Member Info for tomglan

29th Feb "These purchases are the last purchases to be made under the first £550 million tranche (the "First Tranche") announced on 06 October 2023, part of the £1.1 billion share buyback programme announced on 05 October 2023; accordingly, the First Tranche of the programme has been completed in accordance with its terms. Under the First Tranche, the Company repurchased 30,317,505 shares of 10 pence each at an average price of 1,814.13 pence per share."

So the board knew of an offer for ~230p in late Jan but decided not to tell shareholders and subsequently shares were changing hands for 155p yesterday morning. They then had their hand forced when the shares started to randomly spike up 10-13% on seemingly no news. Is this how bids are normally handled?

"Total capital returns in FY24, including ordinary dividends and share buyback, expected to exceed £2.4bn" So working backwards that's at least a 2% dividend increase on top of the buyback.

"Prime minister Rishi Sunak is considering imposing a complete ban on smoking for the next generation in what would amount to some of the strictest measures to tackle the health problem anywhere in the world." From FT

If they only keep the US listing then UK shareholders will have to pay a 15% dividend withholding tax on all future dividends which would be a major disaster for UK shareholders in my opinion. There are some SIPP providers that have arrangements for US dividends to be paid gross, however, this wouldn't work for shares held within ISAs.

Americans blowing up the global financial system due to greed... can't we have a different crisis for once?! Let's hope that LGEN's 240% SII coverage is enough to weather what's on the horizon.

Yes and the market also thought LGEN was exposed to the pandemic fallout in March 2020 which allowed me to pick up a chunk of shares in the 140s. Who knows what the future holds but they seem to be performing and if they can continue to do so eventually the price will come to reflect this.

I thought it was Tuesday as well until I double-checked their website: "Direct Line Insurance Group plc ("Direct Line Group") will publish its 2022 preliminary results on Monday 13 March 2023 at 7am. Management will host a presentation for investors and analysts at 11.30am."

Looks like the price moves on results day was just algos upset that they won't be able to dance around another big buyback. I must admit I was confused why the SP went down on those results, especially given the div 6% increase. Not sure I buy the debt shock either... BATS has about £3bn of free cash flow after paying the dividend, did they really expect the debt to go down much during a year they also spent £2bn on buybacks? Next gen starting to look interesting too. ATB

Well done for holding on for so long Jon. I recall BAT produced a chart in their 2017 Investor Day presentation which showed total shareholder return grew at a compound annual rate of 17.5% for almost two decades - totally eclipsing the FTSE 100. The smart strategy was to hop aboard and not get off - as you did.

Trading Update for Q3 2020 released 8th Nov 2022 "our 2023 and medium-term targets and the outlook for dividend capacity remain unchanged". Hmmm... time for a new CEO and board I think, preferably hired based on competence.

Change of management? No thanks. Check out the performance of LGEN vs AV over 5 years or more on google finance, speaks for itself.

Not a bad time for IMB to be using dollar profits to buyback shares priced in great british pesos either

Strange how Kwasi (whose budget caused gilts to tank) used to work for Odey. Small world.

From FY results: "We have already started to return £400m of the proceeds to shareholders in the form of special dividends, split equally over the interim 2021, final 2021 and interim 2022 dividends. 46 pence per share of the total final 2021 dividend (of 118 pence per share) is in respect of the Penguin sale and the final 45 pence per share will follow in October 2022."

Sabre insurance read across

Fair enough, I was just making the point that looking at total return for companies like IMB can be useful rather than focusing on share price alone

LTI that assumes one bought at the high and didn't reinvest any of the dividends during the decline. For example, I first started buying at just over £31, however thanks to reinvested dividends and some opportunistic buys during the lows (£12-14) I'm now slightly in profit on an average cost basis.

"The Board has approved an interim dividend of 42.54 pence per share which will be paid in two payments of 21.27
pence per share. The first interim dividend payment will be paid on 30 June 2022 to shareholders registered on 27
May 2022."

Divi do you have a source for the "saving £10 million per annum on Bromley office" comment? Was it mentioned earlier on the call?