Well that was a damp squib: AIM-listed Minoan (MIN) announced its interims as expected this morning, but disappointingly there was no confirmation of the travel & leisure sale, nor of what will happen with Cavo Sidero. We are again left waiting – although not for long, I hope. There were, however, one or two little tit-bits in there to offer at least some encouragement.

This was the moment I had been thinking about for most of the 14 hours and 33 miles to keep me going but I could not have imagined the wonderful reception we would get at the Camp as you can see below.

There is nothing like a bunch of regulatory news statements in the morning to get your blood pumping...although I guess a profit warning or so is never good for the heart...or the bank balance. Anyhow the cardiac and fiscal resuscitation units were on standby earlier as three names that have disappointed me at various times in recent months updated the market.

A latest quarterly report from Berkeley Energia (BKY) includes “the government of the region demonstrated its continued support for the Salamanca mine in June when it rejected a resolution from opposition groups requesting that the company's potential €250 million investment be halted”, though also there’s been “issued a notice to the municipality recommending that the Urbanism Licence should not be awarded until two outstanding items regarding the licence are resolved”…

A trading statement from LED lighting products, wiring accessories and portable power products manufacturer and distributor, Luceco (LUCE) includes “the group expects to deliver year-on-year adjusted operating profit growth in the second half of 2018. The group's order book has improved and management remain confident in the group's long term growth potential”. So why currently a decline of more than 8% in the share price, to 34p, in response?...

Hello, Share Shovers. There are times when I'm so confident that a share is worth your further investigation that I feel I should keep on banging the drum. I sometimes do this when there is no immediate news to go on. And that's for the simple reason that when jolly news does break it's not always the best time to dive in. One should try waiting till the kettle is off the boil.

Globo (GBO) was a fraud which claimed to have cash but did not and is now bust.  Its downfall was precipitated by ShareProphets publishing a Gabriel Grego dossier after the FT and snot-gobbler Dan McCrum merely tipped off the CEO allowing him to dump all his shares and failed to publish. Now the Financial Reporting Council says that it is letting auditor Grant Thornton off the hook and dropping its enquiry.

Amazed to find that one of her share tips had actually gone up, Jo Hart of the Midas column In the mail on Sunday  advised the poor saps who follow her to top slice or sell Optibiotix (OPTI) on Sunday. Just as a buy note from Ms Hart is seen by most folks as a sure sign that a PR puff campaign is underway and that you should sell at once, the Midas sell stance seems to have pushed the shares ever higher as the chart below demonstrates. Yes £1 hit again, another case of ouzo Cynical Bear needs to send me. I discussed why I’d not be selling at this price as I expect fireworks soon HERE. Meanwhile…

Some might see Foxtons Group (FOXT) as a good recovery play given how far the share price has fallen in recent times... but is it?...

I see that AIM-listed Tern plc (TERN) shares are now trading on a spread of 24-25p, which is below the 26p placing price of last week. As Tom Winnifrith often reminds us, shares which drop below the placing price tend to head lower still.

First of all thanks for all the kind comments on the Woodlarks walk. The final photos and my final thoughts are HERE. It is not too late to donate HERE and that is what David Lenigas should do now as he gets his twitter knickers in a twist over his pre-placing tweets on UK Oil & Gas (UKOG). He now says on twitter he was an insider -in the US that would be a perp walk admission. The shameless old ramper is now batting for Angus Energy (ANGS). Elsewhere I cover Optibiotix (OPTI) and the odd Midas call, Wolf Minerals (WLFE), N4 Pharma (N4P), Arden Partners (ARDN) and Goldplat (GDP). Back to Woodlarks: next year I seek volunteers to join the 4 rogue bloggers. I now have 4 (PR genius Steffi, daughter Olaf, my pal the Euro loon Jonathan Price and Steve Moore), if you are up for it email tomat49@gmail.com

AIQ (AIQ) joined the Standard List in early January and spent most of the first four months of its life suspended due to a disorderly market, had to correct its admission document because it had missed out some information and steps had to be taken to remove some internet references to businesses which, we are told, it had nothing to do with. It was a shambles. This morning it released its interim numbers to April.

For a decade, investors around the world have ridden a rising tide of more than $12 trillion - the extra cash pumped into the global system by key central banks to counter the deepest financial crisis since the Great Depression and its aftermath. Now that flow of so-called quantitative easing is turning to the ebb of quantitative tightening, and markets are - perhaps not coincidentally - showing increasing volatility.

This may surprise a few people given my pessimism on the housing market and the housebuilding sector but I am not bricking it about the world of bricks. Now maybe it is because I am a sentimental old fool who lives near an area whose heritage is wrapped up in the world of bricks, but my simple observation is...

I commented at the start of the month (HERE) that it could be the end of the road for Lord Razzall and the gang at Boxhill Technologies (BOX) after a disappointing trading statement and I understand things are getting worse but before going into that, I need to cover the shoddy deal from earlier in the month in which yet another payment company is jettisoned!

Over the years the one area of growth where Range Resources (RRL) has really excelled has been the number of shares in issue, with 8.5 billion of them now trading following the latest placing. The oil and gas company, which has interests in Trinidad and Indonesia, announced last week that it has completed yet another placing, and this time it raised £1 million at a share price of 0.11p.

Hello, Share Pedlars. Pearson (PSON) is still perceived mainly as a publisher of printed material. But that is changing fast. For example, it used to own the Financial Times and the Economist. But it sold them off. The famous firm is moving more towards e-publishing, including its very prominent online educational courses.

This week, we use the 38,000+ stock tips currently performance-tracked on the Stockomendation platform to analyse the relationship between a company’s size and the level of scrutiny it typically receives from brokers and tipsters.

The 33 mile walk from Horse Hill to Woodlarks was actually a bit longer for myself and super-fit Dan Levi, Brokerman Dan. At about fifteen miles Dan and Lucian were striding ahead and myself and Andrew Bell were somewhat lagging. We came to a junction and the sign clearly said head left, downhill. And so we did that. Worrying that we might have made the wrong decision I called Lucian who assured us that it was okay to follow the sign at the gate. He said Dan and he would wait.

I am ever more convinced that there is some big news coming from AIM-listed Minoan (MIN) and that it could well be this coming week. We have been told the sale of the travel and leisure business is on the way, and that the company expects to settle the Hillside loan which has been extended (yet again) to a long-stop date of the end of August. But we have also been told a general meeting will be required.