Member Info for FJGooner

A fair point - I hadn't considered that.

I just totalled those figures up to 88.69%.

So only 11.31% remaining available in the public domain.

All before entry to the FTSE250 and further fund buy-ins.

HI Allenby,

I don't see why we would expect a pull back as this was unexpected news, only released at 6pm yesterday. Any promotion to the FTSE was hitherto only expected in March and was by no means a certainty.

The only investment fund that has bought in recently, as far as I can see, is Kelso with a modest 400,000 shares.

Therefore, I would expect significant institutional buying in the weeks ahead.

Really great news that Saga will be promoted to the FTSE250 next Monday. It'll be interesting to see how soon additional funds etc start buying in.

From Google AI Overview:

Promotion to the FTSE 250 (or any major index) generally has a positive effect on a company's share price due to increased demand from passive funds forced to buy the stock, boosting liquidity and visibility, although some historical analysis suggests immediate post-promotion performance can be mixed as initial hype fades.

Why it affects the share price:

Mandatory Buying by Trackers: Index funds and Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs) that track the FTSE 250 must buy shares of newly added companies to mirror the index, creating significant demand.

Increased Liquidity: More buyers and sellers entering the market for that stock generally improves trading volume and narrows bid-ask spreads, making it easier to trade.

Enhanced Profile: Inclusion in a major index raises a company's profile, attracting broader institutional and retail investor interest, signaling stability and growth.

see: https://****neyrebel.substack.com/p/the-bumper-2025-year-end-rebel-review-9ce

Oh dear...... classic.....

Yes, sorry, that's right. Written by Singer, distributed on Research Tree.

And this was the initiation note, published a few days earlier.

-------

Tide is Turning: Saga’s Journey from Legacy to Growth

We initiate coverage of Saga with a Buy and a 12-month target price of 285p, implying ~80% upside. Under CEO Mike Hazell, the group has undergone a strategic reset, with >80% of profit now driven by the faster-growing Travel division - led by high-margin Ocean and River Cruises and a recovering Holidays business. The Insurance segment is being streamlined and de-risked, removing historical earnings volatility. On a LFL basis (excluding discontinued) we project PBT to grow from £37m to £100m by FY30, and FCF improvement to materially reduce leverage. Overall, we believe Saga is an overlooked contrarian opportunity in the small-cap space, offering top-down and bottom-up growth appeal with significant re-rating potential.

I think that you must be referring to the Note from Research Tree.

-----------

Repositioned for growth: AGM update confirms strong H1

Saga’s AGM update reinforces management’s growing confidence in delivering its five-year strategic transformation plan and grow PBT to >£100m. The update underscores a dual focus: executing long-term structural change while maintaining strong trading momentum across all divisions a combination that supports both immediate performance and future value creation. This is clearly evident in Travel, which is trading ahead of our revenue growth assumptions, supported by robust demand and effective execution. Insurance transformation milestones remain firmly on track, and the new NatWest partnership in Money adds further momentum to the group’s broader partnership strategy. Net debt is trending lower, and this should be well received. We make no change to forecasts at this stage but see upside risk. The shares are up 15% since we recently initiated but remain great value on 9x YR1 P/E, falling to 6x. We reiterate our high conviction Buy and 285p SOTP based PT. We encourage investors seeking a deep value contrarian/turnaround equity story to look at Saga see our Saga initiation note.

it's very transparent that roguemale has fully sold out at lower prices and is now worried that the share price is moving strongly upwards.

i've never known anyone who retains a significant holding in a company to post such relentless negativity as roguemale .

as jim royle would say "halved my stake, my ****".

A couple of years ago, when results were FAR worse and transparency going forward was utterly lacking, Saga was trading between 300p and 400p. If I recall correctly the CEO bought £200,000 worth of shares at just under £3.90.

Now, with travel almost fully on track and cruise booming, why all this gloom from the markets?

Insurance has been under pressure over the last couple of years, but all the talk in the media over the last couple of days has been about motor policy prices rocketing.

So why the gloom?

https://sharecast.com/news/news-and-announcements/saga-says-annual-profit-set-to-more-than-double--15995692.html

Saga says annual profit set to more than double

Saga said on Tuesday that it expects full-year underlying pre-tax profit to more than double on the previous year as it hailed an "outstanding" year for the cruise and travel businesses.

In an update for the period from 1 August 2023 to 29 January 2024, Saga - which specialises in products and services for the over-50s - said it now expects revenue growth of between 10% and 15%.

Ocean Cruise revenue is expected to grow by around 30% year-on-year, it said, delivered through a load factor of 87% and per diem of £331, both significantly ahead of the 75% and £318 seen a year earlier.

As a result, and in line with previous guidance, the group expects to exceed its target of £40m Ocean Cruise trading EBITDA per ship.

Meanwhile, the river cruise segment is expected to return to underlying profit, supported by a load factor of 85% and a per diem of £285. This equates to revenue of around £44m and 17,000 passengers, up from £29m and 12,000 a year earlier.

Travel revenue growth is expected to be between 40% and 45%, with 58,000 passengers, up more than 20% on the prior year. In line with previous guidance, travel - when combined with the river cruise business for consistency with previous reporting - is on track to return to pre-pandemic underlying pre-tax profit, it said.

Chief executive Mike Hazell said: "For 2023/24, Saga remains on track to deliver significant growth in revenue, in addition to an underlying profit more than double that of the prior year, exceeding our previous guidance.

"Our cruise and travel businesses have had an outstanding year, having taken around 120k passengers on holiday, with customers continuing to be drawn to the strength of the Saga brand and offer. As a result, these businesses will return to profitability, in line with expectations. In insurance, the market-wide inflationary environment and declining policy volumes are continuing to impact our performance.

"The year ahead will see a continuation of these trends across our business. Bookings for the new seasons in cruise and travel are robust, showing good overall progress."

Saga confirmed at the end of last week that it was considering options for its cruse business, including a partnership arrangement.

...

updated: 21 dec 2023

best and worst all-inclusive holiday providers

from companies with ****tails on tap to those that won’t even give you a can of coke, we rate the biggest, best and worst all-inclusive package providers.

...

our survey of nearly 2,000 holidaymakers found that those who picked the cheapest all-inclusive holiday provider ended up forking out a whopping £367 more per week on extras.

lastminute.com’s customers found that their ‘all-inclusive’ resort was anything but. on average they spent an extra £128 a week in the resort, and £239 outside the resort on things like meals out and food and drink from the supermarket. that’s £367 in total.

they also had a pretty poor experience, rating their holiday just two stars out of five for accommodation, organisation, transfers, included benefits and customer service. lastminute.com’s 63% customer score puts it firmly at the bottom of the table of all-inclusive providers.

at the top of the table, jet2holidays’ customers had a very different experience. the restrictions on what you could eat and drink, and when, were the lowest of any brand. ‘the package included everything we needed and desired’, said one happy customer.

long haul specialist, kuoni, and over 50s operator saga also received excellent customer scores in our survey, with four stars for the benefits included in the price of their holiday.

...

saga 80%

saga holidays are only available to those who are over 50. saga says it hand-picks its hotels, making sure they meet its exacting standards. judging by our survey, they met yours too. it was one of only two brands with a four-star rating for its accommodation.

guests also praised the ‘excellent standard’ of the food and drink and told us they had everything they needed. they spent very little on average outside the resort - just £44 per week.

which? verdict with high ratings across the board, and the lowest spend on extras, saga is truly all-inclusive for the over 50s.

I don't post often these days, but just a comment in passing in addition to my humorous observation yesterday.

I will be celebrating in no party until at least £8 imho. And, even then, just cream tea with scones. Otherwise we're wrongly celebrating the abject failure of an irrational stock market that is undervaluing a great British brand that is in its earliest phase of post-Covid recovery.

We need to have faith that the current board of directors knows what it is doing and will return the business to strong profit growth over the next few years. And if the CEO needs to be assessed in his performance, then the Chairman is perfectly capable of doing that without our input.

I worked at Saga for over 25 years in a senior role, so I can understand the history and the evolution of the business model that is now underway.

We had major office buildings in Kent and Sussex. Enbrook Park was a huge purpose-built complex with a separate pavilion for a staff restaurant and other office and tertiary facilities, another large building in Folkestone town centre known as Middelburg and a smaller office block in Cheriton with about another 400 employees there.

In addition to that, we had a huge contact centre in Thanet and another large complex in Hastings.

All of these buildings are now gone, replaced by a work from home model supported by very small office hubs in Folkestone, Ashford and London.

These enormous reductions in costs will surely feed through at some point, along with the sale of all of these properties, which are happily in a booming area.

The groundwork for next-gen Ocean and River cruising has been completed. Capital costs have of course been absorbed onto the balance sheet but the true, rather than projected, benefits have yet to be seen.

Roger de Haan is no fool. I have been in meetings with him over the years and have always been impressed by him. If he is backing this over the long term, then so will I.

Happily buying Saga stock at these ludicrous prices.

I'm off to enjoy a beautiful summer.

Good luck to all and see you in a few months.

FJ

I saw the advert below this morning. Made me laugh. :)

Insurance Trading Manager
05 April 2023
Saga - Ashford Hybrid, CT20 3SE
£45,000 to £60,000 per hour

Re: "If you bought at £3 I’d be astounded if you made a profit in 12-18 months…..any insight as to why you think the share price will double over that period?"

I'll answer that on his behalf, if I may.

Perhaps because ... :

a) he isn't short selling like some on here

b) the SP here is still artificially extremely low, trading at just 10p per share in old money. Even compared to RDH's rescue price which was around 27p

c) every metric is in far greater shape than 20 months ago when the share price was a depressed 450p. The cruise ships had been mothballed for nearly a year at that point.

But, by all means, increase your short that lost you another 6% today if that makes you feel happy.

Good luck to you - you'll need it when common sense returns shortly.

Fake poly parrot shorter yaps: "I bought back at 80 and sold at 1.80,"

Course you did Walter Polly Parrot Mitty. Then why are you still here yapping like a baby?

Yawn!

Typical self-serving shorter, trying to peddle baseless fears. Not nice.

We all know that Saga is in good shape, so stop the lies.

I didn't realise that Jackanory was back.

Hi RDH,

You posted yesterday:

"What was better? Revenue was up slightly and they paid down a little debt, but excluding the goodwill write down from last year's numbers they lost more, and that was comparing to 2020 which was the height of covid. So barring an accounting entry the business managed to generate less profit when operating more? How is that a step forward?"

An appallingly unpleasant poster called Cleverinvester on Advfn posted (ref 23 Mar '22 - 09:01 - 20742 of 20770):

"What was better? Revenue was up slightly and they paid down a little debt, but excluding the goodwill write down from last year's numbers they lost more, and that was comparing to 2020 which was the height of covid. So barring an accounting entry the business managed to generate less profit when operating more? How is that a step forward?"

Sounds a bit similar eh?

So are you happy for that chap to be copying your posts? If you don't object to this plagiarism, are you the same poster under yet another different name after getting banned from this site before?