Ganoderma, DXN's main product, is the cause of basal stem rot, a serious disease in oil palm trees. See http://sawitsecure.mpob.gov.my/ganoderma-basal-stem-rot/ and https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9571826/

According to Section 7.28.1 of the Prospectus, DXN is facing non-compliances with land use and express conditions on land titles in Kedah and has shut down at least some of its Ganoderma cultivation and processing facilities.

I wonder about the extent to which the fear of Ganoderma in the plantation industry, perhaps we may call it Ganophobia, affects the current share price and future share price prospects of DXN.

The high dividend is also worrying. As an veteran CEO once told me several decades ago, "it's easy to hide a poor performance in a good dividend". Just look at what happened to Astro. It was going great guns and paying a whopping dividend of around 9% ... until it wasn't.

Revenue seems relatively stable, albeit decreasing slightly year-on-year, but what is concerning is that the net margin has progressively decreased from its peak of 13.6% in the December quarter of 2022 to 12.1% in the September quarter of 2023. This raises the concern that the company could get caught between inflating costs and an incapacity to increase prices.

But what about the so-called vernacular productions?

Astro crashedo used to mean the set-top box had died. Now it means something entirely different.

Would the last Astro ultra box to automatically shut down kindly wind up the company.

This morning I received the following email:

Dear XXXX XXXX XXXX,You have reached 70% of yr credit limit (Maxis a/c no:XXXXXXXXXX, RMXXX.XX). Please remit payment to avoid service interuption. To pay, click Maxis Care Portal at https://care.maxis.com.my/ OR for Hotlink Postpaid, go to Hotlink Care Portal at https://selfserve.hotlink.com.my/ or online banking with JomPAY (Biller Code 1123) or WhatsApp at +60123451123. Please disregard this email if payment has been made.Thank you.

When I called them to investigate whether a third party had been making unauthorised charges to my account, they said that they were having "system issues" and that I should ignore the email.

According to the BBC, in September last year, "Australian telecommunications giant Optus revealed about 10 million customers - about 40% of the population - had personal data stolen in what it calls a cyber-attack."

It's curious how the 8 Conlay logo looks uncannily like the core of a smallpox viron. See https://www.sciencephoto.com/media/87445/view/smallpox-virus-particle-tem

Samsung is seeing a significant slump in sales. See https://www.bbc.com/news/business-64182874

The integrated circuit business goes boom-bust-boom-bust. In part, it is because setting up a production line is very expensive, but once the production line is set up, incremental production is relatively cheap.

I should think a bust is coming. I urge caution.

Anyway, this is the response I received from CIMB when I lodged my complaint:

"RM0 RM0.00 CIMB: Ref to feedback: 1-13470750956, please be inform that the CIMBClicks Apps has no impact to the user internet connection. Should you have issues with internet connection, kindly refer to your internet / telco service provider for further "

When a user reports a problem, you do not go into denial. That's just a sure fire way of making sure that the problems accumulate.

I know this is a bit off topic, but has anyone noticed that the CIMB Clicks app, now mandatory for approving most online banking transactions in Malaysia, hangs a Samsung handphone's internet connection after a few hours? If I install the CIMB Clicks app and then just leave my telephone sitting idle for a while, the internet browser on the handphone won't respond to requests to display new pages. If I remove the CIMB Clicks app, everything returns to normal. Has anyone else noticed this?

The essence of that thesis is that an expectation of future growth trumps past earnings, which it does ... but the Malaysian banks are not really growth businesses in the same league as the FANGs were a decade ago. A rule of thumb for considering growth would be to look at the PEG ratios of the companies. Simply Wall St quotes the PEG for PBB as 1.4 (values over 1 are generally considered to be a bad bet). In comparison OCBC is 0.9, UOB is 0.9, BOA is 1.1 and JPM is 1.3. I still think the Malaysian banks are insanely over-priced, and maybe JPMorgan is a bit shaky too. I think the real truth is that PBB is a beneficiary of a flight to safety in what are quite clearly financially dangerous times and that that very flight to safety has so inflated the price of the perceived-to-be safe stock that in due course the perception of safety may well turn out to be a mirage.

I think Malaysian banks are insanely over-priced. According to Google, the P/E of CIMB is around 16. In comparison the Singapore bank OCBC, is at 11 and UOB is 12. Similarly with the American banks BOA is 10 and JPM is 9. I also worry that a large proportion of the security for loans is embodied in unoccupied real estate. If these empty flats hit the market all at once, for sure they will turn out to be worthless.

I think Malaysian banks are insanely over-priced. According to Google, the P/E of PBB is around 16. In comparison the Singapore bank OCBC, is at 11 and UOB is 12. Similarly with the American banks BOA is 10 and JPM is 9. I also worry that a large proportion of the security for loans is embodied in unoccupied real estate. If these empty flats hit the market all at once, for sure they will turn out to be worthless.

I notice from the annual report that the CEO is retiring and, unless I have got it wrong, will be replaced by his 38-year-old daughter. Now there are certainly cases where daughters have taken businesses to new heights (see Harvey Norman), but it does smell somewhat of nepotism. I think this lady needs to show us that she can introduce new and competitive products before we assume that the company's past achievements are any indication of its likely future performance.

plantationgameover, if all you can do is speculate, you might be right, but to me the only question that matters is whether the net present value of the company's cash flows per share is greater than the price of the share. If the answer to that question is yes, and in the case of this company that may well be true, then either other investors will, in due course, recognise that the company is under-priced, and the share price will rise, or you can simply wait and collect the result of the incoming cash flows in the form of dividends.

The Indonesians have changed their export rules:

https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/indonesia-hikes-palm-oil-export-levy-maximum-375-per-tonne-2022-03-18/

https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/indonesia-hikes-palm-oil-export-levy-maximum-375-per-tonne-2022-03-18/

CPO price from the horse's mouth:

https://www.bursamalaysia.com/market_information/derivatives_prices?code=FCPO&session=day

Hi Thomas, the other thing to understand, specifically about retained earnings is that they are essentially the profits of the company that have not been distributed as dividends. Via a rather indirect route, they're the balancing component of the money accumulating in the bank account in a double-entry bookkeeping system. So if a company earns profits and divides those profits between dividends, savings in the bank account and capital investments, retained earnings is the balancing entry for savings in the bank account and capital investments. That is how they have gotten so huge. Profits got retained and then reinvested in new trees and infrastructure and so forth.

Thomas, retained earnings could potentially be used to pay dividends (as in the way that Genting Malaysia and Genting Berhad are presently doing), but it is more likely they are being accumulated as a "war chest" to provide for future acquisitions or capital works. When a company uses retained earnings to pay dividends, it's usually trying to hide a poor result in a handsome payout -- in effect conning the shareholders into thinking the company is doing well when it is actually struggling.

One can increase the supply of mineral oil by merely persuading people to pump it out of the ground. To increase the supply of bio oil one must plant the trees, apply fertilizer, hope for conducive weather and then wait, and wait, and wait

One can increase the supply of mineral oil by merely persuading people to pump it out of the ground. To increase the supply of bio oil one must plant the trees, apply fertilizer, hope for conducive weather and then wait, and wait, and wait

Sources:
Company revenue and results, company quarterly reports;
Company share price: Yahoo
Price of oil: https://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/RWTCD.htm
S&P 500: Yahoo

I think stockpip’s view is a bit simplistic. In an effort to obtain a more considered view of the effect of an oil price (and presumably correlated availability) shock on the profitability of Scientex, I examined the profitability and share price of the company from a few years before until a few years after the Global Financial Crisis of 2007 to 2009. Regrettably I cannot present a chart on this platform, but here are the statistics in tabular form:

Manufacturing Property Share (adj as per Yahoo)
Quart Revenue Result Revenue Result Oil SP500
05M01 105,120 5,370 18,245 4,967 0.1112 48.25 1,181
05M04 114,555 5,830 18,608 4,251 0.1071 49.20 1,191
05M07 107,713 5,374 22,434 3,704 0.1125 60.71 1,220
05M10 114,262 5,830 27,853 5,122 0.1088 59.80 1,249
06M01 121,658 7,127 22,456 4,612 0.1158 67.86 1,280
06M04 111,853 6,164 24,499 5,254 0.1146 71.80 1,270
06M07 123,407 6,349 27,291 6,678 0.1158 74.56 1,304
06M10 127,525 6,531 24,604 5,930 0.1187 58.72 1,401
07M01 126,317 7,452 21,703 5,580 0.1683 58.17 1,407
07M04 121,803 4,216 18,820 4,833 0.2317 65.78 1,531
07M07 119,877 1,455 19,248 7,039 0.2283 78.20 1,474
07M10 126,565 4,468 20,655 4,799 0.2167 94.16 1,481
08M01 139,617 7,252 21,213 5,240 0.1917 91.67 1,331
08M04 142,702 8,042 22,887 5,798 0.2083 113.70 1,400
08M07 145,294 5,947 22,303 4,539 0.1950 124.17 1,283
08M10 131,117 4,836 22,330 4,317 0.1717 68.10 896
09M01 88,712 3,565 19,074 3,129 0.1583 41.73 735
09M04 96,579 7,038 17,163 4,017 0.1933 50.35 919
09M07 111,995 7,110 22,761 8,478 0.2067 69.26 1,021
09M10 136,400 7,736 28,514 6,218 0.2200 77.04 1,096
10M01 127,106 8,373 31,608 6,506 0.2250 72.85 1,104
10M04 141,541 9,969 37,961 9,399 0.2300 86.07 1,089
10M07 139,973 10,965 51,713 10,881 0.2817 78.85 1,049
10M10 138,413 7,453 48,212 13,531 0.3000 81.45 1,181
11M01 142,271 7,629 52,615 16,298 0.4500 90.99 1,327
11M04 159,170 8,129 58,142 18,015 0.4400 113.39 1,345
11M07 145,607 12,230 59,593 14,153 0.3900 95.68 1,219
11M10 154,110 9,473 59,652 17,067 0.4083 93.19 1,247

In case it gets mixed up, the columns left to right are the quarter, manufacturing revenue and result, property development revenue and result, approximate share price at the end of the quarter, price of oil at the end of the quarter (Cushing, OK WTI) and the S&P500 at the end of the quarter. E&OE.

The progressive increase in revenue as the oil price increases rather looks to me like the company is able to pass on increases in its input costs as the price of oil increases. Despite the volatility in operating profit, the company’s share price would seem to have been remarkably stable until the Lehman-precipitated recession and stock market crash of September 2008. But even under those extreme conditions, the share price only dropped 32% peak-to-trough and then recovered again within a year.

My conclusion is that although there might be some oil-price-induced hiccups in operating profit from the manufacturing division, there is insufficient evidence to support the notion that the volatility will propagated into a foreseeable reduction in share price. In comparison, a global recession is much more likely to result in such a reduction, but that in such circumstances, the company is robust and likely to recover quickly.

Are the revenue estimates and discount rate that were used to verify that the intangible value of the WTE investment is not impaired available in the public domain? If not, has anyone attempted to estimate what they might be?

Dear Karlos, what you say is entirely true, but my big concern is that the WTE project at Ladang Tanah Merah is overrunning severely and that both the interest on the finance debt and the overrun costs are being capitalised into "intangible assets" under IC Interpretation 12, notwithstanding that it may be difficult to realise the value of the overrun costs and interest by operating the WTE plant.

The auditors highlighted this in the 2020 Annual Report and closed by writing "From the matters communicated with the directors, we determine those matters that were of most significance in the audit of the financial statements of the Group and of the Company for the current financial year and are therefore the key audit matters. We describe these matters in our auditors’ report unless law or regulation precludes public disclosure about the matter or when, in extremely rare circumstances, we determine that a matter should not be communicated in our report because the adverse consequences of doing so would reasonably be expected to outweigh the public interest benefits of such communication."

And then, it would appear, the auditors resigned.

What this company needs is less mucking around with the numbers and more knuckling down and getting the WTE project finished.

The big question is whether someone had a problem with letter ordering and WTE should really be ETW?

Notice of EGM:
"The Board of Directors of Cypark Resources Berhad (“the Company”) wishes to inform that the Company’s Auditor, Messrs. Mazars PLT (“Mazars”) had informed the Board about their intention of not seeking re-appointment in the last Annual General Meeting due to shortage of resources of the firm which might constrain the level of service required by the Group’s growing businesses."

High debt is a symptom, like fever, not a cause, like coronavirus. It would be interesting to know if the cause is being brought under control.

Can anyone in the vicinity of Port Dickson take a look at the Ladang Tanah Merah waste-to-energy building site and see if anything is happening?