NRP 2026年第三季度业绩电话会：债务下降，派息升至2.34美元

要点速览

• Natural Resource Partners L.P. 在2026年第三季度实现净利润2700万美元、经营现金流4400万美元及自由现金流4500万美元。
• 该合伙企业已将季度分红提高至每普通单元2.34美元，高于8月就第二季度发放的每单元0.75美元分红。
• NRP在本季度偿还了1300万美元的债务，并表示剩余的1400万美元预计将于下月偿还。
• 矿产权部门本季度产生4700万美元的季度自由现金流，过去12个月累计达1.85亿美元，继续成为NRP最主要的现金来源。
• 管理层预计，根据当前情况，2027年煤炭定价不会出现重大变化。管理层还指出，纯碱基本面疲软将使得2027年比2026年更为艰难。
• NRP预计，在纯碱需求复苏或处于低迷状态的市场出现实质性供应调整之前，Sisecam Wyoming不会恢复分红。

关键财务数据

业务与运营表现

矿产权

部分资产的冶金煤价格和销量有所提高，加上付款时点的因素，推动了该部门现金流实现同比增长。不过，2025年第三季度收到的租赁协议修改费抵消了部分利好。

在2026年第三季度，冶金煤约占煤炭特许权使用费收入的70%及煤炭特许权使用费销售量的45%。

管理层表示，全球钢铁需求依然疲软，持续压制冶金煤价格。由于天然气价格偏低以及发电厂煤炭库存维持高位，动力煤市场同样低迷。此外，柴油成本上涨也增加了生产操作方的利润率压力。

纯碱

纯碱部门净利润同比下降200万美元，主要因国际市场供过于求导致售价下滑以及平板玻璃需求疲软所致。

管理层指出，国际市场价格已止跌，但仍低于大多数生产商的生产成本。随着合同重新定价以及国内价格对国际价格的溢价收窄，预计国内价格将会下跌。

公司继续将 Sisecam Wyoming 视为全球生产成本最低的纯碱业务之一。其管理合伙人正在维持安全稳定运营的同时寻求削减成本。

管理层展望

管理层表示，当前各项指标并未显示2027年煤炭价格会出现重大变化，但地缘政治冲突可能会推动价格双向波动。

在纯碱方面，管理层预计市场重新恢复平衡将需要数年而非几个季度。虽然已有工厂关停，但供应端的调整响应依然缓慢。由于国内合同定价下降，预计2027年将比2026年更具挑战性。

未来的分红方案将由董事会根据经营业绩、流动性需求以及现金的其他用途（包括单元回购或择机收购）按季度决定。

风险与关注事项

• 全球钢铁需求疲软正在压制冶金煤价格。
• 天然气价格偏低和电厂煤炭库存偏高正拖累动力煤市场行情。
• 地缘政治不确定性和柴油成本上涨可能会影响大宗商品价格、供应链成本以及生产操作方的利润率。
• 全球纯碱供应过剩和需求疲软继续对产品定价构成压力。
• 在需求改善或供应大幅缩减之前，预计 Sisecam Wyoming 不会恢复分红。
• 不同季度之间的自由现金流和分红可能存在较大差异。

分析师问答亮点

在回应有关潜在单元回购的问题时，管理层拒绝透露其对 NRP 内在价值的评估。

NRP 还表示，在完成资产负债表去杠杆之后，公司在二氧化碳封存、太阳能、地热和其他可再生能源相关业务上的策略并未发生改变。该合伙企业继续寻找能够在旗下土地上开发项目的承租方。

业绩电话会议完整文字记录

完整财报电话会议逐字稿

管理层陈述

Operator

Hello, everyone. Thank you for joining us, and welcome to the Natural Resource Partners L.P. Third Quarter 2026 Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions]

I will now hand the conference over to Tiffany Sammis, Investor Relations. Tiffany, please go ahead.

Tiffany Sammis

Thank you. Good morning, and welcome to the Natural Resource Partners third quarter 2026 conference call. Today's call is being webcast, and a replay will be available on our website.

Joining me today are Craig Nunez, President and Chief Operating Officer; Chris Zolas, Chief Financial Officer; and Kevin Craig, Executive Vice President.

Some of our comments today may include forward-looking statements reflecting NRP's views about future events. These matters involve risks and uncertainties that could cause our actual results to materially differ from our forward-looking statements. These risks are discussed in NRP's Form 10-K and other Securities and Exchange Commission filings. We undertake no obligation to revise or update publicly any forward-looking statements for any reason. Our comments today also include non-GAAP financial measures. Additional details and reconciliations to the most directly comparable GAAP measures are included in our third quarter press release, which can be found on our website.

I would like to remind everyone that we do not intend to discuss the operations or outlook for any particular coal lessee or detailed market fundamentals.

Now I would like to turn the call over to Craig Nunez, our President and Chief Operating Officer.

Craig Nunez

Thank you, Tiffany. Good morning, everyone. NRP generated $45 million of free cash flow in the third quarter of 2026 and $166 million of free cash flow over the last 12 months before the investment in our soda ash business earlier this year. Last quarter, I said that [ barring ] something unforeseen, we intended to raise distribution significantly in November. We are delivering on that. A decade of work to pay down debt and derisk the partnership has brought us to the point where we can pay out free cash flow beyond the unitholder tax liability. We generated $45 million of free cash in the quarter. We paid down $13 million of debt, leaving $32 million or $2.34 per unit available to distribute.

Our free cash flow can move around a lot from quarter-to-quarter and year-to-year. Our Board will decide on distributions each quarter weighing our results, our liquidity needs and other uses of cash, which could include unit repurchases or opportunistic acquisitions. If the Board decides to retain cash rather than pay it out, we will hold ourselves to the same test as always, more than $1 of intrinsic value per unit for every dollar we keep.

Last quarter, I said our Mineral Rights segment was our most dependable cash generator. It delivered again this quarter, producing $47 million of free cash flow and $185 million over the last 12 months. Spot prices for metallurgical coal bumped up modestly in the quarter before pulling back. Global steel demand remains weak, and that keeps a lid on prices. Similar story with thermal coal. Natural gas is cheap, power plants are sitting on plenty of coal, and we do not see anything on the horizon to change that. The geopolitical backdrop remains bumpy and diesel is up more than 75% this year which raises costs all along the supply chain and squeezes operator margins. For 2027, nothing we are watching points to a material change in coal pricing. If geopolitical conflicts drag on, prices can move in either direction, and I will not pretend to know which.

Now to Soda Ash. The picture is the same as a quarter ago, too much supply, too little demand and no quick fix. Increased natural soda ash exports from China are pushing older synthetic plants to modernize, shutdown or both. Producers are doing what you would expect. Running plants at lower rates, shedding higher-cost capacity, cutting discretionary spending and hunting for efficiencies. International prices have stopped falling, but have settled at levels that are below the cost of production of most producers. As we explained last quarter, domestic prices should move lower as contracts reset and the premium over international prices narrows. That will make 2027 harder than 2026.

Closures are beginning to occur, however, but slowly. We continue to think rebalancing the market will take years, not quarters. Our investment in Sisecam Wyoming is -- holds one of the lowest cost of soda ash operations in the world and low cost is what carries you through a downturn. Our managing partner continues to aggressively pursue cost savings while keeping operations safe and reliable and protecting the plant's competitive position. This cycle may take years to turn, but we are confident in the quality of the asset and its ability to generate competitive returns when the market returns to balance. So to sum it up, Mineral Rights keeps generating strong free cash flow. We have $14 million of debt left to repay next month, and we are finally at the point where we can return the cash this business generates to you, our partners, subject to the Board's quarterly decision.

With that, I'll turn it over to Chris.

Christopher Zolas

Thank you, Craig. In the third quarter of 2026, NRP generated $27 million of net income, $44 million of operating cash flow and $45 million of free cash flow. Of these consolidated amounts, our Mineral Rights segment generated $37 million of net income, $46 million of operating cash flow and $47 million of free cash flow. When compared to the prior year third quarter, our Mineral Rights segment net income decreased $4 million primarily due to increased DD&A expense. Operating cash flow and free cash flow each increased $2 million as compared to the prior year period, primarily due to higher met coal pricing and volumes at certain properties and timing of payments, partially offset by lease amendment fees we received in the third quarter of last year. Regarding our met thermal coal royalty mix, met coal made up approximately 70% of our coal royalty revenues and 45% of our coal royalty sales volumes for the third quarter of 2026.

For our Soda Ash segment, net income for the third quarter decreased $2 million compared to the prior year quarter. This decrease was driven by lower sales prices due to the oversupplied international soda ash market and weakened demand for flat glass. Operating and free cash flow was flat when compared to the prior year period due to not receiving a distribution of third quarters of 2025 and 2026. NRP does not expect distributions from Sisecam Wyoming to resume until the sodas market demand rebounds where there is a significant supply response to this depressed market.

Moving to our corporate and financing results. Net income, operating cash flow and free cash flow for the third quarter of 2026, each improved $1 million as compared to the prior year period. These improvements were due to lower debt resulting in lower interest costs and less cash paid for interest. Regarding our quarterly distributions, in August, we paid the second quarter distribution of $0.75 per common unit. Also during the third quarter of this year, we fully repaid the remaining $13 million balance on our Opco credit facility. As a result, and consistent with our communications throughout the year, the partnership increased the distribution to $2.34 per common unit with respect to the third quarter of 2026.

In our recent earnings release, we have included a reconciliation of this Q3 distribution amount from the operating cash flow we generated in the third quarter.

And with that, I'll turn the call over to our operator for questions.

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Your first question comes from the line of Robert Lu.

Unknown Attendee

This is Robert Lu. I'm an independent investor in NRP for the last few years. I'm curious, you talked about the potential for share buybacks when you saw that the intrinsic value is below or above the current market price. I'm curious, would you be able to share your thoughts on that and where that might be?

Craig Nunez

No. We will not give you guidance on what we think is the intrinsic value of our units. But thank you for your support.

Unknown Attendee

Yes. Thank you for following through on what you said you do and excited about the news today.

Craig Nunez

You bet. Thank you.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Steven Balsam with Yellow Gate Capital.

分析师问答

Steven Balsam

I just wanted to say congratulations on reaching this point. It's really rare to see such a long-term decision taken and made and follow through consist really been fantastic [indiscernible] on long-term sale trend feels great to get to this point. I'd like to just one question regarding...

Craig Nunez

Thank you for being with us for a long time and supporting us. We couldn't have done it without all of our partners.

Steven Balsam

You bet. I was hoping maybe you guys could comment a little bit on potential activities that you're looking at, whether it be carbon sequestration or any other sort of actions that your debt that are going on with respect to the various properties.

Craig Nunez

I would tell you that our activities with respect to CO2 sequestration, solar, geothermal, all of the renewable type activities that we look at they're not changing at all as a result of the change in our capital structure and the change in our cash allocation strategy, capital deployment strategy here now that we've paid off our debt or about to pay off all of our debt. There's no changes to that. We're attempting to maximize the acreage that we have, find lessees that are willing to come in and and develop projects on our acreage for all the various types of initiatives. And we've been doing that even before we've reached this point with our -- with respect to our capital structure.

Steven Balsam

Excellent. I love the approach and really happy with the approach taken on it as far. And I realize there's nothing -- no statements made about future distribution like the way it was set out in the financials being that variable distribution paid out of free cash flow feels great. Congratulations, again.

Craig Nunez

Thank you so much. Appreciate it.

Operator

There are no further questions at this time. I will now turn the call back to Craig Nunez for closing remarks.

Craig Nunez

Thank you, operator. And again, thank all of you for your support over the years. We're still on the journey. But being able to raise our distribution today and pay out a larger share of our free cash flow now that we have practically delever the entire balance sheet. It was a joint effort, and we couldn't have done it without you. So now we got to look ahead and add value in the next period. So with that, thank you, and have a great day.

Operator

This concludes today's call. Thank you for attending. You may now disconnect.