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| Share Name | Share Symbol | Market | Stock Type |
|---|---|---|---|
| Erinaceous | ERG | London | Ordinary Share |
| Price Change | Price Change % | Share Price | Last Trade
|
|
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0.00 | 0.00% | 1.65 | 01:00:00 |
| Open Price | Low Price | High Price | Close Price | Previous Close |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1.65 |
| Top Posts |
|---|
Posted at 08/8/2008 09:43 by simon gordon Property Week - 8/8/08:Erinaceous's £205m debt toll Creditors report reveals huge losses for Bank of Scotland, Lloyds TSB and HSBC Erinaceous's spectacular April collapse has left creditors out of pocket to the tune of £205m, it emerged this week. A 145-page creditors report from administrator KPMG, obtained by Property Week, shows that creditors are owed £205m following the biggest-ever failure of a UK property services firm. KPMG estimates that property 'one-stop-shop' Erinaceous's lenders, Bank of Scotland Corporate, Lloyds TSB and HSBC, will be unable to recover at least £108m of the £235m they are owed since it went into administration. The remaining £126m of debt was swapped for control of three of Erinaceous's divisions: Erinaceous Insurance Services, which was valued at £125m, and the residential management and property maintenance businesses, worth £500,000 each. Unsecured creditors are not expected to recover anything, and will be left £97m short of what they are owed. As well as Revenue and Customs, which is owed £10m, unsecured creditors include Erinaceous staff owed wages and bonuses, and property firms Savills, Grosvenor, DTZ and Stiles Harold Williams. The banks had hoped to engineer a rescue of the group by finding a buyer for Erinaceous Insurance Services at the start of the year but were unable to do so. They are now running the division until a buyer is found. Along with the residential and property maintenance divisions, Erinaceous Insurance Services has been spun into a new business, Caley. This is being run on behalf of the banks by Tim Redburn and Dominic Lavelle, the men brought in to Erinaceous to try and save the company at the end of last year. The banks have extended a further £60m credit facility to Caley, Companies House documents show. Of the businesses KPMG was able to sell, architecture firm Leach Rhodes Walker netted the most, £1.5m. Quantity surveyors Francis Graves and Dearle & Henderson were sold for a total of £80,000 to Francis Graves managers. The Milton Keynes and Bedford offices of Douglas Duff were sold to management for £75,000, as was auctioneer Harman Healy, for £25,000. Commercial agency Egan Lawson was sold back to management for £25,000. Albemarle, the private investor syndicate managed by Geoff Egan, bought Shoreham airport for £10. KPMG's report said that, as with all administrations, an investigation is ongoing into the conduct of the directors and a report will be submitted to the secretary of state by October if necessary. Founding chief executive Neil Bellis and chief operating officer Lucy Cummings left the company in November. They are not listed as creditors, but Juliet Bellis & Co, the law firm of Bellis's wife Juliet, which was involved in some of the myriad legal claims, is owed £26,880. A creditors meeting is scheduled for next Tuesday. |
Posted at 12/12/2007 13:33 by gearing9 Should be no sellers left at these lows ...anyone who wanted out would have sold up by now... Leaves plenty of room for new investors to make money as the price recovers. |
Posted at 08/12/2007 18:35 by ch2175 Maybe. But the Banks must have believed the hype and stood for it even though the accounts of the acquired companies show it didn't stack up. Lending millions without doing their own research they deserve to get hit. As for Fursa and the rest of the investors who piled in it isn't completely wasted. Its called education. |
Posted at 08/12/2007 17:07 by p0lzeath Erinaceous , the troubled property services group, dropped 48.3 per cent to 3¾p. Traders said a debt for equity swap looked increasingly likely and shareholders were starting to bail out. At the end of November, Erinaceous warned investors that refinancing discussions were likely to result in significant dilution for shareholders.Still some dopes buying though LOL |
Posted at 28/11/2007 13:22 by tubruk One of the guys on iii reckons Dunlop Haywards is suing one of the insurance arms because it didn't advise it correctly on its PI insurance. The mind boggles! If true, what this shows is how desperate they are regarding the fraud allegations. This is one of the things frightening off potential investors as what's come out to date is probably the tip of the iceberg.The only possible reason for them to do this is that: 1) The PI won't pay out as it's fraud 2) They don't have anything like a high enough limit of indemnity so are trying to use the broker's PI as a backstop. Either way they're stuffed. |
Posted at 26/11/2007 07:16 by p0lzeath Disgrace at Erinaceous As anyone who has ever watched Property Ladder over the past few years will know, even the most inept amateur property developers has more or less been bailed out by the UK property market. So one has to wonder just how inept the management at Erinaceous has been to make such a mess of it. This column has covered the tale of woe that is Erinaceous in depth so we promise this will be the last comment for the foreseeable future. But investors will certainly be feeling bitter, to put it mildly, to read that the former chief executive Neil Bellis and former chief operating officer Lucy Cummings have pocketed £736,000 in severance pay equal to more than 5.6 per cent of the company's current market capitalisation. There is nothing investors can really do about the payout to the pair, who are being paid in accordance with the terms of their contracts. Investors backed those contracts, so only have themselves to blame, but here is a radical idea how about ensuring director contracts include some sort of tie-in to value generation? Since Erinaceous shares peaked at 405p in March 2006, the group has lost 97.3 per cent of its value, and it is little short of a disgrace that the directors who led the company during that period are walking away with anything, never mind £736,000. Hopefully this will draw a line under what has been a disaster for investors, and the new senior management at Erinaceous has a chance to turn things around. They face a huge task, but one that will be easier now they've moved on. Even if doing so has cost the company an arm and a leg. |
Posted at 28/9/2007 07:19 by polzeath Erinaceous GroupOur view: Sell Current price: 53p (-5.5p) The omens have not been good for some time at the property and facilities services group Erinaceous. Takeover talks with four potential bidders kicked off in April but the share price began falling hard a long time before the talks were officially called off in August. Investors were braced for bad news after all, the stock had already fallen by more than 80 per cent since the start of the year. But a £3.9m interim loss, down from a profit of £12m in the first half of 2006, was far worse than expected. To compound the bad news, Erinaceous confirmed it has breached some banking covenants due to current poor trading, and although it has received a waiver from its banks that should be enough to send sensible investors straight to the exit. It looks like the only way out for Erinaceous is to sell the family silver to cut borrowings. A plan is being put into place to dispose of property assets and developed land, but this is not a good time for a property firesale. A management shake-out was also inevitable, and yesterday's announcement confirming that founder and chief executive Neil Bellis will move on should come as no surprise, although surely it is only a matter of time before he is also relieved of his new position as deputy executive chairman. Somewhere underneath this mess there may be a decent company, but Erinaceous has been managed appallingly. Senior staff have been deserting and at least four lawsuits involving former employees should have had alarm bells ringing for a while. Despite the fall in the share price, this is not a buying opportunity. By its own admission, Erinaceous may be unable to continue trading, and investors still in the stock should cut their losses. |
Posted at 22/8/2007 07:46 by polzeath Faltering Erinaceous sale talks knock 11% off sharesBy Sarah Spikes Published: August 22 2007 03:00 | Last updated: August 22 2007 03:00 Shares in Erinaceous, the UK property services company, yesterday slid more than 11 per cent in thin volume on concerns that talks about a possible sale were faltering. Last month HBOS made an indicative offer of 300p a share - valuing the company at about £320m - but withdrew its interest this month, making it the third serious bidder to back away from the company after considering an offer. Private equity firms 3i and Bridgepoint also considered backing a management buy-out before withdrawing, though both are understood to be likely to have a second look after Erinaceous's next set of interim results, ex-pected in September. Vincent Tchenguiz, the property entrepreneur, has also considered an offer. Market sources said yesterday that they had little confidence that a deal would materialise. Erinaceous's shares closed down 15¾p at 123¼p. Any successful sale is now likely to be set at considerably below the price originally offered by HBOS following the continued decline in its stock. The company's share price had already more than halved in the past six months before yesterday declines. On Friday Erinaceous' share price closed at 158p, after hitting a two-and-a-half year low of 143p on Thursday. Since HBOS withdrew its interest, Erinaceous has begun talks with a group of unnamed parties, including a bank, a hedge fund and several private investors, about forming a consortium to back an MBO. If a bid is not forthcoming, senior management has made assurances to investors that it is prepared to continue with plans to ex-pand the company through further corporate acquisitions. The management of Erinaceous, led by Neil Bellis, chief executive and co-founder, is understood to want to retain control ofas much as half of the company should the buy-out go ahead, although terms are still far from being confirmed. |
Posted at 14/3/2007 11:09 by simon gordon From Savills Prelims, re: UK Commercial Agency:'2006 was another strong year for investor demand and we estimate that the level of investment in UK commercial property was broadly in line with 2005's record level. Around 30% of the purchases of UK commercial property in 2006 were by non-domestic investors. Investor demand continued to drive up prices. Yields in all the UK markets that we monitor ended the year at or close to record lows. Looking ahead we expect similar conditions to prevail in 2007. Tenant demand in the office and industrial markets is likely to stay at or slightly above average levels due to an improving macro-economic environment. Retailers will continue to be cautious in their expansion plans as consumer confidence stays low. Although we anticipate that retailers will look to open new outlets, this demand will be highly location specific. Investor demand for commercial property is likely to remain high over the next 12 months, with both domestic and international investors still showing interest in the asset class. The introduction of REITs to the UK in 2007 may well increase this interest in the sector, leading to further upward price movement. In terms of the leasing and development markets, we expect that the Central London office market will continue to show the strongest rental growth and returns.' |
Posted at 09/5/2006 09:20 by simon gordon Article from an LSE marketing brochure in late '05:Large corporates can call on big IR teams to help deliver their message and ensure they gain investors' attention. Smaller companies are lucky if they have one dedicated IR professional. More often than not, responsibility falls on the finance director or the company secretary. This may seem like a huge setback, but there are still a number of ways in which a limited budget can be used more efficiently. "Time is the biggest cost," says Lucy Cummings, commercial director of property services company Erinaceous Group. "When you are a smaller company, the institutional investors want to see the chief executive the person who has the vision not a marketing person who is just regurgitating what they have been told to say." At Erinaceous, Cummings, the company's chief executive and the finance director attend about 90 per cent of the investor meetings and interviews with analysts. "Sometimes an analyst briefing can take up half a day for our finance director, especially when reviewing financial models. Since moving from AIM to the main market late last year, we have spent much more time on IR, but it has been worth it," she says. When the company had a smaller profile, it would often deliver its message to new investors through presentations at privateclient brokers. The time and effort put into developing a strong institutional presentation could be easily used to present to a room of high-net worth clients or their respective brokers. Erinaceous has also learned that an effective public relations firm can be extremely useful. The company changed PR agencies last year and has seen dramatic results since appointing Gavin Anderson. Even so, it is vital that senior managers are still involved. "If management cannot be bothered to put the message across themselves, how can an agency be expected to do it on their behalf?" asks Cummings. Although Simon Howell, company secretary to audio production company UBC Media, has a financial PR firm to help prepare documentation such as year-end results, the management team works hard conveying the company message to the market. This means talking to journalists in the trade and financial press, analysts at smaller broking firms and retail investors. The efforts have paid off, according to Howell. Seven brokers cover the company and feedback from big institutional investors has been positive. Listening to retail investors' ideas also acts as a good sounding board, he says. Erinaceous and UBC Media may be in completely different sectors, but the significant cost of having senior decision-makers outside the office is a common problem. Investor relations consultant Jane-Astrid More of M:Communications has a few tips that have helped her clients, be they large corporates or smaller businesses. The first way to stretch an IR budget is to find out who owns the company by creating a shareholder identification list. Given that there is not much liquidity in most SME stocks, the relationship with institutional investors is crucial. The chief executive should be using his time wisely by seeing those institutions that invest in the company's peer group, especially those that he has not yet met. Corporate brokers can help to identify potential investors, but the job should not be left entirely to them. "A company should do its homework on how target investors make their money,"says More. Companies need also to find out how they are perceived in the market. "You need to know what people think about you before you can sell your product," says More. She believes companies should conduct in-depth surveys to find out the market's take on their business, its sector, its relative positioning and how its corporate message is understood. "The purpose of this is to get the true story," says More. "You'll want research from the sell- and buy-side. Once you've done that, you can clarify any wrong assumptions and shape your story into the one you'd like to be telling." |
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