I noted last week that the Lonrho deal to be taken over by a Swiss billionaire was almost certain to go through without a higher bid emerging — and now that my trading embargo has ended I’ve sold my full Lonrho position at the market price (which is pretty much the offer price). This books […]

Those of you who follow Lonrho know that in addition to featuring it as an “Idea of the Month” back in 2009, I’ve owned it for my own accounts for quite some time. This is a conglomerate that refashioned itself in 2008-2009 by focusing on a few key sectors in Africa, and further reorganized in […]

A Look at Byron King's latest "Rockefeller Riches" pitch for the Friday File -- plus a couple updates and notes on other stocks

Friday File look at Nathan Slaughters pitch for Scarcity and Real Wealth ... plus a few stock updates for the Irregulars

If you’re wondering why Lonrho (LONR.L, LNAFF), one of my core stocks, took a beating today in London, it’s because they released really weak results — just as we’re expecting them to achieve a sustainable profitability and start rewarding shareholders for those years of capital investment, we learn that they had several segments with “revenue […]

Hi Travis, any ideas what is going on with Lonr.l in London again? Last couples of weeks nothinh but down…recently bought some more at 9 pence, but wish i had waited a bit… Herbert

I noted last week that the stocks on my watch list for buying more shares included Lonrho and Berkshire Hathaway, and that just got pushed into action today — I’d still like to add some more Berkshire to my portfolio but haven’t rushed into that, but with the recent dip in Lonrho shares I did […]

Quick note on my favorite African company

Lonrho shares have been hurt even more than the overall market — in part that’s due to the fact that the spinoff of the aviation division (was Fly540, will be FastJet) to Rubicon (RUBI in London) has not provided a short-term bump. Rubicon is down considerably from the 4.8 pence deal price, so Lonrho’s holdings […]

Africa is probably the last great frontier for regional air travel, with a hugely underserved and increasingly urban population, but that doesn’t mean that investing in airlines is necessarily a lot more profitable in Africa than it is anywhere else … the list of failed airlines, or companies that get bogged down in the massive […]

A few readers have written in asking about Chris Mayer’s new pick in Mongolia — he hinted about such a pick in a recent email interview he did with his colleagues at Daily Resource Hunter, but there weren’t many clues. This is his exchange: “What is your favorite emerging market right now? “Right now, I’m […]

A couple more incremental buys in my personal portfolio

A couple key comments from Lonrho's annual report have me feeling optimistic

Friday File look at a teaser that continues to circulate, with some new twists (and stocks) and a personal buy.

Compiled list, in order of affection, of our past "Idea of the Month" picks with updated opinions

Over the years I’ve shared a few “Idea of the Month” picks that are plays on various emerging markets — the most direct emerging and frontier market picks have been Lonrho in Africa, Brazil Fast Food in Brazil, and Nagacorp in Cambodia, so let’s check in with those. As with the rest of our annual […]

There’s certainly a lot going on in the markets these days — most of it, of course, driven by the massive buy/sell herd that feels the need to trade on the macro news of what’s happening in Europe or in Washington, D.C. Since I don’t live in DC anymore I can’t even pretend to have […]

Friday File look at a Peak Energy Strategist teaser

The markets are debt-obsessed once again, I’m afraid — not corporate debt, as they were in 2008 and 2009 when any company with leveraged was thrown out the window, but gummint debt. I don’t know whether this will be a real “reckoning” for the US government, when we really take stock of our obligations and […]

Today, dearest Irregulars, I’ve been a bit thwarted in my efforts to find new and intriguing investment ideas for you — that is, I’ve found some, certainly (they’re always out there), but they haven’t matched the template for what I generally like to share with my favorite readers (yes, that’s you). The first one I […]

I didn’t expect to be adding to my Lonrho position this week, but when the news that they expected to uplist to the main board at the London Stock Exchange by the end of the month brought the shares down a little bit, I decided to add a small tranche to my holdings. Moving up […]

A couple weeks ago I started my annual navel-gazing exercise of looking back at past “idea of the month” stock (and other investment) suggestions — that first look covered the first year or so of these more formalized ideas for the Stock Gumshoe Irregulars, from 2008 to mid-2009, and now we’ll try to catch up. […]

Before I get into the meat of today’s Friday File article, which plays off of one of the investing themes I feel most strongly about (the long-term growth potential of Africa), I should share a few housekeeping notes regarding my portfolio — I decided to sell Accuray (ARAY) and got stopped out of my position […]

This week, instead of digging into a new teaser for your Friday File pleasure, I thought it was time to update you on a few of the “Idea of the Month” stocks that I’ve been thinking about recently. First, I should also tell you that I’ve now made two buys this week personally, both of […]

Just a quick note: I’m adding to my position in Lonrho this week, the african mini-conglomerate that I profiled for the Irregulars back in October — this is the second buy I’ve made of Lonrho shares, both at prices above where it was then, but I think the current price again, after a bit of […]

Just a quick note to let you know that as of this morning I’m adding Lonrho to my personal portfolio at a price of about 18 cents/share (close in London was right around 12 pence).  I wrote about Lonrho as one of my African “idea of the month” stocks back in October, and I consider […]

The idea that we’re finally going to enter an era of just and profitable growth in Africa (or at least, sustainable growth) has been around for a long time, and it’s been wrong for a long time, as Africa has arguably been subject to more exploitation, poverty, and human suffering than your average continent over […]

When I say that the Stock Gumshoe readers are the wisest souls on the Internet, I don’t just mean in North America — we’ve got a pretty fair crop of friends around the world here, and I like to take a look at non-US teasers every now and again. Two of the countries that boast […]