Member Info for fleccy

I live on a gated development in a semi rural area, and about 5 or 6 months ago CityFibre were micro-ducting the whole area including down the road leading to our development, but nothing's been said since to suggest they're anywhere near connecting customers in our area.

About 3 or 4 weeks ago our local exchange was added to Openreach's new Full Fibre build locations, and I assumed it would be at least a year before I heard anything else, so I registered interest on Openreach's Fibre checker webpage and haven't heard anything since. This morning a team of contractors landed on our development and proceeded to run Fibre through the ducts on the development, so I had a chat with them; They told me they'd already run Fibre down the road outside our development, and that the exchange was ready for connection and service should be available within a month or two.

I have to say I thought CityFibre would be the first to offer FTTP around here, but it looks as though Openreach are nearly ready to connect within 3 weeks of adding our area to their rollout schedule.

Total voting right have increased by 5,563,596 for September:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/e/2PACX-1vS0oSavIsBjHgD7k6NMyk7Z591Cm2IrevvLI-Jq95gOmESrOI0Vi_NhA8LIO9rMz90Y5zCOCoFuEItG/pubchart?oid=1812824850&format=interactive

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/e/2PACX-1vS0oSavIsBjHgD7k6NMyk7Z591Cm2IrevvLI-Jq95gOmESrOI0Vi_NhA8LIO9rMz90Y5zCOCoFuEItG/pubchart?oid=1451011517&format=interactive

"would an acquisition by a UK owned private equity consortium be blocked by government ?"

Most of the Altnets are being backed by UK private equity, it's possible they could also put a bid together for BT but unlikely in my opinion. If a consortium were to make an offer, how much would they offer? Drahi would want to profit on his investment, and DT would also want to see a fair offer on the table, otherwise they'd both just use their combined 37% shareholdings to block any takeover.

Trying to get a takeover of BT past the National Security and Investment Act, would be like trying to score a goal in a football match where the Goal is bricked up. Data Infrastructure is among the 17 most sensitive areas of the economy and listed as a notifiable acquisition.

"Total loans and advances to customers reduced to £308.1 billion (31 December 2022: £312.7 billion), with an increase

in average LTV to 42.3 per cent (31 December 2022: 41.6 per cent). The proportion of balances with an LTV greater

than 90 per cent increased to 1.7 per cent (31 December 2022: 1.4 per cent). New lending at 90 per cent LTV or above

is supported through the Mortgage Guarantee Scheme or other risk mitigation and is tightly controlled through

enhanced lending criteria. The average LTV of new business decreased to 60.2 per cent (31 December 2022: 61.7 per

cent)"

https://www.lloydsbankinggroup.com/assets/pdfs/investors/financial-performance/lloyds-banking-group-plc/2023/q2/2023-lbg-hy-results.pdf

It's obvious that people who have massive amounts of Equity in their home's wont want to go into default, they'll battle to pay their mortgage no matter what. Even if the banks offer some mortgage payers payment holidays, the hit will be short lived with the interest added to the loans and enhancing future returns. With an average LTV of 42.3 per cent I doubt Lloyds will be worried.

"The general consensus is house prices will drop at least another 5% which will undoubtedly impact on Lloyds in terms of repossessions and a falling housing market. Those who were gleeful that rising interest rates were the holy grail for Lloyds in terms of improved net interest margins should be starting to question themselves."

You need to look at Lloyds LTV's and you might take a different view.

"I have noticed that no one really responds to them anymore as they are either filtered or ignored. That damages them a lot more than challenging them"

You got me worried then for a minute, just checked myself out in the mirror and can confirm I'm fully intact. Looks as though being filtered hasn't done me any harm whatsoever.

If your definition is correct Hanji, why do the values of Fiat currencies gain value with the strength of the issuing economy, and values fall when economies show weakness? Clearly Fiat currencies are tied to the strength of the issuing economy, whereas BTC's value isn't tied to anything.

"but the bank notes that people carry around in their wallets have no real world value. They used to have a gold equivalent held in the Bank of England but that went a long time ago."

This is one of the myths put out to justify high valuations for Crypto tokens, but it's completely incorrect. It's true that many currencies were anchored to the Gold standard, so the more Gold held by a Central bank the higher the currency value. Fiat currency is backed by the issuing Central Banks and Governments, with the value based on the strength of the economy where the Fiat currency is issued. To say the that Crypto and Fiat are the same is ridiculous and wrong; The Euro is valued against the strength of the combined Eurozone economies, just like the value of Sterling is based on the strength of the UK economy, what backs Bitcoin other than hype and belief?

There's no economy or commodity to anchor BTC against, so its value floats based on the belief of the purchasers and sellers, and it has no inherent value; It's also been suggested that Proof of Work based on the amount of Electricity it uses to process the Blocks, somehow gives BTC value, but that narrative's also fake and highlights the inefficiency of the Proof of Work concept. The scarcity myth is also fake and anyone taken in by this needs a reality check. The vested interests will try every trick in the book to keep the music playing, but the illusion will eventually fade and BTC will become worthless.

Did he use it as a propellor?

Toger, Gold has loads of real world uses, it's actually a very useful Element used in industry and medicine. Bitcoin is just a database in the form of a distributed ledger. It's unbelievable that people can be suckered by something without any intrinsic value, that can be easily replicated by someone who has coding skills. Crypto is probably the biggest con in the history of the World, ever.

"The best poll to follow (unlike polls conducted by vested interests - papers)"

Mick-b my prediction, for what it's worth, is that the turn out at the next general election will either be historically low, or people will register protest votes by voting for independent's and fringe parties. From conversations I've had, people are as disillusioned with Labour as they are with the Conservatives; I expect there'll be a hung parliament with Labour being the largest party. Maybe I'm a bit biased, as I'm as disillusioned with the current political class of all colours as the people I've spoken to, but we'll see what happens next year. I wouldn't believe any poll, since they're notoriously unreliable, I form my opinions on conversations I've had with others; I actually predicted Brexit correctly, even though the polls predicted remain would win.

"It's not in the miners interest to kill bitcoin , why would they do something that in effect puts them out of business. Hence your scenario will never happen."

I agree, BTC will become insignificant long before commercial Quantum computers become available.

TOTHEMOON, I agree with what you're saying about the Quantum threat to current encryption protocols, but that isn't what I was referring to; I was referring to the difficulty algorithm limiting the block processing speed to one block every 10 minutes. If it becomes possible for a Quantum computer to consistently process blocks every 5 minutes, irrespective of increases in the difficulty level, the target hash could quickly become so low that the difficulty level increases massively to a point making it impossible to meet the target hash, effectively breaking the protocol. All the ASIC miners would be wiped out and the Quantum miner would have to operate in stop start mode as the difficulty level fluctuated between switching the protocol on and off. I'm guessing the above, but it makes sense and would probably kill BTC.

"Why has UK productivity growth been so bad? Economists have debated many reasons: the financial crisis, the end of the information technology boom, Brexit… There is currently no consensus. However, one obvious explanation has yet to be widely considered: the forced divestment of UK Defined Benefit (DB) pension schemes from productive investment in the UK and international companies to unproductive investments in government bonds."

https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpolicy/are-the-pension-regulators-practical-men-responsible-for-the-uks-productivity-crisis/

"Fleccy, out of all your investments in Lloyds, BT, Vodafone, please could you tell me which are up over the past few years?"

We're currently sitting on paper losses, but all three of our stocks are undervalued with P/E's below 10. Our current initial investments were around the time of the Brexit vote and have seen ups and downs since, hence the current paper losses. Over the years, since those initial investments were made, we've taken the opportunity to top up with more capital and dividend reinvestment when the prices were low, and have doubled the dividend income even though all three reduced the dividend payouts, as well as reducing our average cost per share; So from bringing in a dividend income of around £12,000 post Brexit, we're are on target for over £25,000 in tax free dividends in the current tax year. We intend to reinvest dividends while we perceive the stocks to be undervalued, and will probably divert dividends for other uses when we no longer view our stocks as undervalued.

I don't mind admitting that our timing's been off, but I believe UK stocks have been shunned by international investors and the current low prices present an opportunity to get in cheap, with the benefit of compounding future returns through dividend reinvestment. With investing timing is everything, at least dividend reinvestment gives you choices when your timing is off. I could be wrong about QBT and it could make a lot of money for some on here, that's the bet's, but I believe the odds are 50/50 or less.

"Right. So you’ve just posted in response to one of his posts"

You should read what I've quoted and check the post I actually responded to, you'll find I responded to the Phatkatzout post at 00:51. If you're looking at having a go Pete, you should check your facts first.

"That would mean a modest £10,000 investment now could be worth £2.5 Million", or it could go to £0.00.

Quantum technology might be moving forward at a rate of knots, but a working Quantum computer with enough Qubits, and priced affordably, is still many years away. In the event a Quantum computer did work, and gave a company the ability to mine Bitcoin super fast, it would break the Bitcoin difficulty process and also give the player the ability to do a 51% attack, which will erode trust and likely kill the Token anyway.

Lots of If's and Maybe's around QBT, so it's a gamble rather than an investment. If you can afford to bet £10,000 and not miss the cash if you lose it, then it's worth making the bet but on the understanding that's all it is. If I thought the odds of QBT getting to £1, or even 10p, were sufficiently high I would probably bet £10,000 on them myself, but I see the odds the other way.

One thing that could kill Crypto is AI hype. Currently AI is sucking up all the oxygen in the investment world, and unlike Crypto AI can actually benefit business and industry. The AI bubble is a likely candidate to deflate the Crypto bubble.

" So on mandys latest diatribe- " I have felled the roughneck Joe"

Hmmm, I don't feel any different. The only reason I haven't posted for a little while is because I haven't had anything worth saying. As far as Mandy's throw away comments, they don't even register so don't warrant a response; If you guys want to waste time responding to someone who displays clear signs of mental instability, then that's up to you.

"Fleccy, it’s in the going concerns for lots of shares, don’t try to mislead again!"

What?

What you've said there is clearly wrong, who's trying to mislead?