Lots of fear on this boardThe arguments are 1. Management has sucked in the past why should they do better now? Well we got a new CEO thats one reason to look forward not backward. Hopefully this guy isn't a bag of dicks. 2. What if they downgrade the debt to junk? Its a utility thats unlikely, they would cut the dividend to zero before they ever got a downgrade to junk. Besides if that event were to ever pan out or happen they would sell the entire company first to ENB for close to book value. 3. What if they don't get the utility rates hikes they want and that brings in less revenue? The guys doing the review know the state of the company and what they need to maintenance and to make a profit. They will grant ALA what they want. You saw in cases of pacific gas ..companies that don't get what they need to properly invest cut back on maintenace which can lead to issues, like fires or gas lines blowing up. We wouldn't want granny to freeze to death in the winter because ALA didn't replace her pipeline because they didn't have the required funds and delayed maintence.
Fears are overblown at this point by the .63x book value trading at half that of peers...Does it deserve to trade lower then peers? YES until they show execution ..it deserves to trade at book , not above it like ENB but not below it like the current status. The company generates $1.2 billion in free cash flow has a payout ratio below 35%. Unless the world is ending, the stock deserves a higher multiple. Tax loss selling and ex-dividend today. Last day for tax loss is Dec 27th. We are nearing the end here of the constant @ss pounding.