Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Chinese stocks - German listing

There are a number of stocks from Chinese originated enterprises being primary listed on German stock markets, usually on Frankfurt stock exchange.

Allow me to introduce some of them:

Asian Bamboo AG:
Incorporated in Hamburg, functions as a holding for different Chinese enterprise, following a integrated business model. Forestry, harvesting, processing is all done by subsidies.
IPO in Frankfurt Prime Standard 2007, another private placement following in 2009. Now 43% free float.
Main products by the leased plantations are bamboo timber as well as fresh and processed bamboo shoots. Domestic demand accounts for most of the revenue. Also they are starting up a bamboo fabric production, competing with cotton and synthetic (petroleum) fabric.
They also experimented with the production of paper, somehow this business got "moved" in 2011 to another company, in which they since 2010 hold a 20% stake. This is a bit mysterious to me.

United Power:
IPO June 2011, Prime Standard Frankfurt, 18,45% free float.
Pre-IPO Investors Lockup: 6 months, Founding and Controlling Shareholders: 12 months.
Manufactures engine-driven power equipment, like generators, engines, etc.
Follows a strategy of both ODM business for third parties and own brand products with competitive pricing.

 KINGHERO AG:
  IPO in August 2010, Frankfurt Entry Standard. 12 months lock-up for existing shareholders. Mai 2011 secondary offering. Free float on August, 19th was 37,9%.
Designs, manufactures and sells primarily casual wear under its own brand. Their sales network cover 30 cities in whole China.

All of those enterprises have something in common: They are all valued very very low.
I will dig into the financials of some of these enterprises at a later time!

Sunday, August 28, 2011

SA-7 aka. Strela-2 sprouting up in Libya

Probably a much more troubling development than the vast collection of different handguns (see my post here) is the increasing number of MANPADS creeping out of Qaddafi numerous weapon caches.

The soviet infrared-guided surface-to-air missile SA-7 can for example be seen in action in this picture or this one.
Especially alarming to me was this picture of a warehouse, clearly showing dozens of SA-7s ready to take.

The SA-7 is cold-war tech, introduced in the late 1960s, so nowadays its kind of outdated. It will have a hard time against combat jets, the infrared will get easily confused by so called flares, being emitted by the targeted aircraft. Those flares basically consist of magnesium stripes, who will burn at very high temperature when ignited. This way the signature of the aircrafts engine exhaust will be covered from the infrared-guided missile.
Additionally those missiles only have a limited time-frame before they expire, depending on the storage - there electronic is quite sensitive.
I have not been able to seek out how old those weaponry could be, yet i guess the arsenals got stocked up from time to time, whenever Qaddafi got the chance to acquire some.
Another point is that training is necessary, those missiles are not easy to handle. But apparently there is enough material for practice.

While there performance is poor against combat jets, they still are deadly to civil airplanes as well as helicopters. There have been attacks by al Qaeda in this style. With the rebels to be said having jihadists in there lines, they might spread this tools towards the global terror hot-spots.
This article is about Libyan SA-7 reaching the black market in Mali and also talks about a (key-) weapon buyback program.

Background check KHD Humboldt Wedag International AG stocks Part 1

Bei KHD Humboldt Wedag handelt es sich um eine deutsche AG, welche im Bereich des Anlagenbaus für die Zementbranche tätig ist. Ist ist über 150 Jahre alt und weltweit tätig. Gelistet in FRA als KWG im general standard.
Das Unternehmen erweckte mein Interesse, da es über sehr hohe Cash-Bestände verfügt.
Zum 30.07 waren nicht zweckgebundene Geldmittel in Höhe von 277.537.000€ verfügbar.

Die Marktkapitalisierung lag zum 28.08 bei 257.523.794€, also unter dem Geldmittelbestand. Der break-even liegt hier bei einem Aktienpreis von 5,58€. Der Aktienpreis lag am 28.08 bei 4,98€.

Die Umsatzrendite 2010 lag bei 5,5%, 2009 bei 10,3. Eigentlich ganz ordentliche Werte.
Das Capex ist erstaunlich niedrig, 2010 lag der Free Cashflow bei 48.106.000€, 2009 bei -5.186.000 €. Das der Wert 2009 negativ ist, liegt vermutlich an dem geringem Auftragseingang, 2010 wurden wieder Voranzahlungen geleistet und das Inventar erhöht. Von 2009-2010: Order Intake: +366%; Order Backlog: +42%. Langfristige Verbindlichkeiten sind so gut wie nicht vorhanden.

Eigenkapitalquote liegt bei 35,9% (2010) bzw. 39,5% (2009). Sie wurde vermutlich durch die 50 Mil. € Dividende in 2010 verringert.

Es stellt sich also die Frage, weshalb dieses Unternehmen deutlich unter ihrem Cash-Beständen gehandelt wird. Es ist vermutlich in der Lage sein Kerngeschäft nachhaltig zu finanzieren und ist sogar in der Lage profitabel zu wirtschaften.

Der Return on Investment (RoI) liegt bei 0,004% bzw. 0,009% (2009).
Eigenkapitalrentabilität: 0,01% bzw. 0,02% (2009).

Dies zeigt meiner Meinung nach sehr klar, dass in dem Unternehmen viel zu viel Geld vorhanden ist.
Wieso kauft kein Fonds dieses Unternehmen auf? Wieso verliert die Aktien seit Monaten kontinuierlich an Wert?

Fortsetzung folgt!

Dies ist keine Anlageberatung oder ein Investmenttip!
Ich teile hier nur meine Gedanken, für deren Richtigkeit ich nicht garantieren kann!

Libya: Modern firearms in the post-Gaddafi era

As sporadic fighting still goes on while former strongman and dictator Gaddafi continues to be on the run, many interesting pictures out of Libya can be seen:

The G36:
German made from famous H&K, used as standard rifle in the German army (since 1995) and the Spanish (1999).

Pictures can be seen here: Guy carrying brand new guns 
and here: Guy standing and again in action (the other rifle looks like a AK 101- 105 type, also quite new).

The producer H&K issued a official statement saying they didnt ship G36s to Libya at all.
My guess is that they are being produced with licenses from HK  in a plant in Saudi-Arabia, using a loop-hole in gun regulatory rules. Whether HK knows about this is uncertain, but clearly one could think of such happenings before giving licenses. German government is aware of this, however an allowance for the export of the license was not necessary.
The G36 uses standard 5.56 x 45 mm NATO ammunition, so supply might be difficult to the fact, that most of Gaddafis arsenal consists of soviet 7,62 x 39 mm or 5,45 x 39 mm.

The FN F2000:
Belgian made assault rifle, bullpup design, first publicly displayed in 2001.
Pictures can be found in this blog, on this image, aswell as here. All pictures seem to come from Misurata (Misrata).
The shown configuration comes with the 40 mm under-barrel grenade launcher. Ammunition again is 5,56 NATO, same as G36.
This weapons are part of a dealing with the Belgian government in 2008. According to this article 400 F2000 were to be delivered.

The FN P90:
Same producer as above (FN Herstal, Belgium). Introduced in 1990.
Only seen this image so far.
Part of the same deal as the F2000 in 2008. 367 of this submachine-guns were to be delivered.
Since FN developed a special high-velocity ammunition (FN 5.7×28mm) for this gun, sustaining supply will be difficult, not to talk about spare-parts, magazines, etc.

Due to the fact, that ammunition supply will be getting tighter (especially for the P90), it is most likely for them to become showcase weapons.
More attention should be payed to all this AK clones flooding the country.
For further reading: Globalpost article.

Thursday, August 25, 2011

The best dough for baking rolls, bread, pizza, ...

Yes, a cooking receipt!
Weird way to start a blog, indeed, but after you tried this you know why.

This is the best receipt for dough used for all kinds of stuff. And: its very easy, as you will see!
The secret lies in its ingredient, i.e. beer. Wheat beer to be exactly.
But: step by step!

First take a bowl and add 500 gram (1 lb) wheat flour, doesnt quite matter which kind, however, more than half should be type 550 (normal white type) at least. Add other stuff, like seeds, spices, garlic, oat flakes, etc. if liked. The fantasy (and the taste) is the limit!
Then include yeast, check package for instructions (how much for 500g). Doesnt matter whether dry or "alive" yeast. To round things up, add some little tiny bit of salt and some drops of (olive-) oil!
 Now the king of all beverages, used since centuries - beer! Make sure it is not cold, it should be around room temperature! Add some beer to the bowl and stir, dont worry if it sparkles a bit, repeat until mass is smooth the handle, not too sticky on the hands, not too dry.   The dough must feel right, kitchen people will know what I mean, the others will learn that soon.
For pizza dough might be a little more dry, since you will have to roll it out later and you wouldnt want it to stick on your wood.
Cover the bowl and let rest for 1 or 2 hours. Then process as wished. Since the dough might get more watery during the rest, you might want to add a bit more flour.


This dough is basically good for all kinds of things, whether sweet or sour. It is definitively my favorite, due to its flavor and its "softness" in the sense of light.
Dont worry about the alcohol of the beer in the case of children, during the baking the alcohol will get almost totally lost! Furthermore the yeast-bacterias will reduce it before.
Nevertheless this is nothing for abstinent people.

I got the receipt originally from this German cooking site: Chefkoch.de.
Enjoy!

First post

Hello Friends,
so this is it - my first post!

Yet I am not quite sure, how I want to fill my blog, regarding the content.
Probably it will be a mix with a white range of subjects, a bit politics, stocks, security matters, everyday stuff, etc.
I dont plan on promoting this blog via Facebook or whatever to friends, acquaintances etc.
So should really ever somebody (apart from myself) read this: Welcome!

On the link-list you will find some of my favorite sites/blogs etc.
My post will be in English or German, however it suits me better, i apologize for that.

Due to the fact, that tomorrow is the day of my final presentation for my bachelors studies, I wont have too much time at hand for now.