After a difficult trading year that has seen losses for CCT and the sp nose-dive to 25p at one point the solution to return to profits may come from the launch of electronic Sudoku games in time for Christmas. Character will launch two Carol Vorderman Sudoku products. For Sudoku fans on the move, there are two handy travel size products: a hand-held LCD game (19.99) with over 750 grids, and a touch screen version (29.99), with over 100,000 permutations of the game. A plug and play version, allowing addicts to play Sudoku on their home TV (29.99) will follow later this year. It won't take many sales to rack up good profits if these are anywhere near as addictive as the puzzle books have proved to be so far.
500,000 sold at guess 5 profit per item would rack up 2.5m, with less than 53m shares that is a healthy EPS of 4p on one item alone and my estimate is probably conservative? They also have licensing rights to Dr Who, Little Britain and Batman amongst others.
Also 70% of these shares are in the hands of Directors, Pension Trusts and Funds and as has been seen in recent weeks, moderate buying has pushed up the share price. It has all the hallmarks of a possible recovery stock as was IDS which I tipped last year at 81p and is now 382p. Not saying this will reach those heights but if Sudoku sells well this Christmas expect CCT to show a good start to their financial year. 2005 figures ending August 31st will not be good but we don't buy shares on the past, there is no gearing and 8m of shareholders funds available.
Take a look. The profits could be more pleasing than solving the puzzles.

Like you Greyhound watched this for a while and took the plunge a few weeks back.
I might be 39 but i`m still a big kid at heart and i know i wouldn`t mind waking up Christmas morning to a few things from the character range.
There was a piece on radio 5 yesterday about the limited supply of some toys this Christmas and remote control daleks got a mention ,they are fetching double the price on ebay .The downside to this demand is that character are going to miss out on a lot of sales,as the shopkeeper they spoke to had 1 remote control dalek and no more stock comming in for 2 weeks.
DB66

If you accept that you'll never get the quantity right, I'd rather all available stock being sold even if some lost opportunity than stock being sold at huge discounts or written off. Its looking good for CCT.

Greyhound
Character Group is recovering very fast the M/Cap is still only 25m, the Daleks are fetching 125 on the black market, like I said on another site if the kids don't get one before xmass they will make sure they get after you can preorder them, as for the sp I can see this going way beyond the 100p

Thanks for your comments guys, need to do a bit of fund switching as little point buying in the ISA now.

Adverts on the tely for the daleks on one of the big stores can't remember
which one. Also an advert by cct for there Othello board game.
This company only been brought to my attention last week but I like what
I see. Will be watching for some time to try and get in on a good price.

Ted1
I would say now is a good price the sp has settled down over the last week, when this stock moves up it tends to shoot up on very little volume. Make sure you get in before the aim move at the end of this month thats when we will see a steady rise IMO.

Countdown to transfer to aim and trading update. If H1 2006 is just as good as H2 2005 it is on a ridiculous PE of <6. I think it will be better.
With no debt and limited stock not aligned to directors & investment trusts the sp of this should rise early next year, I think I might have a few more at this price!!

Brought into these yesterday.
For once very good timing.
Merry xmas

A nice rise in SP this morning glad i picked some more up on Monday at 50.24 looks like my luck is changing.
I do expect them to have had a bumper Xmas just from what other parents have been telling me they have bought their kids .Roboraptor a firm favourite with the boys!
DB66

This thread has gone largely un-noticed since I started it, I don't mind at all, topped up again yesterday, 13% rise today, good timing but I think the fun starts in January. Potential to double from here, transfer to Aim will help, brokers report due in the New Year, nice dividend will cover buying costs and oh yes, CCT may well have had a storming run-up to Christmas this time. Well done to those who have jumped on board, have a happy Christmas and may we all be happy and prosperous in the New Year.

andy
Thanks for putting me on to these I am now back in the blue.

Same here Andy,another nice move up so far today.

Andy
Full of praise indeed. After doing my research I brought in last week.
Good web site and plenty of tv adverts run up to xmas.
My son got loads of Doctor Who stuff, sonic screwdriver, radio controlled dalek etc
My local Big W only had a dozen or so of each left on Boxing day and after asking the staff they had no plans to reduce the stock, expecting to sell the lot at full price even after xmas.
Would be nice to see a trading statement after the new year.
Many thanks once again.

This share is picking up speed a lot more volume than usual.

Last chance to buy before we move to aim!!
Let the games begin!! and plenty have been bought!!

Still looking good.

Paul Rowland, Western Mail

CHRISTMAS sales of Doctor Who merchandise have been "in a different league" to rival TV and film spin-offs this year, toy retailers said yesterday.

The popularity of the toys and figures from the hit BBC series, which is filmed in Wales, has comfortably outstripped that of merchandise from blockbuster films like Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith and Batman Begins.

Chris Davies, at The Entertainer toy chain's Cardiff shop, said radio control Daleks had easily been its most popular items in the run-up to Christmas.

"They've just been flying off the shelves," he said. "Last Thursday we got 50 in, and by the next morning they were only four left.

"Most of the rest of the range has been going nearly as well. It's easily outselling things like Star Wars, which aren't even in the same league as it at the moment.

"We thought that might just be because it was filmed in Cardiff, and so might have been popular here because of that, but then we phoned our other shops around Wales and found it had been going just as well there as well."

The Doctor Who range also includes a battery-powered Sonic Screwdriver, a themed board game and walkie talkies modelled on Christopher Eccleston, who starred as the Time Lord before being replaced by David Tennant, and one of the bloodthirsty Slitheen aliens.

Ben Keywood, of mail order firm Galaxy 4, which specialises in merchandise from the cult series, said manufacturers had been taken by surprise by the popularity of the spin-off products.

"It's been very difficult to meet the demand," he said. "The problem has been that nobody really anticipated that it would be quite so popular, and so the companies who were licensed to produce it didn't make enough.

"It's only been in the last couple of days that we've had enough radio-controlled Daleks on our hands to fulfil all the pre-orders we've had, and so it wasn't until then that we could post them out for Christmas.

Mr Keywood said the visual appeal of the Dalek made it irresistible to fans of the show.

"Obviously it's to do with the fact that the Dalek is so iconic and if you see one in the shops, you will just buy it because it looks so good and it's quite quirky.

"I think you can't resist buying it when you see one, so when they have appeared, people have just snapped them off the shelves.

"But the biggest reason is because the series is so popular and it just brought people back to Doctor Who all over again.

"The merchandise has become this year's must-have present because the series was so well written and so well produced and it just captured everyone's imagination all over again."

Interest in the toys is also likely to have been boosted by the airing of a feature-length episode on Christmas Day.

In October, the new series of the show, the first for 16 years, scooped three prizes at the National Television Awards, including Most Popular Drama.

Tick down, CCT has gone X divi today.

Character Group PLC
09 January 2006


The Character Group plc ('Character' or 'the Company')


Digital Division Approach


Character announces that it has received an approach which may or may not lead
to an offer for a substantial part of its digital products division.
Negotiations are presently ongoing and shareholders will be updated in due
course.

The sale of the Digital Division could be 50p to 100p on the sp IMO

I reckon we could see cash returned to shareholders, wouldn't that be good, sp up and cash returned.