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The results were well recieved which is encouraging. But cost cutting, while great, is not a long term growth strategy. ! You could be right about waiting on others to fold. The Sunday business post is my favourite paper but its probably the weakest paper now and I notice the Sunday indo has beefed up its business offering considerable. There seems to be no floor newspaper sales won't break through and that's the main problem. Online must offset revenue decline in the traditional print or inm is in trouble. That's why I was disappointed with the online contribution in the results.
As I understand it, they are not charging at present for online content, hoping to raise the number of 'clicks' and profit from advertising. I doubt if they have sufficient exclusive content to justify a paywall. Further staffing cuts will probably lead to thinner content, so it's a problem. Really they need one or more competitors to fold, thus reducing the competition for ads and sales.
The contribution from online advertising is less than 10 mil. One third from grabone, which as the economy improves might not be as popular. Online revenue is a small percentage in the 320 mil total revenue. There seems to be nothing generated at all from online website content. Does it seperate out the profit from online anywhere in the accounts? if its at the 10% margin shown overall then online is miles away from being the saviour of inm. They badly need to find away to have customers pay for online content because 500,000 users contributing 1m to profits is not going to make up for falling hard copy profits.
The website is www.thephoenix.ie, but I think you have to subscribe to access content. It'll be in the shops until the 26th.
sorry, at 15p two sales of just under 20m each.
Some person or persons sold almost 60 million shares in Dublin today, at 16p (two sales of 10m) and 15p (two sales of just under 40m). Price recovered to 17p soon after.
I think the results were as expected and possible a bit better. But it was all about putting the breaks on. 2014 is the make or break year. By mid year they would need to show some signs that they have the ability to make money from digital content and print advertising. If they can't then they are in trouble. I have a long way to go before I break even but have no intention of averaging down and I have faith in DoB so I'll continue to hold and hope.
Could you post a link if you can? I couldn't find it....
Interesting piece in today's Phoenix, suggests V. Crowley's departure may be related to APN deal.
Am away at the moment so can't watch the results presentation. Just catching newspaper reports. If it as as it looks; circulation stabliised; print revenue slowing it's downward trend; and, growth in digital revenue.....then I think they have a fighting chance in the recovery. Initial thoughts are that I'm happy. I would say the Vincent Crowley was becoming increasingly lost in meetings about social media, digital advertising and had v soft paywall implementation........I really hope they don't replace one dinosaur with another........
The key line is that the rate of decline in advertising income has slowed - but not stopped. The company is running hard to stand still, more or less, in terms of profit. Competitors must be hurting too, though.
lots of selling in dublin today, disappointing results coming?
due thursday. Anyone know why Vincent Crowley is leaving? The announcement does not give the impression that they tried hard to dfissuade him.
Good point, but I actually don't think its quite accurate for two reasons: 1. DOB didn't have to issue shares to raise the money to take up the rights issue in APN. Whether or not, for example, the board of INM believed the share price of APN would bounce or not, this would still have been a big problem for INM to do. In effect, DOB can do what he likes with his own money. 2. Its possible that DOB may have anticipated that the share price of APN might go down after the capital raise. In my opinion, however, he probably didn't think about it at all. He is no doubt investing on a much less immediate timeframe….so the initial reaction is not important. The overall recovery of the company over a 3-5 year window is what matters. Then again, I haven't a clue what a guy like DOB thinks about anything…..
However, DOB evidently did not expect APN shares to crash, since he arranged to take up INM's rights on his own behalf.
I definitely don't think they will find the answer in circulation figures. They are never going up again. For anyone. I do think that if they can unlock the digital potential of their offering through recovering advertising spend, the significant reduction in costs and debt profile will hopefully see them move back to profit. Perhaps even the tiniest of dividends??? On the rights issue, thats a tricky one. If they had agreed to it, shareholders in INM would have thought this could mean another capital raise which would have really damaged INM with a tanking share-price. And there was no way of knowing the share price of APN would bounce as a result. Perhaps INM would have been the only people to take up their rights…..in that scenario they could have had the double whammy of a tanking share-price (INM) with a tanking investment (APN). Its all a bit of a lottery really. I still think, on balance, they made the right decision. I also this that the reaction of the INM share-price (basically, no reaction) confirms this. But each to their own….
Sure, they are doing most of the right things, but share price won't improve much until they produce a decent set of results. Irish market is still very depressed, circulations down again in today's figures. Still think it was a mistake to pass up the APN rights, would have been an instant 40% profit (rights shares issued at discount of 12 1/2 %). Also a bit disconcerting to see DOB grabbing the upside.
APN shares jumped 33% in Australia overnight when the trading halt was lifted. I think that both Denis O'Brien and INM made the right calls respectively. I've been through the restructuring plan for APN reasonably closely and it looks good. Cleaning up, selling off and focusing on a core business. Their debt profile is now reasonably low (2.7 x EBITDA I think) and the capital raise must have been a success (based on the fact that the shares jumped last night). I much prefer companies to focus mainly on a core business and either succeed/fail, rather than get dragged in multiple directions and get trapped in the quicksand of too much debt. Mostly though, I love the way that nobody bothers to post on this message board because INM is out of favor with investors. INM is now restructured (debt), slimed down (costs) and well-funded (capital raise). The holy trinity of restructuring. My gut tells me that this will swing sharply in favor of investors over the next 3-5 years.
It appears the APN rights shares which INM is not taking up, are being taken up instead by a vehicle owned by Denis O'Brien. Not sure how this works, but it sure is a smart deal for DOB.
It is disappointing that INM is not taking up its APN rights, dropping its share below 20%, i.e .relative insignificance. The banks could hardly lend an extra £20 million to INM, so soon after writing off 100 million plus, but INM shareholders would surely support a rights issue for a dilution of no more than 10-15%. One must presume that one of the major shareholders was not keen on putting in the cash, is somebody a bit stretched? As for future opportunities in the Irish market, hard to see any worth having.
seems to have run out of steam for the moment?
Don't see it going under 16.5c.............I feel euro equities are heading for 5yrs of positive growth,inm is heading for a min target of €2/3 with an optimistic target of €5.depending on APN's recovery..... This is an impossible target viewed from were we're standing now ,so I am not looking for an educated debate. I am also not trying to ramp, so please don't take this as encouragement ,I am an insane gambler. And so it was written! gla january2014
In spite of the restructuring and large issue of new shares, the true free float is relatively small. Remember Denis O'B holds just under 30% and won't be selling, D. Desmond has another 15%, ditto, pension fund has I think 5 %, banks have 10% which may be sold down over time but prob not yet, Tony O'Reilly another 7%, ditto: adds up to almost 70% fairly firmly held - and then there are DOB's camp followers, probably responsible for most of the recent buying. So it doesn't take much buying to push the price up, and a significant drop is unlikely unless there are bad results (which of course is possible, but then you might not wish to buy).
I could only recommend against it. I did the same for about 2 weeks with this stock. Always trying to pick up a 1 cent lower etc. Every day it rose and I ended up losing about 33% percent of what I could of bought. You might be lucky to pick up a 17 dip, but today was actually the worst I've seen the stock in a while. There was a sudden drop early today but if you look at the volume. It was a under 100quid sale. 5 years, I could not possibly predict. Wild guessing at it's best. It's far too long to consider in the changing/shrinking industry. I expect 4-6 months, perhaps 30-40 cents. An increasing trend for 1.5-2 years. then I'm just guess.