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I also hold 888 albeit it’s quite a small holding but I’d be surprised at Draftkings going for 888 instead. It’s Entain’s superior technology and large US market share they’re after and 888 aren’t in the same league from what I can see. What surprises me is MGM not taking another run at Entain. It will be interesting to see how the next few days pan out!
I don’t think the takeover will happen. Which is probably the best outcome for the long term. Cash and stock deal is no use to man nor beast when it’s based on Draftkings extortionate valuation which means the £28 per share offer isn’t worth the paper it’s written on. I think an all cash offer for close to £28 a share would get over the line but I doubt Draftkings or MGM could afford that.
I’ve been reading these posts for the past few days and I’m amazed at the amount of time non holders spend commenting on a stock they do not own! And given the scaremongering taking place, I’d have to assume these posters have massive short positions on IAG. No I didn’t think so. I’ve only taken a small position at 151p however talk of a RI when IAG had 10.2 billion liquidity a couple of months ago is strange! EasyJet dragged down IAG yesterday and the broker update today hasn’t helped. But I haven’t seen anything with IAG that has changed within the company in the last few weeks, if anything passenger numbers will be up! It definitely looks like industry jitters caused by EasyJet that has caused a sharp drop the past couple of days. So to all the doom and gloom merchants that seem to spend a ridiculous amount of time running down IAG when they aren’t invested (clearly too much time on their hands!), short it at £100 a point and put your money where your mouth is!
While I can see the attraction of receiving a special dividend, which I think would be between 80p and 100p costing between £3 billion and £4 billion, I think share buy backs are a better bet! Less shares in issue will improve the eps as well as the dividend which would be better for long term holders. I’ve always thought returning massive amounts of surplus cash to shareholders is a balancing act as usually the share price will drop by the dividend amount so you’re receiving it in one hand and losing it from the other!
Ive looked at the share price rises and falls of both Entain and MGM International over the past couple of months. It’s pretty clear that the Entain share price is getting dragged along with the MGM share price. The moves are almost identical! And with the American market seemingly selling off, I think Entain is going to get dragged lower if the MGM share price continues to be weak. Which is frustrating because Entain is the much better company in my opinion!
I think it’s another rotation from growth stocks into value stocks. Companies like Rolls Royce are up today and Entain has dropped quite a bit! Hopefully it doesn’t go into a second day though! Although there seems to be a lot more buys today than sells, can’t quite work it out myself! Entain also seems to be tracking the share performance of MGM International! Presumably because of the takeover rumours, the stronger the MGM share price the better the potential bid could be and with the MGM share price weak its dragging down Entain.
There have been takeover rumours circling ITV for years. Obviously it would be great if it happened but I’m not sure it will any time soon! About 6 months ago the share price was 54p, which was a steal. A takeover never happened then so I can’t see it happening now. I hope I’m wrong!
So the trading update was scheduled for 8th April, in the last couple of days the share price has drifted lower and there were a couple of large buys after hours yesterday and then today they release a 4th quarter trading update even though the quarter hasn’t finished yet! Hmmm!
I don’t think the complaint is because the fund went down and the investors lost money. The issue is HL had the fund in their ‘Best Buy’ list whilst HL themselves had communicated with Woodford that they were concerned about the illiquidity of his holdings. It’s too simplistic to say that Woodford investors lost money and are looking for someone to blame. IMHO as soon as HL analysts became concerned about Woodfords holdings in terms of lack of liquidity then the fund really shouldn’t have remained in the ‘Best Buy’ list! I’ve held HL shares for a few months but sold out on Monday at break even until there’s a bit more clarity as I can see the share price being stuck for quite a while. Especially when Peter Hargreaves is a keen seller of his shares.
I decided to hold onto my shares too! I’ve been stung before with 888 in that I sold at 195p before results and it shot up! So I’ve decided to hold this time. If it rises great, if it drops due to a bit of profit taking I’ll just top up!
I can see the share price moving sideways for quite a long time. I think with Peter Hargreaves saying he won’t sell anymore shares for at least 3 months (I think it was 3 months!) tells the market that he’s planning on offloading more! He’d have been as well saying nothing about his future plans! I bought in on the dip at 1510p however the share price seems to get a nosebleed at anything above 1540p.
I’ve been in and out of CMC Markets for nearly a year! I decided I’d use it as a trading share rather than a buy and hold. So I’ve got to know the share price movements pretty well. It’s quite a thinly traded stock and it tends to surge the week before results/trading updates, then kind of stays elevated for a few weeks. But it ALWAYS drops back on ‘no news’ but on this occasion I’m surprised how far back it has fallen. I bought back in at 390p and thought I was getting a bargain! My concern is the drop is due to investors roaring out of growth stocks into recovery stocks. There’s certainly nothing wrong with the company, it’s an outstanding business and money making machine. However recovery stocks that have barely made a profit the past 12 months, paying no dividends and on much higher PE multiples seem to be in favour at the moment and stocks like CMC are suffering even though the fundamentals are highly impressive. I have no idea where this will bottom out and hopefully it has already.
I’d imagine it is going to drop further. Not much further though. I don’t normally average down when buying shares but I’d make an exception with AstraZeneca. If it drops to 6500 I’d be looking to double down at that price given the quality of the company and the positive outlook.
Yeah goodwill is important but up to this point AstraZeneca have been slated, mainly in Europe. I’d be amazed if they didn’t start profiting from the vaccine from July in that case. I’d be happy for Astra not to profit from the vaccine if all the other pharma’s followed suit and it was a combined effort. I thought I did well to get in at 7200!!
To me there are 3 things causing the SP drop. Firstly investors are pouring their money into the recovery stocks (airlines, hospitality etc!) for quick gains and the likes of Astra are too ‘boring’ at the minute. Secondly the strong pound against the dollar won’t be helping. And finally I think Astra’s decision to charge for the Covid vaccine at cost while other pharma’s make a mint isn’t helping. The BoD at Astra can’t do much about the first two but they have control over the price charged for the vaccines. I’m aware that they have stated that they won’t profit from the vaccine rollout ‘during the pandemic’. Does anyone know if they have put a time frame on this? Covid clearly isn’t going anywhere so how long does a pandemic remain a pandemic? The sooner Astra start profiting from the vaccine rollout like all the other companies the better for Astra shareholders, which at the end of the day the BoD have a responsibility to.
I could be wrong on this but if investors buy shares through DMA (placing orders directly on the order book) it’s possible to buy the shares at the sell price and sell shares at the buy price and that’s what causes the distortion. I could be wrong though! Happy to hear other explanations!
Yeah I’d regard Astra as a growth stock too but I think ‘low teen’ growth isn’t appealing for a lot of investors just now for a couple of reasons.
Firstly, when you look at the airline and hotel stocks etc they could have at least a 40% uplift in their share prices as we come out of lockdown and life gets back to some sort of normality. Investors are looking (quite rightly) for large, quick gains and they are overlooking the likes of Astra. Personally I’d rather buy Astra at this price rather than IAG or EasyJet at its current price when they’ve hardly flew a plane for a year! But maybe I’m just a bit more cautious but if the proverbial hits the fan in terms of an end to lockdown being much further away than the summer then I know where I’d rather have my money invested!
I’m sure the Trainline share price has performed better the past 6 months than Astra or Unilever! That says it all!
I think a lot of defensive stocks are struggling just now even after good results. You only have to see what’s happening with the Unilever share price. Very respectable results yet the share price is down 11%. AstraZeneca’s results today were very good with good growth forecasts yet there is a lack of enthusiasm for the stock. In my opinion a lot of investors are switching to recovery plays and growth stocks in the assumption the life will be back to normal in a few months and that’s why defensive stocks are out of favour! I have no doubt that if the markets started dropping suddenly you’d see companies such as AstraZeneca and Unilever rise considerably.
Today I was tempted to buy when it went under £72 but I’m sitting on my hands to see if it hits £70 as I think the closer we move towards coming out of lockdown the more defensive stocks share prices are going to lag!
I’m also not sure that providing the Covid vaccines at cost is helping sentiment. It’s admirable for sure and I’m aware Oxford may have had something to do with it but I think it’s galling when other pharmaceuticals are making money from it.