Us Special Opps Trust Share Discussion Threads

[praipus] 16/8/2012 20:36

Final payment through off to the WAM thread to reinvest.

[holliss] 20/2/2011 14:08

USPI get first prioity of assets up to a max 121p so will get all the net assets currently 40p. USPC will get nothing and the few zeros are a leftover 99% have been paid back and the rest will be taken in the new tax year and have already been accounted for.
They said they are not disposing until the last 3 months i.e. 1st March onwards. If the Russell2000 and the $ remain stable should get 40p. However if the $ falls 5% from 1.62 to 1.70 to the pound, that will knock that to 38p and vice versa. The strong pound is not helping these and has mitigated the recent Russell2000 rise.

[praipus] 18/2/2011 15:05

They've got until May and there must be quite a few options in terms of selling to other funds in the group, rolling into a new trust as well as market sales. £10m I would hope should not cause too much adverse movement...but you never know.

[envirovision] 18/2/2011 13:50

thanks Praipus wonder how the disposals are going, they must have sold a few since the last update.

[praipus] 18/2/2011 10:48

Yep 40p ish...hopefully, though as holliss says in post 8 they should be getting circa 121p!

Z's get circa 180p as per NAV statement, but they dont trade and there is only 200,000 anyway.

[envirovision] 18/2/2011 10:19

Praipus, do you see a 40p return here for people with the USPI shares or more?

Im struggling to work out the zeros, do zero holders get nothing, 120p or 180p ?

[praipus] 08/12/2010 11:20

Thank you. Please let me know of any error's or omissions on your travels.

[holliss] 08/12/2010 11:05

Yes you are correct, the first 121p of net assets go to USPI, so USPC are in effect worthless.
Your 'tracking the arbitragers' site is very good, just ploughing through their holdings now.

[praipus] 08/12/2010 09:51

Am I right in thinking the USPI rank before the capital shares USPC in a wind up situation?

And that in theory the USPI are owed £1.28 per share?

[praipus] 07/12/2010 21:16

zastas excellent....10p...isn't that great investing?

Similar experince with ECWC after Utilico (UTL also trade at a discount) bought a block at 25p (I bought nervously at 40p and all the way up!) the subsequent rally took them to £9...of course I didnt sell any then. The inevitable drift to £8-£6-then the 2007 and £4 followed before conversion to the current incarnation ECWO. ECWO (pays a dividend) trades at a nice discount to NAV but no short or medium term liquidation events to narrow it at the moment.

The trouble is there are many more failure and mistake stories which arent so easy to brag about. As you say we hope we learn from "too many mistakes".

USPI 9% in cash too so it's not a scary portfolio, from what I can see.

IWN Ishares Russell index chart added to header.

[zastas] 07/12/2010 20:40

USPI I bought as part of the great institutional sell-out bonanza of the splits, in 2002/3. I bought them at 10 pence, and then swithched some more funds into it in 2004 at about 40 pence I remember. As I said, somehow I didn't sell out completely in 2007; don't know quite why other than inertia.

Gerrards, yes I think they got taken over or absorbed; was it Singer& Friedlander? It didn't do me any good handing Nigel some of my cash; but then you hopefully learn from too many mistakes!

As you said, roll on May 2011; I feel like USPI is like an unruly outstayed-his-welcome guest to me! I notice they have moved 20% into an Ishare fund now; let's hope they can encash the illiquid bits on time without too much of a haircut.

[praipus] 07/12/2010 20:21

"Simple but not easy" comes to mind.

May I ask what caused you to buy these in the first place?

and what are the likely growth drivers that keep you here now?

Gerrards! Thats a name from the past what happened to them?

[zastas] 07/12/2010 19:02

Thanks Praipus. It's refreshed my memory and made me dream again about those glorious splits from 2003 onwards......... I was wrong then in that it launched in 2001, not 1999. Also according to the AITC graphic its NAV in April was actually above 60; so there's more sunshine suddenly.

Also intersetingly or not, one of the listed managers, Nigel Sidebottom, used to run an IT portfolio for me - and others too- at Gerrards, stockbrokers, in the mid-nineties. I thought there was a bit of unnecessary churn and thought I could do it better myself anyhow..... never regretted I moved those assets a year later.

[praipus] 07/12/2010 15:02

17% return between here and May 2011 doesnt seem too bad....all usual market/world risks allowing.

[zastas] 07/12/2010 14:32

Another buyer at 33, probably one of your illustrious cuastomers Praipus. It's moved the offer to 35.

I suppose for new investors there's a juicy worm at the end of USPI's rod. If, IF the NAV reaches the 50-55 pence ( currently about 40 ) again by winding-up date, not impossible I suppose, then it could mean a 50% quick return. So perhaps I should stop talking my residual holding down!

[zastas] 06/12/2010 16:59

Let us here remember the poor souls, RIP, or more likely institutions, who paid 100 pence for these, sometime in 1999 if my memory serves me correctly. Not to mention those who bought USPC ; from 100 pence to 0.5! Collective fees and admin in the millions though. At least the zeros weren't wiped out.
Who said property investment was bad?

[praipus] 06/12/2010 12:00

Well done on selling down 80% in 2007.

Roll on liquidation.

[zastas] 05/12/2010 14:39

Thanks. They can have mine if we get a little rally again. That is what I have still left, after thankfully selling 80% of them in Dec 2007, at/near its peak of about 90 pence. Even had a trade of 50.000 reversed, as it was 'against market-etiquette', by Selftrade, acting for the broker. Sold them the next day then.

Performance here has been awful; not so much the crash 07-09, but since then. Too small for viability. Too much in fees and admin costs, no matter how poor the results. No 'income'. Too illiquid and no good for PIs, unless available at huge discount to real NAV. At least that's my conclusion.

I'll be glad when it is liquidated in 2011.

[praipus] 03/12/2010 16:30

Thread following the arbitragers

[praipus] 03/12/2010 16:28

QVT, Weiss and Laxey

[zastas] 03/12/2010 16:15

Praipus, which ones?

[praipus] 24/11/2010 12:28

Some interesting shareholders here.

[praipus] 24/11/2010 12:18

Winding up of the Company is due on or around 31/05/11.