Advantage Energy (TSX:AAV) Q2 2026 Earnings Call

0:00 Morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Advantage Energy Ltd. Q2 twenty twenty six Results Conference Call. Session.

0:20 This call is being recorded on Friday, 07/31/2026. I would now like to turn the conference over to Mr. Brian Bagnell, Vice President. Please go ahead. Thank you, Joelle, and welcome, everyone, to today's conference call to discuss Advantage's second quarter twenty twenty six results. Before we begin, I'd like to remind listeners that our remarks today will include forward looking information and references to specified financial measures. Advisories on those items are contained in our news release, MD and A and annual information form, which are available on our website and on SEDAR plus I'm joined today by, Advantage's executive team, including John Festival, Advantage's interim CEO and Craig Blackwood, our CFO.

1:07 As usual, if you have detailed modeling questions, we'd ask that you follow-up with us individually after the call. And with that, I'll turn the call over to John. Thanks, Ryan, and thank you all for joining us this morning. Now having recently stepped into the role of CEO on an interim basis, my focus today is to give you a broader perspective on the quarter and the direction of the business and the team through this transition period. So Advantage achieved several significant milestones during the second quarter.

1:42 We completed our twenty one day turnaround at the Glacier gas plant and this was a major operation. There were more than 500 individuals on the Glacier plant site at points during this turnaround. I'd really like to thank the Advantage team and our contractors for completing this important project safely and on time. We also completed and commissioned the Progress gas plant. We moved past these major infrastructure phase embedded in our three year plan. And we did all of this while keeping a resilient balance sheet in a capital intensive first half of the year and even in a weak natural gas environment. So completion of the Progress gas plant has several significant benefits for Advantage.

2:27 Our corporate production exited the second quarter at approximately 90,000 BOE per day and it's a new record for Advantage. It unlocks opportunities to develop liquids rich Montney and Charlie Lake opportunities in the region surrounding the Progress gas plant. It also reduces our reliance on third party processing and increases the utilization of our owned and operated infrastructure and reducing our costs, our operating costs per BOE. Now with these major milestones behind us, we are entering period of lower capital intensity and greater flexibility in capital allocation. And our focus has turned towards maximizing free cash flow generation and directing those returns to shareholders.

3:15 Now Craig is going to walk you through our quarter in a little more detail. Craig, over to you. Thanks, John, and good morning, everyone. Firstly, I'll highlight all the financial and operating information that I will discuss is for Advantage Energy only and excludes Entropy Inc. So starting with the financial aspects of the quarter, adjusted funds flow was $88,800,000 or that's $0.53 per share. Net capital expenditure expenditures were $88,800,000 in the quarter,

3:46 and we've now executed over 70% of our 2026 program. This is important because the first half carried a heavier capital load, and the second half will be materially lighter, which supports our transition into higher free cash flow generation for the remainder of this year and into 2027. As expected, net debt has been substantially flat during the first half of twenty twenty six and ended the quarter at 560,200,000 That's pretty notable given the large capital program, the planned downtime at Glacier, as well as the weak natural gas prices. Moving on to operations. Production averaged 70,611 BOE per day in the quarter, down as expected from the first quarter due to our planned twenty one day turnaround at the Glacier gas plant.

4:35 The liquid side of the business continued to perform well, averaging 12,650 barrels per day, up 4% from Q1. Liquids actually represented 18% of our production during the second quarter and generated 67% of our total sales. With the Progress gas plant completed and the glacier turnaround concluded, as John mentioned, we exited Q2 at approximately 90,000 BOEs per day, and we expect to maintain that production level through to the end of twenty seven, of course, within normal operating variability around that level. With such major investments in infrastructure complete, we expect to see operating costs approximately, let's say, 5 per BOE in the second half of twenty twenty six.

5:20 So we see ourselves trending to the lower end of our full year guidance range. The progress gas plant is important for our liquids development. It opens up drilling opportunities that didn't exist before, and most notably at our liquids rich Valhalla in progress place. In fact, at Valhalla, just brought on a new three well Montney pad on production in the second quarter that delivered average per well IP 30 rates of thirteen seventy five BOE per day, and that was about 44% liquids, which is an outstanding result. And in progress, we just recently spudded two well pad offsetting our initial sixteen and thirty six discovery well, which had very strong oil weighted production. Glacier continues to be an outstanding asset.

6:07 Nine wells have been brought on production so far in 2026, achieving average peak IP30 rates of 16,400,000 cubic feet per day of raw and natural gas. At Wembley, a three well pad is currently being completed and will be brought on production in the third quarter. Turning to Entropy. It was also a very active quarter for them as well, completing and commissioning the Glacier CCS phase two project, currently concurrent with our turnaround. This project will substantially decarbonize the Glacier facility and will contribute to Entropy's operating income with project funding provided by Entropy's investment partners and not Advantage. Hedgeing and market diversification continue to be an important part of our strategy.

6:56 For the second half of twenty twenty six, we've hedged approximately 48% of our forecast natural gas production and 43% of our forecast crude oil and NGL production. For 2027, we've also hedged approximately 34% of forecast natural gas production and 26% of forecast crude oil and NGL production.

7:17 That basically leaves us with direct AECO exposure for the second half of twenty twenty six at just 12%. And for 2027, we have AECO exposure of about 16%. We also continue to proactively layer in hedges extending right through to 2029. Lastly, during the second quarter, we also transitioned to a new covenant based credit facility. Boring capacity remains at $650,000,000 but now on a three year facility that extends to June 2029. The facility provides a more flexible financing platform, including lower borrowing costs relative to our prior reserve based structure. From our perspective, this is a great reflection on the increased scale, financial strength and sustainability of our business, and we thank the bank and syndicate for their continued support and confidence.

8:09 With that, I'm going to turn it back over to John. And thank you. Thank you, Craig. With our heaviest period of capital spending now behind us, we expect the business to generate strong free cash flow for the second half of twenty twenty six and into 2027. So based on current commodity pricing, we expect to reach the net debt target range of $400,000,000 to $500,000,000 in the second half of twenty twenty six, while repurchasing up to 5% of our shares outstanding. Share buybacks are going to be our main vehicle for shareholder returns, while our shares are trading below intrinsic value. But before completing the call, I want to comment briefly on the leadership and the broader organization.

8:59 The Board has begun a formal CEO search process, and the objective is straightforward. We want to identify the best qualified individuals to lead Advantage into the future. That process is being approached thoughtfully and deliberately with a goal of ensuring the company continues to build on the strong foundation already in place. So since stepping into the CEO role over the last few months, I really have been impressed by the quality and discipline and depth of the Advantage team. Over the last few years, you've seen the results from our Montney operations. And you can also concur that we have done well in those technical areas. This is a highly capable organization.

9:44 The company has a strong technical, financial, operational and commercial team. Obviously, a high quality asset base and a clear capital allocation framework to deliver shareholder returns into the future. So the team has not missed a beat through this period of leadership transition. They continue to execute a very active capital program. And I would like to thank our employees, contractors, Board and shareholders for their continued support. With that, I'm going turn the call back over to Brian. Thank you, John. That concludes our prepared remarks. And Joelle, would you please open the lines for any questions? Thank you.

10:30 Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, we will now begin the question and answer

10:42 question we now Your first Ladies question comes from Jamie Kubik with CIBC. Your line is now open. Yes, good morning. Thanks for taking my question. I'm just curious on the liquids rates in the quarter. How repeatable is the oil rate that you guys put up this quarter into the next several quarters? And how is your drilling mix adapting to the current commodity environment? Thanks, Jamie. It's Neil Bogenford here. Our corporate philosophy on liquids is we think we can maintain a flat production. About 60% of our remaining capital for the balance of the year is oil weighted. Anything that's being spent on gas is basically completing wells that have been drilled already.

11:38 So our program is weighted towards liquid in the second half, completing and we'll bring on a three well Wembley pad in Q3. And we also have our progress drilling, which is a two well pad offsetting our new progress 04/21 gas plan. That's a liquid waiting opportunity as well. So we're optimistic and confident that we can maintain liquids through the second half of the year.

12:15 As far as pivoting volumes from different areas of the asset base and potentially bringing on more liquids volumes? Thanks. Jamie, was that a question whether we can continue to do that or not? Just the flexibility that the progress gas plant gives you, I guess. Can you just comment on that?

12:40 Yeah. Sure, Jamie. We can direct Charlie Lake, Montney assets into that gas plant. We actually have a tiny little bit of white space in it for liquid growth and gas growth over the balance of the year. So our interconnectivity between our infrastructure allows us a lot of flexibility on capital rotation and where we position wells.

13:22 We do have one question on the webcast that I'll read out. It's from Kevin Little at Macquarie. The question is, how do you think that production will trend in 2028?

13:32 Will you continue with 5% to 10% annual growth expectations? And at what price would it take to restart development in Northeast BC in the Cariboo plant area? That's, the Conroy area. I'll I'll just make a comment that, as you know, we are holding flat at roughly 90,000 BOEs a day through at least the end of twenty twenty seven. Our current three year plan only goes until the end of twenty twenty seven, so we're in the process now. We're beginning the process of

14:03 considering our next three years, which would be 2027 through 2029. And as you know, we have a very deep set of opportunities for development in our portfolio. It will take some time to evaluate where we want to go with that, whether more in a liquids direction or in Northeast BC that would be maybe in a more gas focused direction. But no plans at the moment, and we'll do our work. And when it comes to the price, I would say we need to complete our work, but our estimate would be somewhat higher than what we see in the current forward strip. Maybe just Craig here. In terms of the 5% to 10% production growth, as Brian said, we have a deep inventory.

14:51 That being said, we're also about delivering returns to shareholders. We will evaluate what we see.

14:58 We will watch what happens with commodity price. And if it makes sense, we can grow. If it doesn't make sense, then we will buy back shares depending on our share price as well. So we're about delivering returns. We are not about delivering production growth. Thank you, Kevin. Joel, I'll pass it back to you for one last check on the phone lines. Thank you. There are no questions at this time. I will turn it back to Brian for closing remarks. Okay. Thank you, everybody, for joining the call. Have a good long weekend. Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes your conference call for today. We thank you for participating and ask that you please disconnect your lines.