Genesis Energy Limited (GNE) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Thank you for standing by, and welcome to Genesis Energy Full Year Results for the 2026 Analyst Briefing. [Operator Instructions] I would now like to hand the conference over to Mr. Malcolm Johns, Chief Executive Officer. Please go ahead.

Welcome, everybody, and thank you for your time. It is a pleasure to be here today to talk you through our FY '26 results. My name is Malcolm Johns, Chief Executive of Genesis, and I'm pleased to be joined today by Emma Oettli, our CFO; and Michael Hunter, our GM, Investor Relations. I'd also like to introduce you to the wider executive team doing an awesome job. Claire Walker, our Chief People Officer, has worked hard to strengthen our leadership bench through a combination of building and buying talent, setting up strong internal succession lines. Stephen England-Hall, our Chief Revenue Officer, leads our trading portfolio and customer teams, driving commercial performance and customer value to a strong result in this past year. He also led the final stages of our move to a single repositioned Genesis brand, which went live in August. Matthew Osborne is our Chief Corporate Affairs Officer, a busy year with a number of regulatory and policy matters in play. Ed Hyde, our Chief Technology and Transformation Officer, delivering our 3 major platform upgrades on time and within budget. Tracey Hickman, our Chief Operating Officer, excellent execution of existing asset upgrades and delivery of our pipeline of new renewable generation. Every part of our business is delivering our strategy well, and you will see the proof points as we talk through our FY '26 results and then look out to FY '28 and FY '32. On the screen now is today's agenda. We will spend about 20 minutes talking through FY '26 before touching on our outlook to '28 and '32 and then moving to your questions. Our strategy remains Gen35, and we are delivering Horizon 2, the period out to FY '32 or what we call the FY '32 growth plan. At Genesis, we believe electricity is the solution to New Zealand's energy challenge. It's efficient, it's increasingly renewable. And because it's made in New Zealand, it provides greater energy security and independence. However, today it only makes up around 30% of New Zealand's total annual energy. 70% comes from fossil fuels. And as we have seen since the Iran conflict began, this can have a material impact on the total energy costs for Kiwi homes and businesses. If electricity made up 60% of New Zealand's total annual energy today, the average household would save up to $3,000 per annum on their total energy costs or New Zealand's total annual energy bill would be around $10 billion a year less than it is today. This is why our vision is a country that lives life at full power, homes, businesses and the country leveraging our natural renewable electricity advantage to thrive at full power for this generation and the generations that come after us. Achieving this is about the electrification of transport and heat. This will not only lower the total cost of energy for our customers, it will also grow demand for our products and services. As a sector, we must deliver the 60, 95, 100 formula. 60% electrification of New Zealand's total energy, at least 95% renewable generation and electricity that is available 100% of the time regardless of the weather or customer demand outcomes. For Genesis, Gen35 is about growing customer demand for electricity through electrification, reducing average generation costs from increased renewable generation investment and energy security and flexibility from Huntly Power Station. For our investors, we are focused on embedding 3 commercial foundations in our culture: margin quality, cost discipline and strong capital management. Gen35 life at full power delivers for our customers, our investors and for our country. Can I now hand to Emma to talk you through FY '26. Emma?

Thanks, Malcolm, and cure, everyone. FY '26 provides a number of important proof points that Gen35 is translating into financial outcomes. At the heart of our strategy, we are focused on 3 commercial disciplines: margin quality, cost discipline and strong capital management. On margin quality, group gross margin increased to $949 million, our strongest result to date, reflecting improved customer netback and lower generation cost. On cost discipline, cost to serve reduced as planned and investment within our Big Rock program remains within the overall $145 million program envelope. And on capital management, the March equity raise materially strengthened our balance sheet and provides funding capacity to fund the next stage of our growth program while retaining investment-grade credit metrics. Together, these highlights demonstrate tangible progress in executing Gen35. I'll now take you through our FY '26 business performance and the progress we've made across customer, renewables, Huntly and our Big Rocks technology program. In customer, our strategy over the past 18 months has deliberately prioritized value over volume to support margin quality and cost discipline. We have repositioned the portfolio while simplifying our brands, products and operating model. This did result in lower customer numbers during FY '26, but the economic outcome was strong. Electricity netback increased to around $176 per megawatt hour, cost to acquire reduced materially and cost to serve also declined. At the same time, we continue to build higher value relationships around electrification. EV plan connections increased, rooftop solar connections grew and flexible customer demand reached 58 megawatts. The final stage of our move to a single brand strategy was completed in the fourth quarter. And since June, ICPs have returned to growth. The important point is we are targeting profitable customer growth that supports both margin quality and cost discipline. Alongside customer, we are investing to structurally lower the cost of our generation portfolio. Our FY '32 growth plan targets more than 2 terawatt hours of additional renewable generation, allowing us to progressively displace higher cost baseload thermal generation. During FY '26, Tihori solar farm moved into construction. And today, we are pleased to announce the final investment decision for the Leeston solar farm in Canterbury. Lauriston completed its first full year of operation, and we have also secured additional geothermal supply from Ngawha from 2029, further strengthening and diversifying our renewable supply. And we continue to progress a broader pipeline across wind and solar. Investment decisions remain subject to our capital management framework. They need to improve portfolio economics and meet our target returns. As our renewable portfolio grows, Huntly continues to evolve alongside it. We're positioning Huntly for the future needs of Genesis, transitioning away from baseload gas generation by around FY '29 or earlier, adding Huntly firming options, increasing our asset-backed trading activity and firming Genesis customer needs. Based on current market conditions and assuming no major outages or significant regulatory change, we are confident that Huntly, together with our hydro assets can provide all the flexibility, firming and peaking capacity Genesis will need to grow securely for the foreseeable future. We see Huntly centered around our new batteries, 3 upgraded ranking units and our fast-start peaker. We retained the option for a second fast-start peaker, although there is no commercial case for that investment today. Those assets will be supported by diversified fuels of coal, gas and diesel, with biomass remaining an option as economics improve into the 2030s. Should imported gas become an option, fuel pricing will determine which fuels are dispatched at what times. We continue to engage on gas storage. However, while this may be helpful, it is not fundamental to delivering our FY '32 growth plan. We plan to continue contracting minimum levels of take-or-pay gas except where price and volume is commercially attractive. As we have done over recent years, we will continue to leverage our fuel diversity alongside the wholesale electricity market and tactical short-term gas contracts to drive margin quality. Unit 5 is a large, well-maintained generation asset. However, its size and minimum operating range of 180 megawatts makes it increasingly challenging to see a commercial case to support it once baseload gas generation is displaced. We have been clear since we launched Gen35 in FY '24 that we will only maintain assets with clear and reliable commercial business cases. Over the next 12 months, we will be undertaking a review of Unit 5's commercial future. All options will be considered, including offshore sale. Finally, a quick update on our technology program. As we set out at our 2024 Investor Day, we're delivering 3 major technology programs; a new billing and CRM system, a new financial management system and a new electricity trading and risk management platform. These are complex programs, but we remain on track to complete them by the end of FY '27 within a total cash envelope of $145 million. Turning now to our group financial performance. FY '26 delivered strong earnings, strong cash generation and a stronger balance sheet, reflecting the disciplined execution I've discussed. In FY '26, we delivered our strongest gross margin to date, up 10% on the prior year, reflecting improvement in margin quality in our customer book and lower generation costs. This translated into reported EBITDAF of $518 million and normalized EBITDAF of $522 million, while also funding around $56 million of operating expenditure associated with our Big Rock technology investment and single brand strategy. Looking at the $85 million increase in gross margin, the 2 largest drivers were improved margin quality in our customer book and lower generation costs as a result of increased hydro and a full year of Tauhara and Lauriston. Market conditions provided less opportunity to add value through length. That lower contribution was partly offset by Huntly firming option premiums in the second half. On operating expenditure, normalized OpEx increased $16 million to $377 million. The increase reflects wage inflation, technology support, a full year of Ecotricity OpEx and $5 million associated with the single brand strategy. Note, there has been a $15 million reclassification of metering costs to gross margin during the year. As the major technology and single brand programs conclude in FY '27, the focus increasingly shifts towards converting these investments into ongoing margin quality and productivity benefits. The operating result translated strongly into cash. Operating free cash flow was $322 million, which is the equivalent of a 62% cash conversion ratio. Working capital was a positive contributor, including payments from counterparties supporting the strategic coal stockpile under our Huntly firming options. Our capital program remains balanced between maintaining the resilience of existing assets and investing in growth. Same business CapEx was $119 million. This included investment in the Rankines as part of the Huntly life extension program. This multiyear program supports the continued availability of Rankines through the FY '35, consistent with the Huntly firming options. Growth CapEx was $182 million, concentrated on solar development and BESS, which will progressively displace higher cost thermal generation and structurally lower our long-term cost of generation. Our strong cash generation, together with the $400 million equity raise has materially strengthened the balance sheet. Net debt has reduced to approximately $940 million, and our debt-to-EBITDAF ratio has reduced to 1.6x. This gives us the financial capacity to execute the FY '32 growth plan while maintaining resilience through energy market cycles. The Board has declared a final dividend of $0.0758 per share, taking the full year dividend to $0.1488 per share. The Board has set a fixed dividend policy through to FY '28. We expect to provide an update on our dividend policy beyond FY '28 at the FY '27 half year results. Turning now to FY '27. For FY '27, we are guiding to normalized EBITDAF of $480 million to $520 million, assuming P50 hydro, wind and solar conditions. As always, guidance remains subject to hydrology, fuel availability and plant reliability. Our digital Big Rocks program will conclude in FY '27 with around $45 million of final program spend. Stay in business CapEx is expected to increase to $140 million to $150 million, reflecting the second year of the Huntly life extension program. And growth investment is expected to be up to $325 million, predominantly supporting battery and solar developments. I'll now pass back to Malcolm to discuss the group outlook and closing remarks.

Thank you, Emma. A solid year with good proof points, our strategy delivery as we balance the needs for our customers and investors. We have balanced investment well between supporting better services and products for our customers and to set the business up for competitive returns and growth for our shareholders. FY '28 remains our target year for being clear of major technology investment. Current wholesale electricity prices present a potential near-term opportunity and risk. However, our outlook to FY '28 continues to see credible pathways to EBITDAF in the upper $500 million range. That outlook is based on P50 generation assumptions, no major changes to regulatory or market settings and no significant unplanned outages or fuel disruptions. Importantly, it reflects the continued benefits to our customers and investors from executing our strategy to deliver improved margin quality, cost discipline and strong capital management. If we now look beyond FY '28 and out to FY '32, this is Horizon 2 of Gen35, the period from now out to FY '32. We first shared this framework during our successful capital raise earlier in the year. The FY '32 growth plan has 5 commercial pillars to it: customer, where we are focused on growing demand through electrification of transport and heat along with new and emerging demand sources. This will also lower the total cost of energy for our customers, as I mentioned earlier. Renewables, where our focus is structurally lowering our long-term average generation cost through investing in new renewable generation. Huntly, where we are leveraging the existing and emerging growth opportunities the Huntly site offers us to firm our portfolio and increase asset-backed trading. OpEx, returning to core operating cost levels from FY '28 and delivering ongoing productivity gains and our headwinds, the cost of maintaining a future development pipeline of around 2,500 megawatts and the known and planned decline of Kupe out to around FY '34. So to recap, we are building a culture focused on margin quality, cost discipline and strong capital management to deliver demand growth, a lower average generation cost, leveraging the opportunities from the Huntly site, deliver a competitive operating cost base and lean into our known headwinds. Thank you for your time today. We will now move to your questions.

[Operator Instructions] Our first question is from Grant Swanepoel with Jarden.

So you've started the year really well from a hydro perspective. Your guidance is sitting midrange at $500 million. Does that mean that because it's a P50 actually, at the moment, we're tracking above mid guidance? And on that front, the gas that you're on selling, is there a bit of a loss in that through winter? And how do you mitigate that going forward? And with that in mind, is the Tariki gas storage potential still looking good, even though you are saying you haven't committed to that yet?

Thanks, Grant. Obviously, we've guided based on P50 hydro, wind and solar and hydro conditions will play a role in terms of where our final result lands as they did in FY '26. We also, of course, have the remainder of the tech project OpEx in there and the remainder of the single brand OpEx in there as well. So that's where we've come to the $480 million, $520 million is based on P50 hydro, wind and solar and with those known big project costs in there. In terms of gas, I'm not sure I understood your question correctly. Could you just repeat it?

Well, you would normally have to use a lot more gas and you've sold that gas on through winter because you've had so much water. Is that gas being sold at a material loss to what you're paying for it?

No. In terms of our net position, no.

And Tariki? How is that developing?

And Tariki, so we'll continue to have engagement with the joint venture partners that own Tariki. They're in subsurface work at this point in time. Quite clearly, as we said, gas storage is helpful, not essential to Genesis' FY '32 position, but potentially material to the long-term viability of Unit 5.

Second question is around IT delivery. You're saying that most of that will be done by the end of FY '27. Is there quite a bit of slippage in that or is the slippage under your control?

The slippage is under our control at the moment. As we said, I think at results last year, the 3 big systems we're replacing is like a heart and lung transplant for the business. The financial management system is now in. The electricity trading and risk management system is well advanced. We're through the first phase of the billing and CRM system. The big migration will occur in the second half of this financial year. And once that's complete, then all 3 systems will be in place. But we would consider it at this point in time to be under our control, Grant.

Our next question is from Joshua Dale with Craigs Investment Partners.

Just on your FY '28 EBITDAF target for $500 million, stay on track with commissioning of Leeston and Edgecumbe solar is pretty critical to reaching that target in that specific time frame. What gives you confidence those are going to come in on time? And what is the risk of slippage?

We're working with reputable EPCs. And so on that basis and based on our experience to date, we see no reason for slippage in COD in those projects. As with all of these projects, that's based on our knowledge today. If we encounter problems, there's always a risk of that, but we don't see it as a high risk at this point in time, Josh.

Okay. That's great. Second question, just around gas. If we look at Slide 31, it shows your equity ownership in Kupe dropping to 0 in the middle of 2029. If you are off baseload gas by then, I guess, perhaps, it's less important to have. What is your thinking around keeping Kupe? And I suppose also if you are exploring an offshore sale of Unit 5, have you done any preliminary work around what price per megawatt might be achievable? I appreciate it's conditional on LNG.

Yes. So those dips that you can see, in particular, in November '25 are the planned outages for Kupe gas field, and they normally occur in November each year and they coincide with the planned outages of Unit 5. So that's why you see that. But in essence, I'm not actually 100% sure why our equity gas drops to 0 then. Let us find out the answer to that and come back to you, Josh. In terms of your second question, which was about offshore sales, we have done some preliminary work around what the international market for units like Unit 5 is. And you can do the same thing yourself if you want to, just basically Google them and there's a number of different purveyors of these machines. And I wouldn't want to put a price on it at the moment, but the 4-year time line that -- the wait list, sorry, that's in the market at the moment means there is a demand for these machines and people are paying attractive prices for them.

Our next question is from Andrew Harvey-Green with Forsyth Barr.