Bought a lil at $0.64 - had to use some spare cash up before I did something stupid, I almost bought PPL with it, gosh.
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Bought a lil at $0.64 - had to use some spare cash up before I did something stupid, I almost bought PPL with it, gosh.
Im pretty sure that is their standard price, it didnt have the red tag they usually do for specials. Possible answer to your question..... A friend of mine works for a large food company, and Aldi ripped off one of their products - The food company threatened legal action unless Aldi removed the product, to which Aldi offered to stock their product instead. The food company thought they wouldnt be able to make their margins and sell at Aldi's prices, but as it turned out Aldi is a super efficient company that does things VERY diferently to other supermarkets (distribution, logistics, warehousing, shelf stocking practices etc) which is why their products are so cheap, rather than pounding down their suppliers prices (although im sure that probably happens a bit too). End story is, I think, a2 still makes the same margin and Aldi still makes their normal margin - consumer wins (which is why Aldi is growing so quickly) - hence the $4.39 for a tasty bottle of a2!
Will keep an eye on it however in-case it was just a special...
The mystery surrounding the identity of Equity Casa Grande, the Delaware-registered company that owns 30 million shares in ATM and is its sixth biggest shareholder with a 4.55% stake, turns out not to be such a mystery after all.
It is the investment vehicle of colourful US billionaire Sam Zell, who is a close friend and business associate of ATM’s chairman Cliff Cook. He was the guy who famously created America’s biggest property empire, Equity Group and cleverly sold it off for US$39bn just before the Global Financial Crisis, whereupon the US property market turned to mush and most of the group’s properties became worth less than the mortgage debt they carried. He also famously bought the Chicago Tribune media group which included the Los Angeles Times for US$8.2bn and then put them into bankruptcy protection a year later (the papers now survive under different ownership structures).
Zell is estimated to be worth about $5bn and his current major investment vehicle, Equity International (owned through Equity Casa Grande LCC), specialises in identifying and partnering companies outside the US, usually by investing in real estate-related opportunities. He is a co-investor in London-based LifeCare Residences, a luxury international retirement village operator set up by Cliff Cook, who had founded and then sold off NZ listed retirement village operator Metlifecare. LifeCare has retirement villages on Waiheke and in Remuera.
Zell received ATM shareholders’ approval at the shareholders’ meeting in 2008 to purchase 50 million shares. It’s interesting now to look back at what happened then, as reported by The Independent:
“It was through retirement home connections that A2 Corporation chairman and substantial shareholder Cliff Cook and his right-hand man Greg Hinton met Zell and his executives, culminating in the fund's investment in A2.
“A2 shareholders also voted on Friday in favour of a placement of 28 million shares to AMP Capital for 10c a share, (bringing its total stake in the company to 40.015 million shares, or 12.85% of A2) as well as the issue of 13.915 million shares to the Child Health Research Foundation in exchange for it agreeing to terminate an agreement it entered into with A2 in April 2004 for entitlement to a portion of future royalties. This agreement related to a jointly held patent between the two parties for processing milk from cows with only A2 beta-casein protein, free of the A1 casein linked to illnesses such as heart disease, diabetes, autism and schizophrenia.”
In July this year, Dairy Farms NZ Ltd, which is a US-NZ JV 62.8% owned by Zell, received OIO approval to buy 434.4ha of dairy farmland at Lowcliffe in Canterbury for $22.3m. Whether this is connected with the ATM-Synlait operation I don’t know.
NT001,
Clavell Capital, the Auckland based investment advisors behind A2 Milk are also behind Dairy Farms NZ, who boast Sir Henry Van Der Heyden (ex Fonterra) as an advisor to the company.
There are indeed possibilities for Dairy Farms NZ (who anticipate listing in mid 2015) to increase their*revenue by converting some of their herds to A2.
The Companies Office website is down for maintenance, but a casual examination of the Dairy Farms NZ shareholder list on the NZCO website would reveal some*interesting names...
Like lada cars
Still trying to get a real feel for the A2 financials, mainly because I struggle to get any DCF to give me anywhere near 90 cents / $1
Is this slide really meaningful (from annual results preso) - like say for Australia is the intercompany charges and license fees of $14.2m a real cost or just a lot of smoke and mirrors to confuse mere mortals like me. Upon consolidation it probably has no impact and A2 have put this disgram in to try to show how much money is made in each segment.
Reading all this stuff it appears as A2 say that 'investment for growth' was $7.5m - does that imply normalised earnings were about $7.5m pre-tax then?