Welcome to another weekend's mutterings from the mountains, and to kick things off today, just a wee note about 'mentoring' emails - my replies can be terse thereto. Please don't take offence if you happen to receive a somewhat brief response. Other than within these ramblings, longwinded just ain't my style!

So what's new this weekend? Not a heck of a lot really - just the same scams working their way through the 'system' - the banks reporting writedowns of toxic waste exposure while bribing shareholders to stay on board by offering increased dividend payouts - HBOS and RBS being the most recent offenders. And supposedly "prudent Scottish companies" too - shame on them! It appears HSBC will announce a $17bn writedown during the week - I wonder by how much they'll increase THEIR dividend? And if you believe that the current writedowns represent ALL the toxic waste lurking somewhere in the murkiest corners of bank balance sheets, then you'll believe that these increased dividends are indeed the "sign of strength" these dodgy operators would have you believe.... and talking of "dodgy", the media has been full of the fact that Tesco has been avoiding UK corporation tax by basing property - related deals offshore - it seems that around one third of the seven hundred biggest UK companies pay no corporation tax. The chattering classes of course are deeply offended by this fact and "somebody should put a stop to it". Maybe the same people should concentrate a wee bit more on government waste of taxpayers' money? Network Rail has just been fined £14m for being useless. Remind me please - who actually owns Network Rail? It wouldn't be the taxpayer, would it? So if YOU happen to pay UK taxes, YOU have just contributed to that fine! Think about it...and for sure, if the likes of Tesco et al had to pay more in tax, what might they do about it? Maybe put up prices to cover the cost? The other thing of course (and I'm well aware this is a Williams rant - but it is one of the few things, other than snowboarders, that really gets me going...) is the question of what successive UK governments have done with all the North Sea oil revenues? How come Norway has a "sovereign wealth fund" (SWF) of over £300bn from oil revenues and the UK has exactly zilch? (A lot less than "zilch" in fact when you consider the level of public sector borrowing.)

And the Network Rail head honcho has just collected his knighthood - when is the average UK taxpayer going to wake up and yell "enough already!" Never, probably - not even when booze doubles in price to "reduce binge drinking". What a great excuse for yet another tax hike, eh? Mind you, taxes need to rise in order to cover MPs' expenses claims - what a great idea, having an investigation into the level of these. About time too! Only trouble is, it's a committee of MPs doing the investigating. Yup, tax hikes will definitely be needed then. It's a bit like all the so -called "green" taxes - just another scam from start to finish. But at least you won't be getting free plastic bags when you're accosted by some politico in a shopping centre now that Green Gordy has banned them from government use. Gosh - he has saved the planet single - handedly. What a star.

Talking of plastic bags - Markies' latest wheeze is a good one - prop up dwindling sales figures by charging for 'em! Brilliant idea - that will turn the balance sheet around in no time.

Oh yes - while I remember (and maybe the last reference to Northern Wreck for a wee while in these ramblings) I see that the UK taxpayer (ie YOU - if you qualify for that dubious distinction) is paying a tidy wee salary to the new chief exec. Only £90,000. Fair enough.....oh - sorry - nearly forgot to add - that is per MONTH.....

Step forward the next scam (mentioned before too of course - these things never go away...) - according to the official body in charge, there are "insufficient funds available" for the cleaning up of atomic waste. It's not just in the banking environment then.

And I note Gordy's wee glove puppet has warned of "difficult times ahead for the UK economy." Ahead of the curve as usual. But nae worries Allie - as you also said, "I believe we will get through this turbulence..." Yes Allie, that is certainly true - but in what state will the UK economy be, after you have "got through it"?

Returning to bank toxic waste (if you are a total newcomer to WICS, please type "toxic waste" into the search engine and you'll find more than one reference thereto) it seems a German bank plans to sue UBS (a huge Swiss bank) over CDO - related losses, on the basis that "UBS acted solely in its own interests and not those of the client". Gosh - a bank acting solely in its own interests? Never! The blame game has only just begun, trust me. So many lawsuits will be flying around that they'll gather a couple of billion freebie air miles in no time at all.

Great timing by Visa for its proposed IPO (Initial Public Offering) of half its business. $18bn is what they expect to raise. Hmm. Desperate times call for desperate measures eh? They have high hopes in a very cash - strapped marketplace. Over the past 60 odd years until the start of 2007, auctions in the USA of municipal bonds "failed" 44 times, according to my USA sources. "Failed" means that not enough bidders wanted to buy so the sale was "pulled". In the past 12 months alone, 639 bond auctions have failed. What might that figure suggest, eh?

And it appears that Yanks are raiding their pension funds - the "401(k)" arrangements that let them squirrel away money for retirement - as never before. They can take money out - but it is added to their income for tax purposes - and there is a 10% penalty to account for too, for those under fifty - nine and a half years old. Car repossessions are at an all time high - and so it goes on. The FDIC (Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation) - a government body that guarantees the first $100000 of bank depositors' money - is advertising for people with insolvency/receivership management experience and it seems that between one and two hundred small to medium sized American banks are expected to go bust over the next two years or so. Scary stuff! But the jobs are well enough paid - up to $180000 a year - not bad for picking over carcasses!

Anyway - onward to a chart or two - but first, a wee reminder to read the email from "Ernie" in WICS of 10th February this year. Print it out and frame it, then put it up where you can see it every time you fire up your computer!

First today I have put up the chart of Ambac again (from 17/02/08 WICS) because last week, the US rating agencies like Moodys, reaffirmed the AAA rating that it has always enjoyed. In other words, it is deemed to be good for all its potential debts even if the bonds it insures go under. If ever there was a scam, this is the mother of 'em all! Cetainly Mr Market has been unimpressed - if "AAA" were actually worth the paper it is written on, what might you have expected the share price to do? It's the main reason why I bang on about banks and "more bad news to come" - once it becomes obvious that much of the toxic waste is actually uninsured because the insurer itself is bust, "writedowns" will have to become "writeoffs" and bank balance sheets will be trashed - which is when the lawsuits will really start to fly. Buy shares in paper manufacturers? Plenty will be needed! (That of course is NOT trading advice!) Next we'll look at Tesco - twice in fact - and nothing to do with "the news" as mentioned above. Trust me - "news" is all rubbish when it comes to trading. Indeed, although it amuses me to rant on in these mutterings (and hopefully it sometimes gives YOU a chuckle too!) the truth is that as far as the Williams household goes, pretty much everything emanating from the fourth estate is utter rubbish. "Unbiased reporting" is as good an example of oxymoron as you'll find anywhere. A bit like "honest politician". Anyway, Tesco is there to let us look at trendline breaks, and also at a triangle. As always, type such words into the WICS search engine for more - if you want more! Finally we'll examine the Aveva chart - a great example perhaps of "patience" protecting you from a potentially losing trade. (It was featured in video 1053 if you have access to these).

And just one other thing today - it surprises me how little Google gets used in this game - if you see something/read something that interests you - eg the mention above of SWFs - and you want to know more - use Google! It works really well. The same applies to a share - if you see a chart of interest, certainly use the WICS search engine first, just in case the stock in question has already been discussed - and then go to Google and type in something like "Mapeley News" or whatever. You will be surprised at what you can learn, and since it's YOUR money that's at stake in a trade, it often amazes me how little research some people do! Just one thing though - anent my comments above about journalists in general - be careful. Mention of a takeover bid (as in the Mapeley example above) is fair enough, and useful in understanding why the price recently shot up. Gossip regarding the private life of a chief exec (as with Lord Browne of BP a while ago) is of no possible trading benefit. And don't email me regarding 'stories' you have read! Come to your own conclusions in that regard. (The Mapeley story, by the way, is of NO trading benefit as such - but it does help you understand why the price went up.) And if you can find "no stories" about a share you're interested in, so what? All you "wasted" was a few minutes of your time.

Anyway, that's all for this weekend - with my dose of the cold disappearing fast, it's time for a slide down a piste or two before the lifts close, so all the best till next weekend.

Ian.

'IMPORTANT NOTICE: These WICS charts are for EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES ONLY. They represent only MY understanding of what is happening in the market for any particular share, stock, commodity or index. In NO circumstances should they be construed as recommendations to trade. If I choose to trade what I see, that is MY decision. YOU must, in turn, come to YOUR OWN conclusions about what action, if any, YOU might choose to take'.