A recent major development in financial spread betting has been the introduction of betting on individual shares. At first it was only possible to take a view on just a small number of leading companies shares, but the range has grown to the point where you can take a view on any of the companies in the FTSE 350. Most bookmakers also offer bets on some individual European and US shares.
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Trade Centamin Shares
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Trading Ashmore Group
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Trading Aegis Group
Spread Betting African Barrick Gold
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Trade Amlin Shares
Balfour Beatty Shares Trading
Cobham Shares Trading
Derwent London Stock Market Trading
Drax Group Shares Trading
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Homeserve (HSV)
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Trading Permisson Shares
Premier Oil Spread Betting
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Sports Direct Spread Betting
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William Hill Betting
Rotork Shares Trading
Ashtead Group
AVEVA Group
AZ Electronic Materials
Barratt Developments
Bellway
Berkeley Group
Booker Group
BTG Group
Cairn Energy
Capital and Counties Properties Stock
Carillion
Catlin Group
Close Brothers Group
Colt Telecom Group
Cookson Group
De La Rue
Trading Debenhams
Trading Dunelm Group Shares
Essar Energy Stock
Ferrexpo
Filtrona Stock
Foreign and Colonial Investment Trust
Great Portland Estates
Greene King Stock
Halma Shares
Hays Stock
Henderson Group Stock
HICL Shares
Hikma Pharmaceuticals
Hiscox Stock
Hochschild Mining
Hunting Shares
Trade Imagination Technologies Group Shares
Trading Inchcape Stock
Intermediate Capital Group Shares
Invensys Shares Betting
Jardine Lloyd Thompson Group Stock
Jupiter Fund Management Shares
Ladbrokes Shares
Lancashire Holdings
Man Group
Michael Page
Millennium and Copthorne Hotels
Mitchells and Butlers
MITIE Group
Murray International Trust Shares
National Express Group
Playtech Shares
PZ Cussons
QinetiQ Stock
Renishaw Shares
Rentokil Initial Shares
Rightmove Stock
RIT Capital Partners
Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust
SEGRO Shares Trading
Shaftesbury Stock
SOCO Shares
Spectris Stock
Spirax-Sarco Engineering Stock
St. James’s Place Capital Shares
Stagecoach Shares
TalkTalk Telecom Group
Taylor Wimpey Shares
Telecity Group
Templeton Emerging Markets
UBM
Ultra Electronics Holdings
For the beginner involved in financial trading this offers a wonderful opportunity to make money from all the major companies. For the non-professional, it’s easier to gain information and have an opinion on companies such as The Body Shop, football teams such as Manchester United, or even Lastminute.com.
Looking at Manchester United’s you’ll notice a big climb in early 2000 when they announced profits, sponsorship deals etc… and in mid March the same year shares dipped when they were knocked out of the Champions League.
With so many stocks, dealers rely on an automated system which takes the current share price of a company, is then increased to reflect interest rates, then decreased to allow for dividend payments and the end result is a futures price for each company. An opportunity to make serious money from betting on this price occurs because the bookmakers often don’t have the quality of information, nor the time to focus on one company, that you the small-scale trader has! Again, it is a golden opportunity to beat the bookie at their own game!
There are a number of ways of identifying potentially profitable company share price changes and several reliable approaches are open to you. Fundamental, technical and quantitative analysis can all be used. But there is an excellent way of predicting share prices that is available to everyone and isn’t always considered by investors. As a famous politician once said, ‘back to basics’ is a very good route to take when betting on individual share prices. Use your own personal views and opinions.
Start by studying a small number of businesses. Gradually you’ll gain an incredible amount of information that will help to evaluate and anticipate future share prices. Of all the top 350 companies listed on the stock market, most are household names. You may even work or have worked for one and you almost certainly know of someone who does work for one of the top 350. Being household names, we know all about them, their products and services. If they are a High Street company, you’ll have a fairly good idea of the amount of business they are currently doing or whether they are still popular with the general public.
A prime example is Burtons, part of The Arcadia Group, which has seen its credibility amongst teenagers drop drastically. If you speak to any streetwise kid, they’ll gladly inform you that shopping at Burtons is no longer cool! Another famous example is Next. The high street store was a huge success in the 1980’s and opened hundreds of stores all over the UK. But, gradually the market for their products slowed. Suddenly every fashion conscious person was stepping out in sportswear. Sports retailers such as JJB capitalised on this and saw their shares climb to lofty heights as a result.
If you examine the share prices of these companies for the period in question you’ll see how the changing market has affected their performance. And you could have made a great deal of money by second-guessing their performance as a result of talking to your kids, nephew or niece, next door neighbour or people who work for these companies. All perfectly legal inside information that is very hard for the financial experts to get!
Also remember that many investors react to market news. A company involved in takeover speculation almost certainly can expect their share price to be affected. Anticipating corporate results is another way, and boardroom changes, new product launches, increases in orders and favourable press reports can all affect the share price of a company.