Is Keller Group (LON:KLR) Using Too Much Debt?

The external fund manager backed by Berkshire Hathaway's Charlie Munger, Li Lu, makes no bones about it when he says 'The biggest investment risk is not the volatility of prices, but whether you will suffer a permanent loss of capital.' It's only natural to consider a company's balance sheet when you examine how risky it is, since debt is often involved when a business collapses. Importantly, Keller Group plc (LON:KLR) does carry debt. But should shareholders be worried about its use of debt?

Why Does Debt Bring Risk?

Debt assists a business until the business has trouble paying it off, either with new capital or with free cash flow. Part and parcel of capitalism is the process of 'creative destruction' where failed businesses are mercilessly liquidated by their bankers. However, a more common (but still painful) scenario is that it has to raise new equity capital at a low price, thus permanently diluting shareholders. By replacing dilution, though, debt can be an extremely good tool for businesses that need capital to invest in growth at high rates of return. When we examine debt levels, we first consider both cash and debt levels, together.

See our latest analysis for Keller Group

What Is Keller Group's Debt?

The image below, which you can click on for greater detail, shows that Keller Group had debt of UK£185.0m at the end of December 2020, a reduction from UK£310.3m over a year. However, it does have UK£67.1m in cash offsetting this, leading to net debt of about UK£117.9m.

How Healthy Is Keller Group's Balance Sheet?

We can see from the most recent balance sheet that Keller Group had liabilities of UK£512.0m falling due within a year, and liabilities of UK£313.4m due beyond that. Offsetting this, it had UK£67.1m in cash and UK£488.0m in receivables that were due within 12 months. So it has liabilities totalling UK£270.3m more than its cash and near-term receivables, combined.

While this might seem like a lot, it is not so bad since Keller Group has a market capitalization of UK£567.0m, and so it could probably strengthen its balance sheet by raising capital if it needed to. However, it is still worthwhile taking a close look at its ability to pay off debt.

We measure a company's debt load relative to its earnings power by looking at its net debt divided by its earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, and amortization (EBITDA) and by calculating how easily its earnings before interest and tax (EBIT) cover its interest expense (interest cover). Thus we consider debt relative to earnings both with and without depreciation and amortization expenses.

Keller Group has net debt of just 0.72 times EBITDA, indicating that it is certainly not a reckless borrower. And it boasts interest cover of 7.5 times, which is more than adequate. On the other hand, Keller Group saw its EBIT drop by 6.8% in the last twelve months. That sort of decline, if sustained, will obviously make debt harder to handle. There's no doubt that we learn most about debt from the balance sheet. But ultimately the future profitability of the business will decide if Keller Group can strengthen its balance sheet over time. So if you want to see what the professionals think, you might find this free report on analyst profit forecasts to be interesting.

Finally, a company can only pay off debt with cold hard cash, not accounting profits. So the logical step is to look at the proportion of that EBIT that is matched by actual free cash flow. During the last three years, Keller Group generated free cash flow amounting to a very robust 99% of its EBIT, more than we'd expect. That puts it in a very strong position to pay down debt.

Our View

On our analysis Keller Group's conversion of EBIT to free cash flow should signal that it won't have too much trouble with its debt. However, our other observations weren't so heartening. For instance it seems like it has to struggle a bit to grow its EBIT. When we consider all the elements mentioned above, it seems to us that Keller Group is managing its debt quite well. Having said that, the load is sufficiently heavy that we would recommend any shareholders keep a close eye on it. When analysing debt levels, the balance sheet is the obvious place to start. But ultimately, every company can contain risks that exist outside of the balance sheet. These risks can be hard to spot. Every company has them, and we've spotted 2 warning signs for Keller Group you should know about.

If, after all that, you're more interested in a fast growing company with a rock-solid balance sheet, then check out our list of net cash growth stocks without delay.

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