Russ Mould is AJ Bell's Investment Director. He has a Master's degree in Modern History from the University of Oxford and more than 30 years' experience of the capital markets.
He started out at Scottish Equitable in 1991 as a fund manager, where he had responsibility for the Nordic and Swiss equity markets. In 1993, Russ joined SG Warburg, now part of UBS investment bank, and worked there as an equity analyst covering the technology sectors for 12 years. He has also worked on IPOs and M&A deals. Russ was voted best analyst in the semiconductor sector in 2001 by Institutional Investor and reached the level of Managing Director in 2003 when he became head of UBS' global semiconductor research effort.
A member of the Chartered Institute for Securities and Investment (MSCI), Russ is responsible for providing written and video content for customers and clients. He also helps to build the company’s profile in print and broadcast media as part of AJ Bell's wider PR and brand team, working alongside the Investment Committee.
Russ joined Shares Magazine as technology correspondent in 2005 and took on the post of Editor in 2008. He was appointed as AJ Bell's Investment Director in 2013 following the company's acquisition of Shares' parent company, MSM Media. Russ regularly creates content across the AJ Bell website, including the Daily Market Update and Chart of the Week, and he hosts his own 'Breaking the Mould' weekly video series.
Outside of work, Russ is a qualified cricket coach, Italian speaker and avid fan of Doctor Who and NFL.
3 October 2019
Is the WeWork fiasco a warning of wider market volatility ahead?Wednesday’s 3.2% fall in the FTSE 100 is getting the new month off to a bad start and it may prompt some investors to think of the comment made by Mark Twain’s character Pudd’nhead Wilson: ‘October: This is one of the peculiarly dangerous months to speculate in stocks. The others are July, January, September, April, November, May, March, June...
2 October 2019
Flutter stakes its claim for a bigger slice of the American betting pieFlutter Entertainment was the second-best performer in the FTSE 100 in the third quarter of this year (and William Hill was on the fringes of the top ten in the FTSE 250) so someone, somewhere clearly felt the bookmaking sector was ripe for action – and Flutter’s announcement of an all-share deal to buy Canada’s Stars Group suggests they were...
18 September 2019
FTSE 100 down to five female CEOs as Laury prepares to leave KingfisherWhen Kingfisher boss Véronique Laury steps down on 25 September she will become the tenth FTSE 100 CEO to do so this year, with five other already-announced changes at the top yet to become effective. In addition, her departure, as she is replaced by Thierry Garnier, will take the number of female FTSE 100 CEOs down to just five following on from...
9 September 2019
PPI claims rush crimps Lloyds’ cash return plansLloyds is joining RBS and CYBG in admitting that it needs to set aside more money to cover a final rush of PPI compensation claims and – like CYBG – the provisions look set to hit the bank’s plans to return capital to shareholders.
Lloyds has stated that it will suspend its share buyback programme with some £600 million still to go, owing to the...
4 September 2019
Will the iPhone 11 launch give Apple’s shares a lift?Shares in Apple have surged by more than 40% from the low reached after the profit warning of 3 January but they have yet to recapture the all-time high reached last September, when the firm’s market valuation briefly exceeded $1 trillion. The major reason for this is poor earnings momentum and investors will be looking forward to the iPhone 11...
28 August 2019
Marks & Spencer ready to check-out of FTSE 100 in latest index reshuffleWe have already had four changes to the FTSE 100’s make-up in 2019, and further changes look likely at the reshuffle that will take place based on stock market valuations at the close on Tuesday 3 September. Marks & Spencer’s modest £3.5 billion stock market valuation means it looks doomed to automatic relegation and that would end the retailer’s...
6 August 2019
Three reasons why financial markets do not want to see tariffsWhen Donald Trump was running for President, financial markets were wary of him, not least because of his calls for tariffs and protectionist policies. For a while it looked like that had all been forgotten but the President’s latest threats about more tariffs from 1 September is prompting a rally in bonds and gold and a fall in equity markets to...
5 August 2019
HSBC’s Flint becomes fourteenth FTSE 100 boss to announce departure in 2019At least HSBC’s share price has been courteous enough not to go up on the departure of its CEO but this is likely to be of little particular comfort to John Flint, who becomes the fourteenth FTSE 100 boss to leave or announce plans to leave their post (with four of the group set to depart in 2020).
What may grate with Mr Flint is that he had the...
2 August 2019
Rising loan losses raise questions as RBS struggles with 2020 profit goalsNormally you would have thought that investors would be pleased to see a huge jump in pre-tax profits, an increase in the dividend and a meaty 12p-a-share special dividend but shares in Royal Bank of Scotland are still down, despite this tempting trio.
This is because the quality of the earnings increase is poor, with a capital gain on disposal...
30 July 2019
Centrica dividend cuts begs the question of who will be next (and a checklist to test how safe forecast pay-outs really are)As yet another fat dividend yield that looked too good to be true proves to be just that, with Centrica’s decision to slash its interim payment by more than half, income investors will be starting to wonder which FTSE 100 firm will be next to make the unkindest cut of all.
Vodafone, Marks & Spencer and now Centrica have all cut their dividends and...
4 July 2019
Why US stocks need to deliver strong Q2 earningsAmerica is celebrating Independence Day just as its Dow Jones Industrials, S&P 500 and NASDAQ Composite all reach new all-time highs thanks to hopes for a trade deal with China and lower interest rates from the US Federal Reserve. Improved trade flows, lower interest payments and stimulus to corporate and consumer spending could all help American...
1 July 2019
Trade talks need to deliver a firm agreement rather than more tweets to help lift global manufacturingGlobal stock markets are welcoming the encouraging noises over trade, tariffs and relations between America and China after the G20 meeting in Japan and even if it is not entirely clear what tangible progress is being made in those negotiations the latest manufacturing purchasing managers’ indices (PMIs) around the world show why investors are so...
25 June 2019
How to play gold if the precious metal’s price really starts to shineThe prospect of looser central bank policy, concerns over global growth and unrest in the Middle East are all giving gold a boost, thanks to its perceived status as a store of value and a haven asset during times of uncertainty. But what is really getting gold-watchers excited is a break-out on the metal’s price chart above the $1,350-to-$1,360 an...
19 June 2019
FTSE 100 may need more earnings momentum to make further gains“We are six months into 2019 and the FTSE 100 is up nearly 11%, with the prospect of a dividend yield of some 4.5% on top, returns that pretty much any investor would have taken had you offered them up at the start of the year. The big question now is where do we go from here?” says Russ Mould, AJ Bell Investment Director.
“A lowly valuation – in...
5 June 2019
Card Factory confounds the doubters with solid first-quarter salesRoyal Mail’s dividend cut shows that the former FTSE 100 member is finding life pretty tough in the digital age, as letter volumes keep declining faster than expected, and you could be forgiven that retailers of greetings cards would be in similarly dire straits. But Card Factory’s first-quarter trading update shows sales growth of 2.3% on a like...
29 May 2019
How investors can choose between the four options they have regarding the M&S rights issueLast week’s underwhelming set of full-year results and the possibility that next week’s reshuffle will relegate the company from the FTSE 100 for the first time ever means that Marks & Spencer will be hoping that its proposed £600 million rights issue goes as smoothly as possible. Investors now have four options available to them as they assess...
24 May 2019
Change in Prime Minister unlikely to ignite stock marketThe FTSE All-Share is up today, as investors weigh up the prospect of a new Prime Minister and hope for greater domestic political stability. However, history suggests it takes more than a new incumbent in 10 Downing Street to really get the stock market going.
Since the inception of the FTSE All-Share in 1964, three Prime Ministers have taken...
13 May 2019
Four ways to tell whether a dividend may be safeMarks & Spencer has already taken the plunge and announced a plan to cut its dividend and although BT has decided to keep its payment unchanged investors are understandably nervous about some of the yields offered by some of the UK’s biggest firms. With the best cash ISAs offering an interest rate of around 1.5% and the UK 10-year Government bond...
15 February 2019
Short-sellers may be on to something in the UK (but they are getting stomped in the US)Not everyone approves of the practice of short-selling but supporters will point to the diligent research involved, the risk posed by the unlimited downside of a short position and the liquidity provided, says Russ Mould, AJ Bell Investment Director. Some investors may view hedge funds’ occasionally public promotion of their bearish views as...
3 January 2019
Share buybacks prove useless as Apple shares get crushed after profit warningApple frightened investors back in November when boss Tim Cook announced the firm would no longer disclose unit sales figures for iPhones, iPads and iMacs and the overnight profit warning has confirmed investors’ worst fears.
At the after-hours trading close of $146 a share, Apple’s total market valuation is now just under $700 billion after the...
6 December 2018
World Investment Outlook - Chapter one: UKThe FTSE All-Share trades within barely 10% of an all-time high that it set in Spring 2018 but investors might not guess as much, given the prevailing confusion over the Brexit talks, a fragile Government and dire warnings over the economy from the Bank of England and its Governor Mark Carney.
Sterling has acted as the main Brexit shock absorber...
6 December 2018
World Investment Outlook - Chapter two: USALike him or loathe him, markets are having to listen to President Trump and keep an eye on his Twitter account for good measure (even if his heavy use of the service has done precious little to help that particular company’s wobbly profit and loss account or share price).
It is hard to believe that the mid-term elections are already behind us and...
6 December 2018
World Investment Outlook – Chapter three: JapanThe dream lives on, at least for Prime Minister (PM) Shinzō Abe. The 2019 Rugby World Cup will be but a taster for the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) President, fresh from his victory in September’s party leadership contest. He has his eyes on the real political prize, which is Japan’s status as host of the 2020 Olympic Games.
If Abe can stay in...
6 December 2018
World Investment Outlook – Chapter four: AsiaIt could be argued that the Asian baby was rather thrown out with the Turkish bathwater in 2018, as a stronger dollar, weaker commodity prices and Istanbul’s foreign borrowing woes all served to weigh on emerging markets overall.
Those investors with substantial asset allocations to the Asian region will be content to ride out the storm, arguing...
6 December 2018
World Investment Outlook – Chapter five: Western EuropeSince 2012, European Central Bank (ECB) President Mario Draghi has done “whatever it takes” to keep the euro and the Eurozone’s economy on the road – but 2019 will usher in the next chapter in the story. The ECB stops adding to its QE scheme in December, and Draghi steps down next October.
Meanwhile, the impact of Brexit will (presumably) be felt...
6 December 2018
World Investment Outlook – Chapter six: Emerging MarketsThe themes which dominated in 2018 – key elections, the direction of the dollar, commodity prices and trade talks with America – are all likely to be just as influential in 2019 as Emerging Markets try to recover from a testing year.
Dollar strength, America’s hard-line stance on Iran and oil’s late-year retreat all hurt the Africa/Middle East...
29 October 2018
Budget 2018: our first thoughtsThe Budget failed to make a significant impact on the London stock market with the UK-focused FTSE 250 index moving up slightly during the start of Chancellor Philip Hammond’s speech, before giving up all of these gains and more.
While the index closed the day 1.17% higher at 18,566, all of the gains were ultimately attributable to this morning’s...
31 August 2018
Whitbread sale of Costa begs the question of who will be next on the activists’ hit-list?“Today’s huge leap in Whitbread’s shares following the sale of Costa Coffee, breaking up the group far more quickly than expected and for a higher price than analysts had expected, must be seen as a vindication of activist investors that the FTSE 100 firm’s unwieldy structure meant that there was hidden value waiting to be unlocked,” says Russ...
1 August 2018
Apple’s valuation nears the $1 trillion mark – but is that such a good thing?“Apple’s third-quarter earnings easily beat analysts’ forecasts, as sales rose 17% and earnings per share soared by 40%, as price increases on its hardware and flourishing services and app store revenues more than compensated for sluggish volume growth in iPhones, iPads and iMacs,” says Russ Mould, AJ Bell Investment Director.
“The shares...
13 July 2018
Superyachts, hot weather and high valuations show it’s tough being a retailer (even a really successful one)It’s not as if much further evidence was needed, but today shows just how tough it is to be a retailer in the current environment of low wage growth, high debts and brittle consumer confidence,
DFS has coughed up a profit warning, Dunelm’s trading update lived down to the low expectations set by May’s disappointing update to leave its shares at a...
12 July 2018
What could trigger a sterling crisis and what could investors expect as a result?Sterling has suffered three crises of confidence since 1945, so a repeat cannot be entirely ruled out owing to the current political upheaval and lack of clarity on Brexit, although previous notable plunges have been the result of economic problems rather than any games of musical chairs at Westminster.
Prime Minister Harold Wilson devalued the...
5 July 2018
Three quick ways to measure the second-quarter results season in AmericaAmerica’s headline S&P 500 index is up by just 2% for the year in dollar terms, which seems like a pretty paltry return given how bullish everyone seems to be.
Worries over tariffs, inflation and a steely Federal Reserve, which seems unwilling (quite rightly) to mollycoddle the markets, are all weighing on share prices and once Independence Day is...
22 June 2018
Financial markets side with Project Fear, two years after the EU referendumIt is two years since the British public voted in favour of Brexit and financial markets continue to approach March 2019 with a degree of trepidation.
This is not to say the markets are right to be cautious about what Brexit may bring but three clear trends suggest that investors would at the very least like greater clarity on what sort of deal the...
7 June 2018
NAO hands out further criticism of Government – but ultimately Carillion was a failure of managementToday it is the turn of the National Audit Office to unpick and quantify the cost of the Carillion debacle. The NAO hands out further criticism of the Government’s efforts to monitor the financial health of central government’s sixth biggest supplier by value, suggesting it did too little too late to properly monitor the risk posed by its reliance...
10 May 2018
Is it time to have a spring clean of the junk in portfolios?US investment legend Warren Buffett once commented: “We have a lot of fun as the bubble blows up and we all think we are going to get out five minutes before midnight – but there are no clocks on the wall.”
Thankfully, investors do not need to rely on missing clocks when it comes to protecting their wealth from
the dangers that lurk in markets...
11 April 2018
Market volatility – we haven’t seen anything yet“Despite talk of stock market volatility, the reality is that the FTSE 100 and S&P 500 indices are still behaving pretty calmly relative to the last 20 years, so investors may need to be prepared for wilder times ahead,” says Russ Mould, AJ Bell Investment Director.
Similar quiet periods to match the subdued stock market action of 2015-2017 – such...
29 March 2018
Four lessons to draw from 18¼ years of precisely zero from UK stocksA potential takeover bid for a fourth FTSE 100 stock is helping the index to try to cling on to the 7,000 mark, as Takeda’s plan to consider an offer for drug manufacturer Shire adds to the offers (hostile or otherwise) for GKN, Smurfit Kappa and Sky.
But that 7,000 mark is still awfully close to the 6,930.2 mark reached on 31 December 1999. This...
22 March 2018
How to test the foundations of the property sectorHe is unlikely to have appreciated it, or cared, at the time, but Mark Twain’s advice to “Buy land, they aren’t making it any more” has long since formed the basis of the investment case for UK commercial property, either via quoted stocks or dedicated funds.
Whether property is right for an investor’s portfolio will depend upon their overall...
15 March 2018
How to use moving averages to pin down the FTSE 100In capital, local currency terms, the UK is the worst performing country among the 23 nations classified by the MSCI as ‘developed’ markets in 2018 to date.
The UK is the worst performing developed market so far in 2018 Capital return, local currency Last 12 months 2018 to date * Hong Kong 25.6% Hong Kong 5.6% Austria 20.6% Singapore 4.4% Norway...
8 March 2018
Four reasons why financial markets may not want to see tariffsWhen Donald Trump was running for President, financial markets were wary of him, not least because of his calls for tariffs and protectionist policies, and it now looks like those fears may be realised, depending upon how America’s trading partners respond.
Such concerns could start to counter the optimism generated by the President’s drive for tax...
1 March 2018
How to build a margin of safety into stock portfolios (Part II)The first part of this column, which looked at price/earnings ratios (PEs) and how to use them cited Warren Buffett a lot. With uncanny timing, the American investment legend’s annual Letter to Shareholders in his Berkshire Hathaway vehicle arrived last weekend (24 February) to provide an ideal context for the second part of our look at how to...
21 February 2018
How to build a margin of safety into stock portfolios (Part I)The UK stock market’s leading indices, the FTSE 100, FTSE 250, FTSE All-Share and (for small-cap fans) FTSE AIM All-Share, have all forged some kind of rally subsequent to the sudden slump of early February.
However, not one of the quartet is showing a gain for the year, as of the time of writing, unlike the headline American benchmarks, the Dow...
7 February 2018
Will the Year of the Dog mean China is markets’ best friend or a foe?While drops in the US dollar, the American Treasury market and even the US stock market are grabbing all of the headlines, China’s currency is storming higher, buoyed by solid economic data and the political stability which seems to be the result of last autumn’s 19th five-yearly Party Congress.
China’s Shanghai Composite index also made good...
7 February 2018
Five lessons to learn from the market meltdownAs the legendary US baseball player Yogi Berra once noted: “It’s tough to make predictions, especially about the future.”
The task is a precarious and generally thankless one, especially when it comes to financial markets, not least because no-one – but no-one – has a crystal ball.
Positive forecasts can easily come unstuck and then be subject to...
31 January 2018
Is this really the end for the long bull run in bonds?Japanese Government Bonds (JGBs) have the nickname of ‘the widow maker’ because so many traders have come unstuck trying to call the top in the JGB market over the past 25 years, generally getting themselves carried out as they shorted, or sold, Tokyo’s debt market.
Experts who look at, and investors with exposure to, the West’s Government debt...
25 January 2018
All hail the declining dollarThe American politician John Connally packed a lot into his life, including a rare switch from the Democratic to the Republican Party, but he is best known for two things.
First, he was sat in the same limousine as John F. Kennedy when America’s thirty-fifth President was assassinated in Dealey Plaza, Dallas Texas in November 1963.
Second, as...
17 January 2018
Are hopes for a tax-cut boost to US corporate earnings simply (American) pie in the sky?All four leading US stock market indices – Dow Jones Industrials, S&P 500, Nasdaq Composite and Russell 2000 – all racked up a string of record closing highs in 2017 and one key reason for this was what, ultimately, became President Trump’s first major piece of Capitol-Hill-approved legislation, namely December’s Tax and Jobs Act.
The tax changes...
10 January 2018
How to judge whether it is time to follow – or go against – the crowdWith the FTSE 100 trading above 7,700 and the FTSE All-Share also setting new highs just under the 4,250 mark, investors are off to a good start in 2018 and momentum seems to be on their side.
The FTSE 100 and FTSE All-Share have both begun 2018 on an all-time highSource: Thomson Reuters Datastream
However, the crushings handed out to Debenhams...
3 January 2018
Three sectors to keep an eye on in 2018After ending 2017 on a hot streak, with a string of consecutive closing record highs, the FTSE 100 stands above 7,600 and sits within barely 5% of the 8,000 mark.
FTSE 100 set a run of new all-time record highs at the turn of the yearSource: Thomson Reuters Datastream
This naturally begs the question of whether this momentum can be maintained...
20 December 2017
Five themes that look set to shape portfolio returns in 2018After last week’s attempts to learn key lessons from 2017, this column will now turn its attention to the year ahead. In the (unfortunate) absence of a crystal ball, no promises or guarantees can be offered, but below are five themes which investors will need to think about when it comes to portfolio strategy in 2018 and beyond.
They are:
Central...
