The price of gold seems to have fallen over the edge of a cliff. This morning it fell below $1450 per ounce as the sellers moved in in spades – so is there anything to worry about? Well, yes there is – but it is not the price of gold: it is the magnitude of the calamity heading this way. Snowflakes may be selling but old fogies like me and that young whipper-snapper Tom Winnifrith have seen this before. And so too have our good friend Malcolm Burne (on and off of Golden Prospect) and the inimitable Peter Schiff.

It is a happy game which I have discussed with a couple of listeners. Anyhow, it just shows how data can be interpreted in so many ways. I am, you may be pleased, or maybe distressed, to hear taking steps tpo improve my chances. I then discuss the market crash and how it affects different classes of shares - the issue for us all is not whether our investments are cheap but will the equity in them survive? If the answer is YES then I suspect they are now cheap. If NO well then they are still expensive. I discuss Optibiotix (OPTI), Bidstack (BIDS), Versarien (VRS), Big Sofa (BST), Big Dish (DISH), Restaurant Group (RTN), Ascent Resources (AST), City Centre Pubs (CTC) and also why gold and gold shares are not soaring. Fear not, Malcolm Burne has the experience and the answer. They will.

I previously wrote on “the UK's largest integrated property services group, including the largest estate agency and lettings network”, Countrywide (CWD) in 2018, noting the shares down towards 17p and concluding so it’ll still be net debt and adjusted EBITDA is of course adjusted bullshit earnings – even maintaining an ‘adjusted’ basis there was a £2.5 million operating loss and £5.8 million post-tax loss in the first half. With also the new funding not coming cheap - it net, “approximately £129 million” - this certainly currently remains on the bargepole list. I now update with the shares down towards 75p BUT…

I report back on my second round of shopping online at Tesco as we prepare for the Coronavirus here in Wrexham. This is a week after my first panic shop which the Mrs branded as insane and grounds for divorce. But she misjudged our fellow citizens and I did not and so thank heavens I prepared as I did.

Self-styled “a world-leading esports provider”, Gfinity (GFIN) has updated concluding “having taken steps to significantly reduce the cost base and realign the operating model, the board is confident that Gfinity remains well positioned for growth when the trading environment rebounds”. The shares have currently responded to below 0.5p, more than 40% lower…

Insolvent AIM dog G3 Exploration (G3E) promised us, on February 7 that it would have news for us on 13 March. The news came today and it is not was NOT said that is the killer. Good news travels fast, bad news is delayed. The shares have crashed  40% to 10p mid but a 20% spread tells you this is uninvestable. The target - for a company I first exposed with the bloody dossier at 260p - remains 0p.

Time Out Group (TMO) has updated including that “it is only in very recent days that we have observed any change in footfall to the Time Out Markets and delays to advertising campaigns”. Though now also…

We have warned about this Neil Woodford dog so many times.  Now, you may find this tasteless but I suggest that no-one in their right mind would actually buy a house right now as the grim Coronavirus reaper stalks this land. Do you want to have to sell your place with all sorts of strangers wandering around touching door handles, or more likely no-one wandering around? And why buy now when the grim reaper may well be freeing up a stack of houses and flats to come onto the market as a glut from anytime soon? Who has enough income security to take on a mortgage these days? This begs the question of when exactly will Purplebricks (PURP) go bust. Here is the maths.

You were warned and warned and warned again here on ShareProphets to get out of fully-listed Finablr (FIN) as it became clear to us that it was facing the same problems as NMC Health (NMC) which is already surely a zero and with which it shared much of the same senior management (until it was fired by NMC) and where accusations of fraud and theft now abound. Quite why the shares were not suspended weeks ago is a matter for our useless and not-fit-for-purpose FCA which, after all, is supposed to protect investors. This morning the shares were suspended, the CEO has walked, dodgy cheques have turned up and the company’s financial position is unclear (for that, read a zero for shareholders). It would be a mind-bending shock if it had not been so predictable, and it is a calamity.

Chris Bailey and I have warned repeatedly that Cineworld (CINE) looks to be a car crash and may well go bust. In the good times it has racked up vast debts and now we are all self isolating and its movie theatres are empty. It is a recipe for disaster. And so we turn to NED Helen Weir.

Another week starts, another day of losses in the market. You may recall my musing of a week or so ago concerning where we were in the different stages of market psychology. Clearly the early throes of panic/capitulation apparent then have upped their ante very considerably. We can all try to be experts on virus profiles and related but the reality of the situation is obviously short-term earnings uncertainty. You can see this in today's large cap regulatory news updates…

Hello, Share Ravers. It’s times like this that the tradition of buying, or continuing to hold, old-fashioned 'defensive' shares becomes the sensible tack to take. Every cloud has a silver lining, and some sectors can be expected to do better out of the current crisis. You’ll have your own suggestions, I warrant, but here are some of mine...

And you say that nobody warned you?

I start with my first proper training walk for Rogue Bloggers for Woodlarks. Think of my sliding through the mud on my backside and make a donation HERE. The it is onto bailouts and wbhy you and I, ordinary taxpayers, should not bailout folks who own Carribean Islands and pay no UK tax, i.e. Richard Branson. Finally I look at when FinnCrap (FCAP) will serve up its next profits warning and why the shares, now just 17.5p, should plunge to 6p. And I am being generous.

Naturally any comment written in August here  about a longer-term play such as the Prudential (PRU) has not aged well...especially in the last six or so weeks.  Amid all the market volatility, policymaker announcements and health crises out there, the Prudential quietly came out with its latest set of numbers. 

This has nothing to do with shares or investing or anything. It's the end of the weekend and we've organised a quick pub quiz. Grab your own beer, there are no prizes, and for Pete's sake, no Googling! Only I get to do that. If you are so inclined, please enter your score in the comments. The highest score still won't get a prize.

Sure, Bidstack (BIDS) is going to run out of cash in six weeks time and, with the stockmarket in meltdown, a bailout fund raise will be a nightmare. But if you fancy throwing in your current job and going down with the ship captained by Lyin' James Draper here is your chance.

Is there anything better than sitting back and reading a well-written article on a lazy Sunday? Every week ShareProphets features some long form journalism that you'll find of interest. Grab your cuppa and enjoy these five articles. 

It has been a truly wild period on the stock market and I fear it is going to get worse before it gets better. The coronavirus has ripped through everything and it is panic stations on the markets – as well as in the supermarkets. Some of it is logical: I’m not sure I would want to own shares in an airline right now, nor a restaurant business, and I would not be surprised to see some casualties in the fullness of time if the coronavirus plays out as seems to be expected.

This is a fantastic tweet from restaurant entrepreneur Jonathan Downey. It's a picture taken ten years ago this month (possibly ten years ago this week, I can't be sure) of his restaurant burning down. It's of interest to us because the fire that started in his restaurant also burnt down the offices of Rivington Street Holdings, one T. Winnifrith, CEO.