Member Info for Globex

You're right we shouldn't be getting these now, as ever the explanation will be the board is fast asleep and forgot to send out formal notification. Same thing happened when the process started, the initial form 8s were mistimed. Just inept management.

What a shame to see what was once an industry giant enter to this period of decline. It was only a little over 2.5 years ago they raised £100 million through a placing at 110p. With share price now less than half of that, anyone who bought into that placing must feel pretty silly now. Cash raised from that one exercise alone now the entire market cap.

With shenanigans in India it does raise the question about exactly how overseas contracts were obtained and what sort of "incentives" they've been offering to get them. As publicity around that case develops, other countries may well be re-examining the De La Rue contracts now to ensure they were obtained in an manner that was above board. Hopefully they too don't find more skeletons otherwise this could unravel quickly. Sadly this overhang won't make obtaining new contacts any easier.

Auditors going concern notice and CFO resigning after only a little over 2 years sets alarm bells ringing. Management under big pressure. Big question is can they turn this ship around? We can only judge them on previous form. Hard to now see any catalyst that changes the downwards spiral here.

I suppose at 74 you don't have to be too worried about how this might look on the old CV afterwards if it goes pear shaped. For his sake hopefully compos mentis enough to to have gone into this with eyes wide open.

Interested to see how they play this government red card. Gove has threatened to remove the right to build from non-signers, so perhaps they intend to stop construction and instead move instead to managing the portfolio. Either scenario needs an RNS you'd think.

For me the most interesting outcome would be if CA's board were swept out and new management were able to do a deep dive on this deal with a fresh, untainted perspective. A long shot admittedly, but as they say stranger things have happened. Of all players they're most vulnerable if IIs went against them.

For now I'll certainly be voting no to this grift with my Hurricane shares, great to see the majority of the board here will be doing the same. Make your voices heard.

You're only as good as your last deal in this industry and by gifting so much of Hurricane's cash and prospects to Prax, their credibility is shot now.

CA shareholders may well be wondering why should it be that CA management get to collect their salaries and hefty fund management fees while major questions are being asked about this deal, to put it politely. The gloves are off now.

If you really want to poke the hornet's nest take a look at the major share holders in Crystal Amber.

The thing to bear in mind before doing down this route is CA have given their irrevocable approval, so there's no going back as far as the Hurricane vote with their holdings go. However, there is absolutely nothing stopping CA's shareholder's calling an EGM to oust their board on the back of signing up to this turkey of a deal. Then the various agreements could be looked from a fresh perspective. If the deal is not in the best interest of CA shareholders, the CA board is pretty exposed here.

Where it gets interesting is the CA board actually have very few shares in the firm between them, so they're vulnerable in a vote situation. It doesn't help their case that the rest of their portfolio has totally shat the bed this year.

With all of that in mind, you could start here https://www.sabacapital.com/contact-us/

How lovely that our broker overseeing this deal was able to sell 4.2 million shares as high as 8.5p as they peaked yesterday before the full documentation of the deal had been published, before buying back fewer for less.

Times like this you realise this game is completely rigged for small private investors. I'm afraid we're all playing blindfolded meanwhile insiders get to see the cards first.

Good to see all replies to this tweet rightly giving Bernstein a grilling.

What I'd love now would be a wildcard like Saba calling an EGM for Crystal Amber to oust their board on the back of signing up to this turkey. Pure hopium I know but stranger things have happened. What's notable about Crystal Amber's board is they actually hold very few shares in the firm between them, so would easily be outnumbered if a couple of institutional investors grouped together.

Pension liabilities are the big headwind of course but my other rationale for buying here is that for those hard drinking 1980s hacks the attrition rate must be accelerating rapidly. For the remaining big legacy issue phone hacking, potential share price catalyst is cases due to be settled this year.

I was a long term holder here but sold out this morning. The portfolio had already taken a turn for the worse to put it kindly, with De La Rue alone value falling 50% in 12 months and having a corruption case pending, the sort of thing I wouldn't normally touch with a bargepole so started to feel a bit uncomfortable here anyway.

The Hurricane deal is grim imo as covered extensively on that board. With the portfolio here being shot to bits actually surprised share price here hadn't fallen further so all things considered a relief to be out.

Be careful with the 12.5p figure. It's loaded with so many conditions, structured in such a way that there are none of the normal protections you get with owning shares in a PLC, and over such a long timeframe it's effectively meaningless.

He'll need to pull a rabbit of a hat to explain this one. It's no understatement to say his reputation on the line. Hard to see any other explanation though than the biggest deal of his career simply being as woeful as it appears.

Maybe what's confusing you is the Allied Minds delisting. That's the only thing that's changed, it no longer being a plc. Prior to delist the share price fell off a cliff and consequently CRS sitting on significant paper losses there, unfortunately.

Sadly not. No payment made, the firm is just a mini portfolio comprised of privately owned companies none of which have been sold.

Crystal Amber are a true real mystery here. They're due to report interims within next 2 weeks so likelihood is we'll get some reasoning soon.

They were surely either a) offered a sweetener or b) have given up.

For (a) as long as it wasn't the brown envelope kind but one that would benefit all of their shareholders - such as being offered more liquid deferred consideration units - one option to consider would be hedging with a shareholding there. I thought I was being clever going 50/50 here and there but the downside is without Hurricane I'm afraid the rump of their portfolio is struggling, to put it kindly. I say that as a long term holder.

I wonder if it could simply be (b) though. They were humiliated with a vote going against them at De La Rue, a woeful investment as it turns out with CFO awol and pending corruption case. Allied Minds pretty much collapsed. Sutton Harbour completely illiquid. Equals the only growth story but they've sold. Maybe they simply decided the portfolio had become a basket case so time to shut the doors.

Looks like the job cuts have started
https://www.holdthefrontpage.co.uk/2023/news/more-than-400-journalists-put-at-risk-as-publisher-reveals-fresh-cuts/

Managed decline has to be the MO here now, at least board are responding to margins tightening up. The only mystery is how they can afford to retain the dividend this year with free cash being generated so thin. Seems a risk to me going into a year with some big unknowns. We all know that during times of stress cash preservation key.

Still overall looks value to me at this price. Not a share to set your pants on fire but recovery potential - as long as they don't run out of cash.

Looks like they were a bit naughty releasing that RNS. Only they could benefit from the leak that appeared on one website only about an hour before RNS appears, coincidence? Almost feel sorry for them with what can only have been a attempt to drum up interest, but then you remember that some naïve traders were sucked in again already facing a loss.

Meanwhile Times report Strike being "surprised the announcement was not shared with us prior to release" and worse still that they hadn't even spoken to purplebricks directly. Ouch,

Good find. Here's a paywall free version https://archive.is/yU6wM

Our so called world class buyer started out trading from a £64k maisonette. The Times are heavily insinuating there's something amiss with this firm. No wonder they've done so well if they've been cutting deals like the one presented to us today.

Board members get £4.4 million for seeing this deal through, he'd put out a video of himself tap dancing if it meant that happened so I'll take whatever he says with a pinch of salt. At least we now know why the board weren't buying, and why the hopelessly conflicted Stifel were punting off shares when they had full knowledge the deal on the table was below the share price at the time.

Board are paid £900,000 upon completion and £3.5 million at end, they win either way so what incentive would they have? They'll be slapping themselves on the back today and laughing at long term holders.