George Frangeskides, Exec-Chair at Alba Mineral Resources, discusses grades at the Clogau Gold Mine. Watch the full video here.
Yes a horrible period for them for sure and it may well be the case that they're through the worst.
FWIW Managed to get a look at research (comissioned by FORT) they're forecasting 11.1 fy fully adjusted eps and year end net debt pre IFRS16 of 61.9 m (which is seemingly comparable to the £50m yesterday) so yes further degradation but stunted. Also divi down to 6.2p.
Further info cash year end was 34.3. I wonder what this position is now?
It will be interesting to see how this develops.
*correction to my post yesterday net debt was (-£5.9m) end of last year.
I'd be interested to hear because spending 55.9m (+cash generated from operations) in 6 months seems like an awful lot. Managment clearly recognise this hence cost cutting. I'm potentially a very willing buyer of this but liked it much more when the balance sheet had plenty of cash.
Just to be clear previously it was +5.9m now -£50m a fairly significant swing and the difference includes any free cashflow in the period. I had a look back to the half year update last year and the cash position was an order of magnitude stronger, and so it doesnt seem to be a seasonal thing. Its obviously got a very strong asset backed balance sheet but the cash position is worrying to me. From my quick scan I attribute the spend to capex and inventory. Excess inventory in a slowing market seems unnecessary and I can only assume is due to a shortfall in orders vs projected orders. They may well be able to shift these if they're core selling bricks for example but I wouldn't be surprised if the net debt position continues to deteriorate. It's unbelievable how something can swing from so much cash to a negative position in such a short period of time. Though if they cut the divi, cost cutting measures follow through and at least maintain earnings over the next 1.5 years they should be able to get back to a net cash position relatively quickly. Very surprised at the sp movement but need to get my hands on some research.
AI requires data centres and most data centres require concrete. Also somero have indicated that its a key area that their customers work in.
Some good points RE: USA, Valuation etc.
I've taken a fairly decent position (for me) today after independently coming to similar conclusions myself. Even on 2017 net profit vs current market cap it seems reasonably priced. Add capacity increasing by a fairly hefty 35% from memory, plenty of cash on the balance sheet it looks a decent point to buy with a long term horizon.
I sold out previously largely due to worries around the bell weather Amazon having too much storage space but think things like data centres may pick up the slack. AI is going to need more data that's for sure.
I really like SOM and think it's a cracking long term hold but I've seen quite a bit of commentary around amazon having too much DC storage and assume this could be the case for many online players. Look around many of them have had very tough years. This is a key area of revenue for SOM. I worry that the recent mild profit warning could be a bit of a canary in the coal mine for what could be a difficult period for them, how difficult I'm not sure.
Yes reads well to me, inline & potential for upgrades. Though if it sustained revenues/ earnings at these levels for the next 10 years I'd be delighted on the current multiple.
I'd guess (finger in air) it would be 25% more expensive to build them now. Last I saw steel was 50% more expensive and everything else seems to be up 10%to 30%. Global ship building obviously suffered the same lockdowns as other industries over the last couple of years creating a backlog.
Though perhaps companies are still less willing to reserve ships at the moment given the covid-19 backdrop, meaning demand isn't quite where it was.
*throw :)
Nice to see it tipped in the times today:
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/share-tip-trend-is-turning-in-favour-of-primark-owner-abf-0fnxzp5k9
I don't have access but can imagine that the main thrust is around primarks value proposition and its appeal to households who will have their budgets further squeezed over the next few months. I agree and think it is good value on both a multi year historic and forecast earnings perspective. Through in an appealing dividend and prospective store growth and I think it's one to tuck away for a few years.
RE: net debt. Yes you're right I misread thanks. Interesting net debt is given at the end of May.
I haven't seen the article but perhaps not the strongest of rebuttals from Joules today. Net debt up c.£10m since the last update, unsure if this their typical debt profile for this time of year, none the less KPMG debt advisory brought on to assist.
I happened to find myself in a Greggs a couple of weeks ago and was impressed with pricing of the coffee and just how busy it was. It was a Saturday morning so possibly peak trading.
Whilst downing my coffee I had a quick look through the fundementals and stuck it on my watch list.
I'm partial to a value play and hold some ABF shares for example. I particularly like the fact that both companies shy away from traditional advertising leaning heavily on word of mouth, social media etc Also they plan to increase locations by a significant amount over the next few years looks highly promising. I ask myself can my c26k population town handle another greggs and I think it certainly can but that's more ambitious than they intend with a target of 1 store to every 20k people.
Looking at the latest update and the general state of things margin pressure will likely be a factor for the remainder of this year but the fact they own their supply chain gives me confidence that they will weather the storm much better than their competition.
The new CEO also ticks a lot of boxes for me having been around the company throughout the last few years of dramatic growth and obviously being instrumental in that. It looks a pretty robust handover to me.
I don't think it is necessarily cheap today but I like the business, its future prospects and think earnings a reasonably sustainable at these levels so I've taken a fairly decent position.
Yesteday I saw a good question to ask yourself when buying into any new company; what do I see that others are missing?
It's a challenging one, going straight for your hubris and grabbing it by the jugular, but for me it comes down to growth Greggs could achieve in my home town where I can see at least 1 location that it would do dramatically better from. That, although it is a very small sample size, reinforces the management targets for store growth. Near term I think it is well set up to capture a market who want a cheap coffee and food on the go. Yes inflation is going to be terrible this winter but employers are aware of this and are intervening with one of non-discretionary payments to deal with the super inflation we're seeing in energy for example also the government are bolstering the pockets of low earners so I'm beginning to think the winter won't be as bad as I feared only a month ago.
Finally a clientel that isn't necessarily lured in with TV adverts or expensive ad campaigns will surely be more sticky than in other businesses particularly those where heavy expenditure on influencers, google ads etc lures people in to purchase on impulse. I think there is a genuine affinity for the greggs brand and that it occupies a portion of their regular's minds in much the same way as MCD. I know it is starting to with me as I've earmarked it as the cheapest place I know for a half decent coffee.
cue a massive sell-off tomorrow.
Not sure BB. I'll have a better look when I get a chance best I can see at first glance is that they expect to pay 2024 £150m bond from available cash at maturity. Have a look at the latest presentation good info there
Just a note that the latest guidance taken £312, 85% and £40m ebitda yields £16m profit. They did talk about it in the presentation and attributed the decline to a different landscape than pre covid also that some central overheads were not appropriately apportioned between cruise and tour. The rejig will reduce pbt in cruise but increase it in tour from what I can tell. Effectively landing in the same position.
In terms of the investment case it still stands as far as I'm concerned. If river cruises clean their collective faces, a half decent profit in Ocean cruises and the early 40p analyst concensus looks easily achievable.
*Correction to my last post they've confirmed on track for £40m ebitda per ship next year.
I agree that the CEO had to go and that it is good news at this juncture although he possibly should have gone earlier in the year. Joules really should be matching the best in class operationally e.g. Next etc the last couple of years could have been stewarded much better e.g DC issues. That's the standard of financial control and forward planning they should be seeking.
The investment case remains however, a small base sought after brand where the founder still owns a significant shareholding. Perhaps he could take the CEO role in the interim.
Yes I listened to it all while attempting to work on other things. Plenty of interesting insights and excellent pointed questions which gave a good look under the bonnet. It was interesting to hear that the reformatting of tour means that they can exceed previous levels of profitability with a reduced load factor. I also liked that they reduced net debt by £30m.
I agree with the sentiment give by a poster below relating to travel cleaning it's own face. My base expectation this year is insurance maintains a holding pattern, cruise posts reasonable profits say 25-30m pbt and tour gets to breakeven or a small loss. Though I truly expect all of those scenarios will be well beaten. If it does that £1b wouldn't be a foolish valuation perhaps a bit less if you take out the non asset backed debt.
Using the 316 assumpsion for the first half and once you take out 35 days of non cruising the average is around 75.4 for the full year. a further 2.4% of down days have also been guided now taking cruise to 73% for the full year. This could be attributable to: 1. a contagion effect e.g. cruisers being put off by the rejection from the carribean ports 2. generic refunds from issues that didn't make the news. e.g. I believe there was an issue with the Siemens equipment for a couple of days from memory earlier in the year and one of the ships was moored waiting for engineers to fix 3. potentially war etc 4. alternatively it could be cautious guidance and the actual load factor is the 75.4% and hopefully nothing more than a blip.
Carribean restrictions have eased over the last week with the cdc downgrading many destinations to moderate level 2 risk along with cruising in general so hopefully that risk is moderating.
Another point is that they confirmed yesterday that they are on track to meet £40m ebitda per ship this year and provided load factor curves. in short 73% for the fy is still above pre pandemic booking levels. This after the carribean shock. I don't think anyone would question your sanity if you assume the load factor will revert to the 85/86% guided a couple of months ago in the coming months.
Fuel hedged and ticket prices going up covering the majority of inflationary costs. I've bought more and will revisit in June.
I agree Banbury, current trading guidance may be ropey because of the carribean c.10m lost sales, and c.4m operating costs also the central cruise costs.
Also fuel will be an issue, along with tour being at a standstill due to omnicron.
However I do think that it should be able to post a better than base case ebitda for cruise by the end of the financial year e.g 80 to 90m. If they can maintain 85% loadings and sell above £314 per ticket even taking additional fuel costs into account. Lots of ifs though.