Trodden Under
17 Mar 2017
Re: Director purchase ...and another one. CFO this time. Hmmmm.
Trodden Under
23 Feb 2017
Director purchase Not a huge amount for the Sales director to buy, but perhaps an indication of confidence. I don't suppose he will be looking to lose it all.
Damp Seaweed
23 Feb 2017
Re: Trading Results None the less I'm going to hold onto my shares for the time being, as even at a reduced dividend, as I only have a small stake, I can afford to leave them in the bottom drawer.========== ==Change of plan; Saw 100p on the sell and took it.This problem with intermediaries/ brokers seems a bit of a recurring theme in this business. The risk of more issues before the profits from the sale of these front loaded sales comes through is a big concern.I feel it may be better to sit on the sidelines for a year or two and forgo the decent divi this year and the meagre one in 2018.
Trodden Under
23 Feb 2017
Re: Trading Results Agreed. With dividend re-investment it's still a reasonable return at half the proposed dividend next year. The only real fly in the ointment as far as dividend is concerned is that the reduction appears to be open ended and therefore uncertain. It would have given holders a bit more confidence if they had said it would be halved for a year and then reviewed, depending on performance. It doesn't provide long-term confidence so I will review my holdings after the final dividend.
Damp Seaweed
23 Feb 2017
Re: Trading Results As a shareholder I would like to find something good in this report. The best I can come up with is that HSD might make more money in the (unspecified) distant future.The write off feels indicative of the rather unscrupulous nature of this business.None the less I'm going to hold onto my shares for the time being, as even at a reduced dividend, as I only have a small stake, I can afford to leave them in the bottom drawer.
Damp Seaweed
26 Jan 2017
Trading Results Next results date 23rd Feb 17ps Just a note to myself
Damp Seaweed
09 Nov 2016
Re: buy -sold Back in for a longer term hold @99.9
VoxVoci
20 Oct 2016
Re: Final Results Back in 2013 the dividend cover was .68 and the dividend was cut. This year the dividend cover is back down to .68 which leads me to conclude that a further dividend cut would not come as a surprise.Maybe the CEO sold 75,000 shares to preserve his capital.
Damp Seaweed
22 Sep 2016
Re: Final Results Well I invested some more time in reading the accounts, and can't claim to be a whole lot wiser or comforted by the results.Not terribly impressed by Panmure review, they seem to have picked a target price based on EEV NAV which is a bit of an iffy figure and is usually much higher than the share price in most of the fin companies that I tend to come across.But the real non tangible worry is the CEO's sale of 75K at 115p. Doesn't make me feel great. Hopefully he just had a tax bill or mistress to pay off.
Sambram
22 Sep 2016
Re: Final Results 'The full year results to 30 June 2016 were generally in line with our forecasts with the EEV NAV (key to the valuation) at £196m or 143p/share at 30 June (31 Dec 2015: 138p) compared to our 136p/share forecast. The underlying IFRS profit at £9.2m was slightly below our £11.7m forecast reflecting a number of factors including strong new business sales at £119.3m almost double that of the prior year. We have trimmed our EPS forecasts accordingly. The final dividend of 5.3p/share (+1%) made 8.90p/share (+2%) for the full year slightly below our 9.12p forecast. Current trading appears to be going well with sales in Q1 2017 ahead of that in the comparative quarter last year. The continued strong outlook for sales combined with a better than anticipated EEV NAV has led us to increase our target price from 124p/share to 143p/share." - Panmure via Research Tree
jim b-r
22 Sep 2016
Re: Final Results I'm not too disappointed to see profit down compared to 2015, or even margins, since both have been flagged by the company and accounted for in broker forecasts. For example this from the RNS on 28th July:"New business margins (calculated on a PVNBP basis) are sensitive to sales levels and product mix (regular premium products typically having a higher margin). During FY 2016, we experienced significantly larger new business levels than FY 2015 as highlighted above, but the percentage of single premium business written has increased as a proportion, which reduces the overall average margin"That said, I think the reduction in profit was more than expected by some brokers (for example Stockopedia cited an average £11.6m forecast for 2016, compared to the £9.2m underlying actual. But I'm not sure how much store should be placed in estimates during this transitionary period. The thing to note is that the company is still strongly firmly profitable while sitting on a cash pile equal to a third of marcap. This cash pile plus strong sales growth makes the generous dividend feel pretty safe, even though cover is technically around 1 just right now. DYOR. All IMHO.J
LoadsaDosh2
22 Sep 2016
Re: Final Results Yes disappointed. New business almost double but profit and cash flow down?? At least the exchange rate is working to their advantage.
Damp Seaweed
22 Sep 2016
Re: buy -sold After brief further consideration sold my investment @132.4p.The yield is now ~6.3% which is not enough to justify the risk, whilst we wait for the turn around to flow through.I'll almost certainly re invest if we pullback towards 100-110p. But for now I'm happy to bank a fairly decent profit.
Damp Seaweed
22 Sep 2016
Re: Final Results The issue seems to be that they have to pay out loads of commission up front for the new business, but the profit from that business only flows through in later years. They state that cash flow is going to turn negative over the next few years to fund this growth.Also margins seem to have taken a hit.My gut feeling is one of disappointment, but I'm also probably out of my depth in truly understanding this business and, as my investment is low, sit tight for the moment.
soi
22 Sep 2016
Final Results Good MorningFinal Results just out.New business sales up but IFRS profit down New business sales GBP119.3m GBP60.6m - PVNBP Operating cash surplus GBP15.9m GBP24.3m IFRS underlying profit GBP9.2m GBP12.0m after tax IFRS profit after tax GBP8.3m GBP14.9m EEV operating loss (GBP1.1m) (GBP6.3m) after tax Recommended final dividend per share* 5.3p 5.25p IFRS earnings per share 6.0p 10.9p [link]
