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Bizarre opening drop. Maybe some were spooked by lack of guidance. Brokers will no doubt make up for this when they issue their upgrades.

£10 sounds a lot, but it was trading at that level only 12 months ago! It's just that the share consolidation has muddied the waters.

Plenty of profits to service the debt, so the AA should have no problem refinancing it.

On the contrary, providers of finance anxious to find a secure and lucrative home for their cash will be falling over each other to lend to the AA.

People are forgetting that EVEN WITHOUT A VACCINE, the government has been working on a framework to allow the cruise industry to reopen safely early in the new year, dependent only on "the right infection control measures, the right testing regime and the right facilities to allow them to contain an outbreak".

So a vaccine is just icing on the cake.

Just for fun...

The IPO valued the company at £2.1bn, but the shares did rise from their offer price of 185p to about 225p from memory, before beginning their long journey south.

The maximum M Cap was therefore about £2.5bn or, with 140m shares now in issue, about £18 per share.

“I’ve emailed investor relations asking why they are diluting SH once again, when they categorically stated no extra shares for 180 days” (smorty)

Calm down, smorty! You need to read the full Prospectus (a great way to spend a rainy Saturday morning), and not just the summary in the RNS. You’d then realise that the 180 day lock-up on issues of further shares is “subject to certain standard exceptions”, one of which no doubt would be the issue of shares to an employee benefit trust.

In any event, the Prospectus actually confirms that “the Company has no current plans for an offering or issuance of Ordinary Shares, apart from issuances in accordance with the rules of the Group’s employee share plans”.

Thanks Doofus, a useful post.

Talking of drivel, smorty, you're overlooking the "control premium" attributable to owning 100% as opposed to just 27%.

If this premium were, say, 50% (not unreasonable for the purposes of this discussion), this would take the basic figure of £2.64 to around £4 per share.

However, more relevant, probably, to any offer from him would be the need to see off the competition.

The Takeover Code talks about the highest price paid in the previous 12 months TO ACQUIRE THE SHARES FROM A VENDOR.

For Sir R, there was no vendor: he SUBSCRIBED for the shares, which is not covered by the Code.

So, unless I've missed something, he can offer what he likes - subject to being outbid by someone else, of course.

The next scheduled update from the company is not till the full year figures are reported at the end of March/early April - a long time to wait...

However, in view of this week’s dramatic vaccine news and its implications for the resumption of cruising, we should get some good news on this front from the company by RNS well before then, I would think in the next few weeks.

This should be the main catalyst for next quantum leap in the SP, though such news may well be anticipated to some extent by the market from cruise industry intelligence.

Just re-read the AGM statement in September:

"Given the continued economic uncertainty due to Covid-19, the Group is still unable to provide guidance for the full year financial year. However, the Group intends to provide a further update and reinstate financial guidance to investors and analysts for the twelve months ending 31 March 2021 at the Interim Results, to be reported in LATE NOVEMBER 2020".

It was total lack of guidance which has caused the SP to drift down from 20p-ish to 14p-ish. I'll be very disappointed if they don't at least do enough in the update to reverse that.

KBYK - you must mean Fri 27th. I'm with you on that.

Most recent half year results/trading updates: Friday 16/11/18, Monday 9/12/19.

Thu 26th or Fri 27th are bang in the middle.

So much depends on the next update. Is there a definite date, anyone?

With the general market galloping ahead, a half-decent update should see this back in the 20s, where it was only 3 or 4 months ago. But even at that level, it'll still be the biggest drag on my portfolio!

If I were you, Perturbed, I'd be trying to bring my average down while you can.

Even after yesterday's big jump, I bought 5,000 more today at 184p. Seems a no-brainer, because even that price it is only equivalent to the 12p open offer price, which was itself at a discount to the then market price, and was furthermore set at a time of much greater uncertainty than now.

I fully expect my top-up today to at least double over the months ahead.

But I can see myself holding SAGA for a good few years....

Alternatively: Sir R put in a total of £100m, for c552m old shares, or 552/15 = c37m new shares. £100m/37m = £2.70 per share.

When it gets to £2.70, Sir R will invite us all on board for ****tails, I'm sure...

You're very quiet today, smorty365 - you normally post 2 or 3 times a day.....We're all really missing your positivity!

Interesting comments, Mr BB.

We don’t know exactly what is in the minds of Miton - they’re holding is now down to 14%, from a maximum of 20%. But they have lost about 80% of their original investment, so one can understand any impatience or concern they may have (and I think they have more to worry about than the massive spread at the moment).

They probably can’t see the SP getting back to their average of, perhaps, 25p any time soon; more like 15p, with luck. So I’m sure CRU has been slated by them for partial divestment as and when opportune moments arise, and will be used, only with that proviso, as part of any cash-raising exercise, despite its illiquidity.

Miton clearly bought at the wrong time, but they now appear to be selling at precisely the wrong time too, having sold 2.5m shares last week just before the surprise trading update (issued just 9 days after the last one) which appears to herald improved prospects for the company. Will this encourage them to sell some more CRU, taking advantage of the likely additional buying interest (though no evidence of that today!), or to continue holding instead for the long-awaited rise in the SP? We shall see…

The disposal by Miton needs to be put into context.

The shares sold were part of the "LF Miton UK Multi Cap Income Fund", an £800m+ fund comprised of over 100 different holdings. The fund's Coral shares represent less than 0.1% of the fund by value.

As an OEIC, it has no choice but to sell some of its investments when investors pull out of the fund and need to be paid off. This is almost certainly the reason for its selling 1.5m Coral shares.

However, the fund still retains 12.5m Coral shares, or 15%.

It may just be that its timing of the sell was unfortunate, in view of the next day's upbeat trading statement. If so, they will now want to avoid selling more Coral. Let's see...

Coincidentally, an institution holding about 15% sold 1.5m shares in the last 24 hrs. No doubt the MMs are struggling to find corresponding buyers in this very thinly-traded share. Despite that, the SP has held up well. You could say the trading update was well-timed to neutralise the effect of the big sell...