Keystone Law Share Discussion Threads

[maddox] 16/9/2024 18:12

T-Raider,

KEYS have ascended into a larger company tax bracket that requires Corp Tax paid in the year - so they've been clobbered for this year and half of last year. So, cash position has suffered.

Apart from that all good and they are guiding a small beat for the full-year.

[t-raider] 12/9/2024 09:13

Results ok.. divi up, but no special divi this time. Steady as she goes...

[t-raider] 11/9/2024 11:34

Results tomorrow.. hoping for continued growth and a special divi on top of the interim one. Fingers crossed.

[johnthegeek2] 01/5/2024 18:30

Understand taking some cash out on the back of OK results but an insider selling ~80% of their total holding? That's a lot to dump if you think theres better times ahead. And yeah, the bit the CEO / founder sold is trivial compared to his total shareholding but that makes me nervous for another reason, he owns nearly 30% of the outstanding, that's a big overhang he's going to have to unwind at some point. Given he's clearly the driving force in the company that's going to hurt. Think I'll pass on this one.

[t-raider] 29/4/2024 11:46

Not sure if JPM AM had any holding below the threshold, but now have over 5% holding. Guess that's where the directors shares went last week, as couldn't by all those in the open market without the price moving more substantially. Looking promising for Keystone Law !

[davr0s] 24/4/2024 18:05

Yes not a great advert for the company but I'll hold for now

[tradertrev] 24/4/2024 17:30

William Robins, director of operations and compliance, has sold 430k shares today leaving 168k, so a major disposal (72%). James Knight, CEO, has sold an inconsequential amount from his huge holding.

[maddox] 22/4/2024 23:20

Great results that reveal the attractive business model. The key growth driver is the recruitment of high calibre lawyers – 8.5% growth in Principal Lawyers in FY24. Revenue growth of 15%, with gearing and margins widening, translated into PBT growth of 23%. However, this translated into after tax eps growth of 13% - held back due to the tax rate increasing from 19% to 25%.

Revenue also benefitted from revenue per Principal growing 10%. Net Interest income of £961k on client funds was a new line of revenue generated by the current high interest rates.

This firm is highly cash generative with a 96% conversion ratio and has plenty of capacity to increase the future dividend pay-out. On a historic basis KEYS paid 30.8p dividends, including the Special Dividend a c.4.6% yield.

The quality of the new intake of lawyers looks particularly good – this enhances the firms’ reputation and attracts more high-quality lawyers. KEYS has been the trail blazer of the platform model, but it is now gaining in popularity with circa 50 other firms emulating their platform model with some 3.5k lawyers. KEYS believe that their position at the lead of this growing trend is advantageous for recruitment and future growth.

The Outlook statement is also positive, ‘2025 has started well. Our lawyers remain busy and early recruitment activity provides us with confidence in the year ahead.’

KEYS is a capital light, growth firm and prodigious cash generator.

[davr0s] 18/4/2024 09:08

It rose into results so not that surprised to see a weaker day - trading at a level seen earlier this week. So nothing to get too excited about. Quite happy with that and results seemed fine to me

[t-raider] 18/4/2024 08:21

Just as well they weren't bad results ! A fickle, short term market.. patience will hopefully win out with this well run company.

[sharesoc] 17/4/2024 17:39

We're hosting a SIGnet Follow-Up Meeting on 8/5/24 at 7pm to analyse KEYS' Full Year Results presentation with IMC. SIGnet members can register here:

[ny boy] 01/3/2024 09:40

Looking good, solid play, can see overseas predators coming in before the share price gets to rich a solid hold

[tkamp] 22/2/2024 05:25

Its honestly pretty crazy the stock closed up only 1% on this update. UK small caps are just completely ignored by investors. Eventually that will change though, it always does

[alphabeta4] 21/2/2024 16:41

They will come back T-Raider, I'm in the same boat personally on plenty of items but have a few showing signs of some starting to break out of downtrends they've had despite good news. This is one of them - 550 high from around last March recently breached with potential bowl showing on the chart.

Once interest rates are stable to falling lots of growth companies are going to see significant pe expansion IMHO. Some of their prices are now ridiculously cheap compared to what they were and historic valuations.

[t-raider] 21/2/2024 11:50

Unlike the share price With cap gains going down to just £3k no wonder people are giving up investing here. I like Keystone and just hope value is seen at some stage.I have a few UK companies doing great whilst their share prices stagnate.So frustrating...

[tkamp] 21/2/2024 07:16

Strong update from KEYS. Ending the year with 432 principals was ahead of my forecasts. Numbers imply that revenue-per-principal remained robust in H2 (while I was fearing a slowdown). I am pretty optimistic the hiring environment for them has shifted materially and that the number of principals will continue to grow at a rate of 7-10% per year. Add on that revenue/principal growth of perhaps 3-5% and the company should definitely be able to hit annual earnings growth of 10-15% for many years to come. This company always delivers

[tkamp] 06/2/2024 14:10

Keystone is announcing many new lawyers joining these days (see their LinkedIn page) - I believe they have now announced 10 new lawyers since the start of 2024, a far higher pace than they have had in recent years.

[boozey] 02/2/2024 22:56

Tipped by interactive investor today - may explain the rise.

Trading Update around 20th Feb.

Management understands current market expectations for year to be revenue GBP78.9m and adjusted PBT GBP9.5m

[alphabeta4] 15/12/2023 19:46

Should be higher really given the fundamentals. Well ahead of expectations which is starting to be rewarded in other sectors.

[boozey] 15/12/2023 17:27

A very good day here - one for the patient.

[ny boy] 12/10/2023 18:22

Let’s hope these can out perform once the FED is done and rates start to fall from Q2 - 2024

[boozey] 24/9/2023 07:59

Tipped today in the Mail on Sunday:

[t-raider] 19/9/2023 16:25

Cannacord upping their position to over 13%.

[maddox] 18/9/2023 09:55

Great to see KEYS have rediscovered their ability to recruit lawyers to their platform. To have an 'FY 2024 outlook comfortably ahead of current market expectations' is wonderful in the current economic gloom. This underlines the uncorrelated nature of legal services sector as an investment proposition. Positive potential read-across to other legal firms with 12.2% increase in client billing. It would be useful to get a more detailed understanding of the sub-sector drivers to the increased billing.

More specifically, KEYS attractive business model shines through as this 14.9% growth in revenue translates into a 29.3% increase in PBT to £5.3 million (1H23: £4.1m) and 16.2% increase in basic eps 12.2p (1H23: 10.5p). The capital light nature of the business then generates strong operating cash conversion of 113.3%.
This high gearing is a huge plus point.

Regards Maddox