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[p1nkfish] 23/10/2019 21:09

You mention Brexit, wasnt Mills UKIP Treadurer at one point?
Do quite like the idea he's not pure establishment and more of a swashbuckler.

[p1nkfish] 23/10/2019 20:55

Agree with both of you. This is a keeper and I follow Mills with interest. Mifid2 will have done him a favour with small and madcap becoming even less well researched.

[topvest] 23/10/2019 20:41

NAS is an excellent trust if you look at the annual compound returns which are not too far off Warren Buffet levels. It's always traded on a big discount and is probably wider now due to Brexit and the fact that small company trusts are coming off late cycle. They tend to get hit more in aa recession. Personally, I'm looking to significantly increase my position in a year or so when we are in a bear market. Christopher Mills has a fantastic track record. The always on a discount nature of this trust is due to the dominant influence of him, the low profile and lack of meaningful dividend. The trust will probably get wound up when he retires / dies. He's the sort of entrepeneur that will keep doing deals until his last days I suspect, so could be another 20 years of stellar growth to come. Think he's in his 60s already and hope he keeps going for many years to come!

[robsy2] 23/10/2019 19:44

I’ve been having a closer look at NAS. It looks very cheap at the moment .Why?
• It’s trading on a discount of 29%.
• The Z-score of -2.74 suggests NAS is particularly cheap compared with its own valuation history.
• The company now has a buy back policy .
• We are getting a dividend
• The track record is excellent (especially of late) compared to its peer group, see below.
• The TER is 1%

What intrigues me is that the discount has been widening. I can’t see any special problems with the trust and am a bit mystified.

I have done a few back of the envelope calculations. NAS has 14.2 million share in issue, a MCAP of 429m and NAV of 595m..

I did a bit of stock screening and of the 761 trusts on sharepad it comes in at #44 in terms of discount and believe me there are a lot of oddball trusts in the leading positions . If you start to filter a bit more by filtering out anything with a mcap under 50m , and anything with a positive z- score you get down to 167 trusts . It is 10/167 in terms of z-score value, I haven’t looked too deeply into this but at first glance most of the stuff ranked above NAS looks dodgy. NAS ranks 13/167 in terms of discount.
Within its peer group, UK and global small caps it is the clear winner on both fronts 1/ 14 .
So , it looks cheap, as we who post here already know, but I think it is probably even better than we think, because 16.5% of NAS assets are (or were until very recently) USD T-Bills. So, if we strip out the 98m of T-bills from the market cap we are left with 331m of MCap, if we take it off the NAV we get NAV 595-98= 497.
It follows that the effective discount stripping out the T-Bills if now 33%. This is unduly cheap. This trust deserves a better rating than it has. The Buyback can only help.
That’s it. Happy to hold quite a few of these already and I know I am preaching to the converted, but I thought I’d share it with you . Please let me know if I’ve made some dreadful error in my thinking here .

[p1nkfish] 17/9/2019 18:22

From May 2019, "hopeful".

"The Directors are hopeful that some of the Company's investments will see corporate activity over the coming year and that the year ending 31 January 2020 will see a further rise in the Company's net asset value."

[p1nkfish] 16/9/2019 17:48

If I remember correctly last results said they expected further NAV appreciation by Jan 2020. Discount only likely to widen in that case.

[robsy2] 16/9/2019 16:42

More progress from the trust . Biggest holding is USD T bills which shows a bit of caution and that he is ready to deploy capital. Typically smart move holding T Bills given the strength of USD.
The buy back is sensible as well though the discount seems as wide as ever. Why buy new holdings when you can buy more of the existing ones at a huge discount?

[p1nkfish] 02/8/2019 08:48

It reads as having been going on from 2010.
Doubt there is anything left to fight over once HMRC is made good.

Audits, what are they good for in this case?

[loglorry1] 27/7/2019 14:43

Not sure Mills should be defending Goals that much given the what went on there. Having said that the damage is done and Mills probably wants to extract what value he can. SPD also probably want to get anything left on the cheap.

FWIW I too think it's unlikely only a single person knew what was going on at Goals.

The only positive I suppose is that Mills and SPD seem to think it's worth getting annoyed about, suggesting there might be something worth fighting over.

[topvest] 27/7/2019 12:45

When it comes down to who you would side with Mr Mills or Mr Ashley, it would definitely be the former. Good that he told him to get lost!

[p1nkfish] 27/7/2019 08:49

Plain talking not appreciated by SPD.

Personally never liked the idea of Goals but Mr Mills defends aggressively.

[rambutan2] 26/7/2019 21:32

Made me smile. From SPD late release results. Certainly not a great investment for Mr Mills and us, but nice to know that our manager is more than a match for Mr Ashley!

Widely publicised accounting irregularities have been found at Goals. We have strongly urged the board to allow an independent investigation on our and other independent shareholders behalf to take place as soon as possible to restore trust in the business. We were assured by members of the board that the cause of the accounting irregularities was confined to one person. However, given the significant size of these irregularities and the timeframe over which they took place we need to understand whether the problem is wider than one individual acting alone. Based on many examples, including the recent case of Patisserie Valerie, these matters are always more pervasive than one individual acting alone. To date the Board of the company has stonewalled our requests for an independent investigation repeatedly. We are particularly concerned that the second largest shareholder, Chris Mills, is also a non-executive director and thus has access to more information and insight than is available to Sports Direct as largest shareholder, this simply cannot be right in a matter so serious.

Based on the lack of engagement in this key matter, alongside our general concerns on the pervasive nature of irregularities, we as the biggest shareholder elected to vote against all resolutions including the reappointment of board members. The result of the AGM was in favour of the status quo despite our opposition and the evidence before the market's eyes, however the foul mouthed tirade and aggressive posturing of Chris Mills to the Sports Direct representative, attending the AGM and asking completely legitimate questions, was extremely unprofessional and unbecoming of a listed business to any representative let alone one from its biggest shareholder.

[p1nkfish] 15/7/2019 16:01

Ossian, yes.

[robsy2] 15/7/2019 13:07

Great names as well.
R2

[p1nkfish] 15/7/2019 12:08

Interesting to see Moncrieffe family buys.

[nimbo1] 11/7/2019 12:01

bought in this morning.

[p1nkfish] 01/7/2019 23:45

Was stated clearly they expected further NAV increase by next January. Good to see he action to help close the gap.

[steve3sandal] 01/7/2019 22:40

Indeed. Transactions today look like buys all day. I was surprised Cap Gearing sold down 190k of shares last week but I presume that did allow NAS to BB 132k. They are intent on buying back 1.4m in round numbers and that is quite aggressive given normal daily volumes. The share price has to close towards NAV. If successful I think they might repeat the trick next year too, another 10%. Long term holder but I doubled up around £30 when they announced this and I wish I’d bought a few more! GLA.

[p1nkfish] 01/7/2019 21:13

Looks like the buyback is in swing.
Every chance we move through the all time high if this continues.

[loglorry1] 02/6/2019 21:37

Sorry I need glasses I think! Msg deleted.

[p1nkfish] 02/6/2019 10:42

Management CHARGE.
Actually it's not that bad so long as it keeps heading as it is.

[p1nkfish] 31/5/2019 21:29

I topped up by a decent amount yesterday. The treasuries are a bit of a comfort added to Mills ability and the way the annuals read. Just a shame about the management charge but quality is rarely cheap.

[p1nkfish] 31/5/2019 21:25

About 19% discount to NAV currently, a NAV they expect to rise over the next 8 months.

Interesting to see how much it pulls back and how long for given the buyback. You might find yourself fighting the company for stock.

[topvest] 31/5/2019 21:15

I'm waiting for a good top-up point. It will be a good performer long-term. Nice to start getting dividends as well, now that the P&L deficit is gone.