Member Info for getafgrip

Obviously markets will be impacted by the "brinkmanship" or war in the Ukraine. But I think yesterdays trading was more down to the expiry of $3,000,000,000,000 (3 x Trillion) of options in the US last Friday the 21st January. I think there was a figure of $812 billion of equities in that figure. The US National Debt is around $30 trillion - so options accounting for 10% of this!

A Tsunami for markets, because if the options are not settled because for example; say put options did not expire worthless, due to the share price having risen too much. There is a threat as extreme as market collapse on the radar! I hope you had a chart for this one Boyo, if not its worth thinking about for next time Triple-Witching occurs. For traders it is a golden opportunity.

SE - I agree that Shell will not avoid the Dutch Court rulings, but I think BvB has neatly wrong-footed & then sidestepped the full impact that they thought they could have over a massive independent company. Also Shell will doubtless be involved in further court actions in the future. But, the sand has shifted if Shell plc appeals a decision from London rather than the Hague.

However, Shell plc is now domiciled outside the EU, the legal environment is different, the political/tax/regulatory scene has changed along with social accountability pressures. Also, what is close to a $150 billion company, arguably the 90th biggest company in the World, and the biggest company on the UK's LSE, has shown that it can quite easily and at short notice domicile in another country. In the main Shell plc has been welcomed to the UK, which must be a refreshing change.

In moving Shell has also indicated symbolically that if the courts hounds are not kept on a leash more often, they might change their geographical investment & closure strategy as well.. BvB has made an important agreement with the UK as part of changing domicile, & as you say Shell has a streamlined acquisitions environment. I think the latter will prove to be one of the most important parts of the jigsaw.

I know - it's easily done.

W - I think you will find that if you have sales of £1,900 & a Gross Margin of 90%, i.e £1,710. The remaining £190 is your cost of sales.

Gross Profit Margin = (Revenue – Cost of Goods Sold) / Revenue x 100

Charles does the 90% gross margin that you quote for Dark include an apportionment of the costs of Dark providing technical product sales back-up? And is this technical sales back-up cost included in with the direct costs associated with the manufacture of Dark's product? Also are these costs included in the product sale price? It would be interesting to know your views.

Cyber-security is so important Q may be the new Bond!

The morning report is not very good Charles:

The UK Tech market is down a "bit," The FTSE 100 is down 1.09%, and the FTSE 250 is down 2.5%. This means that if the FTSE 250 falls a "bit" another 39 times, the value of the constituent companies will be zero!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business/market-data

You regularly report what is happening on the US market when it is not even open. I take it you realise that there is a time difference!

Ndn71 - I think there are more than 60,000 shares a day traded btw!

Raj - Thanks for steering me in the right direction - I'm not sure how simple it is as there area a lot of noughts involved.
Ndn71 - you are right. Do we need an "Amazingometer!"

CR888 - In very simplistic terms, on Friday the 21st January, you are describing the trading of shares that amount to very roughly 2 x thousandths of Darktrace's capital value as "amazing." On the same day that $3 trillion of US options hit the buffers. Taking the standard definition of a trillion as a million million, this is $3,000,000,000,000. Or very roughly 10% of the US national debt which is around $30 trillion & counting. Around $800 billion of this was equities.

The impact of these Triple/Quadruple Witching Hours is staggering for World markets. I would save your predictions for next weeks Dark SP until this financial Tsunami has clearly abated.

R - hopefully those who consider that the first part of Poppy's daily schedule is to read the LSE board on Darktrace, to inform her strategy for the day will pay heed to the important points you have raised. Changing & improving the content of the board will involve quite a lot of stating what some people do not necessarily want to hear!

Boyo - ever the Welsh voice of sense and sound reasoning, you've even driven me towards being more interested in charts so many thanks for your posts. Is it from the Valleys or the Mountains?

You've done some smart trading & long may it continue. Yes, we have seen it all before, trading cycles will not disappear as readily as Gordon Brown's "end to boom and bust" speech indicated. I always enjoy a touch of Del Boy Syndrome when things are going well though - "This time next year Rodders we'll be millionaires." What he does not add is that its a good time to sell shares!

There has been a great rise up to Wednesday. I can't see this as the start of a massive correction though, unless the extermination of techs value spreads to bell-weather stocks like Shell. There's a lot of great news to come between now and the 3rd February, a very short timescale, surely they will have got their hedging right in the last Quarter. We don't want two disappointing Quarters in a row, against the OP & GP's of the last year. Institutions and PI's will want to be on board. If the Dividend only went up 4% it is not even keeping pace with inflation, so there is likely to be good news on this front. Especially if Shellemployee is right and BvB regards Shell as having borrowed cash from shareholders, with the Dividend cut, and now owing them

If it is good news on the 3rd February, for me even with the hiding and allocating of spare capital it will be a stunning results day, the pattern should be a firming of the price towards Ex-dividend day on the 17th February. I like £18 as a share price though as it is 11.11% away from hitting the magic £20. Go Shell plc!

Rusty - This must be Shell changing its name "at pace" - there is only a weekend difference, but in their timetable I'm sure it was down as happening on the 24th January. Goodbye RDS.

Strangely Autonomy and Hewlett Packard will have used DCF to determine the share price. It looks like they are about $5 billion dollars adrift of each others estimates. All I am saying is that DCF is neither 100% reliable, nor particularly accurate! But, if you like it, have fun with it!

L - Patronising, pompous & pontificating and not in the slightest respectful, as I would expect. If your projections in year two, let alone year 10, give you the vaguest clue as to a shares present value, good luck to you.

The last thing I would pay any heed to is a page from the beginners guide to DCF, as I have read too many of them over the years. I even managed to absorb the principle of compound interest; not when I completed a Master's degree, but when I was 7-years old.

If sophisticated DCF indicates that performance charts for Bitcoin and Dark are similar, there is little surprise that I have missed this revelation!

Which planets tracking system did this come up on! I would guess Uranus!

Should be spelt Waved!

Sophisticated DCF is often waived around pompously as a form of sorcery that nobody else could possibly understand. Realistically it is wholly based on undetermined future figures, wild speculation, self-proclaimed "expertise," with a heavy dose of the inputters assumptions. When using DCF have you ever come up with negative figures for a company. Is it "sophisticated enough to predict the interest rate in May 2022, CPI and RPI inflation in May 2022, the effects of differing interest rates and inflation across all of Dark's TAM, the year on year effects of Biden introducing a 1% tax on buy-backs, a change in Corporation Tax in 20 different countries - the list is endless.

If you are using the most sophisticated DCF available on the planet, why are your one-directional predictions so consistently dreadfully inaccurate? Maybe you need to change providers.

Or of Dark's "Real" IPO price was £20 the shares are now worth £28. I am happy to sell at this on a matched bargain basis.

BH - I was thinking that BvB and Shell walked on water to open up shop in the UK, now you are saying this was only made possible by a pair of clogs! Would you believe it!