American Shared Hospital Services (AMEX:AMS) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Unidentified Analyst: This is perfect. This leads into my next question. So I was looking at your — some of your debt covenants that you disclosed in your last annual report, and it looks like I could see a total debt to EBITDA covenant at 3x, but are there any current debt covenants which prevent the company now or in the future from paying a dividend to common shareholders?

Raymond Stachowiak: There is a restriction in our banking relationship that talks about how much dividends we can pay out to our shareholders. There is a provision to do so, but it’s limited.

Unidentified Analyst: And to that point, I wonder if just because it’s perfectly reasonable if you have unrestricted cash on hand, which could pay your entire debt, which I believe you do were quickly will, I wonder if they’d be open, or if the company would be open to negotiating an amendment to such confidence that state that if you do have unrestricted cash on the balance sheet, which could literally pay all of the debt, not that you would want to, but if you so chose, if they were loosened some of those restrictions on dividends, but moving on, this is a very specific question. And I only ask this question because it sounds like full speed ahead on proton beam therapy, if possible. I noticed a note in your annual report that you had a $2.25 million in deposits for two Mevion S250 proton beam therapy systems, which were written down to zero.

But my question is, even though for accounting purposes, those deposits were written down to 0. If you so chose to purchase one, Mevion still honor those deposits is going towards the purchase price. So if we separate the discussion of having it written down on your balance sheet for accounting purposes versus the commercial relationship?

Peter Gaccione: The answer to that question is yes. Mevion still has those deposits on our account. So if we purchase proton beam system from Mevion, we get credited for that deposit. I would like to point out that the amounts that we written — that we wrote off in December — in the fourth quarter rather of 2020, did include some capitalized interest on those deposits. So that capitalized interest component would not be on our account with Mevion. Does that make sense?

Unidentified Analyst: Total sense. And then follow-up one — of those $2.25 million in deposits, does Mevion force you to apply half and half to two erent systems? Or if you so chose, could you combine those two different deposits into one deposit on a Mevion 250i system?

Raymond Stachowiak: I think it’d be reasonable that Mevion would assume that each deposit is on each respective order.

Unidentified Analyst: Okay. That’s I also noticed Mevion has been talking about a 250 fit proton system and some other things. But is the S250i still state of the art, or could this deposit be applied until they make some improvement on the S250. I only ask this because if we are full speed ahead on proton beam therapy, rather than dividends or acquisitions outside of regological oncology or to focus on this like a .

Peter Gaccione: Yes, I think it’s a fair assumption that if we acquire a proton system from Mevion, we’ve got good relationships with Mevion. And I think each party would be flexible how those deposits would be applied and how the exact configuration of purchase of the proton beam system, how that configuration would be. There’s lots of different bells and whistle, like they do a Mevion proton beam system. And we’re bound to, if and when we take delivery of such a system, we’re bound to modify the equipment we currently have on order with them to get the latest technology. And Mevion would be in support of that flexibility. We’ve got a good relationship with .