magazine archive
magazine archive
Editor's View
The reaction to Biden’s tax plan is overblown
Thursday 29 Apr 2021The latest tranche of Biden’s tax plan is provoking wails of protest on Wall Street. Proposals to boost capital gains tax have prompted warnings of a big market downturn in the US and already sparked some weakness in shares. The argument is that people will sell their stocks ahead of any tax...
The value rally is being powered by ratings change not earnings
Thursday 22 Apr 2021Another week, another push forward for the UK stock market. We’ve waited for a long time for this to happen and it’s very satisfying to see the FTSE 100 and FTSE 250 finally get some winds in their sails. The key question is whether the rally has legs. Some companies look like they’ve already...
Markets are rallying: should I dump a fund that’s been left behind?
Thursday 15 Apr 2021Two major stock market indices in the UK and US have just hit new record highs, the FTSE 250 and S&P 500 respectively, and the FTSE 100 is at its highest level since February 2020. Investors are likely to be in a good mood as portfolios could be looking flush. Looking at my own portfolio,...
What AstraZeneca’s woes say about ESG investing
Thursday 08 Apr 2021Global multi-national businesses with billions of pounds in revenue and profit aren’t obvious candidates for sympathy but it’s hard not to feel a bit sorry for AstraZeneca ( AZN ) after its experience over the last six months. In partnership with Oxford University, AstraZeneca has developed a Covid...
DMGT’s Cazoo boost: When old media meets new media
Thursday 01 Apr 2021Amid all the hype around the multi-billion-dollar stock market listing of UK car marketplace Cazoo via a special purpose acquisition vehicle or SPAC in the US, it would be easy to miss the big windfall this could mean for newspaper publisher and shareholder Daily Mail & General Trust ( DMGT...
Argument strengthens in favour of UK stocks
Thursday 25 Mar 2021Comments from the Bank of England on 18 March that there is a better outlook for UK economic growth than previously anticipated will strengthen the argument that UK stocks are ripe for picking, particularly companies with a domestic focus. Also supporting this argument is the fact the UK is more...
Missed the rush on an IPO? Wait for a pullback before buying
Thursday 18 Mar 2021With more than 2,000 stocks listed on the London Stock Exchange and thousands more on markets overseas, one might have thought there is no need to fuss about more companies deciding to float on a stock exchange and offer their shares for the public to buy. What actually occurs is a fascination with...
When good news is bad news for investors and vice versa
Thursday 11 Mar 2021We’re in a situation where good news is being treated as bad news by the market and vice versa. While this can be a bit confusing to the casual investor, there is some logic to how stock markets are currently behaving. Three bits of news in the past few weeks have triggered the opposite reaction to...
Big decisions to be made on working from home model
Thursday 04 Mar 2021As we emerge from the pandemic a big challenge for investors is working out which Covid-inspired trends will be sustained, and which will fade away as we return to some form of normality. As this more normal existence draws closer (we hope) the issue is becoming more pressing. Among the big debates...
Will market democracy ever be more than an illusion?
Thursday 25 Feb 2021The internet has transformed how financial markets are accessed and, in some ways, has democratised trading and investing. A whole range of different asset classes and investment vehicles are now available to ordinary punters in a way which would have been unthinkable in the 1990s when you would...