This matter of Mr Sarao has unsurprisingly attracted a lot of comment in today’s press. What shines out is the inability of anybody to identify what has occurred and how it breaches any law remotely understood to anybody. One correspondent (I asked four expert traders yesterday what they thought had gone on) remarks that, seemingly,…
The secret of announcing losses is to describe them as “non-cash”, which means that they do not count. As if. However, should one knock off intangibles from Tesco (TSCO)‘s balance sheet, one is left with £3.3bn tnav. This contrasts with a market valuation of the order of £19bn. This is quite alright provided one reckons…
Ben Edelman, an associate professor at Harvard where he lectures on the MBA course, stayed with me and my wife over the weekend, preparatory to talking in public on Adware Shenanigans in 2015. It was really interesting – clearly there is massive fraud taking place. The chief villain in quoted UK is blinkx (BLNX). Seemingly,…
You have to hand it to Rob Terry. Here he is facing serious questioning from the FCA over his conduct in and around Quindell (QPP) and he asks the FCA for permission to go over 10% of Daniel Stewart (DAN). I suppose that this is roughly analogous to a condemned man asking for a glass…
Poundland (PLND) faces legal problems at the hands of the Competition and Markets Authority in taking over 99p Stores since the authorities have invented the notion that this particular band of discount retailing should be treated as different from all others. I trust that further reflection amongst those who impose these pointless costs of enquiry…
Greatly to my surprise Petro Matad (MATD) has announced a farm-out of aspects of its Mongolian properties with BG Group (BG.). The money problem is also resolved. Petro Matad retains Block XX – apparently this could be pretty good as well. I bought 100,000 at 10p – just to keep my hand in. My friend…
I have very recently commented on the big unravel coming at Mitie (MTO) and was surprised that the stock recovered to 281p at COB last Friday. Anyway, Saturday’s DMail finance section leads on delays now being encountered at Mitie on paying up arrears of pay where Mitie had underpaid in the sense of below the…
As my contribution to this first edition of Master Investor, I have decided to clarify some points concerning regulation of AIM. This is partly because it is not understood and partly because it is complex and unusual. AIM is a division or franchise (as the LSE likes to promote it) of the London Stock Exchange.…
Evil discusses Mitie, Concha and Optibiotix… Mitie (MTO) offer a market update this morning. The telling paragraph is: “As a result of the market pressures in the homecare and social housing businesses we expect our full year headline operating profit to be slightly below current market expectations.” This is just the beginning of the great…
Evil discusses ASOS, Quindell, the business leaders’ letter in support of the Tories, and Sam Cameron… I may have missed something (I doubt it) but ASOS (ASC) is on a PE of the order of 100 and profits are declining. Timber! The fan club would point out, if minded, that I have misunderstood matters. All…
