4 of this year. Since this area was mostly booked from a reserve perspective, we expect being able to expand future reserves, but also continue to lower declines. Each of these incremental improvements, area by area and asset by asset, contribute to Saturn's overall health performance. And now I'll turn over to Scott to review the financial statements.

Thanks, Justin. And good morning, everybody. As John mentioned, we had another record quarter based on production, adjusted EBITDA, and strong adjusted funds flow, and continued to execute on our NCIB. all of which demonstrate the strength of Saturn's strategy. We believe the normalized adjusted funds flow of $114 million and free funds flow of $29.7 million, excluding the one-time hedge monetization, offer a better indicator of Saturn's run rate capabilities for generating cash going forward. With our senior notes debt refinancing complete in the second quarter, we started Q3 in a strong financial position with cash on the balance sheet and a lower prospective interest rate. Further, we are no longer subject to restrictive hedge requirements that were part of our previous dentists As John spoke about earlier, this resulted in Saturdays carrying some unfavorably priced swaps in low-range callers, which we meaningfully addressed in the quarter, improving our hedge book going forward. We similarly took advantage of the upper price movement and layered in higher-value callers, including contracts with ceilings that are north of $84 per barrel. The company also capitalized on the strong Canadian dollar relative to U.S. mid-September blocking in more exchange rate hedges for the next three years on both principal and interest payment portions of our senior notes. Since natural gas is generally immaterial to our overall financial picture, representing only 1% of revenue and approximately 17% of production volumes, we did layer in a small amount of natural gas hedges, approximately 10,000 GJs per day, at $2.73 per GJ through the end of 2026. This active hedge management provides another example of a factor within our control that allowed us to protect against the downside and mitigate risk. Identifying opportunities to reduce costs remains a priority for Standard, and I'm proud to highlight that our off-ex of $19.86 per BOE in Q3 was again our $20 target, even though the new bathroom and flat lake assets had higher operating costs than our corporate average. This exemplifies how our team improves efficiencies and can bring down per unit cost of OPEX post-acquisition. From an FFAC perspective, this focus on controlling costs coupled with a relatively low royalty rate positively contributes to our bottom line. Saturn's Q3 royalties averaged 13%, operating costs were under $20 a DOE, and transportation was $1.70 per DOE, driving average operating FFACs of $42. We will continue to focus on cost reduction and FFAC enhancements free funds flow going forward. Net debt at September 30th totaled $779 million, representing approximately 1.4 times net debt to annualize poorly adjusted EBITDA. We remain committed to continued debt reduction as part of the Saturn Blueprint and anticipating achieving net debt to EBITDA approaching one time by the end of 2025. The company had liquidity at September 30th of over $260 million, including $113 million of cash and $150 million of undrawn availability under our credit facility This financial flexibility positions the company for continued advancing activities that improve per-share metrics, including the NCIB and Tuckin strategic acquisitions. Since October 27th through the end of last week to date, Saturn has returned $5.4 million to shareholders with repurchase cancellations of approximately 2.2 million shares. This aggregate dollar value represents approximately $0.03 per share based on the Q3 weighted average shares outstanding. We intend to continue this pace of buyback with WTI holdings at or above $70 per barrel. If we saw WTI in the range of $60 to $65 for an extended period through 2025, our capital allocation strategy would be assessed and potentially adjusted. However, at current WTI levels, we anticipate maintaining our practice of maximizing the daily MCIP purchase limits. Further, we are expanding our capital markets focus to reach new pools of capital and introduce the Saturn story to be interested for potential investors. We believe there's opportunities for multiple expansion give our fundamentals compared to our current relative valuation. Our full 2025 budget and guidance are expected to be released before the end of the year with our preliminary expectations being to maintain a stable budget that supports continued robust free cash flow generations. With that, I'll turn it back to the operator to open up the line for any questions.

Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. To join the question queue, you may press star then one on your telephone keypad. You will hear a tone acknowledging your request. If you are using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing any keys. To withdraw your question, please press star then two. We will pause for a moment as callers join in the queue. The first question comes from Amir Arif with HTV Capital. Please go ahead.

Good morning, guys. A couple of questions. One just around the hedging. The one-off hedges, just curious, was that limited based on the cash flow you had, or are there any additional legacy hedges that you do plan on closing in future quarters? Or have you closed everything?

No, really it's closed. Yeah, we're just trying to be optimistic as things come up. Again, liquidity at the end of the quarter, well in excess of $100 million in cash, over $260 million of total liquidity. So cash flow and cash availability is definitely not the limiting factor. Just really try and take advantage of the volatility. When we see an oil spike up to $78 in the quarter, we layered on some additional hedges. When it fell back down, we bought up some legacy ones. You know, that was a one-off in the quarter. Are we likely to keep doing it? We're always watching that if we can improve that hedge book. Again, you know, our thoughts here is that we believe oil is going to be in that 70 to 90 range. So, just trying to upgrade our hedge book to kind of reflect that range. So, that's really... That's really been our strategy, and I think you're going to continue to see us kind of roll that out. If we have an opportunity to buy something up that's underwater or layered on when it strengthens, I think we're likely to do that.

And I appreciate that, John. But generally speaking, future hedges you are layering on, they're all generally going to be more collars?

Yeah, we do prefer the collars. I mean, obviously with the FX, that was a swap, but looking at WTI, we're going to focus on callers that kind of sit within our outlook for Bryce Boyle.

Okay, that sounds good. And then just a second question, just on the pace of capital spending. I mean, the first half of the year, the company was smaller. It was about $50 million spent. Second half, there's about $170 million spent coming. So just curious if you have the systems in place and the staff to efficiently be deploying this larger pace of capital that you are starting to run with now, given the size of the company.

Yeah, absolutely. And you're going to see, you know, again, I kind of alluded to it there briefly, but really excited to get the results. The results in Q3 look fantastic. Early results in Q4 are the same. So I think we have the exact right size of staff in place to execute on the balance of 2024 and going into 2025. So hopefully we can have that guidance out here in December, full year 25, but Right now, staffing levels are great. The team that Justin and his guys have put together, Justin doing a bang-out job, beating tight curves, beating expectations. So I think you can expect more of that coming for the balance of this year and hopefully in 2025 as well.

Sounds good.

Thanks. Thank you. We have the next question from Adam Gill with Ventum Financial. Please go ahead.

Hey, good morning, guys. So just on the tuck-in acquisition, how active do you expect it to be on the smaller acquisition front? You know, is there a limit in terms of how much you want to spend on that? And how full is the slate of opportunities for you to make these tuck-in deals?

We're always looking. So what you've seen us do throughout the year so far, if you ignore the bathroom flat lake, the larger acquisition, You've seen us sell Swan Hill and then pick up that Adonai Resources in southeast Saskatchewan, as well as that Brazzotamp Cardium one as well. So net-nets. We netted a couple hundred barrels a day extra, but more importantly, we netted about 50 locations better. So when you look at PDP, when you look at locations, we definitely came out ahead of that when you kind of take those three in its aggregate. That being said, if we can do smaller token acquisitions that build on our core areas with the best results, and we can do so out of cash flow, I think you're going to see us continue to focus on that. As far as pipeline, I think we're seeing an ongoing consolidation. I think in some of our core areas, there are a limited, although a number of smaller players available. And if we can continue to pick up good assets with good running room at two times or sub PDP, you're going to continue to see us focus on that if it fits with our long-term blueprint strategy.

Great. Thanks, John. Second question, on the open-hole multilateral drilling, you've obviously started to apply that outside of the Balkan play. So first off, do you see that mainly as a boost to economics or as expanding the location opportunities? And then secondly, how many employees have you identified as potential candidates for this development technique?

Yeah, I think that feels like more of a dirt question, so I'll pass that over to Justin Kaufman to chime in. Hey, Sean. Hey, Adam.

Yeah, we're looking at it through a multiple different plays. Some companies have tested it in the Viking. Some companies have looked at it far to south in Flat Lake and the Bakken. Right now in the Spearfish, that's kind of the first outweigh outside of the North Viewfield package. We chose that specific area because of the relative thickness of the P1 standard, and that's similar to how we chose it and if you go walking, so really reservoir parameters are essentially dictate where and how you can use that. We'll push it to the Spearfish and we'll see how it goes from there. There is potential in the Flat Lake area, but a little bit more science has to be done up front, but we'll continue to potentially try it in new areas depending on development success we see along the way.

And just with that Spearfish location, Would that have been slated for a regular single lateral, dual lateral, horizontal well? But just given the incentives, now you're going to go with the six leg?

Yeah, actually, like the original P1 sand was developed as a single leg fracked, actually, spearfish sand. And it had very limited success on The actual inflow that they got of oil didn't really meet the volumetrics to make that location pathopositive. But with the increased number of lakes, we're going to see increased number of inflow, and based on the per million crossing we're seeing, we think that we'll have similar results that we saw to our Balkan and the viewfield area. So the single lake, based on the relative thinness of the zone up there, kind of restricted volume inflow, and we think we can expand on that with the additional legs.

It sounds good. That's it for me. Thank you.

Thank you. The next question is from Christopher True with Aid Capital. Please go ahead.

Good morning, and thanks for taking my question. So Saturn discussed about validating a stratigraphic trend between East Plato and Plato. Could you please discuss a little bit more on what you're seeing with this trend and what it could mean for Viking development if it's proved to be a successful trend? Thanks.

Yeah, down in the Plato area, it's more, the Viking's a little bit more starved and trapped. With our development, we've been able to identify the thickness of the Viking there. We're seeing anywhere from three to six meters and general reservoir thickness, and our development has helped us identify that. We have now drilled, if not every section, every second section along that total trend. We do see complete infill development to our east plateau field, which involves about eight one-mile biking locations on a per-section basis. and we've been able to prove out the economics of it. If you look 10 years ago, there was some other producers that tried half a mile shorter horizontal locations that weren't able to make it work as far as the economics go, but with the new type of completions and the longer lateral links, you're seeing that increased rate of return and turning that return positive has helped obviously give us confidence in developing that trend at the same time, so. So a little bit new findings and then just using kind of newer completion techniques to help make those wells capital positive, I guess.

All right. Christopher, does that answer your question?

Yes, thank you.

All right, thank you. The next question comes from Jose Sanchez with Kastner Investment. Please go ahead.

Hi, how are you? I'm pretty glad to see that we are winning our hedge books and especially the swaps. Maybe you can provide more color on what are the free cash flow expected on the next 12 months? How much will be lost? due to the new hedges, the figures that I can find online are not updated with the new hedge book?

Yeah, absolutely. So, unfortunately, we haven't given full guidance yet. Like I said, you should be able to expect that from us here, hopefully in the next 45 days. I think it would be great. I was going to say, you know, when we did closed bathroom and flat lake there in July, we did guide for 12 months out, and we did guide at $80 oil. And that's, you can see in there, we show net and gross of derivatives at the time. Now, that should improve by around $30 million, given the hedge book that we bought out and given that $80 mark. Yeah, I think for the full 12 at that time.

And you're working with an 80 bucks WTI baseline?

Sorry, we were working for the July to July, from July to 24 to July 25, that is what we used. We're seeing some of our peers come out, some at 70, some at 75 for 2025. Some of our peers, I think we're probably prudent to do the same, You know, we're waiting to see, obviously, how this election turned out, how oil responds, and then what the OPEC meeting does in December. I believe it is December 1. So when we come out, hopefully, you know, second week of December, hopefully, I think early numbers, we're looking to guide at around $75 oil for next year. Again, we're just going to respond to what we're seeing in the market. If that's relevant, you know, the big thing for us is we want, similar to our peers. So if the majority of our peers are coming out at 75, I think we're likely to do the same as long as the market kind of supports that thesis as well. So I think we're probably going to be probably around that $75 mark. But, again, you know, a couple big data points left to come out before we can say that for sure.

Mm-hmm.

Thank you. My last question will be about water flooding. We are using water flooding in several of our fields, great results. Can you maybe give us more color about how much of our wells are actually using water flood and how much could we expand that number to how much can we maximize that?

Yeah, absolutely, and I think what I'll do is I'll pass that back to Justin Kaufman to get into the details about where and how we are water flooding. Justin?

Yeah, specifically with the acquisition we did in the springtime on the Flat Lake area, we acquired close to 9,000 barrels a day. About half of that is under current flood, and that specific area is where we're going to be turning 10 producers into.

Sir, you are not audible at this moment.

I love.

Mr. Justin Kaufman, you are not audible at this moment. Ladies and gentlemen, please stand by. Ladies and gentlemen, we apologize. We will need to end our question and answer session at this point. This concludes today's conference call. You may disconnect your lines. Thank you for participating and have a pleasant day.