Member Info for Franalex

Live in hope but thought that when they fell through both 75p and 50p. I think there is break up value in the business but it is listed in the wrong country. It has relatively few U.K. assets and both the Argyll &Bute and much bigger ELWA contract have relatively few years to run.

Why? Trend is down and unless positive news on ATM it will stay depressed. Down again at present against a positive market.

Must be an opportunity here but not under the current management. The business has been badly run for almost 10 years now. Do not forget that the Board rejected an offer from Carlyle Group in 2010 for 120p per share because “it did not fully reflect the value in the business”. It has been on a long term and steady decline since. As a long term holder it has been very frustrating and costly. Some of the institutions need to hold the Board to account and stop appproving more and more remuneration until they deliver shareholder value creation rather than destruction.

Will be interesting to see the Administrators comment on the role of the Auditors given the “000’s” of fraudulent entires. No doubt the auditors will hide behind the directors “letter of representation” but as with Carillion and Afren it merely shows that auditor’s reports carry little value to shareholders. As a finance director for almost 20 years I still find it difficult to believe this can have been carried out by a single individual or board member unless controls were absolutely none existent in which case the audit should have picked this up.

I assume and hope he was.

Snige, would that be the same KPMG who signed off the Carillion accounts for several years with now clearly overstated profits? I have zero confidence in them.

Yes Illbetabuck that was one of the stupid comments on the Carillion thread.

It would be very interesting to know what the CEO told Woodford at their meeting in November that persuaded an astute individual to increase his investment. Sadly I suspect we will never find out because the market has read the RNS issued a few weeks later totally differently. In businesses of this scale trading does not turn so drastically down in the time scale between the meeting and now. He was either misled or the CEO did not know what was going on in the business which given the time and money sp not on the strategic review is boggling. There is bound to be an external consultancy involved in this review. who I wonder?

Anyone beginning to think of investing in this would be well advised to read the Carillion discussion in the 4 weeks prior to liquidation. Absolutely full of individuals calling the bottom, specifying ridiculous prices looking forward and peddling the too big to fail quote. As the comments below show some individuals lost a lot of money, and they are not alone. It is not investing just pure gambling and in th absence of much more clarity people should only invest if they are prepared to lose the lot.

Or, in a similar sector do an Afren. This is just gambling now.

The shorters do not help but these are not the individuals who bring companies down. That responsibility lies with the directors.

NO Krss, it�s a gamble not an investment. Plenty of people on this board bought Carillion on the way down claiming it had bottomed and offered potential for big rewards. Truth is nobody knows and for that reason it is not really an investment.

Agree with you. If people took the time to read the kind of comments that were on the Carillion page then we are seeing them all over again; over sold, big order book etc. At least, as far as I can see, nobody has been stupid enough to post the �too big to fail� comment that was all over the Carillion comment Board.

If Woodford with his fund management experience and access to management can get it wrong, then little chance that private investor could have predicted it.

All the same kind of comments being made about Carillion only a few weeks ago. Truth is nobody knows at present, but this is little more than gambling at this stage. Beware catching the falling knife.

How long before City AM come up with a fictitious story about a bid for the Company as they did with Carillion. Lifted the share price significantly for a few days before collapse and nobody appears to have been accountable for writing this rubbish.

I think some of those individuals who persistently kept posting about recovery, massive upside and specifying price targets and when and banging on about recoveries in Glencore, Taylor Wimpy etc, should reflect that they may have influenced inexperienced individuals to invest who have now lost out in a large way. I know everyone should be savvy and only invest what they can afford to lose but unfortunately some get swept along by what is essentially uninformed guesswork.

Eventually, but this is a long term control issue that suggests audits have not focussed on the right areas. As you say, robust contract management procedures are essential in these complex long term contracts.

Agree with all these points but also where are the auditors in all this who signed off the accounts which clearly did not accurately reflect the real position. They carry huge PI cover and someone should test their liability.

Must be seriously hacked off with somebody persuading him to leave a job with big salary and benefits. Any signing on bonus now worthless.