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This month I'll sum up the report by this quote: "All in all, the behavior of the composite indexes suggests that the recession is bottoming out and that economic conditions will continue to improve in the near term." Pretty simple to understand, straight forward and to the point.
Let's look for some gems in the report: Read More...
Before you read too much into the headline notice I didn't say listen to the analysts; I said don't ignore them. Let me explain the difference. My own blog is called Financial Tides for a reason; I don't recommend swimming against the tide.I think analysts and astrologists have a lot in common. They both claim they can foretell the future by interpreting the signs better than anyone else and are willing to share their insight with you for a price. Most of the analysts are young MBAs with CFAs so they have 2 little pieces of paper to certify how much better they are than you at reading the tea leaves. Their job is to produce reports that will give their brokers something to talk to you about.Most brokerage firms do not allow their sale reps to do their own research. That would open them up to liability so they use these young MBA/CFAs to peruse all the published info on a company to document why they are making a buy/sell recommendation. How can you lose an arbitration hearing if your recommendations are well documented and produced using a standardized methodology? Read More...
So the word is out that Kenneth Feinberg, the Obama hatchet man, is going to have the pay of the top 25 executives at 7 of the companies who have not paid back the TARP money, by as much as 90%. If that's a good idea for those companies why not look at the rest of the people who got us into this mess. What's good for the goose is good for the gander, right? There are more than just these 175 executives who deserve pay cuts.Let's cut the pay of the top 25 executives at the SEC and FDIC, they were asleep at the wheel. Next cut the pay of the 25 top ranking members of both the House and Senate Banking Committees, they didn't create legislation to keep us out of this mess. How about the top 25 executives of the external accounting firms of those 7 companies, they certified financial statements that didn't reflect the true worth of the companies?While we are on a roll let's cut the pay of the top 25 executives of Standard & Poor's, Moody's, Fitch and A M Best they didn't have proper ratings on these companies. Oh, and let's not forget the top 25 analyst at all the brokerage firms who failed to warn us by downgrading these companies when they should have. Read More...
I was going through the stack of newspapers that accumulated while I was on vacation and on the front page of The Charlotte Observer was the headline "Cameron Harris sues Wachovia". Since his family sold their insurance company to First Union, Wachovia's predecessor that's big news here in Charlotte. Friends just don't sue friends in Charlotte, bless his heart.His suit claims that while on a hunting trip with Ken Thompson, Wachovia's then CEO he pumped Mr. Thompson for information about what was really going on in Wachovia. He asserts Ken Thompson's failure to give him what would have been unpublished insider information caused him to keep his stock and incur a large financial loss.. He might have gotten out at $55 instead of riding it down to what ever he owns now. He and his family owned around a million shares so the pony ride down cost him some real dough.I'm no legal genius but if Ken Thompson had told him about what was really going on and he sold his stock before the swan dive wouldn't he be guilty of insider trading? Wouldn't both he and Ken Thompson be eligible of a free trip to Club Fed down at Ft. Walton Beach, Florida? Hasn't he heard of Martha Stewart. Read More...
BarChart Market Momentum -- what percentage of stocks are trading above their Daily Moving Averages? Approximately 5800 stocks tracked -- Bullish
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There are a lot of articles predicting gloom and doom for the Christmas retail season. On one hand we hear the economy is recovering, and on the other hand we hear that we're not out of the woods yet.
I decided to take a very unscientific poll to find out for myself. I'd rather be approximately right than precisely inaccurate, so I called a few friends and asked how they were preparing for Christmas. I got some surprising answers.
Several people told me that they remembered growing up in hard times but everyone's parents had a Christmas Club account. They couldn't find a Christmas Club to join but decided to open a savings account or a money market account and they've been stashing some money away until they see the seasonal sales.
I also heard a term I hadn't heard in years: layaway. Read More...
The whole world seems to be fixated on the economy and the H1N1 Swine Flu.
News reports today that the first shipments of the nasal version of the vaccine, manufactured by MedImmune a unit of AstraZeneca, will begin today pushed me to find out if there might be an investing play in this fear.
The major manufacturers of the vaccine are GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), Sanofi-Aventis (SNY), Novartis (NVS), AstraZeneca (AZN), Baxter International (BAX) and CSL (CMXHF).
None of these are pure plays. Each of these companies has a stable of drugs and products so you are really buying a basket of widely varied profit centers. How do I find the best one? Read More...
Over the weekend, McClatchy Newspapers had two powerful articles entitled "Help with mortgages is difficult to come by" and "Some firms with spotty pasts get tax dollars."
The articles expose how firms like Bank of America (BAC), Citigroup (C) and Morgan Stanley (MS) -- firms who were bailed out from the brink of bankruptcy by TARP with billions of taxpayer dollars -- are now abusing mortgage borrowers who are in trouble. The Treasury is doing little, if anything to monitor the situation.In one case, Ronnie Fruia was about to lose his home when he, his mother and son were all hospitalized. He was recovering from a stroke and couldn't talk, but CitiFinancial sent someone to his hospital room to sign modification papers that didn't even cut his interest rate. State regulators had to step in to get his rate changed from 11.5% to a reasonable 5%. Read More...
