Argghhhh !!!!

I can't call Jarvis right. I bot on CFD at 360, they fell to 328. I cut my loss and sold short, bah, now they're back up to 343.50.

Any feelings on their direction?

JRVS - I was in as they bounced on Wed long @119.75 @ 50 p/p closed @ 130. In again at the bell long @125 @ 25 p/p closed Thurs @ 138.5. Peanuts for some of you but I was very pleased - 2 weeks wage in 24 hrs!:o) Working 4 on 4 off gives me plenty of time trade.( Not all good news took a hit on S&P that wiped 1/2 my profit!)
Long ARM/SPT @ the mo down 2 points...

This post from the fool is worth a read -

Over the last three years I've written several posts about Jarvis, all quite negative, and all based on what I've actually seen on the ground in terms of their performance, or been told by a couple of senior people within their sub contractors, with the addition of a dash of scepticism that what was a third rate contractor 10 years ago had suddenly become a top notch company in a new and extremely fashionable field.
Recently I wrote just such a post in a thread with an enormous number of contributions here. Although some responses "subbie bashing is great for the business, etc" indicated to me a complete lack of understanding of the business, there were many fools who had clearly looked carefully at Jarvis, so I decided to plough through the recent reports and RNSs in case I was missing something.
The first thing that struck me was the similarity with Amey in terms of their business. This was not just a matter of the two companies working in the same fields, but they both seemed to have an enormous diversity of businesses within the business. In theory, this is in keeping with their construction industry roots, where effectively each new major project is almost a stand alone business, but in the construction industry a painful job lasts say two years as opposed to 25 in PFI /PPP so it is even more imperative that the job is properly bid. If bids are seriously underpriced it would almost certainly be possible to turn a blind eye to the loss for much longer with PFI, but presumably it would show in cashflow.
Both were trumpeting wonderful new management "bullshit" type companies, although Ameys went from wonderfully optimistic mentions in the AR to having to pay somone to take Vectra (I think their version was called) away over about 3 years.
I bought into Amey at about 30p a few months before they were taken over, having read, very carefully, ARs etc similar to the last few days of reading JRVS. I have to say that I found the Amey stuff more understandable and credible than Jarvis'.
Both Jarvis & Amey suffered from lousy publicity and consequent reputations, although again my sympathy is with Amey on this one. The reputational problems Jarvis have are for shoddy contract performance in just about every aspect of their business, and underpayment of creditors. None of the other big PFI providers come near them in terms of performance dissatisfaction in any single business element as far as I can see. Amey had a far better reputation in terms of contract performance, with their problem being basically the city's sudden realisation of the implications of UITF34 (I think its called), which Amey adopted about six months before they had to, but later than many. This had allowed them to capitalise tender costs as "investments", and I believe they had been including those costs before achieving "preferred bidder" status. This effectively made their capital base look bigger - handy if you are borrowing lots of money in a frantic push to grab contracts. But again, this showed up in the cash flow - sound familiar?
Although the notes to JRVS accounts complies with ..34, the lack of information within the accounts on progress through the contract stages was, IMHO, annoying to say the least. I could not find clear definition of contracts where Jarvis had been shortlisted or awarded preferred bidder status during the period, or those which had progressed to commercial close, or financial close. Nor was there any clear indication of the extent, cost, cause or financial recoverability of delays in progressing from one status to the next, which was actually the first thing I was seeking in the reports.
In this respect it is worth remembering that the sort of projects Jarvis tend to win are not the exceptional ones - they are the type which are reasonably common now, and should therefore be progressing more quickly through the various stages.