Ann: FY19 Half Year Results & affirmation of FY19 guidance, page-10

I thought nixing the idea of a buyback was a bit of bad news for the market. Also with the heatwave and power issues recently - seems surprising that h2 underlying guidance is so low. The market has run up into these results.

Another issue plaguing the sector is that they want to invest in new projects, but don't feel they have the regulatory certainty to do so. But there is a lot of investment happening. Suspect they might not be able to hit their ROIC targets with lots of capital going into the solar and possibly pumped hydro soon (every potential site is being evaluated by the sounds of things), and batteries.

A potential future winner is a turnaround in their consumer division, once the recent problems have made their way through. There is a lot of activity in this area at the moment with solar panels, batteries, automation of the home, managing energy consumption via timing of devices etc, and a need for trusted advice, which the retailers seem to have been unable to access with all of the apparently untrustworthy activities of confusing clients that has been part of the industry in recent times. They need to find a value add, and fix their reputation with actions rather than marketing, so that they can tap this area. A big organisation should be able to find some benefits of scale in releasing helpful services etc. Both reputation and value add need to be aligned or it is a waste of time however IMO. I reckon they'll gradually come up with some offerings - maybe based on software and home sensors etc over time, to offer value and not just price - but might need a radical shake up first. They need to find such a niche.

I shorted on the results - but just a quickie. I'm not really taking any longer term or valuation view.