We would love to hear your thoughts about our site and services, please take our survey here.
London South East prides itself on its community spirit, and in order to keep the chat section problem free, we ask all members to follow these simple rules. In these rules, we refer to ourselves as "we", "us", "our". The user of the website is referred to as "you" and "your".
By posting on our share chat boards you are agreeing to the following:
The IP address of all posts is recorded to aid in enforcing these conditions. As a user you agree to any information you have entered being stored in a database. You agree that we have the right to remove, edit, move or close any topic or board at any time should we see fit. You agree that we have the right to remove any post without notice. You agree that we have the right to suspend your account without notice.
Please note some users may not behave properly and may post content that is misleading, untrue or offensive.
It is not possible for us to fully monitor all content all of the time but where we have actually received notice of any content that is potentially misleading, untrue, offensive, unlawful, infringes third party rights or is potentially in breach of these terms and conditions, then we will review such content, decide whether to remove it from this website and act accordingly.
Premium Members are members that have a premium subscription with London South East. You can subscribe here.
London South East does not endorse such members, and posts should not be construed as advice and represent the opinions of the authors, not those of London South East Ltd, or its affiliates.
Errrrrr Bluelight. There is no chance whatsoever of a takeover bid for NCYT whist the DHSC dispute is unresolved. More chance of a turkey voting for Christmas! Further, buying back our own shares whilst this dispute is unsettled is also impractical, while even following a positive dispute outcome, it is not perhaps a sensible use of company money at this stage of NCYT's development. NCYT will need to diversify into non covid related areas of diagnostics in order to create future value and work toward mid cap status. The dispute resolution is the 'holy grail'. Period!
@picax
Spot on.
Yet the corrupt, greedy motherfckers have the audacity to stand aside the national flag when making their finely prepared speeches full of empty rhetoric and weasel words.
In theory it is written off as there is no legal way of re-claiming it. Unless you want to send the Mitchell brothers around.
Is it coincidence
A raid on shares this afternoon.
4 Months on Monday rns officially informing the market of dispute with DHSC
Fri, 9th Apr 2021 12:30
RNS Number : 0120V
Novacyt S.A.
09 April 2021
Novacyt S.A.
("Novacyt", the "Company" or the "Group")
Trading Update
Paris, France and Camberley, UK - 9 April 2021 - Novacyt (EURONEXT GROWTH: ALNOV; AIM: NCYT), an international specialist in clinical diagnostics, announces an update on its supply contract with the UK Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) and provides an unaudited trading update for the three months ended 31 March 2021.
DHSC contract
On 29 September 2020, Novacyt announced a second supply contract with the DHSC for exsig® COVID-19 Direct kits and other products. In the full year trading update announced on 29 January 2021, Novacyt explained it was in active discussions with the DHSC regarding an extension of the supply contract. Unfortunately, an extension has not been agreed, although the Company supplied PROmate™ in Q1 2021 in accordance with DHSC demand. Regrettably, the parties are now in dispute regarding the contract, which may have a material impact on Q4 2020 revenues. However, the Company has taken legal advice and believes it has strong grounds to assert its contractual rights.
The debt is not written off as such you just can't bring a claim for it after 6 years. I remain hopeful there will be a resolution before we are forced to arbitrate / litigate.
Is that 6 years as the debt is wrote off.
I'm a believer but I won't be around then.
Both parties have 6 years from the date of breach of contract to bring a claim, otherwise time barred unless a standstill agreement is entered. Now that would require some patience...
Soder, if you look at EKF they have a valuation of £350m and pre covid in 2019 they made just £4m net profit. The market wants to see a path to long term profitability even if covid revenue were to dry up to virtually nothing. Acquiring a business bringing in £5m EBITDA a year and leveraging our relationships to increase that to say £7m a year going forward would add a lot of value to novacyt...
I also agree a massive share buyback would boost the share price short term but it doesn't improve the long term investment picture in my opinion.
I bought back in today. Although I started at 3.19 and stopped at 3.05, which seems nuts to me. 3.05, amazing.
PS, yes, a share buy back would be nice, but digby's right - we probably can't spend that much cash without threatening going concern.
Any way, we've got an mcap of about £200m now, which can't be that far from cash in bank + this year's profits.
I think I'll hold for a bit longer.
Glad that this British company is getting hamstrung by the DHSC for ... seemingly no reason, while supporting foreign companies and at the same time asking British investors to support home-grown industry. What a joke. I think ultimately this just goes to show that Tories won't stand by British industry ... they'll stand on it.
I am no conspiracy theorist but it certainly appears to me that Novacyt is an unlucky victim of a prolonged operation by the UK Govt to cover up their own incompetence, or possibly corruption. ttps://blogs.bmj.com/bmj/2021/07/11/why-all-the-secrecy-around-innova-lateral-flow-tests/?utm_campaign=shareaholic&utm_medium=twitter&utm_source=socialnetwork
@bluelight I don't think there is a time limit. It generally comes down to who wants to resolve it so that they can move on. Obviously in most cases against UK plc it will be the company/contractor as their funds aren't infinite. So they can either settle or take it to court. If it goes to court & win then then there could also be the interest on top. If they choose to enforce it.
Obviously the unpaid invoices can't be left unpaid forever. Especially as they are withholding payment from some goods delivered that aren't even in dispute.
A few years old but link below describes the ADR process & how the UK gov are a great advocate.
https://www.hoganlovells.com/~/media/hogan-lovells/pdf/client-note-on-adr-in-england-and-wales-2017.pdf?la=en
Still frustrating as ****, B2H.
_Mr_Big
It's because one option is to take DHSC to court, - should there be no ADR resolution, - that no information is being made available by either party.
The dispute is holding us back though, we can't make acquisitions because the cash from the contract is tied up until the dispute is resolved. While the chances of making a full refund are small, it's still a possibility. We can't just blow that money, then there's the small matter of being owed 73m, which even after the 19.8m provision and vat is just shy of 40m net to us.
Yeah the interest is to be paid for sure, all major contracts I've been involved in have similar non payment penalty clauses using libor plus x%. That said making a million or two in interest whilst you lose £600m in your mcap due to dragging it out probably isn't the most clever play in the book...
Ncyt buy another biz for 50m. What happens to the SP? Given the current valuation multiples you prob struggle to buy 5m of ebitda for 50m. So the sp prob moves very little.
Ncyt buys 50m worth of stock and what happens to the sp? I would say it probably doubles.
Much better irr for using the cash that belongs to SHAREHOLDERS.
Blue - it seems to be the case that we can actually charge 8%+BOE on the unpaid invoices, so it might not be in the company's interest to accelerate the resolution.
If this was a company not paying bills, there would always be a risk of them going into liquidation, but with UK government a default is highly unlikely.
So, if I was confident that I'm right and they owed me money and wanted to drag the resolution on for extra 6 months, I'd be making plans on how to reinvest the statutory interest. Taking the ****ers to court in 6 months' time will be a lot more profitable.
The frustrating thing is that they are not releasing any information about the dispute, what stage it's at and why it's taking so long.
I don't personally think it's the DHSC dispute holding us back as much as being viewed as a covid stock still. I for one thought we'd move quicker to make non covid acquisitions and start building alternative revenue streams but it doesn't concern me longer term, all it would have done is push the share price higher for now.
The BOD have chosen not to rush in regards to reinvesting this cash and I'm confident that by taking their time they will make the right strategic decisions to build this business into something much bigger. I am in no rush to cash out and so that's all that matters to me, that the fundamentals and outlook are positive.
In general I'm not topping up anymore unless there is an unsubstantiated and dramatic fall, like today.
Had a bad feeling this morning due to the wording of that RNS. Although engagement with shareholders is welcome, it suggests they'll be discussing the 22 June update. Well why not do that on the 22nd of feckin June?
The cynics (bears) will read that RNS as confirmation that we'll have no news between now and then which, I believe, contributed to this afternoons dip.
It's even more frustrating because of yesterday's tweet on the 3G test which should have been RNSd. I just hope that its getting rolled into a larger R&D update, like the one we had in April.
Anyone know if their is a hard limit to the time a dispute resolution can take? Can't imagine you simply don't have to pay your bills for as long as you want before action is taken against you. If I had a car on finance and didn't pay the baliffs would come around. At what point do we send the debt collectors to the DHSC?
The Share Buy Back Idea I mean....
Seems like you have many....
PBWU
Soder.
That is a great idea.
That would certainly draw a line under the sp and provide us long suffering LTH some comfort and security in what is proving to be more than a test of Faith & Conviction.
GLA.
PBWU
I think we all would. By allowing the DHSC to drag on, and the share price to be manipulated they create a ripe situation for a predatory takeover. For £50-100m you can get a world class leading diagnostics company, with 10m (minimum level before we account for increased travel) monthly sales... Err go on them you've tempted me... Any sniff of takeover interest and this will be at £12 before you know it. Only thing I find odd is there havent been any firm rumours as yet
Ther aid a very big argument that the bird, who are there to represent SHAREHOLDERS should conduct a strategic review which should include the possibility of putting themselves up for sales.
It seems the reality is that they are unable to maximise value and a sale may be the best option for shareholders. Even if this means all ncyt staff are let go if we are gobbled up by a big pharma co.