Member Info for fleccy

Savage, Corona Virus starts with one person being infected and then spreads through contagion, I would suggest giving above inflation pay rises to Train drivers will encourage Unions to push for inflation busting pay rises across the board. Junior Doctors getting a big pay rise will feed through to Radiologists, Anesthetists, Nurses, Hospital managers administrators and others demanding big pay rises. Any business that has Union recognition and collective bargaining will look heavenward as Labour shake the public sector money tree. Labour have a long history of kowtowing to their Union masters, the current Government seem to be towing the same line. It's funny how Labour claim to represent the working man, yet it was a Labour chancellors policy change that killed off private sector Defined Benefit pension schemes.

This is why my Pension increases are capped at less than 5%:

"Indexation

Pensions in payment must be increased annually in line with prices for pension rights accrued since April 1997. This indexation is capped at 5% for pension rights accrued between April 1997 and April 2005, and at 2.5% for rights accrued since then.

There is no requirement for schemes to provide indexation of pension rights accrued before April 1997. While there have been calls for this to change, the Government has committed to its broad principle of not imposing requirements retrospectively.

Schemes may offer more generous indexation than required through legislation"

https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/sn05656/

Any large pay increases fuel inflation, whether in the public or private sector, because it encourages pay demands across all industries. If the Train drivers get a big pay rise, why shouldn't the ticket collectors, HGV drivers, Electricians, Mechanics also get a big pay rise. Big wage rises in one sector increase demands for big pay rises in unrelated sectors, and before you know it you have a wage/price inflationary spiral. The only people who can't demand ever larger increases, are people like me who's pension increases are capped at less than 5%.

"for me , it was always inevitable that the dgital world would have its own currency ... and thankfully , not one totally controlled by the CB's, who time and again , just get themselves in a 'hole' and turn on the printing machines !"

Pas the digital world already uses electronic money, I buy products online every week without owning any Crypto.

As far as Central Banks are concerned, they have mandates and their actions are regulated by the currency markets; Crypto has no mandate and is largely unregulated, so the market is controlled by whoever holds the largest amount of said Crypto. With Crypto the Whales are the ones who determine price direction, if the larger Whales decide to reduce their holdings then the price goes down. I believe the ETF's are vehicles to make money for the ETF providers and also a backdoor attempt to allow a potential exit path for the overweight Whales. If a Whale like MicroStrategy needed to reduce their holdings to quickly, to generate cash, dependent on the speed and amount sold it could hammer the Bitcoin price in the absence of other Whales jumping in.

Art valuations are based on uniqueness, perceived beauty, the story behind the art and the reputation of the artist. There are currently around 20 Million Bitcoin available and you can't hang it on your wall, or display it in your hall, Bitcoin isn't art.

Just logged in and noticed this thread.

Two things; I have no vested interests influencing my opinion on Bitcoin, so I'm not talking my own book, and I don't have Fink as a surname.

My opinion about Bitcoin is based purely on common sense, because Bitcoin has no efficient real world use. All the hyped up use cases for Bitcoin have proved to be inefficient and can be done better by other means, its value is based on nothing more than hype and consensus agreement between vested interest's who trade the Token. It's useless as a currency because it's too volatile, useless for transacting since it can only process 1MB of transaction data every 10 mins, apparently equating to a mere 7 transactions per second. Bitcoin is power hungry and environmentally inefficient, as well as being rubbish at all the perceived use cases. The only surviving use case is the pumped artificial store of value one, I say artificial because the valuation is based wholly on consensus agreement of the vested interest network participants, with the token having no intrinsic value.

Blackrock will pump Bitcoin to the moon, if they can make money out of believers transacting the token, it doesn't mean they really believe in the token themselves.

Had a similar experience when we cancelled Sky TV, tried to do it online and got nowhere and took ages to get through. Tried to persuade us to keep the service with various lower prices and wanting to know why we were cancelling. Loads of calls and emails since trying to persuade us to go back.

I'd also like to point out that BT Sports is now run by TNT Sports and is part of a Joint venture with Warner Brothers, so no longer run within BT Group.

Savage, how much gain have you made in cash terms?

Savage the FED cut their rate by 0.5%, so Tech and Bitcoin jumped on the back of that decision. I believe the market is slowly, finally, transitioning into value and away from growth/risk. Low interest rates have powered ever higher valuations of big tech and risk assets like Bitcoin for years, a move to long term higher interest rates will likely signal a move into value dividend stocks. The market analysts just make up the narratives and change them on the fly, to talk their own book's, higher interest rates change the narrative significantly. You may strike lucky with selling BT, but I doubt the BOE decision would have anything to do with that.

Maybe you should apply to be the next Governor of the BOE Savage. I don't believe the interest rate decision has much bearing on the valuation's of Telecom stocks, apart from speculative money moving back into risk and pure growth stocks. If you'd have said you were shedding your BT holdings because you were worrying about something like the Class Action lawsuit result, it would have made more sense.

Actually Garonne Telecoms are down in general today, for no apparent reason I might add. The market makes it up as it goes along these days, price movements are probably determined by the Algo's rather than humans. In my opinion Algo's have made the market dysfunctional, with many stock valuations bearing no relation to their fundamentals. Eventually fundamentals win out, even if it takes years, which is why I only invest in safeish dividend paying Blue chip stocks.

https://www.google.com/finance/quote/VOD:LON?comparison=EPA%3AORA%2CLON%3ABT.A%2CINDEXFTSE%3AUKX

"Is 3.8 Pound this November or not?"

I wish, probably around 1.9p if they split the dividend over the full year.

Mole I've said many times that pure Growth stock fans, like yourself, underestimate the power of dividend reinvestment to achieve portfolio growth. Personally I'm not particularly bothered about capital gain while reinvesting dividends, in fact it actually helps me buy more stock while the prices are depressed, which then feeds into more dividend income from reinvestment. Obviously when dividends are cut, or suspended completely, it puts a dent in that strategy, but between my wife and myself we've done very well out of dividend reinvestment. Even with various reductions in dividends and covid suspensions, we've managed to build up to an annual tax free dividend income of around £25,000 a year, it would have been more if Vodafone hadn't halved the dividend. If we choose to reinvest the full £25,000 over the next year, that leads to a significant compound increase in next years dividends. The thing with non dividend paying pure growth stocks, is that you can only realise a profit when you sell, whereas dividend stocks give you a choice between income and dividend reinvestment.

Mole_man that's just b0l0x, trying to guarantee a 10% annual return from investing is extremely difficult. The reason US Tech has paid off for funds and individual investors, since 2015, is because every man and his dog has piled into them, turning them into massive momentum stocks. Because so much money has been piled into companies like Alphabet, Microsoft and Meta, it has allowed them to sell stock to buy up profitable undervalued companies in other markets. Basically US big tech has been mopping up Intellectual Property from the rest of the World, which begs the question why was that allowed to happen? Regulation is inadequate when it comes to big tech, BT was fined for a software glitch affecting 999 calls, yet I've heard nothing about CrowdStrike being punished for the biggest IT outage in history. Incidentally CrowdStrike has a valuation well over twice Vodafone's, and was much higher again before the outage even though it earns a fraction of Vodafone's earnings. clearly US tech is overvalued, it's only a matter of time before the US Tech bubble goes pop.

"The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has provisionally concluded that the anticipated joint venture between Vodafone Group plc (Vodafone) and CK Hutchison Holdings Limited (CK Hutchison) that will combine their UK telecoms businesses, respectively Vodafone Limited (VUK) and Hutchison 3G UK Limited (3UK) (the Merger) may be expected to result in a substantial lessening of competition (SLC) in two markets in the UK. These are the supply of retail mobile telecommunications services to end customers, including both consumers and business customers (the retail market), and the supply of wholesale mobile telecommunications services (the wholesale market). Vodafone and CK Hutchison are together referred to as the Parties. For statements relating to the future, the Parties’ UK telecoms businesses are together referred to as the Merged Entity"

"I can't see anyone wanting to jump in here for the dividend anymore as there are plenty of other shares paying double the yield of this one"

Rob the yield at the current price is just short of 5%, which is pretty good, I would think stocks with double that yield would carry much more risk.

As far as the Vodafone/Three merger, under normal conditions I'd expect it to be blocked. Many of the articles suggest that structural remedies are off the table, but I find that a bit of a stretch considering Three's joint venture with EE, and the JV between Vodafone and VMO2. Also the post merger company will jump from third and fourth MNO to largest MNO; If the merger is approved, without structural remedies, EE will probably take the regulators to court over the decision.

After glancing through the CMA report, I think there's far more chance the deal will be blocked rather than waved through.

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/66e82b18c069f68b7681bb6b/Provisional_findings_report.pdf

"The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has provisionally concluded that

the anticipated joint venture between Vodafone Group plc (Vodafone) and CK

Hutchison Holdings Limited (CK Hutchison) that will combine their UK telecoms

businesses, respectively Vodafone Limited (VUK) and Hutchison 3G UK Limited

(3UK) (the Merger) may be expected to result in a substantial lessening of

competition (SLC) in two markets in the UK. These are the supply of retail mobile

telecommunications services to end customers, including both consumers and

business customers (the retail market), and the supply of wholesale mobile

telecommunications services (the wholesale market). Vodafone and CK

Hutchison are together referred to as the Parties. For statements relating to the

future, the Parties’ UK telecoms businesses are together referred to as the

Merged Entity"

Personally I'm not even sure this is a good deal for Vodafone, although I can see why Three might want it. I never could understand the reasoning behind Vodafone acquiring Liberty Global's German Cable assets either. Purchasing a Hybrid Fibre Coax DOCSIS network when the sector is moving toward FTTP didn't make a lot of sense to me, I'm not sure a Vodafone/Three merger makes sense either, but what do I know.

My last post explained that Microsoft and Alphabet are Foreign Exchange traded stocks, that aren't listed on the London Stock Exchange, but are used within the Global Equity Segment (GES) of the London Stock Exchange. As I've said previously, I believe these CDI/GES type stocks shouldn't be allowed in ISA's, I can't make it any clearer than that.

LTI, I'll say no more on this since I've made my point several times.

As far as Microsoft and Alphabet are concerned, as I explained previously having a ticker doesn't classify them as a UK listed stock:

Alphabet and Microsoft (CDI):

Market OTHERS

Market segment GES1

Market identifier code (MIC) XLOM

"CDI stands for Crest Depository Interest, a UK financial security that represents a stock traded on a foreign exchange. CDIs are not traditionally listed on the London Stock Exchange, but they are used in the Global Equity Segment (GES) of the London Stock Exchange."

UK listed stock like Lloyds:

Market Main Market

Market segment SET1

Market identifier code (MIC) XLON

Just for you LTI I'll re-paste the meaning of CDI:

"CDI stands for Crest Depository Interest, a UK financial security that represents a stock traded on a foreign exchange. CDIs are not traditionally listed on the London Stock Exchange, but they are used in the Global Equity Segment (GES) of the London Stock Exchange"

Note the sentences stating "CDI stands for Crest Depository Interest, a UK financial security that represents a stock traded on a foreign exchange. CDIs are not traditionally listed on the London Stock Exchange"

CDI:

A UK financial security that REPRESENTS A STOCK TRADED ON A FOREIGN EXCHANGE. CDIs are NOT traditionally listed on the London Stock Exchange. Point made me thinks.

"neither, but I am in the top 1% (well I was many years ago) of the population when it comes to IQ"

That's nothing special, I achieved an IQ above 135 on my very first IQ test and actually got consistently higher scores the more I practiced the tests. When I joined the Army I had to do a 3 stage IQ test, irrespective of my exam qualifications, where passing each stage qualified you to go on to the next stage, passing all three stages qualified participants to go into a tech trade; I wanted to go into REME but they pushed me into Signals instead, probably because I scored highly on the physical fitness tests too; I can't complain too much, it led to a career in Telecoms.

My point is being in the top 1% for IQ is meaningless, many people with high IQ's are worse than useless and you can train your Brain to get better scores in IQ tests anyway. Just because you have an IQ over 135 doesn't mean you can recognise context, or that you're not argumentative.

Then why can't you understand that I'm saying they wouldn't be allowed in ISA's, if ISA's were only allowed to hold UK market listed stocks? I've explained to you that Alphabet and Microsoft aren't FTSE listed stocks and therefore shouldn't be allowed to be traded in ISA's. If I had my way anything with a MIC of XLOM wont be tradeable in ISA's, maybe they wont be after October. You're like a bot that can't understand context, and the meaning behind every word and phrase has to be explained in minute detail to you. Maybe you are thick if you can't understand the point I've been making, since only stupid or autistic people can't understand context which are you LTI?

I'll answer the question since you wont, neither Alphabet or Microsoft are UK listed stocks. On the London stock Exchange they are identified as Others under Market, GES1 under Market Segment and have a MIC code of XLOM.

"XLOM is the market identifier code (MIC) for the London Stock Exchange's (LSE) multilateral trading facility (MTF). The LSE uses the MIC XLON to identify trades executed on its UK regulated market.

The LSE's Global Equity Segment (GES) uses the XLOM MIC code to allow investors to trade in international securities. The GES offers trading in 95 international securities, including US blue chips, Chinese ADRs, Amazon, General Motors, Alibaba, and Ctrip"

https://www.londonstockexchange.com/market-stock/0QYP/microsoft-corp/overview

https://www.londonstockexchange.com/market-stock/0HD6/alphabet-inc/overview

UK stocks are listed with a MIC code of XLON, non UK listed International stocks have a MIC code of XLOM, therefore I've answered the question for you.