UKLA & Worthington - this is surreal

By Tom Winnifrith | Saturday 3 December 2016

Disclosure: I have no positions in any stocks mentioned, and no plans to initiate any positions within the next 72 hours. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from ShareProphets). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.

This is beyond satire. On Friday night, as it does every night, the UKLA published via RNS its list of companies subject to potential bids and guess what? Worthington is still there. Worthington as in the company where an administrator has now been appointed and a first gazette published? Yes that is the one. But it gets better.

Worthington (administrator appointed, no annual report published for the years to September 30 2016. 2015 or 2014, no cash, no assets of value) is subject to a bid approach from Denmark's Nuna Minerals which, as it happens, is already in administration and has no cash just liabilities. I suppose one way of looking at it is that this is truly a merger of equals.

But this is ridiculous. As Rob Terry would not have said 0+0 really always does equal 0. At what point will Companies House kick up a fuss about the lack of accounts and explian fully why no action was taken earlier? At what point will the UKLA wake up and accept there is no deal and thus, with Worthington unable to provide a readmission document - the reason for its original suspension - just de-list the shares?

It cannot be said that, with regard to this company, UK regulators can be said to have been proactive.

As an aside Avanti Communications (AVN) is still on the UKLA list as being in an offer period. Yeah right. It too is teetering on the brink of bankruptcy. Perhaps UKLA might want to put in a call to Fatty Bombast Taffy Williams and find out if anyone is interested in buying his drowning in debt, cash guzzling enterprise. I think we all know what the answer to that would be.

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