Company News

CentralNic Placing Annoys Private Investors

This morning (8/12/2015), CentralNic Group announced the acquisition of Australian company Instra Group. Total cost is AU$33 million payable in cash and shares which will be supported by a mixture of debt and the issuance of new shares in a placing. Overall the new shares to be issued to the sellers and to institutional investors will represent 31% of the new overall equity so there is substantial dilution of existing investors taking place. But what is likely to annoy private investors is ...
Post Date: December 8, 2015 Read more

Rensburg AIM VCT Merger Agreed

Today (27/11/2015) shareholders in Rensburg AIM VCT (RSB) agreed to merge their company with Unicorn AIM VCT in a unanimous show of hands vote. They also agreed the tender offer which was associated with the deal and those shareholders who submitted tenders will be paid in full. Proxy votes were about 92% in favour on both resolutions. This is a definitive snub to Bill Nixon  of Maven who attempted to disrupt these plans on the basis that he could make a more ...
Post Date: November 27, 2015 Read more

Alliance Trust Director Steps Down

It was announced this morning (27/11/2015) that Karin Forseke, Chair of Alliance Trust, will step down in January 2016. Gregor Stewart will take over as Chairman. Alliance Trust has been the focus of campaigns by Elliott Advisors and ShareSoc to get some changes made to this company so as to improve its performance (see https://www.sharesoc.org/alliance.html ) . Although the company has recently announced some changes, and has been furiously buying back shares – presumably in an attempt to close the discount to NAV, ...
Post Date: November 27, 2015 Read more

Globo In Administration

There has been a further announcement by the company today which stated that administrators have been appointed "by order of the court". The administrators are FTI Consulting LLP and they say "Our focus is to undertake an immediate assessment of the Group in order to evaluate any opportunities to realise value from the various businesses.  We will also be looking to gain control of the books and records in order to be in a position to undertake a full investigation.  These steps ...
Post Date: November 3, 2015 Read more

Alliance Trust Investor Forum Report

Yesterday I attended the Investor Forum held by Alliance Trust in London. There were about 350 attendees with the usual audience of investment trust shareholders, many of whom had held the shares for a very long time from talking to a few of them. I pick out below some of the highlights (a full report of the meeting will be distributed to those who have registered for the Alliance Trust Shareholder Action Group (ATSAG - see https://www.sharesoc.org/alliance.html ). Chairperson Karin Forseke covered ...
Post Date: November 3, 2015 Read more

Identity Theft – Experian, TalkTalk and Optimal Payments

There have been a spate of cases of digital identity theft or breaches of security from UK listed companies of late. Their shares prices have all been affected to a greater or lesser extent. On the 2nd October, Experian (EXPN) reported that 15 million US consumers who had applied for T-Mobile services had been the subject of theft of their personal information. T-Mobile is reviewing its relationship with the company, but the share price only suffered a temporary setback even though the ...
Post Date: October 30, 2015 Read more

Globo – the Last Straw

Subsequent to my last blog post which covered the attack by Quintessential Capital Management (QCM) on Globo, this morning the company has made three further announcements: After an emergency board meeting, the CEO (Costis Papadimitrakopoulos), and the CFO (Dimitris Gryparis) have resigned and the COO has been suspended. A committee of non-executive directors has taken over after "certain matters regarding the falsification of data and the misrepresentations of the Company's financial position" were brought to their attention. The joint corporate broker, ...
Post Date: October 26, 2015 Read more

Blogging and Shorting – Globo and Valeant

An organisation called Quintessential Capital Management (QCM) published a report on the 22nd October on Globo. The next morning the shares were suspended at the request of the company so as to enable them to provide a detailed response but they immediately refuted all the allegations in the report. QCM acknowledged that they are active in short selling and have taken a short position in Globo. They also have links to Simon Cawkwell who was also involved in a similar attack on ...
Post Date: October 24, 2015 Read more

IPOs – Worldpay, Equiniti and McCarthy & Stone

The writer has been wading through the 300 odd pages of the prospectuses for Worldpay (already listed), and Equiniti (due to list on the 30th October). The latter will be available to retail investors via certain stockbrokers if you fancy a punt, although you'll be taking the price that institutional investors decide to pay. In addition McCarthy & Stone are lining up to float. I have already written a rather long article for the next ShareSoc Informer newsletter on these three companies ...
Post Date: October 19, 2015 Read more

Possible Volkswagen Legal Action

The following note has been issued by Better Finance (a European Association of private investor groups of which ShareSoc is a member). It is self explanatory. Dear Members, In September, Volkswagen admitted that an estimated 11 million cars worldwide were involved in the falsified emission reports. Reports have emerged that Volkswagen’s top management had been aware of the deception since before the official ad-hoc announcement. Representing VW shareholders, the German investor association DSW, a member organisation of Better Finance, is examining the possibility ...
Post Date: October 17, 2015 Read more