Week 190 Review- Very dull and down another £1K

There were hardly any major movers this week, with just a very gradual drip downwards throughout most of the portfolio. The drop came to £918 so the deficit has widened to £6,597 and portfolio value is down to £91,465.

Only major faller was MAIS:Maistro which dropped 5% and my minuscule holding is now worth £1.96. Part of me wishes it would fold just so I don't have to report on it any more.

IQE:IQE was hammered last week but recovered 5% against purchase price in my SIPP and 7% in my trading account as I bought it much cheaper in there. We need news on 5G supply and the new reactors to be operational before there's any recovery. My biggest fear is they will be bought out while the price is so low.

RED:RedT Energy wins Share of the Week. The price has sneaked up 6% and now matches the open offer price. I have taken up the open offer as I get over 1,000 shares for £28 and there is no commission. Why the hell not?

It's now 9 weeks of misery with just that one week that gave me false hope.

The trend line will soon be flat!

The ISA and share portfolios look like this

			Weekly Change
Cash	£59.28		+£35.00
Portfolio cost	£57,246.22		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£50,941.64	(-11%)	-£612.96
Potential profits	£5,801.37		-£505.96
Yr 4 Dividends	£60.50		+£0
Yr 4 Profit from sales	£1,077.60		+£0
Yr 4 Average monthly cash profit	£141.71	(3%)	-£4.29
Total Dividends	£1,298.83		+£0
Total Profit from sales	£19,774.72		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	£476.68	(10%)	-£2.53
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)

I added £35 cash to cover the RED:RedT Energy open offer and the next few monthly charges. Aside from that the losses were deeper than the reduced potential profit as most things ticked down.

Same story as overall performance

The trend line will be flat here before it is on the overall chart.

The SIPP looks like this after week 174

			Weekly Change
Cash	£93.07		+£0
Portfolio cost	£38,324.77		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£38,855.66	(1.4%)	-£359.50
Potential profits	£4,914.46		-£303.79
Yr 4 Dividends	£0		+£0
Yr 4 Interest	£0.04		+£0
Yr 4 Profit from sales	£484.30		+£0
Yr 4 Average monthly cash profit	£106.60	(3.3%)	-£6.21
Total Dividends	£1,342.25		+£0
Total Interest	£0.07		+£0
Total Profit from sales	£11,029.22		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	£299.94	(9.4%)	-£1.74
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)

Not really much of a drop, and once again losses deepened more than paper profits reduced.

I have a horrible feeling it's going to cross the line next week.

This one's keeping the trend line pointing upwards, but for how much longer?

The trading account looks like this after week 140

			Weekly Change
Cash	£18.80		+£0
Portfolio cost	£2,321.29		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£1,497.49	(-35.5%)	+£43.97
Potential profits	£0		+£0
Year 3 Dividends	£17.33		+£0
Year 3 Profit	£177.06		+£0
Yr 3 Average monthly cash profit	£23.40	(12.1%)	-£0.67
Dividends	£18.48		+£0
Profit from sales	-£64.29		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	-£1.42	(-0.7%)	+£0.01
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)

Apart from LION:Lionsgold which is still suspended and may never be seen again, every share was slightly up this week. It was only a £43 improvement, but maybe there's light at the end of the very long tunnel.

Can we get back to the upward trend?

Come on chart - drag that line back upwards!

That's it. I'm feeling a sense of gloom that nothing seems to be going right at the moment. Let's hope my pension transfer comes through next week and I get to spend £2,200 while things are cheap.

Week 189 Review - The misery just keeps piling up

Yet another dreadful week with bad news hammering one share really badly. The combined portfolios lost £3,708 which widened the deficit to £5,668, and the total portfolio value dropped to £92,359.

IQE:IQE got hammered and dropped 17% after pretty dismal results. I was surprised at the ferocity of the drop in prices, as I thought those results were expected after the trading updates. It was even worse in my trading account where it fell 22% of my purchase price.

OPTI:Optibiotix had another bad week despite great news on new distribution deals. When I see sells right at the start of the day it makes me very suspicious this is being manipulated downwards. It's so easy for a few traders to control the share price they must be making a mint from the fluctuations. It dropped 4p which is 6% and cost me £3,200 of this week's losses.

MMX:Minds + Machines is drifting, down another 6% this week and now 29% down overall. I'm still convinced this is a highly cash generative company - they just haven't demonstrated a willingness to return any of it to shareholders yet. If it's used for funding profitable acquisitions then I'm all for it. This was bought as a potential quick win though. Now it's yet another very long term hope.

TEK:Tekcapital fell another 5% and will continue to do so until they can show a profit.

TND:Tandem Group had a great surge after results, but are slipping again and fell 5% this week.

There were very few climbers. MTFB:Motif Bio announced they have set a date to meet the FDA and hopefully get an answer for how to get approval for Iclaprim. This spiked the share price early in the week, but it's drifted back and so the rise is only 6% of what I paid for them

VRS:Versarien started sneaking back up and this week's great 11% gain has seen them go into profit, albeit only £8.

Share of the Week goes to TAP:Taptica which climbed 12% and may yet make up the 35% loss I'm currently suffering.

Desperate

More desperate

The ISA and share portfolios look like this

			Weekly Change
Cash	£24.28		+£0
Portfolio cost	£57,246.22		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£51,554.60	(-9.9%)	-£1,982.12
Potential profits	£6,307.33		-£2,037.47
Yr 4 Dividends	£60.50		+£0
Yr 4 Profit from sales	£1,077.60		+£0
Yr 4 Average monthly cash profit	£146.00	(3.1%)	-£4.56
Total Dividends	£1,298.83		+£0
Total Profit from sales	£19,774.72		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	£479.21	(10%)	-£2.54
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)

Overall portfolio dropped slightly less than the profits I lost with the OPTI:Optibiotix drop so I guess that's some comfort. Average monthly performance has dropped to the target 10% and will dip under it next week, putting pressure on me to sell something. Unfortunately the only share in profit is OPTI:Optibiotix and I ain't selling any of those, so things are looking pretty bad at the moment.

The last 2 months have seen an almost continuous decline, which is even more worrying as OPTI:Optibiotix are doing ok. The last time things were this bad OPTI:Optibiotix was in the red.

In a few months time the trend line will be pointing well and truly downwards.

Here's the SIPP after week 173

			Weekly Change
Cash	£93.07		+£0
Portfolio cost	£38,324.77		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£39,215.16	(2.3%)	-£1,637.49
Potential profits	£5,218.25		-£1,324.43
Yr 4 Dividends	£0		+£0
Yr 4 Interest	£0.04		+£0
Yr 4 Profit from sales	£484.30		+£0
Yr 4 Average monthly cash profit	£111.81	(3.5%)	-£6.99
Total Dividends	£1,342.25		+£0
Total Interest	£0.07		+£0
Total Profit from sales	£11,029.22		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	£301.68	(9.4%)	-£1.75
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)

The big drop for IQE:IQE and 4% drop for CAML:Central Asia Metals meant losses deepened much more than profits dropped. I'm also well below target now for average monthly performance. Most likely sale to try and get that back will be PAF:Pan African Resources which I may pump into CEY:Centamin to bring my average price down. I really need PAF:Pan African Resources to get back up to 10p though, and for CEY:Centamin to stay around 90p until then. Good news is that my work pension now has enough in it to transfer some to my SIPP, so I'll be adding £2,200 in the next few weeks.

Still just the right side of the red line

Well below the trend line now, but thankfully it's still pointing upwards

The trading portfolio looks like this after week 139

			Weekly Change
Cash	£18.80		+£0
Portfolio cost	£2,321.29		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£1,453.52	(-37.4%)	-£88.69
Potential profits	£0		+£0
Year 3 Dividends	£17.33		+£0
Year 3 Profit	£177.06		+£0
Yr 3 Average monthly cash profit	£24.07	(12.4%)	-£0.71
Dividends	£18.48		+£0
Profit from sales	-£64.29		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	-£1.43	(-0.7%)	+£0.01
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)

It's been looking good the last few weeks, but IQE:IQE got whacked and we're back down again a lot quicker then we went up. Amazing that the average monthly performance is still well above 10% for year 3, but no hope of selling anything in the near future.

Just as it looked like the corner had been turned, back down we go

It may have turned downwards, but it's still above the trend line - woohoo!

I'm not going to speculate on next week, other than whether Legal & General will find some new excuse not to allow my pension transfer. I really need to snap out of this 2-month period of doom and gloom. I don't think it's Brexit-induced. It's been news induced, but none of it has been good news. Surely that's got to change some time?

Week 188 Review - Disaster for RedT Energy

I'm getting pretty fed up of reading RNSs that are full of doom and disaster. It's been a torrid few months! This was another flat week, but at least the portfolio went up a tiny bit, climbing £226 and reducing the deficit yo £1,960. Total portfolio value stands at £96,067.

This week's RNS of doom was that RED:RedT Energy need to do a placing and open offer to keep the wheels on. Unfortunately the 20% drop against my original purchase price (more like 50%+ from the price at the time of the RNS) means the offer price is now well below the open offer price, so nobody is likely to take it up. If nobody takes it up then the wheels will come off and goodbye £1,063 investment. It's so frustrating because their technology is fantastic, but they are spending way too much and selling no machines. There's one hope in a strategic review - maybe they can turn it around. It will just take one big grid supply order.

AMYT:Amryt Pharma has been slipping for months, probably on the back of general doom and gloom in junior pharma and lots of high profile trial failures. It dropped another 5% and is now 27% down.

CWR:Ceres Power is slowly climbing and went up 5% this week and into profit of £13. Glad to be back in this one and hopefully got my timing right for once.

Very few major movers this week, so IQE:IQE gets Share of the Week based on the trading account holding climbing 6% of purchase price. The SIPP climbed 5%. Still pretty grim as the SIPP holding is 32% down and losing £775 whereas the trading holding is down 16% and losing £81.

It's been flat for a few weeks now.

The trend line gets dragged flatter.

The ISA and share portfolios look like this

			Weekly Change
Cash	£24.28		+£0
Portfolio cost	£57,246.22		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£53,536.72	(-6.5%)	+£42.98
Potential profits	£8,344.80		+£519.59
Yr 4 Dividends	£60.50		+£0
Yr 4 Profit from sales	£1,077.60		+£0
Yr 4 Average monthly cash profit	£150.56	(3.2%)	-£4.86
Total Dividends	£1,298.83		+£0
Total Profit from sales	£19,774.72		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	£481.75	(10.1%)	-£2.58
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)

Potential profits up quite well thanks to a 1p rise in OPTI:Optibiotix and CWR:Ceres Power moving into the green, but drops all over the portfolio meant losses only reduced by £42. In two weeks the 10% performance target will be breached.

Not good

As with the overall portfolio, the trend line is being dragged flat

The SIPP looks like this after week 172

			Weekly Change
Cash	£93.07		+£0
Portfolio cost	£38,324.77		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£40,852.65	(6.6%)	+£155.37
Potential profits	£6,542.68		+£253.24
Yr 4 Dividends	£0		+£0
Yr 4 Interest	£0.04		+£0
Yr 4 Profit from sales	£484.30		+£0
Yr 4 Average monthly cash profit	£118.80	(3.7%)	-£7.92
Total Dividends	£1,342.25		+£0
Total Interest	£0.07		+£0
Total Profit from sales	£11,029.22		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	£303.43	(9.5%)	-£1.77
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)

Similar story to the other accounts, with deepening losses stealing £100 of the £253 rise in potential profits. One of the flattest weeks for ages.

Still a reasonable buffer.

Still below the trend line.

The trading account looks like this after week 138

			Weekly Change
Cash	£18.80		+£0
Portfolio cost	£2,321.29		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£1,542.21	(-33.6%)	+£27.77
Potential profits	£0		+£0
Year 3 Dividends	£17.33		+£0
Year 3 Profit	£177.06		+£0
Yr 3 Average monthly cash profit	£24.78	(12.8%)	-£0.75
Dividends	£18.48		+£0
Profit from sales	-£64.29		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	-£1.44	(-0.7%)	+£0.01
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)

Clawed back about half last week's losses. CAML:Central Asia Metals still hasn't made the long overdue breakout and LION:Lionsgold is still showing no signs of re-listing.

It's going up a lot slower than it went down!

I have to remain positive that it's above the trend line despite being in the deep realms of angler fish.

That's it. all the news coming out of OPTI:Optibiotix about improved deals and new deals has moved the share price up 1p in 2 weeks. When will we great a proper re-rate? Maybe next week...

Week 187 Review - Flat and dull

A quick and late entry this week as I was away in the Lake District playing in the snow. Very little happened in the markets, but boring is good after the recent miserable run. The portfolio dropped in value by just £298 expanding the deficit to £2,186 and reducing total value to £95,859.

There were loads of 5% droppers this week, with IQE:IQE, CWR:Ceres Power, TLOU:Tlou Energy and PAF:Pan African Resources all dropping 5% and causing most of the deficit.

CEY:Centamin recovered a little from the 35% drop last week, but only climbed 5% when I was expecting much more.

MMX:Minds + Machines are quietly doing their stuff and also climbed 5% but they are still 27% down on my purchase price.

VRS:Versarien managed a little more of a rise climbing 6% and are almost back to my purchase price. If only I had some more cash I would buy more at  these prices.

TND:Tandem Group easily wins Share of the Week after giving solid results given the difficulties in toys and retail this year. Their forward looking report was excellent, and led to a 23% rise. My holding is still 22% down, but that could be made up in a week of strong buying as there are so few shares in circulation. Current PE ratio is only 4.64 which is just stupid, and this should double to get to a fair price. I've had £65 dividends over the years too, which isn't bad.

Pretty flat and under water.

Well below the trend line and slope getting shallower.

The ISA and share accounts look like this

			Weekly Change
Cash	£24.28		-£3.75
Portfolio cost	£57,246.22		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£53,493.74	(-6.6%)	-£173.28
Potential profits	£7,825.21		-£6.16
Yr 4 Dividends	£60.50		+£0
Yr 4 Profit from sales	£1,077.60		+£0
Yr 4 Average monthly cash profit	£155.42	(3.3%)	-£5.72
Total Dividends	£1,298.83		+£0
Total Profit from sales	£19,774.72		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	£484.33	(10.2%)	-£2.69
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)

Monthly fees came out of cash, profits dropped as CWR:Ceres Power slipped back to loss and average monthly performance stayed at 10.2%. Portfolio value dipped by £173 which is nothing.

Back to the more familiar under water stance for this account

Bad in many ways.

Here's the SIPP after week 171

			Weekly Change
Cash	£93.07		-£14.43
Portfolio cost	£38,324.77		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£40,697.28	(6.2%)	-£74.99
Potential profits	£6,289.44		-£292.06
Yr 4 Dividends	£0		+£0
Yr 4 Interest	£0.04		+£0
Yr 4 Profit from sales	£484.30		+£0
Yr 4 Average monthly cash profit	£126.72	(4%)	-£13.53
Total Dividends	£1,342.25		+£0
Total Interest	£0.07		+£0
Total Profit from sales	£11,029.22		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	£305.20	(9.6%)	-£2.17
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)

Cash down from monthly fees, paper profits down thanks to CAML:Central Asia Metals dropping 4%, other gains managed to limit the losses to £75 and average performance remains unchanged just below target.

Too close to the line, but still the right side of it.

Below trend line which is a worry as the SIPP is usually better behaved.

Here's the trading portfolio after week 137

			Weekly Change
Cash	£18.80		+£0
Portfolio cost	£2,321.29		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£1,514.44	(-34.8%)	-£50.47
Potential profits	£0		-£4.87
Year 3 Dividends	£17.33		+£0
Year 3 Profit	£177.06		+£0
Yr 3 Average monthly cash profit	£25.53	(13.2%)	-£0.79
Dividends	£18.48		+£0
Profit from sales	-£64.29		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	-£1.45	(-0.7%)	+£0.01
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)

First bad week in a long time with no share rising and 3 of the 5 falling. Will I never make any money from this account?

Still very boring.

Above the trend line so I have a ray of hope to end the week.

Nothing interesting due to happen next week so all I can hope is some news comes out about the OPTI:Optibiotix deals in India. It all looks very promising but we need contracts to be signed before the share price is likely to respond.

Week 186 Review - Centamin hammered and profits wiped out

It feels like every time a company in my portfolio starts doing well, something horrible happens and they collapse. A few weeks ago it was MTFB:Motif Bio and this week it was CEY:Centamin. Around £1,000 paper profits were completely wiped out and my holding now sits at a big loss. Add to that a 7p drop for OPTI:Optibiotix and the effect was rather devastating. A £6,656 drop in portfolio value plunged me into the red by £1,888 and dropped the overall portfolio value to £96,158.

CEY:Centamin published their results and there were no surprises. However, they stuck to their dividend policy which is to give back to shareholders what they have in free cash flow. That still works out about 4.7% at the current share price, but was a 75% drop on last year. This completely freaked out the market and the price crashed. In my SIPP it fell 41% of my original purchase price, and in my ISA it fell 35%.

I was so shocked at this drop, and so convinced it would bounce straight back, that I sold my holding in LLOY:Lloyds Bank for a small £11.85 (0.7%) loss in order to buy more CEY:Centamin at what I thought was a bargain price of 98p. As usual my timing was terrible as LLOY:Lloyds went on a rally. albeit only one that would have made me £20 profit, and CEY:Centamin dropped further to 91p so I immediately lost around 10%. I did however increase my holding by 1015 shares at 97.287p costing £999.41.

I guess it wasn't just the dividend cut that affected the share price, as PAF:Pan African Resources was my next worst performer, dropping 12% as gold prices slipped slightly. At least this is still 25% up and a rare splash of green in my portfolio.

OPTI:Optibiotix is being traded mercilessly and after great gains last week dipped 7p this week which is 11% and responsible for most of this week's drop. Members of the board were in India this week, so hopefully there will be news of that trip next week and a bounce back.

RED:RedT Energy just keeps slipping and will continue to do so until a hefty contract is signed. They need to sell a hell of a lot of machines to make a profit. This fell another 7% and is now 66% down.

My newest share VRS:Versarien dropped another 7% so my timing was spectacularly wrong. This is now 13% down after 2 weeks. I'm hoping the bounce will come soon - either that or wait a month as I'll finally get my £2,000 pension transfer in April.

TAP:Taptica keeps threatening to recover, but then doesn't. It fell another 6% this week and is 48% down.

SBTX:SkinBioTherapeutics peaked at 20p and is now subject to the pressures of traders and is on the way down again. This week's 5% drop makes my holding 14% under water. Relieved I managed to sell my SIPP holding for a reasonable profit at 20p, despite the subsequent drop in VRS:Versarien which I bought with the proceeds.

Although mostly doom and gloom this week, there were some good news stories. IKA:Ilika is really motoring now, and climbed another 7%. It's now only 18% down so looking like an unexpected recovery could be on the cards.

TLOU:Tlou Energy is also having a good run as fullproduction is not far away. They just need someone to buy the gas. This week it climbed 8% but is still 32% down.

IQE:IQE has been under sustained shorting attack and there is a possibility these are quietly closing, as for the second week in a row there has been a decent rise. It went up 8% in my SIPP and 10% in my trading account, so hopefully the growth will continue.

Share of the Week goes to CWR:Ceres Power which went up 9% and is now in profit. It's only £6 up, but that's more than most of my portfolio. I'm relieved that the recent dip seems to have turned around as I was worried about catching a falling knife, but my target buy-in price was 150p so I think sometimes the falling knife can be an opportunity if you don't mind losing out if it slips further. A big power generation contract could see this really move. There are exciting development with global partners, so if just one of those deals comes through it will be very exciting.

A very harsh and sudden plunge into the red.

Massively below the trend line now. The optimism of last week has been crushed.

The ISA and share portfolios now look like this

			Weekly Change
Cash	£28.03		+£0
Portfolio cost	£57,246.22		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£53,667.02	(-6.3%)	-£3,828.57
Potential profits	£7,831.37		-£3,610.32
Yr 4 Dividends	£60.50		+£0
Yr 4 Profit from sales	£1,077.60		+£0
Yr 4 Average monthly cash profit	£161.14	(3.4%)	-£5.56
Total Dividends	£1,298.83		+£0
Total Profit from sales	£19,774.72		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	£487.02	(10.2%)	-£2.63
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)

CEY:Centamin accounted for about £100 of the drop in profits and £450 of the deepening loss, with OPTI:Optibiotix contributing the vast majority of the losses. Not much change elsewhere as even the bigger movers are fairly small holdings.

Back in more familiar territory

As with the combined chart, well below the trend line.

The SIPP looks like this after week 170

			Weekly Change
Cash	£107.50		-£11.73
Portfolio cost	£38,324.77		-£0.11
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£40,772.27	(6.4%)	-£2,873.02
Potential profits	£6,581.50		-£2,589.67
Yr 4 Dividends	£0		+£0
Yr 4 Interest	£0.04		+£0
Yr 4 Profit from sales	£484.30		-£11.85
Yr 4 Average monthly cash profit	£140.25	(4.4%)	-£14.72
Total Dividends	£1,342.25		+£0
Total Interest	£0.07		+£0
Total Profit from sales	£11,029.22		-£11.85
Average monthly cash profit	£307.37	(9.6%)	-£2.12
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)

Profits took a small hit of £11 from selling LLOY:Lloyds Bank at a loss but I'm hoping CEY:Centamin will recover quickly whereas LLOY:Lloyds Bank may have a mini collapse when Brexit goes tits up. Cash dropped a little as I topped up the proceeds of the sell to buy £1,000 worth of CEY:Centamin. Very little impact on overall performance from taking the small loss.

I guess the buffer is no smaller than it has been over the last few weeks on the dips.

I was so happy to be above the trend line last week. Now a lot less happy.

Here's the trading account after week 136

			Weekly Change
Cash	£18.80		+£0
Portfolio cost	£2,321.29		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£1,564.91	(-32.6%)	+£45.42
Potential profits	£4.87		+£4.87
Year 3 Dividends	£17.33		+£0
Year 3 Profit	£177.06		+£0
Yr 3 Average monthly cash profit	£26.32	(13.6%)	-£0.85
Dividends	£18.48		+£0
Profit from sales	-£64.29		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	-£1.46	(-0.8%)	+£0.01
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)

Gosh - it's another great week for the trading account, with a £45 increase thanks to the great rise from IQE:IQE and a steady week for CAML:Central Asia Metals going back into profit. Will it be sustained this time - will I ever get the long term performance figure above £0?

Wow - that's a really long, sustained rise. I'm starting to like this account!

Then I look at this chart and reality bites. There's a very big gap to make up before it breaks even. Above the trend line though - but it's a shockingly awful trend line.

So a miserable week following on from quite a few miserable weeks, with bad fortune seeming to be targeting any share I own. I'm getting to the stage where I dread opening an RNS for fear of yet more bad news.

I also have to start looking at some of my train wreck shares, because at some point they will cease to exist and I'll need to account for them.

BLOC:Block Commodities (formerly AFPO:African Potash) are suspended on NEX and I doubt will ever re-appear before the whole thing goes bust. They are worthless anyway, so I'll have a loss of £714 to account for when they do.

TRK:Torotrak have been liquidated but the shares are still in my account. Fortunately I bought them when I didn't know what I was doing so only lost £117, but it's still accounted for as a paper loss.

I'm not sure what's happening with LION:Lionsgold. They are suspended but the fact they are showing no sign whatsoever of re-listing worries me rather a lot. The good news is that they were filler for my trading account so the most I can lose is £345.

I'm most worried about my shares that are not dead in the water, but which are looking very precarious. Biggest risk is KIBO:Kibo Energy which is currently losing £2,343 and which has the potential to lose £2,635. They spent years working on their power project in Tanzania and to be told to get stuffed by TANESCO. Where the hell are they going to get the funding to continue their other projects after sending so much on a dead duck? I'm now really worried about this one.

My next biggest loser is JLP:Jubilee Metals which has gone very quiet lately. We used to get monthly production updates but now we get nothing, and they keep sinking money into new projects before making anything from the ones they have already started. It's not surprising my holding is down 46%. That amounts to a £2,141 paper loss, but has the potential to be a £4,639 loss if it goes belly up. I'm not as worried about this one, but I am still worried. I have become a lot more risk averse since experiencing the dangers of small mining companies.

I'm even more reluctant to invest in small pharma companies since the MTFB:Motif Bio disaster. That's now down 78% and losing £1,971. They may be able to keep going long enough to market Iclaprim, but it's just as likely they'll go bust or be bought out for practically nothing and force my paper losses to be realised.

I must stop feeling morose and sorry for myself and get some lunch!