This isn’t Funding Recommendation. PLEASE DO YOU OWN RESEARCH !!!
Bois Sauvage is a Belgian Holding Firm that I owned up to now and have written a number of instances about:
2014 Replace on Bois Sauvage and Ackerman
In essence it’s foremost enterprise is high-end Belgian Chocolate (Neuhaus, Jeff de Brugges) and quite a lot of different property, from actual property, listed Belgian shares and a few VC/PE like investments.
What created my renewed curiosity within the inventory was this passage in a latest “Newletter” despatched out by the corporate:
These subjects are a part of a broader transformation. For a number of months now, we have now been conducting an in-depth strategic assessment of all our holdings. This assessment will end in concrete bulletins in March 2026. It displays our want to raised focus our efforts on our areas of experience, align our portfolio with our ambition for sustainable development, and improve the readability of our funding profile.
On Bluesky, the person Berkshire Haddaway, who has a deep understanding of the Firm and its historical past speculated the following:
That is clearly a really educated guess. I’d additionally welcome a sale of the listed shares, however let’s see what they do. In any case its one thing that was lengthy overdue.
My foremost concern with Bois Sauvage was at all times, that though the inventory was low-cost and the Chocolate property actually fascinating, the remaining was a kind of random mixture of property and the technique as such was by no means clear.
What already modified structurally within the final years, and particularly after the loss of life of founder Man Paquot was that they began to purchase again shares. Which is a good suggestion when the inventory is buying and selling at 50% of NAV.
In keeping with TIKR, they’ve purchased again greater than 4% and preserve cancelling them on an annual foundation. Nonetheless, this didn’t actually assist with the Low cost to NAV which continues to be at round 50% on the time of the discharge.
That is the NAV calculation from the 2025 half 12 months report. I do suppose that it represents a comparatively honest worth of Bois Sauvage’s NAV:
Greater than half of the worth is the Chocolate Group. One of many greatest drivers for prices and earnings is the worth of Cocoa which has been in regular decline for the reason that starting of the 12 months as this chart reveals:
Cocoa costs half dropped -50% from the start of the 12 months. I’m not positive if the Chocolate group might need hedged the worth at the very least partially, however there may be clearly tailwind from Cocoa costs after a loopy 18 months or so.
Over the past 5 years, the shareholders of Bois Sauvage had endured a comparatively lengthy decline:
The difficulty is that over that time period, Intrinsic worth stagnated/declined as properly. If we search for occasion on the NAV calculation from 2022 we will see that not a lot occurred:
The rise in Worth within the Chocolate Group had been negatively compensated by Umicore and Noel Group. They did pay good dividends (~8 EUR per share) however worth creation over the previous few years was clearly not nice.
Umicore, the most important listed inventory had a fantastic run till 2022 however did very poorly afterwards:
Funding thesis:
That is clearly a brief time period “particular state of affairs” funding for me, not a long run compounder. I have no idea what they may announce in March, however I believe there may be some likelihood that it’s going to scale back the low cost to NAV.
As well as, I anticipate comparatively good numbers from the Chocolat Group or at the very least a constructive outlook for 2026 from the fee facet that may be already mirrored within the valuation of the place for the NAV calculation.
Then again, I do suppose that the draw back is moderately restricted, so the chance/return ratio appears fairly good to me for the subsequent 3-6 months.
On a fast and soiled foundation, I’d assume there’s a 50% likelihood for a 30% share value improve vs. a 50% likelihood of the inventory doing nothing.
Abstract:
Realizing the corporate over some years, I do suppose that the “introduced announcement” represents an fascinating particular state of affairs.
I’ve allotted 2% of the portfolio into the inventory at a mean share value of 257 EUR.
The time horizon for that is 3 to max. 6 months.
Bonus Monitor: Though nobody has requested for it, right here is in fact a bonus monitor. In fact from the band Scorching Chocolate. Let’s hope that funding seems to be a horny factor…..
Scorching Chocolate – You Attractive Factor (ZDF Disco, 24.04.1976)