In today’s bearcast I look at Skinbiotherapeutics (SBTX), Optibiotix (OPTI), Kefi (KEFI), Nightcap (NGHT), VAST Resources (VAST) and finally at my old pal Richard Poulden’s Valereum Blockchain (VLRM), the current love interest of Big Dave Lenigas. 

Reading the top few reviews for Alpha FX (AFX) on Google one is struck by how its customers really do not seem to like it. Luckily to push the bad customer reviews down the pile and make themless read there are newer ones not from customers. Top of the pile, as you can see below, is Josh Royston who just happens to be an employee of Alma PR which is paid to spin for Alpha. Indeed Josh is the Alpha account manager at Alma.  Odd that.

A trading update from marine service provider James Fisher & Sons (FSJ) includes that “revenue in the quarter ended 30 September 2021 was 7.6% higher than Q3 2020 and 8.7% higher than Q2 of 2021… The board now anticipates Underlying Operating Profit for the full year, before separately disclosed items, to be in the range of £27m – £32m”. So why are the shares currently, at around 530p, more than 30% lower?…

Today, Vast Resources (VAST) served up its usual fare of bad news: project delays, financing set backs and death spirals ahoy. All the usual bad news but enough to send the shares crashing below 4p. And it was only two months ago when the company’s third rate joint broker Axis Capital raised it £1.76 million at 6.3p. Ouch. The shares were almost 5.5p last Monday but fell throughout the week to close Friday at 4.2p.

Aquis lobster-pot listed Rutherford Health (RUTH) has announced yet another delay in its acquisition of Proton Partners International Health Care Investments LLC, UAE. The deal, originally announced on 31 August 2021 – along with a placing which is also delayed – was due to complete 21 days on from a share swap deed dated 28 August. Then it was 11 October 2021. Now it is 16 November and the ShareProphets bookies are offering generous odds on yet another extension after that.

I remember – about 25 years ago – that my first boss told me a story concerning a previous contact of his who had bought shares in HSBC (HSBA) many years beforehand and it had provided a fantastic total return profile for the next few decades. Such is the attraction of thinking a bit like Warren Buffett and spotting an idea that is set to continue to perform well for the next thirty or forty years – and holding on. However, hindsight is easy to quote but harder to achieve. And whilst I have my own list of names I anticipate my pension fund is unlikely to sell its holding in during the rest of the 2020s, unsurprisingly this list does not include HSBC which I dumped about 4 years ago (at an akin share price I had purchased the stock at about 4 years earlier). The ‘Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation Limited’ is a flash name, but despite the rise and rise of Asia over recent decades, any HSBC shareholder will be aware that the shares peaked in the year 2000.

Faced with a plunging share price since the “oversubscribed” placing and founder shareholder stock dump in May, what does Dragon’s Den “star” Sarah Willingham do for her NightCap (NGHT) baby.  First: panic. Second put out out a rushed trading statement with old news and missing out critical numbers.

I noted on Friday that the I shares from the alphabet soup that is Edge Performance VCT (EDGH for news, EDGI for the shares) are going to be wound up and sent off to the great share repository in the sky. This is after I shareholders got an 8.5p dividend with roughly another 3.5p to come following the disposal of Coolabi via a takeover on an enterprise value of £35 million. But I fancy I shareholders will be bitterly disappointed, given that they lost over half of their money over a nine-year period. A look at what happened with Coolabi may begin to explain why.

The antics of the Mike Edwards/Jonathan Bixby gang at Aquis listed Dispersion Technologies (DEFI) have been well documented on this website. All sorts of scoundrels backed this in a heavily discounted pre-IPO round, the sort of scoundrels whose accounts at broker Pello ignore lockins and the smoke and mirrors continues today with news of an acquisition. The stench here is getting unbearable.

Hello, Share Smirkers. Even niche businesses have been hit by covid. One such outfit is Zytronic (ZYT), which makes touch sensors for the electronics industry. However, a latest trading update from the company talks about a ‘considerable turnaround’. There’s been a return to profitability since the half year ended at the end of March. Both sales and margins have risen with strong cash generation.

The latest results from pawnbroker H&T Group (HAT) noted Covid-19 related trading restrictions and reduced high street footfall impact but they still showed profitable resilience and noted growing confidence. We can understand why, given the strains raging inflation will put on household budgets, and predict a return to the 380p+ share price levels of early 2020. At a current 283p offer price  (279p when we tipped it two weeks ago) and up to 290p, this is a recovery BUY.

According to a FinnCrap report all UK fund managers are. Even my old pal Mark who is slightly to the right of Genghis Khan? Somehow I doubt it but, as per Joshua and the red clothes day, which fund manager would dare to say that it is all so much shite? I discuss the opportunities that ESG mania offers for those prepared to call out the Emerperor’s New Clothes for what they are. I also discuss whether all entrepreneurs should be feted in the same way by those of us who do believe in capitalism, as per yesterday’s bearcast.

Analyst Jeffrey Christian admits that folks do not agree about what will happen next.  He discusses his recent presentation at the Silver Symposium and how his opinions differ. He notes that all currencies are fiat and that gold’s value is determined by fiat. Much in the same way that currencies are valued by national central banks.

Early stage financial services businesses investment company, B.P. Marsh & Partners (BPM) has announced results for its half-year ended 31^st July 2021 and that it “continue to believe in our strategy of investing in people with ambition, and a track record of delivering within their sectors, and this again has been borne out by these results”.

Here are five long reads that have nothing to do with shares. Put the kettle on, find a comfy chair. You have the time, don’t you? 
 

Back in April here, at the time of its IPO, I observed that PensionBee Group plc (PBEE) – which describes itself as ‘a leading online UK pension provider with a mission to make pensions simple, so that everyone can look forward to a happy retirement’ – was ‘certainly not buying it on day one’.  Well that was a smart choice as whilst the shares hit 180p a few days after the float, they ended Friday’s trading at 140p.  

Okay, it’s the final day of the weekend. Grab a cup of tea, sit back, and test your knowledge against the other ShareProphets members. Write your score in the comments, there are no prizes, and most important of all – no Googling!

The top non-Tom article this week is Centamin – Q3 Report Again Shows All Is On Track: BUY For the Yield, The Upside Is In For Free by Nigel Somerville at number eight or number 14 if you include the Bearcasts. The next non Tom is at 9 or 16 and is from yours truly.

I start with the lamentable Brown whose splash today is about ex Tory Minister sleazy Tim Yeo being branded a liar by a judge. Yes we reported that on July 29 HERE and others including Paul Staines at Guido followed up — and credited us — later that day. And the deadwood press wonders why sales continue to tumble. Then it is onto the storm over a four person £37,000 restaurant tab in London on October 8. Is it wrong? It is certainly utterly vulgar and given why so many folks, especially in London, have become so wealthy thanks to the thief in the night which has locked so many others in poverty, it is the sort of thing which, wrongly, will make capitalism more hated. I discuss.

Asset manager Lawrence Lepard reckons the end of the bull market in everything is nigh. He sees equity growth slowing a sign that we are near a market top. Last year we had explosive growth in GDP but that has waned in recent months. We printed trillions to get us through the Covid period and now benefits are running out. The economy is starting to choke and the key question is will they do further stimulus or will the markets be allowed to roll over.