Unbowed by Brexit

TALK ABOUT the winter of my discontent. Brexit … bleh. Don’t get me wrong I like the opportunity a political crisis brings as much as the next bear. But when a serious chunk my life savings are squirrelled away in international real estate counters such as Stenprop and Redefine International, then I’m sure you can imagine that I’ve not been the happiest camper.

I must confess there were days earlier this month when I needed to draw on every bit of inner resolve not to capitulate my long-term positions in international real estate shares. I would like to reassure you that I steered stoically through the Brexit ripples. But that would be a fib.

I did some buying when the panic was under way, but sadly did not hang onto these positions, which — spying the bounces in the prices of Redefine International, Capital & Counties and Intu — I deeply regret. Live and (l)earn.

This edition has several takes on Brexit — including my wizened colleague Stafford Thomas’s overview of selected long-term buying opportunities.

Aside from the Poms unexpectedly pulling the rug from under investor sentiment, it has been an interesting month on the JSE. Developments at cement group PPC show how even companies with well-set business foundations can flounder. I can’t see much to reinforce sentiment at PPC, and I wouldn’t try bottom picking the share.

Meanwhile Distribution & Warehousing Network (Dawn) seemed to enter the twilight zone with reportable irregularities uncovered — I presume after former Hudaco boss Stephen Connelly took a hard, long look around the company. Restoring decent margins is going to be a huge challenge at Dawn — but I suspect shareholders should have been more forceful about making changes when the first red flags (unjustified bonus payments and fees paid to directors) came to light.

A least the overriding depression about SA’s industrial prospects — as expressed in the dour share prices of Invicta and Torres — found a degree of relief in a rather inventive deal whereby upstart ENX Group could take over industrial conglomerate Eqstra. Perhaps it’s time Torre and Invicta — both with robust balance sheets — get back in the deal-making saddle.

Most heartening is that — at a time when you might reasonably expect more companies to start mulling delisting — we have a sizeable new listing in the form of private equity specialists Ethos. Come to think of it, the JSE now has a merry band of specialised investment counters, including newcomers such as Stellar Capital, offshore-pitched Astoria and Capital Appreciation.

But where are the empowerment investment counters? There should be many more on the JSE, and maybe next month we’ll look at why there aren’t.