Top Ten Retail Investor Buys & Sells for week ending 3 August 2007

Angus Rigby, Chief Executive Officer, TD Waterhouse, commented: As we enter August, British Airways (BA) has taken off on a bad footing this month with news of foul play over price fixing following investigations by the Office of Fair Trading (OFT). The OFT said BA had admitted to colluding with rival Virgin to fix passenger fuel surcharges on long haul flights from August 2004 to January 2006. The fuel charge fiasco has left our customers frosty towards the stock with shares sold heavily this week.

The share price of BA has been on a downward spiral since February this year, down 4 per cent this month on last and is heading closer to annual lows of 370p hit a year ago. Indeed, August 2006 was a similarly turbulent month for the Company as the share price plummeted in line with investor confidence as the airline industry at large struggled with unprecedented security measures at UK airports following a spate of national terror threats.

Aero engine maker Rolls-Royce also saw strong trading activity this week. Despite a positive broker upgrade note from Credit Suisse and strong interim results reported this week, our customers’ spirits have been dampened by concerns over the weakening US dollar and increasing raw material costs in the first half of the year.

Continuing developments in the banking sector dominated the news once more this week after reports that ABN Amro fat cats could be in line for substantial pay increases if Barclays succeeds in its €65.6 billion bid for the Dutch bank. Barclays was optimistic on its chances of a successful takeover bid and our customers were upbeat on the stock this week after the Company reported robust interim profits, with growth up 12 per cent and a drop in bad debts.

TD Waterhouse Top Ten Retail Investor Buys & Sells for week ending 3 August 2007

Top 10 Buys
1 Royal Bank of Scotland
2 Standard Life
3 Lloyds TSB
4 Northern Rock
5 Vodafone Group
6 Barclays
7 Tesco
8 GlaxoSmithKline
9 Tanfield Group
10 BP


Top 10 Sells
1 Standard Life
2 Bradford & Bingley
3 Royal Bank of Scotland
4 Vodafone Group
5 Sainsbury (J)
6 Rolls Royce Group
7 Scottish & Southern Energy
8 Tanfield Group
9 British Airways
10 Lloyds TSB Group


TD Waterhouse Top Ten buys and sells are measured as the number of trades carried out in each stock over the previous 7 days.