AIM

PLUS500 – the Last Word (Hopefully)

I have been meaning to write something on Plus500, an Israeli based provider of CFD trading, for some time. This may be the last opportunity. It is listed on AIM and was discussed at the last ShareSoc Masterclass in Peterborough, with different opinions on it from panel members. Today (1/6/2015) it has become the subject of an agreed cash offer from Playtech at 400p per share, which surely investors in the company will accept. They may be happy to get out ...

Chinese AIM Companies – Sorbic et al

A good letter in the Financial Times today (29/5/2015) from Sorbic investor John Gunn about how AIM rules have failed to protect shareholders. He said it is "a terrible state of affairs" and suggested the AIM regulations had failed completely to protect shareholders. Sorbic International (SORB) is an AIM listed Chinese company which has encountered major governance and legal problems and its shares have been suspended. To quote from the latest RNS, after the board fired Mr Wang Yan Ting, the CEO: "Since ...

Two more AIM Exits – Ludorum and Armour Group

Two more departures from AIM were recently announced - Ludorum (LUD) and Armour Group (AMR). Ludorum have been developing a market for their animated children's TV series based on Chuggington trains and associated consumer products. But revenue has never really taken off as investors hoped. Along with the interim results announced on the 15th December (again somewhat disappointing), the company announced a proposed delisting from AIM.  These are the reasons given in the announcement: The factors taken into consideration by the Directors in ...

AIM is no longer a dog, but the mastiffs are the winners

There was an interesting analysis of the performance of AIM stocks in a recent "AIM Journal", a publication sponsored by Finncap.  As others have pointed out, AIM finally changed course after a long streak of poor performance, and the AIM index actually beat both the FTSE-100 and FTSE-250 indices in 2013.If you had invested in the AIM index back when it was formed back in 1996, even with dividends reinvested  you would still be losing money. And that is the case ...

Are AIM tech company directors underpaid?

Grant Thornton have published a report which says that AIM technology company directors do not pay themselves as much as in other AIM companies. Author Amanda Flint suggests the former might feel themselves undervalued and move elsewhere.According to the report, the average total pay package for AIM technology company chief executives was £383,000 last year. That is less than half the average pay across all sectors. And only 36% of technology CEOs received share-based awards compared with 60% of main market ...

The level of speculation in AIM stocks

How much speculation is there in AIM stocks? Quite a lot based on some figures recently published in a FinnCap newsletter. “Speculation” might be defined as a short term bet on a share price rising or falling. That’s the opposite of “investment” where someone takes a view on the medium to long term returns from investing in a company. These are the figures published by Finncap for the ten most traded AIM stocks in September – based on the percentage of the overall ...

Real Good Food – an example of poor AIM corporate governance

Chris Spencer-Phillips, a ShareSoc Director, attended the AGM of Real Good Food last week. This is typical of many AIM companies in that it has very poor corporate governance. They have an Executive Chairman, who refused to answer the questions from a shareholder at the meeting. In addition they have pay which is wildly out of line with the profitability and general size of the company. That includes £798k (including consultancy fees) to the Chairman, plus share options; and one of ...