Arix Bioscience Share Discussion Threads

[eaaxs06] 31/3/2021 14:57

Doesn't look to be any company buying so far today.

Still, they have an hour and a half left to buy their normal 80,000 or so.

Good luck everyone, Sid.

[eaaxs06] 29/3/2021 12:44

Looks like another 50,000 @192p this morning.

Good luck everyone, Sid.

[pinemartin9] 27/3/2021 10:04

Yes. The strategic review will clearly involve nice options for the boys. You can imagine the BOD talking about how they can get their hands on the recent windfall cash.

[mr hangman] 27/3/2021 09:16

This OUR money either reinvest it, our return it to shareholders in the form of a special dividend

[mr hangman] 27/3/2021 09:13

It is intended that any shares repurchased under the Programme are to be held in treasurySo in over words, the management will be awarding these shares the employees who deserve (BOD) them at a later stageHardly improving earnings per share, it's hard to believe this nonsense still goes on

[skyship] 27/3/2021 08:28

Pretty good estimate. Actually 78k @ 191.95...

[eaaxs06] 26/3/2021 17:10

They certainly seem to be buying up at the mid price everytime, I wish I could.

70k @ 192p today?

[eaaxs06] 25/3/2021 13:39

Another 75,000 shares re-purchased by the company yesterday, there seems to be a pattern here. If they contiunue at this rate they will need 172 days trading to reach their target of £25m!

That will take us virtually right up to the target completion date of 22nd Dec. That's without even allowing for closed periods running up to results, when (I presume) the company and officials aren't allowed to trade, even if they have announced a buy back several months beforehand.

It looks like we're in for a lot more days like this. Good luck everyone, Sid.

[pinemartin9] 23/3/2021 12:59

Presumably they are buying more shares again today? It's going to keep forcing the share price up isn't it. Any positive coverage, company related news will promote additional interest. Ironically, it's in their interests to complete the buy back as swiftly as possible before any positive surprises come out!

[ohisay] 23/3/2021 10:34

Agreed ..
they usually dont.Often a sign the company has run out of ideas.
But as I said a limited buyback for a clear pricing anomaly I'm quite happy with.
A small special dividend however wouldnt have gone amiss.Maybe they should consider this at the next inflexion point..?

[mr hangman] 23/3/2021 10:13

Agreed Mr Turner, buy backs hardly ever work

[rcturner2] 23/3/2021 09:46

I don't think anyone wants them to "spaff the cash away on some overvalued new investments". However there are other types of investment available, like they have done in the past.

As shown in your calculations they are going to spend £25m to raise NAV by 5p. It seems completely pointless to me and totally at odds with the reason why they exist - to make investments in early stage biotech.

[ohisay] 23/3/2021 09:04

The last thing I want them to do is spaff the cash away on some overvalued new investments.
The new board seems very value driven ..they have been quite ruthless over the past six months in exiting non performing positions and building a concentrated portfolio with apparent near term upside.
I'm quite happy to see such an obvious pricing anomaly subject to this limited buy back.They are only spending around 13% of the cash after all .

[rcturner2] 23/3/2021 07:32

I do find the idea of buybacks a bit strange for a biotech investment trust. They have the cash from good investments made that have been sold at a profit. Why not reinvest the cash into new biotech investments? If they are worried about liquidity they can put some of it into listed companies.

[ohisay] 23/3/2021 05:28

For the sake of argument lets take current NAV as 250p per share (Jefferies est).

ie
Assume cash £190m /140p per share
other assets £150m/110p per share.
Shares in issue 135.6m

Assume they spend £25m (max possible)on share buy back at say 205p per share average.Can't see them getting much lower than this TBH over the next few months.

Shares bought back is then 12.2m.

New position then .

Cash 165m/134p per share
Other assets 150m/121p per share
Shares in issue 123.4m .

New NAV 255p.

The lower they can buy back the shares of course the higher the Nav as the fewer shares in issue .
Ideally I guess they would like to buy around 185p.. buying around 13.5m shares (circa 10%) to get the maximum spend of £25m...(that's the new floor for me)
Makes complete sense to do a buy back when the market is currently valuing the non cash assets (at say overall current 195p share price) at circa £75m cf £150m book value.
ie the effective current discount is actually 50% excluding the cash.
Thats the real point of the buyback...

[ohisay] 23/3/2021 04:38

Free to read on registering ..Worth a look .

Hardman has an even higher Cash position estimate than ST of £190m or 140p per share .

Deployment of cash
The strong performance of 2020 coupled with more active management of the
portfolio, particularly the publicly listed assets, has left ARIX in a strong financial
position. The £174m cash position (currently increased to an estimated ca. £190m)
is expected to be deployed in the following way:
► £9m has been committed to specified investee companies;
► £35m is retained as a reserve to support unexpected calls on cash from portfolio
companies;
► operating expenses in the range of £15m-£20m covering the next three years;
► new company investments
► possible share buy-back in the event of an opportunistic discount to NAV – the
company has shareholder authority to buy-back up to 10% of the shares.

[pinemartin9] 23/3/2021 00:29

So we purchased 73000 shares today at 193.4. That is £141k of the possible £25M spent! We will weaken the balance sheet by reducing our cash but the effect on the share price will be interesting! My only concern with shares held in Treasury is if they will be gifted to the execs further down the line...

There now remain 135,536,653 shares in issue. If they spent the remaining allowance at 200p then they would get about 12.5M shares and reduce the shares in circulation by about 10%. Theoretically this would mean each share would be worth about 10% more than presently. So this buy back should be worth about an extra 20p on the share price.

What am I missing? Would this then also reduce the discount to NAV. Anyone more financially savvy than me who could shed more light?

[pinemartin9] 22/3/2021 22:34

Clearly they see value and are getting in before the market cottons on.

[ohisay] 22/3/2021 21:23

Date of purchase 22 March 2021
Aggregate number of shares purchased 73,000
Highest price paid per share 193.50p
Lowest price paid per share 191.25p
Average price paid per share 193.40p

They are not hanging about !

[pinemartin9] 22/3/2021 20:04

Maybe they won't do buy backs...it could just be an option for them if the share price ever dips for a particular reason.

[chesil356] 22/3/2021 13:34

Christopher Thomas evans has been selling his stake down for some months, down from 4.9 percent to 2.9 now, so hopefully the Arix buyback should clear that and we can get to fair value.

[frazboy] 22/3/2021 13:18

I wondered if Acacia would sell into it, that would cap any rise.

[skyship] 22/3/2021 13:15

Looks likely that they will have to pay well over 200p to secure any meaningful level of stock for buybacks:


free stock charts from uk.advfn.com

[nk104] 22/3/2021 12:19

Up to £25m share buyback announced.

[skyship] 18/3/2021 16:04

Been watching for a pullback since that update article last week put the shares out of reach for a time.

Now on offer @ 183p so have bought a few at that level. With buybacks likely soon they again look quite good value on a c27% NAV discount to the Jefferies 250p estimate.