Roundtable Discussion; The Future of Mineral Sands. Watch the video here.
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I can see the markets are not the best at the moment but I hope the next RNS from ITX is a good one cos a nearly 25% loss in two days is painful.
I am satisfied after yesterday's presentation. Never a nice thing to prevent loss of a customer.
I got the sense that there are bigger projects in the background. It would be nice to have an RNS everytime we signed up a new customer.
Interesting to see what happens in the leather business.
Sorry all but think I missed this - they said they'd be issuing an RNS shortly relating to a new product? That's quite exciting if so.
Oh and IF JS could improve GM further in 2024 towards 40% overall plus revenue growth towards $9M (not expected - I know) we are then looking at a breakeven year. ie the EBITDA loss of this pass year is history. It’ll be interesting to monitor further shipments.
Hi DB
Will double check that and update my spreadsheet, must have totally missed that, apologies.
You do not buy in all that raw materials without there being an end product, maybe a combination of leather products and the possibility that the revenue that was reduced for this year is more than likely not lost, but will magically materialise again very soon, must be very costly for the merchandisers to re-formulate and lose all that sustainability credentials as well?
ATB
AJP
Thanks for this AJP but if I read that link you posted correctly Chemtan received 4 shipments - 3 in Feb 24 1 in March, meaning 160T so far for this year. It looks like leather treatment is indeed becoming a big deal. And hopefully at juicy Gross Margins.
Thanks AJP - sounds from call today there will be a near term RNS for any new diversification client wins so lets await that soon. Cheers
Hi Doughboy/Elsol
These are the shipments of raw materials over the past 2 years or so, we just had another shipment late March 2024, which makes it 120 Tonnes so far this year, which would suggest to me that there must be something in the pipeline ingredient wise to cover this, Bio Astrix leather products?
1 16/06/2022 COHECTASE2035082 Itaconix 19800 20PKG
2 03/07/2022 KLSQTAOKW2204354 Itaconix 19800 20PKG
3 04/08/2022 EXDO62Y0220197 Itaconix 19800 20PKG
4 25/08/2022 EXDO62Y0220796 Itaconix 19800 20PKG
5 15/10/2022 KLSQTAOKW2208079 Itaconix 39600 40PKG
6 19/03/2023 TXSLQD2302Y376 Chemtan/Itaconix 19800 20PKG
7 19/03/2023 TXSLQD2302Y375 Chemtan/Itaconix 39600 40PKG
8 02/05/2023 UULNQD23030547 Chemtan 19800 20PKG
9 01/07/2023 TXSLQD2305Y361 Chemtan/Itaconix 59400 60PKG
10 09/02/2024 UULNQD23120454 Chemtan 39600 40PKG
11 15/02/2024 UULNQD24010550 Chemtan 39600 40PKG
12 25/03/2024 https://www.seair.co.in/us-import/product-itaconic-acid/i-chemtan-co-inc.aspx Chemtan 39600 40PKG
Last entry not showing on Import Genius for some reason, but appears on two other sites I use, have copied in the link.
ATB
AJP
For an armchair investor like me, this type of company is exactly what ISAs are for. In now, next to other speculative efforts, then check back later. Fundamentally good in the long term I’m sure, short term not fun enough for the day traders out there!
Good luck and may your patience never wear thin.
Worth a watch, maybe a bit more concise.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XISX0v54wig
ATB
AJP
Interesting presentation - nothing really added to the RNS, but an honest appraisal as to where we are.
In response to a question and if I heard Laura correctly, the 'lost' merchandiser was not a direct customer, but an intermediary supplying two of our customers.
JS also intimated that these 'lost customers' will have to replace ITX formulations with ones which are petroleum-based. So if they have an eco-conscience, may be all is not lost and they may return to the ITX fold at some time in the near future.
Long presentation and a lot of questions. So here is my honest take on today and whether now is the right time to invest or not.
Positives:
1. The company clearly justified its decision and reasoning regarding its largest customer. Feels like the door is still open there.
2. Really liked all the graphics. They illustrated gross margins of 72% in hygiene and 63% in beauty which are very impressive.
3. Clear explanation on super absorbents and the company are 100% right to get the product right first. It has to match or be superior to existing products to justify the premium.
4. Glad they are going to be pushing investment in Itaconix outside the U.K. I noticed there are listings for Itaconix in France (18GO.F) and Germany (18GO.SG and 18GO.DU).
5. Overall the company is doing all the right things.
Negatives
1. Unless the company wins back their largest customer of 2023 revenues for 2024 will be lower than 2023. We all know why that it but the market will focus on cold hard numbers.
2. As a result of point 1 the next trading update for 2024 H1 will be underwhelming (unless it does a deal with its largest customer).
3. As was repeatedly said break even and all numbers have shifted back 12 months.
My overall conclusion therefore is that the company is a good long term investment. I’m just not convinced that now is the time to invest. I am worried that there will be share price drift until the next really positive RNS. So I’m going to maintain a watchful wait for when best to reinvest.
So my final question re: issuing RNS for new 1st diversification wins --> mgt expect to issue one in next few months - great! I expect this is a "leather" based channel since its always been one of the first in the list for textual updates and also in the last RNS majors on this.
The leather area seems to be the closest major diversification channel 24/25/26 so for John to articulate in such a granular fashion I'm guessing orders are now very close indeed and Im suspecting was a key trade-off consideration for the loss of lower profitability detergent customer. He keeps waving his tan shoes everywhere but lets see the stilettos now!
John said that negotiations are still ongoing with lost customer which is interesting and a potential upside that could easily come back.
Discussions with North American customer 'ongoing'.
So they've not gone away completely then. It's just a stand-off... for now.
Hi
https://jingbotanics.com/products/the-revitalising-hair-and-scalp-serum
https://www.beautyindependent.com/new-brand-jing-botanics-eastern-flair-scalp-care/
ATB
AJP
Gross Margin up to 31% is very impressive. All cashed up as well, This looks a lot better than some of my other investments for sure.
It will be very interesting to see how quickly the freed up capacity is used up - a real gauge of how Itaconix and its products are regarded by the chemical market.
John has been saying for a while now that he expects Itaconic to become a large company - a bounce back this trading year will go a long way to validating that claim.
Canaccord Genuity has published a new research note on:
Itaconix plc.
Please click on the below title to see the full release:
FY results: strong cash flow.
Anyone who has an account to view this and can summarise please?
Interesting that we had revenue shown for Bio Asterix in 2022 but none in 2023, if someone could ask for clarification on this during the presentation that would be helpful, I will be at work.
Agree though, very upbeat and positive.
Looking good.
'Our balance sheet now gives us freedom to drive revenue growth from our current ingredients, the opportunity for us to develop new ingredients, and the ability to grow revenues from our itaconate technology platform.'
ATB
It looks like an extremely good set of results and a very promising outlook.
Hopefully we can replace the North American low margin customer quickly, although it wouldn't surprise me if they came back to the table. Negotiating takes all sorts.
Looking forward to the presentation later.
Agreed SI, looks like they traded off one weak profit contract in pursuit of upsides elsewhere. Will be good to see later today during management meet me call with Q &A
It was the outlook part of the statement that interested me. Hopefully we will get more insight this afternoon:
“We are pursuing growth from other existing customers and from new accounts with a view to replenishing this revised expectation with higher margin revenues.
“Our balance sheet provides us with new opportunities to target higher revenue growth. There are many exciting opportunities for us to develop new ingredients and increase revenues and we are positioning ourselves to better capture the commercial value of our performance ingredients with new customer wins, new volumes in non-detergent uses, and important new product development initiatives.”