Its Not Harry

Comment and opinion for retail investors in the UK

Announcements

Midweek Musings – your questions, please!

by 2 Comments

I have not got any interesting ideas to post this week as markets bump along in a mildly optimistic (ex China) holding pattern while central banks try to sound tough and everyone else knows that they will be cutting rates soon.

This is an opportunity for any reader to comment on this post with a question (your full name is not shown if I approve the comment), or email me direct with a request that I address a specific investment portfolio related topic. I will then reserve a future post or posts to address any subject that I decide is of broad interest. I won’t publish replies that relate to individual circumstances, of course and all my guidance is always generic in format.

Over to you!

Midweek Musing – over to Jeremy

by Leave a Comment

When I was a teenager, the social environment in the ancient all boys grammar school that I attended was not much progressed from Victorian times and bullying was just part of the rough and tumble (and it was rough and there was tumbling). One boy who was mildly picked on had what was then thought to be a serious misfortune – his given name was Jeremy. He would have been marginally better of being called Nigel or Brian in that school in the 1970s.

It occurs to me that there are quite a few Jeremies (is that the correct plural) of a certain age in the public eye today and none of them are universally loved: Clarkson, Corbyn, Vine and Hunt came to mind. Then Beadle and Thorpe came back to me, with a prompt from Wikipedia.

As the name is rooted in Jeremiah, the Hebrew prophet whom I have used before in articles opining about unreliable short term predictions, perhaps there is something mystically negative about the name.

I know that in truth there will be many happy and successful Jeremies. Maybe Irons?

I direct your attention to the name because I have nothing to say about investment markets this week.

You are very welcome to devote the time freed up from reading my pontifications to working out what Jeremy Richard Streynsham Hunt MP has to offer you by way of changes in the UK tax system and prospects for the English economy.

White Rabbit

by Leave a Comment

Apologies to anyone hoping to read my monthly commentary today, but I have got into two subjects that it is proving a little more tricky to explain lucidly than I anticipated. My initial scribblings need some reworking and expanding, I have decided.

I will need to spend time getting the words right and won’t be finished today, mainly because I don’t usually work on Fridays!

The hopefully worth reading text should be available early next week.

As a little teaser, I can tell you that I will exploring the relevance of the ‘equity discount factor’ to current market valuations and what to correctly do (which is not what almost everyone actually does),and why you should do it, when you end up with a hefty loss on a fund.

Midweek Musings – holiday time!

by Leave a Comment

I will be overseas (for me, but actually in England) for a couple of weeks and so my next post will be the August monthly briefing.

Not much worthy of comment has happened in the last week. Markets seem less volatile but the currency markets have heavily favoured the US dollar against the Euro because of fears that Russia will self-sanction and cut off gas supplies to Germany, and against the Pound due to England not currently having a functioning political leadership.

Not thinking too hard for a fortnight!

You need to be logged in to view the rest of the content. Please . Not a Member? Join Us

Midweek Musings – over to you

by Leave a Comment

I will include my latest thoughts on markets and portfolio risks and opportunties in my monthly briefing, which will be published in the next few days.

In truth , nothing much comes to mind that is different to the thinking I have published in the last 2 or 3 weeks – markets have returned to a more stable and optimistic state and those who took up a buying opportunity in early March will have been rewarded so far.

In my monthly missive, I usually address a specific subject in detail with my objective being the broadening of my readers’ knowledge of the way in which investment markets work in reality and at times I address some of the underlying theoretical apsects.

Answers on a postcode (email, actually) – ASAP, please!

I don’t have any topics in my queue ths month, so as I have done before, I invite all subscribers to email me with any topics you would like addressed in the style that you will know by know I adopt.

I try to treat my readers as intelligent experienced people who don’t want to be fed baby food but something more meaty, but not so esoteric or techincal as to be indigestible!

Please respond straight away if any subject comes to mind!