Good morning! I'll trot through about eight trading statement/results this morning for small caps (which I loosely define as under £200m market caps), as I'm then jumping on a train into London, to attend the Cenkos/Shares Magazine investor forum, which has a lot of interesting companies attending.
The (healthy and overdue) market correction is likely to continue today, with a nasty session overnight in the USA, so at the moment FTSE 100 Futures are indicating an open down 36 points at 6,428. I must look at some larger caps actually, as the FTSE 100 has really gone nowhere overall in about 15 years, whereas smaller/mid caps have gone through the roof in the past two years. So the bargains may well now be more at the top end than the bottom? That said, there are always overlooked & unloved small caps to be unearthed, and finding them is so much fun, it's like doing a puzzle, and so exciting when you uncover a nugget of gold!
Walker Greenbank (LON:WGB)
This luxury furnishings group reports positive trading today. H2 (to 31 Jan 2014) has been stronger than H1;
...adjusted profit before tax for the year is expected to be ahead of the top end of analyst forecasts.
Group sales are expected to be 3.4% ahead of last year at £78m, so they are talking good, rather than stellar figures by the sounds of it. Nothing is said about the outlook, although one assumes it must be fairly solid as economies recover.
As you can see from the Stockopedia graphical history below, the company has rebuilt profits after a difficult credit crunch, although the PER has been getting steadily more expensive, and the dividend yield deteriorating. To my mind this means that the share price has correctly accounted for improving performance by rising, hence on a current PER of around 15, in my opinion the share price looks about right, with fairly limited short term upside.
Portmeirion makes a higher operating profit margin, pays a better dividend, and is on a lower PER, so that would be my pick in the luxury goods area, although it's pottery as opposed to home furnishings for WGB, so a bit different.
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