Member Info for CaneToad

@Splendor: Good, balanced analysis of the pros/cons.

I was looking to buy back in here, but won't be. It's nothing at all like Serco, which has been a profitable business for 5+ years. In contrast, the CPI results are weak: Profit Before Tax: £0.1m, Operating profit/(loss): (£51.2m), Net debt: (£710.4m).

Those numbers are a joke. Hardly a recovery.

All it needs is for a tiny slowdown and they could tip to a significant loss. Do we have a slowdown on the way?

I can't yet see any evidence of a bottom. Have R&M stop selling? Are the Biles family buying shares? It's tempting to think that all the news is out, but what if the results are terrible? This continues to be a falling knife.

@robizm: It's extremely fishy that they 'ran out of time' for the split. Why did it matter if it took another few months? Am I missing something? The whole thing was bizarre. I think there's more to this, but we're not going to ever know. It's also telling that none of the institutional investors are buying.

Thanks for pointing out the detaisl of the legal structure. With Provi, they made it very clear and investor relations were able to confirm the details. With MCL, I've never heard a thing. It's totally opaque.

The most likely scenario that I see is a big discounted raise, or insolvency. Somebody will then pickup the digital business for pennies.

Provident was a different situation. They had the company setup with several ring-fenced legal entities. They could have let the subsidiary go insolvent if necessary. Morses tried to re-arrange the corporate structure to achieve the same but the FCA wouldn't allow it; presumably after seeing what Provi did.

In terms of 'fundamentals', Stockopedia also rates MCL very highly. But beware. These valuations/metrics are stale and totally misleading, because they ignore the claims situation is likely to sink them if the court doesn't allow the scheme.

"Set up in 1860; Maybe the brand is worth more than 5m?"

I doubt it.

Ince itself was insolvent just a few years ago and wiped out shareholders then. They've now wiped out shareholders again!
They've burned through even more cash than I thought and were unable to make a loan repayment, even though they had supposedly got access to juicy cash from Arden's balance sheet. And covid problems in HK/PRC are not resolved and we're now heading into a recession while we know the next set of results are 'below expectations'. The balance sheet was already diabolical, with deeply negative NTAV. Have a read of the review from Paul Scott from Stockopedia.

I'll continue to follow and will invest if it looks like Donald can turn this around, but it's a timebomb at the moment.

"The Placing and the Loan are conditional, inter alia, upon the approval of the Company's shareholders ("Shareholders"). A general meeting of the Company ("General Meeting") at which shareholder approval to the Fund-raising will be sought will be held on 15 August 2022, notice of which will be set out in a Circular to Shareholders."

Maybe I'm reading this wrong, but could it be the case that punters are actually buying shares being offloaded by others...I wonder if Adrian is selling some of his shares. I'd also be surprised to see R&M doing an about face - more likely, they're offloading the rest of their shares, along with Ruffer?

And furthermore, there is no bank loan unless the raise is completed. Too risky for me. I expect they are in serious trouble (insolvency?) if they don't get the bank loan and the proceeds of the full raise.

I'd also like to hear how many shares that Adrian Biles buys, given his huge holding. Unless I'm mistaken, he's not significantly contributing at the moment?

I guess the following line is key: "Arden reserves the right to close the Bookbuild without further notice. There can be no certainty that the Placing will complete. The Placing is not being underwritten."

I might take a punt once we hear how many shares were sold. Then there will be the shock of the actual results, which don't sound great. I think there's some good upside if Donald can rein in the costs.

"Canetoad/erratum - The tension between you guys is sizzling! ... Time will tell who is right. Nothing else."

I was right, but as I mentioned at the time - 'being right' is *not* what makes you profitable in trading/investing, nor is it important to me. The most important thing is to keep losses small in relation to profits. Some here will have learned that the hard way.

I chuckled when reading the comment "The Placing is not being underwritten", given that Arden is doing the placing!

I just hope that they're not breaking any LSE rules by conducting their own public raise...

Cash is King! The analysis was SPOT-ON.

13 Jun 2022: " I'm old-fashioned. I like to see a balance sheet and/or trading update which gives actual levels of cash and/or borrowing headroom. To my knowledge, there has been no such update for months. I never said there had been any breach of any debt covenant. What I said was that they had (many months ago) used up almost all borrowing capacity on their RCF. Do you have proof about the levels of cash they have or is just your opinion?"

"@CaneToad. I am keenly aware there are many people on the board that know the company very well, but as you demonstrate with almost every post, you are not one of them."

If you believe in TA, then the contraction of volatility in a pullback is a good sign, but I would say that this no longer looks like a pullback, because 50D MA > 21D MA > 10D MA, i.e. trending down on all time scales.

(I am LONG I3E and bought more yesterday)

If you compare the ADV over the last 10 trading days to the ADV over the last 3 months, the change is about -60%. It has continue dropping over the past month.

2-4p? I don't think there'a a floor to the share price any more. The company is worth zero if the scheme is rejected by the court. Even with a scheme, there's likely to be a big raise at some point once the claims are behind them, because every penny will be going out the door for the forseeable future.

Yep - similar to Amigo. The company is finished if the court doesn't approve the scheme. It's pretty clear, there was no appetite for any of the large shareholders to write a blank cheque.

Seeing that the CEO had a small position, purchased @ 13.9p (~£18,765) and not added to since, but a salary of £430k told me all I needed to know. Something is not right. There is a bad smell in the air.