Image source: Getty Images. Lloyds Banking Group (LSE: LLOY) shares have climbed 60% in 2025. And they’re up more than 200% over five years. That’s a cracking performance. And forecasts for the next few years are upbeat. I see reasons why City experts have a firm Buy consensus on Lloyds shares at the moment. But I now want to know what AI large language models have to say about the future. Asking AI I asked ChatGPT: “Where will Lloyds shares be this time next year?” And the answer definitely gives me some insight into the usefulness of AI for investors.…
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Image source: Getty Images In a year when an awful lot of FTSE stocks have gone up in price, those that haven’t tend to stick out. This is particularly true if they happen to be a big household name. Today, I’m looking at one heavy faller and asking whether it’s madness to think that this market laggard could actually become a huge winner in time. Big loser The stock in question is discount retailer B&M European Value Retail SA (LSE: BME) — or plain old B&M to you and me. It’s share price has pretty much halved in 2025 so…
Image source: Getty Images The chatter about a stock market crash has been deafening. A host of experts have been warning about ‘a big one’ — potentially the worst since the financial crisis or the dotcom crash of 2000. This happens every October. It’s a volatile time, and both the Wall Street crash of 1929 and Black Monday in 1987 hit this month. Yet as I’m writing (29 October), the FTSE 100‘s just hit another all-time high, as the S&P 500 did yesterday. Japan’s flying too, while emerging markets are enjoying their best run in 15 years. The FTSE 100 is…
Image source: Getty Images By mid-morning today (29 October), the Next (LSE:NXT) share price was up 6% following publication of the group’s third-quarter trading update. And the retailer appears to be doing very well. As has been a regular feature of its stock market announcements in recent years, it’s upgraded its full-year pre-tax earnings outlook. For 2025, it’s now expecting a profit before tax of £1.13bn, £30m more than previously anticipated. The catalyst has been a strong sales performance. During the 13 weeks to 25 October, it reported a 10.5% year-on-year increase in its top line. Analysts were expecting a…
Image source: Getty Images Goodwin‘s (LSE:GDWN) been the biggest FTSE 250 success story of 2025. The stock’s up more than 190% since the start of January. While artificial intelligence (AI) has – justifiably – been the story catching investor attention this year, it’s not the only part of the stock market that’s been seeing success. Defence So far, 2025’s also been an outstanding year for companies that supply into the defence industry. Increased NATO spending has caused strong sales growth almost across the board. This is a key market for Goodwin, which makes components that go into military jet engines.…
Image source: Getty Images The essence of investing for passive income is very simple. Put your money to work in high-quality investments. Withdraw when the target goal is reached. Whether the endpoint is £1,000, or £5,000, or £10,000 monthly passive income, the nuts and bolts are the same. One difference between strategies comes in the savings rate. Those on smaller incomes who might be scratching around to save a few pounds a day shouldn’t be following the exact same process as those saving 10 times as much. Making bad choices in this regard could end up costing a lot of…
Image source: Getty Images Earlier in October, when the Aston Martin Lagonda (LSE:AML) share price was hovering around the 75p mark, I read an online exchange of views about the future direction of the luxury sports car maker. One of those involved in the conversation wrote: “Sure, the Rolls-Royce share price was 75p five years ago”. The implication being that Aston Martin’s share price could follow that of the aerospace and defence group’s and grow exponentially by October 2030. Whether the author was being slightly tongue-in-cheek or wildly optimistic, it’s impossible to tell. But reading today’s (29 October) earnings release…
Image source: Getty Images Aviva (LSE:AV) stock’s up 45% over the last year. It has vastly outperformed the broader FTSE 100, recently hitting its highest level in over a decade. That might all be in the past, but investors are now focused on where the Aviva share price can go from here. Here’s what the experts think. Forecast prices Of the 16 analysts that currently have a view on the stock, the average target price for the next year is 689p. For reference, the share price currently sits at 668p. Within that bucket, there’s a variety of views. The team…
Image source: Getty Images Investors rushed to buy PayPal (NASDAQ:PYPL) shares on Tuesday (28 October) after the firm announced a deal with OpenAI. But I’ve a big question about the stock for investors. Over the last 10 years, PayPal’s free cash flow has been around $46bn. So my question is pretty simple: where’s all that money gone? Where’s the money gone? Spoiler alert: I’m not saying there’s anything untoward with PayPal or its accounting practices – to the best of my knowledge, there isn’t. But its cash does just seem to disappear. The company hasn’t paid a dividend in the…
Image source: Getty Images All we’ve been hearing for the past couple of years is how artificial intelligence (AI) is going to take over the world. Don’t get me wrong, semiconductor and tech stocks have done incredibly well. But with some saying they could be in a bubble, I’m starting to look and see what the next big stock market move from AI could be. Here’s one area that’s starting to heat up. Going nuclear I’m talking about nuclear energy. It could be the next big growth area as AI adoption progresses and investors look for the next batch of…