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Mat - yeah, I deal directly with Chrystal. I went via them for my Northern Leaf CLNs and strongly considered their Yooma raise, before deciding I was better off adding here (bad timing...) I appreciate all your posts, but I think Ed's latest appointments are at least worthy of review - not an eye-roll - given some of the uncertainties. I'm not even saying they bode badly for us, necessarily, but I've got a lot riding on SEED, am currently underwater, and want to watch my back!
Barwick, just checked back in the presentation, and we've got £2m. Running costs are £65 to £70k / month, though, so you're right that there isn't much more than £1m to invest at the moment.
Also checked major shareholders: the top 5 individuals own 31.55% between them.
Ed's new Board appointments seem to be:
a) his own holding company, off the shelf yesterday, and hasn't done anything (even though he had one before...)
b) a shared holding company with some mates: one from Chrystal Capital, one who runs yacht races round the Isle of Wight, and one who was a director at Hemogenyx
It feels a bit rich after Ed complained he was spending far too much time in Leap's Board room (shared offices with IMG, right? round the corner from Openbet...?) and wished he had longer to spend on the day job. Still though, I'm sure it's nothing suspicious...
Bunts...
https://www.investormeetcompany.com/investor/meeting/seed-innovations-annual-general-meeting
Full video still available if you're signed up (free). It's worth watching from about 50mins in. Precise quote is at 54:10
Anyone have a quick answer to why Ed was appointed here yesterday:
https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/13650120/officers
...and here last week?
https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/13294725/officers
...before I end up down the rabbit hole?
I think his only other active directorships are irrelevant / personal. (Although it appears he rents his place in Notting Hill?!)
I KNOW!! But you could potentially go to Ed and, as IMG, and say "hello Ed, we all think Leap is worth £100m to IMG in total... SEED have got 44%, so how about we give you £50m for lock, stock and barrel... why don't you put it to a shareholder vote?"
That would explain why Ed responded to a question on share price by saying "if someone offered me £50m for SEED, I'd say no"... which is a pretty indirect way of answering a question. There could have been a bunch of junior execs from IMG who didn't "officially" know anything, but bought into SEED on the offchance Ed would sell it to IMG with a SP > 20p.
And / or... IMG would have 66% of the voting rights in Leap (I think?) if it had control over SEED. I can't remember what Mellon and cronies hold collectively, but it'd get IMG a good chunk of the way if they arranged a deal. Sorry if it sounds implausible, but if I were IMG I'd explore all the avenues before writing a cheque for £50m?!
Nope nope, I was referring to buying out SEED. If our stake in Fralis is currently worth £50m, and SEED's market cap is £15m, there could be all kinds of reasons why it would be more efficient for IMG to pick up SEED instead of buying Fralis from SEED. Not necessarily, of course, but it would explain Ed's odd comment and potentially some of the recent selling.
If IMG secured 51% of SEED, wouldn't that effectively give them total voting control over Leap??
888 do you think there was a bit of a dog whistle in Ed's shareholder Q&A, then? When he said ~ "if someone offered me £50m for SEED tomorrow, I'd say no". Do you think that's because IMG have effectively already offered £50m for SEED? (I thought at the time it was a really weird way to phrase his answer on value...)
Given our MC is curently £15m, they might have tried to buy us out of the whole caboodle?? Do you think the inexplicable selling spree recently could even be from IMG / their exec's, who have to get rid of their holdings if IMG pick up Fralis instead of SEED?
Gooner - almost spot on!! I'm younger than that and finished my degree - but that just means I listen to re-runs of the Radio 4 news shows all day, instead of Jeremy Kyle... while testing the product and looking exactly like Neil - in both dress code and hair. Good instincts!
Could there be a link to OpenBet...? As in, if IMG had picked up Leap with pocket change, would it have set a precedent which meant OpenBet could push for $2bn instead of $1.2bn, using comparable metrics? Or perhaps, when looking at the DCFs in order to value OpenBet, it was beneficial for Leap to NOT be within the Endeavour family, as it would show a greater profitability of the OpenBet acquisition and therefore a higher price?? Easier to get the big deals done first, then spend the pocket change? I don't know. I feel like something's going on, but it seems to defy logic.
Troll, I mean this as "agreement", not to be patronising... but I think every single one of us on here believe Ed's IPO rumblings are a means to expedite a sale to IMG.
(Barwick - I think your point to 888 about Ed might be... the same point as 888 was making?? Maybe not. Most of this week, when looking at the share trades, I have felt like I have NO IDEA what is happening. What is happening?! Answers on a postcard, please.)
Does anyone have any insight about the corporate structure, e.g. is it technically Fralis / Leap that would be sold, and are there drag-along / tag-along clauses that would be triggered by a 66% holding....??? (As in, can IMG force a 100% buy-out of Leap, if SEED agree to sell them the 44%?)
Enjoy the Ryder Cup. If you've recently been working in the energy supply industry, it does feel a bit like total shutdown!! (It wasn't us who got it wrong, by the way, if I hear Ofgem saying one more time "we won't reward failure", when that is literally what they do every time they run their internal payroll....!)
I've been lucky and had a few very nice job offers, since, but I've just been for an interview at a C&C woodcutting company - driving past an empty petrol station - and the warehouses were piled up with completed glamping pods / shepherd's huts etc. that are waiting for haulage; also with raw stock, as the supply chain is so unreliably... and they can't meet demand because their new warehouse has been idle for two months because they can't get anyone to install the electric meters.
Is the Ryder Cup golf...?? Never thought it was a real thing.
Quint - somewhat agree re Ed's temperament. I do think he knows what he's doing, I just wish he could explain it as well as Fleta Solomon. (Even the little things, like I added both Ed and Fleta on Linkedin. Ed ignored the request; Fleta accepted and sent me a personalised note back, thanking me for my interest etc.)
I mentioned a scenario that I'd run on my tracker yesterday, assuming modest growth in most investments (broadly 10% across the board over six months) and factoring in opex, interest on loan notes, discount on conversion (assuming all the planned IPOs go ahead). If Leap - as a whole - floated for £50m... that gets Ed to £40m NAV for SEED by Feb / March 2022. There are a number of things that could nudge us closer to £50m, and I don't think slippage of 3months is too bad. "£50m by the end of the year" is not ludicrous, in my opinion.
(And yes Barwy, I know we need to wave goodbye to Leap, it just feels like a shame. Everyone seems desperate to get rid of it, and we need the cash, but at the same time I'll be sorry not to have it in the portfolio...)
I've always taken Leap with a pinch of salt. It was a risk-weighted part of the attraction for me, as was Mellon's stake in FFWD, but it was mainly the CBD interests (particularly that SEED had recognised the potential of Northern Leaf - even if they were capped at £600k due to the oversubscription). I've even argued on here that we should keep Leap for the divi's when it hits profit - why sell off one of our best assets?! (Although that argument was slightly facetious.)
If you ignore Leap, though, our listed stocks are pretty much at market value and the convertible loans aren't large enough in any one company to be a huge attraction. The portfolio could be very attractive to an institutional investor, but if I were an individual looking at SEED now... I might go straight into LGP instead.
I can only imagine the sellers yesterday were disappointed day traders who were looking for a quick bump from a Leap announcement, and - faced with waiting six months - got out at a loss to punt their cash on crypto or something. Not the kind of investors we need. I think we've just got to hang on until we've got liquidity from Leap (agree a raise would be devastatingly dilutive), then we'll get the investments that will drive decent daily volumes.
I hope those people are right, who think Ed is drawing a buyer out of the woodwork by talking the IPO game. He's done well to wait until Leap has grown, its market has grown, there are precedent prices in the sector, and the potential acquirers have had strong results. It's absolutely realistic that, as they work up valuations for an IPO, this forms the due diligence for a quick sale.
Guessing today will be a quiet one, though... or will we have a mysterious leg up at EOD...??
Well I think the 30% discount would close if all those (very prudent!) predictions come good. My avg. is around 8.6p but I haven't been here long (since Feb / March?). I'm pretty confident in an SP of at least 17.2p against a NAV / share of 19.4p by March, giving me a comfy 100% return in a year. Obviously new investors today have been even more lucky...!
Yeah absolutely - it was just a scenario in response to O'Donnell's question. I've quickly knocked up a scenario which looks forward six months with very prudent returns. It assumes opex of £1m; IPOs of the companies where we have convertible loans (accruing interest, then showing discount on buy-in price, then a growth of 10%); growth of 10% in listed and unlisted holdings (LGP, Yooma, Eurox, Portage, Vemo... but with Juve' left unchanged); and Leap shown as floating for £50m total, but with us getting a 15% discount on the buy-in. I think that's all pretty reasonable, and shows a NAV / share of 19.4p by March 2022.
https://we.tl/t-OO2NY5zKCw
You're welcome to download / play around with this tracker. To give SEED a NAV of £50m total, with all other investments left unchanged, requires our holding in Leap to be worth c. £35m. With this adjustment, it would make the current NAV / share = 23.7p