Member Info for Sher-Lock

for whatever reason. There is not much left you can buy, the Russian names are gone for most investors, Fresnillo failed again with not delivering guidance (a recurring issue with the stock), Endeavour is too new for most and controlled by the Sawiris family. Centamin bad management and many other names are just too tiny.
Oh, one left, Hochschild, Peru - delivered last year and is doing all right. Guidance for 2022 is a bit on the safe side, assuming to over-deliver. But generally, I point to analysts doing not a proper job of modelling/forecasting. In most write-ups these days you can read again - like last year - "2022 guidance for a back-half weighted year".
Mining the veins of gold resources is not an easy job and we talk here about a miss of one, two, three per cent in guidance - a big joke. They should learn to write up like the colleagues of AI companies or Shi.Coin and investors would pull in.
The market cap of the entire sector is still so small compared to all the IPOs we have seen recently.

13th largest defence company globally, just by the stripped out defence revenues.
At 8.1160 Euros the market capitalisation is just 4.7 billion Euros.
Estimate revenues/EBITDA/net income 2021/2022/2023 in €:
14.146/1.592/511 - 14.804/1.720/639 - 15.415/1.860/749
EPS 0.88 / 1.15 / 1.32 in €
The Italian government owns 30.2 per cent of the share capital (578.1 million shares).
In the past, one concern was the debt load. Net debt in billion Euros 3.232 (2021) - 3.080 (2022) - 2.726 (2023), not today anymore.
A good broad range of defence equipment and well connected to the US army with the DRS Technology acquisition in 2008 - which was a bit too expensive $5.2 billion. But the responsible managers are all gone. Complete new management moved in since 2017.
Last year the IPO of DRS failed as the US investment banks priced the deal too low. Leonardo DRS would have had a market cap of just $3.2 billion. The company withdraw the deal - which was right & smart. With the sector valuation moving up sharply over the last few days (Hensoldt is up 113 per cent in five trading days, and Leonardo bought a 25.1 per cent stake in January 2022), they could reconsider a listing and pay down debt.
Leonardo itself is in negotiations to sell its armoured vehicle and some ammunition business - well-timed!

They could not fulfil the need of the US army, as they want all kinds of nice things like wearing Victoria's Secret bulletproof string below the armoured body shield. It can't work because at one end you have to accept having less protection or more comfort. grippa is right, read the RNS, well explained. Anyhow the other business should do fine when governments across Europe start spending!

How suddenly things can change! Beginning of December in the FT - EU risks its own security by branding defence industry socially harmful! A few weeks later, governments across Europe increase defence spending - a big joke and too late! Suddenly the Germans talk about a delayed nuclear exit. Since the Greens moved into the government they were bashing against Russia/Putin/NordStream2 as the energy change was clear to be lost. Now they behave like everyone having a chance to play/make politics. How fast they can adapt!
Hensoldt share price through the roof - closed at 25.50 Euros today!

Not much left in Europa as a pure defence play Leonardo SpA in Italy, Avon Protection PLC in the UK - the others too much other business & historic mess -> BAE Systems.

I don't know, why everyone is so hot on the numbers of the AISC! In the meantime it should be in everyone's mind, higher exploration costs & investments = an increase in AISC. Mining companies like to calculate results down, as they have to pay fewer taxes/royalties. If a gold mining company invests the entire pre-calculated profit before tax in exploration and can increase its reserves, what is more, significant for a shareholder? Hochschild invests to extend the life of its mining operations & in new projects. A great turn from a few years ago, when it was not sure, if they can repay the debt they loaded up. Today, analysts behave like chickens. They still favor growth stocks with a P/E of 40, ten, or twenty times market cap over revenues and even many times not profitable at all - no P/E! Here you have a store of value and after great production results, when the stock popped up to 1.3060 on 20th Jan. the stock is down. Gold was trading at 1'844 now 1'910, mmh? These are real facts, even if energy prices are rising as the price of gold. There is sufficient oil & gas in the world - you have just to wipe out all the speculators who play a hundred times the daily needed real consumption!

The spread gets a bit smaller when the bid is above 10p & you see if the market makers are working on any trading order on hand, i.e. to buy or to sell and then the size of the bid/offer moves above the current 10'000 shares.
The below strategies are all fine, but are an issue when all do the same - that is probably the reason we always break down in the share price when we trade above 11p!

We are almost the same persons who write up the story. Everything is on the point, but more has to be done to get the share price to a fair NAV. Timmit mentioned, he sees CAP as a zero value investment. It is a disaster there was not a try to exit CAP before the listing was cancelled. Without a financing round by a broker, the story will stay dead. There is not a single analyst writing up on the story. The Proactive-Muppet-Show has no value - the same people here in the chat what it and that's it. As long management does not take some money to promote the story it will bounce between 7 and 14 pence - like for years. The growth in the net asset value and the share price performance are two pairs of shoes - which is not clear to management. On every NAV update, they write up the increase of the NAV which includes partly the future payments of Ascendant. Good projects & some good investments, but unfortunately illiquid. Therefore a discount of 30 or 50 per cent has to be accepted as an investor. Sorry for those who paid up in 2014 or 2017, but sometimes you have to stick to your investment basics. Natural resource investments are not easy to handle and time. All the buyers having the balls to buy here will sell out above 11 pence again, capping a further rise. MAFL has the possibility to buy back its own shares, so far (last two years) zero shares were repurchased. Now at 9.5 pence offered, close to half the NAV, could be a steal - or does not the management believe in the story/NAV?

The CEO joined Unilever in 1985, the CFO in 2002, CDMO in 1990, CSCO in 1991, and the COO in 1987 - they are tired to adapt to changes. Consumer Healthcare is not the future for Unilever and probably the idea of Sunny Jain, appointed in March 2019 to be president of Beauty & Personal Care, he arrived from Amazon!

I hope this failure of the takeover will sweep through the management of ULVR and these guys have to leave. Everywhere the same stupid guys ruling, Nestle, L'Oreal, and so on. If you fail to grow the existing business with innovation, you move on with an expensive acquisition. The GSK business is not worth the 50 billion GBP, close to ten times revenues with what kind of margin. Read comments, the business was growing four percent per annum over the last few years.

In the 4th quarter, shopping mall REITs were one of the best-performing stocks in the US. The US shopper has enough of online shopping as there is no real effect of a real shopping feeling where you end up in one of the fast-food chains with full shopping bags. In Europe, the largest one is the French Klepierre and then Unibail-Rodamco. The first one trades with a ten percent discount to the NTA, the second much higher, but has operational issues. In the Eurostoxx index, the two large players have a high weighting, followed by the smaller ones. I discovered Carmila, the old Carrefour Property Development with 241 shopping centers in the portfolio. The NTA is more than twice the current stock value and the company decided to pay out a minimum 1 Euro dividend per annum over the next three years. Nice dividend yield with a strong shareholder base (Carrefour owns 35 percent of the share capital).

You both are right with your conclusion! Instead of using every year the possibility to issue new shares, the free float would be greater today. Who cares about the NAV - the share price performance and trading liquidity should be regarded with a higher priority. On the other side, the company could arrange a trading/liquidity agreement with a market maker to guarantee a smaller bid/ask spread. 10 to 11.5 Pence is criminal in any respect.

What can you say if the company is too stingy to pay an RNS to give the share price a little boost?

The increase in net value and the performance of the share are two stories to which too little attention is paid.

The Italian defense company acquired from KKR a 25,1 per cent stake in Hensoldt for 606 million Euros or 23 Euros pe share. Today's share price 12,80 Euros - who is right, bargain?

The share price lost 30 per cent this year. Business went smoothly, and the company invested more than a billion Euros in expanding its storage facilities. Solid dividend of 1.20 Euros, the book value of its assets probably much higher than today's share price. HAL Trust owns 48 per cent of the share capital - probably not happy about the performance.

HAL Trust did own 76 per cent of GrandVision NV, and the share price performed poorly since the IPO took place (February 2015). Last year they managed to get a high take-out price from EssilorLuxottica.

Probably something similar could happen with Vopak NV!?

There is news out B2Gold of Canada will eye some acquisitions of gold mining assets in Zimbabwe. The only name which comes to mind is Caledonia Mining. Strong balance sheet, good production profile going ahead, a bit less well on the cash holdings/liquidity as they expanded current operations. A Russian gold company is also in the country for a new gold mine/project, could be Nord Gold who operates in different West African countries.

A PGM play, not listed in London, is Zimplats. More than three-quarters of the share capital is held by Impala Platinum. This is a huge cash machine, and not small. But the question is, how will PGMs develop over the next years?

Here is a list of different investment companies with their current discount to NAV and if they offer a dividend yield:
Princess Private Equity Global - discount (13.1) - yield 4.6
Apax Global Alpha Global - discount (12.0) - yield 4.9
BMO Private Equity Trust Global - discount (14.8) - yield 3.7
Deutsche Beteiligungs Europe - premium 14.9 - yield 2.0
HarbourVest Global Priv Equity Global - discount (16.6) - yield 0.0
HgCapital Trust UK - premium 1.4 - yield 1.2
ICG Enterprise Trust UK - discount (16.0) - yield 2.0
NB Private Equity Partners Global - discount (18.5) - yield 2.9
Oakley Capital Investments Europe - discount (13.7) - yield 1.2
Pantheon International Global - discount (15.8) - yield 0.0
Standard Life Private Equity Trust Europe - discount (15.5) - yield 2.6
Symphony International APAC - discount (44.3) - yield 5.4

Peer group average - discount (13.7) - yield 2.4

A few years ago, they paid the Clinton Foundation close to $500K to get legal/political support to solve the issues in India. Clinton's are gone, the money is gone, and the Company has still the same legal issues in India. The new legal advisers are just an additional cost block which is not necessary - you can't win in an Indian court.

No = you have no mind?
No = can you prove the opposite?
Yes = management has been burning money of investors for years - management compensations were paid all the years, even when they failed with delivering

The failure to reinstate the Bhukia licence should be the final warning sign for any investments in India. The local court's judge, as they like and foreign investors were cut off. 13 years ago, the excellent investment story for a precious metal project in India. Later the spin-out of the West Africa exploration portfolio in Aforo Resources - which is bankrupt today. Then there was the story with Anglo Saxony. Now, after all the failures to deliver, again West Africa prospects. With the current market cap of £ 14 million and only $ 1.6 million on hand at the end of March with such a track record of realizing projects = everyone can make up his mind.

Most closed investment vehicles trading at the LSE have a discount to NAV, and some are more significant, up to 40 per cent others smaller, like a few single digits. The reason is the portfolio composition or liquid tradable positions, or non-listed private equity holdings. Some investment companies take measures to reduce the discount to the NAV by buying back and redeeming their shares or starting to pay a dividend. It is also a question of communicating with investors and paying a broker/analyst to write up a good story. Then, investors can gauge what to pay for the share a premium for the story/of the unlisted holdings. The current discount of about 1/3 is correct, taking into account the illiquid trading patterns. The market makers are visible what they have in orders in the pipeline. Like today, 10K at 11.5p bid - 30K at 13p offer = they have no buy orders on hand and a seller. If someone pays up 13p for 30K, the offer is probably gone, and the bid would move up to 12p, The same is, if someone hits the bid and sells 10K at 11.5p, the bid would probably move down to 11p. Just to explain how these market makers work. They have no interest to take a position on their own book - therefore limited trading liquidity, only when orders are on hand.