AIM-listed Haydale (HAYD) has announced that it has got a grant of £120,000 from a package worth £249,600 and the shares have raced ahead by 21% to 32p. Of course, the RNS announcing the funding was an RNS reach and therefore does not affect the dire financial position of the company, which I fear may be doomed. Shareholders would be well advised to look skywards in gratitude and view the rise as a welcome opportunity to exit.

Fox Marble (FOX) has announced the acquisition of its joint venture partner based at the Prilep Alpha Quarry, Macedonia and “look forward to seeing the benefits of our increased participation in the Prilep Alpha quarry feeding through to the bottom line going forward”. Hear, hear!...

With any company where there has been fraudulent activity you have to consider whether there are more skeletons in the cupboard which could cause a further freefall in the share price when they emerge.

It’s been an eventful week on AIM. Patisserie Holdings’ (CAKE) announcement of “significant, and potential fraudulent, accounting irregularities” on Wednesday blindsided the investment community. Urals Energy (UEN) is comparatively smaller, but the company’s discovery of an unauthorised loan made with its funds – meaning the firms “working capital position will be significantly constrained” – brought some more unwanted bad press; UEN shares slid 31.3% since the announcement. With AIM firms making the news, we take at the current state of broker and tipster sentiment towards AIM over the last 30 days.

From the FCA's spreadsheet of short positions required to be disclosed to it, the following shows the shorted AIM shares with positions from 2017 and thus far in 2018 (by net short position %) - and if this position has increased (red), reduced (green) or remained unchanged (black) since last week...

In today's podcast I start with a brief but of macro babble then look at RM2 (RM2) specifiocally but  also at the wider Neil Woodford stable* of dogs. Then I discuss whether I'd buy into Patisserie Holdings (CAKE) at 50p. It is certainly not the same as Conviviality (CVR) which Thirsty Paul Scott bet heavily on the day before it went bust. There are similarities but 1 big difference.

Hello, Share Scrapers. Who among us isn't a bit spooked by issues affecting the global economy? But what should we do to protect ourselves - and make the most of any opportunities? Well, after doing the research and basing predictions on it, this is what I think.

I explained earlier why Frontera (FRR) really could be a zero. Now here is the City's No 1 oil analyst, Zac Phillips of SP Angel, with his take on today's news:

Earlier this week, Michael Alkin started to present the compelling bull case for Uranium (HERE). Now he continues theme c/o the latest podcast from Palisade Capital...

Forgive a brief historic digression at the start of this podcast but I start with a history lesson for those misguided souls who think that SinnFein/IRA brought peace and happiness to Ireland. Then I look at some other tossers from Ulster, First Derivatives (FDP) and the 3Xs. I comment briefly on Purplebricks (PURP) and Versarien (VRS) then move via BCA Marketplace (BCA) to Neil Woodford. Then it is onto MySquar (MYSQ), Symphony Environmental (SYM) and on to UK Oil & Gas (UKOG) with a few words for Dominic Frisby on the nature of bitcoin and its bubble ahead of our bust up next week in London.

The gyrations in the share price of Frontera Resources (FRR) caused by its latest lie-packed City presentation have forced the company to put out a statement and it makes for truly grim reading. This company is worth 0p per share and in the current climate it may well get there before too long.

Having reached circa 130p in August, shares in OptiBiotix Health (OPTI) have slid to 78p-81p. This is despite a pipeline of seemingly very significant deals likely to be converted and as such…

Columbus Energy Resources (CERP) has updated on the third quarter of 2018, including that it “has incorporated Steeldrum's business performance into Columbus' financial accounts with effect from 13 July 2018, the effective date of the acquisition… (and) adding significant optionality to increasing production going forward”...

Yesterday I asked you for suitable captions for this picture of Big Dave Lenigas and Lyin' Steve Sanderson of UK Oil & Gas (UKOG)  standing next to a tanker at Horse Hill. There were several splendid suggestions as you can see HERE and Mr Contrarian certainly wins a commendation for his cracking caption. But the winner of the semi naked photo of Britain's top share blogger before lunchtime, Thirsty Paul Scott is Jules2k6 with:

A bad day for diversity as AIM loses a female CEO in the form of Melissa Blau at Veltyco (VLTY). No doubt our wretched Prime Minister Theresa may will be cross about this but folks who care about weeding out failures and rewarding talent rather than daft quotas will not be crying. The question is whether Veltyco’s statement is true or not. Methinks it is not.

I continue to hold a small parcel of shares in AIM-listed Sosandar. I had been hoping to offload a few more at 50p but in the wake of a placing at 32p and the market sell-off that seems somewhat optimistic for some time to come. Tom Winnifrith sold all his shares some time ago and has commented on the update from the company and the placing at 32p HERE and HERE. So I thought I would throw my 2p worth in as well.

Hello Share Treaders. Down under there is a precious metals company called ECR Minerals (ECR). With gold values possibly set to rise in a difficult environment for most other shares, it might pay to have a gander at this one. ECR’s wholly-owned Australian subsidiary Mercator Gold Australia has Avoca, Bailieston, Moormbool and Timor gold exploration licences in Central Victoria.

Accounts for private companies such as Immunocore Limited are supposed to be filed at Companies House within nine months and thus, at October 11 2018 I wonder where the accounts for FY17 are for billion dollar unicorn Immunocore. I note on the Woodford Investment website that as at 31 August 2018 this investment accounted for 5.33% of WPCT and 0.75% of the Woodford Equity Income Fund (although I can’t see any income here!) And Woodford’s exposure here isn’t limited to just that, because the Dublin-based Malin Corporation (of which Woodford is the largest shareholder) is also on the shareholder register.

I never had Roger Lawson of Sharesoc down as a natural wit but I did chuckle when I read his comments on Telford Homes (TEF) and London/UK house prices. He is bang on the money, echoing exactly what I said in bearcast yesterday.  Anyhow back to Roger “it’s the way he tell’s ‘em” 

For macro musings and thoughts on stocks that really will crater in a bear market see my bonus bearcast HERE. In this podcast I discuss Versarien (VRS), First Derivatives (FDP), Sosandar (SOS), 13 Energy (I3E), UK Oil & Gas (UKOG), Chariot Oil (CHAR), Avocet Mining (AVM) and BlueJay Mining (JAY)