Sears Holdings (SHLD)

[winston]

not vested

Jan 25, 2018

Top 4 Reasons Sears Could File Chapter 11 Bankruptcy in 2018

A special report on why the end could be near for an iconic American brand.

By Michelle Lodge

"Sears is at the intersection of being highly leveraged and highly vulnerable without a strong omnichannel [presence].

Sears has also endured thousands of store closings and laid-off legions of long-time employees. Some of the stores were sorely out of date, with bare shelves and dirty floors, and seeing declining revenue.

Meanwhile, the bad news for Sears has caused some suppliers to shun it and the need to raise massive debt to stay alive -- money often coming at high interest rates from Lampert's company ESL Investments Inc.

Bad Sign No. 1: Endlessly Closing Stores
Bad Sign No. 2: Wary Suppliers
Bad Sign No. 3: Rising Interest Rates
Bad Sign No. 4: Pushing Out Bond Repayments

Last month, Sears extended the maturity of $400 million of debt that had been set to mature in June 2018, although it repaid $568 million in 2017. The maturity date on the remaining debt is now January 2019, with the option for Sears to further extend it to July 2019.

On a separate $500 million loan, Sears paid down half of the balance and pushed back the maturity date to April 2018, with the option to extend the date to July 2018.

The company's total outstanding debt as of the third quarter was $4.5 billion, half of which is due over the next two years.

Sears owes $1.2 billion this year — out of which Lampert's hedge fund, ESL, owns $874 million, which is secured by either inventory and receivables or by real estate.

Of the $874 million held by ESL and affiliates, $461 million is secured by real estate.

Source: The Street

https://www.thestreet.com/story/1445039 ... -2018.html

[winston]

not vested

Sears Holdings' Store Closures: No Problem for Seritage Growth Properties

by Adam Levine-Weinberg

Earlier this month, struggling retail icon Sears Holdings (NASDAQ: SHLD) announced yet another round of store closures. By early April, it will shutter 64 Kmarts and 39 full-line Sears stores.

This might seem like bad news for Seritage Growth Properties (NYSE: SRG). After all, the Sears spinoff still leases the vast majority of its property to Sears Holdings. However, only a small handful of the 103 stores being closed this spring are owned by Seritage -- and in most of those cases, Seritage probably wants the space for redevelopment purposes.

Sears Holdings' master lease with Seritage Growth Properties has enabled these moves. Under the master lease terms, Sears has the right to terminate the leases for stores that aren't earning enough money to cover the rent. Given the sorry state of Sears Holdings' finances, a lot of its stores may fit this description.

On the flip side, Seritage generally has the right to "recapture" 50% of the square footage in its properties (and 100% in some of them) in order to redevelop that space and lease it to new tenants that are willing to pay higher rents.

Fortunately, the master lease prevents Sears Holdings from dumping a ton of unwanted real estate on Seritage all at once. It is limited to terminating about 20% of its leases with Seritage in any given year. Sears is also required to make a payment equal to one year of rent, taxes, and other operating expenses upon terminating the lease for any property.

It doesn't look like Seritage will feel much negative impact from lease terminations related to the current set of Sears and Kmart store closures. In fact, none of the 64 Kmart stores being closed are leased from Seritage.

Furthermore, five of the Sears stores that are closing were previously owned by a joint venture between Seritage and Simon Property Group. However, Seritage recently sold its 50% interest in those properties to Simon, collecting $68 million -- and relieving itself of the need to invest in redevelopment projects at those sites.

Source: Motley Fool

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/sears-ho ... 00144.html

[winston]

not vested

7 Dec 2017

Sears investor calls out 'alarming' volume of short selling, urges retailer consider going private

Memento issued an open letter to Sears Thursday morning.

The firm is expressing concerns over "historical patterns of alarming short-selling activity" in Sears shares.

The Switzerland-based investment manager is urging Sears to form a board to look after shareholders, to temporarily suspend short selling in Sears' stock, and to evaluate strategic alternatives that include going private.

by Lauren Thomas

Memento S.A., a Switzerland-based investment manager for the Elarof Trust, owns about 2 millions shares in Sears.

"We have invested in Sears because of our belief in the long-term value of its vast national network of over 1,100 Sears and Kmart retail stores across the United States, the strength of its well-established proprietary brands, its position as the nation's leading provider of appliance and product repair services, and its insurance subsidiary,"

Short interest in Sears shares has fluctuated between 12 million to 19 million shares just within the past two years.

Source: CNBC

https://www.cnbc.com/2017/12/07/sears-i ... ivate.html

[winston]

not vested

Time To Shop Sears Holdings Corporation (NASDAQ:SHLD)?

by Julian Fleming

If Sears Holdings has been on your watchlist for a while, now may not be the time to enter into the stock given its negative future prospect.

However, before you make a decision on the stock, I suggest you look at Sears Holdings’s future cash flows in order to assess whether the stock is trading at a reasonable price, as well as other important fundamentals such as the company’s financial health in order to build a holistic investment thesis.

Source: Simply Wall St.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/time-sho ... 41421.html

[behappyalways]

Sears: The slow death of a US retail giant
http://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-us-can ... tail-giant

[behappyalways]

2018.10.21【文茜世界財經週報】美零售業巨擘Sears聲請破產　寫下當代啟示錄
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=910QK37 ... wlqT1IXpxu