They have 3 factories - Aus, CHina, Philippines. Their problem is they have been fundamentally poorly managed by an egocentric bully until he sold out a year or two ago. Whether new management is solid or not will only be proven in time. I like the fact that at least they make announcements and appear to keep the market informed of wins as well as losses, unlike before. But still they are a small player in an area that could disappear with changing technologies as was illustrated perfectly by the HKJC contract loss - bec HKJK are taking on different technology and won't need the old-style tickets that MPI made for them.
Their management of the install and operation of the China factory was pretty bad. The ability of their sales people to turn wins into reality doesn't seem to be great. (Whatever happened to the licence deal in Sth America that was supposed to add work-fee royalties to the bottom line every year?). They spend a fortune on sales, around $1m a year which is a huge proportion of sales and even more, of profit.
I had them and sold out. Anyone could see that at 15c they were overpriced on any measure, I was surprised it stayed at that level until the bad news. The overpricing was also the reason that price dropped so far on one bit of bad news - it was a reality check and it is now back around a fair value -- if the risk of more bad things about balances possibilities of future good deals which I reckon is fair enough.
A true high-risk stock.
MPI Price at posting:
0.0¢ Sentiment: Buy Disclosure: Not Held
