Natural Resource Partners Q1 2025 Earnings Report

Natural Resource Partners EPS Results

• Actual EPS: $2.97
• Consensus EPS: N/A
• Beat/Miss: N/A
• One Year Ago EPS: N/A

Natural Resource Partners Revenue Results

• Actual Revenue: $60.54 million
• Expected Revenue: N/A
• Beat/Miss: N/A
• YoY Revenue Growth: N/A

Natural Resource Partners Announcement Details

• Quarter: Q1 2025
• Date: 5/6/2025
• Time: Before Market Opens
• Conference Call Date: Tuesday, May 6, 2025
• Conference Call Time: 9:00AM ET

Natural Resource Partners (NYSE:NRP) (NYSE: NRP) is a master limited partnership that acquires and manages royalty and other mineral interests in coal and other natural resources across North America and Australia. The partnership was formed in 2010 as a spin-out from a major U.S. coal producer and is headquartered in Fairmont, West Virginia. Its core business model centers on owning gross proceeds interests, gross royalty proceeds interests and fee minerals, which provide the right to receive a portion of revenues from mining and mineral production without operating the mines directly.

NRP’s U.S. portfolio spans the central Appalachian Basin, northern West Virginia, southwest Virginia, Colorado’s North Fork Valley, and northwest New Mexico and Arizona. These assets encompass both thermal and metallurgical coal deposits as well as fee mineral estates that cover precious and base metals. In Australia, the partnership holds an equity interest in a thermal coal development project in Queensland. By structuring its holdings around royalties and flow-through interests, NRP can benefit from multiple revenue streams tied to commodity prices and production levels while avoiding the capital expenditures and operating risks associated with direct mining operations.

Throughout its history, Natural Resource Partners has focused on growing its royalty footprint through strategic acquisitions of mineral interests sold by private and public mining companies. The board and management team leverage decades of experience in mineral leasing, asset evaluation and capital markets to identify and secure high-quality interests. This approach aims to deliver stable cash flows over the long term, making NRP an option for investors seeking exposure to coal and mineral royalties without direct operational involvement in resource extraction.

Natural Resource Partners Q1 2025 Earnings Call Transcript

Key Takeaways

• Free cash flow of $35 million in Q1 and $214 million over the last 12 months supports plan to pay down $118 million of debt, paving way for significant unitholder distribution increases next year.
• Prices for metallurgical coal, thermal coal, and soda ash have declined precipitously over the past year and are expected to remain weak, dragging on near-term results.
• Mineral rights segment generated $44 million of free cash flow in Q1, benefiting from higher operator sales prices without bearing increased production costs.
• Soda ash distributions dropped 80% to $3 million in Q1 as prices hit decades-low levels below production cost, signaling a prolonged bear market with no quick catalyst for price recovery.
• Carbon neutral initiatives, including underground sequestration, geothermal, solar, and lithium leasing, have seen slow uptake due to regulatory and market uncertainties, though small-scale progress continues.

Presentation

[Operator]

Welcome to the Natural Resource Partners L.P. First Quarter 2025 Earnings Conference Call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker's remarks, there will be a question-and-answer session. If you would like to ask a question during this time, simply press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, press star one again. I would now like to hand the call over to Tiffany Sammis, Investor Relations. You may begin.

[Tiffany Sammis, Head of Investor Relations at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

Thank you. Good morning and welcome to the Natural Resource Partners First Quarter 2025 Conference Call. Today's call is being webcast, and a replay will be available on our website. Joining me today are Craig Nunez, President and Chief Operating Officer; Chris Zolas, Chief Financial Officer; and Kevin Craig, Executive Vice President. Some of our comments today may include forward-looking statements reflecting NRP's views about future events. These matters involve risks and uncertainties that could cause our actual results to materially differ from our forward-looking statements. These risks are discussed in NRP's Form 10-K and other Securities and Exchange Commission filings. We undertake no obligation to revise or update publicly any forward-looking statements for any reason. Our comments today also include non-GAAP financial measures. Additional details and reconciliations to the most directly comparable GAAP measures are included in our first quarter press release, which can be found on our website.

[Tiffany Sammis, Head of Investor Relations at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

I would like to remind everyone that we do not intend to discuss the operations or outlook for any particular coal lease or detailed market fundamentals. Now, I would like to turn the call over to Craig Nunez, our President and Chief Operating Officer.

[Craig Nunez, President and COO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

Thank you, Tiffany, and good morning, everyone. NRP generated $35 million of free cash flow in the first quarter of 2025 and $214 million of free cash flow over the last 12 months. Prices for metallurgical coal, thermal coal, and soda ash declined precipitously over the last year and negatively impacted our results. As you've heard us say for over a year now, we expect weak prices for all three of our key commodities to persist for the foreseeable future and provide a drag on our performance. Despite this, we expect to continue generating robust free cash flow, which we will use to pay off remaining debt, which stands at $118 million today. We are now reaping the rewards of the capital allocation decisions made over the last decade. Our capital structure is solid, and our financial outlook is bright.

[Craig Nunez, President and COO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

We look forward to the prospect of significant increases in unit holder distributions as debt is paid off next year. Our mineral rights business generated $44 million of free cash flow in the first quarter of 2025. Sluggish demand for steel, relatively high inventories at power plants, and an uncertain geopolitical environment have pressured metallurgical and thermal coal prices to levels that we believe are at or near the cost of production for many producers, and there are no clear catalysts in sight to push prices materially higher in the near term. With that being said, operator cost inflation has increased the break-even coal sales prices for our lessees. As a royalty owner, we benefit from higher sales prices without having to bear the burden of our operators' higher costs of production.

[Craig Nunez, President and COO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

As a result, we believe the royalty revenue we receive at our operators' break-even levels is higher today than in the past. Turning to soda ash, we received $3 million in cash distributions from Sisecam Wyoming in the first quarter of 2025, an 80% drop from the previous quarter-year quarter. Soda ash prices remain at the lowest levels in decades, with sales prices trading below the cost of production for many producers. We believe we are in the early innings of this soda ash bear market, given the current supply-demand imbalance, and that it will take multiple years for global markets to fully absorb excess supply and stabilize at materially higher price levels. While we have seen some high-cost production shut down globally, most notably in the United Kingdom, Poland, and Argentina, the scale has been too small to materially benefit the market so far.

[Craig Nunez, President and COO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

We take comfort that Sisecam Wyoming is one of the world's lowest-cost producers. While distributions will likely remain at these lower levels in the near term, our positive long-term view of our soda ash investment has not changed. Regarding carbon-neutral initiatives, or CNI, the slowdown that we expected for the general market for most CNI activities has materialized. Leasing interest for underground carbon sequestration remains lackluster, as political, regulatory, and market uncertainties pose significant hurdles for developers contemplating large capital investments for these types of projects. We are, however, continuing to see activity in the geothermal, solar, and lithium space and are making small-scale progress on several initiatives. While the timing and likelihood of future free cash flow from CNI activities is uncertain, we still believe our vast ownership footprint provides opportunities for carbon-neutral cash flow while requiring minimal capital investment by us.

[Craig Nunez, President and COO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

With that, I will turn the call over to Chris.

[Chris Zolas, CFO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

Craig, thank you, Craig. In the first quarter of 2025, NRP generated $40 million of net income, $34 million of operating cash flow, and $35 million of free cash flow. Our mineral rights segment in Q1 2025 generated $45 million of net income, $43 million of operating cash flow, and $44 million of free cash flow. When compared to the prior year's first quarter, our mineral rights segment net income decreased $15 million, and operating and free cash flow decreased $27 million and $26 million, respectively. These decreases were primarily due to weaker steel demand that resulted in lower metallurgical coal sales prices and volumes. Met coal made up approximately 55% of our coal royalty revenues and 40% of our coal royalty sales volumes in Q1 2025, compared to 75% of our coal royalty revenues and 50% of our coal sales volumes in the prior year first quarter.

[Chris Zolas, CFO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

Shifting to our soda ash business segment, net income in the first quarter of 2025 decreased $1 million, and both operating and free cash flow decreased $11 million as compared to the prior year period. These decreases were primarily due to a lower weighted average net sales price resulting from an increased percentage of sales into a lower-priced international market in 2025. International soda ash pricing has declined significantly from the record highs seen in 2023, primarily due to weakened demand for flat glass from the construction and automobile markets and additional soda ash supply from China. We expect prices and our distributions received from Sisecam Wyoming to remain muted until demand rebounds and the soda ash market is able to absorb this additional supply. Wrapping up with our corporate and financing segment, Q1 2025 segment performance was relatively flat as compared to the prior year period.

[Chris Zolas, CFO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

Q1 operating cash flow and free cash flow each improved $1 million as compared to the prior year period due to lower interest payments from less debt outstanding. Regarding our quarterly distributions, in February of 2025, we paid a fourth quarter 2024 distribution of $0.75 per common unit, and in March of 2025, we paid a special distribution of $1.21 per common unit to help cover the tax liability associated with owning NRP common units in 2024. Today, we announced a first quarter 2025 distribution of $0.75 per common unit to be paid later this month. With that, I'll turn the call back over to Mark, our operator, for questions.

[Operator]

We will now begin the question-and-answer session. If you would like to ask a question, simply press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, press star one again. If you would like to ask a question, simply press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. Our first question comes from the line of Philip Kramer with Plains Marketing. Philip, please go ahead.

[Philip Kramer, EVP at Plain Marketing]

Yes. Do you have any anticipation of what the dividend may be one year from this quarter?

[Craig Nunez, President and COO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

Good morning. No, we don't at this point have an anticipation of that one year from now. I will say that we do anticipate that distributions will be high on our list of cash flow priorities. To the extent that we don't need cash internally to bolster the balance sheet, to do anything else, you're going to see distributions going back to unit holders.

[Philip Kramer, EVP at Plain Marketing]

Okay. Congratulations on your strategy of debt reduction and the execution of it. I was just curious whether you were going to prioritize share buybacks or dividends.

[Craig Nunez, President and COO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

I would suggest that in order of prioritization, I think of it this way for our uses of cash. Number one is liquidity, balance sheet strength. We have to make sure that we don't find ourselves in a position that we found ourselves in in the past because of poor capital structure. To the extent we've satisfied that, next on the list of priorities would be the distribution, then unit repurchases if it was possible to repurchase units at what we would think would be material discounts to intrinsic value. Last would be opportunistic-type acquisitions that if we're able to purchase things at prices that provide a margin of safety.

[Philip Kramer, EVP at Plain Marketing]

Thank you.

[Craig Nunez, President and COO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

You bet.

[Operator]

Your next question comes from the line of David Spier with Nitor Capital. David, please go ahead.

[David Spier, Managing Member and Portfolio Manager at Nitor Capital]

Hi, how are you guys?

[Craig Nunez, President and COO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

Good morning.

[David Spier, Managing Member and Portfolio Manager at Nitor Capital]

Just as a way, as a possibility of speeding up the capital returns process, is there any opportunities to either sell assets or monetize assets, take advantage of the disconnect maybe between the market value of the company and potentially the private asset value of some of your assets as just a way of then using those proceeds to pay down the debt to then speed up capital returns?

[Craig Nunez, President and COO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

Just candidly, we do not have plans to sell any of our assets. We tend to be a, as a royalty owner, a mineral owner, we tend to be an acquirer and a long-term holder of those assets. We find that over time, that tends to be the best way to maximize value. I will say, however, that if we felt an opportunity existed to monetize an asset at some value that was in excess of what we believed the asset was inherently worth, its intrinsic value to us, we would certainly consider that. I think those will be not frequent opportunities.

[David Spier, Managing Member and Portfolio Manager at Nitor Capital]

Got it. In longer term, I mean, are there any other mineral rights packages, let's say even on coal, where given the sentiment towards the coal industry overall, where there would be opportunities to pick up other packages over time and really scale your existing corporate infrastructure where you get some benefits, some accretive benefits and acquisitions?

[Craig Nunez, President and COO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

We really do not want to talk much from a competitive perspective about our desires for growth and investing and that type of thing. I would say, though, that we are still at a point where we are executing to finish the strategy we have put in place to delever the business. As you could tell from the prioritization I gave you a few moments ago on our cash uses, acquisitions is the bottom of that list of four different uses of cash. I do not want to get too far ahead of ourselves on that right now.

[David Spier, Managing Member and Portfolio Manager at Nitor Capital]

Yeah. Okay. I appreciate it. Thanks so much.

[Craig Nunez, President and COO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

You sure thing.

[Operator]

Your next question comes from the line of John Mason with Aegis Companies. John, please go ahead.

[John Mason, Regional Director at Aegis Companies]

Hey, guys. Thanks for taking my question.

[John Mason, Regional Director at Aegis Companies]

Sure. Just looking at your volumes across for this quarter, I noticed that you guys saw a real uptick in the Illinois Basin. I guess just a couple of questions. One, do you expect that uptick in volume to persist? Two, I think at these MET index prices, it's pretty uneconomical for, I think, a lot of producers on the cost curve. Do you anticipate any of your lessees on the met side to reduce production at these levels over time, or do you think that'll persist? I guess a question on sort of Illinois Basin specifically, and then the impact of the MET index pricing on the volumes for your met producers.

[Craig Nunez, President and COO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

Right. First of all, let me say that as Tiffany mentioned at the outset, remember, we do not comment on specific operators. Illinois Basin is, in fact, one operator for us. I think generally we can answer your question this way. The volumes you have seen for Illinois Basin for us in the quarter are within the range of what we would expect to see going forward. It is nothing unusual. Hopefully that helps your question there with that. What was your second question again?

[John Mason, Regional Director at Aegis Companies]

I think Illinois is primarily thermal, but on the met side, the index pricing, obviously in the Q1, so Q1 is sort of the first quarter that you're seeing is fully reflected. Do you expect any of your met coal producers to reduce production given that I think this pricing is pretty uneconomic for a lot of producers across the cost curve?

[Craig Nunez, President and COO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

We think you're right. We do believe that you're correct in that prices today are at or below marginal cost of production for many operators. We do have operators we believe, although we're not necessarily privy to their cost structure. We don't have the right to see that, so to speak. We do believe that we do have operators that are right there at that break-even, maybe right before. It would not surprise us if there were idlings of production. We have nothing we can point to right now that says we're going to have a material change in our volumes as a result of that. As you could tell from our prepared remarks, that's what we want to make sure everybody, all of you are aware of, is that we're sensitive to the price levels that exist in the space right now.

[John Mason, Regional Director at Aegis Companies]

Yeah. Sounds good. Thanks so much.

[Craig Nunez, President and COO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

You bet. I will just say this. One of the things that we spend a lot of time doing around here and have for a number of years is trying to think of bad things that can happen to our business. You have identified one of them that we regularly consider, and we run stress tests on. It is a wise question that you asked.

[Operator]

Your next question comes from the line of Uman Kamarya. Please go ahead.

[Operator]

Hi. Thanks for taking my question. Basically, my question was supposed to be a bit similar to the previous one I asked, but just a couple of things. The first thing is that previously, M&A has been pretty strong for NRP, but I just wanted to get a sense of whether or not this is going to be a theme. Also, with regards to the new administration, there seems to be more support for met coal going forward. I was just wondering, have you heard of any talk with regards to that with your other partners, whether they're actually looking for more met coal sourcing further up the supply chain? Yeah, pretty much those two things.

[Craig Nunez, President and COO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

Could you repeat your first question again, please?

[Craig Nunez, President and COO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

You can disregard the first question. It was about M&A, but I think you covered it all right. Could you just answer the second question, please?

[Craig Nunez, President and COO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

I would say that we do monitor legislative and executive orders, legislative developments and executive orders fairly closely to the extent they impact our space. We have not identified anything that we think will materially impact our business per se. We can't make forecasts as far as what's going to happen on the regulatory front, but we've seen various administrations come and go over the life of NRP, and we frankly haven't seen a dramatic impact, just for example, over the last decade through two-plus administrations that we've weathered. We don't know exactly what impact that's going to have on us, and we're not changing our business plans because of it.

[Craig Nunez, President and COO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

Got it. Thank you so much.

[Craig Nunez, President and COO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

Yeah, you bet.

[Operator]

There are no further questions at this time. That concludes our question-and-answer session. I will now hand it back over to Craig Nunez for closing remarks.

[Craig Nunez, President and COO at Natural Resource Partners L.P.]

Thank you, operator. Thank you, everyone, for joining us today and for your support of us. We're nearing the end of a very long journey to conclude the strategy that we put in place back in 2015. We couldn't have done what we've done so far without your support. The headwinds of the market are certainly headwinds at the moment. I can honestly say that despite the outlook for our three key commodities being probably the worst it's been in my tenure at NRP, the outlook from the perspective of an equity holder is certainly brighter than it's been over the last decade. Thank you again, and look forward to speaking to you soon. Good day.

[Operator]

That concludes today's call. You may now disconnect.

Participants

Executives

• Craig Nunez, President and COO
• Tiffany Sammis, Head of Investor Relations
• Chris Zolas, CFO

Analysts

• John Mason, Regional Director at Aegis Companies
• David Spier, Managing Member and Portfolio Manager at Nitor Capital
• Philip Kramer, EVP at Plain Marketing
• Analyst