Whilst I greatly respect the investors exitingtheir positions once their investment thesis had been broken I personally willhold despite break even not playing out this quarter as expected. I think theshare price is clearly irrationally low and I honestly think staying in overthe next 3-6 months will likely outperform any investment ideas I haveelsewhere.
WhilstI am suspicious of management (after the earnings release prior to the quarterlywhich in my eyes was either a pump or subtlety letting us know breakeven hadn’tbeen reached) they have pointed to key reasons why expenses were higher thenusual including:
· Increased cost inglobal shipping.
· 40% Inflation inprice of key ingredients for milk and protein products.
· In there words ‘tactically’buying more inventory and leasing a warehouse for storage to combat the above.
· Staff costs (mostlyredundancies) which were up $1 mil to in their words streamline ahead of newfinancial year.
· $900,000 spent onexpansion of protein/snacking plant.
Sobased on the above I believe there is at least $2mil in non recurring expensesand it remains to be seen if the increased inventory and warehouse storage maysave money (I believe it would). Plus they will receive a $560,000 grant forexpanding the warehouse. Taking all of this into account and remembering Colescontract will commence I think they will come bloody close to profitabilitynext quarter.
I agree with TEP in that the company still has$4.1mil cash and undrawn debt facilities of $1.8mil which isn’t too bad but ifthey had to do a credit raise at these price levels it would be disastrous.Hopefully management realise this and pull the finger out next quarter.
I am worried our large sellerwhich damaged the share price initially may have ceased selling after theperformance share were released and it was retail who drove the price downrecently.
