21st May, 2004

Long term investing: In March 1987, persuaded by a spivvy Antipodean broker, I put £500, a small fortune at the time, into an unlisted Australian company which owned the worldwide rights to market a wonder cure for AIDS. Less than 6 months later I mentally wrote the investment off as the Crash came along seemingly removing any prospect of this thing ever getting to the market, never mind whether or not the drug ultimately proving efficacious which given the callousness of the times we didn't really care about. Miraculously, whilst a cure for AIDS remains elusive, Flair Reseach was acquired in December that year, listed as Medirace and my £500 was suddenly worth £4,000. I took my profit and left my original stake invested. I shouldn't really have bothered. 16 years later, after various incarnations, and now courtesy of a bid by a Belgian pharma company which drove the share price of Celltech up 25% or so on the day, that £500 is worth just over £1,000. Doubling your money in 16 years somehow feels a bit inadequate, particularly against a background of the FTSE100 index which has tripled over this period...but maybe we've just been spoilt rotten.Interesting coincidence. I hadn't seen my spivvy Antipodean broker since 1988 and yet rushing for a train home from Green Park on the day that Celltech was bid for who should I bump into going down the stairs. You've guessed it. Shame on me....couldn't stop to say hello. Had a train to catch.