I'm sorry - but what the hell is going on with the OPTI:Optibiotix share price?
It's now almost the lowest since the massive spike from 56p to 97p in November 2015, aside from the very brief dips in December 2016 and August 2017.
Yet here we are with a barrage of great news, and on the cusp of what can only be described as a global health revolution.
Why is it that only a tiny band of dedicated long term holders can see this?
When it dipped below 60p today, that was the final straw. I don't care if I'm overweight by miles in this stock, it's a once in a lifetime opportunity for something truly amazing, and the fact that the wider investing community can't see that is their loss.
I keep trying to work out what I'm missing - and the only circumstances I can envisage to make this fail are that the supplements don't work - but there are peer reviewed papers to say they do. Maybe they'll poison someone? However they have been on sale for a while and all we hear are positive reviews.
I had to take the opportunity to buy below 60p so I found a few shares to sell and free up some cash in my ISA.
First of all I sold a small number of my AMYT:Amryt Pharma shares. I had 33,813 and they were making a small profit, and were 9.4% of my portfolio so earmarked for top-slicing but not until they got to 11.4% of the portfolio value. I just top-sliced early. I sold 5,500 shares at 19.6p making £46.58 (4.5%) profit and liberating £1,066.05. This still leaves me a healthy bunch for the long term, and I will top up if I get the chance to take profits elsewhere.
I sold my last remaining gold mine, CMCL:Caledonia Mining. This is a sound company, but I bought at the wrong time and there have been some difficulties. I'm convinced they will do well eventually, and will keep an eye on them for long term investing as they pay a nice quarterly dividend. I sold all of my 200 shares at 531p making a £223.54 (-17.4%) loss and liberating £1,050.05. It will damage my performance stats but will be worth it.
So, I am delighted to have been able to buy 3,560 OPTI:Optibiotix shares at the completely mental bargain basement price of 59.111p costing £2,116.30.
This takes my total holding in OPTI:Optibiotix to 57,041 costing £38,170 at a weighted average of 66.9p. This is currently losing £5,122 which is a spectacular disaster! It now makes up 53.3% of my combined portfolio cost and each 1p change in price affects the portfolio by £569.64.
However, I am still convinced that when this share price madness sorts itself out, the price will pass 100p with little resistance. If it does hit 100p that will result in paper profits of £18,834 to start with. When you add free shares in SBTX:SkinBioTherapeutics and Sweetbiotix then we could be looking at much higher returns, and with a 10-year horizon, I think it's more a case of how high can they go before someone buys them out?
The share price action was very suspect today. My purchase showed as a sell, and it appeared the spread was higher than it should have been so I suspect many buys showed as sells, which surely has the effect of spooking investors and justifying the continued drop in price.
Then lo and behold, just before the closing bell a load of massive buys go through at sub 60p. Well I never! I wonder how long those had been getting trickle fed as the price kept going lower and lower during the day?
As long as the stock exchange can get away with disguising buys as sells and vice versa, there's always smoke and mirrors over what is driving the share price. It's completely wrong and makes manipulation of the share price too easy
Having said all that, maybe I'm being stupid, as I shouldn't really care what's going on day-to-day. If I have done my research and am satisfied a company is sound, then I should be grateful for chances like today where I can increase my holding. It's just hard to keep telling myself that after 2 years when the share is losing me more money than ever before.
All this is just a week before Probiota 2018, when I have a feeling some long-awaited press coverage might finally appear.
Patience...
Wednesday 31 January 2018
Saturday 27 January 2018
Week 129 Review - Catastrophic losses and plunged into the red
What an absolutely dreadful week. OPTI:Optibiotix dropped another 2p losing me over £1,000 and putting the offer price 2.5p below what I've just paid for them in my great bargain last week, and IQE:IQE has been utterly savaged by hedge funds. Pretty much everything else has dropped too. The end result is a fall in paper profits of £3,664 and the combined portfolios dropping to a loss of £1,249 and a value of just £70,553 when it was knocking on £80K in the Autumn.
IQE:IQE has been hammered, losing 19% in my SIPP which was purchased at 131p. More painful is losing 64% of my purchase cost of 39.2p in my ISA. I'm devastated as I thought this was going up, and even recommended someone buy it at 135p which I don't normally do - and now I know why! This is surely being manipulated and doesn't give me much faith in the workings of the market. It appears is if someone is getting their journalist mates to print fake news articles about Apple that damage the IQE:IQE share price, and I think that has to be some form of fraud?
WRES:W Resources dropped 12%, MTFB:Motif Bio dropped 8% and virtually everything else dropped at least a few percent.
Share of the Week by miles was KIBO:Kibo Mining which climbed a huge 4%. That's as good as it got!
First drop below the red line in about 6 months. Very distressing.
The ISA and share accounts look like this
Most of the drop in potential profits is IQE:IQE, and OPTI:Optibiotix also contributed significantly. One of the worst weeks ever for this portfolio.
Well into the red
The SIPP looks like this after week 113
Potential profits were hardly touched, as both IQE:IQE and OPTI:Optibiotix are loss-making, so it was just the 1% drop in LGEN:Legal & General that affected paper profits. A thumping big £974 drop in portfolio value was rather unpleasant though.
The narrowest the gap has been for a long time. Could these go into the red for the fist time in over a year?
The trading account looks like this after week 79
No worse than usual
It's not been a nice week, and I'm not convinced next week will be any nicer. My biggest holdings seem to have been targeted either by shorters in the case of IQE:IQE or something else equally sinister with OPTI:Optibiotix.
The hedge funds are utterly evil. So much fake news about Apple pulling the iPhone X. Why would Apple do that when the supply can't keep up with demand? The hedge funds are using every weapon in their armoury to drive IQE:IQE down until they can close at a massive profit. I hope against all hopes that there's some deal or contract about to be announced and causes a gigantic surge in the price, as making money in this way is just plain wrong. Shorting stock just encourages manipulation and dodgy practice, but it will never be banned as it makes rich people so much money, and they make the laws.
I really don't know what's happening with OPTI:Optibiotix. I can only suspect there's a massive order being filled, because there is so much good news being issued and yet the price keeps going down. I must stop worrying - although my weekly performance is being hit really hard, this now makes up 50% of my portfolio and a 1p rise is worth £534, so when that elusive trigger happens this will go bonkers. Surely it must come soon...
IQE:IQE has been hammered, losing 19% in my SIPP which was purchased at 131p. More painful is losing 64% of my purchase cost of 39.2p in my ISA. I'm devastated as I thought this was going up, and even recommended someone buy it at 135p which I don't normally do - and now I know why! This is surely being manipulated and doesn't give me much faith in the workings of the market. It appears is if someone is getting their journalist mates to print fake news articles about Apple that damage the IQE:IQE share price, and I think that has to be some form of fraud?
WRES:W Resources dropped 12%, MTFB:Motif Bio dropped 8% and virtually everything else dropped at least a few percent.
Share of the Week by miles was KIBO:Kibo Mining which climbed a huge 4%. That's as good as it got!
First drop below the red line in about 6 months. Very distressing.
The ISA and share accounts look like this
| Weekly Change | |||
| Cash | £10.89 | +£0 | |
| Portfolio cost | £44,964.39 | +£0 | |
| Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission) | £42.790.47 | (-4.8%) | -£2,672.11 |
| Potential profits | £5,110.52 | -£2,008.00 | |
| Yr 3 Dividends | £34.11 | +£0 | |
| Yr 3 Profit from sales | £1,104.47 | +£0 | |
| Yr 3 Average monthly cash profit | £194.10 | (5.2%) | -£8.09 |
| Total Dividends | £1,213.16 | +£0 | |
| Total Profit from sales | £7,816.97 | +£0 | |
| Average monthly cash profit | £299.17 | (8.0%) | -£2.34 |
| (Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months) |
Most of the drop in potential profits is IQE:IQE, and OPTI:Optibiotix also contributed significantly. One of the worst weeks ever for this portfolio.
Well into the red
The SIPP looks like this after week 113
| Weekly Change | |||
| Cash | £39.01 | +£0 | |
| Portfolio cost | £26,492.59 | +£0 | |
| Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission) | £27,523.61 | (3.9%) | -£974.42 |
| Potential profits | £4,002.10 | -£8.66 | |
| Yr 3 Dividends | £0 | +£0 | |
| Yr 3 Profit from sales | £496.89 | +£0 | |
| Yr 3 Average monthly cash profit | £205.95 | (9.3%) | -£8.66 |
| Total Dividends | £916.10 | +£0 | |
| Total Profit from sales | £9,422.08 | +£0 | |
| Average monthly cash profit | £386.53 | (17.5%) | -£3.42 |
| (Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months) |
Potential profits were hardly touched, as both IQE:IQE and OPTI:Optibiotix are loss-making, so it was just the 1% drop in LGEN:Legal & General that affected paper profits. A thumping big £974 drop in portfolio value was rather unpleasant though.
The narrowest the gap has been for a long time. Could these go into the red for the fist time in over a year?
The trading account looks like this after week 79
| Weekly Change | |||
| Cash | £0.03 | +£0 | |
| Portfolio cost | £345.65 | +£0 | |
| Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission) | £239.34 | (-30.8%) | -£18.48 |
| Potential profits | £0 | +£0 | |
| Year 2 Dividends | £0 | +£0 | |
| Year 2 Profit | -£218.50 | +£0 | |
| Yr 2 Average monthly cash profit | -£35.07 | (-121.7%) | +£1.35 |
| Dividends | £1.15 | +£0 | |
| Profit from sales | -£241.35 | +£0 | |
| Average monthly cash profit | -£13.18 | (-45.7%) | +£0.16 |
| (Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months) |
No worse than usual
It's not been a nice week, and I'm not convinced next week will be any nicer. My biggest holdings seem to have been targeted either by shorters in the case of IQE:IQE or something else equally sinister with OPTI:Optibiotix.
The hedge funds are utterly evil. So much fake news about Apple pulling the iPhone X. Why would Apple do that when the supply can't keep up with demand? The hedge funds are using every weapon in their armoury to drive IQE:IQE down until they can close at a massive profit. I hope against all hopes that there's some deal or contract about to be announced and causes a gigantic surge in the price, as making money in this way is just plain wrong. Shorting stock just encourages manipulation and dodgy practice, but it will never be banned as it makes rich people so much money, and they make the laws.
I really don't know what's happening with OPTI:Optibiotix. I can only suspect there's a massive order being filled, because there is so much good news being issued and yet the price keeps going down. I must stop worrying - although my weekly performance is being hit really hard, this now makes up 50% of my portfolio and a 1p rise is worth £534, so when that elusive trigger happens this will go bonkers. Surely it must come soon...
Friday 19 January 2018
Week 128 Review - Crypto shares perform best and worst
A flat week that's registering as a loss of £123 but that's the difference between cost and value. I banked £496 profit, so really there was a small tick up if you look at just the portfolio value. It is now £363 higher than last week at £74,256 although the buffer between cost and value is down to £2,414.
The worst performer this week was BLU:Blue Star Capital, dropping 10% and now down 41% in the few weeks I have owned it. We'll see later that these types of shares can be a tad volatile though.
MTFB:Motif Bio has rallied recently, but is heading down again now, dropping 9% this week.
RED:RedT Energy is another share that's rallied over the last few weeks and people must be profit taking as this dropped 8%.
No change at all for OPTI:Optibiotix despite yet more great news.
IQE:IQE staged a bit of a recovery, managing to save me from the falls elsewhere by climbing 5% in my SIPP and 17% of purchase price in my ISA. I just wish the shorters would give up and let this settle.
IKA:Ilika has surged recently, climbing 9% this week and only just missing out on Share of the Week. It's still 56% down so a long way to go yet.
Share of the Week is my other crypto-currency company LION:Lionsgold, climbing 13% in my trading account but still 25% down. Yesterday the share price surged 86% but fell 18% today so no chance of reaching my 7p limit sell order. Maybe calling it a giant turkey last week was premature!
Looks pretty flat to me.
The ISA and share portfolios look like this
Quite a nice calm week, with the rise in IQE:IQE enough to stifle the losses elsewhere.
Just scraping along the top of the red line - far too close for comfort.
The SIPP looks like this after week 112
The sale of CAML:Central Asia Metals gave me £496 profit for year 3 and improved my overall average monthly performance by £12.37 a month. The portfolio was pretty flat otherwise, with the profits and sell value dropping by about the same amount as the cost value went up. Cash got another £11 as the limit order came in cheaper than the 65p I set, and you have to quote a number of shares rather than an amount of money. I missed out on another 17 shares because of that!
CAML:Central Asia Metals is now down to 10.1% of my portfolio value, so my plan to implement the 10% rule worked perfectly, up to the point I allowed OPTI:Optibiotix to go to 50.7% of my portfolio value by buying a load more!
Pretty flat here too, but the cost sneaks up a bit more.
Here's the less depressing trading account after week 78
I think LION:Lionsgold is a good trading share, with 86% rises followed by 18% drops. If I was clever I would have bought just before the 86% rise, but although saying I should do it I didn't. I think I may get to sell these sooner than I thought - and next time will be a bit more careful when I buy - wait for the sweet spot!!
Let's hope it lasts
That's it for week 128. When OPTI:Optibiotix released one of the most exciting RNSs yet, absolutely nothing happened to the share price. However, I was able to get my average price down a bit more and topping 50% of my portfolio cost means this is where I definitely stop buying. Honest. This time I really mean it...
The worst performer this week was BLU:Blue Star Capital, dropping 10% and now down 41% in the few weeks I have owned it. We'll see later that these types of shares can be a tad volatile though.
MTFB:Motif Bio has rallied recently, but is heading down again now, dropping 9% this week.
RED:RedT Energy is another share that's rallied over the last few weeks and people must be profit taking as this dropped 8%.
No change at all for OPTI:Optibiotix despite yet more great news.
IQE:IQE staged a bit of a recovery, managing to save me from the falls elsewhere by climbing 5% in my SIPP and 17% of purchase price in my ISA. I just wish the shorters would give up and let this settle.
IKA:Ilika has surged recently, climbing 9% this week and only just missing out on Share of the Week. It's still 56% down so a long way to go yet.
Share of the Week is my other crypto-currency company LION:Lionsgold, climbing 13% in my trading account but still 25% down. Yesterday the share price surged 86% but fell 18% today so no chance of reaching my 7p limit sell order. Maybe calling it a giant turkey last week was premature!
Looks pretty flat to me.
The ISA and share portfolios look like this
| Weekly Change | |||
| Cash | £10.89 | +£0 | |
| Portfolio cost | £44,964.39 | +£0 | |
| Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission) | £45.462.58 | (1.1%) | +£270.65 |
| Potential profits | £7,118.52 | +£379.63 | |
| Yr 3 Dividends | £34.11 | +£0 | |
| Yr 3 Profit from sales | £1,104.47 | +£0 | |
| Yr 3 Average monthly cash profit | £202.19 | (5.4%) | -£8.79 |
| Total Dividends | £1,213.16 | +£0 | |
| Total Profit from sales | £7,816.97 | +£0 | |
| Average monthly cash profit | £301.51 | (8.0%) | -£2.37 |
| (Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months) |
Quite a nice calm week, with the rise in IQE:IQE enough to stifle the losses elsewhere.
Just scraping along the top of the red line - far too close for comfort.
The SIPP looks like this after week 112
| Weekly Change | |||
| Cash | £39.01 | +£11.32 | |
| Portfolio cost | £26,492.59 | +£485.56 | |
| Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission) | £28,497.03 | (7.6%) | -£438.42 |
| Potential profits | £4,010.76 | -£501.96 | |
| Yr 3 Dividends | £0 | +£0 | |
| Yr 3 Profit from sales | £496.89 | +£496.89 | |
| Yr 3 Average monthly cash profit | £228.83 | (10.4%) | +£242.21 |
| Total Dividends | £916.10 | +£0 | |
| Total Profit from sales | £9,422.08 | +£496.89 | |
| Average monthly cash profit | £389.95 | (17.7%) | +£12.37 |
| (Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months) |
The sale of CAML:Central Asia Metals gave me £496 profit for year 3 and improved my overall average monthly performance by £12.37 a month. The portfolio was pretty flat otherwise, with the profits and sell value dropping by about the same amount as the cost value went up. Cash got another £11 as the limit order came in cheaper than the 65p I set, and you have to quote a number of shares rather than an amount of money. I missed out on another 17 shares because of that!
CAML:Central Asia Metals is now down to 10.1% of my portfolio value, so my plan to implement the 10% rule worked perfectly, up to the point I allowed OPTI:Optibiotix to go to 50.7% of my portfolio value by buying a load more!
Pretty flat here too, but the cost sneaks up a bit more.
Here's the less depressing trading account after week 78
| Weekly Change | |||
| Cash | £0.03 | +£0 | |
| Portfolio cost | £345.65 | +£0 | |
| Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission) | £257.82 | (-25.4%) | +£44.34 |
| Potential profits | £0 | +£0 | |
| Year 2 Dividends | £0 | +£0 | |
| Year 2 Profit | -£218.50 | +£0 | |
| Yr 2 Average monthly cash profit | -£36.42 | (-126.4%) | +£1.45 |
| Dividends | £1.15 | +£0 | |
| Profit from sales | -£241.35 | +£0 | |
| Average monthly cash profit | -£13.34 | (-46.3%) | +£0.18 |
| (Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months) |
I think LION:Lionsgold is a good trading share, with 86% rises followed by 18% drops. If I was clever I would have bought just before the 86% rise, but although saying I should do it I didn't. I think I may get to sell these sooner than I thought - and next time will be a bit more careful when I buy - wait for the sweet spot!!
Let's hope it lasts
That's it for week 128. When OPTI:Optibiotix released one of the most exciting RNSs yet, absolutely nothing happened to the share price. However, I was able to get my average price down a bit more and topping 50% of my portfolio cost means this is where I definitely stop buying. Honest. This time I really mean it...
Thursday 18 January 2018
Naughty, naughty Speccy
I've been a very naughty investor!
After writing my long post yesterday about the importance of the 10% rule, and looking at all the possible things I could do with my liberated £1,000, I have completely blasted the whole thing out of the water and bought some more OPTI:Optibiotix!
I'm sorry, but when I looked at the alternatives, and following the staggering news yesterday, I had no choice.
I do have one rule though, that I only buy more OPTI:Optibiotix if it means averaging the price down.
I set a limit order for 65p last night after proof reading my blog. This was 1p below yesterday's offer price, but more importantly it was 0.04p lower than my weighted average in the SIPP and over 2p lower than my overall weighted average.
Nothing happened all day, with the share price sat resolutely at 66p. Today was the only day I've ever wished the price of OPTI:Optibiotix would have dropped.
It finally dropped at 16:22 hrs and my order triggered to buy 1,584 shares at the stupendous bargain price of 64.445p costing £1,032.76. I've never been so happy to see a share price drop!
So I do have to question - if all the trades before that had really been sells as indicated, how can selling 57,648 shares relentlessly all day not cause the price to dip earlier? Could it be the MMs didn't want to encourage people to buy shares? Could they be filling a great big order? Could they have decided at the last minute to fill a couple of buy orders that had been lying around all day because they had achieved their targets? I'm amazed they would let a buy order sit there all day for 1p less than the offer price and not drop the price to fill it until the last minute, despite relentless sells all day.
I know it's really, really bad that I sold some CAML:Central Asia Metals because they had gone over 10% of my portfolio, only to spend the proceeds on taking OPTI:Optibiotix over 50% of my portfolio cost. I just couldn't stop myself - the story here is getting better every week and yet the share price is stuck at bargain basement. I'd be mad not to take advantage while I can.
In summary, OPTI:Optibiotix now makes up 50.7% of my combined portfolios, with 53,481 shares costing £36,054.04 at a weighted average of 67.4p a share. They are currently worth £33,657.18 at bid price minus commission, so losing £2,396.86 and they are still my biggest monetary paper loss and Nemesis Share. I just feel the time is rapidly approaching when these will blossom into something quite spectacular.
Remember yesterday I said it would have been a good day to buy LION:Lionsgold? It appears I was right, with the share zooming up 86% today. That means the offer price is now more than I paid for it, but I still have a 7% loss. Much better than yesterday, and maybe there's hope my trading account might get to break-even soon! Maybe I should calculate what I need to get back to my original £500 and slap a limit sale order in, as this one is bouncing all over the place!
After writing my long post yesterday about the importance of the 10% rule, and looking at all the possible things I could do with my liberated £1,000, I have completely blasted the whole thing out of the water and bought some more OPTI:Optibiotix!
I'm sorry, but when I looked at the alternatives, and following the staggering news yesterday, I had no choice.
I do have one rule though, that I only buy more OPTI:Optibiotix if it means averaging the price down.
I set a limit order for 65p last night after proof reading my blog. This was 1p below yesterday's offer price, but more importantly it was 0.04p lower than my weighted average in the SIPP and over 2p lower than my overall weighted average.
Nothing happened all day, with the share price sat resolutely at 66p. Today was the only day I've ever wished the price of OPTI:Optibiotix would have dropped.
It finally dropped at 16:22 hrs and my order triggered to buy 1,584 shares at the stupendous bargain price of 64.445p costing £1,032.76. I've never been so happy to see a share price drop!
So I do have to question - if all the trades before that had really been sells as indicated, how can selling 57,648 shares relentlessly all day not cause the price to dip earlier? Could it be the MMs didn't want to encourage people to buy shares? Could they be filling a great big order? Could they have decided at the last minute to fill a couple of buy orders that had been lying around all day because they had achieved their targets? I'm amazed they would let a buy order sit there all day for 1p less than the offer price and not drop the price to fill it until the last minute, despite relentless sells all day.
I know it's really, really bad that I sold some CAML:Central Asia Metals because they had gone over 10% of my portfolio, only to spend the proceeds on taking OPTI:Optibiotix over 50% of my portfolio cost. I just couldn't stop myself - the story here is getting better every week and yet the share price is stuck at bargain basement. I'd be mad not to take advantage while I can.
In summary, OPTI:Optibiotix now makes up 50.7% of my combined portfolios, with 53,481 shares costing £36,054.04 at a weighted average of 67.4p a share. They are currently worth £33,657.18 at bid price minus commission, so losing £2,396.86 and they are still my biggest monetary paper loss and Nemesis Share. I just feel the time is rapidly approaching when these will blossom into something quite spectacular.
Remember yesterday I said it would have been a good day to buy LION:Lionsgold? It appears I was right, with the share zooming up 86% today. That means the offer price is now more than I paid for it, but I still have a 7% loss. Much better than yesterday, and maybe there's hope my trading account might get to break-even soon! Maybe I should calculate what I need to get back to my original £500 and slap a limit sale order in, as this one is bouncing all over the place!
Wednesday 17 January 2018
Central Asia Metals top-slice
I've always wanted to top-slice some profits from a share, but it was never a scientific enough process for my brain to tolerate. I felt I was losing some of a good thing.
My new process for keeping one holding to 10% of my portfolio worked wonders today though, as I had set a limit order to sell 320 CAML:Central Asia Metals at 330p and it triggered today.
The price did reach 333p at one point, but that was share price rather than bid price. That seems to have peaked at 332p very briefly, so I sold fairly near the top. By the end of the day the bid price was back down at 326p.
My 320 shares resulted in £496.89 (88.8%) profit, helped by the fact I left all the purchase commission charges on my remaining holding and removed them from the sale so I don't double-count.
The sale has liberated £1,044.08 to be re-invested.
So what made this sale so successful? Simple - I didn't really need to do it so I held out until it reached the price I wanted. Normally I'm too eager and make the sale because I want to buy something else quick, so I lose out.
I need to remember this lesson and apply it to future sales. As there are only 4 shares that are likely to exceed 10% of my holding, it's not a technique I'll get to use very often. If these continue to climb then I'll sell a few hundred more next time there's £1,000 to liberate, and if things go well for AMYT:Amryt Pharma I may get to top-slice there too.
IQE:IQE and OPTI:Optibiotix are the only other two, but they are more complicated.
IQE:IQE would be straightforward if I hadn't just bought a load more for 166p. With the price now at 125p I can't possibly offload any until 200p just to make those pay, despite my overall holding being 200% up. It was 400% up a few weeks ago so I'm keeping them all for now.
OPTI:Optibiotix is even more complicated. It's going to be a few months until we find out what free SBTX:SkinBioTherapeutics share are being handed out, and even longer before Sweetbiotix floats. As I'm counting on free shares in both to really make these pay, then I need to hold the maximum possible amount until then. I don't really want to sell any until they are 200p and I have the free shares. That would compensate nicely for the 2 years of misery watching my losses deepen, then occasionally threaten to become profitable before returning to loss again.
I'm even more excited about OPTI:Optibiotix after today's RNS that they are publishing a paper at Probiota 2018 on the identification and development of a prebiotic which selectively enhances the growth of Lactobacillus rhamnosus GG (LGG(R)) in the gut. This is the best-selling probiotic in the world! There's an existing market and all the manufacturers have to do is add the new prebiotic to enhance their existing ingredient!What baffles me is how that news only resulted in 28 trades, and most are showing as sells. Do people not understand??
There was at least a 1p increase in share price, which cancelled out the negative £496 from my CAML:Central Asia Metals sale on this week's performance, leaving me £60 up on the week, which is much better than £2,600 down last week.
So I have my £1,000 to play with, but I'm not spending it yet. I had been looking at VRS:Versarien after they were certified as producing proper graphene, which apparently most companies aren't. I wish I had invested then as the shares were around 20p, but I didn't and now they're 91.5p. They have done something similar to OPTI:Optibiotix and soared early on - so it's possible the same will happen as did to OPTI:Optibiotix and they will drift around the 60p mark for years.
With that in mind I'm not buying any at 91.5p as I made that mistake with OPTI:Optibiotix, and more recently with BLU:Blue Star Capital and LION:Lionsgold which have both been unmitigated disasters.
Have I finally learned my lesson?
There was a documentary on the telly about Warren Buffet last week. I knew most of the story from reading his biography, but the program showed a picture on his office wall of a baseball player's position, surrounded by the possible places the ball could arrive when pitched, and a scoring system for which place is most likely to result in a clean strike.
There was one small sweet spot just right of centre.
The analogy was that many, many balls will fly at the batsman, but he must wait for one to arrive in the sweet spot before hitting it. I realised as I watched that my technique is to swing wildly at whatever comes in my direction, which explains why I only occasionally make a good hit, with the majority flying off the wrong way or going nowhere.
So - patience is required when buying new shares not just to choose the right company, but to choose the right moment to buy the company. Today would have been a far better day to by BLU:Blue Star Capital and LION:Lionsgold, although both were foolish gambles on the crypto-currency bubble which seems to have burst the second I got on board.
If VRS:Versarien drop back to around 50p then I may consider them - but have more research to do yet anyway. I must admit I'm desperate to buy IQE:IQE, but I simply mustn't crush my 10% rule when I've only just resolved to re-instate it (albeit gradually).
What else do i have in my SIPP that may perform better?
OPTI:Optibiotix is out as I'm way, way to deep in that already. On the other hand - it's just so bloody brilliant, and one more purchase would take it to 50% of my portfolio value. Surely I could then whittle it back to 10% after getting the free shares? The current price is only 1p more than my weighted average in the SIPP and 1p less than my overall weighted average. Oh the temptation!!
LGEN:Legal & General would be safe, but is probably a bit expensive at the minute, ARL:Atlantis Resources is still suspended pending reverse takeover, WRES:W Resources is rubbish and I wouldn't touch it with a bargepole, so that just leaves TRX:Tissue Regenix.
I'm quite tempted to top up on TRX:Tissue Regenix at 9p as my current holding was bought for 18.7p. Things do appear to be looking more promising for them, so there could be a re-rate fairly soon. They are cheaper now than they were 7 years ago when they had nothing. Now they have a product on sale and have just bought a profitable company. With an emphasis on sales rather than product development, these could rise nicely from here.
The other possibility is MTFB:Motif Bio which is also about to commercialise their product. My ISA holding is already up 36% and my concern that it's near the top of it's recent range, so could easily drop again from here prior to full commercial news.
When I sold TLOU:Tlou Energy a few weeks ago I said I would watch them like a hawk. I have. They are back down to the price I originally sold them for. If they drop to their resistance level of 12p then I may give them another go.
A completely left-field option is KAT:Katoro Gold. I've been watching them because I hope to receive free shares at some point via KIBO:Kibo Mining. The price has dropped from the 5p IPO price to 2.76p to buy. I've been impressed by CEO Louis Coetzee's approach to the KIBO:Kibo Mining coal to power project, so this could be a good price to buy in, but with production a few years away and the prospect of free shares anyway, maybe not.
I'm determined not to rush this decision and hold the cash for a while - in fact I should be aiming to keep 10% of my portfolio value as cash anyway - but that's really, really hard...
My new process for keeping one holding to 10% of my portfolio worked wonders today though, as I had set a limit order to sell 320 CAML:Central Asia Metals at 330p and it triggered today.
The price did reach 333p at one point, but that was share price rather than bid price. That seems to have peaked at 332p very briefly, so I sold fairly near the top. By the end of the day the bid price was back down at 326p.
My 320 shares resulted in £496.89 (88.8%) profit, helped by the fact I left all the purchase commission charges on my remaining holding and removed them from the sale so I don't double-count.
The sale has liberated £1,044.08 to be re-invested.
So what made this sale so successful? Simple - I didn't really need to do it so I held out until it reached the price I wanted. Normally I'm too eager and make the sale because I want to buy something else quick, so I lose out.
I need to remember this lesson and apply it to future sales. As there are only 4 shares that are likely to exceed 10% of my holding, it's not a technique I'll get to use very often. If these continue to climb then I'll sell a few hundred more next time there's £1,000 to liberate, and if things go well for AMYT:Amryt Pharma I may get to top-slice there too.
IQE:IQE and OPTI:Optibiotix are the only other two, but they are more complicated.
IQE:IQE would be straightforward if I hadn't just bought a load more for 166p. With the price now at 125p I can't possibly offload any until 200p just to make those pay, despite my overall holding being 200% up. It was 400% up a few weeks ago so I'm keeping them all for now.
OPTI:Optibiotix is even more complicated. It's going to be a few months until we find out what free SBTX:SkinBioTherapeutics share are being handed out, and even longer before Sweetbiotix floats. As I'm counting on free shares in both to really make these pay, then I need to hold the maximum possible amount until then. I don't really want to sell any until they are 200p and I have the free shares. That would compensate nicely for the 2 years of misery watching my losses deepen, then occasionally threaten to become profitable before returning to loss again.
I'm even more excited about OPTI:Optibiotix after today's RNS that they are publishing a paper at Probiota 2018 on the identification and development of a prebiotic which selectively enhances the growth of Lactobacillus rhamnosus GG (LGG(R)) in the gut. This is the best-selling probiotic in the world! There's an existing market and all the manufacturers have to do is add the new prebiotic to enhance their existing ingredient!What baffles me is how that news only resulted in 28 trades, and most are showing as sells. Do people not understand??
There was at least a 1p increase in share price, which cancelled out the negative £496 from my CAML:Central Asia Metals sale on this week's performance, leaving me £60 up on the week, which is much better than £2,600 down last week.
So I have my £1,000 to play with, but I'm not spending it yet. I had been looking at VRS:Versarien after they were certified as producing proper graphene, which apparently most companies aren't. I wish I had invested then as the shares were around 20p, but I didn't and now they're 91.5p. They have done something similar to OPTI:Optibiotix and soared early on - so it's possible the same will happen as did to OPTI:Optibiotix and they will drift around the 60p mark for years.
With that in mind I'm not buying any at 91.5p as I made that mistake with OPTI:Optibiotix, and more recently with BLU:Blue Star Capital and LION:Lionsgold which have both been unmitigated disasters.
Have I finally learned my lesson?
There was a documentary on the telly about Warren Buffet last week. I knew most of the story from reading his biography, but the program showed a picture on his office wall of a baseball player's position, surrounded by the possible places the ball could arrive when pitched, and a scoring system for which place is most likely to result in a clean strike.
There was one small sweet spot just right of centre.
The analogy was that many, many balls will fly at the batsman, but he must wait for one to arrive in the sweet spot before hitting it. I realised as I watched that my technique is to swing wildly at whatever comes in my direction, which explains why I only occasionally make a good hit, with the majority flying off the wrong way or going nowhere.
So - patience is required when buying new shares not just to choose the right company, but to choose the right moment to buy the company. Today would have been a far better day to by BLU:Blue Star Capital and LION:Lionsgold, although both were foolish gambles on the crypto-currency bubble which seems to have burst the second I got on board.
If VRS:Versarien drop back to around 50p then I may consider them - but have more research to do yet anyway. I must admit I'm desperate to buy IQE:IQE, but I simply mustn't crush my 10% rule when I've only just resolved to re-instate it (albeit gradually).
What else do i have in my SIPP that may perform better?
OPTI:Optibiotix is out as I'm way, way to deep in that already. On the other hand - it's just so bloody brilliant, and one more purchase would take it to 50% of my portfolio value. Surely I could then whittle it back to 10% after getting the free shares? The current price is only 1p more than my weighted average in the SIPP and 1p less than my overall weighted average. Oh the temptation!!
LGEN:Legal & General would be safe, but is probably a bit expensive at the minute, ARL:Atlantis Resources is still suspended pending reverse takeover, WRES:W Resources is rubbish and I wouldn't touch it with a bargepole, so that just leaves TRX:Tissue Regenix.
I'm quite tempted to top up on TRX:Tissue Regenix at 9p as my current holding was bought for 18.7p. Things do appear to be looking more promising for them, so there could be a re-rate fairly soon. They are cheaper now than they were 7 years ago when they had nothing. Now they have a product on sale and have just bought a profitable company. With an emphasis on sales rather than product development, these could rise nicely from here.
The other possibility is MTFB:Motif Bio which is also about to commercialise their product. My ISA holding is already up 36% and my concern that it's near the top of it's recent range, so could easily drop again from here prior to full commercial news.
When I sold TLOU:Tlou Energy a few weeks ago I said I would watch them like a hawk. I have. They are back down to the price I originally sold them for. If they drop to their resistance level of 12p then I may give them another go.
A completely left-field option is KAT:Katoro Gold. I've been watching them because I hope to receive free shares at some point via KIBO:Kibo Mining. The price has dropped from the 5p IPO price to 2.76p to buy. I've been impressed by CEO Louis Coetzee's approach to the KIBO:Kibo Mining coal to power project, so this could be a good price to buy in, but with production a few years away and the prospect of free shares anyway, maybe not.
I'm determined not to rush this decision and hold the cash for a while - in fact I should be aiming to keep 10% of my portfolio value as cash anyway - but that's really, really hard...
Saturday 13 January 2018
Week 127 Review - IQE gets hammered
After a couple of decent weeks I was hoping 2018 was going to be kind, but the combined portfolios took a £2,634 hammering this week, reducing the value to £73,893 and halving the buffer between cost and value to £2,538. Rather frustrating given it was my 50th birthday on Friday. Spookily the same day as a much more famous blogger, as Tom Winnifrith from ShareProfits posted his 50th birthday thoughts on the same day!
As the title of this week's blog implies, IQE:IQE was the worst performer, dropping 13% in my SIPP and now losing money, and dropping 42% of my original purchase price in the ISA. That holding is still up by 212% but it wiped around £1,000 off my portfolio value. It reminds me of when GVC:GVC Holdings was attacked after it steadily rose from 400p to 750p. It was battered down to 600p for no reason, but given the number of trolls that appeared on the bulletin board during the descent, some people made a lot of money from the fall. Now it's trading at 950p so it was a very short term problem, as will be the attack on IQE:IQE in my opinion.
BLU:Blue Star Capital showed my dally into crypto-currency was appallingly timed, dropping another 8% and now 31% down.
OPTI:Optibiotix is still being prevented from rising by a persistent seller, dropping 5% which is only 3p but cost me over £1,500 this week. This also relegates OPTI:Optibiotix back to Nemesis Share, losing £2,362 on paper.
There were some great performers, but they couldn't do enough to shake off the big drops above.
CAML:Central Asia Metals reached another all-time high and climbed 6% to go 85% up on my original purchase price. Although the cost of these was only 6.5% of my current portfolio cost, the value is now 11.9% of my portfolio value. I have been considering my risk profile lately, and am conscious that I'm disobeying my max 10% holding in one stock rule horribly with OPTI:Optibiotix, so am thinking that when that settles down and free shares get issued, maybe I should sell down until it's back within 10% of the portfolio value. If I do that with CAM:Central Asia Metals I'd need to cut the value by £1,444 to get it to 10%. That would mean selling 450 shares and allow me to take a small amount of profit, but still maintain a sizable holding. Unfortunately I'd want to spend the money on IQE:IQE while they are cheap, but as they already comprise 14% of my portfolio value, it immediately breaks my new rule! I'd love the chance to get one over on the shorters though. With hindsight, If I had sold 1% value of IQE:IQE on the way up as soon as it went over 11%, it would have been timed around their peak price and I would have banked some profit. This could be a good rule to implement - in stages...
MTFB:Motif Bio continued a steady rise, climbing 9% and going 39% up. One of my rare well-timed purchases!
Share of the Week is rather unfortunate as I don't like it. WRES:W Resources climbed 20% in my SIPP and 14% in my ISA so with a bit of luck I'll soon be able to get rid of the things.
Half the buffer wiped out, just as things were picking up.
The ISA and share portfolios look like this
Losses in potential profit were all IQE:IQE and most of the other losses were OPTI:Optibiotix. Going back to my 10% thoughts above, I wouldn't get these drastic weeks when one share does badly if I stuck to the 10% rule. I really must put together a plan to do that - but not until OPTI:Optibiotix has had its moment in the sun.
This could easily go back into loss next week with only a £227 buffer.
Here's the SIPP after week 111
Potential profits actually increased thanks to CAML:Central Asia Metals, but the sell value plummeted thanks to everything else. So - as I've been writing I've been thinking more about the 10% rule, and I am going to implement it but only for shares that are on a steady rise and where the cost of the shares was less than 10% of the portfolio.
I calculated at what point above 10% I'd get £1,000 for selling and it comes out as 1.4% on my current portfolio value. That calculation has been added to my spreadsheet as it will change over time as the portfolio value changes. Although both IQE:IQE and OPTI:Optibiotix are also above 10% of my portfolio value, they are on a downward trajectory or making a loss, so they don't qualify, but any future shares that get above 11.4% will have £1,000 top-sliced to get them back to 10%.
With that in mind I've just added a limit order for 320 CAML:Central Asia Metals shares at 330p which is 10p above the current price, as I'm not really bothered if I don't sell them so may as well ride the momentum a bit more. Let's see if this technique works! It goes to show how useful writing this diary is - I never would have thought of this otherwise.
Not too much to worry about, but if the sale goes ahead then there will be a bit of action as I buy something next week.
The trading portfolio looks like this after week 77
Just desperate! LION:Lionsgold may be a giant turkey!
As above
So I'm quite excited about next week now - with the potential for £1,000 to play with in the SIPP. My first instinct will be to snap up more IQE:IQE while they are so cheap, but that's not going to help me with my new 10% rule. I've been watching a few more shares, and one in particular so there may be a new addition to the portfolio next week...
As the title of this week's blog implies, IQE:IQE was the worst performer, dropping 13% in my SIPP and now losing money, and dropping 42% of my original purchase price in the ISA. That holding is still up by 212% but it wiped around £1,000 off my portfolio value. It reminds me of when GVC:GVC Holdings was attacked after it steadily rose from 400p to 750p. It was battered down to 600p for no reason, but given the number of trolls that appeared on the bulletin board during the descent, some people made a lot of money from the fall. Now it's trading at 950p so it was a very short term problem, as will be the attack on IQE:IQE in my opinion.
BLU:Blue Star Capital showed my dally into crypto-currency was appallingly timed, dropping another 8% and now 31% down.
OPTI:Optibiotix is still being prevented from rising by a persistent seller, dropping 5% which is only 3p but cost me over £1,500 this week. This also relegates OPTI:Optibiotix back to Nemesis Share, losing £2,362 on paper.
There were some great performers, but they couldn't do enough to shake off the big drops above.
CAML:Central Asia Metals reached another all-time high and climbed 6% to go 85% up on my original purchase price. Although the cost of these was only 6.5% of my current portfolio cost, the value is now 11.9% of my portfolio value. I have been considering my risk profile lately, and am conscious that I'm disobeying my max 10% holding in one stock rule horribly with OPTI:Optibiotix, so am thinking that when that settles down and free shares get issued, maybe I should sell down until it's back within 10% of the portfolio value. If I do that with CAM:Central Asia Metals I'd need to cut the value by £1,444 to get it to 10%. That would mean selling 450 shares and allow me to take a small amount of profit, but still maintain a sizable holding. Unfortunately I'd want to spend the money on IQE:IQE while they are cheap, but as they already comprise 14% of my portfolio value, it immediately breaks my new rule! I'd love the chance to get one over on the shorters though. With hindsight, If I had sold 1% value of IQE:IQE on the way up as soon as it went over 11%, it would have been timed around their peak price and I would have banked some profit. This could be a good rule to implement - in stages...
MTFB:Motif Bio continued a steady rise, climbing 9% and going 39% up. One of my rare well-timed purchases!
Share of the Week is rather unfortunate as I don't like it. WRES:W Resources climbed 20% in my SIPP and 14% in my ISA so with a bit of luck I'll soon be able to get rid of the things.
Half the buffer wiped out, just as things were picking up.
The ISA and share portfolios look like this
| Weekly Change | |||
| Cash | £10.89 | +£0 | |
| Portfolio cost | £44,964.39 | +£0 | |
| Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission) | £45.191.93 | (0.5%) | -£1,917.07 |
| Potential profits | £6,738.89 | -£898.15 | |
| Yr 3 Dividends | £34.11 | +£0 | |
| Yr 3 Profit from sales | £1,104.47 | +£0 | |
| Yr 3 Average monthly cash profit | £210.98 | (5.6%) | -£9.59 |
| Total Dividends | £1,213.16 | +£0 | |
| Total Profit from sales | £7,816.97 | +£0 | |
| Average monthly cash profit | £303.88 | (8.1%) | -£2.41 |
| (Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months) |
Losses in potential profit were all IQE:IQE and most of the other losses were OPTI:Optibiotix. Going back to my 10% thoughts above, I wouldn't get these drastic weeks when one share does badly if I stuck to the 10% rule. I really must put together a plan to do that - but not until OPTI:Optibiotix has had its moment in the sun.
This could easily go back into loss next week with only a £227 buffer.
Here's the SIPP after week 111
| Weekly Change | |||
| Cash | £27.69 | +£0 | |
| Portfolio cost | £26,007.03 | +£0 | |
| Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission) | £28,449.89 | (9.4%) | -£702.95 |
| Potential profits | £4,512.72 | +£76.15 | |
| Yr 3 Dividends | £0 | +£0 | |
| Yr 3 Profit from sales | £0 | +£0 | |
| Yr 3 Average monthly cash profit | £-13.38 | (-0.6%) | +£2.23 |
| Total Dividends | £916.10 | +£0 | |
| Total Profit from sales | £8,925.19 | +£0 | |
| Average monthly cash profit | £377.58 | (17.4%) | -£3.43 |
| (Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months) |
Potential profits actually increased thanks to CAML:Central Asia Metals, but the sell value plummeted thanks to everything else. So - as I've been writing I've been thinking more about the 10% rule, and I am going to implement it but only for shares that are on a steady rise and where the cost of the shares was less than 10% of the portfolio.
I calculated at what point above 10% I'd get £1,000 for selling and it comes out as 1.4% on my current portfolio value. That calculation has been added to my spreadsheet as it will change over time as the portfolio value changes. Although both IQE:IQE and OPTI:Optibiotix are also above 10% of my portfolio value, they are on a downward trajectory or making a loss, so they don't qualify, but any future shares that get above 11.4% will have £1,000 top-sliced to get them back to 10%.
With that in mind I've just added a limit order for 320 CAML:Central Asia Metals shares at 330p which is 10p above the current price, as I'm not really bothered if I don't sell them so may as well ride the momentum a bit more. Let's see if this technique works! It goes to show how useful writing this diary is - I never would have thought of this otherwise.
Not too much to worry about, but if the sale goes ahead then there will be a bit of action as I buy something next week.
The trading portfolio looks like this after week 77
| Weekly Change | |||
| Cash | £0.03 | +£0 | |
| Portfolio cost | £345.65 | +£0 | |
| Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission) | £213.48 | (-38.2%) | -£14.78 |
| Potential profits | £0 | +£0 | |
| Year 2 Dividends | £0 | +£0 | |
| Year 2 Profit | -£218.50 | +£0 | |
| Yr 2 Average monthly cash profit | -£37.87 | (-131.5%) | +£1.58 |
| Dividends | £1.15 | +£0 | |
| Profit from sales | -£241.35 | +£0 | |
| Average monthly cash profit | -£13.52 | (-46.9%) | +£0.18 |
| (Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months) |
Just desperate! LION:Lionsgold may be a giant turkey!
As above
So I'm quite excited about next week now - with the potential for £1,000 to play with in the SIPP. My first instinct will be to snap up more IQE:IQE while they are so cheap, but that's not going to help me with my new 10% rule. I've been watching a few more shares, and one in particular so there may be a new addition to the portfolio next week...
Saturday 6 January 2018
Week 126 Review - Good start to 2018
The post-Christmas recovery continues, with lots of small rises across the portfolio resulting in an increase of £1,682 in value to £76,528 and a buffer between cost and value of £5,173.
Biggest loser was predictably in my trading account, which appears cursed. After watching LION:Lionsgold drop from 6p to 4.5p I thought I'd found the bottom before purchasing, but now it's 3.25p and I've lost 34% in 3 weeks. The morale of the story - wait for it to bounce back up rather than trying to catch a falling knife! If only I could remember that...
The other reasonably big fall was MTFB:Motif Bio, dropping 6% but on the back of a 16% rise last week. I can see this drifting up and down until news of approval to sell Iclaprim, but there's bound to be a fundraise at some point so let's hope it's after the approval.
Lots of 7% rises this week. CMCL:Caledonia Mining has been increasing steadily after announcing the quarterly dividend. I'm still losing 15% but half the deficit has been made up in the last few weeks, so when it moves it's moving fast.
RED:RedT Energy has been a massive disappointment recently and I'm losing 18%, but a 7% rise this week will be accelerated on news of orders. What this really needs is announcement of a big deal, for example with National Grid or a major wind farm company. Grid storage would need lots and lots of units, and only volume sales will push the company into profit.
WRES:W Resources was a mistake purchase as I've watched my holding diluted to hell over multiple placings, but there may actually be a chance of recovering some of my 44% loss if news of financing comes through. A 7% up-tick this week was in anticipation of that I think.
Share of the Week isn't the biggest riser as it only climbed 4%. OPTI:Optibiotix rose 2p, but thanks to some purchases at 63.8p on Thursday, each penny increase is now worth £518 and it's a rare example of me buying something and getting an immediate increase in value. The rise also reduces my OPTI:Optibiotix loss to just £805 when it was £3,500 a few weeks ago. This means I have a new Nemesis Share, with TRX:Tissue Regenix having tumbled to a £919 loss but heading back in the right direction, and OPTI:Optibiotix is only 3rd worse after JLP:Jubilee Metals dropped to a £887 loss. It would have been even better for OPTI:Optibiotix if I'd not taken the £855 loss on LOOK:Lookers this week and ditched that donkey from the worst performer ranks!
Boing!
Here's the ISA and share portfolio performance
This is complicated! Potential profits are down £511 and most of that is due to selling TLOU:Tlou Energy for £828 profit. So in reality, potential profits from the rest of the portfolio are up by around £300. The profits gained from the TLOU:Tlou Energy sale were negated by the £855 loss getting rid of LOOK:Lookers leaving me with fractionally less than I originally invested. When I re-invested the resulting £3,445 in OPTI:Optobiotix, the cost of the portfolio dropped by £17 compared to what it was before the sales. The subsequent 2p rise in OPTI:Optibiotix went a long way towards the £1,084 rise in value, with contributions from the other 7% risers mentioned in the intro. Cash dropped due to ISA charge and using some for the purchase.
The main thing is - I've ditched LOOK:Lookers and no longer have to look at it's sorry performance in my portfolio any more - huzzah!! I do regret losing TLOU:Tlou Energey though. I'll be watching it like a hawk for a potential re-entry opportunity. Oh - and I have another 5,363 OPTI:Optibiotix shares which makes me want to do a jig of joy.
Note that I forgot to put the increase in portfolio cost onto the graph as few weeks ago, which explains why it looked like the green line didn't cross the red. Now it's been corrected and there was a crossing, but that's behind us now.
The SIPP looks like this after week 110
Another monthly charge reduces my cash and hammers my year 3 performance. This could be interesting as there's nothing I particularly want to sell so could be negative for most of the year. A good rise in potential profits was partly because OPTI:Optibiotix is back in profit in this account - Woohoo! The portfolio isn't far off it's highest ever value, overall performance is still 7% above target and that's all that really matters.
The gap between cost and value is back to a decent width after the Crimbo scare.
Do I really have to look at the trading account after 76 weeks of misery?
LION:Lionsgold tanked some more. It is massively volatile though, with rises or falls of 6-12% every day. If the crypto madness kicks in again I may yet escape without a horrible loss. I just have to admit I'm not very good at trading - probably for the best that I have this tiny account to prove it.
Good grief!
So an interesting week where I made a tactical sacrifice to ditch a donkey and buy some more of my favourite share. I'm really pleased to have achieved all that without impacting performance, but I do have pangs of regret at losing TLOU:Tlou Energy. However - I'll be back...
Biggest loser was predictably in my trading account, which appears cursed. After watching LION:Lionsgold drop from 6p to 4.5p I thought I'd found the bottom before purchasing, but now it's 3.25p and I've lost 34% in 3 weeks. The morale of the story - wait for it to bounce back up rather than trying to catch a falling knife! If only I could remember that...
The other reasonably big fall was MTFB:Motif Bio, dropping 6% but on the back of a 16% rise last week. I can see this drifting up and down until news of approval to sell Iclaprim, but there's bound to be a fundraise at some point so let's hope it's after the approval.
Lots of 7% rises this week. CMCL:Caledonia Mining has been increasing steadily after announcing the quarterly dividend. I'm still losing 15% but half the deficit has been made up in the last few weeks, so when it moves it's moving fast.
RED:RedT Energy has been a massive disappointment recently and I'm losing 18%, but a 7% rise this week will be accelerated on news of orders. What this really needs is announcement of a big deal, for example with National Grid or a major wind farm company. Grid storage would need lots and lots of units, and only volume sales will push the company into profit.
WRES:W Resources was a mistake purchase as I've watched my holding diluted to hell over multiple placings, but there may actually be a chance of recovering some of my 44% loss if news of financing comes through. A 7% up-tick this week was in anticipation of that I think.
Share of the Week isn't the biggest riser as it only climbed 4%. OPTI:Optibiotix rose 2p, but thanks to some purchases at 63.8p on Thursday, each penny increase is now worth £518 and it's a rare example of me buying something and getting an immediate increase in value. The rise also reduces my OPTI:Optibiotix loss to just £805 when it was £3,500 a few weeks ago. This means I have a new Nemesis Share, with TRX:Tissue Regenix having tumbled to a £919 loss but heading back in the right direction, and OPTI:Optibiotix is only 3rd worse after JLP:Jubilee Metals dropped to a £887 loss. It would have been even better for OPTI:Optibiotix if I'd not taken the £855 loss on LOOK:Lookers this week and ditched that donkey from the worst performer ranks!
Boing!
Here's the ISA and share portfolio performance
| Weekly Change | |||
| Cash | £10.89 | -£25.31 | |
| Portfolio cost | £44,964.39 | -£17.58 | |
| Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission) | £47.109.00 | (4.8%) | +£1,084.52 |
| Potential profits | £7,637.04 | -£511.83 | |
| Yr 3 Dividends | £34.11 | +£0 | |
| Yr 3 Profit from sales | £1,104.47 | -£27.19 | |
| Yr 3 Average monthly cash profit | £220.57 | (5.9%) | -£7.60 |
| Total Dividends | £1,213.16 | +£0 | |
| Total Profit from sales | £7,816.97 | -£27.19 | |
| Average monthly cash profit | £306.29 | (8.2%) | -£3.53 |
| (Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months) |
This is complicated! Potential profits are down £511 and most of that is due to selling TLOU:Tlou Energy for £828 profit. So in reality, potential profits from the rest of the portfolio are up by around £300. The profits gained from the TLOU:Tlou Energy sale were negated by the £855 loss getting rid of LOOK:Lookers leaving me with fractionally less than I originally invested. When I re-invested the resulting £3,445 in OPTI:Optobiotix, the cost of the portfolio dropped by £17 compared to what it was before the sales. The subsequent 2p rise in OPTI:Optibiotix went a long way towards the £1,084 rise in value, with contributions from the other 7% risers mentioned in the intro. Cash dropped due to ISA charge and using some for the purchase.
The main thing is - I've ditched LOOK:Lookers and no longer have to look at it's sorry performance in my portfolio any more - huzzah!! I do regret losing TLOU:Tlou Energey though. I'll be watching it like a hawk for a potential re-entry opportunity. Oh - and I have another 5,363 OPTI:Optibiotix shares which makes me want to do a jig of joy.
Note that I forgot to put the increase in portfolio cost onto the graph as few weeks ago, which explains why it looked like the green line didn't cross the red. Now it's been corrected and there was a crossing, but that's behind us now.
The SIPP looks like this after week 110
| Weekly Change | |||
| Cash | £27.69 | -£10.97 | |
| Portfolio cost | £26,007.03 | +£0 | |
| Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission) | £29,152.84 | (12.1%) | +£635.60 |
| Potential profits | £4,436.57 | +£223.48 | |
| Yr 3 Dividends | £0 | +£0 | |
| Yr 3 Profit from sales | £0 | +£0 | |
| Yr 3 Average monthly cash profit | £-15.61 | (-0.7%) | -£6.38 |
| Total Dividends | £916.10 | +£0 | |
| Total Profit from sales | £8,925.19 | +£0 | |
| Average monthly cash profit | £381.01 | (17.6%) | -£3.94 |
| (Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months) |
Another monthly charge reduces my cash and hammers my year 3 performance. This could be interesting as there's nothing I particularly want to sell so could be negative for most of the year. A good rise in potential profits was partly because OPTI:Optibiotix is back in profit in this account - Woohoo! The portfolio isn't far off it's highest ever value, overall performance is still 7% above target and that's all that really matters.
The gap between cost and value is back to a decent width after the Crimbo scare.
Do I really have to look at the trading account after 76 weeks of misery?
| Weekly Change | |||
| Cash | £0.03 | +£0 | |
| Portfolio cost | £345.65 | +£0 | |
| Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission) | £228.26 | (-34%) | -£55.43 |
| Potential profits | £0 | +£0 | |
| Year 2 Dividends | £0 | +£0 | |
| Year 2 Profit | -£218.50 | +£0 | |
| Yr 2 Average monthly cash profit | -£39.45 | (-137%) | +£1.72 |
| Dividends | £1.15 | +£0 | |
| Profit from sales | -£241.35 | +£0 | |
| Average monthly cash profit | -£13.70 | (-47.5%) | +£0.18 |
| (Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months) |
LION:Lionsgold tanked some more. It is massively volatile though, with rises or falls of 6-12% every day. If the crypto madness kicks in again I may yet escape without a horrible loss. I just have to admit I'm not very good at trading - probably for the best that I have this tiny account to prove it.
Good grief!
So an interesting week where I made a tactical sacrifice to ditch a donkey and buy some more of my favourite share. I'm really pleased to have achieved all that without impacting performance, but I do have pangs of regret at losing TLOU:Tlou Energy. However - I'll be back...
Thursday 4 January 2018
A few more Optibiotix to start 2018
I find myself wanting to buy more OPTI:Optibiotix every time it dips below 65p. I can't stand the idea of newbies coming in at a lower price than I paid, and it relieves some of the misery of a drop when I know I'm reducing the average price.
I've been really pleased with TLOU:Tlou Energy and it's done very well for me, but after the recent rapid rise and with a long way to go before being a profitable venture, I decided to take my £828.15 (59.3%) profit and re-invest the proceeds in OPTI:Optibiotix at these ridiculous prices.
I've also been bothered for 2 years by one of my biggest dog shares LOOK:Lookers. Sentiment in the auto industry is going nowhere, and despite this company being very under-valued, I'm just fed up and have wanted out for ages. I was concerned about the effect of my loss on performance, however today gave me an opportunity to sell without impacting performance. I sold them for a £855.34 (40.9%) loss but liberated £1,212 to spend on OPTI:Optibiotix which I believe has a far better chance of making back my loss than LOOK:Lookers has. The loss was only really £769.21 as I had £86.13 dividends over the 2 years and selling TLOU:Tlou Energy cancelled that out.
So, in my share account I bought 1,921 OPTI:Optibiotix shares at 63.8p costing £1,237.55 and bringing down my weighted average to 64.88p.
In my ISA I bought 3,442 shares, also costing 63.8p (a total bargain!) for £2,207.95. This brought the weighted average down to 69.18p which is great given it used to be about 85p!
My OPTI:Optibiotix holding has now increased to 51,897 shares costing £35,021.28 at a weighted average of 67.48p. This is 49.1% of my entire portfolio cost.
I know the general rule is no more than 10% in one company, but everything I see about OPTI:Optibiotix is so exciting that I'm convinced it's heading for greatness.
The catalyst for today's purchase was news that OPTI:Optibiotix will be co-exhibiting at Probiota with DSM in February. This is one of the long-running joint ventures that's been off the radar for ages, but the sort of partnership that could be massive for OPTI:Optibiotix and be the catalyst for spinning off SweetBiotix as a separate company.
Although TLOU:Tlou Energy did go up some more today, so did OPTI:Optibiotix, so the bid price is already more than I paid.
Each 1p rise in OPTI:Optibiotix will now be worth £518.97, and with over 50,000 shares I should get a decent slice of both SBTX:SkinBioTherapeutics and Sweetbiotix, although my most recent purchases are probably too late to qualify for SBTX:SkinBioTherapeutics.
I'm feeling very happy as 2018 starts off in what promises to be a game-changing year for OPTI:Optibiotix.
I've been really pleased with TLOU:Tlou Energy and it's done very well for me, but after the recent rapid rise and with a long way to go before being a profitable venture, I decided to take my £828.15 (59.3%) profit and re-invest the proceeds in OPTI:Optibiotix at these ridiculous prices.
I've also been bothered for 2 years by one of my biggest dog shares LOOK:Lookers. Sentiment in the auto industry is going nowhere, and despite this company being very under-valued, I'm just fed up and have wanted out for ages. I was concerned about the effect of my loss on performance, however today gave me an opportunity to sell without impacting performance. I sold them for a £855.34 (40.9%) loss but liberated £1,212 to spend on OPTI:Optibiotix which I believe has a far better chance of making back my loss than LOOK:Lookers has. The loss was only really £769.21 as I had £86.13 dividends over the 2 years and selling TLOU:Tlou Energy cancelled that out.
So, in my share account I bought 1,921 OPTI:Optibiotix shares at 63.8p costing £1,237.55 and bringing down my weighted average to 64.88p.
In my ISA I bought 3,442 shares, also costing 63.8p (a total bargain!) for £2,207.95. This brought the weighted average down to 69.18p which is great given it used to be about 85p!
My OPTI:Optibiotix holding has now increased to 51,897 shares costing £35,021.28 at a weighted average of 67.48p. This is 49.1% of my entire portfolio cost.
I know the general rule is no more than 10% in one company, but everything I see about OPTI:Optibiotix is so exciting that I'm convinced it's heading for greatness.
The catalyst for today's purchase was news that OPTI:Optibiotix will be co-exhibiting at Probiota with DSM in February. This is one of the long-running joint ventures that's been off the radar for ages, but the sort of partnership that could be massive for OPTI:Optibiotix and be the catalyst for spinning off SweetBiotix as a separate company.
Although TLOU:Tlou Energy did go up some more today, so did OPTI:Optibiotix, so the bid price is already more than I paid.
Each 1p rise in OPTI:Optibiotix will now be worth £518.97, and with over 50,000 shares I should get a decent slice of both SBTX:SkinBioTherapeutics and Sweetbiotix, although my most recent purchases are probably too late to qualify for SBTX:SkinBioTherapeutics.
I'm feeling very happy as 2018 starts off in what promises to be a game-changing year for OPTI:Optibiotix.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)