Cindy Taylor
Analyst · Morgan Stanley. Your line is open
Yeah, I'll try to do that. The first quarter historically in 2020 has compensation liquidations that are a headwind to positive working capital generation. Those are traditional now, obviously, in this environment, thus are much smaller. So we don't expect much in Q1 relative to what we had in 2020. I think Lloyd guided you to you to our 2020 CapEx, the end about $15 million. And as we go into 2021, we're going to look at comparable levels to that, again, it will be market dependent upon timing of any activity recovery amongst our business lines. And we're going to be quite frankly, very, very cautious about that allocation of capital, based on the visibility, which US visibility is short, unlike offshore products, where you know, backlog will help us dictate some of our CapEx means, but those are the puts and takes. But again, we'll give you more guidance in February when it goes through it on CapEx. But at this point, we're not expecting a huge need for CapEx, albeit at the allocation between segments might be different, just depending upon the opportunity set that we have. Clearly, you know, our revenues are down 2019 to 2020, that has led to liquidation if you will of working capital, I think we've done better than that. Just in terms of squeezing out some receivable liquidation as we've gone. That clearly, we've paid our payables in a very timely manner. So nothing we've done is really extended out the payables landscape to create that working capital, if you will. We've been very transparent and clear in our Q2 and Q3 documents, that the magnitude of the Cares Act benefit was $41 million. So it had a very favorable impact to our cash flow. Now, that is nothing more than monetization of an asset on our balance sheet. But previously, when the administration took over, they limited the ability to carry back those NOLs. But obviously, that was the point of the Cares Act. So it's just a monetization of an asset we had. I hope I've answered your questions and all I said, cost out certainly have helped, but it's in an environment and it's been harsh revenue declines. So as we recover back those revenues, particularly if you get back to 2019 levels, we need to be looking at the roughly 20%, 20% of cost out of the system that we think are going to be permanent. And therefore, again, your incrementals improve that I think everybody in this industry, clearly us included, are looking for, obviously, an improved outlook, you know, with the COVID induced demand destruction has been horrific. And I'll also tell you, I've thought about this because it's not lost, should not lost on anybody, if you watch the news every day, that we're back into yet another kind of COVID induced concern, if you will.\ I think the difference is, I think we've learned how to work through a lot of the COVID situation and still keep your doors open. I know my attitude about my - the way I conduct my daily life, today is much more informed than it was in April and May. And you look back, we had a horrific 30% decline, nearly 25% to 30% decline in demand. Because of, you know, we didn't know if we're picking up germs off of tables and waterfalls, you know, it is different today. And I think, importantly, the big hit to current demand has been airlines, and jet fuel demand was never recovered. So one has to say, can it get materially worse from here? I think the answer is no, at this point in time, I'm not minimizing. And by any means the entirety of the pandemic, but I think we're in a kind of a different place, with the knowledge we gained on how to work safely, while it's still in our communities, if that helps.