U.S. Forest Products Stock Index Declines 41 Percent Year-Over-Year

LOS ANGELES, Calif.—The U.S. Forest Products Stock Index of the 27 largest forest company stocks fell 41.16 percent to 50.59 from the same period a year ago. This was reported Monday, Jan. 26 at market’s closing by Forestweb, an independent provider of business intelligence for the forest products sector, which includes timberlands, pulp and paper, packaging, and wood products.

Among the most active stocks in the Forestweb iiStock Index is Smurfit-Stone Container Corp. (SSCC) at $.04, nearly a 100 percent drop from a year ago. Temple-Inland (TIN) fell 74 percent from a year ago to $4.46, and International Paper (IP) saw its stock price fall to $10.73, or a 66 percent year-over-year change.

Many analysts agree that 2009 promises to be an extraordinarily tough year across the forest products sector. A number of factors continue to place the industry in a very tight box, including: a severe cyclical downturn marked by startling volume declines; an acceleration of negative secular trends in some niches; and tight credit conditions.

Industry downtime has come swiftly. Many in the industry were concerned yet optimistic about the future as recently as Labor Day. But none could have predicted the full extent of Wall Street’s financial havoc, as witnessed by the Jan. 26 Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing by Smurfit-Stone, the second largest containerboard and corrugated producer.

According to the Fibre Box Association, box shipments fell 14.4 percent in November from a year earlier, while containerboard consumption was down 15.3 percent. For 2009, U.S. box shipments are estimated to drop by more than 3.5 percent.

The recently launched U.S. Forest Products Stock Index by Forestweb is a comprehensive index containing the stocks of all publicly held forest products-related companies headquartered in the United States that trade on the New York Stock Exchange. The index is calculated using a market capitalization approach similar to the S&P 500 and is updated every 10 minutes to reflect the price movement of significant sector participants. The Forestweb iiStock Index is available at no charge and e-mailed each day at the close of the market to registered users. To sign up, visit http://my.forestweb.com/iiStockIndex