Top Ten Buys and Sells - UK Equities

Top Ten Buys and Sells - Weekly Retail Investor Activity Summary and Comment

The Top Ten Buys and Sells should not be taken as a recommendation to buy or sell any particular bond or stock, and it is not intended to offer any form of advice. Instead it is simply an indication of the general buying and selling trends amongst some TD customers, observed during the period stated.

Darren Hepworth, Trading and Customer Services Director, TD comments:

“Financial and oil stocks were by far the most popular choices among TD customers this week, accounting for over 85% of their top ten buy and sell trades in total. The buy:sell ratio finished the week at 1.3:1 as the FTSE 100 reached 5490.15 at close of trading in the week ending Tuesday, 13 December, having peaked above 5,600 briefly last Wednesday (7 December).

“Britain’s biggest banks occupied the top three positions in our customer buys and sells this week, led by Lloyds Banking Group (LLOY), which took the top spot in both tables, ahead of second-placed Royal Bank of Scotland Group (RBS) in the buys and Barclays (BARC) in the sells. 

“The most popular trade among TD customers besides the three banking giants was Gulf Keystone Petroleum (GKP), which gained two places in the buys and four in the sells to finish the week in fourth position in both tables. It emerged this week that Gulf’s CEO said he may have to pay a $6 million fine to US  tax authorities for not declaring overseas accounts and trusts, while separately the company’s COO, John Gerstenlauer described preliminary results from the company’s fourth well on the Shaikan field in Kurdistan as very promising. The company’s share price remained relatively steady in the week ending Tuesday, 13 December however, closing just under 2% lower than it did the previous week. 

“AIM listed oil and gas explorer Range Resources (RRL) entered both the buys and sells table this week at seventh and ninth respectively as the company announced better than expected drilling results from one of its wells in Trinidad. Friday’s (9 December) announcement saw the company’s share price peak at nearly 8% above the previous day’s closing price of 8.11p.

“Meanwhile, Desire Petroleum’s (DES) share price spiked on Tuesday (13 December) after fellow Falkland Islands oil explorer Rockhopper Petroleum (RKH) unveiled its latest oil discovery (Desire holds a 40% interest in the associated well). Desire’s share price opened up by 6p on its Monday (12 December) closing price of 24p, before closing out the week at 25p.
 
“Finally, Thomas Cook (TCG) continued its run as one of the ten most popular buy stocks among TD customers, dropping to ninth place from third as it prepared to announce a pre-tax loss of £398m for the year to September 30 yesterday and the potential closure of  200 of its stores.”

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