those that attended meeting , page-19

Meercat, I'm one of the long term faithful on ARU and I'm not selling a single share/option just yet - they're tucked away till who knows when. But I support your right to have a different strategy to me. I have some trader friends who are trying to make a quid getting in and out of stocks and some are doing very well. I'm no good at it and have decided to stick with long term investing and I think I'll probably do better in the long run than traders (but that could just be arrogance - we shall see). Your short term predictions make more sense to me than those who are overly optimistic, but I still think I'll do better by not selling. You have a right to your posts and at the risk of losing friends on this thread, I'll say that I think you have been treated poorly here. There are many other small share holders who might be considering a short term play around the demerger and the long termers would prefer it if they didn't, but the long termers seem to be getting a bit up them selves and think that only those who share their view have a right to public speech. If you predict that the share price will fall, and you think that selling is the best way to make a profit from this situation, then you have a right to say so - and if that contributes to the share price falling in the short term, so be it. It's a free world (sort of).

The thing that puzzles me is why you do share your opinions. If I was using a short term sell strategy, the last thing I would want was to convince everyone else to do it too – they might get in first and push the price down. Surely you want the sp to go up as much as possible to maximise your sell price. Unless or course, you have already sold…..

Now I don’t know you at all, so what I’m about to say may or may not be a reflection on you, but I will put forward a thought as to what your motives might be. The only way your posts makes sense to me is if you've already sold and now want to replace your holdings at a lower price, and so are trying to talk others into bailing out? If so - that's more manipulative than the long termers who are talking the sp up. When the long termers ramp the share they believe what they are saying – the long term story is very compelling. We all believe that anyone who buys now and holds for the long term will do very well – no one is getting ripped off. When the short termers down-ramp they also believe what they are saying – there is good reason to think that ARU will take a dive post-demerger because of all the short termers (the short termers who predict it are collectively creating a self fulfilling prophecy). But when you post the down-ramping opinions, the motivation smells a bit – you are not posting to help others find a win, you are trying to manipulate the share price down so that others will sell to you too cheaply – if you do influence the market and talk the price down and there’s a mass exodus, then many small time holders are going to sell way too cheaply – you will buy and you will have (imo) ripped them off. The trading world has a dog-eat-dog mentality about it (or is it meercat eat less experienced trader).

Of course, another possibility is that you have warm and fuzzy feelings towards your fellow traders and want to help them by telling them when to sell, but I think you wouldn’t make much profit as a trader if you did that.

A third possibility is that you are similar to those long-termers who are getting so annoyed with you – you dislike them because they think differently from yourself and you wish they’d go away – so you post here just to stir them up. Ramping, down ramping – it’s all the same really just one person trying to tell others where the price is going – everyone does it for their own reasons and it’s all crap.

I’m glad we had this little chat – it’s made things a bit clearer to me.
Ramping a stock that is fundamentally bad is manipulative and ethically repulsive, so is down-ramping a stock that is fundamentally good. It’s all designed to persuade others to buy something you don’t want at too high a price or to sell something you want at too low a price – it’s all based around making a profit from someone else’s loss. Long term investors are not guilty of the same thing. We are all getting richer together and enjoying the ride.

It seems like I’ve wandered into the investor/trader war myself when I started out trying not to take sides.

The last explanation is that you are not trying to manipulate anyone. You just see the long termers talking the stock up, you think it’s crap and you want to tell them so. If this is the case, then keep posting, but if you’ve already sold and intend to buy back in, then you are sprouting more crap than they are and the motivation is much more insidious.

I hope you haven’t sold. It’s rare and good to see someone who can stand up to a crowd.