Monday, 21 February 2011


18/2/2011

Bought 6448 Centamin at £1.21

Centamin is currently the biggest mover on the stock exchange.

21/02/2011 - 9.59am

Holding my position. Price: £1.2890 - £420 potential profit.

The reported miner strike at their Egyptian Gold Mine was over exaggerated. The market reacted with a 13% drop in share price from £1.40 to £1.20. Further news of what happened revealed the situation was not as serious as thought.


Will wait until the price recovers and close my position.

Thursday, 10 February 2011

Egypt, the land of the Pharaohs and Centamin Egypt Limited

Centamin's Mining Fleet (Source: Centamin.com)


Mulling over the political uncertainties of Egypt's situation I decided to invest in Centamin Egypt Limited.

Centamin claim they are not exposed to the current political crisis, but as the markets are run by confidence it now means Centamin is relatively undervalued.

10/2/11 - Bought 5698 Shares at 130p
10/2/11- 5pm - Share price has risen to 140p --> Currently making £506.02

All in a days work. I await Hosni Mubarak's speech tonight, hopefully he will resign immediately instating current Vice President Omar Suleiman, allowing for a more stable Egpyt.

Centamin Egypt Limited is a mineral exploration development and mining company dual listed on the Main Market of the London Stock Exchange (LSE:CEY) and the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX:CEE).


___________________________________________________________________

Update :

Mubarak has now left, Centamin has responded positively. Closing the position.

11/02/11 - Sold 5698 at £1.49

Total profit inclusive of Stamp Duty = £990 / 13% return on investment, over 2 days.

Hopefully Egypt will get social reforms and leadership that they need, as they did under Former President Anwar El Sadat.

Monday, 31 January 2011

Unfair Dismissal Checklist

UNFAIR DISMISSAL

Under s94 Employment Right Act 1996, [Employees name] has a right not be be unfairly dismissed

For an unfair dismissal claim, [Employees name] must be a qualifying employee i.e have one years continuous employment – which he [is/isn’t]

Here the dismissal is:….

Actual dismissal (dismissal by the employer with or without notice)

Constructive (the employer has committed a repudiatory breach of an express or implied term of the contract)

Was the 3 step procedure for dismissal complied with?Yes?

Was there a potentially fair reason for the dismissal?Yes?

The most likely one in this case being:

[pick one]

(a) The capability or qualifications of the employee for doing work of the kind he was employed to do (this could include incompetence, or inability to do the job by reason of illness or injury);

(did the e’or warn the e’ee and give him a chance to improve?

-Did he provide adequate training?

-Could he have been moved to a job within the e’ee’s competence?

-Illness, did the e’or consult e’ee about duration and nature of illness?

(b) the conduct of the employee (this must generally relate to conduct within the employment – outside behaviour will only be relevant if it has a direct bearing on the employee’s fitness to do the job);

-thorough investigation

-employee should hava a chance to state his case

-only if misconduct is gross or persistent

-ACAS Guidelines consulted?

(c) the employee was redundant (in this case the employee will be entitled to a redundancy payment (see below));

(d) the employee could not continue to work in the position held without contravening some statutory enactment (eg where a lorry driver loses his driving licence);

(e) some other substantial reason justifying the dismissal of an employee holding the position which the employee held (it is not possible to give a comprehensive list of such reasons, but this category has been held to include dismissal where the employee refuses to accept a reorganization affecting his working hours and a dismissal arising out of a personality clash between employees); and

(f) retirement – if it takes place at or after 65 (or a lower age which is objectively justified by the employer) and it meets procedural requirements, such as complying with a duty to inform the employee of the intended retirement date and of the employee’s right to request to work beyond that date.

S98(4) ERA 1996, the tribunal must decide..did the employer act reasonably?

Was dismissal a reasonable response?

Warn, redeploy, chance to improve, train




Misconduct discovered after dismissal, e’or cant rely on it but it may reduce compensation available



Remedies:


Basic award: -


Above 41– multiply by 1½

22 -40 – multiply by 1

below 22 – multiply by ½


Falls into what category?


No. of years he’s ½ , 1 or 1 ½

been in that category x x 310 (statutory minimum)


Compensatory award


Calculated in light of

immediate loss of net wages from the date of the dismissal to the date of the hearing, assuming the employee has not at that date got another job;

future loss of net wages – based on an estimate as to how long it might take the employee to get another job (assuming he has not yet done so);

loss of fringe benefits; and

loss of statutory protection. In any new job, the employee will have to start building up as against a future employer his statutory rights to a redundancy payment and unfair dismissal protection and a statutory minimum notice.



If the grievance, disciplinary or dismissal procedures haven’t completed and its e’ors fault?

e’ee can get uplift of 10 – 50% on compensation

But if non compliance is due to e’ee, - 10-50% decrease in compensation


Max is 60,600












WRONGFUL DISMISSAL


Is a common law claim based ib the employer terminatig the contract iun a way which is in breach of the contract of employment

What type of contract is it?

Indefinite – terminated with no or inadequate notice

Fixed term without break clause – termination before the contract expires

Has notice been given properly?

Notice period, if tye notice period is shorter than the one in ERA 1996 s86 the longer one prevails unless agreed otherwise

Stat minimum

1 months continuous employment - 1 weeks notice

2 years continuous employment - 2 weeks notice

up to 12


Remedies


Damages for breach of contract (out party back to position they would be in had contract not been broken)








REDUNDANCY


Must be qualified employee (2 years continuous employment)

Refer to employment tribunal within a 6 month period from reduncancy

Prove that he’s been dismissed actually or constructively

It becomes presumed that the e’ee was dismissed for redundancy


Is the reason within one of these 3? i.e within s139 ERA 1996…


(a) complete closedown (the fact that the employer has ceased or intends to cease to carry on the business for the purposes of which the employee was employed by him);


(b) partial closedown (the fact that the employer has ceased or intends to cease to carry on that business in the place where the employee was so employed); and


(c) overmanning or a change in the type of work undertaken (the fact that the requirements of the business for employees to carry out work of a particular kind, or for employees to carry out work of a particular kind in the place

where the employee was employed by the employer, have ceased or diminished, or are expected to cease or diminish).


Employee entitled to a redundancy payment but may lose it if he’s nreasonably rejected an offer for suitale alternative emplyoyment











Tuesday, 4 January 2011

Happy New Year and Blog Statistics

We all love statistics, well I do. So here is some self-indulgence.

Our Law in Action's page views for the month of December 2010:

Pageviews yesterday
1
Pageviews for whole month
101
Pageviews all time history
159

Looks like you readers are enjoying the regular postings


Here are our global audience figures (for the period May 2010- January 2011)

United Kingdom
106
United States
20
Russia
15
Croatia
4
Germany
3
Singapore
3
Israel
2
Slovenia
2
Hong Kong
1
Ireland
1

I look forward to posting on a broader range of legal issues as well as some discussions on trading in 2011-2012.

Wednesday, 29 December 2010

First Foray into Trading and Seminars

Credit: Reuters


My first investment into shares was on 27th of January 2010. For the year 2010 I have made a 36.19% Return on Investment so far.

1st Trade - Initiated and closed over a few months

Bought 908 of Barclays PLC - Ord 25 / at £2.73
Sold 908 of Barclays PLC - Ord 25 / at £3.60
Profit £813.79 (inclusive of Stamp Duty and Commission)

I traded at my own risk and taught myself the markets. I didn't rely on seminars by self-righteous Trading Gurus. Anton Kriel of BBC's Million Dollar Traders fame is offering 2 day seminars on trading which can apparently turn you into a 'lean, mean trading machine'. The cost to attend is more than £2000.

In my experience trading is about strong research, trusting yourself and cutting your losses, and these elements are best self-taught.

Insider Trading - White Collar Crime

Market Manipulation is still a crime - Credit: LegalMatch


Being an active trader on the London Stock Exchange, white collar crime and the offence of insider trading in particular are areas of personal interest. I recently came across an interesting case on Insider Trading (or dealing). In his book Stock Market Efficiency - Market Abuse, Paul Barnes details the case of Insider Dealing with a tip off related to Lord Alan Sugar's Company Viglen in 2000.

I have written a quick overview:

During this pre-dot com boom era a tip off was received by the Daily Mirror that Viglen was on the verge of venturing into selling it's products online. The Mirror published this in it's City Slickers Column, following with Viglen experienced a significant rise in its share price.

The day before the tip was received Piers Morgan, the then editor of the Mirror purchased £67,000 worth of Viglen shares. Investigating Viglen's booming share price the London Stock Exchange forwarded the matter to the DTI (Department for Trade & Industry) who considered whether there had been a breach of Insider Trading statue.

The investigation showed there had been Insider Trading conducted by Hipwell, Bhoryul and Shephard. The DTI's view was that the tip was a 'deliberate act of manipulating the market by ramping the share price from which they were able to profit.' (DTI, 2001).

Hipwell and Bhoyrul were sacked from the Daily Mirror for gross misconduct and the Press Complaints Commission criticised the actions of all three as well as Piers Morgan. Hipwell, Bhoryul and Shephard were charged with Consipiracy under s1(1) Criminal Law Act 1977 to contravene s.47(2) Financial Services Act 1986. This is only one of the few convictions for Insider Trading in England and Wales. The DTI did not pursue Piers Morgan for Insider Trading.

_______________________________________________________________

I have outlined the majority of the current Insider Trading offences below.

There are two approaches to I.D. in UK Law:

1) Old approach - Insider Trading is a Narrow Offense

Pre 1989 EC Directive: 1980 CA and 1985 Companies Securities Act (inspired by US I.D. law)

Classical Theory of liability= founded on the insider’s fiduciary duty to company

...to disclose the information to the counter party... or not pursue dealing

Or with respect to passing inside information to another (tippee)... in breach of fiduciary duty to the company...

and where the tippee knows or should know that there has been a breach of fiduciary duty... thus the tippee is also affected by the same trusts as the insider.

Individual must have a fiduciary relationship to the company (usually only including Directors)

Directors owe a fiduciary duty to company as a whole...

2) Contemporary Approach - Insider Trading is a Wider Offense

Post 1989: 89/592/EEC & CJA 1993:

Fiduciary duty not a prerequisite

By managing I.D. (issue of CAPITAL MARKETS) with the provisions on I.D. it is clear that UK company law (with emphasis on fiduciary duty to the company) has migrated to securities law.

UK law on I.D. à Governed by: CJA 1993

- Influenced by EC Directive 89/592/EEC

- Designed to coordinate regulations in the EU on insider trading amongst member states (many of which didn’t have laws regarding it)

Outline of offenses

s.52 (1)

Insiders dealing in “price-affected” securities using “inside information”

Elements of the offense:

· Offense must be committed by an individual

· Individual must have information as an “insider”

· Individual must “deal”

· In “price-affected securities”

· “In relation to the information”

· As per s.52 (3) acquisition/disposal on the regulated market – dealing themselves/ professional intermediary...

Two Inchoate I.D. offenses

s.52 (2) (a) Insiders Encouraging others to deal in price-affected securities

Encouraging

· Offense must be committed by an individual

· Individual must have information as an “insider”

· Encourage another to “deal”

· In “price-affected securities”

· “In relation to the information”

· Knowing/having reasonable cause to believe the dealing would take place... As per s.52 (3) acquisition/disposal on the regulated market – dealing themselves/professional intermediary...

s.52 (2) (b) Insiders Disclosing the information to another person

Disclosing

· Offense must be committed by an individual

· Individual must have information as an “insider”

· Discloses it to another – other than in the functions of his employment

· In “price-affected securities”

· “In relation to the information”

Disclosing Offense(s)

s.52 (1)

Dealing in the price-affected securities

s.52 (2) (a)

Encouraging another to deal in the price-affected securities

s.52 (2) (b) + s.52 (3)

Disclosing information

Monday, 20 December 2010

Ministry of Justice - Reforms 2010


The Ministry of Justice Business Plan 2011-2015 makes for interesting reading. As Michael Howard said in 1993, 'Prison works'. Based on this report, this doesn't seem to be the Coalition's message. The Coalition's is focused on lowering prison numbers, whether that is done by giving more power to Judges on sentencing or with developing rehabilitation initiatives, to lower the offending rates of detainees once they leave prison.

Whilst this approach may be logical and more efficient in its conception, the cost cutting motivations behind this new direction of the Ministry of Justice are questionable. It is the reduction in funding for the Ministry, which has initiated these new measures, which the Coalition hope lower Prison numbers, thereby saving the Department a considerable amount (in light of the fact that the average cost per prisoner place is above £30,000).

Whether this is sustainable in the long term remains to be seen.