Expired Warrants - another failure10 Nov 2023 09:25
Back in May 2022 a dilution of share was announced, again, by a company that has a track record of dilution and selling off assets.
The dilution represented 55% of the companies capital. At this point they raised just £2million based on a dilution of 50,000,000 new shares. Tied to this was the prospect of another 90m warrants. This was a fire sale raise for reasons I have documented before.
In addition just over another 51,000,000 shares were offered - 2 million going to the Directors and the rest on open offer.
At this time the down ward spiral from the giddy heights of 2020 was already well under way. The price in May 2022 was just 3.85p. No wonder the huge number of warrants were needed to attract enough to pay out.
This huge dilution was passed at the AGM in early June 2022 but take up was poor. In the end only £2.2m was raised (as per final accounts for 2022). The dilution happened and yet here some seem to be celebrating the fact that since then the company has performed so badly that the fire sale warrants didn't dilute them further.
So here are the questions:
1) Where has all the money gone? Remember, they sold the "Crown Jewels" for £6.4m the same year. They posted they had £5 million left in March (oft quoted here) but that means a cash burn of over £300K a month. Many will argue that those days are behind ODX and so expect cash to be £4m. With consultancy, accreditation and a continued lack of good news (so poor that a one off sale of £50K was published as an RNS) this seems unlikely. Anything less in Novembers figures will confirm the downward spiral.
2) They promised in the 2022 half year results, much to the excitement of some, that EBITDA would break even in 2022 and yet, despite the cash injection they has a £2m loss of EBITDA. Why with the money injected to improve sales and systems were the results so bad? Remember, revenue fell in 2022.
3) What next? The dilution in 2023 was rejected by shareholders once it was pointed out them what a disaster it was for them (again). But they still voted through a blank cheque for the board to do what they want with dilutions should the shareprice get above 4p. It is doubtful many would fall for warrants again so if they need money, which this company has a track record of, then the dilution would need to be of epic proportions. Again.
Finally
4) If the Directors are so confident:
i) Why havent they posted any forward looking guidance for this FY?
ii) Have they taken an additional £300K out of the business in bonuses at a critical investment time?
iii) Haven't bought a higher stake in the business themselves? (For such a small business the shareholding of the board is criminally low)
The best shareholders for a company are those that hold truth to power and act as critical friends. The worst thing anyone can do is place implicit trust in a board that has a bad track record of delivery.
You have been warned. (again)