I just tuned into the shareholder presentation given by Todd...

I just tuned into the shareholder presentation given by Todd Barlow and Brendan O Dea and wanted to note down some of my thoughts

- The overall vibe was very much business as usual and I wouldn't say there is anything in this set of results that surprised me just more good old fashioned long term thinking by Soul Patts. Based on the net portfolio value given of 11.5 billion we are sitting at a NAV per share of $31.40 so an 11 percent premium to todays SP. I won't be buying at these prices but you could certainly argue the long term outperformance of SOL justifies this premium.

- There were 475 million in new investments in private credit and private equity as the large cap portfolio shrunk continuing the post milton merger theme we've seen over the last couple of years. The private equity portfolio in particular increased to a 12% total exposure and is now sitting over a billion dollars for the first time

- Cash reserves reduced from 600 million to 394 million

- There is now a 345 million total exposure to Uranium of which 200 million is an investment in Next Gen Energy. I've really got no clue how to assess this I struggle with commodities in general!

- There was also a lot of talk around agricultural investments which have continued to grow. Management are big believers in Australia's competitive advantage in this space as we become the food basket of Asia.

I asked for a perspective on todays AFR article which suggested a revisit of the cross shareholding with BKW in light of the good recent share price performance along with other mergers in the construction sector (I'm actually more than happy for this to stay in place I was just interested to get their take on it) and they basically just said that they constantly assess whether there is a transaction to be done and haven't been able to find a tax effective way to do it as yet.