ShareSoc Blog
The ShareSoc blog provides news and informal commentary from directors, members and other contributors. Entries reflect the personal views of the authors, which do not necessarily reflect ShareSoc’s formal position. Contributors may hold shares in the companies mentioned. Nothing in this blog should be viewed as financial advice. You may submit comments on blog posts, but ShareSoc reserves the right to remove or edit inappropriate or defamatory submissions.
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The views expressed in this article are those of the author and not necessarily those of ShareSoc.
It’s a sparkling wine budget – or at least one to celebrate for investors as there are no really negative changes in it that were widely rumoured. At least that is apart from the rise in dividend taxes and freezing of allowances previously announced.
Here’s a list of the key points:
The National Living Wage is being increased.
The Government is substantially increasing funding for R&D.
...
From Cliff Weight, ShareSoc Director
A friend from Punter Southall, sent me a round robin email and I thought all ShareSoc members would find it of interest and many would find it useful to help them find their investments.
Hello and good morning. You are one of just 30 people I have chosen to send this message to.
National Pension Tracing Day (NPTD) is coming up this weekend and I’m hoping that you can support the campaign in some way, whether that’s with your ...
The views expressed in this article are those of the author and not necessarily those of ShareSoc
There were several good articles in this week’s Investors’ Chronicle. I cover them briefly below.
The Editor, Rosie Carr, reported on feedback on readers’ views on taxation. Should the wealthy readers of the IC pay more was one question previously posed and the consensus answer seemed to be Yes. For pensioners it was suggested that they should pay National Insurance on their income and that there ...
Asking a question at an AGM is often a good way to get access to the Board and force them to engage on a key issue. This approach worked well with the FCA, where I submitted three questions and one of which, on financial education, was answered in the live part of the meeting. Page 18 of the written record of the meeting records that I asked FCA Chair Charles Randell:
Will the FCA support greater financial education in schools and in the wider world, ...
The views expressed in this article are those of the author, not necessarily those of ShareSoc. Today’s RNS from GHE (Gresham House plc) who own Gresham House Asset Management...
The following article represents the personal views of Cliff Weight and not necessarily those of ShareSoc.
I saw this interesting article in the FT: We need people to know the ABC of finance: facing up to the financial literacy crisis.
The article showed data on Responses to financial literacy questions around the world. An example: If you had $100 in a savings account and the annual interest rate was 2%, how much would be in the account after 5 years, more than $102, ...
UKSA’s policy team are drafting a reply, jointly with ShareSoc, to the FRC’s consultation on proposed revisions to the Audit Firm Governance Code see https://www.frc.org.uk/getattachment/1a453bac-671f-4375-a738-9d6fc7f73262/Consultation-Proposed-Revisions-to-the-Audit-Firm-Governance-Code-(August-2021).pdf. We believe audits are important to shareholders as they underpin their confidence and trust in their companies, management and the numbers they report. In relation to audits it therefore follows that the audit regulator’s requirements for audit firms’ governance is also important and we would like to provide our thoughts to the FRC on this. We ...
This article represents the view of its author and not necessarily those of ShareSoc
The issue of skin in the game and executive pay and how this impacts future share price (and dividends) performance is a crucial one. My favourite quote is from Charlie Munger "you show me the incentives and I will show you the behaviours".
So when leading proxy advisor firm ISS announce their plans for next year, it is well worth looking at them. Please note these are their US ...
Since June 14 (see https://www.sharesoc.org/sharesoc-news/policy-and-campaigns-progress-update-14-june-2021/ for previous update), ShareSoc's Policy and Campaigns' team have worked on:
Woodford Campaign: Leigh Day have submitted their claim. They now have 11,000 claimants and another 3,000 registered, but yet to sign their Leigh Day agreement. We held a very successful webinar on 30 Sept with 942 registrants.
ShareSoc’s Woodford Campaign now has over 1,500 members, which enables us to lobby strongly for regulatory change and to hold to account those who have done wrong.
...
This is a personal blog by ShareSoc Director Cliff Weight and does not necessarily represent the views of ShareSoc.
I have been concerned about Closet Indexing for some time. As have many others, eg
https://www.sharesoc.org/blog/general-news/closet-index-trackers-are-you-paying-over-the-odds/
https://www.sharesoc.org/blog/general-news/closet-index-trackers-investigations-in-progress/
https://www.sharesoc.org/blog/collective-investments/closet-indexing/
I met with executives from the FCA on 26 July to discuss our concerns. I have also had several conversations with David Rankin from Punter Southall. The latest news is that Harcus Parker have now starting gathering claimants for a class action against Scottish Widows. They have said-
Harcus Parker ...
