Member Info for CJohnSpain

My apologies: two websites.

Perhaps we should have paid double for the privilege.

The Company is pleased to inform shareholders and the market that Rosedog Limited ("Rosedog"), a private company in which Craven House announced on 13th March 2020 it had acquired a 29.9% interest, has launched two on-line sales platforms to promote and execute sales of its health supplements:

Mark Pajak, non-executive director of Craven House, stated, "We are gratified to see one of our most recent, simultaneous e-business investments making immediate progress in executing its sales and marketing strategy. We look forward, as and when this becomes appropriate, to announcing further developments with Rosedog and the Company's four other recent investments in the e-commerce arena."

So Rosedog now has a website. The excitement is pulsating.

Look at it on the bright side. There's only $60K left. And overall we've made a profit. Really!

In mid-April, we will be left with a small rump of 178,675 LMFA shares. Hooray!

Hello, Tully, you may have forgotten this:

"The LMFA loan is repayable on April 15, 2020 with interest payable at a rate of 6% p.a. The LMFA loan is repayable in cash or, alternatively, the principal and all accrued interest can be repaid via the transfer of 640,000 shares in LMFA from CRVNA to LMFA."

So CRV have every interest in paying off this loan with their LMFA shares, given how dirt cheap they are. I'd be absolutely flabbergasted if they used the $3.9m to buy more LMFA.

Also, let's pray it's not blown on another internet concept company, unburdened by turnover or assets.

Hi Tully,

I'm trying to work out what you think might be happening....?

This reminds me that AIM doesn't protect small investors in the way, for example, the Singapore market does.

I have shares in a small successfully run engineering company that quotes on AIM/ + Singapore. Until last year, it had always shown conservative and prudent management values and was/is trading at a discount to tangible asset value.

Suddenly the management got bored with being dull, had a rush of blood to the head and proposed a $200m reverse takeover - with huge pay outs to an external "adviser" - by a an early stage heavily loss-making tech company with almost no turnover.

I rang the FD; but no joy. He was utterly infatuated with the concept and excitement of a blue sky tech revolution. (Chances of said tech company pulling off their ambitious plans were close to zero, in my view.)

Anyway not a peep out of AIM about this crazy plan, which would wipe out all existing shareholders. But the SIngapore stock exchange waded in with a series of publicly published and devastating questions which exposed the utter idiocy of the plan. It was subsequently shelved.

This is what we needed here.

Hi Tully,

Good luck with the shopping!

We've been in "lockdown" here in Spain since Friday. Only allowed out to shop or visit the doctor or go to those workplaces still open. Very few people in the street.

My flight to the UK was cancelled; so I'm cut off from my dear old mum, who's 90 and intending to stay indoors as of today.

I can't make head or tail of the Scandinavian deals. They totally contradict CRV's declared investment strategy! The fundamental problem, as you say, seems to be that M Pajak is a one man band. He really needed some external input on this one: ie to tell him to back off.

I can't believe there's anything dodgy in the coincidence/connection of the Swedish companies and Gyllenhammer. Gyllenhammer is an honest operator.

It begs the question if Gyllenhammer WAS really involved in some way.

On the face of it, this isn't the sort of company that would interest big G at all!!! And yet, he bought another large chunk of CRV shares on the 24th Feb, after the announcement of the potential 5 acquisitions earlier in the morning.

HI Tully,

it's even worse than you say. The 5 sums of $1.6m (600k) buy only 29.9% of each of these five companies.

So each is valued at $5.33m by CRV.

What bloody madness!

….an utterly insane acquisition.

Yes, this is, on the face of it, an utterly acquisition.

I can see no justification for the sums handed over; even paying with CRV shares at $10.

What's more, it's completely out of line with CRV's previous approach of taking stakes in companies on the basis of their manifest discount to asset value.

Hi Slalom 1,

I have been posting over on ADVFN, re ORM.

I am very much in favour of a return of capital to shareholders.

The tungsten mine disaster demonstrated multiple incompetence by the board.

I've been forwarded your e-mail by Jbe81 and am now sending you an e-mail

Coincidentally, my father died ten years ago the day before Christmas, so my best wishes for you and your family.

The simplest course of action - and probably the best - is to hold for now.

The shares are very undervalued on asset grounds . And there have been clear signs of progress in the last year, which may lead to a significant revaluation. (The real asset value is significantly higher than the $10 figure that has become a talisman for shareholders.)

At moments, there is decent liquidity, but usually not.

So usually, if you want to do anything more than sell dribs and drabs, you need to speak to your broker and put an order into the market. (Not all brokers will do this with CRV, because of the peculiarity that it's quoted in dollars.)

Yes, the drop in NAV is due nearly entirely to mark-to-market pricing of CRV's holding in DLC. As we know, DLC's share price soars up and down on tiny volumes and was at 12 Canadian cents (down from 27 cents) at the balance sheet date. It's currently at 18 cents. DLC itself trades at a very marked discount to its net asset value, even at 27 cents.

Desmond now offering to permanently eliminate the management fee!!

The reduction of capital was completed post period end, so company can now purchase own shares, if so desired.

They may possibly close the Angolan loans early and repatriate capital to invest in Europe/US. I'm all in favour of that! The only point in continuing the loans would be if the loanee company was in trouble and CRV could move into the equity structure. But all loans are preforming, paying a princely 5%. Much better returns elsewhere.

hi Tully,

I'm just wondering why they bothered with the fiction of paying $1.6m for 29.9% of each of the five entities, if in fact YRRO and Rosedog do not yet have any active business?

Why not state openly that the 5 entities are all part of the same conglom? And the total price for 29.9$ was $8m. And why not mention that YRRO and Rosedog do not yet have any activity?

Hi Tully,

Yes, we're already aware that all the five companies are registered at the same London address and are all part of the same conglomerate. We already know what their lines of business are.

But there's a problem with pro-vitos and north doctor. There is no online web site for them. So we can conclude they are not yet up and running......

BTW I haven't been able to find any online presence for north doctors or pro-vitos, two of the five companies in the proposed CRV acquistion.

Might these two be mere ideas/projects?

Would anyone else care to have a look?

Hi Steve,

To be honest, i was pretty surprised to see the references to CRV and an AIM listing on the Instagram account. Surely a faux pas on Cato Crogh's part? (Particularly if there was a RTO upcoming.)

Could it be an all-Swede RTO, ie Crogh and pals plus Gyllenhammer? It's an interesting idea, but why would an on-line media (and vitamin and appointment) business like the 5-fold conglomerate want to take on something so wildly different from their area of expertise?

I'm taking it at face value: CRV is their banker. Gyllenhammer perhaps introduced Swedes to CRV.

As to a Gyllenhammer takeover of the whole shebang, this looks increasingly unlikely. If he was involved in introducing the other Swedes to CRV, then he has made life more difficult for himself, by increasing the share base.

Amongst all the other things going on, the most encouraging, in my view, is that Gyllenhammer has gone on buying new shares, even if he's now down to "only" 20.94%.

He really wouldn't be doing this, if he had any doubt as to the value of CRV's assets on the balance sheet.

Glad to hear that, Steve.