Warren Buffett famously said, 'Volatility is far from synonymous with risk.' When we think about how risky a company is, we always like to look at its use of debt, since debt overload can lead to ruin. We note that Hanexpress.Co., Ltd (KRX:014130) does have debt on its balance sheet. But is this debt a concern to shareholders?
What Risk Does Debt Bring?
Generally speaking, debt only becomes a real problem when a company can't easily pay it off, either by raising capital or with its own 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 think about a company's use of debt, we first look at cash and debt together.
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What Is Hanexpress.Co's Net Debt?
The image below, which you can click on for greater detail, shows that at December 2020 Hanexpress.Co had debt of ₩128.5b, up from ₩104.2b in one year. However, because it has a cash reserve of ₩4.34b, its net debt is less, at about ₩124.2b.
How Strong Is Hanexpress.Co's Balance Sheet?
Zooming in on the latest balance sheet data, we can see that Hanexpress.Co had liabilities of ₩193.3b due within 12 months and liabilities of ₩39.8b due beyond that. Offsetting this, it had ₩4.34b in cash and ₩96.4b in receivables that were due within 12 months. So its liabilities outweigh the sum of its cash and (near-term) receivables by ₩132.4b.
The deficiency here weighs heavily on the ₩74.6b company itself, as if a child were struggling under the weight of an enormous back-pack full of books, his sports gear, and a trumpet. So we'd watch its balance sheet closely, without a doubt. At the end of the day, Hanexpress.Co would probably need a major re-capitalization if its creditors were to demand repayment.
We use two main ratios to inform us about debt levels relative to earnings. The first is net debt divided by earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, and amortization (EBITDA), while the second is how many times its earnings before interest and tax (EBIT) covers its interest expense (or its interest cover, for short). Thus we consider debt relative to earnings both with and without depreciation and amortization expenses.
Hanexpress.Co's debt is 4.0 times its EBITDA, and its EBIT cover its interest expense 3.8 times over. Taken together this implies that, while we wouldn't want to see debt levels rise, we think it can handle its current leverage. More concerning, Hanexpress.Co saw its EBIT drop by 4.0% in the last twelve months. If it keeps going like that paying off its debt will be like running on a treadmill -- a lot of effort for not much advancement. When analysing debt levels, the balance sheet is the obvious place to start. But you can't view debt in total isolation; since Hanexpress.Co will need earnings to service that debt. So if you're keen to discover more about its earnings, it might be worth checking out this graph of its long term earnings trend.
Finally, a company can only pay off debt with cold hard cash, not accounting profits. So we clearly need to look at whether that EBIT is leading to corresponding free cash flow. Over the last three years, Hanexpress.Co saw substantial negative free cash flow, in total. While that may be a result of expenditure for growth, it does make the debt far more risky.
Our View
To be frank both Hanexpress.Co's conversion of EBIT to free cash flow and its track record of staying on top of its total liabilities make us rather uncomfortable with its debt levels. And even its interest cover fails to inspire much confidence. After considering the datapoints discussed, we think Hanexpress.Co has too much debt. That sort of riskiness is ok for some, but it certainly doesn't float our boat. When analysing debt levels, the balance sheet is the obvious place to start. However, not all investment risk resides within the balance sheet - far from it. For example, we've discovered 5 warning signs for Hanexpress.Co (2 make us uncomfortable!) that you should be aware of before investing here.
When all is said and done, sometimes its easier to focus on companies that don't even need debt. Readers can access a list of growth stocks with zero net debt 100% free, right now.
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About KOSE:A014130
Low and slightly overvalued.