He's been cannibalizing real assets to support operations for years. When he started, Sears had a billion in free cash flow. Now it's selling everything it can just to keep the lights on. If you look at everything else like Land's End, Seritage, etc, their cash flow was supported by Sears' rent, and they needed massive cash infusions from banks just to keep things going. For a supposed genius finance guy, how did he miss something super basic like the value of free cash flow? He doesn't seem to comprehend it at all, and if you just pay attention to things like EBITDA and fake trumped up income like SYWR, NOLs, stock buybacks hat have been in freefall for years, and on paper real estate valuations, you're basically Enron. It doesn't appear that Eddie doesn't understand anything, and I mean ANYTHING about keeping a business alive. You need to bring in more cash in than you spend, it's as simple at that. You can hedge, gamble, and speculate all you like, but at the end of the day, Eddie has no idea how to actually make money from the creation of goods and services for sale. Even now, it looks like he's trying to build up some kind of e-commerce business without any actual business model or value proposition. But everything he's done lately points to complete and utter desperation of an actor who has strung out every last bit of non-existent credit and goodwill that he has left, because he's made good on none of his debts.
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It's no mystery to anyone who's watched the financials that Eddie uses his companies as his personal piggy bank, and his actions the last few years show someone who has no liquidity whatsoever. The borrowing of billions for Seritage. The beyond the last minute credit bid for Sears (little cash up front) that even counted trumped up nonsense like SYWR like that really wasn't all that much without which Sears would have liquidated. The cutting back of things like toilet paper, WiFi, trailers, maintenance crews, and the pittance of retiree insurance. Ugly PR like the St. Jude debacle mandatory things like various taxing authorities. Administrative fees that has him scrambling to pay attorneys and the bankruptcy court, parties you really don't want to skip payments on. Destroying vendor relations that preclude any hope of a comeback, destroying valuable brand equity that he could have sold for hundreds of millions earlier.The emperor has no clothes, and he's desperate to hide this fact. People always say he's an avaricious predator, and he is, but he's also an incredible mo–n who k–led the golden goose.
No one knows because the value of his personal assets is totally unknown. Everything he’s done has been through ESL (or an ESL affiliate), with Lampert’s estimated net worth varying based mostly on the value of SHLD stock.
As poor as Lampert’s decision making has been, he hasn’t yet loaned anything out if his own pocket. ESL probably tanks 6-8 months after Sears goes under, but Lampert himself is safe.
@2nob- Not entirety, but he is a very large shareholder.
Eddie owns lands end ?
Eddie is as broke as a joke and has been for awhile. If you add up the net worth of his assets and liabilities, his net worth is massively negative, and has been for awhile. The only reason he isn't personally is because of the separation of personal, shareholder, and creditor interest and the corporate veil that protects shareholders, and the fact that you aren't personally liable when companies declare bankruptcy. This is why he's created this Ponzi scheme of companies that hold other companies that own shares in yet other companies, because every entity is as broke as every other, and he's run out of assets to shift around, because everything everywhere is collateralized to the hilt, every penny is spent on servicing debt, and operations are running massively in the red. The overall enterprise that is Eddie Inc. is worse than Enron ever was, and his personal life, his professional reputation, and everything else is a complete shambles. The anthem of TransformHoldCo should be "Can't Buy Me Love", but hey, at least it can get you a loyalist who can lead you through multiple failed digital transformations that will lose you a few billions here and there while the gorgeous is off in Scotland or wherever doing stuff that matters taking a stand against breast cancer with an ocean between because she can't stand you.
‘Cause he’s broke and a joke, he should light up a toke.
What he uses, adds to, etc. for Sears/Kmart is surely totally separate from any "personal" money he has for himself and his family. We see where he loans money to things like TransformCo bu we don't actually know if he's loaning it from his personal money or from a different LLC. You know everything is insulated from each other.
And honestly, I doubt he's taping into his "personal" money at all.
He just secured another $200 million to keep the operation afloat. I’m not sure what he’s aiming for.
He himself? He’s fine.
Rest assured Eddie won’t be selling the yacht anytime soon. Pretty sure he’s got several million (if not billion) squirreled away in offshore accounts for himself
Be that as it may, Seritage's free cash flow is a nothingburger. It's doing all that it can just to service the massive interest it took on just to pay its bonds. Uncle Warren doesn't work for free. Land's End is bleeding cash. He sold his AutoZone state awhile ago to fund Sears, and that disappeared real quick. His buybacks are a joke. The $2B was all on paper, and that's gone poof too. His actions the past two years aren't the actions of someone who has money in the bank, unlike before.
Eddies owns seritage, lands end, and more. He’s still worth about 2 billion so don’t cry for him just yet, he’s not broke.
Seritage tenants as far as Sears and Kmart goes is now down to 10% the rest of the properties have been leased to new tenants at 4X the rent they were getting from SHLD. Look at Seritage's last financial report on yahoo and the number of early lease terminations where Sears & Kmart were booted out. Many think this will be a good REIT to buy into. I look at it as sinful as t-b-cco stocks though. I would say the next report should show many more early lease terminations. Lambert took Sears and Kmart's best properties and put them into this REIT where he is the primary shareholder. From 200+ Sears & Kmarts down to 20 at best and those will be closed too.