Keir Starmer’s landslide victory at the polls was greeted with a collective “meh” from small-cap investors.
The AIM All-Share barely flickered in early Friday and was up around half a percentage point to 773.89 for the week.
Compare this to the FTSE 100, which achieved a near triple-digit point return over the same period to stand 1.2 per cent higher.
Of course, big business has something tangible to celebrate with the expected investment in new housing, green energy and infrastructure.
Shrug: Keir Starmer’s landslide victory at the polls was greeted with a collective “meh” from investors in the small-cap market.
For the smaller players in the market, the picture is a little more nuanced. A decrease in base interest rates will inevitably attract some venture capital that is not in the market.
However, experts believe that structural reform (particularly to AIM) is needed to allow growing companies to have quicker and easier access to investment than is currently the case.
A quiet week in terms of news, but there were also some significant declines. Microcap engineer, Pipe Hawk fell 78 percent after announcing it was taking steps to place its subsidiary QM Systems into administration potentially “or a similar corporate insolvency process.”
In a brief stock exchange statement, he said the trigger was QM’s failure to secure two “significant orders” it had been hoping to win.
It was a week far from golden for Chaarat Gold Holdings Ltd., which plunged 63 percent amid a debt crisis, specifically, $38.9 million in convertible notes due at the end of the month and another $1.2 million before Sept. 30.
Chaarat said he had made limited progress with Xiwang International Company on a previously announced financing package.
Meanwhile, it has been in negotiations with representatives of convertible bondholders for the past few weeks to discuss a possible restructuring of the outstanding debt.
Active energy Shares fell 51 per cent after the green fuels group’s board effectively read it the last rites by voting to place the business into members’ voluntary liquidation.
Physiomics plunged 46 percent, underscoring how difficult it is for small-cap companies to raise money by offering new shares at a 50 percent discount.
The drugmaker raised just £381,000 at 0.6p, while a separate retail offering via Winterflood’s WRAP platform brought in a further £25,000.
Gases lighter than air had the effect of sending the stock price of Bluejay Miningwhich increased by 75 percent.
Specifically, helium and hydrogen have been discovered in the Outokumpu belt in Finland. In addition to these, other naturally occurring industrial gases, such as argon and xenon, were also present.
The interest around Bluejay and others in this space, such as Propeller exploration (3 percent more) and Helium One (a 15 percent drop) is due to a shortage of helium, which is used in medical scanning equipment and semiconductor production.
Meanwhile, demand for hydrogen is likely to increase along with expanding requirements for green fuels and energy.
Image Scan Backgrounds The company’s shares rose 61 per cent after it revealed it had secured a contract with a “major UK defence contractor” to supply its ThreatScan portable X-ray system. The deal is worth around £3m spread over three years.
UK Oil & Gas enjoyed a rare “up week” as it rose 35 percent amid reports it is spearheading a project to create large hydrogen storage units beneath the former British naval base at Portland Harbour, Dorset.
According to the Sunday Telegraph, the plan involves digging 19 caverns, each the size of St Paul’s Cathedral, to store hydrogen for emergency use during shortages of power from wind and solar sources.
The news came two weeks after UKOG suffered a huge setback after the High Court effectively put a permanent block on Horse Hill, the company’s onshore oil well in the Surrey commuter belt.
In fact, the ruling has ramifications for the future development of new ground operations.
One company to keep an eye on is an Aquis-listed company that seems to be flying under the radar. The company’s name is Coinsilium and it is run by seasoned entrepreneurs Malcolm Palle and Eddy Travia.
He invests in and advises Web3 companies, i.e. those dedicated to blockchain technology, decentralization and token-based activities. This week has seen a wave of news that has gone virtually unnoticed by the investing public.
For all the latest small-cap news, visit www.proactiveinvestors.com.
