Friday’s small-cap stocks to watch

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Inside the Market's roundup of some of the Canadian small caps making news and on the move today. This post will be updated throughout the morning

Black Diamond Group Ltd. said it is confident it can sustain its monthly 8 cents per share dividend, but provided an operational outlook that illustrated the serious challenges it faces in its business of providing accommodations in the Canadian energy and resource sectors.

"The company anticipates that EBITDA in Q4 2014 will be approximately 20 to 25 per cent lower than the $38 million in Q4 2013. This decrease is due to the company's Canadian Structures and Energy Services business units and its Australian operations. The workforce accommodation segment of the company's Structures business unit currently anticipates lower than projected utilization in the quarter, however going forward this will be partially mitigated by the recently announced $27 million in new camp contracts utilizing existing fleet, and the completion of phase one of the previously announced 1,244 bed Dawson Creek project which will have first revenue early in Q1 2015. With these new contracts, the company anticipates that EBITDA in Q1 2015 will be moderately ahead of that in Q4 2014," Black Diamond said in a statement.

As for Black Diamond's 2015 outlook on earnings, "based upon current baseline run-rate, contracts in place, anticipated contract renewals and without considering additional capital expenditures beyond firm committed or meaningful new contracts, expectations are for EBITDA to be slightly below 2014 as a whole. However, with the strength of the company's balance sheet and capital discipline, cost-awareness, ongoing cashflow from operations, and healthy sales pipeline, and given a history of maintaining and increasing its dividend, the company has confidence that a monthly dividend of $0.08 per share per month is sustainable."

Shares opened down 11 per cent this morning.

CIBC World Markets analyst Jon Morrison commented, "Although we believe the weakening 2015 outlook is largely driven by the recent commodity price headwinds and will echo results across the Canadian oilfield services sector in the coming year, in our view, the reduced Q4/14 expectations is more subsector and company-specific, given that E&P activity levels have yet to witness any material decline to date. As such, we believe the Q4/14 profit warning reiterates factors that we have highlighted over the past few quarters, including declining oil sands capital spending plans, increasing workforce accommodation competition, continued weakness in the Australian mining sector and Canadian LNG projects needing to reach positive final investment decisions (FID) for the company's bid log to begin to materialize.

"The net impact of the operational update is a approximate 12 per cent decrease in our Q4/14 and 2015 estimates and reduction in our price target to $15.00 from $18.50. We reiterate our Sector Underperformer rating," Mr. Morrison said.

Also on the Street, Raymond James downgraded Black Diamond Group to "market perform" from "outperform" and cut its price target to $18 (Canadian) from $20.

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Silvercorp Metals Inc. announced a Normal Course Issuer Bid, pending TSX approval, to acquire up to 16.5 million common shares, or about 10 per cent of its public float.

"The company is taking this action because it believes that prevailing market conditions have resulted in Silvercorp's shares being undervalued relative to the immediate and long term value of Silvercorp's portfolio of producing and development properties in China," it said.

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Keyera Corp. announced it has agreed to become a 60 per cent owner in the Zeta Creek gas plant that's being constructed by Velvet Energy in the West Pembina area of Alberta. Keyera will be the operator of the Plant, which will have a licensed capacity of 54 million cubic feet per day of sweet gas and be able to extract natural gas liquids.

As part of the transaction, Keyera will also participate as a 75 per cent owner in the proposed sales gas lateral pipeline to be constructed from the plant to the TransCanada mainline.

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Alderon Iron Ore Corp. said its chief financial officer, Anthony Glavac, is leaving the company to take on an executive position outside of the mining sector. An interim CFO has been appointed.

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Copper Fox Metals Inc. released results of the recently completed National Instrument 43-101 resource estimate for the Van Dyke copper project located in the Globe-Miami Mining District, Arizona.

Elmer B. Stewart, President and CEO of Copper Fox stated, "We are very pleased to establish a significant resource for the Van Dyke copper project that exceeds the historical estimates with respect to the amount of contained copper in the Van Dyke project. The Inferred Resource, the total contained copper and the fact that the mineralization remains open to the west and southwest indicates a new dimension to the potential size of the Van Dyke deposit. Additional drilling will be required to realize this potential and to define the unexplored portions of the Van Dyke project."

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Cardiome Pharma Corp. announced that one of its subsidiaries has entered into an agreement with Eddingpharm to develop and commercialize BRINAVESS in China, Taiwan, and Macau and re-launch BRINAVESS in Hong Kong. The medications target cardiovascular disorders.

Eddingpharm will be responsible for any clinical trials and regulatory approvals required to commercialize BRINAVESS in the countries covered by the agreement. Under the terms of the agreement, Eddingpharm has agreed to an upfront payment of $1.0-million (U.S.) and specific annual commercial goals for BRINAVESS. Cardiome is also eligible to receive regulatory milestone payments of up to $3.0-million. Other financial details have not been disclosed.

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Centerra Gold Inc. announced it has extended its existing $150-million (U.S.) revolving credit facility with the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development until Feb. 17, 2016, on the same terms as the existing facility, LIBOR plus 2.9 per cent.