Gareth and Jeremy discuss macroeconomic developments and how they might impact financial markets. Plenty of noise around tariffs still, and still difficult to determine any signal. Meanwhile, the Fed and the BoE have both had contentious rate-setting meetings, highlighting the unprecedented way in which like-minded policymakers have differing views about the future path of monetary policy. Jeremy questions whether we are seeing the end of the era of central bank global orthodoxy. There will be m...
Aug 10, 2025•15 min•Ep. 10
This week, Jeremy and Gareth talk Turnberry and trade deals - with a backdrop of some tech titans' Q2 earnings reports with such strong results that "American Exceptionalism" seems as strong as ever. The anticipated dispersion of capital to other venues will have to wait, as AI spend dominates and American giants are mainly the beneficiaries. The US FOMC decision (to leave rates unchanged) allowed Jay Powell to highlight that the credibility of the Fed relies on his ability to not bow to politic...
Aug 01, 2025•15 min•Ep. 9
IG Design Group Interim Executive Chair, Stewart Gilliland and Chief Financial Officer Rohan Cummings present the group's results for the year ended 31 March 2025. 00:00 - Opener Stewart Gilliland, Interim Executive Chair 00:16 Introduction 02:48 FY2025 Summary Rohan Cummings, Chief Financial Officer 04:16 DG Americas FY2025 performance 06:32 DG Americas Divestment 08:52 DG International FY2025 performance 10:22 Group Revenue 11:30 Adjusted Operating Profit 12:33 Financial Summary 14:28 Cash flo...
Jul 29, 2025•37 min•Ep. 8
Creightons PLC (CRL) Full Year 2025 results presentation for the year ended 31st March 2025, given by Paul Forster, Non Exec Chair, Philippa Clark, CEO and Qadeer Mohammed, CFO. Paul Forster, Non-Executive Chairman 00:00 Changes to the Board and Corporate Governance. Philippa Clark, CEO 02:51 Agenda 03:14 About Creightons 05:25 Financial highlights 06:40 Operational highlights Qadeer Mohammed, CFO 09:04 Revenue streams 11:02 Gross profit margin 12:22 Operating profit 13:37 Cash flow movement 15:...
Jul 22, 2025•42 min•Ep. 7
Wynnstay Group CEO, Alk Brand and CFO, Rob Thomas, present the group's results for the six months ended 30 April 2025, followed by Q&A. Alk Brand, CEO 00:16 Introduction Rob Thomas, CFO 01:25 H1 Highlights 04:39 Income statement 06:09 Balance sheet 07:52 Cashflow statement 07:59 Net cash Alk Brand, CEO & Rob Thomas, CFO 08:31 Feed & Grain division 12:50 Arable division 15:45 Stores division Alk Brand, CEO 17:51 Project Genesis update Rob Thomas, CFO 22:50 Strategic proposition 25:44 ...
Jul 16, 2025•47 min•Ep. 6
This week Progressive's George O'Connor and Ian Robertson canter through the newsflow of recent weeks, Bytes, Accesso, Northcoders and Hostelworld. Is Bytes broken? No, but its reputation has taken another beating. Hostelworld’s direct marketing expense reminds us why many startups sometimes feel they are just working for Google. Reflecting on Salesforce’s recent wins with the US government, George looks back upon the Efficiency and Reform Group in the UK and whether its cost-saving success will...
Jul 14, 2025•15 min•Ep. 5
This week, Progressive's Gareth Evans and Jeremy McKeown discuss how an emboldened Trump has raised the tariff temperature while also considering the potential for a version of the future to be one of US economic growth. But whatever the path forward, Paul Tudor Jones' mantra, that all roads lead to inflation, seems increasingly appropriate. Risk assets continue their march higher with Nvidia and Bitcoin reaching new all-time highs. Nvidia is not the first company to be valued at over $4 trillio...
Jul 11, 2025•15 min•Ep. 4
Progressive's Jeremy McKeown and Gareth Evans discuss the week's macro market news and developments, comparing the plight of the Trump and Starmer administrations, which are six months and a year in, respectively. The differing outcomes, at least in part, reflect the degree to which the bond markets constrain the UK government more than the US. We are halfway through 2025 and have had a turbulent Q2. Equity markets are recovering everywhere, but persistent dollar weakness has made the US seem le...
Jul 04, 2025•15 min•Ep. 3
Progressive Analysts George O'Connor and Ian Robertson catch up on events in and around the UK small and mid-cap listed tech. Visma – potential London IPO. Parallels with Sage are inevitable. Visma has grown through acquisition, but still delivers on organic growth. It does not, however, scale per the SaaS storybook. A judgement in store not just for London vs the world but PE valuations vs reality and analysis too? IP Group capital markets event – Ian is hugely enthusiastic and reminded that UK...
Jul 02, 2025•25 min•Ep. 2
WW3 is over, oil prices are plummeting, inflation is dead, Daddy Trump is putting the world back together, including doing a trade deal with China and getting interest rates down, even if it means sacking the man who is in his way. And the UK smaller company sector has discovered the Bitcoin magic money tree and is bathing in the prospect of free money. What a time to be alive! What could possibly go wrong? This week, Progressive's Gareth Evans and Jeremy McKeown spend some time discussing the n...
Jun 27, 2025•15 min•Ep. 1
Progressive's George O'Connor and Ian Robertson wish AIM a Happy 30th Birthday, consider its success and follow Charlie Munger’s edict of ‘invert, always invert’ to gain some context. 1,700 companies on AIM in 2007 was too many (polite way to say it), but 700 now is too few. The politically impossible bail out is not the answer, but what can be done for little cost and risk to the public purse? Perhaps if we make it more profitable for fund managers, and in particular for those with credible voi...
Jun 23, 2025•26 min•Ep. 834
This week, Progressive's Jeremy McKeown and Gareth Evams discuss the market reaction to Trump's potential intervention in the Israel-Iran conflict, as well as interest-rate "holds" from the US and UK in the face of ongoing inflationary pressure. Japan continues to confuse - and to present major risk - with high inflation and close-to-zero interest rates, while the US/Japan trade deal is still conspicuous by its absence. Progressive client news focussed on one stock, Oxford Metrics , whose H1 res...
Jun 20, 2025•15 min•Ep. 833
Progressive's George O'Connor and Ian Robertson catch up on events in and around the UK small and mid-cap listed tech. London Tech Week - George has been out and about and is enthused about by the talk by Gary Turner and Steve Vamas of Xero fame. More LSE departures - To read the eulogies you would think that Ricardo was the greater success story. Ricardo was just easy to explain and love. Spectris was a bit of an effort to understand but made the effort to grow. Few make the observation that WS...
Jun 17, 2025•24 min•Ep. 832
This week, Progressive's Jeremy McKeown and Gareth Evans talk about the dramatic overnight events in Iran, as Israel's actions have led to spikes in the prices of oil and gold, but not driven the usual "flight to the dollar" in any meaningful way - the USD is trading at three-year lows. Does this signal a loss of status as a safe haven, or is it simply that investors expect the conflict to be contained and localised? More broadly, we have seen the US / China trade deal being pieced together, alt...
Jun 13, 2025•15 min•Ep. 831
This week, Progressive's Jeremy McKeown and Gareth Evans describe what felt like a more normal few days, with signs of a slowing US economy and falling bond yields. This was suddenly upended by the public and bitter (and very rapid) falling apart of the Trump-Musk relationship. Musk's backing of Trump was at least partly predicated on promises of a smaller state, but Musk (and DOGE) have failed to deliver the meaningful cuts promised. Now we have Musk shouting from the sidelines about the unsust...
Jun 06, 2025•15 min•Ep. 830
Progressive's George O'Connor and Ian Robertson catch up on events in and around the UK small and mid-cap listed tech. Looking to the US, Salesforce and C3.ai results show positive momentum for AI, as of course do Nvidia’s. But investors are asking more questions and AI vs. Economic Downturn is a match that’s difficult to call. Ian is more immediately concerned about the impact of US government actions to curtail sales into China by Cadence, Synopsis and Siemens EDA – companies which, like ASML ...
Jun 02, 2025•22 min•Ep. 829
Progressive's Jeremy McKeown recently had another chance to talk to Substack’s No. 1 financial commentator, Doomberg. It has been some 15 months since they last spoke, a time when Rishi Sunak was Prime Minister and Joe Biden was President. Much has happened subsequently in areas of energy policy, energy markets, politics, and global trade and conflict. And I was keen to catch up. Doomberg utilises his expertise in understanding our fundamental and complex energy requirements and how they impact ...
Jun 02, 2025•50 min•Ep. 828
Cerillion CEO, Louis Hall and CFO, Andrew Dickson present the business's Interim results for the six months ended 31 March 2025, followed by a Q&A session. Louis Hall, CEO 00:16 Introduction 01:14 Company background 01:50 Cerillion's products 03:33 Business overview 03:58 H1 2025 highlights Andrew Dickson, CFO 07:25 Performance against KPI's 10:30 H1 2025 Financial highlights 12:48 Cash generation 14:02 Income statement 14:38 Balance sheet Louis Hall, CEO 15:09 Summary & outlook 17:10 Q&...
Jun 02, 2025•40 min•Ep. 827
Joe Bryan is a former investment bank derivatives trader turned sports betting entrepreneur who, during lockdown, went down the proverbial Bitcoin rabbit hole. After Joe exited the company that bought his sporting odds business last year, a friend invited him on a weekend away. Each guest had to prepare a short talk to lead a discussion on a topic of their choice. Joe chose Bitcoin; it was his passion and his specialist subject. However, it's a big subject and he didn’t know where to start. So, ...
May 30, 2025•53 min•Ep. 826
This week Progressive's Gareth and Jeremy continue their discussion about the bond market's predicament. Japan's Ministry of Finance thought that sending a questionnaire to its bond investors would resolve its problem. But it soon encountered another difficult auction, suggesting that its first step in acknowledging the problem was insufficient. Meanwhile, Japan's manufacturing prowess is under attack from China, its biggest competitor and from the US, its largest customer. The fact that Japan h...
May 30, 2025•15 min•Ep. 825
Progressive's George O'Connor and Ian Robertson consider Sage’s results and the return of the normal share price path following results. George points to Xero as Sage’s rain cloud whilst Ian points to the success of Sage’s Intacct offering. Gamma’s AGM statement contained comments in the UK market that led to a share price fall, although the progress in Germany is something that the market should not ignore. Tech and defence is discussed – George and Ian reflect on the spoof potential, surely no...
May 27, 2025•13 min•Ep. 824
This week Progressive's Jeremy McKeown and Gareth Evans discuss a smorgasbord of newsflow...from trade deals to interest rate cuts (or lack of them) and the selection of Maro Itoje as captain of the Lions team. UK stocks discussed include ZOO Digital and Van Elle , and Jeremy describes the divergent outcomes for Alpha Group and Argentex...two payments/FX trading platforms who have had their resilience tested in recent years, with wildly different results. Next week will see UK unemployment and G...
May 09, 2025•15 min•Ep. 823
Progressive's Jeremy McKeown and Gareth Evans discuss a slightly more normal week - Larry Fink and Jamie Dimon are talking up the UK market just as capital is being freed-up from the Mag Seven. The UK small-cap space is delivering strong performance from stocks able to deliver not-worsening performance...we discuss Watkin Jones , Sanderson Design Group and IG Design as well as global shipping heavyweight Clarkson. Jeremy highlights that lower energy prices could help pressure Putin towards peace...
May 02, 2025•15 min•Ep. 822
Progressive's Jeremy McKeown recently spoke with David Dredge of Convex Strategies in Singapore. David is widely regarded for his deep understanding of risk and for delivering his insights in a highly engaging and entertaining manner. He dedicates his time to analysing sources of risk and developing strategies designed to mitigate their impact. His approach involves embracing convexity—purchasing pockets of inexpensive volatility as a form of insurance against adverse outcomes in uncertain envir...
May 01, 2025•1 hr 1 min•Ep. 821
Progressive's George O'Connor and Ian Robertson catch up on news and events affecting UK small and mid-cap tech. IBM’s figures get George pondering the differing paths with AI for software vs IT professional services. He highlights the Asian IT services area, where growth is notably better than in the EU or North America, before looking at results from ActiveOps, GB Group and iOmart. Ian comments on Oxford Metrics’ in-line update , Northcoders, and then Tracsis, where investors who bought into a...
Apr 29, 2025•15 min•Ep. 820
This week, Progressive's Jeremy McKeown and Gareth Evans wonder whether there are signs of life... UK plc is perhaps "priced for failure" and recent share price moves suggest that even in-line performance (or only a small warning!) can lead to material upside. Severfield is a case in point, but this week has seen a number of examples. Jupiter and AJ Bell are also talking more positively. Still, risks abound, as the unfortunate Argentex investor base have seen - a canary in the coal mine, showing...
Apr 25, 2025•15 min•Ep. 819
Progressive's Jeremy McKeown talks with Lawrence Lam, who invests globally in founder-led companies. Lawrence has run the Lumenary Global Founders Fund since 2017 and is the author of "The Founder Effect - The Three Pillars of Success in Founder-Led Companies." – A great read if you are trying to understand good long-term management decisions and how to spot them. Jeremy and Lawrence discuss what exactly is the founder effect, and how can investors accurately determine whether a management team ...
Apr 23, 2025•40 min•Ep. 818
Progressive's George O'Connor and Ian Robertson catch up on events in and around the UK small and mid-cap listed tech. Alphawave’s lack of guidance for 2025 is no great surprise, but in an industry as complex as semiconductors can anyone take forecasts seriously. Ensilica’s recent newsflow suggests not. We can, however, confidently predict that the forecasts are wrong. Kainos is steadier than it was, but do the cuts mean that it is now out of sync with the rest of the market. George looks to the...
Apr 22, 2025•22 min•Ep. 817
This week, Progressive's Jeremy McKeown and Gareth Evans consider the ongoing shocks to the global system - and wonder whether the UK (or UK plc at least) is unusually well positioned, as well as attractively priced. Although Trump's "shock and awe" has calmed this week, gold is rising, the dollar is falling and US government debt is highly volatile...it feels as though we've had "America's Brexit moment", a "global Liz Truss event" and now a re-run of Covid supply chain pressures - as we hear r...
Apr 17, 2025•22 min•Ep. 816
David Seaman of Alpha Cygni Asset Management and a seasoned emerging markets investor joins Progressive's Jeremy McKeown for a fascinating discussion with Sean Peche, the manager of the Ranmore Global Equity Fund. Sean recounts how he honed his value investing credentials at Orbis after qualifying as an accountant in South Africa and before launching Ranmore in London in 2008. Sean has a first-hand take on how capital flows have shaped equity values and built up today’s imbalances. While relativ...
Apr 14, 2025•43 min•Ep. 815
