Peter Lynch stated, “Insiders might sell their shares for any number of reasons, but they buy them for only one: they think the price will rise.”

Therefore, it is my absolute pleasure to introduce our global Investing Matters audience to Asif Suria, the former technology analyst, serial entrepreneur, software services creator, quantitative fund founder, owner of the InsideArbitrage website and newletters, investor with a focus on event driven strategies including merger arbitrage, spinoffs, (legal) insider trading, buybacks and SPACs and also the author of the recently released Harriman House book, The Event-Driven Edge in Investing: Six special situation strategies to outperform the market.

Asif was one of the earliest contributors to Seeking Alpha in 2005 and his work has been mentioned in Barron's, Dow Jones, BNN Bloomberg and other publications.

He has been an active investor for more than two decades and his background in technology has helped him build machine learning tools that inform his investing process, especially as it relates to event-driven strategies that require updated data and processes. He previously ran a quantitative investment firm focused on insider transactions.

Operating experience as an executive at venture funded San Francisco Bay Area based companies gave him a front-row seat to understanding how to build and grow companies.

In this insightful and fascinating Investing Matters interview, discover Asif Suria’s fascination with the Beatles, his journey from being a technology analyst, Seeking Alpha contributor, running a quant fund, managing his own website InsideArbitrage, newletters and analysing vast databases of transactions, learn about his personal investing strategies and about his brilliant new book, The Event-Driven Edge in Investing: Six special situation strategies to outperform the market, and also ….

-Y2K bug / Dotcom bubble & bust

-Learning from mistakes

-Investing Influenced by Benjamin Graham, Philip Fisher, Warren Buffett, Peter Lynch, Charlie Munger

-Value investing / Value trap

-Growth at a reasonable price (GARP)

-Connections with Portfolio Manager, CEO, CIO, Investment Manager & authors Vitaliy Katsenelson & Tobias Carlisle

-Event driven strategies

-Merger arbitrage/ Risk arbitrage strategies (Microsoft / Activision Blizzard)

Legal insider transactions (buying/ selling)/ insider transactions (Amazon/Jeff Bezos)

-Bruce Sachs / Vertex Pharmaceuticals

-Stock buybacks / Cannibals (Apple NVR Inc) Double dippers

-Special purpose acquisitions companies / SPACs / WeWork

-Spinoffs (McDonalds / Chipotle Mexican Grill.. Fiat Chrysler / Ferrari)

-Management changes

-Personal investing strategies

-The too hard bucket

-Psychology

-Hedge Fund

-Venture capital fund

-The importance of the law of averages

-The InsideArbitrage database

-Why seasonal / cyclical strategies matter

-Idea generation

-Key lessons & learnings from investing

-Importance of being a learning machine

& much more

We hope you enjoy this podcast, and we look forward to hearing your feedback.

Please subscribe to this podcast on your platform of choice and follow the @InvMattPodcast on Twitter.

To quote Sir Francis Bacon, “Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested.”

Therefore, it is my absolute pleasure to introduce our global Investing Matters audience to the Investor, Mentor, Keynote speaker, Business Development guru, Multi award winning Fund Manager and global bestselling author of one of the best investing trading books, ‘The Art of Execution: How the world's best investors get it wrong and still make millions’ - the global investment thought leader Lee Freeman-Shor.

Lee left school with ambitions to become a Chef. However, he discovered he did not like the unsociable hours. He then returned to education to study and attained at Law degree at Nottingham Trent University. Alas he didn’t have the desire pursue the path of a legal sector profession. “Through unplanned serendipity”, Lee qualified to become an Independent Financial Adviser (IFA) thus commencing his professional finance/investing journey.

His role as an Investment Development Manager, with AXA Winterthur in March 2002, was followed by the same role at Schroders in September 2004. Then, his previous boss at Winterthur, who moved to Skandia Asset Management as their CIO, asked Lee to join him on the Investment Research side of Skandia with the possibility of eventually running money in October 2005. To quote Lee, “the rest is history.”

From October 2005, Lee went onto be the Fund Manager for the $1bn+ Best Ideas Fund Range. Previously Co-Head of the Equities Research team, he co-managed a 10-person, multi-national team and had direct responsibility for the research and monitoring of all equity managers used across Skandia's platforms, including multi-manager funds, single strategy funds, guided-architecture ranges and much more.

The significant success that Lee achieved at Skandia Asset Management led to be him being recognised as one of the World's Top Fund Managers in the inaugural Citywire 1000 report: for the performance of the Skandia European Best Ideas, Skandia Global Best Ideas and Skandia UK Best Ideas funds.

Following the merger of Skandia Investment Group and Old Mutual Asset Management in 2012, Lee became a Fund Manager for Old Mutual Global Investors from June 2012 until May 2018. During this time, he went on to manage many more billions per year, including bonds, multi-asset funds of funds, winning mandates and managing a larger number of global fund managers.

In this insightful and fascinating Investing Matters interview, discover how the multi-award-winning Fund Manager and international bestselling author Lee Freeman-Shor, researched over a period of seven years. Hear about the investing habits of forty-five of the best Fund Managers in the world that he had allocated between $25m and $150m during that time. Hear about ‘The Winners checklist’, ‘being greedy when winning’ and much more, including…

-Serendipity

-Importance of proper mentoring

-Equity Management / Best ideas

-The Kelly Criteria

-Risks

-The genesis of the global bestselling book, The Art of Execution

-Learning the about the characteristics, mindset & straits of individuals & fund managers

-Performance & investing performance hit rates

- Discover the five distinct tribes and habits of investors: Assassins, Hunters, Rabbits, Connoisseurs and Raiders

-Best strategies for when you are experiencing a losing investment

-Best strategies for when you are experiencing winning investment

-The Wingman, the trading tool

-Psychology

-Biases impact even professional investors

-Overconfidence bias

-Confirmation bias

-Endowment Bias

-Anchoring bias

-Sunken cost bias

-The boredom factor

-Price targets are bad

-Dealing with losing trades

-Why price targets are bad

-British American Tobacco, Superdry, Bitcoin, Nvidia, Gold, ETFS, S&P 500, Mining stocks

-Long-term investing & compounding are key

-Ride / run your winners

-Cultivate multibaggers

-Personal investing strategy

-Investing & much more

We hope you enjoy this podcast, and we look forward to hearing your feedback.

Please subscribe to this podcast on your platform of choice and follow the @InvMattPodcast on Twitter.

To quote Ray Dalio, “Principles connect your values to your actions.”

With that in mind, welcome to this insightful Investing Matters interview with Richard Stone, hugely talented former Chartered Accountant, Equity Analyst, Financial Controller, Finance Director, CEO, leader and now Chief Executive of the Association of Investment Companies, which he joined in September 2021.

Prior to that, Richard was Chief Executive of Share plc (The Share Centre platform) from 2014 to 2020 and was Finance Director from 2006 to 2013. At Share plc he positioned the company to deliver exceptional customer service, including digital transformation, for both direct retail clients and other partner investment firms. Floating the business on London’ Alternative Investment Market (AIM) in May 2008. Richard led Share Plc for seven years as Group CEO prior to the business being purchased by Interactive Investor in 2020. Many of you will be aware that as a subsidiary of Interactive Investor, that Share plc was purchased in May 2022 by the behemoth investment company Abrdn Plc.

Having had an interest in stocks and shares since his teens. Richard’s passion for numbers led to him pursuing and attaining a Philosophy, Politics and Economics Degree at York University.

Following this he gained his “first proper job” with Ernst & Young (EY) as a Trainee Accountant. Richard excelled at EY and went on to win the coveted KPMG Peat Prize (The Peat Gold Medal & Prize) for the highest mark in his final Chartered Accountancy exams. Richard is qualified ICAEW Chartered Accountant.

After some year auditing for EY, Richard got the opportunity in 1999 to move to London to work as a software and information technology equity analyst for the US-based Investment Bank, Robertson Stephens. Where he worked on numerous IPOs in London. He then moved to ECsoft Group Plc the Information Technology Consulting Service co, a dual listed Nasdaq firm as their Financial Controller. Following which he moved to Huntsworth Plc, becoming their first Financial Director, where as part of the team backed by 3i, worked diligently and rapidly over three years grew the company from 100 members of staff to 600. He then joined Gavin Oldham at the Share Centre (Share Plc).

Richard has seen and worked across the US & UK Capital Markets from almost every angle during the past two decades, which makes for fantastic and insightful Investing Matters which will be informative for all.

In this Investing Matters interview, Richard gives a brief overview of his roles and responsibilities at the Association of Investment Companies, AIC’s fantastic team, Investment companies’ growth, capital raising, dividends, reasons to be optimistic and much more.

Topics and discussions also include:

-Equity participation

-Investment companies / Investment Trusts

“Never get into stockbroking”

-Studying economics / Big privatisations

-Investment companies discounts to Net Asset Value, tightening cycle

-Private Equity

-Renewables / Infrastructure

- Reasons to optimistic

-The UK market “is pregnant with value”

-Mergers, wind-ups, buybacks

-The British ISA

-Shareholder engagement

-Investment companies cost disclosures

-Stamp Duty

-AIC’s education & building awareness strategy

-Structural benefits of investing in investment trusts

-Dividend Heroes

-A long-term savings plan

-Long-term investment outperformance

-Investing & much more

We hope you enjoy this podcast, and we look forward to hearing your feedback.

Please subscribe to this podcast on your platform of choice and follow the @InvMattPodcast on Twitter.

To quote Pearl Zhu, “Systems Thinkers shape a worldview based on the realization of interconnectedness”

With that in mind, welcome to this insightful Investing Matters interview with the hugely successful former Investment Banker, now Head of Primary Markets – Americas for the London Stock Exchange Group, Chris Mayo CFA.

As the Head of Primary Markets - Americas at London Stock Exchange Group, Chris provides guidance to companies and their shareholders on their bespoke financing requirements and strategy. He helps companies from the Americas across all sectors access high quality institutional capital in London’s public markets.

Chris has close to 30 years of corporate finance experience in New York and London as an Investment Banker for Barclays, Salomon Smith Barney, Citigroup and Schroders and has completed numerous M&A and equity transactions.

Before taking up primary markets responsibilities for the Americas, Chris spent two years as the LSE’s specialist in London on the technology and life science sectors with a focus on building LSE’s relationships with venture capital investors. Immediately prior to joining LSE, Chris spent 3 years as an investor and Head of Strategy for an early-stage cloud networking technology managed services company, which exited to a UK technology company.

Salford, UK born Chris is a huge Manchester United fan with historic connections to the football club. He holds a First Class Honours Degree in International Business and German from Aston University, a Masters in International Affairs from Columbia University and is a CFA Charterholder.

In this Investing Matters interview, Chris gives a brief overview of his roles and responsibilities at London Stock Exchange Group, the value-added global financial access available via London, his unique transatlantic perspective on markets / listings / equity culture, his personal investing strategy and much more.

Topics and discussions also include:

-Junior Analyst to Investment Banker dealmaker

-Working on the minority Liverpool FC stake sale to Granada TV

- Experiences of the Dot com Boom & Bust, 911, Financial crisis, working on interesting deals

-Being a “staffer”

-Regulatory changes/ Audit / Accounting / Sarbanes-Oxley controls

-Initial Public Offerings (IPOs)

-Career journey & roles with London Stock Exchange Group

-LSEG’s Lifesciences & Tech initiatives

-The vital role that the London Stock Exchange Group plays in the Private and Public markets

-The positives & advantages of listing in the UK

-Venture Capital / Private Equity

-Capital raising for small and large companies

-Investing reforms needed

-Listings including, Diversified Energy / MaxCyte / Microsalt / Helix Exploration / Boku

-Equity culture difference between US & UK investors

-British ISA

-Investing diversification

-Stamp Duty

-Pensions / Pensions allocations

-Visibility & Awareness

-Performance of US IPO market

-Personal investing strategy / having the courage of your investing convictions

-Investing in ETFS & actively managed funds

-London Stock Exchange Group is a tech company

-Shein & Raspberry Pi future UK listings

-Global access to financial markets via London

-Valuation differentials

-Investing & much more

We hope you enjoy this podcast, and we look forward to hearing your feedback.

Please subscribe to this podcast on your platform of choice and follow the @InvMattPodcast on Twitter.

To quote Danica McKellar, “Maths is the only place where truth and beauty mean the same thing”.

With that in mind, welcome to this insightful Investing Matters interview with the hugely successful Fund Manager, Jean Roche CFA, the Lead Manager of FTSE-list Schroder UK Mid cap Fund and one third of Schroders' UK Small Mid cap Team with Andy Brough and James Goodman.

After attaining a Master’s Degree in Financial and Industrial Mathematics from Dublin City University, Jean was successful in being selected for Morgan Stanley’s graduate programme and commenced her investment career in 1999. As an Equity Analyst, Jean covered the tobacco sector, food producers, then general retail. Jean also worked for Panmure Gordon, before moving to Hargreave Hale in 2013 as a Fund Manager.

Having been personally selected by the hugely talented and respected investing legend Andy Brough, Jean joined Schroders in 2016 and became Fund Manager of Schroder UK Mid Cap Fund plc in February 2021, having been Co-Fund Manager since September 2016. They have been successfully compounding fantastic investment return for Schroders and their investors ever since. Most recently Jean was nominated for the award of Fund Manager of the Year in the Plc Awards.

In this Investing Matters interview, Jean gives a brief overview her roles and responsibilities at Schroders, the winning analytical methodology and processes undertaken by the Schroders Mid Cap team when selecting long-term holdings, the importance of checking balance sheets, compounding winning stocks, her own personal investing strategy and much more.

Topics and discussions also include:

-The Schroder Mid Cap team’s investing philosophy, methodology and strategy

-The Heineken index.

- Stocks, Games Workshop, 4Imprint, Chemring, Babcock, Bodycote, Qinetiq, Inchcape, Dunelm, Man Group, Renishaw, Oxford Instruments

--When to sell a holding.

-Unique, Flex & stocks to avoid.

--ESG / Sustainability.

-Digital transformation.

-The importance of balance sheet screening.

-Personal investing strategy, Pension.

-ETFS.

-Diversity / Inclusion / The Diversity Project brainchild of Dame Helena Morrissey

-Finding 30 multibaggers, what are the characteristics

We hope you enjoy this podcast, and we look forward to hearing your feedback.

Please subscribe to this podcast on your platform of choice and follow the @InvMattPodcast on Twitter.

To quote Wayne Huizenga, “Some people dream of success, while other people get up every morning and make it happen”.

With that in mind welcome to this latest episode in the Investing Matters podcast series in which I have the privilege of speaking the hugely multi-talented and globally respected Writer, Trader, Musician, DJ, Entrepreneur, Financial Educator, former Wall St trader and Editor of The Daily Dirtnap, a newsletter for professional investors, Jared Dillian. The author of four books including the fantastic Harriman House recently published book: No Worries, How to live a stress-Free Financial Life.

Jared graduated from the United States Coast Guard Academy in 1996 with a B.S. in Mathematics and Computer Science, from the University of San Francisco in 2001 with a Master’s in Business Administration, concentration in Finance, and from the Savannah College of Art and Design in 2023 with a Masters in Fine Arts in Writing. Jared worked for a small floor market maker on the Pacific Options Exchange from 1999-2000 and was a trader for Lehman Brothers from 2001 to 2008, specializing in index arbitrage and ETF trading.

Jared is a master of market psychology and has been called the “Dr. House” of trading, and he has a following ranging from casual investors to professional traders and hedge fund managers.

He has been a regular contributor at Bloomberg Opinion, Forbes, TheStreet.com, and other outlets. Jared is a frequent speaker at conferences, and his appearances include MSNBC, Bloomberg TV, The New York Times, LA Times, Business Insider, was the host of The Jared Dillian Show, a nationally syndicated radio show on personal finance.

In his spare time, Jared is a progressive house DJ and speaks frequently on mental health issues at financial institutions. Additionally, Jared is an adjunct professor in the business program at Coastal Carolina University. He was also an investment strategist at Mauldin Economics.

In this fascinating and insightful Investing Matters interview Jared Dillian a survivor of 9/11, financial educator, former Wall St. trader, with over twenty-five years’ experience of the markets, shares many investing, trading and personal finance lessons and strategies on how to achieve a “No Worries” stress-free financial life.

Topics and discussions include:

-Desired to a writer and author

-Serving a spy for Coast Guard Intelligence.

-His catalyst for going part-time to Business School.

-Outworking everyone else.

-His first lucky break in finance.

-His hunger and determination to succeed.

-Working on the Trading Floor

-Working at Lehman Brothers as an Index Arbitrage trader & later as the Head of the ETF trading desk.

-Lessons learned at Lehman Brothers

-Rejecting a huge financial salary & security.

-Backing himself & the importance of thinking big.

-The Daily Dirtnap newsletter growth & success.

- How & when he started investing and his current Investing/trading philosophy.

-Always being contrarian.

-Buying out of favour stocks.

-Sentiment a recurring winning strategy.

-Huge OIL qualitative trading success.

-Psychology.

-Deep value investing

-No stock, no index, no mutual fund is safe.

-Generating risk adjusted returns.

-Minimising volatility.

-The characteristics and straits of success investors & traders.

-Hedge Funds

-Growth of Private Equity and potential risks.

- How to “Live in the Noise” of the markets and optimise your decision making.

-The rationale behind the use of “Invest then Investigate”.

-The book, No Worries: How to live a stress-Free Financial Life.

-Why F.I.R.E. is a dumb philosophy.

-- Why we can all choose how much money we earn.

- The optimal way to minimize financial risk and stress.

-Buying Vs Renting property

-The Cult of Home ownership

- The rule 150.

-Investing diversification.

-The awesome portfolio of ETFs.

-Stocks/Bonds/Cash/Gold/Real Estate

-Trading Bitcoin

-The emergence of the Bitcoin ETF

-The option value of cash

-Personal finance and the Abundance Mindset

As the Biologist, Researcher and two-time Pulitzer Prize winner, Edward Osborne Wilson stated, “In our attempt to make scientific discoveries every problem is an opportunity and the more difficult the problem the greater will be the importance of its solution”.

With that in mind welcome to this latest episode in the Investing Matters podcast series with the hugely talented and globally respected, Dr. Jeremy Skillington, the Scientist, Biotechnologist, Entrepreneur and CEO of London AIM listed, £50 million market cap Poolbeg Pharma.

Poolbeg Pharma plc is a biopharmaceutical company that is engaged in the development of medicines to address the unmet need for infectious and other prevalent diseases. The Company is involved in the development of a range of pharmaceutical products. Its product pipeline includes POLB 001, POLB 001 Oncology, POLB 001 Influenza, AI Programs, Oral GLP-1R Agonist.

Its POLB 001 aims to target the Cytokine Release Syndrome (CRS) associated with many cancer immunotherapy treatments which impacts 70% of patients undergoing CAR T or Bispecific Antibody therapy. The company uses artificial intelligence to identify infectious disease drug targets & treatments.

Its Oral GLP-1R Agonist is a delivery system which offers a scalable, natural, Generally Regarded As Safe (GRAS) approved solution for the oral delivery of metabolic peptide cargo to specific areas of the gut and into systemic circulation for the treatment of diabetes, obesity and other metabolic diseases.

Jeremy whose father worked at a Pfizer manufacturing plant in Cork, Ireland, “Always had an interest in the sciences”. Which would first take him to Munster Technical University where he attained his Diploma in Food Science and Technology, followed by his Biochemistry, Bachelor of Science Degree with Honours from the University of Galway (UoG). He also later attained his Biochemistry PhD from UoG.

After completing his PhD Jeremy did Postdoctoral research at the University of California, San Francisco for three years before entering the Biotech industry in the Business Development group at Genentech in California in 2002. Throughout his time at Genetech up to 2009 Jeremy played a significant role in executing over forty licensing, investment and collaborations with biotech companies globally.

Jeremy recalls, “how he learned so much from this hard-working, driven, smart but friendly and supportive Genetech Business Development team. With two stand out people in those early days, being his hiring manager, Dr Jonathan Lewis, an Oxford educated Immunologist and investment banker, and an industry veteran, Dr Jack Obijeski. Who both took him under their wings and showed him the biotech ropes.

Since returning to Ireland in 2009, Dr Jeremy Skillington has crammed in an awful lot globally, including investing in the Medtech space, being the third employee of the very significant Irish biotech firm Inflazome, which after a mere four years achieved a landmark exit in September 2020 when it was purchased by Swiss drug giant Roche, This after Inflazome’s leadership team with Jeremy heading up its business development had driven its phenomenal success. Then in 2021 he took “the call“ from seasoned serial entrepreneur Cathal Friel to become the CEO of Poolbeg Pharma. Jeremy has held that role since mid-2021 prior to Poolbeg Pharma’s AIM listing in July 2021.

Dr Jeremy Skillington, CEO of Poolbeg Pharma now has over twenty-one years’ experience in the biotech industry, please listen to his fascinatingly insightful Investing Matters interview. As he shares insights on the global and Irish MedTech, Pharma, Biotech industry, angel investing via the Medtech Syndicate, the importance having “skin in the game”, leading and investing his money into Poolbeg Pharma’s long-term potential, due to its world class leadership team and robust pipeline of innovative products and much more.

To quote Melinda Gates, “When we invest in women, we invest in a powerful source of global development”. With that in mind, welcome to this insightful global women’s, diversity and inclusivity champion Alexandra McGuigan, the CEO and Founder, of Inclusive Asset Management.

Inclusive AM is a consulting firm focused on changing the face of the asset management industry. They do so by giving visibility to diverse investment talent and helping them to access wider networks to improve their chances at success.

‍The Asset Management industry favours larger fund managers as they are deemed less risky. The problem is, as assets under management grow, returns tend to decrease incrementally. This means that new innovative fund managers never make it to scale, and investment returns are stifled by size.

Inclusive AM’s goal is to change that and therefore change where capital flows go, to ensure the growth potential of innovative fund managers. Although women and minorities are overrepresented in top quartile investment performance, they end up managing one cent in the dollar. This presents an exceptional opportunity for allocators to have greater diversity in their portfolios. Inclusive AM works with diverse managers to change the demographics of the investment industry.

Prior to founding Inclusive AM, Alexandra was the Global Development Director for 100 Women in Finance and was responsible for all business development and corporate engagement.

A sales and marketing strategist with a specialisation in alternative investments, Alexandra has successfully helped international fund managers navigate and develop a presence in the APAC region, raising over $2.5 billion AUM from institutional investors.

Based in Singapore, Alexandra has also held senior roles at Tribeca Investment Partners, SHED Enterprises, and Investec, where she was responsible for developing and implementing sales and marketing strategy for products and new business opportunities.

Alexandra has worked with international fund managers, across asset classes including GAM, Adveq, Och Ziff, Diamond Asset Advisors and Qblue Balanced.

She started her career in Asset Management at BNY Mellon Asset Management.

Alexandra is a Chartered Alternative Investment Analyst and a CAIA Singapore Chapter Executive. She holds an MBA majoring in International Business from UTS and has a BA Media Communications, Sydney University. She has studied in Australia, France and the USA.

Although fewer females are in the stockmarket or are in leading positions as CEOs, CFOs, Founders, Fund Managers, Asset Managers or Wealth Managers, numerous studies have found that women investors over the long-term outperform their male peers. In this fascinatingly insightful Investing Matters interview Alexandra McGuigan will share with you the inspiring career path and investment journey that has taken her around the world, enabled her to speak various languages and light the entrepreneurial leadership spark in many men and countless women around the world in her quest to make the Asset Management industry far more inclusive.

Topics and discussions also include:

-Career starting in the Wine Industry

-Passion for education and continual learning

-Roles, experiences & lessons working in the Asset Management industry

-Personal investing strategy

-Role as CEO & overview of Inclusive AM

-Benefits of diversity & inclusivity for Corporations

-Gender pay gap

-Imposter Syndrome & Confidence

-Importance of good leaders & mentors

-Private Equity, supply chains

-Financial discipline / Superannuation / Compounding

-Good investment opportunity

-Succeeding against the odds

- 100 Women in Finance / Gender Equality / Diversity / Inclusion

- CAIA Association

-Association of Investment Companies research

-The importance of backing yourself & self-development

-Raising your first billion dollars

-Unconscious bias

-Inspiring & investing in others

-Plans to launch a Woman’s Fund

- and much more