News in lumber

Demand for wood and wood products is unrelenting. Resulting in lumber prices reaching historic high levels and daily climbing ever higher. The shares of publicly traded lumber manufacturers, distributors and retailers wood suppliers continue to soar. While oddly enough, trees themselves remain dirt cheap in places like Louisiana, where timber supplies are plentiful.

Astara Capital Partners, LLC (“Astara”) announced on Thursday (4-15-21), that it has acquired a majority stake in Cross City Lumber (“CCL”). Based in Cross City, Florida, CCL is a Southern Pine sawmill that produces specialty and dimensional grades of lumber. Astara leveraged its network of sawmill executives to source the opportunity and to underwrite a series of capital projects that will substantially increase the capacity of CCL and significantly reduce its breakeven point.

Rayonier Advance Materials (RYAM), a global leader in high purity cellulose pulp, and GreenFirst Forest Products Inc. (GreenFirst), a Canadian lumber company, announced today that the parties have entered into a binding asset purchase agreement in which RYAM has agreed to sell all of its six lumber and one newsprint facilities and related assets located in Ontario and Quebec to GreenFirst for an expected purchase price of approximately $214 million (USD), including inventory on hand at the time of closing, which will be payable in approximately 85% cash, 15% common shares of capital GreenFirst.

Maine’s Hancock Lumber, a seventh-generation integrated forest products company, which currently operates nine existing lumber yards, eight kitchen design showrooms, three sawmills, truss and wall panel manufacturing facilities, and timberlands, has announced that it has agreed to purchase Lapointe Lumber, a fourth-generation building materials supplier, with facilities in the Augusta and Gardiner markets.

Northern Ontario lumber producers are struggling to keep up with surging demand as lumber prices in North America are reaching all-time highs. After a difficult year in 2020 for sawmill operations, leading some producers in Northern Ontario to ask for government assistance to remain in operations, the industry experienced a real turn around thanks to rising prices.

Interfor Corporation announced on Saturday, March 13, 2021 that it has completed the previously-announced transaction to acquire the WestRock Company’s sawmill located in Summerville, South Carolina.

It took them nearly a decade, but Scierie Girard, a sawmill based in Shipshaw, Que., finally convinced Hydro-Quebec to offer a rebate for medium-volume customers who want to use the utility’s surplus electric power.