Monday, December 10, 2012

Phillips Carbon Black - Goes in the red!

In this post, I am merely providing an update of some interesting things that have happened  with respect to Phillips Carbon over the past year or so, in normal, jargon-free, understandable English! This is not at all a reco to buy/sell (I am a reco-less person) and I would urge readers to digest the info and then take their own buy/sell decisions based on own analysis, logic and common sense.


The basic fundas

  • Carbon black is used mostly as a pigment, which finds vast application in the tyre industry, among others.
  • The basic raw material for carbon black is carbon black feedstock (CBFS), which can be obtained in 2 ways; from oil refineries (Indian way of doing things) or through the coal tar distillation route (Chinese way of doing things!). The price of  CBFS obtained from oil refineries is directly linked to crude prices.
  • Well, it so happened that due to increase in crude prices, the Indian way of making carbon black became more expensive than the Chinese way. As a result, the Chinese happily started dumping carbon black in the Indian markets. Being a complete commodity, branding, manufacturer reputation etc just does not matter.
  • The annual Indian demand for carbon black is about 6.5 lakh tons, while the Indian manufacturers produce about 7.2 lakh tons, some of which is exported.
  • The Indian carbon black market is a duopoly, with just 2 companies; Phillips Carbon and Aditya Birla Nuvo controlling more than 80% of the market.
  • Now, till FY11, the Chinese imports of carbon black in India were about 16000 tons annually, which is no big deal. But then, the dumping started. In FY12, Chinese imports increased to about 80000 tons and over the trailing 12 months, have been estimated to have crossed 1.1 lakh tons. Now thats a big deal. If one wants to understand more on this, one can read this notification by the DG - Safeguards. Gives very good data as well as an overview of the sector. (I have highlighted the document for faster reading)
  • Landed cost of the China-maal is about 18-20% lower (esti) than the locally sold carbon black. So obviously, the local manufacturers could not compete and were severely hit. Phillips Carbon was no exception and the recent results paint a very sorry picture. 


What has happened now

  • The Indian manufacturers obviously got pissed off and made a case before the Govt to impose a safeguard duty on Chinese imports to curtail their dumping.
  • The Govt found the concerns of the Indian industry valid and a safeguard duty of 30% was imposed on Chinese carbon black for a period of 15 months from Oct 5, 2012. Go India!
  • Of course, there would be existing stock of cheap, pre-duty Chinese carbon black, yet to be exhausted, so one cannot expect immediate miracles for the Indian manufacturers.


What are the risks if one thinks of investing

  • The company does something RPG-ish! 
  • Further increase in crude prices
  • Raw material is heavily imported and rupee is at 54ish.
  • Severe slowdown in Auto sector, trickling down to severe slowdown for carbon black sector
  • A really awful upcoming quarterly result is possible!


My thoughts

  • As far as possible, one should not look at an RPG company as a long term investment. So, at least for me, that door is closed. 
  • However, what does Phillips Carbon earn in a 'normalised scenario'? Well, Rs.1800-2000 cr of sales with 6-7% PAT margins seems doable for the company. So, is Rs.100 cr PAT? Easily possible. Btw, the stock price has drifted down from Rs.220ish to Rs.95 over the last two years, giving a market cap of Rs.330 cr at present. Interesting!
  • So whenever the company starts showing improved profitability, the market will reward it with a nice spurt in the stock price. Forget EPS growth, forget 're-rating'..even a 'reversion to mean' can give good returns in this case.
  • Now, the big question is - when will this happen?! While I will not talk about that, I can say that I dont think it will happen in this quarter's (December) result, since existing cheap Chinese stock will take time to get exhausted. December result may also be equally bad, in which case the stock price will take a further hit. But this does have potential as a 2-3 quarter short term puff!

So will Phillips Carbon start batting properly or will it get bowled by the Chinaman?! Time will tell!

Until then,
Cheers and happy investing!!!




Disclaimer(s)!!
1) All the posts on this blog, including this one, are for educational and discussion purposes only.
2) I post articles on individual stocks as well as varied topics like behavioural finance, industry analysis etc. None of the material posted should be regarded as advice to buy/sell any stock. My articles are not recommendations to buy/sell individual stocks, and should not be construed as any form of investment advice.
3) As a professional analyst, I may have positions in stocks discussed.
4) PLEASE DO NOT TAKE BUY/SELL OR ANY INVESTMENT DECISION BASED ON ARTICLES YOU READ ON THE BLOG. These are only meant to provide information and initiate discussion. Final decision is and always should be, yours and only yours! 

25 comments:

Alternatives said...

The stock has a dividend yield of about 4%

Alternatives said...

Hi Niraj,
Sorry for the previous short comment on the dividend yield, I just looked up based on your note.
Aditya Birla Nuvo - The stock price has steadily moved up
Phillips carbon black stock is languishing.
Why is that?
Though I completely agree on the RPG group part. IT has a strong dividend yield of about 4%

Neeraj Marathe said...

Dear Alternatives,
One should say that the stock HAD 4% dividend yield. For FY13, it may not give the same dividend as that of last year, due to deteriorated performance.
ABN has many other businesses too. So as a company, it cannot be compared to PCB.
cheers!
Neeraj

Ketan Shah said...

Hi Neeraj,

Your CMI FPE posting is quite good! In-depth analysis...is there further update on that? Would you have some idea on the numbers of unlisted entity (that is going to be merged)? What is your gut feeling on whether the parent would be fair towards minority shareholders?

Neeraj Marathe said...

Hi Ketan,
Ya its kinda WIP..
One just cannot say whether the parent will be fair to minority or not. That, as i said, is a big risk.
Ketan, may i humbly request you to post comments in the relevant post? It becomes easier for me to manage too!
thnx..
Neeraj

paritosh said...

Hi Neeraj,

great blog as usual.

when you say RPGish - is it related to poor governance/ fraud or poor management/ capital allocation?

regards
paritosh

Ketan Shah said...

Sorry, Neeraj. I understand and will post the comments in the relevant post. Thanks for taking time to get back to me.

Neeraj Marathe said...

Hi Paritosh,
Umm i would say 'all of the above'! :-)

Hi Ketan,
Thnx!

Cheers!
Neeraj

Purushottam said...

Crisil Report..

http://www.moneycontrol.com/news/brokerage-recos-commodities/phillips-carbons-profitability-to-improvenext-2-qtrs_791581.html

Vishal Mittal said...

Interesting, Neeraj.

I think there are 2 additional risks:

1. There is high capacity build up, so Carbon Black price may remain subdued.

2. The management seems to have a penchant for raising fresh equity to support capex. He may not do QIP at this price, but could issue fresh equity/ warrants to himself at this price.

But worth looking at in detail.

Cheers

Neeraj Marathe said...

Hi Purushottam,
thnx! also, its interesting to note that a few quarters ago, when the price of PCB was about 180, Crisil had a buy rating on the same, with a fair value target of 300 bucks :)

Hi Vishal,
Totally agree with you. So here, i am not looking at EPS growth (although there will be EPS growth) or PE expansion..am just looking at 'reversion to mean'..when the market understands that this wont b a loss making company forever! Thats just my thought, which may be totally wrong..
The mgmt also has a penchant for acquiring something! :) last year, when their competitor did an acquisition, they were also scouting for one. Fortunately, the cycle turned for the worst and they had to keep quiet! :)

cheers!
Neeraj

Anonymous said...

Happy new year

Anonymous said...

P.C.'s 9 month results are out. In Q3, though the company barely made a profit, on a 9 month basis, its is sufficiently in red in that mostly it won't report profit for the whole FY.
Finance costs have also shot up.

What do you think Neeraj? Is the 290 cr market cap justified?

The co. does not seem close to the "100 cr profit" or "mean reversion" scenario you allude to in the blog post. Do share your take.

Neeraj Marathe said...

Hi anon,
the result was much better than i was expecting :-( I was hoping for a nice fat loss, like in the previous quarter.
I agree that currently, the prospects do appear dim. The question is, will it always be like this in future?
cheers!
Neeraj

Anonymous said...

Just some Pointers
The govt Anti Dumping is valid only till Dec 2013..It being extended remains to be seen ...another Birdy tells me that is not the only worry.. you have an another anti dumping law which is going offline that's on the tyre Front (the consumers of Carbon Black) the Tyre industry will be facing cheap imports from Thai and China once this anti dumping bill gets abolished ..there goes your Tyre demand ... one more thing didnt fuel Oil prices/Demand go up (Something that never happens ,Fuel oil is a loss making cracker for any refinery...Jamnagar Refinery swears that never Produced one ounce of it)...hmm so your CBFS should also rise ,Alash even thou your OIL Prices are falling....BY A Reluctant Indian Investor

Neeraj Marathe said...

Hi,
thnx a lot for the pointers. And i really like your name :)
cheers!
Neeraj

Pranav Pratap Singh said...

Hi Neeraj,

Just stumbled upon your blog and really like it!
I had bought PCB a few months back because:
carbon black looks like a usual commodity that is down in dumps.
number of automobiles are only going to go up in the country
Government is ok with the idea of protecting domestic players through anti-dumping/additional tariff measures.
The flagship companny of the group CESC is making 700 crs of cash every year, so the promoters can see negative cashflow years in PCB without much trouble.
And the biggest: its power generation - even if PCB operates at current capacity, it would generate about 100 crores of revenue from power. Raw material being free (flue gases) it generates 80-90 crores of pbdit. I think that the value of these power plants would be close to the EV (~900 crores) of the firm. It assumes operation of the plant at about current production levels.

My assumption was that I would have to hold it for about 3 years, since there might be more pain in this industry still left. However, I have no idea about corporate governance practices of RPG group. Infact, I assumed that it would be good.
Let me know your thoughts (especially, how would you value its power business) and any insights/reference about the corporate governance of RPGs.

Anonymous said...

The Q4 of fy12-13 was GOOD but the stock is still getting hammered in the markets. It has come down to Rs. 43 levels as of today.

Alas, the "nice spurt" you predicted didn't happen.

What's the possibility that Q1 of this year will be good?

Rupee has tanked against the $. Does this make PCB's raw material expensive?

The domestic auto industry is in doldrums. That means WEAK tyre demand.

Not to mention the cheap imported tyre possibility mentioned above.

Does all this point to a bad Q1, hence the bloodbath to the stock?

One further risk I see is dilution of EPS by raising equity from founders/otherwise?

Any thoughts (on thoughts)?

Neeraj Marathe said...

Hello pranav,
Yes I completely agree with your logic. However, since the other business will continue to bleed, the power earnings will be negated and thats whats been happening currently.
When earnings are hit, mkt wont look at value of assets etc..
That does provide a long term investor with opportunity!
cheers!
neeraj

Neeraj Marathe said...

Hi anon,
Thnx for pointing out that a nice spurt never happened! :)
May I request you to also go thru an update on the stock which I had written?
I am still waiting to take a plunge in this stock, but I think the time will come soon!
cheers!
neeraj

Anonymous said...

Dear Neeraj.. could you please shed light on the raw materials used up by both these carbon black players and also the number and locations of warehouses of Birla Carbon?
Thanx

Neeraj Marathe said...

Hi Anon,
I have already written about the raw mat..
No idea bout the warehouses..
cheers!
Neeraj

Neeraj Marathe said...

Hi Anon,
I have already written about the raw mat..
No idea bout the warehouses..
cheers!
Neeraj

Pranav Pratap Singh said...

Hi Neeraj,

Thanks for the feedback. Can you give some details about RPGs corp. governance too?

I was thinking that with Sterling's acquisition by Thomas Cook, they would compete directly with Club Mahindra. Looks like there is bloodbath going to come in timeshare industry, which has been dominated by Mahindras. Have yo given it a thought?

Neeraj Marathe said...

Hi Pranav,
I am always scared of the accounting practices followed by the timeshare industry, hence never really looked into it.
cheers!
Neeraj