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PWE - Penn West Petroleum


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I received an update from LinkedIn for a job at Penn West today (engineering). So they have started to hire again at least in some areas.

 

Do specialize in shutting in wells?

"Fiscal Engineer" ;-)

 

Regarding oil, just wait for the OPEC meeting.  Till then there is nothing to think about.

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I received an update from LinkedIn for a job at Penn West today (engineering). So they have started to hire again at least in some areas.

 

Does it make sense for them to hire?  Given commodity prices, it's likely that fewer of their projects are economic.  So I'm not sure if it makes sense for them to be expanding their labour force???

 

Or are they looking for people with a specific skillset related to shutting in wells or something?

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I received an update from LinkedIn for a job at Penn West today (engineering). So they have started to hire again at least in some areas.

 

Do specialize in shutting in wells?

"Fiscal Engineer" ;-)

 

Regarding oil, just wait for the OPEC meeting.  Till then there is nothing to think about.

 

The job title was pretty close to fiscal engineer, actually. It was for a job doing technical evaluation of projects and comparing their economics to the rest of the PWE portfolio. That's pretty much what I do right now at another producer (plus big-picture work on a specific project trying to improve its economics). I sort of think its like being a value investor in the oil patch (capital allocation work in an industry where its generally weak).

 

Anyway, I thought this might be of interest to the board, as it can be interpretted two ways.

 

1) They're confident they have this thing turned around and they're right.

2) They're confident they have this thing turned around and they're wrong.

 

Either way hiring provides a bit of insight into what management is thinking.

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PennWest cut the dividend to a penny (from 3).  Dividend cash outlay will be about 20mm/yr

Debt covenants modified: increased in Senior debt to EBITDA and total debt to EBITDA to 5:1 (from 3:1 and 4:1) for a period of about 18 months.

Dropped their unused revolver from 1.7b to 1.2b

Funds flow will be about $1/share with assumptions of $65 (cdn)/barrel and exchange of 1.15  (down from 1.89)

Now say they are best in class in their core operating areas

 

Lost 1.7b last year - much due to write downs/non cash

They wrote down some reserves - but seem to still have a fair bit of optimism baked in e.g. oil estimates around 80 in 2016 and then going up to 90....

 

Changing the covenants (should be finalized in April) gives a fair bit of time for oil to stabilize or turn.  They are still asset rich even if the book value is overestimated for todays oil price.

 

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You might want to actually read the report - & not just scan it. Those Oil, NGL, and gas prices are quoted in $C - convert at todays FX rate & they are pretty much at todays market prices. They are also not going to have any trouble at all in paying down 650M over 2 years; without an asset sale. We were all handed a very big gift today; you just had to be willing to pick the dimes off the street  :)

 

SD

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The exchange rate benefit is definitely there and yes brings the current $Cdn price close to the assumptions.  The table of future assumptions and what the reserves are calculated on - would be hard to characterize that as conservative. One might argue that assuming today's oil price for a year is not exactly conservative either (not knowable but we may not have bottomed)

 

Curious to understand how you think paying down 650mm over 2 years would be easy?  Capex plus the penny dividend is still over 100% of cash flow. Barrels produced is dropping

 

 

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Guest wellmont

The exchange rate benefit is definitely there and yes brings the current $Cdn price close to the assumptions.  The table of future assumptions and what the reserves are calculated on - would be hard to characterize that as conservative. One might argue that assuming today's oil price for a year is not exactly conservative either (not knowable but we may not have bottomed)

 

Curious to understand how you think paying down 650mm over 2 years would be easy?  Capex plus the penny dividend is still over 100% of cash flow. Barrels produced is dropping

 

there is a guy who follows this stock extremely closely---a bull. he says they need to sell hundreds of millions of assets and they need the oil price back over $60 within 3-4 months. otherwise he thinks they will have to sell the entire company. that would be a distressed sale. he is still really bullish based on the asset values. But that's the situation as he sees it.

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Not that lonq ago PWT was proposing to pay dividends at 0.14/quarter - roughly 250M/yr, AND their proposed capex was higher. We're pretty sure that at some point over the next 2 years we will see the same underlying conditions, for an extended period, that supported this REDUCED payout. They aren't selling bitumen; they are selling light crude & NGL's.

 

We're pretty sure they will not get sold either, simply because they would look for private placement money first. GS, GE, are both examples that we're all very familiar with.

 

We're also pretty sure there will be a asset sale, but it will not be at fire-sale prices. If it happens, great - but it's not the end of the world if it gets delayed either.

 

As already pointed out - where is the risk here? We would also highlight that you're getting a 2% cash yield to take it.

 

SD

 

 

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Does anyone know where I can find a transcript of the conference call (not an audio replay)?  Usually they are posted on Seeking Alpha within a day or two, but it doesn't seem to be there.  Also can't find it on the street.com.

 

Thanks in advance.

 

 

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Nawar and a few others have started to highlight, the massive discrepancy in valuation between Penn West and WhiteCap, Crescent Point, Raging River and others.

 

Basically, if Penn West was sold in pieces: Cardium, Viking, Slave Point, Spearfish to producers who are adjacent to them in these areas, they would likely obtain enough proceeds to repay their debt which is all senior notes at fixed rates or at an average of 6.0% and deliver a multiple bagger to shareholders. Of course, assets such as the Duvernay, Peace River and royalties would still be there. Recent transactions of that nature or consolidating an area if you will, have received very acceptable metrics despite the severe plunge in oil prices.

 

IMO, transactions of that nature have and would be easily accepted by investors, analysts and bankers for the acquiring producers which are not very large cap oil producers: pay a much better price than a few months ago and realize economy of scale in that area.

 

The question is: would the company and management be willing to entertain such proposals?

 

While it is not part of the current plan since the Cardium, Viking and Slave Point have been identified as core areas and Penn West has already best in class results in these areas (which again points to the non-sense in its valuation), it would not be a problem for a large entity acquiring the entire company.

 

At $5 a share, it would be just over $4.6 billion CAD in Enterprise Value or a very manageable sum for many private equity firms, hedge funds and large O&G companies. Such premium would be enough to convince worried shareholders to tender or just like for the Talisman Energy acquisition.

 

Being a strong entity or not forced into a corner to negotiate, they could then start the piece meal process and easily net within 12 months, $2 billion from their investment even at current metrics for transactions. If they are a bit more patient $4 or $5 billion is certainly not out of the question. These are very attractive returns for anybody and especially firms that are looking to deploy billions in capital in what is an over-heated market for fixed income and other yielding assets.

 

Moreover, an asset that has been overlooked at PWT are the tax pools which stand at $4.7 billion at year end. That alone is $1.7 billion more than the current entire Enterprise Value of $3.0 billion.

 

With the added flexibility from their new debt covenants and the Spearfish and royalties already being for sale, they could very well survive this downturn and end up on the other side in a very good shape with all their crown jewels. The market does not seem to believe in any of these scenarios and if we are to put any weight to the very low level of analysts participation in the last conference call, confidence is at an all time low.

 

Cardboard

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One thing I forgot to mention. And if you are that strong entity buying out Penn West, you spend a few hundred millions hedging against the industry: oil price, puts on companies involved, energy indexes, credit default swaps if available. And since these are all trading at lower volatility than Penn West, it is cheap insurance.

 

It is almost a guaranteed way to make money.

 

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Guest wellmont

I have followed nawar for a while now. his bullishness on pwe went down after the last report. his latest idea is that pwe has a few months to "make things happen". and they need the price of oil back up to around $60. otherwise there will be a large forced sale of assets in Canada.

 

there is an obvious bid ask spread in what buyers are willing to pay and what sellers want for their assets. this was stated clearly late last week by ceo of raging river, who is in a position to buy assets. there are three or four distressed sellers in canada (that I know of) with good assets right now. no deals are getting done. the buyers are not going to pay big premiums in this environment. this is an environment for vultures. this is why it's a waiting game right now. sellers waiting for prices to recover. buyers waiting for them not to.

 

regards

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"no deals are getting done."

 

This is not true.

 

- TORC bought Saskatchewan assets on Feb 5

- Bonterra bought Cardium assets on Feb 19

- Tourmaline bought assets from Perpetual this week.

 

What is not getting done are large deals such as what happened with the acquisition of Talisman. Hence why I mentioned the importance for mid to large cap players in Canada to make deals that allow them to consolidate their core areas. This is the only way for Bay Street to give a thumbs up to such deals.

 

Until majors or private equity are willing to entertain full take-overs of companies that are suffering, not from the quality or the value of their assets, but from a capital structure problem, then we won't see big deals. My guess is that this is coming and it may come in the form of unsolicited offers and taken directly to shareholders.

 

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As already pointed out - where is the risk here? We would also highlight that you're getting a 2% cash yield to take it.

 

Reading the last few posts since the release last week, I find that baked into everyone's view of the future is that oil is going up.  PWT has bought itself some time, but if oil falls then isn't that where the risk is.

 

I speak as an investor who bought in at $5+ and never appreciating the depth of the oil collapse.

 

I still watch it, but I think this thread ignores the possibility of $30 or $40 dollar oil or at least oil not moving from here for the next few quarters.

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As already pointed out - where is the risk here? We would also highlight that you're getting a 2% cash yield to take it.

 

Reading the last few posts since the release last week, I find that baked into everyone's view of the future is that oil is going up.  PWT has bought itself some time, but if oil falls then isn't that where the risk is.

 

I speak as an investor who bought in at $5+ and never appreciating the depth of the oil collapse.

 

I still watch it, but I think this thread ignores the possibility of $30 or $40 dollar oil or at least oil not moving from here for the next few quarters.

 

What is sad is that I played the what if game in my head.

 

I said, what if oil companies in the USA keep drilling.  Then what happens to the oil supply.  But if the oil supply increase, what if the USA keeps drilling.

 

Even after tha exercise I didn't see this.  But I have to say that this was never a slam dunk.

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another sizable drop, who's re-evaluating their thesis and cursing that they ever bought into this?

 

I'm not doing anything until I have time to look into PWE and a few others again.  I might DCA but in a bucket of oil companies kinda way.  SU is a new Buffett holding so that one is in my sights.

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