Debt Structure refers to the ratio of current/short term debt to long term debt in your business. This metric provides insight into how you are financing your business’ needs.

Those who know me know that I am consistent in my belief that short term assets should secure short term debt and long term assets should secure long term debt. This is because short term debt (think about your current liabilities) is expected to be paid off with current assets (like cash) whereas long term debt would be paid out with fixed assets (if a lump sum is required versus retiring the debt over time with regular payments.) That premise is Financial Management 101, and while not a hard and fast rule, it is sound guidance.

More to the Debt Structure conversation, we calculate this ratio by dividing Current Liabilities (all payments and payables due in the next 12 months) by Total Liabilities; same for Long Term Liabilities (total debt not yet due within the next 12 months.)  Here is an example:

In this example, there are total liabilities of $5,951,350 (calculated as $2,551,350 in Current Liabilities + $3,400,000 in Long Term Liabilities.) The debt structure is 42.8% short term and 57.2% long term. While this is good to know, the next question is “So what?”

On its own, the debt structure ratio does not carry much weight. The value is found in trending the debt structure ratio. For example, if your short term debt trend is increasing it may be an indication of liquidity challenges in your business.

Ideally, calculating your Debt Structure Ratio will cause you to ask more questions and seek more clarity, such as:

• What types of debt make up my short term liabilities? What are these debts for?
• Are my short term liabilities trending up, down, or remaining fairly steady? Why?
• What is the right ratio of Debt Structure for my business/industry?

With economic indicators preparing us for more volatility than years past, and with interest rate increases on the horizon, it is a good idea to have abundant clarity on your overall debt situation. Understanding your Debt Structure, including how your Debt Structure will affect your business under different economic situations, creates an opportunity to “get your house in order,” so to speak, before things start happening.

Plan for Prosperity

The winds of change are blowing. Are you simply going to lower your sail and wait it out, hoping to survive whatever comes? Or are you preparing to chart new courses so that whatever winds you get you are still able to make progress and move forward?

How is your business affected by:

• NAFTA
• Trade Wars
• Real Wars
• Geopolitical strife
• Interest Rates
• Income Tax
• Sales Tax
• Foreign Exchange
• Oil Prices
• Commodity Prices
• Utility Prices
• Inflation
• Deflation
• Theft and Vandalism
• Weather and Natural Disasters
• The 4 D’s (Death, Divorce, Disagreement, Disability)
• Physical, Emotional, Spiritual, and Mental Health

You have full control over none of these. At best, you might have partial influence over two or three on that list. Yet you, your business, and ultimately your family will all feel an effect that falls somewhere between minimal and profound.

The way to minimize the negative effect of any of The Uncontrollables is to prepare. You wouldn’t head out on a road trip with an empty fuel tank and no spare tire, would you?

A strong balance sheet (meaning low Debt to Equity along with surplus Working Capital) will mitigate the negative effects of The Uncontrollables. Conducting sensitivity analyses on the likes of tariffs, interest rate changes, tax changes, and foreign exchange will provide your business with the critical knowledge needed to make informed decisions in the face of The Uncontrollables.

Plan for Prosperity

We can scream and holler, protest, or pout all we like in the face of The Uncontrollables; it will change nothing.

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.

-Reinhold Niebuhr

Having the wisdom to know the difference between between what you can control and what you can’t is merely the fist step; acknowledgement of what you cannot control on its own will not mitigate the effect of The Uncontrollables. Action will trump intention every time.

Take action to protect your business, your family, your legacy. You need not be a rudderless vessel helplessly surviving on the mercy of the sea. There is no need to be stranded on the side of the road with no fuel, no spare tire, and no phone.

This statement applies to so much in our world. From interest rates to fashion trends, from climate to markets, so much of what we see, hear, do, say, and feel is cyclical.

In meeting with commercial bankers recently, here are some of the points I took special note of in the conversation:

• Many of our clients are struggling through a slow-down right now.
• Very few applications are for growth. Most are to restructure, especially in preparation for increases to interest rates.
• So many of our clients do not understand their balance sheet or how it affects their business.

The first bullet above led to a longer portion of the total conversation. The banker who made this statement went on to describe how the boom years we have recently enjoyed led many people (entrepreneurs and employed folks alike) to create some bad habits, such as not preserving cash (working capital) and increasing their debt. When things slowed down and business got tight, the debt payments still need to be made, as does payroll, and utility bills. Somehow, the elevated lifestyle expenditures that cycled up during times of easy prosperity did not cycle back down when profitability and cash flow did.

A similar sentiment was gleaned from an ag banker (who asked to remain nameless while granting me permission to include the response below) serving North West Saskatchewan and North East Alberta. When I asked about what the trend has been in that part of the province for farm land prices and rent rates, the response included the following:

“Profitability and cashflow has been squeezed the past 3 years, due to a combination of the weather anomalies (in most cases, more moisture than needed), increase in production costs, and financing needs (and in some cases may be “wants” vs actual “needs”).  Those producers/files with the stronger balance sheets and working capital positions, have fared better through this, compared to some others.”

For any of you who think that your business (or industry) is the only one to have to manage cycles, please understand that cycles are industry agnostic. The market does not care what you’ve been through, what your plans are, or what your name is. Your business plan needs to include M.O.C. – Management of Cycles.

Long time readers of my commentaries know that I have referenced Moe Russell of Panora, IA on more than one occasion. It was from Moe that I first heard the term M.O.C. – Management of Cycles. Moe tells the story of how he picked it up during a chance conversation in an airport with Matthias Grundler, the then Head of Procurement for Daimler. When asked, Grundler admitted that M.O.C. (management of cycles) was his greatest concern.

What cycle are we headed into right now? If we knew, if anyone truly knew, business would be so much easier! The risk, of course, is that we tend to get caught up in recency bias:

Recency bias occurs when people more prominently recall and emphasize recent events and observations than those in the near or distant past.

www.morningstar.co.uk/uk/news/…/why-recency-bias-is-dangerous-to-investors.aspx

The construction of a balance sheet is quite simple: assets on the left, liabilities plus owner’s equity on the right. As the name implies, the two sides must balance. So when liabilities are greater than the assets, there is negative equity. Yes, you can have negative equity, but not for long unless you have an incredibly patient banker.

When describing the instances above where the balance sheet gets too much emphasis, the focus is clearly on the bottom half of the balance sheet, specifically the long term assets & long term liabilities and the owner’s equity. The equity is usually provided by appreciation of long term business assets, and if the equity is built almost solely on that and not retained earnings (net profit from operations) then there is definitely too much emphasis put on the bottom half of the balance sheet, namely equity.

The top half of the balance sheet is where most of the trouble starts. The top half is where we find the current assets and current liabilities; the difference between the two is working capital. Current liabilities have grown to dangerous levels from ever increasing loan and lease payments, cash advances, and trade credit. When current liabilities exceed current assets, you have negative working capital.

If your balance sheet has negative equity and negative working capital, you are the definition of insolvent, and the next phone you make is likely 1-800-AUCTION.

Ok, so there is equity on your balance sheet, more than enough to cover off the negative working capital. A patient and understanding lender might be willing to help you tap into that equity to “recapitalize” the business.  Do that once if you need to. By the time you’ve gone to that well two or three times, you’re likely closer to needing the classifieds to find a job rather than the next deal on equipment.

Equity doesn’t pay bills. Cash does.

Why punish your cash and working capital by rushing debt repayment to create equity?

Plan for Prosperity

The next time you catch yourself, or anyone else for that matter, leaning hard on the bottom of the balance sheet, namely the equity portion, think long and hard about why the focus is not balanced between the top half and bottom half of the balance sheet.

Not only do the left and right sides of the balance sheet need to balance, but so does the top and bottom.

“If you benchmark yourself against the average you’ll be out of business in 5 years.”

Dr. David Kohl

What Dr. Kohl is referring to is that “average” is not success. As one client said this past week, “Average is the best of the worst, or the worst of the best; either way it’s not where we want to be.”

Personally, I’ve never been a fan of using averages when analyzing business performance. The sample pool will skew the calculation up or down; extenuating circumstances create anomalies in year-over-year business results; the list could go on. In my opinion, average is a useful tool to make yourself feel better about where you’re at. I prefer to make clients uncomfortable about where they’re at so that they are motivated to “Be Better™”.

Here’s someone we all know about who is never not trying to be better: Warren Buffett. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not suggesting the Oracle of Omaha is without flaw or that he is somehow worthy of unwavering praise, but it cannot be denied that his approach to building wealth has enjoyed success beyond most of our wildest dreams. Recent articles in the Financial Post indicate that Berkshire Hathaway is currently sitting on about $116 Billion in cash and other short term investments. This cash is sitting idle for the purposes of making acquisitions, but Buffett has admitted that he’s struggled to find acquisitions at sensible prices. Also, the article states that Buffett is unwilling to load up on debt to finance deals at current prices.

“We will stick with our simple guideline: The less the prudence with which others conduct their affairs, the greater the prudence with which we must conduct our own,”

Warren Buffett.

It has been written in this series of commentaries that during the elongated commodity super-cycle which ran from about 2007 to 2015 we could find many “average” businesses who appeared to be “excellent”. The appearance of excellence was fed by strong yields and high commodity prices. To translate: everybody was making money, even the worst managers and the high cost operators. To paraphrase Dr. Kohl: when the bottom 20% of producers become profitable, we’re in trouble! It didn’t take much prudence to be profitable during the boom; how did you compare during the boom? How do you compare now?

So when considering who you want to mirror, is it one who has been racking up debt balls-out on the expansion train or one who has been quietly amassing a war-chest of financial strength that can be deployed when the right opportunity presents? Is it one who operates with reckless abandon, or strategic execution? Is it someone who is average, or is it the cream of the crop?

Plan for Prosperity

Benchmarking data is hard to come by; not everyone is willing to share the details of their successes or failures. So to start, benchmark against yourself. How did your most recent year stack up against your best year ever? How do your 2018 expense projections compare to your 2003 expenses? What has been the 10 year trend of your working capital, EBITDA, net profit, total debt, and total equity? Is it something you’d be proud to share? Let me know; I’d love to hear from you on what you learned from this exercise.

It was the same about a year ago. We check what nutrient levels remain after harvest, consider what crop will perform best in each field next year, and begin to apply appropriate nutrients (following the 4R’s of Fertility: Right Source, Right, Rate, Right Time, and Right Place) in fall and/or in spring. The crop get’s sown, produce get’s harvested, and we check the soil again. Based on what we started with, what we added, and what the crop used to through the growing season, we compare to what is left in the soil to evaluate how efficient our fertility program was.

If it wasn’t as efficient as it could have been, we examine the effects on our production (moisture, heat, disease, insects, etc.) and we examine our own role in the process by questioning if the seed tool did a good enough job; how about the sprayer? Often time we use weather as the justification to acquire bigger, newer equipment to “get the job done faster.”

What if the entire industry, not just the progressive managers but the entire industry, used that same methodology in analyzing profit and cash flow? It might look something like this:

This is the time of year when spreadsheets all over the prairie are being used to tally up the performance of the business over the last growing season. We start with the working capital we had after last harvest, consider what crop will perform best based on your crop rotation and market outlook, and begin to project input costs and yield & price for each crop. We enter expected operating and overhead costs into a projection, and convert those projections to “actuals” as the year progresses. Once harvest is complete, we evaluate working capital again.

If profitability and cash flow was insufficient to meet expectations, we examine if operating costs stayed within budget or not (and why), we examine if overhead costs were projected correctly or if we let both operating and overhead “get away” this year. What did we not foresee? What did we properly plan for? Did we market appropriately?

The practice of soil testing compliments crop and fertility planning. These are crucial steps to take to create the most efficient plan. Remember, you need to produce at the lowest cost per unit possible. Period. Hard Stop.

The practice of checking financial performance is similar to keeping score. It would be awfully tough to know what adjustments need to be made during the game (growing season) without knowing the score along the way.

To Plan for Prosperity

It’s been said by agronomists that soil testing is “seeing what’s in the bank account” and they carry on in supporting that analogy by stating that no one would write a cheque without knowing what the bank balance is first. Sadly, there any many people who do both: write cheques without knowing what’s in the bank and plant crops without knowing what’s in soil. One won’t break you, the other could.

Knowledge is power. Knowledge comes from management. Management requires measurement. Test your soil (financial performance), because if you don’t measure it, you can’t manage it.

**Side note: the photo is from my farming days, and provides a glimpse into the soil I used to farm. I found it interesting to so clearly see the A, B, and C horizons in a single core. **

When you see yellowing bottom leaves and/or thin, spindly plants in the canola crop, you know it is lacking nitrogen. If you see the signs in time, you can top dress nitrogen fertilizer onto your crop and see a positive benefit.

When we see a tire is low, we fill it.
When we see windows are dirty, we clean them.
When we find the level of fuel in storage is low, we order more fuel.
When cash flow is abundant, we spend it in ways we wouldn’t usually spend it.
Yet, when working capital is depleted, when cash flow is tight, or when profitability is dicey, we typically soldier on…doing what we’ve always done.

This makes no sense. The last two sentences above make no sense at all.

When the bank account is empty and the line of credit is nearly full, do you:
a) Apply for more credit, at your primary lender or elsewhere?
b) Evaluate your cash outflow to date and reexamine your plans for the rest of the year?

When working capital as slipped down so low it would barely cover the crop inputs loan, do you:
a) Analyze what caused the current situation?
b) Seek action to rectify your working capital position?
c) Both a) and b) ?

The case for “knowing the signs” is made by acknowledging the impact of each risk that is identified.

In the crop, the yellowing of canola leaves won’t spur any action if the risk to yield potential is not understood.  If the risk is understood, then an informed decision can be made to act or not act. If there is no effort put in to understanding the risk, then the decision to act or not act falls somewhere between apathy and laziness. Being ignorant to the specifics of the risk and its implications is no longer an excuse now that we have access to all of humankind’s knowledge in our pocket…

If you’re unaware of what are the signs of nitrogen deficiency in canola, if you’re unaware of what are the risks of foot-rot in your cattle herd, you are best to seek advice from an expert.

To Plan for Prosperity

The risks of maintaining insufficient working capital, and the risks from shortfalls in cash flow, are obvious to those of us who specialize in the financial side of business. We know the signs. We know what it takes to fix it. We know what should happen to ensure the situation isn’t repeated.

Drawing up plans to seed just over 6,000 acres this spring, Fred can’t let go of the notion that he needs to be at 10,000 acres. There are a couple of neighbors who’ve hinted that they might not put a crop in this spring, and if Fred could take on both, he’d be at 10,000 acres. That would feel pretty good driving through town letting everyone know he was now a 10,000 acre guy! Heck, he might even put it on the side of his truck like some companies do with their safety awards. They’re proud of their accomplishments and show them off, why not Fred?

As he goes over his crop plan, he starts wondering about where he’ll procure his inputs. If he maxes out the lines of credit at both input dealers in town, and the one at the bank, he’ll be able to get everything seeded, fertilized, and sprayed. “No problem,” Fred thinks to himself. He gets on the phone to get prices from each input supplier so he can decide what to buy from whom.

About a week into April, Fred gets the word he was hoping to hear: both neighbors who were considering retiring will not be seeding a crop this year and will be renting out their land. Fred immediately gets in the truck to pay his neighbors a visit to see if he can secure a rental agreement with each of them. To establish good-will and earn the opportunity, Fred offers each $5 per acre cash rent above what they were asking. They shake hands, and Fred excitedly heads home.

Upon sharing the news with his hired help, Fred is too excited about his “accomplishment” to recognize that his lead hand is not happy about what Fred is telling him: the seeding rig will have to run 24 hours since there isn’t time to buy another air-drill and get it field ready. Fred heads back to the house to update his crop plan and to secure more crop inputs.

Two days later, Fred’s world comes crashing down:

• he is unable to get any more credit to acquire crop inputs for his additional rented land;
• he has been denied a new cash advance because he was late paying back the old one;
• he has lost his new rented land because he can’t get inputs and because the cheque he wrote to each landlord for upfront rent payment has bounced;
• his lead hand just quit to go work for a neighbor who provides a “better work environment.”

To Plan for Prosperity

They key is in the heading title: PLAN

Fred doesn’t plan; he reacts. He is not able to expand his farm even though he thinks he is. He is not as financially strong as he thinks he is because he cannot get more credit when he needs it. He is now short on help to get seeded on his own current acres. Fred wants to be bigger, but he’s overlooked being better.

At risk of “over-flogging” this issue, Fred’s challenge has been lack of working capital. And it is that lack of working capital that has not only directly cost him an expansion opportunity, but indirectly cost him his lead hand.

It’s been said that “if you fail to plan, you’re actually planning to fail.” Fred has become the embodiment of those words. The ramifications of this story go farther than we have time to discuss.

You can avoid falling in with the likes of Fred by enacting control over your future: implement strategic growth using sufficient resources with discipline.

*Fred is a fictional character. The story portrayed above is fictional. Any similarity to a real person or situation is purely coincidental.

Knowledge is recognizing that a tomato is a fruit.

Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.

A fellow farm advisor called me last week to ask for my opinion. The scenario illustrated a farmer’s plight of whether to seed or not to seed.

More specifically, this 1,800 acre farmer, a bachelor nearing 60, had put together a 5-year plan before the 2011 crop to retire from farming after 2015. After the 2015 crop, a review of his plan indicated he would have yielded a comfortable $400,000 after total farm dispersal. For a guy with no family and a willingness to drive someone else’s tractor in the busy season, that’s not terribly bad.

Despite a plan being in place, despite a nice tidy sum to live on from the sale of farm assets, despite being at the brink of achieving his own stated goal, he felt he wasn’t sure if he could actually retire. So he put in another crop for 2016.

Now in early May 2017, after poor yields and quality on what he actually could harvest, with about 300 acres left to harvest before 2017 seeding can even begin, as the bank is not prepared to extend further operating credit, my colleague asked the farmer, “Do you even want to put in a crop in 2017?”

Let’s summarize:

• About 16% of last year’s harvest is still in the field as of May 10;
• What crop did come off was poor quality;
• There are 1st and 2nd mortgages on owned farm property;
• Working capital is virtually non-existent;
• Operating credit has been denied.

Even if this farmer wants to seed a crop in 2017, I don’to see how he will be able to.
What to do?

To Plan for Prosperity

Why did this farmer not stick to the plan he initiated and helped build, that plan that would have left him in a reasonably comfortable spot? Did he review it over those 5 years? Was it adjusted? What changed?

It’s likely that he made the plan at the urging of his advisor, and that he himself was never really committed to it. If that is the case, then the effort, the document, and the strategy are about as valuable as durum with 20% fusarium…throw in all in a pile and burn it.

Collectively, farm advisors have been clamoring for years for farmers to put more effort into planning. Yet without commitment to act on the plan (for whatever the excuse,) any plan is absolutely worthless. It is, in effect, the same as not planning at all, except that we can pat ourselves on the back because we “made a plan.”

No one makes a crop plan then does not act on it. Why does the financial, transition, management, or capital expenditure plans not get the same commitment?

The plan exposes and elevates the knowledge, but it’s the wisdom to act that makes it valuable.

The Canadian Young Farmers’ Forum brings together farmers from across Canada. This past weekend in Ottawa, they held their annual convention and invited me to speak as part of their agenda.

There were many takeaways from the event; here are a just a few, with my perspective following in brackets.

1. Agriculture is incredibly diverse right here in Canada. (We shouldn’t just stay in our little echo chamber with others who produce the same as what we do.)
2. Even with such diversity, young farmers face similar challenges across all sectors and across all provinces & regions:
   1. Building and protecting adequate working capital is difficult (I’ll keep preaching the importance of this;)
   2. Profitability is cyclical (we may have heard this before;)
   3. Competition is increasing for land, labor, etc (and they’re stressed out trying to figure out how to handle it;)
   4. Small farms struggle to compete with large scale & well capitalized operations (yes, there are large potato, berry, vegetable, dairy, poultry, & egg farms like there are large grain and cattle farms, and competing with them for land and labor is just as tough;)
   5. Young farmers feel lost when trying to determine if/how their parents ever plan to slow down/retire (this also applies to every other family business, not just farms.)
3. The desire to learn more and be better is strong (learn, unlearn, relearn.)
4. The desire to take part in something bigger, such as industry groups with lobby or policy influence, is significant.

CYFF is for farmers under 40. Based on the passion of these young farmers, and their desire to learn & be better at everything they do, I think the future of agriculture in Canada is in good hands.

To Plan for Prosperity

The issues you face, the challenges you struggle with on your farm are the same as almost countless other farms. The relief and comfort seen on the faces of these young farmers when that became evident was obvious. They felt less stressed and less alone when they realized that they are not the only ones feeling the angst, the despair, or the helplessness that dogs their personal situation at home.
Don’t sit alone and wallow in your own anguish over what challenges you in your business. Sharing your trials and tribulations will not only help mentor the passionate successors to our industry, it may help you find comfort in knowing “you’re not alone.” It might even turn up a solution.