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Holden Cuts Jobs As Commodore Sales Sag

How figures can tell a different story:


Holden yesterday cut around 600 jobs from its Adelaide car manufacturing business as sales of the new fuel-thirsty six cylinder Commodore continued to underperform the company’s expectations.


The cuts came as figures were released showing that car sales have jumped 9 per cent in the first two months of the year: but sales of locally-made Holdens are sluggish.


Hence the pressure on employment.


The company said the cuts would be made through voluntary redundancies and follow the ending of the dual manufacturing of the new and old Commodores models and the more efficient plant after half a billion dollars was spent upgrading it.


Yes, but the latest figures on car sales show the new Commodore isn’t doing well, so there’s a big hint the company is matching labour force to car production levels.


With Ford selling fewer Falcons (Ford’s performance is worse than Holden’s so far in 2007), there will now be questions over the Melbourne operations of that struggling US giant.


The Adelaide job losses follow a slide in sales of the locally built Commodore range in 2006 and the carmaker’ $144 million after tax loss for 2005.


Holden cut 1,400 jobs in August 2005 when it decided to axe its third shift at Elizabeth due to falling local and global demand for large cars: that situation hasn’t improved here or in many foreign markets.


Likewise Mitsubishi has seen some stability in the sales of locally made versions of the 380 model, but at a low level. Sales have risen slightly in the first two months of this year but nothing like the 14 per cent rise in locally made Toyotas (for the Camry and the Aurion).


So it could be more bad news for Adelaide later in the year with continuing speculation about the future of the Mitsubishi car making operations there. There was considerable speculation late last year that they could be closed in 2007.

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Alinta Bidders Emerge?

The utilities group was the only ASX sector to rise in yesterday’s nasty 132 point sell-off. It edged up just 0.7 of a point thanks to a Bloomberg report that Singapore Power and Babcock and Brown were combining to launch a joint bid for Alinta.

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Markets: A Nervy Day

It’s going to be a nervy day on local markets today after Wall Street fell sharply on Friday and the prices of major commodities also slumped.


After our market shed 4.1 per cent on the ASX 200 last week (and which closed lower on Friday at 5786, with the All Ords also down at 5775) the last thing investors would have wanted was a bone rattler on Wall Street and other markets on Friday night.


But that’s what they got.


The Dow lost 120 points or about 1 per cent, while the broader S&P 500 index fell 1.1 per cent. NASDAQ composite fell 1.5 per cent on Friday: all big falls but amplified by the nervousness ignited by Tuesday’s big fall, the biggest since September 11, 2001.


For the week, the Dow lost 4.2 per cent and saw its worst decline on a percentage basis since late March 2003; The S&P 500 lost 4.4 per cent for the week, in its worst weekly performance since late January 2003 and NASDAQ fell 5.8 per cent this week, the worst drop in just over two and a half years.


US Government 10 year bonds finished at 4.5 per cent, equal to the level set in the aftermath of Shanghai Tuesday last week and a sign that more and more investors are retreating from the sidelines.


Here the SFE Share Price Index was showing a 47 point fall Saturday morning for the ASX 200 when trading resumes today. But everyone will be watching how China and especially Tokyo open later on.


US investment banks such as Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, Bear Stearns, Citigroup and big banks in Europe such as HSBC, UBS and Credit Suisse all saw their share prices under pressure last week because investors perceive them to be engaging in risky activity: whether it is emerging markets, private equity, hedge funds, aggressive proprietary trading or servicing the troubled US housing market, including the imploding subprime sector.


Anything to do with risk is now being avoided by investors so it will be interesting to watch the prices today of Macquarie Bank (up in Friday’s down market after a profit upgrade), Babcock and Brown, Allco and Allco Equity Partners and similar sorts of listed investors.


Qantas firmed to over $5.20 on Friday in the wake of the ACCC’s approval of the buyout on Thursday.

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Commodities Sag

In London on Friday the Financial Times was reporting that commodities, though down over the week, had shown some resilience.


A few hours in New York it was clear that apart from oil (which eased a touch only) commodities were much weaker than thought.


For example LME copper prices eased $US87 a tonne to $US6013 a tonne, a fall of 1.4 per cent. Several hours later in New York the price closed down 2.56 per cent at $US2.63 a lb, a loss of 7USc a lb.


Gold closed down sharply around $US648 an ounce in London, and was off more in New York at $US644 an ounce, a loss of 3.1 per cent.


Traders said that what was notable was the way the instability in stocks fed into other markets (with US bonds the only one benefiting as prices on bonds rose and yields fell sharply).


Much of the shuffling in equities and commodity markets was done by financial investors (AKA speculators, hedge funds and the like) who liquidated positions to generate cash and de-risk their books.


Copper prices in New York fell 5.2 per cent last week ending the February rally.


Gold fell 6.2 per cent last week, silver 12 per cent. Analysts said $US1.3 trillion in value was wiped from equity markets around the world and hundreds of billions more disappeared in commodity and other markets.


Bonds, not precious metals were the only safe haven for nervous investors.


Copper is being hurt by the withdrawal of speculative positions built up in the rally last month: as US copper consumption fell, dragging prices down in January Chinese buyers started picking up the cheaper priced metal, leading to a rush of money punting on a rise in Chinese consumption.


What many forget was that China withdrew from world copper markets in the last half of 2006 because prices were too expensive and ran down internal stocks.

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QGC Says ‘Yes’ To AGL

Queensland Gas Company shareholders have emerged big winners from a series of takeover offers which boosted the value of their investment, doing what a host of investment and institutional analysts couldn’t see: expose the company’s rapidly growing value.


QGC shareholders accepted a revised and better partial offer from AGL Energy on Friday, shortly before a meeting of shareholders in Brisbane was due to vote on the original offer.


The meeting’s outcome had been complicated Wednesday by a last minute offer worth $812 million from US-based investor, TWC (part of the Societie Generale Banking group of Europe).


That came Wednesday, on Thursday QGC slipped out a statement revealing the upward revaluation of its gas reserves by 25 per cent and then late Thursday AGL Energy increased its offer with a letter to the company which was then released Friday morning.


Wonderful timing you might say but in any case the deal has seen QGC shareholders retain their company, at the cost of acquiring a major shareholder. But more importantly they have a very big gas supply contract with AGL.


AGL’s new offer is worth $1.60 a share, up 16c from the original $1.44 a share. That will give it a 27.5 per cent stake after a buyback of 14.7 per cent of its capital by the company at $1.52 a share.


This will cost AGL $327 million.


AGL’s deal is summarized:


1. Acquiring 204.3 million QGC shares at $1.60 per share.

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Cars Can Sell, Really

Perth-based car dealer, distributor and logistics group, Automotive Holding slipped through a solid net interim earnings report last week, plus a further move to expand its base in Perth and in the very competitive Sydney market.

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The Clash

In the words of an adviser to President Clinton back in the race for the 1992 presidential election, a sign was placed in the campaign office which read “It’s The Economy, Stupid”.

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Profits: Hastie Does Better

Air conditioning and refrigeration company Hastie Group Ltd has reported a strong rise in underlying earnings and maintained its full year earnings guidance.


The company said that while net profit for the December half year was $9.99 million, down from $11.32 million in the previous corresponding period, on an underlying basis, earnings jumped almost 65 per cent to $10.15 million.


Underlying EBIT (earnings before interest and tax) rose to $18.22 million from $11.78 million.


Earnings per share jumped by almost 51 per cent to 8.9c from 5.9c, and an interim dividend will be paid of 5.5c a share.

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Profits: MCC, HWI, SRA

Brisbane-based Macarthur Coal posted a sharp drop in first half net profit yesterday but says the full year is still on track.


The company has already signalled that earnings in 2007 would be lower because of various reasons but especially lower export prices as well as problems at the export and rail facilities and changes in mining policy.


Macarthur said that first half profit fell almost 50 per cent to $42.4 million, from $82.1 million in the first six months of 2006 financial year.


“Macarthur Coal’s profits were primarily affected by the 30 per cent reduction in the US dollar coal price in April 2006 from the record previous price,” the miner said.


But analysts said the result was better than the the market had been expecting and the coal miner has reaffirmed its guidance for a net profit of $63 million to $73 million which was given at the 2006 AGM.


Sales fell 22 per cent to $216.2 million from $277.6 million.


“Rain has impacted coal mining in the March 2007 quarter and port congestion has increased,” Macarthur said.


“Coal inventories are also low, leaving the company without stocks to cover unplanned production stoppages.


“Despite the weather-related delays in shipping, the company confirmed that it expects to meet its 4.5 million tonne annual shipping target subject to no further interruptions caused by rain or port congestion.”


Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) fell 48 per cent to $64.5 million and the company sliced its interim dividend by half to 11 cents a share from 23 cents a share last year. Earnings per share naturally fell from 47.1c to 22.6c in the latest period.


The shares eased 6c in the sell off yesterday to $4.87.




Takeover target Housewares International has posted a $29 million loss first half and omitted dividend thanks to its underperforming Australian homewares business.


The $29.1 million net loss for the six months to December 31 compares with a net profit of $11.67 million in the first half of 2006.


The overall result was dragged down by $37.2 million in significant items, primarily a write-down of the assets of the Australian homewares business.


Housewares, which sources products offshore and on-sells to its Australian customers such as department stores, said its Australian homewares division suffered a $6.1 million loss for the six months to December 31.


This compared with a $900,000 loss in the previous corresponding half (and the reason why it has been looking to unload the business, without success).


Housewares said that the continuing losses primarily result from fierce market competitiveness, in particular significant direct import by major customers and associated discounting.


The company has been warning of this for at least 18 months as big retailers, such as Myer and Target, Kmart and Big W move to directly source homewares products from manufacturers in China.

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Another Bid For QGC

Shareholders in Queensland Gas are doing very well: the company has just received another takeover offer, taking the number of full offers to three and ‘deals’ to one.


Sounds confusing. It should. There have been two bids from Santos, both now abandoned after the ACCC said no. AGL Energy has THE deal on the table at the moment which would give it a 27.5 per cent stake in exchange for long term gas supply contract.


And now US investment firm The TWC Group has launched an $812 million takeover bid for QGC.


The offer is well-timed, coming just two days before the QGC shareholders meeting tomorrow to discuss and approve or say no to the AGL deal, which is valued at around $292 million for the share deal.


After the TWC offer, Friday’s meeting might be off.


TWC is offering QGC shareholders $1.51 per share in cash or preference shares or a combination of each.


QGC shares rose in yesterday’s sell off to finish 18.5c higher at $1.54.5c on more than 11.5 million shares.


The cash offer will be tasty for shareholders after the sell down yesterday which has made investors twitchy.


Cash in the hand beats future promises in unsettled times, capital gains tax and all!


TWC said its offer was within a value range provided by an independent expert and represents an 11 per cent premium to QGC’s closing share price on Tuesday.


TWC, which has about $150 billion in assets under management, said its offer was superior to a proposal for QGC by AGL Energy.


“Our offer provides QGC shareholders with superior value and allows QGC shareholders the opportunity to participate for all of their shares, unlike the AGL proposal, which only included a limited 12.5 per cent buyback option,” TWC managing director Blair Thomas said in a statement.


QGC previously backed a proposed $292 million deal with AGL that would involve AGL taking a 27.5 per cent in QGC.


Last week, oil and gas producer Santos dropped its bid for QGC, which would have resulted in the creation of a “new” QGC, after opposition from the competition watchdog.


Santos kicked off the bidding at $1.26 a share which was too low; AGL slipped in with the placement/contract deal that sort of put a price of around $1.44 a share on QGC.


Santos then recast its offer into an old QGC/new QGC which it said effectively valued the company at around $1.80 a share (the ‘new’ company would be spun off, with Santos taking a large but not controlling stake).


The basic offer though was $1.30 a share and the promise of the spin off. The ACCC knocked that on the head so now TWC appears to have the upper hand.


TWC said it has an investment plan for QGC’s Undulla Nose coal seam assets and intends to ensure that QGC’s gas resources are commercialised soon.


“In addition to the development of QGC’s reserves, we will seek to address existing infrastructure bottlenecks that inhibit efficient development of Eastern Australian gas markets,” Mr Thomas said.


TWC said under its offer, QGC shareholders can receive their consideration in the form of 10 per cent preference shares that can be put into the company for one year.


If they elect to receive cash, they can also receive a maximum of 25 per cent of their consideration as preference shares instead.


TWC’s offer is subject to conditions including a minimum of 50.1 per cent acceptances.


Los Angeles-based TCW, which has about A$150 billion of assets under management, claims to be one of the biggest investors in coal seam methane in the world.


The company’s energy and infrastructure unit has more than $7.4 billion invested in more than 190 energy projects and owns stakes in five large coal seam gas operations, mostly in the U.S. and Canada. This deal, if successful, would be around 10 per cent of that total. TWC is part of the asset management arm of the European bank, Societe Generale.

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Goodman Improves

Only the New Zealand economy, its operations in that country and high commodity prices, stand in the way of food giant, Goodman Fielder, achieving its full year prospectus forecast of a pro-forma net profit of $223.9 million.

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WOW Wows

The enormity of the gulf between Woolworths and Coles was driven home yesterday when Woolies produced net earnings for the first half of 2007 that went within $100 million of matching the amount Coles expects to make in a full year.

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OneSteel Earns More

Like Promina and Suncorp-Metway OneSteel’s latest results are interesting in a historical sense but it’s the immediate future that holds the key to the company’s progress and profitability because of the dramatic changes that about to happen.

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