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Authoritative Independent Monthly Share Selections Using Technical & Fundamental Analysis

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Secondary Recommendation

Merlin Entertainments - Owner of Tussauds and Legoland brands has ambitious growth targets

April 2017

Investing in shares may lose you all or some of your money. Past performance is no indication of future performance. Some of the shares recommended here may be small company shares, which can be relatively illiquid and hard to trade and this makes such shares more risky than other investments.

  • Epic Code:
  • MERL
  • Price:
  • 494p
During the late 1990s dot com boom shares in leisure firms were all the rage, but the puzzling exception was AIM-listed minnow, Vardon, owner of various bingo halls and “Sea Life” visitor attractions on the South Coast. Nevertheless, its managing director, Nick Varney, saw an opportunity to use visitor attractions as a vehicle to consolidate the industry and after leading an MBO (and re-naming it Merlin Entertainments) he acquired Legoland for £250m in ’05 and the Tussauds Group for £1bn two years later, both deals funded by private equity. The latter brought in a veritable “Who’s Who” of visitor attractions including Madame Tussauds, Gardaland and the London Eye. By the time it floated on ...

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With small companies there is an above average degree of risk compared to buying blue chips. Please be aware that we have not assessed the suitability of any of these investments for you. The newsletter simply states a personal view and diarises the editor’s investment decisions. Please speak to your stockbroker or other qualified individual to ascertain whether any of these companies mentioned would form useful additions to your own portfolios. Past performance is no indication of future success.

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