While the market went up a bit over the last year, and no doubt...

While the market went up a bit over the last year, and no doubt some shares roared ahead 50-100 percent, TGA came in at a credible 40% SP increase for me, which is hardly “nowhere”.. I bought 80,000 TGAs for $114,655 (average $1.433) a year ago (between 1/5/2012 and 26/6/2012). Actually, I bought them for their dividend-cum-franking-credits stream, which is currently 14.29¢ (10¢ ÷ .7 = 14.29¢) – a yield of 9.97% on my buy-in price, which is good enough for me.

As we run towards 30 June, investors do crazy things for taxation reasons, and instos in particular. There was a dip last year on 22/06/2012 when the SP closed at $1.410. The SP had dropped a few cents to $1.480 on the ex-dividend date of 08/06/2012. By 31/07/2012 the closing SP was $1.595. What this all means I cannot say for sure, because predicting SPs and timing the market is not my forte, but being an arrogant swine, I'll hazard a tentative opinion. If you are a long-term income-seeking investor who is not loaded up with TGA, then buy between now and late June. You could wait for the interim report to be published on 25 May if you are afraid of Black Swans.

On the matter of TGA always seeming to be underpriced relative to its metrics compared to other stocks, this has amazed me for years – long enough for me to have abandoned the notion of things changing positively to give the SP a fillip over and above what a rising EPS and DPS does. This is more a positive than a negative, other things being considered. I feel more comfortable buying TGA at a PER of about 10 than buying IVC at about 28, or WOW at about 19.

What is sauce for the goose is not good for the ice cream, and so is the case with the different categories of shareholders – their objectives, time frames, aptitudes, funds, risk appetites, time spent on stock-market matters, knowledge and their source of kicks, are different. I write from my perspective – I seek long-term upward trending dividends and franking credits, but I have a fairly high appetite for risk, so I'll take a punt or two on the basis of more upside expected than down side. As for getting punts wrong - on the bright side, it's character building.