Good morning! Thank you for the late surge in donations for my spring charity fundraising, which is a dual purpose one this year - I ran the Brighton Half Marathon yesterday, but am also abstaining completely from alcohol for 3 months. So far so good on both fronts! We were incredibly lucky with the weather, and to everyone's amazement, after being battered by storms for what seems like an eternity now, Sunday was a glorious sunny day here in Brighton (and hopefully was where you are too).

I sauntered along for about 6 miles, but then the remaining 7 miles was a bit of a nightmare. I'd not done anywhere near enough training, and it really showed. So whilst I improved on last year's slow time of 2:23, by doing 2:15 this year, it was a backward step from the 2:09 I managed in last autumn's London Parks run. So the target for the next one is sub-2 hours. Thanks again for your generous donations to MacMillan Cancer Care, and the Sussex Beacon, and donations can still be made here, if you wish.

 

 

 

DQ Entertainment (LON:DQE)

A couple of friends have told me this one is cheap, although most friends won't touch it with a bargepole (same with me), as it's Indian and displays the classic signs of having questionable reported profits. The main classic sign is very simple - excessive Debtors. The Balance Sheet nearly always shows where the bodies are buried, and it amazes me that so few investors properly scrutinise them for warning signs.

Profit can be manipulated to report pretty much whatever you like, but the evidence of manipulation will stick out like a sore thumb on the Balance Sheet, with usually quite obviously inflated Debits (i.e. Debtors, Stock, Intangible Assets, but not Cash! [because cash is so difficult to fake]).

DQE is an Indian animation company, which looks amazingly cheap on a PER basis, but has the classic problem of enormous Debtors. Think about it logically. If you invoice your customer, and they still haven't paid a year later, then something is wrong. Either the product/service hasn't been provided at all (i.e. a totally fictitious sale), or perhaps the amount charged is being disputed by the customer (i.e. the invoice has been inflated beyond what the customer regards as…

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