The iCollege Ltd (ASX: ICT) share price finished in the green on Friday, up 7.7% to 21 cents. Over the past month, the ASX share has ascended 50% in value.
The micro-cap ASX share is having a great 2022 so far. While the S&P/ASX All Ordinaries Index (ASX: XAO) has been falling 12%, the iCollege share price has gained 71%. Now that's an outperformance.
iCollege is a leading vocational education provider comprised of businesses providing accredited and non-accredited training across Australia.
In an interview on Livewire, 1851 Capital's Chris Stott says iCollege shares are a buy.
Stott said:
This company's in the beautiful position that they've got extraordinary demand for their product in the form of students coming back into the country post-COVID-19.
They can travel again, they're having to add capacity in the form of new facilities to house a lot of these students.
So again, strong balance sheet, very well run, with the merger with RedHill not so long ago, so buy.
Stott is referring to iCollege's off-market takeover of RedHill Education Limited in October 2021. The deal was that RedHill investors would receive 9.5 iCollege shares for every RedHill share they owned.
iCollege received 94% support from RedHill shareholders, which enabled it to compulsorily acquire the remaining shares in October 2021.
What's news at iCollege?
iCollege released its FY22 full-year results on 29 August.
Revenue was up 187% to $46.8 million on the prior corresponding period (pcp), with RedHill contributing $31.5 million.
Its earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, and amortisation (EBITDA) went up 37%. The company said growth was "driven by [the] RedHill acquisition and recovering international student revenues".
The company said it expected revenue and profit "to materially increase in FY23".
This is due, in part, to student numbers exceeding pre-COVID levels, growth in bachelor degree intakes, restructuring activities, and higher campus utilisation to improve earnings.
The company has a market capitalisation of $213.59 million.
