Navigator Holdings Ltd. (NYSE:NVGS) Q3 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Sean Morgan: Okay. So potentially partnerships in different products, and maybe kind of more focused on existing ethylene with Enterprise. And then in terms of the production exports out of the terminal flagged a little bit. Was that primarily driven by sort of, I know we talked before about the bottlenecks of having to ensure that you have the capacity to contractual requirements for throughput? Was that kind of more demand driven? Or was it more constraints on that kind of latter factor of making sure you had enough available capacity to kind of hit your Q4 obligations in Q3?

Mads Peter Zacho: I think it’s a very complex question. And it’s quite difficult because you are, it’s a partly ethane, it is partly ethylene, it’s partly domestic production, inventory management, demand worldwide and polymers. So in the summer there was readjustment from the Europeans whereby the Asians, the Asia Pacific didn’t buy because they had enough already in their inventory levels and the Europeans came in. However, they weren’t. Europe is smaller market than Asia Pacific. So, the general demand went down on the buying side. And then at the same time there were issues with storage and so forth in the U.S. So there was, I don’t know, there was a whole myriad of issues that seemingly have been sorted now definitely for Q4 October or November.

We also are seeing robust denominations for December. So I think the world is getting kind of back to track for ethylene point of view. Today there was an announcement by the Chinese government that they are reducing their quarantine restrictions for travel, international travel from whatever they have today to three days after lunar new year and then zero from 1st of April. So I think demand generally picks up again before Chinese lunar year. And so I think, I think we’re on the right track this summer was just awkward generally a little bit lag from the war in Europe.

Sean Morgan: Okay. So then if I’m sort understanding correctly, then the biggest barometer for kind demand and throughput, then even though Europe is gathering a headline is still going to be China in Greater Asia, and so we should kind of be focusing on that as we forecast?

Mads Peter Zacho: I think if you forecast Italy in demand for shipping, I think, we go back to the general rule of thumb. We have these 25% to Europe, 75% to Asia. So I think, if you look at one of the graphs we have it clearly shows that we are kind of in that arena again.

Randy Giveans: Thanks, Sean. Next caller.

Turner Holm: It’s Turner from Clarksons. So, just listening to prepare remarks there were a couple comments about fourth quarter being an improvement or the price significant improvement. Can you give us a sense of magnitude of the snapback we could see in Q4? I mean, you previously on the adjusted EBITDA level in the mid-50s. Is that kind of the benchmark that we should be thinking about?

Mads Peter Zacho: Mr. Nolan?

Niall Nolan: I think, it is, we would be disappointed if we didn’t achieve at that level. We’re obviously halfway through November, so halfway through the quarter right now. And certainly, what we’ve seen in October and to date in November is indicating that that would be the case.

Turner Holm: Okay. Thank you. And then a question for

Niall Nolan: The important number here is of course, utilization because an extra day of revenue goes straight to the bottom line. So, that’s the very direct impact, which is also why we guiding on utilization because it’s such an important factor.