reports
- Mark Thomas
Volta Finance Limited (VTAS): Volatility put into context
In this report we review Volta’s volatility during recent “crisis” periods (2025 tariff uncertainty, Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, early COVID-19 experience). In one of these events, Volta’s share price showed more volatility than that of equity markets, in one it was broadly in line, and in one it displayed less volatility. There is insufficient evidence to say Volta is more or less volatile than equity markets in risk-off periods, which may come as a surprise to some investors. Investors ...
Addressing the “risk off” investment challenge
A challenging environment for UK companies As we approach mid-2025, life remains challenging for many UK companies and their shareholders, and ‒ as a broad generalisation – consensus suggests little will change in the foreseeable future. So, are we now facing a real risk of the UK economy stagnating due to lack of funding? If that is the case, who is going to take the initiative and avert such a crisis? Business life must continue, despite the macro environment providing limited visibility an...
- Mark Thomas
- Mike Foster
- Richard Jeans
Hardman & Co Monthly: June 2025
Feature article: Addressing the “risk off” investment challenge As we approach mid-2025, life remains challenging for many UK companies and their shareholders, and ‒ as a broad generalisation – consensus suggests little will change in the foreseeable future. So, are we now facing a real risk of the UK economy stagnating due to lack of funding? If that is the case, who is going to take the initiative and avert such a crisis? Business life must continue, despite the macro environment providing ...
- Mark Thomas
ICG Enterprise Trust plc (ICGT): Investing in resilience, delivering g...
The key message from ICGT’s FY’25 results (to January) is the continued strength of the operating companies, which delivered, on average, 15% LTM EBITDA growth. Margins have widened by ca.4% (average revenue growth 11%), which should help allay some concerns over the impact of the challenging environment. New investment is accelerating, and realisation activity continued with an average 19% uplift to carrying values on exit. A degree of short-term volatility is to be expected, and the five- and ...
- Mark Thomas
- Mike Foster
Real Estate Credit Investments (RECI): Meeting any potential macro cha...
In our view, there remains great uncertainty over the effects of tariffs and whether the US/global economies will fall into a recession. Over the past six years, we have written many times on RECI’s resilient model. In this note, we revisit why RECI’s model is so strong, noting in particular i) its credit assessment, monitoring and problem account management, ii) the benefit of being a senior finance provider, iii) geographical and sector diversity, iv) portfolio mix changes, including the reduc...
- Richard Jeans
accesso Technology Group: 30 new venue contracts and pipeline remains ...
FY24 results, released last month, were in line with its January trading update. Revenues grew by 5.3%, when excluding discontinued components, while cash EBITDA eased by 3.4% to $22.8m to reflect a margin of 15.0%. Management is cautious on the near-term outlook due to uncertainties over the impact of trade wars on consumer sentiment. We have cut our revenue forecasts by 4% in FY25 and 6% in FY26 to reflect this uncertainty. However, costs also fall and FY26 adjusted EPS moves higher in USD te...
- Mark Thomas
NB Private Equity Partners: 2024 - short-term noise over long-term gro...
Like many in the PE space, NBPE’s 2024 total $ NAV return (1.5%) was below the five-year average (11.0%), driven by falling valuations of listed holdings and forex. The private company growth (6.9% constant currency) was also below average, with lower-than-usual exit activity seeing less exit uplift benefit. In our view, 2024 was noise within a long-term value-creation model that should outperform listed equities. Despite challenges, the past 12-month EBITDA growth from investee companies was a ...
- Brian Moretta
- Jason Streets
- Mark Thomas
Hardman & Co Monthly: May 2025
Feature article: Attractive asset managers - Radical derating presumes things only get worse The UK asset management sector has been significantly derated over the past couple of years. It has faced the dual problem of a shift towards passives and to private assets and away from traditional listed equities and bonds. However, the sector’s assets haven’t collapsed; its margins have proved relatively robust and its profits fairly stable, even against all the rising costs. The clear implication, ...
- Mike Foster
Hardman & Co Insight: REITs - a much more positive outlook
Hardman & Co has carried out several assessments of the REITs sector in the past; in 2024, we looked at whether they represented fair value in terms of their share prices compared with the average discount to NAV at which share prices traded over several historical cycles. We concluded, at that point, that REITs were trading at very close to the historical, long-run average but that the macroeconomic momentum was not strong enough to encourage us to view prospects for REIT share price performanc...
- Brian Moretta
Chesnara plc (CSN): Showing good operational progress
Chesnara announced its 2024 results, which showed positive progress compared with 2023. The main features were positive market returns, offset by some mixed operational experience. Economic Value profit of £69.1m represented a 17% increase on the £59.1m in 2023. Economic Value increased to £531m, up slightly on £525m 12 months earlier, with a negative forex impact as well as dividend payment. Cash generation was excellent, with base cash increasing to £51.6m and commercial cash to £59.6m. The di...
- Mark Thomas
Arbuthnot Banking Group - 2024 results: franchise growing through the ...
The core of any successful, long-term business lies in offering clients the products they want so that they give you more business and, in turn, you attract new customers. The 2024 results show how ABG has achieved this, with growth in i) specialist lending (now £828m, 35% of loans up 33% in 2023, 27% in 2022 and 21% in 2021), ii) deposit volumes (+10%), and iii) wealth management (FUMA +30%). 1,200 new banking clients were onboarded in 2024. Short-term profits reflected that ABG had optimised r...
- Martin Hall
Hardman & Co Insight: 2024 Pharma Statistics
An efficient reporting system has seen all the listed multinational pharmaceutical companies announce results for 2024, which has given us the opportunity to update our industry statistics and drug database. This report provides the first snapshot of global pharmaceutical market growth plus the global and US company rankings for 2024. The year was characterised by 9.2% underlying (ex-COVID-19) growth. Much of the growth was driven by recently launched anti-obesity drugs and oncology drugs. Both ...
- Mark Thomas
Apax Global Alpha (APAX): Jam yesterday, and tomorrow, but not today
AGA was transparent in that 2024 was a below-average year for the company, with a total NAV return of 0.8% (-3.0% constant currency, including a 4Q total NAV return of 2.6% (-1.8% cc). By comparison, the five-year total NAV CAGR return was 8.3%. Problems in healthcare (no longer a core sector), and one portfolio company in particular, meant the strong average investee company EBITDA growth did not fuel NAV growth. However, the detail in the results bodes well, with i) investee companies deliveri...
- Mark Thomas
- Martin Hall
Hardman & Co Monthly: April 2025
Feature article: 2024 pharma statistics An efficient reporting system has seen all the listed multinational pharmaceutical companies announce results for 2024, which has given us the opportunity to update our industry statistics and drug database. This report provides the first snapshot of global pharmaceutical market growth plus the global and US company rankings for 2024. The year was characterised by 9.2% underlying (ex-COVID-19) growth. Much of the growth was driven by recently launched ant...
- Mark Thomas
H&T (HAT) - 2024 results: reasons to be cheerful 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5
H&T’s 2024 results were reassuringly in line with expectations, delivering 10% PBT growth, with the pledge book capital value up 26%, retail sales up 27% and forex profits up 11%. The outlook remains positive, with i) strong demand in the core pawnbroking business where H&T is taking share and may have increasing acquisition opportunities, ii) consumer trends favouring its multi-channel, value-for-money, new and used product retail offering, iii) an expanding range of currencies helping forex gr...
- Mark Thomas
NB Private Equity Partners (NBPE): Update on: NAV, capital, Trump and ...
We highlighted our capital markets day takeaways in CM day: 6 November fireworks; notably, i) positive market trends, ii) NB’s platform unique benefits, and iii) multiple levers for value creation. In this note, we update investors on i) the latest NAV/portfolio, ii) NBPE’s revised capital allocation framework, iii) the potential impact of current Trump polices, and iv) the impact of interest rate expectations, which seem to evolve daily but which, in our view, have seen a trend of higher-for-lo...
- Brian Moretta
Jenson EIS Fund - Jenson Ventures (Jenson Funding Partners LLP)
The Jenson EIS Fund is a generalist fund that invests into follow-on investments from Jenson’s existing SEIS and EIS investments. The fund invests at three different stages, with each tranche looking to diversify by stage of development, sector and business model. Jenson aims to provide 5-10 investments in each tranche, although towards the lower end of that is most common in practice. Jenson has a small team, using appropriate outsourcing to give scale. The report goes into details of how the...
- Brian Moretta
Seneca EIS Portfolio Service - Seneca Partners Limited
The Seneca EIS Portfolio Fund invests in a mixture of unquoted and AIM-listed companies that are scaling up. It has a target return of 2x capital (before fees) and typically provides 5-7 investments in each portfolio. The fund has been running for over a decade and the management team has been in place for some time. Seneca has achieved a good number of exits over the past decade, taking advantage of liquidity on AIM when appropriate. The report goes into details of how the investment process w...
- Nigel Hawkins
Hardman & Co Insight: UK energy policy - up for grabs?
UK energy policy has changed of late, following the election of a Labour government last summer. The quest for Net Zero by 2030 – a hardly realistic target – is now a priority. Rightly or wrongly, the issues of security of supply, electricity prices and generation investment have all been superseded by this overarching aim. In recent months, the government has withheld licensing approvals for various oil and gas projects – the latter, in particular, is much needed. Irrespective of the ca.£40bn ...
- Mark Thomas
- Nigel Hawkins
Hardman & Co Monthly: March 2025
In this month's feature article, we review the energy situation in the UK. On the domestic front, Ofgem has recently announced the new price cap figure of £1,849 for a typical household’s annual use of gas and electricity; this figure represents an increase of 6.4% over the January-March 2025 price cap. UK energy policy has changed of late, following the election of a Labour government last summer. The quest for Net Zero by 2030 – a hardly realistic target – is now a priority. Rightly or wrong...
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