Richard Beddard

Richard is a highly-respected investment writer well-known for his Share Sleuth portfolio, a model portfolio he runs for the investment platform Interactive investor. Richard eats his own cooking – buying good businesses at reasonable prices and holding them for the long-term in his Self Invested Personal Pension.

I’m a long-time ShareScope and SharePad fan and my aim is to help you find better companies faster using the fantastic tools at your disposal. My focus is on finding businesses we can reasonably expect to prosper for many years. As well as analysing data, I work out the strategies companies are following and try to verify that they are working in the real world by quizzing executives, visiting companies, trying their products and observing how they operate.

Elephants can gallop

The latest haul of 5 strikes shares includes Halma and RS, proof perhaps that big companies can gallop, or at least trot. Richard also doffs his cap to Bloomsbury Publishing and works out how profitable Next 15 really is. We’re in a low period for annual report publishing as the large number of companies that

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PETS hits a home run

The standout share from Richard’s latest 5 Strikes haul is Pets at Home, a dominant pet care business in the UK with a strong financial track record. Fifteen companies have passed the Minimum Quality Filter since my last update, but the finances of only three score less than three strikes, according to the 5 strikes

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The devil is in the data

Richard’s 5 Strikes systems discover four more potential long-term investments, but he doesn’t investigate any of them. Instead, he’s drawn to B-Corp aspirant and gaggle of consultancies Next 15. It has only two strikes to tarnish its name. Since the last 5 Strikes update, my 5 Strikes system has discovered four more candidates for long-term

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Adding stardust to SharePad

Bad news: customer service is in decline in the UK. Good news, we can still invest in the companies bucking the trend. Richard sprinkles some stardust on SharePad to reveal companies that are doing the right thing and reaping the rewards. A chance encounter with an article about declining standards of customer service in the

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5 shares and only 4 strikes between them

The latest companies to pass Richard’s 5 strikes system include a direct seller of swag, an estate agent franchise, an engineer that should galvanise investors, a soft drinks company, and a market-leading mortgage intermediary. Since my last update, I have run 16 shares through the 5 Strikes system. Five achieved less than three strikes. This

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Nichols: As sweet as grape, blackberry and raspberry again

If ever there was a company that demonstrated complexity can be bad for business, it’s Nichols. When diversified, profitability crumbles. When it sticks to marketing soft drinks it prospers. Guess what it is doing now?  The one thing you will not read much about in this article is Vimto. Vimto is a soft drink and

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Homing in on quality

Richard tightens up his “Minimum Quality” filter so that SharePad is doing more of the heavy lifting. In a not-very-scientific test, 18 out of 21 good-quality businesses were identified by it. Last month I shared a list of all the companies that passed my semi-automated sifting of the entire stockmarket over the course of the

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Show me the MONY

Richard unearths five good-quality businesses that have recently published annual reports. Top of the list are InterContinental Hotels (IHG), and MoneySupermarket (MONY)… Joyfully, I am away on holiday but my holiday is mistimed in one respect. The post-Christmas lull in annual report publishing has come to an end. A large number of companies with financial

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All the 0’s 1’s and 2’s

For a year now, Richard has been scrutinising companies and awarding them ‘strikes’ for complications that make them tricky to analyse and potentially unpredictable as investments. Now he’s combed the entire market, he reveals all the shares that didn’t strike out. It’s a year since I started the 5 Strikes project, which means I have

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Two companies pass first hurdle

IntegraFin and Shoe Zone are the only companies to achieve less than three strikes as the winter lull in annual reporting intensifies. Richard also takes a closer look at Renew. 5 Strikes Since my last 5 Strikes update, I have only found two shares that achieve less than three strikes. A strike is a complicating

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How much profit did RWS really make?

Richard Beddard goes through the adjustments RWS made to turn a reported £6.9 million loss into an adjusted £123.8 million profit. He thinks there are generalisations we can apply to many adjustments that make it easier to form a view on their profit. Oh my word. Translator RWS’ accounts for the year to September 2023

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Latest fish caught in the net

Richard introduces the latest fish caught in his 5 Strikes net. The seven shares include a giant caterer, a software supplier with a perfect track record, and a travel agent that makes “jollies even jollier”. Post-Christmas, there is a bit of a lull in the annual reporting season. That is because a large number of

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