JANA recently condensed its original thesis down to what it calls “The 5 Cs”: cost management, controls, capital allocation, conglomerate structure, and corporate governance. Agrium, meanwhile, recently gave a rebuttal presentation, stating that “JANA gets an ‘F’ for its 5 Cs.” In the words of Inigo Montoya, let me explain. No, there is too much. Let me sum up.
1. Cost management
One of JANA’s main complaints is that Agrium operates too many retail stores. Agrium’s stores are run more like distribution centers, with customers making orders by phone and having them shipped out, generally within a 50-mile radius.
JANA has found that almost three-quarters of Agrium retail locations are within 25 miles of another store, creating significant redundancy that could be eliminated to cut costs and improve store-level metrics. Agrium counters that it has already closed about 20% of its stores, and that judging stores based on proximity to each other fails to account for things like competitors’ locations and market demand. After all, 80% of Americans live within 20 miles of a Starbucks, and that doesn’t seem to be a problem.
JANA also takes issue with Agrium’s growing sales, general, and administrative costs. Since initiating its integrated strategy in 2005, SG&A costs have grown almost twice as fast as net income. Contrast this with Agrium’s chief competitors, Potash Corp./Saskatchewan (USA) (NYSE:POT), Mosaic Co (NYSE:MOS), and CF Industries Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:CF), each of which has had not only great net income growth, but also far lower SG&A growth.
2. Controls
This is one area Agrium could stand to work on. The company provides very detailed information on its wholesale division, but not much on retail. I agree with JANA that it would be good if the company were to start giving typical store-level metrics like same-store sales and sales per square foot. Without store-level metrics, it’s hard for investors and analysts to know whether Agrium really does need all those overlapping stores, or if they’re just cannibalizing sales from each other.
3. Capital allocation
Agrium could do the most immediate good for shareholders by following JANA’s advice regarding capital allocation. JANA would like to see Agrium stop investing so much in its business and start distributing more capital to shareholders. This might sound like a corporate raider using the company’s balance sheet as a piggy bank, but that’s not the case.
Until recently, Agrium hadn’t raised its paltry dividend for almost 10 years, despite growing cash flows. Competitors such as PotashCorp, Mosaic, and CF are also stingy with their dividends, but that’s no excuse.
The greater problem, according to JANA, is that Agrium is investing in its business, and not, well, in its business. At the 2012 Investor Day, Agrium announced plans to increase its nitrogen capacity, despite also asserting that its wholesale assets alone were worth more than the company’s entire enterprise value. In other words, Agrium believes its existing assets are being undervalued by the market, but instead of doing the easy thing and repurchasing shares, the company is spending money to unnecessarily develop new assets.
