Monthly Archives: July 2017

The Belgium international defender remains tied to Spurs until 2019, but no breakthrough has been made in discussions regarding an extension

Toby Alderweireld admits that zero progress has been made in discussions regarding a new deal at Tottenham.

The Belgium international has established a reputation as one of world footballs finest centre-halves during his time at England, on loan at Southampton and then with Spurs.

Spurs to finish above Arsenal in PL - 4/5

His current club are eager to reward that standing with fresh terms, while removing a 25 million release clause which is due to kick in if they take up a 12-month option through to 2019.

Alderweireld, though, says that no breakthrough has been made as he waits on updates from the club and his representatives.

Poch: Dier rumours are positive

The 28-year-old told Sky Sports when quizzed on the extension talks: No news that I know of so nothing zero.

Alderweireld has formed part of a settled defensive unit at Tottenham, with Mauricio Pochettino having pieced together a Premier League title-challenging squad.

There has been one departure from the ranks this summer, though, with Kyle Walker moved on to Manchester City for 50 million.

Spurs have a ready-made replacement in Kieran Trippier, but Alderweireld is disappointed to have seen another England international leave the club.

Levy: Prem spending unsustainable

He added on Walker, who he could face in an International Champions Cup clash in Nashville: Everybody is sad that he left.

He is one of the best full-backs in the world and unfortunately he goes to another [Premier League] team, but we have to focus ourselves to win the game.

Alderweireld joined Tottenham from Atletico Madrid in the summer of 2015 and has made 80 appearances for the club over the course of two seasons, netting five goals.

Read more from the original source:

Alderweireld admits to 'zero' progress in Tottenham contract talks - Goal.com

COLUMBUS Area performers are tuning up for an annual showcase of musical talent.

Twenty-five acts will take the stage Aug. 4-6 during the Power and Progress Music Festival at Camp Pawnee.

For the sixth year, the event is presenting a lineup of bands covering a variety of genres.

We try to include more diverse acts every year. We reach out to musical acts all across the state, said Tom Adelman, one of the event organizers.

Adelman, a member of The Midland Band, said the event has grown over the years, in both attendance, which reached around 800 in 2016, and the number of musicians who want to participate.

We get a lot of submissions every year. Its hard to choose. We have to pick and choose who we want. I wish we could have everyone, Adelman said.

The festival focuses on displaying the talent of area musicians. The lineup typically includes acts from Columbus, Omaha, Lincoln and Norfolk. This year, there are also regional bands from Kansas and Minnesota.

We really try to have a broad spectrum, Adelman said of the type of music played, which ranges from bluegrass, 80s and tribute tunes to punk, funk, jazz and electronic music performed by bands and DJs.

A couple of bands Adelman expects to be big draws are tribute bands Rock and Roll Suicide from Omaha and Lincoln-based Jerry Pranksters. The Omaha group will perform songs by David Bowie and the Lincoln band will play music from the Grateful Dead.

The event is open to people of all ages and camping space is available, including a separate area for families. Music will be played on two stages with live performances taking place until the early morning hours.

The event starts at 5 p.m. Friday and runs until noon the following Sunday.

The lineup includes the following performers: The Midland Band, Kind Country, Funk Trek, Linear Symmetry, Rock and Roll Suicide, Jerry Pranksters, 3 Son Green, DJ Blac, Chemicals, Pure Brown, Slow Stoics, Floppydisco, JMNM, Dr. Webb, Zed Midland (Midland Band tribute to Zed Tempo), Dudes Gone Rude, The Grand Poobah, Soul Tree, Ruegazz, Levi and Hammersaw.

Along with the music, a number of art and food vendors will be on site. There will also be a costume contest Saturday night with prizes awarded.

Read this article:

Power and Progress Music Festival back for sixth year - Columbus Telegram

As of the time of this writing, one of my holdings happens to be Civeo Corp. (CVEO). As a niche accommodation business servicing the commodities industry (oil sands in Canada, coal and other products in Australia, and some oil and gas in the US), the company is well-diversified, flexible, and a nice fit, in my opinion, for my energy-centric portfolio. Given that it has been nearly three months since my last piece on the company and given that its share price has fallen a hefty 30.6% since the publication of said piece, I figured it would be interesting to look back at the business and give an update on my thoughts.

I approach investing from a long-term perspective. This means I look for a return thats in excess of the market over a period of 5 to 10 years (depending on the opportunity). As such, it doesnt matter too much to me if a holding is down for 4 of the 5-year minimum that I look at. Even so, seeing shares drop so much, such as Civeos 7.3% decline on July 28th, is never easy and makes me wonder if Im right in my evaluation of the firm. To see if this is the case, I dug into some of the data recently provided.

One thing I noticed about Civeo is that management has turned a bit more bullish as of late. Previously, the firm had expected revenue for this year to come out to between $337 million and $353 million. However, after landing four different accommodation contracts for Canadian pipelines, valued at 20 million Canadian dollars, this sales figure for 2017 was raised to be between $354 million and $363 million. Not only does this increase revenue as a whole, it also decreases the range from $16 million down to $9 million for the year. Thats quite a nice move.

Despite the increase in revenue expectations, EBITDA expectations havent moved that much. Truth be told, I really dislike EBITDA, but thats all management gives so thats what I need to deal with. If current forecasts are accurate, the business should generate EBITDA this year of between $61 million and $66 million, an increase for the floor and ceiling of just $1 million compared to prior forecasts.

Its hard to say precisely what cash flow will be based on this. During the first two quarters, the company reported total operating cash flow of just over $14 million. With sales more than halfway done for the year, you would expect operating cash flow for this year to be around $28 million, give or take a bit. However, if you annualize interest expense from the first half of this year and dont consider taxes since the company is likely to report a net loss because of its high depreciation and amortization expense for this year, youre looking at operating cash flow of around $43 million for the year at the mid-point. With capex of $12 million to $15 million thrown in, free cash flow would be $29.5 million. This means that either the rest of this year will be more cash accretive or investors should expect some downward revisions.

The last thing I noticed is a mix of good and bad relating to the company. Right now, its debt, according to management, stands at $320.2 million, which is a decrease of $3.7 million from the prior quarter. This is great to see and is great compared to the $353.3 million in debt seen at the end of last year. However, currency fluctuations have been moving against the business. During the last quarter, an uptick in the Canadian dollar relative to the US dollar hurt the firms debt repayment of $4 million. This is something that needs to be watched. On the other hand, due to a share issuance earlier this year, the company does have a nice $27.3 million in cash on hand and still has $117.5 million in borrowing capacity under its revolving credit facility. That provides it some nice flexibility so long as things dont materially worsen from where they are today.

Although many in the energy space are bearish about the future, it appears as though Civeos management team believes that better days are around the corner. For instance, if you look at the table below, you will see that, over the past three years, the company has continued to add available rooms to its physical footprint (this excludes other aspects of their business). Between 2014 and 2016, room count rose by 2,160 rooms, which is an increase of 9.9%. So far this year, the room count between Canada and Australia has grown by 118 rooms to 24,106 rooms. This is despite cash flow at the firm suffering during this energy downturn as demand for its services have plummeted.

*Created by Author

One thing I noticed is that, on the plus side, at least in Canada, the surge in the oil and gas rig count for the nation has been beneficial for Civeos occupancy rates there. Today, the rig count in Canada is estimated at 220 units, up from 118 the same time last year. As a result, the occupancy rate for Civeos Canadian operations during its latest quarter came in at 81% compared to last years 62%. While this is great news, there were some caveats here, such as the percent of available rooms that were rentable. Adjusting for this actually saw a small reduction in overall rooms occupied. Whats more, the companys average rate per room decreased from 108 Canadian dollars to 89 Canadian dollars. As you can see in the image below, occupancy rates for Australia remained flat, but it managed to see a very modest increase in how much it can charge.

*Taken from Civeo

This data appears to be rather mixed and highlights continued risk in its existing markets. While management has continued adding rooms to its set of operations, business remains weak. On the other hand, the companys strengthened balance sheet and revised estimates for this year is a positive that suggests the market may be getting better for the firm. The reason why I bought into Civeo is because I like its operations and cash flow potential, but it has always been among my smallest holdings (its my second smallest stock) because I know that while the firm does have impressive flexibility, it benefits, if my theory is correct, from more intensive commodity investments.

What do I mean by this? Well, the entire purpose of Civeo is to set up accommodation facilities in areas where alternatives are either too costly or simply dont exist. This means that many of its operations are set in regions that may not have the same kind of clustering ability that others might have for the businesss customers. As such, you would imagine that the real win for the business is when commodity prices are high enough that their customers can afford to spend more on projects that might otherwise be suboptimal. Because of this, my plan for Civeo has been to have a small stake to benefit from the run-up in energy and other commodity prices, but the real payday is like when oil prices hit around $70 per barrel.

Based on the data provided, I must say that recent developments involving Civeo are mostly encouraging. The firm does still have some trouble with its occupancy rates and the amount that it charges its customers, but the overall financial picture, because of the firms flexibility, appears fine for now. Eventually, to get a nice payday, we will need commodity prices to rise further, but I believe that in the next year or two, theres a pretty good chance of that taking place. Until then, I am likely to hold my stake, unless I find some other prospect that makes more sense for me.

Disclosure: I am/we are long CVEO.

I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from Seeking Alpha). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.

Read more:

Civeo: Some Nice Progress But It's A Long Road - Seeking Alpha

Which new electric vehicle wowed a crowd that didn't expect it to be as cool as it turned out?

What environmental regulation is the NHTSA seemingly getting ready to roll back under Trump?

This is our look back at the Week In Reverseright here at Green Car Reportsfor the week ending on Friday, July 28, 2017.

Friday, we covered two separate EPA approvals for diesel vehicles: the agency approved modifications to 326,000 of the oldest, dirtiest VW diesels, and it finally certified 2017 Ram 1500 and Jeep Grand Cherokee EcoDiesel vehicles for sale.

In 2019, Formula E racing will gain two new, prestigious competitors, as both Mercedes-Benz and Porsche said they will enter the electric-car racing series for its sixth season, joining Audi, BMW, and Jaguar.

2016/2017 Team ABT Schaeffler Audi Sport Formula E race car

On Thursday evening, we attended the global debut of the Bollinger B1 all-electric utility truckwhich wowed more than a few people not expecting much from an electric truck designed by a tiny company in upstate New York.

(Our colleagues at the sports and luxury car site Motor Authority were far more effusive: they called the Bollinger B1 "the coolest electric car you've never heard of.")

If you're expecting regular, radical, revolutionary advances in batteries for electric cars, take a deep breath. Battery evolution will largely come via incremental improvements, rather than transformative leaps.

We also warned against the anti-electric-car propaganda in a new video, which was roundly debunked by pointing out numerous errors in actual facts. Facts are hard.

Wednesday, an EV driver explained why he added solar panels to the family house after one used electric car became five separate plug-in vehicles.

Photovoltaic solar panel installation on house, Fremont, California [image: Shiva Singh]

The NHTSA under Trump will review future fuel-economy standards, and could roll back increases to freeze the 2021 standards through 2025.

On Tuesday, a report indicated that Toyota will launch an electric car with a solid-state battery, though not until 2022. We updated that story later in the week as a handful of new details emerged.

And in a relatively rare editorial piece, we suggest that a few electric-car owners should get off their high horses and adopt a gentler tone toward new electric-car drivers.

We kicked off the week on Monday by updating our glossary of green-car terms from four years ago to include the latest terms to keep track of.

Staff at the powerful California Air Resources Board, meanwhile, recommended approval of VW's "Electrify America" plan for increasing zero-emission vehicle infrastructure in the state. (The approval came on Thursday.)

We also came across an oddball story that's one of our favorites: the oldest Toyota Prius hybrid in the world was made in 1946. Confused? We explained (with video).

Those were our main stories this week; we'll see you again next week. Until then, this has been the Green Car Reports Week in Reverse update.

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Battery progress, diesel approvals, Toyota solid-state cells, CAFE rules, Bollinger B1: The Week in Reverse - Green Car Reports