MIDAS SHARE TIPS UPDATE: Now City crime pays for training provider Learning Technologies

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Jonathan Satchell is a man with a mission. He set up Learning Technologies Group in 2013 to help businesses devise digital training programmes and his ambition from the start was to build it into a company with revenues of £50million within about five years.

Having bagged customers such as British Airways and large swathes of the civil service, Satchell has taken a big step towards realising his revenue goal with the acquisition on July 31 of Eukleia, one of the top providers of compliance and regulation training for banks.

Last week’s conviction of Tom Hayes for manipulating Libor, the benchmark for interest rates, highlights the uphill struggle that banks face as they try to make sure employees behave themselves. Eukleia is one of the firms that is helping them to change.

Deal: Eukleia is a top provider of banks’ compliance training

Learning Technologies paid £7.5million for Eukleia, of which £6 million was funded by the issue of new shares at 21p.

Midas recommended the group last November when the stock was 20.25p. Last week, it closed at 22.75p, a step in the right direction.

Satchell is determined to see these shares make further gains and he is certainly motivated, as he owns 30 per cent of the company. 

Brokers predict that revenues will rise more than 50 per cent to £22.8million this year and to almost £30million in 2016. Profits are expected to more than double to £4million this year and to £5.2million next.

The dividend should rise too, from 0.1p in 2014 to 0.11p this year and 0.12p in 2016.

Midas verdict: Companies increasingly use computers, iPads and even phones to help train employees and Learning Technologies is at the forefront of the sector. 

Investors who bought into the company last November should hold. New investors could even pick up a few shares at current levels.