RICHARD: Welcome to the third quarter 2013 Endesa Colombia results conference call. My name is Richard and I will be your operator for today s call. At this time all participants are in a listen-only mode. Later we will conduct a question and answer session. Please note that this conference is being recorded. I will now turn the call over to Mr. Juan Manuel Pardo Gómez, Finance and Administration Officer. Mr. Pardo, you may begin. MR. PARDO: Ok, thank you very much for joining us this morning. Welcome to our quarterly investors conference call. Today we will present Emgesa, Codensa s results for the first ten months of 2013. We will start by presenting the main highlights of the generation and distribution businesses in Colombia for this year. Then we will present the operating and financial results and finally we ll open the conference for a Q and A session. In slide number 3, you can see that during the first nine months of 2013, we had important achievements and news for our businesses in Colombia, which we will see in more detail in the following slides. The first topic that I would like to address is that during 2013 there has been a discussion of the impact of energy tariffs in the productivity and competitiveness of the local industry in Colombia. The Ministry of Commerce of Colombia hired a study comparing energy prices in Colombia to the ones of the OECD countries. I can tell you that the study had positive conclusions on the structure and the efficiency of the Colombia Energy system. It concluded that energy tariffs in Colombia are among the average of the energy tariffs of the OECD countries for the residential and industrial sectors. Although there were some countries with lower tariffs than the ones in Colombia, they had different regulatory frameworks or subsidies from the government. The study also concluded that the energy exchange works relatively well for price formation. Nevertheless, the study also identified opportunities to improve the price dynamics of bilateral contracts, through initiatives such as a centralized regulated market, in which the distribution companies would buy electricity, as a single entity, to serve the regulated demand. In slide number 5 another important topic for the year is the execution of projects under development in the generation business. As you can see, El Quimbo Hydroelectric plant, we are developing the El Quimbo Hydroelectric plant, and the repowering of the El Salaco chain in the Bogotá River. These two projects are strategic to ensure the energy supply for Colombia, and for the city of Bogotá. As you can see in the slide, as of September 30 th 2013, we had a 51.7% physical advance in the execution of El Quimbo, with an accumulated investment of US$502.6 Million, of the US$837 Million budget for the project. During 2013, we had special advances in the main civil works, and the execution of the social and environmental commitments related to the license. On the other hand we had a 53.3% advance in the repowering of 6 units of the El Salaco chain in the Bogotá River, which will allow us to add 144.8 MW of installed capacity in generation.
We have invested more than US$16 Million in this project, from a total budget of US$43.7 Million. In November and December of 2013, we will start operations with the second and fifth units of the Colegio Power Plant and we will complete the repowering of the other four units of this chain by December of 2014. In slide number 6, we got in Codensa s project under development, one of the main projects is the Nueva Esperanza sub-station, in the southern part of the city of Bogotá, with an estimated budget of nearly US$50 Million. This project consists on the construction of a substation to convert 500 to 150 KV to serve the increasing electricity demand from the Bogotá and central region of the country. During the early stage of constructions of this project, Codensa discovered several archeological materials from the pre-hispanic period, which was then declared as a highly relevant finding from the National Archeological authority. As a result, the national authorities ordered the removal of the archeological findings, which will represent additional investments for Codensa for almost US$4.7 Million in the project, and also a delay in the starting of commercial operations to 2016. Moving to slide 7, we also wanted to share with you some of the main highlights of the new regulations for the natural gas wholesale markets. As more participants would start competing, in the commercialization business for the wholesale market, new opportunities will arise from the new regulations for the natural gas, increasing competition and price awareness of clients in this market. In 2013, Emgesa participated in the initial rounds to offer gas supply for periods of two to five years to the wholesale market, and although we were not allocated with any contract, we believe that the know-how and the synergies of the Enel and Endesa group will allow us to profit from the changes in the natural gas market in the near future. On slide number 8 we ll be talking about the hydraulic conditions for 2013, and to tell you that we have experienced a drier year compared to 2012. As you can see in the slide, the aggregated figure of water reservoirs in the national system stood at 62.9% of the total capacity as of September of 2013, below the 80.7% of the total capacity that we had at the same month of 2012. Rain levels of the national system during 2013, stand at 90% of the historical average and the eastern region of the country has received most of the rain during the year. The location of Emgesa s reservoirs in three different river basins, in the central and eastern regions, has been an important competitive advantage during this year. As of September of 2013, the system as a whole had a deficit of almost 3.000 GW/hr, compared to the levels of 2012, to face the summer season, which usually extends between the end of December to the first days of March. According to this, we expect the generation companies in Colombia to be more careful about the use of the water reserves during the following months in order to be able to serve their sales to contracts. In slide number 9, there is another important issue during 2013, and it was the discussion of the revision of the energy tariffs in Colombia. Every five years, the distribution business in Colombia faces a regulatory revision of tariffs. This year the regulator will review the methodology to
remunerate the commercialization and the distribution components of the tariffs for the distribution business. Since the commercialization component, which includes the payment for the consumption measurement, and the billing and collection of the service has been in place for almost 13 years, the industry as a whole has faced a deduction in this component in the current revision. The distribution component of the tariff, which remunerates the maintenance and investments in infrastructure for the distribution of electricity and the quality of the service delivered to clients, has been in place since September of 2008. This year the regulator will review the RORC applicable to calculate the return on the investment in the electrical assets for the distribution companies and will update the methodology to value those assets. In slide number 10, regarding the advances of the electric mobility front, is important to share with you that Codensa has been working very closely with the private and public sectors to consolidate several initiatives of electric mobility including E-bike to work program, the commercial field of electric vehicles and the launching of a pilot program of 50 electric taxis in the city of Bogotá. Codensa has also been actively working in the past three years with the district of Bogotá, to promote the electric mobility as an environmental friendly initiative for the massive public transportation in the capital city. This year Codensa along with Bogotá Eléctrica, a group of business operators, presented a project to the District of Bogotá, to pursued a private public association initiative to include electric busses in the phase I and phase II of Transmilenio, the massive transportation system of the city of Bogotá. This initiative represents an opportunity for Codensa to invest more than 91 Million in the construction of 74 Km of overhead power cables for Codensa, an important investment for the bus operators to include 455 trolley buses into the system, between 2015 and 2021. In slide 11, as you can see during 2013, Codensa and Emgesa received important recognitions for their high quality standards of corporate governance and social responsibility. These recognitions included the IR Committed recognition awarded by the Colombian Stock Exchange, granted for improving our investor relations practices in Spanish and English voluntarily. Only five fixed income issuers were recognized by the Colombian Stock Exchange, including Codensa and Emgesa. Secondly, Codensa ran 6 th in the Survey from the Original Commission of Electrical Integration among several distribution companies in Latin America, with an 86.4% satisfaction index of the quality perceived by clients. The areas in which Codensa had the most important improvements were image, client service and information and communication within the company and its clients. Finally, the Más Familia Foundation granted a recognition to Emgesa and Codensa as a family responsible company, for their extensive programs to improve the quality of life of their employees. Finally, in slide number 12 we want to present the results the of successful local bond issuance, carried out by Emgesa on September of 2013 for a total amount of approximately US$286 Million. The bonds were placed in two series, one of six years and one of twelve years, with a yield at par, of CPI plus 4.25% and CPI plus 5% respectively. The transaction was 2.2 times over described confirmed the investors confidence in Emgesa s management and high recognition as a well issuer, bond issuer in the local market.
The proceeds of this bond issuance will be used to serve investments in El Quimbo, during 2013 and 2014, and to prefund a bond maturity that Emgesa has in 2014. Now, please join me in the next section, to present the operating results of Emgesa and Codensa during the first nine months of 2013. In slide 14, you can see that as of September 2013, the Endesa group reached a total EBITDA of more than 5.2 Million, from which 49% came from the operations in Latin America. In terms of Business Units, Emgesa contributed with 37% of the EBITDA in the generation business in Latin America, while Codensa represented 27% of the regions EBITDA in the distribution business. For the first nine months of 2013, Colombia represented 32% of the EBITDA for the Latin America, and 16% of the Endesa s group consolidated EBITDA. In 16 years of presence in Colombia, Codensa and Emgesa, have managed to improve operational and financial results, becoming since 2012, the leading EBITDA contributor in Latin America for the Endesa group. Now, in slide 16, let s review Emgesa s operational results for the first nine months of 2013. As you can see in the slide, in the upper part of the slide, Total generation in the first nine months of the year reached 9.623 GW/h. That is a 6.1% decrease compared to the same period of 2012, as a result of the presence of dry conditions during the third quarter of 2013. Consequently, thermal generation also increased its participation on total generation from 3% to 8% during this period and generation from our hydro plants decreased from 96% to 92% of total generation. The availability level of our plants improved by 1.6% reaching 91.5% by September of 2013. Our market shares stood at 19.7% in terms of installed capacity, as our asset base has remained stable and decreased to 20.7% in terms of total generation, given climate conditions. Moving to Emgesa s sales volume, we can see that total sales reached 12.103 GW/h, that is a 1.6% decrease compared to the first 9 months of 2012. As you can see in the upper part of the slide, out of the total sales 71% were made through contracts to either wholesales or unregulated clients, and the remaining 29% in the spot market. Out of these sales make through contracts, 73% were sales to clients in the wholesale market, which includes distribution companies such as Codensa, and 27% were sales made to clients in the unregulated market, which includes large industrial companies. The commercial policy of Emgesa, aims for the equilibrium between sales through contracts and sales in the spot market, and at the same time the policy establishes a contract sales target that could also be hedged by the company s own generation. During the first nine months of 2013, our commercial policy focused on increasing the intermediation in the spot market, profiting from higher prices, in order to increase our operational margin. The market s spot price, as you can see in the lower part of the graph during the first nine months of 2013, averaged 176 pesos per KW/h, representing a 31.5% increase compared to the average spot price on the same period in 2012, as a result of the weather conditions that we explained before.
In slide 17, we can see Emgesa s client base, we maintained and important participation in the wholesale and the unregulated markets. In the wholesale markets we sold electricity through contracts to more than 14 large distribution companies in Colombia, including Codensa to which we sold 50% of the sales in this market, on an armed length basis. We also served through contracts almost 14% of the unregulated markets on a national basis, showing a 2.5% growth in sales through contracts to large industrial and commercial clients. Now, in slide 18 through 23, we will present Codensa s operational results for the nine months of this year. As you can see, national electricity demand continued to grow but at a lower pace reaching 3.08% in September 2013. Electricity demand in Codensa s area grew by 1.21% on an annual average rate basis, below the growth national demand as a result of a decrease in the industrial production on a national basis, and in Codensa s area of influence. Although we do not expect this trend to change dramatically in the following months, we have evidence of recovery in the demand of energy from the top 30 industrial clients since the past quarter. In slide 19, we can see that Codensa s electricity demand reached 10.686 GW/h, in the first nine months of 2013, that is a 3.4% increase compared to the same period of 2012. Codensa remained as the largest distribution company in the country with 23.7% of total national demand and 23% of the unregulated market share. In terms of volume, by type of market, Codensa s sales to regulated customers represented 63% of the total electricity demand in Codensa s area, while the demand for the use of Codensa s networks by other commercialization companies represented 31% of the total, and the use of Codensa s network by other network operators represented 7%. In slide 20, we see that since other electricity sales in Codensa went to the regulated market or public lightning, Codensa s commercial policy has focused in active strategy to hedge electricity prices for its clients, by ensuring the electricity purchases through contracts with large generation companies such as Emgesa. These contracts are allocated through auctions at market conditions. Currently, Codensa has hedged more than 90% of its energy purchases for 2013, 2014 and 2015, 66% of these energy purchases for 2016 and 45% of these energy purchases for 2017. In the slide 21 we see that between September 2012 and September 2013 Codensa added 99.108 new clients, reaching 2.6 Million clients in Bogotá. If we add to this figures the client base of Empresa de Energía de Cundinamarca we reach 2.9 Million clients, that is a 4% growth with respect to the number of clients as of September of 2012. In slide 22, regarding the quality of service, we would like to share with you the results for the SAIDI and SAIFI indexes. The SAIDI index measures the average interruption time in the electricity service, by minutes or hours and the SAIFI index measures the average number of interruptions of the service on a monthly basis. Year to date Codensa has experienced a declined in the number of interruptions of the service, compare to the results of December of 2012. On the contrary, the length of those interruptions has increased compared to the results of December of 2012, as a consequence of some failures in the networks, and a short rainy season in March and May of 2013, which impacted the response time of our operational teams.
In slide 23, we can see that Codensa continues to have improvements in the losses index, as you can see as of September of 2013, we reached a new historical low level of 7.06%, below the 7.22% target set for this period in our budget. We continue to see positive results from the renewal and technological update of our macro-measurement infrastructure, in order to better control theft and irregular activities in real time, and the implementation of new programs to promote a culture of payment. Now, let s move to section 3 to present the third quarter 2013 Financial Results for Emgesa and Codensa. In slide 25, we see that the aggregated results for Codensa and Emgesa during the third quarter of 2013, let s please remember that the financial figures are presented in US Dollars, using the official FX rate applicable by the end of each period. However financial statements are prepared on the Colombian Cop in pesos, and therefore we have calculated ratios and variations in pesos, in order to exclude any impact from the indicative FX conversion. As you can see, aggregated revenues and EBITDA for Codensa and Emgesa for the first nine months of 2013 totaled US$2.2 Billion, and US$1 Billion, respectively. Total assets reached US$8.1 Billion for September 2013, and they were backed by US$4.5 Billion in total equity. Both companies are rated AAA locally by Fitch, and this year Emgesa received an upgrade from S&P and Fitch in its international credit rating from BBB- to BBB, with a stable outlook by both rating agencies. In slide 26, we can see that Emgesa s operating revenues in pesos increased by 14.4% as compared to the same period of 2012, reaching US$949 Million as of September of this year. This is due to an increase in the commercialization activity, especially in the spot market at higher prices, and in the revenues from the secondary frequency regulation. Given the increase in our thermal generation and the increased spot intermediation, as previously explained, our total sales in pesos increased by 24.4%. As a result, the company had a 7.6% increase in EBITDA in pesos, as of September 2013, and compared to the same period of 2012, totaling US$587 Million. Consequently, our EBITDA margin, stood at 61.6% for the first nine months of this year. Net income increased by 11.1% as of September of this year, due to our operational results and to our reduction in financial expenditure, which fell 14.2% with respect to the same period in 2012, due to lower interest rates over the period, resulting in a net margin of 35.8% as you can see in the upper part of the graph. Our positive financial results reflected the flexibility of our commercial strategy, that allow us to optimize our water reserves and participate in the spot market, to profit from higher prices in that market. It is also important to highlight, that about 67% of our operating revenues come from contracts sales and reliability payments that create stability and predictability to our cash flow and financial results. In slide 27, you can see that as of September of 2013, we have invested more than US$502.5 Million in El Quimbo, since we began construction. During the first nine months of 2013, we have invested US$195 Million in El Quimbo, and about US$14 Million in the repowering of the El Salaco generation chain. Majors CAPEX for our current assets, which is main preventive, reached US$17 Million in the Third Quarter of 2013.
In slide 28 we see Emgesa s key credit metrics and as of September of 2013, we had a Debt to EBITDA ratio of 2.2 times, slightly above the ratio as of December of 2012, due to the increase in the investment in El Quimbo and Salaco projects, during the third quarter of 2013. The EBITDA to interest expense coverage ratio, calculated from the P&L figures, increased to 12.5 times, given the increase in EBITDA and lower interest rates. Please remember that during the construction period of El Quimbo, the interest expense associated to the debt used to fund the project, will be accounted as higher value of the company s assets, and therefore will not be computed in the P&L. Therefore, it is important as well to look at the interest coverage ratio calculated alternatively with the interest paid which results in 7 times coverage ratio, also increasing from the 6.5 times that we had at December 2012. Net Financial debt increased to US$1 Billion, mainly as a result of investments in El Quimbo an in the Salaco chain. Total financial debt outstanding amounted US$1.7 Billion increasing from the level that we had at December 2012. As of September 2013, the leverage indicators measured by financial debt over equity and financial over assets, totaled 57.2% and 31.5% respectively. Now, in slide 29 let s move to Codensa s financial results for the third quarter of 2013. As you can see, revenues increased by 2% in pesos, as compared to the ones in the same period of 2012, mainly due to the steady demand of the regulated and commercial clients and to an increase in the volume of energy sent to other network operators from Codensa s area. Codensa s EBITDA in the first nine months of 2013, reached US$424 Million, showing a 0.8% increase in pesos as compared to the EBITDA that we had in the same period as of 2012. This is a result of a higher growth in cost of sales, that in the operating revenues. Net income totaled US$204 Million showing a 2.7% increase in pesos, due to a slight increase in the operating income, and an important reduction in the net financial expenses, as a result of lower debt balances and lower inflation rates, at which 92% of our debt is indexed. As such, EBITDA margins for the first nine months of 2013 was 34.4% and Net margin was 16.3% preserving the historical stability that we have seen in the previous years. Our sales composition remained mainly composed of residential and commercial clients. In slide 30 we can see that during the first nine months of 2013, Codensa had invested a total of US$78 million in CAPEX, out of which 38% was focused in serving new demand, mainly through the construction of new sub-stations, 17% was dedicated to improve quality of service, and 10% was destined to savings. In slide 31 we see Codensa s key credit metrics, they remain strong and consistent with our local AAA rating of the company. Debt to EBITDA ratio increased to, decreased to 0.9 times, as the company amortized with cash on hand the US$41 million maturity of local bonds that were due in February of 2013. EBITDA to interest expenditure coverage ratio increased from 13.4 times in 2012 to 16.1 times for the last 12 months, ending September 2013. Since financial expenses in the first nine months of 2013 decreased by 38% as compared to the ones in the same period of 2012, given lower interest rates and the amortization of the February 2013 maturity, bonds maturity.
Net financial debt increased to US$388 Million by September 2013, mainly as a result of the dividend payments and early payments of government transfers, to Empresa de Energía de Cundinamarca, in order to optimize return on cash surpluses. Total Debt reached US$540 Million, decreasing by 7.2% with respect to December 2012. Financial Debt over assets totaled 19.1%, and Financial Debt over Equity reached 34.2%. In slide 32, we conclude this presentation with the main highlights of the companies in Colombia as of September of this year. As you can see, we have significant growth in Operational Results in spite of the drier than average unexpected season and a decrease in the national industrial production. We have a participation in new businesses and new opportunities for growth; we have a strong and stable financial results, with low financial leverage and conservative credit metrics. We are working in line to face new challenges such as the energy tariff revision, the quality of service, the electric mobility in Bogotá, and the development of new markets. And we had public recognition from our stakeholders for our commitment to sustainability. Thank you very much for joining us this morning, and now we ll like to open the conference call for a Q and A session. RICHARD: Thank you. We will now begin the Question and Answer session. If you have a question please press star then one on your touch-tone phone. If you wish to be removed from the queue please press the pound sign or the hash key. If you re using a speakerphone you may need to pick up the handset first before pressing the numbers. Once again if you have a question please press star then one on your touch-tone phone. Standing by for questions. Again, press star then one on your touch-tone phone. We have no further questions at this time. MR. PARDO: Ok, thank you very much for joining us this morning. RICHARD: Thank you ladies and gentlemen. This concludes today s conference. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.