you guys have this stock all wrong. if you put a fair market...

you guys have this stock all wrong. if you put a fair market value on the Aussie centres - which are doing 30% EBITDA margins, mid-80s occupancy, ie shooting the lights out - you get the NZ centres at 80% discount to what Busy Bees just paid to take out Provincial. No doubt the NZ biz has issues but look at the big picture: $24mm in EBITDA next yr and most of it (60%?) will be coming from Australia. the NZ biz - despite its legacy and size and issues - is basically a free option at this point.

if you value the Aussie centres at 4.5x EV/EBITDA, or $2.5-$3mm per centre (high end should be fair given this is where recent transactions have been done by multiple operators), the NZ stub is valued at ~$300k NZD per centre (versus the Provincial deal which got done at $2.1mm per). That's a huge discrepancy right there, either the NZ centres get better (through attrition + improvements) or someone steps in to take them over. Huge synergies if the Kiwi biz joined w Provincial, and BB clearly has the $$,

No doubt if there's more lockdowns again both businesses get hurt. That said I don't think this is an independent entity in 18mos. Anyone wanting to roll this up will do so before the business fully turns. i wouldnt put it past someone like Alceon to make another play here either (exactly what they did with TNK) although liquidity is a bit light to be fair.

Keep in mind the NZ business has not had a proper CEO since mid-year, they haven't said anything about hiring a new one (Chris is running it at the moment, looks like a caretaker role for him as he just wanted to build out the Aussie centres). that alone is a little curious...

not saying this happens tomorrow but in 6mos things will look v different. i assume Omicron will have ended COVID (or we're all screwed) and this will start to be valued on normalized earnings (ie back >$1.1) or the businesses will have been separated and sold or in the process of being taken over.