GuocoLeisure, which has long been operating hotels in London (above), now seeks to become a global hotel operator with presence in 100 major cities by 2023. Photo: Company
Some noteworthy events
Strong committed management with solid reputation
Michael Denoma was first appointed as CEO of Guocoleisure's hotel business in 2012 and was promoted to Group CEO in 2014. Denoma has an excellent track record and is best known for his role in Standard Chartered's global consumer bank. In his 10 year stint at Standard Chartered, he grew their customer base from five million to 14 million and the division's revenue by S$4b.
He also “globalised” Standard Chartered's consumer business across Africa, Asia and the Middle East. Denoma’s plan is to bring Guocoleisure to the same level as major international hotel chains such as Hilton Worldwide and Starwood Hotels and Resorts Worldwide.
According to Lim & Tan, Denoma and his team have around 75m share options at an exercise price of 86 cents, thus it is likely that the management’s interests and shareholders are rather aligned.
Significant interest savings
Guocoleisure has refinanced its GBP138m 10.75% mortgage debenture to below 4% in Dec 2014. According to management, this will result in an annual cost savings of around US$14m per year. Such annual interest cost savings are substantial, especially if they were to be compared against FY14’s group profit of US$39m.
Sale of non core assets
According to Guocoleisure’s FY2014 annual report, management indicated that they are looking to exit non core business such as their real estate interests in Fiji. Lim & Tan postulated that Guocoleisure may sell other non-core assets such as Molokai Island and The Casino biz which are loss making
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After the close of trade yesterday, Guocoleisure announced that Mr Quek Leng Chan bought 132.6K Guocoleisure shares @$0.94952 on 21 May. He last bought 667K Guocoleisure shares @$0.64875 on 18 Oct 2012. In my opinion, this is a positive and significant sign and should (likely) cap any potential downside in the near term. |
Guocoleisure plans to update the investment community in June
Guocoleisure is planning to do a corporate presentation (likely) in June 2015 to update the investment community. It will be interesting to observe the matters discussed in the corporate presentation.
Potential chart breakout amid interesting developments
Since 5 Jan 2015, Guocoleisure has been trading within a range of $0.910 – 0.980. Guocoleisure's exponential moving averages (“EMAs”) seem to have formed golden crosses. ADX has also risen from the low of 11.2 on 9 Apr 2015 to 28.9 on 26 May 2015. This signifies that the trend seems to be strengthening. Price action also seems bullish. Barring unforeseen circumstances, there is an increasingly high likelihood that it may stage an upside breakout from its four month plus trading range of $0.910 - 0.980 in the next couple of months. Measured eventual technical target is S$1.050. Guocoleisure closed at $0.960. Day range was $0.955 – 0.960.
Supports: 0.955 / 0.935 - 0.945
Resistances: 0.970 / 0.980 / 1.00
Valuation
Analysts’ target prices for Guocoleisure range from S$1.18 to S$1.43. Its NAV / share is approximately around S$1.120 but according to the analysts, Guocoleisure’s RNAV can be as high as S$1.80.
Conclusion
Ernest Lim, CFA, CAThe above is a brief writeup on Guocoleisure with the emphasis more on its technical chart and its recent interesting developments. Readers who are keen to know more on Guocoleisure should refer to Guocoleisure’s financial statements. U can email me at
P.S: I have sent out a short writeup on Guocoleisure to my clients on 7 May and 13 May to inform them of Guocoleisure's recent developments.
