Jsedirect With Simon Brown

Simon Shares Shoprite* (JSE code: SHP) trading update sees full year profits down. But the real point is that the second half of the year was way better than the first half as they fixed DC and IT issues and had no further strike action. But it is still tough with lots of products in deflation which is squeezing margins. Massmart (JSE code: MSM) update was a shocker with Game bleeding like crazy. Not a surprise, but as Nic Norma-Smith said on Twitter "Wal-Mart paid $2.3bn for 52% of Massmart in 2010. Today the stake is worth $370m.". Ouch. NFEMOM*, the ABSA momentum ETF has been flying and is almost +20% year-to-date and just behind the S&P500 and best over last year (of indices, local and sub, that I track). I always like momentum and when ABSA changed the methodology of this ETF I switched my personal momentum portfolio into the ETF. Just as I did this everybody claimed momentum was dead, and the ETF struggled. But momentum never dies, even when (if?) value ever comes back, those value stocks will gain

Simon Shares Kumba (JSE code: KIO) results saw production down, but with the average selling price up 57% at US$108 / tonne - they shot the lights out. But this is surely the top here? Rumours are that Vale has iron ore on the water heading for China and slower Chinese GDP may hit demand, sending iron ore back to a more sensible price around US$70 / tonne? Platinum continues to edge higher. Remember S12J? You could invest in a funds that invested into startups (within certain rules). Then whatever you invested would be deducted from your taxable income (on condition you held for 5 years) and tax would only be CGT, albeit on a zero cost basis. Government is now proposing a limit of R2.5million per person per year. Frankly for the vast majority, this is a non event as that's serious money. Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson is the new Prime Minister of England. What one may think of him, markets don't care and for traders / investors that's what matters. That said, hard Brexit remains a stupid idea. IMF cuttin

Simon Shares S&P500 above 3,000 and Dow Jones above 27,000. EOH (JSE code: EOH) have found R1.2billion of bad deals over 4 years, 2013-2017. A new dawn, I think so, but I would add a very slow dawn. Platinum starting to look decent? We have higher lows and two higher highs. A close above US$910 (still a way off) and things looking real strong. If you're long PGM miners. If not an entry on pull backs looks smart. Woolworths* (JSE code: WHL) trading update excited the market and shows a much improved second half, especially in food (expected) and clothing (not expected). Australia remains under pressure but overall good and the real question is if it's a new trend or a one off? Anheuser-Busch InBev (JSE code: ANH) has suspended the listing of their Asia-Pacific business that would have seen almost US$10billion being raised. The reason given is tough market conditions but the bigger issue is they wanted the cash to pay off part of the massive debt bill from buying SABMiller - so for now they remain with too

Simon Shares CSEW40* change confirmed for next Wednesday, it'll now be SMART. Trade peace, kinda ~ for now. In classic Trump style, lots of huffing, puffing and threatening the blow the house down. Until a 'deal' is reached. Afrimat (JSE code: AFT) walks away from the Universal Coal deal. No details, but likely they didn't like what they saw? Respect, far too many deals get deal mania and concluded no matter what. PricewaterhouseCoopers has resigned as auditors of Group5 (JSE code: GRF). Now this is moot as Group5 is in business rescue with no chance of surviving and PWC cites heightened risks due to resignations of many senior execs. But one wonders if they'd had quit in the older auditing days? Upcoming events; 18 July ~ JSE Power Hour: How to invest offshore with the JSE * I hold ungeared positions. fff Download the audio file here Subscriber to our feed here Sign up for email alerts as a new show goes live Subscribe or review us in iTunes Longest economic expansion ever The current US economic e

Simon Shares The Top40 is up almost 20% since the lows of November and over 12% year-to-date. But instead it feels all gloom and doom. Wescoal (JSE code: WSL) results look horrid, but they had strike issues when they employed a new contractor and that hit production and the leverage impact seriously hit HEPS. But they remain a high quality junior coal miner. Omnia (JSE code: OMN) results were ugly, but not as ugly as the market expected. Apparently during the results presentation they blamed the media for their 23 April SENS stating no rights issue, which they then changed their mind on earlier this month? Gold is running and the perma gold bulls are thrilled - albeit surprisingly quiet? However, a number of people are asking if they should buy gold and the answer is usually no, buy a gold miner and benefit from the leverage impact. Bitcoin* is also going wild, now above $12,000. Here the perma BTC bulls are all over my time line. Question is how high will it go? Answer is no idea, in a perfect world it need

Simon Shares Old Mutual (JSE code: OMU) has fired suspended CEO Peter Moyo and detailed what went wrong. The short version is that the company Moyo founded (NMT group), was CEO of and chair since taking up CEO at Old Mutual paid two dividends when they should in the first instance paid Old Mutual as a preference shareholder a dividend and in the second instance they paid when they should have first paid off the preference shareholder - Old Mutual. Moyo has fired back with a lawyers letter stating that Old Mutual is wrong and in fact their representative on the board voted in favour of both dividends. Who's right? I have no idea and ultimately the courts will decide, or more likely the parties will settle. So for now it is about money and how much Moyo gets. The good news for Old Mutual shareholders is that this is not an operational issue, but they do now need a new CEO. Metrofile* (JSE code: MFL) have restructured their debt that cost two CFOs their jobs. The new debt will see the tax rate revert back to th

Simon Shares Solid Stor-Age (JSE code: SSS) results from a stock I have largely ignored and been wrong about. Interesting TymeBank presentation from African Rainbow Capital (JSE code: AIL).  Lonmin (JSE code: LON) is gone, taken over by Sibanye Gold (JSE code: SGL). Lonmin has a consolidation adjusted all time high of over R33,000, exiting at 1480c. They also had a US$10billion offer in August 2008 that they rejected. Market cap now, R4billion or about US$265million. Unpacking the Satrix property ETF ~ STXPRO Retire: Playing catch-up Upcoming events; 20 June ~ JSE Power Hour: Trade the trade wars 18 July ~ JSE Power Hour: How to invest offshore with the JSE Suspended Tongaat (JSE code: TON) suspended. Choppies (JSE code: CHP) suspended. Group5 (JSE code: GRF) suspended. Rockwell Diamonds (JSE code: RDI) suspended. Basil Read (JSE code: BSR) suspended. Esor (JSE code: ESR) suspended. Firestone Energy (JSE code: FSE) suspended. Freedom Property Fund (JSE code: FDP) suspended. I'll stop there because you

Simon Shares US Fed has now promised a rate cut. This boomed markets but under lying the statement is the acceptance that trade wars are hurting the US economy. Horror Q1 GDP number at -3.2%. We knew it would be bad, thanks to aggressive load shedding during the period. But nobody expected this bad. The good news (sorta) is that no load shedding in Q2 should help boost that number. Also Agriculture was down 13.2% and is lumpy and should bounce back helping. But GDP for the year is going to struggle to get above 1%, and we're now almost certain to get a rate cut next month when the MPC meets. ANC / Ace wants "quantity easing". Assuming he means quantitive easing, I still don't understand what the plan is? So we print extra money to boost inflation (not that our inflation is low enough to be a problem) and then I suppose we use that money to buy local government debt, maybe Eskom debt. Then what? Do the lights now magically stay on? Also if we look at QE in the US, who benefitted the most? The rich, not the po

Simon Shares Rough month. We're ending May (well Wednesday mid morning, so 2.5 trading days still to go) up 3.5% for the year, but we started May up 11.8%. No don't quote me rhymes. Astral Foods (JSE code: ARL) issued a SENS detailing issues with municipal water and the cost to the group. They've also spoken about issues with electricity supply. The question is, are they the only ones being impacted? The answer must be no, but they are the only ones being very vocal about the issues. I wonder who else is experiencing same? Famous Bands* (JSE code: FBR) results are decent if you remove the UK indigestion. The second half was tougher than the first but really that UK deal is busy undoing a lot of otherwise great effort by the company, that said the second half was better (and still better post yearend) for GBK but it still losses money. Signature brands are struggling and this isn't a huge surprise as they're more expensive sit down experiences. They're also exiting the Coega Concentrate tomato paste plant, I

Simon Says Upcoming events; 23 May ~ JSE Power Hour: Mastering stop losses with Trader Petri 30 May ~ JSE Power hour: Hard question. Better Answers 20 June ~ JSE Power Hour: Trade the trade wars Coronation* (JSE code; CML) results about as expected and it looks like they're already moving up off the bottom of the down trend. I hold and like. People asking if passive doesn't kill Coronation and the answer is no. We're a very long way from passive being larger than active in South Africa, and even when that happens the real threat is initially the smaller asset managers. In time small active will be the winner, but we're talking a long time into the future. A few people asked me why I don't like Balwin (JSE code: BWN) and Calgro M3 (JSE code: CGR). They great operations but they sell houses and right now the housing market is depressed (or distressed, your pick). Costs are not going down but prices are also not holding so a squeeze. Calgro M3 has an advantage in that they can build at vastly different price

Simon Shares Long4Life* (JSE code: L4L) results. Good and lots of cash to spend. Calgro M3 (JSE code: CGR) results. Horror show. Upcoming events; 23 May ~ JSE Power Hour: Mastering stop losses with Trader Petri 30 May ~ JSE Power hour: Hard question. Better Answers  * I hold ungeared positions. Subscriber to our feed here Subscribe or review us in iTunes Trade wars Can we call it? Trades wars are here and nobody wins. JSE – The JSE is a registered trademark of the JSE Limited. JSEDirect is an independent broadcast and is not endorsed or affiliated with, nor has it been authorised, or otherwise approved by JSE Limited. The views expressed in this programme are solely those of the presenter, and do not necessarily reflect the views of JSE Limited.

Simon Shares Steinhoff (JSE code: SNH) results for September 2017 are out and they're a mess. All they really have is a c70% stake in Pepkor. Trade wars have again spooked the market with the orange trumpet going on a Twitter rampage on Sunday, but as I record US markets are green again. Upcoming events; 23 May ~ JSE Power Hour: Mastering stop losses with Trader Petri Subscriber to our feed here Subscribe or review us in iTunes Elections and markets Recording this on Wednesday afternoon, so voting is still on-going and I have no idea what the results will be. But some thoughts. As a country fairly new to democracy we're really good at it and this is something to be very proud of, many countries (including supposed developed ones) are not nearly as good at democracy as we are. The IEC is world class and we accept the results. The majority party loses provinces, metros and the world doesn't end, we all just carry on. Sure there will be some messes in some places, but pretty much our voting is reflectiv

Simon Shares By this time net week we'll know the results of the 2019 elections. It's been a quieter election season than I'd expected - which is great. Coronation* (JSE code: CML) update. Assets under management (AUM) flat and spot on what I expected but average AUM was 8% lower for the period. HEPS 20%-30% lower worse than the 15%-20% down I expected on the back of average AUM being 8% lower even though it was flat start to finish. I hold and am happy with some cheeky bids in lower if anybody wants to sell to me at discount? I have been buying some Barloworld* (JSE code: BAW) in this pull back as per my Graham value webcast from a few weeks ago after missing my initial entry when it ran to +R130. Still have some bids in lower down. Up coming events; * I hold ungeared positions. Subscriber to our feed here Subscribe or review us in iTunes Shares or cash for dividends? A great question in my inbox, why do some companies issues shares instead of cash for dividends and which should we take? The why is sim

Simon Shares So Christo Wiese wants to sell his non economic but voting Shoprite* (JSE code: SHP) shares back to the company for some R3.6billion? I thinks not, albeit seems I am in a minority here. Afrimat (JSE code: AFT) has made a non-binding offer to buy a Universal Coal (an Australian company mining in SA). The deal is about half their market cap and at a price some 10% better than the next best offer that I knew about. They really are the masters of deals, paying a good price and making them work. But this one is a biggie and risks are much higher than the other smaller deals the've done. The latest SPIVA for South Africa is out and always it makes for bleak reading.  * I hold ungeared positions. Subscriber to our feed here Subscribe or review us in iTunes Unlisted shares Unlisted shares, those not listed and trading on a recognised exchange such as the JSE. There two ways we get unlisted shares; We buy them hoping they will eventually list and become the next Uber (albeit Uber may be a bad examp

Simon Shares The Power Hour from last week by Nerina Visser on ETF fees is awesome and online. What's the net asset value? Net asset value (NAV) is from the balance sheet and is asset less liabilities. The break up value of the company. A share will typically trade above this value as we're buying future profits, not break up value. Tangible NAV (TNAV) is better as this excludes things such as goodwill, so is a real number of actual assets. Goodwill is when you buy a business and pay more than the NAV for the business, rest is goodwill. When things are going well and booming goodwill is not an issue. But when things turn, well it is messy and we've seen lots of goodwill write downs in years past. EOH (JSE code: EOH) states NAV of some R4.5billion. But R3.3billion is goodwill and so not really an asset and with EOH struggling for goodwill right now not really anything to write home about. So TNAV of some R1.1billion meaning EOH trading at more than double NAV while AdaptIT (JSE code: ADI) is trading below

Simon Shares A strong start to the year and so far it seems to be continuing (even as the Rand trdes belw R14) - long may it last. Important to remember that Rand strength is not always the end of the world for our market as it signals foreign buying. S&P500 ETFs. Up coming events; 11 April ~ JSE Power Hour: Know your fees with Nerina Visser Fear and loathing on the JSE We're seeing a new trend on the JSE whereby stock prices are slaughtered after poor (or even just modest) results. Sure bad results have always hurt a share price, but it used to be that a 10% down day was a wildly bad day. Now however 10% is hardly even warming up with many stocks being hit way harder (think 30% down on Aspen results). I think there are a bunch reasons for this new trend. Firstly; the Steinhoff (JSE code: SNH) fear. After Steinhoff there is real fear in the market. Fear that a 'great' company may actually be smoke and mirrors and investors have no idea which is the next Steinhoff. So rather then be caught out they j

Simon Shares Up coming events; 11 April ~ JSE Power Hour: Know your fees with Nerina Visser Selling like a pro We tend to focus on the buying, enteries and selling at profit. But what of selling at a loss? Far to often i hear people state it has fallen too much and so there's no point in selling - this is false. Ignore the loss you already have and focus on the loss ahead of you. A stock that has fallen 90 can fall another 90% and when people ask where's the bottom? The answer is zero, until then it can always fall more. A good sell is as good as a good entry. I exited most of my Calgro M3 (JSE code: CGR) at around 2100c but kept some only to watch it fall to under 1000c. I then finally sold the balance and now it's under 600c. It is never too late to sell and we need to become as good at selling as we are at buying. Sell the dogs (sorry dogs) Know when to panic Subscriber to our feed here Subscribe or review us in iTunes JSE – The JSE is a registered trademark of the JSE Limited. JSEDirect is an indepe

Simon Shares No Brexit deal with 8 days to go. A mess of epic proportions. Load shedding is in full force (well only force 4 with more stages to go) and it's bad. Seems we can expect a 'stable' electrical grid sometime towards the end of the year, albeit stable may still include stage 1 load shedding according to experts I have spoken to. The reasons we know and frankly don't matter. It also doesn't matter who wins on 8 May, this is not a problem that goes away over night. For us individually it s a hassle, a real hassle. For business it is a major issue. Our expected modest GDP growth for 2019 is going to be even more modest while Moodys eyes us for junk status. Most exposed will be retail (extra costs) and property(lost sales and extra costs) while mining has largely managed to get off grid. Metrofile* (JSE code: MFL) results were a horror show with the tax rate hitting 40%, up from 24%. Seems the two now fired CFOs messed up the Kenyan deal so that interest was not deductible as an expense. They out, new

Simon Shares Group5 (JSE code: GRF) goes into business rescue with "a slim chance for any realisation of value.". It seems the construction of a power station in Ghana was the final nail. Remember the +R1billion they were offered to their Eastern European toll operations? But in the end a lack of liquidity killed them. Be very careful of holding Aveng (JSE code: AEG), if nothing else check the bid/offer, price is heading to 1c. No Brexit deal with 15 days to go. A mess of epic proportions. Back in November 2017 I wrote in FinWeek that we'd get zero fee ETFs and eventually negative fee ETFs (they'll pay you to hold them). It has happened. MoneyWeb is reporting on a US ETF offering to pay investors to buy their ETF. Locally our much smaller market and hence much smaller ETFs means we're a long way from free, but I do think in time it'll happen locally and Satrix40* (JSE CODE: STX40) would probably the one able to do it. Aspen (JSE code: APN) taught us some important important lessons. Debt is fine until it's n

Simon Shares Greenest start to a year since the 1960's, Top40 is 6.9% up year-to-date. MultiChoice (JSE code: MCG) has unbundled out of Naspers (JSE code: NPN) with MultiChoice closing at R106 and Naspers off R125 on the back of Tencent weakness over night in Hong Kong. So no value unlock and with fair values for MutliChoice being between 8500c - R150. Most people I speak to say at current prices if you received MultiChoice shares you should hold them at this price. Also MultiChoice will remain in the Top40 index with Truworths (JSE code: TRU) exits Top40 Friday morning. Those saying MultiChoice is dead, well maybe in time. But nothing is that linear and be careful of taking a dislike for DStv pricing out on the share - they're different beasts. They could get bought by a telco (we're seeing that in the US), they could get the subscriber growth they're targeting in the rest of Africa, Showmax could take off of they could muddle along or they could go broke. Lots of options. Below are the index changes effec