Foxtons Share Chat (FOXT)

Just looking at some of the other forums and confirmation of BC partners holdings in Foxtons on another website, just scroll down halfway.

I'll probably find a horse's head on my pillow in the morning ;-

https://sharecast.com/equity/Foxtons_Group/director-deals

Yep, another one bites the dust, this time Chase Evans falls into the hands of the Lomond group, it's 61st acquisition.

No response from the LSE yet with regards to my Foxtons shareholder enquiry but I guess their in-tray must be quite full after the Summer recess (yeah right!) .

https://propertyindustryeye.com/lomond-expands-into-london-after-completing-acquisition-of-well-established-estate-agency/#comments

Don't worry my wife is a lawyer and is writing to the LSE in the morning for clarification on both that latest RNS holdings timing as well as the current shareholder list confirmation.

Need to be careful on the link you shared. If the total-up the values of those biggest shareholdings, you get more than the current market cap. So it’s not accurate somehow

Ok, we've seen many reasonable large shareholding movements in Foxtons over the Summer months most notably Martin Currie's 15.7m trade which considering the NMS of Foxtons of just 15,000 shares you would have thought may have had an effect on the share price...........nah not one bit of it !!

With Platinum Investment selling a few as well as SIM, Converium and the Australian Retirement fund the major shareholder list of Foxtons hasn't really changed since the publication of Foxtons 2023 finals (Page 130).

Or has it ???

Remember last year I posted on here all those large volumes in Foxtons shares outside the main UK exchange but no-one seemed to know anything about them or buried their heads in the sand denying all knowledge.

Well, guess what I think I've found their home, remember I mentioned that I thought BC Partners may come back in for Foxtons, well scroll down halfway in this link to 'major shareholders' of Foxtons.

I nearly choked on my Tiger prawn salad whilst on the beach during my holiday !

https://companyresearch.digitallook.com/cgi-bin/dlmedia/security.cgi?csi=201993&action=deals&username=1039117&ac=208286

I make it 26% up on last August, MajorTom. But stock levels are down a bit, and as Sain points out, the prime areas are not doing as well as outer areas.

If you click on the link and scroll down to the holders of Foxtons shares and click again on the institution names you will see that MCIM had actually completed the deal at the end of June no less !!!!

So where was all this volume in the market and why has it taken so long for an RNS to be issued ??

It seems to me and judging by the rest of the market that the purchase of 15,700,000 shares of Foxtons by Martin Currie Investment Management (MCIM) announced last week has gone rather unnoticed, coincidence or by design ??

Let's look a bit closer at the details.

The RNS printed was on the 21st August 2024 after the deal was supposedly completed on the 14th August 2024.

Hmmmm, so that's an RNS in the middle of August and in the height of the Summer holiday season when everyone is away from their desks and on holiday when the transaction was completed a week ago.

Now take a look at the RNS again and scroll down to where it states that the place of the transaction took place. It doesn't take a genius to know that MCIM Edinburgh is based in Scotland but the 'place of completion ' states it was done in Fort Lauderdale USA !!!

What is the connection between MCIM and Fort Lauderdale I hear you ask, well it's Franklin Resources, an American multinational company and with MCIM comes under the umbrella company The Franklin Templeton Group.

https://markets.ft.com/data/equities/tearsheet/profile?s=FOXT:LSE

Sales are up in August circa 15% v last year by my calcualtions-Sepmeber is the mnth that defines the year now

Yes Lettings certainly holding their own.

The portals don't tell the true pictire of sales revenue.

Foxtons do provide a discrete service for the discerning vendor with transactions operating below the radar

Yet Foxtons only enjoy a very small slice of this pie. 6 figure fees are few and far between .Their diet is more mundane fare.

Dont' think Trevor Abrahamson is troubled very much by Foxtons in The Bishops Avenue.

Still really only firing on 3 cylinders. Many branches with an average of over 26 weeks listing time

Some with over 33 % of sales inventory 6 months or longer

South Ken

Healthy sales inventory of 100 (accc.to ZPL) Yet only 9 U/'O. or SSTC .35 listed 6 months or longer

One would hope that there are a few transactions taking place which are not troubling the portals but still very pedestrian..

More positively of course is that with lettings powering it only needs to improve slightly on the sales side for a real lift

Certainly plenty to play for with the current SP

And this was also good reading whilst soaking up the sun and sipping a Margherita on the beach :-

https://www.foxtons.co.uk/reports/lettings-report/lettings-market-report-july-2024

Whilst away on holiday and in between playing a few rounds of golf we got talking to an estate agent who is well regarded in the West End of London, who will remain nameless for obvious reasons.

He said that so far this year has been one of his best years for sales but not to Joe public. All the quality homes that are coming to the market are being snapped up by banks, hedge funds, AirBnB and private equity and that's even before they are listed on all the media outlets.

What we see on rightmove, Zoopla and even on the Foxtons website are just the dreggs that they don't want to touch(flats especially).

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/ivan-ninkovi%C4%87-458856b7_readysetfoxtons-wegetitdone-foxtons-activity-7226103651251998720-Fuwu

August has been relatively quiet which is usual All set for a bright future when it gets more active.

Shoreditch going great guns but Clerkenwell pedestrian on the sales front .

Acc.toZPL

Current sales inventory of 55 with either 13 U/O or SSTC

Average sales listing time of 32weeks.

Nah, not a bit of it !!

I'm back and refreshed from a nice holiday break, I hope you are all too and whilst I was away I managed to do some light research and will post some very interesting bits of information I found with regards to Foxtons.

We know that there are those people wearing dark glasses looking in here as well as the Foxtons management and I 'm sure they will enjoy my posts throughout this week.

To kick things off, I've seen that Foxtons are still smashing performance records and the link below is just one of many that I read over the Summer and as we end the 3rd quarter of this financial year next month expect another record for Foxtons in Q4 with all areas contributing to the company's success.

Nice link :-

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/jenalyn-masalunga-marla-b6b02288_in-june-foxtons-shoreditch-broke-their-record-activity-7228039735405940736-6aVw

Https://www.edisongroup.com/research/valuation-offers-100-upside/33897/?j=250504&sfmc_sub=20657603&l=715_HTML&u=7452727&mid=536001663&jb=1

Sector is ripe for some M&A activity

Success of TPFG & Belvoor will be an encouragment

Somebody must be itching to have a pop

Just a bot of patience here methinks

Changed my view on this. I don't see this anytime soon. Recent director purchases would indicate there is nothing that the company knows about upcoming as trading in the company's own stock ahead of a known bid would be considered trading on inside info.

I think we are stuck in the 60's for the foreseeable.For this reason I'm thinking of bailing, so good news for other holders as for sure the day after I sell there will be a bid at a 50% premium!

It will be 4 months next week since it was announced they were exploring a sale.

Admittedly we have had an election during that time to interrupt proceedings.

Yet still surprising complete radio silence

Certainly wouldn't view that as lack of interest and wouldn't be at all surprised one was forthcoming

if not now,when?

I take back most of what I said. Cashflows are poor but for justifiable reasons (working capital movements as they said): https://x.com/F15JCM/status/1820421601814286648

Presentation could be clearer IMO

Thanks for your reply..lots of food for thought

No, billing cycles are just background noise (or wilful distraction if I were to be cynical). The very poor (-£0.9m) cashflow is due to lease payments which aren't included in the operating numbers, hence the operating profit figures hugely flatter the actual performance of the business (which isn't very good).

Lease repayments were £6.5m in H1 alone. If you treated those as an operating cost (which to everyone but accountants, they are), it would reduce PBT for H1 to only £1m. This makes the business look incredibly expensive against its £200m mcap.

They are paying the dividends from borrowings. I reckon this might actually be a good short given there seems to be froth in the price from bid speculation.

And no doubt like clockwork we'll get the City A.M. article over the weekend that Mr 4% has sold as well !!

😂

Hardly selling down.

.02% amounts to c.61k shares.

M & A activity just around the corner one way or another imo. Hold for gold ...

It's nothing to do with MM's. Look at today's RNS. We see selling down by insti's. This weeks presentation was ho hum. It's be a long walk north from here unless a bid materialises, which is now looking unlikely to me.

...back under £200m !!

Yeah, right.

No-one's falling for the MMs games but keep calling them down over August and I'll be more than happy to keep adding along the way !