Hargreaves Lansdown: Consensus estimates are too low, but HL is not significantly undervalued unless material cost savings can be realised.

Hargreaves Lansdown is the St James’s Place of retail investment platforms. It has scale and brand, which have enduring value, but, in our view, just the wrong price structure, which it cannot address without killing its own profitability. In current corporate form we see a low single-digit growth business, in the middle of a major technology upgrade, which looks cheap prima facie, given the 11x next year multiple and the 5.4% prospective yield, but which DCF valuation suggests is not. We are mi

Molten Ventures - Forward Partners deal completed

Molten Ventures has recently completed the acquisition of Forward Partners, which allowed Molten to further broaden its portfolio, add a complementary strategy focused on earlier stage companies and potentially provide a pipeline of new core holdings. Furthermore, its recent equity raise gave Molten the funds to pursue new investments in what it currently considers a buyer’s market, with an emphasis on the venture capital (VC) secondary market. In FY24 (to end-March 2024), Molten’s gross portfol

LIBERUM: Investment Platforms: Initial thoughts on the Dear CEO letter

Regional REIT - Performing as expected ahead of refinancing

In a challenging market, Regional REIT’s (RGL’s) FY23 operational and financial performance was robust, in line with expectations and previous guidance. Investor focus remains on the company’s loan to value (LTV) reduction and bond refinancing plans, explored in detail in our previous note and RGL will provide an update on this in due course.

Temple Bar – Foundations for success

We are now more than three years into the tenure of Ian Lance and Nick Purves as managers of the Temple Bar Investment Trust. In that time, the Redwheel team has aimed to establish a well-diversified portfolio of value-orientated holdings, which it says is positioned for a long-overdue reversion to more normal market conditions, after a decade of what the managers believe was exceptional economic policy and quantitative easing. They say that slowing growth and stubborn inflation in the UK have w

Avation - Exercise of ATR 72 purchase rights underpins long-term growth strategy

Avation is a lessor of 34 commercial aircraft to a diversified client base of 16 airlines. This morning, the group has provided an update on its aircraft purchasing strategy, reporting the exercise of purchase rights for 10 ATR 72 aircraft for delivery between Q4 2025 to Q1 2028, which will follow the delivery of two new ATR 72 aircraft in the coming months already on order. In addition, AVAP has been granted new purchase rights and extended its remaining rights for 24 further ATR 72 aircraft, w

Morning Note – 3 May 2024

Foresight Sustainable Forestry

Foresight Sustainable Forestry (FSF) has a long-term strategy aimed at capitalising on the value of existing forested land and the value that can be generated by converting land to forestry. The majority of total returns are expected to come from capital growth, although timber sales and carbon credits are expected to generate some income. Dividends are expected to be irregular and are not expected to be a selling point of the trust. FSF has clear sustainability and ESG credentials, especially v

Murray Income

MUT continues its impressive streak of consecutive dividend increases hitting half a century in 2023…

LIBERUM: DF Capital: Strong momentum carrying into FY 24

Hardman & Co Insight: 2023 was an annus horribilis for Quoted UK Infrastructure and Renewable Energy

The focus of Hardman & Co Research is on the nine quoted Infrastructure Investment Companies (IICs) and on the 22 Renewable Energy Infrastructure Funds (REIFs): the stocks analysed are all members of the Association of Investment Companies (AIC). We are updating our publication of January 2023, assessing both the lacklustre share price performances during 2023 and the key issues, including interest rates, inflation and power prices. As a 31-strong group, its combined market capitalisation is no

Hybridan Research: Sector Review: Artificial intelligence in UK cybersecurity: the human uplift 17/04/2024

Artificial intelligence (AI) is a double-edged sword in cybersecurity. Whilst new AI models, architectures, and innovations are emerging to protect the security posture of organisations, attackers are also benefiting from deepfakes, sophisticated phishing, and automation of malicious codes. To ensure the impact of AI on cybersecurity to be a net-positive, we need to pit good AI against bad AI. Point solutions enhanced with machine learning: Global cybersecurity has been built with point soluti

REMA - Zoning in on Zonal Pricing

Zonal pricing is now under consideration for implementation in the GB power market. While this is very much not a given, this note summarises the key reports on its potential impacts. We find that while there is an overall reduction in revenues across generation, this may be less than originally predicted and new regional price differences and timing differences may favour storage in Scotland and delay new gas plant construction nationally. We think this later second order impact improves the en

Mining Monthly: April Edition

What you need to know: • Following a big breakout in March, gold pressed on hitting new all-time highs, however, lost steam and fell towards the end of the month up just 2% in April. Silver outperformed gold, being up 5% on the month. • Copper held its big gains from early in the month, up 13% to $4.6/lb. However, copper equities lagged, being up only 8%. • We continue to see substantial M&A activity in the sector and have consolidated some transactions as of late in Figure 1. We view M&A as a

Morning Note – 2 May 2024