STU - Steel & Tube Holdings

[Shareguy]

Gosh $.60. Are we going to see $.50?

[Shareguy]

Just had lunch with a competitor of STU who said

"Morale is shot at STU, currently going through across the board redundancies.

Competitors particularly Vulcan are doing far better in what was described as a soft market, with positive signs of improvement, but nothing to be excited about.

Current ceo and board need a total refresh".

Inventory management is a joke with customers forced to deal with competitors.

Sounds like STU have got rusty and need a clean out.

[Basil]

Interesting feedback. I know one major STU shareholder that will not be happy to read that. The board mostly made up of the same team that rejected FBU's offer of $1.90 all those years ago as being below fair value ?

[winner (n)]

Thanks for thase comments shareguy.

Dave Taylor was CEO for about 8 years and when he left in 2017 sales were about the same as when started

Mark Malpass been in charge sinc3 and sales are now significantly lower than they were when he started. Except for the stupid times during 2022/23 when nobody could do wrong sales have been trending down in spite of several 'value adding acquisitions'

STU seems to be one sad company ..and has been struggling all century.

[winner (n)]

Maloass stepped down from the Board to come CEO in 2017

About the same Susan Paterson, Steve Reindler and Chris Ellis joined the Board about the same time

All refreshed to meet the challenges and make STU great

As Guy and his lunch mates suggest time for them to go ....and hope the notices don't say they've done a great job

[Shareguy]

Maloass stepped down from the Board to come CEO in 2017

About the same Susan Paterson, Steve Reindler and Chris Ellis joined the Board about the same time

All refreshed to meet the challenges and make STU great

As Guy and his lunch mates suggest time for them to go ....and hope the notices don't say they've done a great job

Yes Winner and Basil, Would have thought it's time for shareholders to call for change.

[Ferg]

Conclusion: Is this a contrarian buy?  Not yet.

The financial history from 2010 to 2025 is dire reading.  The highlights & lowlights:

1) Total turnover from 2010-2025 was $7,480m; annual turnover has gone from $380m in 2010 to $385m in 2025, after acquiring Tata Steel, HPI, S&T plastics (since impaired & disposed), Composite Floor Decks, Kiwi Pipe & Fittings and most recently Perry Metal Protection.
2) Total NPAT over the same period was $96m (1.3% of turnover) - normalisation adjustments have been ignored given impaired business acquisitions & written off stock were paid for with cash
3) Free cash flow (excluding acquisitions) over 2010-2025 was $235m (3.1% of turnover)
4) GP has averaged 21.4%; last year was the lowest at 18.1%
5) shares on issue have gone from 88.5m to 183.6m
6) Peak NPAT was 2022 at $30m or 18c/share; it would take a herculean effort to get anywhere near that nowadays.

The latest announcement is pretty grim reading too: https://www.nzx.com/announcements/462982

Whilst it is trading at a rough ~20% discount to it's 'net net value', that's still a no thanks from me.

The following graph showing sales per share, NPAT as a % of sales and EPS.  Note all the share issues for acquisitions and debt restructuring has not contributed to increased sales per share.

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[winner (n)]

Good work Ferg

A sad story eh but no doubt some will say avoid bet because it can't get any worse and share price can't go any lower

Smile when people call Steel and Tube iconic

[BlackPeter]

Good work Ferg

A sad story eh but no doubt some will say avoid bet because it can't get any worse and share price can't go any lower

Smile when people call Steel and Tube iconic

Yes, good work - and agree that 2026 (well, the FY) might be still a bit early, just looking at the provided data so far.

What do people say? Wait for 2027? Actually, I think this could be the strategy for STU. Not really assuming them to get on an exponential growth cycle, but they might well get back to the EPS (well, half of it, given the number of shares) they used to have. Who knows, maybe they even add some additional value with the stuff they bought, though I doubt it.

This dark green line might well turn into an inverted head and shoulders ...

But whats wrong with calling them iconic? According to Googles AI "Iconic" describes something or someone extremely famous, recognizable, symbolic, and influential, representing a particular idea, time, or culture. STU was always good in producing good tales which it didn't realize. That's an icon as well.

[winner (n)]

STU share price on fire today

Might even hit 70 cents

Obviously punters thinking that 2026 will see a big construction recovery

[winner (n)]

having a little punt on STU

Not because I think it's a good company but hoping many will think they are a good company and the bad period is over and like all good companies do well in the recovery cycle

Be good if Cod could put up a new chart

Cod'd last report said Price reenters descending triangle, after bump out -- Fractal 5 commences.. I hope that's a good sign

[Shareguy]

Good luck Winner. No insider buying for some time. Retiring
director selling. Distribution manager sidelined to head of
Acquisitions which I would have thought in such a small company would be the ceos job.

[Cod]

Here you go, IMHO I may have been early calling fractal 5 commencing, looks to me as if price is going to just rumble along the bottom for a while, earnings (early Feb) will signal direction. If it's bad news then the lowest price should be around 0.475, but I suspect even "status quo earnings talk" might make price jump a bit from the 0.60-0.70 price range it is in now, based on the perception that the worst is over. -- enjoy
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[winner (n)]

Good luck Winner. No insider buying for some time. Retiring
director selling. Distribution manager sidelined to head of
Acquisitions which I would have thought in such a small company would be the ceos job.

Just a punt on market expectations pushing price up in the hope of better times ... ie a punt on market sentiment

Watching squiggly line on chart .... might be short term punt lol

[winner (n)]

Could be interesting

"There's also been some corporate activity in Australia with a takeover bid for BlueScope Steel, which has a 14.3% stake in Steel & Tube, and we'll see how this pans out,"