Bruce Packard

Financial Analyst, former management consultant, equity research analyst Bruce Packard started his career at Credit Suisse followed by various banks and stockbroking firms before quitting The City to work in financial PR, Litigation finance and finally financial education. In 2008 he predicted the nationalisation of the UK banking industry.

I’m a self-invested, low frequency, buy and hold investor focused on quality. As well as writing for ShareScope I like to capture my financial analysis and non-conformist thoughts on my own blog brucepackard.comI also used to own a craft beer bar in Berlin and for fun play beach volleyball (unlikely to turn professional though). 

Weekly Commentary 14/06/21: Innovation vs disruption

The FTSE remains range bound, up less than +1% to 7,125 last week, still below its 2021 high of 7,130 reached in early May. The S&P500 was flat at 4,239 and Nasdaq was up +1.4% to 13,960. Though companies are talking about input cost inflation, most commodities are also off their recent highs, with the

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Weekly Commentary 07/06/21: Expectations Gap

Last week Brent crude was up +4% to $71 per barrel which helped BP +6% and Shell +4% lead the FTSE 100. Since the 7th May high the index has kept a narrow range between 7,130 and 6,950, currently 7,060. In the US, car companies like GM were up +7% (or +52% since 1st Jan)

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A year of two halves?

The FTSE 100 is up +10% since the start of the year, currently at 7,120. The best performing stock in the FTSE 100 in H1 was Royal Mail +72%, followed by Entain +61% and Ashtead +57%. The worst was Fresnillo -29%, the Mexican-based silver miner. This was followed by food retailers: Tesco -24%, Just Eat

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Weekly Commentary 31/05/21: Operating leverage

The FTSE was quiet remaining just above 7,000 through the week. Looking at the five best performing stocks since the start of the year (Ashstead +53%, Entain +47%, Evraz +38%, Glencore +38%, Lloyds +37%) and the worst five (Tesco -24%, Just Eat -23%, Fresnillo -19%, London Stock Exchange -18%, Ocado -16%) it’s hard to discern

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Weekly Commentary 24/05/21: China Prices

This week I look at Cerillion, the telco billing Group; Sanderson Design Group, the wallpaper and interior design company (previously known as Walker Greenbank); SigmaRoc, which is acquiring concrete quarries, and Games Workshop which needs no introduction to most readers.

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Graph showing company growth

Weekly Commentary 17/05/21: Aaaaaaaaaaaark

Markets sold off last week, with the FTSE 100 down -2.3%, S&P 500 -2.8% and Nasdaq 100 -4.5%. The best performing index was Brazil’s Bovespa, which was still up less than 1%. Despite the sell-off being attributed to inflation, the UK 10Y bond yield at 0.86% and US 10Y bond yield at 1.64% remained steady.

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Football field

Weekly Commentary 10/05/21: The Beautiful Game

It’s good to have management with experience of boom and bust cycles, so Bruce looks at two companies run by Chairmen over 80 years old. With the FA Cup and Champions League Final later this month he starts with some football stories from his time at Seymour Pierce.

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Weekly Commentary 03/05/21 Paradigm shift

Bruce looks at tech stocks reporting Q1 results in the US, Google vs Facebook, and the resurgence of Microsoft. Plus a mix of UK companies reporting this week, including Tristel, Water Intelligence, HeiQ and Sylvania.

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Charts

Weekly Commentary 12/04/21: Equity. James Equity.

We are most of the way through result season for companies with December year ends. Bruce discusses how companies with patchy track records can border on evasive in their RNS disclosure, without quite crossing the line to unacceptable. Often the share price reactions suggests that investors aren’t fooled though.

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