Donald Trump threw TikTok’s future into the abyss when he announced on 6th August that the app would effectively be banned in the US in mid-September. He then issued a separate order which gave TikTok’s parent company Bytedance just 90 days to sell TikTok’s US operations and data. And there you were thinking that only the South African government cares …
View PostI am not completely sure whether the company was named after Johnny Walker’s finest, but I’ve seen the executive boardroom myself and there are many empty bottles adorning the walls. Each one has writing on it, which suggests that it was opened to celebrate a milestone. Blue Label Telecoms is a business that really needs to stick to its knitting. …
View PostI feel that I must apologise up-front for the annoyance of a company name in capital letters. For an education group, one might think that STADIO (see?) would know that only one capital letter is necessary. Nevertheless, that’s their brand, so STADIO it is. Perhaps they want to shout the name from the rooftops and it’s hard to blame them …
View PostThis may sound like I’m about to wax lyrical about Bitcoin. Trust me, that’s the last thing you’ll ever read about from me. I write about real assets i.e. the kind that generate cash flows. There was a time when the smartest kids at university fought over jobs at banks. Investment banking careers, like corporate advisory or proprietary trading, were …
View PostThis is a term that you will hear often. “Company X released earnings today” or “Company Y announced a dip in revenue” – but what does it actually mean? The basics: listed companies must report detailed financials Listed companies (i.e. those that trade on a stock exchange like the JSE) are required to announce certain information to stakeholders. Note the …
View PostIt’s been a busy week for Sanlam, the Cape Town-based financial services firm that historically entrenched itself in the Afrikaans community and has grown from there. The company released results, announced a B-BBEE transaction and suffered a 4% decline in the share price. The standout asset management result in recent times has without a doubt been Sygnia, reflected in 35% …
View PostThe Office is a UK comedy starring Ricky Gervais that has brought tears of joy to many, but the UK shoe business that shares a name with the show has brought tears of sadness to Truworths. It hasn’t been a happy time on mud island for many South African corporates. The 2016 Brexit referendum caused immense pain for the …
View PostLockdown Level 2 is here and boets everywhere are rejoicing. It’s time to klap gym again chana, maybe H2O will even be back this summer! Not so fast chaps. Only 50 people will be allowed in any gym at a time, presumably including the staff and certainly including the skinny folk on the spinning machines. Friends may not let friends …
View PostGaming has become an incredibly lucrative industry. I’m not talking about slot machines; this is the world of mobile, PC and console games. Fortnite has more than 350 million registered players. To put that in context, there are around 330 million people in the United States. Epic Games is the publisher of Fortnite and is worth $17.3bn after its latest …
View PostI am almost tired of writing about how Capitec’s valuation cannot be justified. Almost. Trading at a Price / Book value way above its peers, Capitec’s top management continue to shrug off the realities of lockdown. Shareholders are reassured that everything will be ok and that Capitec will still show a profit this year. Will that be the case? Latest …
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