Marston's Share Discussion Threads

[spacecake] 30/11/2011 18:40

Numis welcomed the report form Marston's, which it said was ahead of its expectations, prompting the broker to repeat its "buy" recommendation for the stock and its target price of 130 pence.

"We view Marston's as a core sector holding, offering attractive defensive, self-financed growth and income. The banks may agree, having extended the bank facility to May 2016 at no extra profit and loss cost," said Numis analyst Douglas Jack.

Shares in the pub group traded at 98.55 pence, up 5.5 percent from yesterday's close. Sage also did well, rallying 3.5 percent to 284.8 pence.
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Today... Investors Chronicle
IC VIEW:

Like-for-like sales since the year-end are 3 per cent ahead at the managed pub division and profits are up 2 per cent at tenanted pubs. But the dire consumer outlook and expectations of rising costs should temper excitement, despite attractions for income hunters. Fairly priced.

Last IC View: Fairly priced, 109p, 23 May 2011



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Today.... www.FT.com
Karl Burns, an analyst at Shore Capital, said Marston's had been boosted by a "robust" start to the year.

"Current trading is encouraging with managed like-for-like sales ahead 3 per cent for the first 8 weeks of the new year – we would expect the unseasonable weather to have helped," he said.

[jeff h] 30/11/2011 16:18

Evolution Securities has reiterated its buy recommendation on pubs owner and ale brewer Marston's, saying that the group delivered exactly as it promised in its full-year results.

"The 'self-help' agenda is now yielding results and this should translate through to rising cashflow and to fund a progressive dividend for income-hungry investors," said analyst Nigel Parson.

Evolution Securities keeps its 140p target.

[spacecake] 30/11/2011 11:52

The final results are out today

[paul442] 30/11/2011 11:00

good rise so far, bought in last week thankfully.

spacecake where did you get those numbers from if you don't mind me asking?

[deanforester] 30/11/2011 10:59

Looks like they are on track to reach the two times dividend cover they want, so maybe an increase in the dividend for 2012 is on the cards?

[spacecake] 30/11/2011 08:00

Another good set of numbers from MARS.

[copestake] 30/10/2011 11:40

My dad has some friends who work at Marstons and they are really busy.. Asking people to work overtime too meet demand.

They have sold 5 pubs to Fullers in London for 16 million good deal for both parties.

[fangorn2] 26/10/2011 09:39

Well, what can I say.

Nice pub - fantastic location to pick up both casual passers by,and local residents in St Ives. Family orientated, several large dining areas and business has been good since opening. Reasonable prices, and a wide selection of dishes on the food front with a current 2 for 1 deal.

Decor is clean and light, the staff very accommodating.



Free wifi too for those wanting to surf whilst they take a break from their journey if they're passing through.

[fangorn2] 24/10/2011 16:40

Off to visit the new Marston's pub in St Ives later tonight. Let you know my thoughts.

[jeff h] 24/10/2011 14:28

Ian/rmillaree some broker comment:-

Five central London pubs. The central London pubs, while of good quality, are
not central to Marston's managed strategy of developing value-led destination
food pubs. Three of them are leasehold. Marston's believe that the £16m
proceeds can be deployed better in support of its core strategy.

Accretive multiple. We estimate that the disposal multiple is in excess of 8x
EBITDA, while Marston's is investing in its core managed developments at c6x.
As a result the move is clearly accretive.

......apparently one of the pubs was loss making as well.

[rmillaree] 24/10/2011 13:14

From the article below is suggests MARS can get better returns investing the cash in their newbuild "mega-pubs"



Its a shame they can't have their beer cake and eat it but i guess the days of unlimited cheap finance for business expansions are well and truly behind us.

[jeffian] 24/10/2011 12:13

Well spotted (only announced by FSTA; MARS didn't seem to think it worth mentioning!). Seems a strange thing to do. I can understand them knocking out underperforming tenanted pubs but selling high-turnover London managed houses is going very much against current trends (everyone else is falling over themselves to buy them). Wonder why MARS felt they should sell them.

[jeff h] 24/10/2011 11:34

Sold 5 pubs to Fullers for £16m today.

[fangorn2] 10/10/2011 20:44

Cheers Pem. Will attempt to pop by in two weeks time or so when I visit

[pem5] 10/10/2011 20:42

Just off theSt Ives bypass on the roundabout heading towards Needingworth and Bluntisham.(A1123)

They are also opening a new pub in March , about 25 miles away in the next few weeks.

[fangorn2] 10/10/2011 10:05

Where abouts in St Ives is the new pub out of interest. My old man lives up that way and am due to visit him next week. Would be interested to pop by.Cheers

[pem5] 07/10/2011 22:48

Recently opened a new pub in St Ives Cambridgeshire.Looks very busy although yesterday evening could not say how long the wait was for a table and people were walking out because of the wait. Not good for reputation?

[jeff h] 05/10/2011 19:47

Only Investec say Sell and as it is a re-iteration then they held that view for whatever reason before today's update.

Marston's: Altium Securities confirms buy rating and 120p target.

Marston's: Peel Hunt keeps buy rating and 130p target.

Marston's: Charles Stanley keeps buy recommendation and 130p target.

Marston's: Investec reiterates sell rating and 75p target.

[jeff h] 05/10/2011 19:40

Interesting that wskill, seems to be at odds with other brokers.

I wonder why they are so negative?

Shore Capital apparently aren't as they've upgraded after todays news from Hold to Buy.

I'll also be interested to hear what pub guru analyst Douglas Jack thinks.

A few days ago he was saying:-

"We expect managed pub trading to have been resilient with full year like-for-like sales achieving our 2.5% target. We expect the leased estate to generate like-for-like profit and total profit growth in 2011, largely due to the success of the retail agreement conversion programme. Overall, we expect to hold our forecasts."

...well as we know managed lfl's came in at 2.9%

[wskill] 05/10/2011 19:16

Found the offending downgrade Investec have a new target of 75p.

[randomwalker] 05/10/2011 19:08

This trading update was most definitely NOT a profit warning. Really, it was a profit affirmation

Annualised dividend yield about 7% !

As to the Sky Sports ruling: very good for pubs....if it is upheld

I have bought today in decent size, and consider Panmure's target reasonable

[jeff h] 05/10/2011 19:02

Yes, very surprising.

Not read anything -ve, a pub landlady won a EU court decision yesterday to allow Prem footie to be shown in her boozer (a Greene King tenancy) via a decoder from Greece and thus not subscribing to Sky.

Whether this is +ve or -ve for the large pub companies I've not read.

Panmure happy with today's update:-

Marston's (MARS) retained its "buy" rating from Panmure Gordon, with a target price of 130p. The pub group had a strong finish to the year says the broker, with like-for-like sales growth of 2.9% in managed pubs during the last 10 weeks. Panmure notes that the group has opened 19 new managed pubs, with one more to be completed in November, and a further 25 scheduled in the 2012 financial year. The shares dropped 5.75p to 84p

[mctmct] 05/10/2011 16:40

Bonkers. This looks like a screaming buy to me.

[jeff h] 05/10/2011 11:17

I note that GNK is down today as well - perhaps some industry specific negative news floating about