National World Share Discussion Threads

[waspfactory] 17/1/2023 08:38

Very happy with this update, good long term hold imo.

[red army] 17/1/2023 08:21

Results outstanding and fundamentals are in good shape to support a much higher share price.

[red ninja] 06/1/2023 17:38

Acquisition of ScoopDragon and NewsChain.

Growth acquisitions continue.

[strollingmolby] 23/11/2022 11:44

No intention to make an offer for Reach...

[red ninja] 04/11/2022 12:45

It makes you wonder what the chance of NWOR acquiring REACH is given the disparity in market caps. and the likelihood that REACH shareholders will presumably be looking for a significant premium to the current share price.

Added later :-
Fridays Times had an article on the possible Reach offer had snippet :-

"A source who knows Montgomery told the Times that National World was prompted to make a statement after speculation, but it's interest in Reach was at an early stage. 'It is almost off the scale.'"

Thus, it doesn't really sound that any sort of offer is imminent.

[red ninja] 04/11/2022 12:24

Guardian view :-

[paleje] 04/11/2022 10:52

Ah yes thanks that could explain it. Didn't take Trium long to declare their position. In current market conditions I wouldn't think funding would be straightforward, I know the're sitting on cash but not that sort of amount.

[spot1034] 04/11/2022 08:57

I think there was a leak, and they were forced to go public before they were ready.

[paleje] 04/11/2022 08:39

Ambitious. Overly so? And why make the announcement in the way they have done.

[abergele] 03/11/2022 19:26

This certainly is a sleepy share, has nobody seen the news yet tonight..
where will this lead NWOR to..gl all lth's

[red ninja] 28/10/2022 19:09

Judith Mackenzie (Downing) on NWOR on Vox Markets : minute 21:54

[waspfactory] 01/8/2022 08:41

Nice write up, and a decent set of results to boot;

Operating profit up 36%, Digital revenue up 41%, cash balance of GBP25.7 million

[red ninja] 29/7/2022 18:58

Downing Strategic Micro Cap I.T on NWor in February investor letter (they mention 3 key names in Nwor):-

Just after January month end, we added NATIONAL WORLD (NWOR), an illiquid and under‐the̴8;radar company trading at the bottom end of the main market. NWOR was a reverse into the regional publishing assets of the old Johnston Press. The management team are top calibre, with experience seldom found in £70 million market caps. David Montgomery has a decades‐ long career in newspapers and considerable experience in newsprint consolidation. Vijay Vaghela is exceptionally well referenced and comes from Reach where he was group FD for almost 16 years. And Mark Hollinshead also brings career‐long media experience to the group, having been managing director of the Daily Record and Sunday Mail, and COO at Trinity Mirror
(now Reach). David and Vijay worked closely together on prior venture Local World, formed in 2013, which acquired certain regional news assets and subsequently exited these to Reach in 2015, increasing equity value by 289% in the process.
The story has several contrasting elements. Namely, declining print married with growing digital; transitioning ad revenues to subscriptions; and organic complemented by inorganic growth. These are all at early stages, but management have begun putting the foundations in place to build a valuable and scalable multi‐platform publishing business.
The JPI Group assets constituted the third largest regional newspaper publisher in the UK.
NWOR has taken control of established heritage titles such as The Scotsman and the Yorkshire
Post and has since launched several regional ‘World Sites’ and a new online national ‘NationalWorld.com’. Management have unpicked the centralisation which drove the decline of the heritage brands, with editorial and commercial responsibilities pushed back into the regions. The acquired assets have been heavily restructured, generating £5 million of annualised cost savings to date and with more to come as significant printing and office contracts come up for negotiation this year and next. These savings will allow management to re‐invest in digital and quality content to drive growth. NWOR is also free of legacy pension
liabilities and fixed costs and assets tied to printing activities which are a millstone around many other legacy‐publisher’s necks.
Ad‐supported businesses and subscription‐supported businesses are quite different. While the aim is to transition to the latter, realistically the business is going to be dependent on both for the foreseeable future. Ad revenues are driven by volume of traffic, whereas subscription requires much more finessing around lifetime value, acquisition costs and churn. This is less science and more art since some methods for converting a cohort of registrants to subscribers
will not work for others. But through data and tracking, management will be able to target users with different content and introductory or renewal rates and this should improve conversion.
Much is achieved from trial and error and that requires the right infrastructure to deliver effectively over many users.
The transition won’t happen overnight, but this is not a bad thing since the print titles are highly cash generative, and more time will allow management to get the reinvestment right. Early signs are positive with digital ad revenues, page views, and digital subscription revenues growing strongly. The size of the prize in digital is significant since we think that print operating margins of around 10%, will be replaced by digital operating margins which are much higher.
This obviously depends on scale, but since there is basically zero incremental cost to serve a digital audience, and the cost base is fixed (versus print cost bases which are high and variable), we think that there is a pathway to 20‐30% operating margins here. Digital is alsoadvantageous since the potential audience is much larger. The New York Times has already achieved more than 6x as many digital subscribers than their peak print circulation since digital
content can be consumed anywhere in the world. National World’s own title, The Scotsman, is gaining traction in regions which the print copy couldn’t access, and in August reached a record
19.5 million page views.
This investment is not without risk. But the heavy lifting in declining print to ‘variablise217; thatcost base has already been achieved. Combined with strong revenue growth and operating leverage in digital, and an experienced and aligned management team at the helm, we think that the prospects are strong. NWOR has £22 million of net cash and is trading on around 5x EV/ EBITDA and almost a 15% free cash flow yield, so there is sufficient optionality for value
creation here.

Peers such as Reach are more expensive, more complicated, and run a
considerably more capital‐intensive operation. If these businesses need to reinvest print cash flows to grow then NWOR has, in our view, the cleanest structure from which to do that.
NWOR’s cash is likely to be deployed into print assets at low valuations, or digital assets at higher valuations. Or, as we expect might be the case, a mix of both. In all scenarios, there is reasonable expectation of multiple and earnings expansion and a share price materially above where it is today. The current valuation must be viewed alongside a business with declining print revenues, but we still think this is particularly cheap given earnings should still grow through a combination of digital transition and continuous cost savings. If management can’t
find a transaction, then the business probably accumulates its market cap in net cash before the end of the decade. In our opinion, that is not a terrible downside.
Like Local World, we expect that an exit is the most likely route to value crystallisation. This could be to private equity looking for a cash generative stand‐alone asset, or an international print publishing group looking for an established and scalable digital platform to leverage their
existing titles. Timing is uncertain, but we do expect this will be a longer journey than management’s previous venture. We think that there are two key aspects to creating a strategically valuable enterprise here. The first is obviously the content itself – digital must be growing, profitable and have intrinsically valuable inventory, with the bonus of a highly cash generative print business in run‐off. The second is the digital infrastructure. We think that any buyer would be looking for a well‐structured, scalable, and portable digital publishing platform
which could be used as a vehicle to continue consolidating the space in the UK and
internationally.

[harry_david] 14/7/2022 09:34

The loss of Vijay, even delayed , means the only executive director with a clue is going and nobody with current industry knowledge is left. Vijay, thanks for what you have done.

[red ninja] 30/6/2022 19:15

Mr. Vaghela said: "Having overseen the PLC's establishment and commenced its transformation, the business is now on a strong financial footing and poised for its next phase of strategic development."

[hibberts] 30/6/2022 12:13

Two directors leaving?

[babscabs] 26/5/2022 06:40

NWOR National World in line update today .

Share prices has been drifting continuously lower down to a remarkable 20p level valuing the company circa 40 million .

Deduct cash of 21.5 million gives 18.5 million .

In line profits of circa 8-9 million gives PE of a crazy 2 .

Unlike Reach no pension deficit, It is to quote my old FD “clean as a whistle” .

It has great titles and a strong team and is not a declining business .

Looks like an anomaly to me but I was saying that at 30p !

[pansybeast] 20/5/2022 16:23

I've added a few, Given their fairly good recent up-date. plus they have 23m in cash. I can't see them needing a raise but yes, inflation and costs won't be receding for a while but the price could easily go lower, so DYOR, but if it does, i would take a full position. Tough market out there... Happy Hunting everyone!

[red ninja] 20/5/2022 10:50

I suppose there is uncertainty with inflation, interest rates rises and falling markets.

However, there should also be opportunity with acquisition targets perhaps being available at cheaper prices.

I've added a few too, but only time will tell if that was wise.

[aishah] 20/5/2022 07:42

Added here. Market has thrown this out of the bath water. Company metrics do not justify this rout.

[red ninja] 23/4/2022 12:40

Downing Strategic Micro Cap. I. T. March factsheet comment :-

National World (-0.8%) reported maiden results under our ownership.
The full year was a 10% upgrade versus consensus expectations which was pleasing. Both the print and digital business revenue performance was stronger than we expected. We continue to think that guidance is set conservatively here with cover price increases and stabilised ad revenues in print and the prospect of an exit run-rate of 200m average monthly page views. In addition, we expect the improved
conversion and monetisation of digital subscribers to play out through 2022. There are also significant further operating and tax savings to come through and £22 million of net cash to inorganically grow the business.