Pinned straw:
Just what we bloody needed before Christmas ... the vague announcement, the abruptness of it and the short duration all makes it look like a shitshow of some sort with Ron. EML has also been here before with Emma Shand turfed out not long after commencing, so EML has a track record of these rapid turf outs. So, not a great look at all.
BUT, if I zoom out of the current shitshow, the following appears to be still intact:
- EBITDA guidance for FY2025 was reaffirmed - so no "because Richard-was-an-idiot-our-new-capability-rollout-and-revenue-is-impacted" type impact on the business. Thats a big tick
- No evidence to suggest that EML 2.0 is in any trouble - it has been barely 4 weeks since the Strategy Update, the reaffirming guidance helps provide some confirmation of this. Another tick
- Anthony Haynes is the dude that ploughed $0.52m to buy a 0.24% stake in EML in Oct 2024 - he has skin in the game AND the controls to the busines. He appears to have the experience and industry credentials to lead EML. Thats another tick
Will need to wait until the 1H results and take stock then.
If the numbers show that the EML2.0 is working well, then all well and good, we move on - this saga could then be put down as Ron being somehow incompatible with EML and so, his early turfing would be a plus rather than a negative.
If the numbers show that the EML2.0 is struggling, then it might be that Ron saw something that the Board didn't, tried to change course, didn't win and was turfed. That would strain my thesis and force me to reevaluate.
Not much more to work on other than the above, unfortunately ...
Discl: Held IRL and in SM.
Trying to learn some technical.
Classic gap fill at 67c before quickly bouncing back up. Below indicator is OBV. Still hope I guess seeing OBV did not dip too far ...
@edgescape yep, classic gap closing. The 70c zone has reasonable support history in the last 2 years, so that is not a bad place to land after today's shitshow.
Would be very interesting to see if it would re-test the 52-week low around the 60c level in the coming days/weeks.
Looks like Tamim Asset Management was the whale buyer yesterday on volume. Hence why OBV recovered.
In good company I guess??
@edgescape Ron at Tamim has been a huge EML bull for about 5 years now. So he has ridden it all way down from about $5 to where is now. That's about an 80% loss I suspect. Good on him for still having conviction if that's what it is...but I wouldn't read too much into his calls on EML as they have been wrong for a long time now...
Joe Aston even wrote him up for it a couple of years ago, when he was still at the AFR as below -
To be fair the fund he runs does have a good track record but it's no thanks to EML.
“Congrats and big thank you to the muppet who sold EML to $4.92 this morning,” he tweeted (with laughing and clapping emojis, naturally) in January 2020. EML’s share price is now 94¢.
He tweeted in February 2020, that EML “has been our largest holding since I joined Tamim at $1.35 and we have bought more along the way”.
Ron joined TAMIM in 2018, months after the Boat Fund, which he founded, was wound up. Before that, he ran his own marketing agency.
“I just want to say great job Reddit Army,” he tweeted in February 2021. “You squeezed the nuts out of the EML short sellers today.”
Two months later: “Our new valuation for EML is $8.”
“EML update isn’t great,” Ron tweeted the following month, after the company disclosed that the Central Bank of Ireland had raised significant concerns over EML’s anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism finance controls.
By October 2021, he spitballed: “I wouldn’t be surprised if EML is already working behind the scenes to have another e-money licence in a different country and kiss the Irish goodbye.” With laughing emoji.
In Ron’s fantasies, EML was fleeing to Cyprus, perhaps co-locating with John Karantzis.
In November 2021, Ron again described EML as “our largest holding”.
He omitted to mention that he personally owns 2.3 million EML shares, or 0.64 per cent of the company. In 2017, he owned 4 million EML shares.
“I see EML shorts growing but my guess is they (sic) wrong again. Watch out for the squeeze,” he tweeted in February this year, when the stock was at $3.13, or 232 per cent higher than it is now.
On Monday, EML’s veteran chief executive Tom Cregan resigned abruptly.
Ron had a hot take: “It’s obviously unexpected, but the stock is very cheap at these levels, so it could make them a takeover target.”
You almost have to admire Ron’s berserk confirmation bias. It could be the work of John Cleese.
Ron has earned his place in the ranks of Australia’s great social media over-sharers. In the hall of fame, they’ll hang his portrait next to James Spenceley’s.
It may be arguable in the modern world, which celebrities mindlessly rule, that there’s no such thing as bad publicity, but the precept sadly doesn’t apply to asset management.