We bent our rules to give engineering giant IMI the benefit of the doubt last week as its shares triggered a sell signal under our stop-loss system.

The company, one of our original top picks for 2014, had seen its shares slide to their published stop-loss level on fears over the impact of the strong pound on its big overseas earnings.

But we feel the pessimism has been overdone and are prepared to hang on to our notional holding a little longer in anticipation of a good recovery in the run-up to next month's interim results, which should show solid growth.

Our other tips produced a more steady performance after the falls of the previous week, although a small majority were still showing losses when we carried out our review of progress on Wednesday morning.

These loss-makers included big overseas earners such as Stagecoach, WPP and Halma, while drinks groups Fuller Smith & Turner and Greene King were hit by thoughts customers could cut back on entertainment because of the slow pace of earnings growth compared with rising inflation.

Fortunately, the losses were largely counterbalanced by some good gains elsewhere, with Anglo-American jeweller Signet still gaining from its recent merger while Marks & Spencer, Saga and Dialight were among those to attract bargain-hunters after recent falls.

However, the longstanding 2011 portfolio was down nearly 1.5% over the week as result of the Fuller Smith setback and profit-taking in distribution group, DCC.

Our recent nominal purchase of shares in cash-and-carry group Booker also slipped back after the shares began trading without benefit of a 3.5p special dividend.

Our latest 2014 tips saw a further 0.7% slippage over the week, caused mainly by IMI.