Weekly Roundup 001

It’s been a mixed week: some small victories, one big setback but I’m not conceding defeat.

 

Shares

I have been sitting on a small profit and noticed that one company I hold, a gold miner, was close to $1.00. So I thought I might wait until they broke that point of resistance before I took profits. I was too greedy. The directors announced they are buying a mine from a large Canadian mining company (that is seeking to exit its Australian operations) and made a $100 million capital raising to fund it. The capital raising was completed at a price per share of 86c, so the shares went down 10% as soon as they resumed trading.

Shareholders in the company I hold are going to be offered the same deal (the chance to buy shares at 86c) and $25 million worth of shares will be on offer. Normally the best way to play this sort of capital raising is to sell my shares at the current price (89c) and buy them back in the capital raising. But a three cent margin doesn’t do it for me and I’m afraid there won’t be enough shares in that 25 million dollars worth to satisfy the demand of all the other existing shareholders and the allocations will be scaled back, so I won’t be able to buy back all the shares I sold originally. So it looks like I’ll be holding my those shares for a while longer, considering the dilution $100 million makes to a $400 million company.

 

The Garden

We’ve been in a heat wave these last few weeks and the garden is suffering. It’s been a bad season for fruit and veg. I pulled some potatoes out of the ground for our Sunday lunch and half of them were inedible. I’m not sure whether to pull the rest up right now or just wait and see what happens with them. The trouble is that usually the potato leaves die off, leaving tubers in the ground that you can pick for a month or so before they start growing again. This year they started growing back even before the old leaves died. So I guess half the potatoes I pick are too old and the other half are too young?

I drove up to the Swan Valley on Thursday to buy some grapes. I managed to get 10 kilos of reject fruit (grapes that were too withered to be saleable) for $2 per kilo. I probably paid too much. Anyhow, I will sun dry those grapes to make sultanas. Sun dried fruit is always tastier than the dried fruit they sell in the shops.

 

Writing

I’ve been able to make good on my New Year’s resolution to write something every day. You can see the evidence by the posts on this site. I’m not satisfied with the quality yet, but I probably never will be. Anyhow, regular posting seems to have increased the number of visits, so I will try to keep it up.

I was quite happy with the post summarizing an essay on selling by Donald L Cassidy. I think it’s quite a useful addition to the knowledge base here.

 

Next Week

I don’t expect to do much in the stock market. I might look for an object to sell in the local online marketplace. I will write a piece on the history of credit, using David Graeber’s research. I think that will make an interesting read for you.

And that’s all I can think of. Good luck with your own speculations!

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