I've had another brilliant idea.

On the problem of what to do with margin calls, what you do is simply
borrow an amount so that if the shares fall by that amount, and you are at
the margin level and have to sell, that you don't have to pay any capital
gains tax at that price. That way there's not too much disadvantage of
having to have sold up when you didn't really want to.  You are selling
them for what they are currently worth, like always when shares are sold.

On the other issue about growth and income figures from ASSIRT, I have the
following figures (for a 5 year period, ending 31-Aug-94).

BT Select Markets Trust - Pacific Basin Fund   11.8  15.0
GT Asian Growth                                5.5   7.1
Jardine Fleming Taipan Trust                   5.5   12.8
Perpetual South East Asia Share                10.9  6.9
Wardley (HSBC) Australia Dragon Trust          16.2  5.3


Does anyone have the Thornton Tiger Opportunities Trust figures?

Let me quote from "Personal Investment", October 1994.

As well, if you have an investment that is regarded as a Foreign Investment
Fund (FIF), you can be taxed on any increase in value even if it is not
sold or realised.  However, only if the total value of your foreign
investments is greater than $50,000 will you face this liability. 
"That stops people investing in a way that they can hold their money
offshore without paying Australian tax" Ellis says.

Investments that fall into the FIF category can be mutual funds, certain
foreign superannuation and pension funds, passive investment companies,
life and general insurance, fund management activities, and property
investment other than construction.

The tax treatment can apply to individuals and investments that use trust
vehicles such as mutual funds and foreign share trusts, unless specifically
exempted.

"Some US individual retirement accounts (IRAs) and some like Canada's
tax preferred savings vehicles can also be caught if over the $50,000
threshold," Ellis says.


Now my question is - presumably these FIFs are some really great
money-making scheme?  In which case, would pauper's like Anthony and the
like be wise to invest in something like this since their investment would
be below $50,000 anyway?

And a question on cash bonds like Rod + Bob are into.  Can I negative gear
into them?  You are meant to negative gear into something that produces
income. Does selling .1% of my bond each year count as an income producing
asset? Someone hinted to me that you could indeed do this with AMP share
bonds (as opposed to their share trusts).  And these other companies put
some of their money into bonds anyway.  I could create a company that
invested in bonds and sold .1% of them as profit, and then others could
invest in my company, if anyone's got any objections?

And BTW Brenton, my buying BTR Nylex shares means that someone who is into
taking risks with new-start companies can get rid of their holdings in BTR
Nylex thanks to me, and invest in a different high-risk, new-start company,
if you think people are only meant to be investing in high-risk, new-start
companies.  And yes, Brenton, all new-start companies are high risk.  Have
a look at what percentage of computer companies that started 15 years ago
are still in business today.

If the share prices were shipped by email, we could have them in a fixed
order, and only the top 500 or something, and a 4-digit number for each, so
that's 2000 digits.  With say uuencoding or something we could use say 50
normal characters, so that would end up being 5 times more effective, ie
400 characters, or 5 lines.  That is really bugger-all transmission that
no-one would object to, especially seeing as once per week would be quite
sufficient. And Frank, I've just put a few things together, that hadn't
registered in my brain before this.  You have insinuated that you are a
stockbroker.  You must therefore have access to the data.  You are computer
literate, in fact you even do programming.  You have a modem.  I have this
subtle hint to give you!  :-)

BFN.  Paul.