Member Info for BoringBernie

To be fair to Moon, and I'm not a massive fan, I believe ( admittedly from second hand info ) that SIS are seen as a good company to work for by it's employees and that they like Moon. A happy workforce tends to be more flexible and productive than an unhappy one, so fair play to Moon and his team in that respect BB

Sheltie Re "The Directors will make didly if the share price does not rise!" That's plain old fashioned wrong. The LTIP options are nil-cost, so as long as they hit their revenue targets the directors will, when they're able to exercise their options, be immediately sat on a nice profit. Plainly the higher the sp is, the more that ( paper ) profit will be, so it's in their best interest to see the sp rise, but whether it rises, falls or stays much the same then they'll be doing nicely. To be fair, if they hit their revenue targets without increasing losses then the sp may well rise to reflect that , but the situation is nowhere near as straightforward as what you're suggesting The sp broke 70p on the back of a newspaper tip and I dare say a few on here were taking profits at that point ( and well done to them if they did ) and they'll wait for the sp to drift back to something they're happy to buy back at so the sp will find support at some point, but I've no idea what that'll be. BB

GCCR Yea, I doubt Moon would exercise his options at the moment either and, if he did, then it would probably be a smallish number. He has ~ 1.7 million exercisable options and, even if he exercised 300 or 400k of those tomorrow, I doubt the market would blink. Anything over 1 million and you'd have to raise an eyebrow though. Probably won't happen in the short to medium term, but it's worth having a plan in mind for stuff which might happen. Good luck with it, hopefully it'll smash £1 in the next six months or so and you'll be able to feel pleasantly smug ! BB

Aye, good luck with your investment Sheltie, for historical reasons there's a lot of bulletin board angst about the CEO, but he's not done a bad job here and is pretty upfront about his business plan. Eventually, it probably will be bought out, and that'll certainly be at a premium to today's share price ( 74p or so ), but I'll swerve it for now. Must admit. I'm not sure about it getting North of 100p by Christmas though, but fair play to those buying now if it does BB

Which of those trades was yours Sheltie ?

GCCR To be fair, when the Annual Report was issued back in March they were forecasting a loss and they also said they were reviewing the LTIP, so it didn't take a genius to work out that the profit based part of the LTIP was going to be changed in favour of a revenue based one, which were both factors in why I sold out. If the main shareholders are happy with the LTIP being changed, then I wouldn't worry about it too much. Keep any eye out on any reductions in their holding from Downing though, They've quite skilfully traded a small percentage of their holding while maintaining a large holding. Any significant sales from Moon would be a sell, or reduce signal too. Mind you, since I sold out the sp has gone up ~30% so wtfdIk ! BB

It's Clarke, Buck and Duignan Clarke isn't allowed to discuss or decide his own remuneration on that committee, though, obviously, it'd be one hell of a surprise if Buck and Duignan didn't give him a nice bonus. To be fair, Clarke's remuneration from SiS is unlikely to be life changing for him I reduced here at a smallish loss a few months ago.and sold up on the results, mainly because they're forecasting another loss for 2016/17 so we didn't seem to be much nearer turning a profit. BB

So, there we have it, we're starting to talk about profits as well as revenue and, to be honest, it's a little before I was expecting it. I don't doubt we'll make an operating loss this FY, but it sounds like we should be thinking about profitability for 2015/16. Plainly Moon's been listening to me :) Well, OK, he's more likely to have been listening to Downing I'd be happy with a loss this year then aiming for 5, 10 and 15% operating profits in the next three years which, with double digit revenue growth, would give something like 500k, 1 million and 1.6 million. Happy days if we can start to deliver that sort of bottom line growth. Ignoring acquisitions it's probably touch and go as to whether we'll need any more funds raising before profits start to flow, but, if needed, it should be fairly minimal. Acquisitions will probably need funding, but, as long as they're at the right price the assets added will mean the company's worth more overall so no worries there. Share based payment charges are just the way of the world and, given they don't effect cashflow, I'm not going to lose much sleep over them. If the business continues to grow revenue and starts to deliver meaningful profits then they'll have earned their shares. BB

It's got a bit quiet over on the iii board with just me and a wanna-be shorter posting so, though I'm not sure if anyone reads this board either I thought I'd type something anyway. Been invested here for over two years and the sp is up by a multiple of three or four times over that timescale, which is nice. Must admit, I think we're almost at the point where we're beginning to look a little over-valued on a "sum of the parts" basis. My gut reaction is that fair value sits somewhere between 950 and 1250p and the results are a few months off ... decisions, decisions. BB

Doubt it'll get much above 80p Alf. Anyway, 85p would only be a "reducing" point. If it got to 100p pre-results I would indeed sell the lot and leave some for the next man. Valuing potential by revenue isn't really anything to do with retailers. Take your revenue, project a possible 20% operating profit some time in the future, make a stab at anticipated growth rates and you've made an informed decision. I'll be quite happy if it doesn't overheat though, but small-caps often do just that. BB

Pretty much agree with what Alf and Graham are saying there. 23% is good revenue growth. I'm not sure it's actually "ahead of target" but 20% has been touted by Moon as a ballpark figure so I know what you mean. If 23% is repeated for H2 then we'd end up with revenue of ~8.4 million. Current market cap ( at 78p ) is 19.2 million, so we're valued at 2.25 x projected revenue. Given PXS bought SiS for ~ 2x revenue, I'd say we're fully valued in the short term ( 6 to 12 months ). If we got up to 2.5 x revenue I'd be getting a bit nervous and taking some profits. That'd be equivalent to ~ 85p a share. BB *puts slide rule away

My guess is 15/16 FY with more substantial profits the year after. We've already been told to expect another loss for the current FY. I don't expect us to ever pay a divi. Assuming revenue growth starts to translate into profit i think we'll be bought out in 3 to 5 years time. BB

" In all these sports brands there is massive headroom for promotion without affecting overall margins" Err, what ? Have you read the RNS at all Alf ? It says "The underlying operating loss (before depreciation, amortisation and exceptional items) was £0.40 million (2013: underlying operating profit of £0.23 million), REFLECTING INVESTMENT IN SALES AND MARKETING TO DRIVE REVENUE GROWTH, together with an increase in administrative costs as a standalone business post admission to AIM." which kind of contradicts your statement. In other words, yes, Gross margin is up, but S&M costs have increased so Operating Margin is down. Now I'm comfortable with that because it's investing in revenue growth which should convert into operating profits at some time in the future, but please, lets keep it real. BB

Loss was a bit less than I'd expected, revenue was as per the trading update so I was reasonably pleased with the results.The appointment of the FD looks good ( possibly Downing's hand in here to keep a tight control on the pursestrings ? Which is no bad thing ). I was a bit disappointed ( but not really surprised ) that a loss is expected this year as well. Overall, fairly happy with the situation. Anything above 75p before we start to look like making a profit would be nice and, in my little world, would be an indication that it was time to take some profits. Anything below 55p or so would be a chance for a decent top-up. Longer term, I'd agree with you on revenue growth and profitability. I think the next big nut to crack which might need funding is the States. Revenue of 10 million + within two or three years looks possible and if we can start to convert some of that to profit then, even at an op. margin of 10% that'd give over 1 million. If they can show the ability to hit that then it'd justify a sp of ~ 100p. There's always the possibility of a takeover, but you could say that about any small to medium size company so I always think that's a pretty p. poor reason to hold shares. Basically, it's a Strong Hold at the moment. BB

Crikey, that was full of typos.

Alf Drive for show, putt for dough. Substiture turnover and profit anf you have what the city cares about. Actually, I don't disagree with your sentiments, you need to invest to grow a business, which can mean sacrificing short term profits for long term ones. But, loss making companies need financing or they go bust. Financing depends on persuading people with free cash that your business model is sound and will results in profits turning up when they're projected to do so. Based on the trading update we can roughly guesses what the NET losses reported will be here. An indication that FY 2014/15 will see profits start to beat pre-takeover levels will be the key to short-term ( < 12 months ) SUSTAINED sp performance. Unless losses are substantially more than I'm expecting, then I'm fairly relaxed about my investmemt here, but it does no harm to keep an open mind. BB

Haha Swines , it's my job to be a pain in the ar$e. Someone's plainly crossed the picket line.

Deece The real spread ( on 10,000 shares ) is a bit over 62p to just under 64p Alf Take your own advice mate, and chill :) BB

http://www.brokerforecasts.com/news/article/articleId/4830324 "Sanlam Securities has initiated coverage of Science in Sports [LON:SIS] with a ‘buy’ recommendation and 83 pence a share target price, believing the stock offers investor’s with an attractive investment opportunity. The broker highlighted four key factors which backup its bullish call. These include its brand leadership through key endorsements from Olympic winners Sir Chris Hoy and Helen Jenkins, its growing market share in a fast growing sector, margin upside and attractive valuation. " 83p seems a tad optimistic to me in the short term but heh-hoh, I wouldn't complain. BB

placings being at a higher price than the market lol, lol, lol Still chuckling here. I mean the idea of saying to an II that they can have, say 500k shares at a premium to something then can buy in the open market It's a beautiful day, the sun is shining etc but that comment will make me smile all day btw. Exceptional costs re. listing are mostly fees to nomads, lawyers and other advisers. The basic cost for listing is minimal Oh, Routey-baby, you're priceless, or something. BB