Week 438 Review - Great end to the year mainly thanks to Optibiotix, despite cashing in some profits

A good last week of 2023 saw OPTI:Optibiotix gain 2p and JLP:Jubilee Metals gain 0.1p, and as my two biggest holdings that saw the deficit between cost and value reduce by £3,993 despite me taking some profits. It now stands at £91,339 and total portfolio value is £114,607.

There were no big fallers this week.

SAE:Simec Atlantis Energy gained 7% and seem to be attracting a bit of interest, although I'm not sure why, and IES:Invinity Energy gained 10%, but both these shares are making massive losses so I don't really pay much attention to their big moves.

POLY:Polymetal climbed by 7%, although I don't know the bid price so it's likely to be a little less, but would still qualify for mention. I long for the day they announce they are selling their Russian assets so they can re-list in the UK.

OPTI:Optibiotix climbed 8% and accounted for most of the rise this week. There was no news before Christmas so we desperately need something early in the new year. I sold some more from my SIPP this week.

Share of the Week goes to FXPO:Ferrexpo which climbed 10%. I don't know if people are thinking that if they managed to survive this long without Russia destroying them, then maybe they are OK. Unfortunately it only takes one missile to wipe out the entire company so it's still on very dodgy ground, and my holding is still 81% down.

Here's the ISA and shares portfolio after week 22 of year 9.

			Weekly Change
Cash	£151.74		+£11.64
Portfolio cost	£99,175.93		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price-commission)	£53,069.24	(-46.5%)	+£2,348.52
Potential profits	£2,368.63		+£399.08
Yr 9 Dividends	£202.72		+£11.64
Yr 9 Interest	£2.46		+£0
Yr 9 Profit from sales	£31.44		+£0
Yr 9 proj avg monthly profit	£39.78	(0.7%)	+£0.51
Total Dividends	£12,114.15		+£11.64
Total Interest	£4.39		+£0
Total Profit from sales	£17,329.97		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	£287.26	(4.9%)	-£0.54
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)
Compound performance	41%		+0%

A dividend of £11 from WHR:Warehouse REIT was a nice surprise, and the increase in OPTI:Optibiotix was the main reason for the £399 increase in potential profits as I have one batch of shares that is up by 74%. The dividend limited my overall performance drop, and helped maintain my year 9 performance at around £39 a month mainly from dividends, which isn't bad given we're almost half way through year 9.

Nice tick up, but there's a gaping gulf between where we are and the injection line.

Almost touching the trend line, and increasing at a steeper angle this week.

The SIPP looks like this after week 422 overall and week 6 of year 9.

			Weekly Change
Cash	£585.35		-£17.65
Portfolio cost	£104,017.65		+£729.05
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£59,455.38	(-42.8%)	+£1,635.33
Potential profits	£1,200.61		-£529.19
Yr 9 Dividends	£70.36		+£0
Yr 9 Interest	£0		+£0
Yr 9 Profit from sales	£3,373.97		+£711.41
Yr 9 proj avg monthly profit	£2,474.46	(43.2%)	+£121.66
Total Dividends	£14,705.24		+£0
Total Interest	£5.93		+£0
Total Profit from sales	£14,209.87		+£711.41
Average monthly cash profit	£284.91	(5.0%)	+£6.65
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)
Compound performance	40%		+1%

I sold 2 batches of OPTI:Optibiotix as part of my strategy to move the whole SIPP to dividend-paying shares as soon as possible. The first batch had been bought at 9.55p and I sold at 25.82p making £313.27 (154.2%) profit. The second batch had been bought at 18.88p and I also sold for 25.82p, making £398.13 (33.8%) profit. This liberated £2,030 to buy dividend-paying shares.

First I bought 206 shares in PAGE:Pagegroup for 488.8497p costing £1,024.02. I wanted to get back into these after selling my AJ Bell dealing account holding and then failing to transfer them to my ISA. I paid 10p a share more than I did last time, so ended up with a few less, but I think the same would have happened if I used the bed & ISA service.

The second purchase was IGG:IG Group which I discussed last week. They pay a great dividend and I think are under-valued. I bought 132 shares for 762.7292p costing £1,023.78. It reduced my average price to 808.46p and they are only down by 7% now, so hoping they will be profitable soon. The dividends actually mean this is at break even now.

Potential profits dropped by almost £200 less than the profits I banked, which was mainly thanks to increases in JLP:Jubilee Metals and PLUS:Plus500. Projected monthly profit for year 9 is still insane as I can't keep it up, but if I don't sell anything else in year 9 it will still be £285 a month which is about my long term average. I'm hoping I'll be selling a load more OPTI:Optibiotix and JLP:Jubilee Metals shares during the year though, and just keeping the ones in my ISA.

Getting closer to the injection line.

Still below the trend line, but going up more steeply than it.

The trading account looks like this after week 388 overall and week 24 of year 8.

			Weekly Change
Cash	£141.20		+£0
Portfolio cost	£1,935.11		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£1,204.37	(-37.8%)	+£9.62
Potential profits	£0		+£0
Year 8 Dividends	£8.56		+£0
Year 8 Interest	£0		+£0
Year 8 Profit	£283.99		+£0
Yr 8 proj avg monthly profit	£52.82	(+32.8%)	-£2.30
Dividends	£68.66		+£0
Interest	£0.03		+£0
Profit from sales	-£646.70		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	-£6.46	(-4.0%)	+£0.01
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)

BARC:Barclays and JLP:Jubilee Metals increased, but SBTX:SkinBioTherapeutics dropped, so the result was an improvement of £9. Will I be able to sell BARC:Barclays soon?

Painfully slow rise.

Still running parallel to the trend line, but still below it.

I think everything is in place for a significant rally in JLP:Jubilee Metals in the New Year, so I'm looking forward to making some profits in my SIPP so I can get more dividend-paying shares. The tricky decision is what to do with the ISA, as in theory I should use that for the more risky investments. That means selling some of my dividend-paying shares so I can focus the SIPP on those. I'll buy the likes of WHR:Warehouse REIT and GAW:Games Workshop in the SIPP from my profits, and sell those companies in the ISA when they are making a profit. GAW:Games Workshop is already, but only 2%. I'll keep them until I've added more in my SIPP and probably use them for more speculative investments like CWR:Ceres Power.

Week 437 Review - Small drop for Optibiotix but little change elsewhere

Not a bad close into Christmas, but a 0.5p drop in OPTI:Optibiotix means the deficit between cost and value widened by £739 to £95,393 and total portfolio value is £109,890.

Only one share fell by 5% or more, with TRX:Tissue Regenix dropping 5% after having spent months not moving at all. I'm hoping it's a tree shake after a long period of consolidation, but we'll see.

BLU:Blue Star Capital went up 13%, SAE:Simec Atlantis Energy 22% and IES:Invinity Energy 19%, but it's a fractional amount of what I paid for them so not winning any prizes. With companies like these you don't know if it's some genuine interest, or just closing a few shorts for some Christmas cash.

FXPO:Ferrexpo have been sneaking higher each week, and this week they went up 7%. There's a long, long way to go, but I remain hopeful these will get back to their previous rate once the Ukraine war is over.

Share of the Week goes to CAPD:Capital which went up 8%. I quite like these and may buy some more if I get some SIPP funds. If bonds behave then I may have enough to transfer £2k at the end of next month. I've upped my work pension contributions from next April as I'm not quite paying enough to transfer every 4 months, and an extra 1% will fix that and guarantee being able to transfer more regularly.

Here's the ISA and shares portfolio after week 21 of year 9.

			Weekly Change
Cash	£140.10		+£0
Portfolio cost	£99,175.93		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price-commission)	£50,720.72	(-48.9%)	-£461.65
Potential profits	£1,969.55		-£39.64
Yr 9 Dividends	£191.08		+£0
Yr 9 Interest	£2.46		+£0
Yr 9 Profit from sales	£31.44		+£0
Yr 9 proj avg monthly profit	£39.27	(0.7%)	-£1.97
Total Dividends	£12,102.51		+£0
Total Interest	£4.39		+£0
Total Profit from sales	£17,329.97		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	£287.80	(4.9%)	-£0.66
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)
Compound performance	41%		+0%

Very little happened. OPTI:Optibiotix was the main reason for the fall in value but it would have been twice that if others hadn't done well. Potential profits hardly dropped because GAW:Games Workshop and CAML:Central Asia Metals increased almost as much as my profitable OPTI shares dropped.

Feels stuck

Starting to move away from the trend line which is a worry

The SIPP looks like this after week 421 overall and week 5 of year 9.

			Weekly Change
Cash	£603.00		-£39.80
Portfolio cost	£103,288.60		+£562.30
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£57,091.00	(-44.7%)	-£290.85
Potential profits	£1,729.80		+£116.41
Yr 9 Dividends	£70.36		+£0
Yr 9 Interest	£0		+£0
Yr 9 Profit from sales	£2,662.56		+£0
Yr 9 proj avg monthly profit	£2,352.80	(41.0%)	-£588.21
Total Dividends	£14,705.24		+£0
Total Interest	£5.93		+£0
Total Profit from sales	£13,498.46		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	£278.26	(4.9%)	-£0.66
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)
Compound performance	39%		-1%

A lot more happened here than the ISA. I decided I wanted to buy some more PBX:Probiotix so added £460 to my AJ Bell SIPP to boost the cash. However when I tried to buy PBX it wouldn't give me an online quote or let me leave a limit sale. That's better than Hargreaves Lansdown who won't even let me trade them at all online.

I gave up and decided I should increase my PAF:Pan African Resources holding instead, so bought 2,929 shares at 16.6433p costing £499.87 to take my holding in that account up to around £1,000.

Later the same day I noticed a tax rebate had arrived, so just messing around I tried PBX:Probiotix again because the amount was so small. This time it did give me a quote, and although I would normally never do a transaction where commission is 16% of the cost, I was determined to buy some and the tax rebate seemed like free money anyway. I bought 656 shares at 8p costing £62.43. It increases my holding in my AJ Bell SIPP to 6,068 bought for an average of 7.75p. They'd almost be in profit if the declared spread wasn't so stupid at 25%.

Aside from all that the losses were really small at £290 because most things had a good week, and potential profits actually increased by £116 after rises in AJB:AJ Bell, GAW:Games Workshop, III:3i Group, IPX:Impax Asset Management and PLUS:Plus500. It's nice to see so much green in an account!

The gap's certainly not getting much wider, but the injection line remains stubbornly far above.

The trend line is getting away from us.

The trading account looks like this after week 387 overall and week 23 of year 8.

			Weekly Change
Cash	£141.20		+£0
Portfolio cost	£1,935.11		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£1,194.75	(-38.3%)	+£12.97
Potential profits	£0		+£0
Year 8 Dividends	£8.56		+£0
Year 8 Interest	£0		+£0
Year 8 Profit	£283.99		+£0
Yr 8 proj avg monthly profit	£55.12	(+34.2%)	-£2.50
Dividends	£68.66		+£0
Interest	£0.03		+£0
Profit from sales	-£646.70		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	-£6.47	(-4.0%)	+£0.02
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)

BARC:Barclays went up 4% this week but SBTX:SkinBioTherapeutics dropped 3%, but the result was an increase in value of £12. BARC is now only 9% down and may actually get to a position where I can sell in the New Year.

Not going downwards any more.

Just parallel with the trend line isn't good enough, we need to be crossing it.

OPTI:Optibiotix assured us that contracts were just waiting for people to get back from summer holidays before they could be signed. That was 4 months a go and nothing has happened. We were told an update was coming before Christmas and that hasn't happened either.

I feel vindicated that I've started selling off some of my more cheaply bought shares. If we do get blockbuster news then I still have enough of a holding to retire early, but the longer that news takes to arrive the more I'll sell and invest in companies that are actually delivering something.

It's very frustrating to feel that way after over 8 years as an investor, but I have to accept that my exposure to risk is utterly massive while I have such a big holding. Certainly in my SIPP where I'm targeting dividend-paying shares, I need to reduce my exposure to companies that promise the world but can't sell enough to make a profit.

I can liberate £1,925 from my SIPP and make £607 profit at this deflated price. It means I'll be relying on the share price getting much higher before I break even on the rest, but I'm seeing great results with the magic formula shares I bought recently using my new approach, so should be pushing more into the likes of IGG:IG Group and get back into PAGE:Page Group in my SIPP. That may very well happen shortly after Christmas.

Week 436 Review - A great week spoiled by Optibiotix and nearly spoiled by a Jubilee Metals placing

An interesting week which saw the nearest thing to a Santa Rally on good inflation news. Unfortunately there's still no sign of an update from OPTI:Optibiotix so the share price dropped 1p. Normally that would have put me deep in the red, but a 21% increase in JLP:Jubilee Metals despite announcing a discounted placing countered the drop and I ended up pretty flat with the deficit between cost and value improving by £165 to £94,653 despite me taking some profits, and overall portfolio value increasing to £110,107.

KIBO:Kibo Energy was the worst performer dropping 13%, but it's 13% of nothing so no worries.

IES:Invinity Energy dropped 7% which is disappointing as they looked like they were on the way back up. At 27p to buy on the market, I decided to let my 50p warrants expire this week.

One of my holdings in JLP:Jubilee Metals dropped 6%. This was a purchase just after the announcement of a new joint venture that should be a game changer for the company, so I bought a load at 6.7p. After assuring shareholders in the past that there would be no more dilution I figured this was a bargain. Two days later they announced a placing at 5.5p. I can understand their reasoning for the placing, but I find it unforgivable that they didn't announce the placing at the same time as the new joint venture. On Friday morning the share price dropped close to 5.5p and I was spitting feathers. It did recover in the afternoon but I was still 6% down in one day. Hopefully this won't matter next week, but I feel let down by what seems like a dirty trick for those in the know to sell into the rise after the joint venture news knowing they could buy back cheaper on Friday morning. "Legally crooked" is the phrase used in a book I'm currently reading.

Onto the good news. CAML:Cental Asia Metals went up by 6% and put one of my holdings into profit. The rest are still down, but if metal prices don't drop then hopefully there can be a sustained rise. With a P/E ratio of just 9.5, these have plenty of room for improvement.

GAW:Games Workshop recovered from last week's big drop and went up by 7% putting my original holding 1% into profit, and my new holding 3% into profit. Happy days.

ASHM:Ashmore Group have been flying, and went up another 8% this week. They are still 24% down, but it means I can change their colour to orange from orange-red.

FXPO:Ferrexpo also went up 8%. I don't think they will re-rate until the war in Ukraine is over, and they are still 84% down, but things could be a lot worse and we can just keep hoping they remain safe.

SAE:Simec Atlantis Energy have been quite volatile lately. They went up 10% this week, but I don't hold out much hope of them ever recovering, and in my mind have written them off, but not yet on my balance sheet.

Share of the Week goes to my original holding in JLP:Jubilee Metals which went up 21% after the announcement of the joint venture. The potential income from this alone dwarfs anything we already produce, and this is just a start. There are piles of slag all over the world, and we now have a capital-rich partner to help secure it. I have 247,451 shares, which is more than I have in OPTI:Optibiotix, although they didn't cost as much. They did cost £21,259 though, so it's by far my biggest holding other than OPTI. Given I've already made £18,849 profit from my previous holdings in JLP, they have been my most successful investment. I hope the curse that tends to fall on most companies I buy doesn't fall on these!

Here's the ISA and shares portfolio after week 20 of year 9.

			Weekly Change
Cash	£140.10		-£65.82
Portfolio cost	£99,175.93		+£93.59
Portfolio sell value (bid price-commission)	£51,182.37	(-48.4%)	+£348.06
Potential profits	£2,009.19		-£126.60
Yr 9 Dividends	£191.08		+£0
Yr 9 Interest	£2.46		+£0
Yr 9 Profit from sales	£31.44		+£31.44
Yr 9 proj avg monthly profit	£41.24	(0.7%)	+£4.17
Total Dividends	£12,102.51		+£0
Total Interest	£4.39		+£0
Total Profit from sales	£17,329.97		+£31.44
Average monthly cash profit	£288.46	(4.9%)	-£0.39
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)
Compound performance	41%		+0%

I wanted to bed my PAGE:Page Group shares in my ISA but tried to be clever and sold them rather than using the bed & ISA process. Unfortunately I didn't know that AJ Bell won't allow you to transfer cash from your dealing account to your ISA until a day after the settlement date - which is next week! Meanwhile PAGE:Page Group were going up in value meaning I wouldn't be able to get as many back. I decided to buy JLP:Jubilee Metals instead, and it was these shares that dropped by 6% after the placing news. I bought 16,072 at 6.72p costing £1,089.99.

I'm left with a bit of a dilemma, as I now have shares in my AJ Bell dealing account that cost £6,154 but I only have £6,200 of my ISA allowance left for this tax year. I do want to bed them into my ISA, but can't do all of them unless I take a loss or risk trying to bed more than my allowance. I think I'll play it safe and maybe bed my cheaper purchases if they get into profit.

Potential profits dropped because of the drop in OPTI:Optibiotix, and none of my JLP:Jubilee Metals shares are in profit in this account despite the 21% rise.

Heading very slowly in the right direction

Running parallel to the trend line but still below it.

The SIPP looks like this after week 420 overall and week 4 of year 9.

			Weekly Change
Cash	£642.80		+£85.09
Portfolio cost	£102,726.30		+£949.79
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£56,819.55	(-44.7%)	-£270.15
Potential profits	£1,613.39		-£293.53
Yr 9 Dividends	£70.36		+£56.37
Yr 9 Interest	£0		+£0
Yr 9 Profit from sales	£2,662.56		+£663.11
Yr 9 proj avg monthly profit	£2,941.01	(51.6%)	+£56.77
Total Dividends	£14,705.24		+£56.37
Total Interest	£5.93		+£0
Total Profit from sales	£13,498.46		+£663.11
Average monthly cash profit	£278.92	(4.9%)	+£6.76
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)
Compound performance	40%		+1%

A busy week! I got a £56 dividend from PAF:Pan African Resources, but unfortunately my holding has dropped in value by £136 as there seems to have been a sell-off after the dividend. I sold another bunch of OPTI:Optibiotix shares, off-loading 4,000 at 25.675p making £632.69 (160.4%) profit after buying them at 9.56p. I used the proceeds to buy 18,198 shares in JLP:Jubilee Metals at 5.55p on the morning of the announcement of the joint venture costing £1,021.94. These are already up 11% and making £112 potential profit.

I also sold ANTO:Antofagasta as they are no longer in my top 30 magic formula shares. I sold them for 1565.1693p making £30.43 (3.6%) profit. I invested in the company I mentioned last week, buying 198 shares in IPX:Impax Asset Management at 503.0055p costing £1,005.90. These are 2% up and making £23 potential profit in their first week.

I also had my monthly investment in AJB:AJ Bell and the curse struck again. I bought 80 shares at 309.067p after they soared last week on brilliant results, the day before news broke that they were going to have to pay more interest on cash to their customers, at which point the share price tanked. I couldn't believe it! Fortunately common sense prevailed, and the price crept up during the week. Although it's just below what I bought them for, my average is 289p so I'm up 3% on my overall holding.

Long term performance improved by £6 a month so my recent OPTI:Optibiotix sales are helping drag this back to something vaguely respectable. What's less respectable is the portfolio being 44% down on cost price.

My strategy with the SIPP is to move to dividend playing shares, so the JLP:Jubilee Metals holdings will be sold and moved to magic formula shares if they get into decent profit. I'll probably sell some more OPTI:Optibiotix too as I need to reduce the risk of my overweight position given the serial disappointment they are serving up. I may change my mind if we ever get good news on Sweetbiotix, but my faith is being severely tested.

Although moving up, it's at the same pace as the cost so not a material gain.

This demonstrates more accurately that we're worse off than last week, but that does happen when I cash in profits.

The trading account looks like this after week 386 overall and week 22 of year 8.

			Weekly Change
Cash	£141.20		+£0
Portfolio cost	£1,935.11		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£1,181.78	(-38.9%)	+£87.21
Potential profits	£0		+£0
Year 8 Dividends	£8.56		+£0
Year 8 Interest	£0		+£0
Year 8 Profit	£283.99		+£0
Yr 8 proj avg monthly profit	£57.62	(+35.7%)	-£2.75
Dividends	£68.66		+£0
Interest	£0.03		+£0
Profit from sales	-£646.70		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	-£6.49	(-4.0%)	+£0.02
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)

A great week for JLP:Jubilee Metals was dampened by a drop in SBTX:SkinBioTherapeutix, with my new holding already 27% down in just a few weeks. The curse of the trading account! JLP is still 52% down so I won't be selling them any time soon. BARC:Barclays went up 2% but still have a 12% deficit to make up before breaking even.

Nice!

Pretty much halved the gap to the trend line which is encouraging.

One week until the Christmas break. I think there's a good chance JLP:Jubilee Metals will advance a little this week as they are getting a lot of media attention, and people will realise the placing will accelerate profits significantly. It's too late for OPTI:Optibiotix to give an update so that could very well continue to slide and spoil the fun at the end of the year.

At least after such an action-packed week I'll be up for a bit of a rest so will be relieved if I don't need to buy or sell anything.

Week 435 Review - A good week and some more Optibiotix profit taken.

A really good week for most of the portfolio, and some more OPTI:Optibiotix profits banked in a fit of pique when GAW:Games Workshop tanked so I wanted to buy some more. The result was an improvement in the deficit between cost and value of £1,613 to £94,818 and an increase in portfolio value to £108,900.

GAW:Games Workshop was the worst performer, with an unbelievable 15% drop following a half-yearly trading update that was pretty good. Even if Q2 was slightly down on expectations, it didn't justify a 15% drop in share price. My holding that was 10% up is now 6% down, which is utterly devastating as it means nearly all my magic formula shares are losing money. I'm so convinced this is a case of manipulation I bought some more.

PAF:Pan African Resources dropped 9% thus contributing to my theory that I curse every stock I invest in, but I get the dividend next week which is a nice Christmas present.

EDV:Endeavour Mining dropped 7% demonstrating that all the gold miners took a bit of a hit despite the gold price staying above $2,000. These have dropped way, way down my magic formula list so I've put in a limit order to sell them, but it's 21% higher than the current price.

FXPO:Ferrexpo dropped 5% but I've given up worrying about these until the war in Ukraine is sorted.

SAE:Simec Atlantis Energy also dropped 5% but it hardly affects the value of my holding.

PLUS:Plus 500 went up 5% but my original holding is still 17% down. My recent SIPP purchase is  7% up though, so a rare bit of good timing.

IGG:IG Group is slowly dragging itself back up, climbing 6% so my holding is now 17% down. I've received 13% in dividends, so it's not doing that bad. I should probably increase my holding.

ASHM:Ashmore Group have been having a torrid time lately, but a 10% increase this week means my holding is now 30% down, or 23% down if you take off the 7% dividends.

BLU:Blue Star Capital went up 14% but that's 0.01p and utterly meaningless.

PBX:Probiotix Health climbed 1p after sitting on 5p for months, so a 20% rise is worth about £1,000 of my increase this week. My holding is still 72% down on the IPO price when I was given the shares as a dividend.

Share of the Week is AJB:AJ Bell which climbed a whopping 23% after great results. Unfortunately my holding is only £250 as I've just started buying them as my monthly investment, so it was in my interest for the share price to stay low for 3 months. This month's investment is on Monday, so I'll be buying on a spike and no doubt will lose out. I nearly switched the investment to something else, but there's a chance the share has re-rated and will continue upwards, as it's still way below the share price from a few years ago.

Here's the ISA and shares portfolio after week 19 of year 9.

			Weekly Change
Cash	£205.92		+£40.32
Portfolio cost	£99,082.34		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price-commission)	£50,740.72	(-48.8%)	+£1,043.74
Potential profits	£2,135.79		-£11.23
Yr 9 Dividends	£191.08		+£44.07
Yr 9 Interest	£2.46		+£0
Yr 9 Profit from sales	£0		+£0
Yr 9 proj avg monthly profit	£37.07	(0.6%)	+£7.65
Total Dividends	£12,102.51		+£44.07
Total Interest	£4.39		+£0
Total Profit from sales	£17,298.53		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	£288.85	(4.9%)	-£0.26
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)
Compound performance	41%		+0%

I got a £44 dividend from ASHM:Ashmore Group and much of the value increase was thanks to the 1p rise in PBX:Probiotix Health and 0.5p rise in OPTI:Optibiotix. Potential profits dropped as GAW:Games Workshop plummeted to loss, meaning my cheapest OPTI holding is the only thing left in profit in the entire ISA, and you could describe that as creative accounting given the huge losses in my other OPTI purchases. Cash went up less than the dividend due to monthly fees.

I also got 3p following a MAIS:Maistro share consolidation which leaves me with 1 share. That share cost me £124 and is worth about 10p and is not tradeable, so not surprisingly I wrote these off a long time ago.

Quite pleased that after 19 weeks I'm showing a projected profit of £37 a month from dividends alone, especially as I never used to have any dividends in my ISA.

Slight tick upwards.

Still below the trend line, but at least moving towards it.

The SIPP looks like this after week 419 overall and week 3 of year 9.

			Weekly Change
Cash	£557.71		+£233.34
Portfolio cost	£101,776.51		+£628.69
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£56,139.91	(-44.8%)	+£564.50
Potential profits	£1,906.92		-£433.10
Yr 9 Dividends	£13.99		+£0
Yr 9 Interest	£0		+£0
Yr 9 Profit from sales	£1,999.45		+£636.51
Yr 9 proj avg monthly profit	£2,884.24	(50.7%)	-£99.10
Total Dividends	£14,648.87		+£0
Total Interest	£5.93		+£0
Total Profit from sales	£12,835.35		+£636.51
Average monthly cash profit	£272.16	(4.8%)	+£5.77
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)
Compound performance	39%		+1%

Cash went up because I paid in my £250 monthly investment and it hasn't been spent yet, minus £16 monthly fees. 

I sold 3,932 OPTI:Optibiotix shares that I bought at 9.56p and got 26.355p making £636.52 (159.2%) profit and liberated £1,024.33. I used that to buy 11 shares in GAW:Games Workshop at 9086.856p costing £1,016.50. They went up to 9145p so are just down on commission now. A big dividend is due in January.

Sell value went up less than the ISA due to the profit taking, and good that potential profits fell less than the profits I took. Year 9 performance looks amazing because we're only on week 3, so I know there's no way I can keep that up. Long term performance only improved by 0.1% as a result of the sale. It's going to take me a long time to recover from DDDD:4D Pharma going bust.

Similar to the ISA - hoping this is the start of a little Santa rally as there's been absolutely no sign of it up till now.

Running parallel to the trend line, but need to get back above it.

The trading account looks like this after week 385 overall and week 21 of year 8.

			Weekly Change
Cash	£141.20		+£0
Portfolio cost	£1,935.11		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£1,094.57	(-43.4%)	+£5.24
Potential profits	£0		+£0
Year 8 Dividends	£8.56		+£0
Year 8 Interest	£0		+£0
Year 8 Profit	£283.99		+£0
Yr 8 proj avg monthly profit	£60.37	(+37.4%)	-£3.01
Dividends	£68.66		+£0
Interest	£0.03		+£0
Profit from sales	-£646.70		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	-£6.51	(-4.0%)	+£0.01
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)

The small gains in JLP:Jubilee Metals and BARC:Barclays were mostly wiped out by the drop in SBTX:SkinBioTherapeutics, but the value went up by £5.

So flat

So far below the trend line

I still have £1,500 I could liberate from my 9.56p OPTI:Optibiotix holding so I am tempted to get another £1,000 for a dividend paying share, and IGG:IG Group are the current favourites as they have a generous dividend and seem to be recovering. The alternative is to look to my new magic formula rankings, which rates IPX:Impax Asset Management Group as the 2nd best stock after PLUS:Plus 500. They pay their dividend in March after a February ex-date, as do IGG, but I'm tempted to give IPX a try.

I won't get another work pension transfer until the end of February so can only buy new dividend shares if I sell something. Many of my original magic formula shares are now outside the top 30 ranking, so I should really sell them and buy something in the top 30. Unfortunately they are mostly making a loss. However, ANTO:Antofagasta went into profit this week. I've only had a feeble £5 dividend from them and nothing due till April, and they are ranked 61. Ideally I'd like them to climb around 6% before I sell, but I may be better off selling for a minuscule profit and getting IPX now...

Week 434 Review - Bad week but cashed in some profits selling a few Optibiotix.

Yet another bad week, but slightly self-imposed as I cashed in some profits. The deficit between cost and value widened by £3,125 to £96,432 and portfolio value fell to £106,364.

Worst performer was BLU:Blue Star Capital dropping 13% but nothing unusual about that as it goes up and down like a yo-yo, but as the spread is 18% there's no way to take advantage in the short term.

SBTX:SkinBioTherapeutics proves the curse of the trading account, as I only got a small volume in there last week but a lackluster trading statement sent the shares down 13%. My recent £5,000 investment is already losing £1,292 as yet again I get it completely wrong.

CWR:Ceres Power continues the abject misery after declaring the the JV money isn't going to come in this trading year. The price dropped another 12% to go 42% down in about a month.

KIBO:Kibo Energy is a heap of rubbish and fell 11% but it's academic as they are already 100% down.

AJB:AJ Bell is another of my recent investments and dropped 8% this week. However, as I'll be investing monthly for 3 more months, I don't mind if these drop for a while so I get cheaper shares.

FXPO:Ferrexpo fell 7% for no reason.

IES:Invinity Energy also fell 7% for no reason.

Normally I save the biggest riser till last, but SAE:Simec Atlantis Energy climbing 22% is utterly meaningless so I'm getting it out of the way first. My holding is still 87% down.

The only meaningful big risers were metals and mainly gold.

ANTO:Antofagasta rose 5% possibly on the back of copper supply reducing due to problems at one of the world's biggest mines. Strange how that boosted ANTO but not CAML:Central Asia Metals.

POLY:Polymetal climbed 8%, EDV:Endeavour Mining climbed 10% and CEY:Centamin wins Share of the Week climbing 11% as gold had a great rally.

Here's the ISA and shares portfolio after week 18 of year 9.

			Weekly Change
Cash	£165.60		+£0
Portfolio cost	£99,082.34		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price-commission)	£49,696.98	(-49.8%)	-£1,249.55
Potential profits	£2,147.02		-£127.69
Yr 9 Dividends	£147.01		+£0
Yr 9 Interest	£2.46		+£0
Yr 9 Profit from sales	£0		+£0
Yr 9 proj avg monthly profit	£29.42	(0.5%)	-£1.73
Total Dividends	£12,058.44		+£0
Total Interest	£4.39		+£0
Total Profit from sales	£17,298.53		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	£289.11	(4.9%)	-£0.67
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)
Compound performance	41%		+0%

Very little happened. Portfolio value dropped and potential profits down thanks to OPTI:Optibiotix losing 0.5p. Value is down by nearly 50% so I'll have to switch to crimson next week unless we get a turnaround.

The decline has been going on a worrying number of weeks.

Well below the trend line now, so it's getting pulled flatter.

The SIPP looks like this after week 418 overall and week 2 of year 9.

			Weekly Change
Cash	£324.37		-£103.95
Portfolio cost	£101,147.82		+£1,466.88
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£54,946.72	(-45.7%)	-£1,867.60
Potential profits	£2,340.02		-£1,393.29
Yr 9 Dividends	£13.99		+£0
Yr 9 Interest	£0		+£0
Yr 9 Profit from sales	£1,362.94		+£1,362.94
Yr 9 proj avg monthly profit	£2,983.34	(52.6%)	+£2,983.34
Total Dividends	£14,648.87		+£0
Total Interest	£5.93		+£0
Total Profit from sales	£12,198.84		+£1,362.94
Average monthly cash profit	£266.39	(4.7%)	+£13.53
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)
Compound performance	38%		+2%

Lots going on here. I started off selling my small holding in EDV:Endeavour Mining in my AJ Bell SIPP because I wanted to invest in PAF:Pan African Resources before their dividend date. I sold my 31 shares at 1766.3643 making £52.37 (11.1%) profit. I used the proceeds to buy 3,471 shares in PAF:Pan African Resources at 16.9133p costing £599.95.

I also decided to sell some of my cheap OPTI:Optibiotix shares so I could show a profit. I sold 8,000 at 26.24p after buying at 9.56p and made £1,310.57 (166.1%) profit, liberating £2,087.

Half of it went on more PAF:Pan African Resources. I bought 5,771 but the price had gone up to 17.3278p. That cost £1,016.94. Happy to say the sell price is 17.4p despite going ex-dividend, so these are only down my commission. Let's hope gold stays at the current levels for a while.

The other half of the proceeds went on more JLP:Jubilee Metals as I'm hoping they have finally reached the bottom. I'm still bewildered how they dropped so low. I bought 21,568 at 5.1p costing £1,111.92. The sell price is now up to 5.1p so these are just down on commission. I now hold 213,181 JLP shares, making it my 2nd biggest holding after OPTI:Optibiotix. My hope is that I can take profits and invest them in bigger dividend paying miners in my SIPP and leave the ISA in JLP longer term. I do really need to start moving my SIPP holdings into dividend playing shares and leave the ISA for more risky investments.

The result of the selling activity was a meagre £13 (0.2%) a month increase in long term performance, showing how much profit needs to be made if I want to get back to my 10% target from 4.7%.

I'm less concerned about this chart than the ISA, although it's still pretty bad.

And so we cross the trend line - bugger!

The trading account looks like this after week 384 overall and week 20 of year 8.

			Weekly Change
Cash	£141.20		+£0
Portfolio cost	£1,935.11		+£0
Portfolio sell value (bid price - commission)	£1,089.33	(-43.7%)	-£8.17
Potential profits	£0		+£0
Year 8 Dividends	£8.56		+£0
Year 8 Interest	£0		+£0
Year 8 Profit	£283.99		+£0
Yr 8 proj avg monthly profit	£63.38	(+39.3%)	-£3.34
Dividends	£68.66		+£0
Interest	£0.03		+£0
Profit from sales	-£646.70		+£0
Average monthly cash profit	-£6.52	(-4.0%)	+£0.02
(Sold stocks profit + Dividends - Fees / Months)

Hardly any change here, with a drop of £8 in value mostly down to SBTX:SkinBioTherapeutics.

Looking very flat

No sign of getting back above the trend line.

It felt great to finally make some profit from my OPTI:Optibiotix holding. Granted it nowhere near makes up for the £56k loss I'm sitting on, in fact it makes that worse, but it is making a start in my strategy to move SIPP shares into dividend-paying companies. At the current rate I have another £1.5k potential profit in my SIPP which would liberate £2.5k for dividend paying shares and not dent my OPTI holding by too much. That would make sense from a risk management point of view, but I'll probably wait until I can liberate £3k.