Sentiment Analysis of the earnings transcript to help figure out if there are any bullish or bearish sentiments that could be gathered from it. We're doing ML and AI based analysis on the earnings call to get some more insights.
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| Statement |
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| Well, we are very pleased with the strong fourth quarter and full year financial results and operational results delivered by the Precision team in 2023 |
| As Carey mentioned the progress achieved over the past several years improving our balance sheet and reducing our debt levels, while growing our revenue and cash flow has positioned us with the financial flexibility to execute on a number of opportunistic financial actions to further enhance shareholder value |
| Precision's annual financial results showed continued improvement from 2022 and reflect the focus on the 2023 strategic priorities that Kevin will address in his commentary |
| Annual highlights include revenue of CAD 1.9 billion a 20% annual increase, adjusted EBITDA of CAD 611 million a 96% increase, funds from operations of CAD 533 million and a 89% increase, cash from operations of CAD 501 million, a 111% increase, debt reduction of CAD 152 million and a CAD 30 million of share repurchases while funding two acquisitions with cash or assumption of debt totaling approximately CAD 100 million and positive earnings per share every quarter during 2023 and for the past six consecutive quarters |
| Our team has been successful sustaining our activity in the low 40s over the past couple of quarters |
| And we're pretty happy about this |
| And they're doing a really good job |
| Over the next several years, we believe this will deliver very good shareholder returns |
| We've got to have a good value proposition, great technology |
| I believe we are well-positioned to grow this business segment as the international land drilling industry continues to recover |
| and working their way through the synergies was a strong result for the combined team |
| We expect results will improve in Q1 with increased rates and activity the absence of Q4 transaction-related costs and the realization of transaction synergies |
| And I'd like to take a moment to comment on the strategic decision to purchase these long lead items because I believe it exemplifies Precision's ability to leverage our scale to reduce costs while positioning the company for growth opportunities |
| Visibility beyond the next few months is a little less clear, but we continue to see positive leading indicators including customer inquiries, LNG export, project startups, exhausted DUCs in the Permian and an increasing focus on drilling inventory quality and of course the desire for longer reach laterals |
| Our Alpha and EverGreen products both in Canada and the US continue to demonstrate broad market penetration |
| And as we get activity a bit higher in the second quarter, we think that margins have an opportunity to expand |
| Now Precision scale, our highly skilled crews, vertical integration and a procurement advantage allows us to improve the returns that CWC achieved on these rigs, while we remain a price competitive and relative participant in this rig class |
| And this transformation towards take-or-pay term contracts improves our revenue visibility, it improves crude performance and stability and it keeps those rigs off the market supporting tight supply fundamentals for the non-contracted rigs |
| So we've got to be very good |
| And the outlook for the balance of the year looks good with the strong Canadian macro supporting customer activity |
| In our Canadian drilling and our well services businesses both delivered strong operational and financial performance throughout 2023 and we're carrying that momentum on into 2024 |
| Yet the combined business is performing very well |
| No doubt we have some work to do as we continue to expand our presence in the oil plays, while remaining well-positioned for an improving gas macro |
| Today we're operating 83 service rigs with 11 of those on 24 our operations, doubling the asset's revenue efficiency |
| Our EverGreen emission solutions have strong customer support |
| So we feel really good about this relationship |
| Utilizing our strong free cash flow, we met or exceeded all of our financial priorities for the year including debt reduction share buybacks |
| We expect these factors will help to catalyze upgrading and high-grading growth opportunities particularly for our Super Triples with our Alpha Automation capabilities |
| With our well-established international infrastructure already generating strong returns, we expect this increased activity to flow through income statement and essentially no increases in our fixed costs or overhead |
| But as we approach our target debt levels of below one times we are confident in our ability to increase our allocation to direct shareholder payments as a percentage of free cash flow |
| Statement |
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| This has been a little more challenging than we expected as US rig activity has been essentially flat for several months with very few new rig deployment opportunities |
| And then things turn to warm, causing some intermittent road bans and with the unusually warm weather in late January making some well locations and accessible, again, negatively impacting the activity |
| The E&P base in Canada, United States, Kuwait, anywhere would rather see the market oversupplied |
| So that's kind of the negative side of things |
| Now, we experienced a roller coaster of weather first losing activity in mid-January due to extremely cold weather conditions in Western Canada |
| In Canada, drilling activity for Precision averaged 64 rigs, a decrease of two rigs from Q4 2022 |
| I might also add that on EverGreen, I've been quite surprised by the uptake in the U.S |
| So it is going to be a little bit of a drag on margins in Q1 |
| The decrease in margins is mainly due to overhead costs spread over fewer activity days compared to Q4 |
| I think your comments say that maybe rig activity could be a little bit down |
| Now for most of the last decade, the Canadian market has been constrained by hydrocarbon takeaway bottlenecks and constraints |
| And it's tough when there's, not a lot of new opportunities popping up |
| Now the Canadian Tele-Double drilling market remains oversaturated and highly fractured too many rigs, too many contractors and the competition is intense |
| In addition to those hard mobilization costs, the operator will have to be a little patient as the high-graded rig and new crew come up the learning curve and that specific operator's practice |
| We expect depreciation of approximately $290 million, cash interest expense of approximately $75 million, cash taxes to remain low, and our effective tax rate to be approximately 25% |
| No question it will be a little tougher for us to do that than somebody who's got 50 or 60 rigs already running in the Permian Basin |
| And I understand that because they want to have oversupplied rig supply, so that that keep rates as low as possible |
| Kevin Neveu And those numbers I gave are just a random decision, nothing we see right now points to rig count declines or for that matter imminently rig count increases |
| That said I'm not thrilled with 39 rigs running |
| So back in 1982 the biggest challenge of drilling contracts could bring to a Technical Engineering school was how do you automate the racking board to make -- to take that person out the racking board |
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