Abu Dhabi National Energy Company PJSC (TAQA) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Hello, everyone. Welcome to our Q3 2024 results call. My name is Asjad Yahya, and I head Investor Relations at TAQA. I am joined by our CFO, Stephen Ridlington. Please note that this session is being recorded. And by participating in this meeting, you consent to the recording. This presentation will follow the usual script. Steve and I will walk you through our operating highlights and the financial performance of the quarter. We will then open the floor for Q&A. I'll now pass it over to Steve, who will guide you through the key highlights of Q3 2024

Thank you, Asjad, and hello to everybody. Welcome to this call. Turning to the first slide, Slide 5, the results overview. In line with recent quarters, our utility business performed strongly in the third quarter of 2024, which more than offset a decline in oil and gas The underlying strength of the Utilities business has been further reinforced with the consolidation of TAQA Water Solutions or TWS, which was formerly known as SWS. Group revenues for the quarter were up 14% year-on-year, led by Transmission and Distribution and TAQA Water Solutions. Meanwhile, EBITDA and net profit were up 11% year-on-year and 15% year-on-year, respectively, with all 3 components of the Utilities segment contributing to this increase. I will take this opportunity to highlight that during the third quarter, we made some changes in the way we report our EBITDA, bringing it into line with best practices in the sector. This follows a benchmarking exercise. The most notable change is the inclusion of dividend income from ADNOC Gas in EBITDA, along with other income and foreign exchange gains and losses. For your reference, Slide 20 of the deck provides a comprehensive illustration of the impact of the change in EBITDA definition. The quarter also witnessed significant spending on CapEx and investments, including partial payments for the TWS acquisition and additional injections into Masdar. This translated into negative free cash flow for the quarter. The Board has proposed a dividend of 0.7 fils per share for the third quarter of 2024, in line with our publicly declared dividend policy. Last but not least, MSCI upgraded our ESG rating to A with the market continuing to recognize the strong efforts being made by TAQA to develop a more sustainable business. Turning to the next slide. As I mentioned before, revenue grew 14% in the third quarter. Transmission and Distribution witnessed the strongest year-on-year growth at 24%, while generation recorded a modest 1% increase. The Oil and Gas segment, on the other hand, continued to witness a decline in topline as anticipated. The contribution from TAQA Water Solutions accounted for about 4% of group revenues. Turning to EBITDA. Generation recorded the strongest year-on-year increase in our business segments at 19%, followed by transmission distribution at 6%. TAQA Water Solutions added AED 398 million to EBITDA in the quarter, accounting for 7% of the total. Meanwhile, Oil & Gas profitability continued to be impacted by lower commodity prices and reduced production. Asjad will take you through the underlying factors impacting revenue EBITDA growth of each segment later in the presentation. Turning to nonoperating P&L items for the third quarter of '24. These items below EBITDA, interest income declined 29% year-on-year as a result of the utilization of cash for CapEx and investment activities. Overall, net profit attributable to TAQA increased 15% year-on-year, benefiting in particular from a healthy bottom line growth in generation, the consolidation of TAQA Water Solutions and lower taxation. Turning to liquidity and the debt profile. Total debt declined to AED 61 billion as of the end of September. The repayment of about USD 1 billion in outstanding bond issues earlier in the year serves as the biggest factor impacting this line item. Our debt continues to be almost entirely fixed at an attractive level of 4.9%. The increase in interest costs compared to December last year can be explained by the repayment of lower cost of bonds and additional addition of the TAQA Water Solutions debt. Our net debt-to-EBITDA ratio remained largely unchanged compared to December 2023. Note that the ratio for 2023 December has been recalculated under the new the EBITDA definition. [indiscernible] remains the core of our financial strength. This was reflected in the strong investor interest we received for the USD 1.75 billion bond issue in October. I'll now pass back to Asjad, who will lead us through an overview of the segment performance.

Thank you, Steve. Starting with Transmission and Distribution. The segment delivered strong operational and financial results during the third quarter. Network availability remained solid at 99%. One important change that Steve alluded to earlier is that Abu Dhabi distribution company and Al Ain Distribution Company are to be merged under a single new brand as part of the launch of TAQA's unified brand identity. Transmission and distribution CapEx increased by 35%, which was driven by the timing and phasing of project implementation across the sector. Our regulated asset base decreased slightly to AED 76.5 billion. Again, as Steve mentioned earlier, T&D revenues increased 24% year-over-year. This was led by a combination of higher MAR as a result of positive impact of RC2, an increase in pass-through revenues and reimbursement of corporate income tax. EBITDA meanwhile, grew 6% year-over-year, benefiting from the impact of RC2 framework and inflation. Moving to generation. From an operational standpoint, commercial availability improved from 95.9% to 98.6%. This was primarily driven by lower outages across the UAE portfolio and the timing of maintenance activities. CapEx surged to AED 368 million, driven by construction progress on the Mirfa 2 and Shuweihat 4 Reverse Osmosis desalination plants. On the portfolio development front, we achieved the financial closing of Najim Cogeneration Company Limited in Saudi Arabia. Another recent notable transaction is the completion of the acquisition of 50% stake in Terra-Gen by Masdar. Terra-Gen is one of the largest independent renewable energy producers in the U.S., and this acquisition represents one of the most significant transactions in the sector this year. On the financial front, generation revenues grew 1% year-over-year, supported by the recovery of corporate income tax. EBITDA, on the other hand, recorded a stronger 19% year-over-year growth as a result of higher contributions from associates and JVs and improved profitability of the UAE fleet. Moving to TAQA Water Solutions. We completed the acquisition of TWS in September, and the company has subsequently been rebranded to TAQA Water Solutions. It continues to add significant value to the group and accounted for 4% of total revenues and 7% of EBITDA in Q3 2024 on the back of a very healthy 65% EBITDA margin. TWS asset availability reached 94.3%, highlighting strong operational performance during this period. In terms of oil and gas, continuing with the trend seen in recent quarters, production declined in the third quarter as a result of a cessation of production in the Northern North Sea. I should add over here that we have successfully completed -- successfully ceased operations on the Northern North Sea assets and are now moving towards a safe and efficient decommissioning of the assets. This decrease was partially offset by an increase in production in our Canadian assets. CapEx for the segment increased 26% year-over-year due to higher drilling and infrastructure investment in Canada. In August, we also completed the sale of our interest in the Atrush field in Iraq. In terms of financial performance, Oil and Gas segment's results were impacted by a combination of lower commodity prices and a decrease in production. Average realized oil price decreased by 17% year-over-year, while the average realized gas price declined by 61% year-over-year. This translated into a 38% year-over-year decline in revenues and a 31% decline in EBITDA over the same period. Taking a look at the performance of the 9 months as a whole, our top line grew by 6% year-over-year. This was largely driven by an increase in revenues in the T&D business and consolidation of TWS into our accounts. On a reported basis, group EBITDA dropped 36% year-over-year. The 9-month period for 2023 included a one-off gain of AED 10.8 billion on our investment in ADNOC Gas. Excluding this one-off, EBITDA was up 9% year-over-year on a like-for-like basis. Net income similarly dropped 59% on a reported basis. In addition to the aforementioned gain on ADNOC Gas, net income for the first 9 months of 2023 was also impacted by AED 1.1 billion deferred tax charge. Adjusting for these items, net income grew 13% year-over-year in the first 9 months of 2024. Free cash flow for this period was AED 2.9 billion. Cash generation was impacted by an increase in CapEx, higher investments, and working capital changes. I'll now hand over back to Steve to conclude this formal presentation with closing remarks.

Thank you, Asjad. Starting on the strategic front, TAQA has commenced a comprehensive exercise to unify brand identity across its portfolio. This major milestone is a key part to our evolutionary journey. This rebranding is expected to significantly increase awareness and understanding of the scale and breadth of our business. This process will include the merger of Abu Dhabi Distribution Company and Al Ain Distribution Company to a single brand and a single company called TAQA Distribution. We are confident this rebranding will play a vital part in enhancing customer experience and strengthening our internal capabilities. Moving to ESG. Our sustained efforts on this front continue to garner attention from the market as well as rating agencies. As I've already mentioned, our MSCI rating was upgraded to single A compared to CCC in 2020 when the new TAQA came into being. We also completed another successful USD 1.75 billion dual-tranche bond placement in October, including our second green issuance. Both tranches were priced below our portfolio-wide debt cost of 4.9% at the end of September 2024. 12-year green notes were priced at 4.75%, while the 7-year conventional notes bear a coupon rate of 4.375%. And we were, in fact, able to price the bond at a 0 new issue premium in what was a very volatile week in terms of global and regional news. We see this as a testament to TAQA's underlying operational financial strength, which in turn makes the company a very attractive proposition for investors. Last but not least, we continue to make significant progress towards achieving our 2030 targets. Total gross generation capacity stood at 52 gigawatts at the end of Q3 2024 compared to 39 gigawatts at the time of our announcement of our 2030 targets. We remain confident we will deliver on our stated targets, including the 150 gigawatt capacity target. I'd like to point out the KSA market in particular, where TAQA is capitalizing on its position as one of the leading utility players in the region. We have announced several project wins in the Kingdom during recent months. We'll provide a more comprehensive update with our Q4 2024 results of how the company is progressing relative to its longer-term targets. As always, I remain confident about the growth, availability of TAQA and continue to view the future with great optimism. Thank you, back to Asjad.

Thank you. I'll now open the floor to Q&A. Please raise your hand, and I'll open up the mic for you to speak. All right. It looks like there's no questions this time around. So thank you very much for joining us. We look forward to speaking to you next quarter again and always -- as always, interacting in between as well. We're always available if you have any questions, feel free to e-mail me, and we'll be in touch. Thank you very much for attending.