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Should see a nice pop in a week or two.
Right now, just wasting time watching the ticker
Might add if goes to $1.50.
Yes I remember them downgrading the S&P when it was 666. That was hilarious.
What's more epic was the S&P downgrading the S&P during that time as well. Lmao
SMH
Bought @1.72
RadioShack Corp. replaced its finance chief with a longtime restructuring adviser, shaking up the struggling retailer's top management as it runs precariously low on cash.
Chief Financial Officer John Feray left the company Friday after seven months on the job. The electronics chain, which hasn't posted a profit since 2011, tasked AlixPartners Managing Director Holly Etlin to work as interim CFO in his place. Ms. Etlin, 57 years old, held the job before. She was interim CFO from July 2013 until Mr. Feray, a former Dollar General Corp. executive, started in February.
The executive switch comes in the middle of a frantic effort to stabilize the company's balance sheet before it runs out of cash. The company last week warned it could be forced to liquidate or seek bankruptcy protection if it can't find a way to improve its finances soon.
RadioShack has been losing market share to low-cost retailers and online rivals for years. A focus on mobile phones and wireless accessories failed to pull the company out of its downward spiral. As of Aug. 2, the company's cash stockpile had dwindled to $30.5 million, representing about $6,800 for each of its 4,485 stores, though the chain also had access to $152 million under a credit line.
The company is considering a $585 million financing package proposed by hedge fund Standard General LP and investment bank UBS AG as a way to keep the chain out of bankruptcy, according to people familiar with the matter. The funds would be used to replace loan and credit facilities from lender GE Capital and soften the terms of those loans, the people said.
RadioShack on Thursday said it is working on a recapitalization plan that it anticipates announcing "in the near term." But if that plan were to fail to materialize, the company may seek bankruptcy protection.
Ms. Etlin was on the RadioShack team that last year helped the company secure an $835 million loan package. Executives said the package would give them ample time to overhaul their stores with a new, less-cluttered format designed to spur sales.
RadioShack hired Mr. Feray from Dollar General, where he worked for six years and was responsible for the budget retailer's financial planning and strategy.
Mr. Feray took RadioShack's offer because it offered him a chance to work as finance chief while again living in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, a person close to the matter said. Mr. Feray was unavailable for comment.
Possible entry coming for me
I don't understand why people say you only need to go online.
Yes, certain items can be ordered cheap but it can't possibly beat having someone explaining to you and helping you explore your needs.
You can pay all your bills and do all your finances online now. Why do banks need to be around then?
The same way you need the banks to help you with your banking needs.
Joe Magnacca
Thank you. I’d like to start today with an update on our balance sheet recapitalization work. I know that’s foremost on people’s minds, and then I’ll give you a brief status update on our efforts to turn the business around and the associated work streams. And I’ll finish with a few comments on the upcoming holiday season.
It’s clear that the current pace of our turnaround is simply not fast enough to address our near term liquidity needs. This is a fact despite the steady progress we are making with our strategic initiatives. Every day we see consumers responding positively to the key elements of our turnaround strategy such as the actions we have taken on reinvigorating our store experience, revamping our product assortment and creating a stronger inventory position. But we know we need additional financial flexibility to move ahead with our goals.
As a result we are actively exploring options for restructuring our balance sheet and are in advance discussions with a number of parties. We are in the process of working with our key financial stakeholders including our existing lenders, bond holders, shareholders and landlords to create a long-term solution that would potentially involve a comprehensive recapitalization. This may include a store based consolidation program and other measures to make significant reductions in our cost structure in order to provide the additional liquidity and time necessary to see the effect of our turnaround strategy.
So now let me share a few thoughts on our second quarter performance. We continue to face an uncertain business environment including fundamental challenges in our mobility business where we are working to optimize profitable transactions. As a result, we believe our reported financial performance for the quarter does not reflect the meaningful progress we are making on several fronts.
I’d like to start with our retail business which represents approximately half of our sales and I am pleased to say we’re making progress and during the quarter we trended in the right direction. In fact, comparable store sales continued to improve during the quarter as a result of our focus on in-stock performance, greater product innovation and better customer service. That trend is continuing into the third quarter and I am proud to say that innovation has become part of the RadioShack DNA; a far cry from where we were before our turnaround efforts began.
As we called out in the last quarter, we have made significant progress in inventory management which is driving some of the success. There is more work to be done, but retail is where we see the most significant progress being made. In that context, operational efficiency is an absolute imperative and we have continued to successfully reduce cost across our business with a particular focus on removing expenses that don’t impact the customer experience including cutting discretionary expenses in our corporate office.
We’re also realizing benefits from our centralized sourcing and supply chain efforts that we discussed on our last call. Importantly, we continue to drive improvements in our on-time delivery and further cost savings in products we source through our highly valued and efficient global sourcing operation which as you know are primarily private brand products.
We recently moved certain elements of product development to the United States and consolidated facilities in China to an appropriately sized overseas operation with top notch talent.
We’ve been keeping in mind the strength of the RadioShack brand and with that have been re-centering on the performance of our private brands. We’ve added more private brand options in areas like portable sound and power thus deepening our penetration of private brand in our stores.
We see demand in this area trending in the right direction with gains each month through the quarter and we are seeing that trend continue. At the end of the day it’s all about the customer experience and to that end we are extremely focused on executing our comprehensive store based consumer centric turnaround strategy.
I know you’re all familiar with the work we are doing on many fronts to revamp our operations and I would like to highlight a few areas today as part of this call. It’s worth remembering that since the beginning of our store revamp process in 2013, we have provided basic upgrades including updated merchandising and product assortments across our full portfolio of stores. Approximately 2,000 of these locations also received upgraded signage, paint, lighting and improved merchandising and presentation.
Our concept stores are a key element of this work and represent the future of RadioShack’s retail footprint. They continue to show positive sales performance as the modern design and interactive experiences they offer drive new traffic. For example, our speaker wall continues to drive year-over-year sales of portable speakers into the triple digits along with our highly successful interactive displays for headphones and tablets. These stores are outperforming the chain and we continue to focus on operational execution, growing sales and driving margin rate improvement.
We’re also pleased with the rollout of our fully scalable interactive remodel program. We now have 84 stores that have been remodeled, drawing from the best of what we have tested and learned in the concept stores. These stores are getting the concept store elements that have been driving success at a low capital cost. The interactive elements include our speaker wall, headphone and wall displays with live demo units, live devices for experiencing phones and tablets and impulse fixtures near the checkout.
All of these features drove strong sales growth for these products in the concept stores. We’ve also allocated space for new product categories like a connected home area, wearable technology, power headquarters, 3D printing and fashion accessories along with floor space for our new service offering Fix-it-here.
Another key element in our strategy is represented by our Fix-it-here, RadioShack labs and DIY initiatives. These are growing and establishing a wider presence across our stores base as we revamp our product assortment and service offerings, bringing in new categories, new brands, new product and new private brand innovation.
These initiatives are particularly important because they’re all emblematic of RadioShack maintaining its relevance to today’s consumer by going back to our roots and reinforcing the strength of the brand. Smart, qualified service and technology expertise simply doesn’t exist in the marketplace and we are strongly positioned to provide it today. Fix-it-here is in more than 500 stores and will continue to grow to 750 locations by November of this year. We are the first national chain to offer in store repair for mobile devices. Fix-it-here is driving incremental, profitable growth in our stores and as a result, we will continue to further accelerate the program.
Our reputation for trustworthy quality service has resulted in strong performance already. RadioShack Labs is a strategic partnership with PCH, a respected leader in product innovation and we’ve already sourced several exciting new products through that relationship, and our DIY initiatives are gaining traction as well like the expansion of our assortment of products, cobranded with Maker Media, a leading community DIY group of makers. As a result, we are making meaningful progress on refreshing 30% to 40% of our assortments this year with new products.
Beyond these efforts to develop a strategic pipeline of innovation and new products, we continue to see strength in the stable of categories that have performed well for us over the past several quarters. Categories that revolve around sound continue to be strong like portable speakers, headphones and sound bars. This includes strong sales of brands like Beats and SOL Republic as well as our growing assortment of products from AUVIO, our private brand. Through our brand purpose of do it together, we do particularly well in driving sales in categories that are new to consumers and which benefit from personal interaction with one of our store associates.
For example, our connected home category of products allows us to have a solution based conversation about the full range of components and infrastructure underpinning the Internet of Things. These products allow our customers to connect with and intuitively manage their surroundings.
In the entertainment category, we continue to see solid sales of streaming media players, where customers are cutting the cable and using new products we’ve added like digital antennas, Google’s Chromecast, Roku’s line of streaming players and Apple TV.
Turning now to our mobility business, there are several factors that have been weighing against us; soft consumer interest in the handsets currently available, aggressive price competition on these products and intense wireless carrier marketing activities. The postpaid mobility business continue to be the primary driver of our sales decrease in the second quarter as consumers anticipated this week’s iconic handset launch and have delayed purchasing or upgrading their phones. This in turn has led to further aggressive price competition on existing handsets among the wireless carriers and other retailers.
They’ve also not seen the full benefit of new carrier financing programs which were only available in our stores for a portion of the quarter. These new financing programs are starting to gain momentum. We will continue to build awareness with consumers that we offer these options. Meanwhile, the carriers continued their intense marketing activities, which included financial incentives to induce customers to switch carriers in addition to new, heavily promoted financing programs.
The entire mobility industry is facing changes and at least one retailer has exited the market. However, we see opportunities for mobility with in our full product mix and we are addressing challenges head-on by focusing on profitable sales. We have already begun to do this by improving technology that we use to sell mobile phones and bringing in new wireless offerings. We believe that over the long-term, our adjusted approach to mobility, less dependent but still a key component of our offerings will make an important contributor to the overall business.
As part of our approach, we are focused on solutions for carrier pre-paid plans. One example of this is our recent announcement that RadioShack will be the exclusive national retailer for Defense Mobile's new nationwide 4G LTE mobile services, which will be offered to over 50 million members of the U.S. military community including those actively serving veterans and their family members. The launch is significant as the first ever mobility program which offers value-added exclusive discounts, content and other benefits that reward and honor our military. I like to think of this as a military loyalty program.
Another example of our commitment to the mobile space is our new partnership with Trustev to use anti-fraud data fingerprinting technology at the point of sale to enhance the customer experience when buying a mobile phone. The Trustev service will allow us to rapidly screen over 260 online customer data points thereby speeding up transaction time. This ensures that we are able to provide the most suitable mobile product and payment structure for their credit profile. Although we’re already making progress on fraud prevention, we believe the introduction of Trustev will provide additional benefit in this area.
Looking at our business as a whole, we have several focused initiative in motion from store remodeling to product merchandizing to marketing and promotional activities. These foundational elements of the Company’s turnaround plan will require careful execution and above all, time to fully take hold.
Shows $1.02 on my feed.
HAGW
Spike pass $1 after the bell. Lol
Looks like we will close at $1 for the day and the week.
Would be an awesome stock for day traders this week if this is your thing.
11% is still 11%.
Haven't followed Cramer for a long time. He was the best contrarian indicator anybody could ask for before he was exposed by Jon Stewart.
JCP was also extremely hated. But they've managed to turn things around fairly nicely. I got rid of it too soon.
In all my years of investing, I've never seen a company so hated by analysts or the media.
Each rally attempt is met with immediate downgrade whether it be Fitch or Moody etc... Not to mention the mm pricing of the stock.
Quite interesting.
Makes me more firm that this company is going to do well, really really well.
If George Soros said it's a good company, then I'm going to buy more once the opportunity shows itself.
Wow you guys are still here?
Rsh is not going to get delisted. Holy cow, long convo.
Thus far, the only one who has any common sense on this board is manatthebeach. If you read the transcript, it seems like the company is making great stride. The only problem is the creditors.
If, like they said in the near term, a deal is struck, we can see radioshack skyrocket to the roof.
You can talk about all the GAAP terms you like, in the end, nobody can project earnings.
On a side note, just came here to say something.
Whether you're long or short. It's your decision. There's no need to laugh at anyone's decision. The ones on the losing side are already paying by pain with financial losses.
Secondly, there's nothing funny about rsh closing business so that thousands of people lose their jobs. Some have family and children to look after and making ends meet.
Just my ranting for tonight. Glta.
Sorry chapter 11. Whatever. You know what I mean.
I see today as a positive actually.
IMHO, Bankruptcy could be a chapter 7. In which case the company can still be in operation, don't have to worry about the creditors, close down the 1100 stores they desperately need and the creditors get nothing. And finally focus on profitability instead of debt.
An excellent move.
That's right, Creditors could smarten up and give them the closure or they get none of their money back. Simple.
K "hold on to your shorts" champ
The longer you hold the bigger the ride.
Same old story with mms shaking people left and right.
I said awhile back, conference call is key.
We're not directly out of the woods yet, that $1.6 is a little stubborn. We will retest it but given all the right moved radioshack is taking, we should blow through it soon.
Iphone 6 and Iwatch coming this holiday season, I'd imagine sales will go pretty well if RadioShack takes advantage of it. Glta longs.
Congrats to those who took advantage of the mms shakeout yesterday and this morning. :)
Don't worry about the shorts or the "non position" short trying to dissuade you. Ride this stock with us longs back to fair value of $5 and beyond.
As manonbeach says, there's going to be more rehash of same negativity but those are the opportune time time to buy more. I'll be back on the next downgrade or "stock going to zero" bs.
This had me chuckled.
Lol
"But pros almost never make bad tax decisions. Players do. Must admit that I'm not an expert on losses. I have large gains on 100% of my investments. Read my bio. "
That's a bold statement. Your bio is written by you right?
"Given RSH's tiny market cap, little institutional money is in it. At one time, prior to 2011, index funds would have owned a good chunk. That was when RSH was in the S&P500"
This is what I still can't get to a lot of people head. When a stock is $100 and it's in the large index fund because it's safe. When it's at a huge discount like rsh, it's suddenly risky.
Once again, when a pro buys at $100 and he sells it at $.99 you call him a genius because he writes off his taxes? Then some clown jumps on the bandwagon and downgrades the stock and he's also a genius. Where was he when it was at $100?
Until $1.6 gets taken out, I'll let the day traders gloat.
I reiterate shorts will be killed here if they continue to press short.
Once again, before earnings, mms are going to catch stops. So don't bet on earnings.
Still hurting from your $.50 short?
Once again, repeating the same bs... Different author but same bs.
Your guess is as good as mine. But the mms always have one of those crazy moves to clear the stops before the release.
You probably won't see under $1 soon though.
Don't worry too much about the release, listen to what the company has to say.
"It's all in the footnotes" as Buffett likes to say
I see some people still trashing this company. Must've had some beef with them.
You take pictures during midday for crying out loud... And who's to say that the pic you took isn't one of the non-performing stores?
It's going I take a little while before you see the company recover to their original state. When you operate on a patient, you don't suddenly heal overnight. It'll take a few quarters but trust me, patience here is the key. Like I said at $.70 and $.50. Shorting here is suicide. The shorts probably couldn't go home cause their mothers couldn't even recognize them.
Give this company time and I guarantee you you'll be nicely rewarded. They're making all the right moves.
Here's my 2 cents. Don't play earnings.
Some experts will tell you it's going to zero. That's a given.
Some, who shorted at .50 are still saying the same thing, 0.
If my 20 years of experience had taught me anything, playing earnings is a dangerous game.
Having said that, I do hope for this company to do well as I'm a shareholder myself.
The $1.6 is a tough price to break at the moment. Should that get broken, hold on to your seat.
Fix it here:
I think this is a fantastic article on RadioShack fix it here strategy. To me, I think it's a wonderful idea.
What's not to like about a company who cares about your wallet and the environment?
http://www.forbes.com/sites/willburns/2014/06/11/the-radioshack-fix-it-here-program-is-a-welcome-commentary-on-disposable-consumerism/
If you’re over 35 or so, you remember a time when life wasn’t quite so disposable. If the TV broke, you didn’t automatically go out and buy a brand new one. You took it to the TV repairman. And he would fix it. But all that has changed now that we live in a world where business models, particularly in mobile devices, have somehow made repairs less economical than purchasing replacements. It’s cheaper (or the same price) to just buy another one. And so we did.
But RadioShack aims to change all that by introducing a national repair program called “Fix It Here,” where customers can bring in their broken mobile devices and RadioShack will fix them, right on the spot. It’s an idea laced with potential.
“Fix It Here” from RadioShack is more than a service, it’s a point-of-view.
RadioShack could use the “Fix It Here” idea to pave the way to a larger social movement; a movement towards saner consumerism. Giving consumers an escape hatch from the modern-day inertia of “buy new!” is a commentary on our society as much as it is a service that can give RadioShack a much-needed financial hedge as it tries to rebuild. Better yet, the idea drafts off several powerful trends: weak economy (fix, don’t buy), do-it-yourself movement (gives people more control over their devices), and environmental movement (fewer phones going straight to the landfill). It’s an idea whose time has come.
It’s like a neighborhood IT guy.
Last time I checked, there’s a RadioShack 5 miles from 95% of America. That is an asset RadioShack is wisely leveraging with this “Fix It Here” program. Best Buy could do this program, too (and probably will), but they are much farther away from the average consumer. Suddenly, these tiny RadioShack stores are that much more relevant because I can drop off my shattered phone on my way to the grocery store. With this idea, location trumps the small footprint.
Bringing a broken product into a RadioShack store is traffic, plain and simple. More importantly, it’s indiscriminate traffic. No bias against RadioShack when your phone is shattered. So the entire bell curve of consumer candidates are represented.
Now, odds are that some percentage of those people will buy something they didn’t intend to buy as they wait for the fix. Suddenly, the importance of the store experience to not only sell attachment products, but to reframe how people perceive the store as a whole, comes into graphic relief. The store becomes a presentation. Proof that the ’80s wanted (and got) their store back. A fix of a product becomes an opportunity to shore up brand perception itself.
And I must say, being a bit of a tech nerd myself, RadioShack stores are actually fun to browse. Nearly every product they have is one personal synapse away from a problem solved. Unsuspecting consumers who had never set foot in a RadioShack store might just realize this truism and come back again someday.
Brand inspired.
If you’ve read any of my Forbes posts, you know I’m a brand purist. I get downright giddy when I see a brand come out with an idea that is not just linked to a larger brand idea (“linkage” is not enough), but inspired by it. The “Fix It Here” idea comes straight out of RadioShack’s larger “Do It Together” brand idea, where in this case “it” is repairing your broken stuff, together.
Now, don’t hold back. Call us out.
Despite RadioShack’s serious financial issues that would breed fear in most senior executives, I truly hope they give this program some bold “anti-disposable” edge in their marketing. Call us out. Call the industry out. Make us feel silly for so easily defaulting to new. Throw the proverbial sledgehammer into the proverbial Big Brother screen.
“Fix It Here” is RadioShack’s golden opportunity to be a leader in modern practicality and consumerism. The question now is, will they really, truly take it.
So much bs traders here...
I'm with the guest post that replied to Sean N, the one you copied and paste from on the comment section posted 9 days ago.
If you're so sure, go short it champ.
:)
Agree and disagree.
Fundamentals are for the what but technicals are for the when.
Buying a stock like tsla is what some fundamentalists like but leaving out the when. You'll see a bunch of analysts upgrading it right now. Why?
Cause it's in their portfolio and they want to look good. They're not specialized in anal for nothing. They want to shove it up your ass or pull bs out of their ass whatever way you want to see it.
If pros exit near bk prices they wouldn't be called pros. They're called losers. The ones who buy high sell low. Pros are considered pros for a reason. They are suppose to make superior returns.
Read Peter Lynch "one up on wallstreet" another recommended read.
Don't listen to the hoopla and buy great companies like RadioShack.
Only time can tell.
Media never helped me in my trading accounts. They're my contrarian indicators for years.
I want those writers to come out and call the Avis Budget (CAR) and the JAZZ shareholders at $.50 "idiots" now.
Not at this price imho.
We'll see $1.6 soon.
Depending on the economics of the company in the coming days, a break of $2 in the near term not out of the question.
Betting short right now would be a little silly.
$1.6 still a bit of a barrier but I think we'll revisit it soon.
Are you still shorting this stock?
Gotta love how analysts come out to downgrade a stock AFTER the fact most of the time.
A fifty percent haircut is ridiculous.
On watch
It makes me wonder why someone with no position nor interest in the company be around a board everyday bashing the company with bad news.
It's extremely difficult to load the boat if you have so called experts telling you the stock is going to zero everyday and scaring you.
I pounded my fist on the table saying they're wrong and my messages get deleted.
Going forward, IMHO, shorts are going to continue to get burn if they continue to short here.
Have a great weekend all :)
Hmmm... We need to blast through $1.60 for me to be convinced here.