New Fortress Energy founder and Chairman Wes Edens has disclosed the company is in the final stages of arranging the sale of its Jamaican asset, as it sets its sights on Puerto Rico.

Addressing questions regarding the sale of its assets during NFE’s recent earnings call, Edens said the company’s divestment of its assets is, in part, aimed at reducing its debts and increasing its cash flow.

“So Jamaica is the country where we went first. So it’s our oldest and most developed market; just by review, it’s about a 30 BTU downstream market. We generate about [US]$125 million in EBITDA [earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortisation]. Virtually all of that is cash flow because that’s what happens to these businesses over time is that once they’re up and running, there’s very little capex (capital expenditure) to run them. It’s an extremely attractive profile of assets,” Edens told listeners on the earnings call.

In a January update, NFE outlined that it was pursuing asset sales in the range US$2 billion to $3 billion to reduce its corporate debt amounting to US$5.8 billion at the end of 2024. Back then, it said it received its first round of bids in December 2024 and was involved in “ongoing due diligence, management presentations and site visit”.

Financial performance and lawsuit

Fourth-quarter (Q4) earnings at NFE were $313 million while full-year EBITDA amounted to $950 million. Both surpassed the company’s estimates. However, the company incurred a net loss of US$224 million and full-year loss of US$242 million “driven primarily by costs incurred with refinancing our debt including a Q4 loss on extinguishment of debt of [US]$260 million”.

In November 2024, NFE was embroiled in a class action lawsuit in which it was the defendant against claims of securities fraud.

According to allegations, “The filed complaint alleged that defendants created the false impression that they possessed reliable information pertaining to the company’s projected revenue outlook and anticipated growth while simultaneously minimising the risk involved in New Fortress’ plan to have its Fast Liquefied Natural Gas (“LNG”) projects fully operational and to increase business growth globally. In reality, New Fortress’ Fast LNG projects failed to fulfill the Company’s public statements that its FLNG 1 project would be in service by March 2024.”

“Even following the announcement that these delays were costing the Company upwards of [US]$150 million per quarter, defendants continued to tout the speed at which New Fortress was building facilities. Defendants misled investors by providing the public with materially flawed statements of confidence and growth projections that did not account for these variables,” the allegations continued.

NFE’s Jamaican operation has an over-20-year contract for receiving supplies of liquefied natural gas. While noting that the asset is “sought after” and in a suitable market, Edens also shared that NFE “started this [sale] process back in the fourth quarter.

“We’re now in a kind of a final process with a handful of different folks. And although it’s always hard to predict the exact timing for this, if you like, the outcome thus far has been very positive, and then we’ll kind of go on from there. So it’s the asset sale update,” he said.

Refocused energy in Puerto Rico

On Monday NFE announced a one-year extension of its 80 TBtu islandwide gas supply contract with the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority. The islandwide gas supply contract has substantial capacity to supply both NFE’s current downstream gas demand as well as other legacy power plants running on diesel that can be converted to run on natural gas.

“Optimizing our existing contract allows us to accelerate the delivery of cleaner, more affordable energy while achieving meaningful cost savings and environmental benefits for the people of Puerto Rico,” Edens was quoted in a release from NFE.

Edens, during the earnings call presentation, said that there is a “massive opportunity for us to basically take fuel ready assets that currently burn diesel, switch them to natural gas, save hundreds of millions, billions of dollars over the years in time for the Puerto Ricans and actually generated a significant amount of business for us.”

He added that given the Puerto Rican Government’s priority to switch from diesel in a bid to realise cost savings, “This alone would double the size of our portfolio and say Puerto Rico two fifty million dollars to $500,000,000 a year. So, it’s a win win on both sides and something that we are very, very focused on in the short term.”