Very niiiice:PRINCIPAL: "ROBERT GENOVESE NAME : BG CAPITAL GROUP SOUTH FLORIDA, INC.
"6/25/00 CORPORATE DETAIL RECORD SCREEN 7:51 PM NUM: P97000005760 ST:FL ACTIVE/FL PROFIT FLD: 01/21/1997 FEI#: 65-0776485 NAME : BG CAPITAL GROUP SOUTH FLORIDA, INC. PRINCIPAL: % ROBERT GENOVESE CHANGED: 03/23/98 ADDRESS 2424 N. FEDERAL HWY., #101 BOCA RATON, FL 33431 RA NAME : GENOVESE, ROBERT NAME CHG: 03/23/98 RA ADDR : 2424 N. FEDERAL HIGHWAY ADDR CHG: 03/23/98 SUITE 101 BOCA RATON, FL 33431 US ANN REP : (1998) B 09/03/98 (1999) A 02/01/99 (2000) A 05/16/00
hey bud, small world;
? Two independent securities analysts, Access1 Financial, and Financial Strategies and Investing, Inc., have made strong buy recommendations of $30 or more per share. insidewallstreet.com
========================================================== "Without any expansion, the company's revenues are projected at $11.5 million in 1999, according to Richard Geist, an analyst for Financial Strategies and Investing Inc. in Massachusetts, which researched Neptune before the Boca Raton group bought it."
Ashes anyone? Boca firm takes death care public Marco Commisso Staff Writer A group of Boca Raton venture capitalists, wagering that money can be made now from the hereafter, has taken the nation's largest cremation company onto Wall Street.
BG Capital Group, a Boca investment banking firm, bought The Neptune Society in Los Angeles for $27 million using Lari Corp., an existing public company that had no assets, as its vehicle for the aquisition. It closed on the deal April 30, changed the name back to The Neptune Society, and brought the new company public May 4 at $6 a share. It closed at $6.47 earlier this week.
The cremation company was founded in 1973 by Manny Weitraub, now 72, who will stay with the company as a consultant.
The venture capitalists for The Neptune Society (OTCBB: NPTN) see a big future in cremation services because a growing number of people, especially baby boomers, are expected to choose cremation instead of ground burial when they die because they care more for the environment and are beginning to shy away from traditional funerals.
About one of every four deceased people is now cremated and that number is expected to reach two out of every five by 2010, according to the Cremation Association of North America.
Neptune has 52,000 living contract-holders who paid between $1,200 and $1,400 each to pre-fund their cremations. In the past 25 years, The Neptune Society has cremated between 3,600 and 4,000 people a year, but has signed membership contracts with almost twice that many people, executives say.
A one-time membership fee goes into an interest-bearing trust account, which as of December 1998 contained $33.6 million. By 2004, the company estimates it will have $86 million in this trust account.
"We're taking advantage of a sleepy little company with a great idea," said Gary R. Loffredo, vice president of investment banking at BG Capital Group. "They are the only pure cremation company out there that I know of, and the only ones who have made a national brand out of themselves."
Loffredo and his partners plan to bank on the company's credible name and expand its services by buying other private cremation services in other states, including Texas and Illinois, he said.
The Neptune Society also is in search of two high-profile executives to be its president and vice president.
Without any expansion, the company's revenues are projected at $11.5 million in 1999, according to Richard Geist, an analyst for Financial Strategies and Investing Inc. in Massachusetts, which researched Neptune before the Boca Raton group bought it.
"It's been a big coup for us," Loffredo said. "We're a venture-capital firm that specializes in companies that are turning the corner or have already made that turn in terms of revenues. All they need is the capital to grow even faster." bizjournals.com |