Century Aluminum Co (CENX) Q2 2026 Earnings Call Transcript

Hello, everyone. Thank you for joining us and welcome to the Century Aluminum Company second quarter 2026 earnings conference call. After today's prepared remarks, we will host a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star and one to raise your hand. To withdraw your question, press star one again. I will now hand the conference over to Chad Rigg, Vice President, Finance and Treasurer. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Operator. Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to the second quarter conference call. I'm joined here today by Jesse Gary, Century's President and Chief Executive Officer, and Peter Tchaikovsky, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. After our prepared comments, we will take your questions. As a reminder, today's presentation is available on our website at www.CenturyAluminum.com. We use our website as a means of disclosing material information about the company and for complying with Regulation SD. Turning to slide two, please take a moment to review the cautionary statements with respect to forward-looking statements and non-GAAP financial measures in today's discussion. And with that, I'll hand the call to Jesse.

Thank you, Chad, and thanks to everyone for joining. I'll start today by reviewing our second quarter operational performance, including the completion of the Mount Holly expansion and the restart of Potline 2 at Grinder-Tonghi, before turning to the continued strong market conditions we are operating in today. Pete will then walk you through our Q2 results and Q3 outlook before I conclude the call with the latest on our new Oklahoma smelter project and on President Trump's important new executive order incentivizing companies like century that are building new american aluminum capacity before we get into the quarter i want to thank the century team across all of our sites for another strong quarter of safety performance over the last six months our teams have executed two major capital projects on two continents all while welcoming hundreds of new employees into our plants and they did it safely that is not luck it is the product of planning discipline and a workforce that looks out for one another. Thank you to each of you. Turning to page four, when we spoke with you in May, I told you that by the end of July, for the first time in over a decade, all century assets should be operating at full capacity. I'm very proud to report today that our team has delivered on that commitment. At Mount Holly, we completed the restart of the final 90 pots in late June, on time and on budget, returning the plant to full capacity. This project increases total U.S. primary aluminum production by nearly 10% and has added over 150 full-time American manufacturing jobs to the plant. We were proud to host U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Letnick and South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson to the plant last week to celebrate this major achievement. At Grunder-Tonghi, we completed the restart of Line 2 at the end of July, roughly six months ahead of the timeline we first shared with you last October. it is worth taking a step back for a moment 10 months ago we had just lost a pot line in iceland following an unprecedented transformer failure and mount holly was running at only 75 capacity today both plants are producing at full capacity into a market that needs every unit we can produce that turnaround was accomplished by our operations and technical teams working across time zones in parallel on two of the most complex projects this company has undertaken. Congratulations to all of you. This is a remarkable achievement, and you should be proud of it. Staying with page four in operations, we saw strong performance across the portfolio in the second quarter while executing this level of major project work. At Mount Holly, the ramp up progressed on schedule throughout the quarter, with the plant reaching full production at the end of June. As a reminder, because of the incremental nature of the restart, Q2 reflects only a partial quarter of the expanded run rate. We will see the full benefit of these tons for the first time in Q3. Note that we have seen some instability of the plant following the restart. This is not unusual following a restart of this size. The team is working through it, and the impact is included in your outlook. Note that we do not expect any impact beyond Q3, and the project remains fully on track to repay its capital costs by the end of 2026. At Grundertongi, the line two restart went smoothly and the plant is now close to full production. As we discussed last quarter, we are running line two at slightly reduced amperage until our new replacement transformers arrive and are installed in the fourth quarter. We are being deliberately conservative here to avoid putting undue stress on the repaired units and the team has managed that balance well. At Jamalco, we brought our new power generation turbine, known as TG4, online at the beginning of August. This is an important milestone. TG4 allows us to run Jamalco on entirely self-generated energy, eliminating expensive, and as we learned last winter, sometimes unreliable purchases from the Jamaican grid. The full benefit will phase in over the balance of the year and is a significant step change in the Jamalco cost structure. Nice work by the Jamalco team getting this one across the line. As we discussed last quarter, the refinery does continue to see lower quality bauxite from certain of its mining areas. The team has a revised mining plan in place and is working through it, but we expect this will take another couple of quarters to fully implement. In the meantime, it remains a modest headwind to Jamalco's costs and volumes, and Pete has reflected that in our outlook. Finally, Seabree delivered another excellent quarter. This plan has now strung together quarter after quarter of top tier operating and financial performance, and it continues to set the standard for the rest of the portfolio. Great work again by the entire Seabree team. Before I hand things to Pete, let's spend a few minutes on the market, starting on page The short version is that we are bringing these additional tons from Mount Holly and Grunertongue into as strong a market as this industry has seen in a very long time. Following the limited reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, prices have now returned to pre-conflict levels. LME is approximately $3,250 per ton today. The U.S. Midwest premium is approximately $1.11 per pound, and the European duty paid premium is approximately $500 per ton. The market continues to evaluate what is happening in the Gulf. Research has only been announced at EGA, and that is a welcome development for our friends there. But we have not yet seen restarted announcements in Bahrain or Qatar, and I would be careful about assuming that the production levels in the Gulf as a whole will come back quickly. Restarting curtailed hotlines is slow and difficult work. We know that better than most, having just done it twice ourselves. And these plants are doing it while their raw material supply chains are still not fully normalized. We do not have good visibility into how long it will take, nor can any of us say with confidence what further disruption to transit through the strait would do to those timelines. On the demand side, the U.S. picture is as strong as we have seen it in years. Monday's ISM manufacturing report for July came in well above expectations, the seventh consecutive month of expansion, and the strongest reading since May of 2022. That is the strong environment our customers are operating in, and we are seeing it directly when we speak with them. Aluminum demand is being driven by the power and data infrastructure build out, by commercial aerospace, and by defense and rearmament programs, as well as the continued reshoring of extrusion and downstream fabrication following President Trump's April action closing the valuation loopholes in the Section 232 program. When you take the supply and demand picture together, we continue to expect a global deficit of around 1 million tons this year, and we would expect deficit conditions to continue in 2027. With Middle Eastern smelters producing material less metal in 2026 than they otherwise would have, a large portion of that shortfall is now locked in, no matter how the restarts go from here. You cannot make up lost times in a market that was already short. The result is visible in inventories. Global days of consumption held in inventory have now fallen through the post-financial crisis lows we have referenced on prior calls and are approaching all-time lows. With deficits persisting through the balance of this year and into next, we expect that drawdown to continue. There is very little cushion left anywhere in the system. In a market with no slack, the value of secure domestic units goes up. And with the completion of both restarts, Century now has more of them to sell in both the U.S. and EU markets. Pete will now take you through our second quarter financial performance in Q3 Outlook. Thank you, Jesse.

I will begin with the review of our Q2 financial performance and provide an update on the Mont Halle expansion and restart of Gundertongi Line 2, along with an update on cash flow for the business. Lastly, I'll share our Q3 outlook. Turning to slide eight, on a consolidated basis, second quarter shipments totaled approximately 131,000 tons, a 6% increase from the prior quarter due to an additional production from the restart of line two in Iceland and the Mont Halle expansion. Net sales for the quarter were $752 million, a $103 million increase sequentially, primarily due to higher realized LME and regional premiums, as well as higher shipments. For the quarter, we reported a net income of $249 million, or $2.39 per share. Our adjusted net income was $257 million, or $2.46 per share, excluding exceptional items. Exceptional items included the unrealized gains on our derivative contracts, business interruption losses in Iceland, and restart expenses at Mahtali. Adjusted EBITDA for the quarter was $327 million, primarily attributable to higher LME and regional premiums, and increased volume resulting from expanded output at Mahtali. During the quarter, we continued our efforts to enhance the balance sheet. Our cash balance stood at $388 million at the end of June. We continue to prioritize debt reduction with $66 million in debt repayments in the quarter, resulting in no outstanding borrowings on our credit facilities at the end of the quarter. Net debt was reduced to $98 million. And as of the end of July, our cash position exceeded our total debt. more on that in a couple of minutes. Turning to page nine, adjusted EBITDA for the second quarter increased $96 million to $327 million. Realized LME was $3,250 per ton of $350 versus prior quarter. Our realized U.S. Midwest premium was $2,480 per ton of $280 and higher European and premium of $450 per ton was up $140. Taken together, LME and regional premiums pricing contributed an incremental $95 million compared with the prior quarter. Energy costs returned to normalized levels after winter and raw material costs were higher as anticipated. Volume and sales mix were up $8 million over prior quarter. This increased production volume was expected from our expansion at Mount Holly. However, shipments at quarter end were affected by cutoff timing, which resulted in a sequential increase in finished goods inventory related to the Mount Holly expansion. We expect that inventory to ship in Q3, and I'll cover that in more detail shortly. As anticipated on our last call, operating expenses increased over prior quarter driven by the Mahali expansion reflecting the 100% capacity run rate. Now let's turn to slide 10 for a look at cash flow. We began the quarter with $332 million in cash. We generated strong cash from operations during the quarter. We continued to accrue 45x tax credits quarterly, with cash receipts following the filing of our annual tax return. In Iceland, we continue to have a cash impact as the insurance recoveries on the Line 2 loss profits lag on a quarterly basis. In the quarter, we received $46 million related to previous loss profit margin. Quarterly capex totaled $59 million, of which $37 million was related to the investment for the Mount Holly expansion and our new power generation unit, TG4, at Jamalco. We have $30 million in hedge settlements during the quarter. Cash interest in the quarter was roughly $5 million. We had a working capital build this quarter as the expansion at Mount Holly increased our working capital back to 100% capacity as well as increased finished good inventory that I mentioned earlier as a result of shipment timing. We expect to recoup cash from some of this finished goods inventory into Q3. We paid down 66 million dollars related to our Icelandic revolver in Q2 and ended the quarter with no borrowings on our revolving credit facilities. We ended Q2 with $388 million in cash and strong liquidity in place. As discussed, many of these items will convert to cash in future quarters. For example, at the end of July, we received $94 million in cash for 45X tax credits outstanding related to fiscal year 25. We also received an additional 19 million dollars in July for the Grundertunggi insurance recoveries. All told, Sentry's balance sheet has never been stronger with all short-term debt repaid and as of today, Sentry's cash on hand exceeds its total debt. Going forward, we are expecting even stronger cash flow conversion as investment capex related to the Mont Halle and Grundertonghi restarts are now complete, just leaving primarily sustaining capex over the second half of the year. Now let's turn to slide 11 and I'll look ahead to the next 90 days. For Q3, lagged LME of $3,325 per ton is expected to be up about $75 versus Q2 realized prices. The Q3 lagged U.S. Midwest premium is expected to be $1.09 per pound, down $0.03 versus Q2 realized prices. The European duty paid premium is expected to be approximately $520 per ton in Q3 or up about $70 per ton. Taken together, the lagged LME and delivery premium changes are expected to have a $5 to $10 million increase to Q3 adjusted EBITDA when compared with Q2 levels. We expect energy headwinds of 10 to 15 million dollars as we typically see due to warmer summer weather. Looking at our other raw materials, we continue to see moderate increases in our input costs. We see a small headwind of 5 million sequentially. We expect OPEX to be flat in the third quarter volume and sales mix is expected to improve 15 to 25 million dollars with increased production and shipments at mont holly all told at expected realized prices we expect q3 adjusted emita in the range of 325 to 345 million dollars consistent with prior practice we also include the estimated hedge and tax impacts to help model our business at the bottom of the page. We expect a $20 to $25 million headwind from realized hedge settlements and $10 to $15 million tax expense, both flowing through our Q3 P&L and impacting adjusted net income and adjusted earnings per share. And with that, I'll hand the call back to Jesse.

Thank you, Pete. Before I turn Oklahoma to finish the call, a brief word on Hawesville, which you can see on page 21. When we sold the site in February, we received $200 million in cash and retained a 6.8% non-dilutive interest in the completed data center. Since then, the project has taken a significant step forward. Our partner, Kara Wolf, has signed Anthropic as the data center tenant to a 20-year lease that is expected to generate lease revenue of approximately $19 billion dollars in total over its initial term. Energization is still expected in the second half of 2027 and our right to put our share in the data center back to TerraWolf becomes exercisable one year after that. We told you in February that we believe the stake would be worth well in excess of our initial cash proceeds. A signed 20-year lease with two five-year extensions and a high-quality tenant goes a long way towards proving that out and Century has no obligation to fund any part of the development costs. The anticipated monetization timeline of our 6.8% stake lines up reasonably well with the construction in Oklahoma, making it a further potential source of capital to help fund Century's share of that project if needed. Okay, turning finally to our new Oklahoma smelter project with our joint venture partner, Emirates Global Aluminum. We made further progress in the second quarter. Bechtel continues its detailed engineering work. we advanced negotiations toward a final energy contract and we made significant progress on the financing for the smelter those three items the final energy contract detailed engineering and financing are the near-term milestones we are focused on and we continue to expect fid and groundbreaking by the end of this year with first hot metal by the end of 2029 that brings me to page 12 and to what i think is the most important policy development of the quarter On July 20th, President Trump issued a new executive order establishing an incentive for companies that build or expand primary aluminum production here in the United States. Under the program, approved companies will be able to annually import primary aluminum up to the amount of the new production they are building at a reduced tariff rate of 25% versus the 50% rate that would otherwise apply to imports. I want to underline what this represents. The Section 232 program first leveled the playing field for American producers and workers. In April, the Trump administration closed the valuation loopholes that importers have been using to get around it. And now, with this order, the program goes a step further and actually incentivizes the companies that are putting capital in the ground to build new American capacity. Each step is built on the last, and each has been enforced with no exceptions and no exemptions. For Century, the effect is direct. We expect the Oklahoma project to be approved under the program to import up to 750,000 metric tons at the reduced 25 percent rate beginning in 2027. That will be split 60 percent to EGA and 40 percent to Century. That means Century could begin importing up to 300,000 metric tons per year at the reduced rate starting in 2027 and we intend to apply that benefit to help fund century's share of the oklahoma project this is another well-designed piece of policy and we are grateful to president trump and his team for their support and commitment to restoring production of american aluminum taken together a balance sheet where our cash now exceeds our total debt the tariff benefit under the new executive order and the value we have created at hawsville century has real and growing balance sheet capacity to fund its share of the oklahoma project as well as to pursue other opportunities and priorities to create best-in-class value for our shareholders to wrap up earlier this year we said we would have every asset running full by the end of july and we did it next we intend to bring the first new American smelter in nearly 50 years out of the ground. No company is investing more to restore American primary aluminum production than Century. We are already the largest producer of aluminum in the United States. We employ more American primary aluminum workers than any other company. And thanks to President Trump's leadership and the Section 232 program, we are investing billions more new and expanded production in Mount Holly and in Oklahoma. We are laser focused on execution. We thank you for your time and we look forward to taking your questions today.

We will now begin the question and answer session. Please limit yourself to one question and one follow-up. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one to raise your hand. To withdraw your question, press star one again. We ask that you pick up your handset when asking a question to allow for optimum sound quality. If you are muted locally, please remember to unmute your device. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. The first question comes from the line of Nick Giles with B. Riley Securities. Your line is now open.

Yeah, thanks, operator. Good afternoon, guys.

Just first wanted to ask about the executive order, kind of where you'll ultimately source the metal and just how you value this benefit in terms of EBITDA and cash flow thanks hey nick yeah as i mentioned the executive order is very important and provides a nice opportunity for century and of course anyone else who's investing in new u.s aluminum production um for us there'll be a number of different sources um that we believe we'll build source the metal from obviously our own resources in iceland um but we anticipate also other sources but what we'll do is commerce will ultimately promulgate some rules for the EO and we'll wait for those to come out and then we'll give you you know the final analysis there just to scope the opportunity for us again you know we'll wait for the final opportunities to get hard numbers here but you can just simply take that reduced tariff level so if we're paying 25 versus the 50 percent kind of quick rule of thumb you just take that choose your lme so today we're at 3250 apply that that will give you a sense of the benefit per ton and then century will be should

be able to import our share of the new production which is 300 000 tons and just multiply those together and you can see it'd be quite material the benefit should be the same on both the uh the EBITDA and cash flow site there got it no thanks Jesse that's very helpful maybe just on the project itself I mean would be good to get an update on the DOE grant you know when you would expect for us to have more information there and then maybe just on financing sources more broadly you know what what kind of work is ongoing today in terms of project financing and you know you mentioned the stake as well at Hossville. Curious for your thoughts there. Thanks.

Sure. Just a reminder on the DOE grant. So that is that is secured. Of course, there are a number of milestones that we need to work through for the project and DOE to release that grant. But The grant pays out basically dollar for dollar for investments that we make into the project to release that $500 million so really no change from what we've told you before everything remains in place there all looks good on the broader financing picture. we're working on a number of different potential sources. Once those are secure, we'll obviously come out to you with the details, but we're talking with a number of parties, and that includes some potential government sources of financing.

The next question comes from the line of Katya Jancic with BMO Capital Markets. Your line is now open.

Hi, thank you for taking my questions. Jesse, you mentioned there are multiple sources of potential cash to finance the smelter. And your free cash flow conversion is expected to improve from here. Can you talk a bit about how you're thinking about shareholder returns at this point, especially with your balance, she'd be in a very good place.

Absolutely. So, if you just look at slide 22, as you mentioned, we've had some very strong cash flow generation already. As Pete mentioned, after the quarter, we did receive our $94 million 45X refund, as well as another nearly $20 million in insurance recoveries, which puts us in a position where our cash exceeds our total outstanding debt as of the end of July. And you can see also our liquidity at 785 significantly exceeds our target. So the balance sheet is in a good position and we anticipate keeping in a very good position and we've got a lot of opportunity with a lot of cash flow coming in to do so we did tell you we would come back to you on capital returns once we clear these targets and we will but what we also said is we had a clear priority for capital allocation of course that's to maintain the liquidity through the cycle then to ensure we have enough sustaining capital and then we would look first organic growth opportunities so obviously the new smelter in Oklahoma falls into that category. And what we just asked is as we're proving out the final details there, so we're working through the final engineering numbers and CapEx numbers and getting the FID, people remain patient with us. But we do fully anticipate that we will find ourselves in a position where we have plenty of cash to finance a smelter, including our equity piece, and also to pursue our other priorities, whatever those may be, and of course, including capital returns.

And maybe shifting gears a little bit to Iceland, in 4Q, you're going to install the new transformers. Will that impact production volumes, or how should we think about that?

Yeah. So, as I said on the call, we're now back to close to full production, but we are being a little bit conservative with the amount of amperage that we're running through the repaired transformers. this is not a this is not we're not talking huge amounts we're pretty close to full production but once we do get those new transformers installed in q4 you should see us increase the amperage which will further increase the volume coming out of grunder tongi and you'll see it return back to that normalized run rate that you saw before the interruption that full normalized run rate and and i can if i just add katia i think maybe your question was when we start installing them and putting those into service will we have any interruption of production

and because of the redundancy we'll have with the repair transformers uh we'll come back to you in three months and give you our cue for outlook but i wouldn't expect sitting here today any interruption to production no no there shouldn't be any interruption to production the next question comes from the line of timna tanners with wells fargo your line is now open yeah hey good afternoon I wanted to ask about Mount Holly.

First off, you didn't mention them as a potential beneficiary of the new executive order with the 50,000 ton restart. So is that not potentially eligible or is it? And then also regarding Mount Holly, can you quantify the instability and the impact into Q3?

Thanks, Timna. No, because we are now complete with Mount Holly and that new production is coming out, we don't anticipate now that being eligible. The program is designed to allow, as we understand it at least today, it's designed to allow imports during the pendency of investment while new production is coming online. But then once it's online, you can't bring in additional imports. So Mount Holly, given that it's done, we don't anticipate it being eligible today. the instability as i said that's this is something that sometimes happens during restarts of course a plant is sort of used to operating at a lower level of production and some of the corollary areas of the plant suddenly need to operate a higher level of production you have more metal going through the cast house you have more anodes being produced in the carbon area and sometimes you get little instability there there's nothing material it's in our q2 guide does have some impact on on q3 timna but we do think we'll get it fully resolved in q3 so then you should actually get

a little bit more volume coming back in q4 than what you're seeing already in q3 okay helpful thank you and my second question uh if you could help us understand the dynamics in the new Oklahoma smelter, you know, being far away from the situation, we just see the headlines and some of the pushback and debates from the local level. Can you help us understand what's happening there and your conviction, it sounds like, is pretty clear for it moving forward, but would just like to understand it from your perspective better, please.

Sure, and of course you can understand, you know, the communities want to understand what's going on when a major project gets announced in their area. And I think we're working very closely with the community in Inola and elsewhere in Oklahoma to better understand what their concerns are and to make sure that they have all the facts about our technology and process. And then we're very confident that the smelter will pose no harm to anyone and that everyone will be comfortable with what's going on and get to see the benefits to the state and to the local community of all the investment and jobs that are created. I mean, we're talking very, very substantial benefits to everybody, but we're working closely to understand their concerns and to make sure that they get comfortable.

The next question comes from the line of Matthew Key with Texas Capital. Your line is now open.

Good afternoon, and thanks for taking my question. You mentioned that you'd be completing some power capacity at Jim Malco in August. I was wondering if you could maybe help quantify the potential financial benefit there. Would you only experience cost benefits during times of like an energy outage, or would this be a more sustainable benefit long term?

It's really twofold, Matt. So, one, as I mentioned, we will have the ability to be fully self-sufficient in our energy generation within our foreign walls. In other words, we'll be able to operate as an island within the island, if you will. But, of course, under normal circumstances, we will remain connected to the grid for stability reasons. But if there are problems in the grid, then we will be able to operate as an island. the other part of it is the cost savings so energy is expensive in the caribbean of course and we will be able to generate energy ourselves through tg4 that fully meets our our energy needs so we'll be able to stop those grid purchases going forward from the beginning of august and you'll see savings of course it depends on where market prices are in jamaica what those savings are but if you kind of think of about a twenty dollar per ton benefit there that would get you close and i would just add matt i already reflected that in the outlook for you on the q3

got it okay um that's it for me best of luck moving forward the next question comes from the line of nick giles with b riley securities please. Your line is now open.

Yeah, thanks for taking my follow-up. I just was curious, and sorry if I missed this, if you could just kind of outline some of the working capital unwind and just cash flow considerations in the second half, whether it be on the insurance or other side. Thanks.

Yeah, sure, Nick. I can take that to start. So, I talked a little bit about the working capital bill this quarter. In the second quarter, you know, I didn't quantify the breakdown but you just think of it as two two buckets one we brought back mont holly and the expansion 200 capacity so you kind of got supplies and inventory growth there and receivables to sort of reflect that um and then you also had because of the production increase we we had the conversion the shipments and you know quarter n is a snapshot in time so we had some cut off timing of those shipments um so that was the working capital building q2 and i would say going forward obviously you're not going to get back um the working capital you need to operate mont holly at 100 but certainly you'll get back a good portion of those finished goods inventory sitting on the balance sheet at the end of q2 in q3 so that should be a good tailwind of cash And then really just going forward on cash flow conversion, like I said in my remarks, expecting that to convert even stronger than what we have been thus far. As we continue, like I already said, we have the $94 million from 45X credit. We got an additional $20 million on the insurance recovery. Continue to work on that. And then the growth CapEx really falls off. You know, we're complete on the Mont-Holly expansion. We're complete on bringing line two back on in Iceland, and we should only really have sustaining capbacks going forward. So just given where we are on the balance sheet, I think you'll see that strong cash flow conversion going forward.

Got it. No, that's really helpful, Pete. Maybe just back to Oklahoma, I was curious for any update that you might have on just the power contract negotiations. Are there any, you know, gating items that you could call out, or when should we expect to see that finalized ahead of the ultimate FID and groundbreaking later this year?

Yeah, Nick, we continue to work really well with our counterparty there, both with our partners, EGA, but also with the utility counterparty in progressing that work. We are making progress. These are complex contracts. They do take some time to get fully negotiated through the lawyers and all that. But I would just say things continue to move forward well and make good progress. Of course, we'll have that done before we make FID, but I don't really want to handicap it further for now. Just know that we're working hard and continue to make progress.

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

Thank you, everyone, for joining the call today. We're proud of the quarter. We look forward to Q3 and what's next to come for Sentry. Thanks a lot.

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