Woodford Concerns

dividendhero wrote: »

Hopefully will be better than this feeble statement from HL today..

https://www.hl.co.uk/news/articles/woodford-our-view

Why we removed Woodford from the Wealth 50

We don't make any investment decisions, or changes to the Wealth 50, lightly. Time, consideration and thought goes into every investment decision we make. It's what we spend our waking hours doing, and we do it because we also want to help our clients make good long-term investment decisions.

Dear me. They didn't remove the fund from their buy list until after it became physically impossible to buy it!

Malthusian wrote: »

That's as good as the case against HL gets. In fact if I was an ambulance chaser in the US, where class action suits are possible, I might be licking my lips. But you say this was from an archive. What did it say after the allocation to unlisted cold fusion companies got ramped up?

The archive is from September 2018, not that long ago and well after he went balls-deep into Industrial Heat.

Malthusian wrote: »

Rather doubt it as OEICs are allowed by legislation to have 10% overdrafts to make day-to-day buying and selling easier (see the FCA handbook) - it's not the same as gearing, which generally refers to borrow money to invest long-term.

The handbook explicitly states that borrowing must be a short term measure - typically for less than three months, and only for the purposes you describe, rather than as part of a gearing approach or investment strategy. But WEIF had a maxed out overdraft for over two years, not to meet short term liquidity issues but as part of a long term strategy.

Malthusian wrote: »

A list of 50 funds is not a recommendation. If you choose one fund out of that 50 and bash all the wine gums on it that's your problem .

HL's own page on the Wealth 150 makes it clear that it is a recommendation, specifically designed to guide investors as to which funds to invest in - "The Wealth 150 was launched in 2003 with the simple aim of helping investors to pick good quality funds for their ISA, SIPP and investment portfolio.
I got out in 2017 so it's not "my problem", but plenty of vulnerable investors who didn't follow the dodgy antics closely and instead relied on HL/SJP to act in their best interests have been totally screwed.

Johnnyboy11 wrote: »

Do you have a link for it, I remember watching it, but can't seem to find it?

He asks Woodford specifically whether the unquoted companies make the fund more risky, and whether he worries about the liquidity of that part of the portfolio:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aubNwZtmfdk

jamei305 wrote: »

He asks Woodford specifically whether the unquoted companies make the fund more risky, and whether he worries about the liquidity of that part of the portfolio:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aubNwZtmfdk

Thanks, but I recall another HL video specifically justifying Woodford's fund passing the cut into the Wealth 50.

The "cold fusion" company, Industrial Heat that Woodford invested in has a rather colourful founder

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrea_Rossi_(entrepreneur)

What on earth was he thinking of? :eek: