What happened
Shares of space concern Maxar Technologies (MAXR +0.00%) are up 10.1% as of 12:30 p.m. EST today, and it's not hard to figure out what the reason for this was -- but it's less certain whether it was a good reason.
This morning, with little to no warning, Maxar revealed that it will be announcing its Q3 2019 earnings numbers this afternoon right after the market closes. This was investors' first clue about when earnings might come out, and it appears to have sparked a strong reaction.
Image source: Getty Images.
So what
But is this single announcement reason enough to value Maxar at 10% more than what it was worth at the close of trading last week? Perhaps not.
You see, in addition to springing the earnings date on us, Maxar also advised that it has decided to run a "private offering" of $1.25 billion in "senior secured notes due 2023," which monies will be used "to repay all of the borrowings that were outstanding as of September 30, 2019 under the Company's revolving credit facility, and term loans A-1 and A-2, each under the Company's existing syndicated credit facility, and to pay certain fees and expenses related to the offering of the notes, the use of proceeds therefrom, and an amendment of the syndicated credit facility."
If nothing else, this news seems to confirm that Maxar is not yet generating significant amounts of free cash flow from its business -- not enough to make much of a dent in its $3.4 billion debt load, at least, which is why Maxar needs to roll over that debt, replacing existing obligations with new debt.
Now what
Of course, we won't need to speculate about that for much longer. This evening's earnings news should make it pretty clear whether Maxar is generating cash from its business. As for what else Maxar might tell us, for what it's worth, at last report, analysts were predicting that the company would report $1.06 per share in earnings for this most recent quarter on sales of $560.3 million.
We'll tell you tomorrow how that worked out.
