magazine archive
magazine archive
Feature
Six ways to play the UK’s squeezed middle earners
Thursday 28 Jun 2018The UK’s middle income earners are feeling the pinch. Consumer price inflation remained flat at 2.4% at the last reading but higher petrol prices and planned energy price rises point to inflation coming back with a vengeance. Meanwhile wage growth unexpectedly softened to 2.5% in the three months...
Where next for the gambling sector after major events in the US and UK?
Thursday 21 Jun 2018The gambling sector has this year experienced a mixture of very good and very bad news, prompting wild share price movements. Now is an opportune time to take stock of the sector, particularly as share prices have had time to price in forthcoming changes to the UK fixed-odds betting terminals...
Should you invest in the legal eagles joining the market?
Thursday 07 Jun 2018When Gateley ( GTLY:AIM ) listed in London in June 2015, it became only the second law firm in the world to join a public stock exchange. Only Australian firm Slater & Gordon had made the move before, back in 2007. Now there are four legal ‘companies’ on the AIM market and while all feature...
Can investors enjoy a World Cup boost?
Thursday 07 Jun 2018On 14 June at 4pm UK time at the Luzhniki Stadium in Moscow the 21st football World Cup kicks off as the host nation Russia takes on Saudi Arabia. As well as football fans, several stock market names will be watching the tournament closely to see if they will enjoy a World Cup-related boost to...
Where to invest your SIPP cash windfall
Thursday 24 May 2018Many individuals with SIPPs (self-invested personal pensions) are likely to enjoy a cash windfall in late May as tax relief from HMRC relating to the previous tax year is paid into their account. In this article we will examine why many investors will see cash drop into their account now and offer...
How a stock’s liquidity can affect your returns
Thursday 17 May 2018Most investors will be familiar with the charges associated with trading stocks and shares. However, a hidden cost which sometimes isn’t given sufficient prominence is the difference between the price at which you buy and sell a share, known as the bid/offer spread. The bid price is the maximum...
How to adjust price-to-earnings ratios for debt and cash
Thursday 26 Apr 2018Experienced investors should be familiar with the price-to-earnings (PE) ratio. For the less experienced, it is the most popular way of valuing companies and their share prices, certainly among retail investors. Even fund managers, equity analysts and other investment professionals commonly use it...
How the SOX index can help investors work out whether stock markets are going to rock or roll
Thursday 19 Apr 2018A slide in the share prices of Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix and Google’s parent Alphabet, the so-called FAANGs, and Tesla is grabbing all of the headlines. Whether this is down to a collection of company specific reasons – such as questions over Facebook’s involvement in the Cambridge Analytica...
What does less than a year until Brexit mean for the FTSE 100?
Thursday 12 Apr 2018Investors reared on the quiet calm and steady gains of equity markets over the past few years were given a reminder of that old adage ‘investments can go down as well as up’ as stock markets globally took a turn for the worse over the first quarter of 2018. Bottom of the class was the FTSE 100,...
Are directors’ interests really aligned with shareholders?
Thursday 12 Apr 2018The failure of drinks distributor Conviviality ( CVR:AIM ) has highlighted a growing problem with UK smaller companies, namely the misalignment of interests between shareholders and executive management. I am shocked how large institutional investors are prepared to throw vast sums at small...