Got a hot tip for the stock market in 2010? If so, there is still time to join the Birmingham Post’s annual share-tipping competition.

To enter, simply email your choice of share (one only, please) to editor Alun Thorne (alun.thorne@birminghampost.net) by close of business on December 31.

Write one sentence explaining why you think you are on to a winner.

As usual, a magnum of champagne is on offer to whoever’s share gains the most over the next 12 months.

The competition – a strictly for-fun affair that should not be taken seriously by compliance officers or as investment advice by non-participating readers – usually attracts an impressive array of entries from stockbrokers (and Post business reporters) and 2010 looks like being no exception.

According to the “rules” drawn up by Nevill Boyd Maunsell, who retired from the Post earlier this year, entrants are limited to one share. That means no portfolios will be considered and there can be no “dealing” during the year.

One slight change this time means the competition will judged on a comparison of an entrant’s closing price between January 4 and December 31, 2010.

More than a 100 readers fancied their chances of finding a winning share in 2009 in the depths of one of the worst recessions on record.

Next year should be a lot easier, shouldn’t it?

The FTSE 100 index stood at 5,349.48 at the time of writing, off the 2009 high point (at that stage) of 5,382.67 seen on November 16. That represented a rally of 20 per cent for London blue chips since the start of the year.

But with Britain seen to be staging at best only a “fragile” economic recovery in 2010, the pundits are predicting a bad year for the Footsie.

Not that that will worry the Post’s tipsters. They often burrow down into the lower regions of the London stock market in search of a good punt, sometimes with startling results.

The winner of the 2009 competition will be announced in the December 30 edition, but at this stage we can hint at the fact that it is almost sure to be a stock far from the mainstream.

Here’s another clue: the bull who backed it summed it up with one word, “undervalued”.

He (or she, of course) was right. It’s looking to end the year with a four-digit percentage gain.

The likely second place share has also motored strongly ahead this year with similarly-sized gain.

Both are several country miles ahead of the rest of the field, so there is little likelihood of a dark horse coming up on the rails.