Is the Time to Invest in Banks approaching?

***xyz***

I was in 2 'schemes' - at the end of the term, one was available to buy at 5 pound something - so I cashed the money in for these.

The other one was the 4.44 ones and at the time IIRC the share price was well above this so 'bought' them.

I am a complete shares novice, so I don't really know what I was doing.

Still dont, but will hang on to them and see what occurs!

I also have some Standard Life ones from something or other.

sabretoothtigger

XLF is or has approached a possible turnaround point apparently




http://finance.yahoo.com/q?s=XLF

sabretoothtigger

Qatar Holdings, an arm of Qatar Investment Authority, the sovereign wealth fund, said on Wednesday it had reduced its holding from 6.4pc to 5.8pc in Barclays after selling 35m shares in the bank last Friday, when its shares closed at 227p.
The sale crystalises a loss for Qatar, which bought Barclays' shares at 282p last June as part of the bank's £4.5bn fund raising.







Qatar also took part in Barclays' £7bn fund raising in November, agreeing to take mandatorily convertible notes in the bank. When the notes convert into ordinary shares in Barclays in June, Qatar will own 7pc of the bank.
Barclays also raised money from the Abu Dhabi royal family. They own about 1.7pc of the bank and the stake will rise to 3pc in June.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/banksandfinance/5207212/Barclays-to-increase-UK-lending-by-11bn.html

Hatone

Some good news for Barclays biggest shareholders I guess - they were against the idea of Middle East investors in the first place which caused an outrage last year.

But I've heard some of the richest Qataris are cutting back on their investments, having lost so much money over the past year.

StevieJ

Hatone wrote: »

Some good news for Barclays biggest shareholders I guess - they were against the idea of Middle East investors in the first place which caused an outrage last year.

But I've heard some of the richest Qataris are cutting back on their investments, having lost so much money over the past year.

They were not against them, they were against them getting a preferential deal, doesn't seem to be impacting the share price, up to £2.27p.

sabretoothtigger

• Overview
• Regulatory News
• ShareCast

FTSE 100 movers: Banks boosted by HSBC upgrade

Date: Wednesday 29 Apr 2009

LONDON (ShareCast) - HSBC gave a boost to the UK banks sector with a forecast of further recovery for the three of the big four.

"With the threat of recapitalisation and associated dilution removed, we believe shareholders can give greater credence to book values. We would expect valuations to recover to 1x net tangible assets (NTA) over the coming months," HSBC said.

The bank has upgraded sector peer Barclays from ‘neutral’ to ‘overweight’ and upped its price target from 110p to 300p. It also has ‘overweight’ recommendations for Royal Bank of Scotland and Lloyds Banking.

With regard to the latter, HSBC notes that Lloyds shareholders currently have an entitlement to subscribe for 0.63 new ordinary shares at 38.4p. Based on Lloyds' current share price, this entitlement is worth 24p per share, HSBC calculates.

The price target for Royal Bank of Scotland has been lifted from 35p to 50p, while the target price for Lloyds has been upped to 150p from 40p.

Barclays continuing to approach its 282p rights issue price of last summer

FTSE 100 - Risers
Royal Bank of Scotland Group (RBS) 37.20p +13.76%
Amlin (AML) 381.75p +7.46%
Barclays (BARC) 248.00p +6.78%
Lloyds Banking Group (LLOY) 101.90p +6.59%
Aviva (AV.) 291.50p +5.90%
Anglo American (AAL) 1,418.00p +5.66%
Standard Chartered (STAN) 974.00p +4.79%
Old Mutual (OML) 62.70p +4.50%

FTSE 100 - Fallers
Liberty International (LII) 397.50p -6.58%
Home Retail Group (HOME) 258.25p -4.35%
Tesco (TSCO) 340.10p -2.24%

Tesco is a bank, they bought out RBS on the good stuff. seems ironic :laugh:

StevieJ

Barclays still going along nicely - £2.80

ricll

I've made 30% with Barclays in the last couple of weeks, good profit with Lloyds too, I just regret having sold my RBS shares too early.

sabretoothtigger

The US scrapping Mark to market and wide spreads have changed perceptions, who would have thought Barclay would rise in price from last summer.

The market overall might have steam left in it 4200 is 400 below Jan but Barclays has to be near the top range surely, I said this when they were about half the price though :laugh: The SP500 is back to Jan value levels

I'm still inclined to take a dividend of my own early, will they really yield enough in August to justify this price

mrposhman

ricll wrote: »

I've made 30% with Barclays in the last couple of weeks, good profit with Lloyds too, I just regret having sold my RBS shares too early.

I've been quite lucky with timing on the banks, most notably on Barclays where I bought in 3 stints, one is now worth 400% of my investment, the others are woth nearly 300% so going well. I'm not sure when to sell, they smashed through my first price target of £1.80, then they smashed through my 2nd of £2.50 but still rising so I will continue to hold.

Lloyds, I'm up now (after being down for such a long time), bought in 4 stints and now up on all but 1 of them which actually was my first purchase of shares!!

Very happy with this performance now.

Anyway, money saving expert tip for you all. When those on this board are saying don't buy then buy. I did that on Barclays and Lloyds when Barclays were less than 65p and Lloyds less than 50p when everyone was saying "don't buy, too risky". Full nationalisation was never going to happen imo and therefore I'm smiling now.