Determining the best AIM shares to watch can be difficult, especially as the number of resources available can sometimes be sparse. This article uncovers some of the tips, tricks and strategies AIM investors might deploy in order to find the top AIM shares on the market.
Regulatory News Services (RNS):
For over 300 years, the London Stock Exchange has produced detailed market information for companies and investors. Starting out as a twice-weekly paper publication distributed solely to the London business community, it has transformed into a continuous flow of electronic information to all corners of the financial world.
Launching in 2000, its RNS Internet Service now allows for companies listed on AIM to easily fulfill their regulatory obligations, providing them with a portal to quickly submit their announcements to the market in the required format and style. From an investor’s standpoint, it provides a single platform to easily check on the latest company updates in real time.
Although emanating from the London Stock Exchange, there are several other sites that pull through this information in a much more logical structure − FE Investegate, for instance, has a much more user-friendly platform to interact with.
Proactive Investors:
Based on the regulatory news emanating from the above, but with the addition of exclusive updates, video interviews with directors, and column contributions from industry experts, Proactive Investors is one of the best news sites for financial information. The ability to filter the news by market, together with the option of filtering by sector, makes it a site I imagine most investors visit on a daily basis to find AIM shares to watch.
Notably, Proactive Investors also has a selection of subsidiary sites − namely, Mining Capital, Oil Capital, Tech Capital, Biotech Capital and Capital Network. Capital Network can be especially informative at times, providing much more in-depth analytical coverage, offering the option of downloading reports specific to certain companies − many of which are listed on AIM.
In terms of column contributions, the Hybridian Breakfast News is probably most relevant, especially for anyone wanting to follow new listings on AIM.
DirectorsTalk Interviews:
Another good site for breaking news is DirectorsTalk Interviews. Clear in their purpose of helping articulate company objectives, news and decisions more clearly to help private investors make more of the right decisions, faster, this site features companies listed on both UK and US indices but with a strong AIM-component to their reporting.
Particularly useful are the broker ratings that are regularly updated from the likes of Barclays Capital, Liberum Capital, Citigroup and finnCap.
The fact that company directors will often release an RNS whenever they have been interviewed by this site shows the gravitas that the site has within the community.
Bulletin Boards:
A practical way to save time and effort going from site to site trying to uncover the latest AIM-specific news and insight, is to make use of the AIM bulletin boards that exist on the likes of Hargreaves Lansdown, London South East, and NewsNow.
Combining news articles from sites such as Proactive Investors and DirectorsTalk Interviews, along with other sites including City AM, ShareCast, Mining Weekly and Money Observer, these bulletin boards are a great way to keep up-to-date with the latest AIM-related news and announcements.
Discussion Forums:
From the FTSE 100 to the FTSE AIM-All Share, all companies listed should have their own designated discussion board on London South East. Whilst some boards may only have the occasional post, a lot have really high levels of engagement.
There are obviously certain users on these forums with a very narrow viewpoint on their investment, but there are many others who are there to simply facilitate an open discussion and to share relevant information. As such, whenever certain companies are experiencing a strong upward or downward trend in share price, it is often informative to refer to the company’s forum to gauge the consensus for the logic behind the movement.
Rampometer:
To uncover shares possibly being ramped on such forums, there is a useful resource called a Rampometer that detects unsavoury behaviour.
Probably doing the tool an injustice with an explanation, but through tracking certain indicative phrases such as ‘fill your boots‘ and ’10 bag‘ across various platforms and forums, the website keeps a leaderboard for the most ramped shares in the last 24 hours, as well as the top rampers to be wary of.
Although there will always be individuals who are just simply excited about the prospects of their current holdings, the tool can prove useful for checking against any serial rampers that are trying to create hysteria around a company’s current share price.
Social Media:
A place where you are even more likely to come across individuals trying to ramp a particular share is Twitter. A quick search within the platform will uncover plenty of users making reference to their successes on the market, but please proceed with absolute caution − better yet, stay away.
If you do decide to use Twitter, though, my suggestions would be to follow reputable financial journalists who have an interest in smaller cap companies, along with investment research and advisory companies, as well as the news sites mentioned above, such as Proactive Investors and Vox Markets. Also make sure to follow AIM-Watch on Twitter.
Google Alerts:
Moving on, providing that the company isn’t one referenced constantly for a range of topics unrelated to the company’s share price (e.g. ASOS, Boohoo), Google Alerts can also be a useful tool for tracking your investments, especially as it provides the option of having alerts sent to you as soon as the news is released.
I should probably point out that alerts aren’t quite as instantaneous as you might hope, plus you have to sift through a large number of updates that prove more of a distraction than they are pertinent to the share price, but it remains a good way for safeguarding against being left in the dark on any important news relating to your AIM investment.
Investor Relations:
Something else often overlooked is simply making use of a company’s investor relations pages. Not only can you find the latest news, results and reports, you can also find a huge amount of other information pertaining to the fact that under AIM Rule 26 each company must maintain a website on which a large amount of relevant information must be available free of charge. On top of this, there should also be a dedicated service offered for any investment-related queries you might have.
Broker Recommendations:
Broker recommendations and price targets are projections of a company’s share price performance across a given period of time. Typically updated following the most recent trading update or financial report, they provide an insight into the sentiment shared amongst industry professionals towards a particular company. They are, of course, highly subjective and can often completely miss the mark, but they are still important to track both before and after buying shares in a particular company. A good place to go for the latest broker views is Shareview from Equiniti.
AIM-Watch.com:
Finally, AIM-Watch has been carefully put together to help investors passionate about finding the best AIM shares to watch. Here you can find insights specific to AIM companies, insights specific to the trading of small cap companies more generally, the clear breakdown of AIM companies by sector, the listing of all important trading and company updates, as well as a review of the most price-sensitive AIM news and information to hit the market on a daily basis.
In conclusion, then, the decision to invest through AIM in what are relatively small companies does not equate to putting blind hope in a share price that you simply have to hope will go in the right direction. Using these resources, investors can make strategic investment decisions that they can truly get behind, as well as closely monitor for any changes in sentiment.
Now that you’ve found several good AIM shares to watch, when would be the right to invest? For this, explore our introduction to technical analysis, starting with an overview of the questions to always ask yourself before pulling the trigger.
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