News & Insights #51
Dreaming of South Africa, a tropical island in the Indian Ocean... and of sending Brent Ashton to Rotterdam for a holiday
Links, references & more
» Here to learn…
One of the first times that I see $1522.hk BII Transportation Tech mentioned by anyone.
, any thoughts on a resolution for how the company is getting squeezed on its working capital… and has been attracting financing to pay the dividend?That’s been a key factor holding me back with this one.
» Value Investors Club
pointed me to a VIC write-up on a HK 第部分. Now drawn to the platform, I decided to look around for write-ups on interesting companies/stocks. Here are a couple from between 2024/12/01 and 2025/04/10…Canada
2025/03/08 - $HASH.v - Simply Solventless Concentrates; I learnt a few new things about this Hidden Jam
Europe
2025/02/21 - $HAYP.st - Haypp Group; online retailer of nicotine pouches and fintwit darling
Hong Kong/China
2025/04/02 - $0001.hk - CK Hutchison; infamous HK conglomerate
2025/03/25 - $…QD.us - Qudian; cash, last-mile delivery, and aircraft leasing
2025/03/24 - $6686.hk - Noah Holdings; wealth manager
2025/03/24 - $2191.hk - SF Reit; industrial and logistics properties with 10% DY
2025/03/10 - $0066.hk - MTR Corp; infamous HK public transport operator
2025/03/05 - $0700.hk - Tencent; leading tech platform
2025/02/19 - $PDD.us - PDD Holdings; e-commerce leader
2025/01/13 - $0823.hk - Link REIT; property REIT with two potential catalysts
2024/12/19 - $1448.hk - Fu Shou Yuan; deathcare services co
Japan
2025/04/10 - $8136.t - Sanrio; who does not know Hello Kitty?
2025/03/17 - $5962.t - Asaka Industrial; USD 10m market cap, 3% DY, AND #1 position in the Japanese market for high-quality shovels and gardening tools?
Singapore
2025/04/10 - H02.si - Haw Par - HPAR.sp
Fenkell makes a case for further value unlocking with upside up to SGD 30 p/s. He opened my eyes to the separate listing of United Overseas Insurance, which also holds a small stake in Haw Par.
2025/02/28 - $P34.si - Delfi; chocolates leader in ao’s Indonesia, where it and Mayora collectively hold ~60% market share
South Africa
2025/03/20 - $SUI.jo - Sun International; casino’s in SA… for brave investors
United States
2025/03/25 - $MRVI.us - Maravai Lifesciences; this healthcare technology platform co has been absolutely clobbered
Jaminvest resources
Some useful links to key resources on Jaminvest.
🏷️ - Financial models/templates/et cetera (f🔐)
🏷️ - Hong Kong (sub-)portfolio posts
🏷️ - Portfolio posts (f🔐)
» » - Stock/Company list, alphabetical lists of many of the stocks mentioned
🏷️ - Tutorials including Excel sheets
Table of contents
Remember; the website version contains an interactive Table of contents accessible on the left side of the screen.
Hidden gems
Biorem; Q1 doesn’t change a thing (…imo)
Covalon Technologies; Brent needs to visit Rotterdam
HK 第部分
Miscellaneous
Best Mart 360; He’s alive!
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China Tower
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Odd lots
Adcorp; South Africa has absurd-cheap stocks too… just very illiquid ones
Disclaimer
Footnotes
1. Hidden gems
For newer members on
, please find the Hidden gems recap in footnote 👉 1.Hidden gems index
Biorem; Q1 doesn’t change a thing (…imo)
Covalon Technologies; Brent needs to visit Rotterdam
Hidden gems
1.a. Biorem 🏷️
$BRM.v
The cleantech’s Q1 (backlog to) revenue conversion came in matching the lowest level since 2023Q1.
Revenues for the first quarter reflected expected seasonal differences in construction schedules and logistical issues experienced by the owner of a large project, which combined to push expected revenues into the second, third and fourth quarters of 2025.
The project-nature of the activities along with (weather-related) seasonality makes it hard to read much from 1-quarter’s financial performance at Biorem. On the bottom-line, a weak/strong revenue number gets magnified due to a relatively large fixed cost basis. That dynamic was pretty obvious at play in Q1, with profits evaporating.
Taking a step back, however, and seeing the growth initiatives…
“Sales initiatives executed in 2024 are now converting into orders in our growing backlog. Bidding activity remains robust and expected to continue throughout the year”, said Derek S. Webb. “Management remains focused on a number of organic growth initiatives and delivering the historical backlog that has been built up over the last several quarters.”
“One of the key challenges we face is supporting a growing number of international clients that require significant shipping capacity to move our proprietary next generation biological media to their locations. Several current projects require almost 1,000 sea containers in 2025. Securing containers and a berth on vessels on a weekly basis is proving difficult for our customers and we have tasked our logistics team with supporting their efforts in this area.”
… the very healthy CAD 68m backlog, which should support CAD 0.20 or more in annual EPS, on a sub CAD 2 share price, with CAD 0.30+ per share in net cash… sounds like an attractive risk/reward to me… certainly with a CEO who has proven to be an excellent stewart of shareholders’ capital.
1.d. Covalon Technologies 🏷️
$COV.v
1.d.i Promotional communication 🤦♂️
The Canadian woundcare company reported weak results, which had already been the cause for a big share price decline with the prior results presentation.
While I believe the business (and the stock) hold promise - some of the products are absolutely critical for patients - I believe CEO Brent Ashton does a DIS-service to the company and its shareholders by being overly promotional in marketing the Covalon-stock. Brent has been creating overly high expectations among investors with bullish statements like the following one from the 2025/04/23 Planet MicroCap conference… 🤦♂️
I am absolutely confident that we can on average double the price of Covalon's shares in each of the next five years
The 2025/04/22 closing share price was CAD 2.27. So that would imply a 72.64 share price by 2030/04/23… Perhaps he meant that the share price could increase CAD 2.27 each year for 5 years, leading to a CAD 13.62 share price by 2030/04/23. Anyhoe, usually CEO’s just disappoint with these type of predictions. Just run the business well, and the share price will take care of itself. Niet Lullen Maar Poetsen they say in Rotterdam.
1.d.ii What else?
With the poor communication addressed… crossed fingers that the inventory de-stocking at one of Advanced Wound Care U.S.’ strategic partners is indeed in the rearviewmirror…
Relying on the management commentary 😬… I know, I know… 😬😬
… the just reported FQ2 figures should have marked the bottom, with a sequential increase in US and overall revenue coming up in FQ3, and H2 revenue to be stronger than 2025H1 revenue.
Looking further out, if management comes close to the plan to double revenues » CAD 60m+ revenue by FY2028, things can become very interesting. At roughly CAD 60m revenue I would expect about CAD 5-7m in free cash flow (FCF). The current CAD 50m-ish enterprise value would just be too low for a solid-growth and healthy cash generating healthcare company.
Three last titbits from the earnings call….
VALGuard product » Opportunity to grow from a few million CAD revenue today to CAD 30m by 2030
US tariffs » Over 99% of COV’s revenue is manufactured in North America. Competitors producing in China (such as Medline) are slapped with 30% tariff... and European manufacturing (such as Solventum, ex-3M) may be impacted by tariffs too.
Gross margin is highly driven by geographic mix shifts, as non-North American revenues holds considerably lower margin. The Gross margin should pick back up from Q3.
2. HK 第部分
For newer members on
, please find the HK 第部分 recap in footnote 👉 2 .HK 第部分 index
Miscellaneous
Best Mart 360; He’s alive!
…
China Tower
…
…
2.a. Miscellaneous
As usual, you find some of the filings I looked at in the footnotes, footnote 3 this time.
The most interesting finds this time around are (as so often) nanocaps…
……. ………… Holdings; A c10% divi stock, from a company that is riding the trend of AI and data center investments in China… with two global tech giants as customers (two out of these three??; Alibaba, Bytedance, Tencent??). The stock is listed in the Interactive Brokers platform, but I believe it is available only for residents outside US/Canada/Europe. Please let me know if your broker allows buy orders.
The specific tech nature of the activities…