Member Info for shandypants2

Agree with central costs - could do with a further breakdown as this is confusing. It appears £7.8m is 'unallocated' and in 2022 the equivalent was £6.8m - so not an excessive increase when revenues have almost doubled. As revenues continue to increase this should hopefully become less of an issue.

Would be interesting to know what % is marketing and also why this hasn't been allocated to the specific brands.

I do like XPF and Boom Battle is a good brand in an exciting sector.

The growth is clearly in Boom as the new sites bed in and add revenues and increased margins. I particularly like the Boom EBITDA increased to 18% which was made up of 11% in H1 and 23% in H2.

So in 2024 if revenues increase to say £35m (from 28m) and EBITDA is say 25% - both conservative IMHO - then EBITDA for Boom is almost £9m (up from c£5m in 2023). £40m and 30% should be £12m EBITDA.

The more mature Escape Hunt has EBITDA at 42% so that shows where Boom should be in a couple of years.

Cashflow is good - and a sensible business model - generate £9m and use a % of this to fund new sites and purchase franchises etc.

The big negative for me and perhaps why the SP is so depressed is the confusing accounts. 3 separate EBITDA figures are quoted and the slightly disappointing c£1m profit also appears to be a loss when lease costs are factored in.

Why? Revenues are still very low and there is not much cash in the bank to drive growth. Costs have been cut to ensure it is a going concern but not sure there is any growth. Happy to be proved wrong.

My wife had a food and drinks voucher to use so she booked in Manchester for last Saturday. Revolucion de Cuba on Peters St, just off Deansgate.

She booked for 4pm, which was a strange time, but i was informed it was the only available slot left for that day.

I presumed they probably had limited tables designated for food.

How wrong was i. At 4pm the place was packed with a DJ getting the dancing going. A good mix, including a hen party .

Left a 6ish and the place was still rocking.

If this is a regular Friday/Saturday then they can easily cope with quieter midweek days.

RBG just need to focus on the lower performing bars and shut the worst performers and the good ones will take care of themselves.

Not great H1 numbers. Despite a good revenue increase, due to new bar openings, like for like down 10%.

Short on cash and now high borrowing charges mean some way from being profitable - EBITDA a bit meaningless when a company has high borrowing costs.

Whilst i'm sure train strikes have had an impact there are clearly bigger issues. WFH cannot be helping these city centre locations in midweek.

Newboy - a TU was released in Jan (rev almost doubled to £44m) and we were told more details would be provided in March. We are halfway through March so expect news in the next 2 weeks. Don't forget the YE has been extended to 15 months for this financial period so YE is 31/3 not 31/12

Excerpt below...

"Overall performance is expected to be in line with market expectations for the twelve months to 31 December 2023, and provides confidence of achieving market expectations for the 15 month financial year to 31 March 2024.

The Company will publish an interim report for the 12 months to 31 December 2023 in March 2024, and audited financial statements for the 15 months to 31 March 2024 during the summer."

Medi - some are surprised as money was only raised 6 months ago and we have also been selling non core assets.

With only c£500k raised today it is likely another placing will be needed int he next 9 months or so and even if a JV is possible is we are short of money then we will not be in the strongest position during negotiations

The issue with the over estimating of prescriptions and blaming it entirely on a 3rd party is bizarre IMHO.

As prescription numbers are reported after period end i am not sure why any estimation is required and this has never previously been mentioned to the market via RNS.

For example in Sept we were told that the H1 prescriptions were 26,284 - not estimated, but were reported as actual numbers.

In the Feb 2024 RNS we were told the estimation was flawed and numbers were marked down, including both Q1 and Q2 2023. Well Q1 2023 finished almost 11 months previous so even accounting for a time lag these 'estimates' should have been validated a few months afterwards.

So there are 3 issues here - the estimation methodology used (which STX should have reviewed and approved anyway), the fact that STX never told the market that prescriptions reported were not 100% accurate and were devised via this methodology and then thirdly that STX weren't verifying actual number vs estimates in a timely manner.

All 3 are 100% down to the BOD - yet no admission of error, no resignations and no doubt no clawback of bonuses

Agree - results have been consistently good, however, this has not translated into SP increases.

Results for the 12 months (financial year is being moved to end of March, so 15 months this period) will be in March, so hopefully in the next 2 weeks.

As per the Jan TU RNS

"The Company will publish an interim report for the 12 months to 31 December 2023 in March 2024, and audited financial statements for the 15 months to 31 March 2024 during the summer."

A very low valuation Jolly.

How about 10 x EBITDA - c£1m p.a so £10m.

Plus almost £2m cash

Plus over £5m to come - discounted by 20%.

SP c£16m valuation - c 116p a share.

A good finish yesterday and also start to today. A c20% rise over this period hopefully is more than just down to low volumes etc

Nipped into the Beckenham High St Card shop on Friday and was pleased it was quite busy - then remembered it's was a couple of days before Mothers Day!

The best thing was that many people were buying items in addition to the cards. Candles, chocolates and balloons etc. Guessing these all have a higher margin.

I did see the sweets - quite a small display of Haribos etc, but a decent addition for impulse buying etc

Avoid a binary cliff!!

Forgot to say the big positive for me today was the answer to the question regarding the deferred consideration from the EM deal which was quoted at c£8m to £10m. The answer was quite comprehensive and they were keen to ensure a 'binary cliff' i.e. you only get a payment is a specific target is achieved. The amount quote is a "very achievable expectation", with upside also built in.

Yes agree, 90 plus.

In Jan RNS we were told the new business margin in H2 exceeded the 8.5% they achieved in H1. New business profits in H1 were excellent so if this volume has continued into H2 with a higher margin then the reported profit should be impressive.

H1 excerpt is below..

Retirement Income sales2 have more than doubled to £1.9bn (H1 22: £0.9bn), which has driven a 112% increase in new business profits to £161m (H1 22: £76m), with a consistently strong new business margin of 8.5% (H1 22: 8.6%).

Yes, have to agree a little underwhelming.

Very high level with no specific examples e.g. we are now dealing with company X for a deal worth £10m over 5 years which wouldn't have been possible 6 months ago etc.

Clearly lead time for deals is long so they don't want to make any solid growth projections (and couldn't release any market sensitive info) but surely they must know we want a bit more detail as to how the £17m will be spent.

For example if cash is to be c£10m at YE, as was stated, how will the £7m be spent and how much revenue and profit should this investment generate.

Was it me or did CEO look a bit bored and uninterested. If the CEO can't be enthusiastic regarding his own companies prospects then some investors will wonder why they are invested.

SP does look undervalued, however, can't see any short term catalyst based on that presentation

Hopefully the BOD can explain their plans for the driving growth etc over the next year or so. As CEO and CFO are gaining c£500k between them in bonuses for the recent sale they need to show us they are worth this money.

Wow, almost £200k trade at 8.41 today. Pretty sure that's a buy. Bodes well for tomorrow

Yes surprised no TU for YE, but results should be out in April and should be well ahead of last year. As has been said if there was anything untoward it would have to be released.

Feels very undervalued at these levels - growing profits, lots of cash and now dividend paying. What's not to like?

CRL don't usually provide trading updates, but with the SP going nowhere it might be helpful if they gave us some guidance either just before or after the YE. H1 reported in Dec wasn't too bad considering and a small profit was reported. Hopefully supply chain and inflationary pressures have eased in H2 so trading should have improved.

CRL do seem to manage costs quite well so any revenue increase should flow to the bottom line.