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Even a few of our detractors have now come around
I start with a few words on Oxford Cannabinoid (OCTP). I have not said fill your boots nor should you. The issue here is management allegedly lining their own pockets ahead of corporate action which they know all about. One should not buy shares in such companies. Then I reflect on an excellent piece by Maynard Paton on Cake Box (CBOX) which you can read HERE. I comment on some of the excellent points he makes but add in half a dozen of my own, notably comparing boasted net cash and net interest costs but also the shameful CEO pump and dump and the macro headwind given the demographic of its end user base. This is probably not another Patisserie Valerie but at 320p it is a stonking short.
I explain why there was no bearcast yesterday. Then I look at the part this household is playing in the fuel crisis. It is all about psychology. Then a look at Real Good Food (RGF) and companies delisting before a look at the pathetic punishments for the enablers of fraud at Patisserie Holdings (CAKE) I also look at what Australian regulators are doing to tackle pump and dump twitter gangs while the FCA jerks off on more ESG porn doing nothing about tackling real crime. I flag up Aura Energy (AURA) in this regard.
Nobody doubts that Patisserie Holdings (CAKE) was a fraud and it was a spottable one. This website expressed its professional scepticism about how sales were surging while footfall in the malls where patisserie outlets were sited were collapsing. Others questioned how a company claiming huge cash balances has almost no net interest income. Yet Grant Thornton lead by partner David Newstead signed off on its accounts for the years to September 30 2015, 2016 and 2017 without question. They were sheer fiction.
No Rogue bloggers training walk today but I had an excuse so please donate HERE anyway. Then back to Patisserie Holdings (CAKE) and more whining from a failed auditor.
Of course some of us identified that there was a real problem at Patisserie Holdings more than a year before the public became aware and explicitly warned folks about it HERE in November 2017. Some, like ShareSoc director Chris Spencer-Phillips knew better. Thankfully Chris sold before it was too late but now identifies the real problem. He writes:
The fact that the Miton Smaller Companies Fund has collapsed in value by around two thirds since the start of 2018 is pretty remarkable. It must be a real embarrassment to City grandee Gervais Williams who runs the fund. But his real shame should be in how the money was lost.
Covering Quindell (QPP), Naibu (NBU), Patisserie Holdings (CAKE), Staffline (STAF), Sefton (SER) and more I look at the role of auditors and lawyers in enabling corporate fraud and what needs to change to stop this.
I know that Thirsty Paul Scott was a major bull of Staffline (STAF) and a shareholder. Today's shocking news of allegations of accounting irregularities made by the company's own auditor PWC and a share suspension is enough to turn any man to drink. In this podcast I give background and explain what I think the outcome will be. It is bad but not, I suspect, a Patisserie Holdings (CAKE) but it might get very nasty.
I am plagued today by Bulletin Board Morons reporting me to the FCA, by Roger Lawson and some ungracious comments on fraud busting at Globo (GBO), Quindell (QPP) and Patisserie Holdings (CAKE) and by our former in house Bulletin Board Loon who has returned to really rile me with some vile comments on the holocaust which expose him as the Jew hating vermin that he is - HERE. I comment on Angus Energy (ANGS), UK Oil & Gas (UKOG), Domino's Pizza (DOM), Feedback (FDBK), Photonstar Led (PSL), Starcom (STAR) and Cabot Energy (CAB). Footnote, Roger is now planning to run an amendment flagging up that I did advise folks to sell/short Patisserie warning "something's not right". Roger you are a gent.
How I suffer for you dear listeners. All is explained. Then there is a long discussion on the administration of Patisserie Holdings (CAKE). I move on with a few more words on The Escape Group (ESC) which I covered HERE and then look at Eve Sleep (EVE) and the folly of Neil Woodford, Scancell (SCLP), Anglesey Mining (AYM), Ariana (AAU), Bluebird Merchant Ventures (BMV), Chesterfield (CHF) and Metro Bank (MTRO). Finally it is one day to ouzo time (again) on Frontera Resources (FRR).
In this podcast I look at the utterly useless coverage of the LCF scandal provided by the Sunday Times which seeks to blame the poor old FCA for daring to trying to stop a ponzi. I then look at the bloodbath on the high street and the madness and denial of some. There is comment on Patisserie Holdings (CAKE) and Pizza Express and also on house prices in New York and what that tells us about Brexit.
Since I broke up the leaderboard into stories and Bearcasts—as a way of shoehorning in more stories—readers don't really get to see the domination of Bearcasts on the leaderboard, much to Tom's irritation.
In today's bearcast recorded before my first training walk for Woodlarks I look at Sabien (SNT) and ask if CyanConnode (CYAN) misled ahead of its last bailout placing. I deal with the nature of fraud, the culpability of Luke Johnson (there is none) and Patisserie Holdings (C AKE) and then explain why I think Malcolm's stance on the bankers is bonkers
My pal Luke Johnson used to be known as Lucky. Just like Lord Lucan. Luke does not stand accused of butchering his nanny and is not fleeing the country but there is blood on the streets round at Patisserie Holdings (CAKE) and Luke’s luck seems to have run out. Though I was a perma bear on Patisserie it gives me no pleasure to be revealed as a superb journalist once again...
Having previously noted a respectable showing from the start of 2018 top shorted London-listed shares, how was the performance of the AIM shares then shorted?...
As I have noted before, it is probably a good thing that the UK economy is not based on my personal consumption habits, especially when the highlight of my annual 'pre-Christmas trip to the shops' was purchasing an advent calendar marked down from its original price by over 75%... A very cheap way to buy some good quality chocolates (and - naturally - to ascertain the quality level I had to consume days one to fifteen in one sitting).
What are your Sunday rituals? The most reliable one of mine is a phone call from Tom demanding to know where this column is.
After everything that has happened to Patisserie Holdings (CAKE) in recent weeks, it is of little surprise that today's deadwood press includes an article about a potential bidder for the business:
A marginally less bad day today for AIM-listed Patisserie Holdings (CAKE), owners of Patisserie Valerie in that there was good news in with the bad as announced just before 9am this morning. The good news is that a winding up petition against its main trading subsidiary, Stonebeach Ltd, has been thrown out. Good news: no trip to the insolvency shop, then. As for the bad news, it is a relatively small matter but perhaps tells us what may have been going on.
Clearly, the topic that brought loads of people into ShareProphets this week was Patisserie Holdings (CAKE). It makes you wonder why this alleged fraud captures the interest of the mainstream media but the Globos and Folly Follies and Quindells do not. Is a high street presence what stops a scandal from being reported or not?
Early this year we showed Shorted AIM shares at the start of 2018. After the recent market slide and compared to late August, how's the latest performance?...
Kelvin McKenzie is a major hero of mine. His Sun front page Gotcha! with a picture of the Belgrano sinking was his finest moment on Fleet Street so it was a pleasure to be a guest on his radio show today. My section is about 20 minutes in
First things first - we have almost raised the £2,500 needed for the Woodlarks Christmas grotto. I am sure you can spare a fiver to get us over the line HERE. Secondly, I am in London tomorrow and on the warpath and hope to see many of you HERE. I was distracted today doing a radio interview with my friend and hero the great Kelvin McKenzie of "gotcha!" fame. That covered Patisserie Holdings (CAKE) and fraud and I continue with that theme. I also look at Superdry (SDRY), First Derivatives (FDP), Frontera (FRR) and Purplebricks (PURP).
A few days ago I mused upon occurrences at Patisserie Holdings (CAKE) which I did not own shares in but intrinsically I liked...especially as a customer. It seems to me that my gut feel back then that the combination of a skilful fraudster, poor internal controls and a professional lack of duty from the auditor all contributed. As Luke Johnson - Chairman and biggest shareholder - noted in an article in lieu of his Sunday Times column this week:
First of all please read abut the Christmas Woodlarks Santa's Grotto £2500 appeal and donate a tenner. If you like bearcast you know you can afford it. Details are HERE. This podcast covers the shameful and ignorant treatment of Luke Johnson over Patisserie Holdings (CAKE) and I stand in defence of Luke. This country needs more folks like him not fewer and much, if not all, of today's coverage is shockingly bad in every respect..
With any company where there has been fraudulent activity you have to consider whether there are more skeletons in the cupboard which could cause a further freefall in the share price when they emerge.
It’s been an eventful week on AIM. Patisserie Holdings’ (CAKE) announcement of “significant, and potential fraudulent, accounting irregularities” on Wednesday blindsided the investment community. Urals Energy (UEN) is comparatively smaller, but the company’s discovery of an unauthorised loan made with its funds – meaning the firms “working capital position will be significantly constrained” – brought some more unwanted bad press; UEN shares slid 31.3% since the announcement. With AIM firms making the news, we take at the current state of broker and tipster sentiment towards AIM over the last 30 days.
In today's podcast I start with a brief but of macro babble then look at RM2 (RM2) specifiocally but also at the wider Neil Woodford stable* of dogs. Then I discuss whether I'd buy into Patisserie Holdings (CAKE) at 50p. It is certainly not the same as Conviviality (CVR) which Thirsty Paul Scott bet heavily on the day before it went bust. There are similarities but 1 big difference.
In today's bearcast I start with a look at Patisserie Holdings (CAKE) run by my pal Luke Johnson and I discuss the nature of fraud. I look at Sosandar (SOS) again and get really very angry (warning bad language alert), at FastJet (FJET), Telford Homes (TEF) and the folly of Government policy, Online Blockchain (OBC), and at Urals Energy (UEN) and the folly of the AIM Cesspit.
Just when you think you have seen almost everything the market could throw at you...news today that Patisserie Holdings (CAKE) shares are suspended after 'the board of directors of the Company...has been notified of significant, and potentially fraudulent, accounting irregularities and therefore a potential material mis-statement of the Company's accounts'. Well we know what majority shareholder and Chair of the company Luke Johnson will be coordinating for the next few days, if not weeks and months…
From the FCA's spreadsheet of short positions required to be disclosed to it, the following shows the shorted AIM shares with positions from 2016 and thus far in 2017 (by net short position %) - and if this position has increased (red), reduced (green) or remained unchanged (black) since last week...
If you want me to analyse a stock for you just drop me a line at sqmir@hotmail.com - Today I look at shares in Kennedy Ventures, Patisserie Holdings and Strategic Minerals, setting share price targets for all three stocks.
