Member Info for BlahBlahDoh

Bharti Airtel is definitely the parent from which AAF was spun. They are distinct companies, but various Bharti family members hold major positions. To some extent, AAF is reliant on Bharti technology too. Not sure major shareholders necessarily see downside, they are just early backers taking a profit. Long term upside from 140p seems highly likely, imo, with vast opportunity across the continent and a seeming ability to outperform rivals.

Don't know where Fincapp get £36m from, but it's somewhat surprising that people have absolute faith in the companies own projections, given the 'blah blah, d'oh!' witnessed over the past year. A pinch of salt can sometimes improve perception of reality

POLB effectively is DIM, in the sense that it is the only way ORPH have EVER sold any data. DIM itself remains merely a pitch, an idea, around since the very start of ORPH but still just a speculative archive, rather than a real business with revenue. Small POLB deals serve to engage others in prospecting for value in the ORPH datasets.

The share buyback is an unexpected bonus, on top of the already generous dividends. LTHs here have done well out of income alone. Not sure what other investors are waiting for, this share has been cheap since launch and remains so.

Some reports said "The company proposed an unchanged second interim dividend of 12.2p a share". Not strictly true, the "final" dividend is slightly down from 12.23p last year. Nevertheless, the overall dividend continues to progress and the share buyback makes this probably the best, most reliable income share on the market.

The "interim"/final dividend issue comes up every year. It is to do with which funds are used to pay the dividend, I think, with final dividends only allowed to be so named if they are paid from newly generated cash. The complexity of M&Gs business model means they don't do that, but for the full details you'll probably have to do your own research.

We should celebrate the contribution of Interim Chair Fiona Clutterbuck for garnering these impressive results, she has spent the year in the role and hands over to Edward Braham next week

Either your predicted bottom of 75p was correct or it wasn't. You seem to want it both ways. If it was "correct" then why are you trying to do the impossible by attempting to buy below the bottom? If you don't buy when it has reached your "correct" predicted bottom then the only logical alternative is to buy when it is higher, or not at all.

The fact that you now want to make another guess, for some unexplained reason, suggests that your prediction was not really "correct" at all, and your new guess is that the bottom is actually much lower than your incorrect previous prediction, although you are now much vaguer about where it is. You seem more committed to your second guess than your first, but if your previous guess was wrong, how can you have any faith in the new one? An alternative "strategy" might be 'third time lucky', whereby you'd get to make another random guess before pulling that trigger?

https://www.investorschronicle.co.uk/news/2022/03/01/xp-power-dogged-by-increasing-lead-times-and-shortages/

https://www.edisongroup.com/publication/focused-on-efficiency-and-growth/30568/

https://www.edisongroup.com/edison-tv/executive-interview-xp-power-fy21-results/

Final results significantly more disappointing than the trading update suggested, with diluted EPS now revealed to be down 29% due to a huge decrease in margins. Quite a shock, as there was no previous guidance on this, AFAIK. Market certainly surprised, and the stock is now looking cheaper than it has for a long time.

The outlook arguably still looks good, with a promising successor to the retiring (in a year) Chair appointed, useful recent acquisitions, and revenue climbing. The sudden, dramatic margin issue must be a concern though: can it be shored up or does competition make it a long term problem.

Interesting that a lot of ex-pats are expected to leave Hong Kong this quarter once their bonuses are paid, now that it's citizens are under the jackboot of China. HK has extreme Covid restrictions like the mainland. Chinese Covid policy is pretty stupid, it's headed for decades of quarantine and random lockdowns - wonder how long it will be before Pooh Bear understands how dopey this is. Maybe Singapore is a more stable and optimal base for the Pru?

"Well I did say fell for "weeks".
Weeks did not imply fall permanently never to recover."

True, but the share price didn't fall for weeks. It only fell from April 12th until April 19th and then it rose for weeks. Hopefully a similar thing is happening now too.

Edison have upped their EPS forecast for this year as a result of the acquisition, and forecast EPS growth of 12.3% next year.
That would bring the prospective P/E ratio down to the low 20s. The market currently seems to disagree with that analysis!
https://www.edisongroup.com/de/company/xp-power/

Really want to change that second company name from "th" to "ff" ( :

Apologies for my "dangerous conjecture" about Mintz, which was probably not strictly accurate, and thanks for the corrections. Nevertheless, the underlying point was that if the patents are valid, the incentive to settle on both sides seems very low. Even if Nanoco have the final say, the legal experts surely have a massive influence on that decision.

This wasn't just a cheeky spat between rivals, Nanoco faced existential threat. The patents in question were not disputed at any point during the long discussions between Nanoco and Samsung, only after Samsung had understood and appropriated the technology, and been challenged, and some way into the initial court proceedings, did they come up with this retrospective excuse. They have pinned everything on proving that the patents are invalid. In that context, assuming validity there seems no reason why Mintz should not be confident about getting the maximum possible compensation, and no apparent reason to settle for anything less.

What utter piffle Moany, exactly the opposite of what CF said when he started ORPH - he was supposed to have sold it within 18 months, he was "in a hurry", yet here we are 3 years later with no direction home. He isn't "trying his hardest", he's a very naughty boy

The pre trial agreement ... seems the likeliest outcome

I appreciate the logic and common sense of your argument, Becontrarian, but I'd counter it with two points:
1. We know from previous cases that Samsung are not motivated by common sense or logic (or legality), and they do not even always operate in their own best financial interest. Very odd, but it is what it is.
2. This case is effectively between Mintz and Samsung. Mintz have zero interest in a settlement which is anything less than the absolute maximum they can obtain, so any offer Samsung make to them will have no appeal if the patents are valid. Similarly, any highball offer Mintz make will probably give little incentive for Samsung to pay, when they could hope for a lower one in court. Again, if the patents are valid, it seems likely they would be crucified in court, but they seem to regard court decisions as merely a starting point for negotiation, rather than an obligation to pay.

It's always possible the two sides could meet in the middle, but history seems to show that Samsung's primary aim in legal cases is delaying the inevitable, rather than minimising it

"Look at Polarean as a case in point and the ludicrous reason why its life saving and ground breaking pulmonary imaging system was rejected."
The FDA had no problem with the efficacy of the product, only issues with the manufacture. That seems reasonable and normal. It's a sensible and important criteria. Allowing badly made or unsafe medical devices to be distributed would have been a dereliction of duty. The company certainly doesn't think they were ludicrous - that's why they have changed manufacturers to attempt to fix the identified problems and raise the quality to acceptable standards.

When Boracic says "From a couple of previous cases, Samsung like to brazen it out ", that's putting it mildly. In one case, after the whole long court process which they lost, they then caused significant further delay by simply ignoring the court orders, only finally reaching a settlement when faced with a new trial. Don't underestimate Samsung's criminal mindset - they are a really, really unpleasant organisation, founded by one convicted criminal and currently headed by another.

Generally the SP spent all of last year rising and all of this year falling. The falls started before the trading update, so maybe that wasn't the main cause. They looked pretty good, certainly a huge improvement on last years, when the falls seemed to be down to tactically reduced margins. A couple of brokers had targets of £9 or more fairly recently, and most are above £7. Maybe the falls should be attributed more to the bond issue - the assumption of a large new chunk of debt - or worries over the US economy?

Mary previously did some good trading on dips, based on careful attention to the trading range, which established a loose pattern for a while. Risky, quite a lot of work, but fun if you are good at it. Mary is, so hopefully she gets another opportunity if this starts yo-yo-ing again.

I'd completely forgotten that one Highveld, yes very similar number of shares too. It fell quite a bit further on that one and I'm not sure we ever learned who the seller was, but as you say, recovered within weeks then soared. Nothing much Airtel can do if an early investor wants to cash in, it's normal.

There's been a lot going on lately without any RNS - the exit from Ghana, losing the 5G auction in Nigeria, and the troubles in Northern Nigeria. Most companies would have put something out about one or all of these? I guess they are not regarded as sufficiently significant in the context of a complex and widely spread business.

"It entered the FTSE100 the day after that post,"
Not sure which post you are referring to Paul, but as I said before, Chamer gave us the heads-up about it on 22nd January, NINE days before it entered the index, which was pretty handy.

The fact that institutional investors snapped up 58 million shares is positive, imo. Warburg are a private equity firm who have invested in Airtel companies from the beginning in India, but there now seems to be more widespread support here, and perhaps a notional wholesale "floor" @ around £1.40.

You called it right Chamer, down on good results, but only slightly. Market reaction seems to indicate this is more or less what was expected. Logically, confirmation eliminates uncertainty, which you might think would firm the price up a little, but the market flounces it's hair at logic.

It looks like AAF are stealing customers from rivals. Nigeria is hard to judge due to the legislation changes, but other regions show customer numbers growing substantially. With rising EPS, and declining debt, this all augurs well for the future.

Interesting to see AAF operations described as "Nigeria, East Africa and francophone Africa". They used to operate in anglophone Ghana too (AirtelTigo), but sold out to the Ghanaian government in November last year.