Standard Life Shares

ReportInvestor

Morgan Stanley remains underweight but raises Standard Life target price to 324p

Telegraph says hold

"...Analysts reacted positively to Standard Life's results, but a lack of strategic news sent the shares down. At this level they trade on 12½ times forecast earnings with a prospective yield of 3.6%. Floated at 230p last July, the shares have performed fairly well. Hold says the Telegraph...."

mad

Thanks RI Doc Proc and others. I thought this thread had died.

I have been hanging on, although when the share price went back down to 2.86 had serious wobble and nearly folded. I am in for the long term now although I originally thought I would be out at £3.

it's been a longish thread, who is still in?

epninety

I'm still in... just spotted the dividend news on Reuters and dropped in here to see why no-one had commented. Didn't get the 'new post' email for some reason.

Will hang in for dividend and bonus issue, then probably ride until theres a good reason to jump out, or I need the dosh for something else. I really should find the time to invest in more than one co. though!

foggy27

Does anyone know when the dividends will be paid? I have heard anywhere between May and July.

Also, my mother-in-law holds some shares thanks to her With Profits endowment and then I bought an extra £1000 worth with the purchase option last summer in her name as she couldn't afford to buy them. I presume she will receive one cheque for the dividends based on the total amount of shares held in her name instead of 2 chqs for earned shares and purchased shares?

All mother-in-law jokes welcome.

skid112

We are recommending the payment of our first dividend of 5.4p a share on 31 May
2007, as indicated at flotation, based on a record date of 30 March 2007. This
dividend represents around half of the total dividend that we would have
expected to pay if Standard Life plc had been listed throughout the year. Our
intention is to pay a progressive dividend which will take account of the
long-term earnings and cash flow potential of the Group.


From the press release for the figures

ReportInvestor

Hi mad,

Still in there with 5K shares (1/3 of my original stake). I was regretting not selling another 2K shares at 320p before the big fall to 286p.

But that was before the recent rise and DocProc's observations about director purchases .

The main reason I didn't sell more was because my overall portfolio felt underweight in shares/unit trusts in general & holding Standard was a cheap & easy way of staying in the market.

So I keep checking to see if Standard are OK value vis a vis the rest of the stock market.

ReportInvestor

We've just gone ex-dividend i.e. if you sell the shares now you should still be entitled to the dividend.

Yahoo link

"... Still on the downside, ex-dividend factors had an impact, taking 2.7 points off the FTSE 100 index, with the likes of Scottish & Newcastle (LSE: SCTN.L - news) , Wolseley (LSE: WOS.L - news) , Standard Life (LSE: SL.L - news) , and BSkyB (LSE: BSY.L - news) all hit..."

BUT even though this would ordinarily have knocked the share price back, in fact Standard shares are currently up 4.75p at 314.75p. So it looks a very good day so far in terms of both capital and income .

Additional news:
FT - Standard is a long distance runner
We will be able to assess the company, and Trevor Matthews (the likely future CEO) better when we see can see how effectively they have met their extra £100m cost cutting targets by 2009. Our old friend, arch-bear Roman Cizdyn, is trying to persuade journalists not to get carried away with the recent results.

mad

Thanks RI I think as Doc proc does that the directors think this is a long distance runner. Shares end at 3.16 today and another director buys shares.

Standard Life (LSE: SL.L - news) (SL.) Director name: Mr David Thomas Nish Amount purchased: 16,000 @ 305.68p Value: £48,909

Glad I didn't bottle it at 2.86

full-time-mum

mad wrote: »

Shares end at 3.16 today and another director buys shares.

Right, complete virgin when it comes to shares. I've been looking on the SL site (here) in an attempt to get a feel for how things are but I don't understand the share price page. Would some kind soul take pity on me and explain what it all means?

Date Last Trade: 29/03/2007 Time Last Trade: 17:07
Price: 316.00 Closing Price: 310.00
Change: 6.00 Bid: 315.50
Day High: 316.50 Ask 316.50
Day Low: 308.75 Year High: 320.75
Day Volume: 7,132,761 Year Low: 235.75

Day/Year High/Low and date/time are obvious but what about the rest.

Thanks

ReportInvestor

Closing price = the price at the end of dealings on Wednesday = 310p
Change = +6p on Thursday to 316p
Ask = price to buy = 316.5p
Bid = price to sell = 315.5p
[The difference is so the market makers can make a profit, although it's often less than 1p.]
Volume = the number of shares traded (it can be useful, if you compare with average volume, to see if price movements are being driven by buyers/sellers or by the market makers playing games).