Photo credit: Seadrill
Seadrill (SDRL) recently reported stronger than expected first-quarter results. The contract driller beat analysts' expectations and even gave its investors a surprising dividend boost. Let's take a closer look at what happened in the first-quarter and what investors can expect from the company going forward.
Drilling down into the numbers
In my earnings preview of Seadrill I pointed to three areas investors should watch closely when it reported first quarter earnings. Topping that list was to look to see if Seadrill could join Transocean (RIG -0.69%) and Ensco (VAL) and beat analysts' estimates. Going into the quarter analysts were expecting earnings of $0.68 per share and revenue of $1.41 billion. Seadrill, however, deconsolidated Seadrill Partners (SDLP) from its financial results, which made it tough to get an apples-to-apples comparison.
Because of the deconsolidation of Seadrill Partners, Seadrill reported earnings of $6.54 per share and revenue of $1.221 billion. However, by drilling down a little bit further we are able to get a better comparison of Seadrill's results to what analysts were expecting. On a consolidated basis Seadrill was able to beat revenue estimates as it reported $1.436 billion in revenue in the first quarter. Meanwhile, the company reported operating profit of $890 million, which was well above the $534 million that analysts were expecting. While operating profit was affected by a drop down sale to Seadrill Partners, the company still saw strong growth from new rigs entering service. Add it all up and Seadrill joined both Transocean and Ensco in beating analysts' estimates in the first quarter.
That being said, it wasn't all good news for Seadrill investors. The second area I thought investors should pay close attention to was the company's utilization rate, which for its floaters fell from 94% in the fourth quarter to 91% this quarter. The company noted in its press release that it was disappointed with these results. Overall, the company noted utilization issues with three rigs in the quarter, however, on a more positive note the company's remaining rigs ran with an economic utilization of 95%. Meanwhile, its jack-up fleet's utilization rate held steady at 97%.
The final area investors needed to watch heading into the quarter was the contract backlog. This number was also a bit of a disappointment as it fell from $20.2 billion to $18.8 billion. One of the reasons for this is the fact that the ultra-deepwater market experienced its most challenging quarter since the financial crisis. Seadrill noted that just seven ultra-deepwater rig years were contracted in the quarter, which was the lowest quarter of activity since 2009.
Photo credit: Seadrill
Decent outlook
That being said, Seadrill isn't worried that the market is collapsing. The company noted that it expects second quarter EBITDA to "show meaningful improvement" from this past quarter. The addition of new rigs entering service when combined with higher utilization rates should provide a meaningful boost to the company's bottom line. Overall, the company expects to have a solid year.
That's one reason why the company decided to boost its dividend by two pennies a share and bring it up to a dollar per quarter. It's a surprising move for the company, which just last quarter had said that it saw "limited value" in paying out more to its investors each quarter. The company, however, now appears to be at its dividend limit until it sees a meaningful improvement in the offshore rig market.
Investor takeaway
Seadrill reported really solid results amid a struggling offshore rig market. It expects its results to continue to be solid through the end of the year. While it hasn't navigated past the challenging rig market just yet, those challenges aren't likely to sink the company, nor its hefty dividend, which is great news for long-term investors.
