Struggling to understand what Quindell (LSE: QPP) is talking about? Here’s a quick guide that might help…
7 April: “…significant new contract with such a distinguished and respected brand as RAC “, with potential subscriber revenue of “$720 million to $2.2 billion per annum“. But just five months later, after the deal had been scrapped…
2 September: Chairman Rob Terry told The Telegraph that the contract was “hardly a focus!” So either his earlier claims had not been realistic, or he really didn’t think the prospect of more than £1bn a year in revenue was worth focusing on.
9 September: “…judgement in its favour in its libel action against Gotham City Research“. The truth is that the US firm responsible for a scathing report on Quindell simply didn’t turn up — it has no operations in the UK and nothing to gain. Meanwhile, Quindell still hasn’t sued any UK-based commentators making similar claims.
23 October: At Q3 time, “The Board remains confident of meeting all of its FY2014 key performance indicators“. But revenue guidance for the year was cut from £800-900m to £750-800m… Quindell doesn’t see revenue as being important? I guess that fits with Terry’s dismissal of that claimed income potential from the RAC contract.
5 November: Quindell proudly announced “Director Share Purchases” and gave details of apparent new larger holdings for Terry and two of his cronies. As we now know, the three were actually massive net sellers and had dumped more than 8.5 million shares, with Terry responsible for the bulk of the sales.
10 November: Quindell was forced by the LSE to admit they “transferred the legal and beneficial interest in a number of shares […] in return for […] receiving a payment“. This time the announcement actually meant what it said, even though it’s the second-most weasly way of saying “sold” that I’ve ever read.
17 November: “Canaccord Genuity Limited submitted its one month notice of resignation as the Company’s financial adviser and joint broker on 21 October 2014…“, but we didn’t give shareholders this important information until today.
8 November: “Robert Terry, the Company’s Chairman, has resigned from the Board of Directors with immediate effect“. He’s now just a paid advisor, still effectively calling the shots, with associate David Currie standing in the interim.
20 November: “Quindell […] is not actively seeking to sell its shares in Nationwide Accident Repair Services“, after claims in several newspapers that it was trying to do just that after having failed to obtain new funding from banks and hedge funds. But it remains silent on whether it had been trying to dump the shares at the time of the claims.
26 November: Laurence Moorse failed to meet a margin call on the shares he sold in November and has forfeited any right to repurchase them. Presumably Rob Terry was similarly called, but as he’s not actually a director now there’s no need to tell us via RNS.