Tag: Coronavirus

New Book Published – A Journal of the Coronavirus Year

This is a war story, but it is not a story of heroic deeds. It is how an ordinary family faced the Covid-19 epidemic that killed millions of people in 2020 and 2021. The battles were fought in hospitals and other medical facilities but the fear of infection spread panic among the population and Governments took aggressive steps, often misguided, to try and control the pandemic.

This journal was commenced in March 2020 after the Government advised the author to stay at home and not associate with anyone at all as he came into the category of someone who was especially vulnerable to the coronavirus. It provides an interesting record of events in the following eighteen months as recorded at the time, and his reactions to them, in what was a particularly historic period in more than one way.

It focuses to some extent on the impacts on the stock market and the economy in which the author had a particular interest as an active private investor, but also covers how his family and others survived the epidemic and the way life changed as a result for many people. And it gives some insights in how the author became an active and successful investor by adding some biographical notes including the successes and failures in his life in the last 70 years and other events that will be of interest to readers.

For more information and to purchase a copy go to: https://www.roliscon.com/journal-coronavirus-year.html

Roger Lawson (Twitter: https://twitter.com/RogerWLawson  )

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Year End Review of 2021

As I have published in previous years, here is a review of my own stock market portfolio performance in the calendar year 2021. I’ll repeat what I said last year to warn readers that I write this is for the education of those new to investing because I have no doubt that some experienced investors will have done a lot better than me, while some may have done worse.

It’s worth bearing in mind that my portfolio is very diversified across FTSE-100, FTSE-250 and smaller company (e.g. AIM) shares listed in the UK. I also hold a number of UK investment trusts which gives me exposure to overseas markets, and some Venture Capital Trusts (VCTs). Although I have some emphasis on AIM shares, they are not the very speculative ones.

One feels wary of publishing such data because when you have a good year you appear to be a clever dick with an inflated ego, while in a bad year you look a fool. Consistency is not applauded on social media. But here’s a summary of my portfolio performance which turned out to be a good year despite the damage done to economies by the Covid pandemic. Total return including dividends was up 19.3% which I consider a good result bearing in mind that the FTSE All-Share was only up 14.56% which I use as my benchmark (the latter figure does not include dividends though). But the FTSE All-Share is dominated by FTSE-100 companies – the dinosaurs of the financial world in many cases – of which I hold relatively few.

During the year, and in the previous year, I had moved to a more defensive portfolio position as I thought the market was somewhat overvalued although I retained a strong emphasis in technology stocks. Cash holdings increased as I sold out from a number of companies early in the year when over-optimism for a quick recovery from the pandemic seemed common. I did purchase more holdings in property companies where REITs and property investment trusts seemed to me to be on excessively high discounts and warehousing companies such SEGRO and Urban Logistics benefited from more internet retailing. Self-storage property company Safestore also contributed. Bigger holdings in property companies also helped total dividends received to increase, with good pay-outs from VCTs also making total dividends received to be the highest level for 4 years.

Smaller technology stocks were a very mixed bunch – Tracsis was up substantially despite the fact that I expected train companies to cut back expenditure as their passenger revenue must have fallen. Clearly it’s a sector more reliant on government subsidies than simple economics to make money. Other smaller winners were DotDigital, SDI and Judges Scientific but GB Group fell substantially. Diploma and Reach were other winners supported by takeovers at Ultra Electronics and Wey Education. I had no substantial individual company losses during the year which always helps overall portfolio performance. Perhaps I am getting better at avoiding the duds.

My investment trust and fund holdings all did well often because they have substantial US holdings. I failed to beat Terry Smith’s performance at Fundsmith for yet another year but Scottish Mortgage and Polar Capital Technology produced only moderate performances as all but mega-cap technology stocks fell out of favour.

What does the future hold? Inflation is rising as Governments pump money into the economy in response to the epidemic while interest rates are still at record low levels. It’s certainly no time to be holding bonds or other fixed interest stocks. It’s a return to the good old days when you could buy a house that was rapidly inflating in price when the mortgage cost was much lower than the inflation gain. So I expect house builders to continue to do well as there is still a shortage of housing in some parts of the country despite a few people returning home to the EU. Brexit turned out to be a damp squib so far as most UK people are concerned and I see no great change in that regard in the coming year.

A year ago I said “some things may permanently change as we have become used to doing more on-line shopping, working from home, travelling less and getting our education on-line”. Those are the trends that will continue I suggest. The movement to improve the environment and halt global warming which is requiring substantial changes to the UK and other economies continues to be a priority for the Government and many businesses although there is too much hot air spouted on the subject. One has to be very careful about enthusiasm for “hot” market sectors – they often turn out to be flashes in the pan.

It looks like we will need to learn to live with Covid-19 as variants arise which hopefully will be less virulent. You can expect to receive repeat vaccinations against Covid variants – I already have my fourth lined up. Life may gradually return to normal – at least I hope so.

Roger Lawson (Twitter: https://twitter.com/RogerWLawson  )

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Mining Companies, Takeovers and a Journal of the Coronavirus Year

The usual stock market gyrations are taking place in August and this year it seems to be the turn of big mining stocks. Rio Tinto (RIO) is down 20% since its recent peak in May and Anglo American (AAL) fell sharply after it recently went ex-dividend. BHP Group (BHP) is also down but not by as much as might be expected after it announced that it was intending to unify its corporate structure and this will mean it will no longer be a FTSE-100 stock so some tracker funds will have to sell it. The downward move was probably limited because this company is dual listed in the UK and Australia and there was a discount in the UK versus the A$ price which will be eliminated.  

The reasons given in the media for declines in mining stocks are numerous – some profit taking after a long rise, worries about Covid infections rising, US stimulus measures being cut back, a slow-down in economic growth in China and several other reasons. All of this is probably just “noise” that can be discarded as financial news tends to be thin during the summer so media tend to invent stories.

As regards the BHP move, where I hold the stock, I do not oppose the simplification. It will still be listed in the UK but as a FTSE-250 stock. However the one-off costs of US$500 million to do the unification seems to be unreasonably high. I hope we see a good justification for the move when it comes to a vote. But it has been suggested that one motivation is a more relaxed corporate governance environment in Australia. As I have pointed out in previous blog posts, excessive regulation in the UK is providing an incentive to list elsewhere or not list at all.

Other market news is a recent spate of takeovers in my portfolio such as at Avast (AVST) and Ultra Electronics (ULE). The Avast proposal is not at a great premium but I have only held it for a short while so I will not oppose. It’s a good opportunity to simplify my portfolio which still has too many holdings in it.

As regards Ultra this is another short-term holding and the agreed offer price is at a very good premium so I will support. The Government has required the competition watchdog to assess ‘national security issues’ over the sale but the share price barely moved after that announcement so it seems the market expects this will not thwart the deal. With UK and US defence companies now so intertwined it would seem pointless to object.

On a more personal note, in March 2020 I started a diary because the coming year seemed likely to be a momentous one. With the Covid epidemic spiralling out of control and our departure from the EU (Brexit) having happened but no free trade agreement yet in place which was forecast to be a disaster by some people, it looked likely to be an interesting year economically and politically. And so it turned out to be.

My life in the period has been somewhat mundane as meetings have been cancelled and travel much restricted. But I thought it might of some interest to my offspring in due course. My father wrote a diary covering the years before, during and after the Second World War which proved to be fascinating reading when it came to light over 50 years later even though he was in a “reserved” occupation and the nearest he ever got to fighting was in the Home Guard.

I have now finished my diary as I consider the epidemic to be substantially over and Brexit has turned out to have minimal consequences on our daily lives. But some aspects of our lives have changed. My diary has been printed under the title “A Journal of the Coronavirus Year” and is comparable to “A Journal of the Plague Year” by Daniel Defoe published in 1722.

I have published other books in the past – the most recent one via Amazon which is relatively simple to do. But I only wanted a few hard copies for my family so I used a company called BookPrintingUK (https://www.bookprintinguk.com/ ). This I found to be a very good low-cost service which I can recommend it you have a similar need. It is easy to use and they can include colour photographs.  Photograph of completed volume of 400 pages is above.

The current book contains both personal information and commentary on the financial world – the latter often taken from my blog. Is it worth turning it into a publication that the general public, or at least the investment community, might find of interest? Let me know if you think that would attract any demand. As a history of the epidemic and other events from March 2020 to June 2021 and how life has changed in that period it may be of some interest to historians.

Roger Lawson (Twitter: https://twitter.com/RogerWLawson  )

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Coronavirus News, AstraZeneca Vaccine, Bowling Alleys and Boeing 747s Retired

The UK death count from the Covid-19 virus is now 45,233. At least that’s the latest figure available because daily reports of deaths have now been suspended because the statistic is now known to be unreliable. Anyone who was identified as a Covid-19 infected person but later died from any cause is identified as a Covid-19 death. The result is that someone who was at death’s door from cancer before infection is counted as a Covid-19 death. Even someone who is run over by a bus is likewise included. This is truly bizarre and the Government has ordered an investigation.

The good news is that a second vaccine candidate looks like it might be effective. This is the one produced by Oxford University and which AstraZeneca (AZN) is gearing up to manufacture and distribute in volume. The share price of the company perked up on Friday as a result based on press reports and rumours although the trial results are not due to be published in the Lancet until Monday. Whether they will really make any money from this product remains to be seen. I only hold a few shares in the company and will wait to see a clearer view before buying more.

The other good news is that bowling alleys and other similar entertainment venues such as casinos will be able to reopen on the 1st August. But there will be restrictions on bowling alleys with only alternate lanes open, players limited to groups of 6 and they will be offered gloves to wear. Also bowling shoes are out.

I always thought the provision of shoes was a bit odd now that everyone is wearing trainers or other rubber/plastic soled shoes as I thought the original purpose was to protect the wooden runway. It seems that bowling shoes also enable the players to slide along the surface but only professionals actually do that. Bowling shoes may now die out.

CFO of Hollywood Bowl Lawrence Keen was quoted by the BBC as saying: “At 50% capacity, the company will still be profitable, albeit just”. I own a few shares in both Hollywood Bowl (BOWL) and Ten Entertainment (TEG) but again I think it is best to wait and see whether the players return before buying more shares.

Other news was the announcement by BA that they are “retiring” their entire fleet of Boeing 747s. With 31 planes they are the largest operator of the planes in the world.

As airline passenger numbers are much reduced from the epidemic impact, BA clearly sees little chance of filling the planes in future, and you need to fill a 747 to make them economic operationally. Boeing 747s were first made operational in about 1970 and unbelievably are still being manufactured, albeit with a lot of updates such as improved engines. They are still in demand for cargo flights due to their large capacity. What’s the price of a good second-hand 747-400? About $12 million, although I suspect prices are falling rapidly.

Memories: I recall the original promotional videos for the plane which featured lots of space to walk around in “lounges” with a bar at one end. In reality they soon crammed in as many passengers as possible and were hence not particularly comfortable, particularly in economy class. Some planes were configured to use the “upper deck” which one reached via stairs and I do recall at least one trip in that location. But the large number of passengers always meant it took a long time to unload and load, with long queues at passport control resulting.  Certainly a plane to avoid for passengers in my opinion even if you were flying business or first class. There was a certain comfort in having four engines in case one or two failed, but aircraft engines improved in reliability over the years so the initial doubts about flying more fuel efficient twin-engined planes soon vanished.

Roger Lawson (Twitter: https://twitter.com/RogerWLawson  )

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Business Trends, Speedy Hire and the Hospitality Sector

After my negative comments in a previous blog post on Friday about the short term prospects for share prices bearing in mind all the uncertainties that face us, there were several other commentators over the weekend who suggested the market was ignoring the realities. Too much exuberance in expectation of a quick recovery was a common theme. That may be why the market opened in a sluggish manner this morning when Monday morning is often a time when share prices rise after investors read share tips over the weekend.

What is really happening in the real economy is the key question? Just walking around the streets near my home it is clear that builders and home improvers have got back to work. This is also apparent in the trading statement issued by tool/equipment hire company Speedy Hire (SDY) this morning, in which I hold a few shares. Their revenue is only 17% down on the prior year for the last week, whereas it was down 35% in April. With aggressive cost cutting measures already taken, the “Board remains confident that the Group can operate within its existing debt facilities and covenant tests during a prolonged period of reduced trading activity”.

However the bad news is that the accounts have been delayed and they are investigating a claim against a subsidiary named Geason acquired in 2018. They are also writing off the carrying value of goodwill and the contingent consideration payable on that acquisition. It only represents c.2% of group revenues but they say it has not performed in line with management’s expectations. It looks like an acquisition that was unwise. It is probably no coincidence that the finance director is soon departing.

One indicator of investor confidence is of course the state of the housing market. When house prices are rising, investors feel wealthier, and when they are falling, confidence is undermined. Knight Frank reported a 2.1% decline in central London property prices in April and Nationwide reported a national 1.7% fall in May. That is not surprising though bearing in mind that the Covid-19 epidemic may have discouraged house purchases given the economic uncertainty and job losses. Will people really be buying houses when they have just been “furloughed”? In addition, estate agents have been closed and house buyers deterred from visiting properties by isolation restrictions. But in the real world, this may be rapidly changing. A neighbour of mine in our outer London suburb decided to sell her house recently. In just a few days she had a number of inquiries and there were several offers received in no time at all. She did lower the price somewhat as against what I would have asked, to achieve a quick sale no doubt, but it is clear the market is alive and well.

Retailers are getting back in operation – there have even been two new shops opened recently in our local High Street. But the travel and hospitality sector firms are furious about the new quarantine rules for visitors coming into the UK. They claim, perhaps rightly, that it will kill their businesses and they would have to cease trading. A group called “Quash Quarantine” claims the quarantine rules are unjustified and not based on any science, i.e. they are disproportionate. A “letter before action” has apparently already been submitted to the Government. Comment: This looks like shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted as checking incoming visitors and enforcing quarantine might have had some effect in the early stages of the epidemic in the UK but it will now have minimal impact. It surely makes sense to have some targeted restrictions (e.g. visitors from known “hot-spots”) and more checks/testing of visitors in general but a blanket set of rules with little chance of 100% enforcement seems very unreasonable. Otherwise the tourism industry will be destroyed at enormous financial cost, and the whole hospitality sector damaged.

Roger Lawson (Twitter: https://twitter.com/RogerWLawson  )

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Market Trends, Big Miners and Will the Music Stop?

Stock markets continue to rise. They seem to be ignoring the bad company results that are going to come out in the next few months. Although there are signs that the Covid-19 epidemic is weakening, some sectors such as hospitality are going to be in lock-down for some time. The economy is clearly going into recession with many employees being laid off. The lack of consumer spending, not just because some people have less money to spend, but because others are growing more nervous of spending money or finding fewer things to spend it on, is going to have a wide impact on the economy.

Cash is being put back into the stock market, simply because with very low interest rates there seem to be few good alternatives. The measures taken by central governments to refloat the economy will promote asset inflation so these trends may continue.

Investment trusts I hold which are popular with private investors seem to be some gainers from this market enthusiasm with their discounts narrowing again. Small cap stocks are also recovering and with very low liquidity just a few trades can raise their prices dramatically for no good reason. Or sharply reverse when a few sellers think the prices have risen too far. Rational judgement on share prices flies out the window when share prices are being driven primarily by momentum.

My portfolio continues to follow the market trend as it is very diversified even though I don’t hold shares in the sectors worse hit by the epidemic. I may have to put cash back into my ISAs which I withdrew only in March after making some sales. I have been buying a few large cap stocks which is not usual for me. I tend to avoid FTSE-100 companies as their share prices are driven by professional analysts’ comments, by geo-political concerns, by general economic trends and by commodity prices. You can buy a FTSE-100 company and soon find it’s going downhill because one influential analyst has decided its prospects are not as they previously thought.

But I did start buying a couple of big miners, BHP and Rio Tinto, in March which has worked out well. I considered the fundamentals sound and China, which is their major market, was clearly recovering and getting back to work rapidly. There was an interesting article in the Financial Times a couple of days ago highlighting other reasons why they are doing well. It was headlined “Australia’s iron ore miners exploit supply gap as Covid-19 hobbles rivals”. It explained how BHP, Rio Tinto and Fortescue Metals Group were capitalising on the production problems of their competitors in Brazil and South Africa who have been badly hit by the epidemic, while demand has remained buoyant. In Australia, where most of the mining is in Western Australia, they took vigorous action to halt the virus early on and most of the workers fly in and out so are easy to monitor. It seems that this unexpected turn of events has helped rather than hindered my investment performance for a change.

Although I am confident that the economy will recover in due course, and stock markets will follow that trend as they always must do, in the short term I find it difficult to be positive. It is hard to identify companies where one is both confident that they won’t be badly affected by the epidemic in the short term and where one can reasonably accurately forecast their future earnings. It’s the opposite of shooting fish in a barrel to use a bad metaphor. Together with the uncertainty of whether we will get a second virus wave, whether a working vaccine will be found, the impact of Brexit and the prospect of higher taxes, mine and the confidence of other investors must surely be low. In the short term, growth in company profits is going to be hard to come by, which is often the major driver for improving share prices.

But the market is ignoring that. It reminds me of the infamous saying of Citigroup CEO Chuck Prince during the last big financial crisis – “When the music stops, in terms of liquidity, things will be complicated. But as long as the music is playing, you’ve got to get up and dance.”

Unfortunately judging when to move in and out of markets is not a skill that most investors have and so I will stick to trend following while keeping a sharp eye on events.

Roger Lawson (Twitter: https://twitter.com/RogerWLawson  )

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Covid-19 Economic Impact and Was It All Based on Faulty Analysis?

Readers don’t need to be reminded on the damage being caused to the UK economy as a result of the coronavirus epidemic. Most of the damage has been caused by the “lock-down” that has closed whole swathes of UK business and industry. There can’t be many readers’ stock market portfolios which have not suffered as a result. The lock-down was all done based on the advice of Prof. Ferguson of Imperial College and a computer model that he used.

This is what Steve Baker, M.P. tweeted today: “Today, I read the Imperial College Covid-19 Code: https://github.com/mrc-ide/covid-sim . I then read this for a second time with growing horror: https://thecritic.co.uk/a-series-of-tubes/ . Software critical to the safety and prosperity of tens of millions of people has been hacked out, badly. It is a scandal.”

This is what I wrote yesterday in my diary (which I have kept since the start of the epidemic to make interesting reading for my offspring in future years):

“There has been a lot of controversy of late over the role of Professor Neil Ferguson in the epidemic crisis.  He is professor of mathematical biology at Imperial College London and has been advising on the UK government’s response. His virus modelling led to the current lockdown being put in place. It seems his past forecasts of the impact of epidemics of other diseases have been wildly pessimistic. He has now resigned from the Government advisory body after ignoring the lock-down rules to meet a paramour.

But when people looked at the software code that he has been using to forecast epidemic spread, it seemed to be unreliable. It consisted of 15,000 lines of undocumented and unstructured code that allegedly gave different answers when run more than once. It very much appears to be a rather unprofessional approach to software development that one might expect from a scientist rather than an IT professional”.

I then covered my past career as a programmer and lamented the lack of professionalism in some parts of the world as regards software development, 40 years after I gave up programming. This is a good quotation from the Daily Mail on the latest fiasco: “David Richards, co-founder of British data technology company WANdisco said the model was a ‘buggy mess that looks more like a bowl of angel hair pasta than a finely tuned piece of programming’. He also said: ‘In our commercial reality we would fire anyone for developing code like this and any business that relied on it to produce software for sale would likely go bust’.”

So now you know why we are all stuck at home and in such a financial mess.

Roger Lawson (Twitter: https://twitter.com/RogerWLawson )

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Dividend Cut at Elecosoft, Dignity Trading and Public Transport Problems

Many investors are suffering from dividend cuts by companies. The latest one in my portfolio is Elecosoft (ELCO), a company that produces software for the construction sector. In their announcement of the full year results this morning they indicated revenue and earnings were much as forecast to December, and cash flow was good enough to put them in a net cash position.

Normally these results would not have caused any concerns that the dividend would be reduced or cancelled, but not this year. Even though they only previously paid small dividends and half the “cost” as a scrip dividend, this year’s final dividend has been cancelled. This is what the company had to say:

“Proposed Dividend: Elecosoft’s strong trading performance and cash generation in 2019, and, ironically, the strong start to trading in 2020, would normally have warranted the payment of an increased final dividend. However, having regard to the uncertainties created by the Coronavirus situation and the need to conserve our cash resources, the Board has decided to not recommend a final dividend”.

I don’t normally like to challenge the wisdom of management, who may know more than me about the trading position of the company and future revenue, but this does look at first glance to be excessively cautious. That is particularly so bearing in mind they could have paid it as a scrip dividend if they wished to conserve cash. ShareSoc has published some comments and written to the FRC, FCA and BEIS on the problem of dividend cuts suggesting they should issue some guidance. That seems to be a sensible suggestion because at present we don’t know whether this is just management panicking or being simply prudent.

One company that should surely be benefiting from the coronavirus epidemic is funeral provider Dignity (DTY) – I do not hold the shares. More deaths surely mean more business for them. But in their trading update today they show that it is not that simple. The company says the following:

“The absolute number of deaths increased by approximately one per cent to 161,000 from 159,000 in the comparative period last year. Sadly, since the end of the quarter, the UK has witnessed in excess of 20,000 deaths in a single week, the highest since the beginning of 2000. The number of possible incremental deaths as a result of COVID-19 is a matter of substantial speculation. Should 2020 witness a large number of incremental deaths, beyond the 600,000 originally anticipated by the Office for National Statistics, then it is possible that 2021 and 2022 could experience a lower number of deaths than in 2019. The Group will not speculate on the most likely outcome”.

In addition there is the problem that as many people cannot attend funerals, some funerals are being postponed or executors are opting for lower cost funeral packages. Dignity was already suffering from aggressive price competition which had prompted a strategic review before the latest crisis arose.

The company had previously decided to suspend dividend payments. Like Elecosoft they apparently are simply unable to forecast the likely impact of the epidemic on their business. So no guidance for 2020 is being provided.

On Saturday the 9th May Grant Shapps, Transport Secretary, said that only 10% of former public transport capacity will be available in some locations if social distancing is to be maintained. It seems likely that will be so for many months even if people are permitted to go back to work. This will clearly cause major problems in London where almost all commuters use public transport such as trains, the underground and buses.

After the Prime Minister spoke on the 10th May, Mr Shapps issued this tweet: “Speaking this evening the PM was clear – if you’re going back to work in a job that cannot be done from home, please avoid public transport if possible. Go by car, or even better, cycle or walk. To help, we’ve announced more than £2bn in the biggest ever boost to cycling and walking”.

An example of how problematic London transport has become is a report in the Times that says Transport for London (TfL) has asked the Government for £2 billion. To quote: “TfL is down to its last £1bn, which is being burnt at a rate of £21m a day — leaving it less than two months from emptying its coffers and illustrating the intense pressure on local authority finances”. The article suggests the Government will attach some strings to any funding.

Mr Shapps was clearly right to point out the public transport capacity problem, but his apparent remedy to get everyone walking and cycling makes little sense. It is a typical view of politicians who can afford to live in central London. But for the vast majority of London commuters who travel many miles to get to work, it’s simply impractical even if they are keen cyclists.

Mr Shapps also justified his proposals by saying the epidemic is a great health opportunity to encourage active travel with the objective to double cycling by 2025. He also proposes to implement at least one “zero emission” city, and argues that one of the few positives will be improved air quality. He actually said there are “more than 20,000 extra deaths a year attributed to NO2 emissions”.

This figure is nonsense. It repeats the past allegation of 40,000 deaths from air pollution in the UK which has been shown to be simply wrong and a corruption of statistical evidence. In reality, there may be a few months shortening of life expectancy from all air pollution sources, a lot of which cannot be removed such as natural sources. But the figure is essentially uncertain and it is clear there are no deaths directly attributable to pollution. To specifically indicate NO2, which mainly comes from transport, as being the problem is also wrong when the Government advisory body COMEAP could not even agree that NO2 contributed to the negative impact on health of air pollution from particulates.

Mr Shapps clearly knows little about air pollution and its impact on health but is using his ignorance to put a positive spin on his actions in response to the transport crisis.

Just to show how there is no direct correlation between traffic levels and air pollution, this is what the London Air Quality Network (LAQN) recently reported: “Levels of the pollutant nitrogen dioxide (NO2) has reduced significantly during lockdown, research from King’s College London has found. Concentrations of NO2 have lowered as much as 55% due to less road traffic. However, levels of PM10 and PM2.5 were higher after lockdown than at any other time in 2020, due to easterly winds and pollutants from northern Europe”. The reduction in NO2 is perhaps not surprising when measurements by the LAQN are often taken at the roadside so will be heavily influenced by adjacent traffic. But as particulates (PM10 and PM2.5) are of much greater health concern you can see that Mr Shapps’ spin on the air pollution issue is somewhat misleading. Other UK cities have also shown no direct correlation between traffic reduction from the epidemic and air pollution – at least to date.

The air pollution problem is much more complex than can be solved by encouraging walking and cycling alone.

Roger Lawson (Twitter: https://twitter.com/RogerWLawson )

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Ocado Trading Update, Coronavius Apps, EMIS AGM, IDOX Pay, Segro Dividends

Ocado (OCDO) issued a trading update today, and it shows their joint retail venture with M&S is benefiting from the coronavirus epidemic. In the second quarter revenue was up 40% on the prior year. They have had to ramp up capacity significantly to meet this demand, and they have suspended delivery of mineral water so as to cope with the needs of additional households. The announcement gives the distinct impression that they need more warehouses (or CFCs as they call them).

On a personal note, my family has been using Sainsburys’ on-line delivery system and as a “vulnerable” person we get priority. The result has meant neighbours asking us to shop for them. But at least I don’t need to accept the offer of food parcels sent to me yesterday by the local council!

There has been good coverage of coronavirus apps in the national media in the last couple of days. This UK Government has chosen one that relies on a centralised system and it looks distinctly insecure and not good enough to protect privacy. Robert Peston pointed out another flaw in it that someone could maliciously chose to report themselves as suffering from symptom thus causing everyone they might have come into contact with in the last two weeks to self-isolate. I am not at all clear why the Government has chosen this approach, which may deter take-up anyway, when Google and Apple are implementing a different system with fewer privacy concerns. That has been adopted by other countries so there will be problems with international travel.

EMIS (EMIS) held their AGM today. Nobody allowed to attend and no on-line session which is not good enough for an IT company. EMIS operates in the healthcare sector. Recurring revenues have held up but new business sales have been lower. They still expect to meet full year expectations.

However, they did get 15% of votes AGAINST the remuneration report. That included my votes as a holder as it looked a typical complex scheme with total pay too high in relation to the size of the business.

Another example of a poor pay scheme is that of IDOX (IDOX), an AIM listed company that operates mainly in the provision of software to local authorities. Reviewing the Annual Report, the Chairman acquired 585,000 share options last year (current price about 40p, exercise price 1p) based on a share matching scheme. The CEO acquired 3,512,400 share options under an LTIP with an exercise price of 0p (nil). The CFO also acquired 1,000,000 share options, again with an exercise price of 0p, but with a performance condition of the share price being greater than 45p. In summary I think this is way too generous so I have voted against the remuneration report. The AGM is on 28th May, so other shareholders have plenty of time to submit their votes.

Another item of annoying news I received recently was from Segro (SGRO) the property company. They will no longer be sending out dividend cheques from next year. I still prefer dividend cheques for my direct holdings because it is easy to check that the dividends are received and you know exactly when the money is in the bank because you pay them in yourself.

However looking at a report published by the Daily Telegraph last year, it quotes registrar Equiniti as saying that up to 30% of dividend cheques do not get presented which is a rather surprising statistic and must create a lot of extra work. Kingfisher, Marks & Spencer and Vodafone have already stopped dividend cheque issuance, forcing you to give the registrar your bank details. I may have to accept this as a reasonable change even if I don’t like it.

Roger Lawson (Twitter: https://twitter.com/RogerWLawson )

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Why I Am Optimistic

The UK death count from the Covid-19 virus is now 25,785 and continues to grow, albeit at a slower rate. There is a lot of bad news about the economy still being reported – new car sales have fallen to the level last seen in 1946 and according to the Daily Telegraph the state is now paying more than half of all adults. The same dire economic picture is also seen in the USA and most other countries. But I am still optimistic for the following reasons.

Apart from being a naturally optimistic person, which is a required attribute for any entrepreneur, the medical scene is looking better for several reasons. Below is a chart issued by the Government today which shows the daily number of confirmed Covid-19 cases.

Reported Covid19 Cases 2020-05-05

It is clear that the spread of the disease is falling rapidly and hence the “R” (reproduction) rate is probably less than 1. If the same conditions persist then the disease will gradually die out. Emergency “Nightingale” hospitals are already closing because of a lack of patients. With fewer new cases, the spread of the disease declines. Tracing of infected people and ensuring they are isolated, plus the new phone App to help identify contacts, are two ways the Government hopes will assist in this process. That’s ignoring the potential vaccines or medical treatments on which a lot of money is being expended worldwide at present. It has even been suggested that taking Vitamin D supplements might avoid the worst symptoms of the disease.

But the Government is concerned that if the “lock-down” restrictions are relaxed to enable people to get back to work then the virus may stage a resurgence and we will be back at square one.

Bearing in mind that the current very severe restrictions are causing enormous financial damage to the economy and costing the Government (and by implication, you and me) billions of pounds in paying the wages of furloughed staff and providing loans to companies, the question is how to make a rational decision on when to relax the restrictions and by how much. One way to look at this is how much you value a life. If you know what that value is then you can do some calculations to see what the cost might be and whether it is justified to relax the restrictions.

The Government already has that figure. For example, when calculating the benefit of road safety measures a figure of about £2 million is put on the benefit of saving one life. That is a somewhat optimistic figure though because it not just includes the cost of lost economic contribution and the cost of medical treatment but also what people say they would pay to avoid the loss of life, i.e. it’s a subjective figure to a large extent. However, it is a good starting point.

In the case of Covid-19 deaths, many of the cases are of the elderly or those with existing medical conditions who cost the state money rather than contribute. So the loss might be much less than £2 million from a Covid-19 death. Maintaining the existing strict lock-down might actually be causing some deaths from lack of attention to the early symptoms and treatment of some diseases such as cancer.

You can see therefore that it might make some sense to do some calculations on the impact of relaxing the restrictions to enable the majority of people to get back to work even if it means the deaths might increase. I won’t even attempt to do such a calculation but the Government should.

Those people who are particularly vulnerable could of course choose to continue to self-isolate but there is no reason to have a lot of the economy shut down. It would also be wise to have a phased relaxation of the restrictions so that meetings of people in confined spaces are still banned until the picture is clearer.

There would still be some sectors of the economy that will be severely affected. So restaurants other than those providing take-aways would need to remain closed and hotels be very restricted. Even if they opened they might have few customers. Airlines and trains would also suffer and it’s perhaps no surprise that Warren Buffett has sold all his shares in airlines. He had acquired stakes of about 10% in American Airlines, Southwest Airlines and United Airlines in 2016 which rather surprises me as surely he used to say these were typically bad businesses. I would guess he lost a few billion dollars on that punt. It seems most people don’t expect airlines to recover for at least a couple of years and aircraft leasing companies are in major difficulties as are aircraft and engine producers such as Boeing and Rolls-Royce. Nobody will be buying new planes for a while.

But a lot of the economy can surely get back into action over the next few months if the Government makes some sensible decisions which is surely good news for investors – so long as you are selective about the companies you hold.

In conclusion the panic should be over. We are not all going to die from Covid-19 although a few of us might do so. But in comparison with the normal hazards of living it may not be significant. For example, about 6,000 deaths happen each year from accidents in the home which is many times the figure for accidents on our roads but little attention is paid to the former mainly because the cost of preventing them would be very high and they do not attract much public attention. Average UK deaths from common influenza are 17,000 but it can be as high as 30,000 in some years.

The Government just needs to take some rational economic decisions on lifting the restrictions.

Roger Lawson (Twitter: https://twitter.com/RogerWLawson )

You can “follow” this blog by clicking on the bottom right in most browsers or by using the Contact page to send us a message requesting. You will then receive an email alerting you to new posts as they are added.

© Copyright. Disclaimer: Read the About page before relying on any information in this post.