Cip Merchant Capital Share Discussion Threads

[shaker44] 06/6/2021 13:38

Shame on Simon Thompson for missing this. Judgement clouded by wanting to promote his earlier tips maybe

[riskvsreward] 06/6/2021 13:15

It is the big institutional investors that are responsible for such absurd blunt defraud of the shareholder money as they don't care about the money that is not their own and that they are all in it together. There are quite a few of them around, this one and tfg are among the worst.

Those big institutional investors have both the knowledge and power to hold the directors and fund mangers to account but they choose to turn a blind eye on it.

I would avoid such trusts as well as those funds who are big investors in these trusts but fail to stand for their investors who put their trusts in them to look after their value.

[skyship] 06/6/2021 12:00

The most egregious aspect of those £2.88m management fees is that just over half was levied on CASH. If I were at the AGM I would ask not only for zero fees on cash balances in the future; but also for half of those past fees levied on CASH to be refunded.

[donald pond] 06/6/2021 10:15

Very good post Sky. I read the ST article and thought these were worth a closer look. For a journalist to pump them without mentioning the issues you cover is imo totally irresponsible

[shaker44] 05/6/2021 14:33

Thanks skyship you have told me enough to take this off my watch list. Simon T has blinds spots unfortunately and you have identified a few

[skyship] 05/6/2021 14:05

I was well pleased that ST revisited CIP this week; however I would hope that on some occasions he would challenge management on the negatives, rather than just listing the positives.

In the case of CIP the positives are the discount; and the opportunity to buy into a select portfolio of microcaps.

The negatives are more apparent to the long-term holders:

# The 19% decline in asset value over the 3yrs since two Italian private equity managers took control. A pretty lamentable performance by any measure.

# That underperformance compounded by the 2%pa management fees - a level one might expect from a successful hedge fund

# Further compounded by the fact that the fees are levied on cash balances - something pretty verboten these days; but not recognised by the Italian duo it would seem.

# Over the 3yrs to Dec'20 they have charged a total of £2.88m in management fees - a full 30% of the asset value decline - shifted from shareholders into Italian pockets!

The Directors have got to change things; and I have suggested to Simon Thompson that there are a number of things which might rectify matters:

# Most importantly and easily done: No management fees on cash balances

# The Company strategy at launch was for capital gain, so no dividends. As they have blatantly failed on that score; they should provide shareholders with some measure of return. I would suggest taking a leaf from Private Equity and offer an annual dividend levied at the rate of 3% of NAV

# They should institute a 3yrly Continuation Vote

# …and finally they should confirm that Interim and Preliminary statement should be published within 3 months of the half year and end year - the Prelims on 1st June were far, far too late

[skyship] 02/6/2021 09:11

ST summary: "CIP’s shares are trading slightly below my 57p entry point in my 2020 Bargain Shares Portfolio, and I expect the ongoing investment performance to drive a material re-rating. Buy."

[shaker44] 02/6/2021 07:40

So promoted again by Simon Thompson today yet his last 2 promos of CIP still leave a heavy discount to NAV.
Is there a 'trust' issue here? Management or regulator or both?
Given the shortage of good PE deals, surprising a bid hasn't emerged if it's as good as it looks on paper.

[skyship] 02/6/2021 07:24

CIP Merchant Capital announces that as at 28 May 2021 the unaudited net asset value ("NAV") per ordinary share was 87.62 pence.

[rcturner2] 30/5/2021 08:21

Also worth noting that when ST named his 2021 bargain portofolio, he updated on his holdings in the 2020 list and still rated this as a buy.

[hugepants] 28/5/2021 18:19

yep possibly. btw didn't realise Stephen Thompson (investor chronicle) has this in one of his bargain portfolios;

[skyship] 28/5/2021 17:09

HugePants - I may well take the long weekend to construct a spreadsheet to monitor the individual holdings and resultant weekly NAV.

Seems to me that as at the close today the NAV to be announced on Tuesday will show a reasonable rise - for the moment a guesstimate of c87p...

[skyship] 26/5/2021 14:09

...or maybe not it would seem!

Meanwhile, 50k dumped yesterday @ 52.95p; so those will have to be absorbed before we see any firming beyond the current 52p-55p.

[skyship] 19/5/2021 09:09

The recent fall in EKF is what has slightly reversed our NAV; however they are now bouncing back, so we'll see the next NAV recovering...

[networker] 14/5/2021 14:18

Skyship
Thanks for your prompt and helpful response.

[skyship] 14/5/2021 13:49

AJBell & IDealing both allow...

[networker] 14/5/2021 12:13

Does anyone know which brokers deal in these shares? Barclays tell me that they don't ( except for selling orders ), which is somewhat surprising.

[skyship] 13/5/2021 15:32

Lifted from the CTH thread. A good article in February on CTH - our largest holding at c16.5% of the port.

[skyship] 13/5/2021 15:17

10 days ago CIP paid 40.36p for 1.55m VTU. Yesterday they jumped to 48p after delivering a great set of Finals. Dropped back to 46p....but still, VTU was a nicely timed investment, albeit only c1.5% of the port.

"These results, which are ahead of expectations, are outstanding in the Covid interrupted circumstances. I am proud of the entire Vertu team for their adaptability and effort to deliver these remarkable results."

[quepassa] 12/5/2021 19:14

RCTurner has well-known alcohol-related mental health issues unfortunately.

Best ignore.

[skyship] 12/5/2021 15:19

Made a small top-up @ 55.8p. Good figures from one of our core holdings (REDD) puts them up another 7% today to 390p.. REDD represents c4.5% of the port....

[rcturner2] 10/5/2021 14:23

The main thing I like here is that their holdings are very much aligned to what I think which is that small caps are going to do very well over the next 12 to 24 months and this is a good way to get access to that market segment at a massive discount.

Another similar play is Crystal Amber although that has a huge % of the NAV in one company (De la Rue).

[kirmich] 10/5/2021 14:17

Took a small amount today at 57p , their poor results since the ipo warrant the discount I think, also the Coro Energy and especially the Italian private outfit i don't like. Aside those 2, i quite like the rest of their pics.

They seem to be making some sensible investments also as of late and nobody gets everything right.

With that kind of discount, there is some margin for error.