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Toff,
MMs make money by trading huge volumes daily, a sideways or falling market is the best for them as more trades keep flowing. Trump talks about the stock market, the FED talks about the stock market.......our useless pub landlord / landlady PMs have no clue along with the dumb Canadian BOE guy. Anyway in order to distribute wealth, you can’t give it away for free but stock market is a way to give smart people a chance to make some money. As long as the companies get access to cheap financing, investors will reap rewards. The U.K is a dumb country where only old fashioned entitled bastards are running listed companies. If S&P falls 50% from current high, it would still be higher than pre-crisis high.......the FTSE100 on the other hand would be almost 40% lower than pre-crisis high. We underperform when in bull market then outperform in a recession!
Taverham
“How can you compare those companies to American ones”
Who’s comparing uk shares to American tech shares?
Not me.
I’m comparing uk shareprices with their value 20 years ago.
I fully understand the rise of American techs have boosted the Dow.
That’s partly why it’s tripled since 1999 while the ftse 100 has risen about 6 percent. If there’s a worse investment than the ftse 100 over the past 20 years let me know about it because I don’t know one. And that includes keeping money under the mattress
Toff
Toff, ref the ftse companies trading on low valuations - it is because the demand for their shares is low. How can you compare those companies to american ones , where the big fang stocks are growing up to 20% each year? uk companies have been left with dwindling income while the new fang companies such money out of our economy and send it off to the USA. Worse still the penion liabilities are exacerbated by low interest rates. So, on reflection If examine the uk company performance they generally deteriorate each year whilst the american ones keep growing imv. BTW I also feel the pain.
Avro:
Yes, I lost money on both Carillion & Capita too!! I was holding onto Capita and even bought more at 158, it went even lower.. In the end I sold the lot and bought RMG when they had a 17p dividend - clawed some money back - but even RMG has gone down from its highs of over 244 just after the election to 174p today!
All these businesses are still functioning, the government is quite happy to take our UK PLC debt into more trillions but if a companies debts increase as they restructure things, its literally destroyed by the markets.
Bluepeter
There’s an unspoken consensus that share trading is gambling and anyone who loses only have themselves to blame. That mindset explains the total lack of protection retail investors get.
An erroneous view in my opinion. At least gambling is predicated on chance - and if that chance is fixed there’s punishment and justice.
Not so with the UK stock market. If gambling institutions fixed it so everyone lost they’d end up in jail and have their licenses revoked.
There’s too much laisser-faire in share dealing. The MMs provide liquidity so have enormous power -but does that make it right to cheat? The price is wealth destruction for the masses.
This issue is specific to the UK market; other markets value shares based on realities such as fundamentals, not aset of numbers to be shifted and set to ensure traders almost always lose.
Toff
Toff- I've no idea whether the credence you give to influence of MM's is as extreme as you suggest but if you are correct then it represents a national scandal and exploitation of small investors that should attract government intervention.
If it's ok for the government to screw the share value of certain businesses with excessive regulation perhaps they should apply similar constraints on market trading.
D955
I am with you. Everything I've bought in last few years has ended in disaster, big losses all around. Its not just BT thats affected - MKS, RMG, SLA, CNA, RBS..
Absolutely. I could easily add another 50 ftse 100 companies to that list. This is a permabear index that doesn’t trade on fundamentals or reality.
If BT were a £1 for example. Deutsche Bank would still be issuing price targets of 70p. And unenlightened retail investors would be blaming the derisory shareprice on the management.
Uk shares, for the most part trade on an alternative reality imposed on us by rabid market makers to line their own pockets
Far worse that interest rate fixes and LIBOR scandals when you have a market that values most of its companies at historical bear market lows.
What I want to know is - how much longer can they get away with it before a massive scandal breaks.
Toff
H-hi
“Easy money for big banks to trade against retail traders with little funds and short timeframe.”
Absolutely correct. Many of the ftse 100 companies are trading on the most savage bear market valuations imaginable.
Far from creating wealth, uk markets are engines of wealth destruction. The index may be up today, but it’s always the same few shares that rise, while most drift ever lower.
You’re right of course, the market makers and their banks and brokerages conspire to strip retail investors of their money. Not valuations, just a set of numbers chosen to benefit them.
I don’t know a single global market where a company can beat market expectations, only to FALL on the news - as Barclays did this week. I find that truly shocking. You wouldn’t even see that truck in a banana republic’s stock market.
If BT was a US company trading on the same fundamentals it would be £5-6 on current markets.
You’d think the FCA would step in and clean the scum out. It never used to function like this - it’s become virtually impossible to make money on uk stocks because however low you buy in the bent MMs know they can mark them down ever lower without sanction.
Toff
Sorry that should have read sold MKS and bought Next instead.
d955uk,
There are good rational reasons why all those companies have disappointed.
BT, CNA (British Gas) and RMG are all ex nationalied industries and (are) were all controlled by the unions which resulted in low worker morale and nearly non existent customer services. Have any of you ever tried making a complaint against Royal Mail or BT. Marks and Spencer is now only a shadow of its former self and its management has never come to terms that the future of retail is online. (You might want to consider what I did a few years ago I sold my BT and bought Next instead). RBS is lucky to be still around if it had not been for the governments rescue they would have gone bankrupt years ago. With you record I am surprised that you never mentioned Carillion.
D955uk and Toff,
You guys are right but wrong.........the U.K is the number 1 shorter’s paradise. Too many CFDs are used by retail traders. Easy money for big banks to trade against retail traders with little funds and short timeframe. Also both U.K. and foreign buyers are not buying u.k equities......Woodford got burnt buying u.k equities while those funds who bought crazily priced amazon and Tesla are laughing to the bank. The U.K market is not normal, wealth is not being created here unlike in America.
Toff:
I am with you. Everything I've bought in last few years has ended in disaster, big losses all around. Its not just BT thats affected - MKS, RMG, SLA, CNA, RBS.. all our companies can't be that bad.. Deutsche Telecom received 15% of BT shares for the EE sale and gave them to an offshore hedge fund.. my gut feeling is that the market is being manipulated by powerful people in Europe (Germany & France) to make us pay for Brexit..my opinion..
" Intuition is what seems to work for me. " - Avro, not the first I've read that from you, and this is as good a time as any to voice concern.
You've been investing long enough to have read research that proves the stock market is the absolute last place on earth for human intuition. It will be the death of your savings. Never yet read a book by any billionaire investor who states:
' I owe it all to intuition'. No such animal exists - in the stock market.
Don't think there's a single recorded instance of any repeatable, permanent success by any investor using no strategy whatsoever, other than the pot luck method of relying on human emotion.
In almost every other sphere of human activity, intuition will save your ass time and time again. But it will be the death of you in direct stockmarket investment. Holding long term for instance is not intuition. That is a strategy in itself. It's Warren Buffett's but he picks the stocks that meet his criteria in the first place. He has rules. The best investor alive has rules. A strategy. A plan.
Here endth the sermon.
When you muse: "Is it just a pause for breath ?" well I can only purse my lips in angst and drawl, allow me to attempt an answer to that in 24 to 48 hours :) until then, that's a fair question, a good question, that's yet to be dealt with, and as yet remains unanswered.
---------
" Velo, read your piece but not convinced." I'm pleased you posted that BoBetts. What I'm doing is pure trading, and not recommended to anyone. I expect to be long only for the short term (unless by accident and chance this occasion turns out to be the ultimate floor).
What you've highlighted prior to that statement reveals you to be contemplating a longer term investment as an investor. On that basis I can't fault your analysis. Debt is calculated to reach a climax by maybe 2023/24 plus BT is a political prisoner. Always a bad combo. I'm trying something that worked before with BT and I hope will work again. If not to be on this occasion, then that's okay as I'm not letting the exit sign out of my line of sight.
Lamtree,
Having read Toff's comment blaming the MM's on eveything under the sun.
"Not only BT. About 70 percent of the ftse 100 has."
It reminded me of the following story.
An elderly man was driving down the M1, his mobile phone rang. Answering, he heard his wife's voice urgently warning him, "Toff, I just heard on the news that there's a crazy guy going the wrong way on the M1. Please be careful!"
"Hell," said Toff, "It's not just one nutter. It's hundreds of them!"
Again just using my intuition, somehow I get the feeling that Toff is a former Market Maker who lost his job.
Lamtree
“So over the last 5 years BT has collapsed because of MMs?”
Not only BT. About 70 percent of the ftse 100 has.
Make that over the past 20 years. Strip the miners out and you’re left with the worst 20 year investment in stock market history.
And the lowest valuations of any market.
Everyone loses. But to ensure that stocks have to be continually marked down - regardless of reality. Yet another massive disadvantages of living in the UK
Toff
D955
“BT shares 5.5 million sold, 17.8 million bought - more than 3x difference - yet share price nudges only 2.08p UP!!!!”
BT often falls when there are twice as many buys as sells.
I expect you’re wondering what happens to the differential between buys and sells. The answer is, the market makers use their brokerage arms to mop up excess shares. If they priced shares fairly they wouldn’t have to do this, but this is exactly how they manipulate shareprices.
Rat-holing shares is the most blatant method of insider trading in existence. It should be illegal for a MM who is trading a company’s shares to rat-hole them in their brokerage arm.
But you’d expect that from rats.
Toff
BT shares 5.5 million sold, 17.8 million bought - more than 3x difference - yet share price nudges only 2.08p UP!!!!
Guess we have to be glad it has n't gone down!
Maybe we should set up our own BT shareholder site spelling out the real value of BT shares based on fundamentals than these brokers who don't justify their target prices.
Vodafone is up a lot today too, 4p+ much higher than BT - despite VOD and BT now on parity as regards the SP.
Both FTSE and US markets down today - yet both VOD and BT up - considerably. Hmmm...
And the canary in the mine ultra short term, 'fliberty-gibbet', trend lines which I devised for heads-up notification only - and not a buy/sell decision maker (that's the next level up trend lines) have also turned bullish. The first time they've turned bullish since the election result in ealy Dec last year!
I still need another confirmation. See what happens tomorrow, but I have to sit on the sidelines a bit longer for confirmation. The break has been made. Now confirm it.
Wow! Closed closer to 156p than 155p.
Get this - As per my post below, tiny volume for today into close, wished I'd noted the actual amount now, but I only looked at the graph.
THEN IN THE FINAL 5 MINUTES. In 5 minutes flat - 5 minutes! The most humngous volume of the day bar none - bar none - huge! Came in like a roaring bull! And drove the SP up at speed to 155.8p!
I'm very suspicious, as of yet maybe for the wrong reasons. But the speed and sheer size of that intense 5 minute volume buying has driven the low volume for the day up to longer term averages but has had a drug like effect on oversold condition. The SP is as of tonight, officially just out of oversold and onto a level playing field!
- Who's the big money, moving in fast, last thing tonight?
What's going on?
How can big money, move in that fast, that huge amount, with every single forecast and media report so bearish? What made them change their mind?
And more to the point - is it just the start? Looking like it.
The bearish media, the analysts forecasts, that are so bearish, what's going on? That last media report this morning telling you BT is down 1% and repeating it in the summation to drive home the point that BT is heading in one direction only.
How it goes. Tell you one story in the media, but maybe not the right story.
Jumpimg the gun (should wait another few minutes or so, after hours auctions and delayed stockmarket reporting catch-up's) but unless something dramatic occurs in after hours auctions I'm more and more liking the past 5 days (today inclusive) price formation. Actually seeing a terrific close on live prices [155p!] but will wait another few minutes on that)
The media and Consensus forecasts et al, control the bearish narrative but I'm starting to sniff the opposite as the oversold matures towards termination.
I'd be more bullish except for one thing - a well known bull trap condition - ultra low volume yesterday and so far today. It's a well known fact amongst those who study these things, that if you control enough cash you can contol the price of most shares on the market - in low volume days only - quite easily.
No response in the SP to the most bearish consensus forecast update by analysts yet - and yet the SP ignores it. Baked-in?
I'll buy that so long as this doesn't turn into a false rally and the trap is sprung. The low volume could mean those who were desperate to sell have already done so - and gone. What happens to price when sellers are reluctant to sell?
They've had since Christmas week last year to unload huge amounts so it could be that forced sellers have sated their vomiting. Buyers are actually paying marginally a tiny bit more. Or as Jim Cramer once boasted of his Fund Manger days on Youtube:
"I (then changed to I know people)could bring down any company in the world with just five million bucks - legally!"
Will check the day's volume when all in for the day, but wary when price rises on low volume. However, things starting to look up just a wee nit IMO hpowever shortlived it turns out to be. We'll see.
" Velo,
I have an interesting observation and would appreciate to hear your opinion..."
----------------------
Honest reply is: I just don't have any data on that Avro, just homilies and truisms.
For instance a few months ago, I read a US guru trader saying (without providing back up data):
"The price in the mornings is what you think is right. but the price by the end of the day is what the market thinks is right".
I have no info on whether the US like or dislike BT. Just don't know on that.
What I do know from direct personal experience is that if sentiment moves seriously, first in the US, we here in the UK follow suit pretty quickly. In fact the 10 year history of the DOW and such as the S&P500 look pretty similar. You have to check you're on the right Indice chart, they're that similar. To a lesser extent the FTSE on a smaller scale has followed the US trends-ish within it's own universe. It's never really seriously down overall, in any particular year when US markets are up. US markets looked bearish in 2015 and so did the FTSE - When the US turned up in 2016 - so did FTSE, but in all cases the US leads the UK markets by the nose - and not only the UK either.
BT? Well judging by posts on here, over the years many would think the US has had it in for BT for many a year LOL! I just don't hold a view on that one.
From trading the DOW I can confirm another homilie: "The most volatile trading occurs in the first 2 hours, after that you can take the day off" (mostly; not always true, but mostly).
Does that sounds similar to "the morning price is what you think - and the afternoon price . . . . ." ??? Or hearsay and homilies?
But trying to fit a conspiracy theory into all that? If there is one it will always show in the longer term trends. The short term trends are anybody's for a free glass of shandy on a rainy Sat night. But long term trends are the bald truth.
I follow the trends so if the trend is down - it's down, and I don't usually care why that is, (I do 'try' to find out) it will trend up when it's on the rise after a decent period of time, and I won't care why, as the uptrend will be telling me anyway.
So, in all cases, the end of day price at close is what matters most.
" our cousins over the pond do not like BT. "
Avroham
Their big boss doesnt like BT and others using Huawei ..maybe they have targeted BT as a response to that decision ??
Velo,
I have an interesting observation and would appreciate to hear your opinion. There have been loads of occasions when BT has opened very positive and remained so all morning. Then come afternoon they start hurtling down. The only logical reason for that is that our cousins over the pond do not like BT. Maybe that is the real reason why BT withdrew its presence from the USA market.
So far so good. But the two hours from 2:30pm onwards are when US market sentiment could stick its oars in for the first time since the new Q4 forecast reveal (media analysts quiet; maybe they said 'it all' in Q3? They've hitherto been quick off the mark to publish on analysts updates)
If the SP 'rangeboundness', flat floor, of the past few trading days that back into last week, holds until close, then I'll be checking acutely for the first signs of seller exhaustion resulting in oversold condition beginning to terminate. They always, always, have in BT - (terminated) - with a useful mini rally afterwards (but mostly lasting weeks to months before the long term trends reasserted themselves).
It's that out of oversold period I'll be targeting for a short term, modest profit (or maybe it becomes longer term - who can really say for sure?)
There is so much universal media fear and loathing in BT that it's beginning to qualify for Buffett's "Be greedy when others are fearful..." but only when the signs point in that direction. Not yet though... not yet.
-Just ruminating. My personal opinions as always, of which I have plenty :)