SMALL CAP MOVERS: Versarien soars as advanced materials group offloads non-core assets

Small Cap Advanced Materials Engineering Group Versarien I had a week worth celebrating with a range of new international licensing deals announced to the public.

Firstly, Versarien announced the sale of its South Korean plant and equipment to MCK Tech for £604,000 along with an exclusive licensing agreement for five patents.

This move is part of Versarien’s strategy to divest non-core assets, including the Korean plant acquired from Hanwha Aerospace in 2020.

The transaction also includes an exclusive license for MCK Tech to use Versarien’s patents in Korea, with payments set at 4.5 percent of revenue from sales of products using these patents.

Then came the announcement of a five-year licensing agreement with Brazil-based multinational company Montana.

Montana was granted the use of Versarien’s Graphinks brand products, such as dispersions and formulas, for its own products.

The market celebrated and Versarien shares soared 58 percent throughout the week.

There was less to celebrate in the stock market overall, although not much to mourn either, with the AIM All-Share Index approaching the end of the week essentially flat at 739.

However, midweek trading was buoyant, with markets revising expectations for when the Bank of England will make its first rate cut after an ONS labor market report showed weakening in several areas, including a weaker wage growth.

On the blue chip front, the FTSE 100 hit a three-month high on Wednesday on the back of this data. Although it pulled back a bit in the second half of the week, footsie managed to close up more than one percent.

Inmufarma was one of the most successful in the biotechnology space. The peptide-based therapeutics developer announced it will participate in the spring BIO-Europe meeting, billed as a “premier partnership event, designed to provide biotech companies the opportunity to present and connect with investors alongside the community.” global biopharmaceuticals”. ‘.

capital metals led the charge in the mining sector, surging 40 per cent after Sheffield Resources took a 10 per cent stake in the mineral sands company as part of a £1.25 million investment at a bumper premium.

In the technology space, Smart space software agreed and recommended the terms of an acquisition by Sign in Solutions to its shareholders, valuing it at £28.35 million. Shares added 30 percent.

A corporate update from the supercapacitor manufacturer. CAP-XX was met with a radical response, as the board warned of a pressing need for funding or front-end management.

“In this eventuality, it is unknown how much value, if any, would be returned to shareholders,” the group admitted. As expected, the stock collapsed 85 percent.

Speaking of fundraising, communications company LoopUp Group made some worrying comments about the state of small-cap funding on the London Stock Exchange.

The group announced plans to delist from AIM to tap private markets for capital. LoopUp’s board unanimously concluded that “this proposal to delist and conduct a private fundraising is in the best interests of the group and our shareholders as a whole.”

Like CAP-XX, loop up has some urgent funding requirements – according to a trading update, cash at the end of the year was £845,000 – but it has a £6m loan from Bank of Ireland due to be repaid in September.

LoopUp shares plummeted 70 percent in response.

Blue Star Capital received a major shock to the system when his stakes in Dynasty Gaming & Media and Googly Media were revalued at less than £450,000 after a combination of the two.

Blue Star had made these investments for a combined valuation of approximately £5.45 million. Blue Star shares fell almost 50% following this significant valuation drop.

Stocks of second-hand electronics people. musicMagpie They were also down after reporting their full-year results.

To be fair, it was a music playlist; Although top-line revenue fell 6 per cent, tight margin control meant pre-tax profits rose 15 per cent to £7.5 million. For the year until November.

But there was also the issue of debt rising from £7.9m to £13.1m in the period. The stock eventually took the bearish route and fell 19 percent on Friday.