Kaldvik AS (KLDVK) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the presentation of Kaldvik's results for the third quarter in 2024. My name is Roy-Tore Rikardsen, and I am the CEO of Kaldvik. Together with the CFO, Robert Robertsson, we will take you through the presentation this morning. This disclaimer you all know, so we'll just skip that. The agenda, and after the presentation, we will have a Q&A session. [Operator Instructions] Our Q3 highlights. In Q3, we had an operational EBIT of EUR 2.1 million. We harvested 3,800 tonnes with a superior share of 93% in the quarter, which is pretty good. Our group EBIT was EUR 0.55 per kilo, and we are relatively pleased with the result in a demanding quarter with low prices. It's still a strong biological status with around 22,500 tonnes biomass in sea at the end of the quarter. And also the smolt production is going well. And we also have this new reporting currency, and Robert will include that in his presentation. And we have the guiding for 2024, it's 15,000 tonnes, and it's down from 17,500 tonnes in the second quarter. So farming operation done, I will -- we will start with an update on this. During the quarter, we released 2 million smolts with an average weight of roughly 360 grams. We anticipate releasing around 6.2 million in 2024 compared to 5.4 million in 2023. At the end of the third quarter, we had released 4.0 million smolts. And the remaining 2.2 million are expected to be released in October and November. Of course, we have -- we had higher ambitions for 2024, but a delay in building activity in North lowered our input in -- so far in 2024. So we have had our challenges with winter wounds and ISA. Happily, all our smolt is vaccinated with a new vaccine against winter wounds, tailored for the Icelandic condition and also ISA vaccine. As you all know, smolt is important, and it has been important for Kaldvik for many, many years. Our extensive project to improve the quality and the capacity of smolts production in '23 and '24 are coming to an end, and we expect to produce and deliver around 7.5 million smolts per year going forward with an average weight of plus 400 grams. The production volume in North and South will be over 40,000 cubic meter, and with the licenses of 6,000 tonnes, we could have a yearly theoretical capacity of 10 million smolt at 600 grams. But we still need some more CapEx to carry out the project. So in total, we will be able to create a fund amount for reaching our milestones going forward. So to our sea farming operation. Record high production in the quarter with a net growth of 9,000 tonnes even though we had 1-degree lower average temperature compared to earlier years. And the biomass, as mentioned, is -- in the highlight is a record high, 22,500 tonnes at the quarter's end. And also our, i.e., cameras still show no sea lice, and that is confirmed manually and also during the harvest. We expect harvesting at full capacity in the fourth quarter and also in the first quarter of 2025. And also the 12-month rolling mortality rate shows that we have a mortality of 6.1% at the end of the third quarter, and that's a really low number. So over to the harvesting in the third quarter. We harvested 3,800 tonnes this quarter, and it was 700 tonnes below the guidance. And we will harvest 6,700 tonnes in the fourth quarter, which will give us a really good utilization of our harvesting capacity. As we highlighted, we lowered the guidance for 2024 down to 15,000 tonnes. This is due to lower capacity in our value chain and harvesting and delay on the extra wellboat capacity. Next year, harvest volume, our guidance is 25,000 tonnes. This means that 2,500 tonnes is gone from the last quarter's guidance, but we haven't had more morts -- mortality, and we still have the number of fish. So this is also a part of the restrategizing production to achieve higher harvesting weight and have more volume in quarters with historically higher prices and may also for the year of 2026. The price achievement in the third quarter went down from EUR 7.3 in the second quarter to EUR 6.2 in the third quarter. And we harvest most of our volume in September with the lowest prices this quarter. It was 2,000 tonnes. Utilization of the capacity at the harvesting station and wellboat throughout the quarter lowered our harvesting cost. So we also installed a new gutting machine in the harvesting station in Djúpivogur. And we finally received the ASC certification in the third quarter, so we can start to capitalize in the market, and it's also a demand for all the customers out there. So this ends the operational update from my side, and I will let Robert take us through the financial update.

Thank you, Roy. Good morning. As Roy-Tore mentioned earlier, we have changed the reporting currency for Kaldvik from NOK to euros. This is due to the fact that the group's functional currency is now euros. The group is financed in euros, a big majority of our revenues and big portion of our costs are in euros. And the main assets in the Norwegian parent company are shares in the Icelandic subsidiaries who are Euro companies. This exercise will alleviate the translation risk that existed when the Norwegian parent was using NOK. So the financial statements are now presented in euros, and all comparative figures have been translated to euros using the year-end 2023 conversion ratio. And here, you have the highlights from the quarter. Total group revenue amounted to EUR 24.5 million, which is a significant increase from the corresponding quarter last year and also from last quarter, the second quarter. As mentioned earlier, the harvest volume amounted to around 3,800 tonnes, which is also a significant increase. Cost levels decreased from last quarter, which is -- which was expected as harvest volume increased. The cost levels enabled the company to better utilize the harvesting station and wellboats, thus lowering the cost levels of the company. The average price achievement decreased from last quarter, as expected. The average price achievement amounted to EUR 6.2, like Roy mentioned earlier, compared to EUR 7.3 per kilo in second quarter. Despite reduced price achievement, the group's operational EBIT reached EUR 2.1 million during the quarter and EBIT per kilo amounted to EUR 0.55. And so we are pretty satisfied with the overall results of the quarter. And over to the balance sheet assets. As demonstrated on the graph on the left-hand side, total assets increased by roughly EUR 31 million during the quarter. Investments in working capital and CapEx make up majority of the asset increase. The book value of biological assets increased by roughly EUR 22 million and ended around EUR 155 million at the end of the quarter. Total liabilities increased by roughly EUR 31 million, like, well, basically almost the same number as the asset increase. And this is -- the liability is increasing due to financing of CapEx and financing of our biological investments. And finally, our financial health remains robust with around 57% equity ratio. And here, you can see high level analysis of net interest-bearing debt, which increased by EUR 17 million during the quarter. The main aspects of the EBITDA are shown here in the flow chart -- sorry, main aspects of the net interest-bearing debt are shown here in the flow chart. EBITDA reached around EUR 5 million in the quarter. Net investments in working capital, particularly in biological assets amounted to EUR 12 million. CapEx investment amounted to EUR 5.5 million, and we keep our CapEx guidance for 2024 of EUR 25 million. Financial items amounted to EUR 3.6 million, where finance cost is the main contributor. And as previously stated, Kaldvik activated incremental borrowing of EUR 23.5 million last June. The borrowing is split into a EUR 12 million increase of the revolving facility, that's the facility for our biological investments, and EUR 11.5 million in CapEx facility. And Kaldvik is fully financed through 2025 with a total bank facility of EUR 180 million. Net loans from the bank syndicate amounted to around EUR 154 million at the end of the quarter. That's it for me. Thank you. I'll turn over to Roy again.

Yes. Our 30,000 tonnes milestone in reach. We faced a setback in 2022 with the detection of the ISA, which impacted our harvest volumes in '23 and beyond. However, I'm looking forward to a year with higher volumes, demonstrating that we have laid a solid foundation for our continued growth towards our milestone of 30,000 tonnes. I have spent the first months here in Iceland to get to know the organization, both sea and land, and also the harvesting station and all the operations. And it's good to see, especially that there has been low mortality and no sea lice on the East Coast. So I'm excited to join a company like Kaldvik. So this is a company with the potential to achieve a sustainable production of over 30,000 tonnes of salmon. And this, along with over 200 dedicated employees who work tirelessly every day to produce food for a growing global population, that really inspires me. So the Kaldvik team have already identified 3 projects for going beyond the 30,000 tonnes. And we will continue working on these 3 projects. Produce bigger smolts, especially for releasing in the fall. What will give us a shorter production cycle, maybe 2 years in the sea instead of 3 years, and therefore, also reduce our operational risk in sea. We also want to start utilizing our sterile licenses, and we did a trial some years ago, where we've not succeeded, but there has been some development on the sterile since then. And as also, it's 12,800 tonnes of MAB. We are looking into optimization of our production areas. That means utilizing -- better utilizing of our MAB. For now we are only utilizing a little bit more than 50% of our MAB licenses. So this is the growth ambitions, areas under planning, and we will come back when we are ready for execution. Outlook and summary. When it comes to the market, we see a good opportunity globally for our premium salmon. And we are also positive to prices next year. When it comes to the harvest outlook, as we have mentioned, both me and Robert, is that we -- in 2024, we'll harvest 15,000 tonnes and we will deliver 25,000 tonne ASC salmon -- ASC-certified salmon to the market in 2025, and the fourth quarter of '24, we will do 6,700 tonnes. And also we have mentioned this new reporting currency. And we're also looking at -- we have focus on improving quality and performing -- performance of our operation. And, yes, we also stepped closer to get the 10,000 tonnes license in Ísafjarðardjúp. It's 6,500 tonnes fertile and 3,500 tonnes sterile licenses. So we hope to have the licenses in place in the first half of 2025. And also when it comes to investment, we are -- we have an investment program to reach our capacity for 30,000 tonnes. And we also invest in sustainable production. And now, we are open for questions, Robert. Thank you.

Yes, we have questions. Ola asks, can you comment on the harvest profile for 2025 versus 2024? How much is in the first half of the year versus second half of the year?

Okay. The answer there is for 2024, we had -- I think it was -- there was a split, 30-70, and for 2025, it will be 45% in the first half and around 50%, 55% in second half.

So significant improvements to our harvesting profile. How much of the guided volumes in '25 comes from the '24 generation? And how much comes from the '23 generation?

'23, I think it's -- I'm not 100% sure there, but I think most of the harvesting in 2025 comes from '23.

What is the contract here for Q4 '24?

I think we will have approximately 20% to 30% in contracts in the fourth quarter.

Do you expect lower costs in the coming quarters as well with even higher volumes and scale benefit for harvesting? Because we expect the cost level to remain stable. With increased harvesting, we are optimizing or even getting better utilization of our harvesting station and wellboats. So that's a plus. But yes, with increased harvest, we anticipate the cost level to come down even lower. But I think, at least for now, we are anticipating stable cost level in the coming quarters. You expect improved price achievement in Q4. Is this due to higher harvest rate? Yes. The first question is, is it the highest? Yes. Obviously, we have postponed some of our harvest. That exercise was partly due to the fact that we wanted to better utilize the growth period in Q3 as well as optimization of the price achievement and profitability of the company. So I think it's a combination of the 2, better price achievement, hopefully, and even bigger fish that we're harvesting. If the harvest rate was 4 kilos in Q3, what do you expect the coming quarters?

We expect that the harvesting rates are 10% to 20% higher, so [indiscernible] -- yes, once again, we will see that.

Yes. What is your long-term target, I guess, when it comes to the harvest weight?

It's to be over 4.5 kilo at least in average weight, so 4.5 to 4.7. So it's a good harvesting weight.

Yes. What was the sales split by geography in Q3? I think it was approximately 70-30, 70% going to Europe and 30% going to the U.S. But I'm -- yes, I can't swear by those numbers, but that's approximately what I think. How much to U.S. and Europe, for example? And how do you plan for the upcoming increase in sales volume? Yes, we are -- we have set up our sales team. Our former CEO is now the Head of the Sales Organization of the company. And his focus is to find new markets. We have been putting some focus on Asia. And -- yes...

I think also that still the U.S. market is important for us, so we will be on every corner of the world, hopefully, with the Kaldvik.

Yes. Okay. So -- if there are any other questions, please share either in chat or just speak up. If not, then I think we are done, good for now. Thank you.

Yes. So, everyone, thank you for listening.