Siem Offshore Inc

OSE:SIOFF

Earnings Call Analysis

Earnings Call Transcript 2023-Q3

[Bernt Omdal, executive]

Good day, everyone, and welcome to the review and presentation of our results for the Third Quarter. My name is Bernt Omdal, and I'm the CEO of the company. I'm joined by our CFO, Vidar Jerstad, and together, we will take you through this presentation. Siem Offshore's report for the Third Quarter was released prior to the market opening today.

In this presentation, we will cover main highlights of the report, and we will refer to the presentation issued together with the financial report. And at the end of the presentation, we will open up for questions. Looking at the highlights for the quarter. We had 27 vessels in operation and all vessels delivered a positive EBITDA margin. We had close to $86 million in revenue, and we delivered $41.5 million in EBITDA.

This is equivalent to 48% EBITDA margin. Our cash position was close to $100 million at the end of the quarter, and our book equity ratio was 42%. We continue to deliver safe and efficient operations in all regions. This is a result of high focus on safety at all levels in the company.

The utilization of the fleet in third quarter was 87%. This number is excluding vessels in lay-up. We had two vessels in lay-up at the end of the quarter. We signed a medium-term contract for two of our anchor handlers, Siem Aquamarine and Siem Amethyst and we also got in place an extension for a sister vessel Siem Topaz, ensuring continued operation well into the fourth quarter and next year.

Siem Dorado was also awarded a contract extension, securing utilization until mid-next year. Vidar Jerstad will now give some more details regarding the results for the third quarter. Vidar?

[Vidar Jerstad, executive]

Thank you, Bernt. Siem Offshore's third quarter report is yet another report to confirming that we are in a positive market trend. The company had a $85.6 million in revenue for the quarter. That's up from $73.7 million same quarter last year. Operating expenses ended at $39 million, up from $34.4 million.

G&A expenses was unchanged at $5.1 million. Operating margin for the quarter was $41.5 million, up from $34.1 million. The depreciation was $17.4 million. There were no impairments or any reversal of impairments in the quarter. Net financial items ended negative by $11.8 million and is affected negatively by a net currency loss of $5.3 million. However, note that positive currency effects of $3.7 million is reported under the comprehensive income. Net profit before and after taxes is $12.3 million. And after adjusting for minority shareholders, we ended up at $10.4 million.

This slide shows operating margin distributed on segments. The figures are before G&A expenses. Due to common markets in the anchor handling segment compared to last year, the segment experienced reduced margin of $3 million. Despite this increase in total margin before G&A was $7.3 million. And in the graph to the right, that represents year-to-date figures and shows a total increase in operating margin of $41 million or 41%. After G&A expenses, operating margin is up 50% year-to-date.

Let us take a look at the balance sheet. The book equity of the company has been growing steadily every single quarter since the successful restructuring 2.5 years ago. The company has now $424 million in book equity. That figure represents a book equity ratio of 42%. Gross interest-bearing debt is $505 million. Net interest-bearing debt is $405 million. Siem Offshore's financial position is good and it will continue to improve.

Siem Offshore is an attractive and solid business partner. And now the cash flow for the last 9 months. We started 2023 by having $95 million in cash. We had generated $105 million in cash from operations. We have paid $15 million in interest. We have invested $22 million in the vessels, and we have repaid debt of $66 million, and we have now $100 million in our accounts. Note that Siem Offshore's capacity for repaying debt is good. And now the contract backlog. At the end of first quarter, the backlog amount is $368 million with quality counterparties. The Subsea segment consists of 7 vessels and dominate with 70% of the backlog.

Over 6 PSVs has 13% of the backlog and over 9 anchor handling vessels are also represented by 13% of the backlog. Our Fast Crew & Oil Spill recovery vessels has 4% of the backlog. On this slide, you see firm contracts and options in green and [ vehicle ] vessel capacity in blue. The anchor handling vessels represent the largest exposure to the market, implicating market risk and market opportunities going forward.

However, we now see the backlog for anchor handling vessels building up a bit. Under the current long-term trend of improving markets and continued focus on energy security, we believe the available capacity going forward in general represents an attractive earnings potential. Back to you, Bernt

[Bernt Omdal, executive]

All right. Moving on. Our fleets consists of 27 owned vessels as listed on this slide. And in addition, we have 3 vessels under our own management. There's no major changes to our fleet composition. So we will not spend more time on this slide. The company has a good global footprint which is important for the utilization of the fleet. We will continue to move vessels around the world where we can perform safe operation with sustainable conditions.

For the anchor handler segment, there are mainly shorter contracts and campaigns. And currently, we have a Siem Opal, Siem Pearl, Siem Emerald, and Siem Ruby, all trading in the North Sea spot market. Siem Sapphire, Siem Amethyst, Siem Topaz, Siem Aquamarine are trading in Asia and we have the Avalon Sea on the term contract in Canada.

The construction vessels. There we have the Siem Barracuda in the North Sea and Siem Spearfish is on a firm contract currently operating in West Coast of Africa. And Siem Stingray is operating in the North Sea on a long-term contract and Siem Dorado is on a firm contract in Brazil.

And then we have the two well intervention vessels also working in Brazil. We have a fleet of 6 PSVs, most of them are on long-term contracts. In Australia, we have Siem Thiima and Siem Pilot. In Brazil, we have Siem Atlas and Siem Giant and Siem Pride is on a long-term contract in the North Sea. And Siem Symphony is also in the North Sea, but she is trading in the spot market. For [ all of us ], our smaller Brazilian fleet, we still have the two oil spill vessels Siem Maragogi and Siem Marataizes on term contracts with Petrobras.

And we have two vessels in lay-up that is the fast crew vessels in Siem Pentotiba and Siem Piata and then we have the core drilling vessel, Joides Resolution. It is continuing working around the globe on a term contract. As shown on previous slides, we have a good contract coverage for this year. At the same time, it's important to have vessels available in an improving market to increase the potential of earnings.

Moving on. The third quarter was strong in most regions and for most segments, but the anchor handler segments remains challenging. The North Sea spot market has been strong for the PSVs with good rates throughout the quarter.

The anchor handler segment did not experience the increased summer activity that was expected that resulted in low utilization and reduced day rates for the North Sea tonnage. Southeast Asia and Australia saw increased activity, but we struggled with few and short campaigns. This has resulted in low utilization for anchor handlers. The OSCV fleet had full utilization throughout the quarter at high daily rates.

Most segments are experiencing an increased number of multiyear contracts hitting the market. That's signaling that charters are positioning themselves for future projects. The expected increase in activity for all segments indicates good market prospects for our high-end fleet.

So to summarize, we delivered a strong quarter with high activity. We continued improving our financial position. We still deliver first-class operation with an excellent HSEQ performance. We have a strong backlog with quality clients, and we have a positive long-term market outlook in all segments. We will now open up for questions.

All right. We are then ready to take any questions that you might have, please .

[Ina Golikja, analyst]

Congratulations on another strong quarter. This is Ina Golikja from Fearnley Securities. And I have a couple of questions. The first one would be, given, let's say strong performance on the anchor handler side. I was wondering how do you see the North Sea but also Southeast Asia in the fourth quarter? You mentioned fewer shorter campaigns. What do you expect in terms of campaigns there. If those campaigns will just be postponed or canceled altogether. So if you can just comment a little bit on the anchor-handling side being the segment in which you have more spot exposure .

[Bernt Omdal, executive]

Well, the spot exposure we have today is in the North Sea, and we don't see any campaigns coming up in the fourth quarter in the North Sea. When it comes to Southeast Asia, we have more or less full coverage for our fleet down there. The day rates in the North Sea, it's hard to predict. We have seen some really good pictures. But again, utilization is also an important measurement or important factor here. So we see the day rates are steadily creeping up. So we are in a way positive. But again, no campaigns scheduled for the North Sea to our knowledge.

[Ina Golikja, analyst]

I understand. And as you fix to anchor handlers at midterm, for contract midterm duration, I was wondering if you might be open to do a similar exercise also for other anchor handlers in order to have a bit more visibility in terms of revenues?

[Bernt Omdal, executive]

If there is well-paid contracts, we are there to grab them.

[Ina Golikja, analyst]

And my last question would be, if you could give us a bit more color in terms of the refinancing that say, the balloon payment that's coming due next year.

[Vidar Jerstad, executive]

Yes. The Board and the management have a high attention on the debt bullet maturing in December 2024. But note that the company has very good capacity for debt repayments. And we are very comfortable with the situation and the position we are in today, and we have a very positive outlook with regards to handling the debt bullets.

[Bernt Omdal, executive]

Any other questions, please? Remember to unmute.

Okay. So if there is no further questions, we will then end this session, and we thank you all for attending. Thank you.