"An investor is simply a trader who forgot to take his profit"

Whether you subscribe to this rather simplistic viewpoint or not is incidental. What is important however is having the ability to recognise what type of market you are operating in and equally, knowing your own psychology as an investor or trader. This will determine whether you can trade or invest effectively in the prevailing market climate, whatever that may be.

The last couple of years have undoubtedly favoured the nimble and more fleet of foot - those who are able to identify undervalued stocks very early on and are also able to recognise at which point to cut out, before market sentiment reverses. In jittery markets, unless you are prepared to take a very long term view, that’s the only effective way to operate.

Mines and Money London 2011 was the Exhibition Organiser's most successful event in Europe to date, with 210 exhibitors and nearly 3,800 delegates attending. Their Hong Kong show is coming up in March, so we took the opportunity to speak to Events Director Pablo Martin to get his take on the overall prospects for the sector going forward and particularly, his views on the growing level of participation from the Private Investor community.

Through MiningMaven, Pablo also extends an invitation to all Private Investors to attend Mines and Money events free of charge. To apply for tickets for the forthcoming Mines and Money Hong Kong show, Private Investors should send an email request, quoting reference "BH650MAVEN", to Charlie Hastings at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it . For all their other Mines and Money events, including Mines and Money London in December 2012 (it will come around faster than you think!), make sure your subscription to MiningMaven is up to date and nearer the time, we will email you with full details on how to apply for your free tickets.

You can listen to the full interview with Pablo here:

Reasons to be Cheerful!

In July 1979 punk/new wave band Ian Dury and the Block Heads released their seminal hit “Reasons to be Cheerful – Part 3”. At the time no one even thought to question what happened to Parts 1 and 2?

Part 3 it was then, and fans spend hours learning by heart the 50 or so rather random Reasons to be Cheerful, which included, but was not exclusively limited to, such pearls as "the smile of a parrot, a little drop of claret, sitting on a potty, slap and tickle, and coming out of chokey" ("chokey" being colloquial for solitary confinement in Prison).

All indeed jolly good reasons to be cheerful and all set to a thumping and very danceable rhythm,  working towards what must be considered to be one of the most engaging saxophone reprises of all time (certainly up there with Gerry Rafferty's Baker Street and Al Stewart’s Year of the Cat).

But there are some startling similarities between 1979 and 2012; most significantly, back then as now, there really was very little to be cheerful about.