Amazon.comAMZN3136,86 $
A fleet of American LNG tankers sailed to the stock exchange. Amazon introduces tax on inflation. Corporate executives around the world make sensational confessions about ESG.
Disclaimer: when we talk about, that something has grown, we mean a comparison with the same quarter a year earlier. Since all issuers are from the USA, then all results in dollars. When creating the material, sources were used, inaccessible to users from the Russian Federation. We hope, Do you know, what to do.
"The prank was a success": the first major oil and gas IPO of this year in the US was successful
U.S. network of LNG terminals Excelerate Energy (NYSE: EE) successfully entered the stock exchange in the USA. Share price, on which they were placed during the IPO, amounted to 24 $, and during the first trading session of the company, the value of shares reached 28,2 $, at the close of the session, they traded at the price 26,85 $, which is higher than the IPO price.
So the IPO can be considered successful.. His success was consolidated at the end of last week., when the value of these securities after the market closed on Friday was at the level of 28 $ — significantly higher IPO price. Let's figure it out, why it's important for investors.
Firstly, this is the first big IPO since the beginning of the well-known events in Eastern Europe. Many companies have begun to postpone their plans to go public.. That fact, that EE was able to successfully conduct an IPO in such an environment, may inspire many companies to return to plans to go public.
Secondly, the past IPO can be considered a good indicator of the increased interest of investors in the energy sector. Excelerate Energy successfully completed the task, raising $ 384 million during the IPO. Now the company's capitalization is approximately 2.96 billion.
It was the first oil and gas IPO in the U.S. in more than a year.. This may attract additional investor interest in the commodity sector.: in it, in recent years, the revision of reporting forecasts has mainly been upwards., in contrast to the vast majority of sectors of the economy.
Thirdly, this shows the interest of investors in the topic of LNG. EE has a fleet of 10 floating LNG tankers – more 20% from 46 similar units of transport in the world, which makes her services very popular in the era, when Europe is trying to get rid of dependence on Russian gas.
As for the EE business itself, then it looks, according to the company's registration prospectus, somehow.
The money. Revenue - 888.555 million dollars. The company's operating margin is 15,68% from proceeds. Total margin — 4,63% from proceeds. Revenue is divided into two segments:
- LNG transportation and storage services on the company's tankers — 52,67%.
- Gas sales — 46,32%. In fact, the resale of LNG itself.
Debts. The company has an impressive debt burden: 1,496 billion in arrears, of which $ 520 million must be repaid within a year. She doesn't have much money.: 72,86 million in accounts and 260.535 million counterparty debts.
Given the demand for LNG now, the company's revenues will increase, and its financial condition will improve significantly. Hope, that EE will soon appear on SPb-Exchange: taking into account the latest trends, the company looks like a fairly promising investment for investors.
Flesh for Inflation: Amazon introduces new fees from sellers
Internet commerce giant Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) introduces an additional fee on its platform 5% from sellers "to cover fuel costs and inflation". The fee will take effect from 28 April for those sellers, who use amazon's storage and delivery system.
This story can be viewed from two sides..
For sellers, Amazon once again behaves like a caricature of a capitalist villain straight from "Ignorant on the Moon". I think, that Amazon's new measures will lead to a further escalation of the conflict between sellers and the platform, since the former already have a fairly long list of claims against the company: from Amazon's own copying of their products to discrimination in advertising displays..
For the company itself, these fees will help keep its graceless retail business afloat., for which her entire business functions.
It's fair to say, that similar fees have been introduced by other companies. Taxi aggregators Uber Technologies and Lyft introduced additional fees from customers "for fuel", and the logistics businesses FedEx and United Parcel Service have introduced additional fees, the size of which varies depending on the size of the package. So amazon didn't introduce these fees out of spite., but simply to cover the greatly increased costs.
But the company's shareholders have something to worry about.: probably, Amazon's next report will be worse than expected, and the new "inflation tax" is designed to mitigate the negative effect of the ongoing processes.
"There is pollution.? And if I find?»: new survey among directors about ESG
The Harris Poll Company, engaged in marketing research, conducted a survey among 1491 leaders from different countries, working in different industries. The survey was devoted to the topic of ESG. And here's what interesting things you can learn from it.:
- 72% directors attend at least five events each quarter, related to sustainable development. That is, you can say, that every two weeks they have at least one planner about the environment or something like that.;
- in the field of sustainable development, they invest about 10% budgets of their enterprises;
- 63% of managers are ready to conduct their business on the path of environmentally friendly development, even if it means lower revenue in the short term;
- almost half of the respondents are ready to tie bonuses and the amount of remuneration of their work to the fulfillment of ESG-metrics;
- only y 36% companies have a system of assessments of ESG-progress;
- 65% managers don't know, how exactly they meet ESG indicators.
The report is quite interesting in that regard., which shows us an important point: the corporate world has already "taken under the visor" and adopted a progressive agenda, but never made an opinion about, what is ESG and, that is, how to assess the company's progress in this area and compliance with corporate policy. This is a common problem., about which I wrote in a large article about the device of ESG-investing.
It seems to me, that this moment will stimulate the proliferation of "ethical business consultants". Something similar can already be seen in Hollywood..
BLM protests and the wave of "cultural trials" caused by them – censorship of films, ostracism against artists and other restrictions - led to the emergence of a huge number of Hollywood consultants on cultural and discriminatory practices. Special Person Watches movie or a script and indicates possible miscalculations, who may offend representatives of a particular group.
I think, that the corporate world will be waiting for something like this: there will be auditors-"inspectors", who will check the ESG parameters of companies, how ordinary auditors check the accounting department.
That's going to be a problem., as major scandals are possible here, related to, that the unpleasant truth about, that the management of some company "did not agree" about the level of emissions. In this case, the damage to quotes can be very serious..
This situation will be exacerbated by the fact that, that there is no single generally accepted ESG standard, which means, different auditors may evaluate the performance of the same company differently.
Because all auditors want to eat, then, probably, in the information environment there will be a lot of stuffing with the revision of "ESG-conclusions" of some auditors by others. Such stuffing will be designed to discredit competitors and attract attention., in order to take their contracts. It seems to me that the implementation of such a scenario is fraught with considerable dangers for the market.: stocks will become more volatile.
However, if the ESG audit is successfully intercepted and developed by the largest rating companies like S&P, Moody's and Fitch, then these risks will be greatly reduced. If the auditors give bad estimates and, Worse, scandalize about ESG metrics, customers will shift their corporate debt assessment to their competitors.
As you remember from our story about, how companies pay to get into stock indices, for rating companies, their business of assessing the credit rating is of decisive importance. So the threat of ESG-baiting of shares of some issuer will be leveled, if its ESG metrics are evaluated by a major rating agency, which, probably, will evaluate its own credit rating.
But even in this scenario, there is a possibility that, that there will be a wave of indignation from small ESG auditors, who can make a fuss and make a major scandal about, how major auditors evaluate ESG reporting. After all, if small auditors do not get something., then they have no reason to be complimentary to issuers., ESG-certified, issued by competitors. Think, this factor will be widely used by shorting researchers, which can lead to serious fluctuations in quotations.
