wow that is scary16 Dec 2020 15:19
Capita (LON:CPI)
43p - mkt cap £720m
This complex, low margin outsourcing group briefly dipped into small cap territory in October, but along with many other bombed out shares, bounced strongly in November on positive vaccine news, in what fund manager Keith Ashworth-Lord recently described as a “dash for trash”!
I want to follow up on it, because I covered Capita’s Q3 trading update here on 10 Nov 2020, and was quite shocked at how weak its balance sheet is - one of the worst I’ve seen, with NTAV negative at £(1.6)bn. Therefore a large equity fundraising will be needed at some point - hence shareholders are hostages to that being done on reasonable terms. If it’s bungled, and results in large dilution, then that could damage existing shareholders. Why take that risk?
There were going concern and bank covenant problems. So despite its size, I saw this share as very high risk.
A lot hinged on the pending disposal of its Education Software Solutions business. The good news (announced Mon 14 Dec 2020) is that an agreement has been signed with a credible buyer, Montagu Private Equity, to sell ESS for an enterprise value of up to £400m, with £298m payable on completion, expected in early 2021.
This certainly reduces risk at Capita, once it completes, which looks likely & imminent. However, Capita is far from out of the woods, because even with this cash injection, it will still have a painfully weak…