Time for an update, more down...

When I started this blog I intended to work entirely off 'free' sources and on the cloud if at all possible. I couldn't do it at the time because of my lack of confidence in google spreadsheets compared with using excel as I had in the past. Well, in October, when my laptop died along with all the data I had stored in excel on it, I suddenly regretted my decision. Which is why it is now April, many months since my last posts.

I have now started the process of using google docs and I have found it has some excellent tools for keying into google finance (the googlefinance() function), which will in time make the project easier, although just at the moment I am also learning the limitations of tablet computers when it comes to spreadsheets- good for viewing, difficult to edit.

I plan to restart the spreadsheets with quarterly dates in mind for updates, but in the meantime, the results to date don't look good for the clean energy index (CEI) market cap index.

From October to April:
CEI.cap.asx: -5.5% (how's that for a snappy name?)
ASX200: +3.3%
ASX200 energy: +5.5%

The biggest movers for the index were:
Positive: SLX, GXY
Negative: CFU, DYE, WAS, IFN

Remember that these weren't necessarily the biggest Movers in the index, just that they had the biggest impact, all of these companies fall in the top ten shares held in the index, which isan issue I discussed previously - how do you capture the gains of the smaller cap, potentially bigger moving stocks. The range of movement of the full index was from -93% to +137%, but from the movers and shakers above, the range was +45 to -62%.

There was also one company that was bought out in the intervening period and has therefore left the index - GHT was bought out by Havilah, and the share purchase plan won't be reflected in the index, so I'll have to work out how to handle that one.

WAG ceased trading in December due to a capital raising to buy pacific pyrolysis, but announced 7 March that they failed in their bid to raise the capital and nothing more has been said. I don't know where this leaves current shareholders...

Here's hoping the world of tablets and clouds helps in blogging about about finance, and that the ASX, along with the renewable energy stocks, get out of the doldrums and start to move in the right direction....