Good morning! Paul & Graham are here with you today. Today's report is now finished.

Agenda - 

Paul's Section:

Ted Baker (LON:TED) - an agreed cash takeover bid is announced at 110p, only an 18% premium. The 3 biggest shareholders (including the founder) have agreed it, so the company's trading and outlook can't be much good. This was not a convincing turnaround, so maybe this is a lucky escape for shareholders?

Sopheon (LON:SPE) (up 5% at c.550p - mkt cap £58m) [no section below] - announces a $11.2m, 5-year contract, with the US Navy’s submarines. It “will help to underpin financial goals for current and future years”, so forecasts not being raised at this stage. Sopheon always looks promising, but its profits have reduced every year since 2019, and only $0.8m PBT is forecast for FY 12/2022. So it’s certainly not a value share. Although longer-term, this could be an interesting company. Today’s contract win certainly sounds impressive as a reference for winning other business. If you like the company, then you can buy this share at half the price it was a year ago.

Smartspace Software (LON:SMRT) - H1 trading update today is in line with expectations. Still loss-making, but it seems to have enough cash (just), and cost control is mentioned. For such a tiny company, it seems to have lots of moving parts - different divisions/products, and operating in various countries. Despite some reservations, I think the share price shedding c.75% of last year's peak valuation, has brought it down to a more reasonable valuation which might be worth a little dabble at some point. Acceleration in growth is now key - if that happens, then the shares could do well. If it doesn't, then they might continue drifting down.  

Tribal (LON:TRB) - interim results don't impress me at all. Too many adjustments that seem to recur each year, so genuine profit doesn't look much for the high market cap. Also I dislike the weak balance sheet, poor cash generation, and wobbly-sounding outlook statement. Risk:reward looks poor to me. Although sticky customers, with recurring revenues, could be attractive to a bidder - software companies often attract perplexingly high takeover bids. Or did anyway, in the latest tech boom. 

Castings (LON:CGS) - a reassuring trading update today, shows that CGS is coping well with supply…

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