Oh well, here it goes.
Mr. Tan is not front-loading his newsletter readersLet's get two things clear first. One, every buy and sell decisions for ICap fund management business is done by Mr. Tan himself. Two, buy or sell call by the newsletter advisory is done by his analysts. Of course, he will supervise, but he usually won't change his analysts' recommendation (only once he changed it as far as i was still there).
Why the conflicting calls between the two? Well, the main reason is because you are referring to a
not-frequently-updated stock call list. The only time a buy/hold/sell call of a stock is being reviewed is either when; 1) The stock is being featured in the newsletter; or 2) Quarterly reporting. So, when Mr. Tan sell off a particular stock from his ICap fund due to whatever reason, the old recommendation is still there. And no, he never ask his analysts to issue a report or publish a short note subsequently to reflect his disposal. Hence, it appears that he is front loading, but he is not. You are just looking at an outdated stock call list.
Furthermore, there is no target price in their stock call list, simply because there is none in the first place. So you don't even know when a Buy call stock is already overvalued.
And do you guys really believe that the newsletter have the "power" to push up share price of a particular stock? A piece of advice if you really want to use the newsletter to invest. Just look at the paper portfolio in the newsletter and monitor what is the latest purchase or disposal by him. That is his conviction pick (which will usually be what he buy or sell for his actual fund portfolio). Ignore the stock call list and maybe also the company analysis.
Btw, i am the analyst who put a Hold recommendation on Axiata. Previous Buy call was done by other analyst who left the company shortly after i joined. In between the period i joined the company and issuing a report on Axiata, there is this Axiata rights issue and disposal by Mr. Tan (of which, the Buy recommendation was never updated during this period). Will this clear things up?
No "China Wall". In fact, why need "China Wall" at all in the first place in ICap?To say investment advisory and fund management business is run by different group of staff is half-truth. After all, Mr.Tan is the fund manager, and he is also the head of research.
Mr. Tan have a team of analysts to cover stocks, and the main purpose is now more towards churning out report to fill in the weekly newsletter, rather than finding investment ideas for his fund. This is especially true after majority of his senior analysts left the company. On the fund management side, practically there is no one else except Mr.Tan.
What is the main purpose for Icap to have subscription fee based weekly newsletters?