Excelerate Energy - Q1 2024

Transcript

Operator (participant)

Hello everybody, and welcome to the Excelerate Energy 1st Quarter 2024 Earnings Conference Call. My name is Sam, and I'll be coordinating your call today. If you would like to ask a question during the presentation, you may do so by pressing star followed by 1 on your telephone keypad. I'll now hand you over to your host, Craig Hicks, Vice President of Investor Relations and ESG, to begin. Craig, please go ahead.

Craig Hicks (VP of Investor Relations and ESG)

Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining Excelerate Energy's 1st Quarter 2024 Earnings call. Participating on the call today are Steven Kobos, President and Chief Executive Officer, and Dana Armstrong, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Also joining the call today is Oliver Simpson, Executive Vice President and Chief Commercial Officer. Our 1st Quarter 2024 Earnings results press release and presentation were released yesterday afternoon and can be found on our website at ir.excelerateenergy.com. I would like to remind everyone that we will be making forward-looking statements on this call that involve a number of risks and uncertainties. Our actual results may differ materially from those expressed in these forward-looking statements, and we make no obligation to update or revise them. Today's remarks will also refer to certain non-GAAP financial measures. We provide a reconciliation to the most directly comparable GAAP financial measures at the back of the presentation.

With that, it is my pleasure to pass the call over to Steven Kobos.

Steven Kobos (President and CEO)

Thanks, Craig. Good morning, everyone. I would like to start with saying we delivered strong financial results for the first quarter. Excelerate Energy's financial performance reflects the robust earnings power of our core regasification business. It also highlights our commitment to operating our FSRU fleet at the highest levels of reliability and to delivering natural gas safely to our customers. As a global energy company, we take great pride in using our FSRU fleet to deliver integrated LNG solutions to customers who need them most. In addition to operating our core regas business, we are focused on expanding our presence in new and existing markets across our global footprint. On today's call, I'm going to share with you some additional insights into our business development strategy to help provide a better understanding of where the opportunities are and when we expect to start deploying capital.

I'll then hand the call over to Dana, who will walk through our financial results for the quarter. Since we were last together, the Excelerate team has made great progress toward our plan to grow our company and maximize value for our shareholders. To recap our strategy, we are optimizing our core regas business and are executing our comprehensive organic and inorganic growth roadmap with three key areas for value creation. First, acquiring ownership interests in LNG regasification terminals. Second, establishing a diversified LNG portfolio. And third, investing in downstream natural gas infrastructure. While many companies in our industry aspire to expand their presence in markets around the world, Excelerate already has an extensive global presence. Excelerate operates approximately 20% of the global FSRU fleet. We have regional offices in 11 countries and an operational presence in Argentina, Bangladesh, Brazil, Finland, Germany, Pakistan, the UAE, and the United States.

Let's be clear: this is a competitive advantage for our company. We are using our expansive reach to pursue growth opportunities in both new and existing markets. This means leveraging our relationships with sovereigns. It means leveraging our reputation as the world's leading provider of FSRUs. How? By having meaningful and constructive conversations for new regas infrastructure and long-term LNG supply. All our business development efforts are aligned with strategic areas of focus along the LNG value chain. We are optimistic that these discussions will lead to strategic investments that will enhance our long-term contract revenue and margins, create pull-through demand for future vessel deployments, and capture incremental LNG and gas sales opportunities. As part of our effort to calibrate our growth strategy, we have identified and evaluated in detail a number of organic and inorganic opportunities and have prioritized the most promising ones.

Though we have identified opportunities across our asset footprint, the majority of the opportunities we're exploring are focused in the Asia-Pacific and the Americas. Our commercial teams are now in advanced discussions with several potential partners worldwide who satisfy Excelerate's requirements for value creation and for compliance. We continue to pursue opportunities to develop LNG regas terminals. We do this with a focus on priority projects in countries with growing economies and an increasing demand for LNG. These are markets like India, markets like Vietnam, markets like Brazil. As it relates to capital investment, 10 of the projects range between $50-$400 million. Two of the 12 projects have CapEx greater than this range, one of which is Payra. I cannot emphasize enough that the entire Excelerate management team understands the importance of being good stewards of our shareholders' capital.

We will continue to take a disciplined approach as we evaluate these investments and are committed to closing deals that meet or exceed our return hurdles. We are confident in the project portfolio that we have shared in today's presentation, and we look forward to making subsequent announcements regarding several of these opportunities in the coming weeks and months. To recap what you've heard today, Excelerate Energy is a compelling growth story. We are investing strategically in our FSRU and terminal assets to enhance our earnings and to provide us with a solid foundation for substantial growth. As a leader in the LNG space, we are essential both to ensuring energy security and accelerating the energy transition. We are leveraging our share of the global FSRU fleet and our presence around the world to pursue growth opportunities in new and existing markets.

We are in advanced talks with several counterparties for investments along the value chain as we focus on maximizing value for our shareholders through our disciplined capital allocation strategy. With that, I'll now turn the call over to Dana.

Dana Armstrong (EVP and CFO)

Thanks, Steven, and good morning, everyone. As stated by Steven, Excelerate delivered strong financial results for the 1st quarter that were in line with our expectations. We reported net income of $28 million, which is a sequential increase of $8 million, or up 40% as compared to last quarter. Adjusted EBITDA for the 1st quarter was $75 million, up $4 million, or up about 6% versus last quarter. The sequential increase in adjusted EBITDA over the 4th quarter of last year was mostly driven by the timing of vessel operating costs and the timing of certain SG&A expenses, including business development expenses, which were lower in the 1st quarter of this year as compared to the last quarter of last year. Our 1st quarter 2024 financial results include the impact of our dry dock for the FSRU Summit LNG in Bangladesh.

Summit is one of two FSRUs in our fleet that are under a build-own-operate transfer, or BOOT, structure. The other is the FSRU Excellence, which underwent dry dock services in the 4th quarter of last year. Because of the BOOT structure, the majority of the dry dock cost for the Summit in the 1st quarter and the Excellence in the 4th quarter of last year were expensed to the income statement instead of classified as maintenance CapEx. The Summit and the Excellence are the only two vessels in our fleet that are required to expense dry dock cost. For the full year 2024, the vast majority of our earnings will be driven by our FSRU and terminal services business since all 10 of our vessels are currently contracted. This is noteworthy for a few reasons.

First, the shift in revenue contribution from gas sales to FSRU and terminal services is driven largely by the transition from our previous gas sales agreement, or GSA, in Brazil to a long-term 10-year regas charter with Petrobras for our FSRU Sequoia. As we've said before, the transition of the Sequoia from a one-year GSA to a long-term 10-year charter contract will provide enhanced visibility to both near-term and long-term cash flows for Excelerate. Our core FSRU and terminal assets are underpinned by a high-quality contract portfolio that is comprised of over $4 billion long-term fixed-fee contracts with a remaining weighted average of roughly seven years. We believe these attractive financial attributes distinguish our core regas business and are a major reason why Excelerate Energy represents a relatively low-risk investment opportunity. As of the end of the first quarter, our total debt, including finance leases, was $752 million.

We had $579 million of cash and cash equivalents on hand, $40 million of letters of credit issued under our revolver, and no outstanding borrowings under our revolver, allowing for about $310 million of available revolver borrowing capacity. In the first quarter, the Excelerate Board of Directors approved a program to repurchase up to $50 million of Class A common stock. During the first quarter, Excelerate purchased 588,000 shares, or $9.4 million, of our Class A common stock. With the free cash flow generated by our core regas business, our strong balance sheet, and the liquidity provided by our revolving credit facility, we remain confident that we will have sufficient capacity to fund our growth and strategic objectives in the near term and the long term. Now let's turn to an update on our financial guidance for 2024. We are reaffirming our previously communicated financial guidance for 2024.

For the full year, we continue to expect Adjusted EBITDA to range between $315 million and $335 million. This range is inclusive of roughly $20 million in expected business development cost. For the full year, we continue to expect maintenance CapEx to range between $50 million and $60 million and committed growth CapEx to range between $70 million and $80 million. As a reminder, committed growth CapEx is defined as capital allocated and committed to specific infrastructure investments currently in execution for previously approved capital projects. This year, most of this committed growth CapEx is related to milestone payments on our new-build FSRU, which will be delivered in June 2026. We will continue to provide updates on our committed growth capital estimates as definitive contracts are executed with counterparties that drive incremental capital needs for 2024. With that, we'll open up the call for Q&A.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. If you would like to ask a question, please press Star followed by one on your telephone keypad now. If you change your mind, please press Star followed by two. When preparing to ask your question, please ensure your line is unmuted locally. Our first question comes from Chris Robertson from Deutsche Bank. Chris, your line is now open. Please go ahead.

Christopher Robertson (VP and Equity Research Analyst)

Hey, good morning, everybody, and congratulations on a strong quarter.

Dana Armstrong (EVP and CFO)

Thanks, Chris.

Steven Kobos (President and CEO)

Thanks, Chris.

Christopher Robertson (VP and Equity Research Analyst)

Yeah, just going back, Dana, going back to the point that you made around the share repurchase program, I just wanted to clarify, it was 588,000 shares. Could you clarify the average price per share paid?

Dana Armstrong (EVP and CFO)

Yeah, sure. So it's 588,000 shares, and it ended up being $9.4 million. So it was roughly just under $16 per share.

Christopher Robertson (VP and Equity Research Analyst)

Okay. Thank you. I guess looking at the project portfolio that's been proposed here, several different projects, obviously. So Steven, wondering if you could maybe just expand upon that further, maybe by rank order or some other mechanism here, just talking about what would make a project the most attractive in your eyes. I mean, there's a lot on the table here, but as you're going through the different variables, whether it's return or a risk-adjusted return or the type of project and the type of counterparty, etc., could you just clarify maybe how you're thinking about what's the most important factors for you?

Steven Kobos (President and CEO)

Sure. Thanks, Chris. We are excited to provide a little more clarity because the fact of the matter is, this is a prioritized list. We think there is an enormous TAM out there. So to look at this and say, "This looks like a lot of projects," actually, this is paring down the opportunity set that we see substantially. Now, as I mentioned on the call, obviously, we're going to look at everything through our hurdles that we have. We're going to look at it through the WACC we have for different countries. But what we've shared for a long time is that we care about fundamentals in markets. We care about the need for the energy. So we're looking not just at the project fundamentals. Those have to be there.

But we also want to know that the market itself needs the gas, has an economy that needs to fuel it, is otherwise going to shift to coal. But certainly, any of these are going to meet our hurdle expectations and our country-specific WACC. So we feel confident that we have prioritized the right subset of the TAM.

Christopher Robertson (VP and Equity Research Analyst)

Okay. Yeah, it makes sense. I'll turn it over. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Our next question is from Wade Suki of Capital One. Wade, your line is now open. Please go ahead.

Wade Suki (Research Analyst)

Great. Thank you so much for taking my question. Well, just to flesh out a little bit more, kind of dovetailing on Chris's question on the project portfolio, any clarity you can give on these, let's call them, 12 prioritized projects in terms of terminals, ships, new builds, maybe adjacent asset classes, things like that would be fantastic to hear a little more detail of to the extent you feel comfortable?

Steven Kobos (President and CEO)

Sure, Wade. Thanks. I'm going to turn it over to Oliver Simpson here in a second. But I would just say, look, we are a global LNG company. We have a presence all over the world. Everybody knows all of this LNG needs to find a home. We are the home builders. But Oliver, you want to get into, Wade, some of the nitty-gritty on the asset classes, etc., we're looking at?

Oliver Simpson (EVP and Chief Commercial Officer)

Sure. Yeah. Thanks for the question, Wade. So I think what you see with the list of 12 projects there is we have a wide range of geographical projects covering a number of different types of projects that have a different reach across the LNG value chain. So I think we see from the asset class, obviously, a number of these projects will require new FSRUs. We have a growth strategy for our fleet. That's a core part of our strategy. And we'll be looking to add whether it's new builds or conversions as appropriate for those projects. But I think also, as you see, some of these projects, a number of these projects offer integrated solutions which allow us to drive the incremental returns and make gas sales and deliver additional products to our customers.

I think, in general, we're excited about the broad range that these projects offer. To Steven's earlier point, these are really projects in markets that we've targeted and like. I think that hopefully, that gives a little more clarity.

Wade Suki (Research Analyst)

It's fantastic. Thank you. I'd love to get a sense, I mean, obviously, y'all are very active on the commercial side. Just get a sense what the thinking is of the customer these days. We've got, as you mentioned, a good amount of LNG hitting the market here in the next couple of years. Gas prices have come down. Just give us a sense of what the temperature is, what are the concerns, what's on the top of mind for the customer, if you wouldn't mind. Thank you.

Steven Kobos (President and CEO)

Wade, Steven, I'll just jump in. I think what we're seeing all over the world, and especially within a number of these Global South markets, they're back at the table. The disruption of the war, the war in Ukraine, was surprising to the Global South. They weren't prepared for it. It took them away from the LNG market for a while. But we've gone through that now. And they've recognized and accepted that LNG is a key part of their strategy. You will have seen it all over the place, like India's announcements on the increased share of natural gas that they intend to have in their energy mix by 2030, all kinds of ways that they're manifesting it, the reentry into the spot market, the contracting for long-term supply, and the focus on LNG projects in general.

The sentiment out there is bullish, and it is part of the energy mix for the South. We remain a credible alternative to coal in much of the world.

Wade Suki (Research Analyst)

Fantastic. Thank you all so much. Appreciate you taking my question. Have a great day.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from Jeremy Tonet of J.P. Morgan. Your line is now open, Jeremy, so please go ahead.

Noah Katz (Senior Equity Research Associate)

Hey, this is Noah Katz on for Jeremy. First, I wanted to touch on your capital allocation priorities. I know you guys authorized up to $50 million of repurchases through February 2026. So are there any thoughts on weighing repurchases versus future dividend raises and leverage reductions, or are you thinking about any other bolt-on opportunities? Anything you can provide there would be great. Thank you.

Dana Armstrong (EVP and CFO)

Hey, Jeremy. Thanks for the question. So we will continue to stress the importance of growth in our capital allocation strategy. I mean, as Steven just said and Ollie just said, there's a lot of focus out there with the Global South, and we expect to use our cash to generate growth on these projects. So as far as the share repo, as you know, we purchased $9 million through the end of the quarter. We have $50 million, so remaining $41 million to use through February 26th. We'll use that opportunistically where it makes sense. But our priority will remain growth. As we have excess cash on hand, we'll evaluate paydowns. We'll evaluate potential dividend increases over the long term. But our priority right now is obviously growth. Does that answer your question?

Noah Katz (Senior Equity Research Associate)

That's helpful. Thank you. Yeah. Yeah, definitely. Thanks for that. And then as a follow-up, can you speak to what you guys are seeing?

Dana Armstrong (EVP and CFO)

Sorry to call you Jeremy. No. Sorry about that.

Noah Katz (Senior Equity Research Associate)

No worries. No worries. Can you guys speak to what you're seeing with other growth opportunities outside of FSRUs, such as with investing additional assets in vessels for onshore regasification efforts with smaller players? Thanks.

Steven Kobos (President and CEO)

That's a great point. There's no one-size-fits-all for these markets. We've said for some time, Noah, that the home for the LNG is going to be in a lot of different-sized opportunities. We've mentioned how much of an impact any single FSRU can have. The proof point for that is our FSRU in Karachi delivering something like 1.25% of global LNG into that market. So they can make a difference. But at the same time, we fully expect that many of the projects out there in the world that will come online this decade and the coming years are going to be in the... they're not going to be that size. Some of them will, but some will be in the one, two million, three million-ton range. Those are going to call from a variety of solutions.

But Oliver, if you want to weigh into that, there's just, to my way of thinking, there's no one-size-fits-all.

Oliver Simpson (EVP and Chief Commercial Officer)

No, I think that's exactly the point that we're seeing. We're seeing a downstream demand in these markets for natural gas and therefore LNG. We have a wide range of technical solutions that we can provide. We're happy to assess all the different solutions. We're not married simply to large-scale FSRUs. We'll assess on each project depending on the needs of that market.

Noah Katz (Senior Equity Research Associate)

Thank you, guys.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from Bobby Brooks of Northland Capital Markets. Bobby, your line is now open. Please go ahead.

Bobby Brooks (Senior Equity Research Analyst)

Hey, good morning, guys. Thanks for taking the question, and congrats on the solid quarter. So on slide five, you guys mentioned the piece on investing in the core business to protect and enhance long-term revenues and margins. Outside of maintenance Capex, what are maybe some examples of this? And could those examples push margins even higher?

Steven Kobos (President and CEO)

Thanks, Bobby. Yeah, I think that would really build upon Oliver's comments. We are bullish on our asset class. We're going to continue to invest in these assets. We have a track record of upgrading these assets, and we will continue to do that. There are all sorts of upgrades that you can make, upgrades that have been valued by our customers. We are looking at an entire suite of those. Those could be anything from reliquefaction capacity modules. Those could be minimum send-out compressors. There are all kinds of upgrades that you could make to them. That's really one of the drivers and why we were able to get 17 years of contract extensions in 2023. We are looking all the time for how do you deliver the product that your customer needs and that your customer has evolved into needing.

Bobby Brooks (Senior Equity Research Analyst)

Got it. Thanks for that, Color. And then maybe more specifically, kind of circling back on previous questions, but when looking at acquiring specifically interest in regas terminals that are either existing or developed, outside of economics and then obviously, the key that you guys made was market dynamics, outside of those two pieces, what are maybe the other key focuses when evaluating on a project that's already operating or one that's under development?

Steven Kobos (President and CEO)

Thanks, Bobby. I mean, we find that markets that need LNG, when they get LNG, they need more LNG. So as you say, the fundamentals of the market are going to remain the critical driver. One of the other drivers is obviously our outstanding reputation for governance that we enjoy all over the globe and which we take very seriously and which we believe is a value driver for Excelerate. So that's one aspect of what we need and require. And then obviously, the third part is financial, just how we think about the WACC for those projects. And does it allow us an entry point into a market that we want to be in? So that and the counterparty as well, I think those are the key pieces of the puzzle.

Bobby Brooks (Senior Equity Research Analyst)

Got it. So it's not necessarily you're kind of looking at existing projects and projects that are under development pretty much the same way. There's no kind of no preference to either?

Steven Kobos (President and CEO)

No, I think it's all about what helps you get to where you want to go and what helps you get into the markets you want to be in and what you think is going to allow you the most upside from, as Oliver mentioned earlier, the incremental opportunities associated with certain projects.

Bobby Brooks (Senior Equity Research Analyst)

Got it. Thank you for that. Then just last question for me. I want to say the slide seven, this with all the prioritized projects, I think that was excellent. So thanks for providing that detail. But my question is, and I know you kind of I think you said those projects range from $50 million-$400 million, I think maybe was that. But I know all projects are going to vary in terms of the size. But in general, how should we think about maybe the projects like C, G, H, and K, which check all four boxes in terms of how much that would cost and the associated EBITDA generation potential from them? Are those sized opportunities something that you could maybe do two over the next 18 months, or would it more so be one and then take some time to digest?

Steven Kobos (President and CEO)

Bobby, we're out there doing a full-court press, my friend. And we are going to boat as many tunas as we can. I'd like to give you more color, but the reality is we want to be as transparent as we can with our investors. We're committed to doing that. And I'm, of course, eager to share everything we can with you all. I hope this is a step in that direction. But events on the ground are going to drive some of this. But we are going full speed on as many of our prioritized projects as we can.

Dana Armstrong (EVP and CFO)

Bobby, I'll also comment, and this is probably obvious, but obviously, the more integrated projects, the ones that you mentioned, those are the larger, more integrated projects. Those are going to cost more. They're going to be a little bit more complex. Then the smaller projects are going to be more in that $50 million-$200 million range. So we're very pleased that we have this wide diversity of projects. So some of these will be potentially equity buy-ins that we can go to market on real quickly. Others like Payra will be more complex and take a little bit more time.

Bobby Brooks (Senior Equity Research Analyst)

That's terrific, Coll. I really appreciate it. And I like the basketball reference there, Steve. I'll turn it back over. Thank you, guys.

Dana Armstrong (EVP and CFO)

Thank you.

Steven Kobos (President and CEO)

No comment about Timberwolves, Bobby.

Operator (participant)

As a reminder, if you would like to ask a question, please press star followed by one on your telephone keypad now. Our next question comes from Michael Scialla of Stephens. Michael, your line is now open. Please go ahead.

Michael Scialla (Managing Director)

Morning, everybody. Steven, you talked about the new projects you're working on. You mentioned Asia-Pacific, which you've talked about in the past. But you also mentioned the Americas. I was a little surprised there rather than, I think, in the past, you'd talked about Sub-Saharan Africa. Has there been any changes in market dynamics that are driving that?

Steven Kobos (President and CEO)

No, thanks, Mike. I appreciate the question. As I've said, we are a global company. We're out there. Sometimes I speak to India, not writing off Sub-Saharan Africa at all. But the reality is there are interesting points all over the global market. And since we have offices all over the world, we have insights into those opportunities. So I'm not meaning to denigrate any of those regions, but we clearly do like Americas as well. And you shouldn't take that we're writing off any particular part of the world. We're just prioritizing in the way we best can what we think are the most likely near-term opportunities.

Michael Scialla (Managing Director)

I guess from a reverse point of view or anything that elevated the Americas recently, anything changed there that has made that look more attractive?

Steven Kobos (President and CEO)

Mike, nothing I want to get into right now. As soon as I can provide better color, we will.

Michael Scialla (Managing Director)

Gotcha. And then I just wanted to ask on the long-term LNG sale and purchase agreements. Do you plan to continue to tie those agreements together like you did with Qatar and Bangladesh? And if so, any thoughts on where the Plaquemines LNG volumes go, or do you leave some for the spot market? And that's all I have. Thanks.

Steven Kobos (President and CEO)

Yeah. Thanks, Mike. I'm going to turn to Oliver in a second on it. I will say very happy with the QatarEnergy deal. It's a good fit, good solution for an important market of ours. And frankly, we've been working with Qatar for some time. And as we've mentioned before, 10% of their existing LNG is regasified across our asset class. So really proud about that deal because it shows the high regard that Excelerate has held by major players around the globe. But Oliver, let me turn to you for Mike on a little more. Obviously, we want to support integrated deals.

Oliver Simpson (EVP and Chief Commercial Officer)

Yeah. Thanks, Mike. I think, as we mentioned in the presentation, mentioned before, establishing a diversified energy portfolio is a key part of our strategy. I think you see today in that prioritized project portfolio that we have a number of projects where we'll need that energy supply. These U.S. Gulf volumes, they're some of the most attractive FOB volumes, they're some of the most flexible volumes that are out there. So they're a natural fit to these projects. At the same time, we're seeing good interest for LNG volumes. So we'll assess the different opportunities, whether in the projects or elsewhere, as needed. But I think to your question, building that energy supply portfolio is very much aligned with how we see the downstream demand growth. So we'll build it in parallel with that and to match that demand.

Michael Scialla (Managing Director)

Makes sense. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from Craig Shere of Tuohy Brothers. Craig, your line is now open. Please go ahead.

Craig Shere (Director of Research)

Morning. Thanks for taking the questions. I look forward to catching up later this afternoon. The growth opportunities are obviously exciting, but you've got to walk before you run. Quite frankly, we think you're not getting credit for the speed at which you're walking today. I've got two simple questions about 2020 for guidance and what the business really looks like. First, excluding growth-oriented development expense and smoothing out that unusually expensed vessel dry dock costs that I believe only occurs every few years, what would a more current recurring average run rate EBITDA look like? That's my first question.

Dana Armstrong (EVP and CFO)

Thanks, Craig. That's actually relatively simple. So as you can see from our guidance, the midpoint is $325 million for 2024. And as we stated previous week, of that $325 million, $20 million is what we expect to spend in business development this year. And we spent roughly $20 million on our dry dock. That was the all-in spend. Some of that was off-hire. But we have net P&L impact for the Summit dry dock of $20 million in this quarter. And we had roughly a $20 million P&L impact last quarter for the Excellence. And you are correct. That happens every five years. None of our other vessels are on a BOOT structure. So we will capitalize all of our dry docks for the other eight vessels. So you can safely assume, I think, a run rate. You could probably exclude that $20 million.

However, I would caution you not to exclude that business development spend from a run rate viewpoint because we are a growth company. We will continue investing growth. And so the $20 million of business development, I would see as pretty in the range of an ongoing average run rate for a growth company of our size. Does that make sense?

Craig Shere (Director of Research)

Yeah. I mean, I guess the point I'm trying to drive home here is if you're not being paid for growth, we probably shouldn't be docking you for expenses to pay for growth. And it sounds like smoothing out the dry docking, your run rate, if you weren't focused on these tremendous opportunities, might be in the area of about 350. Does that sound about right?

Dana Armstrong (EVP and CFO)

Yeah. That sounds about right. Maybe a little bit more. But yeah, I mean, if you just add back the $40, you get a $360 flat. So yeah, somewhere around $350-$370 would be the range without the growth spend and the dry docking.

Craig Shere (Director of Research)

Okay. And as to the discussion about the Global South returning to spot market purchasing, can you opine about what, if any, is included in your 2024 guidance on one-off upside there that you've seen in prior years? And to the degree it's not included, does that represent prospective upside for this year?

Steven Kobos (President and CEO)

I mean, in terms of Craig want to understand the question, I think you're asking, does our guidance contemplate much in the way of additional incremental cargo sales questions?

Dana Armstrong (EVP and CFO)

Yeah. So Craig, we don't expect a huge amount of cargo sales this year. We had one in the first quarter. From a guidance perspective, it's included in our expectations. It's not a material figure.

Craig Shere (Director of Research)

Okay. In prior years, you had managed to, on occasion, get some low millions of dollars of margin from unexpected kind of seasonal opportunities. You don't think that exists today the way you're working?

Steven Kobos (President and CEO)

I think, Craig, the words you used of unexpected and seasonal are probably the right way to think about it. But I'm not going to give the commercial team a hall pass, obviously. And they're going to be out there trying to do what they can. But I think we've got the right balance of that in our guidance.

Craig Shere (Director of Research)

Great. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

As a final reminder, if you would like to ask a question, please press star followed by 1 on your telephone keypad. We next have a follow-up question from Wade Suki of Capital One. Wade, your line is now open. Please go ahead.

Wade Suki (Research Analyst)

Hey, everyone. Sorry for the double tap. Just heard you say something. I think it was in response to Bobby's questions on upgrades. Did I hear you correctly saying reliquefaction capability? Is that right?

Steven Kobos (President and CEO)

Wade, thank you. I don't want to geek out too much on what we can how we can AMG these assets. But yes, that's one option. That's a decent-sized option you can put a skid on for efficiency. It's all going to depend upon how a particular market or customer utilizes their asset. Are they sending out maximum every day, 365, is it? Or are there periods of time because they're balancing hydroelectric where they're looking at other factors? So each market, each project has a very specific tweak to a base asset. And we understand that well. And we're in discussions with a number of customers about those optionalities.

Wade Suki (Research Analyst)

Okay. Great. Yeah. I was trying to understand how a customer might be using that capability or maybe this would be a new type of or maybe a different type of application for one of your vessels.

Steven Kobos (President and CEO)

Yeah. I think, in general, it would be someone with an intense seasonal demand where they're just going to sit there for part of the year and make more robust use in other parts of the year. Anyway, we do have a good technical team. We know how these assets operate. We have a long track record at this point. And obviously, we consider all the best ways to upgrade them. And as I mentioned before, upgrades are just how you keep a happy customer, how you seek to increase return on base contracted assets, and how you increase contract length. So it's an important part of the shop.

Wade Suki (Research Analyst)

Further optimizing the asset, I guess, would be another way to think about it. And along those lines, I guess, beyond upgrades, looking at the existing portfolio, existing set of assets, are there other sort of smallish one-off things you can be doing to kind of further optimize the existing portfolio?

Steven Kobos (President and CEO)

Yes. I'm not going to pull the curtain back entirely, Wade, but yes, we're going to keep.

Wade Suki (Research Analyst)

I could. You can't blame me for trying here, right?

Steven Kobos (President and CEO)

Yeah. No, no, no. But I assure you, best way of thinking about this, we value the asset class. The asset class has a long useful life. We will do what is necessary to ensure we are deriving value from those assets for their entire useful life.

Wade Suki (Research Analyst)

Great. Thanks again. Appreciate it.

Operator (participant)

There are no final questions, so I'd like to hand the call back over to Steven Kobos for any closing remarks.

Steven Kobos (President and CEO)

Excelerate Energy is a compelling growth story. Just want to leave you all with the thought that we are essential to ensuring energy security and accelerating the energy transition. Thank you all for joining us this morning.

Operator (participant)

This concludes today's conference call. Thank you, everyone, for joining. You may now disconnect.