TELME.COM-CHARMAN BUYS 1MILLION SHARES 31/12-BE QUICK!!!

11:53, Mon 31 Dec 2001
Telme's chairman finally tells his broker
Telme Group’s top brass has backed the company’s recent transformation into a focused customer relationship management business (CRM) with £75,000 worth of share purchases.

Non-executive chairman John Walker-Haworth, who has never bought shares before despite holding a board position for nearly two years, picked up 1 million at 7p.

Hopefully he knows a thing or two about investing after an extensive career in merchant banking and serving as deputy chairman of the Takeover Panel. He has certainly done well by steering clear of the stock up until now.

Richard Law, who has bought before, more than doubled his holding with the purchase of 66,000 shares for 7.5p each, which takes his stake to 110,000.

Law, formerly group finance director and company secretary, has had the title of chief executive added to his tally following the company’s decision to get rid of its Internet travel businesses.

On Friday – the same day as Walker-Haworth and Law bought – shareholders approved a proposal to sell off Telme’s (TMC) travel interests for £4 million cash. A further £1 million may be raised, depending on the performance of the sold business over the next year.

The sale leaves the group totally focused on CRM.

The CRM business consists of a postcode database software business, database maintenance services and selling sample data for marketing campaigns from Telme's databases. Its main clients are banks and utility companies.

In the year to March 2001 it reported a 22% rise in turnover on these businesses to £11.1 million and they managed to make an operating profit.

Earlier this month Citywire’s Joanne Wallen argued that the shares, then at an all time low of 5.25p and fully backed by the cash from the up coming sale of the travel business, were worth a punt.

The stock has done extremely well since whizzing up nearly 60% in just over two weeks to today’s 8.25p – up 0.75p on the day. However, it is still a long way from this year’s top price of 40p and 2000’s 240p high.

The current share price values the company at £6.6 million, still only £2.6 million more than the cash that should be coming in from the recent disposal.

©2001 citywire.co.uk