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Is this going to keep going up after the earnig (obviously if the earnings are better than expected they will go up ). They have been going up - does the large shareholders know something and trying to push up the SP and sell befor the bad news?
Re landline, you still make landline calls?
re mail client, you do realise there are plenty of other mail clients you can use.
re the crackling hissing line, that will soon resolved when you are moved over to a digital line (i.e. IP telephony).
NEXT.....
Not surprising ,bt landline connections suck ,all auto if you want to complain ,it runs a test and says all is ok if you still have problem ring and go through press this press that then wait 45mins and then through a crackling hissing line they say we have run a test all is ok ,internet broadband reasonable ,but the latest up date to email logoff it takes you to an advert everytime it used to take you back to login so you could go to your other email s but some bright jerk thinks you may want to upgrade everytime you logoff , sorry bt no wonder your slipping ,time for complete loss of landline methinks
If so I'm with fleccy, fill your 👢 👢 👢 👢.
For information that limit I mentioned is 30%
RE: Drahi
Given debt issues with his other companies, it is IMHO unlikely that he will buy more BT shares, also he is very close to the limit he can buy without being forced to make an offer (or reduce stake) for BT.
Market seems to think it's more likely that he will reduce stake, but he states otherwise.
https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/markets/article-13304289/Debt-ridden-Patrick-Drahi-wont-hang-BT.html
No mention of Patrick Drahi increasing his stake? Any thoughts?
Depending on the yield I’m getting at £3 a share I may keep holding.
I presume if the share price is £3, it’s because the balance sheet has much improved and we are getting more than the current lacklustre 7.7p a year.
Can only hope and dream of the 15p a year dividends again one day
Im no highfalutin , fancy dandy wheeler dealer like many on here. The shares i own are from BT employee share saving schemes plus the occasional company freebie . Holding a modest amount of shares is more of a hobby for me , but its nice to hear the thoughts of the real players (obviously that doesn't include Mandy)
So the share price i prey for is (((((( £2.74))))))) As this would give me a cool £100,000 , to add to my pension fund.
Alas we can only dream
I think around £3 would be a fair valuation for BT once the current capex cycle ends and the cost savings kick in, showing up as an increase in the bottom line Net Profit. I don't see BT as a revenue growth play due to their incumbent status, but BT has massive potential for savings through building closures, network transformation and staff reductions. To put things into perspective, BT's yearly Capex spend at around £5 Billion is more than ARM Holding's total yearly revenue, ARM has a market cap of $113.23 Billion and BT's market cap is around £10.5 Billion. Once the current capex cycle ends, BT will have the largest national FTTP and 5G network's, and enough firepower to reduce debt should it choose to. It's blindingly obvious to me that the market is undervaluing BT's assets, so I have no problem topping up as dividend cash becomes available. Whether or not ARM has the potential grow revenue and justify it's large P/E ratio remains to be seen, but it's anyone's guess as to why Telecom stocks are being hammered down to historically low valuations; My theory is that big players are depressing Telecom stock valuations, to push out retail and quietly mop up stock behind the scenes.
Rolls Royce is a good example of how the market can move prices when they want to, from 39p in Oct 2020 to around 423p today. Rolls Royce rerating is even more miraculous when you consider there were 1,930,995,313 total voting rights in Dec 2019 and 8,416,696,989 today and they dropped the dividend and still have debt. If Rolls Royce isn't an example of big market players gaming stock valuations I don't know what is, since it's the only way I can make sense of the disparity in valuations between different stocks and sectors.
Me, I’d start to cash out at circa 130p, and be all out at circa 150p.
One is the most recent high, the other is the year high.
Excellent question Abject - That is the $64000 question
What BT SP would you cash out at? (only answers above £1 accepted)
Fair enough Fleccy thanks for reply .
You say you can wait out an irrational market , I can too.
What price do you deem rational for you to sell at?
Fleccy
Re your Keynes quote.....
It reminded me regards the Nikkei Index. It hit a high in October of 1989...........it took circa 35 years to make a new high, in January of 2024.
I seem to recall BT once hit a high of over £10, during the dot.com boom. Mind you that price was irrational.
Well, I sold my HSBA shares...
1. They hit a year high (I almost always sell).
2. I only bought them after the circa 10% drop that happened in Feb.
https://www.ft.com/content/05177d82-ac3b-4108-a958-e49bd482adcd
Started at under 600p, managed to collect the full year dividend and later sold them for 660p.
I sold way too early (now 700p)......fortunately BT has pretty much held at the price I paid those few weeks ago.
"But more importantly to me, the rest of the market has risen strongly and I have decided to sell and seek a bargain and one that is still currently paying quite a high yield. I am aware of the risks, but the potential reward seems well worth it"
Good luck with your choice, we should all do what's right for us. We're currently sitting on a £24,000 paper gain on our Lloyds shares, and I still consider them undervalued with a fair value over 70p, so I'll just watch and wait.
"John Maynard Keynes said that markets can stay irrational for longer than you can stay solvent, fortunately I can stay solvent longer than the market can remain irrational."
Well I'm also 'in' and with a substantial holding. I am also a former BT employee (with Global Services), and yes I believe that at current levels they offer really good value.
But more importantly to me, the rest of the market has risen strongly and I have decided to sell and seek a bargain and one that is still currently paying quite a high yield. I am aware of the risks, but the potential reward seems well worth it.
If BT were to lose this class action, I think it would open a can of worms for insurance companies. Whether it was for bundling or automatice renewal.
The issue is, that BT were told that OFCOM would seek to take enforcement action to reduce the price by £5-£7.
BT then volunteered to reduce, thus preventing OFCOM from carrying out that enforcement action.
In short, OFCOM put a gun to their head.
If I had such a gun to my head, I'd not describe handing over the cash as volunteering. ;-)
OFCOM expressed an opinion and used it's powers to coerce BT into lowering landline rental charges, whether a voluntary reduction can be used as evidence of overcharging is a different matter. The class action has also includes Split Purchase customers, which OFCOM described as well engaged and therefore requiring no further action, so the lawyers have included a customer type OFCOM considered as being treated fairly.
In my personal opinion I don't see how BT have done anything wrong, especially since all Communication providers operate a policy of increasing out of contract pricing significantly; I've experienced it myself when I was a Sky customer, if you don't renegotiate at the end of your contract then you'll get hammered by a significant price increase, they all do it.
Abject there's some contradiction in your post, on the one hand you state that my "lack of criticism and low expectations of both companies and their management annoys" you, and on the other hand you state "Fleccy my holding is approaching yours in Bt And I have probably 1/3 your holding in vod"; You either believe the companies are undervalued, or you don't, and if you don't believe the companies share prices will eventually recover to fair value, why invest there at all? If you read through my previous thread, about the compounding effect of reinvesting dividends when the share price drop's, you'll get some understanding of my thought processes. I used to work in Telecoms, so I have a bias toward investing in the sector, but my reasoning for investing in BT and Vodafone is because I believe they're cheap safe stocks, and I have unlimited patience when it comes to investing as long as I'm receiving dividends.
IDMB if I had a crystal ball all my stock purchases would be timed to perfection, I'd consistently buy at the bottom and sell at the top, but I haven't got some way of predicting the future unfortunately. Obviously when I first invested in Vodafone and BT I had no idea the prices would fall so low, but we are where we are so I play the hand I've been dealt. I've now brought my averages down to low enough levels to mitigate any risk of losing money in the event of a takeover, in fact if BT or Vod should become takeover target's I'll make a good profit on them.
John Maynard Keynes said that markets can stay irrational for longer than you can stay solvent, fortunately I can stay solvent longer than the market can remain irrational.
Https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0014/107321/standalone-landline-evidence.pdf
Evidence supporting the last statement I posted.
Https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0015/107322/standalone-landline-statement.pdf
The initial review document, the one that likely as not led to Patrick (former OFCOM employee) from starting the class action.
I must admit after reading this, I'm perhaps a little more concerned with my bet.... ;-)
OFCOM clearly intended to enforce action, BT just jumped the gun. Also, looking at the chart on page 5 it was perhaps surprising that they did not request it be back dated.
The 118 case...I referred to.
https://www.ofcom.org.uk/about-ofcom/bulletins/enforcement-bulletin/all-closed-cases/cw_01242
...and yet they did not fine BT for the so called 'overcharging' of millions of customers, or a period of many years.
My expectation is that BT will win this case, hence buying in two weeks ago at circa 105p. In short it's a gamble and I think the upside outweighs the downside, especially at these levels.
My reasoning is there was no overcharging, BT were not making high let alone unusually high profits on this business. Just because the service was not considered good value, does not mean that they are being overcharged if the cost of provision of that service is higher, and perhaps even subsidised by the sale of broadband to most customers, after they voluntarily cut the price.
Just because they made an offer to reduce the price does not mean that they were overcharging, just that they accept the it was not good value.
What is good value?
If the court allow this action, it will be opening a door to hundreds if not thousands of claims. An example, Asda and Waitrose both sell food. Could Waitrose be sued because it does not offer good value when compared to Asda?
Do Aston Martin offer good value, relative to other car manufacturers, even if they are making a loss on selling cars.
Surely the cost of provision, even if it is seen as bad value to the consumer does not mean that they are being overcharged. They are just paying the company a price that reflects the costs to that company, plus a reasonable profit on providing that service.
Back to BT, a case in point, all of the other line providers were charging the same rate as BT for these customers. Virgin also voluntarily lowered the price at that time.
...and most importantly, OFCOM did not fine BT or in anyway force them to lower the price. Whilst in the past even when BT made an error in pricing of 118 calls to mobile users, they were fined because of the error, even though they had already rectified it and refunded it.