The Hour Glass

[weijian]

The Hour Glass (“THG”) 42nd AGM - 28 Jul 2021

Rough notes of meeting

Much remains the same. 

Family-Owner-Mgmt remains grounded in the mission of advancing watch culture, focusing on the basics of good retailing, focusing on training high-quality staff, focusing building a strong alignment with brands. Importantly, remains grounded and wise in not blindly-following industry trends and rushing into new business (see Q7). 

What seems to have changed - and for the better - is (i) an upward shift in the economics of luxury watch retailing and (ii) THG's business model has become more robust with higher earnings power. (see Q11 and Q13)    

An official version of the AGM minutes, not too far from Choon's (thanks Choon for sharing notes selflessly)

The share buyback has been the most interesting feature for the OPMI in the last 1 year. At 1.3-1.5x of NAV purchases, the company is demonstrating that it values the intangible know-how/business relationships to be worth more than 0.3-0.5x of what is tangible.

Whether this is value or not, it will be for the future to judge. Generally, share buybacks are at their peak during peak prices and vice versa, and THG shareholders would hope that this isn't true over here.

MINUTES OF THE 42ND ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING OF THE HOUR GLASS LIMITED HELD BY WAY OF ELECTRONIC MEANS ON WEDNESDAY, 28 JULY 2021 AT 10.00 A.M

With regard to the question on the motivation behind the Company’s share buybacks, especially since February 2021, Mr Tay stated that from the Board’s and Management’s perspective, they saw value in the Company and its business, and believed in the long term sustainability of the Group’s financial performance. By way of elaboration:
(i) the Group’s strategic business units had performed well through the last 12 months, 
(ii) there was a strong alignment on values and goals with principal brand partners, from which the Group had received encouraging support,
(iii) the Board and Management were confident that certain structural and operational shifts in the industry, business and markets were here to stay even when the world reverts back to its pre-COVID form,
(iv) the Board and Management had confidence in the current and future crop of general managers in place, and 
(v) whilst the COVID-19 Delta variant may cause disruptions from time to time, the Group had learnt to operate within the confines of the respective trading restrictions and had been able to continue to manage its business well in that regard. 

Hence, as a management group, the Company and the Board, being value oriented operators and investors, believed in deploying capital in the right way.

https://links.sgx.com/FileOpen/Minutes%2...eID=681790