Venture Life shares rise 15.63% to 37p on report of 36% higher revenue in 1H22
Venture Life said it expected revenues to grow 36% YoY to £18.9m in 1H22, reflecting recent acquisitions of BBI Health Care Limited and Helsinn Integrative Care Portfolio, and a strong recovery of the existing business following a difficult FY21. The acquisitions contributed £6.3m to revenues, representing 10% and 6% of overall revenue growth for BBI and Helsinn respectively.
Cash inflow more than doubled to £1.5m from £0.7m reducing net debt before finance leases to £2.6m from £3.2m, and net debt after finance leases to £7.2m from £7.5m, versus December 2021.
Jerry Randall, CEO, commented: "The Group has delivered revenue growth in the first half primarily through the Acquisitions. The challenging retail environment continued in the first half, but I am delighted to see that, notwithstanding this, a number of our own brands, as well as some customer brands, have demonstrated strong revenue growth in the period. The margin improvement seen versus 2021 is particularly encouraging, and customers have been very responsive to our request to order further out than their normal lead times, enabling us to both ensure supply of raw materials and packaging in time to produce, and manage costs."
Agriterra Limited shares jump again 23.95% to 4.76p on continued volatility following last week's CEO change announcement
Agriterra announced last Wednesday that its CEO, Rui Sant'ana Afonso, had tendered his resignation, effective 31 July 2022. Hamish Rudland, a current Non-Executive Director and controller of the Company's largest shareholder, Magister Investments Limited, will assume the position of Interim CEO from 1 August 2022 until a suitable replacement full-time CEO is identified.
Agriterra also announced the appointment of Peterhouse Capital as Broker to the company with immediate effect. Strand Hanson will remain Nominated & Financial Adviser.
Agriterra shares have been on a rollercoaster ride since the announcement. They jumped 28.95% on the day of the news. Then corrected down 18.28% on Friday. And today again rose 23.95%.
Altyn Plc shares rise 18.61% to 102p on acquisition of US$40m credit line
AltynGold plc announced its application for an additional credit line of US$40m from Kazakh Bank JSC had been approved by the bank’s credit committee. The loan is repayable in installments over a term of six and a half years and bears 6% interest.
The loan will be used to expand the capacity of the processing plant at Sekisovskoye to 1 mtpa in anticipation of an increase in mining production. The signing of the loan agreement will be carried out after passing the necessary internal procedures of the Bank. Altyn said it would issue further updates as the process progresses.
7digital Group shares rise 22.22% to 0.28p on new long-term contract with Utopia Music
7digital announced it had signed a long-term contract with Utopia Music, a B2B music fintech company. Per the terms of the agreement, Utopia will be able to utilise 7digital's music catalogue and metadata to improve its music tracking systems. 7digital did not provide financial details of the contract.
"Using 7digital's global music database capabilities, in addition to Utopia's existing data capabilities, Utopia's customers will be able to monitor and measure the consumption of their music copyrights globally. In so doing, Utopia's customers can leverage data for faster, more accurate payouts of royalties to copyright holders." 7digital said.
Upland Resources shares rise 19.09% to 26p on Tunisian farmout agreement
Upland Resources said its subsidiary Upland Saouaf had signed a farm-out agreement with Pennpetro Energy PLC through Pennpetro's subsidiary Nobel Petroleum USA (NPUSA). Per the agreement, NPUSA can farm-in into Upland's Saouaf permit area in Tunisia. NPUSA will farm in for an 80% working interest and assume operatorship, subject to Tunisian state oil company ETAP's approval. The Saouaf permit is held in a joint venture with ETAP.