Century Aluminum Company (NASDAQ:CENX) Q3 2023 Earnings Call Transcript November 8, 2023 5:00 PM ET
Company Participants
Ryan Crawford - Financial Planning & Analysis and IR Manager
Jesse Gary - President and CEO
Jerry Bialek - EVP and CFO
Conference Call Participants
Ryan Crawford - Financial Planning & Analysis and IR Manager
Jesse Gary - President and CEO
Jerry Bialek - EVP and CFO
Operator
Good afternoon, and thank you for attending today's Century Aluminum Third Quarter Earnings Call. My name is Jason, and I'll be the moderator for the call today. [Operator Instructions].
I would now like to pass the conference over to your host, Ryan.
Ryan Crawford
Thank you, operator. Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to the conference call. I'm joined here today by Jesse Gary, Century's President and Chief Executive Officer; Gerry Bialek, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer; and Peter Trpkovski. Senior Vice President of Finance and Treasurer. After our prepared comments, we'll take your questions.
As a reminder, today's presentation is available on our website at www.centuryaluminum.com. We use our website as a means of disclosing material information about the company and for complying with Regulation FD. Turning to Slide 1, please take a moment to review the cautionary statements shown here with respect to forward-looking statements and non-GAAP financial measures contained in today's discussion.
And with that, I'll hand the call to Jesse.
Jesse Gary
Thanks, Ryan, and thanks to everyone for joining. It was a busy quarter with lots to discuss, so I'll get right into it. Turning to Slide 3. Lower LME and regional premiums were the primary drivers of reduced Q3 adjusted EBITDA of $9 million. While we were able to offset a significant portion of the fall in metal prices with lower input prices, higher-than-expected Mt. Holly power costs resulted in our Q3 results falling a bit below expectations.
We expect Mt. Holly energy prices to return to normal in Q4. And as we recently announced, we entered into a new power contract from Mt. Holly that will become effective on January 1. I'll provide some additional detail on the new contract in a bit.
In general, the macro environment for aluminum remains complex. As you can see on Page 4, the global market remains roughly balanced, with Chinese deficits largely offsetting a small surplus in the rest of the world.
Turning to China specifically, Chinese demand has benefited from strong solar and electric vehicle demand, with China Solar demand alone up around 1.5 million tonnes from last year. Recent stimulus announcements in China should drive further recovery in building and construction demand as the Chinese economy continues to recover from COVID lockdowns.