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FELP - Foresight Energy


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Well, I guess it is really tough to be a FELP long. Deer Run mine is going to reopen soon, distribution could be doubled soon, yet the common unit price drops 10% in a week.....

 

Haven't paid much attention to this after my child's birth earlier this year. Equity wouldn't appreciate as long as cash sweeps are in place. I think most of the volume is coming from the warrant holders.  They do have 8-9m export volume projected this year and API2 has been strong, so first quarter cc will be interesting.

 

I don't quite understand this whole deer run mine opening. How are they going to find 100-150m to fund it? And Murray keeps complaining abt inventories. Maybe they are getting ready to refinance debt again and sending some positive messaging.

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Haven't paid much attention to this after my child's birth earlier this year. Equity wouldn't appreciate as long as cash sweeps are in place. I think most of the volume is coming from the warrant holders.  They do have 8-9m export volume projected this year and API2 has been strong, so first quarter cc will be interesting.

 

I don't quite understand this whole deer run mine opening. How are they going to find 100-150m to fund it? And Murray keeps complaining abt inventories. Maybe they are getting ready to refinance debt again and sending some positive messaging.

 

Their undrawn revolver has the capacity to fund at least $100M. And their existing longwall is financed with low rate (~5%) secured debt. So, assume they make a down payment of 40% with revolver and the rest 60% with new longwall secured debt, that should not be too difficult.

 

 

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Haven't paid much attention to this after my child's birth earlier this year. Equity wouldn't appreciate as long as cash sweeps are in place. I think most of the volume is coming from the warrant holders.  They do have 8-9m export volume projected this year and API2 has been strong, so first quarter cc will be interesting.

 

I don't quite understand this whole deer run mine opening. How are they going to find 100-150m to fund it? And Murray keeps complaining abt inventories. Maybe they are getting ready to refinance debt again and sending some positive messaging.

 

Their undrawn revolver has the capacity to fund at least $100M. And their existing longwall is financed with low rate (~5%) secured debt. So, assume they make a down payment of 40% with revolver and the rest 60% with new longwall secured debt, that should not be too difficult.

 

Have to read those debt covenants again but not sure how they will be allowed to take more leverage. And what about the demand side? Export capacity is constrained. Don't think Murray will open the mine based on spot demand.They need to have a fixed contract. I am hoping the netbacks will continue to improve.

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Have to read those debt covenants again but not sure how they will be allowed to take more leverage. And what about the demand side? Export capacity is constrained. Don't think Murray will open the mine based on spot demand.They need to have a fixed contract. I am hoping the netbacks will continue to improve.

 

DeerRun will be the lowest cost mine with a margin of probably close to $20/ton, assume they invest $100MM and it only produce 2M ton in the first year, that will likely brings about $40MM incremental EBITDA, then the overall leverage actually comes down even further. My numbers are just for illustrative purpose. But I think those guys must have done the math before investing in it.

 

Regarding the contract, from the latest CC, they said they are getting calls constantly for supplying coal because customers were running low in inventory. They are ready to sign fixed contract when the price is right. I think that was at a time before NG price went over $4.

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Murray is hiring aggressively, business must be good:

 

https://www.spglobal.com/platts/en/market-insights/latest-news/coal/121918-murray-energy-offers-signing-bonuses-to-new-western-kentucky-mine-employees

 

Louisville, Kentucky — Murray Energy is offering $10,000 signing bonuses to attract new employees to its mines in western Kentucky, a spokesman for the St. Clairsville, Ohio-based company said Wednesday.

 

 

 

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  • 1 month later...

Today ARLP's earning and outlook is pretty strong. Interesting that with all the talks on China weakness on import and API2 down to $80, ARLP still expect strong export volume and margin in 2019, and stable domestic for the next five years.

 

Here are some interesting read:

https://www.spglobal.com/marketintelligence/en/news-insights/trending/TrgtbrGoiGNWo5M-M3LPAg2

 

"Talking to some of our coal-producing customers, it's pretty clear that utilities are screaming for coal at this point," said Alan Shaw, the railroad's executive vice president and chief marketing officer. "That's kind of the factor that we're seeing right now, limiting both volumes in the utility franchise and on the export side, is coal availability, particularly thermal coal availability."
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  • 3 weeks later...

Foresight is a leading producer and marketer of thermal coal controlling nearly 2.1 billion tons of coal reserves in the Illinois Basin. Foresight currently operates two longwall mining complexes with three longwall mining systems (Williamson (one longwall mining system) and Sugar Camp (two longwall mining systems)), one continuous mining operation (Macoupin) and the Sitran river terminal on the Ohio River. Additionally, Foresight has recently resumed continuous miner production at its Hillsboro complex and continues to evaluate potential future mining options. Foresight’s operations are strategically located near multiple rail and river transportation access points, providing transportation cost certainty and flexibility to direct shipments to the domestic and international markets.

 

 

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20190213005400/en/

 

Is that a misprint? I didn't hear anything about this in the last CC. Not a mining expert but how were they able to get a mine up and running so fast?

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Is that a misprint? I didn't hear anything about this in the last CC. Not a mining expert but how were they able to get a mine up and running so fast?

 

I don't think so. The part that has been resumed is the continuous mining, not the longwall mining.  Continuous mining has different cost and economics, it won't add significant volume. See their Shay #1 Mine, which has two continuous miner and only produce about 2Mt a year.

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I don't think so. The part that has been resumed is the continuous mining, not the longwall mining.  Continuous mining has different cost and economics, it won't add significant volume. See their Shay #1 Mine, which has two continuous miner and only produce about 2Mt a year.

 

Yes, the long wall has higher coal recovery but does require large initial capital outlay. Either way any extra tonnes are adding to the bottom line. Wonder whats the demand and pricing on ILB now. The spot is at $39 which is better than $32 from last year but the contracts are usually negotiated at a higher price than the spot. CC will be very interesting.

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Yes, the long wall has higher coal recovery but does require large initial capital outlay. Either way any extra tonnes are adding to the bottom line. Wonder whats the demand and pricing on ILB now. The spot is at $39 which is better than $32 from last year but the contracts are usually negotiated at a higher price than the spot. CC will be very interesting.

 

Yeah, they pushed the CC ahead to Feb from March, hopefully they have some good news to share with us that they cannot wait.

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  • 1 month later...

Anybody still following? At this rate I will add a chunk soon, personally. Lots of catalysts impending that could unlock tons of value, but the market right now seems fixated on the current distribution amount. Or am I missing some big ticket item??

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The resignation of Vining appears significant.

 

Why? Here is from the recent 10K, looks like he is retiring:

 

Paul H. Vining is a member of the board of directors of our general partner. He was appointed to the board of directors of our general partner on January 1, 2016. Mr. Vining was previously the CEO of The Cline Group LLC, as well as President of Foresight Reserves LP and CEO of Cutlass Collieries LLC, the international development arm of The Cline Group, retiring from these positions in February 2019.

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Anybody still following? At this rate I will add a chunk soon, personally. Lots of catalysts impending that could unlock tons of value, but the market right now seems fixated on the current distribution amount. Or am I missing some big ticket item??

 

I am still following and "bag-holding" my position. I agree that several catalyst impending (domestic coal price up, Hillsboro coming back) . In addition to the disappointment of distribution increase, I feel like that market is also not comfortable with the big extra CAPEX (~$100M) for the Hillsboro, it may make them exceed the 4X ratio again since they were at 3.9X.

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Why? Here is from the recent 10K, looks like he is retiring:

 

I don't know, but you wonder if Murray wants to take private?

 

Per the 10K, All members of the Board, other than Paul Vining (who is appointed by Foresight Reserves), are deemed appointed by Murray Energy and can be removed and replaced by Murray Energy at its sole discretion.

 

Vining, appointed by Foresight Reserves which is controlled by the Cline Group, has never received any director compensation. Why serve on a board at the request of Cline for no money and then decide to retire?

 

I could be way off base here. Just thinking through scenarios.

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With FELP and MURRAY's debt traded in high double digits yields, I don't think either can have access to capital market now to take the company private. The $100M extra CAPEX for Hillsboro will be already a stretch for FELP. It makes more sense for FELP to focus on getting Hillsboro back online, increase EBITDA to close to $400M, which will lower the leverage ratio to below 3X.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Murray is buying Mission met coal assets out of bankruptcy. Not much positive press here, that's for sure.

 

 

Murray has no incentive to support the share price. He is better off that the share price remains depressed if/when he take it private after paying off the MQD. I don't understand why Cline has approved this cap allocation unless he knows something demand wise? Bond market is pretty spooked due to inverted yield so maybe they are selling all the converted shares. 

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