This blog gives you the latest topical news plus some informal comments on them from ShareSoc’s directors and other contributors. These are the personal comments of the authors and not necessarily the considered views of ShareSoc. The writers may hold shares in the companies mentioned. You can add your own comments on the blog posts, but note that ShareSoc reserves the right to remove or edit comments where they are inappropriate or defamatory.

Blinkx AGM Report – Was it a black swan event?

At the Blinkx AGM today the events of the last year were various described by the management as a “black swan event”, “one in a 1000 years”, and “a perfect storm”. That probably echoed the emotions of shareholders after the Edelman blog, the attack by shorters, the resulting collapse in the share price, and the subsequent profits warning that caused it to fall by a further 60%. The share price peaked at 230p in November 2013 and is now 35p, so needless to say there were a number of grumbles from shareholders at the meeting.

I will not go into details of past events at the company because they have been well reported on our blogs and in our Members Newsletter.

There is a detailed four-page report on this meeting here. The meeting no doubt helped to explain some aspects of past events to shareholders present, and apparently the company is considering share buy-backs.

Is this a temporary hiccup or are there major trends in the industry that are moving in the wrong direction for the company? Are buyers of advertising being put off by the general reputational damage of the Edelman blog, and will this recover as the story fades into history? We will have to wait and see for answers to those questions it seems, as it is not clear that the board knows them.

I do think the board and major shareholders have to ask whether they have the right Chairman and CEO to put things right though (that’s a personal opinion of course).

Roger Lawson

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.