Intercede Share Discussion Threads

[accumulat0r] 01/8/2008 14:45

I find having an account with TDW (that do T20 settlement) is handy for those situations when you're waiting for funds to come through. Saves having to wait ....

[howdy do da] 01/8/2008 14:41

Transferring money by TT into the trading account. May hit today, certainly soon.

Re the 5K sells and 50K buys, the price is too similar. The MM's seem to be fixing a floor at 24/25p so the chances are he is buying for more than he is selling. Doesn't make sense. Unless he is trying to unsettle others to start some selling momentum but the positive RNS and Director buying has created a few other buys so it just doesn't make sense.

The only positive thing is that it is creating a little liquidity.

[igoe104] 01/8/2008 14:35

Ive been in that situation before howdy, where ive been waiting for cash to arrive in my trading account, i can,t understand why it takes a few days to arrive. if you have a bet on-line you can transfer funds into your account with-in seconds if you want, why can,t you do that with share accounts ?

[accumulat0r] 01/8/2008 14:34

Looking at Thales' list of alliances:



I don't see anyone on their list that's got an identity management system that can compete with Intercedes'.

[igoe104] 01/8/2008 14:27

This could be bad news for mr 5k plans, ive got the feeling it the same guy who purchased the 50k and the 40k buys over the last couple of weeks, and hes dripping them back onto the market bit by bit to bring the price down.

[howdy do da] 01/8/2008 14:24

true, come on cash hit my trading account!!! 26p on the offer is a bloody bargain.

[igoe104] 01/8/2008 14:21

They got to be more than odds on with a secure project which involves a data-base.

ps igp never get mentioned when partners win contracts anyway, im sure they will but an order to use igp software, igp have mentioned the uk id project in pervious up-dates over the last couple of years anyway.

[howdy do da] 01/8/2008 14:13

igoe, but can you be sure IGP will do the software? I know IGP have a deal with Thales but there was no mention of Intercede in the article.

Nice piece though. Thanks.

[wjccghcc] 01/8/2008 14:12

Excellent news. Odds on that IGP is part of the Thales team.

Thales Wins First Contract on U.K.'s ID Cards System (Update1)

By Kitty Donaldson and Robert Hutton

Aug. 1 (Bloomberg) -- Thales SA won the first contract to establish a national identity card program in the U.K., which may eventually be worth 5.4 billion pounds ($10.8 billion).

The French defense and electronics company has a four-year contract worth 18 million pounds to design, build and test a system to issue the cards, along with a computerized national identity register aimed at preventing fraud, a spokesman for the U.K. Identity and Passport Service said by telephone.

[igoe104] 01/8/2008 14:04

Looks like we are going to be involved in the uk id card project.

[igoe104] 01/8/2008 14:01

YEP mr 5k is back, at least we know hes losing money selling at this price, so if he thinks hes having a laugh at our expense, hes not.

Im not selling any shares until im making a massive profit, i don,t need the money, so i can wait forever and add along the way.

[howdy do da] 01/8/2008 10:39

Personally I hope we see the offer ease a little, I am hoping for some cash to hit my trading account so I can pick up another 75,000 of these today, or certainly by Tuesday.

[jailbird] 01/8/2008 09:06

there is a mr 10k this morning..however MM offered less than the bid.

No drop in price..yet!

do we another order in or maybe part of an order was only filled yeterday.

Boring day as being a Friday..may as well enjoy the sunshine.

[howdy do da] 31/7/2008 22:38

A whole day without Mr 5000. Hopefully he has sold out fully and we can look forward to more gains like today.

[howdy do da] 31/7/2008 14:19

No sells at all today. Long may it continue.

[igoe104] 31/7/2008 14:13

ITS probably someone building a position in the company, i wouldn,t mind betting its the same person who got over 50,000 shares the other week.

[jailbird] 31/7/2008 11:11

nice post boedicea.

Someone here just bought 40k at mid.?

or do we have a new investor

[boadicea] 30/7/2008 11:37

APHRO/HDD/j-b,
I think between you, you have just about summed up the position regarding the share price

A few other observations which may affect the casual share-searcher.
One is the negative equity position. This makes the share looks distinctly unappealing to anyone doing a quick search for 'value'. We are therefore left with those looking for a speculative investment.

The underlying reason for the negative figure is that no value is attributed to 'intangibles' - i.e. various ip rights, potentially valuable R&D etc. This results in a very transparent (naked?) appearance to the bs. However, it does have the advantage that investors are not seriously exposed to the risks of large headline-grabbing (but non-cash) write-offs.

In the absence of a substantial investor for a chunk of the company, someone wishing (for any reason, and there are plenty of possible ones atm) to liquidate a sizeable block has no option but to drip feed at the rate the market (i.e. a few pi's) will take them up and that is not very fast!

Is there a cure for this situation?
The obvious route of a take-over now would be a pity as the price realised would likely fail to reflect true value.
A publicised valuation of the ip would be nice, but is open to such a wide range, depending on the interpretation of market prospects, that no-one is likely to risk their reputation in attempting to produce one.

Either, therefore, we are left waiting for a change in the market's appetite for risk, (it will come, but who knows when?)
OR ...
for one of the partners to find themselves in an advanced (but possibly undisclosed) state of needing a substantial licence/access to their expertise and deciding that it would pay to own the company outright.

Just a few ramblings. I am content to wait, possibly add, using capital that I don't expect to need tomorrow ... or the next day.

[howdy do da] 30/7/2008 10:45

very interesting.

[jailbird] 30/7/2008 10:28

here's a good article..but not IGP specific

From today's telegraph, nothing particularly ground breaking and i'm not quite convionced either is applicable in the case of mercator but a decent read anyway, shows that we're certainly not the only ones in trouble.

Making sense of dramatic movements in volatile stock markets
By James Clunie
Last Updated: 6:24am BST 30/07/2008


Why is it that the prices of some UK shares move 10pc or more on days on which no company specific news is released? If, like me, you've been watching the stock market recently, this question has probably crossed your mind more than once.

Our collective understanding of how shares should get priced in a "perfect" world struggles to explain such moves.

Fortunately, help is at hand. In recent years, stock market researchers have identified a series of activities that can move share prices temporarily and dramatically away from fair value, possibly explaining some of the violent moves we have seen recently. Two of the more interesting phenomena are known as "predatory trading" and "crowded exits".

Consider, first, "predatory trading" - a practice explained in lurid, theoretical detail in some recent academic papers. A "predator" learns about the trading position of some other market participant and begins to trade against him.

If the predator is strong enough, he can move the market price of the stock away from fair value. This imposes losses on the other party, and as the losses build, the victim struggles to hold on to his stock position. Eventually, the victim capitulates and closes out his position at a loss, and at around the same time, the predator closes out his own position at a profit. The share price eventually recovers to its fair value.

Who might fall victim to predatory trading? Victims could include anyone with a position that they might be unable to maintain as losses mount. This could include an investor in financial distress, a hedge fund unable to meet a margin call, or an open-ended fund having to sell shares to meet client redemptions. A more topical example is an underwriter left with an unhedged stock position after a rights issue. Other traders would quickly surmise that the underwriter held unwanted stock.

If the share price were driven lower, the underwriter's losses would mount. For risk control reasons, the underwriter might be unable to hold on to the losing position and might sell low. Predators would cover their own positions by buying cheap stock from the distressed seller.

Now, I do not know for sure that predatory trading was taking place in some UK bank shares recently, but the pattern of share prices and trading volumes that we saw in HBOS shares last week certainly matches the theoretical model.

Another phenomenon that could explain some of the recent, violent share price moves is the concept of "crowded exits". We know that the hedge fund industry has grown rapidly in recent years, and that there has been a noticeable increase in short-selling, the practice that involves selling shares that are not owned and buying them back at some later date, hopefully at an advantageous price.

Now, there is plenty of evidence that heavily shorted stocks perform, on average, badly and this suggests a simple trading strategy for short-sellers: namely, to identify heavily shorted stocks and build further short positions in those stocks. However, such acts of "imitation" change the market dynamics and can lead to unexpected consequences.

In this case, imitation can lead short positions to become large relative to the number of shares that are normally traded each day in stock...the short position is then said to become "crowded".

If a catalyst of some sort were to prompt short-sellers to change their minds rapidly and simultaneously, we would have short-sellers rushing to buy, but no new rush of people seeking to sell. This is known as a crowded exit.

The idea is akin to the audience in a crowded theatre rushing to a narrow exit door once the fire alarm sounds?...?only so many can leave the building in any given interval of time. The effect would be temporary upward pressure on the share price.

A variety of catalysts for a crowded exit are possible: a broker could change a recommendation on a stock, an investor could place a large buy order, or a rumour could cause a rapid change in sentiment.

Recent patterns of share price moves and short-seller activity in companies as diverse as Punch Taverns, Bellway and Trinity Mirror have been consistent with the notion of a crowded exit. In fact, the shares of these three companies rose by an average of 43pc in just four days last week.

A study into crowded exits* using UK stock lending data from Index Explorers shows that crowded exits are associated with significant losses for short-sellers who are unable to cover their positions rapidly. Traditional, long-only investors would generally be unable to exploit this finding by buying into crowded exits, as by definition these are illiquid positions.

If short-sellers continue to grow in importance on the London Stock Exchange, it is likely that we will experience many more crowded exits.

For an active stock market trader, it is vital to be aware of the risk of crowded exits, and to avoid at all costs the risk of becoming a victim of predatory trading. At the same time, astute traders who feel that they understand the reasons for extreme volatility can trade to benefit from temporary mis-pricings.

If they are right and the share prices are eventually restored to fair value, they can earn excess profits. For the rest of us, and in particular for long-term, fundamental investors, the advice is much simpler. Crowded exits and predatory trading are technical events that have nothing to do with the fundamentals of a company.

Fundamental investors should simply ignore the extreme volatility and stick to estimating companies' cash flows.

James Clunie is Investment Trustee at The CBF Church of England Funds

*Caveat Venditor - Crowded Exits! University of Edinburgh Centre for Financial Markets Research Working Paper. Clunie, Moles and Gao, 2008.

[jailbird] 30/7/2008 10:27

maybe someone is dripping these for a buyer..MMs holding here @16k sold.

wishful thinking!