2014 – The Great Irish Share Valuation Project (Final – Part X)

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Aer Lingus Group, Dalata Hotel Group, Donegal Investment Group, Escher Group Holdings, Irish Residential Properties REIT, Irish shares, Irish Stock Exchange, Irish value investing, ISEQ, Karelian Diamond Resources, Mainstay Medical International, TGISVP, The Great Irish Share Valuation Project, TVC Holdings, Zamano

Continued from here:

[NB: Worth revisiting Part I if you’re a new reader, or you’d like a refresher on TGISVP & my approach to the whole project.]

OK, it’s the final furlong..! This should be my last TGISVP post – that will make it a grand total of 80 Irish companies, all covered in very random order since February. Except this last post – I deliberately withheld DCP:ID & ZMNO:ID ’til I got around to posting separate write-ups for each, plus I’ve only just added another 3 (recent) Irish IPOs. I also debated including 3 other vaguely ‘Irish’ stocks, but decided (somewhat arbitrarily) against them in the end…

[FYI, my 3 rejections were:

– Kennady Diamonds (KDI:CN):   Dermot Desmond has long been involved here – he currently owns a 17.5% stake & the Chairman Jonathan Comerford’s actually an investment manager with IIU. However, the company has no other Irish connections, and I’ve never noticed any kind of Irish PI/institutional following for the stock.

– Kennedy Wilson Europe Real Estate (KWE:LN):   KWE’s a new fund launched by Kennedy-Wilson Holdings (KW:US), focused on investing primarily in real estate & real estate loans in the UK, Ireland & Spain. While the fund’s already completed a chunky Irish acquisition, one would expect Irish assets will ultimately be the smallest component of the portfolio (considering the relative size of the UK/Spanish economies & property markets).

– Metro Baltic Horizons (MET:LN):  MET’s another of those funds launched back in 2006 – focused on property development in the Baltic States & St. Petersburg, and targeting a minimum 25% IRR. Aaah, those were the days, eh..?! Garrett Kelleher & Dermot Desmond/IIU (again!) originally backed the company (with a 27% stake between them), and after some farcical/fraudulent events along the way, the board’s now comprised of a senior IIU executive & two other Irish directors. MET has become a cash/litigation shell & a suspension of its listing’s now imminent – but we should hopefully see some new proposals (inc. a continuation of MET’s listing) from the board shortly.]

So, without any further ado – let’s dive right in & finish up:

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2013 – The Great Irish Share Valuation Project (Part V)

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Abbey plc, Better Capital, Big Pharma, CPL Resources, Gallaghers, Glanbia, ICON, Irish shares, Irish value investing, Jon Moulton, milk quotas, STV Group, TGISVP, The Great Irish Share Valuation Project, TVC Holdings, UTV Media

Continued from here. Let’s take the next batch:

Company:   ICON

Prior Post:   Here

Ticker:   ICLR:US

Price:   USD 28.43

ICON’s starting to fire on all cylinders again, as I correctly anticipated. Well, except for the share price…but I’m sure investors aren’t complaining! 😉 Last year, the company was squeezed between (virtually) zero growth in its existing contract revenues & the challenges/expenses of ramping up to meet some v large contract wins. Operating margins, even on a pre-exceptional basis, had fallen to near-zero – but valuing ICLR on that basis would clearly have been incorrect. It seemed reasonable to presume margins would return to 10%+ as new contract revenues/margins matured.

The Great Irish Share Valuation Project V

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Better Capital, Dart Group, FL Partners, Irish Continental, Jon Moulton, Marketspreads, Paddy Power, Pageant Holdings, Petroneft Resources, Ryanair, Siteserv, Smurfit Kappa, TGISVP, Total Produce, Tullow Oil, TVC Holdings, United Drug, UTV Media, Worldspreads, Zamano

Continued from here:

Before tackling the next batch of stocks, some readers may want to revisit my first TGISVP post. This project’s not about doing a detailed writeup/valuation on each stock. Sure, I spend ample time on each stock (on a best efforts basis)**, but less than if I were making an investment and/or doing a detailed writeup. That’s why I label these rough and ready valuations! On average, yes I’d expect detailed and rough & ready valuations to be similar, but ‘average‘ is key here..! Take a closer look at any company, and my new valuation could be (possibly significantly) higher, lower or unchanged vs. my original valuation.

What this project is designed to do: i) Illustrate the wide variety of valuation assumptions/approaches that can be applied depending on each individual company/situation, and ii) provide a cheatsheet to highlight the potentially best (and worst!) Irish stocks, on an absolute (or relative) basis, that may merit further research and potential purchase/sale.

How About Another Catalyst? (Part V)

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activist investors, Bill Ackman, Carl Icahn, Chapman Capital, Daniel Loeb, Eddie Lampert, Free Capital, Guy Wyser-Pratte, IIU, Laxey, QVT, SEC Edgar, TVC Holdings, Weiss

Continued from here:

iv) Activist Investors are the next catalyst I’d like to highlight. Obviously, there’s no well-defined timeline involved here, but considering the approach of most hedge funds (who comprise the majority of activists) and their return expectations, a timeline of 6 months to 2 years.

Activists targeting asset discounts/realizations will tend to have a shorter holding period, while activists seeking operational change are usually forced to adapt to a longer investment horizon. With the multitude of investment trusts and companies listed in London, activists have generally focused on the former type of operation, while elsewhere in the world they focus more on significant operational changes/improvements to a business.