Member Info for shychap

FWIW, TW incorrectly states in his bearcats this evening that Martin Hunt should have been up for election this AGM as he has already served three years without re-election. In fact, all the directors were re-elected at the 2024 AGM – the agenda for which included the following:

"Resolutions 4 to 8 – to re-appoint an existing director retiring by rotation

The Company’s Articles of Association require that any director that has either (i) not been re-elected at

either of the preceding three annual general meetings or (ii) has been appointed as a director since the last

annual general meeting shall retire and offer themselves for re-election by shareholders. Notwithstanding

this requirement, the Directors have determined that each of them will stand for re-election on an annual

basis in accordance with recommended best practice and in line with the principles of the UK Corporate

Governance Code."

So why have SBTX now abandoned the QCA code which they claim still to adhere to?

Yes, jansy, this is a nonsense rationale by SBTX - especially when the QCA Corporate Governance Code, which they claim to adhere to, recommends annual re-elections for all directors.

Pied_piper, MD reiterated to me this morning that he had never spoken to Ashman.

While it is surprising that our principal shareholder has never tried to communicate with Ashman, it is truly shocking that Ashman has never tried to call MD – despite MDs contact details being known to our financial guru, Emily Bertram, who deals with his TR-1s. This despite the SBTX Corporate Governance Statement proclaiming: "Between the Chairman and the executive directors an open and regular dialogue is maintained with the Company’s major shareholders".

MD has been a significant shareholder for 9 months - and a very significant shareholder for 2-3 months, now owning 14% of the company.

Any CEO doing his job properly would surely want to talk to him – except for any CEO who wanted to avoid accountability. But presumably, since MD is not an II, Ashman classes him as a retail investor and has therefore swept him under the carpet like the rest of us.

There is something seriously not right with Ashman and his understanding of his duties in a public company.

DaveC55, TW could coordinate an EGM without calling one himself.

Or he could buy a share for fourteen pence.

Of course, an EGM would cost a few quid and Ashman will doubtless once again blame vexatious PIs for wasting the company's money – even though he has brought it on himself.

Pied_piper, it seems to have changed another clock: the deadline for electronic voting has been extended by 5 days to 23 December.

They will also doubtless now claim that the revised Corporate Governance Code – which was amended after the original AGM notice to cancel annual director re-elections – is now legal and can be applied to the current AGM.

Yes, Bazzaman, TW has predictably – and justifiably – gone ballistic this morning.

One question he raises is that today's new AGM notice should require a new 21-day notice period, which would make it impossible to hold this year.

He is now trying to coordinate an EGM.

AquaeSulis01, you may be right about TW but the feeling is clearly mutual judged by Ashman's comments about TW in last week's Q&A. But that simply means that TW will watch SBTX like a hawk – more so now than when he was a shareholder – and trumpet up every misdemeanour he uncovers. He's like a dog with a bone until he gets his man - or woman - so the best defence is not to give him any misdemeanours to attack with. Ashman has given his detractors far too much ammunition this year and needs to start playing with a straight bat.

Agreed, AquaeSulis01…the BTS forecast was £3m pro forma but Ashman was "very, very confident indeed" of hitting the £2.9m forecast for Dermatonics. Now that they have banked £4m, the forecasts are a bit more restrained.

Indeed, Toyin. FY25 guidance then was for £5.9m from Dermatonics and BTS alone – and Ashman has the nerve to describe the actual results as "a slight miss".

Toyin, if you are talking about FY25 guidance which was disseminated in Oct 2024, I think that subsequent events have proved that guidance to be inaccurate.

AquaeSulis01, you may assume that but Singer were apparently just being slippery. Ashman, if you believe him, did state that the Singer note included Croda revenue...as detailed with video evidence in the TW 21/8/25 SBTX story about the scale of the revenue miss pre-placing.

AquaeSulis01, Ashman's July IM Q&A made it clear that Singer's FY forecast *did* include Croda numbers. But I agree that it's hard to tell from reading that broker note as it studiously avoids talking clearly about the elephant in the room.

Their sleight-of-hand extends to publishing a graph forecasting different scenarios for Zenakine royalties over the period 2026–2039. That graph forecasts Croda revenues at under £1m in 2026 and 2027, with £5m not reached until 2031. These aren't accurate or confident forecasts but they will have been guided by Ashman – at a time when he knew that Croda royalties were around £750k in 2025.

Hopefully, the next Singer note will upgrade these forecasts but it's possible that they will allow them to stand. It also looks likely that the FY26 forecast of £6.2m is driven predominantly by uplifts in the subsidiaries and not by a significant increase in Croda royalties.

So, let's be optimistic but, I suggest, not confident about Croda royalties in the early years.

Toyin, I'm sure the Q1/26 numbers will be good but the main reason for that appears to be revenue slippage from Q4/25. I assume that the FY26 forecast allows for the same pattern to repeat. Ashman's comments are meaningless in a sense because they relate to a notional 58 week year. It's possible that Ashman's bumper Q1/26 numbers could be true and that the broker's FY26 forecast is also true. They certainly knew about Q1/26 numbers when they came up with their £6.2m forecast; but let's see if they have cause to upgrade it.

Toyin, hopefully Singer will have cause to upgrade the 26 forecast before the HY results. But those of us who derided their forecast this year got a rude shock when SBTX released the August trading update so I rate them more reliable than Ashman. And a lot more reliable than BB optimism.

Like you, AquaeSulis01, I'm hopeful. Zenakine is out there in the pipeline and that's a major milestone. But much now depends on pull-through and re-ordering. We need a big retail success story for that – and to push the late adopters into placing their first orders for Zenakine. For me, we have a gosling which will hopefully turn into a golden goose; but Skin's FY26 forecast is understandably cautious while noting that Zenakine sales are difficult to forecast – for the same reasons that I remain hopeful and not yet confident.

Hopefully, AquaeSulis01, but we currently have too many unknowns to be over-confident. We don't know which, if any, VIP cosmetics house will be launching new products with Zenakine inside, nor how they will frame their marketing claims for it, nor whether their customers will buy it, nor whether enough customers will buy/re-purchase to make them re-order from Croda.

It's early days…and too early to believe that Zenakine is the golden goose we hope it will be.

Nashwan123, you need to know that Ashman's track record on such assurances is not good. He has misled us on a number of occasions this year so it's probably prudent not to believe his assertions last week until/unless they come to pass.

But while the Croda FY25 royalties estimate is higher than many expected, we should probably wait to see how re-orders from Croda's customers pan out before getting over-excited. It's a new product and not even SBTX know enough about Croda's sales yet to predict what will happen in 2026 and beyond. Hopefully we will learn more over the next 12 months.

Big market for dupes… https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c246le4p7rgo