Roundtable Discussion; The Future of Mineral Sands. Watch the video here.
I mentioned when the shares were over £30 (around early September I think it was) that it may be better to wait to add further funds until the long term downtrend showed that it was turning - I thought the share price moving from £23 to £27 was that but when it started falling again I sold at just over £24 on the basis of the continued uncertainty in respect of supply chains/covid - I'm waiting to add/trade as I'm not sure the trend is over yet.
In all the years I've been trading I've never seen anything like we have had this year and my own view is that until we have more clarity on covid and the supply chain issues there will be no change to sentiment/momentum. If the scaremongering is to be believed, then we are in for a tough time now with the moronic variant, however, looking at what happened in South Africa I do believe that this variant will prove to be mild and if that proves to be the case it could indeed be the beginning of the end of covid.
At the end of the day, over the long term I have no doubt that there will be a strong rebound in the share price here - when that will be is another question though.
Out today is showing that they are confident that they have now passed the peak with the Omicron variant. In addition there has been another study which has come out saying that the reason Omicron isn't as severe as Delta is because the disease doesn't get into the lungs and if that is the case, if Omicron becomes the dominant variant, then that should signal the end of the pandemic.
Sell off started once Boris the Buffoon announced he was doing a press conference at 5.00 - people just don't know what he's going to do next to keep his parties off the front pages.
Out today is showing that things are slowing down over there and they are confident that they have passed the peak. In addition, a new case study has just come out which has stated that as Omicron doesn't go into the lungs, its a much less severe variant than Delta, and as Omicron becomes the dominant variant it will effectively see the end to the pandemic - hopefully only another week before we catch up with South Africa and if our hospitalisations/deaths don't shoot up and we copy South Africa then we should see 2022 as a boom year for the UK stock market.
It's surprising how much of a sell off there's been in a considerable number of companies since March and the only reason that I can think of for that is the continued uncertainty about covid and how this country have dealt with it.
I think they said in the House of Commons starting about 10.00 discussing the impact covid is having on the travel sector - should make for interesting watching and may actually put pressure on the Government to remove the need for the additional testing introduced.
Is roughly the same as ASC since it's top in March - they're both about 60% down - my own view is that its all to do with covid - the uncertainty with the supply chains and how that will hit bottom line profit, increase in costs - the sooner we get covid sorted the better.
Boo aren't that much different to ASC from their peak around March - both roughly 60% down. Personally I think it's down to the continued uncertainties of covid in respect of supply chains and how much that takes off the bottom line. I think someone on the Boo board mentioned Joules being down the other day when they released their figures and that was apparently because of supply chain issues.
Claire - where have you seen that? Only asking as its totally opposite to what I'm reading and seeing. Feelings are that Omicron could actually see the end of the pandemic and whilst it wouldn't suit online in the short term, ASC will benefit considerably I should imagine as the supply chain problems will ease, costs will come down, uncertainty will be removed and the share price can then move forward.
There's been so many different things coming out - but I've just read that anyone who has come into contact with someone that has covid, if they have had two jabs, then rather than having to isolate for 10 days they are now being told to do daily tests instead - government starting to look at the data maybe?
R1bobuk - I just think it was timely that panic set in about the virus when all this nonsense about Xmas parties started to hit the news - bit convenient in my view.
Who revealed the existence of the Omicron variant has been giving an interview on LBC and has said something along the lines that "there is no reason why you can't believe us that this is a mild disease" - let's hope the more positive commentators start outweighing the negative/fear mongering that's been going on.
That's probably what a lot of people will do - but as soon as more data comes out confirming that Omicron is not as severe as Delta, and that we could be starting to see the end of the pandemic then bookings for flights/holidays will be immense and as IAG will then be able to charge what it wants because the demand will be back then they will restore their balance sheet quite quickly - anyone shorting travel/leisure shares at the moment need their heads read because we could only be a matter of days away from having that confirmation from South Africa.
Robbren - let's hope for their sakes they are vaccinated and only suffer mild symptoms.
My own thoughts are that the government got things woefully wrong last year with the Delta variant and were trying to go for herd immunity - they are now over reacting to the new variant and the tone of the news reports (to me anyway) today given the information coming out of South Africa is a lot calmer than it has been for the last few days - it's been sheer fear mongering in my opinion.
Danno that is a fair point. However, to counter act that point you could say that the level of vaccinations in this country is far greater than in South Africa so perhaps that balances things out.
I'm just watching Dr Susan Hopkins on the Andrew Marr show at the moment - she has said that there are only a few over 70's in hospital in the country with Omicron at the moment and its still too early to say about the severity here.
There's 3 more days of data to come out from South Africa before the vote - combined with 3 more days where we will have an understanding of the numbers here, but more importantly severity/hospitalisatons so I wouldn't count on harsher restrictions - more likely to put their hands up and say we've been too cautious.
That's one way of looking at it and something that should be considered. On the other side of the coin though you have to look at this countries reaction - timely that all the panic started when all the news about Downing Street parties started to come out - classic distraction technique.
As we know, the only thing this Government is worried about is themselves so as more and more data comes out of South Africa (and I would say they would have to be careful not to mislead the world with their data) hopefully we can all start to think more positively about the future.