1698 days ago
In today’s podcast I start with a couple of reflections on the joys of modern life involving Andrew Monk of VSA, cannabis and the tossers at Barclays Bank (BARC). I look at Burford (BUR), Falanx (FLX), IQE (IQE), Xaar (XAR), Providence Resources (PVR) and Lansdowne Oil & Gas (LOGP). I forgot to mention Restaurant Group (RTN) but Chris “Three Brains” Bailey, again, covers it very well HERE and he is right. It is a slam dunk sell. Lucian Miers reckons it might just be a zero.
2773 days ago
Having had the run around from my Barclays team in Douglas, Isle of Man as I described on bearcast yesterday, I was advised to go to a Barclays branch in Bristol with two forms of ID to change its records of whom I worked for. As I had a dental appointment in town I walked to the main Barclays branch in central Bristol, at Broadmead, where the bastards then wasted another forty five minutes of my life with sheer incompetence.
2773 days ago
I reflect on how we gym users suffer and on how dealing with Barclays Bank as a customer has made me so angry today. I hate the banksters and make a few unkind comments about the Isle of Man. Then it is onto Feedback (FDBK) and a detailed look at Cyan (CYN) and an awful broker note you can read HERE from Beaufort which I tear apart. I really despair at how bent AIM has become. What is the point of being honest anymore?
3332 days ago
Nominally I have a premium account with Barclays Wealth International in the Isle of Man. Given how most of its customers are multi-millionaire tax dodgers my tiny account (balance on Monday 90p because Darren forgot to pay me in full last month) must be a bit of an anomaly but still I am meant to get a premium service. If that is the case God help the rest of you with a “standard service”
After 30 minutes on the phone on Monday I had established why the ATM was refusing to give me cash. I said thank you and did not actually need to use the card again until Friday lunchtime when knowing that I had at least £600 (thanks to Darren paying and reclaiming an annual fee taken without my wish by Amazon) I offered to buy a bloke lunch. I was declined.
Kindly he paid but I shall repay him £68.40 at a later date. I insist.
On returning home I called Courtney my account manager in the IoM.
“Why are you calling me
4132 days ago
Robert Sutherland Smith started his City career the year before I was born. He is, I think, 157 years old. He and I have worked together for almost eight years. at t1ps He is my friend and he is a very funny and intelligent chap. He is now branching out to celenrate his 158th by doing some freelance writing over at TradingResearchPoint on FTSE 350 Income stocks. He is a great one for focussing on yield. He is also going to do a monthly column for me on this blog on the subject that really interests him, life on Hampstead Heath. I am sure we all look forward to “Pond Life.” RSS kicks off with his take on Barclays Bank and those wicked banksters.
Because the yield is too low for a bank (in historic terms), Barclays Bank (BARC)shares are clearly viewed by the market as a ‘momentum’ stock; the elementary investment principle being, that because the shares are going up, buy some more? So good so far as it goes; but an increasingly insufficient justification as a share price rises, further discounting whatever it is the future holds. As the late, great lamented philosopher, Sam Goldwyn, taught us! ’Never make forecasts – particularly about the future!’ Had he had been alive to run the Federal Reserve Bank in the in the 1990s and not a picture studio, we might have avoided a lot of trouble.
The possibilities for banks and the banking model generally, have been given a boost with the latest results and share price performance of the Bank of America. Having been in a dreadful condition, BoA has just proved itself the best performing US bank in terms of an annual share price rise – up116% over one year
4323 days ago
The banksters at Barclays have today been found guilty of what is, in effect, market abuse. They deliberately worked systematically to manipulate the LIBOR rate and so screwed millions of customers out of millions of pounds. This is just dreadful and Barclays shareholders will now pick up a bill of £290 million to clear up the mess. The scumbag who runs Barclays, Bob Diamond, and a few senior colleagues have agreed to forego their bonuses this year as part of the mea culpa. But that is not enough. Diamond should go.
