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.

There is more news given in the News page of our web site and more analysis of news is provided in our monthly newsletter for members – see the Newsletters page.

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Beaufort and the Regulators: US Prosecutors Expose Wide Ranging Scam

Post Date: March 3, 2018

News began to emerge yesterday of problems at broker Beaufort Securities. Firstly, the FCA posted this RNS stating that brokerages Beaufort Securities Limited and Beaufort Asset Clearing Services Limited had been placing into insolvency, must cease all regulated activities, and that administrators had been appointed who would seek to protect client assets. Not long after, this indictment by the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) came to light, alleging market manipulation in the US by Beaufort Securities and the individual Peter Kyriacou. ...

ShareSoc will Demand Action from the FCA over Account Switching Delays

Post Date: February 22, 2018

Earlier this month I read this Times article concerning disgruntled clients of Barclays' Smart Investor platform. It highlights once again the longstanding issue that changing your provider of share trading services (stockbroker or platform) is often a painful process. It is not unusual for the switch to take several months, during which you may not be able to sell shares that you own or access funds held in your account. I find this unacceptable in the 21st century, when modern IT systems ought ...

RBS Shareholder Committee: We’ve (almost) won!

Post Date: February 14, 2018

Great news from RBS! RBS have agreed to have our resolution put to the AGM. UNFORTUNATELY, they will only agree to this, if the resolution is a SPECIAL Resolution rather than an ordinary one. That means that we will have to resubmit our requisitions for the special resolution. So, if you own RBS shares, please complete the new Special Resolution Requisition form, which you can download from the ShareSoc website, click here. Getting the shareholder resolution on the RBS AGM agenda is a huge ...

BEIS Committee investigates Carillion. ShareSoc and the UK Shareholders Association submit joint response.

Post Date: February 5, 2018

The item below is ShareSoc and UKSA's joint response to a request for comment from the BEIS parliamentary select committee on Corporate Governance regarding events at Carillion. Click here to read the PDF version. 5 February 2018 Chris Shaw, Clerk, BEIS Committee on Corporate Governance Dear Chris, Carillion and implications Please note this is a joint response on behalf of UKSA and ShareSoc We understand that the Select Committee, along with the Work and Pensions Committee, is looking at the collapse of Carillion at the moment. So, we are ...

Carillion and FRC investigation

Post Date: February 5, 2018

I know that some members are taking a very active interest in what went wrong at Carillion. The email below from the FRC contains a link to a document which you may find both useful and interesting to support your own research and in helping to reach some initial conclusions. "From: FRC Sent: 29 January 2018 09:54 To: Various Subject: News Alert - Accounting and reporting framework for the construction and business support services sectors In the light of the collapse of Carillion, the Financial Reporting Council ...

New Year Angel Competition

Post Date: January 25, 2018

In light of the popularity of our Fat Santa and Scrooge competitions at Christmas time, we thought we would redress the balance and celebrate the beginning of a whole new year...

Regulation of shareholder action groups following the debacle of the RBS case

Post Date: January 16, 2018

Regulation of shareholder action groups following the debacle of the RBS case (see http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/news/article-5266449/Demand-probe-RBS-Shareholders-Action-Group.html ). As regards the suggestion that such groups be “regulated”, I do not see how that would necessarily assist to protect the interests of shareholders. Indeed, it might result in even more involvement of lawyers when one of the big problems is that legal firms often set up and run such groups and this is often in their interests rather than the claimants. Introducing regulation would also make ...

Private Investor Dialogue with the FRC

Post Date: January 16, 2018

Following the success of the last year's FRC event (photo below) a date of 26th November 2018 has been agreed for a Private Investor Dialogue with the FRC. Please put the date in your diaries. More details will follow later in the year. Click here to see the feedback survey results of last year’s event. The FRC were very pleased with the event and the feedback research. We continue to have regular meetings with the FRC and are increasingly being invited to ...

ShareSoc Requests Investigation into the Affairs of Blancco Technology Group

Post Date: January 8, 2018

Press Release 101 - ShareSoc Requests Investigation into the Affairs of Blancco Technology Group ShareSoc (the UK Individual Shareholders Society) is requesting the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and the Financial Reporting Council (FRC) to investigate certain issues concerning Blancco Technology Group plc (BLTG), an AIM listed software company specialising in data erasure. Shareholders in the company have been financially devastated by the collapse in the share price following the reporting of several accounting issues at the company. As a result the share price ...

RBS Campaign Update 10 – 161 forms submitted, press release issued and huge media coverage

Post Date: December 30, 2017

Update 10 29/12/2017 - 161 forms submitted, press release issued and huge media coverage Today I travelled to London to deliver the 161 signed forms to RBS. Yesterday, we issued a press release. Radio 4 reported on it in their Business Briefing at 6.25am. There were lots of press stories. Cliff Weight Delivers Requisitions to RBS We thought the press coverage today was balanced. We have worked well (together with RBS people) in avoiding the negative publicity that occurred earlier in the year. This is ...

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