It happens all the time, part of the playing field, name of the game. If you’re like me and dumb enough to have an opinion on a wide range of stocks and traded vehicles, especially in the wild world of junior mining, you’re going to get your rear end handed to you on a platter on a regular basis
The latest edition of this round these parts is Arizona Mining (AZ.to), a stock I laid into a while ago for a couple of reasons. They included a) Mn issues showing up in the conc, b) permitting issues and social risk, c) the way they planned to cram all their mine infrastructure on the small footprint of patented land they have instead of admitting they have a space problem. The thing is, South32 disagreed with me, bought into the stock and then early this week made a friendly $6.20 bid for the shares. That means the stock has doubled from the point I got mouthy about it and no matter what I think about its future potential or the sagacity of South32’s decision to buy out the company, I got this one wrong. Period.
Which means of course that when a mouthy git like me puts in a bad call, the mails start flowing and yup, I’ve had a few on this one. I particularly liked the one from Garrett Goggin, who decided to drunk-mail me and call me a jackass. Yes folks, the very same Garrett Goggin that has had his holy ass handed back to him all year on his failed crypto calls, but that’s beside the point. I think. Also the ones that demand I apologize to the world are great because….are you guys freakin’ joking? Did I tell you to short the thing? No. Did I short it? No. Did I lose any money? Not a bean. Did you take the word of a mouthy blogger as Bible? Are you responsible for your own trades? Etc. This blog isn’t The IKN Weekly, where I get the serious work done and call my trades for all to see, if I screw up there (and it happens) subbers get a full autopsy on what went wrong. My bad call on AZ.to isn’t some sort of anomaly either, I’ve been wrong so many times I lose count but recent ones like Red Eagle, Lithium X, Starcore and Focus Ventures come straight off the top of my head without even checking any lists. AZ.to is another wrong call, I’ll live with it because I know for a fact I get way more right than I do wrong (you don’t get to write a report that a whole bunch of people pay good money to read for coming on for a decade without a decent strike rate, you go out of business). This is junior mining folks, if your strike rate is better than mine, I doff my cap. If it’s 100% you’re a liar.
However, there is one thing I need to say (and it’s really why this post exists), that’s to heartily and sincerely congratulate Richard Warke for his success at AZ. Not only was he right, but in the midst of my criticizing period against his company he took time to make contact, put his point of view and arguments across and all while being very civil and gentlemanly. Full applause for you, sir, spend your winnings well. The rest of you, keep tuning into IKN for more screw-ups and bad stocks calls, this won’t be the last one.