Poundland vs. B&M
January 14, 2015 5:10 pm by Ken Odeluga
http://www.cityindex.co.uk/market-analysis/market-predictions-2015/36163782015/ken-odeluga-bp-leads-sunken-oil-john-wood-bests-cornered-oil-services-poundland-vs-bm/
Poundland vs. B&M, who?
Investing in the UK low-cost segment is not straightforward.
There are few listed players, with Poundland Group Plc. the most prominent. I think Poundland makes a strong case as a play on the low-cost UK supermarket segment, with half-year earnings
in November jumping 11.7% to £9.3m for the 26 weeks to 28th September against the comparative period, and like-for-like sales up 4.7% on a constant-currency basis.
This needs to be balanced against its poor forward yield of 1.5% and the overall sense that it lacks the focus, canniness and aggression of the near-notorious Aldi and Lidl (which are unlisted.)
On that basis, it looks like there is a better opportunity than Poundland, in a relatively overlooked listed UK rival.
Market forecasts expect London-listed small cap B&M European Value Retail SA to grow marginally faster than Poundland: consensus forward PE of 27.65 vs. 25.87 for Poundland.
Shares of the latter have so far failed to build up steam from the highs on their IPO day: 401p, on 12th March 2014 and they’re currently 15% lower at 342p.
Poundland stock seems to be ‘on watch’ with investors in this segment, due to its stronger-than-average weighting to UK consumer strength, competition against established value-end non-food and food (Morrisons and ASDA), and of course Aldi and Lidl.
It’s most direct rival is N. Brown Group Plc., and whilst the market expects Poundland to grow faster than N. Brown, we suspect the investment case is edged by the much more sophisticated multi-channel discount operator B&M, chaired by former Tesco CEO Terry Leahy.
For the moment we need to take Poundland at its word, after it said in November its performance for the full-year was “dependent on delivering a good Christmas”. Its next earnings report has yet to be scheduled.
At the same time consensus forecasts place B&M net income for 2015 at £102.85m, against £33.5m for Poundland, possibly evidence of the former’s purchase of a majority stake in Germany’s JA Woll discount chain last year.
There’s evidence of contradiction here: although neither B&M nor Poundland currently yield a value comparable to the market average, the expected price-to-earnings gradient of B&M sharply lags its rival by 23%.
At the same time, B&M current enterprise value over sales would provide much for the group to grow into (and I think it’s very likely to) with a near 150% premium against Poundland’s.
The balance is that for this fledgling low-cost segment, which is very likely to be the retailing mainstream of the future, for now I opt for B&M Value.