Member Info for Agricore

Https://www.investorschronicle.co.uk/tips-ideas/2002/01/02/latest-update-companies-smashing-broker-forecasts/

VLG among those forecast by IC to grow earnings.

Aggregate Broker forecast EPS next 12 months has grown from 5.3p -> 6.7p up 23%) from 3 months ago to today.

6.7p EPS on a 32p buy puts VLG on a PE of 4.77

Another presentation from CEO Frank Bedu-Addo of PDS. Q2 results out on Monday (14th)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tf8FGxVJ3SI

Nothing new - but it sums up why PDS has exciting prospects with its Phase 3 Trial and the Fast Track Designation.

Lolly,

Whilst the Edison article related to GROW, the source of the data I was quoting in Exhibit 17 was Pitchbook and was based on trends in the wider venture capital market for Q1 2023 relating to net asset values. So you've now dismissed both Bloomberg and Pitchbook as credible sources of data but have been unable, throughout, to give any cogent reason why.

This isn't about Molten, this isn't about £60k fees. This isn't about Molten's 70 holdings. Do you not remember we were discussing your contradictory dismissal and acceptance (in the same sentence) of the "totally academic" nature of net asset values? Your fantasy illogical "divestment mechanisms" for TEK too? It is only 1 or 2 posts ago, surely it's not that complicated? The reason I offered further evidence was you claimed the world had changed. Now it's proven the world of Venture Capital hasn't changed, you resort to base insults instead?

As you say, life's too short. It's past time to just put you on ignore.

Within Edison's latest note on GROW even during Q1 2023 the mix of up rounds/flat/down rounds were 72%, 10%, 19% respectively.

Source: (https://www.edisongroup.com/research/cash-is-king/32516/), Exhibit 17: Share of VC deal count by up/down/flat rounds

In other words, in 4 out of 5 times, based on $1bn of follow ons, even in Q1 2023 the valuation for further funding was was where NAV was either **holding up** or **actually too low**.

Good to see how the world treats NAV valuations in 2023 hasn't changed since Bloomberg's long term findings in 2016 despite today's stock price (which is at or close to despair based on sentiment). It made no sense it would have changed, and that's demonstrated by the facts.

Looking at Tern today reminds me of one of those fair ground rides which violently drop you back towards the ground.

Back to GROW I was encouraged to read in Edison's latest note that even during Q1 2023 the mix of up rounds/same /down rounds were 72%, 10%, 19% respectively. (The data used was from Pitchbook)

(https://www.edisongroup.com/research/cash-is-king/32516/)

In other words, 4/5 times the NAV is either holding up or actually too low. That's a very positive fact, combined with the fact that GROW has cash reserves to tread water while the market improves.

It seems Tectonic have today answered the question I pondered 2 days ago "what is radioactive?", and confirmed the positive potential upside to the "bad news":

To quote:

"This is worth understanding in more technical detail as the source of the radiation is weakly radioactive thorium, a Rare Earth Element (REE) found in monazite. The HMS ores at Walviskop include economic concentrations of rutile, zircon, and monazite. Rutile and zircon are widely used with a range of industrial applications. Monazites are less well known, but are rare earth minerals typically comprising thorium, lanthanum and cerium. Lanthanum and its neighbour on the periodic table, cerium, are used in high end lighting applications, think flat screen TVs and iPhones. Thorium is used in heat resistant ceramics and platinum catalytic converters in diesel engines on cars, trucks, ships and trains. The elevated radiation readings in the Kazera testing should be understood as evidence that the ores contain valuable monazites. With China’s recent restrictions on the export of certain REEs, this is a positive outcome for Tectonic. "

Perhaps the gross profit of $200/tonne may be revised upwards. Excited to wait and see!

Astounding that you can still buy in right now at a 0.861p offer.

Lolly,

1/ You believe long-term statistics from Bloomberg can be dismissed because "the market's completely different today". How have the way valuations are carried out in M&A changed in the past 7 years? You offer no facts. Most people would consider long-term statistical averages from Bloomberg to be highly credible, myself included. How has the way businesses buy (and value) other businesses changed in 2023 compared to all the years up to 2016? Makes no sense.

2/ Isn't it a contradiction to say in the same sentence "I'm not disputing the NAV prices" and "NAV is completely academic". Which do you believe? Makes no sense.

3/You speak of a "divestment mechanism" and point to LUCY's initial market price and subsequent fall as evidence of "froth in the price". Let's go back to August 2022. $7.35m was raised in difficult markets. This was for about 9% of LUCY. The only divestment mechanism possible would have been either sell more than 9% (the book runners gauge interest so presumably there was insufficient interest) or for TEK to take the $7.35m raised instead of it remaining in LUCY which would have starved LUCY of these growth funds. That's like transplanting a sapling and taking its food and water. You'd kill the growing tree. Makes no sense.

Let's consider those 9% initial LUCY owners and the alleged "froth in the price". Perhaps you've not thought this through. They are investors like you. When they participate in an IPO they assess the net asset value (regardless of whether you think it academic), as well as its growth prospects, and (crucially) how much cash it has and will be burning - its runway - the potential upside and downside. If TEK had said we're keeping the cash and we're selling you a stake in something that has no cash and we no longer believe in how many shares would they have sold? The IPO would have failed. TEK's asset could be worth zero today, starved of cash, rather than an admittedly low £3.27m or 1.8p/share. Your belief that TEK could have somehow hoodwinked people into paying above the odds for "froth" and whisk out the money perhaps to pay us TEK shareholders a special dividend is frankly ludicrous. Makes no sense.

Yesterday's announcement increases ownership of the Enphys management co. to 30%.

The $2.5m investment provides a fair value uplift of its Enphys holding of $6.4m thus being a FVTPL of $3.9m or £3.1m.

Compared to yesterday's close price putting the (whole) market cap of IX at £17.6m this "should" have been a 17.5% or 3.5p uplift to the share price. Instead the increase was zero.

Enphys has an impressive team led by Jorge De Pablo with a success track record in this space. The Chair, CFO (none other than the CEO of IX) and COO have similar impressive track records.

Enphys Inc is a SPAC sitting on $345m of equity. This money would be used towards buying the asset. IX owns the management co who run the asset. The target asset is an undisclosed $1bn - $1.5bn asset (or assets) in Latin America. So the asset will be 25%-33% equity funded with the rest via debt. The enphys management company should/could earn 1%-2% gross returns suggesting that that could be worth $10m-$30m of fees per annum less expenses of a generous $4m and on a 10X price earnings would suggest a valuation of between $60m-$260m (as opposed to today's $16.7m valuation). In other words there remains a completion risk in the price (by quite some degree) where the market ascribes a 27%-93% chance of failure. ($16.7m vs $60-$260m)

LatAm has some of the lowest costs (called LCOE) for both solar, wind and hydro. Others such as President Energy have already done extremely well from this. Green hydrogen is maturing as a technology so some form of energy export asset is a possibility here too.

Given their track records and the fact that the equity is already raised and waiting (and has appreciated by 4.5% this year) there seems to be a major mismatch here - in other words IX seems insanely cheap. Just based on a Enphys alone when this is only the #2 holding. (I've written previously about Wastefuel which has bright prospects, backed by BP, and the number of methanol powered ships continues to grow)

Given the 30% pull back and yesterday's news I've doubled my holding here. The Enphys have got the Tshirt and are aiming at completion in the next few months.

GLA

1/ The interim results. Last year they were 15th August.

2/ Hopefully, too, the well test results. On 5th June "the workover operations on the Sabria N-2 well in Tunisia have been completed. Having successfully removed wellbore restrictions and recompleted the well, the Company has mobilised surface testing equipment to the well site to evaluate well production. Upon completion of the testing program the Company will make a further announcement with the testing results."

Quite what takes over 2 months to test I do not know. Test 1 does it squirt oil? Test 2 how much? Test 3... round of golf anyone?

Tulsatel, you make a good point. I think we can agree Bell will do well through its link with McKesson via a mix of X-plor, and once it’s signed off via Discov-R.

Hammerhead announce a positive Q2 albeit with lower short term profits https://www.hhres.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/2023-08-Hammerhead-Corporate-Presentation_vF.pdf

Lolly

Yes, you do give this same argument with some regularity.

Statistics are NOT on your side. The fact is that historically Bloomberg tells us average buy outs are at a 10%-50% **PREMIUM** to NAV: (Source: https://www.wallstreetprep.com/knowledge/premiums-in-ma/)

To quote: "The vast majority (83%) of global M&A deals in 2016 had premiums between 10-50%, according to Bloomberg. When Microsoft acquired LinkedIn on June 13, 2016, it paid $196 per share, representing a 49.5% premium over LinkedIn’s closing share price of $131.08 per share the day prior to the deal announcement.

Premiums tend to be higher in strategic deals (one company acquiring another company) as opposed to financial deals (a private equity firm acquiring a company). That’s because a strategic acquirer often gains cost savings (synergies) from the newly combined firm that increases how much it can afford to pay."

Now the better question might be to consider are TEK's holdings strategic? Are they valuable to someone?

Would the likes of Philips sniff around at BELL? Would the likes of Luxottica sniff around at LUCY? Waymo at Guident? Unilever or Pepsi at Microsalt?

Let's examine your argument further:

1/ >> your holding prices are totally unrealistic.

These are not my holding prices. They are TEK's net asset values and current market prices. What the company believes is the fair value of its assets minus its liabilities..... it doesn't make these numbers up. There are rules in accountancy to determine what is fair. If you believe they are "totally unrealistic" then you should take this up with TEK's auditors not me. They signed them off as fair.

2/ >>if it tried to offload all its shares in one go:

You seem to be assuming that TEK's only way to have any value is sell its shares in the open market and all at once. M&A is a much more likely route. In any case, for something to be worth something you don't need to offload it all in one go. For example, you own shares in TEK (presumably) and they are worth something aren't they? Even though you've not offloaded them. Your argument makes less and less sense.

3/ >> a divestment mechanism at IPO stage, when there’s usually more froth in the price.

The IPO was a partial divestment mechanism?!!!!! TEK went from holding all of LUCY to part of LUCY ergo the partial divestment. I disagree there's usually more froth in the price - where's your evidence for that? The reason LUCY floated was to list the holding (turn it from private to publicly listed) but also to provide capital for its growth. It had 100% uptake of the shares remember?? LUCY has since been victim of unforgiving markets where growth is bad, small is bad - most of the Russell 2000 are doing terribly. Outside the magnificent 7 there are plenty of quality high growth US companies doing just as badly as LUCY. I'm optimistic on LUCY - but I don't see much of a future for your arguments.

>> Orders for 2024/2025.

Because it was a relative comparison and assuming in 2022 people were placing orders for 2024 then the point of 30% growth still stands. But I don't believe retailers are placing orders 9-18 months ahead. These are healthcare FMCG items not aircraft. 6 months is a reasonable number in that market. A family member worked for P&G and still works in FMCG so I am basing that on facts I know. Also we do know from past VLG updates, customers have been *committing* to orders for months ahead due to supply chain disruption and ensure supply of stocks. VLG are very circumspect of the order book due to commercial confidentiality but I disagree with the concern that growth in the order book isn't a reasonable predictor of booked sales. The key word is "committing". What's changed?

>> "the tone from management is overly cautious"

Having managed through a difficult period of years and a previous Chinese distribution partner disaster, I am not surprised! Overly cautious suggests scope for potential upside to me.

Let's think about similar companies engaged in HMS and their latest results and grades:

1. Someone getting very excited about Chilwa which has 3.9% HMS content. Because "There has been a global underinvestment in heavy mineral sands projects over the past decade." Nice to hear. But KZG has 49.9%.

(Source: https://www.sharecafe.com.au/2023/07/06/searching-for-heavy-mineral-sands-and-rare-earth-elements-in-africa/)

2. Image Resources "flagged an updated ore reserve at Atlas of 5.5Mt at 9.4 per cent total heavy minerals,". 9.4%? Nice but KZG is 49.9%.

(Source: https://www.businessnews.com.au/article/Image-Resources-upbeat-for-mineral-sands-production-in-2023)

3. Base Resources "The heavy mineral (HM) grade of ore mined in the quarter was lower at 3.0% (last quarter: 3.9%) due to the lower grades associated with the North Dune. 3%? KZG is 49.9%

(Source: https://wcsecure.weblink.com.au/pdf/BSE/02689519.pdf)

4. Grade for the quarter was 4.03%. Despite this "Cash generation has remained strong, supported by product pricing and shipments. In addition to paying record dividends and scheduled debt repayments, the business has continued to build cash. In line with our capital allocation policy, we are considering a share buyback of approximately $30 million. A further update will be provided with our H1 2023 results in mid-August.”. 4.03%? KZG has 49.9%

(Source: https://ir.q4europe.com/Solutions/Kenmare2018tf/3908/newsArticle.aspx?storyid=15823758)

5. Iluka 4.7% grades of HMS. Yet achieve an EBITDA margin of 53%. KZG has a 49.9% grade.

https://www.iluka.com/media/u3nbgflj/quarterly-review-to-31-march-2023.pdf

One can conclude a significant opportunity for Kazera once the radioactivity question is resolved. Let's not forget the marine diamonds.

But is Walkiskorp about to get even more significant?

1. CREO Design's JORC noted Zircon and rutile accounted for 1.2% and 0.92% *on the beach*. Will it prove higher in the surf?

2. What is Radioactive? Monazite is usually the culprit. What does it contain? Thorium (there is growing interest in using this as a nuclear fuel), and less often Uranium, but frequently rare earths are found too.

(Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monazite)

Could thre be commercial viability of Thorium/Uranium/REE extraction? If these are commercially available this could be a further game changer. It's not unheard of. Iluka in the above links does this.

But let's not get carried away. Remember, we don't need to. Afran was sold for the equivalent of 1.2p a share so you're getting these HMS (plus anything else) for free and a quarter of your money back at current prices. And a future 2.5% of lithium & tantalum revenue from Aftan. Free too are the diamonds - DeepBlue or marine.

Happy Sunday.

If you visit the BELL board I explore why the McKesson news is a major catalyst which the market does not (yet) understand

Tacly, So if you bought 3 years ago RGL was 80p, and you bought just after a large drop in NAV and after the April covid price recovery. A strange time to buy. But if you are 25% down you must have bought at 62.6p so you didn't buy 3 years ago. But let's keep going. In 3 years you've received 20p of dividends, so net cost is 42.6p, and you own assets worth 73.5p/share so 30.9p more, albeit you're looking at a 14.4p loss on your screen. You're receiving a fully covered yield of 10.53%.

You've not taken the opportunity to average down. If you had, say at 42.6p, the recent low, your overall buy price would now be 52.63p less your dividends your net cost would be 32.63p. You'd own a share worth 47p your yield would be 12.5% at that cost price and you'd own assets worth 40.87p more than your net cost price.

I've not taken into account inflation, and netting dividends from the buy price might be seen as a bit naughty but I rationalise my investments based on intrinsic value (which is based on Buffett's approach to valuing assets).

So you are up or down, really, depending on your perspective on your 'investment' and what actions you could have taken to improve your position.

Interesting to note that Waymo has launched services into Phoenix, LA and SF. While Cruise in Phoenix, Austin and SF

(Source: https://waymo.com/waymo-one/)&(https://getcruise.com/rides/)

Waymo's approach is to have 2 computers. The 2nd monitors the 1st. And who monitors the monitors? Sorry, flashback from the film enemy of the state.

(Source: https://ltad.com/about/waymos-backup-systems.html)

Cruise's approach is to stop the car and call 911.

(Source: https://getcruise.com/safety/)

How they will launch a service into Florida, Germany or many other States and countries introducing legislation concerning back up systems for autonomous vehicles.

There's no cabability with either system to remotely drive the vehicle. However both have remote monitoring centres and sometimes Waymo drivers sit in a Robotaxi. To quote "Oftentimes, passengers will find Waymo-trained drivers in the cars. These trained drivers are onboard to make sure passengers have a great experience, and they serve as backup drivers only." (Source: https://ltad.com/about/passengers.html). Well that must cost quite a bit!

It's encouraging to note that a/ there's a gap in both of these robotaxi offerings b/ these services have actually launched. Robotaxis are Science Fact not Fiction.

Guident is on the books for 9.7p/share. That's a book value, not a market value. Did you see what happened yesterday over at Tern when there was an announcement about Wyld talking to SpaceX about potential collaboration? So not a penny of revenue nor profit, no contract signed. But the talks made a 126% gain. Is a similar announcement possible for Guident? Not just from one of 2 robotaxi firms either. Car Manufacturers. Drone Manufacturers. Aircraft Manufacturers. Tractors and Farm Machinery. Bus manufacturers. Truck Mfrs. Post/delivery firms....

So if 9.7p goes up by 126% suddenly Guident is worth 21.9p/share (NAV).

Let's not forget that for 0.5p more (10.2p TEK buy price minus Guident 9.7p) you get 12.2p/share of listed or imminently listed shares (as at 4th August 2023).

LUCYD - TEK holds 5,189,086 shares @ $0.80 = £3.27m = 1.8p/share (Publicly traded)

BELL - TEK holds 15,138,767 shares @ £0.34 = £5.15m = 2.9p/share (Public traded)

Microsalt - TEK holds 97.2% = £13.37m = 7.5p/share (Imminent IPO)

Each with their own story, their own catalysts why they, too, might jump on news.

GLA

And to put a bit more colour on the significance of the McKesson deal. Their US market share is about 38% (Source: https://csimarket.com/stocks/competitionSEG2.php?code=MCK)

And there are 34 million Americans with respiratory conditions: (Source:

https://www.grandviewresearch.com/industry-analysis/north-america-oxygen-concentrator-market)

To hit the forecasts laid out by Dowgate (6250 in 2023, 20000 in 2024, 40000 in 2025) totalling 62,500 over 2.5 years so that's only 1 in 1283 Americans with a respiratory condition.

12.9m Americans according to the data use McKesson. (38% of 34m)

So in the next 2.5 years BELL need to sell to 1 in 206 McKesson customers with a respiratory condition.

Go back to my other post and play Top Trumps again. Will fewer than 1 in 200 of McKesson's customers want a POC which is quieter, mobile, lighter and comes with a health app on your phone?

The market does not appear to understand the significance of the McKesson deal.

Apologies TMT's holding in BLZE is $25m including a partial cash exit.

TMT's half year's results are also due in 2 weeks. Last year it was 18th August.

Of course Cenkos is not alone in positive feelings towards Backblaze. The lowest upside forecast is +60% and the highest is +125%. https://www.nasdaq.com/market-activity/stocks/blze/analyst-research

Q2 Results are out next Tuesday so it'll be interesting to see progress. TMT holds about $20m of BLZE stock which is about 23% of the value of its market cap. In other words the forecast upside in BLZE alone could be worth 12%-30% upside to TMT's share price.