Dropped 2.39% today and now at three year low.
Spooked by possible failure of major bank I guess.
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RBS said sell a few weeks ago.
Time to clench.
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>> Time to clench.
Fists? Teeth? Buttocks?
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These things happen from time to time. The markets are worried but it'll blow over. If you're in the market long term, these things are to be expected.
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The main thing worrying the market is Deutsche Bank. It was a Rock and Anchor during the last crisis, but since its been revealed its as crooked as barclays, and now as exposed as RBS was.
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It's been slipping quickly since the start of the year. The oil price is also a concern. It's somewhere around $30 today and Total (who may or may not be representative of the industry) are saying they need it to be $45 to be economic for them. And the outlook for China & Japan is worsening, and emerging markets have never really achieved much traction.
The US interest rate hike a few weeks ago wasn't popular amongst investors and the US gov are making noises that they won't do another one this year, even though they were predicting one a few weeks back.
Hornby toys were 81p yesterday morning. Today they are about 28p. Buy at the bottom?
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>> Hornby toys were 81p yesterday morning. Today they are about 28p. Buy at the bottom?
Hornby has been an on and off basket case for the last 50 years. Its gone bust countless times.
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Yeah - their share price fall is less to do with the market generally and all to do with their sales performance since Christmas, and future confidence.
As Sooty said, there is truth that if you are in for the long hau,l it generally comes back again. However if you are managing your own investments surely it would be better to bail out at a certain point then jump in when you think it's turned the corner rather than riding the market to the bottom. The problem is knowing when to bail out and when to jump back in... not even the experts can tell you that.
I see there's talk about quite a few companies talking advantage of the cheap share prices to buy-back shares.
Last edited by: smokie on Thu 11 Feb 16 at 13:47
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"I see there's talk about quite a few companies talking advantage of the cheap share prices to buy-back shares."
My wife and I still have some Santander shares - they are a throwback to the demutualisation of Alliance and Leicester and the subsequent take-over by Santander. We, of course, should have sold them as A&L shares when they rocketed - but we never got round to it - and we've been contemplating dumping them ever since they were taken over by Santander.
A couple of weeks ago, we received a communication from Santander about a convenient share-selling offer. "All very convenient for us", we thought and then, we noticed that the price was free-falling. So, I suspect we may just hang on to them for a bit longer until the market picks up. I suspect that this has been timed however, as Smokie suggests, as an opportunity for Santander to buy back shares on the cheap.
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My wife and I still have some Santander shares - they are a throwback to the demutualisation of Alliance and Leicester and the subsequent take-over by Santander.
I too have Santander shares, mine came from the de-mutualisation of Abbey National and the subsequent take over. I voted against de-mutualisation (and would do today too) but as the shares cost me nothing (they did of course, but not measurable) have hung onto them.
The only ones who made any real money from the de-mutualisations in vogue a few years back were of course the boards of the mutuals with their huge tranches of allocated shares received for basically being there and doing a Judas.
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The problem is knowing when to bail out and when to jump back in... not even the experts can tell you that.
I pick some good funds and stick with them until they meet my plans, that's my thoughts anyway. I think for the ordinary punter trying to time the market is foolish.
Edit, although I've just moved into passive managed rather than active. A fair saving in management fees.
Last edited by: sooty123 on Thu 11 Feb 16 at 14:11
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The ordinary punter has no inside information that is why the stockmarket is always a gamble.
No problem with that if you can afford the money.
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Basket case Hornby is up over 30% today. Shame it's today as I was readying some money to have a punt later this week.
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>> Basket case Hornby is up over 30% today. Shame it's today as I was readying
>> some money to have a punt later this week.
Market has no idea what it thinks the share is worth. You'd be as well putting the money on a horse.
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I don't really care what the market thinks the share is worth if I can make money on it. It seemed a fairly good bet to me, that when the market rose, or some external influence occurred, it had quite a long way to rise. It doesn't happen often and a horse would return better odds but I do know quite a bit about betting and IMO you are unlikely to find such a dead cert. And of course, with a horse it's win or lose. At least with a share you can choose to cut your losses.
Anyway, I missed it!!
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The reason the market is so indecisive is probably because of the fear of Hornby going bust in the near term; if/when that goes away then the shares will probably rise in the short term at least and will surely be less volatile.
In the recent statement the company said that it might breach its banking covenants in March. That could put things in the lap of the gods (or the banks).
The rise today was because the CEO stepped down - not much of a reason save that it looks as if something is happening. When such non-news moves the price so much there's no saying where it might go until more uncertainty is removed. There was a reason the shares were at 26p earlier today, and nothing has really changed.
I agree that it looks like a reasonable punt; but the problem is that (i) you could be wiped out at any point if the company anticipates the covenant breach and puts itself into administration or some other bombshell explodes; (ii) for the game to be worth the candle you'd need a meaningful stake. £100 worth won't change your life even if it doubles.
I was working for a company in 90/91 when the intra-day share price went to 9p. The company had issued some convertible bonds that it never anticipated having to redeem but the share price was already low enough that the bondholders would come for the money, which the company wouldn't have, with a real risk that it could go bust unless it could get the banks' backing.
I bought at 16p, and sold at 27p feeling quite pleased, on a day when the skies were a bit bluer. Do I wish I still had those 10,000 shares...about £70 each last time i looked. I made about £1,000, using £1600 I couldn't really afford to lose, and then "lost" about £699,000 by selling them (when the company's future was still by no means certain). I don't do that sort of thing any more.
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Everybody says that you should bet what you can afford to lose. Which is true enough.
but there is a second and more useful categorisation; Generally it is a good measure to only buy what you can afford to keep. Buying something knowing that you will at some point *need* to sell it frequently ends in tears.
Once you can afford to keep it, you can then pick and choose your moment.
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I did some day trading a bit back, when the bank shares were up and down a lot. I rarely held a share overnight, I was trying to make a quick buck. That's what I'd have done with the Hornby shares if I'd go the £10k together - stuff it in once everything looks like it's going the right way, then I'd have probably been out again at 10% profit, or at least taken some of the profit. Mind you the 20% was passed really quickly today and for most of the day it's sat around 30 - 33% (closed at 36% I see). I reckon it'll open significantly lower tomorrow.
I did once buy some RBS shares at the end of a day. Not sure why I broke my rule buit I did. SWMBO was weatching the news the next morning and said that she hoped I wasn't holding any RBS as there was wghat appeared to be a bad annpuncement pre-market. On open, the shares went up arounf 35%. I couldn't deal them because the electronic system was overloaded and too slow, by the time I got rid it was down to about 25%. Quite happy with that. But I did realise that it's no way to earn a living, and even if it was you don't see those levels of volatility very often.
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Hornby already up another 6% today (jumped to 10% as I typed this) and Glencore (the other one on my watch list) up over 4%. Market has only been open 9 minutes!!
They will no doubt be down later...
Last edited by: smokie on Tue 16 Feb 16 at 08:10
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Marketwatch - Glencore up 8% today so far. Don't say I didn't tell you :-) Will now shut up about it.
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>> The reason the market is so indecisive is probably because of the fear of Hornby
>> going bust in the near term; if/when that goes away then the shares will probably
>> rise in the short term at least and will surely be less volatile.
>
The failure or otherwise of Hornby is not a significant factor in the stock market. Its been bust several times before, if it fails again its only significant worth is the name and goodwill "hornby trains" and "Scaletrix" both of which can be easily sold off by the receiver.
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>> >> The reason the market is so indecisive is probably because of the fear of
>> Hornby
>> >> going bust in the near term; if/when that goes away then the shares will
>> probably
>> >> rise in the short term at least and will surely be less volatile.
>> >
>> The failure or otherwise of Hornby is not a significant factor in the stock market.
>> Its been bust several times before, if it fails again its only significant worth is
>> the name and goodwill "hornby trains" and "Scaletrix" both of which can be easily sold
>> off by the receiver.
I meant indecisive about the value of Hornby. What happens to Hornby makes no difference to the market (except in its own shares).
The failure of Hornby is significant for Hornby shareholders who will get nothing if it goes bust.
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>> >> >
>> The failure or otherwise of Hornby is not a significant factor in the stock market.
>> Its been bust several times before, if it fails again its only significant worth is
>> the name and goodwill "hornby trains" and "Scaletrix" both of which can be easily sold
>> off by the receiver.
>>
Hornby's problem is that the hobby side of the market isn't big enough to be profitable, they need to sell toy trains to be viable. At various time the Thomas the Tank Engine and Harry Potter Hogwart's Express sets have boosted sales but as toys go train sets are no longer a big seller.
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It's pretty neat that you've spotted that here yet their management still seem to be under some other illusion :-)
They do make other stuff like Scalextric don't they? I had a really big set in the late 60s, my Dad got it second hand. I loved it but wasn't often allowed the space to put it out for any length of time.
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>>>>
>> They do make other stuff like Scalextric don't they? I had a really big set
>> in the late 60s, my Dad got it second hand. I loved it but wasn't
>> often allowed the space to put it out for any length of time.
>>
newsthump.com/2016/02/15/jeremy-corbyn-pledges-to-nationalise-hornby/
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>>Dropped 2.39% today
A tad better now at -1.99!
Sooty has it spot on in my 'umble opinion.
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Times like these are not good for the small investor.
I have some shares from my previous employer and am keeping them for a next egg in a few years time (weddings etc.). I got them as a bonus and wasn't allowed to sell them for a while. Now I can sell them they are down about 1/3 over the last 3 months. I am not one to trade shares regularly and expect (hope) that they will go up again.
I also have a share-save scheme with my current employer, that has had a similar fall. At least you can get all of your money back on these if the share price is below the offer price but I might wait until next September and October to see if the new scheme offers a better price.
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>>I see there's talk about quite a few companies talking advantage of the cheap share prices to buy-back shares.
What is the advantage of the companies doing this?
I can see that cash is used impacting cash flow but there will be less dividends to pay out on the cash.
Assets will also be reduced (reduction in cash - current asset) - but I don't know where the equivalent reduction in liabilities is?
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It allows them to buy the stocks cheap and then sell them back after the price has risen.
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www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/042015/why-would-company-buyback-its-own-shares.asp
which essentially says
1) a way to pay off investors and reduce the overall cost of capital
2) to take advantage of undervaluation. Their example shows how a company was able to turn $2.5 million in equity into $3.5 million without further diluting ownership by issuing additional shares.
3) to make a business look more attractive to investors
Last edited by: smokie on Thu 11 Feb 16 at 14:30
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6 months ago I decided to ditch my cash Isas ... Transferred substantial funds into a share dealing stocks & shares fund. To be on the safe ride I Set a stop loss on all the equities. 8 of the 15 shares were sold automatically when they hit the stop loss. I bought 5 of them back and then they got sold again on my stop loss system.! In truth, the 15 were speculative, some of them oil stocks, but I'm currently 45% down on my overall fund.
Hey ho.
Think I'll stop in Spain
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Welcome to the club LL, I invested quite a bit in funds last July when I stopped work and took most of the cash out of my one man company. There was some deliberateness about the high risk I took with some of it, but it's clearly not paid off and I am just retreating back into cash and licking my (rather deep) wounds.
In the order of 25% for me but in actual fact I can console myself that as the company put it into a pension fund for me there was no corporation tax paid so I've lost what the taxman would have had. I just wish I'd bailed earlier...
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I think the thing with investing in stocks and shares is to come up with a target, ie what do you want the money for and when, then work back from that with risk, funds, companies etc. Don't just bung it and hope for the best.
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Trust me, I did LOTS of research before I 'bunged' my funds into 15 speculative companies. Read lots of broker reports, independent financial websites, spoke with friends who work in that particular field.
Just as well I only invested what I could 'afford' to lose, without substantially affecting my lifestyle
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...nor did I just "bung" it in to some random companies. I had some ideas, did my research and decided to go with some quite significant risk but it didn't pay off. Hey ho, but that doesn't disallow me from feeling a bit disappointed with it (and myself) ... I've learnt lots along the way... :-)
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There was significant 'risk' with my investments...spread over 15 companies with plenty of due diligence on my part. Sadly, I don't think I've really learnt anything. Given the same circumstances I would act similarly, all things considered.
Pal of mine invested £7k in Pantheon...bought at 20p and I recommended he sell 6 months later at £1.40. Spectacular gain in his S& S Isa..now down to around 80p but still a four bagger despite the spread price.
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>> ...nor did I just "bung" it in to some random companies. I had some ideas,
>> did my research and decided to go with some quite significant risk but it didn't
>> pay off. Hey ho, but that doesn't disallow me from feeling a bit disappointed with
>> it (and myself) ... I've learnt lots along the way... :-)
Dipping in and out of the market with short term goals and a small spread portfolio is almost guaranteed to be a disaster.
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Totally agree. Got to take a 5 year perspective as a minimum.
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Well I haven't stopped investing, just paused while the market re-aligns. I'd say it's called Active fund management...
Whyever would I want to sit watching my pot dwindling when I can take a break until the market is on a more steady footing?
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The idea is to invest at the bottom? The trick is to know when that is.
Forget that asset managers job, stick with PM.
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I wasn't having a go at anyone's investment strategy :-) Just commenting on my ideas about investing.
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Stop loss orders aren't always a great idea. They can make more sense to protect unrealised gains than to prevent actual losses, because there's always a good chance that a stock will go down in the short term and a loss is guaranteed if the stop loss is triggered on a short term fluctuation.
The current downward movement is a bit more than a fluctuation, which can raise another problem. When there have been big losses overnight on other markets, stocks can open significantly lower than they closed, and can trigger a sale at a price well below the stop loss.
I'm not happy about the price drops, but I haven't sold anything yet. In fact I'll probably suspend drawings from my pension this year (I took a year's worth of capped drawdown last March and planned to do the same again) so I can avoid depleting the capital too quickly.
I have cocked one thing up though. We planned to spend quite a lot improving and extending the house this year, and I neglected to sell down the S&S ISA holdings in anticipation of paying for it. Dumb. It might get delayed for a while.
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>> Sooty has it spot on in my 'umble opinion.
Yes.
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Might as well go down the bookies, which sounds a lot more fun.
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I'd much prefer to have gone to the bookies with it. At least they've pretty much cleaned up their act - not a lot of doping, "not trying" or other cheatery these days, unlike the financial markets where you are up against the hedge funds and shorters who are manipulating markets for their own benefit.
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Back in the 90's I invested £80k in the bond market, the market crashed and I lost £18k in no time at all, but that includes what I would have earned as interest in the building society at that time. A fool and his money ... !
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My mistake was not selling shares at the right time.Greed takes over what goes up will come down.
Spend your money whatever you have.Emergency fund makes sense.
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I genuinely don't care. At all.
uk.finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=%5EFTSE
Wind the scale to max. You can buy random stock at ANY point over the last 20 years and in the long term your investment will increase. It's a blip, caused by incompetent regulation, panic selling, dodgy betting, and the fortunate and hopefully imminent economic death of China.
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>> I genuinely don't care. At all.
Nor should you as a youngster. If you are putting regular amounts into funds for example, you are currently getting more units for your money.
Even if you are just sitting on investments for the long term, it's madness to sell every time there's a general drop, even a big one; you'll just end up with no money.
I'm more likely to buy than sell in the near future.
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Odd to see that Shell is up this morning. It was about £1 down from the current price a couple of weeks back. Also up a few minutes ago on my "watch list" are Astra Zeneka, Aviva, BAE, HSBC and Legal and General
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Quite a strong surge today, FTSE up 1.6% at the moment but needs quite a few days like that to recover lost ground.
I see Rolls Royce are up quite a bit (13.5% today), they announced they were slashing their dividend. They dropped a lot at the back end of last year (were £8 in the summer, now just over £6)
Glencore seems the one for a daily punt, The price gets driven down +/- 10% one day then seems to go up a similar amount the next (well not quite daily but you see what I mean - uk.finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=GLEN.L#symbol=GLEN.L;range=3m )
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My DC pension contributions are invested automatically at the end of each month (in to three funds selected out of ten by me) by the employer appointed company regardless of the market conditions.
Majority of my personal savings are in the stock market, most of them in ETFs tracking indices spread about the world. I am not a "trader". I do not buy and sell, I just buy and hold - except near the end of each tax year as explained below.
My philosophy has been not to try and pick individual shares, nor get stressed about daily or weekly fluctuations in the indices or the underlying currencies in the regions I am tracking. I invest each month, trying to pick as much of a low point as I can but accept that it may go lower during that month or even further down in the following months.
During volatile swings such as we have had in the last 6 months, I bring forward my investment dates to whenever the media makes a big fuss over markets crashing. Also, I invest more (double or triple) than the regular sum than I normally do.
By making it a rule to continue investing at roughly equal regular intervals, it has allowed me to take advantage of pound-cost-averaging.
I sell selectively in February and March to crystallise some capital gains to make the most that I can of the annual tax-free allowance.
The present turmoil is a buying opportunity for me, even if markets go down further in the next few months.
Twelve guilty parties had a hand in the current market turmoil
www.ft.com/cms/s/2/fcca701c-d0fd-11e5-831d-09f7778e7377.html
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>> Glencore seems the one for a daily punt, The price gets driven down +/- 10%
>> one day then seems to go up a similar amount the next (well not quite
>> daily but you see what I mean - uk.finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=GLEN.L#symbol=GLEN.L;range=3m
Investing in mining ores and minerals at the moment is more dangerous than giving a kid a cuthroat.
(I was doing some work at Xstrata at one of their peaks - its always a roller coaster)
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So at the time when I said that "Glencore seems the one for a daily punt" their shares were about 87.6p. Today they are at about 144p, whereas Hornby are only up about 25%. I would have put my money where my mouth is too.
Except I had to move it from one provider to another to be able to do day dealing. The transfer began, albeit slowly, and the money was going to a Willis Owen fund. Their provider who runs their platform (and portal) has gone bust, leaving my money in a state of suspense - I can't reach it to do anything. Mighty annoying... www.willisowen.co.uk/%5Cwillisowen_platform_redirect.php
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>> seems the one for a daily punt,
The daily punt teqnique will always give you a bath.
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>>Investing in mining ores and minerals at the moment is more dangerous than giving a kid a cuthroat.
>> The daily punt teqnique will always give you a bath.
Correct and correct, for us ordinary herberts.
Avoid share tips like the plague. If you like equities and you want a bit less volatility than the index with the prospect of similar returns, follow a good manager such as Woodford or Barnett at Invesco, and drip the money in.
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No, I'm not a real one. But I have been swimming with manatees at Crystal Springs.
Harmless things, but not much conversation.
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>>But I have been swimming with manatees at Crystal Springs.
Nice. I have a rellie in Florida [21° today] I'll have to ask him about Crystal Springs.
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I was out and about this morning, my excuse for being er, wrong. It was Crystal River, which I think is where the manatees are currently gathering round the underwater geysers. I can't recall whether we were actually on the Crystal River itself or the adjacent Homosassa, but there were warm springs.
We had a week in a place called Cedar Key, up towards the panhandle on the Gulf coast. We'd been to Tampa/St Petersburg to the Dali museum and spotted the billboards with manatees on them on the way there and back, so the next day we went and had a closer look.
There was a diving school that did "swim with manatees" trips for about $50/person. There were three of us on the dive boat ( me, boss and our then 14 year old son) who just borrowed wetsuits, fins and masks, and another family of three who had scuba gear.
The 'captain' looked like Quint from Jaws. The boss couldn't get the hang of the snorkel to start with and came up spluttering by the boat the first three times she went in; he just hauled her out with one hand and placed her gently on the deck to recover.
It wasn't exactly high octane, and I'm sure dolphins are more engaging; but there's something about manatees. They don't seem bothered whether you are there or not most of the time, and it's easy to get in among them. Mostly their attention is focused on chomping weeds, but they'll come and have look at you if you don't flap about too much. They don't care about the stock market as far as I know.
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Seems to have bounced back at least in part. Back over 5800 this morning.
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Now over 6000.
It never ceases to amaze me just how quickly market sentiment can change.
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The FTSE 100 seems to be holding up.
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My money is in my current account at my local bank.
No risk for me, thank you.
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You are still at risk from inflation, even though that is low for the present. Since you get no interest on your savings you might be better advised to park them in Premium Bonds.
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>> you might be better advised to park them in Premium Bonds.
They are beginning to look attractive but for how long, I wonder.
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stock market looking a bit scary - Lygonos
