Forum Energy Technologies, Inc. (NYSE:FET) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Unidentified Analyst: Okay. That’s helpful. And then just when you think about the debt a little bit, I mean, what is kind of your ideal level? And then, I mean, are there opportunities in the market? I mean, I know rates have increased, but the current rate on the debt isn’t – I mean, phenomenal by any means. Are there opportunities to refinance that, reissue, stuff with – I mean, gets less restrictive covenants? Or I mean, have you looked into that at all?

Neal Lux: We have, Erik. And I think probably the first highlight is – or first comment would be looking back, leverage on a pro forma basis at the end of the year would have been 1.4x, so down to a reasonable level. I think as we think long term, we want to make sure that we think about our debt in relation to our working capital, specifically things like receivables. In the event that there’s ever a market slowdown, we want the ability to have those receivables monetize and be able to manage our debt load. So we feel like we’re at that level now and have a comfortable level of debt. And clearly, with our liquidity on hand, we’re in really great shape. I think on the positive note, the debt markets for our industry have improved dramatically.

In the last – end of last year and beginning of this year, we saw some debt deals get done in the public markets on the high-yield side, in particular and see – and so we’ve seen debt capital come back into the space. I think that being said, our quantum of debt is still relatively small. And so that makes it challenging to find alternatives that might be out there. We’ve got plenty of runway on our indenture. The debt is not due until 2025. So there’s no burning platform that says we need to resolve that today. So we’ll keep our eyes open and watch the markets and see if there is an opportunity to, as you say, reduce our interest load or find less restrictive debt. But I think as today, what we have feels like a pretty good piece of paper.

Unidentified Analyst: Okay. Great. I guess my last question would be, I mean, just – I mean, you guys kind of touched on kind of the relative value of the equity to peers. And when you see – and I guess you kind of answered my question already by saying there’s only so much you can actually put equity buybacks at this point. But the convertible debt holders now becoming equity holders, I’m not sure that they’re necessarily long-term equity holders, but there’s been a few filings with a few of those debt holders that now own approximately 10% a piece. So there’s – I think there’s two holders out there that probably own 20% equity. It’s just an interesting dynamic given the fact that the equity seems incredibly cheap and there’s probably people willing to let it go at what probably long-term equity holders wouldn’t let it go.

Mostly a comment rather than looking for your remarks, but I mean it would be great to be able to find some liquidity to take those guys off the table.

Neal Lux: Definitely agree with that, Erik. One of the things that we have seen is the change – marked change in our average daily trading volume. If we go back to the fourth quarter, we traded about 30,000 shares a day. And so far in the first quarter, we traded 3x that, over 90,000 shares a day. So we’ve seen a marked increase in that and that came about the time of our debt conversion. So there’s clearly more activity. That’s a good thing we believe for our stock to get more liquidity for investors in. Also, I think if you think about our new shareholders, any of those who want to move out of the stock, the market is more liquid than it was before. So that should provide some opportunity to be able to do that.

Unidentified Analyst: Well, I appreciate it. Thanks guys.