AMC Entertainment is furloughing hundreds of corporate employees and running its headquarters with a skeleton team on reduced hours
- Furloughs have hit AMC Entertainment's corporate headquarters in Leawood, Kansas, two people familiar with the matter have told Business Insider.
- A company spokesperson confirmed the furloughs, saying that the plan is "absolutely necessary to preserve cash and to ensure that AMC can reopen our doors once this health crisis has dissipated."
- The spokesperson said that the action affected all corporate employees, including CEO Aron.
- "The furlough plan calls for reduced working hours at reduced pay, or no working hours at no pay, for the hopefully short period of time when AMC's theatres are all closed," the AMC spokesperson said.
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AMC Entertainment is furloughing hundreds of employees in its corporate headquarters, as the cinema chain reckons new headwinds and disappearing cash flows amid the coronavirus pandemic, Business Insider has learned.
The Leawood, Kansas-based movie-theater chain, like its competitors around the world, is getting slammed as the novel coronavirus has local governments racing to limit large gatherings and shut non-essential businesses.
In a virtual conference call on Wednesday, CEO Adam Aron told associates in its corporate department that they would be furloughed, with varying degrees of compensation, according to sources familiar with the matter. This affected between 500 and 600 employees, one of the people said.
Reached on Wednesday, a company spokesperson confirmed the furloughs, saying that the plan is "absolutely necessary to preserve cash and to ensure that AMC can reopen our doors once this health crisis has dissipated."
He also said that the action affected all corporate employees, including CEO Aron.
"The furlough plan calls for reduced working hours at reduced pay, or no working hours at no pay, for the hopefully short period of time when AMC's theatres are all closed," the AMC spokesperson said.
According to one of the people familiar with the furloughs, the majority of corporate employees will have their work temporarily halted altogether, with no pay.
Some employees essential to continuing company operations will be furloughed to four workdays a week, with pay reduced to 80%, this person said.
Another bucket of employees will only work two days a week, for 40% pay, this person said.
Positions affected include those in IT, 24-hour AMC support services, and marketing, this person said.
Before the coronavirus crisis took hold, the world's largest movie theater chain had been attempting a turnaround and was building out a subscription business. Wall Street had been focused on negative free cash flow and billions in debt the company has taken on to overhaul theaters and make acquisitions, as well as looming threats from streaming-content providers.
Its stock has plunged since the start of 2017, and with the spread of coronavirus has gone into total freefall.
AMC shares were trading at around $3.50 on Wednesday, less than half their price just a month earlier, when Business Insider first reported on the company's efforts to turn its fortunes around. The company, which boasted a market capitalization of $3 billion at the start of 2017, now has a market cap of less than $375 million.
Adding to the pain for theaters, in the absence of a theater audience, some studios have started releasing new films on streaming platforms - an unprecedented move that weakens the distributors' grip on exclusive windows for showing movies.
This is a breaking story and will be updated.
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