Blue Star Capital raises £1.02m and invests £0.2m into NFT Investments
(BLU ) has raised c.£1.02m which it intends to use to provide it with general working capital and additional funds for investment in new and existing opportunities.
The investing firm which focuses on esports, payments, technology and applications within media and gaming said it has raised £1.02m pursuant to a placing of 142,857,143 new ordinary shares and the exercise of 442,221,889 warrants at a price of 0.175p per share.
As previously stated, the Company said it is considering making a further investment in Dynasty eSports Pte Ltd while it has made a separate investment into NFT Investments.
Blue Star Capital has invested £0.2 million in the IPO of NFT which began trading on the AQSE Growth Market earlier today following a "substantially oversubscribed" placing.
NFT Investments is the first pure-play investment company focused exclusively on investing in non-fungible tokens to launch on a stock market in a major jurisdiction worldwide.
NFT was launched by the co-founders of Argo Blockchain to invest in non-fungible tokens, a specialised class of assets that certifies authenticity and proof of ownership of digital assets.
“NFT Investments' admission to the AQSE Growth Market marks a significant milestone for the non-fungible sector. Our record-breaking raise on AQSE provides a strong foundation on which the Company can execute its long-term growth strategy and capitalise on its first-mover advantage,” commented Executive Chairman of NTF Investments, Jonathan Bixby.
Blue Star disclosed back in January that the value of its investment portfolio had grown by c.78% in its final results for the year ended 30 September 2020, moving it into profitability.
In particular, the esports market is experiencing significant growth. In 2020 it was estimated at around 495m viewers and is projected to reach around 646m viewers by 2023.
This is expected to result in revenues growing over the same period from $950m to $1.60bn.
Shares in Blue Star Capital have increased by over 11% in value since the beginning of 2021. The stock was trading 7.89% higher this morning at 0.205p following the announcement.
Blue Star is an investing company with a focus on new technologies. Its investments include a 27.7% holding in SatoshiPay, a payments business using blockchain technology; investments in 6 early stage esports companies with shareholdings ranging from 5.9% to 13.6% and a 0.9% investment in Sthaler, an identity and payments technology business which enables a consumer to identify themselves and pay using just their finger.
The company provided an update in respect of its esports portfolio back in December 2020 as well as its investee companies - The Drops Esports Inc and Diemens Esports PTY Ltd.
Since the group’s initial £0.9m investment in six esports opportunities in November 2019, Blue Star has invested around £1.68m across seven companies. It has since invested in Guild Esports PLC, Dynasty eSports Pte Ltd and, most recently, in FORMATION Esports SaaS.
Based on the current valuation of Guild which was admitted to the standard segment of the LSE’s main market on 2 October 2020, and the higher valuation achieved by Dynasty in its subsequent fund raises, Blue Star's esports portfolio is now valued at £3.71m showing an unrealised gain of £2,035,890 and an increase of approximately 120%.
In its FY20 final results for the year ended 30 September 2020, which moved the group into profitability, the group said it had made a profit for the period of £1.7m compared with a loss in the corresponding period of £0.68m. The group cited the major contributor factor as ‘the uplift in valuation’ achieved on its investments in Guild Esports and Dynasty Esports.
The group hailed “an excellent year with strong performance” from its esports portfolio as well as “encouraging progress” from its tech payment businesses. It said its portfolio was successfully diversified with the move into esports which is now seen as its major focus.
Given the market growth and potential commercial opportunities, the Board ‘firmly believes’ that esports will eventually take up a significant proportion of the global sports industry.
Specifically, over the last twelve months, Blue’s esports portfolio has enjoyed two major successes and at the year end the valuation of the esports portfolio stood at around £3.8 million compared with an accumulated investment to date of approximately £1.7 million.
The board remains ‘highly confident’ in the strong underlying trends in esports and believes there is significant upside to be achieved moving forward from the esports portfolio.
Cash as at 30 September 2020 was £0.132m compared to £0.12m in the corresponding period. Post the year end the Company raised £0.095m through the exercise of warrants.
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