Castelnau Share Discussion Threads

[hosede] 01/1/2011 12:16

Tempus in the Times selected CGL as one of his shares for 2011 - on value grounds but also as a potential takeover target

[joesoap3] 17/12/2010 12:03

It's had a nice bounce since it was sold down to almost 330p but I still dont understand why it has stayed so low given its low p/e and over 7% dividend

[rrogans] 17/12/2010 11:40

Yep!
1.4M traded today as opposed to about 30k yesterday.

[ohisay] 17/12/2010 11:38

Beazley after it post Hardy?

[augustus1] 17/12/2010 11:36

Interesting day today

[eater24] 01/12/2010 12:01

bouncing back

[jonwig] 30/11/2010 17:59

It looks like the day-end uncrossing (UT) so it's buys matching sells. Don't read the tea leaves too much!

[joesoap3] 30/11/2010 16:48

what an interesting day especially the last half hour of trading

Whilst I know ADVFN's buy and sells are not necessarily accurate, they throw up some inetersting figures

At 16.00 hours BUYS SELLS BID OFFER

538,816 558723 331.5 331.6


At 16.30
573,264 865753 331.9 332



So, just under 35000 bought but 303000 sold plus small increase in price when all day any amount of selling caused an immediate fall in the price. Is there a large buy order above these prices lurking somewhere/

[kenny] 30/11/2010 14:53

My partner and I have today each invested this year's ISA allowance in CGL at an average price of about 329p. The yield is very attractive irrespective of the ups and downs of the insurance cycle.

[salpara111] 30/11/2010 11:39

Now back at break even for me...didnt expect to be here again!

Nothing seems to be wrong so I will hold and see if we get a reversal. Divi is good and well covered.

[hosede] 25/11/2010 15:42

Thanks Effortless
I just went into AFN financials and clicked on "more like this".. I guess I should have known - AFN financials are notoriously unreliable!
I have coompared all those you suggest. CGL looks the best value on the almost all of the simple criteria I chose

[hooley] 24/11/2010 19:18

Just 7m shares out on loan - a proxy for the likely short sellers position? A sizeable reinsurance book and a requirement to adopt a more conservative reserving stance doesn't help. The bond book will be at the short-dated end of the market with the currency profile matching liabilities. Still, the shares do look cheap - or so 5 out of the 6 specialist analysts reckon.

[q4z] 24/11/2010 17:47

jonwig
lol! Good point. I take comfort in it only being money.

[joesoap3] 24/11/2010 16:38

wel lets hope the 335/6 was the bottom. I feel sure that this is undervalued. Bearing in mind it was 390 in mid August and there's been decent results and increased dividend and no real bad news there must be some upside to come

[jonwig] 24/11/2010 16:27

q4z - actually I wish this investment business was as simple as quantum mechanics ...

[q4z] 24/11/2010 15:13

jonwig
Your post makes it seem difficult but it's hardly quantum mechanics. They sell insurance and when claims go up the premium rates invariably follow. The money in hand is invested conservatively so on that score if CGL gains or loses, it's a reflection of what the markets as a whole are doing.
Unless you have extensive inside knowledge you can't judge the edge one company has over another and even if you could there's no guarantee things won't soon have changed. (Witness the situation where company directors at large have bought or sold at what appears to be the wrong times).
It's appreciated that private investors come at the end of the food chain but on balance it seems better to invest than deposit any spare cash one has. It's not difficult also to find investment trusts or other vehicles which have a record of outperforming the average so that's another way to go.

[effortless cool] 24/11/2010 14:37

hosede,

JLT is a broker whereas CGL is an underwriter - their financials are not comparable.

Best compare to BEZ, CHU, AML, HSX, OIH, HDU (and BRE, while they're still here)

[hosede] 24/11/2010 14:23

just bought a few of these. Seem very undervalued compared to say HSX or JLT
...... PE .... Yield ... SP/Book ..... Tobins Q

CGL 3.5 ..... 7.5 ...... 0.6 ....... 0.12
HSX 4.6 ..... 4.3 ..... 1.18 ....... 0.36
JLT 17.3 .... 3.65 .... -96 ....... 1.45

Both the latters SPs have been rising steadily. anyone here know a good reason? Certainly the recent posts on this board don't give any clue

EDIT Sorry Jonwig overlapped your last post

[jonwig] 24/11/2010 14:18

I'm amazed at some recent posts - today for example.

Its business is not too difficult to understand so we know the fundamentals and that CGL offers a very good dividend.

I've spent ages trying to get to grips with the Gen Ins market and it's far from simple. And the dividend is predicated on so many factors, not the incidence of cats, the regulators and the much-loved A M Best.

If there are big catastrophe losses, investors here will cry "Woe, Woe, Thrice Woe" not realising that these losses are the clue to future rising profits (via higher underwriting rates).

Quite honestly: we need to realise that the divi comes at a cost. A big attraction for me is that performance ought to be un-correlated to the wider stockmarket. In other words, the share price will fall if the market falls, but the actual prospects for the company depend on other things. Most of their cash is invested in bonds, which is a factor worth watching.

[q4z] 24/11/2010 13:47

thamestrader
My suggestion was to decide on two figures; one which you think undervalues the dividend and another which overvalues it. If you depend on market movement you are allowing others to dictate when you get in or out and experience suggests that that means paying too much and being paid too little.

[thamestrader] 24/11/2010 10:11

I quite like them at this price (336p), but they're still falling, so keeping powder dry just now.

[q4z] 24/11/2010 09:59

Its business is not too difficult to understand so we know the fundamentals and that
CGL offers a very good dividend. So it's simply a question of deciding on a price you'll take the shares at, and if you are so inclined, a price you'll accept to hand them back. And of course, this may apply to part as well as complete holdings.

[joesoap3] 18/11/2010 19:08

I believe that this is being shorted recently. Why, I dont know but I cant see any other reason for the fall from 260 to 240 after the recent decent results. However Landsdowne partners shorted AV. and ended up getting their fingers burnt - certainly with regards to Aviva. What they did with the cash is debateable but they ended up reducing the short by paying a lot lot more for their shares.

There must comre a point when people think that CGL is very very cheap and like AV., it will rise rapidly.

At least that is what I'm hoping for.