Owen

Excess Spread — What the Solutions? 9fin | Excess Spread is our weekly newsletter, covering trends, deals and more in structured credit and asset-based finance.

Ah thanks! 9fin.com/insights/exc...

Anything notable happen in the US mortgage market in 2008?

Raise a glass to Britain's used car dealers, who shockingly do not have their customer's best interests at heart

...and Magnetar is all over the cap stack....easier to get the company to do GPU deals when you also own the stock, converts and regular bonds

Do I want to run a refinery? No. Do I have the money to run a refinery? Also no. But it is kind of amazing how little money down one needs to pick up major strategic assets in this space

The actual working capital that Prax didn't borrow was just a tiny sliver, basically whatever crude was in the cracker?

Prax had this working capital, $518m of recievables securitisation. Glencore owned the crude, and it discounted the invoices from selling the petrol as soon as it was out the door

The working capital bit is supet interesting too, as the FT piece highlights

Instead they ended up doing "private credit" deals at like 20% with the kind of funds you don't mess with...and spending the money on a massive acqusition bender

If they'd come out six months earlier people would buy any old shit with minimal covenants, they'd probably be in a consensual restructuring rn trying all kinds of chicanery to keep the keys

But still maybe the bond deal they tried to do in 2022 could have saved them?

Too big too fast: how $10bn UK energy challenger Prax unravelled Collapse of Lindsey refinery owner is a cautionary tale of a company lacking financial heft to manage its sprawling operations

FT is right to point out that extracting $500m of synergies from a $167m acquisition seemed pretty punchy www.ft.com/content/5113...

Look at this thing it's an absolute beast

First, isn't it wild that you can just buy an oil refinery for $167m? Like, I walked past suburban london property worth more than that taking my daughter to school

Might as well stop my bluesky lurking with a bit of Prax posting, small thread