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Just seen this news , just as well as RNS this morning broker buy back instruction to buy at a max of 111.32p
Wow they made 1m ebidta in November alone. Profits for year nearly 6m pbt. With big cost savings in 2022. 700k Euros.
This firm was way under valued!
sadly not when your average is £300. watched this get devalued, name change, devalued for the last 5 years. was waiting for the boom they kept promising. You live and learn
So a private equity firm has looked at this and realised the firm will be making a lot of money in 2022 and small shareholder have options to cash out. As Morton and CEO own 60% here it will get voted through on the nod. I had hoped this would reach 200p. Reality is they needed cash to expand and this deal will give them 20m or so to do so. Not done the maths. So 111p is better than 38p. Worth more than 111p now? Hmmmm. If you don't take offer you get nothing?
https://www.telummedia.com/public/news/telum-talks-to-brian-tyson-deputy-ceo-of-sec-newgate-and-managing-partner-of-sec-newgate-australia/z0v802n9lq
Very positive interview where Brian keeps saying how well the business is doing and how they offer a one shop boutique which now is based over many countries across the world. Month old but not suprising given recent RNS. Aus area has recently hired 2 new partners.
Publicasity in UK also seem to be hiring several staff. Could this really start to take off here? Makes 2022 quite exciting if they do more acquisitions. Huge difference from Porta days where operations kept closing. I think Porta just lacked a strong European base to build from. Plus ran out of cash to do what they wanted.
https://*********************/companies/uk/other/sec-newgate-spa/research/arden-partners/sec-newgate-good-trading-update-optimistic-outlook/15_4292
They reiterate buy with view that further acquisitions should give strong sp movement. Couldn't see full report or price.
Has anyone seen this or know what it said.
Nice update. Cross selling going well and the integrated process paying off. Will we see buying beyond Morton transferring funds. Would be nice to get a broker upgrade as its been 9 months since 89p rating.
Next update could also be a US or China acquisition. With further cost savings next year this could be good. Twister moving will have cost savings too no doubt. Sooner or later dial must shift here.
Okay tired eyes last night. They are actually moving more shares into the HHL fund now and not away from. They own 29.66% of SECN for now. So if they are moving all the shares this could go on years at this rate. Not sure what their plan is.
Had a further look at this. The last RNS from Morton did vary from it's 2019 RNS.
Sep 2019. 846,698 (HIHL) 6,335,183 (RGL)
May 2021 1,096,698 (HIHL) 6,085,183 (RGL)
So 250k exchange between the 2 funds. Could be for tax reasons or just clearing HHL stake of it's fund to another area.
I figure another 200k shares has now been moved since the May RNS. Are they obliged to report only when each part of fund crosses a threshold? On that basis there is 650k or so more shares to move.
I think a few of the trades could of been PI but I really doubt there is much spare stock on the market right now.
I don't believe they are allowed to go over 30% here as he would have to make offer for the company. Also no idea how he is doing health wise. Albeit it's likely his sons are running things.Given there losses here and the profits now flowing into SECN it would take an offer well above 90p to get them to sell here. They are dead on 29.99% here.
All of this explains why the SP rarely moves prices here as the fund is pretty much setting market prices. Hence why few directors could be buying if limited stock.
A solid H2 and strong TU must push this higher at some point. They are posting a lot of 2 year notifications of Porta/Secn all saying how well things are going. Another video saying they have been a part of 10-11 IPO deals.
On another forum a poster suggests they are looking for new deals in China and US to strengthen their footholds there. So expansion should continue. Just need to wait for the news. Not sure when they will announce. PR timing no doubt.
2022 cost reductions on rent must be good news too. Overall ignore the day to day trades here and focus on the news as Mortons total number of shares has not changed.
4 trades today. Two are delayed buys. Bizarre how SP dropped before results and now shares soaked back up. Hold your nerves!
Good article from PRWeek. Mostly quoting the results. Results much earlier than usual. No operations have closed. I do wonder how much furlough grants they are still getting. Why could Porta never make these profits?
https://www.prweek.com/article/1726067/sec-newgate-reports-solid-h1-industry-returns-pre-covid-19-levels
yeh ND/EBITDA now at c 4.3x which compares to 3.1x last year.
though adjust for lease liab, leverage = 2.5x vs last year 1.4x
still the underlying business momentum is supporting the debt burden imo
Been drifting past 2 weeks due to a seller. H2 last year was stronger than H1. Plus numbers include 3 months of German firm. Debt is now almost 18m?
Still making money. No mention of a dividend. Australia star performer again. UK seems stagnant in terms of revenue.
Think there is a lack of trust from market as Morton still 30% shareholder. No sign of new funds biting here.
I was expecting share to be higher than this. Not as though they are losing money anymore. New operations doing well. Cost savings from office moves next year too.
expensive spread but it will be worth it when it's 50% higher... relative valuation speak for themselves...
Advertising & Marketing peers in Bloomberg forward P/E average 55x Median 25x.
SEC Newgate fwd P/E 13.6x
now looking at fwd P/S
Peers: median = 2.4x average = 3x
SECN: 0.3x !!!!
and fwd EV/EBITDA
Peers: median = 12.2x average 16.7x
SECN: 4.2x
1m back on bottom line. With some costs saved this year for Newington too from July. Market here entirely owned by funds. Pretty much no private trades on that news. Maybe already factored into price. Should give bigger margins for 2022. Where will this head price wise? If they can maintain H2 performance price has to rise here. Unclear what will happen when furlough schemes stop. It could also be clients are holding back on projects too.
See what happens. TU in August?
Trying to work out the numbers as 2019 only included part of Porta full year.
Looking at the groups segment breakdown this is quite revealing. Australia turning over 17m euros. 27% of the overall group! That appears to be where a lot of the profits are coming from. It was the same for Porta back in the day with Asia providing 1.5m+ profit. Singapore doing very well too but about tenth of size of Australian operation.
Revenue in Italy seems to of taken a big hit here. Down by 5m Euros due to covid?
Poland, Germany and Spain the same albeit they have just acquired a firm in Germany. Revenue for these 3 areas is below 1m each anyway. Belgain and France holding their ground.
China and US revenue seem tiny. Barely 20-70k? Albeit the Segment for N America shows closer to 1.5m. Maybe this was revenue which the UK group took on.
I make 2020 revenue about 38m Euros for the old Porta Group. It was turning over £40m in 2018. However it has made large cost savings. Ditching clients which don't make money.
I think they seem to know what they are dong. There is cash in the bank albeit future financial requirements in the future. They need to buy up more chunks of Australian business.
The big chance here is that profits have gone up but hopefully not just because of government subsidies due to covid. You would expect clients to increase activities when countries return to some kind of normalities.
Pleased that they seem confident about 2021. Moving UK HQ too. Hopefully they will reduce their rental income and use working from home to achieve a lower rent here. I always thought they couldn't afford the London rent.
Seems the cost of loans from Hawkholding are at 6% now. These used to be 12% or so.
As for share moving up we will have to wait for the funds to finish their game of exchanging shares. Next big news will be August or before if they do another takeover. Be interested to see what profit this new German group might add to the bottom line here.
For now happy to hold. No big sell off here.
Seems to me the dial won't shift here till the funds swapping shares are done. These small buys and sells are getting silly.
Sounds like things are going very well H1. We may have to wait for an August TU for more info.
I wonder how much they got in covid grants from government. I see also they are giving out shares now? Zero trades so far which means little stock about or funds not yet swapping stock.
Also unclear how much of these figures come from reduced rent. Need to look through in detail. Not got time right now.
This company has started to turn a corner under its new umbrella. Looks like it was the best direction for porta under sec as expansion and branding starts to pay of hopefully. Maybe one day we will see a return on our porta shares. Market makers moving it up on uncrossed trades tells me they it is a less riskier business that it was once. Figures show that today. Let's see what the future brings .
Thoughts?
10 more shares another 2%.
So 16k worth of sells in week share dips 2% and recovers without any buys. 10 shares purchased today and share up 2%. Even with another 900 or so sell afterwards. Buyer seller fund still exchanging shares?
This tells me someone is soaking up the sold shares here. With likely a big push on the week of the results. Next week.
Could get some Q1 info in results. Will directors still buy at these prices? Any stock left to buy? Any good news could push this to 120p. See what happens.
So someone paid 120p for 23000 shares on 6th.
Been some odd trading going on last 2 days. Lots of trades appearing as buys. With a UT trade yesterday for 97p. Unclear if buys or sells or agreed trades.
Paul Scott had a rant about Porta/secn yesterday saying they used accounting to make bad figures look good when in fact bankrupt. He dumped porta a few years back as he said they had lied to him. I would agree they had painted losses as good news and progress for years. He told Stockopedia investors to stay clear with a bargepole. Ouch.
I think management changes have taken place and David Wright and his allies have now left. Emma Kane seems a very credible business woman. I think they are likely making an actual profit now. Over last 2 years Porta and now Secn have made big cost savings. The headcount at Newgate hq is much lower. i reckon they cut out at least £1m this way. Plus shared rent costs. Plus reductions in rent too?
Secn suggest 3m euros profit. Albeit much will be paid out to third party ownership. Have to see numbers after tax.
At present i think things have turned the corner. This sec merger needed to happen 1-2 years sooner. Judge them on the figures in 2-3 weeks time. At present the market thinks under valued . someone is buying up stock. Azimut? Others?
Still a seller in background here. Difference is the buyer is forcing up price here. So looks like most trades here are funds. The FT update suggesting Azimut had over 3% was removed a few days later. I think the seller has 250-370k of stock. How much of this is cleared i don't know. There are very few private investors here. Could get a 3% rns from them at some point. I always thought Porta needed a merger to reduce Admin costs. I think a further merger here will add more value. Maybe US based. Or even Asia based. Still some markets SECN has not taped yet. China is a huge market. Middle East too.