Dallas, Texas 10/11/2013 (Financialstrend) – On September 18, it was announced that Russia’s government funded development bank had in principal approved a $2.5 billion loan to “coal and steel” production company Mechel OAO (ADR) (NYSE:MTL). The $2.5 billion would be used to put in place basic infrastructure like a rail road to the coal deposit site located deep in Siberia. The proceeds from the loan will also be used to operate in the first phase of the mining project which is expected to yield 11.7 million metric tons of coal by 2017.The second phase of the project would be to expand the mining activity to extract close to 2.2 billion tons of coal estimated to be present in the general area.
On the announcement of loan becoming public, the stock of MTL went up 6.4% in a single day of trading. Since then the stock has plummeted 17% to hit bottom at $3.14 as of close of business on October 9. Since then the stock has gained 3.18% and settled at $3.24 as of close of business on October 10.
The current valuations of the stock indicate a 56% dip in value over its prior 52 week valuation. It is trading 24% up in comparison to its 52 week low pricing. It has a total of 416 million shares outstanding with a market cap of $1.34 billion. It has an annual sales turnover of $10.81 billion. Over the past 18 months, the net income of Mechel has gone down drastically. It is sitting on net loss of 2.17 billion. Hence the loan approval from the Russian state bank was all the more crucial.
Mechel OAO stock has depreciated in value by 17.39% over the past 30 days and has shed close to 53% of its overall value over the past one year. Its investors would be hoping that the stock is able to decisively turn the corner with the injection of the loan funds.
