Fixed Income Research Report | 8/12/19
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FIXED INCOME RESEARCH REPORT | 8/12/19 Transocean Ltd. DishRecommendation Network Corporation: BUY COMPANY NAME (Ticker: RIG) (Ticker:Business DISH) Rating: 6 (Ticker: DNR) Security Rating: 5 Author: Swati Jain BUSINESS RATING SECURITY RATING NEGATIVE POSITIVE NEGATIVE POSITIVE d POTENTIAL FOR RETURN RISK LIMITED SIGNIFICANT LOW HIGH d Bond Rating: B- Jarvis Rank: 914 Stock Price: 4.58 (8/8/19) Sector: Energy Industry: Energy Equipment Bond Price: 82.00 (8/8/19) & Services (Data as of 8/8/19 unless specified) Interest Coverage Debt/Equity: 3.68 Debt/EBITDA (TTM): 9.31 1.691 Ratio: Debt/EBITDA EBITDA (TTM): $1.1B1 10.32 Interest Expense: $659M1 (forward): EBITDA (forward): $926M2 Market Cap: $2.8B Cash/Cash Eq.: $2.2B3 Total Debt: $10.3B3 Enterprise Value: $10.2B Debt/EV Ratio: 1.0 Asset Coverage: 2.523 Free Cash Flow: $324M1 Stock 200 Day RSI (stock): 51.3 $7.98 Dividend Yield: NA Moving Average: Insider Transactions (2019): Three directors bought ~39,300 shares; Payout Ratio: NA SVP David Tonnel sold a total of 16,561 shares Spread/Turn OAS Spread: 933.1 YTM: 11.0% 1.18 Leverage (TTM): (Report based on 7.45% 4/15/2027 bond with $88 million Grab-and-Go outstanding) THESIS “An investment in Transocean is a WHY WE RATE TRANSOCEAN play on oil and gas pricing trends, E&P capital spending outlook, BONDS A BUY improving dayrates and utilization rates in the challenging offshore We rate Transocean’s 7.45% 4/15/2027 bond (CUSIP: 893817AA4) a drilling market. Oversupply of high spec rigs and uncontracted BUY at this time. Transocean’s large and high-quality rig fleet, newbuilds is currently advanced drilling capabilities, and diversified international pressurizing dayrates in the highly footprint, which has historically provided earnings stability in an competitive market. Transocean’s inherently cyclical industry, are credit positives. A strong liquidity largest and highly specialized fleet concentrated in ultra-deepwater and harsh environment floaters 1 Last Twelve Months ending June 2019 will help in sustaining its 2 Based on FactSet consensus forward EBITDA estimate leadership position.” 3 As of end Q2 2019 (6/30/19) “Seeking Equity Returns from High Yield Bonds” 1 0.94 FIXED INCOME RESEARCH REPORT | 8/12/19 profile, no significant upcoming maturities and access to capital markets further support our rating. However, headwinds in the offshore drilling market and high leverage pose downside risks for Transocean. With a more challenging business environment in 2019, improving its free cash flows and optimizing its balance sheet will be of primary focus for the company. The following are the key reasons why we rate the bond a BUY: 1. Large and high-quality asset portfolio with a focus on harsh environment assets: Transocean is the Grab-and-Go market leader with a large fleet size of 53 floaters TALKING POINTS (including newly added), 93% of which is comprised of ultra-deepwater and harsh WHAT WE LIKE WHAT WE DON’T LIKE environment drilling rigs in the floater space. The Large and High- Headwinds in the average age of the overall floaters is ~11 years and quality Asset Portfolio Offshore Drilling with a Focus on Harsh the average age of ultra-deepwater floaters is ~8 Market years. Ocean Rig acquisition secures 34% of top 50 Environment Assets Better Competitive UDW floaters and 31% of top 100 UDW floaters High Leverage Position worldwide. The fleet utilization rate is at 56% and is improving. Customer Repurchase of Bonds Concentration 2. Better competitive position: Transocean is well- positioned in comparison to its competitors and Robust Inorganic Huge Capex has the industry's largest and most technically Growth capable fleet of floating rigs along with the most Strong talented and experienced crews and shore-based Liquidity Position support personnel. Its fleet is twice as large as its largest competitors (Ensco Rowan and Seadrill) Positive FCF and is high-spec heavy. It accounts for the highest Access to Capital number of UDW and harsh environment floaters as Market compared to its peers. RIG’s contract backlog of $11.4 billion is 4x larger than its next competitor. 3. Repurchase of bonds: RIG has a history of open market bond repurchases. The company’s continuous bond repurchase activity in the open market is perceived positively by the bondholders. The company repurchased $130 million of its senior notes for six months ending June 2019. Such actions instill confidence that the company is committed to its bond investors and will manage the financial obligations appropriately in the future. 4. Robust inorganic growth: Transocean has completed multiple acquisitions in the past such as Ocean Rig and Songa. These acquisitions have helped in adding fleet capacity as the company acquired 11 offshore drilling units from the Ocean Rig acquisition and seven offshore drilling units from the Songa acquisition. RIG’s strategy is to grow through acquiring rigs in various segments; however, management will now focus more on utilizing its idle fleet capacity. If the company pursues additional debt-funded acquisitions, the company’s financial metrics might deteriorate further. “Seeking Equity Returns from High Yield Bonds” 2 0.94 FIXED INCOME RESEARCH REPORT | 8/12/19 5. Strong liquidity: Transocean has adequate liquidity of $3.6 billion comprising of $2.2 billion of cash and $1.36 billion available under the new revolver. RCF can be upsized by $140 million to $1.5 billion in the future, further enhancing the company’s liquidity. The company has a reasonably long liquidity runway through June 2023. 6. Positive FCF: Despite subdued performance in the last few years, Transocean was able to generate positive free cash flows. The FCF remained positive but declined by ~42% on a y-o-y basis in FY 2018 due to declining dayrates because of oversupplied offshore drilling market. The company reported FCF of $324 million during LTM June 2019. Improving offshore drilling market conditions will help the company in maintaining its track record of generating positive free cash flows in the coming years. 7. Access to capital market: Recent issuance of 5.375% senior secured notes depicts the company’s access to the capital market at a lower rate. Despite high leverage and declining revenue, access to capital markets was not that tough for Transocean. Raising additional debt to repay existing debt is basically buying more time with expectations of an industry upturn. 8. Headwinds in the offshore drilling market: The offshore drilling market is unfavorable due to the excess supply coming from the overhang of uncontracted newbuilds and idle supply. CEO Jeremy Thigpen mentioned that with the Brent crude averaged to the level of $65/bbl level currently, there will be heightened demand for offshore rigs. Transocean is well prepared for any kind of further slowdown in the market as it has the most profitable backlog, providing unparalleled visibility to future cash flows. 9. High leverage: Currently, the company has a high debt load of $10.3 billion including $495 million of finance lease obligations. The company’s credit metrics are deteriorating gradually with leverage at 9.3x (6.7x net) and interest coverage at 1.69x as of Q2 2019. Any further slowdown in offshore drilling activity or increase in CapEx will impact the free cash flows of the company and worsen the credit metrics. However, the asset coverage ratio of 2.52x provides the company enough reserve to pay off its debt in full. 10. Customer concentration: Its top three clients, Royal Dutch Shell plc, Chevron Corporation and Equinor ASA, account for ~65% of consolidated operating revenues and ~88% of total contract backlog. This shows high customer concentration risk. 11. Huge capex: The company is facing significant newbuild capital spending in the coming years with expected CapEx of $900 million in 2020 and $900 million in 2021. Due to the expansionary capex and $621 million of near-term debt through 2021, the company is estimating liquidity of $1 billion to $1.2 billion by 2021. “Seeking Equity Returns from High Yield Bonds” 3 0.94 FIXED INCOME RESEARCH REPORT | 8/12/19 SUMMARY OF THE BUSINESS AND THE INDUSTRY ◼ Business Transocean Ltd. (RIG), founded in 1954 and headquartered in Steinhausen, Switzerland, is the largest international offshore drilling contractor with a presence in every major offshore producing basin around the world. The company was formed as a result of the merger of Southern Natural Gas company, later Sonat, with many other smaller drilling companies. In September 1996, Sonat Offshore Deepwater Drilling Inc. acquired Transocean ASA. During this period, the company name was changed to Transocean Offshore Deepwater Drilling Inc. In 1993, Schlumberger spun off Sedco Forex, which merged with Transocean Offshore Inc. to become Transocean Sedco Forex, the world’s largest offshore drilling contractor. Multiple mergers and acquisitions have helped Transocean to become the largest offshore drilling contractor and have continued to set world deepwater drilling records by upgrading the high-specification fleet. The Company's primary business is to contract its drilling rigs, related equipment and work crews on a dayrate basis to drill oil and gas wells. The Company's drilling fleet consists of floaters, including drillships and semisubmersibles, and jackups, which are used for both exploration and development. Transocean categorized its offshore drilling fleet in five categories namely ultra-deepwater (UDW) floaters (59% of total revenue), harsh environment floaters (32%), deepwater floaters (4%), midwater floaters (2%) and high specification jackups (2%). As of June 30, 2019, the company owned and operated 47 mobile offshore drilling units, including 31 ultra-deepwater floaters, 13 harsh environment floaters and three midwater floaters and constructing four additional ultra-deepwater drillships and one harsh environment semisubmersible. Ultra-Deepwater Deepwater / Midwater Jackups As of Q2 2019, the company’s contract backlog was $11.4 billion with total fleet average revenue efficiency at 98% and low rig utilization rate at 56%.