I am certainly not on the inside. If I was, I wouldn't be commenting here! I am a Chartered Accountant (and James Bond fan, hence "CA007") and a retail investor. I bought in recently as a turnaround play so am keen to see how this refinance plays out. I'm just not a fan of people making statements in these forums without anything to support them - I have seen it plenty on HotCopper and it's really not great for anyone.
Why do you have such a disclaimer? Is it because you have been called out for making unsubstantiated statements in the past? Do you think anyone reads that disclaimer and thinks "oh hang on, maybe I shouldn't listen to this guy"? A disclaimer doesn't give you license to say what you want without being called out on it. From the comments above, other readers clearly give your comments credence as an industry insider. So you should be careful with what you say and how you say it, as it may well influence the investment decisions of others, regardless of whether or not that is your intention.
Here is a more acceptable statement:
"AMA has had some cashflow challenges recently (*fact*), so they
may have under-invested in replacing ageing equipment". This is using a fact to draw a hypothesis, rather than making a statement of fact that you can't substantiate:
"SMART
is an aging model
with aging plant and equipment"
Notice the difference? Here's a reminder of the posting guidelines:
Draw whatever conclusions you like. But if you can't substantiate them, keep them to yourself.
The age of a business has nothing to do with the age of its equipment if it is well maintained or replaced at the end of its useful life. McDonalds was founded in 1940 - do you think any of their restaurants have ageing equipment?
AMA is in the position it is in due to previous management (none of whom are present today) making one of the worst deals in history in massively overpaying for the Capital SMART business, then signing another terrible deal to fix the price for 3 years, then getting hit by COVID and an inflation storm whilst having limited ability to pass on price increases (which virtually the entire economy was doing at that time). A perfect storm for eroding enterprise value!
Existing management and board have inherited a proverbial sandwich, but they seem to be steadying the ship. Time will tell.
