George Frangeskides, Chairman at ALBA, explains why the Pilbara Lithium option ‘was too good to miss’. Watch the video here.
I’m sure they have plenty of targets and will of course be investing many millions very shortly, on top of the many millions already invested.
I don’t correlate their look warm treatment of PI’s to their ambitions and ability to invest.
I get your point.l though l, why not take the rest of the £10m or so while it was being offered.
I clearly don’t know so can only speculate and that speculation is that they a) Didn’t feel, based on their projected investment timelines, they needed that money now and b) simply didn’t want PI’s to have a substantial share of the float.
Not saying if that’s right or wrong or sensible or daft but my guess would be a mixture of the two.
And my honest feel is that it won’t materially impact our long term returns anyway as I believe they have raised more than enough cash to achieve the scale needed here.
My take is they simply didn’t need the cash.
The II raise was already many millions higher than expected and they have a huge raft of warrants at 28.5p sitting there to provide many millions more (hopefully!).
The fact is that PI’s are valued by some companies but seen as a necessary evil by others that comes along with access to public capital markets.
Jim has already shown in this company what he thinks of the PI with his effort to take it private on the cheap...in there lies the answer to your question I think.
I think you have answered your own question RW!
Let’s be honest Mellon is not exactly famous for his care and attention of the PI so I think we should be thankful for small mercies here.
The warrants were the real prize here so no surprise that the option was popular this time around (no one wanted to know the last time an option was available at the mighty price of 5p!)
Clearly a bit of churn here today as some of those confident of their 25% have taken the opportunity to bank some profit. Will be interesting to see what the institutions do once they get their hands on the new shares. You would hope they have been placed with cornerstone investors but we should never doubt an II’s capability of dumping shares for a quick buck!
So probably a bit more turbulence to come but once it settles down we should get a steady flow of confirmations of the new large holders (hoping for a few big hitters in there) and then some serious news on where the new funds are going.
After all that we should be able to sit back and enjoy the ride up as this tech goes mainstream and changes the world!!
It is indeed!
So a 5 year plan to double revenues has seen them increase by 30% in Year 1!.
Plus it sounds like we have increased margin in the controls area with more to come.
Plus we have multiple new products hitting the market
Plus we are successfully penetrating industrial scale filtration in China.
Great update
Yeah that’s a fair point and probably why we’ll see an across the board haircut. All depends on how much effort the parties want to put into it I suppose...which leads me back to an across the board haircut!!
The RNS is not stating how they will allocate but if 6 times over subscribed and a 50% increase in availability then we can assume the base allocation will be 25% of what has been asked for.
But I hope they deliver a minimum to all then taper from there. So for example everyone gets their first 10,000 shares and the taper is applied on amounts higher than that. An approach of that ilk rewards the true small PI’s and scales back the whales that have waded in for loads that few other PI’s can afford.
All should become clear in the next day or two as I think the option closes mid day tomorrow.
Beef is probably right up there in terms of complexity so I don’t think anyone was expecting it to be ‘soon’. It is also the most likely candidate to need some sort of GM approach.
But that’s exactly why we have a portfolio of companies stretching from testing to proteins to by products (leather) to fish to white meat to red meat...they will come to market at different times and hopefully we’ll benefit plenty along that journey!
The fact that AXS have ignored completely the China news suggests to me that no matter what happens there it’s not material enough for an RNS.
A look at the annual report also suggests they are not interested in showing this region as a contributor in any way, shape or form.
And while it’s all a bit odd for them to say absolutely nothing about developments that, after all, still involve their licensed product I take comfort from the fact that the rest of the world is proving to be more than lucrative for accoya and tricoya.
CBM only talks about Accoya and its licensing partner Titan Wood (a wholly owned AXS company)
So it appears they only have a license for accoya.
AXS has a holding of 500,000 CDM shares but carries these at nil value as CDM itself appears to have zero cash and is only partaking in its JV via loans. It also seems to have many millions (66.6m possibly) of shares in issue so the CDM holding (originally costing £10m as Diamond Wood) is worthless in any real sense.
CDM (previously Diamond Wood) clearly has the rights to accoya in China and other Far East countries (Thailand etc.) but quite what those may be worth in royalties is unclear (so probably very little). What is clear is that somehow AXS managed to lose £10m and give the accoya rights to that region away both at the same time.
The only sure value to put on BlueNalu is its last fund raise value...£13.4m to ANIC. Anything beyond that is speculation.
But clearly there is an argument to suggest BlueNalu is worth more than its book price to ANIC and that value can be asserted to its future potential. One way of doing that is to assess how the market is valuing other disruptors in the industry...hence the observations of the IPO of Oatly. It’s certainly a more valid observation than musing about Altavista.
As for why others put you on a filter list...not sure why you are asking me why another person took the action they did so maybe it’s more of a question to ask yourself?
Of course there is a direct read across...it’s a challenger in the same market some of our investments are looking to challenge in. Oh and the likes of Memphis Meats have ‘celebrity’ backers as well, so if that’s important to you then you’ll find a lot of celebrity and smart money already in cellular agriculture if you care to look.
You are also doing a read across with Altavista to BlueNalu prospects...seems odd that you are comfortable to do that yet can’t accept the IPO’ing of alternatives to incumbent food markets is in any way informative of the potential prospects of when one or more of our investments are ready to do the same thing.
Of course they are different companies with different products but it’s clear that, amongst other things, they are at least showing what is possible, that the market values these insurgents highly and that they can gain market share. That’s all relevant to the investment case here.
I’m also certain you don’t need to keep lecturing on confirmation bias on these boards. It’s a specific board to discuss the future prospects of our investment. I’m sure the vast majority of PI’s here know the risks and that because Oately has done well does not automatically mean BlueNalu will. But it’s also clear that BlueNalu IS leading the market in its development, has signed some very big players with its recent MoU and those players have confirmed they fully expect alternative sources to play a huge part in their supply. That’s not confirmation bias that’s seeing real progress and tangible evidence that the industry is already accepting this will and needs to happen.
So you see no value in looking at a market insurgent replacing consumers staple product in the food industry to inform of potential value of our companies doing something very similar? Interesting.
As for BluNalu having a ‘theoretical market’...aha that’s actually quite a good one and made me chuckle.
You also appear to occasionally forget that ANIC has investments in companies that are not trying rot grow full blown food stuffs of ‘restaurant level consumption. I suppose the market for the leather from VitroLabs is theoretical to you as well?
Oh and that’s now two posts recently where you have tried to make the product coming out of CellAg sound sooo boring and unmarketable. Yet anyone with an ounce of imagination (as shown in the post immediately after yours) can see multiple ways to market cultured meat very
positively indeed. Odd.
And finally efficient markets...clearly the market is assigning some additional value as the SP is at a significant premium to NAV so reflecting a premium to the prices paid on investment in BlueNalu er. al. But that these investments are privately held so making price discovery rather difficult. Price discovery being a key pre-requisite of your efficient market theory. Not that anyone with half a brain believes that theory applies fully to here or anywhere else in the real world of course ;-).
Of course it will be more difficult....the EU in particular are slow in approving anything and have always been beholden to the incumbents. The CAP doesn’t exist for no reason!
But difficult does not mean it cannot and will not be achieved. Again no one expects this to be ‘easy’. But having regulatory success already (albeit Singapore) proves that this technology can and will be accepted by regulators. Israel is another market that seems perfectly open and responsive to rapid approval and deployment.
Almost all governments including the EU and the US are committed to food security and reduction in agricultural greenhouse emissions. This tech is a golden ticket for them in that regard and there is no doubt in my mind that the products will be proven to be safe to eat.
That will take time of course (with the EU probably last!) but again the world is a large place and Asia in particular will be a significant market...one corner of which has already accepted and approved a product!
I get the fact that you see challenges and obstacles. I doubt any investor here doesn’t. But on the flip side the benefits of this technology is far far too large to be stopped and as such these hurdles will be overcome in time, that to me is obvious and, while it needs accounted for, is not something to fret about.
No one, not one single person, has ever called this process ‘easy’.
There are multiple challenges but the story is more than robust enough to overcome them. Singapore has proven you can get this product approved and to market.
If you are not viewing this investment in a 5 - 10 year timescale then you are in the wrong place. You don’t revolutionise the future of food through an ‘easy’ process...it’s an iterative process that has come a long way but has a substantial journey to go on. Which is exactly why it’s so exciting, we are in at the ground floor and the risk v reward is very high. Absolutely there will be failures along the way but it’s also very clear that some companies are well on the way to success and the high rewards that will come with it.
There is no genetic engineering required...the product is 100% genetically the same. That’s not to say that genetic engineering can’t be used and despite the immediate negative connotations that may be no bad thing.
Competitors will of course enter the market but with reference to earlier discussions the market is huge and BlueNalu already have an MoU with some of the biggest players. I’m highly confident there is room for plenty of innovators in this sphere...all the more reason to back ANIC which in turn is backing multiple players.
This tech will absolutely be fed to cats n dogs...we already own a chunk of Bond Pet Foods who are developing proteins for this very purpose. That’s one of the beauties of CellAg...it’s way more than a sizzling steak on a plate!
As for the naming. Yes some states in the US are being pressured around the use of the word ‘meat’ etc. but resistance from incumbents is all part of the game. The world is a large place and a few well connected Texan farmers are not going to stop this revolution.
Not sure any of that ‘news’ is price sensitive until it actually happens.
What would this ‘brand’ do and what is it for?
And as for a potential U.K. investment...well until the money changed hands then it’s not worth an RNS.
You are oddly negative to CelAg for a holder in here!
Story on available market and share - don’t believe the hype
Story on how the incumbent players are subsidised to the hilt - many challenges to CellAg
Personally I think this story shows that current practices rely on a ridiculously large subsidy (61%!) and that current farming methods are inefficient and non profitable...that to me is music to the ears of any technology and companies looking to disrupt that market.
As for the farmers themselves, well it looks like they are ready for retirement already when you see the average age and despite getting huge subsidy for many years might also benefit from U.K. to another £100k from the public purse just to sell up. And when doing so return the use of the land to environmental purposes. I wish them well but I’d also suggest now would not be a bad time to get out!
The time for revolution is clearly upon us
Not sure we will see any future funding rounds....certainly not for a long time.
We have just raised £60m+ and the warrants (if exercised ) will be another £80m+ on top.
I reckon that will be plenty for the next couple of years and might be the full amount envisaged as required full stop.
It’s possible that will change but if it does it won’t be until we have seen substantial progress from this stage so for me the ‘threat’ of fund raisings are well off the table now for a long time.
No danger that there won’t be an uptake to fulfil the £2m on offer.
What’s not clear is if the broker will be giving out allocation on a first come first served basis and then closing the offer early. Or if they will wait the full period then allocate a % across the board based on asked v available.
I’ve also seen these work, where the demand is way too high, in that they give everyone a set amount then taper the allocation above that. That gives the smaller holding pi’s their full or close to full ask and heavily tapers the whales asking for huge amounts.