Genesis Energy (GEL) 8-KGenesis Energy, L.P. Reports Third Quarter 2024 Results

As provided in General Instruction B.2 to Form 8-K, the information furnished in this Item 2.02 and in Exhibit 99.1 hereto shall not be deemed “filed” for purposes of Section 18 of the Securities and Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, nor shall it be deemed incorporated by reference in any filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, except as shall be expressly provided by specific reference in such filing.

This press release and the accompanying schedules include non-generally accepted accounting principle (non-GAAP) financial measures of Adjusted EBITDA and total Available Cash before Reserves. In this press release, we also present total Segment Margin as if it were a non-GAAP measure. Our non-GAAP measures may not be comparable to similarly titled measures of other companies because such measures may include or exclude other specified items. The accompanying schedules provide reconciliations of these non-GAAP financial measures to their most directly comparable financial measures calculated in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles in the United States of America (GAAP). Our non-GAAP financial measures should not be considered (i) as alternatives to GAAP measures of liquidity or financial performance or (ii) as being singularly important in any particular context; they should be considered in a broad context with other quantitative and qualitative information. Our Available Cash before Reserves, Adjusted EBITDA and total Segment Margin measures are just three of the relevant data points considered from time to time.

When evaluating our performance and making decisions regarding our future direction and actions (including making discretionary payments, such as quarterly distributions) our board of directors and management team have access to a wide range of historical and forecasted qualitative and quantitative information, such as our financial statements; operational information; various non-GAAP measures; internal forecasts; credit metrics; analyst opinions; performance; liquidity and similar measures; income; cash flow expectations for us; and certain information regarding some of our peers. Additionally, our board of directors and management team analyze, and place different weight on, various factors from time to time. We believe that investors benefit from having access to the same financial measures being utilized by management, lenders, analysts and other market participants. We attempt to provide adequate information to allow each individual investor and other external user to reach her/his own conclusions regarding our actions without providing so much information as to overwhelm or confuse such investor or other external user.

Available Cash before Reserves, often referred to by others as distributable cash flow, is a quantitative standard used throughout the investment community with respect to publicly traded partnerships and is commonly used as a supplemental financial measure by management and by external users of financial statements such as investors, commercial banks, research analysts and rating agencies, to aid in assessing, among other things:

We define Available Cash before Reserves (“Available Cash before Reserves”) as Adjusted EBITDA adjusted for certain items, the most significant of which in the relevant reporting periods have been the sum of maintenance capital utilized, interest expense, net, cash tax expense and cash distributions paid to our Class A convertible preferred unitholders.

We use a modified format relating to maintenance capital requirements because our maintenance capital expenditures vary materially in nature (discretionary vs. non-discretionary), timing and amount from time to time. We believe that, without such modified disclosure, such changes in our maintenance capital expenditures could be confusing and potentially misleading to users of our financial information, particularly in the context of the nature and purposes of our Available Cash before Reserves measure. Our modified disclosure format provides those users with information in the form of our maintenance capital utilized measure (which we deduct to arrive at Available Cash before Reserves). Our maintenance capital utilized measure constitutes a proxy for non-discretionary maintenance capital expenditures and it takes into consideration the relationship among maintenance capital expenditures, operating expenses and depreciation from period to period.

Maintenance capital expenditures are capitalized costs that are necessary to maintain the service capability of our existing assets, including the replacement of any system component or equipment which is worn out or obsolete. Maintenance capital expenditures can be discretionary or non-discretionary, depending on the facts and circumstances.

Beginning with 2014, we believe a substantial amount of our maintenance capital expenditures from time to time will be (a) related to our assets other than pipelines, such as our marine vessels, trucks and similar assets, (b) discretionary in nature and (c) potentially material in amount as compared to our Available Cash before Reserves measure. Those expenditures will be discretionary (or non-mandatory) in nature because we will have significant discretion as to whether or when we incur them. We will not be forced to incur them in order to continue to operate the related assets in a safe and reliable manner. If we chose not make those expenditures, we would be able to continue to operate those assets economically, although in lieu of maintenance capital expenditures, we would incur increased operating expenses, including maintenance expenses. An example of a discretionary (or non-mandatory) maintenance capital expenditure would be replacing an older marine vessel with a new marine vessel with substantially similar specifications, even though one could continue to economically operate the older vessel in spite of its increasing maintenance and other operating expenses.

In summary, as we continue to expand certain non-pipeline portions of our business, we are experiencing changes in the nature (discretionary vs. non-discretionary), timing and amount of our maintenance capital expenditures that merit a more detailed review and analysis than was required historically. Management’s increasing ability to determine if and when to incur certain maintenance capital expenditures is relevant to the manner in which we analyze aspects of our business relating to discretionary and non-discretionary expenditures. We believe it would be inappropriate to derive our Available Cash before Reserves measure by deducting discretionary maintenance capital expenditures, which we believe are similar in nature in this context to certain other discretionary expenditures, such as growth capital expenditures, distributions/dividends and equity buybacks. Unfortunately, not all maintenance capital expenditures are clearly discretionary or non-discretionary in nature. Therefore, we developed a measure, maintenance capital utilized, that we believe is more useful in the determination of Available Cash before Reserves.

We believe our maintenance capital utilized measure is the most useful quarterly maintenance capital requirements measure to use to derive our Available Cash before Reserves measure. We define our maintenance capital utilized measure as that portion of the amount of previously incurred maintenance capital expenditures that we utilize during the relevant quarter, which would be equal to the sum of the maintenance capital expenditures we have incurred for each project/component in prior quarters allocated ratably over the useful lives of those projects/components.

Our maintenance capital utilized measure constitutes a proxy for non-discretionary maintenance capital expenditures and it takes into consideration the relationship among maintenance capital expenditures, operating expenses and depreciation from period to period. Because we did not use our maintenance capital utilized measure before 2014, our maintenance capital utilized calculations will reflect the utilization of solely those maintenance capital expenditures incurred since December 31, 2013.

Adjusted EBITDA is commonly used as a supplemental financial measure by management and by external users of financial statements such as investors, commercial banks, research analysts and rating agencies, to aid in assessing, among other things: