Pre 8 a.m. comments

It's Budget day today, so hopefully we might see some measures to stimulate small cap investing. The removal of Stamp Duty on AIM shares (or indeed all shares) would be a positive measure, and removal of the restriction from putting AIM shares in ISAs could also be in the pipeline. I won't be doing any in-depth coverage of the Budget here, since you can get chapter & verse on it easily elsewhere.

Cyprus also continues to be a major worry, since their Government has rejected the appalling bail-out deal which involved direct theft of depositor bank balances by the Government, a measure which is precisely the opposite of what is needed when investors have fragile confidence in the banking system generally, to loosely quote Alastair Darling - who I have a lot of time for, since he usually talks sense, and very unusually for a politician, is generally fairly truthful and direct in what he says, in my opinion. Incidentally, Darling's memoirs of the financial crisis, "Back from the Brink", is a must-read for people interested in finance.

I remain long of Gold, and am surprised it has not risen more, given that the irreversible Euro project may be about to lose its first member. How much longer then, will it be before the populace of Greece and Spain demand a Euro exit too? You can't keep enforcing austerity and 6% p.a. (compounded) GDP contraction on people, as has been the case with Greece. Eventually they snap, and a revolution of some kind occurs, which I believe is the most likely outcome for Greece, and maybe Spain.

 

Turning to company results, Inland Homes (LON:INL) announces half yearly results to 31 Dec 2012. Inland has a very poor track record in my view, originally raising and investing money at the top of the market just before the credit crunch, almost going bust, then failing to generate much shareholder value since, whilst Directors have lined their own pockets with salaries that are completely disconnected with their poor performance. The FD in particular is (inexplicably) paid more than most AIM CEOs.

That said, figures today look encouraging, with net asset value having risen a bit to 28.24p per share, and there is also over 5p (post tax) off balance sheet net asset value relating to one project at…

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