These 4 Measures Indicate That Packaging Corporation of America (NYSE:PKG) Is Using Debt Reasonably Well

Legendary fund manager Li Lu (who Charlie Munger backed) once said, 'The biggest investment risk is not the volatility of prices, but whether you will suffer a permanent loss of capital.' So it might be obvious that you need to consider debt, when you think about how risky any given stock is, because too much debt can sink a company. Importantly, Packaging Corporation of America (NYSE:PKG) does carry debt. But the real question is whether this debt is making the company risky.

Why Does Debt Bring Risk?

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. If things get really bad, the lenders can take control of the business. 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. The first thing to do when considering how much debt a business uses is to look at its cash and debt together.

View our latest analysis for Packaging Corporation of America

How Much Debt Does Packaging Corporation of America Carry?

As you can see below, Packaging Corporation of America had US$2.48b of debt, at September 2020, which is about the same as the year before. You can click the chart for greater detail. However, because it has a cash reserve of US$1.05b, its net debt is less, at about US$1.43b.

How Healthy Is Packaging Corporation of America's Balance Sheet?

The latest balance sheet data shows that Packaging Corporation of America had liabilities of US$775.4m due within a year, and liabilities of US$3.39b falling due after that. On the other hand, it had cash of US$1.05b and US$864.6m worth of receivables due within a year. So its liabilities total US$2.25b more than the combination of its cash and short-term receivables.

Given Packaging Corporation of America has a humongous market capitalization of US$12.2b, it's hard to believe these liabilities pose much threat. But there are sufficient liabilities that we would certainly recommend shareholders continue to monitor the balance sheet, going forward.

In order to size up a company's debt relative to its earnings, we calculate its net debt divided by its earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, and amortization (EBITDA) and its earnings before interest and tax (EBIT) divided by its interest expense (its interest cover). Thus we consider debt relative to earnings both with and without depreciation and amortization expenses.

Packaging Corporation of America has net debt of just 1.1 times EBITDA, indicating that it is certainly not a reckless borrower. And it boasts interest cover of 7.6 times, which is more than adequate. It is just as well that Packaging Corporation of America's load is not too heavy, because its EBIT was down 22% over the last year. When a company sees its earnings tank, it can sometimes find its relationships with its lenders turn sour. When analysing debt levels, the balance sheet is the obvious place to start. But ultimately the future profitability of the business will decide if Packaging Corporation of America 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 we clearly need to look at whether that EBIT is leading to corresponding free cash flow. During the last three years, Packaging Corporation of America produced sturdy free cash flow equating to 68% of its EBIT, about what we'd expect. This free cash flow puts the company in a good position to pay down debt, when appropriate.

Our View

Based on what we've seen Packaging Corporation of America is not finding it easy, given its EBIT growth rate, but the other factors we considered give us cause to be optimistic. In particular, we are dazzled with its conversion of EBIT to free cash flow. Looking at all this data makes us feel a little cautious about Packaging Corporation of America's debt levels. While debt does have its upside in higher potential returns, we think shareholders should definitely consider how debt levels might make the stock more risky. The balance sheet is clearly the area to focus on when you are analysing debt. But ultimately, every company can contain risks that exist outside of the balance sheet. Case in point: We've spotted 4 warning signs for Packaging Corporation of America you should be aware of.

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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