Warrior Met Coal, Inc. (HCC) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning, and welcome to the Annual Meeting of Stockholders of Warrior Met Coal. Please note that today's meeting is being recorded. [Operator Instructions] It is now my pleasure to turn today's meeting over to Stephen D. Williams, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Warrior Met Coal. Mr. Williams, the floor is yours.

Thank you, and good morning. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the 2021 Annual Meeting of Stockholders of Warrior Met Coal. My name is Stephen Williams, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the company. I now call this meeting to order. I would like to introduce Walter Scheller, the company's Chief Executive Officer and a director of the company. Mr. Scheller will be administering this year's meeting in order to minimize potential interruptions caused by various speakers being in different remote locations. Mr. Scheller?

Thank you, Doug. Here with me is Kelli Gant, Chief Administrative Officer and Secretary of the company, who will act as Secretary for the meeting. Also present is Dale Boyles, Chief Financial Officer of the company. I would like to also introduce the 5 other directors of the company who are participating in this meeting virtually: Ana Amicarella, Brett Harvey, Alan Schumacher, Gareth Turner and Stephen Williams. We are hosting this year's meeting in a virtual format, which will allow us to conduct a safe meeting in light of the coronavirus pandemic. The agenda for today's meeting should be visible on your screen, and the meeting procedures should be available on the meeting website as well. As the agenda notes, there will be a general question-and-answer session at the end of this meeting. Unless related to a particular proposal up for vote, please hold any questions until the designated question-and-answer portion of the meeting. Please submit any questions electronically by following the instructions provided on the meeting website. I would now like to acknowledge Ms. Courtney Lam, who's been appointed to serve as the independent inspector of election at this 2021 Annual Meeting. Ms. Lamb is attending virtually and has taken a note of office, which the Secretary will incorporate as part of the minutes of this meeting. Thank you, Courtney. I would also like to introduce the Affidavit of mailing from Computershare Communication Services, Inc. Computershare certified that beginning on March 15, 2021, a notice of availability of proxy materials was mailed to the registered stockholders as of the record date and to each bank, broker and other nominee through which beneficial holders held their shares as of the record date. A certified list of all registered stockholders entitled to vote at this meeting is available for inspection by our stockholders at any time during the meeting. The list indicates that as of March 5, 2021, 51,353,326 shares of the company's common stock were outstanding and entitled to notice of and to vote at this meeting. The inspector of election has reported that there are present at this meeting in person or by proxy and entitled to vote, approximately 46,271,054 shares. This -- thus, a quorum is present for this transaction of business, and the meeting is duly convened. There are 3 matters for consideration today. These matters are the election of 6 directors, the approval on an advisory basis of the compensation of our named executive officers and the ratification of the appointment of Ernst & Young LLP as the company's independent registered public accounting firm for the year ending December 31, 2021. If you wish to change your vote or you have not previously voted and wish to vote during this meeting, please follow the voting instructions on the meeting website. Only persons holding a valid proxy for such shares or with proper evidence of stock ownership may vote during this meeting. I now declare the polls open. I will outline each of the 3 proposals. The first item of business is the election of 6 directors to the company's Board. The 6 nominees as placed before the meeting in the proxy statement are: Ana B. Amicarella; J. Brett Harvey; Alan H. Schumacher; Gareth Turner; Stephen D. Williams; and I'm, Walter J. Scheller III. Each of these nominees is currently serving as a Director of Warrior Met Coal. I hereby declare all 6 individuals duly nominated for election. As the company has not received timely notice in accordance with the company's bylaws of any other proposed nominations, I declare the nominations closed. The Board of Directors recommends that stockholders vote for the election of each of the 6 Director nominees. The next item of business for consideration is a resolution to approve on an advisory basis, the compensation paid to the company's named executive officers as disclosed in the company's proxy statement. The Board of Directors recommends that stockholders vote for the compensation of our named executive officers. The next item of business for consideration of a proposal to ratify the appointment of Ernst & Young LLP as the company's independent registered public accounting firm for the year ending December 31, 2021. Before proceeding, I would like to acknowledge Mr. Richard and Ms. Caroline Wilson from Ernst & Young LLP, who are attending this meeting virtually. Ernst & Young served as the company's independent registered public accounting firm for fiscal 2020 and has been selected by the Audit Committee to serve in the same capacity for fiscal 2021. There will be a question-and-answer period later in the meeting during which our stockholders can ask your questions if they wish, and you'll have the opportunity to make a statement. Thank you. The Board of Directors recommends that stockholders vote for the ratification of the appointment of Ernst & Young LLP as the company's independent registered public accounting firm for the year ending December 31, 2021. We will now take any questions related to these proposals. Please hold any other questions that you may have until the general question-and-answer session of the meeting. I direct that the vote be taken for the election of directors, the advisory vote on the compensation of the company's named executive officers and the ratification of the company's independent registered public accounting firm for year ending December 31, 2021. I hereby declare that the polls are now closed. We will now report on the results of the voting. Please note that these are preliminary results, and we will report the final results in the current report Form 8-K to be filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission within 4 business days following today's meeting. I would now like to turn the meeting over to Kelli Gant, Secretary of the meeting to report on the preliminary voting results.

Thank you, Mr. Scheller. Based on information provided by the inspector of election, we are pleased to announce that the preliminary voting results indicate that the company's 6 director nominees have been reelected to the Board. On the advisory vote of the stockholders regarding the compensation of the company's named executive officers, the preliminary voting results indicate that the compensation of the, as disclosed in the company's proxy statement, has been approved. Third, the preliminary voting results also indicate that Ernst & Young LLP has been ratified as the company's independent accounting firm for the year ending December 31, 2021.

Thank you, Ms. Gant. The formal business portion of our meeting is now concluded. Before we begin, let's please note that today's discussion may contain forward-looking statements, and actual results may differ materially from these -- those discussed. For more information regarding forward-looking statements, please refer to our SEC filings. Also, please note that we have posted reconciliations of the non-GAAP financial measures discussed during this meeting on the Investors section of the company's website. I'd like to begin by acknowledging present circumstances and the reason we are meeting virtually today. Last year's widespread outbreak of COVID-19 has affected us all in new and unprecedented ways. While we continue to operate our minds as critical infrastructure business in the state of Alabama, these are challenging times, and I would like to thank all of our employees for their hard work and resilience in the face of adversity. We've taken the necessary measures to adjust our workplace environment to comply with all social distancing and personal hygiene guidelines set forth by various global, national and state-level health organizations, while maintaining our operations. In my view, this is quite an accomplishment. Despite the many unknowns, there are a few important reasons that our business is well-positioned to weather any prolonged economic challenge. One, we have a strong balance sheet and adequate liquidity. Two, our low and variable cost structure enables us to drive high margins and free cash flow across most business environments. Three, we've made significant investments in our operations over the past 4 years, allowing us to now reduce capital expenditures as needed without impacting Operations. Four, we maintain one of the world's highest quality Met Coal portfolios, and we have strong long-term customer relationships. And five, our highly talented workforce is committed to safely and efficiently driving results. As a result of these factors, I'm confident we will emerge from this health crisis ready to achieve our long-term growth potential. Turning to our 2020 results. Despite these challenging headwinds, especially on Met Coal pricing, we were able to deliver strong operating and financial performance in challenging times. We achieved an industry-leading safety rate that is 25% better than our peers and an incident severity rate measure that is consistently less than half the national average. We achieved annual sales volume of 6.7 million metric tons and production volume of 7.1 million metric tons. We achieved our lowest annual cash cost of sales per metric ton of $92.31 and reduced SG&A expenses by 11% to $32.9 million. We reduced our planned capital expenditures by 40% or $57.5 million from plan as we continue to balance our free cash flow and liquidity preservation. We delivered positive cash flows from operations and nearly positive free cash flow in a low price environment, while continuing to invest $114.6 million in property, plant and equipment and mine development. We maintained a strong balance sheet and ended 2020 with total liquidity of $243.5 million, consisting of cash and cash equivalents of $211.9 million and $31.6 million available under our ABL facility. And we demonstrated an ongoing commitment to returning capital to our stockholders by continuing to pay our regular $0.05 per share quarterly dividend. We will continue to appropriately adjust our operational needs, including managing expenses, capital expenditures, working capital, cash flows and liquidity. We've delayed the development of the Blue Creek project, and our stock repurchase program also remains temporarily suspended while we focus on preserving cash and liquidity. The safety of our employees is always our top priority, and we've worked hard over the years to ensure that all our people come to work and return home every day safely. We are proud of our safety record, including the industry-leading safety rates I mentioned a few moments ago. We are also proud of our environmental track record and commitment to conducting business responsibly. We've worked to collectively lower energy usage, reduce greenhouse gas emissions and assure land reclamation. We have a 99.8% compliance rate with environmental water regulations and an almost perfect record with the EPA's national pollutant discharge elimination system. We are pleased that these efforts are now being reflected in positive sustainability ratings. Our collective bargaining agreement contract with United Mine Workers of America expired on April 1, 2021, and union members began a strike on the same day. We will continue to work with the UMWA to reach a resolution. While we continue to negotiate in good faith, we have business continuity plans in place and continue meeting the demands of our customers. While we do not know how much longer the challenge is presented by our negotiations with the UMWA, the COVID-19 pandemic and the Chinese ban on Australian coal and door, looking ahead, there are many reasons to be excited about our business. Although we delayed the start of the development of our Blue Creek reserves in Alabama in order to preserve liquidity during these uncertain times, the project holds great potential. As one of the last remaining large-scale untapped reserves in the U.S., this transformational investment will greatly expand our production capacity and reinforce our position as a premier Met Coal provider. We plan to be opportunistic in evaluating funding alternatives for Blue Creek, which we view as very manageable given our current liquidity position and ability to utilize existing free cash flow and equipment financing. Even with the current uncertainties in capital markets, we believe our strong balance sheet and free cash flow generation provide us with significant flexibility on how and when we choose to finance Blue Creek longer term. In sum, with our strong balance sheet, talented workforce and proven ability to navigate market cycles, Warrior is well-positioned to continue delivering meaningful shareholder value in the years ahead. And with that, we can move to addressing any questions you may have today.

[Operator Instructions]

I previously introduced Richard Wright and Caroline Wilson with Ernst & Young, which serves as our independent registered public accountants. Richard and Caroline does either you wish to make a statement?

No Walter, We have no statement.

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for attending today's virtual stockholders meeting on behalf of everyone of Warrior Met Coal, I'd like to thank you for your continued confidence in and support of the company. I hereby declare the 2021 annual meeting of stockholders of Warrior Met Coal, Inc. adjourned.

This concludes the meeting. You may now disconnect.