It has been a quiet week in town. Even the local Fish & Chip shop has shut for the week. I guess this is the lull before the school hols storm! But we have a new barmaid at the local who has brightened the place up a bit This one actually smiles most of the time. Mrs G. decided we needed a new gate fitted at the side of the house this week and I (innocently) agreed. We now have new fencing all round, the garden shed has been relocated and a barbecue built! I knew I should have got her to write the plans down first and sign in blood!

Monday was a nothing day with the FTSE100 hardly budging throughout. On the other hand, a scare from Nokia on Tuesday sparked a sell-off of telecomms stocks which drove the main index down 56 points to 5804. Contrarily, it was a small bounce by BT on Wednesday which helped to claw back 16 points but next day the LSE was swayed by the bad vibes from Japan and the US and, once more, plunged into the red. The FTSE100 ended the day a sorrowful 5752. Friday was more of the same, although a rally in the afternoon restricted the FTSE100 drop to 29. The week's close? 5723. Somehow, I see 5600 looming large on the horizon - or I am being too optimistic!

There are a few additions to the ADVFN WAP service this week with New Monitor Column Options added - Volume , Mini-Quote , Intraday Chart Link , Level 2 Link , Quote Link and Mini Quote Link. There is a health warning - the column options marked in red should be used exclusively. Otherwise you run the risk of making the page too large for your phone to handle

There was also news this week of a high-profile success for Success! They have developed a strategy enabling them to provide tailored courses designed specifically to meet individual client requirements in a way which does not impinge upon existing training plans. This week they announced that they had won their first major contract in this area. They will assist SJ Berwin Solicitors, the City-based international law firm, by introducing 40 of its trainees to the Financial Markets. (Headline could have read "Bullie goes legal!", but I thought he might sue!) :)

The Weekly BB Review

When a thread begins with "before you all groan...." you sort of guess that the stock in question is going to be one of a handful which tend to repeat on you. In this case, it was rally with Just Group - Run up to Excellent Results (JUS) on the PBB. rally reckons results due out in July will show turnover up over 100% and profit some 180% better. Sun-Tzu was quick to add some of the goodies coming up. On the FBB things were more voluble. Optimistic's Just Group RNS (and Profit Should be up 175% on Last Year) had racked up more than 1300 posts in just a couple of weeks. bonney, Adie2001 and darose posted their "letters from America" for which everyone was duly grateful and WESTHAM's hope for support at 11p was beginning to materialise on Wednesday. petkay, by then, was up to 4 Weetabix a day level. It is good to see the BUMs being so well received but I'd sure be happier if "Pinky & Perky" were kept out of the picture - never could stand the little critters, even as a kid! The share price drifted off a bit on Friday, but then so did most of the others. Good to see some action at last.

pommy either got over-excited (or his nipper got him up too early) to kick off trading on Thursday. As a consequence, the regular daily traders thread turned out to be the Thread Thread - Thursday 14th June 2001. It wasn't enough to confuse the regulars who flooded into trading with a vengeance.

Always on the lookout for a bargain, SpiceBoy this week was off to the supermarket - Tesco, in fact. (Supermarkets - whatever next?) Our spicey friend thought it "...A nice medium-term trade..." while alkrington was looking for a bounce from Thursday's 258p. FORESTHUTCH anticipated an upbeat trading statement at the Friday AGM and outlined how the opposition's share prices had performed this year in relative terms - Safeway - up 31%, Somerfield - up 63%, Morrisons - up 14% and Sainsbury - up 6%, against the Tesco fall of 4%. All of this perhaps a reflection of the current market where retailers are seen as safe places to hide. The Tesco Q1 statement showed a 14% rise in total group sales. In the UK, total sales for the twelve weeks to May were up 9.8% and like-for-like sales were up 6.7% with sales volumes up 6.4%. The company said it will announce price cuts in the UK next Monday amounting to over £60m of reductions on 700 products. However, on Friday the share price took a knock along with all the others in the sector and as crocodile says, they are on a downtrend, looking for a new support level. "The trend is your friend", as they say. Maybe time to side on the sidelines and watch for a while. A lot of blood in the aisles on Friday!

Will the hit parade succumb to the virtual talents of TMmy, Digital Animations answer to Britney Spears? DAG obviously hope so. She has cerainly got them some high profile marketing exposure - even before her single comes onto the shelves. The hype is quite something - she even has her own photo gallery and official fan club. Aldric is obviously a fan already, although rangers99 thought it all a ramp. Thanks to "Dad", blondee has already made something of a killing and expects more in the long term. This week's chart (stock, not pop!) looks interesting enough. If the song gets enough plugs when released and DAG keep making positive PR out of it, then who knows. I joined the TMmy Fan Club anyway - at the insistence of my grand-daughter, of course! :) spud finished off TMmy set to become No1 Hit? nicely with a piece "borrowed" from "Broadcast - Weekly Newspaper for the Television and Radio Industry"

It looks very much as though Independent Insurance has gone belly-up. The company "temporarily" closed for new business on Thursday, facing unquantifiable losses stemming from claims that have never been entered into its accounting systems. And all of this was known by them TWO WEEKS AGO! If it hadn't been for a press leak, they would still be going on going on. DEPEND ON INDEPENDENT INSURANCE has a fairly dull ring to it now. pdowlen was licking his wounds but still hopeful as the week began while taximania was glad he wasn't tempted. With the latest revelations (including the swift departure of "Barrow Boy Bright", as recruiter calls the former CEO), it sounds as though MBanani and NTV are right - the old grey goose is dead!

House prices are constantly in the news. In recent months, house builders benefited from a new rush to buy. But, the signs now are that belts are tightening and the sector is slowing. Maybe talk of interest rates stabilising at current levels (or rising!) is the driver behind that. ebiz predicted this at the end of last month in House Builders - Time for fall?, singling out Persimmon, John Laing and McAlpine as examples. By this week, he had largely been proved right. By this Tuesday, BYRDSONG had picked Bovis as his shorting target. gopher wisely was looking for those with the biggest exposure in the Sounth East where housing market volatility is likely to be most exaggerated. At the same time, matthewa was pondering over the reasons for Laing's resilence - the only one of this selection showing even early on Friday Sadly they finished the day 5.5p down. With brokers downgrading the whole sector earlier this month, probably after reading ebiz's thoughts :), it is not a good time to be bargain-hunting YET! Unless, of course, you are buying a house. On Alfred McAlpine, ChrisG was congratulating himself on perfect timing for bailing out. I wonder how many others called it right.

Chuckie Egg introduced Innovation Gp is a compelling sell, here's why..... (TIG) at the end of May with a compelling argument and a good opening statement which outlined why the acquisition of Huon Holdings might not be such a good idea. However, Dutch Alert and melfaraj were quick to disagree - the latter so strongly that it got a quadruple posting. mattharrop was another to think TIG over-valued and the acquisition too pricey but noted that the suspension of trading was timed well and avoided the worst of the bad US market performance of the time. At re-entry, the share price inevitably took a tumble. The open offer (3 for 14) complicated the picture somewhat and it was difficult to judge where the shares would go. Rumour suggested that the company had gained a lot of institutional support but by Friday it was evident that the only direction was South, looking increasingly like Bluflame's 500p prediction could come true! The final session of the week saw the shares at 590p bid, off 7.4% in the final session.

NewMedia SPARK to buy GlobalNet woke everyone up on Friday morning and the various connotations of how this might affect ADVFN began to emerge. As SpiceBoy said it is likely that there will be more consolidation in the sector before long. According to my (out-of-date?) fundamentals pages, NewMedia SPARK still hold 5.98% of ADVFN and GlobalNet hold 4%. ExecLine posted news that GlobalNet were to close the UKInvest site but Aquila found they were insisting that wasn't the case. A more interesting thought (commercially speaking) was his later postscript about UKInvest being provider of financial information to Freeserve. Now there's a Hmmmmmmmmmm! if ever I saw one. ;) At close of play, NMS were trading 1.5p down at 19p bid.

As my wife hails from Birmingham and her family were brought up as devout Blues supporters (aah!) and have a box there, I tend to notice if anything stirs regarding the shares. Hence I took a look at Birmingham City so cheap its unbelievable, although I didn't realise at the time it was about the share price. :) I remember attending a "fund-raising" do there a few years ago when a mini-skirted Karen Brady tried very hard to persuade corporate guests of the fun it could be to have a box at the ground. She didn't get too many takers as I recall, although most of the guys remembered the lady herself quite well next morning as, seated rather low at our tables, we spent a good proportion of the evening addressing her legs! As for Birmigham City as an investment...the long-term chart shows them at their lowest since they floated. Where do they go from here? Well, they are actually operating at a profit which is a big plus but the bulk of the shares are in very few hands and if David Sullivan loses interest, it is difficult to see where a buyer would come from. That said, they have a fanatical local following and the ground is usually full so there is a regular income stream. Even rally's giant buy (NMS is 500!) on Friday couldn't stop The Blues ending the week RED. Keep on chanting SirY2K - every little helps. :)

I know it is only for fun but I like to take a peek at The Rampometer to see if the Tadpolers have been knocked off their perch at the top. Nope! They're still there. But the Kingston Communications fan club seems to be closing ther gap.

Poster of the Week this week goes to jhurbanek for his continued good grace in the face of all sorts of criticism and clatter. John has provided us all with a great deal of amusement and interest throughout the year both on the PBB and in his weekly newspaper column and I'm sure the majority of BBers want him to succeed. At the same time, I'm sure John is grateful for a lot of the advice he has received here - some of which he might even have taken :) Congratulations John! Please drop me a line with a delivery address and I'll get your prize on its way. Now you are REALLY famous, how about including a few lines about yourself for the Who's Who for the benefit of those who don't read the Sunday papers?

Winner of the inaugural "Quote of the Week" competition is a smiler by mg on the * USA STOCKS - June 2001 * thread - nominated by wonging. The quote is in reply to Mr. Jam - "Not sure if I agree with the buy on dips theory - on the daily charts it looks very much to me like a huge head and shoulders - with the shoulders around the mark we're at now. (Admitted - there are two heads - but this is a monster of an index at the moment)" Congratulations mg! Please drop me a line with a delivery address and I'll get your prize on its way. (How about a contribution for the soon-to-be-improved Who's Who?)

Thank you for all of your contributions. It was a difficult decision to find a single winner as there were so many classics. I do hope you will continue to keep your eyes open for more gems during the ensuing week! When you find one, please send me a mail with Quote of the Week in the subject line, the nickname of the BBer responsible for the gem and the thread from which it comes. As usual the competition will close at 16:30 Friday, except for Renda2 whose entry must be with me by 16:29. :)


Good Hunting!

The ADVFN Who's Who is still growing and is now a quite long list. If you haven't sent me your bio yet, please drop me a few lines about yourself - a full editing service is provided! No e-mail addresses are published unless specifically requested.