Should You Invest In Art?

Following the sale of a Leonardo da Vinci painting for $450 million, those readers who like to speculate might think that investing in art may be worth trying. This was a painting that sold for only £58 in 1958, perhaps because its authenticity was doubted and it had been “overpainted” in some areas. It’s now been restored but it’s far from perfect even so.

It is now the most expensive painting ever sold. Back in 1987, the most expensive painting ever sold was “Irises” by Van Gogh for $54 million (Wikipedia has a list of the most expensive paintings if you wish to follow how these blockbusters have gone up in value, but it is not a smooth progression). Potential buyers of these rare, or unique, paintings which will fetch stratospheric prices should however best leave this market to professional dealers.

But is investment in lower price paintings sensible? Fine art has steadily increased in value so in the long term you can probably expect to beat inflation. But particular genres can go in and out of fashion which could easily add or subtract 50% of the value. In addition you have high trading costs. Auction costs can add 30%, and the market is hopelessly illiquid. Making a sale even at an auction can be a hit or miss affair. If you buy paintings direct from a dealer and are paying “retail” prices then it may take you years to recover the value when you sell because of dealers’ high mark-ups (retail prices are typically higher than auction prices).

The best quote on this subject was probably this one from Lew Grade: “When a little girl asked me what two and two make, I’m supposed to have answered – it depends whether you’re buying or selling”.

In summary if you wish to buy art to hang on your living room wall, then OK. You may gain some tax advantages as it will be considered a “chattel” if you ever come to dispose of it. But as an investment, art is far from the best choice.

For more information on the valuation of paintings (written when Van Gogh’s Irises was the most expensive painting), see http://www.panvertu.com/valuation.htm

Roger Lawson (Twitter: https://twitter.com/RogerWLawson )

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Preparing for Brexit

Apparently MPs on the Public Accounts Committee are very concerned that a new Customs Declaration Service will not be ready in time for Brexit – at least this was in a report in the Financial Times, assuming it is not another of their scare stories. The timescale is indeed somewhat tight to get the new system in place before the likely Brexit date, particularly if one bears in mind that many Government IT projects overrun.

Inability to process export declarations quickly could result in massive queues of traffic awaiting clearance. I recall a previous suggestion that lorries might be backed up along the M20 as far as the M25 which would certainly personally inconvenience me.

But I have some experience of implementing major IT systems for HMRC (or Customs and Excise as it then was) as I was involved in the implementation of the VAT system back in 1973 (when we joined the EEC at the same time). This was a project commenced two years earlier. It had to go operational on time, and it did so without a hiccup. One of the more successful events in my IT career although I only played a minor part in it. The key point I wish to make is that fixing a date when it had to go live concentrated everyone’s minds on the project, and it ensured the best expertise was available to deliver it. The VAT implementation project, which affected not just tax collection work by the Government but also almost all UK businesses was one of the biggest and most important Government IT projects ever completed.

Now when Mrs May decided to fix a specific date for when we will be leaving the EU, to my mind this was a wise thing to do. It will focus those responsible for the supporting systems to enable this to happen smoothly (whatever the nature of the deal, if any, finally agreed with the EU for post-Brexit trade arrangements) if a date is fixed now.

But yesterday the Daily Telegraph ran a front-page story on the “Brexit Mutineers” who were planning to revolt against a fixed date, and as a way to undermine Brexit it was suggested. Lots of other news channels covered the story and one of the mutineers, Bob Neill my local MP and one of the “mutineers”, appeared on television to suggest it was simply the normal democratic scrutiny process. The revolters also signed a letter printed in today’s Telegraph saying a fixed date was too inflexible. There may need to be last minute extensions to conclude a transitional deal. I beg to differ. A fixed date will concentrate the minds of both British and EU Brexit negotiators, which could be of course the reason for Mrs May’s decision.

On both political grounds, and to help those implementing the required systems, fixing a date is the right thing to do in my opinion.

Meanwhile the FT has an editorial supporting the “no fixed date” revolt, and they also published several letters today opposing Brexit. All I can do is yawn at their persistence in ignoring the realities of the situation.

Roger Lawson (Twitter: https://twitter.com/RogerWLawson )

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Abcam AGM, Cambridge Cognition, Ultra Electronics, Wey Education and IDOX

Yesterday I attended the Annual General Meeting of Abcam (ABC) in Cambridge as I often do as I have held the stock since 2006. Share price then (adjusted for consolidation) was about 50p and it’s now about 950p so I like most investors in the company, I am happy. Alex Lawson will be doing a full write-up of the meeting for ShareSoc so I will only cover a few points herein.

One shareholder expressed concern about the rising costs. The company is clearly making heavy investments in new infrastructure and more management. Although revenue was up 26.5% last year, earnings per share were only up 11.8% (unadjusted) and operating margin has been falling. Also Return on Capital Employed (ROCE) has been falling – only 12.3% last year when it used to be in the high teens.

Apart from opening a new building next year, they are implementing an Oracle Cloud software solution to replace their historic purpose-built legacy software systems. The total cost of that project is £44 million (see page 23 of the Annual Report) when profits last year were only £42 million post tax. In other words, all of last years profits could be taken to be consumed by this project. This project has been running for some time and I have asked questions about it in previous years. This year I asked: “is the project on schedule and on budget”. I did not get a straight answer. But it was said that initial cost estimates have expanded, and additional modules been added (for example warehouse management). It should “go live” in the current financial year. From those and other comments made, I got the impression that this is a typical IT project that is too ambitious and costs are escalating while delays have arisen. Those “big bang” IT projects rarely go according to plan, but management are often suckers for them.

Now it may be arguable that older systems need replacing (for example, the CEO mentioned it was impossible to bill in Swiss francs that at least one customer would prefer), and maintaining old code was clearly proving to be difficult. The massive investment in this area alone may be justified by the company’s ambitions to “double the 2016 scale by 2023 by investing in operating capabilities” as the CEO mentioned. The expectation is that growth will improve revenues and hence margins in due course.

One more way that costs have been rising is increased pay for management. CEO’s pay alone up from £614k to £1,378k in the last year (“single figure remuneration). In addition, I commented negatively on the fact that the LTIP target had been adjusted for the “scale and complexity of the transformational programme” of the new ERP system implementation, i.e. costs are much higher than expected so the LTIP target has been made easier to achieve!

At least Louise Patten (acting Chairman now after departure of Murray Hennesey for a proper job, and Chair of the Remuneration Committee) admitted later that LTIPs are often problematic but institutions like them. LTIPs at Abcam have rarely paid out, and management at many companies seem not to value them highly. There are better bonus scheme alternatives.

I also spoke briefly to a representative of Equiniti, the company’s registrar, about the difficulty of voting electronically. He is to look into it. Amusing to see the company slogan on his business card is “Our mission is making complex things simple”, exactly the opposite of my experience!

In the morning I also visited Cambridge Cognition (COG) who have offices in the village of Bottisham east of Cambridge. Although their offices are in what appear to be wooden huts, they are well furbished. The company specialises in cognitive health (brain function). Sixty per cent of its revenue comes from clinical trials for pharmaceutical companies, thirty per cent from research institutes and academia and ten per cent from healthcare and consulting.

On clinical trials they do about 15 deals a year so by their nature they are lumpy one-off deals. Total revenue was £6.8 million last year. Before last year revenue was flat but it grew last year and is forecast to grow this year.

A lot of pharma companies are actively researching alzheimers and other degenerative brain diseases, and developing products to assist – as the population ages such diseases are becoming more prevalent. Cambridge Cognition’s technology relies on historically well validated studies. The company provides a lot of consulting support in clinical trial sales.

Such deals include 30 to 40% of software which is billed and paid for on normal 30+ days terms, with the services paid for as provided. One issue that arose is that their accountants are likely to require them to change so as to allocate the software revenue over future periods due to IFRS 15 because they host the software. This is the same problem that Rolls-Royce have tripped up on, and it is also an issue at Ultra Electronics (ULE) according to a report in the FT yesterday. That company also issued a profit warning on Monday and the share price fell 19.5% on the day. I used to hold it but not of late. The FT writer suggested it was time to “exit”. Cambridge Cognition did suggest though that they would not need to restate last years accounts, and the change might actually smooth their revenue figures. IFRS 15 is an important correction to historic aggressive revenue recognition policies in some companies.

Otherwise Cambridge Cognition have some interesting technology – for example using smart watches to monitor brain function during the day, and using speech recognition to perform analysis. Whether these can be turned into profitable markets remains to be seen. One of the original ideas in the company was to provide their software on i-Pads for general practitioners to use in diagnosis but that never took off due to changes in purchasing arrangements in the NHS who of course are notoriously difficult to sell to (and budgets of late for technology seem to have been cut). If anyone wants more background on Cambridge Cognition you are welcome to contact me.

A few weeks ago I purchased a minute number of shares in Wey Education (WEY). Minute because although it looks an interesting business I thought the share price was way too high on any sensible fundamental view. This morning the company announced a share placing to make an acquistion. This will be at 22p which is a 33.3% discount to the price on the 14th November according to the company. Clearly advisors and institutions took the same view as me on the previous share price. Has the share price collapsed this morning as a result? It’s down but not by much so far. Wey Education does look like one to monitor (which is why I bought a few shares) but I think I’ll stand back from the speculation for the present while the market is so twitchy.

This looks like one of those hot technology stocks that are all the rage of late (the company provides education over the internet as an alternative to school attendance). But investors are clearly getting more nervous about many of those stocks in the last few days – it’s no longer “keep buying on momentum” as some share prices have fallen back from their peaks (Abcam is one example), so it’s now sell, sell, sell. And if a company indicates that the outcome for the year will not be as good as the optimistic broker forecasts suggest, as IDOX did mid-afternoon yesterday, then the share price gets hammered. Announcements mid-afternoon of this nature are never a good idea. Interesting to note that Richard Kellett-Clarke is to remain on the board after all as a non-executive. He was previously CEO. That might inspire more confidence in the business as these kinds of hiccups did not occur during his regime.

Roger Lawson (Twitter: https://twitter.com/RogerWLawson )

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A Quick Guide to New Issues, SMRs, Car Market and Brexit

In today’s Financial Times (11/11/2017) Neil Collins gave a quick guide to new issues which is worth repeating. This is what he said: “Do not buy into an initial public offering if most of the capital raised is going out of the business, or if it replaces existing debt (because the capital has already left). Do not buy if private equity is selling. Do not believe any forward-looking statements, because if the prospects really were that good, the vendors would wait and get a higher price. Do not buy any share that has been listed for less than a year. You will miss some bargains but you will avoid many more disappointments. Leave it to the professionals to lose other people’s money.”

Those are wise words indeed. He also made some ascerbic comments on small nuclear power stations which he says have been rebranded as “small modular reactors” (SMRs) to make them less scary. Rolls-Royce, who have produced such reactors for submarines, have touted them as a potential future business growth area for several years, but the FT’s in-depth review of the subject last week suggested that they are not likely to be put into production any time soon. Meanwhile the share price of Rolls-Royce is still below where it was in 2014.

Neil Collins also commented on the car market. You probably don’t need to be told that new car sales have slumped. The share prices of car dealers are cheap as chips and even my shares in Auto Trader are down substantially this year. Indeed one could apply Neil’s comments about IPOs to the company although it has taken a couple of years to reveal that the debt when listed is handicapping the company now. The car market is inherently cyclical which is one reason why car dealers are normally not valued highly, and they also show low barriers to entry with the car manufacturers controlling the market to a large extent and limiting the profits that dealers make. But Auto Trader is similar to Rightmove in the property market. High margins, dominant market position and a business with great network effects with the result that competitors find it difficult to muscle in on their market. I think I’ll stick with it for a while yet.

I am not convinced that we have reached “peak car” as some have suggested. There seem to be more cars on the road than ever although traffic volumes have slowed in London where most such commentators live. But that is as much about political policies that have limited road space and caused congestion, mostly irrational, than car buyers desires. Another good analysis in the FT recently was about how “green” various car types actually are. On total life emissions, some smaller petrol/diesel vehicles can beat “all-electric” cars. How is that? Because the manufacture and decommissioning of electric vehicles generate large emissions, and producing the electricity for them often does also.

With all these plugs I just gave for the FT, it is unfortunate that it coninues to publish such tosh about Brexit. Most of their writers predict the financial outcome will be calamitous. Whether that will be the outcome or not, I don’t have the space to provide a full analysis here, but most people who voted for Brexit did not consider the financial issue as conclusive. Consider an American colonialist in the year 1775, before their declaration of independance. No doubt with an economy very reliant on trade with Great Britain many people would have counselled against leaving the protection of their parent country. Did that deter them? No because they valued freedom more highly. They wanted control over their own affairs including that over taxes, and not to be ruled by a remote and undemocratic regime where they had minimal representation. That is the analogy that all the remainers should think about.

Roger Lawson (Twitter: https://twitter.com/RogerWLawson )

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National Grid, Johnston Press, Crown Place VCT, Lloyds Bank, LoopUp and Brexit

I had a busy day yesterday, but let me first comment on the news today. National Grid (NG.) published their half year results this morning. They reported “Adjusted operating profit, excluding timing up 4%….” but statutory earnings per share were down by 12%. What exactly does “adjusted for timing” mean? I have no idea because the announcement does not explain it in any sensible way. For example, it says under “UK Timing”: “Revenues will be impacted by timing of recoveries including impacts from prior years”. Why are these revenues not being booked in the relevant period? Why are they not being recognised as revenues in the period concerned? Looks like a simple “fudge” to me as “adjustments” to reported figures in accounts often are. Many analysts seem to have a negative view of the stock, and I am coming to the same conclusion. I sold some of my holding in the company this morning.

I have previously mentioned the requisition of an EGM at Johnston Press (JPR), but the company has rejected this on the basis that it is “not valid”. It seems this is because the shareholder who requested it holds their shares in a nominee account (i.e. are not on the register). Yet another example of the obstruction caused by the use of nominee accounts. Changes to the law in this area are required to fully enfranchise all shareholders. See the ShareSoc Shareholder Rights campaign for more information: https://www.sharesoc.org/campaigns/shareholder-rights-campaign/

Yesterday morning I attended the AGM of Crown Place VCT, managed by Albion Capital. No excitement there. Just a competently managed VCT and a well run AGM with a presentation from one of their investee companies (PayAsUGym) who have developed an innovative business selling gym sessions. Crown Place made a total return of 14% last year and currently provide a tax free dividend yield of 6.9% which is covered twice by earnings. The expense ratio is 2.4% which is certainly better than many of the VCTs I hold. Previously this company had a strong focus on “asset-based” investments but they are now restricted by the new rules for VCTs so they are moving into more “exciting” fields. There are also concerns about further rule changes or removal of tax reliefs in the budget next Wednesday. Investors in tax incentivised vehicles seem to be getting nervous.

After lunch with representatives of AGMInfo, I filled an hour or so before the ShareSoc AGM by dropping into the Lloyds Bank legal action nearby which I have mentioned in previous blog posts. On the witness stand was former CEO of Lloyds TSB Eric Daniels being cross examined by the littigants QC. He gave a confident performance and was clearly well prepared. He said he was “bitterly disappointed” over the need to raise £7 billion in capital and was also disappointed that they would end up more highly capitalised than other banks. It was clear from his other comments that there was a certain momentum to go through with the deal (the acquisition of HBOS) and that they did not revisit the benefits of the transaction at every turn (e.g. as more information came out of the due diligence work for example).

He disclosed that in a conversation with the FSA there were real concerns that they could lose the vote of shareholders. This could be because there were views that HBOS could remain independent, although the Government had already indicated that it was promptly going to be nationalised if no rescue deal could be done; and because Lloyds TSB shareholders might vote against it.

The case continues. Lloyds Bank and the former directors continue to say that the claims have no merit of course.

It was then onto the ShareSoc AGM. Again no great excitement there. Mention was made of a possible merger with UKSA and as a former director of both I spoke in favour of that. Spreading the fixed costs over two organisations of a similar size makes a lot of sense. It should never have been necessary to set up a rival organisation to UKSA, but interesting to note that ShareSoc has more members now so my efforts in recent years were not in vain.

The ShareSoc AGM was followed by one of their company presentation seminars. Of interest to me (being current holders) were the two by LoopUp (LOOP) and Ideagen. I reported on Ideagen recently on coverage of their AGM so will only cover LoopUp herein. The presentation by their joint CEO Steve Flavell was slick but it was more a sales pitch for the product/service to customers than one to investors. The issue of them having two joint CEOs was raised in a question later.

The emphasis was on the simplicity of the service, so anyone could take it up easily and quickly. This is the major USP as there are lots of other conferencing products around. Most interesting was his explanation that they leapfrogged the “chasm” by ignoring the early adopters (who often like techy products) by aiming straight for the “mainstream majority”. His reference to “Crossing the Chasm” is from a book of that name by Geoffrey Moore which is essential reading for all sales/marketing executives in the software field, or investors in early stage technology companies likewise. Just had a chat with an Uber driver about this book – he has a degree in marketing – that’s the modern world for you. It will be a great shame if Sadiq Khan manages to put Uber out of business – might miss out on intelligent conversations with cab drivers. I read the book when it first came out back in the 1990s and Mr Flavell had read it also. I highly recommend the book. LoopUp is clearly a sales/marketing driven organisation but the technology is sophisticated enough to make it all look simple.

On the current valuation, the company has obviously a long way to go to grow into that valuation. Questions were raised about whether growth could be accelerated (revenue only up 39% in 2016m and 44% in the interims this year). But I expressed scepiticsm on attempts at a faster growth rate to Flavell after the meeting.

The Financial Times continue to publish anti-Brexit stories and editorial every day. My letter to the editor on the dubious bias, which they published, has obviously had no impact whatsoever. Tim Martin, CEO of JD Wetherspoon, had a lot to say about the subject of the impact of Brexit on food costs in his latest trading statement. He accused the media, and the Chairman of Sainsburys and that of Whitbread, and the head of the CBI, for completely distorting the facts. Rather than food prices rising after Brexit, he suggests they will fall. For his arguments see:

https://www.investegate.co.uk/wetherspoon–jd–plc–jdw-/rns/fy18-q1-trading-update/201711080700068513V/

My conclusion is quite simply that some foods might become more expensive, others might become cheaper, and home-produced products might also be cheaper; plus the Government might be able to save a lot of money on contributions to subsidising inefficient farmers. But that of course means that food buying habits might change as consumers react to price changes. Is that a bad thing? Readers can ponder that question.

Whether the Chairmen or CEOs of public companies should be making comments on essentially political issues, one way or the other, is also a question to consider. I suggest that might best be left to bloggers like me. Sainsburys and Whitbread (Costa, Premier Inns) might find they disaffect half their customers while having minimal impact on public opinion.

Roger Lawson (Twitter: https://twitter.com/RogerWLawson )

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Johnston Press, Blancco Technology and Intercede

Companies in difficulties always make for interesting reading, and here’s a brace of them.

Firstly Johnston Press (JPR), a publisher of newspapers. That includes many local ones but also the Yorkshire Post and the Scotsman who cover national business news – the latter is particularly good on the travails of those big banks registered in Scotland such as RBS and Lloyds. The company had more operating losses than revenue last year, debt is way too high and dividends have been non-existant for years. Local newspapers have been shrinking as advertising revenue has moved elsewhere and traditional national newspapers have also been battered by the availability of free news on the internet. It is clearly operating in a sector in sharp decline.

Now it has become the subject of an attempted revolution by its largest shareholder, Norwegian Christen Ager-Hanssen who holds 20% of the equity. He wishes to replace some, if not all, the directors and called an EGM to do so. Removal of the Chairman of Johnston is proposed and the appointment of Alex Salmond, former First Minister in Scotland, and experienced newspaper executive Steve Auckland.

Apparently they feel confident of winning a vote, and would have been even more aggressive in removing directors if the company did not have a “poison pill”. One of their issued bonds includes a provision that if new directors form a majority of the board but were not appointed by the existing directors the debt could become immediately repayable. The company would have little hope of doing that. Mr Ager-Hansen says this mechanism is a “breach of fiduciary duties” and is consulting lawyers as to whether action could be taken against the directors. This writer certainly agrees that this arrangement was and is morally dubious and the sooner the Chairman of Johnston Press Camillia Rhodes, goes then the better. Shareholders should vote accordingly.

Whether a new management team can revive such an ailing business, even if editorial policy and management improves (which is one of the issues apparently) is surely doubtful.

Blancco Technology Group (BLTG) has been in turmoil for a couple of years. Results for the year to June were published today. They changed the nature of the business to focus on software for “erasure” and “mobile phone diagnostics” and new management was put in place a couple of years ago. But today’s announcement makes grim reading. The Chairman, Rob Woodward, spells it out to begin with by saying: “2017 has been a year of substantial challenges for the Group, with the business performing far below our expectations”, But he does say: “However, the underlying strengths of Blancco remain in place and I am confident that these, together with the significant number of remedial actions we are taking, will restore a sustainable growth trajectory and build long-term shareholder value”.

But the detail makes for horrific reading. For example: “During April the Group undertook a review of cash flow forecasts and identified anticipated pressure on the cash position of the Group.  This pressure was caused by the non-collection of £3.5 million of outstanding receivables relating to a sale booked in June 2016 and a sale booked in December 2016, and costs associated with past acquisition activity, including earn-outs and M&A advisory fees”; and “On 4 September 2017 the Group announced the reversal of two contracts totalling £2.9 million booked as revenue during June 2017, following a number of matters being brought to the Board’s attention”. As a result the 2016 accounts have been restated. In addition, the new interim CFO, Simon Herrick, was appointed interim CEO and the former CEO departed.

Last year’s accounts were full of adjustments and the complexity compounded by the number of disposals and acquisitions. This year is not much different, and they even report “adjusted cash flows”. I always thought cash was cash, but apparently not. But the share price perked up somewhat – up 30% at 72p at the time of writing after a long decline. The company does seem to have some interesting technology but whether all the problems have now been revealed we do not know. The Chairman is sticking around after previously announcing his departure but they are still looking for a new CEO.

I would not care to predict the future for this business. But one question worth asking is “what were the auditors doing last year?”. Revenue recognition is often a problem in this kind of company and it looks like a case of sales proving to be fictitious when some questions were asked about them. This is yet another example of the audit profession falling down on the job which we have seen so many times before. Shareholders in Blannco should consider asking for the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) to undertake an investigation into the audits of this company. The auditors last year were KPMG.

Intercede (IGP) issued a profit warning yesterday in a Trading Update. A large order for its identity software solution that was expected will not now be received until the next financial year. Other orders are also apparently being delayed. As a result, revenue growth this year will be below market expectations. The share price fell yesterday and today and is 34p at the time of writing.

I first commented on Intercede back in 2011 when ShareSoc ran a campaign against the remuneration scheme in the company. The share price then was about 60p. It briefly went over 200p in 2014, on hopes of real growth in revenue and profits but then steadily declined before this latest announcement. In reality this company is a consistent under-performer. It operates in what should be a hot sector (personal id security) but never seems able to capitalise on its interesting technology in a growing market. Change is made difficult as Richard Parris runs it as “Executive Chairman”, assisted by his wife who is also employed in the business. An example of a “lifestyle” business, not uncommon on AIM, where the directors extract signficant sums while the business goes nowhere in particular.

This company would probably be worth a lot more than the current market cap to a trade buyer who could exploit the technology and improve the sales and marketing. What’s the chance of that happening? Not much I would guess.

Note: the writer has trivial holdings in Blancco and Intercede.

Roger Lawson (Twitter: https://twitter.com/RogerWLawson )

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On-Line AGMs and City of London IT

I mentioned in a previous article the growing concerns about the use of “virtual” Annual General Meetings (AGMs) in the USA. There are not many on-line AGMs yet in the UK but yesterday there was a good example at the City of London Investment Trust (CTY). I actually had to complain to the company last year about the defects when I attempted to attend it on-line rather than in person – it did not work on the day, plus a later recording that was available had all the Q&A part cut out.

This year it was better, but a long way from perfect. Parts of fund manager Job Curtis’s presentation could not be heard. But at least it gave shareholders the opportunity to attend in person, or attend on-line. Questions could be submitted on-line.

Here’s a brief report on the company and the AGM:

The City of London IT is probably the most boring holding in my portfolio. It invests mainly in large cap UK listed companies. Top ten holdings are British American Tobacco, Royal Dutch Shell, HSBC, Diageo, Unilever, Vodafone, Prudential, GlaxoSmithKline, Lloyds Banking Group and BP, totalling 32% of the portfolio. It’s in the “UK Equity Income” sector for trusts. So you can see it’s not going to be any racehorse as these are quite defensive stocks. However the performance over many years has been good and it tends to outperform its benchmark. Not last year though where it underperformed the benchmark but still managed to achieve a total return of 14.5% (All-Share was up 18.1% for example with growth and smaller cap stocks more in fashion in a buoyant market). The current yield is 3.9%.

Here’s a few comments from fund manager Job Curtis from his presentation who has been with the fund management company (Henderson) for 26 years. He mentioned the fact that dividends have grown every year for more than 50 years. They manage this by keeping some cash back in revenue reserves in good years, which are then used to pay dividends in the bad years.

They use gearing and last year moved up the gearing to 7% by taking advantage of the very low interest rates – they are now borrowing at 2.4% over 32 years. (Note: have mentioned before how astonishing it is that such trusts can borrow at rates lower than inflation and for long periods).

Job Curtis said their on-going charge figure was now 0.42% which is the lowest in the equity income sector.

Positive contributors to performance last year were housebuilders (they hold three – Persimmon, Taylor Wimpey and Berkeley) and pharmaceuticals (Glaxo and AstraZeneca, but they also hold Merck, Johnson & Johnson and Novartis). They also benefited from a below average exposure to oil and gas producers. Detractors from performance were banks, mining companies and a holding in Provident Financial which they have now sold.

There were few questions in the Q&A session (a good indication that shareholders are happy), and you can hear those and the rest of the event by going to this web site: www.janushenderson.com/trustslive .

Certainly this format provides a good approach for those investors who cannot easily get to AGMs, while not prejudicing those who wish to attend in person and chat to the directors. They do need to iron out the technical glitches though.

Roger Lawson (Twitter: https://twitter.com/RogerWLawson )

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Lloyds Case Impressions, Ideagen AGM and Return on Capital

Yesterday I attended the Annual General Meeting of Ideagen (IDEA) at 12.00 noon in the City of London – see below – and afterwards spent an hour in the High Court listening to one of the witnesses being cross-examined in the Lloyds Banking Group case. What follows is just an impression of the scene because the whole case is running for months so in no way can this be considered a comprehensive report. I have covered some more details of the case in previous articles, but to remind you the litigants are suing Lloyds and the former directors of the company over the takeover of HBOS which they declare was contrary to their interests as shareholders in Lloyds TSB. Lloyds deny liability.

The case is being heard in the Rolls Building in New Fetter Lane – a modern building very different to the ultra Victorian main Courts of Justice building in the Strand. See this link for a video tour of the building: https://www.judiciary.gov.uk/you-and-the-judiciary/going-to-court/high-court/the-rolls-building/virtual-tour/

The witness being cross-examined on the day was Tim Tookey, the former Finance Director of Lloyds TSB. Richard Hill QC was undertaking the task for the litigants under the eyes of a single judge, Mr Justice Norris (sans wig). It was a pretty impressive scene with at least 6 barristers in wigs and gowns plus about another 10 supporting legal staff. Why do barristers still wear wigs? To quote from the web: “The courts didn’t officially add wigs to the legal dress code until the 18th century when they became culturally chic. … They continue to wear them because nobody has ever told them to stop”.

It was a pretty impressive scene, somewhat lost on the few members of the public present – half a dozen litigants and members of the press. But the court was digitally up to date with every desk holding a screen on which the written evidence was displayed as it was invoked. However the witness being cross examined still referred to a paper copy, extracted from 150 large A4 binders stored in shelves on the left hand side of the court – filling almost the whole wall.

Mr Tookey gave his responses to questions firmly and without emotion. A confident witness giving clear answers. He was questioned about the events leading up to the announcement of the acquisition of HBOS and over how much capital Lloyds anticipated would be required to ensure the deal was “bullet-proof” (i.e. not creating unacceptable risks if the economic circumstances worsened). He was questioned about the extent the risks had been considered and whether enough due diligence on HBOS had been done before the decision was taken to proceed. Apparently it came down to a decision at 4.00 am on a Monday morning to proceed. They we being forced to decide to proceed or not by the Government before the markets opened on Monday. But he said that he thought all the risks had been considered and the board was supportive of the deal because of the strategic advantages of the HBOS takeover in the longer term. Recapitalisation involving the Government was necessary because there was no way it was possible to raise even £3 billion (underwritten) by the Monday, which was the minimum requirement. Government involvement “de-risked” the deal. The case continues….. for another dozen weeks.

One can see from the above exactly why the costs of such cases are so enormous.

Ideagen AGM

Ideagen (IDEA) is a software company in the Governance, Risk and Compliance sector. I have held the shares for some years when it has grown revenue and profits considerably, both from acquisitions and organic growth. They have a strong emphasis on the importance of recurring revenue. They are presenting at the ShareSoc Seminar on the 8th November, although that event is fully booked I understand.

There were fewer sharesholders at the Ideagen AGM than members of the public at the Lloyds hearing, but that’s not exceptional for small companies. But it was still a useful event – a brief report follows.

One question I raised was about return on capital. Now you might think this was prompted by an interesting article on that subject by Leon Boros in the latest ShareSoc Newsletter, but I did not get around to reading that until later in the day so it’s somewhat of a coincidence. Leon compared the return on capital at Bioventix (one of his favourite stocks which he likes to talk about regularly), and YouGov. He pointed out that not only are measures such as Return on Equity (ROE), Return on Capital Employed (ROCE) and Return on Assets (ROA) better at Bioventix calculated on the headline numbers, but that those for YouGov are somewhat doubtful because they capitalise and amortise the cost of recruitment of their survey panels. Plus they capitalise and amortise software development costs. But they then produce adjusted earnings figures that excluded the amortisation of both those costs, effectively pretending they are not real costs. He has a point.

Now I always look at returns on capital when I am investing in new companies because I consider it one of the most important measures of a company’s performance – as I told the directors of Ideagen. Hence at the Ideagen AGM I asked a question on that subject. On page 18 of their Annual Report they give the “Key Performance Indicators”, 9 of them, that the directors use to monitor the performance of the company. They all look good, but none of them measure return on capital. Should they not include a return on capital measure?

In reality the headline figures for ROE, ROCE and ROA reported by Stockopedia for Ideagen are all less than 2%, and that ignores even the large number of shares under option that the company has that would dilute the earnings. The reason for this is partly the fact that the profit measures used are “unadjusted” and as the company has very substantial amortisation of goodwill from past acquisations, and £1.2 million of share-based payment charges, these distort the numbers. The CEO David Hornsby, responded with “what measure would I like to use?” to which I responded that I did not mind so long as it was consistent from year-to-year. Companies often publish such figures, which are frequently based on “adjusted” profits. I also suggested cash return on assets might be a good measure, something I also look at.

The company actually generated Net Cash From Operating Activities of £8.3m last year which on Net Assets of £30m at the start of the year is very respectable, although technically one should probably write back the cost of past acquisitions that have been written off. In addition some of the cash generated was spent on contingent consideration on past acquistions and on “development costs” which they class as “investing activities”. This demonstrates that for some businesses, looking at headline return on capital figures or those reported by financial web sites can be misleading. One needs to look at the detail to get a real understanding on what is going on in such a business.

A short debate on the issue followed. Otherwise after a couple of other questions, the CEO mentioned the half year for the company ends today, and shareholders should be very pleased with the results.

In summary, a short AGM meeting, but a useful one. And the ShareSoc newsletter is well worth reading – it even includes some articles from me.

Roger Lawson (Twitter: https://twitter.com/RogerWLawson )

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Why I Still Won’t Invest in Banks

I do not hold any bank shares at present, and have no plans to change that policy. But I thought it would be worthwhile to look at the results announced by Lloyds Banking Group (LLOY) yesterday for the third quarter. That particularly is so now that the revelations about the HBOS takeover are coming out on a daily basis.

The announced results were positive. The prospective dividend yield on Lloyds is now near 6% and the p/e is about 9, which is all that some investors look at. But I learned from my experience of investing in Lloyds and RBS before the financial crisis of 2008 to look at the balance sheet.

The latest figures for Lloyds Banking Group show total assets of £810 billion and liabilities of £761 billion, which you might consider safe. But if you look at the asset side there is £161bn in “trading and other financial assets at fair value”, i.e. presumably marked to market. They have £27bn in “derivative financial instruments”, which Warren Buffett has called “weapons of mass destruction”, and £480bn of “loans and receivable”, again probably marked to market.

Shareholders equity to support the £810bn of assets is £49bn. Which does not strike me as particularly safe bearing in mind what happened in the financial crisis. For example, that small bank HBOS, which Lloyds bailed out, eventually wrote off £29.6bn alone on their property loans after everyone suddenly realised that their lending had been injudicious and the loans were unlikely to be recovered in full.

In addition, banks can conceal their assets and liabilities as we learned at RBS and more recently in the Lloyds case. Indeed tens of billions of loans from Lloyds and others to HBOS were concealed and hidden from shareholders in the prospectus with apparently the consent of the FSA.

So I follow the mantra of Terry Smith of Fundsmith who said in 2013: “We do not own any banks stocks and will never do so” having learned from my own experience that it is a very risky, and cyclical sector. I am not convinced that improved regulation, and better capital ratios have made them “investable” when one can invest in other companies with far fewer risks.

Roger Lawson (Twitter: https://twitter.com/RogerWLawson )

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ADVFN Results and More on Lloyds

ADVFN Plc (AFN) published their results for the year to June yesterday. I have a very small holding in the company (acquired for reasons I won’t go into). ADVFN are information providers on the stock market, primarily to private investors. Many people monitor their bulletin boards although like many such boards frequented by private investors, they are somewhat of a curate’s egg so far as serious or sophisticated investors are concerned.

But they certainly have a large following – they say they have 4 million registered users. Does this enormously large mailing list ensure they have a profitable business? In reality no.

Indeed last year they barely managed to break even (£47k operating profit) on £8.2 million of turnover. That is however a massive improvement on the previous year when they lost £650k on similar revenues.

At least they showed postive cash flow but the net assets of the company are £1.7 million so they have a long way to go before they show a decent return on the capital employed. Current liabilities also exceed current assets. At least they have changed their strategy so as to stop further investing with a focus on “profits rather than growth”.

Regretably this kind of business model just shows that private investors are reluctant to pay money for good information provision. Folks can sign up a lot of “free subscribers”, which is no doubt ADVFN’s customer base, by spending money on marketing but monetising those eyeballs is another matter altogether. Relying on advertising to do so is also getting more difficult as Google and social media platforms are tending to dominate that market.

The other moral of this story is that one needs to be wary of investing in companies with unproven business models. It’s easy to spin a good story about the enormous demand for a given service, but the real proof of the pudding is when the model generates profits (and cash as well of course). Companies like Uber and Deliveroo appear to be chasing the same mirage. Lots of people like the services and are willing to pay their low prices, but whether they can compete profitably is another matter.

Lloyds TSB/HBOS case. My previous blog post was on the topic of the current legal case being heard in the High Court. One of the witnesses called in the case is Hector Sants, former head of the Financial Services Authority (FSA) at the time of the takeover of HBOS by Lloyds. His evidence is to be heard in secret, for reasons unknown. Indeed, even the fact that this was to be so, was kept secret until challenged by media organisations.

Why is this relevant? Because it was suggested at the time that without the takeover of HBOS, Lloyds would not have had to raise extra capital (and it was that which diluted shareholders interests). But the FSA told them they would still have to raise more capital even if they did not proceed with the takeover. Some shareholders allege that this was a forceful encouragement by the Government to go ahead, regardless of the interests of their shareholders. Perhaps that might have been in the public interest, as was similarly argued on the re-capitalisation of the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) and other banks, which was effectively a partial nationalisation. But many shareholders are more concerned with their own immediate interests rather than the public interest although it could possibly be argued that ensuring no melt-down of the UK financial sector took place was also in their interests. So Mr Sants evidence might be very revealing about the motives and actions of the Government, but the public may not learn much about it, even at this late date.

Roger Lawson (Twitter: https://twitter.com/RogerWLawson )

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