Chrysalis has published its quarterly NAV report. At the end of June, the NAV was 145.51p, down 2.21p or 1.5% from the figure at end March 2024. A writedown in the valuation of wefox was offset by write up of other positions.
The position in wefox has now been written down from £188.6m in October 2023, to £126.5m in March 2024, and now to £60.5m at 30 June. The new wefox valuation is said to reflect both funding uncertainty and a change to the basket of listed comparables that the valuation is based on that puts an increased emphasis on stocks in the lower quartile of valuation ranges. Underlying revenues were not much changed from those of the previous quarter. During the second quarter of 2024, Chrysalis invested €5.5m into wefox (funding this from sales of Wise Group).
Since the end of the quarter, Chrysalis has invested a further €15m. This was funded from the sale of Graphcore. The advisers stress that the valuation of Chrysalis’s stake in wefox is protected by anti-dilution measures, and that they don’t think that Chrysalis will have to invest any more money in that company.
Chrysalis still has cash of about £49m and so the board is thinking about when it can start with the next phase of its capital recycling programme – which would likely mean share buybacks.
Starling was one of the investments that was written up, helped by higher prices for equivalent listed companies. Klarna seems to be progressing – selling Klarna Checkout, passing 100,000 subscribers at $7.99 per month for its Klarna Plus service, and using AI to drive down costs. Chrysalis says “Speculation concerning an IPO continues to swirl. The CEO has given a number of interviews in the quarter indicating that an IPO is likely to happen “quite soon” and intimating it would occur in the US. The company has already considered the ramification of such a move; at the company’s carrying value, this could imply a liquidity injection of £100m if a full exit is made, equivalent to approximately 21% of the company’s current market capitalisation.” Smart Pension looks set to gain about £500m of assets under management as it absorbs Options Master Trust.
Featurespace released its annual report and accounts for the year to December 2023, which showed 47% revenue growth to £50.4m, with recurring revenues accounting for 79% of revenues, up from 70% in 2022. Due to this strong topline growth, the loss for the year decreased from £20.9m in 2022, to £8.1m. Despite these losses, cash flow was strong – cash rose to £28.7m from £25.7m.
CHRY : Chrysalis invests more in wefox
