The latest Investing Matters Podcast episode with London Stock Exchange Group's Chris Mayo has just been released. Listen here.
Well I don't usually follow F1 but because of all the hype about the closeness of the last race I thought I'd watch it today - not being a follower, looking at what happened just now, I don't think the result is a fair one on Hamilton - what's others views?
TD - its not so much from a political perspective that I'm saying about the scare mongering - I watched a segment on Sky News at the beginning of last week when one of their reporters were in a township in South Africa interviewing people - no-one was saying it was covid, they were saying it was a cold and on a scale of 1-10 one guy said the symptoms were about a 4 in severity.
I think my point is more from a mental health perspective - all this scare mongering is doing no good when people have been through so much over the last 20 months with covid and the way the news has been reported with over the last few days with x number of cases and x number of deaths could actually tip someone over the edge - a more balanced approach by the media and the government would be far better in my own opinion.
O - don't hold back will you :-)
Seriously though I've said for a while that I think Boris has engineered all of this - he hasn't wanted the job since last year and I mentioned a while ago that it was all building for the time when his second child with his current wife arrived - its all been too much like hard work for him and the sooner Sunak is put in office the better for the country. I don't disagree with anything you've said, and the problem now is that no-one is listening to what the government are asking of the population - and the way its been covered in the press since the beginning of last week with nothing but fear mongering will strengthen peoples resolve to do their own thing now with the data that is coming out of South Africa. The doctor that highlighted the variant has given an interview on LBC today saying something like "there is no reason for you not to believe what we are saying in that this is a mild illness".
Good morning all - its quite dark and dull here - ooops, its Sunday lol.
Just thought I'd post a quick message on here about covid - I'm fed up with the last couple of days scare mongering in the press and on some of these chat forums so I've been looking at the data coming out of South Africa. Whilst our demographic is different to South Africa, I'm really hoping that some of the researchers/commentators from South Africa are right in what they are saying in that they reckon the Omicron variant has peaked over there - one person I started following on twitter over the last couple of days is supposedly a researcher in a University - someone on the IAG board has posted a link to his twitter account if anyone wants to have a look at it - and his comments this morning are quite encouraging in that he reckons that any vaccinations that haven't already been sold will never be used - I really hope he is right and that covid now fades away as quickly as the Spanish Flu did.
I hope everyone is having a good weekend.
Afternoon all - Friday already - and only a few more weeks of this year to go.
Hope everyone's had a reasonable week and what's been lost on the swings can be gained on the roundabouts. Just thought I'd post something that some may find interesting - its all about the supply chains. I was watching Bloomberg this afternoon and one of their reporters was on a dockside in Los Angeles - admittedly it was in the early hours of the morning, but the facility was supposed to be working 24 hours a day but the only people there at the time were the reporter and the cameraman with the explanation being that they just can't get the staff to man it for 24 hours a day.
Anyway, the head honcho was interviewed just now, he has said that there's only been a 10% improvement in the supply chain since early October and that all aspects of the supply chain were stressed - container costs were 10 times their normal costs and he can't see things getting "back to normal" until at least quarter 2 next year. He said there were 97 ships waiting to dock just at that port and the lead time in was 21 days from where they were out at sea.
Having listened to that, I'm steering clear of any retail shares until there's some improvement in the supply chain - it's just been drip, drip, drip downwards for ASC but obviously its all supply chain issues.
Hope everyone has a fab weekend - custard tart sounds lush - enjoy.
Good morning all - dark and dull here so far this morning.
FTSE futures slightly up this morning - fingers crossed that its the start of a Santa rally and an ongoing upward trend. On the subject of how difficult it has been this year, there was an item on Bloomberg, and also covered in the Money Mail, about a renowned fund manager - Nick Train of Lindsell Trust I think it was - has had his worst year in 20 this year.
M - Hot pot sounds lovely - hope you enjoyed.
V - Hope ODX works out well for you today - don't forget spikes and shakes if appropriate.
Good luck everyone - hope its a good day today.
Good afternoon all.
M - no, didn't watch the programme but now you've mentioned it I will put it on my to do list - I'm just getting ready for my walk now so hopefully its not too cold.
N - that's the one - it can be quite useful/informative at times.
V - sorry, don't know anything about ABX.
N - well done on your trade.
There may finally be light at the end of the tunnel (fingers crossed anyway) - I was watching EZJ - they sank earlier on when there was mention that Boris was going to bring in Plan B, and then all of a sudden they shot up - flicked over to Bloomberg quickly and apparently the scientists have come out and said a booster jab is sufficient to keep the moronic variant at bay - lets hope that really is the case.
Good morning all - very dark, dull and windy here - hope no-one's suffered any storm damage overnight.
Things seem to be a bit quiet this morning on the futures market - UK futures slightly down, US futures slightly up - not sure what is going to drive the markets today in either direction but I'm just watching Bloomberg about the news of the Pfizer vaccine which doesn't look like its particularly good news unfortunately.
TD - you must be a happy - looks like one of your holdings (CLN I think it is) looks to have accepted a take over offer this morning.
So - whose going to be watching PMQ's lunchtime? Apparently there's a get out of jail free card in respect of the party that didn't breach rules because it was either a business meeting or held on crown property which apparently doesn't have to follow the rules that the Government set out - I still think all these leaks are a deliberate ploy by Boris to get out of doing the job - the timing of all the wrong doings/leaks now is so suspect.
Hope everyone has a good day today.
Well everything seems calm at the moment - market wise I mean not weather wise - storm is building here weather wise - I wonder if the same will be said this afternoon in the markets considering Biden is off to discuss things with Putin.
N - imagine if you had held onto Avon when they dropped down to £10 odd - consider the impact that would have had on your portfolio - every negative has a positive and vice versa I suppose. I would tend to agree with you about Jesse Livermore - that doesn't make sense to me either, but I have been thinking of Mark Miniverni's 80/50 thing and there's an awful lot of companies that I can think of that fit that criteria - not just AIM - but ASC, BOO, DARK, ARB, NYCT to name just a few.
O - I don't disagree with anything you're saying about things having changed since the start of the pandemic and I suppose this is where our different strategies are evident - to me the volatility brings short term opportunities - ie buy and try and sell on the same day, whereas you're more of a buy and hold type of investor - nothing wrong with either approach really.
DJ - thanks for coming back about the short selling - hope you're having a good day.
Good morning all - from the sound of things its going to be baton down the hatches today - stay safe everyone.
Looks like the markets are set up for a good day today - futures up around 0.39% at the minute but watching the close of the US markets on Bloomberg last night they were saying that they thought yesterdays rally was a bit of short covering - I think its going to pay to be nimble and try and be in and out of things for the next few weeks.
I was also surfing some twitter accounts last night just to get a feeling about what "may be happening" and there was one person who was quite down about their portfolio being worth 40% less than it was earlier on in the year (so its not just some of us feeling the pain I suppose) - and it was surprising how many people responded with the same sorts of figures - I know from my own holdings in CCL and MCRO they are quite a bit down from where they were at the start of the year so perhaps I need to go back to my old strategy of not holding anything and just cashing in everything at the end of every week - I suppose I'll have to re-assess things when I make my plans/targets for next year.
O - The wedding sounds absolutely lovely - glad that you had such a nice time. I'm surprised that you're taking a back seat from doing any trading with the volatility that's around at the minute bearing in mind how well you did last year from the same sort of situation - I'm hoping that the volatility stays for a little while and then the start of next year things get back to "normal" - whatever that is in the market but certainly a trend reversal with the majority of shares/companies.
V - I don't blame you for switching off at times.
N - Is your shed your man cave really? I don't know if you've been looking at Mark Minnervini's twitter, but he's put a couple of interesting comments on there lately - one has been about the psychology of trading, and the other one has been about his 80/50 rule I think he calls it - something along the lines that 50% of the time 80% of companies that reach a "peak" fall by 80% or 80% of companies that reach a peak fall by 50% and he's quoted some examples - its certainly got my brain matter turning things over.
M - Things did pick up yesterday afternoon as you predicted - you've not been giving us your breakfast menu lately though :-)
Fingers crossed for a good day for everyone today.
DJ - not sure if you found the answer to the shorting question the other day, but as far as I'm aware there's no date by which shorts have to close - they have to be covering charges/interest while the short is open as far as I'm aware but that's the only thing - if you find out any different please let us know.
Good morning all - dark, dull and wet here this morning.
I have to be honest I'm surprised at some of the price action on the markets today - MCRO down nearly 25% since last week and considering the news out on the weekend about the requirement for testing for travel some of the travel sector are up - I suppose that's because of Fauci's comments on the weekend about the moronic variant looking less severe as Delta - I really hope that is the case, as following some scientists comments, it really could be the beginning of the end of covid if the moronic variant becomes the dominant one - all we can do I suppose is hope.
I wonder if we will now see a Santa rally after the sell off of the last few weeks.
Hope everyone has a good day.
Good morning all on this gloriously sunny Saturday.
For those of you in CINE, just in case you didn't see it for yourselves, Mookie Grainger is it (the CEO) was interviewed on Bloomberg last night - was very positive about people returning to cinemas.
Good morning all - overslept this morning - think its going to be a bit boring today so going to take the day off to get the house ready for my Xmas tree.
DJ - welcome to the board - we all share information on here so anything you think may be good/useful then we will be pleased to hear about it.
TD - well done on your trade - its always nice to have a goal in mind with your earnings.
Hope everyone has had a reasonable/good week and have a good weekend.
Good morning all - dark and cold here again this morning - not long before we hit the shortest day of the year and it starts getting a bit lighter again.
Looks like the markets in the US were spooked by the moronic variant again - went from 1% up to 1% down in about an hour last night - apparently Dr Fauci was saying they don't know enough about it yet and their first cases were found over there. At least with the schizophrenic market there is opportunity - FTSE futures over 1% down at the minute. I got accused of scare mongering on the EZJ board because I said on there last night that the US airlines fell around 7% last night - maybe a good opportunity with them this afternoon if they drop significantly. I was only looking on the chat forum as my old Chairman from my RBS days (Stephen Hester) has taken over there as Chairman - he bought shares yesterday but perhaps he should have waited until today - mind you, he did the same with RBS shares when he took charge there - think he must have sold them at a loss.
So, what does everyone think about the latest "leak" from Downing Street about Xmas parties last year?- I'm not sure whether I said it on here, but I definitely discussed it with a friend of mind, but I think Boris is deliberately acting in the way he is because he wants a vote of no confidence in him - I don't think he's wanted to be PM for over a year and perhaps its his way of manoeuvring himself out of the job.
M - sounds like you had a good night - never heard of the groups you went to see but hope you enjoyed. Like you, I'm a little concerned about what we are being told about this new variant but all we can do is try and keep ourselves safe - and I still can't book myself in for my third/booster vaccination - perhaps that's why I'm a bit more anxious.
V - Sounds like the volatility on some of your stocks is helping your trading - hopefully you'll have a fantastic December - it's been quite tough this year so be nice to end the year on a high.
N - Hope you enjoyed the film last night - from the trailers I've seen, I have to be honest, it just seems like a repeat of Spectre I think it was - jumping off a train (bridge this time), dyeing/going underground as he did on the Caribbean island - be interesting to hear what you thought of it.
Hope everyone has a good day - good luck all.
N - yes, I've still got a holding in MCRO but not as large as it was. Have a fab time at the cinema.
V - I bet you're glad that limit sell worked out for you on NCYT looking at how far the share price has dropped from your sale - know what you mean about taking losses - everyone has to do what suits them at the end of the day.
TD - Have you considered trading CINE - selling on a spike and either buying back more with your sale proceeds or buying back the same number of shares and pocketing the cash?
O - Markets are going to be a bit schizophrenic over the next few weeks by the looks of things - I can't make up my mind if there's nothing to worry about or should panic take over - at least with a bit of volatility comes opportunity.
M - you still hungover after your concert the other night?