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ShareSoc Blog

This blog gives you the latest topical news plus some informal comments on them from ShareSoc’s directors and other contributors. These are the personal comments of the authors and not necessarily the considered views of ShareSoc. The writers may hold shares in the companies mentioned. You can add your own comments on the blog posts, but note that ShareSoc reserves the right to remove or edit comments where they are inappropriate or defamatory.

There is more news given in the News page of our web site and more analysis of news is provided in our monthly newsletter for members – see the Newsletters page.

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It’s a Bleak Mid-Winter

It’s a bleak mid-winter, everybody is hunkering down against the icy winds, Royal Mail have given up delivering post even in the London suburbs, and retailers are suffering. Well no, actually it’s the second day of Spring but the first was the coldest one on record. But the stock market is drifting down and the news from many companies is dire. Let’s review some of those to start with. Note: I hold or have held some of the companies mentioned. Safestyle (SFE) sell ...

Running Out of Gas, and InvestorEase to Close

Media reports suggest that National Grid is running out of gas, and having to pay industrial users to stop consuming it. This is due to the exceptionally cold weather spell. But National Grid has also been running out of shareholders because of fears over possible nationalisation. The share price is down by 33% on its peak in 2016. As I have probably said before, the threat of nationalisation has undoubtedly spooked international investors who now dominate the holdings of UK public ...

Persimmon Pay and Rightmove Results

This morning the directors of Persimmon (PSN) gave in to demands to revise the benefits they would get from their LTIP scheme. This has drawn lots of criticism from investors, even institutional ones who voted for the scheme a few years back. They clearly either did not understand the workings of the scheme or did not understand the possible implications. I voted against it at the time as a holder of shares in this company, but then I do against most ...

ShareSoc will Demand Action from the FCA over Account Switching Delays

Earlier this month I read this Times article concerning disgruntled clients of Barclays' Smart Investor platform. It highlights once again the longstanding issue that changing your provider of share trading services (stockbroker or platform) is often a painful process. It is not unusual for the switch to take several months, during which you may not be able to sell shares that you own or access funds held in your account. I find this unacceptable in the 21st century, when modern IT systems ought ...

Hargreaves Lansdown and Fund Charges

Phil Oakley of Sharescope wrote a good piece on Hargreaves Lansdown (HL) in his weekly roundup published on 16th February. Why are they so profitable a business when, as Terry Smith said, they seem to be in essence a “distributor” operating in a highly competitive field with few barriers to entry? The answer, apart from their high-quality customer service, is the level of charges they make on investment in funds (unit trusts and OEICS, not investment trusts which are treated as ...

RBS Shareholder Committee: We’ve (almost) won!

Great news from RBS! RBS have agreed to have our resolution put to the AGM. UNFORTUNATELY, they will only agree to this, if the resolution is a SPECIAL Resolution rather than an ordinary one. That means that we will have to resubmit our requisitions for the special resolution. So, if you own RBS shares, please complete the new Special Resolution Requisition form, which you can download from the ShareSoc website, click here. Getting the shareholder resolution on the RBS AGM agenda is a huge ...

Audit Quality and the Caparo Judgement

There was a very good letter from Guy Jubb and Mark Solomon on the subject of the Caparo legal judgement in the Financial Times yesterday (6/2/2018). It was headlined “It is time the curse of Caparo was broken”. Here is some of what it said:  ….the joint inquiry into Carillion by the parliamentary Work and Pensions Committee, and Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee, must examine closely the little-known consequences of the Caparo judgment (Caparo Industries plc v Dickman [1990] 2 AC ...

BEIS Committee investigates Carillion. ShareSoc and the UK Shareholders Association submit joint response.

The item below is ShareSoc and UKSA's joint response to a request for comment from the BEIS parliamentary select committee on Corporate Governance regarding events at Carillion. Click here to read the PDF version. 5 February 2018 Chris Shaw, Clerk, BEIS Committee on Corporate Governance Dear Chris, Carillion and implications Please note this is a joint response on behalf of UKSA and ShareSoc We understand that the Select Committee, along with the Work and Pensions Committee, is looking at the collapse of Carillion at the moment. So, we are ...

Carillion and FRC investigation

I know that some members are taking a very active interest in what went wrong at Carillion. The email below from the FRC contains a link to a document which you may find both useful and interesting to support your own research and in helping to reach some initial conclusions. "From: FRC Sent: 29 January 2018 09:54 To: Various Subject: News Alert - Accounting and reporting framework for the construction and business support services sectors In the light of the collapse of Carillion, the Financial Reporting Council ...

Revenue Recognition, Patisserie Valerie, Utilitywise and Cryptocurrencies

Revenue recognition is a hot topic at present as folks have come to realise that this is a frequent cause of company accounts misrepresenting the true state of the business. Quindell and Blancco are two examples and I cover Utilitywise below. But first let me report on the Annual General Meeting of Patisserie Valerie (TIDM:CAKE) which I attended this morning (as a shareholder of course). The company operates a chain of cake+coffee shops under the company name but they also have several ...
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