Member Info for GoCPI

Media.monks is now just Monks, and split into 2 distinct practices - Marketing services and Technology services. Read on for more details. Changes afoot and valuation upgrades next once green shoots are visible in the next update - it's coming.

https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/media-monks-operating-brand-s4-100000729.html

The best thing that one can do about it is put him on filter or ignore him - he's just a thin-skinned opportunist! Plenty of green posts on my view saves me the trouble of reading through these posts and then realising plenty more brain cells died during that process.

After all someone who thinks a hair-gelled CEO is a loser, is about as useful as an ashtray on a bike. LMAO!!

Good luck all - patience is a virtue with a turnaround share, in spite of short term shenanigans on the low liquidity LSE.

1Pencil - the UK is insignificant for S4 from a revenues standpoint. The US is the key money spinner (circa 80%) and is set to get bigger after we recently clinched another whopper there - GM. But look broadly, any piece of global macro improvement news is certainly welcome!!!

JCJ07 - I didn't know you were a psychic, alongside being a perennial glass half empty chappie!!! WPP's update is on the 7th of August...

https://www.wpp.com/investors

My bad, JCJ. Obviously I can't read - I see what I want to see and all that. I haven't seen/read WPP's update yet

Plenty of green shoots from the Publicis update though. THey've stated that Tech sector client spend is coming back after a dour 2023 and that's significant for S4.

JCJ07 - what part of the Publicis update fills you with no confidence?

I'm going to put FearFul back on filter. Spot on there, Broomtree - he's a total attention seeker. Just a few months ago he was slating Adolfo on a near daily basis, pi*ssing about that he didn't trust his gelled hair style and someone with that look could never do a CEO's job. And now he's the best thing since sliced bread? Crikey!!

It's pointless listening to his daily drab 'trading' explanations - personally, I don't come to this site for a daily dose of tripe.

Back on filter goes FearFul.

Thanks, Kula. Good early signs for the sector and possibly a leading indicator for SFOR. I should've been adding today, but I suppose there's still time before SFOR puts out their 'update', a la the shiite LSE style light weight update without the detail that say Omnicom provides, driven by US listing requirements.

Omnicom is a lot less tech client centred and that may be driving the out performance vis-a-vis SFOR, but the tide will turn, and soon, IMO.

" I don't believe that anyone could be down less than 50% on an investment in CPI."

There are plenty that accumulated when the SP was in the low teens for ages. Assuming they hadn't thrown the kitchen sink when CPI was in the pound plus range, these holders should be in the green now and that includes me too. So, I'm sure there are plenty who're in the money, let alone down 50% - It's all about timing, spare fire power and patience. I hope yours comes good too.

"Rotation in US out of Tech to Value; what brings you to this conclusion please.

Are you still in O+G?"

Kipper9 - A couple of reasons why IMO. US 10-Yr Treasury yields are dropping as economic data is rather tepid and that rate cut promise is impacting interest rate sensitive sectors positively - Industrials/Cons Discretionaries/Solar, are all chugging along to the upside today with Dow hitting new highs, and big tech like FB/NVDA selling off a bit today. That rotation is quite positive and tells you that the market is now again pricing in a soft landing scenario. I'm not 100% sure if this is a sustainable rotation over the medium term, but we'll need to see a few rate cuts materialise from September onwards, along with oil prices staying tempered. THis is why I think that Value stocks will drive the market higher in H2 vs Tech driving it higher in H1. CPI and my other large holding SFOR sit squarely in that GDP linked recovery stocks.

I'm 95% out of my O&G holdings. I'm completely out of my UK O&G holdings - I saw the writing on the wall when the Tories put on a windfall tax in 2022 and knew that if Labour were to come back to power it would get a bit more worse. I have a couple of Canadian O&G holdings as a buffer against high oil prices, but they'll (both oil and stock prices) go nowhere far IMO - the dividend yields are great though.

I agree that CPI could indeed be a dividend play in 2025 once there is better visibility on organic FCF and that could be the driver that pushed CPI towards the 40s/50s over the next year or two at the most.

In the meantime, if we're as nimble and successful as AimLess and FearFul, you can make money trading these shares - Lol...kidding, as these chaps can only really make some money when a stock is range bound, not when it breaks out as quickly as it did in the past 2 weeks. Their flapping about with their inane near term price prognostications was a sight to behold, but that is what traders could miss out on when the price turns and runs away from them. I really hope these levels hold though!!

Good luck to all..

Looks to be in play in the US and will no doubt meander its way down to the UK. The US markets are broadening out now from Tech towards Value stocks, and that rotation is pushing up Dow to all-time highs. This bodes well for a deep value stock like CPI in the medium (this could even be 3 weeks to the time when the H1 results are released) to long term.

Unlike some traders on here who can track/trade shares daily by virtue of plenty of time on their hands, and provide us entertaining (not) hourly commentary, IMO the best bang for the quid will accrue to the patient who wait this out. Just in the past 2 weeks, personally I'm up a pretty packet by sitting through the rally rather than try to time and trade.

I know there are some sitting on over 2M shares (Crow and another chap I can't remember) and they'd up >£170k in just 2 weeks, assuming they're still holding. That's the virtue of conviction and patience, and for a turnaround stock the best rewards accrue to those who wait.

Oil and gas stocks in 2021/early 2022 gave me the ammo for my current top 2 UK holdings and I'll happily sit out on the vast majority of these in CPI through the 40s at least. I can't really see AH and team f'ing this up like JL & co did last year and prior.

Unlike the footie, this is truly coming home ;-) !!! IMO.

Trump couldn't turbo charge his backside if it mattered. That pathological liar and bully is a danger to world order and who knows what he may get upto in a possible second term.

Biden has done just fine to my portfolio values. And more importantly for my current portfolio, the Tories have laid the groundwork for Labour to seize the day and ensure that the UK economy grows as interest rate cuts kick in over the next few months. That's all that matters to the UK economy and certainly for CPI, and not what the Orange man does across the pond. IMO.

Correct, unless the Secretary of State decides to block the deal, and I can't see a reason why they would as there is no national security issue with the buyer.

Yep, and it was as communicated in the disposal RNS. They did they will withdraw this condition if the new listing regime kicks in prior to the original date of the AGM.

"Easy to batter the ex CEO. This was not an easy turnaround and there is way to go yet"

But the results are plain enough to see. Year after year of shareholder value destruction under Jon Lewis that it's pretty straight forward to pin the b;ame for the past 5 or so years' morass on JL. It's easy to talk strategy and direction (focus on making this as an outsourcing business), but not follow through on execution by lowering bloated costs for a rapidly shrinking business from all the disposals. That blame sits squarely with JL and TW - who else are to blame for not looking under the hood and start to properly cut costs 3 or 4 years ago?

And of course, there's the proclamation last year that the 'Turnaround was complete' - the hollowness of that statement without the cojones to actually see it through by implementing tough costs early on, is mind-boggling. Good riddance to that lot.

Adolfo is not Mexican - he's Spanish. He went to Uni in Grenada, Spain. Did his masters there as well.

"RR SP X 6 over a 22 month period. I think CPI could come close to that performance. Also my comparrison on valuations of Serco & SS."

It's indeed possible that CPI gets to 72p (6x from the lows) over the next 2 years, but we need 2 things to happen.

1. UK economy grows much more than expected - great for CPI consulting side of business (experience), boosting revenues

2. Fantastic execution operationally - it's one thing to have vision, but far, far more important is to translate that to cold hard numbers by delivering on costs and on FCF. EBITDA % of revenues needs to climb closer to 10% for any significant upswing in the SP, IMO.

Can AH and his team do it? Of course, they're far more shareholder focused than JL and his (painfully useless) Motley crew, but the market will wait to see a string of strong financial reports before a significant rerate. I'll stay patient and wait for news!!!

1. UK

"The price action simply dies not reflect the volume of buys going through. It's distorted to the downside by much smaller sells.

That is Human interference which makes my blood boil.

And to be frank, the sale this week just reflects how poorly valued the company is in the first place, by these so called market makers."

If you read my other post, you'll see my view on how shallow a market the LSE is. There is not enough participation in the UK markets and its easy to move a SP down on hardly any volume. It's all down to simple demand and supply, exacerbated by non-participation from the UK funds who run away to the US to get outsized returns, and they're very deep markets. What Fu*cked up the UK markets - for me, a key factor was Brexit. We lost market participants and we lost growth since that momentous decision to seize the day, and I still don't know what it is that we've got control over!!

UK markets - it is what it is. If you're expecting a miracle and for CPI to be suddenly valued higher today because a few people on this board think it should be higher now, then you'll be sorely disappointed. This is why I don't bother myself with day to day movements, and provide running commentary on those here. I know and believe there's deep value here and it will come good over time as better updates are provided by management over the next 6 to 12 months.

Amo - Capita will receive a net of £183 mill after costs for the Capita One deal, but it's a welcome addition to the cash. There's another £9 mill deferred payment due in November for the (travel business?) deal closed last November.

Buybacks/dividends will not happen in 2024 (I hate to bust the dreams of a few on this board) - further SP rises will need to be driven by improving financials/business updates, and we have one in 3 weeks' time. I'm glad we got to where we got to, circa 20p. I don't expect straight line upward movement in the SP on the back of a sale news and it's good we're getting this correction out of the way. The traders jumping off I suspect, but I like consolidation before another runup.

Now let's talk about those damn manipulating MMs, shall we? They live rent free in the minds of many, and they only come out when it's time to bring a stock price down!!! ROFL..

" Both my US stocks (Meta & Coin) took a right pasting. " It's about time it happened and is a great sign that the US market is broadening out from Mag 7. We hold some Nvidia and Arm, and can feel a tiny bit of pain, but the rise in 'value' shares from this broadening out theme is what is welcome. S&P equal weighted index was up yesterday, even though the market weighted index was down, led by the tech giants. We need more of this.

CPI and SFOR - two of the best medium/long term plays in my book. That's irrespective of what may happen in the next week or the two.