The latest Investing Matters Podcast episode featuring Jeremy Skillington, CEO of Poolbeg Pharma has just been released. Listen here.
Sky News were well informed and there may be something afoot dependent upon how one reads the 'information light' RNS from the company. Ireland is a booming market so who knows. There have been a few small trades and I guess the shares still offer a decent option on a deal with little downside risk. Positively NBNK are controlled by serious players so not the usual crappy AIM cash shell
In his heyday, David Marshall controlled nearly 10 quoted entities, listed here, Luxembourg and RSA. Now I think just three being London Finance, his master company Marshall Monteagle [RSA] and Western Selection [ISDX]. There is also the soon to be wound up Halogen which is the delisted rump of the old Falcon Mines. Its only asset is a decent stake in fast growing Heartstone Inns which it will distribute in specie shortly London Finance are unusual as they retain a full listing but are a pint sized concern but potentially undervalued all the same. Their assets are threefold being 8m Finsbury Food Group, nearly 8m Western Selection and a super blue chip portfolio and cash of around £6m having made an allowance for liabilities/the recent Finsbury share sale. With just over 31m shares in issue that translates to NAV of around 67p with Finsbury accounting for c28p, Western Selection 19p [using its NAV and not the well below asset value share price] and 20p for the general portfolio/cash. London Finance is debt free. 63% of the equity is controlled by three shareholders [Marshall family 41%] with, I imagine, a long tail of very small holdings harking back to the time when London Finance was East Rand Consolidated Clearly with Western also trading at a large discount, the cost of maintaining two listed entities and the expense of a Premium Listing one would imagine there is scope for some housekeeping here which would reduce costs and help reduce the discount. Equally there would also seem to be the opportunity for other corporate activity given the 'group' is asset rich, debt free and clean. Then again with the Marshall family no doubt content to play a long game they may just be looking to retain the status quo. There is also the debate about Finsbury, that is having such a large slice of the pie - they have been a stellar performer but even after selling 2m shares, is the holding still too large? It is always good to know companies like London Finance remain listed and hark back to a different time
With now less than a month to go before the deadline established nearly three years ago expires can we expect the company to be wound up? One would think that with four shareholders controlling nearly 94% there might be scope for a corporate action [even if outside the banking sector] but then again the return of cash - 35-36p per share might also seem attractive too. This is the cleanest of platform companies stuffed with nearly £20m Then again Crystal Amber could make an all share bid at around NAV to garner funds and retain the right to sue HMG for the disgraceful situation over the Verde assets which have now fallen into foreign hands. No question NBNK would have offered something different but thanks to Clegg's meddling and the absurd preference for Co-Op - which could never have afforded the purchase - this was not to be Clearly the market has forgotten all about this stock though there seems to have been a small trade this week. All in all an interesting situation
Does anyone know what is happening with this stock which, as far as I can see, has very few shares freely floating and looks to trade well below the cash value. Yet the price has been all over the place this last week with some poor soul paying up to 43p yet today many thousands of shares have been bought at 30p or less?
Thank you Chan. These are decent numbers and especially pleasing is the debt reduction achieved in H2 and the ratchet down of their target debt/EBITDA to 1.5x from 2x. The dividend, being ahead of schedule [1.5p intimated at the interims], while only a nominal yield, is also positive. With good forward guidance from the ITV behemoth and hopefully UTV confirming the overall 'health' of Channel 3 when they report in a couple of weeks, 2014 should be a solid year. Next stop for STV will be cancelling the share premium and merger reserves to remove that hideous P&L balance which is a testament to how badly STV was run prior to the peerless Rob Woodward joining - they blew a third of a billion pounds on rubbish. Also of note is the elimination of the pension deficit and with renewal of the licence and extension of the debt profile, really STV have completed their de-risking of the business [other things being equal of course!] The question for the market is what rating.......ITV are on a forward P/E of 16. STV should trade at a discount but 12x would give a price close to the Numis target so maybe that has merit. In fairness to STV they alerted shareholders to the results in their 11/2 RNS about the licence so we shouldn't berate them too much
This seems to be one of AIMs bigger companies yet I cannot find very much information on London Security other than it owns a great range of fire extinguisher and protection brands including the British stalwart Nu-Swift. It seems to make good profits and is debt free. There is also a good dividend. Maybe a forgotten gem though I sense there is not much of a market in the shares. Interesting that.....and no other posts