Author: Shawn Hickman
PPS +10.57%: the independent investment platform provided an impressive 4th quarter update today despite a small fall in the 3 months. Total Funds Under Administration (FUA) at the end of the year was $40.5b, up 10% over the year despite most asset classes falling in the period. FUA fell 4% in the quarter as inflows of $300m were more than offset by a negative investment performance of $1.5b.
BGA was thumped -8.5% yesterday after delivering a profit warning caused by rising Victorian milk prices – the downgrade equated to ~8.6% basically exactly what the stock fell. There’s plenty of conjecture in the press overnight around how this news may have been leaked earlier allowing 3 brokers to downgrade the stock on June 20th however from our perspective all we care about is whether BGA is now presenting good value as it plunges towards $3.
Elon Musk recently announced his intention to walk away from his $US44bn takeover bid for Twitter (TWTR US), the April bid of $US54.20 now looks extremely rich in today’s value contraction environment – the NYFANG Index has tumbled well over 20% since his bid. Clearly Musk’s timing was awful and the world’s richest man now has a legal battle on his hands after throwing in some fairly lightweight reasons to justify the bids withdrawal, on paper this might be one step too far for this often eccentric billionaire who we believe is still very much on the proverbial TWTR hook.
EML -24.61%: a difficult day for the pre-paid card company after their CEO resigned. There was little explanation given for Tom Cregan’s abrupt departure other than the decision being made by mutual agreement. The role has been filled with EML board member Emma Shand taking on the MD & CEO role.
ZIP -5.22%: UBS cut their price target for the BNPL stock in half yesterday which put pressure on the stock today. The analyst talked to higher bad debts and the strategies put in place to limit the issue potentially doing the opposite. While bad debts in the retail arms of banks are decreasing, BNPL has been experiencing the opposite.
EML +10.51%: a strong day for the payment card company, initially catching a bid with the broader tech sector, but spurred on with a strong contract win. Tech was well bid today as investors added duration to portfolios with bond yields falling. Mid-morning, EML announced it had secured a deal with Spain’s postal service to supply 500k preloaded cards, each with €500, totaling around $320m worth of deposits.
Supermarket operator COL delivered a solid result in April with sales growth driven by accelerating inflation, everything looks solid over the next year or two with COL but it will need population growth to expand meaningfully moving forward. The stock is not particularly cheap trading on an Est P/E of 23.9x for 2022 but a sustainable 3.4% fully franked yield makes it relatively easy to be patient if concerns are growing towards much of the ASX.
BHP and Woodside have agreed a deal whereby Woodside will acquire BHP’s Petroleum business. BHP shareholders will receive payment in WPL shares with BHP shareholders set…
