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Hi Tom,
It's very interesting to hear the stories of 1987 retold by the 'old timers' just to keep in perspective the mild downturns that we have had since then.
Over here the bullish news (or should that be bullshit news) comes thick and fast about how well things are going and how the boom will last indefinitely but they don't mention the chain reaction of US downturn = China downturn = Australia downturn.
House prices are reaching new highs and at are all time affordability lows but people just extrapolate it into the future . I must admit it does set me on edge when I see house prices keep rocketing up by +12% per year, at the moment I'm renting and have to resist the urge to capitulate and pay a crippling price for a house.
The people who are laughing are the retirees who are transferring the wealth of the younger generations into their bank accounts when their houses are sold.
I did the interview thing on Monday so hopefully there should be an article mentioning AIM in a future edition of Smart Investor, I'll post a copy if it appears (and makes any sense)
Regards
Neil
ETF's at last.
The modern world has arrived in Australia!
Last week they launched the series of Ishares on the local exchange I think about 8 different ones in all.
They are CDI's so they are basically the same as the ones you have in the US.
This means I'll be able to diversify and AIM various overseas indexes. It should be a good time to start a few ETF's as the Aussie Dollar has gained some real strength and is probably over valued even so it would be good to pick up some foreign assets.
Regards
Neil
Hi Is7550,
I like the spreadsheet and have a question about it.
How do you indicate that you have carried out a buy or a sell and get it to update to the next price? I don't think it was mentioned in the help screens
Very nice popup screen, some good work there.
Regards
Neil
Hi Tom,
I can see the sell bar now, hiding on the price trace, I knew there must be a simple explanation.
Just had my tax return finalised for the year (June 30th is our year end) and I it looks like I'm going to have to say goodbye to my accountant of 7 years now as it seems as a matter of course he just ups the bill by 10% per year so, I'm paying almost double what I was 7 years ago.
I enclosed a letter expressing my displeasure at the creeping increases, especially my accounts have got simpler over they years as I don't do options or futures trading anymore. If he carried on with these increases I would imagine that by the time I reached 60 I'd probably be working just to pay his bill.
Looks like I will have to do the same thing as I do with my insurance, change every few years. It's a shame as I like to deal with familiar faces.
Do you face this same problem?
Regards
Neil
Sell in Andean Resources.
What a little cracker this one has been. I started off with three buys but as it was a speculative purchase I only bought $1000 quantities on the way down.
It hit a low of around 25c around a year ago, now it is standing at $1.40 and I have had 5 sells and just one quantity remaining to ship out of the door which I would like to move out of the shop at about $1.70 or better.
The 'grazing' technique of running a quantity of speculative shares and only putting a maximum of around $3k in (3 buys of $1000 on the way down) then biting of the tall shoots is a great little method of cash generation from speccy volatility, this can then be funneled into more stable stocks that actually have earnings.
Regards
Neil
Hi Aimster,
Well, I had a call today from the people at Smart Investor magazine and they have arranged to interview me on the Monday so I'm going to give AIM a good plug.
I directed the interviewer to Tom's website to do some background research and I said I'd answer any other questions on the Monday.
So maybe I can cause a traffic spike, lets see.
Maybe this is my Andy Warhol 15 minutes )
I'm sure that things have quietened down because the real risk s in the market are not being recognised by a majority of investors, so, that being the case a risk management tool like AIM would be given low priority.
The Australian market is breaking yet more records 6779 is the new high. Each night we hear that the market is breaking new records. This will probably suck more people into the market and keep the momentum up, which is fine by me as it will give me the opportunity to sell my stocks to them.
Regards
Neil
Hi Tom,
I noticed on your graph that you had 2 buys indicated on those dips but the second buy was higher than the first, was that just a top up or was it a signaled buy?
I'm still waiting over this side of the pons for some more ETF's to appear. Interestingly, while I was downloading data the other day I noticed that some new securities were added to the database and low and behold they were I-shares, but I'm not sure if the data provider was giving the data out as a nicety or whether they can be purchased on the ASX.
Regards
Neil
Hi Al,
I get the impression that most younger people are cynical about investing, due to some of the things you mentioned, about the scams and how workers are sometimes exploited.
I have said that they could look at it a different way, now I tend to be cynical about politics and with good reason, I find very few politicians inspirational and they have subverted democracy and turned in into a hollowed out shell.
With the ability to put your money where your mouth is so to speak, you can back companies that you believe will have a benificial influence on the world rather than a negative one. I choose to put funds into the area of renewables because it is something I believe we need to really push forward.
My government isn't going to do it as it doesn't believe there is a problem, this is the great thing about investing, if I am right and they are wrong I can back my feeling.
The use of AIM helps me back my convictions by redcing the very high risk of investing in newly listed companies.
If people became more educated in the area of finance we could take the power from the politicians and shape a world, hopefully better than they can.
Regards
Neil
Publicity.
Recently I attended a bash thrown by the Australian Financial Review at the Adelaide Wine Centre.
I got there and found that I didn't know anybody and, funnily enough there never seems to be any younger people here, like they just don't seem to be involved in the the investing area.
When standing there sipping my wine a young lady struck up a conversation with me, I later found out she was giving the lecture that evening.
I had mentioned the method I used for buying and selling shares and she was very interested and asked for my contact details so they could do a possible interview for the Smart Investor magazine to talk about AIM.
If it comes through I might be able to raise the profile of AIM and Mr Lichello's other great tool Twinvest. It still amazes me that it has not taken over from Dollar Cost Averageing as the way to enter into investments with less risk.
Regards
Neil
Aussie Market New High.
Well, the Australian market spent the week taking out new highs and still we are told that that things are not expensive but I have an uneasy feeling that the risk levels are not being adequately taken into account.
The thing is that it is so easy to get caught up in the frenzy and feel that being out of the market that you are missing out.
There is still $100 billion dollars of losses not accounted for in this low doc mortgage mess that is going to rear its head at some point.
I've been reading (for the first time) The Intelligent Investor by Ben Graham and I am so taken by the similarity in his beliefs that you should be selling out as the price of a stock rises as the risk is increasing which is exactly what AIM does. I guess it must have been a very influential book for Mr Lichello.
As for AIM activities this week. I purchased a small quantity of Wind Hydrogen (WHN.AX).
This was a stock I picked up in a float (I know, I should be punished severely for buying in a float). I went for a minimum initial quantity and that hasn't traded above it's issue price of 20c, I bought some more at 13.5c and will now monitor it closely.
I liked their technology that would give a boost to wind power by adding the missing link, the ability to supply power on demand rather than only when the wind is blowing.
I think people have dismissed the renewables area in this country because the government doesn't give a stuff about global warming and just wants to sell as much coal as possible to the rest of the world. I'm counting on it getting more recognition as the sheep like perception of people slowly comes to realise what a mess we are in.
Regards
Neil
Floating or drowning,
Quite an active day over here and quite a bit of red on the screen.
I did get a sell in Equigold (EQI.AX)at $2.66 which went off nicely followed by a buy in Antares Energy (AZZ.AX)at $0.40.
I also was in a stock float that listed today, not the best of days to make a debut and the float promptly sank.
The company was Wind Hydrogen Ltd (WHN.AX).
They are an interesting renewables company that are using hydrogen balancing to give control of the amount of output power and so match the supply with the demand, one of the things that wind power has bee criticised that it cannot do.
I must admit I had been wondering for a few years why nobody had mentioned this before. It just seemed so obvious that when the supply is there but the demand isn't that you must use that supply do do useful work, such as splitting hydrogen or pumping water. Then when the demand is there but not the supply you burn the hydrogen to produce power or release the water through turbines to generate power. Obvious.
Might have to wait for a while for it to surface again.
Regards
Neil
Interest Rates,
It will be interesting (no pun intended) to see if the markets are correct about a drop in the interest rates.
The Fed is between a rock and a hard place, with inflation worries on one side and support (collapse) of the USD on the other. I would think that if I had lots of USD in my account and they were going to reduced the interest rates that that I would be looking to get rid of them and look for a higher yield elsewhere.
This of course would push up the prices of all the imported goods, unfortunately a lot of US manufacturing has now been shipped offshore so that means pay the higher price or do without .
An interesting link is to my favourite gold commentary page:
http://the-privateer.com/gold6.html
Regards
Neil
Hi Toofuzzy,
The 2008 figure is from 1st July 2007 which is the start of the financial year here in Oz.
The 2007 financial year is over, it's probably a figure of speech more than anything else, you could say 06-07 year but I just stick to 2007.
Regards
Neil
AIM return measurements.
I have been using a different method for calculating my portfolio returns.
I've based my idea on the way companies report their profits.
On my spreadsheet I have a purchases column and a sales column, I total each of these columns then subtract the sales from the purchases, this gives me the equity.
I have a running equity as well as an equity for a period such as our financial year.
So, at the end of the financial year I work out the totals up to that date, this tells me the equity (or Working capital) at that point. I then work out the profits from the sales and dividends and divide it by the equity, this gives me the ROE.
I also track the Net Tangeable Assets (NTA) to see how much above the equity they are, they are quite high at the moment as the market is at near highs, but as these profits are unrealised gains they are of curiosity value only.
So far my ROE for the years on my full AIM account have been:
2004.....6.7%
2005....13.4%
2006.....9.7%
2007....23.9%
2008....14.7% (to date)
My LD AIM Account has done.
2004.....2.7%
2005.....7.4%
2006....18.4%
2007...104.8%
2008....11.0%
The 104% 2007 return is high because there was quite a bit of selling in the earlier part of the year and this reduced the equity and in turn produced profits.
Regards
Neil
Housing.
I've been watching all the unfolding housing issues over there on various websites and am wondering when people are going to get the message over here.
Around the time I moved over to Australia I was pleasantly surprised that housing was relatively cheap, it would have been selling for an average of 4 times the annual salary.
A level that has been consistent for most of the last century.
Thing started to go a bit crazy at the turn of the century when the prices started rising abnormally strongly, now, house prices are the worlds most expensive.
Below is an article printed in The Australian in Aug 2005
AFFORDABLE home ownership has slipped further from reach with a US report revealing Australian real estate is the most expensive in the world when adjusted to median household incomes.
Access Economics director Chris Richardson said four Australian cities featured in the world's 10 most expensive, when median house prices were compared with median household income.
The data from United States-based research group Demographia, which was interpreted by Access Economics, found Los Angeles was the most expensive international city, then San Diego and Sydney.
Melbourne ranked eighth on the list, followed by Hobart and Adelaide. Brisbane was the 11th most expensive city.
Australia had the dubious mantle of having the world's most expensive real estate on an adjusted basis, followed by New Zealand.
Mr Richardson said Australia was also the most interest-rate-sensitive nation because of the crisis in housing affordability, and he criticised the Reserve Bank's decision to raise rates by 0.25 per cent in March.
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"It was certainly a mistake, but not a disaster," he said.
The head of property research at Macquarie Bank, Rod Cornish, said any calculation of housing affordability needed to take into account interest rates, but he conceded that Australian cities rated as some of the most expensive in the world.
Mr Cornish said the most accurate measure of house affordability was the percentage of household income used to service a mortgage, which had fallen in several cities in the past year.
The latest estimates from AMP and the Real Estate Institute of Victoria say that the average family would need to devote almost 30 per cent of its income to monthly loan payments to afford an average house in Melbourne. But Melbourne was far from the worst case, with loan payments on an average house eating up 31 per cent of the average family's income in Brisbane, and 36 per cent in Sydney.
Two years after that article and prices are still going up, the music hasn't stopped and they are even more unaffordable now. There will be a blackswan event that will knock the stuffing out of the market here at some point, just like it has done in the US, I can't predict what it will be as it is a blackswan after all an unknown unknown as old Rummy would say.
Regards
Neil
Purchasing dept,
I forgot to mention how busy the purchasing dept was towards the end of the month when we had our dive.
I have been using some valuation software so I can gauge if I'm paying the right price or not for the companies earnings.
The software basically works out a normalised ROE then you divide that by the return that you want and finally multiply that figure by the equity and that should give you the approximate price (that is if the stock was paying out all the earnings, similar to a bond), the price will be higher if the depending upon the retained profits.
The recent market plunges have been good opportunities to buy companies at far better prices.
I picked up some ANZ Bank, Macquarie bank and Aristocrat Leisure for some very attractive prices, these are all in the 'Blue Chip' category as I wasn't going to start any new programs with tiny mining stocks.
At least with the three stocks above they are all good dividend payers.
Regards
Neil
Back again,
I've been a little slack posting recently, it has been cold at night(winter has just ended) so I've been retiring early and reading.
There has not been a huge amount of action over this side of the pond and quite a few stocks in the portfolio are in the middle of their range.
I did get one buy through the week on Ceramic Fuel Cells (CFU.AX)at a price of $0.86, this follows three sells, the last of which was at $1.34, so I'm building up the holding again.
Another stock came out of its 30 day timeout period so a buy has been placed on Antares Energy (AZZ.AX) which is busy drilling in good old Texas. This too has had some good volatility, three sells up to a price of 93c, one buy at 47c and another placed at 40c after waiting for a period to deploy more funds.
I also have a sale lined up in Equigold (EQI.AX) after a huge move up on the Friday. As Monday is going to be a big dive day I'm wondering if it will hold up as the gold price was pretty strong.
It is tempting to hang onto a stock but in these volatile times having cash in your pocket is important.
Regards
Neil
Gold!
About the only stock in my portfolio that went up today was GOLD.AX which is a gold bullion holding fund that reflects the gold price in A$.
As it happens I purchased some gold while on holiday in rainy England, maybe if it had been sunny I wouldn't have been tinkering about on the computer.
I'd noticed the A$ was buying 88c US, as high as I can remember, at the same time the gold price was low in USD terms, therefore a screaming buy.
Fast forward a mere 2 weeks and the A$ is now worth just over 80c US so this has forced up the A$ price of Gold, a nice little hedge.
Now to get it into an AIM program.
Regards
Neil
9/11 Comparison
Interestingly, the market in Australia, after the news of the Sept 11 incident, dropped from 3183 to 2867 over the course of two weeks.
This was a drop of a mere 10%, not really that much in comparison with the fall so far with the US mortgage collapse we are down 11.5 %, it would have been even more if it hadn't been for the late day recovery.
Back in 2001 the market dropped from a high of 3425 to a low of 2867 which was a total drop of 16%, I could see the market surpassing that if we continue at the current velocity.
Another interesting item.
I'm currently reading a book called Liars Poker, about the Solomon Brothers bond traders in the late 80's I think. While the new employees are going through their induction into the firm, one of the old traders comments that there was too much credit being created in the form of bonds and it was completely out of sync with the GDP and it would all end in tears.
It did.... in 1987.
Fast forward to 2005-2007 could this be history repeating itself, all this credit being magiced out of thin air, given to people who had no idea of the obligations they were under. How little we learn from history.
Regards
Neil
Wild Gyrations
Greetings from Down Under, now for the market report.
Some really wild gyrations today with the market making a precipitous drop of 300 Points or 5% at it's worst during the day.
I heard that this was due to a brief closure of the futures exchange for some kind of maintainance, this forced the hedge funds who are shorting the market with a fury to switch to the physical market to then short the hell out of stocks. As soon as the futures market opened again they switched around, covered their shorts and continued to short the SPI.
So after the 300 point drop the elastic prices shot back and the index ended up closing about 88 points lower.
I bought some more shares to start a new program in ANZ Bank, its down 13% from its high and according to my valuation software about 20% away from it's valuation. It has quite a nice dividend yield of around 7% before tax.
I am being selective about which shares I buy, making sure they are of the highest quality with good earnings. I'm ignoring some of the buy signals from some of the more speculative end of my portfolio.
Currently the DOW futures are down a further 141 points so it might be a weak opening over your side of the pond.
Regards
Neil
Gnashing of Investor Teeth
Yes, I'm sure there was plenty of that going on today on the All Ordinaries as it fell 181 points or over 3% during the day.
The accountant, had a word again while at work and was considering going to cash. I did remind him that timing the market is fraught with difficulties.
Wouldn't you just kick yourself if you changed your retirement savings to cash right at the bottom.
I meanwhile started another AIM program on Macquarie Bank (MBL.AX) which has taken a hammering since it's high of over $98, I picked up an initial quantity at $68 or thereabouts I think. It is at below valuation at this point so I don't mind picking up more.
More companies are coming into value range now so I'm dusting off the cashbox as the sellers all dive into the shop.
Regards
Neil
Insurance,
Ho ho ho, even had the accountant at work asking me how much it would cost to buy index Put options to protect his portfolio.
I think he's asking me as I used to be an option trader, I had to give him disappointing news.
hard to believe that an accountant would not know the in's and out's of various financial instruments.
He wanted to buy a Put with a year expiry at around current index levels.
Now, this is kind of like asking for an insurance quote as your house is burning down, not quite the best time.
I worked it out that to buy an All Ords Put would set him back around $3,800 for around $60,000 worth of protection, if he went for a futures Put then that would cost a hefty $11,000 but then you get around $170,000 worth of protection.
But the time to buy is when everyone is happy and smiling and bullish, NOT when they are jumping out of windows.
Don't you just love all this irrationality.
Regards
Neil
Posting Volatility,
Wow, all this market volatility has lead to a spike in posting volatility, umm it a shame its not tradeable.
Gee I've been slack, it is amazing, you go away for a month and it takes over a week to catch up on things, all the time the market is acting like it's on uppers one minute then downers the next.
Hey I actually had a buy last week in Antares Energy (AZZ.AX) for 47c so I have now topped up the account after having around three sells on it in the last 6 months.
I am debating whether, next time I get a buy signalled that I should in fact go and buy the convertable note instead of the share as it is now paying a hefty 13.5% interest rate. Interestingly I noticed that one of the directors was also in there buying as well, a little vote of confidence.
I have a market order in to pick up some more Pro Medicus (PME.AX) at around $1.20, this stock has a great ROE if it can be picked up at the right price.
I noticed that the DOW sprang back from its lows on the Friday even though it did close lower, does this mean we are in for a "dead cat" bounce.
What is the on the ground feelings regarding the Low Doc fallout, does anyone have any first hand contact with people that are in the middle of losing their homes or can see the effects around the country.
Regards
Neil
Hi Aim Hier
I used to short stocks quite a few years ago and it is a much more nervous experience than buying shares.
I think this is mainly because when you buy a share you are buying part of a tangible asset (a company) but when you short, in effect you are making a comment on the management of the company and saying the value is being destroyed and so the price should fall.
As we all know though share prices don't necessarily have any link with value so the share price can leap about all over the place making the job of a shorter very difficult. Another thing is that it is psychologically hard to go against the crowd.
Also there is the uptick rule to contend with and the fact that I don't think there are any online brokers that short, unless of course you use CFD's.
I'm awaiting the open of the Australian market, it should be interesting, I've checked the September index futures and they are down by 123 points so it looks like we are down the elevator tomorrow morning.
Regards
Neil
Back again,
Hello all, I've just arrived back from my rainy holiday in the England and straight into the market turmoil, all exciting stuff.
Just what we AIMers were looking for.
I did have a few market orders placed when I went away, one of those were triggered in Perseverence Mining (PSV.AX) to buy a further $1000 of shares. I'd purchased these shares initially over a year ago and not had much action in them, all of a sudden I get too much action as they announced a slowdown in gold production due to lower grade ores along with rising input costs and higher A$.
First purchase was made at 33c, the triggered one was at 27c and I picked up some more when the price slid to 15c.
I'm now on a 30 day timer before I decide to buy again.
I also started up a new program in Gold Bullion (GOLD.AX) which is a pure gold holding company. My reasoning was a weak US$ and a strong A$ meant it was pretty cheap to buy gold and at the time (before the recent routing) there was nothing else regarded as cheap.
It just so happens that it was good timing as the A$ weakened and the gold price strengthened (against the US$).
Also placed an order in for monday's market to buy Antares Energy (AZZ.AX)I had a last sale in AZZ back in March at 93c, I'm hoping to pick some up at 47c or better if there is a morning panic on monday.
Regards
Neil
PS England was wet, very very wet. I had 4 days out of the month when it didn't rain. That is not to say of course that we had sun on those 4 days. I was glad to get back to some warmth in Singapore for a few days. Paid a visit to the Simex exhange where Nick Leeson caused Barings bank a big upset
Holiday
Hi folks,
I'll be a bit quiet for around a month as I take a trip overseas for my brothers wedding.
I shall be in rainy England for around a month, I'm hoping that AIM will be chugging away in the background with very little intervention necessary.
Back shortly
Regards
Neil
A Red Day.
It was a day of red ink on the markets here in Australia and I don't mean a little red ink but lots and lots.
The market fell 2% or 120 points which is odd as it usually shadows the U.S. market and the DOW was only down around 8 points I think. Umm, maybe the Aussie market is anticipating more falls today in your market.
I missed out on what would have been a very nice sale if I had been a little quicker of the mark, or rather if I had made sure I'd entered market orders even though a stock was a round 8% below the sell point.
Geodynamics (GDY.AX) shot up this morning and hit my sell point of $1.98 but by the time I scrambled to get an order placed the action was over and the price began to sink back.
Actually you shouldn't blame me for not placing an order because the stock had settled at a price of $1.78 the previous night, some 20c away from the next sell, I had no idea it would move that quickly up. Maybe next time.
Despite the market being down by 2% today, my portfolio held hp remarkably well and actually put on 0.4%.
My LD-AIM account was more volatile mainly because I am measuring Net Tangiable Assets against Equity and so, as I have been selling in this account over the last week the equity has reduced and the remaining NTA (as a percentage) looks quite large and hence is more volatile.
With 2 more days before the end of the financial year I expect to see some interesting action due to the institutions doing their usual window dressing.
Regards
Neil
Sell sell sell!
Wow, a great start to the week with a couple of sales then at the end a couple more sales, what a productive week.
The end of week sales occurred in Andean Resources (AND.AX), talk about people getting overexcited and irrational.
I last sold some of this stock only on the 16th of April for 55c, my next sell point was around 72c but I actually obtained 77c, that was on the Thursday.
I decided that I should just put another over ambitious sell hurdle in so I thought how about 98c, that's nice and high, should take a month to get over there.
Bam, next morning the stock has shot up again and as lady luck would have it my limit order got taken out at the open not for 98c but for a mighty $1.16, the near high for the day.
These sell points are way above the standard AIM sell points so I'm going to have to fudge it a bit to get it to play ball and not make me sell more below $1.16.
My LD-AIM account is being rapidly reduced to cash, is that good or bad?
Regards
Neil
Hi Steve,
What we refer to over here as Superannuation is the equivalent of your retirement savings accounts.
I think they would be the equivalent of your 401k accounts.
Currently there is a compulsory 9% contribution by the employer that goes into your fund.
You have discretion of where or who invests these funds.
You can also "salary sacrifice" more of your earnings into the Super. This saves you a bit of tax, SS contributions are taxed at 15% rather than your marginal rate such as 30% or 45% depending upon your earnings.
Most people have very scant knowledge or care about their Super, especially when they are younger. It is only as they get older and the spectre of having no retirement savings looms that they take it more seriously.
I just stuff all my Super into a Vanguard High Growth fund as I want low cost and volatility and I'll let the dollar cost averaging do the rest.
Regards
Neil
Sales bonanza!
Just as I was thinking it would be a quiet end to the financial year (June 30th) the public rush the doors and start buying up the stock at some healthy prices.
They made off with some Technology One (TNE.AX) on the Monday, at quite an inflated price I must add (10% above my last sell)
On the Tuesday the sought after, must have item was Geodynamics (GDY.AX), Australia's primary geothermal play. 11.6% higher than the previous price.
Then today, they were at the doors again this time after some gold and took away some Andean Resources. 40% higher than last sell
I need to pause and wipe the sweat from my brow in case there are more buyers out there.
I have a theory on what is causing all this action.
The government has changed the Superannuation rules and for a brief window, closing on June 30th people can put up to $1,000,000 into Super without penalty. This is driving up the market to higher and higher levels as people sell properties and purchase shares or funds.
It will be interesting to see if there is any profit taking at the beginning of July.
Regards
Neil
Sell on Reckon Software
A small sell on this small holding. This was one of the ones that got away so to speak.
I only bought a small initial amount around 18 months ago with the idea that I'd pick up more at a better price. I didn't get the chance and the price has traded higher since purchase so I decided to sell out and take a small profit in the difference between the $0.80 buy price and the $1.25 sell price.
Reckon Software (RKN.AX) are distributers of the Quicken range of software along with other financial packages
I'm currently trialling some stock valuation and out of the nearly 400 companies on their database (they exclude the mining sector as it has little control over the commodity prices)there are only around 2 companies that are fair value, the average is a 38% over valuation.
This will at least allow me to purchase companies that are more financially sound than some of the choices I've made in the past.
Like with all things, even AIM responds by crap out when the input is crap.
Regards
Neil
Sell in Geodynamics
Wow, after a drought of any activity in my accounts for about 5 weeks I get a sale of some Geodynamics stock (GDY.AX).
This has been a great little AIM stock, very volatile at the beginning, dropping by 50% in the first couple of weeks since my initial purchase.
It then recovered all those losses to give a first sale at the same point as my first buy. It is now a good way above that level and after a sell on Wednesday the next boundary is looking achievable.
I think the excitement has been caused by the imminent arrival of their new specialised deep drilling rig to drill into the hot rocks of in the top area of South Australia.
Now I have AIM on my side I like the excitement of riding the big waves of the markets, not getting sea sick any more
Regards
Neil
Congratulations Tom,
I hope your new venture works out really well, I'll be really sad if that means the end of your contributions to the AIM board.
It is amazing how much I have learned in the 2.5 years I've been using the AIM system all down to this great bunch of people that are so willing to help and explain things in an industry where more often secrecy and misleading information are more the norm.
I hope the legacy I-Wave will still be available for viewing as it shows how you were ringing warning bells before the big dotcom crash and even more recently with the rising risk you have been indicating I have been only opening LD-AIM accounts as a risk aversion method.
All the very best for the future
Regards
Neil
PS the back problem is gradually getting better at this end. I bought a little tool for balancing the back called the Sacro Wedgy, strange name but apparently it works, have you come across it at all?
Hi Toofuzzy,
I still think they are barking up the wrong tree looking to produce hydrogen vehicles.
I think the philosophy of the guys at Tesla is still the way to go, a total battery-electric.
I think fuel cells in cars are a red herring made as a distraction. I realise that Honda have a fuel cell car around but I think that their prototype costs many hundreds of thousands of dollars.
The benefits of full electric cars is:
1. Instantaneous startup (no waiting for fuel cells to get warmed up)
2. The electrical infrastructure is already built, you don't have to rip up current refueling stations.
3. Battery technology is improving rapidly. Altairnano's battery can be recharged in under 10 minutes and they are currently being fitted in electric vehicles (fleet sales only for now).
4. The Altairnano battery has a lifetime as long as the car.
5. Charging of electric vehicles can be done by either at home or by solar while parked (like they HAD in California).
All that is needed then is for the grid energy to be produced in a cleaner way. Even if it isn't it is not really a concern as electric vehicles are many times more efficient than gas cars. Like the difference between an incandescent bulb and a flourescent, one is 80% more efficient than the other.
I have a few shares in a fuel cell company but they are targeting the home (distributed) power market where the fuel cell replaces the standard boiler and produces both the hot water and electric power.
Regards
Neil
Hi Tom,
Well, the thing I must always remind myself of is the saying that "Nobody rings the bell when the market hits the top". All the reports and financial news coming out about the Aussie market is that market values are just slightly above long term value. This is due to the steep increase in company earnings.
Apparently in times past, it is when there is a divergence between these earnings and the climbing stock prices, that is the warning of an imminent correction.
I think what may happen is that earnings may slow down and level off but the sheer momentum of the market will continue to carry prices higher.
As earnings reports are only released half yearly it takes a while for that news to filter into the market and by the time they do stock prices could get quite extended.
The assumption we must make is that on previous market corrections such as in 1987, 1997 and 2000 all the data & news coming out must have contained no bearish news until well after the fact or else people would not have bid the markets so high in the first place.
Keep your guard up.
I must admit I keep getting tempted to plough more money into new AIM accounts as it starts to build up so I don't have any 'lazy' money hanging around.
But I can't find much value around at the moment.
Regards
Neil
HI Mark,
Have you managed to work out why I am getting those strange data results in the A.I. Back testing yet?
It must be something that has happened in the last 6 months or so as I am pretty sure it was behaving itself before that point.
It seems like any stock I pick now to do a backtest on it will give erroneous trades.
Surely there must be a way of seeing the data that is downloaded from Yahoo and then working out why it is giving these strange results.
regards
Neil
Fear psychology?
Here is an interesting article regarding a possible scenario of why certain stories are released at certain times during a market cycle.
http://www.kitco.com/ind/Droke/may102007.html
Interesting, could this be true?
Neil
Hello Clive,
It certainly is a worry what is happening in the UK, an I can say that as I am an ex resident, now living in Australia.
I moved over here in 1991 as I couldn't take much more of the prime minister at the time.
At that time there were no cameras watching your every move. It is indeed very Orwellian and I am amazed how the public has just accepted it all so passively.
They have given up their freedom to in exchange for protection against an exaggerated enemy (again very Orwellian)maybe 1984 was the blueprint for all of our so called democracies.
Maybe we should have invested in the companies making the surveillance cameras.
I couldn't see myself every moving back there.
Regards
Neil
Hi Toofuzzy,
I think that is an excellent exercise and I shall be giving that a try once I can get myself down to the local gym.
I do use a chin up machine on a regular basis, I'll have to try bringing the legs up to the chest as well.
Thanks
Neil
Hi Aim,
Thanks for all the encouragement. It is easy to feel a bit down when you get pain each time you move.
I think I have detected a slight improvement, it is a slow process though.
The usual method I try of exercising my back (from a book) is to lie on stomach and gradually use the arms to push backwards flexing the back. This was too painful at first so I'm still in the rest phase.
I want to steer well clear of the surgeons knife (no disrespect intended), I know that I will be fine in a couple of weeks.
Thanks
Neil