Blue Star Capital PLC (LON:BLU), the technology company investor, said it was pleased with the performance of its portfolio companies over the half-year to March 31,2020, as its asset value jumped by 13%.
The company, which has stakes in micropayments group SatoshiPay, fingerprint security group SThaler and a suite of esports business, said net assets had risen to £5.97mln from £5.2mln six months earlier.
Losses for the period were £189,000 (2019: £495,000) which, it added, included a substantial loss relating to non-cash adjustments to the carrying value of investments.
This equates to a net asset value per share of approximately 0.19p.
Going forward, Blue Star noted SatoshiPay is currently testing its B2B payments solution and expects to have a public beta product launch live sometime in the fourth quarter of 2020. Blue Star’s 27.9% stake has a carrying value of £4.75mln.
Two of the esports businesses, Guild and Dynasty, also recently signed signficant agreements.
Guild agreed to work with ex-England and Manchester United star David Beckham to find and develop new esports stars.
Dynasty, meanwhile, recently signed a five-year deal with the Malaysia esports Federation to provide a portal to manage esports development in the country.
BlueStar has a 13.7% stake in Dynasty and recently invested a further £480,000 to maintain its stake in Guild at 11.7%.
This illustrates the potential upside from our esports investment portfolio, said Blue Star chairman David Lew.