Morning Tom, people on the BB speculating you have sold your OPTI holding, can you confirm please?Thank you. That was one of the emails that I received this morning. The short answer is "its bollocks" but perhaps this merits a longer answer.

A £2 million placing by Ortac Resources (OTC) clearly shows a return to a more positive attitude by investors to fund exploration risk. Having said that, developments do see investors follow more than $30 million of investment risk capital already sunk into Casa Mining’s, DRC-located, Misisi gold project.

Caption this photo of Labour star Diane Abbott on Countdown . The deadline for entries, in the comments section below, is midnight tonight.

Hello Share Planters. Here I am again, risking a commendation to look at the shares of one of the major British banks. This time Lloyds (LLOY) seems to me a worthwhile proposition. I am heavily over-exposed to this lot, so I personally hope so.

Tom recently published an article about Golden Saint Resources (GSR) reaching 8,822,256,582 shares in issue after a latest bailout placing, asking what is the AIM shares in issue record? Well, as at the end of March, some data from the LSE showed;

Digital Barriers (DGB) has announced a framework contract and a trading update emphasising sales growth and “EBITDA is expected to be in line with market expectations”, BUT…

An “Update on share suspension, Inata and Tri-K” announcement from Avocet Mining (AVM). “Update” on share suspension? When was the suspension then?...

The United States has a President that made his fortune on the back of debt, but somehow the market thinks Trump will govern in a tea-party-hard-money fashion. Nothing could be further from the truth. All investors would be wise to forget anything (and everything) Trump has said, and instead just ask themselves what his most likely course of action will be once he gets to that inevitable fork in the road.

Cloudtag (CTAG) lied to investors to pump its stock price to allow it to raise equity and for insiders to sell. That makes it a fraud. But what was the extent of the wrongdoing? Perhaps Amit Ben Haim would like to discuss Golden Bridge Services Ltd?

This is interesting research from Palisade and the answers may suprise you. And should inform your investment decisions. Before reading, take a guess at the three best and worst performing commodities of 2016 and 2017! Ok now go…

Tom Winnifrith has already covered the hidden bailout placing aspects of the Integritie deal announced by Rosslyn Data (RDT) last week (HERE) but I thought it worth elaborating on the deal (which looks like a real dog) and asking the simple question: why haven’t you told your shareholders about the related-party aspects?

Regular readers here will know that I am not exactly a fan of Blenheim Natural Resources (BNR), nor have I ever been despite plenty of interest from private investors in this company.

AIM-listed Rurelec (RUR) updated the market last Thursday that its currently crocked power generation plant held in its JV Energia Del Sur in Argentina may get fixed rather sooner than first feared – even if the proposed repair sounds a bit of a Heath Robinson affair. Good news. The slightly more disconcerting news is that the Companies House website is showing an Auditor’s Resignation filing as being processed and available in five days.

Hello Share Toddlers. My weekend piece suggesting we don’t sell our shares too soon received a critical response from Uncle Tom. It’s a return to the familiar battle between me in the blue corner and the sage of Bristol in the red one.

I won’t claim to be a mining expert and will leave the technical analysis to Gary Newman who is much better at that sort of thing (see HERE); however, with the odd looking share movements and the Zorbas connection, I couldn’t resist digging through past RNS’s to find something ridiculous and what was clear is that this isn’t really a mining company at all, unless you think rinsing shareholders of cash counts, of course.

The unravel at AIM listed fraud Eden Research may be just days away. Because, its partner in crime, Terpenetech has until April 30 to file its accounts for the year to 31 July. Normally it files on deadline day. Any delays will be telling. But then so too will the numbers. Its a lose lose for the fraudsters. You will remember how this fraud worked....

Of course, of course, of course, the winner this week has to be a Cloudtag (CTAG) supporter. If moronism could be converted to energy, there would be no need of windmills and a Cloudtag supporter would be plunked into the ocean every 500 metres all around this island.

Amur Minerals (AMC) was one of the great mining junior ramps of the past 12 months. With the Sith Lord Zak Mir and Justin the Clown leading the charge using bogus charting tomfoolery and soft interviews with the CEO Robin Young, the shares surged to 15p in December at the height of the rampfest. They are now 6.25p to sell and heading sharply lower. What say you rampers? How about "Tom Winnifrith's repeated bearcast warnings were spot on and Zak & Justin The Clown were talking 100% cock as usual?" 

Recent years have been ones of transition from open pit towards underground mining for Altyn (ALTN). However, production is now starting to increase again - and the anticipated marked increase from current levels looks far from discounted in the present valuation. As such, the shares are a buy

It’s annual appraisal time for the squad members with annual results for the year to 30 December 2016 due in for many of them by 30 April. It was always going to be the strong favourite that most would leave it to the last minute so thought I’d provide a quick summary of who announced and when and include some commentary on each.