Small Cap Value Report (17 Feb 2015) - SHFT, MEC, PTD, SPH, HSP

17th Feb '15 by Paul Scott

10 comments 15891 reads

Good morning!

Firstly a couple of investor events to mention. People sometimes complain that everything seems to be in London, so just for a change here is an event in Manchester, on Wed 25 Feb, starting at 12:30 lunchtime. The event is a private investor lunch with VP (LON:VP.) which is free to attend, but you have to book in using this link. The company is a group of niche equipment hire businesses, is consistently profitable & dividend paying. It's on my watch list, and is starting to look reasonably priced again. Hence my being happy to mention this event here.

A tech event hosted by Bloomberg in London, is on 12 Mar, organised by David Stredder, with some excellent keynote speakers, including Mark Slater, who's always well worth listening to in my opinion, so I shall be attending this event. The booking link is here. This one has a small charge, which is even smaller using a special discount code that we secured for our readers - that code is DISCSTOCK (now corrected. Sorry it was incorrect earlier).

Shaft Sinkers Holdings (LON:SHFT)

Suspension - We wave a tearful goodbye today to this African excavator, as the shares are suspended with any remaining shareholders suffering a 100% loss, as expected. The company says;

This is likely to be one of many small resources stocks that de-list. Not before time, as there have been dozens of no-hopers clogging up the market for the last few years. So a good clear-out will make it a lot easier to focus on the good companies. Sorry if that sounds uncharitable, but there we go, capitalism is all about the survival of the fittest.

Mecom (LON:MEC)

De-listing - This European newspaper group also de-lists today, with the shares no longer trading from 8am today. Shareholders will receive 155p per share in cash, in an agreed takeover which has dragged on quite a while since being announced on 30 Jun 2014.

This looks a good outcome for shareholders, given that the company's shares were as low as 30p in 2013, and I recall trading being poor in Holland some time ago.

Pittards (LON:PTD)

Share price: 135p
No. shares: 9.3m
Market Cap:…

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hassaan1

17th Feb '15

Paul, the discount code for the bbg event doesn't seem to work.

Paul Scott

Hi Hassaan1,

My apologies, I got it the wrong way around. The correct discount code for Mello Bloomberg is DISCSTOCK.

Regards, Paul.

Thanks Paul, works fine now.

CliveBorg

http://www.bloomberg.com/bw/articles/2014-02-27/in-europe-dirty-coal-makes-a-comeback

Reference Hargreaves Services, I've read recently that the use of coal is actually increasing globally. Germany for example, has recently commissioned new coal fired power stations. Therefore I think it's possible that coal is not yet in terminal decline, and there are still huge reserves of the stuff, that might yet outlast oil. Is there a possibility that Hargreaves Services could benefit from this increasing demand, via exports?

hayashi22

PP writes in his piece on Hargreaves that EU policy has led the Uk Govt to schedule the closure of a number of coal- fired power stations.
CliveBorg writes that Germany for eg has recently commissioned new coal fired power stations.
I'm somewhat confused!

cig

Might be emission targets, that each member state can achieve however they like. Some coal + carbon capture is not a bad choice for green(ish) base load.

Besides it looks like the UK's domestically self-imposed target (-30% by 2020, -80% by 2050, from 1990 levels) is higher than the EU's (-20% by 2020)...

jpep

UK Coal fired plant is very ageing and is constrained in the number of hours it can operate due to high pollution levels ("acid rain"). A number of years ago most coal fired plant made the decision not to fit expensive flue gas desulphurisation and other abatement equipment. If they had, they would have been able to run longer. On top of this, all Greenhouse Gas (CO2) policy is geared towards making coal an expensive form of electricity generation. Eg. in 2014 we have seen the closure of Didcot A as it reached the end of its life. The market for coal in the UK is in terminal decline. But this may well be prolonged. As for Europe, Germany did indeed expand coal plants in the last few years due to decisions to phase out nuclear. Their coal plant is therefore much newer and will last many more years despite large contributions of CO2 to the atmosphere. I am pretty sure that vast majority of the German coalers will have long term contracts in place to secure their supplies although I noticed that a significant percentage comes from Russia! Looking at the annual report Hargreaves does have a European operation but its pretty small scale compared to the UK.

18th Feb '15

I'm sure the Uk will 'obey' the relevant EU rules to disadvantage ourselves whilst other nations decide what rules suit and what don't. The rush to solar and particularly wind has been crazy in my view-who wants to live next to a wind turbine? .But clearly good news for the Labour supporting guy who runs Ecocity? who has made himself a £100m fortune on the back of subsidies from the taxpayer!

Rusty2

The problem with wind turbines is you need wind for them to work, even when there is wind many dont seem to be turning, if we are dependent on wind what would happen if we had a few still days, we would run out of electric? Because they cant store large amounts of electric, much is wasted at times of low usage like at night. The other problem is reliabilty with gearbox failures.

20th Feb '15

I think this is perhaps not the right forum as it rather impinges on politics. Anyway I note that the second biggest donation to Labour Party funds is indeed Ecotricity-set up by an ex hippy whose name escapes me.Think he is being sued by his ex wife. The economics of this wind farm operation are essentially based on subsidies (paid for by the tax payer) -most of his wind farms were built during the previous Labour government. Guess its pay back time.

Small Cap Value Report (17 Feb 2015) - SHFT, MEC, PTD, SPH, HSP

Shaft Sinkers Holdings (LON:SHFT)

Mecom (LON:MEC)

Pittards (LON:PTD)

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Paul Scott

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