(GTE)
Q1 2026 Earnings-Transcript
Operator: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to Gran Tierra Energy Inc.’s conference call for first quarter 2026 results. My name is Tanya, and I will be your coordinator for today. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Following the initial remarks, we will conduct a question-and-answer session for securities analysts and institutions. Instructions will be provided at that time for you to queue up for questions. I would like to remind everyone that this conference call is being webcast and recorded today, Friday, 05/08/2026, at 11:00 a.m. Eastern Time. Today’s discussion may include certain forward-looking information, oil and gas information, and non-GAAP financial measures. Please refer to the earnings and operational update press release we issued yesterday for important advisories and disclaimers regarding this information and for reconciliations of any non-GAAP measures discussed on today’s call.
Finally, this earnings call is the property of Gran Tierra Energy Inc. Any copying or rebroadcasting of this call is expressly forbidden without the written consent of Gran Tierra Energy Inc. I will now turn the conference call over to Gary Guidry, President and Chief Executive Officer of Gran Tierra Energy Inc. Mr. Guidry, please go ahead.
Gary Guidry: Good morning, and welcome to Gran Tierra Energy Inc.’s first quarter 2026 results conference call. My name is Gary Guidry, Gran Tierra Energy Inc.’s President and Chief Executive Officer. With me today are Ryan Paul Ellson, our Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, and Sebastien Morin, our Chief Operating Officer. On Thursday, 05/07/2026, we issued a press release that included detailed information about our first quarter 2026 results, which is available on our website. Ryan and Sebastien will make a few brief comments, and then we will open the line for questions. Immediately following this earnings call at 10:00 a.m. Mountain Time, 12:00 noon Eastern Time, we will be holding our Annual General Meeting of stockholders.
During the meeting, I will give a brief overview of Gran Tierra Energy Inc. and where the company is heading. We invite you to join us; dial-in instructions can be found on our website. I will now turn the call over to Ryan to discuss our financial results.
Ryan Paul Ellson: Thanks, Gary. Good morning, everyone. Our first quarter performance marks a solid start to 2026. With production aligning within expectations and capital spending coming in under plan, we highlighted disciplined execution across the organization. With the Simonette asset disposition and bond exchange completed during the quarter, we materially strengthened the balance sheet as we exited the quarter with $125 million in cash and extended maturities. Additionally, we signed an exploration, development, and production sharing agreement with the state oil company of the Republic of Azerbaijan, which provides access to a world-class, proven basin with established infrastructure and contiguous acreage with significant development, appraisal, and exploration opportunities.
Lastly, we entered a strategic partnership with Ecopetrol, where Gran Tierra Energy Inc. expects to earn a 49% working interest in the Tiscorama block, located in the Middle Magdalena Valley Basin of Colombia. Combined with our existing Acordionero-operated operations, this expands our operated position in the basin and is expected to drive operating synergies and enhance long-term value. From a hedging standpoint, oil volumes are hedged throughout the year using a mix of three-ways, collars, and puts, with an average ceiling of approximately $76 per barrel. For gas, we have AECO swaps covering an average of 15.6 thousand GJs per day at approximately $2.71 per GJ for 2026. We continue to evaluate market conditions and will add to our hedge position where options align with our established hedging policy and support our objectives of protecting cash flow while maintaining exposure to higher commodity prices.
As a result of our strategic developments and the evolving market environment, our 2026 guidance has been revised to reflect how our portfolio and the market have changed since our original guidance announced in December 2025. The primary drivers of our revised guidance were higher commodity price assumptions, our completed Simonette disposition, the addition of the Tiscorama block through our partnership with Ecopetrol, and incremental hedges put in place after the original guidance was announced. Despite higher oil prices improving the backdrop, the benefit is partially offset by hedging losses forecast between $70 million and $72 million, the loss of Simonette production, and incremental capital spend tied to our new portfolio additions.
At an approximately $84 Brent average for the year, we are guiding to production of 40 to 45 thousand barrels of oil equivalent per day, EBITDA of $345 million to $395 million, and free cash flow of $95 million to $115 million, with a capital program of $130 million to $170 million. Turning now to our financial results for the first quarter 2026, Gran Tierra Energy Inc. incurred a net loss of $119 million compared to a net loss of $141 million in the prior quarter and a net loss of $19 million in first quarter 2025. The net loss position was primarily the result of non-cash charges such as unrealized hedging losses and the remeasurement of equity compensation plans, coupled with nonrecurring charges such as a senior note exchange and severance.
Ecuador pricing lagged during the quarter due to our M-minus-1 structure, reducing revenue by approximately $16 million versus the average Brent. With Brent moving higher in April and May, we expect the timing effect to reverse and support stronger realizations from Ecuador in the second quarter. The company generated adjusted EBITDA of $74 million versus $52 million in the prior quarter and $85 million in first quarter 2025. Funds flow from operations was $43 million, or $1.21 per share, up 60% from the prior quarter and down 20% from first quarter 2025. Gran Tierra Energy Inc.’s capital expenditures of $45 million were lower than the $53 million in the prior quarter and $95 million in the first quarter 2025. During the quarter, the company spud three development wells in Colombia and three development wells in Canada in the Santa Ana area, which was disposed of in March 2026.
Gran Tierra Energy Inc. recouped the costs associated with the drilling of the Montney wells through the purchase price adjustment related to the transaction, as the effective date was January 1. At quarter end, Gran Tierra Energy Inc. had a cash balance of $125 million, total gross debt of $606 million, and net debt of $481 million. Furthermore, we repurchased approximately $9.2 million face value of the company’s 9.75% senior notes due 04/15/2031. The repurchase represents a discount of 12% to the face value of the repurchased bonds. Alongside the $145 million of cash as of 03/31/2026, the company currently has approximately $54 million of undrawn credit and lending facilities. Gran Tierra Energy Inc. generated oil sales of $172 million, which was up 2% versus first quarter 2025 and up 32% from the prior quarter, primarily due to a 24% increase in Brent price and a 12% increase in sales volume as a result of higher sold volumes in Ecuador, partially offset by higher differentials.
On a per-BOE basis, operating expenses decreased by 3% when compared to first quarter 2025 due to lower workover activities, which were partially offset by higher lifting costs with the inventory fluctuations resulting from the Ecuador sales. With the portfolio changes and current market conditions, we remain focused on generating free cash flow, reducing debt, and maintaining the flexibility to adjust capital allocation as conditions evolve. I will now turn the call over to Sebastien to discuss some of the operational highlights.
Sebastien Morin: Thanks, Ryan. Good morning, everyone. From a production perspective, Gran Tierra Energy Inc. delivered first quarter 2026 average working-interest production of approximately 45.5 thousand barrels of oil equivalent per day, which was 2% lower than fourth quarter 2025 and 2% lower year-over-year. This was primarily driven by the timing of waterflood optimization responses in Colombia and the disposition of our Simonette assets, partially offset by strong performance from the Conejo wells in the Tiple block and incremental volumes from Perico. Turning to operations in Colombia, we continued to execute efficiently across our development program. We drilled the Raahu-2 well at Cohembi and initiated infill drilling of three wells on Pad 6 with the drilling of Cohembi-29.
Together, these two wells were drilled with a total cost of $7.5 million, approximately 18% below budget, reflecting continued capital discipline. We are currently in the final execution phases of the Cohembi program and expect completion by the end of Q2. In Ecuador, we commenced water injection at Tenanke in early February, with early results exceeding expectations and reinforcing our reservoir management approach. In addition, we finalized all injectivity tests and regulatory submissions to initiate waterflooding operations in late Q2 to early Q3 at the Iguana and Perico blocks. With waterflooding operations full steam ahead in Ecuador, we expect to see both an incremental oil uplift and significant water disposal cost reductions. As Ryan previously mentioned, on the strategic front, we entered into a partnership with Ecopetrol to earn a 49% working interest in the Tiscorama block in Colombia’s Middle Magdalena Valley Basin.
The block contains approximately 364 million barrels of original oil in place and has seen limited historical recovery of approximately 7%, or 25 million barrels. This represents a clear opportunity to apply our waterflood expertise gained at Acordionero to enhance recovery and extend field life in the Tiscorama block. By comparison, Acordionero, which has a similar original oil in place of 338 million barrels, is directly adjacent and analogous to the Tiscorama block and has achieved a current recovery factor of 16%, or 53 million barrels, and has a 2P recovery factor of 27%, or an additional 35 million barrels to recover. We expect to initiate operations at Tiscorama in 2026. We also signed an exploration, development, and production sharing agreement in Azerbaijan, securing a 65% working interest across approximately 400 thousand gross acres in a proven basin with established infrastructure and long-term development potential.
The agreement includes a five-year exploration and appraisal period followed by a 25-year development term. Overall, the quarter reflects disciplined execution across the base business, supported by capital-efficient operations and targeted portfolio additions that enhance our long-term growth profile. I will now turn the call back to the operator, and Gary, Ryan, and I will be happy to take questions. Operator, please go ahead.
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Operator: Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, we will now conduct the question-and-answer session for securities analysts. If you have a question, please press star-1-1 on your touch-tone phone. You will then hear an automated message advising that your hand is raised. Your questions will be polled in the order they are received. Please ensure you lift the handset if you are using a speakerphone before pressing any key. One moment, please. Our first question will be coming from Massimiliano Pallotta of Stifel. Your line is open.
Analyst: Good morning. Thank you for taking my questions. Actually, two. Firstly, 2026 CapEx guidance has increased slightly. Can you elaborate on that, and could you confirm if there is any potential incremental spending if prices stay this high? How should we be thinking about a normalized CapEx level going forward? Secondly, on regional mix, most of the activity recently has been in Colombia and Ecuador. What prices do you need to see to ramp up activity in Canada?
Ryan Paul Ellson: Great, thanks for the questions. With respect to the 2026 guidance and capital, there is a slight increase, and that really reflects us securing the Tiscorama block, where we expect to spend $15 million to $20 million this year in the Tiscorama block in order to get water in the ground and start the injection project where we earn into the base production in Tiscorama. With respect to increasing capital with higher oil prices, we are going as fast as we can. We are happy with the capital program. I think it is well thought out, and we are getting water in the ground in Ecuador, so we are really going with the most capital-efficient way we could spend the money this year. We have already started our planning for 2027 and 2028.
Regarding Canada, AECO prices continue to struggle. With Shell LNG fully ramping up, there has been more and more activity on the LNG front, and we expect AECO prices to firm. We need to see AECO north of $3 in order to allocate capital in Canada on the gas side.
Analyst: Thank you very much.
Operator: Gentlemen, there are no further questions at this time. Please continue.
Gary Guidry: I would once again like to thank everyone for joining us today. We look forward to speaking with you next quarter on our ongoing progress. Please join us for our Annual General Meeting of stockholders, which will commence at 10:00 a.m. Mountain Time, 12:00 noon Eastern Time, where I will give a brief overview of Gran Tierra Energy Inc. and where the company is heading. Dial-in instructions can be found on our website. Thank you very much.
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