Member Info for fleccy

What about the £812.2765635 Million 5% Off Book trade on the 7th June, which was obviously part of the Drahi holding?

2021-06-07T09:33:20.000 GBX 178.05 456,207,000 812276563.5 Off-Book XOFF P ECEU

There's an argument that Off Book trades are actually more important than On Exchange trades, because the big players work in the shadows.

"You can never identify the meaning of off book trades - That’s why it’s best to ignore them."

Drahi built his 12.1% stake Off Book, so Off Book volumes are extremely relevant in my opinion. Off Exchange trading is just one of the tools the big players have for manipulating stock prices, through carrying out big trades away from the exchange, while algo's trade the price down on the Exchange.

It isn't an article I posted, it's the case summary. If you want to follow the case, here's the link:

https://www.catribunal.org.uk/cases/14263321-cityfibre-limited

"Can't see Ofcom being overruled"

I didn't think the CAT would give the Patourel case any legs, but they seem friendly toward the case against BT; Personally I don't see how BT did anything wrong, in the case of Landline Rental, with the alternatives available.
In reference to this Equinox case, it begs the question as to whether BT will ever be allowed to compete on a level playing field. I would hope OFCOM have their ducks in a row, and can fight this off, otherwise I can see UK Telecoms tied up in endless litigation. My personal view is that OFCOM have made the right decision, and will be able to justify their position to the CAT.

Looks as though CityFibre are following through on their threat to take out Legal Proceedings against OFCOM, in relation to Equinox.

https://www.catribunal.org.uk/sites/default/files/2021-12/20211207_1426_summary_of_appeal.pdf

Bkkbkk, £33 Million is the trade value of the On Exchange trades

Total On Exchange Volume 19,337,860
Total On Exchange Traded Value £33,484,153.07

With the time of the highlighted Off Book trades

tradeTime . . . . . . . . . price . volume . . tradeValue
2021-12-07 14:03:16 173.55 22000000 38181000
2021-12-07 14:03:16 173.55 22000000 38181000

Off book trades are recorded

tradeTime . price . volume . . tradeValue
2021-12-07 173.55 22000000 38181000
2021-12-07 173.55 22000000 38181000

Todays total volume = 69,521,704
Today's total trade value = £120,574,584.5

"Fleccy, I would be interested, now that I am retired,I do lots of walking, would be good to get a better view of the different sea birds before they fly off. Thanking you."

I'll let you know what they perform like. They're cheap, and going off the write up are only suitable for fine weather, which suits me us as we'll only use them in the car or on nice days. If you wanted something for rainy days, sailing, or near water, you should probably look for waterproof Bino's.

My missus wanted some Bino's for low light and general use, so I started researching different specs, after some reading, and looking at the cheapest Bino's I could find lol, I decided to go for these on Amazon this evening:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Dellonda-10x50mm-Hunting-Binoculars-Supplied/dp/B0881H7BVD/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=dellonda%2BDL2&qid=1638824897&s=electronics&sr=1-1&th=1

https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0223/6261/9978/t/15/assets/90aee4111b2d--DL2-Multi-Coated-Binoculars-User-Manual.pdf?v=1629279043

They're 10x50, with BAK 4 Porro Prisms, apparently Porro Prisms are better on budget models, as Roof prisms are more expensive to produce with the same light throughput. BAK 4 Prisms are also better than BK-7 Prisms, as BK-7 Prisms produce an exit pupil with shaded (blurred) edges, whereas the BAK4 prism have a perfectly round exit pupil. The other specs look pretty good too:
Eyepiece Diameter: 23mm.
Lens Coatings: FMC.
Field of View: 393ft/1000yds. ( Large FOV)
Eye Relief: 20mm. (Good Eye Relief)
Weight: 850g

It's a good wide field of view, good eye relief, and they state that all lenses are Fully Multi coated with 90% light transfer rate.

I assume Dellonda must get another company to manufacture these for them, but with the 10% voucher code they've only cost me £35.98, which seems really cheap for the spec. I'm looking forward to receiving them and seeing if it's true that you get what you pay for, or if these prove that theory wrong since they seem cheap.
I was also thinking about 7x50 models, due to the better low light capability with a 7mm Exit Pupil diameter, but I also read that as you get older Pupil width decreases, so I figured 10x50 might be the best compromise with a 5mm Exit Pupil Diameter.
Anyone got any thoughts? If anyone's interested I can let you know how these perform when we receive them.

Any optical enthusiasts in here, who know their stuff?

Aus, I seem to remember you're a big fan of Virgin Media, but I don't know how relevant this Interview, in May, is in relation to the latest speculation around Discovery and BT Sport. Malone is currently a stakeholder in Discovery, and will likely have a place on the board of the combined Warner Media/Discovery Company, but I don't see where Malone's ownership of Liberty Global is relevant in this instance.
What did come across in the interview is that Malone is suggesting that the new combined company will be in the top 3 along with Disney and Netflix. I admit I didn't listen to the full interview, and skipped a bit, but what about Sky's aspirations to become a content streaming service, and not forgetting Prime?
In my opinion it confirms what I stated previously, that Sky/Comcast are Liberty's/VMO2's competitor. It's clear why BT want out of any form of content delivery, the space is getting ever more crowded and BT have decided to focus elsewhere.
The next couple of years are going to be really interesting, with lots of possible M&A in the Telecom space. I believe there's been a concerted shake out in the Telecom sector, over a number of years, and the narrative is now in the process of changing with Telecom companies on the verge of becoming a lot more attractive. It's possible there'll be acquisition interest from Private Equity, or possible merger takeovers by media content providers, and the Telecom sector as a whole will be rerated at some point.

"Drahi will be able to put the BT Board under a huge amount of pressure, and it could at least result in Openreach being spun off"

I have no doubt that Openreach will eventually be partially, or completely, spun off, but not until the FTTP rollout's completed, and the pension bought out by the trustees; I suspect the conditions will be right in the next 6 to 10 years.

I've read through this thread and did a recommend on Compound's contribution since he made perfect sense, but the past doesn't fortel the future and I see Vodafone as more of a takeover target than BT, even though the current speculation is swirling around BT. I've read that Private Equity are currently sitting on around $1.5 Trillion in cash, and are hungry to make acquisitions; Vodafone would be a historic buy, by any standard, but multiple P.E. firms could partner in any buyout and spread the costs. Vodafone's Net Debt is currently sitting around €44.3 billion (£37.88 Billion) , and the market cap is around £30.5 Billion, so the current enterprise value is likely over £70 Billion, yahoo puts it at £77.39 Billion.
For Private Equity to be interested, they would have to look at Vodafone's various businesses, partnership holdings in joint ventures, and other factors like MPESA. Vodafone is already structured as seperate businesses, within Group, so any takeover attempt would have to weigh up selling all the separate entities with a view to to paying down the debt and seeing what's left, and determining the correct bid premium above the current price, still allowing a good profit.
Since Vodafone are number 2, or 3, in the markets they operate within, there would be less local regulatory blowback than purchasing an incumbent like BT in the UK.
Vodafone are massive, with fingers in lots of pie's, and P.E. may well run the slide rule over the company to determine a breakup valuation; If P.E. saw an easy profit, who's to say they wouldn't team up to make a historic M&A bid for Vodafone? Improbable, but not impossible.

"BT is probably going to fetch £2-4 a share when broken up."

Just don't see the Government allowing a takeover of BT, they'll just block it on National Security grounds. The speculation is good for the price, so no complaints from me on that score, but a sale and break up is highly unlikely in my opinion. I see Vodafone as an easier target, since they're number 2, or 3, in most of the markets they operate in.

"SP just fell of a cliff.."

The close price is 169p. The reason Google shows 164.97 is due to a couple of Off Book trades reported after the close. Looking at the price, It's likely the transaction was from earlier today and only just notified.

Just purchased over 9000 VOD shares at an average buy price of 109.13. I'd missed the early trading, and tried waiting for it to dip below 109 again, but got fed up of waiting. In my opinion, any purchase at such low level is a bargain.

"BT and Vodafone shares are up strongly. This note by a leading Wall Street bank may help explain why"

https://www.proactiveinvestors.co.uk/companies/news/967898/bt-and-vodafone-shares-are-up-strongly-this-note-by-a-leading-wall-street-bank-may-help-explain-why-967898.html

"who cares what UBS think, they obviously have a agenda for BT."

Polo Tang, is the most vocal UBS analyst who's previous notes suggest a PermaBear view; I suspect nothing will change his view of BT, and even though I completely disagree with the UBS view, they have been historically lucky in their predictions. There's no way of knowing why he takes the view he does, but he appears to air the same narrative no matter how low BT's price drops, and irrespective of any positive commentary from the company.

This article from the 15th Jan shows that Mr Tang's crystal ball isn't as clear as he thinks it is.

https://www.proactiveinvestors.co.uk/companies/news/938589/sell-bt-says-ubs-on-risks-from-competiton-pension-deficit-and-spectrum-costs-938589.html

"All in all, this led to UBS’s rating being cut to ‘sell’ from ‘neutral’ and the share price target being trimmed to 111p from 116p."

On the 15th Jan, the price was around 140p, and although it did fall into Feb it didn't even hit the 116p target, and look where the price action has been since then. Other assumptions were off the mark too.

"To be fair most UT trades were marked down due to possible Wall St sell off but the volume?"

It could be a distressed seller, for whatever reason. As a one off I don't think anything can be read into it. The volumes were steady going into the close, if someone needed the cash quickly a large volume sale would drive the price down.