RE: Market has completely lost faith in this company30 Nov 2022 13:22
From a quick review of the last couple of years financial statements, this appears to be a classic case of a company wanting to have their cake & eat it, i.e. wanting to be a debt funded growth company whilst at the same time pay big dividends.
They generated operating cashflow of £53m in 2020+2021, £40m of which was spent on investing activities such as buying fixes assets, leaving a net £13m to support future growth.
However, dividend payments across both years totalled just shy of £32m, this was paid for by increasing their net borrowings by £29m. I.e. they've effectively been paying dividends via their RCF.
Now this was fine when times were good, however clearly economic activity has taken a turn for the worse + risks around Chinese operations should have been clear and obvious to management post pandemic. Quite why they decided to make another big acquisition in early October is anyone's guess, however it's added fuel to the fire re. debt.
Personally I don't see how paying the final dividend of around £12m is feasible or sensible in light of a profit shortfall of £4-6m versus expectations just over 2 months ago. Add in the fact their interest costs are likely around £4-5m per annum and in my view they need to suspend it and plough all free cash flow into deleveraging as rapidly as possible. Until they do that I wouldn't consider buying shares here.