@McLovin good question and one I have asked myself many times for different stocks. I have finally made peace with that and understand that in a given year a number of opportunities will present themselves. So basically I am more patient and able to move on from stocks that I believe I have missed the run and simply added them to my watch list for potential future entry opportunities.

In terms of looking past the selling by Oleg I was satisfied with his response to @strawman when he said he hadn’t taken a salary for a decade or a long time (from memory I think it was something like this) and was basically rewarding himself for what the company had achieved. I thought this was a fair response and reconciled this against other examples such as Kogan’s owner Ruslan capitalising on the companies growth.

When, you look back you see Oleg, by selling has cut himself short 40-50%. Sure he has new options but, nether-the-less the shares he sold, he did so at a far lower prices.

So I have blocked out the noise (ie the so called talk that he is pumping up the price) and tried to focus on what the company is actually saying and the opportunity in the space they are operating at an opportune time for their product. The forward revenue targets, the wars (unfortunate), the market opportunity, the agreements with NATO, Five eyes and the Aus and US government allowed me to decide that they really do have a large opportunity for DRO.

Now before it sounds like I am some zen based emotionally balanced investor dialled into just the companies fundamentals I accept that the market today is not like when I first started. There are many many more retail investors a lot who the market offers them an opportunity to rise financially out of the challenges young people are facing. So once the media started getting interested (all media) and young people were talking about being invested I told myself I wasn’t going to miss the next potential Afterpay because of my stubborn Gen X pre-held beliefs of how something should unfold.

I have learnt or come to accept that sometimes you have to run with momentum, exuberance and if we need to use the term “meme stock” then we need to maybe just accept this is a more frequently occurring component of the new investing world.

In regards to holding I have been torn so I sold a 1/3rd at around 91c. Now I will hold the remainder because the volume and support in the price and the revenue targets the company are chasing suggests this could be multiples of its current share price.

So rather than jump on the Oleg is pumping the stock I am trying to remain focused on the revenue targets.

At this stage the growth in revenue from 2022 to 2023 shows DRO is heading in the right direction, so I will monitor closely how 2024 goes.

Now in terms of have you missed the run - maybe, I am not sure but, I am confident that the next Droneshield opportunity is just around the corner when you are member of Strawman.

Note: Tomorrow is another day.

Love it @NewbieHK . I think you have given me the smack on the head that I need, to perhaps be a little less conservative, and believe the media a little less. Boy is it hard to balance those two things though.

You know I think the portfolio approach quite obviously helps take the pressure off as well….and the understanding you will be wrong on a few, making sure you can exit without going to zero on that particular pick if it’s thesis busted (perhaps those revenue goals).

I got in at about a 5% weighting on droneshield and was happy to lose a couple of those percentage points if it went bad (and it still could)…

everything in my portfolio has some sort of hairs/problems with it….and often it’s something with management.

i’m just focusing on the sales with this one…

come the new fy year though…..I’d probably expect a it to drop a bit wih some profit taking if there’s no immediate sales announcements….

Well I have exited most of my position today @McLovin. I agree with your nervousness around the salesmanship and market announcements and have had that concern the whole time I held, however like @NewbieHK said there were some genuine runs on the board which did back up some Oleg's flash and that is what got me through some of the earlier volatility.

I did have a long term goal for the company, based around their targeted projects, which for me the share price is now well and truly accounting for. Yes the YoY growth is still trending well yet from here they still need to grow multiples to meet that. The early growth rate is the easy part. Maybe there is a buy-out on the horizon which continues the run, but I have learnt the hard way (many times over the past few years) in the small cap space valuation should be paid attention to.

@Bradbury Did you ever grow concerned regarding what seemed to be a lack of MOAT? I get the whole NATO approved value prop, but what's stopping someone else from getting the same approvals in time?

For me being able to determine if their product is legitimately superior is well out of my wheelhouse. My thesis was based around the business delivering on some of the stated goals, and as they grew sales to meet those goals, then there must be some kind of value proposition there.

They now have a big war chest of $160m to go after the next projects in the pipeline, so if they don't start picking up the bigger contracts, then maybe the moat isn't there.

mmm good point.