I've decided to turn things around this month and to start with my summary first. That way no one has to wade through all of my RNS thoughts to get to the meat of the matter - did I actually make any money this month? Fortunately, after a miserable summer, most of my holdings have recovered their equilibrium somewhat despite our elected representatives reaching new heights (lows?) of division, diversion and destruction.
Anyway the clear winner this month was Craneware, as it recovered strongly from its profit warning in June, and I can honestly say that I was oblivious to this turnaround. I don't think that I was the only one. Since the big push up on Sep 10/11 (on high volume) I can find almost no discussion of CRW anywhere. It's right under the radar. The only thing that jumps out at me is that the total disclosed short position started falling at that time. And if that's the catalyst then we've got a way to go. Elsewhere NewRiver Retail has been bouncing back now that Neil Woodford has (finally) sold out all of his massive position while Burford Capital has reached a support level. It's still a long way from the peak but there's no doubt that recent presentations from management have largely reassured investors and we haven't heard much out of Muddy Waters recently.
On the downside the biggest losers turned out to be Learning Technologies and Keywords Studios. This isn't particularly surprising as they're both highly rated growth stocks and yet each of them put out reasonable but not outstanding interim results. I can see why investors have decided to play safe and yet both are growing strongly through a combination of acquisition and organic expansion. If this continues then I expect the current price (for KWS at least) to look like something of a bargain.
Winning positions for the month: CRW 40%, NRR 19%, BUR 18%, RWA 8%, GAW 8%, GAMA 7%, III 6%, DOTD 6%, BOWL 5%, IGR 4%, WJG 4%, KETL 4%, K3C 3%, HAT 3%, PPH 2%, PCA 1%
Losing positions for the month: SDI -1%, FDM -2%, SBIZ -3%, ADT -3%, SCT -4%, LTG -8%, KWS -28%
So a pretty good month overall despite a doubling in the cash level of my portfolio to not much under 15%. I seem to be swimming against the tide here but…
