Morning all.
I see that Ambrian Capital doesn't have a new thread, so thought I would start one myself.
The company used to trade as investment vehicle Golden Prospect, but has widened its emphasis to provide a full brokerage service bringing a number of companies to market in recent times and moving towards launching investment companies, including Golden Prospect Precious Metals, in which it owns a 72% stake.
AMBR also invests on its own behalf, and owns a 9.43% stake in Jubilee Platinum, which has enjoyed a very strong run of late.
AMBR trades on its own account and in March 2006 launched Ambrian Commodities Limited, an Associate Broker Member of the London Metal Exchange, trading all types of metals and now also launching into "softs" such as sugar and carbon credits.
At 31 December 2006 the market value of AMBR's portfolio of listed investments was
31.9 million. It also holds a small portfolio of unlisted investments, with a book value of 4.8 million.
Trading for the FY ending 31 Dec 2006 was profitable, at EPS of 8.16p, up 35% from the previous year, placing the stock on a PE ratio of approx 8.9 at the current offer price of 73p.
Market cap at present is 79 million at SP of 73p. NAV based on the FY results is about 37p per share; you can probably add another 3.7p to that for the rise in the value of shares in JLP since the beginning of this year.
The current PE of less than 9 looks cheap. I have bought on recovery from the recent dip and am expecting this to add at least 10% within a month. I should point out that I am buying as a trading play, but would also consider this as a potential buy-and-hold.
The one thing to watch out for may be a reduction in income from investment banking activities this year as fewer companies launch on AIM. IB made up approx 40% of turnover last year. AMBR was involved in 14 capital raisings, including bringing 5 companies to market, although any likely drop in overall IPO numbers may be ironed out slightly by AMBR's increased profile and business gained from existing listed companies adopting AMBR as its broker and performing corporate actions such as share placings and other capital raisings. The chairman's statement points out that Ambrian Partners, the IB division, is now active in six sectors, whereas it used only to operate in the mining sector, thus broadening both its exposure to the wider market and its client base.
In summary, then, AMBR looks like it has a good future ahead of it, and appears to be slightly undervalued even allowing for a possible drop in investment banking income, given that the company has diversified its interests considerably.
However, I would urge potential investors please to do their own research as all of this is only my opinion.