A couple of days ago I invested a small amount in F. W. Thorpe, a small family company that designs, manufactures and sells lighting solutions in a variety of markets.
I bought my shares at 136p. They form 3.3% of my portfolio. I've been watching them for a while and decided to buy a few shares - I may buy more in future. The market cap is £156m, revenue last year was £63m, profit after tax of £10m (nice margin), net assets £77m, of which £70m is tangible and about £34m is cash or equivalent (very conservative balance sheet).
They're not cheap, at a P/E of 15, but if you strip out the cash they look much more reasonable.
With regard to Tesco I decided to wait and hear their trading update before deciding whether to put some money back in - and the market clearly liked what it heard, so count that a missed opportunity. Presumably the lack of mention of a rights issue was a big factor. I originally bought them expecting downside protection, dependable dividends and upside potential of international growth. I was wrong on all 3 of those, it seems. Should I invest now as a recovery play? I'm not sure they're cheap enough for that (and even less so at 210p than 188p).
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