Quite an interesting and tricky month for the screening with four potential sale candidates coming up based on their Scores. VP the plant hire group again fell into this category, but as I kept it in last time awaiting their results, I am going to do that again this month as these are due this week on the 5th June. The shares have had a good run into this week and the prior update was of the in line variety. So it seems unlikely that there should be any surprises unless they have deliberately kept expectations low so they can pleasantly surprise, perhaps. Lets hope they don't disappoint and leave me regretting my decision to await the results rather than selling before, which might have been the lower risk option. Other than that with the acquisition of Brandon Hire late last year it will also be worth watching out for an update on how the integration is going there for any problems or increase in the expected synergies & cost savings.
Another sale candidate that I decided to give the benefit of the doubt to was Hays Group (HAS) the staffing company which had a positive trading update and looks set for a strong year which ends this month. The main reason the score has fallen is due to no changes to the forecasts in the short term and a decline in the cover ratio as they are expected to pay a much larger dividend via the payment of a special dividend. Thus with the year end approaching I thought I'd await the year end up date & see if that leads to upgrades and an improvement in the Score again and the possibility of hanging on to collect the final and special dividends too. Alternatively I could have switched into the better scoring and similar company Robert Walters, but this was not much cheaper so I dismissed that idea to keep the trading costs down, which is one of the few costs that an investor can control. The remaining two sales candidates which I let go through were Headlam Group (HEAD) & Jarvis Group (JIM). Of these I had given Headlam the benefit of the doubt previously and indeed topped it up last month. But having taken the final dividend their score has deteriorated again after their trading update this month led to downgrades. While it remains lowly valued and they seem to be taking action to manage the business against a difficult background, they acknowledge that achieving their targets will depend on a customary stronger second half & no continuation of recent weaker trends, which leaves them open to the risk of having to warn on profits later in the year. Equally it may all pan out as they hope and the shares might then re-rate on the back of relief over there being no profit warning, but as ever we'll have to wait and see on that. As for Jarvis Group the score has deteriorated here after their somewhat cautious statement that accompanied their bumper full year figures. Thus the expected growth looks pretty lack lustre and there is no dividend growth forecast. Thus although it is probably fine for the long term it doesn't seem to offer that greater value on around 15x earnings. In addition the CIS portfolio has a lot of exposure to financials any way, with two fund management companies, so out it goes, but personally I'll probably continue to hold it myself for the long term as part of a more broadly diversified portfolio. In terms of the replacement candidates a few interesting ideas came up including Phoenix Spree Deutschland (PSDL) which is a property fund that is now specializing in Berlin property. While I toyed with the idea, it seemed a bit too off piste for what I'm trying to demonstrate with the CISP but I might treat myself to a few for a bit more diversification. Aside from that Howden Joinery (HWDN) came up again as a potential re-entrant to the portfolio. But having sold Headlam on around 10x I was reluctant to replace it with another similarly exposed consumer cyclical on 15x, although it may be better quality. Meanwhile Henry Boot (BOOT) also came up as another that could have re-entered the portfolio. But since the portfolio has a housebuilder (Bellway) and plant hire via VP I decided to give that a miss too. In addition I could have picked Abcam (ABC), Renishaw (RSW), Patisserie Holdings (CAKE), Advanced Medical Solutions (AMS) & even Fevertree Drinks (FEVR) but I overlooked these due to my value bias. It does highlight the fact that the Compound Income Scores are not just for yield stocks, but can highlight attractive, quality growth stocks too - hmm perhaps I should rename them the Compounding Scores? Or maybe as I have suggested in the past perhaps I should run an unconstrained portfolio based on the Scores, but of course if you subscribe to them yourself you're able to do that if you want. Any way in the end I decided on a couple of cheaper alternatives in Renew Holdings (RNWH) which may not be the highest quality outfit, but the nature of their business (essential maintenance in the main) should provide a bit of stability. In addition they have seen some upgrades post their recent interims and made a reasonable looking acquisition too. This bolsters their exposure to railway maintenance and is expected to be materially earnings enhancing with the return on investment also expected to comfortably exceed their cost of capital. So on this basis I think there could be more upgrades to come and a possibility that the share which have sold off this year, could may be return toward their previous highs around 480p, perhaps. Finally the other stock I settled on was Forterra (FORT) a brick making company, which trades quite cheaply, but looks to be trading well given the on going push to build houses and shortage of bricks which is leading them to invest in more capacity funded from their cash flow. Obviously not without its risk if the housing market or economy should suddenly go into reverse, but for now it seem fine so into the portfolio it goes. It does also add to the housing and construction exposure on top of Bellway & VP. The portfolio will also pick up the final dividend of 6.4p which goes XD on 14th June for an immediate yield of 2% which will help recover the cost of these trades. So after those changes that leaves the CISP on a forward PE of around 14.5x with a forecast yield of 3.25% on the back of expected dividend growth of 13.2% which all seems OK to me. Don't forget if you'd like to Score your portfolio or get more ideas like these on a regular basis then check out the Scores link here or at the main menu at the top of the site or in the three bars if you are on a mobile.
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Just a quick note to say that the latest Compound Income Scores have been updated again today. Meanwhile as promised here are brief details about the trades that were carried out in the CIS Portfolio which is run using the scores. This month there were three potential sales, although in the end I gave VP Group (VP) the benefit of the doubt as they had issued an in line trading update and final results are due in June.
Consequently Central Asia Metals (CAML) and Portmeirion (PMP) whose scores had deteriorated both left the portfolio having delivered decent returns over about a year in the case of CAML & just three months in the case of PMP. CAML was replaced directly with a similar stock with a higher score - Rio Tinto (RIO) albeit that it is much bigger and more diversified in terms of its operations. While PMP was replaced with Mondi (MNDI) the much larger , international packaging group where the portfolio then picked up the final & special dividends which gave an immediate yield of 6.27%, although obviously the price will have adjusted down accordingly on the XD day. Finally in a bit of portfolio tidying up I also topped up a couple of holdings which had lagged with some of the proceeds of the above sales and from some cash that had accrued from dividends. Thus holdings in Headlam (HEAD) & Ferrexpo (FXPO) were topped up. I know this goes against all the suggestions of running your winners and cutting your losers but in this case FXPO continues to score extremely well and HEAD's score is still quite good at 88 and the CIS portfolio will also pick up the final dividend of 17.25p worth 3.88% which goes xd towards the end of May. That's all for now but don't forget if you would like to learn more about the Scores and how to gain access to them or learn more about the CIS Portfolio then do explore the navigation links at the top of the site if you are on a PC or in the three lines menu at the top if you are on a mobile or tablet or click the highlighted links in the first paragraph. Good luck with your investing and have a great weekend whatever you are up to. Here is another update on the Compound Income Scores Portfolio (CISP), this time on the monthly screening and recent announcements from companies in the portfolio.
Taking the announcements first, we had slightly underwhelming results from Headlam (HEAD) the flooring distribution company which struggled a bit for growth as one of its major customers cut back on orders and conditions in the UK were generally more difficult than the previous year as the squeeze on household budgets from falling real incomes presumably had its effect on demand for carpets etc. Having said that though the European performance was stronger and they also undertook some cost saving measures and made some add on acquisitions which helped to produce some modest 6 to 7% growth in profits and earnings despite the tougher domestic conditions. They also increased the dividend by 10%, helped by their robust balance sheet and their reasonably confident view of the future and a clear dividend policy based on a target level of cover. There was however no special dividend this year as there has been in the last few years given the outlook and the demands for capital investment that they see. Overall an OK set of numbers but the market didn't seem to like them that much and marked the shares down quite sharply on the day of the announcement. They have not recovered since and I note there have been a few small downgrades since then, so they may well continue to drift for now despite looking good value on 10x with a 5%+ dividend yield for the current year. So in summary good value and reasonable quality but lacking momentum and some concerns about the outlook, although their self help measures should help to alleviate the worst of this, so a hold for now but we will have to see how it scores come the next monthly screening to see if it remains in the portfolio. It does however, look like it has come back into a range of support between about 400 and 465p, see chart at the end. On the same day we had better news from Bodycote (BOY) which saw strong growth, paid a special dividend and rose on the day as the market clearly liked these numbers and this helped to offset some of the weakness seen in the Headlam share price, which after all is the whole point of a portfolio. So we have something of an opposite here a quality cyclical which is benefiting from stronger demand and therefore is rated more highly (18x with a 2% yield or thereabouts) and which therefore has better price momentum which is supported too by earnings upgrades seen since the figures. Moving onto the transactions this month these gave me something of a mental challenge as the scores challenged my preconceptions and natural inclination on some stocks as well as presenting some challenges in constructing a suitably diversified portfolio. Firstly on the sales the stocks that came as a result of the screening was Unilever (ULVR). Unilever is of course well know and a solid company which is a classic compounder and one which personally I'm happy to continue holding of a more broadly diversified income portfolio. I did decide to sell it for the CISP though to follow the process, as despite it being somewhat over sold in the short term, it still looks a bit of an expensive defensive, albeit not as expensive as it was given recent share price falls. It has however had earnings downgrades and I guess maybe investors generally are rotating towards more cyclical names given the improving economic situation globally if not in the UK. The second sale candidate was XL Media (XLM), which even though it had only been in the portfolio for a short time, I decided to sell for a small profit despite the recent positive trading update. This was because the score had deteriorated on the recent re-rating and there had been some small downgrades. In addition to this the CISP still has exposure to this area via Taptica (TAP ) and they both seem to have come off recently as they have tapped the market for new capital and perhaps investor appetite for this area is satiated in the short term, so maybe you can have too much of a good thing. Talking of having too much of a good thing that brings me onto the buys this month. Now back in January, which was poor timing with the benefit of hindsight, I did buy another market related stock in the shape of Miton (MGR), which gave the portfolio three positions in market sensitive stocks. Thus when Plus 500 (PLUS) came out top of the pops this month I didn't feel able to add it to the portfolio for that reason as well as being naturally biased against it myself. It does however look very cheap having just had a strong upgrades on the back of a positive trading update and it does trade on about half the rating of IG Group - so the scores are signalling that it should do well if you can stomach the risks. I note however that the directors have also placed a large slug of stock recently, although they do still retain quite substantial holdings - so even they are hedging their bets having tried to sell out previously at 400p to Playtech (PTEC). So in the end I bought some Amino Technologies (AMO) which helps TV networks with IPTV streaming and some Spectris SXS which helps companies with enhancing their productivity, see the name links for more details of their operations. Both these scored well and bring something different to the portfolio. This now leave the portfolio looking reasonable value on around 14x with a 3.4% prospective yield based on the forecast dividend growth 15% for the current year, thereby hopefully it will deliver on the objective of delivering value, income and growth which the Compound Income Scores are designed to identify. So there you go that's it for this week and don't forget if you would like to find out more about the Scores and how you could gain access to them to help you with your portfolio monitoring and construction then check out the Scores page which has all the details. |
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