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Management need to be held to account here. They are in huge salaries and have executed a dud strategy, I.e think they could get away with year after year of above inflation rises. The whole story the directors tell about being happy with regulation is rubbish. The plan was to have a store on every high street and hope customers would not question the charges.
Now that regulators and greater consumer awareness are going to destroy margins time management sorted out costs in the business starting with their pay.
I think this company is in a little bit of trouble in the medium term. Can only see profit margins getting squeezed further. The company may PR that regulation is good for the industry and therefore the company but you can’t get away from the fact the profit margin will be hugely reduced as a a result.
Oops, "I would hope that"
Having been a Funeral Director, I would that an investigation of the Council's role in this takes place.
Nohearts,
Something like that. I only have a buy button as the sell button is broken. FYI I currently hold 0 DTY shares. As I said its low to mid 600s for me.
All the best
https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/britains-competition-watchdog-launches-funerals-072411476.html
Just about says it all...an in-depth market investigation into pricing in the funerals sector, hopefully they will worm out the sharpe and hidden practice of these companies that continually rip families off day in and day out.
when I say ripping off families I mean buy the hidden profits / comissions on surplus items like flowers, death notices, service stationary....etc etc
Averaging down from more than £10 ?
Or was it higher ?
zmxn etc etc,
CMA likely to find that Beyond takes a cut for effectively doing nothing.
I will likely be buying back in here soon.
It's curtains for DTY. At last a nail in the coffin of this exploitative company. Sell while you can.
Nohearts,
Shorts closing
The directors have had shareholders trousers down good and proper. Check out the options they have gorged on, check how they exercised and sold them. Check out the salaries and bonuses. It’s a simple business, no international exposure, a pretty much guarantee that annual deaths are roughly he same. People get buried or burnt.
There is a limit though to how you much you can gouge out of the dead’s families
You can call it what you like, but Phoenix look like they are close to owning a quarter of the company.
You were however boasting about the shrewdness of Phoenix buying in at more than a tenner last year.
You seem over emotional about this share, it’s never a good sign.
Nohearts,
Do you really think Phoenix asset management take 'punts' ?
I'd love to see these shares drop to £4.50.....and maybe I'd scoop a few up. I can certainly see them returning to £6.00 in the next 12 months. As I have said many times before....if they are such good value......why aren't the Directors interested? They've creamed off a lot of profit......surely they must be worth one third of what they flogged them for.....or maybe not!
down and down we go.
The much respected Phoenix taking a mighty punt on this having acquired 1/2 their stake at £10+
Perhaps they will change the management.
londoner7,
Thanks for posting that. I am glad that our taxes are going towards such a thorough review into whether competition exists in a semi-free market. With regard to DTY I am waiting to pick up some more shares in the mid to low 600s.
All the best
There's a short article in the FT on Dignity. I didn't see much of interest but it prompted me to go to the CMA web site.
https://www.gov.uk/cma-cases/funerals-market-study
I was interested in the responses to the interim report. There's a good mix of views from those at the business end, those that seek to represent various consumer groups and those that seek to take a cut from the activity without any direct involvement, comparison web sites, consultants and other agencies - I suspect the interest of the latter is to drive down costs at the business end solely to enhance their own margins.
I only read a small sample but one that stood out was the response from A W Lymn, a small independent funeral provider, who makes a decent argument for quality over cost, at least for their segment of the business. No doubt they also feel that the costs of delivering the actual burial or cremation should be driven towards zero. The larger groups like Co-Op and Dignity who put up the capital for the provision of the essential elements are being targeted from all directions. That said it appears they've had it their own way long enough.
I don't envy the CMA's task to resolve these various views.
Dignity's profits have dropped as the CMA has uncovered a hornets' nest of their greed and overcharging. How McCollum can still try to claim they charge so much because of their superior quality of service is laughable. Empty words - people are getting wise!
Nohearts, I think your numbers are wrong.
The underlying operating profit for H2 was £33.8m. It was £11.6m for Q4. IMO that was a very poor Q4 result and doesn't point to a very good Q1.
However, this comment, "The trial in part of the country of a limited funeral in 2018 resulted in a smaller proportion of full service funerals than expected. Given the introduction of the Group's Tailored funeral, which provides even greater choice to customers and which will be introduced to all locations during 2019, the limited service funeral is no longer necessary and trials of this type of service have ceased." suggested to me that the trial of the limited funeral may have been the cause of the big drop off in average revenues in Q4. Listening to the call I get the impression the sales approach with 'Tailored funeral' will be to offer add-ons to increase revenues above the limited service level price point.
As I've said on this board before, Q4 was a bad quarter. The above explanation may be behind it. The 2019 Q1 will be interesting but faces very tough comparisons on a couple of fronts with 2018.
In the call Dignity guided to underlying profit of £68m for 2019. Although well down on 2018 I still see this as optimistic so I'll be watching from the sidelines.
So last 6 months of the 2018 are;
Underlying profit before tax 11 million
Underlying earnings per share 16.4 pence.
Is this the current run rate ? Perhaps indicating 33p EPS for a full year ? 22 million profit ?
Need more detail, but after thinking this was a buy at around the ?7, I now think its a leave alone.
Now the take over and price gouge is fully exposed, how are they going to grow the top line or bottom line.
Dividend provides some prop to the share price, but love to see what cash they generated.
"Our vision is to lead the funeral sector in terms of ........value-for-money"
Priceless - how he can say that with straight face is beyond me.
Awful company. Complete scum
londoner7: Point 1 - The effect of the report publicity-wise will be enormous as no-one likes to hear of the elderly and vulnerable being ripped off. Undertakers aren't generally well-liked people and the image of the Dignity board rubbing their hands greedily as the money rolls in will be a lasting one.
Point 2 - The CMA has already found big holes in Dignity's responses thus far (e.g. they found that there was no evidence to support their claim that higher prices equates with higher quality). All funeral directors do children's funerals for free, it's not just Dignity, so that's an empty grasp at being virtuous.
Point 3 - Most independent funeral directors already surpass current requirements and would be totally unphased by newly introduced expectations. I fail to see what the financial costs would be. Refrigeration? Who wouldn't have this already?! I think you might find that the new regulations cover such areas as transparency of pricing and the most guilty offender in this regard is Dignity!
Specs1,
So far so good hey mate. Hows your 'short' plan working out ?
At the end of the day I cannot see anything that will make a real big difference from what was happening in the funeral trade prior to the CMA investigation, The big concern was pricing and openness, which dignity have already taken the hit on that one . The crem situation is very complexed and will be hard to change somethings.
I cannot see any great regulation maybe something that could be managed by trading standards.
In the past the CO-OP have had some major cock ups makes the headlines and then fish and chip paper.
Dignity will cope with any bad publicity and move on. Talk to Joe Public and they do no know about any enquiries or anything that is going on, Because funeral homes run under existing names that dignity bought a large % of people do not know it is dignity anyway. Back to regulation as it stands at the moment any body can set up in the funeral trade without so much as a CRB CHECK or any checks, if there was massive regulation it would increase costs more than present level as the councils, would have to charge, and people like HEALTH AND SAFTY ect, ect a big can of worms might escape,
Specs1, thanks for your response. You highlight three areas.
'Effect of report' - The level of publicity will depend on the media's asessment of it's newsworthyness. But whatever comes out will be a one time event and fade from the public consiousness. As an example, we all use and pay for energy so we're inclined to take an interest in energy headlines impacting our pockets, but a small % of the population will be in the market, so to speak, to consider the commercial implications of a report on the funerals business. I don't any media impact will have a longterm consequence on Dignity's business.
'Actions' It still isn't clear to me how the CMA will impact Dignity's business in a market/capitalist economy. Dignity's website has a copy of Dignity's response to the CMA. Dignity point to some possible outcomes and make the point that they already offer free funerals to sectors of the community. Let's wait for the full report.
'regulation' here I disagree entirely with your points. Yes. decent funeral directors would want to meet new regulations - if they are required - but will face higher costs, and an element of that will hit consumers. Less decent funeral directors will attract media attention driving consumers towards the larger groups who are better able to absord these costs across the group. Also, the reputational risk that comes with regulation tends to drive consumers towards the larger groups over time. Look at the poor reputation the low cost energy suppliers now have amongst consumers. The number of funeral locations has increased by 10% over the last five years. I've no doubt regulation will slow that growth.
A correction - in my previous post I questioned the view that creamatorium have high barriers to entry. Further reading suggests barriers do exist, primariliy capital investment cost, but planning less so.
However, this is an investment forum and it's in that context that I assess Dignity. For reasons I've outlined previously I think the next few quarters will be tough comparisons against last year, so I'll be watching for those to pass, hopefully along with the CMA's final report, before evaluating a possible investment in Dignity.
londoner7 - The effect that the report will have is that it will generate publicity and the public will become better informed about shopping around and avoiding being overcharged. If Dignity wants to be able to compete in this more enlightened market, it will have to lower its prices significantly.
There might be action taken against them with regard to their overcharging in their crematoria - they are currently the most expensive by far and the CMA is looking into how the market can be made healthier.
When it comes to increased regulation, most of the more reasonably priced funeral homes have nothing to fear. There shouldn't be anything that would frighten off new entrants - any decent funeral directors who want to make a success of their new venture would want to meet the standards that regulation demands. It was in fact the Co-op that was highlighted in recent years in the media for some practices that were well below where they should be.