After several months of silence, EverBank Financial Corp. Friday filed an updated registration statement with the Securities and Exchange Commission, indicating the Jacksonville-based banking company is moving forward with its initial public offering.
EverBank first filed plans for an IPO in October 2010 and had been submitting updated registration statements every three months.
But until Friday’s filing, the company hadn’t filed an update since August, raising questions about its plans.
Under SEC rules, companies planning a stock offering can’t publicly comment, so EverBank officials have never answered questions about the IPO.
Friday’s filing still doesn’t give any information on how much stock EverBank plans to sell or when it will occur. But by filing an update, it does indicate that EverBank is still planning to go ahead with the IPO.
The latest filing shows that EverBank’s adjusted third-quarter earnings, excluding one-time gains and expenses, were $25.6 million, down from $27.2 million in the third quarter of 2011. It does not have data for the fourth quarter.
CenterState looks for earnings rebound with First Guaranty deal
Just like the Jacksonville bank it acquired last weekend, CenterState Banks Inc. was losing money last year. However, analysts expect its acquisition of First Guaranty Bank and Trust Co. to help return CenterState to profitability this year.
CenterState last Monday reported fourth-quarter earnings of $14.1 million, or 47 cents a share, giving it a net profit of $7.9 million, or 26 cents a share, for all of 2011.
But the fourth-quarter earnings were helped by a large gain related to a previous acquisition.
Analysts at Keefe, Bruyette & Woods and Raymond James & Associates both reported that CenterState’s core results excluding special items showed a net loss of 39 cents a share for the fourth quarter, and a loss of 80 cents to 88 cents for all of 2011.
CenterState, based in Davenport in Central Florida, expects to benefit from the acquisition of two failed banks last month in deals assisted by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.
The company said its acquisition of First Guaranty last weekend, which marks its entry into the Jacksonville market, will add 9 to 11 cents a share in annual earnings. The previous week it acquired Central Florida State Bank in Belleview, which it projects will add 2.5 cents to 3 cents a share.
With those deals, Keefe, Bruyette analyst Brady Gailey raised his 2012 forecast for CenterState from a break-even year to a profit of 15 cents. He raised his 2013 earnings forecast from 35 cents to 55 cents.
Raymond James analysts Michael Rose and Kyle Oliver raised their rating on CenterState’s stock from “market perform” to “outperform” on Tuesday.
They said in a research note that the bank’s fourth-quarter results were “noisy” because of the acquisition-related items and charges from a bulk sale of non-performing loans. But “its reduced risk profile from said bulk loan sale, enhanced franchise value from two FDIC-assisted transactions thus far in the first quarter of 2012 and outsized opportunities for expense reductions following several years of franchise expansion versus peers bodes positively for CenterState,” they said.
CenterState’s stock reached as high as $7.72 last week, its highest price in nearly a year. Rose and Oliver set an $8.50 target price for the stock, which was priced at $7.02 at the time of their upgrade.
RailAmerica stock jumps on acquisitions
RailAmerica Inc.’s stock jumped to record highs Thursday after the Jacksonville-based operator of short-line railroads announced two acquisition agreements.
One is a $40 million deal to buy Marquette Rail LLC, which operates 126 miles of track in Michigan. The other is an $18 million deal to acquire a 70 percent interest in the Wellsboro and Corning Railroad and Industrial Waste Group.
That railroad runs 38 miles from Wellsboro, Pa., to Corning, N.Y., and the waste company performs transload, storage and other services for customers in the energy and waste management industries.
RailAmerica currently operates 43 railroads covering about 7,400 miles of track in 27 U.S. states and three Canadian provinces.
In addition to the acquisitions announced after the markets closed Wednesday, the company also unveiled plans to refinance its debt at lower interest rates.
RailAmerica’s stock has traded mostly below its $15 initial public offering price since the stock began trading in October 2009.
Wednesday’s news sent the stock up as much as $2.37 to a record high of $17.57 on Thursday. It continued to climb Friday, reaching a new high of $17.99.
Wolfe Trahan analyst Edward Wolfe upgraded his rating on the stock from “peer perform” to “outperform” Thursday.
“We have been warming to RailAmerica with expectations for improved revenue and EPS growth the next two years,” Wolfe said in his research report. Wednesday’s announcements reinforced those expectations, prompting him to raise his 2012 earnings estimate by 16 cents to $1.03 a share and his 2013 estimate by 23 cents to $1.25.
Wolfe also sees opportunities for more acquisitions.
“While its acquisition strategy remains disciplined, RailAmerica seems confident that additional deals are on the horizon and our channel checks with private carriers suggest the acquisition market remains active,” he said.
Analysts downgrade new St. Joe strategy
While CenterState was upgraded last week, Raymond James analysts Buck Horne and Paul Puryear downgraded The St. Joe Co. after the company announced it was revising its real estate investment strategy.
St. Joe has gone through many changes in the past year and a half, including moving its headquarters from Jacksonville to WaterSound in the Florida Panhandle and overhauling its management team.
The new management reviewed the real estate company’s projects and developed a strategy that will “significantly reduce planned future capital expenditures for infrastructure, amenities and master planned community development and reposition certain assets to encourage increased absorption of such properties in their respective markets,” the company said in a news release.
St. Joe also said it will incur write-offs of $325 million to $375 million in the fourth quarter related to some of its properties. It didn’t give details, but Horne and Puryear said in a research note that they were surprised by the amount of those charges.
“In our view, the magnitude of these charges (likely linked to infrastructure investments) implies a high probability the planned end-use of many projects has been completely revised,” they said.
The analysts mentioned St. Joe’s one remaining project in Northeast Florida, the RiverTown development in St. Johns County, as one of the projects they “suspect” has come “under particular scrutiny” from the new management.
The analysts downgraded the stock from “outperform” to “market perform,” saying they are “moving to the sidelines until we gain better visibility into its future plans.”
Landstar stock rises on strong earnings
Landstar System Inc.’s stock rose as much as $1.07 to a 52-week high of $53 Thursday after reporting fourth-quarter earnings rose 40 percent to 70 cents per diluted share, 4 cents higher than the average forecast of analysts surveyed by Thomson Financial.
For all of 2011, the Jacksonville-based trucking company’s earnings rose 34 percent to $2.38 a share and revenue rose 10 percent to $2.65 billion. Landstar also said it projects 2012 earnings of $2.62 to $2.82 a share.
Stifel Nicolaus analyst John Larkin raised his price target on the stock from $56 to $58 after the report.
“We continue to believe that shares of Landstar System are attractively valued and we reiterate our ‘buy’ rating,” Larkin said in a research note
Regency also gains on positive earnings
Regency Centers Corp.’s stock rose 98 cents to $42.18 Thursday after reporting its fourth-quarter recurring funds from operations (FFO) rose by 7 cents a share to 63 cents, a penny above the average Thomson forecast.
FFO measures the cash generated by real estate companies and is considered the key measure of earnings for those companies. For all of 2011, Regency’s recurring FFO rose by 1 cent to $2.40 a share.
The Jacksonville-based shopping center developer also reaffirmed its 2012 guidance for recurring FFO of $2.36 to $2.50 a
share.
“Fourth-quarter results were at the high end of guidance, and we expect slow operating trend improvement in 2012,” Morgan Keegan analyst Stephen Swett said in a research note.
“The 2012 outlook now looks conservative in our view,” he said.
Stein Mart sales drop again
Stein Mart Inc. last week reported another monthly sales drop in January.
Total sales for the four weeks ended Jan. 28 fell 4.3 percent to $60.1 million and comparable store sales fell 3.9 percent.
The Jacksonville-based fashion retailer also said that total sales for the fiscal year ended Jan. 28 fell 1.8 percent to $1.16 billion and comparable store sales fell 1.1 percent for the year. Stein Mart had 262 stores in operation at the end of January, compared with 264 at the same time last year.
International Baler lifts earnings
International Baler Corp. reported earnings of $683,663, or 13 cents a share, for the fiscal year ended Oct. 31, up from $254,298, or 5 cents a share, in fiscal 2010, according to its annual report filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission last week.
Sales for the Jacksonville-based company, which produces baling equipment, rose 44 percent to $11.05 million in fiscal 2011.