Share Chap

"We are confident that we will emerge from this crisis as a stronger business ready to return to sustainable and profitable growth." Nick Wilkinson (CEO, Dunelm, 16th April 2020) I have spent a lot of time writing about theory since I started writing my blog back in January 2020. My initial intention had been to take readers on a walk through approach and practicalities, spending a lot of time initially on psychology, then methodology. The rapid change in temperature of the Market at the back end of February 2020 caused me to change direction in my writing. I've written a lot recently about how we can respond as investors in times like these. It was always my intention to move on to application sooner rather than later. I'm now going to start applying some of the theory to real life situations. As my first company in focus, I thought I'd look at Dunelm (DNLM). I hold no position in it and I don't tip (or am qualified to do so)*. I write simply to educate.

There is only one side of the market and it is not the bull side or the bear side, but the right side. Jesse Livermore I began my real investment journey* in 2011 amidst the embers of the 2008 Crash, so this is the first Bear Market that I have lived through as an investor in individual stocks, albeit there have been plenty of "Corrections" since then.  For the uninitiated, a "Correction" is where stocks drop 10% or more from their highs. A "Bear Market" is where stocks drop 20% or more from their highs I allowed most of my trading portfolio to drop into cash at an early stage of the Drop (through use of trailing stops) and left my long term investment portfolio (which is balanced between equities, gilts, bonds and gold- almost entirely in indices and Investment Trusts & Funds) largely intact. The only major buy I made was an increase of my gold weighting about a month ago. I have spent a fair part of the current Bear Market watching from