Member Info for TerrorWit

23 May 2022 — Holding(s) in Company, Richard Griffiths reduced to 5.90%:

https://www.lse.co.uk/rns/holdings-in-company-zpakkvxg4u9r8gj.html

13 May 2022 — Holding(s) in Company, Richard Griffiths at 7.41%:

https://www.lse.co.uk/rns/NANO/holdings-in-company-atuqs3xe3je5lwf.html

22 May 2017 — Holding(s) in Company, Richard Griffiths crossing below notifiable thresholds:

https://www.investegate.co.uk/announcement/rns/nanoco-group–nano/holding-s-in-company/4595517

That history makes “Richard Griffiths might be the buyer” a pretty speculative leap unless there’s a fresh TR-1.

"One must assume he is way to close to the company"

- it's just that I know what it takes to run a business so I find the constant criticism from those who haven't tried unjustified.

All that matters is whether or not they succeed in their strategy. You can weigh the risks of that for yourself but everything else is heat.

I think it’s worth remembering that the forum readers are not fools.

When somebody repeatedly:

* asserts certainty,

* avoids detailed questions,

* filters anyone who challenges them,

* and starts attributing disagreement to hidden motives,

readers notice.

The irony is that if we apply Laura’s standard consistently, somebody could just as easily say:

“A group of new posters appeared after the delisting announcement arguing the vote would fail and the shares would rise.”

Therefore:

“They are plants trying to promote a trade.”

That’s no more or less evidenced than her own claims, none of which are coherent.

Saldog

Those seem reasonable questions to ask, but I am not convinced the Shoei settlement and the proposed delisting are necessarily connected.

One possible explanation is simply that the company concluded further litigation was unlikely to justify the additional cost and uncertainty, while separately concluding that the costs and obligations of maintaining a public listing were disproportionate to the size of the business.

The strategic review has already shown how difficult it has been to realise value from the IP through a sale of the company. That may be frustrating for shareholders, but it does not automatically mean there is a hidden transaction behind either decision.

For me, the more important question is not whether these events occurred close together, but whether the company can eventually generate meaningful revenue from its technology. If it can, the debate about the vote may look very different in a few years’ time. If it cannot, remaining listed will not solve that problem either.

Thank you for all your helpful posting over the many years dduyba. I am sorry to see you selling, but I respect your choice too.

My agenda is that I think the company are doing a sensible thing by the delisting. Since I tend to continue holding and I’m considering investing more, I am more interested in them having sufficientmoney available to execute their strategy and I trust their judgement.

Laura may be correct that many delistings disclose irrevocable undertakings.

She has not established that there is a legal requirement to do so.

And even if their absence is unusual, it does not follow that the board lacks shareholder support

And even if the board doesn’t have any shareholder support and the vote fails, it doesn’t follow that the share price will rise - the increased uncertainty may well cause it to fall further, which seems to be the way the market is reading things.

A board can:

* speak to major shareholders,

* gauge sentiment,

* receive informal indications of support,

without obtaining binding irrevocable undertakings.

Companies do that sort of shareholder engagement all the time.

Laura

If you were proposing a delisting, would you:

1. Spend months preparing it,

2. Issue the circular,

3. Convene the meeting,

without first testing sentiment among the largest holders?

That would be a very strange way to behave.

It's like being on safari in The Serengeti watching the baboons hunting in huge troops .... of two.

I'm not sure what it is you tried to tell me but if it's along the lines that things are going as you expected then I suspect even the most sympathetic observer may have cause to question you.

I suspect your bunsen burner has deprived you of fresh air because there's certainly not much oxygen reaching your brain.

One thing that strikes me is that this forum has become obsessed with one event.

I’m more interested in the outcome.

The event is the vote.

The outcome is whether Nanoco eventually becomes a business that generates meaningful cash from its technology.

Five years from now nobody will care very much about the vote itself if the company is producing revenue.

Likewise, if the company burns through the cash and fails commercially, nobody will care whether it remained listed.

So if there is a trade, it may come after the uncertainty has reduced and there is something tangible for the market to value. That is admittedly slower, less exciting and much harder to sell on a bulletin board—which is probably why fewer people are talking about it.

But it might also explain why the market is buying shares as well as selling them.

By what precise mechanism do you think the CEO and Chairman will deprive all the other shareholders of their money?

Plenty of quoted companies go bust too.

You don’t know what shareholders are thinking.

The assumption that a handful of bulletin board posters can accurately predict the outcome of the vote seems rather optimistic. The company and its advisers have access to information, conversations and shareholder engagement that the forum simply does not.

The forum represents a tiny and self-selecting fraction of the register. The vote will be decided by shareholders, not by whoever happens to be posting this week.

Laura’s calculation highlights a familiar Nanoco problem: despite a three-year strategic review, the company remains unsold.

The assumption that the IP is worth £10–20m also overlooks the investment required to realise that value. Until commercialisation is achieved, both the capital requirement and the ultimate return remain uncertain. That uncertainty may be the real reason the shares have fallen from around 7p to 2.5p following the announcement. It is also possible that defeating the delisting by voting ‘No’ would not remove that uncertainty and could simply prolong it.

As for the recent trading, the absence of any TR1 announcements suggests these are unlikely to be large strategic buyers building meaningful positions. The explanation probably lies elsewhere.

The simplest explanation for the proposal remains the one set out by the company itself: management believes the costs and regulatory burden of maintaining a public listing are disproportionate to the size of the business. Shareholders may disagree with that judgement, but it does not require a conspiracy to explain it.

Laura2022 is now attacking a new poster (DNev) who has just joined the thread. This is a classic tactic: when the substance of the argument is weak, attack the messenger or accuse them of being a fake ID. It adds nothing to the discussion but it tells us us everything we need to know about Laura.

It is rather amusing when you step back from it.

The implicit logic here seems to be:

“I’ve discovered an obvious opportunity that the market has completely missed.”

followed immediately by:

“Let me announce it publicly to thousands of people.”

The most revealing thing is that while you’re calculating how many shares they need to “win”, the share price has drifted from about 3p to 2.4p during the day.

If defeating the delisting were obviously a route to instant value creation, you’d expect the market to be behaving rather differently.