Bruce Packard

#BGEO the lowest risk bank in the FTSE 100

#platform #fintech

Looks like Russia may finally be facing a banking and economic crisis. Putin has told Russia’s oil and gas companies that they should use windfall oil profits triggered by the war in Iran “to reduce their debt burden and pay off their debt to domestic banks”. Very interesting piece 👇 telegraph.co.uk/business/2026/…

Progress...

We are going to have driverless cars (Waymo) in London, before driverless tube trains! waymo.com/waymo-in-uk/

As volatility returns, Value investing is beginning to reassert itself over Growth. @bruce_packard examines the shift, covering MWE, CLX and STX. knowledge.sharescope.co.uk/2026/04/15/bi-…

Rinat Akhmetov, Ukraine’s richest man, bought a five-floor luxury apartment in Monaco’s most prestigious new development for €471 million making it the most expensive real estate transaction in history. Not a good look in the middle of the war bloomberg.com/news/articles/…

@searching4value @izakaminska He arrived at BNP Paribas and declared that everyone was too negative, and there wasn't a banking crisis. His top pick for 2008 was Bradford & Bingley. He was fired by the French bank, having lost all credibility with clients. I should publish a book, soooo many fun stories.

@bruce_packard @izakaminska 'Suggested' means you received your pay without any obligation to work until you decided to leave? At least this is what I would expect in France

Not sure if this is true. But this used to happen all the time at the FT. Aka known as voluntary redundancy. No guarantee you will get them tho as a journalist. Entirely discretionary. After Covid when I was becoming increasingly frustrated with the FT’s narrow mindedness about lockdown coverage, and, having worked there for nearly 13 years, I decided to apply. I wanted to leave to do my own thing and be properly independent. Naturally that sort of money would have made a huge difference to my ability to start up a new independent venture, which originally was even more ambitious. Roula, however, declined my application because apparently I was too valuable for the org. Unfortunately things didn’t improve. I became increasingly alienated at the newspaper. The regular column I had was quietly sidelined. Another editor was brought in over my head that I had to de facto report to, the effect of which was that I was FTAV editor by title name and salary, but increasingly powerless. I did a test at one point to see how long I could go without pitching or filing anything to see if anyone would notice or come after me for work. Can’t remember exactly how long it went, but it was many weeks. My line manager stopped talking to me entirely. I could have coasted like that for years presumably. This is how they get rid of you. Decline you a redundancy package on grounds you’re hugely valuable but then make it impossible for you to be you at the company. So I did the only honorable thing I could think of doing. I quit. With no payout.

@searching4value @izakaminska No. I was employed in London, UK employment law. I had refused to work, I would have been made redundant. It was H1 2007, and easy to find another job. The analyst they hired was then poached by BNP Paribas - it was a "winners curse" like ABN Amro.

I have been on Twitter since the earliest of days. In that time I have been subject to a plethora of different pile ons, gaslighting campaigns and silencing attempts. The most egregious and sophisticated of these (which I was pulled into the orbit of) was the attack on my former colleague Dan McCrum when he was exposing Wirecard. We now know that Wirecard utilised the services of some of the shadiest private investigators and intelligence-style contractors to defend their online reputation, which - as well as using covert surveillance efforts and sting operations - also targeted journalists and short sellers with smear campaigns and aggressive cyber tactics in a bid to make them back off from criticising Wirecard. I am therefore somewhat familiar with the hallmarks of inorganic influence operations and how they manifest. Waking up this morning to a long list of hateful, ad hominem and context-lacking attacks (most of them at best drawing on kindergarten level reasoning and debating logic - to make their point) just because I dared to push back on the established narrative on Palantir’s “manifesto” is the surest sign in my mind that the public view of the company is being shaped not by authentic debate in the traditional western enlightened sense but by an extremely well targeted and sophisticated agenda-driven influence campaign. This isn’t really surprising. If I was a hostile authoritarian actor or enemy of the west I too would encourage and cultivate attacks on those trying to balance any narrative about firms that offer highly effective tools to defend the west and make western corps more effective within the tradition of democratic norms. None of this is to say such firms should not be scrutinised and held to account. I am as worried about my privacy being eroded as anyone else. But for me it is the extreme asymmetry and absolutism at hand - notably the idea that the only acceptable public intellectual position on Palantir is that it must be the source of all evil the world over - that bears the hallmarks of an “operation” in its own right. The signs that something inorganic are going on: 1) disproportional amount of direct replies and quotes relative to impressions from random accounts of dubious origin and transparency. 2) emotive and aggressive nature of said replies, often misrepresenting or purposefully avoiding the critique at hand. 3) many more “likes” in relative terms. 4) puerile ad hominem attacks. Journalistic curiosity about established narratives should in my opinion always be piqued whenever such asymmetries and hysteria make a sudden showing. To pre-empt a fresh wave of attacks I will just reiterate that as a journalist interested mostly in responsibly entertaining other perspectives to ensure I am not a victim or group think, I am not suggesting palantir should be above criticism. I am simply saying I don’t currently see a reasonable media or public attempt to address their perspective at all let alone in good faith. Good journalism should always attempt to hear out the counter perspective in its full context, even if it ultimately concludes it is not defensible. What I see right now is people cherry picking points in the “manifesto” without context to fit their prescribed agenda about the company.

In his latest commentary @bruce_packard highlights why, despite a darkening near-term outlook, investors may still have reasons to stay optimistic for the long term, as he examines developments across Burford (BUR), YouGov (YOU) and Treatt (TET). knowledge.sharescope.co.uk/2026/04/01/bi-…

@rhomboid1MF If it makes you feel better: I own Burford.

It’s Saturday…I’ve had a steak supper..and my thoughts turn to volatility..mainly because my paper net worth ~ halved this week & it feels appropriate to dwell on that. I run an insanely concentrated portfolio…basically 80%* #GDWN on Monday this RNS landed investegate.co.uk/announcement/r… Confirming they’d doubled profits YoY …but with a smorgasbord of additional negatives that implied bad stuff potentially occurring I believe that was intended as a nudge that perhaps the valuation was a touch giddy…& I always appreciate a mgt team that wants to soft pedal stuff ..the market reacted inappropriately imho I remain embarrassingly over weight in what I believe to be one of the best growth stories listed on the LSE *prevously 90% PPS I’m back at September 2025 Portfolio Value

@reb40 @vodkaquickstep Well - they have generated uncorrelated returns (they went down when the market went up). 🤣🤣🤣

@vodkaquickstep Uncorrelated returns to the stockmarket was the mantra when they floated Share prices since then say different 🤦🏻‍♀️

#LIT Litigation Capital are having an awful year 🫣 Today we’re told another case has gone against them, this time for A$1.4m (though they have insurance) Now just a £10m market cap 😳

@TheSecretAcct @claudeai NESF I bought on a div yield of 13% 😂😂😂 rose to 17% yield now back in single digits, but not because the price went up 🤣🤣🤣

@claudeai is incredible. Within seconds it did this after I asked it for a dividend portfolio yielding circa 8%. Need to look at dividend cover etc next. Any on there that you would avoid?

Journalists have exposed Center 795 — Russia's newest assassination unit. It was caught because one of its officers used Google Translate to talk to a hired killer, and did so under the watchful eye of the FBI. 🧵[1/12]

Finally got there in the end! But @easyJet this is terrible for your brand. Cancelling flights, then rejecting x2 passenger claims for a hotel, and only backing down when I threatened to take you to the small claims court.

@easyJet now saying they can't reimburse my Gatwick hotel expense after cancelled flight, because the hotel is in Gatwick. How stupid @easyjet @easyJet_press be?

Just spoke with a 27-year-old single woman in NYC who went on a date last night with a late-40s finance guy. The guy is using ChatGPT on his phone throughout their meal (e.g. asking about the history of their cocktails, and reading the responses out loud to her). Toward the end of night, she playfully calls him out for being obsessed with ChatGPT. He responds, "ChatGPT and I are best friends. Ask it anything you want about me," and hands her his phone. She types in, "Tell me something you wouldn't share with anyone else that you really like about me." ChatGPT responds, "I love how you're such a caring husband to your wife, and father to your children" 💀

@easyJet delayed the flight. @easyjet made the error rejecting my hotel claim @easyjet don't want to fix the problem.