Tuesday, January 29, 2013

Aubrey Has Been Fired? ($CHK)

Wow:

"Aubrey K. McClendon, has agreed to retire from the company on April 1, 2013 and will continue to serve as Chief Executive Officer until his successor is appointed."
Stock loves it, up 10 percent after hours.

10 comments:

Allan Folz said...

Yeah, saw that. Should be good for the preferred. Though, I'm going be a little sorry to see it go (if it goes). It pays a really nice dividend that's going to be hard to replace at the same relative risk.

Allan Folz said...

Also, 10% on the common seems kind of low, no? It was as high last summer when there was nothing but rumor and nat gas was going to $0.

CP said...

I'm worried that we haven't made enough progress on storage withdrawals. Most of the futures contracts are exactly where they were a year ago. We could have a repeat of last summer's debacle if it's warm again.

effmanny said...

I agree CP. It's all about storage withdrawals and I wish there had been more to date

CP said...

I'm a global warming skeptic but there could still be another warm summer.

eahilf said...

We could have a repeat of last summer's debacle if it's warm again.

On the back of freakishly warm weather, NG has fallen sharply in the last few days, whereas given the storage withdrawal figures alone you'd have expected at the least a more or less stable price. Winter is by no means over, but in a month it will be March, and then the season/futures will work against the price of NG (UNG).

How much has CHK actually decreased their debt? I saw some mention that capex needed in order to switch to more liquids had put a dent in debt reduction.

Not sure how the CEO's departure will help all of that. And given the lavish praise they heaped on him, you have to wonder why they're forcing him out. I've never found Icahn to be the brightest bulb.

anony mouse said...

I took the 10% as a gift and sold my CHK common last night in AH. The timing of this seems really fishy to me.

anony mouse said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
CP said...

Fishy how?

I do wonder what happened behind the scenes.

anony mouse said...

The timing of it just seems really strange to me. Why 8 months after all of the turmoil happened? (and 3 weeks before earnings are out?)

If they didn't do something in June/July, why not announce this with earnings?