Member Info for AllAtSea

I've had Aviva shares a long time. IIRC they once traded at comfortable �1 above Pru shares. If Trump has to moderate his stance on CHina, maybe to placate the US pig and soy farmers, then Pru must be cheap right now. But what is certain these days..

Trump/Amazon? Can't find anything else. Seems all about politics right now.

..and the Pru has got a haircut. Guess it'll grow back one day.

I read that Q1 2018 has been the worst quarter since 2011. Not for just for HSBC but for the FTSE100. That is disturbing.

..or was when I started!!

The BBC is an amazing institution but I have never, ever thought it was a good source of financial advice. Nor do I ever rely on a single news source for anything of any importance. (I wouldn't bother to post this except to record the fact GSK is >1400!)

No reply? You just did ;-)

Their responsibilities? What are those? They are a private enterprise, not a charity or part of the welfare state. Caveat emptor applies and always did.

..I decided to to tranship 25% of my Aviva holding into Prudential a while back. No plans to lighten ship any further tho'.

"One of the most important lessons I've learnt , is not to get emotionally attached to a share, as your judgement [ either way ] gets clouded and you will lose money. " Absolutely right there. This Tesco topic is driven very much by wishful thinking because no doubt there are many who have shares from the heady days when they sold at 350 plus. To sell would be to lose. Alas, I have some shares like that but they hand me a decent dividend while I sit on them.

"..the question is would you buy a financial product from Aviva? No." Only because I don't need a financial product right now. In the past I have had 3 endowments, 2 of which went into shortfall. At the time endowment sellers were pilloried because they had allegedly promised rich returns. Largely forgotten now. I do have an Aviva stakeholder which is doing remarkably well. Hell, I might even get a pension out of it one day! Also had an Equitable Life policy years ago when the Guaranteed Annuities weren't quite so guaranteed and Equitable became a hissing and a byword. If something is too good to be true then it isn't true. There will be a lot of sound and fury over this and then it will be sorted out and life will go on. It isn't a Ratner moment by a million miles.

..were some messages on here last time I looked. Anyway, have just got a few in on the recent drop and hope to buy a few more once the Stadium deal is done and I have more funds.

I'm an individual shareholder as is my wife. We both have to admit to NOT being "deeply upset and appalled". Have we the sensitivity of rhinoceri or is it simply that 'worse things happen at sea' (and in the banking industry)? Oh, and I can't say our institutions ARE held in particularly high esteem by us - we don't trust the B*gg*ers any further than our lawyers can read the small print.

Today: "Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, twelve have assigned a hold rating and nine have assigned a buy rating to the company�s stock. The company currently has an average rating of Hold and a consensus price target of GBX 1,530.45 ($21.14)." Do they know any more than we do? Little sign of it.

We shall see. My bet is that a compromise will be found and so not every one will get exactly what they would like but it won't be as draconian as the worst case scenario. "You obviously know very little about the markets." Sure, nor am I a lawyer;I am on a steep learning curve and not alone it seems. Of course it is a highly charged matter for many whose incomes are at stake. My reading is that Aviva had no say in how these shares were traded. They are of course transferrable and I wonder how many are held by the original owners? Were they at some point a hot potato? The financial crisis demonstrated how a market could exist for securies that were not understood, even by experts.

It should be noted that as yet the cancellation is still a proposal, Aviva having stated their belief they have the option to do so. "most holders of the preference shares are funds, trusts etc.... the people in the market that you don't want to cross" People who have been caught napping?

It's likely that these shares have been traded without considering the prospectus for literally decades. No doubt professional advisers have recommended them to their clients unaware that they can be repurchased at par. They have been mis-sold.

No doubt Aviva have in mind another company that did offer investors a guarantee on something it couldn't and shouldn't guarantee. That company was Equitable Life. It's inconceivable that Aviva will have failed to safeguard against promising something as fundamental that it could not guarantee. Suppose Aviva had NOT taken the opportunity to warn about their intentions WRT preference shares. They would then be allowing these to be traded at a price that did not reflect the new situtation. Damned if they do and damned if they don't? So far Aviva's announcement is not a decision just a declaration of intent WRT high-cost debt. As an ordinary shareholder and Aviva customer I would be very unhappy if the management ducked the issue.

"Why Aviva plc could be the Footsie buy of the decade" "Of all the stocks in the FTSE 100, I believe Aviva (LSE: AV) could be one of the best companies to own for the next decade, a view supported by today�s results from the group. " https://www.fool.co.uk/investing/2018/03/08/why-aviva-plc-could-be-the-footsie-buy-of-the-decade/

Of course it is important. The information is misleading and you were right to highlight the issue. GSK has a market cap of �64,773,000,000 so it would be quite possible for a wealthy individual to own 17.5m shares however unlikely! Something LSE needs to sort out. Incidentally, had you considered the possibility that I am literally All At Sea?