Member Info for Fevertreeman

Ask Aegon and Baillie Gifford, both of whom were royally shafted by management. Both entusiastically supported £20m raise at 80p in July 2022 one month after FDA approval. No mention of troubles at interims end of Sept that year, then Newland announced revenue miss on Jan 5th of 2023, completely skewering the share price. Aegon & Baillie Gifford were clearly furious, and as both held 3%+ declarable stakes, you could follow their moves. Both halved stakes during course of next 6 months...BG went from 5.72% to under 3, and Aegon from 3.8% to 2%.....I doubt they will appear on the 3%+ register again. "

Let’s hope that this £500k deal shows the uncertainty over rail investment is finally starting to clear. It’s certainly the first good news we’ve had from the rail side for ages. Combined with QRO’s continued run of success, and the Affini deal, this could finally mark the long-awaited recovery in group revenues. IMO the future is brighter than it’s been for quite a while, despite the presence of the Abdullahs. Can’t see so staying at this level for much longer

Not a profit warning...that would be amazingly good news...this is a bloody revenue warning.....

We all agree that 'prima facie' the fact that Newland raised £8m should be a big plus point especially since it was little over 8 weeks ago. However, he's played this game before when he raised funds at 80p (post the FDA approval when sp peaked out at c140p), having painted a positive picture to institutions about revenue and progress, and then guess what - he delivered a stonking revenue miss. That in turn led to a number of heavyweight institutions selling out because Newland had effectively misled them.

It looks on the cards that Newland is about to pull the same trick : in the fund raise statement Newland reasserted company's comfort re. current market FY forecasts (c£6.3m revenue), which of course would have been guided tyo/provided by Newland & Griffiths. So what is going to happen do you think when we get the HY figs next month? Newland has 16 weeks left of the Year to sign £5m of deals (assuming topend of range £1.3m revs HY). That in a nutshell is the problem - Newland consistently loses support from his investor base

Hard to see what role Griffiths plays frankly, as Newland consistently takes the lead on all aspects incl revenue forecasting.

And if that happens only weeks after Newland reiterated Board comfortable with FY estimate, and raised £8m on back of it. If Newland & Griffiths ( again) screw shareholders then the Board will need to act.

Newland & Griffiths haven't hit any revenue target they have made. Market expectations are effectively set by the company, which provides guidance (and in this case) heavy hints about revenue expectations. The problem with Nero Newland is that he continues to consistently hype expectations, both in deal-making & revenue generation. There can be no excuses this time around. The problem remains that Newland seems to have no clue on how to arrive at a sensible revenue forecast as evidenced by the comments made with FY '23 figs about 1H having a 30pc range on revenues, even though Newland & Griffiths should have had a darn good idea of where those figs would land, as the flash figs for Jan-May would have been available to them.

Newland & Griffiths continue to be less than transparent with s/holders, hence the concern. Remember Newland made the following comment re.FY 24 outlook:" As such, the management remains confident in delivering strong growth in 2024 in line with current market expectations" Since mid-July, 2 shareholders have increase their stakes - i.e. averaged down incl Keane who doubled his holding.

LV, I haven't spoken with Hardman (whom I know well 0 since the debacle that caught them unawares as well. Your commentary & analysis is superior to anything we've had from the Company which is hugely concerning and drives to the heart of the issue as I've said repeatedly. Neither Johnson or Maddocks have articulated the story properly, and there has been a total lack of candour - in Johnson's case, his paranoia over upsetting the OEms has overridden his obligations to his s/holder, with disastrous results.

"Scrap" is a case in point. The big operational problem investors were told was over " single points of failure", which Johnson then refused to elaborate on. BTw: it is only after the Company almost went under that we were properly appraised of the issue with the non productive furnace that has now been written off.

Having been told these issues were broadly fixed, suddenly the SCRAP issue was raised as a massive concern. it was never ever properly defined by Johnson, which is scandalous, as I know from making my own enquiries that delaminated discs could be reworked & that they were stockpiling a tonne of these discs but that Johnson's purist lab technician approach meant that investors were not told about this, so effectively the message was 1:4 discs has to be scrapped etc...

The fact that you have set it out more clearly than the bloody CEO and CFO is frightening and explains why managemetn has been so dreadful here. the sooner the new Chair is in place the better, and what on earth is the CFO doing by not exploring financing alternatives is beyond me!

I admire your optimism. It could equally be the case that Newland issues a revenue warning, having reneged on a forecast he himself put out there, and then desperately tries to rally support among UK retail punters. As it is Newland's credibility hangs by a thread, but having raised fresh funds just in June tapping US investors with the message that all is on track to meet market expectations, the Board will have no choice but to act, as it will be another case of Newland effectively overhyping prospects.

Nope we are not the same person...Adams wouldn't have lasted one minute on the set of Goodfellas, but love the reference.

Has Adams provided any documentary evidence in the form of photographs or video for the Early Works programme..

Early Works until September 2024:

· Completion of preparation for community resettlement;

Amusingly, I recall Pinocchio Adams talking about resettlement for years......a few examples of his press release crafting

28 February 2020 Q4 2019 Operational Update:

The next steps are to:

o launch the on-site development and community resettlement;

16 April 2019 Q1 2019 Operational Update:

Clearance of Community Resettlement: The Ethiopian Federal Government has approved

the resettlement plan and the Local Government has now approved the compensation

calculations. The Regional Government has begun triggering the consecutive steps of the

resettlement programme in consultation with the community and TKGM. The current

focus is on the selection of individual land-parcels, house locations and training. This is

expected to lead to compensation payments in July 2019 for the phase one move of

some 60 households, with the preparations being completed in the meantime

6 December 2018 Project Update

This programme of works follows the advice the Company has received from the Ethiopian

Federal and Regional Government agencies that the handful of remaining regulatory

consents required for triggering the Project are expected to be provided in the coming

weeks. These mainly comprise the approvals of final community resettlement plans,

approvals of Project financing details and the updated works program and schedule leading

to the planned first gold pour in H2 2020.

Incredible isn't it that Adams has consistently got away with it over all this time! Gotta hand it to the dodgy Antipodean, his "This time next year, Rodders" get-rich pitch to punters has paid off handsomely.... but only for him.

According to FT, Clareville Capital ( David Yarrow's hedge fund) has sold entire stake of 1.63m shares between March & July - Yarrow clearly fed up. he has been joined by others.....In March Julius Bear dumped half their holding (sold 872k), joined by Dimensional Fund Management whjo dumped 40% of their small holding ,c 162k & a Luxembourg private bank who dumped a chunk of their holding.... Who has been buying since March? The answer is no one of consequence, as the main buyers have been retail punters thro' likes of Hargreaves.

So this doesn't strike me as good news. Quested's leaving announced on May 1st, with effect from 1 September 2024. You can be sure that the Board knew in advance what he was thinking. So assume h/hunters instructed as of May 1st: given it will be 4 months by time Queested leaves, in that time they haven't been able to produce a permanent replacement. So we have sticking plaster solution of a temp CFO with sod all sector experience. Once again the failure to fill the post to date isn't encouraging given Ashmore's relentless upberat messaging. Either they're not paying enough (unlikely), or the risk profile is deemed too high (possible), or there are question marks over working with Ashmore (possible).

As you say evidence all around that things are picking up and some confidence returning to the housing and construction markets. But absolutely no follow through to HSS at all. There hasn't been a single share purchase from a single director year to date. The only person benefitting is the CEO who is being massively overcompensated and for what - shareholders have had no returns whilst Ashmore has trousered staggering sums.

Newland shot his mouth off about tripling revenues and then doubled down on it at the Prelims barely 8 weeks ago :

"The Company has a strong current pipeline of opportunities that has more than doubled year to date, with significant potential growth opportunities across a variety of end customers, including large pharma. As such, the management remains confident in delivering strong growth in 2024 in line with current market expectations."

Newland & Griffiths are playing a dangerous game. With 5 months of the current year left, they are going to have to get pretty damn close to their own forecast. If they don't, then they will not be forgiven by US investors especially, because many will IMO rightly take the view that Newland & Griffiths have purposely gilded the revenues lily', knowing that they were going to be raising cash (as they did), and therefore presently the most optimistic forecast possible.

I hope that isn't the case & Newland's confident assertion of c£6m for current year is grounded in a realistic assessment of current commercials, thoroughly discounted for delays, contract misses etc etc....

If Newland misses the target, then I'm afraid the Board (having countenanced the Outlook section) will come under intense pressure to act.....

FYI Newland can infer all he likes about the prospects for dual analysis but he is running a commercial company with shareholders, not a research organisation. Newland has to date had £100m+ support from shareholders, which he has burnt thro at a rate of knots. and what have we got to show for it? Yes, FDA approval for only device but so bloody what. The revenues are tiny, as are the commercial deals he's signed to date.

Just trying to inject some realism into discussions around Newland. As investors we all want the best for the company. However, management is always the defining characteristic of successful companies, and in this regard Newland & Griffiths have yet to deliver. Its particularly egregious when Newland raises money on estimates he himself has forecast, only to deliver revenue misses, which is what happened after the 80p raise, which led to UK institutions selling out. You would have thought he had learnt his lesson, but again he has just raised £9m based on hitting his own forecast of 3x '23 revenues (the nonsense about these being market forecasts can be discounted). He has to hit that number or close to it to have any chance of regaining credibility.

Nero Newland .....the man responsible for saying loud n clear that revenues will triple in current year! Despite raising at 15p, the selling continues....1.3 m shares traded so far today of which c70pc are sells (c890k). As long-time observers of Newland know, his track record on forecasting revenue, deals, cashflow etc is so tarnished that Mr Market is consistently on his guard in case yet another one of Newland's targets gets hammered. So even when there is purported good news, there is consistent selling into any rise. As we know the chat now is 2-fold (1) Newland's bombastic confidence about 3x revenues for current year is looking increasingly threadbare with 5 months of the year & commetns about only 1 deal likely (2) Concerns about another raid for cash.....

Lol