Analysis of ABF 2015

Company: ABF

ISIN GB0006731235 | WKN 920876 

Business: A British conglomerate with agriculture, agricultural products as well as retail. Currently they have five business segments: Sugar, Agriculture, Retail, Grocery and Ingredients. To find out more about their grocery brands then please click here.

Active: Europe, Africa, USA and Australia. Heaviest in the UK and Ireland.

P/E: 52.0 (yuk!)

ABF annual report 2015

Associated British Foods with one of my favourite retail chains Primark arrived with their release concerning the full year 2015. Later on a nice report will be made but I care about the figures and not the pictures so I am happy enough with this. The market reaction was not filled with warmth and there was a couple of %-age points drop but much less than what I would have thought to be honest when I read the report.

Coba report Q3 2015

Commerzbank joined the club of reporting the third quarter for 2015. The report was well accepted by the market and that the chairman of the board will not extend his contract (he got around one more year of service) was also not something that caused a stir. In one years time they should be able to find a good replacement. I discussed with a colleague that said that he had done a good job... well... I can agree that he has been helpful in getting Commerzbank back on their feet again and he remained loyal and stayed with the bank during the hard times but on the other hand... he was sitting in the board (not is power though) already when the decision was made to take over the Dresdner Bank that has been the biggest cause for almost all the trouble so it is clearly a grey zone situation.

Fugro report Q3 2015

Fugro my only Dutch company arrived with their Q3 report and as each report has been since I stepped in as a shareholder it has been about cuts, cuts and cuts. What has worried me since the very first report is my concern regarding them cutting away too much meat. by this I mean that they lay off employees take impairment costs and sell off vessels at a far lower value than what they should have... and for what? How much will they be forced to pay to get it all back in two years time from now?

DB report Q3 2015

When whatever hits the fan it spreads. It took DB six years and the kicking of three CEOs before things started to go in a direction that I find more acceptable. The new CEO is pulling all the joker cards he has available by taking massive impairment costs (in the size of 5.8 billion €) as well as deciding to cut dividends for probably the next two years. The market was not pleased and of course neither am I  but if this will lead to a turn around then in the end I will be pleased.