Member Info for TheTrotsky

"... unwound when the other party has finished acquiring the underlying shares ..."

Are you suggesting that SABA's counterparty doesn't already own the shares? How does that work? Somebody has to own the shares.

Surely that type of arrangement only works if the other party's starting point is below 3% i.e. they buy (say) 2.99% (which they don't need to notify), enter into a TRS contract with SABA and then go back into the maket for for more (always ensuring that they don't exceed 2.99% by entering into a further TRS contracts with, say, SABA as appropriate).

I assume such an arrangemnt would fall foul of the concert party rules once the holdings of the parties involved in such arrangements exceeded 30%.

Stupot, that's all well and good in theory but the reality is that the warrant holders will only exercise the warrants at a premium to the current share price if they want to increase their existing shareholding AND they can't accumulate the same number of shares in the open market at an average purchase cost below the warrant exercise price. The current share price is already trading at a c40% discount to the warrant price and if the share price continues to fall it would seem less and less likely that the warrants will be exercised and will instead be left to lapse.

Damienmoore, my reading (based on Google AI) is that the stock lender is obliged to notify a corresponding reduction in their interest too (unless their interest has fallen by less than 1%); they've forfeited their rights for the duration of the contract. It's possible that SABA might have gleaned their interest from five or more current shareholders but that would seem unlikely.

Thanks for pointing that out Damienmoore. That makes a lot more sense and explains why the share price is rising this morning, rather than falling, despite having gone XD. Have to admit that I've not come across TRS derivative contracts before and the Google AI trawl I made this morning didn't throw this up as a possible means for a share borrower to be able to make money from the deal.

The only question that therefore remains to be answered is who is the counterparty that has lent them the shares? If the likes of, say, RM or Rathbones had lent them the shares then they'd have to notify a corresponding reduction in their interest (if their interest had fallen by 1% or more). Rathbones notified a c5% reduction in their interest back in early August but, if they were the counterparty, then SABA surely ought to have notified their interest then, not today.

Well there's part of your answer this morning. The Ex-Div date (16-Oct) is before the transaction date (21-Oct), so the subscription price will be based on the XD NAV.

I think that people's delight in SABA's new holding might prove to be misplaced. As Therosyl has pointed out they've borrowed the shares and, as far as I can determine, the only way they can benefit from this is if they short GSF. I.e. you buy shares to go long and borrow shares to go short.

Went Ex-Div this morning

I believe that the indicative price is just that. It's probably based on the ex-div NAV plus 2% at the date of the announcement on 1 October; it will not be the subscription price paid. The actual subscription price will be based on the ex-div NAV on 21 October, as set out in the RNS. It's just a ballpark figure to enable shareholders to determine what level of funds will probably be required to take up the offer and/or the placing.

There's a lot of paraphernalia on offshore rigs that's probably not recyclable e.g. the accommodation blocks and although steel does have value, its scrap value is relatively low compared to other metals i.e. the value of the metal recovered is unlikely to cover the cost of recycling (part of the reason that the rigs weren't originally recycled). The structural steel on rigs is heavy, so a 97% recovery by weight is not improbale but it's likely to be less by volume.

I'd hazard that the cost of recylcing turbine blades is probably less (less of a logistical exercise and can be done discreetly over a period of time, rather than all in one go) but I'd agree that the value of the materials recovered, if any, is probably considerably less and the materials are probably just as hazardous to handle as the ballast from the rigs (contaminated sea water).

The BX in the middle of the new name about sums it up ;-)

What's with the "CelL"? Pretentious garbage.

I think there will be a lot of share price turmoil on 20 October but opportunities for PIs will probably be limited because online brokers can be very slow to update their systems to allow the new shares to be traded. It should be possible to buy/sell the new shares from the market open on 20 October if you don't hold any old shares (existing shareholders aren't permitted to trade until their accounts have been updated and their old shares replaced by their new share entitlement) but that's not always been my experience with my online brokers (sometimes the new shares aren't readily identifiable to trade).

There is something slightly weird about the special dividend; the record date (17 October) precedes the ex-dividend date (20 October).

It's normally the other way around.

In principle, you shouldn't be able to sell your shares on 17 October and still receive the special dividend but as it currently stands it would appear that you can. Shares are normally settled T+1; so any shares transactions on 17 October would not normally be entered into the register until 20 October (that's why the record date would normally follow the ex-dividend date; to allow the register to be updated).

Have PAY made a faux pas?

Turbine blades are made from composites (fibreglass, resin etc.) and can be recycled but the recycling process isn't straightforward.

On the other hand, recycling offshore oil rigs is not a striaghtforward process either. I believe that, at one time, they used to be simply sunk in deep water but now they are dismantled offshore and cut up onshore but their ballast is an environmental hazard and is still difficult to process.

He's helping a friend who doesn't hold them in an ISA (or a SIPP). He says so in his 2nd sentence!

The trust is registered in Guernsey and any dividends paid are therefore, technically, foreign dividends but as there is no withholding tax (WHT) on dividends paid by Guernsey resident REITs , the UK tax treatment is exactly the same as UK sourced dividends and, as such, it doesn't really make any difference whether they are reported as UK or foreign dividends (any UK tax due that may be due on overseas dividends is calculated on a country by country basis, so there's no benefit to be gained from "pooling").

By contrast, Santander (as an example) is a Spanish bank and its dividends have Spanish WHT deducted at source and, as such, UK taxpayers can claim a deduction for all, or part, of the Spanish WHT to the extent that the dividends would otherwise be liable to UK income tax (you can't reclaim the WHT but you can use it to avoid "double taxation"). Any WHT deduction is capped at the UK tax rate.

Hope that helps.

Steedtrader, take your suppository like a man and stop whining! You clearly aren't too busy to read the BB, so what was your excuse before?!

EyesofBlue, I'm not sure that the BOD has deliberatley set out to deceive shareholders. I've said before that the last financial year was a perfect financial storm; the delays commissioning the new battery storage facilities coupled with pricing problems in all of its operating regions. Most, if not all, of these problems were outside GSF's ability to control.

Some of the commissioning delays may be down to GSF but we know that in the UK, for exapmle, a lot of the problems are down to National Grid and all UK battery operators have found themselves in the same boat. Likewise the failure of new equipment does happen from time to time and delays will inevitably ensue when that happens. If the failure is due to improper installation then the blame may well fall at GSF's door but if the failure is due to faulty equipment having been supplied then that's on the manufacturer.

As regards the pricing issues, it would appear that all of the regions in which GSF operates have been turning the screws on pricing. As far as I'm aware, the issues that GSF has experienced in UK/Ireland, for example, are exactly the same as other operators have experienced. GSF has tried to maximise returns by using new arbitrage software and, from the information they've provided, GSF would appear to have been able to achieve above average returns in a difficult pricing market; whether that's a better or worse performance than other operators is difficult to assess. GRID certainly seems to have been beset by similar operating problems but I don't know whether it has actually performed better or worse operationally than GSF.

Texas is a problem; returns are very weather reliant and the last two summers appear to have been less hot than 2023 and earlier years. GSF cannot control the weather; however much it would like to.

In an ideal world, GSF would just upsticks and move its battery facilities to different locales where it can earn better returns but that's just not feasible.

What the BOD can be held accountable for, if nothing else, is strategy. Should they have realised at the outset that 2-hour storage would have been a better option than 1-hour storage? Was that always the case? Was it a feasible option from the outset? However, you have to bear in mind that the unit cost/pricing landscape today might have been totally different when the original strategy was implemented; it might be easy to say that they made a mistake in hindsight but more difficult to determine whether they made a mistake in foresight.

The other aspect to consider is whether it was sensible to build an intenational portfolio. I know that a few years ago I thought GSF's international protfolio was sensible (spreading risk); now I'm less sure. I can't hold the BOD accountable for something that I thought was a good idea, even if it proves not (I knew in advance and invested because).

Finally, as regards the management fees, I think it's a common theme for all investment trusts, not just

Steeltrader, If you don't read what the board says in it's press releases then the only person who is decepting you is YOU. Nothing that's happened in the last 3 months, including yesterday's RNS, wasn't already flagged in the press releases issued in July (and discussed on this BB at that time). If you're only learning yesterday that the special dividend is being paid in two tranches and that the quarterly dividend for the three months ended 30 June has been foregone then it's very rich to claim that you've been deceived by the board when this all flagged 3 months ago. The fact that I may have had more time to read the RNS and BB is no excuse for you making flagarantly incorrect claims based on the fact that you haven't had time, or the inclination, to actually check your facts.

It's my understanding is that Dai-ichi are obliged to notify the market for every additional 1% incremental increase/decrease in their shareholding over and above the 3% threshold. So, in theory, any further share purchases/sales would have to be notified to the market unless they fell within the 1% band i.e. Dai-ichi wouldn't be obliged to notify the market if they increased their current shareholding from 9.6% to, say, 9.8% but they'd be obliged to notify the market if they increased/decreased their shareholding above/below 10%/9% respectively. That said, I've seen/heard of instances where there has been a failure to notify* but it's highly improbable that Da-ichi would fail to notify the market. A financial firm failing to notify the market would be soundly castigated and suffer signifcant reputational damage and, potentially, hefty fines and/or restrictions placed on their future trading activity. Not a good look.

In theory, by buying on-market, Da-ichi will have absorbed a substantial amount of MNG's "free float" and the share price ought therefore to hold up fairly well now that its purchasing has completed. However, as we've seen with many company buy back schemes in recent years (admittedly on a lesser scale), there doesn't always seem to be a "bottom" to the free float "barrel". We'll just have to wait and see.

* There are similar reporting requirements in the US and Elon failed to notify signficant Tesla share transactions for a couple of years (he considered it to be unnecessary - rules and regulations are for mere mortals) and got away with just a rap on the knuckles (if I recollect).

Scallywag, There's one fly in your ointment; it's probably cost LGEN c£330m upfront to save c£40m annually. So, maybe, that's cash not in the bank ;-)