Mtl Instruments Share Discussion Threads

[ianmacg] 13/9/2004 08:30

Yeah---This one just keeps moving forward, nice and gently no worries here.

[artful dodger] 09/9/2004 21:58

ian -no-one does read this thread
no-one starts another mtl thread
no-one follows this company apart from myself,and I have more than enough shares in my sipp.

more solid results today

break above 220p opens up 300p to begin with.


MTL Instruments Group PLC six months to June 30 2004
Sales - 30.55 mln stg vs 29.89 mln
Pretax profit before goodwill - 2.5 mln stg vs 1.8 mln
Pretax profit - 1.96 mln stg vs 1.25 mln
EPS before goodwill - 8.3 pence vs 6.3
EPS - 6.4 pence vs 4.2
Interim div - 2.6 pence vs 2.5



MTL Instruments Group PLC posted interim pretax profits of
2.0 mln stg compared to 1.3 mln a year earlier and said it looks forward to a
satisfactory set of results for the full year.
"Trading at the start of the second half continues to reflect the progress
we made in the first six months," the company said.
Sales for the six months to June 30 were 30.6 mln stg compared to 29.9 mln a
year earlier. The dividend rose to 2.6 pence from 2.5p.
"We are maintaining our investment in our international sales channel which
we believe will enable us to continue to improve the level of customer service
and drive further growth in the business," the company said

[ianmacg] 25/3/2004 23:19

Absolutely cracking set of results,future looking great and only 10 trades today. Is this stock hidden from everyone? With the number of shares in circulation a few more buyers will send this through the roof!! If anybody ever reads this thread that is. :0)

[ianmacg] 27/1/2004 13:21

Why is the spread on this so high--- 10% on 27th Jan

[ianmacg] 04/12/2003 14:24

Tip from the share weekly, as you see its a couple months old but nothings changed other than the entry price???

Friday, September 05, 2003


MTL's prospects look MOST impressive


MTL Instruments Group
Business Summary
Design, manufacture and marketing of electronic explosion-protection instruments and devices for use in the measurement and control of industrial processes carried out in hazardous environments.

Market: Main
Website: www.mtl-inst.com



The case for buying shares in MTL Instruments Group has much to do with MOST. This is a new product (to be described below) that chief executive, Graeme Philp, tells me could become bigger than the whole of the rest of the business. This is an exciting prospect since it is likely to command high margins. Reassuringly for investors, MTL is a business with a long record of success and is highly regarded by the giant companies in the oil, petrochemicals, pharmaceutical and other process plant businesses that use its products. The shares offer an unusual combination of solid value with considerable speculative potential.


Market Data
EPIC Company Share Price Market Cap £m PER Dividend Yield% 12-Month hi-lo Company Report
MTI MTL Instruments Group 192.50 35.72 35 3.12 77.50-192.50



There is more to the case for the shares than just MOST. MTL consists of three divisions, intrinsically safe electronic controls for industries processing hazardous materials, equipment for preventing dangerous power surges widely used in the telecommunications industry, and the new product, MOST. There is a real possibility that after some difficult years all three divisions could start to prosper simultaneously; that won't happen this year and maybe not even next, but looks very likely on a three- to four-year view which is an attractive time horizon for investors.


Oil price collapse in 1998 launched tough period for MTL
Until a few years ago, electronic controls for processing hazardous materials where almost the whole of the group's business. The customers were overwhelmingly in the oil and gas business, which made MTL's fortunes depend on the oil industry and the price of oil. Putting it simply, MTL provides controls that make it safe to use electric power with highly combustible materials. These are vital products with lives at stake, so quality and reputation is a higher consideration than price. MTL has over 30 per cent of the world market and enjoyed years of strong growth as a result.

Problems began in 1998 when the oil price fell to $10 per barrel, triggering a downturn in the industry and hitting capital spending budgets. When the oil price began to recover, demand was again slammed by the September 2001 attacks on the World Trade Centre. However there are now signs of a durable recovery in demand. This, combined with tight control of costs, down by £1.4m in the six months to 30 June, has enabled the company to report a 29 per cent increase in operating profits at a time when conditions generally are described as challenging.

The continuing negative for the company is its Surge Protection Division. This was a strong source of growth in the late 1990s and early 2000s but since then demand has been depressed in line with the demoralised state of the global telecommunications industry, especially in the USA where MTL does much of its business. The weakness of the US dollar has been another negative factor.


Choice between boosting profits or developing exciting new products
In the face of adverse conditions in both its core businesses, Graeme Philp says the company had to make a choice between trying to deliver continuing good profits and rising dividends or ploughing money into developing the MOST product. The decision was taken to keep investing and hope that shareholders would appreciate the long-term benefits. Perhaps because of the general bear market this proved a vain hope in the short term. Although profits have been gently grinding higher since 1999, albeit at levels below the 1998 peak, the shares have been savaged. They fell from a peak over 400p in 2000 to a recent low point of under £1.

Shareholders may not have liked, or more probably, not fully understood what was happening, but, as a result of that decision, the likelihood is that in a few years time the group will be making profits well above the 1998 peak of £5.4m and the shares too will have far exceeded the 2000 peak.


MOST at heart of open systems revolution
MOST stands for Modular Open Systems Technology. It heralds a transformation in the way the process control industry operates. At the moment, hardware for the process control industry is made by a number of different companies; they include giants like Honeywell, Emerson and others. Customers had to choose to go with one or the other for all their requirements. The move to open systems means that the hardware will come in the form of modular components that can be snapped together to form the hardware basis of a control system. The giants like Honeywell will compete to supply the process control software to make the systems work. As with personal computers, the big money is in the software that will enable the same hardware to work in very different industries from breweries to chemical plants.

MTL says it doesn't mind being stuck with the increasingly commoditised hardware end of the business. It is never going to suffer the same cut-throat competition as is seen in consumer markets and is used to making money from high volumes of production. MTL is, in any case, just as much an intellectual property and know-how-type of business as the US and Japanese giants. One of its future plans is to outsource production to specialist third party manufacturers in places like China. Just like Dell with its emphasis on product design and marketing, there is no need any more for a company like MTL to actually make anything.


£16m spent in eight years developing MOST
Although MOST has the most exciting prospects, that is not the only interesting piece of new technology coming out of MTL. Another important new product that is just starting to have an impact is FieldBus. This brings the digital revolution into the world of process plant by providing, in effect, an ethernet to link the control equipment. This replaces the old cables making the new systems cheaper to instal and operate and building in capabilities such as self-diagnosis of the system, making maintenance cheaper.


Financial Data
Fiscal Year Proj Turnover £m Pretax Profit Change % EPS Change % DPS Change
%
2002 60.1 3.70 NA 14.9 NA 6.00 NA
2003 * 64.0 4.50 21.6% 17.6 18.1% 6.00 0%
2004 * n/a 5.40 20% 19.9 13.1% 6.00 0%

EPS - Earnings per Share
DPS - Dividend per Share


An idea of the potential for the group comes from some numbers on MOST. In the last six months MOST accounted for £7.6m sales out of £29.9m and £1.2m of losses against an overall operating profits of £1.8m. Over the last eight years some £16m has been invested in developing MOST. The plan is for the division to break even in 2004 and make profits thereafter. Very little of this potential is recognised in a market valuation of £35.7m.


The Share Weekly Quality Ratings
Relative Strength 10-year Trend Latest Trading Profit Forecast Ratios External factors TSW Rating
6

[davidhp] 27/11/2003 11:33

Not holding but thinking.

MTL reported as having next 'industry standard for production line sensors' or somesuch. Anyone?

IF true then when world economy truely turns around might be nice little earner to have.

Their overall trend line looks like bottom this time might be roughly 100-120 but with improvements to profits already showing thru I expect bottom at upper end of that.

IMHO one for me to watch over coming months.

[rafieh] 25/11/2003 12:37

I am out. The chart starting to look awful.

[panagos] 04/9/2003 23:33

MARKET COMMENT
Ten Super Techs

By Maynard Paton (TMFMayn)
August 29, 2003


On the look out for stock market bargains? The book Super Stocks could help. Author Ken Fisher, son of investment legend Philip Fisher, offers some clever stock picking ideas for those with a liking for unloved technology shares.


Fisher identifies potential 'Super Stocks' by applying two valuation measures: the price to sales ratio (PSR) and the price to research and development ratio (PRR).


Fisher concentrates on the PSR because: "It is rare to see a Super Company have a truly substantial sales decline. It is quite common to see one suffer from severe earnings reversals. The increased relative stability of sales, in relation to other financial yardsticks, allows you to use sales as an anchor in the process of securities valuation."


In terms of using the PSR, Fisher suggests: "Avoid stocks with PSRs greater than 1.5. Aggressively seek Super Companies at PSRs of 0.75 or less."


Fisher also takes into account 'the cost of a good set of brains'. He believes the future revenues of a technology company are linked to its current expenditure on R&D and thus the PRR is a rough way of gauging a long-term PSR. Fisher advises on the PRR: "Don't ever buy a Super Company selling at a PRR greater than 15. Find Super Companies with a PRR of 5 to 10."


Here are ten UK technology-related companies that currently fit Fisher's PSR and PRR criteria:


Company Share Market PSR PRR P/E* Yield*
price value (%)
(p) (£m)

Spirent (LSE: SPT) 47 441 0.8 5.6 25.0 -
Filtronic (LSE: FTC) 207 154 0.6 5.4 47.1 1.3
RM (LSE: RM.) 127 113 0.6 8.6 20.8 3.3
Oxford Instr. (LSE: OXIG) 183 88 0.5 6.8 14.9 4.6
Genus (LSE: GNS) 214 72 0.4 8.9 9.8 2.9
MTL Instruments (LSE: MTI) 140 26 0.4 4.6 8.2 4.3
Xaar (LSE: XAR) 39 23 0.8 7.3 144.4 -
Flomerics (LSE: FLO) 82 12 1.0 4.7 31.5 1.2
Telspec (LSE: TSP) 26 11 0.3 2.0 31.0 -
Intelek (LSE: ITK) 10 9 0.2 3.9 6.4 3.5

(*Prospective)

A mixed bunch, covering companies involved in developing telecom equipment, educational software, super-conducting magnets, bovine genetics, explosion protection devices and inkjet printers. A cursory inspection suggests Oxford, Genus, MTL and Intelek -- all of whom have a dividend and the prospect of earnings growth this year and next -- to be the pick of the crop.


However, successful tech investing has never been easy. A Super Stock search performed in March 2001 threw up ten candidates whose subsequent share price performances ranged from -100% to +166%. But investing equally in all ten has so far produced a 1% portfolio gain -- not bad considering the FTSE has fallen 25% and the techMARK 60%. But it goes without saying that anybody following Fisher's tech strategy ought to select a good spread of suitable shares.

[ajinvesting] 04/9/2003 22:48

Any broker forecasts you know about?

AJ

[artful dodger] 04/9/2003 08:34

time to introduce MTL instruments.

psr of about 0.5
prr of about 5

nice chart

very tightly held, so serious buying = big price rise

yield of 4%

I like it and hold
has an xpp feel about it

dodger says BUY


RNS Number:3742P
MTL Instruments Group PLC
04 September 2003



4 September 2003

MTL Instruments Group plc

INTERIM RESULTS
For the six months ended 30 June 2003


MTL Instruments Group plc is recognised as a world leader in the development and
supply of Hazardous Area Business, Process Control and Surge Protection products
aimed at the process control and telecommunications industries. Many of the
world's safety-critical processes are monitored, controlled or protected by MTL
products and the Group is distinguished by its global network of sales and
support centres and by its acknowledged position as a thought leader in this
high technology marketplace.

MTL has recently developed solutions which enable process control systems to be
devolved from the control room onto the process plant itself giving benefits of
improved control integrity and cost savings. This has involved the combination
of the Group's three core technologies - Intrinsic Safety, Surge Protection and
Open Control Platforms.

Highlights

* Sales grew in local currency terms by 1.0%

* Operating profit (before goodwill amortisation, exceptional items and
tax) increased by 29% to #1.8m (2002: #1.4m)

* Stock levels down to #9.1m (31 Dec 2002: #10.5m)

* Net debt down to #3.8m (31 Dec 2002: #5.1m)

* Earnings per share (before goodwill amortisation and exceptional
items) of 6.3p (2002: 5.2p)

* Interim dividend per share is maintained at 2.5p

Outlook

Malcolm Coster, Chairman of MTL Instruments Group plc today said:

"In what continues to be challenging economic conditions, MTL has made sound
progress in most geographies outside of the US. Notwithstanding conditions in
the US, the Board expects the Group as a whole to report further progress in the
second half of the year."

[affc21] 02/2/2003 17:24

LONDON (AFX) - MTL Instruments Group PLC moved to reassure investors after
its recent share price drop by saying it expects results for the year to Dec 31
to be in line with market expectations.

More info:



Has any one got any thought's on this company.

[hectorp] 11/5/2002 08:58

Here's one to research for the weekenders - no appology for posting it up two days running. MTL Instruments ....
Expect weekend press or inv chron review of yesterday's excellent products launch. ( 'Shark') see 2 posts above.
The stock is sound, long term, ad IMO, a safe bet to rally 50% in under a year. NOT for trading, its illiqiud, but not a problem in the least if planning something to hold for a full year.
Company offers a dividend and already has mature partnerships with the leasding customers. Downside extremely limited if any.
H.

[hectorp] 10/5/2002 09:50

Pity about the spread , but with a few buys it'll narrow right back down. Also its tightly held, with only 18 m shares or so. One istutution or big player would make them rocket. I see that likely to happen in weeks or a bit longer, which is why I'm a buyer.

[hectorp] 10/5/2002 08:54

thank you!
Now, this is from the RNS of today, and its not half intersting!


The MTL Instruments Group plc

MTL launches revolutionary new Open Control System for the Process Industries



The MTL Instruments Group plc announces the release of a series of products
which together represent an important new approach to process control.


Project "Shark" is the culmination of the MTL 8000 series development on which
the Group embarked in 1994. The MTL 8000 has become the distributed I/O platform
of choice in the process industry, with many of the industry leaders - Emerson,
Honeywell, GE-Fanuc and Siemens-Moore among others - building control systems
around this robust product offering.


With Shark now launched the MTL8000 has the ability to itself become a control
system and is transformed into the first truly open OCP (Open Control Platform)
designed for the harsh environment of the process plant.


OEMs can more readily incorporate this I/O solution into their new products and
systems. All that is required is for them to port their own application software
into MTL's powerful new controller. This results in a much simpler engineering
programme and provides customers with a significantly quicker time to market
than they could previously achieve.


It also frees up MTL to be able to address the end-user market directly rather
than only through OEM partners as in the past. With these products MTL becomes a
supplier to both the traditional control companies and to rapidly growing System
Integrator community.


The Industrial Automation Market ($89B world-wide) is transitioning from
monolithic proprietary systems to systems built from "best of breed" components
that follow industry standards. This inflection point in the market is similar
to the transformation from Mainframe systems to Client Server architectures that
occurred in the IT market two decades ago. MTL became aware of this
transformation early on because of its unique position as a supplier to the
vendors of the proprietary systems and their customers. MTL responded to this
trend and is now in the market at just the right time to lead the growth as the
industry takes up the new system architecture.


MTL's new Non-Executive Director, Don Bogle, whose appointment is also announced
today, said:


"What MTL is doing right now is, in its own way, as revolutionary in the process
control world as the PC was in the office computer environment twenty years ago.


"The industrial automation market is making a slow transition from proprietary
systems towards a truly "best of breed" open operating model. Just as in the
computer world in the 1980s, the automation companies who have the ability to
unlock the door to this new world of enhanced end-user choice and value, tend to
be those willing to break away from the old model and embrace the new.


"Companies like MTL, who have had the foresight to make strategic investments in
open control, and who have demonstrated the willingness to work as an OEM
partner with the major automation players as well as end users, are well-placed
to benefit from this market shift.

[royalexile] 10/5/2002 08:18

go check out COST - trading @ 28.5p with a possible bid offer @ 45p

[hectorp] 10/5/2002 08:11

They announced 5 new product launches today, I'd say they are languishng at only 20p above NAV. Also div yield 3.2 percent. But very illiquid ....and, a forgotten stock . Just the kind to quetly aquire IF you believe they'll sell the products and that their market is boyant, which I can't tell, its not my area.

[goldfinger] 05/3/2001 16:54

Very illiquid market - 4000 shares sold - down 5%. I would keep well clear of this one.

[pussycat] 19/9/2000 20:45

What caught my eye were the two relatively large trades for this share on 12th September.

[pussycat] 18/9/2000 21:14

What do you think ?