Member Info for ProphitOfDoom

With all respect, I think there's little to be gained from trying to micro-analyse the trade data - the fact that it's there doesn't mean that it's necessarily very useful.

A rising price indicates more buyers than sellers, and vice versa for a falling price.

Text from a PME RMS:
"Auction call extensions give London Stock Exchange electronic order book users a further opportunity to review the prices and sizes of orders entered in an individual security's auction call before the execution occurs. A price monitoring extension is activated when the matching process would have otherwise resulted in an execution price that is a pre-determined percentage above or below the price of the most recent automated execution today."

The London market goes into auction mode three(?) times a day - I believe at the open, close and at 12pm. As the text says, if the auction results in a matched-price that diverges significantly from previous trading (implying a mismatch between buys and sells), then the auction period is extended. In itself, a PME means very little.

This is a complex area. In general, there is more 'visible' liquidity available for larger stocks, and at certain times of the day, e.g. close to the LSE auction periods, or at the close. I find that even for mid-cap stocks, someone needs to pick up a phone to do a trade, even in quite modest size.

RBW is a small company, and so brokers are unlikely to be showing two-way liquidity in size on SETS(mm) at all times. (For what it's worth, there are probably at best only a small handful of brokers that make a market in RBW). Also, dare I say it, for stocks which may be experiencing a degree of selling pressure, bids may be slightly harder to come by...

NdOx prices slipping - https://www.kitco.com/strategic-metals/

Just saying...

If Bacanora is worth significantly more to another potential bidder than the current mkt cap of £188m, then presumably they will approach the board and/or make a public offer. The board (esp. the independent directors) would have a legal duty to consider any alternative offer, and the fact that the company is now 'in play' may encourage a bidder to emerge. Unfortunately, Gangfeng are in a very strong position, having effectively mounted a creeping takeover of the company, which would certainly discourage any potential rivals.

To those who believe that the current share price really is at a massive discount to 'true value' - why hasn't another bidder emerged previously to take advantage? Why hasn't the share price been bid up to that 'true value' level already?

There is no chance of another bid emerging. Ganfeng blocked out other players when they took their 29% stake.

If anyone had dreams of £5 a share of whatever, then I'm sorry but that's stock market capitalism for you. Something is only worth what other people are prepared to pay for it - yesterday it was 44p, and today it's 59p, at some point it may be 67p. Be happy with your takeover premium and move on.

I'd go one step further and say that there is no chance of another bid emerging. Ganfeng blocked out other players when they took their 29% stake.

If anyone had dreams of £5 a share of whatever, then I'm sorry but that's stock market capitalism for you. Something is only worth what other people are prepared to pay for it - yesterday it was 44p, and today it's 59p, at some point it may be 67p. Be happy with your takeover premium and move on.

Yes, you can't expect the BoD to give a running commentary about any negotiations that might be going on.

Shanders: Thanks for this. As I wrote previously, I’m inclined to treat gosh-look-at-this, puff-piece articles about IPOs in the press with a high degree of caution. Investment banks have an incentive to 'talk up' the price of a prospective IPO, to curry favour or win business from the company, just as estate agents will b*llsh*t about how much your house might be worth, if you were to use their services.

Having gone through the recent annual results, it's obvious that the share price either 'bakes in' a very healthy valuation (>2x currently booked value) for Oxford Nanopore at the proposed IPO, and/or investors are willing to accept a much-narrower-than-usual discount to NAV. Either way, SUPP is basically at no better than fair value at the moment.

DP: I'm just making the basic point that extraction must be easier and more efficient in a dry season - less mud and holes filling with water. This is the African tropics - rainfall will be much heavier than anything we'd get in Europe.

This is just another shakedown attempt: the powers-that-be have noticed that RBW are mining and exporting a valuable product (a rare thing in Burundi...), and want a bigger slice of the pie. All the hot air about concentration %s is just an excuse to twist some arms. We saw similar things happening in the Congo copper boom 10-15 years ago.

Regrettably, Burundi places very low in the transparency/corruption rankings. Certain swiss bank account balances may be looking a bit healthier in the near future....

A cloudy outlook all round, then....

It is the rainy season in East Africa, after all - this has been flagged up as an issue in previous company announcements. Presumably extraction & transport would be somewhat disrupted also in any case...

Tornado: my goal was to point out the technical difference between 'mineral resources' and 'mineral reserves', not cast aspersions on the quality of the Angolan prospect, which may well be excellent.

That said, it may be that the company will be able to finance the bulk of it's mine development and processing plant build via loans/debt of some kind - there are some specialist mining lenders out there, and of course the involvement of a development bank certainly can't be ruled out. We'll see. If I was in the business of lending to miners, I'd be happier a) lending for a UK plant over a Angolan mine, and b) if there was a healthy slug of equity capital on board as a buffer. I'd probably want a healthy slice of the upside via some mezzanine financing too.

In all likelihood the company is currently trawling through institutional investors with a presentation of the detail of the much vaunted business plan, trying to drum-up interest with a view to fund raising. This is perhaps why the sp has stalled slightly recently.

I suspect that documenting 'Mineral reserves', i.e. those which are 'valuable and legally, economically, and technically feasible to extract', require a great deal more geological surveying, drilling and assaying (i.e. expenditure) than is sensible for a company of the size of Pensana currently. Companies the size of Rio Tinto or BHP do provide Mineral Reserve numbers.

Obviously/presumably there will be some effect on the kind of financing that the company is able to secure, i.e. a greater tilt towards equity capital, with shareholders demanding effectively a higher cost of capital (i.e. lower share prices).

As someone else has noted, this particular issue could be the result of a paperwork error, or something more serious. I'm afraid however that central African governments have a serial track record of 'game playing' - it usually has something to do with seeking 'contributions to the retirement funds' of politicians and officials. Note the problems various companies have had in the DRC.

This is where GB and the board need to be able to demonstrate a high level of acumen and general craftiness.

Casc: your second 'if' is a big one. Don't necessarily believe everything you read when it comes to IPOs - see Deliveroo.

Well, as far as we can tell Industrial Heat has been marked down to near-zero already, and yes maybe there are a few non-written-down, zero-value-really duds in there still.... but that's the nature of early-stage, venture capital investing, no?

The half-year (30th June) report has: "the partial realisation of the Company’s holding in Oxford Nanopore as part of a strongly supported fundraise at an attractive valuation".

So, there was a partial sale, with some valuation uplift to the residual holding. Not clear (to me) what proportion was sold. I would need the end-2020 annual report for this.

DP: I could give you a list of risks, if you like - but are you sure you want it?