Member Info for Bonz1957

I would have thought that the 'good news story here' is being able to buy shares in a solid blue chip high yielding company like NG at 335p. I for one will be taking up my RI in full. I will also be looking at what level the nil-paids are trading at, with a view to dramatically increasing my holding. IMHO this is a win win situation. Yes there will be pressure on the sp, but with the FTSE off 900 points from its recent highs there is pressure on all shares. On the next FTSE rise fully expect this to be trading in the range 500-550p, which puts it on a par with the pre RI price. After all the FTSE is off 16% in recent weeks which would have put NG around 555p from its recent high of 660p, so we are actually slightly above that level even with a RI in play. GLA.

It's certainly going to be a hard one to follow what with the shares going ex-div in the middle of a RI. As if a RI isn't difficult enough!!! As for your last post re: div yield, I expect they will keep it around 6%. But with 40% more shares it will be based on the lower sp, so if you take up the RI, overall it will be worth the same, albeit you will have more shares at a slightly lower div, ie. instead of 1000 x 25p it will be 1400 x 18p. I said it was confusing!!!

Yes and No!!! The price has fallen partly due to the RI being announced and partly due to the general fall in the markets. BUT when these shares go ex-rights on 26/5 they will fall in line with the number of new shares in circulation. So if they close at 564p tomorrow, they will open on Weds 26/5 at 498.6p to allow for the extra 40% of shares at 335p. With the nil-paids being tradable around the 160-165p range, depending on how many people either want to buy the nil-paids or sell their rights.

It is my understanding that you will only receive paperwork if you hold your shares in certificated form, as I do. If you hold in CREST through a broker then I think your rights will be added to your account as soon as they become available. You will then have 3 options: 1) arrange to credit the amount of the cash call to your account, 2) sell all, or some, of your options, or 3) do nothing and wait for NG to sell them and send you a chq for the balance less any expenses they incur. Any paperwork due will come in the next couple of days as they go ex-rights and the nil-paids start trading on Weds 26/5.

You do realise that the article you refer to is over 14 months old?? Where does your 3 months come from?? A lot has changed in the world since that was written.

Expect this to fly on the next upturn in the FTSE. Obviously doing well on the back of cancelled flights. FTSE down another 200 points since my last post but NEX sp only off 4p. The city seem to like this and Stagecoach, both doing well.

No. It doesn't work that way. You need to take the closing sp on the day before the shares go ex-rights. That could be 570 or 490. Multiply that price x 5, add in 2 x 335 and divide by 7. That gives you the Theoretical Ex Rights Price or TERP, which, if there are no major movements overnight, will be the price that NG will open at the next day, as the market then factors in the value of the rights. The sp will then move above or below this TERP in line with the market. REMEMBER that your 'rights' or 'nil-paids' will have a value and can be traded or sold. The value of the nil-paids will be approximately the difference in value between your original 5 shares and the value of your 7 shares less the 335 to be paid. So if they close at say 520 the day before they go ex-rights, they will open the next day at 467 (TERP), the value of the nil-paids will be approx 132, which compensates you for the difference of 265 you have lost overnight as the sp has dropped from 520 to 467. So if you take up your rights and pay the extra 335 then added to the 132 this then equals the new price of 467. Simples!!! Unlike my explanation.

Expect this to fly on the next upturn in the FTSE. Obviously doing well on the back of cancelled flights. FTSE down 700 points since my last post but SGC sp only off 6p. The city seem to like this and Nat Exp, both doing well.

All details can be found at nationalgrid.com. The record date for the RI was 19/5, ie yesterday. The offer is 2 new for 5 old at 335p each. Nil-paids start trading on 26/5 with a full listing on 14/6. If you are eligible to participate in the RI you will be sent the documents by 25/5. I intend to take up my rights in full.

Below are some extracts from the latest trading statement. Basically there isn't a lot of good news hence todays drop in sp. As a holder I would like to say that things can only get better, but I'm not so sure. Was hoping that the aquisition of the GMG Regional titles would have given them a boost, but obviously not yet!! TRINITY MIRROR PLC INTERIM MANAGEMENT STATEMENT 17 weeks ending 2 May 2010 Group revenues in the period have fallen by 2% and on a like for like basis revenues declined by 5%. The acquisition of the GMG Regionals was completed on 28 March 2010 and during the 5 week period to 2 May 2010 it contributed revenues of £6million. The acquisition is expected to be profitable during 2010 and is performing ahead of our expectations. Group advertising revenues for the period on a like for like basis fell by 5%, reflecting a decline of 3% for January and February and a decline of 6% for March and April. Group circulation revenues for the period on a like for like basis have fallen by 6% with a decline of 7% for the Regionals and 6% for the Nationals. Other Group revenues for the period on a like for like basis have declined by 1% year on year, reflecting an increase in contract print of 7% more than offset by declines in leaflet revenue, rental income and sundry income. Group digital revenues for the period on a like for like basis have fallen by 8% driven by the impact of the wider economy on the more cyclical recruitment and property categories. However, excluding recruitment and property we continue to see growth in other digital revenues across both Regionals and Nationals.

All info can be found at nationalgrid.com and click on Investors. The next results are due 20/05/10, the shares go ex-dividend on 02/06/10 and the next dividend will be paid on 18/08/10. Last year this div was 23p.

Posting at 5.22am - you are an early riser!!! The FTSE is off 500 points in the last three weeks, Greece finally looks like being sorted and the election is today, the market correction may have already taken place. The time to have sold was maybe three weeks ago, if you sell now you may end up buying back into a rising market and being worse off than before. Even with a hung parliament and the FTSE standing still for another week or two you will still incur two sets of dealing charges to sell and buy back in later. If you have faith in the shares that you hold then why sell only to back back in again? You may be lucky, but if your timing is off then you will lose out. You need to decide whether you are a holder or a trader. Are you prepared to hold a share long term and live with the rises and the falls, or are you going to continually trade on every rise and fall? The latter takes a lot more time and research, you will need to look at the sp on a daily basis at the very least. Do you have access to live prices? Can you interpret charts? You say that if you get out now you will have made no money in the last six months. Six months ago the FTSE was at 5300, it is now at 5350. The time to have got out was when the FTSE was around 5800 earlier this month. Easy to call with hindsight but very hard for the likes of you and me to judge. When the FTSE was riding high at 5800 we all wanted to stay on for the ride even higher, we hoped!! As ever DYOR, and if you think there are further falls ahead then your call to sell may well be the right one. Personally I will be sitting tight and hoping that the market will start to rise. My biggest problems at the moment are the fall in BP's value due to the oil spill, and the fact that BT appears to be going nowhere. Think the time may have come to sell half of my BT holding and invest in an Emerging Markets Unit Trust.

I feel honoured to be the recipient of your first post - thanks. One of the biggest problems with WTB is the size of the sp. Psychologically it puts some people off buying small amounts to add to their portfolio. £500 only buys 33 shares at 1500p but would buy a healthier looking 100 shares at 500p, or even better still 167 shares at 300p!! Even though the share of the company that you own is exactly the same. Similar story with Imp Tob at £19-£20. Glad to know I'm not the only one in this share, let's see how close we can get to £20 before the year end.

There can't be many shares out there that go up 350p between posts!!! Revenue up 7.5% to £1.43bn, divs up to 38p for the year, 312 new Costa Coffee outlets and another 10,000 new rooms at Premier Inn. If only they had offered shareholders new shares over the years every time they reorganised instead of giving money back then I would have a good few instead of only 118!!

Hello, how are you doing? Nice to see NEX holding up above 250p despite the FTSE falling off a cliff due to our Greek friends - never could stand their food, serves them right if they go bust!!! Hope this explains the rise. Chloride Group surged 88 to 297p after the company, which makes systems to protect against power shortages for clients including Heathrow Terminal 5 and Arsenals Emirates Stadium, rejected a 275p-a-share hostile approach worth £723m from former suitor, Emerson Electric. It is the second time the US company, the world's largest maker of power equipment for oil companies, has made an approach. In 2008, Chloride rejected a 270p-a-share approach which it said undervalued the company. However, analysts at Numis said in a note on Monday that the offer at 275p valued Chloride at 24 times earnings per share. It claims that historically takeover deals in the sector have been as high as 30 times EPS, which could value Chloride closer to £900m or 340p a share.

These are not as good as the last quarter, hence the drop in sp, but could have been worse considering the severe weather and the loss of the Birthdays franchises. RNS Number : 4357K Thorntons PLC 20 April 2010 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 20 APRIL 2010 Thorntons PLC Trading Update and Interim Management Statement Thorntons PLC ('Thorntons' or 'the Company') today reported its third quarter trading update for the 14 weeks up to and including 17 April 2010. Overall, Group sales since January were up 3.1% to £60.3 million, while Own Store sales declined by 4.9%. Sales of Thorntons branded products grew by 5.9%. In an economic environment where consumers remain focused on value, the Board is taking a cautious view on the outlook for the remainder of the year and now expects profit before tax and exceptional items will be approximately £7.5 million (2009: £6.3 million). Key points · Own Store sales declined by 4.9% to £33.5 million and like for like sales declined by 4.6%. The unusually severe weather conditions in the period and sales switching from our Own Stores to the Commercial Channel, particularly with boxed chocolates, proved challenging. While like for like sales in the run up to Easter were positive, Easter trading overall was below plan. · Sales in the Commercial Channel continued to perform strongly with sales growth of 33.9% to £20.8 million. The launch of Melts into supermarkets and a successful Easter campaign helped contribute to the result. · Franchise sales declined by 20.6% to £3.1 million. Whilst three stores were opened during the period, the total number remained at 222 compared to 254 at the same time last year prior to Birthdays going into administration. Franchise like for like sales experienced a similar trend to Own Stores. · Thorntons Direct made good progress and grew by 32.4% to £2.5 million. Both the consumer and corporate business made a positive contribution. The personalisation of products with iced messages or photographs on chocolate boxes proved popular.

Coach and train travel isn't affected by the Icelandic volcano so we might get a little boost from all those stranded air travellers. Likely to be very short lived but may go some way to compensating for lost bookings due to the snow. Every little helps!!

Don't think you should focus too much on the 07:12 thing, probably just when their system updated ,rather than something happening exactly at that time. From what I can see the sp closed at 240.1p on the 13th and opened at the same level on the 14th. Possibly the final price changed slightly after the official close, your site showed the price at the official close, and only updated when the cleaners switched the power back on first thing!!!!!

Yesterdays close was 240.1p. Sometimes, due to activity after the market has closed the sp can vary slightly from the quoted 4.30pm price. Also, as I'm sure you are aware, the opening sp can be very different to the previous days closing sp, due to other markets reactions overnight. Anyway, this share has done remarkably well since the RI, up 42% from the ex-rights price of 173.9 on 30/11/08. So, anyone who took up their RI in full - as I did - has seen the value of their new investment DOUBLE in just over 4 months. Long may this steady rise continue, all we need now is for the dividends to restart.

Thanks for your kind comments and hope you had a pleasant break over Easter. Not sure which way the market will go after the election, guess it all depends on who gets in. We all know that whoever gets in taxes will have to rise to pay for the deficit, but that is already factored into the market. Probably a Tory win would be preffered by big business as they are seen as being more on their side. All Labour ever seem to want to do is tax people and businesses into oblivion to fund their latest 'Nanny State' controlling regime. Unless there is another Greece out there waiting to happen I would not expect a great deal of movement between now and the autumn. However, as always within a slowly moving market, there are bound to be bargains to be had and profits to be made, so as always DYOR and best of luck.