the news

During New York trading last Friday, CNBC reported that Goldman had lined up $1.75 billion in new debt financing for JCP.  The stock, which had already been rising strongly on news that the Soros-run Quantum Fund had acquired a 7.9% stake in the ailing retailer, jumped sharply.  JCP ended the day at $17 a share, up 11.6% on the day.

According to the Wall Street Journal, which isn’t 100% clear, the new loan to have the following characteristics:

–$1.75 billion in size

–a five-year term, after which repayment in full would be due

–a 6.5% interest rate, implying $113.75 million in annual interest expense

–secured by many/most/all the company’s assets not already acting as collateral for other loans.

Neither JCP nor Goldman have confirmed the press reports.  As of Sunday night, when I’m writing this, there’s no SEC filing about this on the Edgar site, either.

my thoughts

1.  From the WSJ account, this new financing appears to be a bond offering rather than a bank loan.   Two differences:   on the one hand, the loan must be made all at once, starting the clock on interest payments, even though the money might not be needed right away; on the other, the lender has, generally speaking, no right to ask for early repayment.

The cost of the financing–before Goldman’s fees– would be close to $570 million over the next five years.

Unlike a bank loan, which can have an indeterminate term, JCP would have to have $1.75 billion available to repay the loan five years from now.  It’s possible that JCP could negotiate an extension, or borrow from someone else to get the money.  Without one or the other, the loan would seem to put a time limit on how quickly the operational turnaround must occur.

2.  To the extent that any assets of JCP serve as collateral for the loan, they would presumably not be able to be sold without the lender’s permission.  This could prove another, possibly severe, limitation to JCP’s options.

In a related story, the WSJ cites a brokerage report by ISI.  The report, which I haven’t seen, asserts that if the top 300 of the properties JCP controls were rented to third-parties instead of being used by JCP, they would fetch yearly rental income of $1.2 billion.  That’s more money than JCP has made in any of the past five years!

I don’t know whether this figure is correct.  If it is, it suggests that even pre-Ron Johnson the value of Penney’s real estate was being frittered away supporting a retail operation that only turned a profit because of a massive rent subsidy.

I’m sure JCP situation is much more complicated than just shutting down retail and allowing the value of the company’s real estate to be recognized–especially now that JCP stores have absorbed so much damage in the recent past.  Still, the point is that accepting the new loan might close out completely the possibility of forming a separate entity with these properties and rerenting them.

It will be interesting to see what JCP chooses to do.