Tuesday, March 13, 2007

Merali Firms... more losses for Investors

I have never been a fan of merali's listed firms...

Sameer Africa (Firestone) - Shares were sold to an unsuspecting public who did not know better at 35.50 about 10 years ago. Today they sell at 15/-. Dividends are a hit or miss thus an extremely poor performer over the years!

Sasini - The recent run-up makes no sense to me. Compared to other agricultural firm (except Limuru Tea), Sasini is horrendously over-priced. Wait for the price to fall as the 1H 2006-7 results are released.

Eveready - Need I say more? The WAP price on Mar 13 2007 is just a mere 3% above the OFS price.

Compare merali's firms to the Aga Khan firms & you realise that Management matters...

5 comments:

MainaT said...

Meralli is a classic case of jack of all trades and master of none. The funny things is Richard Brancson kicked off his empire the same way i.e. going into different businesses and borrowing against them to invest in new ones. Howver, he did start consolidating them and most are now successful standalone entities.

Btw, don't know whether you saw this article http://bdafrica.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=140&Itemid=1574where Equtorial Bank (part of the Meralli business empire) are saying they've been lending to some of his listed entities.

coldtusker said...

I do not think merali's firms will collapse but they are poor performers for the minority investors.

I don't expect problems for Equatorial Bank. Note that the bank is restricted to lending no more than a x% (don't know what it is) to associated firms. Furthermore, there are other EB owners who would keep an eye on the merali loans.

Merali does a lot of business within/between his own firms - which makes sense for him - thus earns more than he would than as an investor/shareholder.

pesa tu said...

these shares were for buy and flip.Those who didnt-too bad.Just reading the EVEREADY prosepctus u can see how bad things are for them.

Klara said...

I doubt it will Collapse! It's still holdin up! but nothin compares to the Aga Khan One!!

odegle said...

i just think that merali is not an investor but a large scale speculator