Mbl Share Discussion Threads

[yump] 09/12/2010 10:04

I think they are on borrowed time here; a couple of questions:

How long does it take to sort out an MBO ?

Is there a nice store of potential bad news that can be regularly issued until an MBO takes place ?

You'll have to excuse the extreme cynicism, fortunately I've only got a small stake left or I would be sitting outside someone's office for as long as it took to get to see them, or get removed by security to the nearest tabloid reporter.

The sort of greed going on here in the face of poor performance is absolutely disgusting.

[masurenguy] 09/12/2010 09:59

tanners - 3233: It's hugely disappointing, but Cowgill's aloof performance at the shareholder's meeting still rankles with me and he was never able to properly answer my question as to why TA's salary had increased at a %age far higher than the %age increase in earnings.

Hmm....what were you REALLY expecting after he had been given a £300,000 bonus by TA previously.
A really generous bonus for an NXD Chairman !

[tanners] 09/12/2010 09:52

Scott - absolutely agree, but IIRC (and I'm sure others will correct me)TA's massive remuneration package was 2 a year deal, so he'll still be coining it in whatever happens.

The bottom line here imo, is that those running MUBL have failed to act in the best interests of the owners and this has been demonstrated time and time again over the past 6 months and more.

It's hugely disappointing, but Cowgill's aloof performance at the shareholder's meeting still rankles with me and he was never able to properly answer my question as to why TA's salary had increased at a %age far higher than the %age increase in earnings.

As stated previously I've sold down most of the last 6 months and will hold a token amount in case the opportunity returns to meet Cowgill/Allan in the future.

[miamisteve] 09/12/2010 09:52

The Group has also been focusing on the direct to consumer market and post year
end has commenced a trial with a major retailer to install concessions within
its retail estate. The trial is still ongoing and is an extension of a few
standalone stores which the Group has opened under the brand 'Big'.

-----------------

Can anyone shed any light on this? Who is the major retailer? I recall that we were trialing kiosk concessions in ASDA, via fuji film, but this is something new.

[rbcrbc] 09/12/2010 09:51

1. Why were admin expenses up 1.5m ?
Administrative expenses (5,646) (4,185)

2. Thats a big rise in inventories.
Inventories 20,941 15,228

[davidlloyd] 09/12/2010 09:43

Are these ISAable ? TIA.
DL

[goonertone] 09/12/2010 09:41

Microscope

Who mentioned music, though this will be part of the offering, its about being able to offer a product to retailers, or any other company come to that, that allows them to use all possible methods of sale if they so wish be it physical or digital and to any appliance they require in whatever format they desire.

GT

[microscope] 09/12/2010 09:34

Sky close music download site due to lack of demand.

[mechanical trader] 09/12/2010 09:29

david, i recognise all the usernames from
the TMF.

check the last dozen out.

[maxcashflow] 09/12/2010 09:28

Cashflow in H1, excluding changes in working capital, was around £1m. And this is after administrative costs have increased by £1.5m. They said that the increase in administrative costs was due in large part to setup of thew new business streams and moving over to new finance systems (in order to support a larger more diverse group).

I think that a typical company would have reported these one-off costs as exceptional. Of course, MUBL isn't trying to 'big' itself up at present so has no need to do this. But let's say that £1m of the increase in admin costs was exceptional, then adjusted cashflow ex WCC would have been £2m, not a huge drop on the same measure in 2010H1:

Adjusted cashflow ex WCC:

2009H1....2010H1....2011H1
£1.7m ....£2.6m ....£2.0m

If they can get cashflow of £4m in H2 (it was £4m in 2009H2 and £6m in 2010H2), which should be possible due to the Christmas trading period, then that is total cashflow of £6m, against a market cap of £16m.

And that's not taking into account new revenue from the digital business, which we will only see partially come through in 2010H2 results (4m worth of trading).

[scott84] 09/12/2010 09:27

Surely the guy has to take a pay cut, you cannot be paid 2 million
at the moment, that is totally ridiculous.

Good luck David, it's been a beautiful 5 years trading and investing
in Mubl but now i'm out and not going to even look at them but will
still read the thread.

[microscope] 09/12/2010 09:26

Agree after all his hard work Davidosh deserved better. But no denying this looks to me a very poor set of results indeed.

And sounds like accompanied by the second profit warning (materially below 'revised' expectations, 'revised' being the key word).

'Following the Trading Update announced on 7 October 2010 overall revenue and profitability for the Group continues to perform behind forecasts. As a consequence, profitability for the year to 31 March 2011 is expected to be materially behind revised expectations.'

No sign of an upswing then. I must confess the imho rather simplistic infatuation with order numbers (especially at the likely highest order peak of the year and when something is growing from zero it is very hard to fathom what margins might be too) did remind me a bit of the 'AC Milan drew therefore LNG must have had a great weekend' mentality.

[shanklin] 09/12/2010 09:24

Another CC - definitely.

[davidosh] 09/12/2010 09:21

Mechanical trader....Are you short TMF ? LOL

Since when was MUBL a so called TMF stock ?

MUBL is a very heavily discussed company on ADVFN. There have been 3220 posts on this thread alone. Do you have anything to add to the discussion here ?

[mechanical trader] 09/12/2010 09:16

another TMF stock bites the dust; yet again.

[davidosh] 09/12/2010 08:59

Coincidentally HMV reported their H1 today as well....

HMV UK & Ireland total sales down 15.3%, including like for like sales down 16.1%

That suggests the MUBL customers are performing better than the general market for entertainment product and certainly shows that the games and music releases in H1 were weak and caused most of the fall in sales.

My view is that a lot of investment has been made for the future and the costs have been mainly sunk into these results. The headline figures therefore look far worse than the underlying picture.

What were the revised expectations ?

I certainly expect the second half to be far closer to last years numbers than the first half especially when taking all the investment into consideration.

There is nothing said about a new non exec nor when the strategy review is expected to be completed. I wonder if they are able to do another conference call now the interims are known as there are many questions again that I am sure we would like to ask ?

We may have to wait until after the busy trading period has been completed but how many would like another CC say early in January or at worst scheduled to be available on the day of the trading update later in January ?

[shanklin] 09/12/2010 08:56

alroyrob

Since management did not tell shareholders what its revised expectations were, or give any guidance on how they are being revised, this text about profit expctations is very unhelpful.

Also, as has been cited above, all the money being spent on investment in new capability, be it state-of-the-art warehousing, new internal computer systems, GMV functionality, etc, should IMHO be taken out to provide an adjusted EPS number... which would be a lot less ugly than the headline 2.9 EPS presented in the results.

And we still have no real idea why MUBL spent £2m on 15% of U-Explore (which may well have been a good investment) or what the purpose of the second strategic review is.

So, sadly a big backward step on the communication front today.

[alunmorris] 09/12/2010 08:53

>As is normal, MMs have taken advantageous and marked the share price down very severely.

On the contrary the MMs opened at 102 - 105 down 13, which wasn't low enough. Sells then drove it down further to 88-95.

The results are dismal. The naysayers were right.

[edmundshaw] 09/12/2010 08:41

The key trading period has only just begun.

A bit early to say regarding this year imo. But for longer investors, the next couple of years are more important anyway. It looks like MBL is moving in the right directions to me.

[alroyrob] 09/12/2010 08:34

Trading Update

"Following the Trading Update announced on 7 October 2010 overall revenue and
profitability for the Group continues to perform behind forecasts. As a
consequence, profitability for the year to 31 March 2011 is expected to be
materially behind revised expectations".

So, it looks like beyond March at the very least until confirmation of a recovery might be seen here. With the collapsed EPS of 2.9 x say..3(pe)? = 85-90p (fair value at the moment)?

[philjeans] 09/12/2010 08:20

As is normal, MMs have taken advantageous and marked the share price down very severely.

Big overreaction; H2 will show a significant improvement and the new online investment will start to pay back in spades.

Give it 6 months and we'll see the share price double - unless we capitulate to an opportunistic MBO!

[shanklin] 09/12/2010 08:19

Also in the current year, MUBL has had to take back considerable higher-margin inventory from MRW, as per:

"MBL's major customer implemented a change in the in-store proposition for home entertainment which increased the concentration of chart titles to the detriment of space historically available for back catalogue titles. As a consequence MBL has credited higher than anticipated returns from the customer which has affected revenue. The terms of the contract with this customer provide limits for returns and it is anticipated that the majority of the stock returned will revert to either the supplier or customer in due course.

It looks like some of this will revert to MRW in due course, or will at least be a useful negotiating tool in discussions with them. I imagine much of this is listed on bee.com where a lot of the titles are non-chart,

[fft] 09/12/2010 08:16

i dont think the success of morrisions or ecommerce will be allowed to be known before an MBO is launched.

what price now ? 140p ?