Fortune telling. #financefriday

To make money on the stock market you do need to be a bit of a fortune teller. Yesterday afternoon, Standard Chartered’s share price shot up but it was on a rumour and quickly fell back again and lost the rest of that high this morning. I am still optimistic about that stock doing well as China and Hong Kong get back to normal, however.

Analysts

BAE Systems is another stock I’m watching closely. It seems promising with a war in Europe still raging. I usually avoid defence stocks but BAE seems like a good investment just now. I have added BAE to my small portfolio and another recent addition, Associated British Foods seems to be doing quite well. 67% of analysts say buy BAE and 30% say buy ABF, none say sell ABF. The analysts say to hold Lloyds Banking group but I’m more optimistic, Lloyds is up 13% over the last six months and is up 4% over the past week. I think it will go up by at least 50% in the next year.

China

Covid is still a big problem in China but young people are recovering quickly and the economy will soon get back to normal. Stocks that are focused on Asia like Standard Chartered are worth watching.

Property market

Don’t be too surprised if the property market doesn’t rebound in the UK; then we will see share prices of builders like Taylor Wimpey rebound too. The analysts are still favouring the oil majors but both Shell and BP are only marginally up over the past month. Every drop in oil prices negatively affects both companies.

Gold

Small investors have dabbled in crypto but they are selling now due to the cost of living crisis. I’m not sure why gold is doing well, up 3.87% this month and up over $200 an ounce since November. Central banks are buying more but I suspect that demand has increased in Asia too.

I’m not a fortune teller but these are my ideas for investments today. The brakes have been on the London market and there is a willingness to get back to business as usual. The Prime Minister isn’t inspiring confidence but at least his speech this week didn’t crash the market again!

Advertisement