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29th October 1999

Well folks, it's been a while, here's a report from Ali from the recent Proshare seminar -

Hi Everyone, For those of you that don't know - I went to the Proshare seminar in London on Sunday and I can highly recommend it. The pace and fun they injected into the day kept the interest high and there was plenty to learn. I think that from now on that one of us should attempt to attend these in future and then share the information with the group. They are planning more focused workshops for the new year. So here is my summary of what was covered - maybe too much in one go, but here goes.

Undervalued longer term shares recommend by multiple sources were: Whitebread, Barrett Developments, Lloyds TSB, Granada

Actions we as a club need to address;

Allocate areas for each member to research
Decide the date & location for our first meeting.
Finalise our objective and strategy

The morning session included;
A presentation on the benefits of Investment Trusts to hedge the risk in the portfolio. I didn't know what these were - so for the benefit of others here is my understanding. They are companies that can issue share but effectively hold shares in other companies and therefore allow you to spread risk. You may have seen there massive advertising campaign at the moment - their logo is the red blob with 'ITs' in it. Basically there big selling feature is that they are very low cost.

A presentation from a member of Monty Fool.(Motley fool, Al - James). James has already pointed us to there website in the past and I am intending on making it a regular visit from now on.

The were 4 presenters from the stock market. One person who explained that the London Stock Market actually does, another who was independant, a guy from Natwest and someone from Charles Schwab; Justin Urguhart Stewart (he appears regularly on TV). He recommend the following on the basis that they are unfashionable at the moment; -

Whitebread (Advised to monitor them until there results cone out. Share price is depressed due to failed takeover of Allied Dominic. Significantly under valued).
Barrett Developments
Cable and Wireless
Lloyds TSB (They have a history of cutting costs effectively, Not in the take over business).
British Aerospace (Well managed, International, Strong US partnerships - Have some bad press which has pushed down share price - Suggested looking at convertible shares)

The Natwest broker recommend the following (for which I have a one page summary reports on each company):

Barrett Developments
SmithKline Beecham
BT
CGU (James - your thoughts on this one?)
Granada Group
GEC
Lloyds TSB (James - your thoughts on this one?)
Misys
P&O
Thames Water
GlaxoWellcome
Bellway

The handouts also included a stock review.

The Natwest guy gave some good advice in getting the basics established first; What is our objective. What benchmark return are we after? Over how long? Then decide on the investment strategy. He said that M&S were going to take a long time to recoverer and investing in them now might be premature. I have also see a similar assessment in the times and they suggested that Debenhams or Next were a better bet because they share price has been surpressed by M&S. Investor (issue 10) This did a profile on PizzaExpress which is a very interesting. I think that we should research this one as well. Japanese investment are worth considering over a 3 to 5 year timescale. I have picked up loads of freebies, magazines such as; Money Observer, Bloomburg Money, Shares and the newspaper Business Sunday. Also a copy of Techinvest (October issue). Will pass on any interesting information once I have a chance to look at this at the weekend. How shall we best share this information? We should meet up for a Club meeting soon. I know it is going to be difficult for all of us to get together but a majority would be good. (Yvette are you planning to come to the UK in the near future?). A lady I was speaking to also recommend that maybe we should be recording, while we are at work, the following programs; Show me the money (Channel 4) at 1PM Business Lunch (BBC2) 12 PM Hope your all well. Bye for now. Alistair

Bradford Grads Share Club webmaster@bradfordgrads.co.uk