This should be a piece of cake

Macron has emerged on top. But France’s involvement in the Euro still needs to be settled – and Macron offers no hope there. And the problem of bringing Islam under control is staring everybody in the face. This latter will not wait for some fiddle.

It means that the Euro short is probably very sensible, majoring on short EUR/GBP. Anyway, that’s what the chairman has told me to do for a 4% profit by 1st June.

*****

Enquiry into Purplebricks (LON:PURP) continues apace. There is this funny TV advertisement in which a young lady has it pointed out to her that she could have avoided commission on the sale of her property of many times the amount paid to PURP. She collapses her shocked face into a cream and strawberry gateau. What the ad does not emphasise is that this flat fee does not secure a sale whereas commission is only payable in the event of a sale. Many – with many more to follow – think that this advertisement is misleading. As one punter put it to me PURP has no chance of financial success. Perhaps they should major on selling lovely cakes. This is however a different business altogether.

*****

Book review: I strongly recommend Edward O Thorp’s A Man for All Markets published very recently by Random House. Thorp came from a poor background and just happens to be one of nature’s mathematicians. He worked out how to profit at blackjack provided one could count cards. He could. He then turned to Wall Street.

All this in itself is fairly gripping stuff (Thorp writes very well) but it is his interweaving of his personal background with his main story that makes the book. Hurry along now.

(Thorp recalls that one casino owner/operator said that “when the lamb goes to the slaughter, the lamb might kill the butcher but we always bet on the butcher.”)

*****

My father, who as readers have been told many times is now 97, has noted the Queen’s imminent need for a gentleman walker. He is tall, has a number of suits in good condition, sports a reasonable head of hair and has plenty of cream silk shirts. And he is good at bon mots. He fancies his chances. Does the nation?

*****

Saturday’s Newmarket card was very frustrating. Had Al Wukair got going behind a faster pace he might well have won. Anyway, I expect he’ll be back for Ascot and we can recover losses then.