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Shares Thread for the next Gordon Gekko's

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  • It would appear that the topic of Bitcoins seems to have hit the headlines recently due to increased value.
    Anyone into these?
    If so, any advice appreciated.

    If you don't know there's no "s" on the end of Bitcoin, I'd say stay well clear. IMHO the concept is one which is designed especially to go in a sentence with the words pole and barge. Think South Sea Company.
    But setting that aside, the good news is that the WHOLE bitcoin thing is "worth" maybe the same as about half a Vodaphone. So when it goes down the toilet no one will even notice.
  • I've dabbled in Bitcoin but with relatively small amounts - although it smacks of barge and pole a lot of people have made a lot of money from it, not sure now is the time to enter though. I'm up about 4 times my original investment over the past 18-20 months.

    People have retired on it. £100 investment in 2010 was £5m at the weekend....... in fact probably nearer £6.5m with the current exchange rate!
  • Thanks GA it's always interesting when things are explained , I intend to sit on my shares as I inherited them and may even just pass them on, eventually.
  • WSSWSS
    edited September 2017
    Rob7Lee said:

    I've dabbled in Bitcoin but with relatively small amounts - although it smacks of barge and pole a lot of people have made a lot of money from it, not sure now is the time to enter though. I'm up about 4 times my original investment over the past 18-20 months.

    People have retired on it. £100 investment in 2010 was £5m at the weekend....... in fact probably nearer £6.5m with the current exchange rate!

    That's insane.

    Were there "traders" in Bitcoin around then though or did you have to do all the mining etc. yourself?
  • I know very little about markets and all that jazz, but my cheques from BT seem to be growing while the company appears to be struggling, I just don't get it. Confused addick I am.

    Dividends can be met from current profits, assets that are sold, or from past accumulated profits or a combination. So dividends may not have to be cut just because of a temporary fall in profits. A permanent fall in profits would however hit dividends eventually.

    BT took a hit in profits recently because they paid out a huge sum in compensation following a financial scandal at its Italian operation. Its share price plummeted because it means it has less reserves to cover future dividends if profits are not maintained. The stock price is all about the prospects, or lack of prospects, for growth in profits/dividends, and how much someone is prepared to pay for the anticipated/hoped for income stream from future dividends.

    In the days before pension schemes more people held stocks and shares for the income, the share price was of less relevance. Today most people invest via a unit trust where dividends are reinvested rather than paid in cash. This increases the value of the holding, but most investors are unaware of how much is attributable to dividends received and how much based on the market/speculative views of future dividend growth that sets the current stock price.

    Dividend patterns are relevant because when the market crashes, the stocks of companies that have a history of modest but sustainable future profits fall least, because the stock price will be largely supported by the security of future dividend generation rather than speculative future profits/dividend growth.

    The bad news for BT shareholders is that BT owes the pension fund £7.6bn and the Pension Regulator expects employers to be fair between shareholders and pension scheme members. So the dividend for next year is promised to fall to allow more of BT's profits to go into the pension scheme. If you are both a scheme member and a shareholder you are in rather a dilemma as to how you feel about this.
  • edited September 2017
    WSS said:

    Rob7Lee said:

    I've dabbled in Bitcoin but with relatively small amounts - although it smacks of barge and pole a lot of people have made a lot of money from it, not sure now is the time to enter though. I'm up about 4 times my original investment over the past 18-20 months.

    People have retired on it. £100 investment in 2010 was £5m at the weekend....... in fact probably nearer £6.5m with the current exchange rate!

    That's insane.

    Were there "traders" in Bitcoin around then though or did you have to do all the mining etc. yourself?
    Buy them and sit on them, I guess.

    I've been using them for a while, for purchases outside of China that I don't want to be connected to me, they're pretty handy for that, but I've never really tracked how much my wallet is worth, after reading on this thread about the recent 'bump' I just went and checked...... Very happy ;D
  • Despite reading up on them I still don't really understand the whole Bitcoin mining and how you make money from them.

    Can anyone give me a charltonlife easy guide to Bitcoins
  • MrOneLung said:

    Despite reading up on them I still don't really understand the whole Bitcoin mining and how you make money from them.

    Can anyone give me a charltonlife easy guide to Bitcoins

    Very hard to make money from minig these days. You would need a specifically bought piece of hardware with very low energy costs.
  • just read an article that helped me understand more

    http://www.wired.co.uk/article/bitcoin-101

  • I think of Bitcoins as being like any other traded commodity, gold for example. It's as if people bought and sold stuff by handing over bits of gold, except Bitcoins are purely digital and your don't need a fork lift truck to lug your gold around and a chisel to cut of a lump to pay for coffee in Starbucks.

    Why it's hard to get your head around Bitcoins as a currency is because we don't have to pay anyone to acquire our current currency, say a £1 coin. That's because a £1 coin has no value beyond its face value, it has no scarcity value and the BofE just mints money as it as needed. A Bitcoin however has a "value" in scarcity, just as gold does, and usefulness (e.g to make secret transactions) and there is a market in place, where traders who have access to a supply of Bitcoins, set the price at which they sell them and buy them. The price of Bitcoins fell over 10% with the news of North Korea's exploits and China putting regulatory obstacles on crypto currencies, so it is not immune from volatility. It's price will go up if people now jump in to buy Bitcoins as a speculative investment.

    Arguably, if Bitcoins eventually replaced national currency as a means of trading with one another, and the maximum of 21million which are ever going to be in circulation are sufficient to meet demand for Bitcoins, they will cease to have a "price" as no one will need to buy them as we would then be paid in Bitcoins from our employer.

    Problem is, if a Bitcoin is worth £3,000 and a loaf of bread from Tesco costs 80p it would be priced at 0.0002666666666666 of a Bitcoin which works by you handing over 1 Bitcoin and the checkout giving you change of 0.99973333333333 Bitcoins (all digitally done). As a practical everyday currency it would seem to have its limitations, but fine for high ticket items like a ton of cocaine.

    So how far will Bitcoins go as a desirable asset which has speculative value is anyone's guess. Possibility is it might end up like the 17 century currency of black tulips when at its height a single black tulip bulb could buy a house, the market collapsed when the price was too high for ordinary folks to buy. There will always be an alternative to Bitcoins for ordinary mortals to shop with, so even if 21m Bitcoins are insufficient for demand, they will have a ceiling price, just like black tulip bulbs did.

    Assuming it remains a niche currency, I think it will likely run out of steam and it's price will collapse at some stage, but in the short term financial institutions are working hard to see how they can make money trading it and offering options, so plenty of time to make a killing and get out.
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  • WSS said:

    Rob7Lee said:

    I've dabbled in Bitcoin but with relatively small amounts - although it smacks of barge and pole a lot of people have made a lot of money from it, not sure now is the time to enter though. I'm up about 4 times my original investment over the past 18-20 months.

    People have retired on it. £100 investment in 2010 was £5m at the weekend....... in fact probably nearer £6.5m with the current exchange rate!

    That's insane.

    Were there "traders" in Bitcoin around then though or did you have to do all the mining etc. yourself?
    I don't know but assume back then it was miners making the money.

    As per link above you can trade in them, it's risky in my view, but like anything with huge potential that normally comes with huge risk. If you do invest only invest what you are prepared to lose in it's entirety.
  • J P Morgan's view on Bitcoins.

    Bitcoin is a fraud that will ultimately blow up, according to JP Morgan boss Jamie Dimon, who said the digital currency was only fit for use by drug dealers, murderers and people living in places such as North Korea.

    Speaking at a conference in New York, the boss of America’s biggest bank said he would fire “in a second” anyone at the investment bank found to be trading in bitcoin. “For two reasons: it’s against our rules, and they’re stupid. And both are dangerous.”


    I am inclined to agree with him. There is a health warning that all regulated investments signpost - "Past performance is no indicator of future performance and your capital may be at risk". For cryptocurrency speculation it should be in flashing red neon lights, particularly as no one can give any rationale for its pricing apart from the categories of currency users described by Jamie Dimon.
  • There were rumours that Dimon said this, the price of bitcoin dropped and subsequently JPM invested £37m in to bitcoin related products.

    I don’t know enough about Bitcoin but numerous people within his own trading staff have disputed his stance. Some publicly.

    Time will tell, but it’s well out of my league to be involved with.
  • There were rumours that Dimon said this, the price of bitcoin dropped and subsequently JPM invested £37m in to bitcoin related products.

    I don’t know enough about Bitcoin but numerous people within his own trading staff have disputed his stance. Some publicly.

    Time will tell, but it’s well out of my league to be involved with.

    Fund managers don't actually "invest" they trade, and will trade rocking horse shit if there's market to exploit for a turn.
  • Isomart on the AIM.
  • Bluejay Mining for a punt for me. Up 20% since i bought a few months back and just seems to be relatively unnoticed compared to some of the AIM nonsense.
  • Walmart shares up to 90$
  • now up to 99$ on the other hand Carillion what the fuck has happened there mega pissed off.
  • now up to 99$ on the other hand Carillion what the fuck has happened there mega pissed off.

    Carillion are in a lot of trouble Steve, all the other Facility Companies are circling like vultures picking off their work.
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  • do you reckon they will go under ?
  • Troubled construction group Carillion has endured a fresh shares collapse after issuing its third profit warning of the year and saying it faced breaching its agreements with lenders.

    The company, which is working on the HS2 rail link as well as other major projects, saw its market value slump by more than half in early trading.

    Carillion has been fighting for its financial future as it tries to deal with a vast debt pile and badly-performing contracts.

    Its shares had already fallen by two-thirds since profit warnings in July and September.

    Carillion, which employs around 43,000 people, is involved in high-profile projects such as work on London's Battersea power station, Liverpool's Anfield stadium and Toronto's Union station.

    The latest alert saw a further shares collapse and though they partly recovered later in the session, they were still off by 30% on the day and around 90% compared with the start of the year.

    It had said in September that despite its difficulties, it still expected to achieve its covenant with lenders - relating to the ratio of debt to earnings.

    The group has been selling off assets such as a series of public-private partnerships but in the latest update it said some had been delayed.

    A start-date for a major project in the Middle East had also been pushed back while improvements in profit margins on some UK support services contracts had been lower than expected.

    It now expects profits for the year to be "materially lower than current market expectations" and borrowing higher - and that the covenant for the end of 2017 will be breached.

    Carillion said that with the backing of its lenders the date set for this would have to be pushed back as a shake-up of the group's financial structure takes effect.

    Interim chief executive Keith Cochrane said: "It is clear that significant challenges remain and more needs to be done to reduce net debt and rebuild the balance sheet."


    Mr Cochrane is standing in until the arrival of new boss Andrew Davies next spring, after previous chief executive Richard Howson stepped down in the summer.

    Siemens to slash 6,900 jobs
  • now up to 99$ on the other hand Carillion what the fuck has happened there mega pissed off.

    What's causing this? I thought price wars with Amazon were hurting Walmart but I don't keep up to date with the US
  • The thing is, a lot of these companies win contracts and everyone thinks good.
    The problems lie when the contract is not financially efficient.
    This lies with both Siemens (Crossrail) and Carillion (Northern line extension)
    Maybe I am wrong, but i question if they actually know their chosen market working standards, which indiffer extremly to what their used to.
  • do you reckon they will go under ?

    I think CE ‘s report covers it, worrying times for them
  • The biggest investing mistake I ever made was selling my $10k worth of Apple stock back in 1999, not just Apple also Amazon, Yahoo, I would probably be a billionaire if I hadn't clicked the sell button back then, I made a nice profit but minuscule compared to what it would be today. I learned a very costly lesson, if you get on the train early, stay on the train. I see Bitcoin in the same way that I viewed the internet stocks back then in the nineties, it has the potential to fundamentally change society. There are no exchange rates to worry about, no three day delays in waiting for money to be transferred by the Bank, no Bank fees. More or less instantaneous peer to peer transfers. If it goes mainstream it has the potential to kill the banks, which is another reason why I think it will be universally adopted eventually.
    The secret is to find the disruptive industries early, invest only what you can afford to lose, then sit back and wait for 10-15 years.
    The main problem that I can see with Bitcoin ATM, is exchanging back into cash when you want to. For that reason I have invested in an ETN (Exchange Traded Note) ticker BITCOINXB. It trades on the Stockholm Nasdaq but can be bought and sold through the major brokers. Other funds that I like and are drip feeding into are ARKK which invests in Disruptive Industries such as Bitcoin, and BOTZ which invests in Robotics.
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