Mercer International, Inc. (NASDAQ:MERC) Q2 2022 Results Conference Call July 29, 2022 11:00 AM ET

Company Participants

Juan Carlos - President & CEO

David Ure - EVP, CFO & Secretary

Conference Call Participants

Roger Spitz - Bank of America

Andrew Kuske - Credit Suisse

Jeff Gates - Gates Capital Management

Paul Quinn - RBC Capital Markets

Operator

Good morning, and welcome to Mercer International's Second Quarter 2022 Earnings Conference Call. On the call today is Juan Carlos, President and Chief Executive Officer of Mercer International; and David Ure, Senior Vice President, Finance, Chief Financial Officer and Secretary.

I will now hand the call over to David Ure.

David Ure

Good morning, everyone. Thanks for joining us today to discuss what has been an eventful few months for us. I will begin by touching on the financial and operating highlights of the second quarter before returning the call to Juan Carlos to provide further color on the markets, a strategy update and of course, our recently announced acquisition.

Juan Carlos was appointed President and CEO effective May 1st, and I'm delighted to introduce him to you on his first analyst conference call with Mercer. As many of you know, Juan Carlos is a globally recognized leader in the wood products and biomaterials space and brings to our company leadership qualities and expertise that will help us drive our growth in the years to come. We are excited for his appointment.

Also, for those of you that have joined today's call by telephone, there is a presentation material that we've attached to the investor section of our website. But before turning to our results, I'd like to remind you that in this morning's conference call, we will make forward-looking statements. And according to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, I'd like to call your attention to the risks related to these statements which are more fully described in our press release and in the company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

This quarter, we achieved EBITDA of approximately $145 million compared to Q1 EBITDA of roughly $155 million. This solid result was principally a consequence of strong demand for all our products, leading to sequentially higher pulp and lumber prices, along with the positive impact of a stronger U.S. dollar being offset by the costs and lost volume associated with our planned major maintenance downtime.