HBOS share advice needed

player

With Christmas coming up I’m in need to some money, I have a holding of 130 HBOS shares about ~£900 worth. Knowing nothing about shares I don’t want to sell them only to find if I would have waited a week the price would have shot up. So if anyone knows anything about market trends etc when would it be is best for me to sell my shares? Thanks

Here is the current price.
http://uk.finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=HBOS.L&t=1y&c=

sergeant121

HBOS shares vary quite widely. Between August and September this year, for example, they varied between about £6.70 and £7.80.

It's a question of picking your moment and/or deciding upon a price at which you will sell. I decided on such a price some time ago - and, typically, the price has not yet been anywhere near that!

cheerfulcat

Hi, Player,

Here's some technical analysis -

http://uk.finance.yahoo.com/q/tt?s=HBOS.L

If you believe in TA then the price is likely to go a little lower in the short term and a little higher in the medium term; but that's a big if! Since you need the money, I would say sell them and don't worry about it. They are unlikely to double as soon as you sell :-)

HTH

Cheerfulcat

deemy2004

Lower !

Higher more like it  ;D

Seriously, if you need the money now then sell now, as for a holding of £900 a few weeks is not going to make much difference.

My personal take is that the market is well into a rally that will take the FTSE towards 5000 by the end of this year, may not get to 5000 but pretty close. This should uplift most stocks between 5-10% even a reatively 'weak' stock such as HBOS - should be significantly higher by end of year than where it is now.

But you need it for Christmas !! Okay sell it at the end of Nov 04 !

player

Thank you all for the advice, I'll be phoning up in the next couple of days when I have some free time.

I was so lucky with these shares, I was <18 at the time they floated but thankfully the account was in my parents name and not mine so I got the shares and not a free file-o-fax 8)

thor

I've been following HBOS shares ever since they demutualised. It must be 10 years now but they go down and up all the time. It is almost purely sentiment based. Even after good or bad figures which may affect the share price for a week or two but invariably the price ends up between £6.5 and £7.5. I've toyed with the idea of selling at the higher and then buying at the lower prices because I am extremely confident that the pattern will be repeated and I can make around a pound a share every few months. Unfortunately, only having about 200 share, the fees would eat up a fair bit of my gains(I'd probably become impatient and buy back well before the pound profit) so I've never actually gone for it. Also knowing my luck, the shares wouldl probably shoot through the roof after I'd flogged them.
They were down around the £4/£5 mark few years ago and almost hit the £9 barrier a few years before that but never hung around those levels for long.
The divis are reasonable however especially at these times of low interest savings accounts so I'll probably hold them a bit longer.

deemy2004

Their earning per shares consistently rises year on year, thus if the price is not rising that means the shares are becoming cheaper. Their last reported earnings equates to a P/E of 11.5 .

Add in a the 5%+ dividend and they are a good long-term hold. Though not a stock for trading in and out of .

If the market goes up then they should be in the upper 50% of rising stocks, if the market goes down then they should be in the lower 50% of declining stocks.

Your not going to get rich with hbos but as long as the market does not collapse again, should do 'OKAY'

player

How will the interest rates rises in the USA affect the share price?

deemy2004

How rate rises effect Wall Street, it is that which effects the UK market.

Basically Wallstreet is expecting rates to continue rising towards to about 2.75%. The big variable is whether they get their quickly or slowly.

A slow rise to 2.75% would be better for stocks than a quick rise, as a quick rise say be Feb or March 05, implies rates have much further to go, a slow rise implies that rates are near their peak.

So slow rise = good for stocks generally
Quick rise = bad for stocks generally