Share Sleuth: trimming a winner, and four shares I’m sizing up
Richard Beddard’s reluctantly taken profits in a holding that became too large. He’s now considering where to put the money to work, naming four firms that are candidates for future investment.
10th February 2026 12:23
by Richard Beddard from interactive investor
One thing I didn’t mention in my 2025 review was how many virtual trades I placed in the Share Sleuth portfolio. There were 24, an average of two a month, which is surely a record.
Most of them were additions to holdings, or reductions as opposed to outright liquidations. There were so many because I refocused my scoring system, the Decision Engine, on risks. Scores drive trades, and my scores changed more than usual.
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I started the year with a single trade and I hope to progress in similarly sedate fashion, now almost the entire portfolio has been rebalanced.
Share Sleuth is published in the first half of the month so that first trade, the addition of Cohort (LSE:CHRT), belonged to December 2025/January 2026. When I considered my trades for January/February on 22 January, only reductions were available to me, and the Decision Engine proposed only one.
Additions were out of the question because there wasn’t enough cash in the portfolio to trade at my “minimum trade size”, which is 2.5% of the portfolio, or £5,300 at the time.
Reducing Goodwin
The Decision Engine indicated Share Sleuth’s Goodwin (LSE:GDWN) holding was oversized. That isn’t because of my doubts about the business, which are few. When I last scored Goodwin, I gave it 8.5/9 for quality. The share price, though, dragged the score down to 6.3, to which the Decision Engine assigns an ideal holding size of 2.7% of the portfolio’s total value.
Because Goodwin has been a one-way bet for quite a while, the holding had increased to 6.6% of the portfolio’s total value, a difference of 3.9%.
I was reluctant to take the profit, because I had already done that three times since summer 2024, only a year and a half ago.
One of the reasons I made so many trades was my reluctance to cut deeply in the face of huge share price momentum. Each time, I reduced Goodwin by the minimum trade size rather than the amount indicated by the Decision Engine. That was the uneasy compromise I made this time too, reducing Goodwin by about 2.5% of the portfolio’s total value rather than the 3.9% proposed.
On 22 January, I reduced Share Sleuth’s holding from 58 shares to 36 at a price of just over £250 per share. It is, perhaps, worth noting that Share Sleuth’s additions in 2014, 2016 and 2019 cost about £36, £20, and £24 per share respectively.
After deducting £10 in lieu of broker fees, the transaction raised £5,491 for the portfolio.
It’s probably not worth speculating why other people are buying while I’m selling, but I’ll have a go.
Goodwin is a multifaceted business. The company is saying positive things and delivering much improved results from some of these facets. It has turned around its long-established steel components business, and another formerly loss-making business supplying air traffic control systems is finally selling some of them.
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Goodwin has incubated a new polymer business that will generate its first revenue in 2026. Other businesses, which have kept the firm profitable and self-funded during this turnaround phase are humming along quite nicely.
There is a lot of belief in Goodwin and, frankly, not much reason to doubt it beyond the complexity of the business and the unknowable future.
The purpose of the Decision Engine is to nudge me towards good companies at cheap prices and limit or eliminate holdings at extravagant prices.
This frees up money for me to invest in shares where perhaps less faith is required.
What I would have added
This table shows the 15 shares with the highest scores in the Decision Engine.
company | description | score | ih% | ss% | ih%-% | |
1 | FW Thorpe | Makes lighting systems for commercial, industrial and public settings | 9.7% | 7.9% | 1.7% | |
2 | Howden Joinery | Supplies kitchens to small builders | 7.1% | 5.8% | 1.3% | |
3 | James Latham | Distributes imported panel products, timber, and laminates | 7.0% | 5.4% | 1.6% | |
4 | Hollywood Bowl | Operates tenpin bowling centres | 6.9% | 2.5% | 4.4% | |
5 | Bunzl | Distributes essential everyday items consumed by organisations | 6.3% | 4.0% | 2.3% | |
6 | Jet2 | Flies people to holiday locations, often on package tours | 6.0% | 4.7% | 1.3% | |
7 | Softcat | Sells software and hardware to businesses and public sector | 6.0% | 4.5% | 1.5% | |
8 | Renew | Maintains and improves road, rail, water, and energy infrastructure | 5.9% | 5.7% | 0.2% | |
9 | Solid State | Manufactures electronic systems and distributes components | 5.9% | 3.8% | 2.1% | |
10 | Auto Trader | Online marketplace for motor vehicles | 5.1% | 5.1% | ||
11 | Churchill China | Manufactures tableware for restaurants etc. | 5.0% | 2.7% | 2.3% | |
12 | Bloomsbury Publishing | Publishes books and educational resources | 4.9% | 4.3% | 0.6% | |
13 | Oxford Instruments | Makes imaging and semiconductor manufacturing systems | 4.7% | 6.0% | -1.3% | |
14 | Judges Scientific | Manufactures scientific instruments | 4.3% | 4.3% | ||
15 | Cake Box | Cake shop franchise and sweet manufacturer | 4.2% | 4.2% |
Click on a share's score to see a breakdown (scores may have changed due to movements in share price). Key: ih% is the suggested ideal holding size as a percentage of the total value of a diversified portfolio, ss% is the actual size of Share Sleuth’s holding, and ih%-% is the difference between ideal and actual sizes.
The highest-ranked candidate for investment is Hollywood Bowl Group (LSE:BOWL), with a score of 8.5, an ideal holding size of 6.9%. The actual holding size is 2.5%, so the Decision Engine would allow me to add shares up to 4.4% of the portfolio’s total value. There’s nothing to stop me adding more Hollywood Bowl shares, except for the fact that I last did that in September, four months ago.
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The other three shares would be new additions, but there are confounding aspects to all three. The car dealer revolt after changes to Autotrader Group (LSE:AUTO)’s website is leading me to question whether the company really can grow by adding more value for its customers. The prospects for Judges Scientific (LSE:JDG)’s businesses are diminished by trade restrictions and the defunding of US scientific institutions. I have yet to warm to the acquisition of Geotek, its biggest business. Cake Box Holdings Ordinary Shares (LSE:CBOX) too has made a big acquisition, Ambala, the Indian sweet company. I’d like to see how that beds in.
These thoughts are likely to preoccupy me in February/March, and new opportunities may also arise.
Share Sleuth performance
At the close on 4 February, Share Sleuth was worth £213,565, 612% more than the £30,000 of pretend money we started with in September 2009.
The same amount invested in accumulation units of a FTSE All-Share index tracking fund would be worth £113,080, an increase of 277%.
Past performance is not a guide to future performance.
After dividends paid during the month from Games Workshop Group (LSE:GAW), Latham (James) (LSE:LTHM) and Oxford Instruments (LSE:OXIG), Share Sleuth’s cash pile is £8,057.
The minimum trade size, 2.5% of the portfolio’s value, is £5,339.
Share Sleuth, 04 Feb 2026 | Cost (£) | Value (£) | Return (%) | ||
Cash (4% of portfolio) | 8,057 | ||||
Current holdings (24 shares) | 205,508 | ||||
Total, and performance since 9 September 2009 | 30,000 | 213,565 | 612 | ||
Benchmark: FTSE All-Share index tracker (acc) | 30,000 | 113,080 | 277 | ||
Companies | Shares | Cost (£) | Value (£) | Return (%) | |
AMS | Advanced Medical Solutions | 1,965 | 4,503 | 4,303 | -4 |
ANP | Anpario | 1,124 | 4,057 | 6,182 | 52 |
BMY | Bloomsbury | 1,882 | 8,354 | 8,657 | 4 |
BNZL | Bunzl | 417 | 9,798 | 8,940 | -9 |
BOWL | Hollywood Bowl | 1,972 | 4,971 | 5,206 | 5 |
CHH | Churchill China | 1,495 | 17,228 | 6,503 | -62 |
CHRT | Cohort | 836 | 6,315 | 9,246 | 46 |
FAN | Volution | 830 | 5,151 | 5,511 | 7 |
FOUR | 4Imprint | 116 | 2,251 | 4,547 | 102 |
GAW | Games Workshop | 66 | 4,116 | 11,227 | 173 |
GDWN | Goodwin | 36 | 871 | 9,936 | 1,041 |
HWDN | Howden Joinery | 1,476 | 10,371 | 12,849 | 24 |
JET2 | Jet2 | 822 | 5,211 | 10,357 | 99 |
LTHM | James Latham | 1,150 | 14,437 | 11,270 | -22 |
MACF | Macfarlane | 7,689 | 10,011 | 5,536 | -45 |
OXIG | Oxford Instruments | 505 | 10,044 | 12,549 | 25 |
PRV | Porvair | 906 | 4,999 | 7,828 | 57 |
QTX | Quartix | 1,618 | 3,988 | 4,741 | 19 |
RNWH | Renew Holdings | 1,310 | 9,804 | 12,380 | 26 |
RSW | Renishaw | 234 | 6,227 | 8,600 | 38 |
SCT | Softcat | 675 | 9,995 | 8,424 | -16 |
SOLI | Solid State | 5,009 | 6,033 | 8,064 | 34 |
TFW | Thorpe (F W) | 6,153 | 14,861 | 17,844 | 20 |
TUNE | Focusrite | 2,020 | 14,128 | 4,808 | -66 |
Notes
Costs include £10 broker fee, and 0.5% stamp duty where appropriate
Cash earns no interest
Dividends and sale proceeds are credited to the cash balance
Objective: To beat the index tracking fund handsomely over five year periods
Source: ShareScope.
Richard Beddard is a freelance contributor and not a direct employee of interactive investor.
Richard owns all the shares in the Share Sleuth portfolio.
For more on the Decision Engine and Share Sleuth, please see Richard’s explainer.
Contact Richard Beddard by email: richard@beddard.net or on Twitter: @RichardBeddard
AIM stocks tend to be volatile high-risk/high-reward investments and are intended for people with an appropriate degree of equity trading knowledge and experience.
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