W. P. Carey Inc. (NYSE:WPC) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Jason Fox: John, we are not €“ I would say we are not really seeing many investment-grade rated leasebacks. And as you mentioned, that’s typically not where we have focused. I think the real opportunity here where €“ and I suspect there is a pretty big divergence. The real opportunity here is just below investment grade, where those companies and those credits have much fewer alternatives to access capital. So, I think again, not that tuned into where investment-grade sale-leasebacks are, but I am guessing that’s been much more stable and probably hasn’t increased as much. Just like the investment-grade bond markets haven’t moved as much as the high-yield markets. I think that’s reflective in the pricing on sale-leasebacks as well.

John Massocca: Okay. And then in terms of your own balance sheet, how are you thinking about leverage today? It sounded like guidance kind of implies a relatively flat leverage versus where you are 4Q. But maybe given where equity pricing is, especially relative to debt pricing, does it make sense longer term to kind of bring leverage down just because the pricing differential is pretty attractive, particularly versus historically?

Jason Fox: Yes. Look, we are

Toni Sanzone: Yes. I think we are still looking at kind of our target leverage levels in that mid to high-5x range. I think we have leaned into our equity. Our equity pricing has been pretty favorable as a source of our cost of capital. I don’t think we view kind of the future environment in terms of where we can issue debt is keeping us out of the market long-term. So, I think we will continue to kind of stay in the range that we are in right now, so somewhat leverage neutral to kind of what you are seeing there. But I agree we are definitely leaning into the equity, given how well priced it’s been.

John Massocca: But I guess no philosophical change in that maybe mid-4 to 5 is the new kind of target range just because of an opportunity set here in the current environment.

Toni Sanzone: No. I would say we continue to kind of look at the existing target range. And look, I think our credit profile was just reaffirmed with the upgrades we got from the rating agencies. So, I think we are comfortable with the target ranges that we have in place now.

John Massocca: That’s it for me. Thank you very much.

Jason Fox: Thanks John.

Operator: The next question is coming from Greg McGinniss of Scotiabank. Please go ahead.

Greg McGinniss: Hey, sorry. Just one quick follow-up. Toni, I appreciate the color on the expected income from the operating properties. I am just curious on looking at the normalized pro rata cash NOI for self-storage and other operating properties. I saw that dropped this quarter from last quarter. So, just wondering what’s going on there?

Toni Sanzone: Yes. There is really nothing of note kind of going from quarter-to-quarter there. I think we continue to see the storage performed well. I highlighted sort of what our expectations are for the upcoming year. And we think that mid to high-single digit growth on storage. There is probably some seasonality in there. We have one hotel portfolio or one hotel asset rather in the portfolio that runs through that line. So, annualizing that is probably taking that number down a bit. But I would say, just to look more to what we are projecting on a full year basis, which is for all of that portfolio, $100 million.