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- ASX-fintech stock Selfwealth (ASX:SWF) turns down a takeover bid from Stake
- Stake offered 17.5 cents per share to the company
- Selfwealth shares have since jumped to 17.5 cents in morning trade
- The company turned its first profit ever in FY23
- Selfwealth says there’s more to come and Stake’s offer is incomplete
- Shares last traded at 17.5 cents
ASX-fintech stock Selfwealth (ASX:SWF) has turned down a takeover bid from the company behind share trading app Stake, Stakeshop Limited.
Stake lobbed an offer at Selfwealth for 17.5 cents a share. Selfwealth reported that the deal doesn’t fairly value the company.
The news pushed up Selfwealth’s share price by 25 per cent to 17.5 cents – matching Stake’s offer.
“After careful assessment, the board … formed the view that Stake’s incomplete and conditional proposal did not offer appropriate value to Selfwealth shareholders,” the company wrote on Friday.
The position is easy to understand.
Selfwealth only made its first profit in FY23 and the company had $12.4 million in cash at the end of June.
The company also pointed to a cost optimisation strategy to be unveiled at an upcoming investor presentation next Tuesday.
In short, it appears Stake has seen value written on the wall and tried to swoop in early.
The ambitious takeover offer at a company that only just exited loss-making status seems obvious to be unlikely at the outset and may have been a strategic testing of the waters from Stake.
At the same time, though, Selfwealth has been struggling in the last year.
One-year returns are down 23.91 per cent (including today’s 25 per cent rise) and versus the one-year performance of the ASX200, Selfwealth is underperforming at -30 per cent.
It has a market cap of $41.2 million and is ranked 1251 of 2400 companies on the ASX.
The company is seeking to expand into the US and earlier this year was exploring partnership opportunities with ANZ and Refinitiv. The company also peddles out educational podcasts on ASX matters.
Shares last traded at 17.5 cents.
