Charityman
04 May 2018
Re: Drop Today Yeah, who flogged nearly half a million shares at 16.40?After hours trades make a nonsense of market opening hours.Also puzzled as to why someone would trade a deal for a number of shares in single figures.
valeite
04 May 2018
Re: Drop Today these after hour trades can be a real pain in r's .
Charityman
04 May 2018
Drop Today Down 2.66% today at 490/499.Contrary to FTSE. must be a valid reason somewhere?
marktime1231
27 Dec 2017
2018 head - to - head Unable to decide which domestic smaller cos trust to choose for my longer term SIPP so for 2018 decided to pit two of the candidates against each other with a big chunk of each - IIT new on my radar, great momentum, tiny charges, and I like the stocks they are buying, but priced at an extreme premium as a result of stellar 2017 returnsSLS an old favourite, big Nimmo fan, strong core holdings, fees rather high but currently on a fair discount, won the 2017 foot race against my third candidate ASL by a mileIt is interesting that both trusts have laid their biggest bets on Fevertree which is now eyeing the US market having conquered our domestic appetite for drowning our austerity sorrows in fancy gin with a premium mixer. Further to run but how much further ... maybe not another double up, but ssscchh you know who might have something to say before too long?Diverge thereafter, but with a similar "conviction" investment strategy of a taking small number of big stakes in companies they like and getting it right most of the time. I would be happy with 15% growth over the year but am hopeful for twice that.
II Editor
09 Jun 2017
NEW ARTICLE: How to profit in the new era of anti-globalisation "When social historians update the textbooks, Baden-Baden may claim a prominent place. The small German spa town would not have been the first to spring to mind for those predicting where a seismic shift in geopolitics and macroeconomics might ..."[link]
II Editor
30 Mar 2017
NEW ARTICLE: Expect further meaty gains at Hilton Food "From a small acorn, supplying meat products to LSE:TSCO:Tesco from a facility in Huntingdon in Cambridgeshire, LSE:HFG:Hilton Food Group has grown into a near-half-a-billion pound company intent on further international expansion.A Portuguese ..."[link]
Omaha man
07 Jan 2016
Small companies follow As a general rule when markets panic heavy selling takes the big stocks down because that is where the liquidity is. Unless they bounce back quickly however, smaller companies usually follow not much later. The NAV here has held up very well in the recent market setback but with a small discount any fall would have to be immediately transmitted to the share price. I've cut my holding this morning despite being a long term supporter. There are other opportunities developing in the market and I think I will be able to buy back here rather lower in a month or so.
Kingel
04 Dec 2015
Nimmo hero, property zero We reverse our usual order with a look first at the most ‘expensive’ investment trusts this week ranked by Numis Securities (see first table below).News that star fund manager Harry Nimmo was looking to do another seven-year stretch on Standard Life UK Smaller Companies (SLS + ) before retiring pleased investors and resulted in the discount – or gap between the share price and its net asset value (NAV) – shrinking to a 10-year low of 1.4%. The shares closed yesterday at 371p, up 4.6% over the previous week. That pushed the sector-leading trust’s Z-score to 3.7 making it this week’s most pricey fund.Just to recap, Z-scores are a measure analysts use to put a share price in some historical context. Roughly speaking, a Z-score of 2 or more shows a stock is significantly above its normal trading range and is therefore ‘expensive’. Conversely, a score of -2 or below shows a stock is significantly below its normal trading range and is therefore ‘cheap’ (see second table).SEE LINK FOR CHARTS[link]
Kingel
05 Jun 2015
Nimmo's trust launches 5% tender offer Standard Life UK Smaller Companies, the former top-performing investment trust, offers scheme to buy back investors’ shares.Standard Life UK Smaller Companies (SLS + ), the former top-performing investment trust run by Harry Nimmo, has launched a tender offer to buy up to 5% of investors’ shares.This is the first tender offer the board has sanctioned in five years and follows a dreadful 2014 in which the £235 million fund failed to grow as smaller companies fell out of favour and some of Nimmo’s bets backfired.However, in making the offer the board also state their faith in Nimmo’s ability and say neither directors nor the fund management team will tender their shares.Whereas in the past SLS shares were much in demand and traded at a premium above their net asset value (NAV), the past 12 months has seen the stock fall to a discount to NAV as investors have shied away. The shares hit a low before the election when they traded nearly 11% below their underlying value.The tender offer gives shareholders the option to sell back their shares to the company and receive more of the underlying value of their investment.Shareholders who join in will be paid cash equivalent to 98% of ‘realisation value’. In effect this is a 2% exit penalty taken off the trust’s diluted net asset value once all costs of the tender offer are deducted.These can be substantial, as the prospectus issued with the tender offer makes clear.Assuming 5% of the shares were bought back, the company estimates total costs, including stamp duty, could be £393,000. As of 29 May that would have produced a tender price of just over 319p per share, which is higher than the 308p closing share price of the previous day, but 5.3% below the fund’s net asset value per share.In 2010 when SLS mounted two tender offers shareholders ended up paying 6% and 6.5% in costs and that was with SLS waiving the 2% exit fee.The tender price for this offer will be calculated at the end of this month. Its precise level will depend on market conditions and how easily Nimmo (pictured) can sell holdings to drum up the cash for shareholders who wish to sell.Gordon Humphries, head of investment companies at Standard Life Investments, hoped shareholders would elect to retain their investment. He pointed out that the post-election rally in smaller company funds had narrowed SLS’s discount to 6.5% today. At this level he said investors may see they can get better value selling their shares in the open market rather than participating in the tender offer.Although SLS has tumbled down the performance rankings over three and five years, it has one of the narrowest discounts in its sector, with the exception of the recently launched 'micro cap' trusts from River and Mercantile and Miton and the sector's top performer, Strategic Equity Capital (SEC + ). This is because in addition to the tender offer – which the board considers every six months – SLS uses share buybacks to ensure the discount does not widen below 10% (since October it has bought back 2.2 million shares at an average discount of 8.5%). No other rival sets a hard discount target while SEC is the only other smaller company fund with a semi-annual tender policy.SLS’ discount control policy dates back to 2008 when it took over the Gartmore Smaller Companies investment trust. The acquisition gave it a much-needed boost after the previous year when it was forced to buy back over 48% of its shares to prise out arbitrageurs who had built up a stake in the shares. This proved to be a watershed and was followed by a golden period for Nimmo (and improved marketing by the trust).The legacy of this can still be seen in the company’s ten-year shareholder total returns of 463%, which are still the best in the sector (and also beat the 275% return from Nimmo's Standard Life Investments UK Smaller Companies + open-ended fund).Whether the latest tender offer is such a 'buy' signal remains to be se
