In QuotedData’s morning briefing 16 September 2024:

• Edward Warner, Chair of JLEN Environmental Assets, has purchased 15,000 JLEN shares at 95.46p per share, taking his holding to 75,000 JLEN shares.
• Octopus Renewables Infrastructure (ORIT) has published its interim results for the six months ended 30 June 2024. During the period, ORIT provided an NAV total return of +2.0% (30 June 2023: +0.9%) and increased target dividend to 6.02p for FY 2024, representing an increase of 4.0% over FY 2023 in line with inflation (CPI). ORIT says that its targeted dividends are expected to be fully covered by the operating portfolio’s cashflows. The dividend per share declared for the period was 3.01p, in line with target. Dividend cover for the first half of 2024 was 1.33x, an increase on the same period in the previous year (30 June 2023: 1.09x). At period end, ORIT’s capacity owned stood at 808MW (30 June 2023: 668MW) and its operating income for the period was £14.6m (inclusive of -£4.1m movement in fair value of investments), with a profit for the period of £11.3m. EBITDA from the portfolio of operational assets totalled £45.3m, arising from gross revenue of £68.7m. In June 2024, ORIT initiated a share buyback programme with an initial tranche of up to £10.0m and, as at 30 June 2024, ORIT held 1,200,962 shares in Treasury, which were bought by ORIT for c. £0.9m at an average price of 73.48 pence per share. In February 2024, ORIT acquired 100% of a 199MW complex of four newly constructed solar farms at Ballymacarney, Ireland, which is the largest solar complex in Ireland. Commissioning tests on a fifth site at the complex are expected to be completed in the third quarter of Q3 2024, after which point ORIT will acquire the asset. In April 2024, ORIT signed a PPA for the Crossdykes wind farm with Sky UK, which is due to commence in April 2025. This is NAV-accretive when compared with power price assumptions included in the NAV and resulted in an uplift of £5.5m. A follow-on investment of £5.9m was made in the Simply Blue Group, a floating offshore wind and sustainable fuels developer. In June 2024, construction had been completed at the 67MW Breach solar farm in the UK.
• HgCapital Trust (HGT) has published its interim results for the six months ended 30 June 2024. HGT says that, during the period, strong portfolio trading continued to be the main driver of performance, contributing to a total return NAV increase of 6.4%, closing the period at 527.9p NAV per share and net assets of £2.4bn. HGT provided a share price total return of +12.7% over the period, closing at 485.0p per share and a market capitalisation of £2.2bn and the discount narrowed from 13% to 7%. During the period, HGT made £310m of new and further investments across the core investment clusters targeted by its manager; with a further estimated £183m of transactions signed pending closing in the second half of 2024. HGT had £348m of gross realisations, with full and partial realisations at an average uplift of 16% to carrying value; an estimated further £75m of realisations signed and due to complete in the second half of 2024.
• BH Macro (BHMG,BHMU) has published its interim results for the six months ended 30 June 2024. NAV per share performance in the six-month period to 30 June 2024 has been slightly negative, being -1.10% for the sterling share class and -1.54% for the US dollar share class. The discount at which the two share classes traded continued to narrow during the period, aided by the share buyback programme that was initiated in December 2023. The discount narrowed from 10.71% (as at 31 December 2023) to 8.62% (as at 30 June 2024) for the sterling share class, and similarly from 11.71% (as at 31 December 2023) to 9.29% (as at 30 June 2024) for the US dollar share class. 2024 remains a challenging year for BH Macro on three fronts. Firstly, whilst investment returns have been within the expected range they remain slightly negative in the six month period to 30 June 2024 and this has been magnified by the relative returns of other assets until very recently. Secondly, whilst the discounts for both share classes have narrowed compared to the discounts seen last year, the respective discounts remain at levels that the board would like to see narrow further. Thirdly, the entire closed-ended fund sector is subject to greater pressure perhaps than at any other time in the last 40 years, with the concentration of shareholder registers, the concentration of the wealth management market, the levels of discount to NAV per share and the regulatory pressure on fee disclosure.

We also have:

• Interim results for HydrogenOne