it's elders time, page-14

I do think there is a bit of sabotage going on here. I noticed on two occasions that the ratings for my posts decreased which means that somebody posted a negative rating for my post. While I hope I am not too egotistical, I wonder why posters would do that. If I was getting figures wrong or talking rubbish you could understand readers scoring my posts negatively but surely it is clear that I am reasonably knowledgeable about investing and have put a fair amount of work into this exercise. I have been a full time investor for the last 16 years and I bought my first shares around 48 years ago. You are supposed to score a post negatively if you think it is of low quality not just if you disagree with the approach. Why are readers out there trying to destroy this attempt at getting some support for the shares? You have comments like “your whole thesis hinges on ….” and “it’s a dog of a company” and “comparing book value to the EV of the company is folly”. Neither of the two posters who made those comments are shareholders. By all means put a case, if you think the company has further to fall but why try to ruin an attempt to get some support for the stock by putting down the messenger?

The other thing I found interesting was the transactions at 25.5c each today. The shares closed at 25.5c making it look like a losing day. Yet only 13,026 shares traded at that price compared to a turnover of 3.3 million shares at 26c or more. Ignoring the close, during the days trading, there were 15 separate trades at 25.5 cents costing a total of $449.82 ignoring brokerage. So the total shares traded at that price ignoring the close did not even make up one marketable parcel. At the close 11,212 shares went through at 25.5 cents and right up until seconds before the close the final trade was set to be 26 cents. It appeared to me that someone manipulated the trade volumes in the final seconds to make it close at the lower price. There does seem to be a hell of a lot of this sort of thing going on these days on the ASX and all I can think that it is designed to achieve is an increase in the negativity surrounding a stock such as this one. Maybe those behind it are short sellers.

Today’s turnover was the second highest for Elders in a fortnight. We know there has been at least one large seller out there in Mathews Capital. When he runs out or changes direction of his trades, that will be the day to celebrate. In recent times this stock has been losing around a cent in price every three days, no doubt helped by the sort of practices mentioned above. It is well and truly time for a change at Elders after four years of dismal collapse in the share price and it is my hope that a few positive comments combined with good timing can produce a turnaround right now.

GPASAS