October 6th, 2025: The Notice Period
My first diary entry!
Storm Amy has seemingly passed, following on from a drab and windy weekend. Admittedly, being in London we certainly didn’t suffer the worst of it. A few upturned wheelie bins was about the worst of what I witnessed. Still, the sun is back out today and a welcome bump in the temperatures for early October, is somewhat welcome, but also somewhat questionable.
The child and his hostile takeover of the living room TV, prohibited me from watching the Singapore Grand Prix live yesterday afternoon, so I had to wait until the evening to watch it. Proudly avoiding any spoilers throughout the day, I was keen to see if Verstappen could revert to type and take an early lead. Sadly, it wasn’t worth the wait. A fairly uneventful race, with practically no incidents whatsoever. Rather drab for a street circuit race, for the second year running. It does make me wonder whether or not Formula 1 needs to have a rethink about some of the legacy street circuits.
Back to work today, but I’m in that horrid, unmotivating transition known as ‘The Notice Period’. I’m six weeks into a three-month notice period and I’m struggling to find any motivation to do much work. I of course understand the necessity for such things, but in a company you have little-to-no desire to work in anymore, it does feel like you’re running down a sentence. Keeping your nose clean and staying out of trouble. Hence the blog…
Anyhow. Enough about a disappointingly dull race and my employment depressions. On to more topical matters!
The Financials
I’ve just finished reading Robbie Burns’ book The Naked Trader. A very, very helpful insight into my first foray of trading. It’s written in plain English for starters, something that a lot of other ‘recommended’ books fail to do. And it cuts through a lot of the bullshit that would otherwise deter wannabe investors from venturing into that world.
It’s given me a great foundation to begin with and a lot of psychological tips to refrain from getting into bad habits. If you’re someone who’s often thought about getting into the world of investing, I would highly recommend this book. It’s UK-focused, but the fundamentals I’m sure can apply to most other US-listed stocks, albeit with some US-nuances. As someone who has tried and failed at US stocks, through options trading or simple share dealing, I very much doubt I will be spending a lot of my time on those. And it wouldn’t exactly be fitting for The Brit Trader to be trading outside of the British Isles now would it?!
In terms then of a foundation and structure around my investments, I’ve pulled together a screen (a stock filter, if you will) on Stockopedia, that’s going to provide me with a pool of companies to review and see whether or not they are worth my time and most importantly, money.
Given the criteria set out in The Naked Trader I’ve managed to narrow down a healthy set of companies that I’ll need to start sifting my way through, as you can see from the below.
| Ticker | Name | Mkt Cap (m GBP) | Net Profit TTM (m) | Net Mgn TTM (%) | Op Profit TTM (m) | Sales TTM (m) | Op Mgn TTM (%) | P / E TTM | Stock Rank™ | Sector | Net Gearing Latest (%) | Spread (bps) | Quality Rank | QM Rank | VM Rank |
| MTO | MITIE | 1854.69 | 101.40 | 2.00 | 161.60 | 5082.60 | 3.18 | 9.67 | 88 | Industrials | 48.64 | 14.50 | 80 | 84 | 81 |
| HILS | Hill & Smith | 1675.14 | 80.90 | 9.36 | 120.40 | 864.00 | 13.94 | 16.38 | 90 | Basic Materials | 11.60 | 23.89 | 95 | 97 | 72 |
| PFD | Premier Foods | 1586.42 | 124.90 | 10.87 | 181.10 | 1149.00 | 15.76 | 12.15 | 92 | Consumer Defensives | 9.96 | 10.96 | 89 | 92 | 80 |
| TEP | Telecom Plus | 1479.83 | 76.10 | 4.14 | 115.89 | 1838.16 | 6.30 | 18.44 | 78 | Utilities | 46.07 | 10.82 | 82 | 83 | 68 |
| KIE | Kier | 1021.80 | 56.40 | 1.38 | 111.80 | 4077.10 | 2.74 | 11.89 | 97 | Industrials | -10.25 | 21.86 | 81 | 92 | 95 |
| BAG | A G Barr | 752.83 | 48.70 | 11.40 | 61.60 | 427.20 | 14.42 | 15.11 | 70 | Consumer Defensives | -11.31 | 14.89 | 95 | 81 | 41 |
| GFRD | Galliford Try Holdings | 532.95 | 33.60 | 1.79 | 39.70 | 1875.20 | 2.12 | 16.20 | 97 | Industrials | -150.53 | 19.18 | 82 | 96 | 93 |
| AEP | Anglo-Eastern Plantations | 518.11 | 88.30 | 20.25 | 108.74 | 436.01 | 24.94 | 8.21 | 95 | Consumer Defensives | -45.42 | 112.57 | 98 | 84 | 80 |
| PRV | Porvair | 343.14 | 16.94 | 8.65 | 23.16 | 195.70 | 11.83 | 19.65 | 76 | Industrials | -1.82 | 80.97 | 92 | 91 | 53 |
| CLIG | City of London Investment | 188.53 | 19.68 | 26.89 | 24.28 | 73.20 | 33.17 | 12.71 | 95 | Financials | -19.81 | 212.77 | 99 | 91 | 80 |
That’s as far as I’ve got so far. The next things I need to do on my ‘Steps to Achieving Financial Freedom’ checklist, is have a good thorough look through each one of these companies and see what story they tell. I’m no self-confessed Warren Buffett, so a lot of the terminologies will no doubt seem alien to me. But given the information I’ve read so far, I’m confident I’ll be able to cut through some of the noise and make a reasonable judgement. Any stocks I find appealing, you can be sure to find my thoughts and commentary on them here.
That’s all for this week. A calm and unexciting post, but no doubt more to come. No Formula 1 this week, so it’s a weekend of most likely re-watching Season 1 of Fallout, to remind me of what the hell happened before Season 2 comes out in December. And then maybe perhaps watching the rest of Matchroom: The Greatest Showmen.
See you next week.
The Brit Trader