Member Info for fleccy

"I think the concern is cashflow - substantial capex investment in FTTP; pension obligations and recent CWU agreement. Drahi pumped in a substantial investment so hopefully that bodes well. Only other concern is the margin in broadband/mobile as this market seems like a race to the bottom."

If you're correct in your thinking, then what sort of P/E would the market consider sensible for a blue chip company under those circumstances? Because BT's current P/E is less than 7.
The current financial debt is just over £13 Billion, with lease liabilities around £6 billion, and since lease liabilities are really part of the operating costs they aren't really debt, at least not in the true sense; Vodafone and other companies list their lease liabilities separately, but the media rarely differentiate financial debt from lease liabilities when discussing BT.
If you consider BT's financial debt of around £13 Billion, in isolation, it isn't much more than the price BT paid for EE and a lot of money has been invested in new mobile infrastructure and spectrum since EE became part of BT. The market cap of BT is currently just over £11 Billion, so less than EE mobile business alone is worth. EE is now being integrated into consumer, so that would need consideration in any valuation.
Openreach could be worth over £20 Billion and is really just the workforce; All the cables, ducts and poles are still owned by BT Group, how much is all that infrastructure worth? With Enterprise and Global merging, how much are they worth?
Assuming the EE mobile business is worth about £13 Billion, I think it's worth more, and guessing the current BT Network Equipment and infrastructure is worth around £11 Billion, then Openreach, Global, Enterprise and the previous consumer business revenues have a negative valuation, if the current market cap is to be taken seriously. The pension deficit is currently around £5 Billion and could be paid off with just a quarter of Openreach's assumed valuation.
I've made a lot of assumptions above, but BT is clearly well undervalued by any metric.

Down nearly 44% since July, on what? Not a lot that I can see. In the absence of any substantive news, indicating BT are struggling, I will continually top up as funds become available.

My Vodafone and BT divi's come through in Feb, I'll definitely be topping up with BT stock at these prices. If there's a definition of below bargain basement territory, then BT is in it in my opinion.

Just got back in and read through the threads and was particularly interested in Bitcoinbull's reasoning for Bitcoin's value.

The key points
"Bitcoin has a maximum number of coins so it will never have its value inflated away"

In my opinion this is a fundamentally flawed argument, you could create other Cryptocurrencies and design the algorithm to limit the possible number of coins, if you wished to; Why not design another coin that can only produce 10 million coins, or 5 million coins. It's a bit like 8 minute abs vs 7 minute abs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JB2di69FmhE

"Bitcoin needs energy to be mined hence where it’s value is derived ( if you believe houses /gold/oil/ food/ heating/ cars have value by definition you have to understand Bitcoins value)"

All the things you've listed are useful; Gold is used in Jewellery, electronics, teeth, medicine, etc and it's obvious where the use cases are for the other things you've listed.
Bitcoin is a poor substitute for the current financial system, there's no protection for losses incurred on the exchanges, and should countries decide to ban conversion, into their national currency, it can't be spent. The only uses I can see, is it allows developers to experiment at other peoples expense and for crooks to receive funds anonymously, for uses like ransomware, blackmail, drug trades, etc, etc. To my mind, Bitcoin's just reinventing the wheel, but making it square instead of round.

"Finally understanding the difference between “crypto “ and Bitcoin, the vast majority of crypto is POS and like the current monetary system has no limits on availability and is created out of little more than thin air"

To say that other Cryptocurrencies are created out of thin air and imply that Bitcoin isn't, is a false narrative. You can polish turds from ten different dog's, at the end of the day you're still left with 5h1t.

"it’s a no brainer for mining companies if we are speeds upto and possibly over 30% as he says."

The point I was trying to make, is that the Bitcoin mining industry is dependent on the success of Bitcoin. If Bitcoin goes into terminal decline, the miners follow. I get that there'll be uses for blockchain in logistics and other things, but I honestly don't see Cryptocurrency as anything but hype.

"Non of us understand it.That’s why I asked the question earlier. No one answered."

I do have an interest in the Quantum subject, but going off the website the only patent listed is "ASIC UltraBoost" which is related to Bitcoin mining and QBT says "While QBT's main goal is to develop disruptive Bitcoin mining systems to have competitive advantage in its mining activity", so their man product is dependent on the success of Bitcoin through the mining companies.
The reason I'm skeptical about cryptocurrency, is that I don't see how it replaces the current Financial services, with the only possible use being in international money transfer, but the risks outweigh the benefits in my opinion. In countries like Kenya phone apps, like MPESA, have allowed the an alternative to traditional banking services, and the developed world can access service instantly with their debit/credit cards, no cash in hand required.

According to Jamie Dimon.

I noticed this page as it's listed as a Hot Chat Topic.
I'm in the highly skeptical camp and don't see any use for current crop of cryptocurrencies, including Bitcoin. That said, I believe Blockchain has a future within industry.
What differentiates QBT from the cryptocurrency world? Which appears to be in decline. I've had a look at QBT's website and can't see anything substantive in their various tabs.
I try and keep an open mind about things I don't understand, maybe someone on here can enlighten me as to the uses of cryptocurrencies and how QBT will survive if Cryptocurrencies go the way of the Dodo?

Anyone have any thoughts on who may become the new CEO?

Olaf Swantee
"Chairman
T-Mobile Nederland
Apr 2022 - Present · 9 mos
The Hague, South Holland, Netherlands"

"Chairman
mobilezone
Apr 2021 - Present · 1 yr 9 mos"

"Executive Chairman
Community Fibre Limited
Aug 2020 - Present · 2 yrs 5 mos
London, United Kingdom"

Plus other roles too, not sure he'd have the time to run Vodafone.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/olaf-swantee-9912a759/

Nick Jeffery
Currently CEO of Frontier Communications, will he want to leave Frontier to become CEO of Vodafone?

"CEO & President: Frontier Communications
Frontier Communications · Full-time
Mar 2021 - Present · 1 yr 10 mos"

https://www.linkedin.com/in/nick-jeffery-ba05b72/

Ronan Dunne is currently a non executive Director at M&S.

Previously:
Verizon
Executive Vice President & Chief Executive Officer
6 yrs 1 mo

Strategic Advisor to the CEO
Full-time
Jan 2022 - Sep 2022 · 9 mos
New Jersey, United States."

https://www.linkedin.com/in/dunneronan/

https://www.themarque.com/profile/ronan-dunne

"When did BT start selling chips??"

Haven't you seen the new logo?

https://i.postimg.cc/1386zR4z/BT-chip.jpg

It's a good article, but no mention of strategically timed articles aimed at reducing sentiment and justifying dropping the price; I'm talking about the bogus articles around Virgin Media taking over TalkTalk and other articles, timed after the event, like the recent FT pension article printed a month after the release of the associated report, then followed up by other media outlets including CNBC. Since July there's been a slew of articles targeting BT sentiment, so the decline in BT's share price, since then, has been driven by spin as much as anything else. Over the years, there have been many suspicious declines in the BT share price, accompanied by highly speculative articles involving speculation around VM/VMO2, TalkTalk and others.
What's interesting is that as soon as BT talks about competing on a level playing field, the competition throw their toys out of the pram.

The link was sufficient, it's one of the few Times articles not hidden behind their paywall.

This is old news, but I suspect the revenue from this BT Global contract should start showing in the results from 2023 onwards.

"The European Commission is coming under criticism after having awarded British Telecom (BT) a €1.2 billion contract for telecoms services that manage highly sensitive EU communications.
According to people familiar with the matter, following a call for tenders, the Commission provisionally gave the green light for the management of its so-called Trans-European Services for Telematics between Administrations (TESTA) to British provider BT, in a move that has sparked concerns over privacy and security, as well as over the EU's broader ambitions for digital sovereignty"

"The provision of services had been due to commence last year but had been delayed, and is now likely to begin later this year. The term of the contract is eight years"

https://www.politico.eu/article/outrage-eu-deal-uk-bt-confidential-network/

"Meanwhile many local branches are recommending reject with emails and text messages being sent to members advising a no vote."

I'd be gobsmacked if the one's earning up to £30,000 vote to continue striking, as they are looking at an overall pay rise of 10% or more; They're also the one's who lose the most from strike days, since they're probably the ones with lower savings and higher mortgages, so least able to afford the loss of pay due to striking.
This local branch news advising continuation of strikes, is just background noise in my opinion, and not even worth consideration. I don't believe BT needed to give the extra £1500, due in January, but my guess is a lot of redundancies are in the pipeline and BT management are looking at dialogue with the CWU to smooth the process. I don't know anyone at BT to back up my opinion, I'm just applying common sense; If the majority of the BT workforce are far left leaning, putting politics ahead of their personal finances, then they may vote to continue striking, but I very much doubt that's the case.

This is an investment chat forum, not a customer complaint department. If you want your complaint dealt with, you should direct it to the correct place and the correct people.

"Maybe even Fleccy´s Verizon will turn up and save them the trouble :-)"

I realise my talk of a Verizon/Vodafone merger is out there, and I say it with my my tongue slightly in my cheek, but there is a possibility.

My reasoning:
The events leading up to Vodafone's takeover of C&WW, with Gavin Darby being an ex Vodafone executive coming out of nowhere to become CEO, and Vodafone then taking over C&WW in short order.
Colao has recently rejoined the board of Verizon, after previously leaving to go into Italian politics, to the surprise of some.
Dunne left Verizon in 2021 and if he is offered the CEO position it will be reminiscent of the Darby/Vodafone/C&WW series of events.

Tentative view, but not beyond the realms of possibility.

If Ronan Dunne gets the CEO position at Vodafone, then I'll be really convinced a tie up between Verizon and Vodafone is on the cards.

"Why would anyone still feel the need to try to wind others up about leaving the EU?"

It works both ways, before you rush to judgement you should look back through Porsche's posting history.

"Sorry to ask as I know this has been discussed ad nauseum, but there are too many posts to wade through.... I take it this includes Goodwill?"

Yes

Oh Porsche stop all this hilarity, your wit is too much for me. You especially cheer me up with your Brexit banter, I can tell how much you love the fact we've left the EU, never to return, so I raise my glass with you to celebrate the country freeing itself from the EU shackles.

"for anyone who's owns these shares at a higher price it's pretty obvious this is not good as they will have lost more of their capital"

Robleo, a paper loss isn't a capital loss until you sell, just like a paper gain isn't a capital gain until you sell. Over my many years of investing I've sat on paper losses several times and sold when the the stocks went back into the black and made a capital gain.
I'm currently sitting on paper losses on all three stocks I own, but I'm confident that I'll make a gain when the prices recover and I eventually sell, however long it takes.
Now some will say, oh but Vodafone's, BT's, or whoever's price will never recover, blah, blah, blah, but the truth is an undervalued stock will always eventually recover to a value dictated by its fundamentals, in the meantime I'll keep topping up as I receive dividends.