Investing update....

It's a slack day on the work front today, and so here's a bit of an update on the investment 'strategy'.

Following on from my post in February, it's been a decent enough ride for the shares and funds that I held onto after my selling spree at the turn of the year.

As I write, I'm still sitting on around 60% cash in both the ISA and the SIPP pots, having resisted the temptation to jump back in at valuation levels I thought to be too high.  

The steady rise that marked the first half of the year wasn't one with too many opportunities for me, since the games I tend to play depend on much more market volatility.  OK, so I may have lost something to inflation by not being fully invested, but I'm more comfortable with that than simply taking hopeful punts in a rising market, and all the while I'm keeping my powder dry for any chances that come along in the future.  


Tracking the shares that I sold at the beginning of the year, half have continued higher afterwards and so I've basically lost out (...the perils of setting tight stops...), but the other half are still trading at below the price at which I sold, so overall it's honours even on that score.  For example, I sold Lloyds TSB (LLOY.L) at a loss for 50p, which turned out to be a bit of a bummer, but I also offloaded African Barrick Gold (ABG.L) at around £4.00. 

I'm still watching some of the other risers with a view to maybe getting back in at a future date, but only when the price is right. 

However, the market pullback towards the end of June was enough to get me buying a couple of stocks again, and with hindsight I can see I was lucky enough to almost hit the bottom of that particular trough.   If they'd have continued to slide, I would have probably bought more of the same a few weeks later - talk about trying to catch a falling knife !   

Luckily though, the subsequent rapid market recovery in July has meant that I'm now sitting on guaranteed decent profits from both stocks I bought then.   

I'm moving up my stops behind the rises on these two, every couple of days.  Even if I was stopped-out today, it would represent around 2% in total portfolio gains, not bad for just a couple of months in the market with these two stocks.

Still a few specks of red around in the portfolio spreadsheets, though.  These must have snagged on the bottom since they didn't rise with the tide, but I'm hanging on to them for now and hoping for the best - it's not as if I can currently see any opportunities in which this cash could be better utilised. 


Note that I'm not a financial adviser - do your own research....