The next focusIR Investor Webinar takes places on 14th May with guest speakers from Blue Whale Growth Fund, Taseko Mines, Kavango Resources and CQS Natural Resources fund. Please register here.
Good to see Slater Investments buying more - they now own 18%, with 22.77m shares
Https://uk.advfn.com/stock-market/london/venture-life-VLG/share-news/Venture-Life-Group-PLC-Holdings-in-Company/93213683
Singer have a 1.9p target price. They have REAT on a current year P/E of just 9.8, falling to 8.5 next year.
They now forecast £2.5m adjusted EBITDA to this September, nicely up from last year, but reduced from prior forecasts by some £300-£400k due to additional investment in personnel, systems etc.
EBITDA is forecast to rise again at Sept'25 to £2.8m adj. EBITDA and then £3.1m the next year.
They say funding capacity could support a furher 26% of EPS increases via more acquisitions in 2024.
Incidentally, last night's holdings RNS hasn't been mentioned here - Harwood Capital/Oryx have been buying and raised their holding to 9.04%, or 96.5m shares in November they had 92m shares):
Https://uk.advfn.com/stock-market/london/react-REAT/share-news/React-Group-PLC-Holdings-in-Company/93207973
Good to see today's trading update confirms strong Q3 trading, with double digit revenue growth, a new £500k contract and an inaugural AI/Machine Learning contract with a drug discovery company:
Https://uk.advfn.com/stock-market/london/sysgroup-SYS/share-news/SysGroup-PLC-Board-Change-Update-Change-of-Registered-Office/93211894
Today's results are very encouraging:
- 0.2p adjusted EPS
- £2.3m adjusted EBITDA is ahead of Singer's £2.2m forecast
- strong momentum since the year end with record trading this year
- £1.64m net cash at the year end, again ahead of Singer's forecast
- £2.44m operating cash inflows in the year
- no need to raise further funds, as current cash enough to pay for not only deferred consideration, but also investments in systems and even further bolt-on acquisitions in the pipeline
- a whopping 87% recurring revenues
- gross margins still increasing, to 27% (from 24%)
- multiple contract wins which will benefit this year onwards
And good coverage of the SuprNation deal here:
Https://www.telemediaonline.co.uk/gaming-platform-suprnation-adds-dcb-to-enhance-onboarding-in-deal-with-fonix/
Great to see the share price breaking upwards over 30p this morning.
Thanks for this - and the share price is looking good now with this morning's break above 40p.
Interesting that web hosting behemoth GoDaddy's shares have surged 40% since November "after the company smashed profit expectations in the third quarter, with earnings per share of 89¢, up 41% on a year ago":
Https://citywire.com/funds-insider/news/software-stocks-surge-up-the-ratings-as-top-investors-swoop-on-rally/a2434637
Informative post from Hydrus elsewhere about the contract win:
"Looking at NY Spins looks like you can deposit between £10 and £40 using Fonix (which is named with pay by mobile).
It’s actually a great option for gambling because I think you can’t use credit cards anymore in the UK in gambling websites due to new regulations and many people don’t like using debit cards because of course the lack of protections.
Could be a big growth area"
The latest view from Master Investor FYI:
"Team Internet Group (LON:TIG) – Outperforming Expectations
I will not bore you anymore with comments on this global internet solutions business, other than to state that Monday’s Trading Update for its 2023 year was very encouraging indeed.
Analysts Bob Liao and Carl Smith at Zeus Capital believe that it has extended its track record of upgrading and outperforming expectations.
They were impressed by the double-digit growth in both the Online Presence and the Online Marketing segments of the group’s business.
Looking ahead they believe that the company has strong long-term growth opportunities including international expansion, new partner development and vertical integration.
Their conclusion is that the group’s shares are very attractively valued.
Over at Edison Investment Research their analysts Max Hayes and Dan Ridsdale remarked that the group has made solid advances on all fronts.
They consider that the rating looks low given the company’s growth profile, diversity and growing track record.
The shares, which closed at 134.40p, remain a good Hold"
Https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/air-ambulances-can-keep-flying-after-last-minute-rescue-deal-d0vr7njlz
"Gama Aviation agrees to buy Specialist Aviation Services hours before it would have ceased trading
A last-minute rescue deal has been struck to prevent the grounding of most of the air ambulances in the south of England.
Specialist Aviation Services, which provides helicopters and pilots to air ambulance charities in and around London, would have ceased trading on Thursday had its administrators not been able to find a buyer.
Gama Aviation, which has contracts with other air ambulance charities, agreed to acquire the business via a pre-pack sale. It paid £280,000, but anticipates that its total outlay, including a cash injection to keep the business running and the costs of the transaction, will amount to nearer £3 million.
Had Specialist gone bust, the six helicopters used by air ambulances serving Kent, Surrey, West and East Sussex, Dorset, Somerset, Essex, Hertfordshire and Cambridgeshire would have been grounded. Last year, the six helicopters were involved in more than 5,000 incidents.
Specialist Aviation Services is based at Gloucestershire airport, outside Cheltenham, and had been owned by a Dutch family office. FRP, which was brought in last October to find a buyer, said that the group had been suffering losses “for a number of years”, mainly because of unprofitable contracts that it had agreed.
In an attempt to shore up its finances, Specialist decided to move away from owning its helicopters and instead leased them back. It also set up a maintenance business.
Jonathan Dunn, the other FRP partner appointed as joint administrator, said that the changes had helped but were not enough to get the company into profit. “They were going to have a cash hard-stop,” Dunn said. “We needed to get a sale done before we hit that point.”
Under the deal, Gama will acquire Specialist’s contracts, as well as its six Leonardo AW169 aircraft and all but a couple of its 184 employees. The Civil Aviation Authority has assigned all of Specialist’s regulatory approvals to Gama.
“Our sector, because of the cost base and the regulatory environment and everything else, it’s really hard to do it without scale, and scale needs investment,” Marwan Khalek, 63, Gama’s chief executive, said. “My observation would be that [Specialist] was caught in that no man’s land of not having enough scale and also not having access to investment to scale up.”
Gama, which also charters private jets, intends to fold Specialist into its “special mission” business, which includes air ambulances and medical repatriation flights. That division is expected to turn over about £50 million in the present financial year. The most recent results for Specialist, for 2022, show that it generated revenue of £24.3 million.
“[Specialist] is being bolted on to a scaled business already, so we’re immediately in a bett
Now up over 10% on over 750k shares traded, so hopefully any sellers are being squeezed out.
Cavendish summarise in today's note as follows:
"Delivering organically
Venture Life Group has released a positive trading update, with revenues expected to be in-line with our forecasts at £51m +16% YoY and a c2ppts uplift in EBITDA margin. FY23E revenue growth was delivered completely organically, a first since 2019, in-line with the company’s near-term focus on organic growth. Significantly, cash from operations increased over 70% to c£9.5m (in-line with expectations) supporting our analysis of free cash generation and yield. Cash generation also supported a reduction in group net leverage, which was 1.25x at December 2023 versus 1.65x at the close of 2022. Looking forward, Venture Life aims to build on its momentum through targeted investment in sales and marketing to position the group for sustained future growth and profitability."
And:
"Cash – The group delivered strong cash from operations, generating c£9.5m (Cavendish est. £9.5m), up over 70% YoY. This cash flow has helped further lower group net leverage to 1.25x at year-end 2023 versus 1.65x as of December 2022. The company notes further improvement to c1.1x post period end.
- Operational – Management has seen encouraging sales from newly developed products, noting improved sales volumes supported by price increases through H2/23A, which will clearly be supportive into FY24E. The company’s digital transformation strategy delivered online sales growth +40% to £3.8m for the year (H1/23 £1.6m). Through the year 28 new listings were achieved across UK retailers, which will further support our FY24E revenue growth expectations."
Big news late last night - GMAA are scaling up their helicopter special mission division.
They've paid just £280k to administrators for a forecast £27m of turnover in acquiring Specialist Aviation:
Https://uk.advfn.com/stock-market/london/gama-aviation-GMAA/share-news/Gama-Aviation-PLC-Gama-Aviation-strengthens-Special-Mission-offer/93177831
Of course there are added wrinkles. Transaction costs etc will take the total cost to £3m, and there are lease obligations on helicopters and property to take on.
Nevertheless, this could be an absolute bargain price given the likely synergies and cost savings etc, with H2'24 and onwards likely benefiting nicely.
After today's update, Finncap have reiterated their 68p target price and their forecasts of 5.4p EPS for last year, rising to 6.4p EPS this year.
Net debt is due to fall to a mere £5.3m at the end of this year (from £16.6m at the end of 2022).
Which puts VLG on a current year P/E of just 5.3.
A sizeable 150,000 shares bought back by MWE at 35.45p yesterday, and they now have 470,000 shares sitting in treasury.
These are unusually large buybacks for MWE. One would hope that they're buying these amounts back in the knowledge that any upcoming trading update or numbers relating to last year are likely to be positively received by the market and prove that the current share price is cheap as per the fundamentals posted by Robsy2 above. Otherwise this would be an extremely strange route to take!
Excellent - a solid trading update in line with expectations, and with no hiccups whatsoever:
- cash coversion and net debt both improving nicely
- own brands revenues growing well organically and now 59% of total revenues
- margins up and benefit of price increases still to come
- and a strong, confident outlook:
"Benefiting from our robust growth, clear strategic priorities aimed at refining our operation, substantial generation of free cashflow and a strong balance sheet, we are now in a prime position to deliver strong shareholder returns"
Time for a re-rating.
FNX have won an appointment as Suprnation's mobile payments provider:
Https://www.fonix.com/blog/suprnation-select-fonix-as-their-mobile-payments-provider/
I note that Suprnation were acquired in November by DoubleDown for £30m. More importantly, DoubleDown have around $75m quarterly turnover so are a very substantial company, and they said this in November:
"DoubleDown Interactive says it plans to use its recent acquisition of SuprNation to build on its success in Q2 and pursue “high-growth” opportunities in markets around the world"
which should mean lots of opportunity for FNX in Suprnation and potentially opening doors in DoubleDown globally:
"SuprNation select Fonix as their mobile payments provider
31/01/2024
SuprNation has launched our Pay By Mobile solution on Duelz, VoodooDreams and NYSpins, making Fonix their mobile payments partner and allowing them to offer players direct carrier billing. Initially launching in the UK, Fonix’s Pay By Mobile will be used to drive new acquisitions, introducing new players and providing them with a frictionless deposit option. With growth as a key objective, direct carrier billing will bolster the cashier user experience and bring further innovation to the SuprNation sites.
etc"
Hybridan have a new note out today after the contract win.
They forecast £0.3m PBT and a £0.5m PAT this year.
They see the cash pile growing to just over £2m by December against the £2.49m m/cap.
There's some useful info re QRO and the new contract win:
"The cameras will be installed at several strategic highway locations in the UK
allowing QRO to showcase the Harrier AI nationally to existing and potential police force customers.
The Harrier AI camera was designed and built by QRO in the UK and launched in December 2023. Empowered by Nvidia’s Jetson processors, it delivers real-time analytics ANPR software-enabled data processing and is powered by machine learning algorithms, making it adaptive and responsive to ever-changing road conditions and offering functions such as vehicle make, model and colour detection and traffic flow analysis."
"Hybridan’s view: QRO Solutions designs, manufactures, and installs cameras for roadside, overbridge and in-vehicle deployment and offers android handheld alerting software, database software and field services. QRO Solutions has an estimated 35% share in the UK police market for ANPR cameras. We believe that QRO Solutions will pursue growth opportunities in ULEZ (ultra-low emission zone) charges and car parks in the UK and perhaps expand its footprint to overseas markets.
Petards’ FY22 annual report indicates that QRO revenues increased 17% in 2022, despite the shortage of microprocessors in the early part of 2022 and QRO’s revenues had tripled since 2017, i.e., the first full year of Petards ownership. We believe that the success of QRO demonstrates Petards’ ability to acquire and integrate acquired businesses."