Sit back, get your tea and post your scores in the comments for bouquets and brickbats. No prizes and no Googling!

It is going to be a busy next week in the markets.  I look forward to that but first a couple of bits of Sunday musing. Five weeks ago here I was thinking about Prudential (PRU) ‘which might have been founded in London in May 1848, but today (post the spin-off of M&G (MNG)) is all about its US and Asian insurance and related business focus’.  Well, as you might have read in the last week, the company’s US division Jackson Financial has formally split and the company is an independent organisation listed on the New York Stock Exchange and technically ‘Prudential shareholders are entitled to receive one share of Jackson’s Class A common stock for every 40 Prudential shares they hold’.

Here are five long reads that have nothing to do with shares. Put the kettle on, find a comfy chair. You have the time, don’t you? 
 

This is getting boring! Gold fails at $1800 and slips, recovers, shows signs of another attack at $1830 resistance and then fails again. Repeat ad nauseam. As can be seen from the chart below, it has been going on for some time now – indeed, since mid-June.

The top non-Tom article this week is My Gold Stocks, and Time To Revisit One I Let Go? by Nigel Somerville at number 4 or number 9 if you include the Bearcast.

Sports, leisure and mobility equipment group Tandem (TND) has announced its results for the first half of calendar 2021 and said that “the outlook for the remainder of 2021 remains positive”.

Ariana Resources (AAU) is pleased to announce recent resource drilling results obtained from the Kepez North area of Kiziltepe, 23.5% owned by the company – emphasising that the area will provide Kiziltepe with a source of high-grade ore for blending with its current processing plant feedstock.

This weekend’s short letter on the N50 website will look at a company whose shares you can trade. Today, I am feeling pretty proud of my take-down of Standard Listed Umuthi (UHS) whose March 4 IPO was to have valued it at £368 million. A series of articles HERE has seen its sole NED resign and nobody now seems to doubt that this is a complete fraud with no business and that the revelations are truly shocking. Sadly, as it is an obvious zero, its shares are suspended but there are lessons. Here are 10 signs that this was a fraud:

Forgive the late bearcast but I was cooking amazing grub for relatives today including long lost cousin C. On the subject of families, congratulations to listeners Matthew & his dog who frequently request more swearing as Matthew has got engaged. In the podcast I discuss two no-one is watching O’clock statements yesterday from MyHealthChecked (MHC) and from Union Jack Oil (UJO). I do not mince my words on either. 

Hello, Share Scrumpers. As Uncle Tom kindly reminds you from time to time, I’m of a great age. This leaves me prone to a few minor health issues that require small-time surgery. But I have to endure discomfort until the covid-ravaged waiting lists at my local hospital push me to the top. But what has this to do with buying and selling shares?

I am a bit of a sweaty wreck as I prepare for a weekend of hell. I explain why. In the podcast I deal with Unon Jack Oil (UJO)  and my article of earlier and of the issue of who CEO’s should do interviews with. In the end of course the share price is driven not by how much time is spent ramping the stock but by whether a company generates cash and how much.

European hostels company Safestay (SSTY) has today emphasised “confidence of returning to pre-Covid levels of trading” but also stated “this is a natural point… to undertake a strategic review”, including a formal sale process. Hmmm.

AIM-listed Gold and Silver producer in Turkey, Ariana Resources plc (AAU), announced another round of drilling results from the Kepez North area at Kiziltepe yesterday and the numbers look very promising.

I commented yesterday on AIM-listed Rurelec’s (RUR) after-hours FY results which were slipped out at no-one-is-watching o’clock on Wednesday whilst Boris was announcing his cabinet reshuffle (a good time to bury bad news). But there are some details worth looking at – for a start, the involvement of former boss Peter Earl, who ran the company into the ground before he was shown the door.

Investment adviser Axel Merk warns that across the West there are growing reasons why tens of millions of folks will opt not to work but to such at the nipple of the State instead.

Thanks to the Winnileaks service I have been sent an email from Gert Viljoen, the CEO of the Umuthi (UHS) fraud, sent on 18 September 2019, almost 18 months before the FCA allowed this con to list. Read and weep at the lies Gert told to folks sold shares in Umuthi by either him or the Queen of the fraudsters Connie Van Nieuwkerk with most of the cash trousered by Gert or Connie and a bit going to Umuthi.

Jadestone Energy (JSE) has announced its results for the first half of 2021, reaffirming full-year production guidance of 11,500-13,500 barrels of oil equivalent per day and anticipating 20,000 boe/d towards the end of the year. We are well up on this 69p offer price share tip but where do we go from here?

This is the market rumour. Shard rather than the listed broker the fraudster’s pals SP Angel is apparently running the book. I have given the company the opportunity to deny it but it seems to have declined that opportunity. Apparently much of the cash is for an acquisition the rest for general corporate purposes yak yak yak. Given the broker apparently in charge…

Mobile data computing and managed services company Touchstar (TST) has announced results for the first half of calendar 2021 and that it “has traded well in recent months, as a result we now expect full profits to be ahead of our previous expectations”. Sounds good.

Hello, Share Squeakers. The Do-It-Yourself game has boomed during the lockdowns. So we could expect some chirpy results from Wickes Group (WIX), the big home improvement retailer. And we’ve got them in the form of sprightly numbers for its half-year to 26th June.