Hello, good afternoon. My name is Charles Maltby, CEO of BW Epic Kosan. I'm joined by our Chief Financial Officer, Uta Urbaniak-Sage. We would like to welcome you to our call to discuss our first quarter of 2023. I would like to highlight that the webinar is being recorded for later viewing and allow us the questions to be asked anytime via the Q&A window. We will answer your questions at the end, either verbally or via a written response, or offer to take offline separately at a later stage. I would also like to draw your attention to the disclaimer on slide two. Moving on to slide three. The first quarter saw improved utilization of over 95%, driven by a stronger market and our increasing average vessel size. Combined with effectively managed operating costs, we delivered a first quarter net profit of $12 million, up 31% year-on-year. With an eye on a sustainable and future-focused fleet, we continued to upgrade our portfolio, which includes pressurized, semi-refrigerated, ammonia, and ethylene-capable vessels, by releasing seven non-core vessels during the quarter, whilst taking delivery of a 7,500 cubic meter newbuild vessel under long-term time charter with purchase options, resulting in our average vessel size being over 9% larger year-on-year. Consequently, we earned a first quarter revenue of $72 million, approximately the same level compared to a year ago, despite the 10% reduction in fleet calendar days. Time charter earnings, TCE per calendar day for the first quarter, increased by nearly 11% year-on-year to $12,956 per day, driven by an improvement in the underlying market and an increase in average vessel capacity. Our lost time injury frequency, LTIF rate, this quarter remained zero, for which we thank our colleagues at sea and ashore for their focus on Zero Harm. Our year-on-year emissions have increased by 3.5%, with an AER of 24.88, in part because of our heavy docking schedule during the quarter, reducing our efficiency. Offset by investments in carbon emission reduction, such as silicone paints and other energy-saving initiatives, our sustainability report, published during the quarter, has further details on our group initiatives. Our first quarter ROE of 9.7% was up from 4.5% in 2022. Whilst a further step in the right direction, there remains more work to be done. Following payment of a dividend in the first quarter and in line with the company's dividend policy to target a twice-yearly payment of 50% of net profit, the board will review further dividend payments in August 2023. BW Epic Kosan operates a world-leading fleet of 64 vessels, ranging in size from 3,000-11,000 cubic meters in the pressurized semi-ref and ethylene-capable shipping sectors. We aim to deliver to our customers the best solution for their transportation needs, along with exceptional service and operational standards. Zero Harm drives our safety culture and commitment to operating without accidents and achieving our environmental goals. Our organization has significant commercial and technical capability across pressurized semi ref, refrigerated gas, and petrochemical transportation, and the flexibility and capability to meet our customers' needs around the world. This operational and technical experience is enabling us to work alongside industry partners to not only reduce emissions, but to also explore projects that support wider decarbonization, such as shipping related to carbon capture and storage. LPG remains a primary cargo for which we are an integral part of the supply chain, both for distribution over the last mile or regionally around the globe, primarily into domestic or residential markets, typically for use as a cleaner energy in cooking and heating. We are also actively involved in the transportation of petrochemicals like ethylene, propylene, butadiene, and VCM. The company is headquartered in Singapore, with Copenhagen covering our regional activities in the West, alongside teams in Manila and Tokyo. Turning to vessel supply, there are a total of 354 pressure vessels on the water, which includes three new builds that delivered during the quarter. The International Pressure Vessel order book has nine more new builds scheduled to be delivered this year, three in 2024, four in 2025, and one in 2026, a total of just over 100,000 cubic meters of capacity. This represents a 5.5% increase in the existing fleet capacity over the four-year period. There are two, 7,500 cubic meter CO2 LPG carrier new build scheduled for delivery in 2024, which are being specifically built for a Carbon Capture Utilization and Storage project at CCUS in Northwest Europe. Turning to the semi-ref and ethylene capable sectors, the smaller size semi-ref fleet has no newbuilds on order. There are 3 7,200 cubic meter LNG dual-fuel ethylene vessels under order for delivery in 2024, which represents a 2.4% increase in existing fleet capacity. The newbuild order book must also be measured in the context of the potential scrapping pool. In the international pressure fleet today, there are 16 ships totaling approximately 50,000 cubic meter that are aged 30 years and older. These potential scrapping candidates represent 3% of existing fleet capacity, which offsets some of the newbuild fleet capacity growth. In the similar size segment, there are eight non-ethylene semi-ref vessels and three ethylene vessels that are aged 30 years and older, equivalent to 3.2% of existing fleet capacity. To summarize, for the combined smaller gas carrier sectors, our expectations are for 2.2%, 1.1%, 0.7%, and 0.1% net fleet growth in capacity before any further scrapping over the next years of 2023, 2024, 2025 and 2026. On the demand side, global LPG seaborne trade remains robust and continues to grow. Drewry's latest research has estimated that seaborne LPG trade in 2023 will increase by 2.7% year-on-year to 120.1 million tons, with a related 3.1% growth in ton mile demand. U.S. LPG seaborne exports have continued to ramp up, whilst recently announced cuts to OPEC oil production is expected to reduce Middle East LPG exports this year, according to FGE. China, India, Japan, and South Korea remain the main demand drivers, and together imported over 16.6 million tons of LPG in the first quarter of 2023, as reported by Kpler, up 2.8% year-on-year. Chinese LPG demand is driven by its petrochemical sector, with producers favoring LPG over naphtha. US cargoes now account for over 34% of total Chinese imports. Indian LPG demand is from the residential and retail sectors, and imports have risen by 11.4% year-on-year. Amidst weaker and uncertain economic conditions, industrial and manufacturing activity declined, which impeded the recovery of the petrochemical sector. Consequently, the global seaborne olefins, that's ethylene, propylene, butadiene, VCM, in 2023, is estimated to increase by only 0.2% year-on-year to just over 16 million tons, with a further 1.2% gain expected next year. Ethylene exports from the US dropped by 5% from the previous quarter, but with exports to Asia, with associated increased miles in the ton mile calculator, accounting for 70% of the volumes, compared to 6% last year, when over 90% of the cargoes went to Europe. Supply of Propylene in Asia is expected to increase, with new plants coming online that offer long-haul trading opportunities to the West. FGE reports that seven new Propylene Dehydrogenation plants, that's PDH plants, are planned to start up in China this year, adding approximately four million tons of annual production capacity to the existing 12 million tons. Turning to the smaller gas carrier demand. The shipping market in Europe remained tight in the first quarter, mostly on account of a strong LPG market. Vessels were generally well-employed, serving contract of affreightment, that's COA, and spot cargoes and short-term floating storage contracts. Strikes in France have disrupted refineries, crackers, and downstream stream production units, and delayed berthing and port turnaround schedules, which impacted shipping availability. Favorable priced LPG from the US offered gainful employment and higher ton mile utilization to the larger sized pressure vessels. Freight levels were firm and gained across all vessel sizes. European olefins producers have continued to manage cracker and downstream operating rates carefully. Downstream demand was stable but at a low level, hence, crackers and derivative plants were run at low rates, which limited regional spot market activity. US ethylene exports remained steady, and with approximately 70% of the product bound for Asia in the quarter, the handy-size sector has been tight. In addition, robust exports of ethane from the US further tightened the 12,000-22,000 cubic meter fleet, offering employment in the Atlantic basin. The shipping market in the East was not as strong as in Europe, with activity levels impacted by planned and unplanned shutdowns. LPG imports into Bangladesh fell by 12% quarter-on-quarter, impacted by rising costs due to the declining value of their local currency against the dollar. Sri Lanka's imports, LPG imports, haven't yet gained traction, with volumes lower by 17% quarter-on-quarter and 41% year-on-year. Regional supply of olefins was impacted by reduced operating rates, heavy maintenance programs, and extended shutdowns on account of poor downstream demand. Intra-Asian trades have declined, and there were no long-haul exports to the West, as was the case a year ago. China's propylene imports were 12% higher quarter-on-quarter, but Ethylene imports were lower by approximately 20% quarter-on-quarter. The quarter ended on a slightly more positive note, with improved buying interest on expectations of tighter supply in the upcoming cracker turnaround season and improving underlying demand. The overall supply-demand fundamentals have resulted in increased utilization and firmer freight market levels, improving the underlying revenues and an encouraging increase to forward cover rates. Year-on-year, there have been gains across all sectors.... +2% for the 3,500-5,000 cubic meter vessels, +10% for the 7,500 cubic meter, 11% for the 11,000 cubic meter pressure vessels, and 6% for the ethylene 8,250 cubic meter sector. All sectors are now above the 10-year average. You can follow our market live via our website on a month-to-month basis, where we publish a monthly report. Our business is globally diversified. At the end of the quarter, we had 11 vessels operating in the Americas, 32 in the Europe, Middle East, Africa belt, and 21 in Asia. In the first quarter, BW Epic Kosan averaged nearly four loading operations every day across our fleet, loading over 1.1 million tons, and was involved in over 950 cargo operations in over 200 different ports. Our cargo mix is split about 50/50 between LPG and petrochemicals, such as Ethylene, Propylene, Butadiene, and VCM, and one vessel in the growing Ammonia trade. This diversity in geography and commodity has widened with the formation of BW Epic Kosan and provides options for our fleet and relative stability in our earnings floor. Ship-to-ship, or STS operations, remain an important part of our business and is an integral part of the global LPG supply chain. We continue to perform STS operations for delivery of LPG over the last mile into developing economies, with 44 such operations performed in the first quarter. Turning to our operating metrics on slide 10. An average size of just over 7,800 cubic meter, up 9% year. We also have four additional vessels with a total capacity of 23,573 cubic meter under our commercial management. We continue to fine-tune our fleet to focus on modern, larger vessels. When it comes to trading of our vessels, we are keen to work alongside customers over the long term and offer flexibility between time charters, voyage charters, contracts of affreightment, and spot contracts. During the first quarter, the fleet traded under time charter for 76% of total voyage days, compared to 63% a year ago, and COA days for 9%, as compared to 8% a year ago. During the first quarter, the fleet experienced 160 technical off-hire days, which included the impact of six planned dry dockings, one of which had commenced in December. Our docking program during 2023 is at a higher level than a typical year due to our fleet age profile. Overall, though, for the quarter, this has resulted in improved fleet availability of 97.1% and an operational utilization of 95.7% when compared to a year ago. I would now like to hand the call over to Uta to step through our financials. Thanks, Uta. Thank you, Charles. I'm starting with our PNL. In the first quarter, we generated TCE revenues of $72 million, the same level we recorded in Q1 last year, despite the reduced fleet calendar days by 10% year-on-year. Our TCE earnings per calendar day have increased by 10.5% to $12,956, reflecting an improved market and the increase of our average vessel size as we redelivered smaller vessels and took delivery of larger-sized vessels. Vessel operating expenses decreased 5.7% from $27.8 million to $26.2 million year-on-year, reflecting the reduction in fleet calendar days, offset by higher costs due to inflationary pressures. Operating expenses on a per calendar day basis increased from $4,957 to $5,308 year-on-year, partly driven by the increased average vessel size by 9% to 7,829 cubic meters. Charter in costs increased from $2.6 million to $3.5 million year-on-year due to charter contracts of additional tonnage chartered in on time charter basis. As of 31st of March, we had eight ships on inward charter arrangements, one on a bareboat basis and seven on a time charter basis. G&A expenses per calendar day increased from $1,053 to $1,262 year-on-year due to the overall reduction of fleet calendar days. Finance expenses decreased from $4.8 million to $4.5 million year-over-year, due to lower outstanding debt across our fleet, offset by increased interest rates for the unhedged part of our debt. As of the quarter end, we had interest rate swaps in place for $233 million at a weighted average interest rate of 1.14%, covering 77% of our bank debt. We achieved an EBITDA of $33.4 million for the quarter, about the same level we recorded in the first quarter of last year. We finished the quarter with a net profit of $12 million, a 31% improvement year-on-year. This translates into a return on equity of 9.7%. Moving on to our balance sheet. The book value of the fleet, excluding assets held for sale and leased assets at period end, is $754 million, $94 million below latest broker valuations. Our total debt, including lease liabilities, as of 31st of March, was $414 million. Including our cash position of $97 million, our net debt is $318 million, down by $43 million from the start of the year, to 40% of book value, which we regard as a conservative level. Our net asset value, based on broker valuations, is $585 million, or $3.67 per share. We are in the process of finalizing a refinancing for $114 million, covering 19 vessels and a hunting line amounting to $20 million that will be available for potential vessel acquisitions. The new facility includes a sustainability-linked marginal adjustment with two key performance indicators. One KPI is linked to fleet emissions, and the second is linked to the number of female seafarers. The existing facilities were due to expire in 2023 and 2024. Upon completion, scheduled for early June, we have no loan expiries until 2026. During the quarter, we sold 3,600 cubic meter pressurized LPG carriers and generated net cash proceeds of $13.7 million. Subsequent to the quarter end, we sold another 3,600 cubic meter vessel, in line with our strategy to focus on larger tonnage. Delivery completed last week. I will now hand back to Charles for a summary and outlook. Thanks very much, Uta. To summarize, the first quarter saw improved utilization, driven by a strong market in the West, combined with an increase in our average vessel capacity. We also continued to add improving long-term coverage for time charters and COAs, and are effectively managing our operating costs. The supply of new-build vessels in our sector remains balanced, with the small gas carrier fleet forecast to grow by 2.2% this year before any further scrapping. The larger order book for larger LPG segments is more substantial, but tight shipyard capacity, demand, and inflationary pressures are leading to increased shipyard new-build costs and a longer order book for all sizes, alongside the higher technology costs associated with dual fuel LPG or LNG, and other emissions reductions improvements. We note that 73% of new-build orders now placed for LPG vessels are for dual fuel LPG, Ethane, or LNG. We expect that the implementation of the IMO's EEXI and CII regulations will result in a general reduction in the global fleet's steaming speed. Our sustainability report, published in March of this year, provides more details on our strategy and is available on our website. The threat of recession in key markets and high interest rates, with uncertainty on China's economic growth and ongoing geopolitics, provides some reasons for uncertainty. LPG demand is expected to remain firm. Drewry's latest research estimates that seaborne LPG trade this year will increase by 2.7% to approximately 120 million tons, with a related 3.1% growth in ton mile demand. The Olefins Seaborne Trade is also expected to grow, but by a more modest 0.2%. Asia remains the main driver for the LPG and olefins markets, but will be impacted by the uncertainty of pace in China's growth. Ethylene exports from the U.S. are also an important driver, and whether most cargoes end up in Asia or in Europe will determine shipping ton mile demand and consequential availability. We are working to manage these impacts through the diversity of geography and commodity available to our fleet, and continuing to deliver efficiency to our combined G&A and OpEx levels. As mentioned, we are placing forward cover at improving levels. We have TC cover in place for the balance of the year at $12,944 per day, an increase of 1,169 per day year-on-year, with 58% of our remaining fleet days for the year uncovered. BW Epic Kosan has the scale and operational strength for future success, is working to grow its average fleet size and to maintain an attractive average age so that we can provide safe transportation in a lower carbon world. We believe that LPG will continue to serve as a cleaner energy form than many alternatives, especially in the residential sector, where it is a growing source of fuel in developing economies. Alongside LPG, we are optimistic for growth opportunities in adjacent sectors such as ammonia and carbon dioxide, CO2, shipping. We have now reached the end of our presentation. Uta, please can you guide if we have any questions today? There was a question in the box here, with regards to share buybacks, whether we would consider share buybacks at the moment. Our board will be discussing this in August, when we make a decision on the next dividend. We feel that these items, share buybacks, dividends, should, yeah, should be discussed together. That will happen during the course of the second half of this year. Thanks, Uta. There's no other question as of now. Okay. Well, thank you very much. Thanks for giving the answer there, which was, well, yes. Our board will consider whether it's something we wish to look at in August. Thank you for your question. If you have further questions, please send them through to us directly. You can reach us via the contact details in the presentation and via our website. If there are no other questions, thank you very much for everyone taking the time to join us and listen today. We appreciate your interest in our company. If you have any questions, please do contact Uta or I. In the meantime, we look forward to catching up in August 2023 for our second quarter and half year 2023 earnings report. Thank you very much.
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