Ex-dividends and potential FTSE 100 changes

Many, many years ago, I panicked when a significant investment of the hedge fund I was working for at the time started one Thursday morning significantly down…until I realised it had just gone ex-dividend. So, if you own shares in Aviva (AV.), Mondi (MNDI), Diageo (DGE), Haleon (HLN), Ibstock (IBST), Auto Trader (AUTO), Land Securities (LAND), Legal & General (LGEN) and a bunch of other stocks do not panic. I could also flip it around the other way, and observe that you should not get overly excited about yesterday evening’s results from the Silicon Valley favourite, Nvidia.

UPDATED: Footnotes: Big Sofa and Skinbiotherapeutics

A busy day dropping off Olaf’s godmother at Crewe Station and on other matters looms so, pro tem, just a couple of footnotes on things I might have overlooked yesterday.

The real sex scandal in British Media is not Phil Schofield but Nick Cohen with the FT, The Guardian and Private Eye among the “guilty men” - Tom Winnifrith

Looking forward to the new week (when it starts properly again)

Whilst the US market reopens today, the UK markets (along with most of those elsewhere in Europe) open again on Tuesday. I look forward to all that, especially as later this week the global corporate earnings season really starts. And if you are looking for anything, beyond a bunch of UK-listed companies, to watch out for later this week then keep an eye out for Friday’s bunch of US banking sector comments. There has just been a little bit of sector excitement there over recent weeks.

I have no desire to buy either stock, but don’t worry about new shares at 3i Infrastructure or more buybacks at Shell

At the end of September last year, about the time when a 4,000-word comedy essay writer in yesterday’s Sunday press was the country’s PM, I wrote that for any investors who were too scared to invest in most shares, then “you can do a lot worse than 3i Infrastructure (3IN)” HERE. These shares, like a bunch of other FTSE 350 names, are up since then but today I notice that its board “is pleased to announce a proposed placing of ordinary shares in the capital of the Company conducted under the existing non-pre-emptive authorities granted by shareholders at the Company's annual general meeting”. How exciting (not). And what about all those share buybacks that have been happening elsewhere in FTSE 350 names?

Busy Christmas results Thursday – Wood Group, Tesco, Whitbread

There are a lot of corporate updates of interest today, but there are three I wanted to immediately comment on.

A big week for UK Christmas trading corporate insights ahead

I am looking forward to this week. Whilst I have no idea whether the weather will be good or bad, I do see a bunch of fascinating upcoming corporate comments and statements from Wednesday. The realities of Christmas trading will start to become apparent as well as a few hopes for FY23 earnings progress (or not).

A boring mid-December FTSE 350 Friday? Not at all!

The good news for all readers is that I am not going to talk about the Bank of England, as we all expected an interest rate rise yesterday. As with most matters in the investment world, what matters a lot more is what happens tomorrow rather than what is happening today (or happened yesterday). And on that basis, some interesting updates this morning from Rio Tinto (RIO), BT Group (BT.A) and Games Workshop (GAW).

Buy, sell or hold views on today’s quarterly updates from Aviva, ITV and Taylor Wimpey

It must be because I spend too much of my time dealing with the global quarterly corporate earnings season that when I see a bunch of UK corporate “trading update” announcements, I know that they will leave more questions unanswered than dealt with. To give the Americans or the Europeans their due, at least every three months any reasonable market cap company will punch out a good quarterly update and a conference call. However, among FTSE 350 names in the UK, good luck hoping for this.

On a busy Thursday, ignoring politics to focus on loads of corporate updates – Bunzl, National Express & Dunelm

I am so happy that today is a Thursday during the quarterly global corporate earnings season, which means I am busy looking at a hundred (and one) companies and can ignore the latest political “excitements”. And to think some people voted for the current PM, in a choice of two, only six weeks or so ago! Back to the corporate world and three UK-listed names which have published a few new thoughts today.