|
|
Kit
Menkins Leasing News
www.leasingnews.org Wednesday,
April 24, 2002 Accurate,
fair and unbiased news for the equipment Leasing Industry
Headlines---- Steve
Geller on ELA Funding Exhibition, Chicago Tyco Rethinks Planned Sale of Its Plastics Operation Fitch/ABS Equipment Leasing Delinquency Indexpdf AOL's $50-Billion Loss Is One From the Books U.S. Places 3rd in Capital Markets Alliance Financing Group selected by IBM Canada
SNL Financial Y-Merge Moves Smoothly Equipment Leasing Recruiters Debate Wednesday---Odds and Ends Irwin Financial First Quarter Earnings Advanta First Quarter Earnings After Losses Greystone Solutions Taps Barry Wolfield as New VP MicroFinancial First Quarter to Previous Not Great Hilton Hotels posts 38 % drop in 1Q net (Waikoloa Village) GATX Reports Q1 Results Really Not Great Congress Panel Agrees to Limit Home Shield in Bankruptcy ###
Denotes Press Release -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Steve
Geller Special Report: Equipment
Leasing Association Funding Exhibition, Chicago, Illinois April
23-24 Special
Report from Leasing News Advisory Director Steve Geller, CLP I
believe that there were over 500 attendees registered at the ELA funding
exhibition, although a lot of people on the roster, who I know, were
not seen there. This
would mean either I did not see them (I doubt) or they did not come.
The number of funders with a booth were down. There
were 41 exhibitors, including 6 service providers. For the
most part, all exhibitors were busy most of the time. Perhaps an exhibitors
reaction on the quality of the interviewees is warranted. What
was very noticeable is that the exhibitors were in the same ballroom
that is used every year and in previous years the aisles were much
smaller. This
year there were four aisles and the space was very wide,
with cocktail tables set up in each aisle. I do think that the industry
needs to get away from thinking that a conference is a failure if
there are fewer attendees than the prior year. Gerry
Egan, president of the National Association of Equipment Brokers (NAELB)
said it last week at NAELB that the smaller attendance did not mean
the conference
was not as good. I think the same was true at ELA Chicago. We
are seeing a change in industry as far as funding goes. There are less
of the traditional bank funders around. Their place is being taken partly
by what we have known as "super brokers." I
do not like that term: Super Broker. I think of a super broker as
one who does not purchase deals for their own account and then resell
them. They are those who will take in a deal from a broker, "sanitize"
it and send it under their own name to a
funding source to discount it and keep a lion's share of the profit. They
represent to both parties, the funder and the broker, that they are principals.
We
are now seeing, and there were a number of them at ELA Chicago,
those companies that have bank lines of credit and they take deals
from brokers and fund under their own lines. This is a more sophisticated
approach. These
types of funding sources represent to the broker their source of funding.
With a dearth of funding these types of sources will become a more
important part of the industry. I would have no trouble working with
them, because for the most part, the rates being charged are reasonable. We
may see banks come back in as traditional lenders, but I believe they
won't come back very soon. We will need to rely on these leasing
companies. In
conclusion, if one goes to conference with major expectations, even in
the best of times, he(she) will be disappointed. If
you go limiting your expectations, this funding exhibition was quite
successful. I
targeted a number of funders to visit and believe that I came away
with two
to three new funders who I can utilize. Steven
B. Geller, CLP Leasing
Solutions LLC 20
Dike Drive Wesley
Hills, New York 10952 845-362-6106 fax
845-354-2803 cell
914-552-0842 (
P.S. I hope to see many of my friends at the joint Eastern Association
of Equipment
Lessors and United Association of Equipment Leasing. Please visit:
www.eael.org or www.uael.org.
It is not too late to sign up. First timers
and those who worked for leasing companies who were members, can
join us for only $425. That is quite a bargain. ) Tyco Rethinks Planned Sale of Its Plastics Operation ( ...has so far failed to find a buyer for all or part of the CIT Group) By ANDREW ROSS SORKIN and ALEX BERENSON New York Times Tyco International is reconsidering the sale of its plastics unit and plans to announce tomorrow that it may suspend the auction for the business because no potential buyer has expressed willingness to pay Tyco's asking price, executives close to the company said yesterday. A decision to give up on the sale of the plastics business may also indicate a partial reversal of its recent plan to split into four parts. In addition, Tyco has so far failed to find a buyer for all or part of the CIT Group, its financial division, and is making plans to spin that unit off if a sale is deemed impossible, the executives said. Tyco plans to detail the proposed spin-off plan tomorrow when it releases its second-quarter earnings, the executives said. A spokesman for Tyco declined to comment. If Tyco cannot sell any part of CIT, the company would spin off the company in an initial public offering as a way to generate cash to help reduce debt. Shares of Tyco skidded for the third consecutive day yesterday, falling $1.36, or 4.9 percent, to $26.69, on new concerns that the company's breakup plan may be floundering. Tyco, which is based in Bermuda and has headquarters in Exeter, N.H., has 240,000 employees worldwide and makes everything from syringes to security systems. Tyco shares have plunged this year on investor concerns about its accounting practices and cash position, as well as the disclosure that its two top executives have sold more than $500 million in stock over the last three years while telling investors that they rarely sell shares. Since the beginning of the year, Tyco has fallen 54 percent, erasing $63 billion in shareholder value. Since January, analysts have steadily reduced their estimates of how much CIT is worth. In February, analysts said they expected Tyco to receive $7 billion to $8 billion for CIT, which Tyco bought for $10 billion. The sale of Tyco's plastics attracted interest from teams of buyout groups, including Bain Capital; Thomas H. Lee Partners of Boston and the Blackstone Group of New York; the Carlyle Group of Washington, and Madison Dearborn Partners of Chicago; and Clayton Dubilier & Rice Inc. of New York and the Texas Pacific Group in San Francisco. However, none offered more than $2.5 billion in the first round of bidding, the executives said. Tyco has been asking for $3 billion to $4 billion, they said. A second round of bidding has been held up because Tyco has not delivered an audit of the unit, which was supposed to be delivered about a month ago. Separately, Tyco is moving quickly to shed CIT so that the operation, unburdened from the rest of Tyco's balance sheet, can regain access to the commercial paper market, a crucial source of financing for financial companies. But spinning off CIT will make Tyco's balance sheet look much weaker, some analysts contend, because it will leave Tyco without the $11 billion in equity that it has put into CIT. Nick Heymann, an analyst at Prudential Securities, said Tyco's debt-to- capital ratio would rise to 48 percent from 38 percent if it spun off CIT without getting cash for the company, he said. In addition, Tyco may take other write-offs that would shrink its equity, he said. As a result, he added, Tyco could come close to violating its agreements with its lenders, which require it to have a debt-to-capital ratio of no more than 52 percent. "You're getting close to triggering that 52 percent covenant," Mr. Heymann said. If Tyco does violate its covenants, it would have to renegotiate $13.5 billion in bank loans, he said. Tyco would almost certainly be able to do that, but it might have to pay a higher interest rate, he said. (Leasing News had reported the thinking was to sell the CIT "division" in the units of specialization. At one time, they reportedly had an offer from Ford Motor Credit, and also General Electric. The financial losses of the car company and the bond condition, plus accounting questions, of GE "scared" off these suitors. Tyco International went back to trying to sell the "division" as "one group," but has not found any buyers at a "decent price" and those seeking the Plastic division, also know this. It puts Tyco International in what is called in New Hampshire " a White Mountain's place full of hard rocks and snow". Or as they say in Bermuda, " between a rock and a hard place, plus cold even in Springtime. editor ) ____________________________________________________________________ http://www.leasingnews.org/PDFFiles/fitch%20abs%20equipment%20expo.pdf Fitch/ABS
Equipment Leasing Delinquency Index--pdf Fitch
Ratings-Chicago-: Fitch Ratings on Monday unveiled a new index that
benchmarks the delinquency performance of equipment lease-backed
securities. Rating approximately 80% of all equipment lease securitizations
since 1997, Fitch designed the ABS Equipment Lease Delinquency Index
to become a leading indicator of ABS equipment lease delinquencies
and, ultimately, act as a barometer
of credit quality within the leasing industry. Featured
in the inaugural issue of The ABS Equipment Expo, a quarterly
newsletter, Fitchs delinquency index provides investors with
new tools and strategies in assessing current and future credit risk
within their ABS portfolios. In addition to highlighting the equipment
lease delinquency index, the newsletter will also include industry
commentary and analysis. Readers
who could not download this newsletter, turn on your Adobe
program, and
then go to this url to download the newsletter: http://www.leasingnews.org/PDFFiles/fitch%20abs%20equipment%20expo.pdf ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- AOL's $50-Billion Loss Is One From the Books Media: Accounting rules could yield a record for red ink, two years after a once- heralded merger.
By JAMES BATES, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer Sometime this afternoon AOL Time Warner Inc. probably will earn the dubious honor of spilling more red ink than any company in U.S. corporate history. With a quarterly loss expected to exceed $50 billion, in one fell swoop the world's biggest media company will lose more than the annual gross domestic product of Ecuador, Croatia, Uruguay, Kenya or Bulgaria. The loss--which is largely on paper and reflects new accounting rules--essentially acknowledges that the merger between Internet giant America Online Inc. and media conglomerate Time Warner Inc. has fallen dramatically short of expectations. Two years ago when the deal was announced, the two companies had a combined stock market value of $290 billion. Today, AOL Time Warner's stock is worth about $85 billion. "It's an appalling number, bigger than the [gross domestic product] of some countries," said entertainment analyst Harold Vogel of Vogel Capital Management in New York. "Most analysts will dismiss it and say it's now behind them and doesn't matter because it's noncash. But it's an admission of a humongous mistake." For the most part, Wall Street already has factored in the loss. AOL Time Warner's shares have fallen 41% this year, partly because the company telegraphed the eye-popping losses a few weeks ago and because of the slowdown in advertising that is hurting its properties. An AOL Time Warner spokesman declined to comment. The accounting losses are a morning-after hangover of the wild run-up in the stock market in the late 1990s. Many companies, including America Online, used their inflated stock to buy other companies. Now, new accounting rules set by the Financial Accounting Standards Board are forcing companies to more accurately state the fair market value of those acquired assets. Often, the result is huge write-offs. AOL Time Warner has said it expects its asset write-down to be $54 billion. The new rules have been especially tough on industries such as entertainment, technology and telecommunications. Their stocks were hyped in the '90s, when promise often meant more than profit. As a result, last year fiber-optics company JDS Uniphase Corp. posted a $50.6-billion annual loss because of write-downs in its assets. Telecommunications equipment maker Nortel Networks Ltd. adjusted its books to the tune of $19 billion. Vivendi Universal, which owns Universal Studios, in 2001 posted the largest loss ever for a French company at $11.8 billion, reflecting its recent acquisition spree. "It's difficult for the typical investor to sort these numbers out. These companies are very complicated, so huge, and the accounting and reporting of the numbers is so complex," said Brian Mulligan, who had to compile similar figures when he was chief financial officer for Seagram Co. before it was acquired by Vivendi. For more than a decade, entertainment companies often have pushed the creative boundaries in how to portray their financial results, in much the same way they creatively sell movies and TV shows. After the 1990 merger of Time Inc. and Warner Communications to form Time Warner, investors were steered away from traditional forms of financial performance measures such as net income and earnings per share. Instead, an array of often convoluted financial yardsticks including "EBITDA," "cash flow," "free cash flow" and "pro forma" numbers were touted by entertainment companies. "It's become like a sleight-of-hand routine at a carnival," analyst Vogel said. " 'Don't watch this hand--watch my other hand.' " Companies such as Time Warner and Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. rarely posted a sizable annual profit but nonetheless often were lauded by Wall Street if other measures exceeded expectations. In the February news release announcing its 2001 financial results, Viacom Inc., owner of CBS, Paramount Pictures and MTV, waited until the third page to reveal it lost $224 million. At a time when corporate earnings are coming under more scrutiny in the wake of the bankruptcy filings of Enron Corp. and Global Crossing Ltd., some critics say companies are too often downplaying profit as a measurement so they can look better to investors. Entertainment companies, often with Wall Street's blessing, have embraced the financial measure EBITDA. It is a "profit" number that excludes many kinds of expenses, including debt interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization. The theory was that traditional financial measurements don't accurately portray the health of companies that have invested in big projects such as cable systems, broadcast networks, technology and telecommunications networks. Mario Gabelli, one of the nation's biggest media investors, said the numbers are merely the tools needed to evaluate a company's health, adding that an investor can't simply rely on any single one. "It's like valuing a big diamond ring. You have to look at color, clarity and carats," Gabelli said. One problem is that different companies use different criteria, much as if speaking different dialects of the same language. Walt Disney Co., for example, is one of the few entertainment companies that still regularly highlight corporate earnings per share of stock. In recent years, though, it also has highlighted free cash flow because of its continuing theme park construction programs. "We try to report our numbers in a way that is most meaningful and most clear, and I can only assume other companies present what they think is meaningful," Disney Chief Financial Officer Thomas Staggs said. "But it ends up being a hodgepodge." U.S. Places 3rd in Capital Markets AP Business Writer LOS ANGELES The collapse of Enron Corp. and the technology sector's bust helped knock the United States from the top spot in an annual ranking of worldwide capital markets, landing the country behind Hong Kong and the United Kingdom. The United States placed third out of 98 countries in the openness and efficiency of those markets in the ranking released Tuesday by the Milken Institute. Access to capital is considered a key indicator of economic health because it determines whether entrepreneurs are able to get the money they need to create and grow new businesses that generate jobs. The Santa Monica-based think tank used more than 50 measurements in its ranking, including tax rates, inflation, amount of government regulation and general economic conditions. Access to money tightened in most areas of the world, with more than two- thirds of the countries scoring weaker results than a year earlier due largely to the recession that hit this country in March 2001. "There isn't the money or the demand to build new businesses," said Susanne Trimbath, a research economist at the Milken Institute. The United States has experienced a decrease in venture capital funding, initial public offerings and foreign investment because of the economic downturn, the survey said. In addition, concerns about the U.S. accounting system after Enron and the failure of so many tech companies that went public in the last few years has tightened the flow of business funding, said Glenn Yago, director of capital studies at the Milken Institute. Economic experts said the national economy has nevertheless proved remarkably strong under these pressures. "That the U.S. should retain a position at the top of the ranking shows it has deep and resilient markets that can withstand profound shocks," said Walter Russell Mead, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. "We've had this great historic meltdown, and everything has kept rolling," he said. One example of the U.S. financial system's flexibility is the orderly bankruptcy process that has preserved assets and jobs, Mead said. In contrast, France has a bankruptcy system that fails to protect bond holders. Without a strong bond market, the country fell to 24th spot from 18th a year earlier, Trimbath said. Hong Kong improved its ranking by decreasing the concentration of assets in its banks and by reducing the volatility of its financial markets, according to the survey. Even though Hong Kong operates in the shadow of communist China, it's ranked apart from China because the international community still views its economy separately. China ranked 35th in the survey, up from 42nd a year ago. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Alliance
Financing Group selected by IBM Canada Ltd. to Provide Consumer Financing
to IBM Customers Toronto
Alliance Financing Group Inc. (CDNX symbol YFG)
has been selected by IBM Canada Ltd. to provide consumer financing
for Canadian customers that purchase IBMs NetVista desktops,
ThinkPad notebooks, eServer xSeries and Options by IBM. The
IBM Consumer Finance Program is currently available and will enable
IBM Canada to offer attractive, fixed rate term financing to customers
across Canada through IBMs call centres, in both official languages
and right at the point of sale. Transitioning
our financing options to Alliance allows us to provide consumer financing
options to our customers and leaves us to focus on what we do best,
differentiating our IBM PC products through investments in key technology
areas, primarily wireless and security, said Ayman Antoun, Director
of the Personal Computing Division, IBM Canada. This
unique program features credit approvals in minutes, and is structured
to provide credit to the widest possible range of consumer credit
profiles. In addition, unlike most retail consumer financing programs,
the IBM program has been designed to offer flexible rates, geared
to each individual customers credit profile. To
facilitate this program, Alliance Financing utilizes Creditwave Corporations
state of the art financing technology, called CreditworxÔ. Creditwaves
unique solution provides web-based, automated credit adjudication,
documentation preparation, documentation audit and transaction funding
for Alliance. Based
on my own experiences with several major Canadian financing programs,
I am confident that the IBM Consumer Finance Program will be very
popular with consumers, and will prove to be a real value-add to the
excellent products and services currently offered by IBM, said
Peter Knight, Vice-President of Operations of Alliance Financing. We
are delighted to have been selected by IBM Canada to develop and manage
this program, said Bernie Shimkovitz, CEO of Alliance Financing.
Our business model, technology and delivery systems allow us
to offer Canadian consumers one of the best computer financing programs
in the marketplace today. About
Alliance Financing Group Inc. Alliance
Financing is proving itself as a leader in providing a broad base
of leasing and financing solutions for both businesses and consumers
in both the traditional bricks and mortar marketplace, and since early
2000, the Internet marketplace. Alliance Financing maintains a high-tech,
human touch philosophy; utilizing a combination of proprietary
technology - such as its private labelled online financing tools,
selected ASP technologies, and a dedicated staff of finance professionals
to deliver a comprehensive suite of end-to-end financing fulfilment
solutions. For
more information about Alliance Financing Group Inc. please visit
www.YourFinanceSource.com,
or contact: Bernard
Shimkovitz
Chief
Executive Officer
Alliance
Financing Group Inc
Tel:
905-660-3660 ext. 225 Toll Free: 877-660-3660
Fax:
905-660-3078
Email:
bernie@alliancefinancing .com ###
############################## ########################
CHARLOTTESVILLE,
VA - SNL Financial LC (SNL) acquisition of Y-Merge.com
LLC (Y-Merge) is operating successfully.. Under the terms
of the deal, Y-Merge has become a wholly-owned subsidiary of SNL.
SNL,
based in Charlottesville, is the leading provider of data and news
on the banking, insurance, financial services, real estate and energy
sectors. Y-Merge, based in New York, sells an Internet-based system
that allows financial institutions and investment banks to evaluate
and analyze a full range of corporate finance and transaction alternatives.
We
are very excited about the addition of the Y-Merge application suite
to our product line and the Y-Merge principals and employees to our
talented staff, said Mike Chinn, President of SNL. Y-Merge
will significantly increase our ability to serve our Wall Street and
public company clients by increasing the analytical horsepower of
SNLs electronic products and services. With the addition of
Y-Merge, we will continue to supply the financial sector with best-of-breed
data, news, research, and now corporate finance analysis for years
to come. Joining
the SNL team solidifies our goal of providing unmatched corporate
finance analytics for the banking industry, said William Pappas,
President of Y-Merge. SNLs superior data and information
will not only allow for expansion of our current financial institution
analytics, but also foster development of a similar analytics platform
for all the industries tracked by SNL. The combined SNL/Y-Merge platform
will increase our ability to serve public companies, investment bankers
and fund managers, forming a truly unbeatable combination and a win-win
for our clients and for the principals of Y-Merge and SNL. As part
of the transaction, Will Pappas will join SNLs six-member board
of managers, which also includes: Edwin T. Burton, Professor of Economics
at the University of Virginia; Michael Chinn, President of SNL Financial
LC; Mark Feldman, President and CEO of the Cold Spring Group; Reid
Nagle, Chairman of SNL Financial LC; and Robert Wong, Managing Partner
of McCabe Heidrich & Wong. LeClair
Ryan provided legal counsel to SNL Financial and Sullivan & Cromwell
represented Y-Merge. Financial terms were not disclosed. About
SNL: Founded
in 1987, SNL Financial (www.snl.com)
is the premier information and research firm covering the banking,
insurance, specialized financial services, real estate and energy
industries. SNL collects and standardizes all relevant corporate,
financial, market and M&A data plus breaking news and analysis
and then disseminates this information through a variety of
database and online services, news services, data publications, and
custom research. Leading
investment banks, investment managers, corporate executives, rating
agencies, government agencies, consulting firms, law firms, and media
such as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and Barrons
rely on SNL for the most timely, accurate, comprehensive, and relevant
information on the companies in our sectors. About
Y-Merge: Y-Merge
(www.ymerge.com) delivers sophisticated
corporate finance analysis via the Internet to depository institutions,
investment banks and fund managers. The product suite includes Capacity-to-Pay
M&A Analysis, Comparable Group Analysis, Discounted Cash Flow
Model, Projected Earnings Model and Branch Mapping. Since its founding
in 2000, Y-Merge has increased the efficiency of corporate finance
analysis for more than 300 clients ranging from community bank CFOs
to leading investment bankers. ###
################### ############################# Equipment
Leasing Recruiters Debate Live
Job Fair in the works. I
see no more argument between Teri's position and Fred's than I do
between the
argument for or against Super-brokers. We each have an idea of our
own value.
But do we each know what our perceived value is? If we are good at what
we do, we'll know it by the repeat business and referrals we get.
If we
are not, we may try to fool ourselves into thinking otherwise, but
we'll know
the real truth when the time comes to make the mortgage payment. (Sound
familiar, brokers and lessors?) Like
all professional services, we are under pressure to demonstrate our value
to our existing and potential clients. Like all professionals, we must
be proactive in doing so, or we will not be able to respond quickly enough
to an actual need. Example, I am working with a leasing guy in the Southeast
who has demonstrated an ability to write over $10 million in equipment
cost with a backlog of an additional $12 million for machine tools,
printing and textile equipment with an average transaction size of $50,000
to $200,000. He is the victim of recent M&A activity and is looking for
a stable environment. I take the initiative of introducing him to
a leasing
company who says he's great at what he does, but they're in an altogether
different market and need someone with that specific background. I
now try to identify and then focus on that need. As Teri said, that includes
assessing the chemistry fit. So I don't make the placement this time.
Next time that company has a need, I've already eliminated over half the
resumes I'll be looking at to fill it. They save time, they make
money. That
has value. When
a good recruiter works with a firm, they try to understand the needs
of that
firm, how the individual will fit into it, what their role will be, what
performance standards are expected of them, and the budget with which they
have to work. (Sound familiar, leasing guys and gals?) We don't
mind "one-off"
placements, but we'd rather have a solid business relationship. This
reduces the time to hire (think approval time) and the time to start (think
funding date), and that translates to efficiency. We made something happen
that would not likely have happened as efficiently. When a client says
I want a GE person, or I want someone who understands the difference between
collateral credits and cash flow credits, we either know what that means
or we ferret it out - fast, and we identify and then surgically remove the
organ from the donor and transplant it to the patient with the need.
We do
it enthusiastically, we sell up the value of working for our clients,
and there
is value in that. Should
everyone use a recruiter? Depends. Upwards of certain levels it definitely
makes sense. Think of professional people as equipment rather than
as supplies. Your customers wouldn't lease their pencils, but they certainly
might their copiers, their computers and their production equipment.
They could go out and pay cash, they could finance certain equipment
acquisitions through their bank, or even in some cases, on their credit
cards, but is that efficient for them? Maybe, maybe not, but if it's not,
it's your function as a lessor to show them how and why leasing makes cents. If
price is the basis for buying I might say, "Mr. Employer,"
(you might say,
"Mr. End User"), "while the traditional Cost-Per-Hire
metric may provide
some level of indication of efficiency, it doesn't take into account such
variables as the level of the position, labor market conditions, or
the availability
of immediate talent. Perhaps you should consider the Staffing Efficiency
Ratio as a more meaningful test. Determine
your total costs (internal G&A and external costs of posting ads,
contingent and retained recruiting fees, research costs, etc.) and
divide that by the total sum of the
base salaries for each external hire during the first year. While
a recruiters
fees may be a third of the first year's estimated income (or starting
salary), it may only equate to five or ten percent of your total costs.
On the other hand, when posting ads and calculating the time spent in
sorting through resumes and bringing in people who have not been prescreened,
your cost per hire may be somewhere more in the 15 to 20 percent
range. Now, notwithstanding the time you save, the quality of the candidates
you interview and your satisfaction as a hiring manager, doesn't it
make sense to let me help you meet your staffing needs? (Sound like
a lease-buy
analysis? You bet it does.) Recruiters
definitely fill a need in the market. We're every bit as important
to a company's getting things done fast and efficiently as a lease broker
or an account exec. Yes, we charge a fee (you do too, don't you?) and
yes, we don't always score a perfect match (you've never recommended
or underwritten
a bad deal?), but we certainly do have value. Teri and Fred each
have their own way of looking at what they do and the value they provide,
as do I. We each believe there is a high perceived value for our service.
We are not here to fit an "A" width shoe to an "EEE"
width foot. We're in it for the long haul, for the relationship. I thi |