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Let me pick up some of these questions.
@MD: Regarding Robin' s comments, could you pull out the exact quotation of what he said. The most recent RNS about the proposed disposal only mentions the ambition for a reverse takeover as described in AIM rule 14, which is what I'm describing. I'd need to see exactly what he said to comment how it fits with the options here.
@potato: I'm not going to make a share price prediction. The deal is with 2p per share. They have 0.4p per share in cash. They'll pay a dividend of 1.8p. That leaves 0.6p per share in cash, which they'll pay if they fail to complete an RTO and have to wind up. If it goes through, the listing is with something too, as I explained, but it's hard to calculate what. Say it worked out that we were then worth 1p, rather than our 0.6p cash, that would be reflected in how our existing shares are valued in the final deal, relative to how the target company's new shares get valued.
When is the last day to get the dividend? When all approvals go through, they'll issue an RNS giving the record and ex date.
@Phantom: What do the board get out of it? If they hold shares, they take part in the uplift. In any case, it's like whenever a board member has completed their time of service. There may be a golden farewell, or may not. It's all part of the deal they negotiate. Often it includes warrants or shares for the departing board. But they need to negotiate a deal that will get the approval of the target company and of the AMC shareholders, so it can't be too tilted in favour of their personal pockets or it won't go through.
Many on this chat will have held through an RTO before, but it seems others don't quite understand what happens. Those to whom the following is familiar, please bear with me, this isn't written for you. But it seems some discussing what happens next might appreciate some explanation.
Misconception 1: Because Amur will have a couple of million cash left, we'll look to buy into a project of that kind of size.
Reality: We wouldn't look for a project to buy with our cash. This would be a reverse takeover, where the target is much bigger than the buyer. We basically issue new shares to give to the current holders of the private company that we take over. That's their payment. Instead of owning their own company, they own the lion's share of what is currently called Amur Minerals, which in turn owns 100% of the formerly private company. Along with the former owners of the formerly private company, we own the rest, along with any who take part in a raise if one is done at the same time.
Misconception 2: The next phase is another chance for Robin to have a go.
Reality: His job is for us to find a private company looking to list through an RTO. It may be nothing to do with natural resources - could be pharma, tech, anything. Almost certainly, unless the experience alignment is too strong to refuse, he and the other board members would leave when the RTO completes, leaving the founders of the target company to run the newly listed company, which will also not be called Amur. They'll find other board members to plug any gaps.
Misconception 3: The value of this company, ex dividend, is basically just our current cash.
Reality: Our value comes from 2 places: our cash (which becomes working capital for the target company), and our listing. Listing on the stock exchange, from scratch, is expensive and time consuming. There are still many checks before the FCA will accept an RTO prospectus, but it's much simpler to be taken over by a cash shell (that is already a public company) than it is to list from scratch. So what we are worth, once we are a shell, is quite a bit more than our cash balance.
If this all goes through, our current directors' job is to say to the world "We are a non trading public company, London-listed, with a couple of million in cash. Anyone out there running a private company who'd like the listing and the cash we've got? Talk to us, we could join forces.". If they succeed, we reap the uplift, and embark on a new journey in a completely different type of company, probably in a different sector and with different management.
Well, the original question asked was for the ex date for the dividend. The answer given was to look in the circular, but "within 90 days" doesn't give an actual date.
I can't find a timetable in the circular. Could you please paste that section into this chat to show me what I'm missing.
Not quite. After 6 months, trading is suspended, but it remains a PLC. After a further 6 months, we delist and become private. The company dissolving would be separate; I've known companies (former BOU for example) delist after the 12 months, but stay incorporated only to relist later.
Someone has to write the first chat post on this board, right?
Welcome to the standard list, FCM. There's a lot going on here, in a stable country with resources being actively worked next door to their areas. Looks like a very promising company.
That's £70k. Not bad
The 560k pair are a correction followed by the correct trade. Hard to see what the difference is - must be too small to show with the rounding. But all that's being reported is a very minor change to the already-announced trade.
If you look at their 6 months results to 31/12/2021 (the most recent we have - we only have a trading update for the following 6 months), there is £5,889k expenditure on R+D, £3,069k on selling and distribution expenses, and £1,794 admin. I'd like to see the admin expenses lower, sure. But the lion's share of their cash burn is R+D. It's this that was fully funded by existing sales until the Scottish problem appeared. I don't mind them burning cash if it's them developing their pipeline of development, because that's the business plan. But I'd like to know how short the Scots have left them, and to have some sense of the scale of the raise or loan they'll need.
What they actually said was that the Scottish Medicines Consortium not recommending Efmody for NHS automatic reimbursement when treating CAH meant that further funding would be needed to reach profitability. Many pharmaceutical companies at this stage of development are not yet profitable. They reached the rare point a couple of years back where they had been able to say that they had enough revenue forecast from the drugs they had approved to get them through to profitability without further cash injection. The Scots meant they had to back-pedal on that one. But the amount of revenue they've lost from Scotland (and others who take their cue from Scotland) will be small relative to their other income, so it's not as if it's suddenly become a cash sinkhole. It's just that they no longer have a clear runway all the way.
So all they said is that they'll need some funds, from some source, at some point, and they'd look into their options, including the possibility of a non-dilutive placing. Nothing urgent (the results today show they have funds for the next 12 months). And not on a desparate scale.
When they explained all this, the share price was 33.5p. It dropped 50% on that day to 17p. It's now lower still. There's no way that particular detail justified that size of drop. Today's results show this continues to be a healthy business with approved drugs generating meaningful revenues. Hopefully it will now start to get back to a more appropriate market cap.
With £16m cash, why would they need a placing with any urgency?
People are looking at the share price uplift at Pires, and thinking "that's not fair, they gain, we lose"
You have to look at the relative sizes of the two companies. They have fewer shares in issue than us, at a lower price. So the cash equivalent of the premium they're getting, divided by the number of shares we have in issue, is not large at all.
It depends what numbers you put in, but roughly: if we are valued at 15p, after the dilution, our shares become worth 14p.
So the effect of the merger is much more whether you think the synergies will lead to greater growth. If so, that dwarfs the dilution. If not, we have bigger problems than the dilution.
So focus on the opportunities rather than the dilution
Why post this twice? I get that one's the draft and one's the sent version, but what's your point to readers of this board?
The warrant holders have paid nothing for them so far.
When the share price reaches 2.4p or above, they have the option of buying one new share at 1.6p for each warrant. That new share doesn't come from other holders in the market; the company will issue a new share. In that sense there is dilution - other holder then hold a correspondingly smaller proportion of the whole company.
The new funds raised will be accounted for as a mixture of share capital (the nominal value of the new shares issue) and share premium (the rest to make it up to the 1.6p paid).
Answer your question?
https://www.lse.co.uk/rns/ADVT/readmission-and-publication-of-prospectus-uyyn13grsmaclnh.html
We've reached a mid price of 2.95p having been much higher, so people who bought in are hurting at the paper losses. Sure.
I think it's worth looking at the share chart, and mapping the newsflow onto it. We passed through this price level on the way up at the start of May last year - 11 months ago.
Let's compare what was known then about Kavango and its licences, and what we've learnt since.
As of 5th May, the KSZ had previously only had airborn surveys done (AEM) - by SkyTEM. The company realised they needed to know much more what was under the ground at Areas A and B, so they'd just commissioned Spectral Geophysics to do some TDEM surveys. The first of those results had just come back, confirming a conductor of 3000 Siemens in the keel of the suspected intrusion. Spectral had been put on retainer to prioritise future survey work. That was it for the KSZ.
Since then, we've discovered Area C as well, discovered and commissioned Mindea as drilling partners, and extracted core from various holes. We've found another conductive zone in Area B, first thought to be 8,200 Siemens, then 11,000, then two separate zones at 16,000 and 2,500. We've learnt that the model is now two stacked zones, with Karoo intrustion underneath Proterozoic. We didn't even know that Area B conductor existed last May.
Now let's think about the Copper Belt. We had various licence areas, had renewed some, bought some more, and let some lapse. All we had to go off, last May, was the prospects of some neighbouring areas, and some soil sample results. In February 2021, SkyTEM had started AEM suveys. After that 5th May, when the price was last at these levels, the first of those AEM surveys returned, and we found 7 targets in the copper belt. We later determined the exact drill targets in PL082.
Lastly, Ditau. As of May last year we knew that there were 12 areas of interest. That was it.
Subsequently (July last year) the first 7 aerial surveys of those came back, identifying 3 drill targets (i1, i4, i10), with the remaining surveys still to complete.
The share price has dropped back from the 6p level because people who bought for hype of immediate company-transforming news have become disappointed or bored and sold. KSZDD002 may not have contained what everyone hoped, but it told us a lot more good news about what's down there, and we didn't even know that area was worth drilling when we were last at 3p.
Compared to when the price was last at this 3p level, things are in much better shape. Much more is known about all 3 of the main areas of exploration, and the company's cash balance sheet is a lot healthier. Surely, if 3p was a fair price in May 2021, it should be valued higher today. The share price movement is all about sentiment, and no reflection of the company's prospects.
That's the way I see it, at least.
Thanks , Ella, you've just explained it clearly, with the POW component.
And, BCB, yes, I know the share price drop was nothing to do with Molopo, but with people misunderstanding the drill results at KSZ where 10k Siemens turned out to be an average of 16k and 2.5k.
It's water under the bridge now, but did anyone get their heads around the percentages?
The bit that was easy to notice was the fact that we were looking to acquire 100% of KKME, not the 85.23% originally envisaged.
But the other change was that, originally, we were told that KKME had 100% of the Molopo Farms Project, but then in the revised deal we were told that KKME had a 60% interest.
So we were taking a higher stake (all) of a company that no longer holds the whole MFP but only holds 60% of it.
Why the drop from 100% to 60%?
Been out enjoying the weather, but it's colouded over, so it's time to come in and reply. I don't come to these boards to pick a fight (unlike some), so I feel no compulsion to have to "win" an argument.
Yes, if you see it in terms of averages, and money that was ever paid in to buy Kavango shares, then I get your point.
But if you look at the cash that's ever been put on risk ...:
Say someone has £5,500 to invest.
At the placing, they take 100k shares at 5.5p.
The price hits 12p. They sell their 100k shares for £12k.
From the £12k, they keep £3,500 and use the other £8,500 to exercise 100k warrants.
This gives them 100k shares, which they sell - as near as immediately as settlement times allow - for £12k.
They've then got £15,500 in cash (£3,500 + £12,000), having initially invested £5,500. Net profit: £10k.
At no point have they had more than their initial £5,500 investment riding on the success of KAV. The most they'd lose is £5,500 (if everything collapsed before they sold their initial shares), or £2,000 (if everything collapsed after they'd used all but £3,500 to exercise their warrants).
If, on the other hand, Mr £5,500 bought shares at 5p in the market, they'd get 110k shares. They could sell those at 12p for £13,200. Net profit: £7,700.
Hope it's still sunny where you are. ATB to you too.
Thanks for engaging, fbrj
I was assuming that someone who took the placing simply sat on their warrants, until the share price reached their desired target, at which point they sell their shares, and exercise their warrants instantly selling the resulting shares.
So they haven't been set on an average of 7p waiting for the right sell price, with twice the cash tied up. They've been sat on an average of 5.5p, waiting for the chance to sell and to make an instant profit on the warrants. As long as their cashflow lets them exercise the warrants, losing access to that cash until the resulting shares settle, it works.
Still think I've got my sums wrong? If so, do explain further. :-)