All Posts Blog

Bluestem Brands Inc. Files Chapter 11

Posted on March 12, 2020

March 11, 2020
BDCs: CPTA, MAIN, HMSX, MRCC

 

After many quarters of balancing on the brink, Bluestem Brands Inc. has filed for Chapter 11. In a press release, the retailer indicated its commitment to remaining in business through the bankruptcy process, and the arrangement of a $125mn DIP financing by a “syndicate of lenders”. The “syndicate” is also serving as a “stalking horse bidder” for the company’s assets, and seeks to de-leverage and restructure the company’s balance sheet.

Who are the members of the syndicate ? Not disclosed. What might the assets be valued at ? Not mentioned ? How much debt might be wiped from the balance sheet ? Still to be determined. Nonetheless, this seems to be a classic debt-for-equity swap where the lenders become part, majority or the exclusive owners of the new Bluestem Brands. Sometimes that works, and sometimes not.

We’ve been writing about Bluestem Brands for a very long time, both in the BDC Credit Reporter and in our database of all under performing BDC companies that we maintain. Barely a week ago we wrote to ourselves the following summation of our views:”3/4/2020: We worry that Bluestem might be about to meet its moment of reckoning in 2020 with the need to repay its publicly traded Term Loan in November 2020 and its modest liquidity above the mandated level at the end of the IIQ 2019. Sales and EBITDA trends are either anemic or negative. The debt is already discounted by nearly a quarter. As a result, we’ve added the company to the 2020 At Risk Of Non Accrual  list.”

Now that’s happened we’ll be interested to see what the 4 BDCs with $28.2mn of exposure at cost  – Main Street (MAIN); Capitala Finance (CPTA); Monroe Capital (MRCC) and non-listed HMS Income – will be doing. We imagine they are committed to a portion of the DIP financing and are likely to end up as owners, and may also be committing more junior capital. As mentioned above, we don’t know how much historical debt will be forgiven. So any sort of valuation is hard , but Advantage Data shows the 2020 Term debt in which all the BDCs are invested trading at a (29%) discount; just slightly worse than the recently announced IVQ 2019 (25%) discount announced by the three public BDCs. That suggests, but does not guarantee, the eventual realized loss to be taken might be over ($8mn). In an earlier article, though, we’d been estimating ($15mn). More immediately, income forgone will be about ($1.4mn) annually, mostly absorbed (4/5ths) by sister BDCs: MAIN and HMS Income.

We will report back as we learn more about how this bankruptcy will play out, and what individual BDC exposures to old and new capital (if any) will look like.

 

 

© BDC Investment Advisors, LLC 2016 – 2019