For example, the company has incorporated a Gibraltar Life Insurance Company, STM Life, which provides life insurance bonds - wrappers in which a variety of investments, including investment funds, can be held. STM has also developed a specialist international pensions division which specialises in Qualifying Recognised Overseas Pension Schemes (QROPS), Qualifying Non UK Pension Schemes (QNUPS) and Employer Funded Retirement Benefit Schemes (EFRBS).
It's a high-growth area to be operating in, and a very profitable one too as was abundantly clear from the company's fiscal 2014 results released in mid-March. But what put me off initiating coverage on the shares was the overhang of a convertible loan note (CLN) issue. But that has now been resolved after the company repaid £700,000 of these CLNs in full and converted a further £1.55m into shares priced at 26p each last week. This increased its issued share capital by just shy of 6m shares to 59.4m shares, but more importantly it now means that only £300,000 of the CLNs are outstanding and these can be easily repaid from cash resources when they mature in March 2016. These outstanding CLNs accrue interest at the rate of 7 per cent a year.