The company recently announced it was looking to sell its energy business, which it only just acquired in 2012 for about $9 billion. Getting back into energy meant a reunion of Freeport with its old energy business, McMoRan Exploration, which was spun-off in 1994. It also bought onshore and Gulf of Mexico driller Plains at that time.
But with crude prices at multi-year lows, and some of its energy assets in expensive deep water drilling locations, the energy business has become a drag. Freeport says it wants to focus on its core mining business now.
Freeport cut its dividend by 84% earlier this year, although even with the shares down sharply, it is still yielding about 1.9%.
Activist investor Carl Icahn has taken an 8.8% stake in the company. Two of his associates were recently awarded seats on the Freeport board of directors which has been cut from 16 seats to 9 independent seats and 2 executive directors.
Can Icahn turn the company around and return value to shareholders?
Freeport McMoRan: http://www.zacks.com/stock/quote/FCX?cid=CS-YOUTUBE-FT-VID
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