Results out soon in August.

Broker recos look very bullish and why not on a P/E of just over 6 to 2011.....

Thomas Cook Group PLC

FORECASTS 2010 2011
Date Rec Pre-tax (�) EPS (p) DPS (p) Pre-tax (�) EPS (p) DPS (p)

Panmure Gordon
02-08-10 BUY 319.00 27.10 11.30 338.00 28.70 12.40

Exane BNP Paribas
02-08-10 BUY 116.00 26.62 10.75 319.00 28.87 11.66

Numis Securities Ltd
02-08-10 ADD 324.20 27.60 11.25 357.10 29.90 11.81

Oriel Securities
02-08-10 BUY 330.40 28.40 11.40 363.50 31.30 12.10

KBC Peel Hunt Ltd
30-07-10 BUY 301.06 25.22 10.75 313.36 26.23 10.93

WestLB
30-07-10 SELL 28.81 11.52 29.91 11.96

Shore Capital
30-07-10 HOLD 312.00 26.50 11.80 347.00 29.50 13.00

Charles Stanley Securities
15-06-10 HOLD

Evolution Securities Ltd
11-02-10 None

Investec Securities [R]
09-02-10 BUY 327.00 27.30 11.74 352.23 29.39 12.49

Fyshe Horton Finney Ltd
25-01-10 BUY

Collins Stewart
24-12-09 BUY

Nomura Research Institute
25-09-09 RED

2010 2011
Pre-tax (�) EPS (p) DPS (p) Pre-tax (�) EPS (p) DPS (p)

Consensus 316.42 26.98 11.36 342.50 29.39 11.96

1 Month Change 1.07 -0.22 0.01 3.43 -0.14 -0.14
3 Month Change -11.92 -1.09 -0.05 -11.79 -1.00 -0.44


GROWTH
2009 (A) 2010 (E) 2011 (E)

Norm. EPS 2.76% 0.38% 8.92%
DPS 14.03% 10.80% 5.26%

INVESTMENT RATIOS
2009 (A) 2010 (E) 2011 (E)

EBITDA �574.90m �589.69m �613.90m
EBIT �372.50m �420.55m �447.05m
Dividend Yield 5.38% 5.96% 6.27%
Dividend Cover 2.62x 2.38x 2.46x
PER 7.10x 7.07x 6.49x
PEG 2.57f 18.55f 0.73f
Net Asset Value PS -240.80p 224.47p 240.43p

bugger bognor!
if you think kenya's posh, go to nairobi .... it's vile and the country's one of the most corrupt in the world

According to the BBC, TCG have stopped selling holiday packages to certain parts of Kenya until October. The 'Bomb Explosions' turned out to be a couple of the usual, daily grenades thrown around a suburb of Mombassa, but nevertheless, there is a high risk to European travellers in Kenya generally, from threats attributed to Al Shabaab.
"The FCO's warning against non-essential travel covered the Mombasa Island area, Kiwayu and coastal areas north of Pate Island, the Garissa district, the Eastleigh area of Nairobi and the slum areas of the Kenyan capital."

Presumably a statement from Harriet Green advising the probable impact on revenue/profit would help the sp recover pretty quickly. Can't imagine she will allow things to slide too far without comment.

depends whether or not she thinks the effect material (downwards)
if not, why should she interfere with the market?

I agree with that, but if the market reaction is going to be worse than the reality, I would imagine HG would reassure investors. I'm not really sure how popular east coast Kenya is as a destination, but presumably most trips are during our winter, so maybe the impact will be minimal.

19 May 2014


Thomas Cook Group plc

Thomas Cook Group plc (the "Company") announces that Harriet Green, Chief Executive Officer, and Martine Verluyten, Non-Executive Director, have purchased shares of €0.01 each in the Company as further detailed in the table below:

Director
Date of Purchase and Notification
Number of Shares acquired
Average Price per Share
Percentage of issued share class acquired
Total holding of Shares following this acquisition
Total percentage of Shares held following acquisition
Harriet Green
19 May 2014
32,700
154.17p
0.002%
732,700
0.050%
Martine Verluyten
19 May 2014
25,000
153.26p
0.002%
165,000
0.011%
==================

Well at least the boss is buying shares at this level ..

Green tells Cameron to shake up 'antiquated' school term system


By Phil Davies | 19 May 2014 at 08.32 GMT




Thomas Cook chief executive Harriet Green has backed calls for a shake-up in what she describes as the “antiquated” school holiday system.

Green was given a role on prime minister David Cameron’s business advisory council and has raised the issue with him after he recently criticised travel companies for charging families more during school holidays.

She believes that the education system is to blame.

“The school year is very antiquated and based on outdated ideas that the children need to help to bring in the harvest,” Green said.

“I would change the construct of the school year and have three equal holidays. It would be in everyone’s interests – not least working families like my own – that we had staggered times and different slots for families to go away.

“It does not work in offices either if everyone is scrabbling for exactly the same time. At the moment everyone pushes for August. I have shared my views [with David Cameron] on this,” she told the Times on Saturday.

Fining families who take their children out of school during term-time is “slightly judicious administration, personally it doesn’t feel right to me”.

In a wide-ranging interview, Green is quoted as describing herself as “a landa” - a cross between a lion and a panda.

“Sometimes I am a real lion, I can roar, make things happen, I can change the course through will, energy and just being incredibly aggressive and assertive. But I can also be a big panda. If a company is sick, you have to be gentler – big eyes, big hugs.”

Discussing the financial turnaround of the ailing business she took on, Green said: “Thomas Cook needed to appeal to a new generation, it was ageing with its customers”.

The day on which she was appointed the share price dropped to 14p. “It was pretty ignominious. I wasn’t from travel, but in fact it helped that I came from the outside.”

Green also alluded to a future for travel agents despite Cook’s well-documented e-commerce drive.

A survey of customers found that although 93% used the internet to research a holiday, 66% wanted to talk to someone first.

“We modernised the web but we also saw that we needed to retain the one-on-one aspect with trust, assurance and personal knowledge,” Green added.

Telegraph City Diary...

Shares in Thomas Cook may have tumbled 16pc in recent days, but the executive board are betting this is only a temporary dip.

Chief Harriet Green has led a show of confidence by buying over £50,000 of stock in the tour operator this week, followed by group CFO Michael Healy, who increased his stake by almost £30,000, and non-execs Carl Symon and Martine Verluyten, who spent £19,396 and £38,315 respectively.

Behind the scenes, Diary is told a further “six or seven” more lowly directors have piled in too, following last week’s improved half-year results.
Diary hopes the board’s “great faith” in Green’s turnaround strategy pays dividends.

Seems like the Kenya situation is worsening, which could hit TCG profit harder than originally anticipated.

I've only just realised Harriet Green is a bit of a babe !

i'm sure she lusts after you too :-)

I'm sure too , don't forget the discussion on the MTC thread ,i eat a bowl of porridge and a banana (including the skin now) every day .

And out with a nice profit , too early i'm sure but i'm thinking the market has to dump at some point and i hav'nt been protecting gains recently on some trades .
This one has been good to me time and time again ,thank you Harriet .

Berenberg Buy 155.70 155.70 - 200.00 Initiates/Starts

Looking a bit juicy at these prices ? and i'm not talking about Harriet this time ..

Down again ,looks like these have further to fall .

First dabble here in a while - increased interest after World Cup demise maybe.

Thomas Cook deploys Lufthansa flight planning to improve operations
Delivers more automation and route optimisation

Thomas Cook Group has deployed Lufthansa Systems' flight planning technology to improve operations at its airlines.

The Lido/Flight system is now being used by all airlines in the group, covering a total of 88 aircraft as part of a ten year contract. Lufthansa Systems already hosted the Thomas Cook data centre.

Thomas Cook Group Airlines comprises Thomas Cook Airlines UK, Thomas Cook Airlines Belgium, Thomas Cook Airlines Scandinavia and Condor. By mid-2016 a total of 25 brand-new Airbus A321 aircraft will be added to the fleet.

Lido/Flight offers flight dispatchers a host of options for optimising flights in terms of flying time, fuel consumption, air traffic control fees and other costs. Integrated data and a variety of additional modules for Lido/Flight increase the degree of automation and support the work of flight dispatchers.

“The Lido/Flight flight planning solution offers us a high degree of automation and extensive route optimisation capabilities. This enables us to lower our fuel consumption and thus our costs," said Christoph Debus, group head of air travel at Thomas Cook Group.

Thomas Cook Airlines is using additional Lido/Flight modules such as the InflightMonitor. Both prior to departure and during a flight, this module reviews new information relevant to safe flight operations which might affect the planned routes, airspaces or airports, and transmits it to the flight dispatcher or directly to the pilots in the aircraft.

In September 2012, Thomas Cook Group moved a large chunk of its outsourced e-commerce operations from Accenture to CatN.

Thomas Cook Group plc: TCG Stock Faces Headwind from 'Structurally Challenged' Industry say Berenberg Bank

Published on Monday, 09 June 2014 09:14

Berenberg Bank have initiated coverage of Thomas Cook Group with a Buy - this despite identifying some major issues facing the tour operator.

Thomas Cook Group plc (LON:TCG) shares are trading 0.55 pct in the red on Monday morning; the stock is 156.75.

Today we hear from analysts at Berenberg Bank who have told clients they are initiating coverage of the company with a Buy rating.

The share price target is set at 200 GBP.

Analyst Stuart Gordon concedes that the risk/reward ration on Thomas Cook Group, while finely balanced, "is modestly skewed to the upside after recent weakness. This is an opportunity."

There are concerns about the tour industry though; "The tour industry remains structurally challenged, with only a modest element of the significant cost cutting undertaken by TCG translating into higher profitability. We estimate that only 25% to 30% is retained in the business," says Gordon.

However, a recovering UK economy could underpin TCG going forward:

The industry sees around a 5% swing in EBIT margins through a cycle. We think we are still early/mid cycle and, with our economists, anticipate
improved consumer confidence in Europe, particularly the UK. We expect a 2% expansion in margin at TCG over the next two years."

Concerning valuation, Gordon says:

"Our 200p PT is based on P/E, EV:EBITDA and DCF. We use P/E and EV:EBITDA relative to the market, applying a 15% discount to recognise our concerns over the structural challenges still faced by the industry. Using an array of sensitivities, we can support a valuation range of 150p to 300p. Recent weakness and this risk/reward profile support our Buy rating."