Member Info for Spikeyj

the poster called bernie came in for a lot of stick from biggib's acolytes back in those days of CEB's glory, for daring to argue that the share had been ramped up to a very overinflated price. bernie put it a tad vociferously sometimes, but it turns out that he was smack bang on. he deserves a bit of an apology at this point for all that abuse, but i'm sure he won't get one.

even more minor bumps would make it interesting. i was reading the other day that goldman reckons S&P will drop 5% if trump can't get his tax reforms through this time round (which is quite possible).

dunno ... if the analysts at these brokers were actually any good at what they do, they would be working for themselves and making a fortune with their own personal hedgefund etc. still, for what it's worth, from friday 27/10 as an upgrade: "(ShareCast News) - Barclays upgraded Aviva to 'overweight' from 'equalweight' and lifted the price target to 567p from 509p, highlighting improving earnings quality and the potential for a �1bn buyback. The bank reckons Aviva can deploy �1.5bn of excess liquidity in 2018, returning proceeds from asset sales, dividends from UK life operations and ongoing cash generation. It noted that Allianz has been one of the performers in European insurance this year, partly driven by a �3bn buyback, and said it believes Aviva's 2018 buyback will be larger, at 5% of �20bn market cap. "We believe the combination of the acquisition of Friends Life and the asset sales in France/Spain/Asia will release significant amounts of capital, which Aviva can deploy via debt retirements and share buybacks over a number of years, while also de-risking the balance sheet." In addition, Barclays pointed to the improving quality of Aviva's earnings. "We believe the difference between operating earnings and net income will narrow, with 84% of earnings falling to the bottom line on average 2017 through to 2022, which should lead to book value growth." It added that 'overweight' rated Prudential remains its top pick in the sector as it offers long-term compounding growth at a modest premium."

sp needs to slow down. i said, "within q1?", not q4!

unilever's results a little while before didn't help market sentiment re valuations on the household products / consumable side with GSK. i wonder too if some in the market see emma's apparent interest in the pfizer division as undermining her previous declared intention to build pharma r&D.

sorry, meant "its" not "it's".

not quite. woodford had actually been quite keen that GSK should reduce the dividend and concentrate on (a) better investment for future growth, & (b) unlocking value hidden with the group because of it's pseudo conglomerate nature. he wanted it to be broken up.

i don't know whether stefan doesn't need retail pis, or if it's more than he is desperate not to let retail investors know what the real situation is. meanwhile, he was able to give himself a pretty chunky pay from mxo. it'd be good to know if stefan also gets money from cornhill. time will presumably tell, at least in part.

perhaps he should have considered updating mxo pis about the use of �300,000 of their money to take a punt by buying up a 1/7th of another oil company [MYN] and explaining to them how that fitted with MXO's strategic plans, and what exactly he is looking for from that? MYN stake may or may not be a good idea for mxo shareholders,but was hardly a trivial sum, & not a peep from stefan about it. i note that cornhill were making plenty of good money from that MYN fundraise which took place with that very practical �300K assistance from stefan's use of MXO shareholder money. (i can't remember what stefan's cornhill involvement is these days; is he still connected to cornhill, or just history?) more basically, perhaps more importantly, even if the legal dispute could prevent stefan from releasing more operational data about aje, surely he should be attempting to give more of an update about the potential timescale of the legal dispute itself, & explain transparently & explicitly what newsflow it does & does not prevent MXO from giving?

(but since i hold a good wodge of RDSB still, i hope that i am right.)

yeah, i'm a reluctant bull, but it feels a bit different. (no view on the short-term.)

i'm not sure what the implications are for mxo, since so many other factors remain very murky, but even i am beginning to feel more positive about the price of oil, on a medium term view.

JP MORGAN SEES "GOOD" ENTRY POINT INTO AVIVA, REITERATES 'OVERWEIGHT' (ShareCast News) - JP Morgan sounded a 'bullish' note on Aviva, telling clients the shares are "cheap" and that the insurer's cash flows would allow it to both grow its dividend even while carrying out share repurchases and strengthening its capital position. Following 4% underperformance of the wider sector since July and trading on 8.3 times' JP Morgan analysts' earnings estimates for 2019, the shares were "cheap" and offered a "good" entry point, the investment bank said. By way of comparison, it pointed out that the sector was trading at an average price-to-earnings multiple of 10. Furthermore, the shares were offering a total capital return yield of over 7%. In particular, JP Morgan noted that Aviva's cash flows over the next three years would suffice to increase the dividend at a compound annual rate of 10% between 2017 and 2019, carry out a �300m share buy-back each year and cut its net debt by �1.1bn in the coming three years. On the downside, the analysts pared their earnings per share estimates for Aviva in 2017, 2018 and 2019 by -1%, -5% and -3%. However, that would be offset in part by an improving capital position and by creating additional headroom to deploy capital in an attractive fashion moving forward. So while the target price was trimmed from 624p to 617p, JP Morgan reiterated its 'overweight' recommendation.

are you primarily here as an investor or as a trader? if the latter, would have thought that you would welcome a bit of intra-week volatility to ride on. if the former, day to day is zzzzz?

very hard to know, eh. no crystal ball to hand. important that something like this is only a relatively small percentage of p/folio. i've added another smidge.

22p is hardly a big shift for a share like astraz.

a couple.

of nice news snippets. neither big ticket items, but every little helps.

not a snowball's chance in hell that they are about to raise the dividend. they've been over-paying for ages, if they are tough enough with the cost-cutting and disposal programme, and PoO holds in the 50s, they may get away with it. but it would be madness to raise it near term.

"And finally, monsieur, a wafer-thin mint." indeed, pleasantly plump.