From the four options I spoke of earlier in the week, I’ve gone all in with Lloyds (option 1) fully taking up my offered allotment of 1,037 shares at £0.37 a share. The rights issue gave me a reduction on current market value of about £0.16 per share or 30%, so I can’t really complain, despite doing my darnedest in my most recent post. Our total holding of Lloyds has now risen to 1,...

Personally, I’ve always considered trading shares a very intimate process. I would do my homework, I would look at the market and I would decide, initially my entry point, and down the track, my exit point for any given equity. The timings were mine, the mistakes – of which there have been many – were mine, and even the odd windfall was mine. It was done to my schedule. I had no ...

Sorry it’s been a while since I’ve posted, what can I say, it’s summer where I’m at and our little portfolio has being just dandy on its own without my meddling hand. There’s been some chunky news floating about, so let’s get down to the nitty gritty. Remember Cosalt – our provider of safety products and services to the marine, industrial and offshore oil ...

Following yesterday’s regurgitation of all gains made on Monday (and then some), today was a little more settled with a handful of modest gains made across our portfolio. Ceramic Fuel Cells finished the day up 6.5% on the back on news that it has extended its agreement with GDF Suez to develop and deploy fuel cell micro combined heat and power (mCHP) units in France. Lloyds Bank continued it...

Now that’s the way I like to start a week, an ocean of blue arrows pointing to the sky, followed by some chunky figures behind ‘em. Leading our list of winners on the day was China Biodiesel which finished north 1.12 pence (12.3%) at 10.12 pence. A month ago you could pick up China Biodiesel for 5 pence, there’s been an upswing in volume especially in the last week and it seems b...

Last October I spent 30 days on a freighter ship as a passenger travelling from Melbourne, Australia to La Spezia in Italy. One whole month without Internet, with only the most fundamental of financial headlines via a copy of the ship’s faxed daily world news summary from its head office. Despite 48 hours of fearing for my life rounding the Gulf of Aden, that trip was one of the best financi...

Following ReneSola’s New York listing (SOL) climbing 35 cents in as many minutes before yesterday’s close of trade, I guess I was half expecting some modest gains in ReneSola’s share price today. Half expecting. Though as I’ve pointed out more than once on Investor Trader, what should happen and what does happen with AIM listed shares, are often two very distinct beasts. So...

On a day when the FTSE finished sharply down, our portfolio provided a mixed bag. We saw modest gains in Lloyds Bank (up 2.3%) and Ceramic Fuels Cells (up 3.0%) but these were more than offset by the continued retracement of ReneSola (down 5.8%) and the yo-yo-ing, Climate Exchange (down 4.9%). After last weeks highs of 240 pence, ReneSola has come back to earth a little – closing today at £...

So, the inevitable happened, ReneSola came back a little. Not a lot, but a little and believe it or not, I’m a touch relieved. Not that I don’t like making money, it’s just that volatile stocks that climb that fast tend to slump back down to earth with an even bigger thump. For ReneSola to have a mild 6.8% retraction – and 6.8% is mild going on this past month’s gains...

We’ve taken a little slice of the UK banking sector on-board with today’s purchase of 774 Lloyds Banking Group shares at £0.6719 for a total outlay of £520.05 plus dealing costs. On the back of a ton of re-structuring news of late, hopefully Lloyds can put a horror stretch behind it and make us a quid or two into the bargain. If it can – a little belatedly – follow in B...