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Earnings Calls: 
Burlington Northern Santa Fe Fourth Quarter Earnings Call
Author: Rozalina Destanova
123jump.com
Last Update: 2:24 PM EST January 31 2008


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Revenue rose to $4.25 billion from $3.88 billion a year ago. The increase in revenue came despite a falling number of carloads on network, which is evidence of strong pricing. Fuel costs jumped to $960 million from $703 million a year earlier. Total carloads reached 2.6 million, down from 2.677 million in the same period in 2006. The company plans capital expenditures of $2.45 billion in 2008, down from the $2.59 billion it spent in 2007.


Investors Question and Answers

 
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Source: Company filings    Q1:March  Q2:June  Q3:September  Q4:December
 
Matthew K. Rose: It is not just one single thing, but as we have gone through a re-pricing of the book, over the last three or four years that starts to wind down to some degree. We still believe that long-term price is going to be in the 3% to 4%, when we look at our business model, because of some of the inflationary indexes that we will see coming into the business. We are in an excess truck capacity situation as those excess trucks are sucked out of the market and as the gross ton miles for the economy start to come back, you will see truck prices come back up, be much more aggressive on the truck price. Then you will see where our businesses compete with trucks, specifically in our Intermodal and some of our industrial, you will see those prices outpace the average of our overall pricing for the company.

John Barnes (BB&T Capital Markets): What is your outlook on some of the other rail legislation that''s pending, the Safety Bill and some other things?

Matthew K. Rose: The Safety Bill is different because it has been through both the committees; it is ready to go to conference. They have not taken it to conference. Depends on where that all ends up, it has got some things in there that we do not think are helpful. Generally, there are some things that we think we can work with as well. We will just have to see if they decide to take it to conference or not, as far as the things like the Rereg bill that have not been through the full bodies, those are harder in getting those through in election year, more distraction. It is harder when the business model for the railroad industry is working. That is where the railroads are spending record capital amounts and we just released the surface transportation commission report that talked about the long-term needs of the highway system the railroad system. We released a rail infrastructure report, the Cambridge Report last fall that talked about the $150 billion we need to spend over the next 30 years. People are struggling with these bills that are more destructive to railroad investments. People are pausing, they know that they are hearing some frustration from customers and trade groups specifically about rail issues, but one plus one, does not necessarily add up to passing a rail Rereg bill.

William Green (Morgan Stanley): How much of your business is not yet re-priced in this new year and how much below market you think it might be?

John P. Lanigan, Jr.: We have virtually gone through everything in our business with the exception of some coal business we have some longer term contracts in coal. In essence, in all the other business units we have gone through, at least once if not twice and maybe coming up on a third time depending upon the business. We have gotten pass that phase where we wonder if the book of business re-price, with the exception of some long range coal contracts. We have about 15% to 20% of our coal business.

William Green (Morgan Stanley): How do you think you can replace some of the International Intermodal that has moved?

John P. Lanigan, Jr.: We will replace the International Intermodal business when the economy picks up and import start to pick-up. We had a major customer last year that made a strategic retreat to the rear from the trans-Pacific trade because of their economics and that was our largest international customer, so put a big hole in our volumes. We are anxiously awaiting the economy to perk back up and we will see those imports try to pick-up and as far as that domestic customer, long-term customer who have majority of their business with us and they simply decided to move additional business to us, in order to make their network more efficient, more effective.

Thomas Wadewitz (JP Morgan): What the number on a per worker basis looks like in 2008?

Thomas N. Hund: On the incentive plans, we would expect that, that becomes a headwind for us next year. This year we did not make our plans and so we had a couple of cent a quarter benefits, which is the way it should work. As we look to next year I expect headcount to be somewhere between flat to down and then the normal cost inflation offset by initiatives, but then we are going to have the headwind of the incentive compensation so we are going to be up several percent on a per employee basis.

John Larkin (Stifel Nicolaus): Do you think the second half might return to a more normalized volume growth rate?

John P. Lanigan, Jr.: We do think that in the second half of the year we will start to move northward from a volume standpoint. The big event for us is lapping the decision by that major international customer to exit the trans-Pacific trade. We lap that after the second quarter so; we are looking at that third quarter timeframe to start to make some improvements.

Matthew K. Rose: There are lots of moving parts in terms of truckload capacity and this economy will not take much in terms of GDP growth to get gross ton miles coming back on all these networks. People can not get a feel on is the sea changes that we saw over the last five to seven years in terms of gross tons miles. They came on all these networks. If you just look at our network alone from call it 2002, we are still up 25% to 30% in terms of units. It has been huge unit growth and all that excess capacity that we had during the late 90''s and in the early 2000 was sucked up and so when we talk about steel having a tight network, we see that on our network and then when you start thinking about 5% more tons for something like coal and then you start thinking about more any GDP growth whatsoever to add more gross ton miles to the consumer side of economy.

John Larkin (Stifel Nicolaus): The Intermodal had big volume drop year-over-year, and then there was the big increase in yield. Were both those moves a function of the large customer''s decision to retrench from the trans-Pacific market?

John P. Lanigan, Jr.: Yes, there is some cause and effect there, but that was part of it. The second part of it is revenue empties have been shrinking dramatically as we talked about for the last few quarters and then the westbound loads have improved because of exports, but it is what is coming off a relatively small base so it did not make up the revenue empties, but the revenue quality of a load versus the empty is significantly higher, so that all contributed to the mix.

John Larkin (Stifel Nicolaus): Some of the competitors, particularly Brandex has talked about the increased train link and the operating leverage that you get with that. Will you have some leverage there, whether you are taking advantage of it, or whether there is any siding length constraints you have to deal with?

Carl R. Ice: It is a big driver; it drives into service, expense and capacity all three. We had over previous quarters talked about that a lot and it has shown significant improvement, we thought we have shown it so many quarters, we dropped it a quarter or two ago, we are up in total compound annual growth by 1% or 2%.

John Larkin (Stifel Nicolaus): Could you give update on the status of the double track project in Chicago railway as well as where you stand in putting up the Intermodal yard in L.A?

Carl R. Ice: The Chicago L.A. route continues although our expansion capital is down for next year. We know we will meet that double track, but we will not meet it quite as quickly, based on where we are volume wise. We are finishing some of the projects that were under way, couple of others we will not do quickly, but sometime over the next couple of years, two or three years we will have it all completed. We do those based on where we need to bring the capacity on line first. In terms of the new dock facility there we are more continuing to move forward to get permit in.

Matthew K. Rose: We just had another favorable development in that, where the local business chamber and everything are looking at how to get LA Long Beach growing again and one of the things that they have put in this commission and this report that they have set is to that is our skid project out of the bill.

John Larkin (Stifel Nicolaus): You have talked of how strong grain was, mostly export. Are you also seeing a similar strength in phosphates and fertilizers into the grain growing regions?
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