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Company Presentation and Supper in Richmond (Surrey)

We are pleased to announce we are launching the very first ShareSoc Supper in the UK and it will be taking place in Richmond in South West London on the 1st March. This is a response to feedback from our member survey telling us they want more events; it will be starting in Richmond but others will follow if our members like it (another one is already scheduled for the 3rd May). The purpose of the suppers is to bring interesting companies ...

Sainsbury and Home Retail – A Done Deal?

As I commented on the proposed acquisition of Home Retail by Sainsbury in previous blog posts (as a shareholder in the latter) here's some on this mornings announcement. In essence a deal has been agreed, with an offer equivalent to 161.3p in the hands of Home Retail shareholders. But that includes a capital return by Home Retail to their shareholders from the sale of Homebase which Sainsbury probably did not want anyway. The key justification for the deal is given later in ...

TD Direct Being Sold?

TD Direct, a favourite execution-only stockbroker among private investors, is likely to be sold according to a report by Sky News. There are a number of suggested bidders but one of them is Barclays Bank who run a similar platform under the name Barclays Stockbrokers. With TD Direct having £13 billion of assets under management, a merger of those platforms would still leave the combination somewhat smaller than Hargreaves Lansdown, the market leader. Mergers and restructurings are the name of the game ...

Placings and Open Offers and How to Do Them – St Ives and Tritax

One of the things that annoys private investors is when a company does a placing of shares. This can be for a number of reasons such as the company needing funds for an acquisition, or simply because the company is fast running out of cash and wishes to stave off financial distress. Because of the EU mandated Prospectus Directive, a full Rights Issue where all shareholders can participate in the share issuance and hence avoid dilution of their stake, does require an ...

More Bad News for Banks and their Investors

If there are any private investors still invested in major UK listed banks, last week (w/e 30/1/2016) was yet another for disillusionment. In the Financial Times, Lex hit the nail on the head when he said "The one-offs keep on coming. If one did not know better, one might suspect them of being two-, three-, or more-offs". He was referring to Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS), but other banks likewise posted bad news during the week. Let's take them in turn: RBS ...