Contempt for shareholders11 Sep 2018 19:02
Source: Shareprophets
Toople – shows contempt for ordinary investors with “delighted to announce” placing
A “Major Contract Win” announcement from Toople (TOOP) on 29th August followed the prior week “contract win demonstrates that Toople is excellently placed” and saw the shares soar to more than 0.92p. I warned with an attempted bailout financing looking on the horizon, sell / avoid, and the shares had settled somewhat around 0.75p before a now “Proposed placing to raise £2.2 million”…
Shares have been conditionally placed “with institutional and other investors”, with CEO of this provider of a range of telecoms services primarily targeted at the UK SME market, Andy Hollingworth, stating “we are delighted to announce this over-subscribed placing”. “Delighted” hey – must have secured a good price then…
… “has conditionally placed 733,333,333 new shares in the company… at 0.3p per share”. You what?!? A more than 67% discount to the price hit after the recent “great win for Toople… we are seeing increased interest from reseller partners and those active in the wholesale market” and a 60% discount to even the last close!
With the funding via a placing (i.e. for a select few – including some directors receiving in shares at the placing price an aggregate approximately £51,400 of fees and remuneration owed), either the company has not “made great operational and financial progress in recent months” as CEO Hollingworth claims or there is contempt for ordinary investors (there is in being “delighted” to announce this placing anyway! And if over-subscribed, couldn’t a better price have been secured?).
Either way, and despite also stating “we expect this funding to see the company through to positive cash flow generation” (we’ll see), I wouldn’t want to own. Bargepole.
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