Genco Shipping & Trading Limited (NYSE:GNK) Q4 2022 Results Conference Call February 23, 2023 8:30 AM ET

Company Participants

John Wobensmith - Chief Executive Officer

Apostolos Zafolias - Chief Financial Officer

Peter Allen - SVP of Strategy

Conference Call Participants

Omar Nokta - Jefferies

Greg Lewis - BTIG

Liam Burke - B. Riley

Operator

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. And welcome to the Genco Shipping & Trading Limited Fourth Quarter 2022 Earnings Conference Call and Presentation. Before we begin, please note that there will be a slide presentation accompanying today’s conference call. That presentation can be obtained from Genco’s Web site at www.gencoshipping.com. To inform everyone, today’s conference is being recorded and is now being webcast at the company’s Web site www.gencoshipping.com. We will conduct a question-and-answer session after the opening remarks. Instructions will follow at that time. A replay of the conference will be accessible at any time during the next two weeks by dialing (1877) 674-7070 and entering the passcode 378900.

At this time, I will turn the conference over to the company. Please go ahead.

Peter Allen

Good morning. Before we begin our presentation, I note that in this conference call we will be making certain forward-looking statements pursuant to the Safe Harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such forward-looking statements use words such as anticipate, budget, estimate, expect, project, intend, plan, believe and other words and terms of similar meaning in connection with the discussion of potential future events, circumstances or future operating or financial performance. These forward-looking statements are based on management’s current expectations and observations. For a discussion of factors that could cause results to differ, please see the company’s press release that was issued yesterday, materials relating to this call posted on the company’s Web site and the company’s filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including without limitation, the company’s annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2022 and the company’s reports on Form 10-Q and Form 8-K subsequently filed with the SEC. At this time, I would like to introduce John Wobensmith, Chief Executive Officer of Genco Shipping & Trading Limited.

John Wobensmith

Good morning, everyone. Welcome to Genco’s fourth quarter 2022 conference call. I will begin today’s call by reviewing our Q4 2022 and year-to-date highlights, providing an update on our comprehensive value strategy, financial results for the quarter and the industry’s current fundamentals before opening the call up for Q&A. For additional information, please also refer to our earnings presentation posted on our Web site. During the fourth quarter 2022, Genco continued to achieve solid financial results, which capped off another strong year of earnings and shareholder returns. Notably, during 2022, we generated EBITDA of $227 million, which marked our second consecutive year of EBITDA well in excess of $200 million. Our earnings were driven by fleet wide TCE of $23,824 per day as we drew on our best-in-class commercial platform outperforming our scrubber adjusted benchmarks by nearly 3,000 per day, which added $44 million to the bottom line from our commercial platform alone. After a transformational 2021 in which Genco embarked on a path to become a low leverage, high dividend payout company, the first of its kind in the drybulk public markets, 2022 marked the first full year of this value strategy. Our successful execution resulted in declared dividends totaling $2.57 per share for the full year of 2022, representing a dividend yield of 14% based on our February 21, 2023 closing stock price. Importantly, during the fourth quarter, we declared a dividend of $0.50 per share, marking our 14th consecutive quarterly dividend. Since Q3 2019, we have now declared a total of $4.295 per share in dividends or approximately 24% of our current share price. We believe our track record of meaningful and sustainable dividends over three and half years through varying cycles speaks to the strength of the company's balance sheet and our prudent approach to capital allocation.