What Next After Another Gold And Silver Sell-Off? [View article]
Paper paper... we have found out gold and silver paper is easier to monetize than money because any bank that the SEC approves can mint more paper gold and silver. And the SEC really couldn't care less who does it as long as they get the filing fee. Take Abbe's QE and multiply it and you will see the amount of paper gold and silver monetization over the last 3 years.
Sure gold and silver production can't keep up. But of course, none of these paper writers ever expects to have to deliver, just like the US never expects to ever pay off its debt and those doing mass QE never expects to ever have to sell the bonds they buy (because they can't without booking a massive loss and revealing that they enriched the member banks they buy them off of at the taxpayers expense).
UniFirst: This Uniform Company Could Rise 15% This Summer [View article]
UNF is rather richly valued for being in the generic clothes market. If you view the uniform business as a specialty or growth industry, which it isn't then you should probably by the more richly valued Cintas.
In reality, just about everybody can start a uniform business and the current trend is security companies to pick up and deliver uniforms just in case you think that someone will try stealing your corporate uniform to get into your building. If your company depends on uniforms to designate employees and identify where they should be, you probably should be back in the 1980s. Otherwise, look into better security or at least a badging and check in system.
If you're too lazy to launder your own clothes get a laundry service. Companies pay a bundle letting uniform companies make money off them by providing uniform maintenance make me laugh.
A Safe Cash Cow With A 5.25% Yield And Growth Potential [View article]
The real risk is that management doesn't sit around letting the future happen to it and decides to blow a lot of cash trying to catch up with current technology and make some silly product that fails. I've seen it time and time again where management of a weakening revenue tech company tries to bolster revenue to preserve their fat cat jobs by destroying all the cash it has on some ridiculous foray into the unknown.
Nokia blew so much cash when it was falling it eventually ran out and had to give their tech development to Microsoft because they couldn't afford to support Symbian or finance any other new OS. Yahoo similarly blew tons of cash before giving into Bing which makes it more like a zombie browser since it eventually couldn't even afford its own browser software technology. And these are the good outcomes. Most tech companies with weakening markets just simply eat it and die.
What Really Happened To Silver: A Different Perspective [View article]
The author only talks about monetization of treasuries which is the normal exchange of US government overspending and the Federal Reserve's job to finance it by buying it up (since it has flooded the market so much that actually selling it on the open market would make yields rise). That is bad, but what is worse is when the federal Reserve uses QE which just takes other debt off the banks or Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and just gives them cash. It is enrichment to the select few and is being used by the Federal Reserve to make this false enrichment help make banker friends they like rich and keep money going into a housing market to create yet another bubble at the risk to the public who backs the private bank called the Federal Reserve.
The worst part is that this is selective entitlement and makes those least deserving wealthy (or keeps them wealthy) at the expense of the erosion of overall worth of the dollar.
As for silver, inflation has nothing to do with its fall. It purely has to do with people printing more and more silver paper they can short without physical silver to back it up. Thus silver and gold is also being papertized by printing tons of it without regards to the actual amount that exists in the world. In the end, paper silver means you own paper saying someone owes you something that they don't have but maybe could get you if you asked for it (don't bet on it).
Own These World's Leading Brands And Never Fear A Recession Again [View article]
This is why big corps, esp. Dow or blue chips trade at a premium and are favored in a downturn. I don't think it is brand related as much as large multinationals tend to endure a downturn better partially because they can benefit off of growth globally and they have enough assets to weather the weak market and sometimes take advantage of the downturn to acquire or destroy their competitors.
Stocks: How 'Bad News Is Good News' Is Very Bad News [View article]
Sorry to say this but the Federal Reserve can and probably wants to support the market forever. It will stop only if it can't dole out more money to their banker friends via QE, which will collapse the economy and let them do QE again.
In fact, its almost impossible for the Fed not to stimulate the economy forever. If they did Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac run out of money fast and the TBTF banks run into problems again instantly from lack of QE support. To give you proof QE and stimulus can last forever look at Japan. Central bank de-legitimization of money supply just addicts the whole country to it and destroys all capitalistic fundamentals over time. Japan has been under the spell of QE for more than 2 decades and its only getting worse.
No one cares about fundamentals only the government and the Federal Reserve. Why? Because smart money recognizes that we now have a socialist monetary system and there is no reason to care about the real economy. QE is the beginning of the end of true capitalism.
Google (GOOG +1.1%) has spent $300M acquiring startups to bolster Wallet and has less than 10M downloads to show for it, BloombergBusinessweek observes. Chalk up the mobile payments platform's struggles to carrier intransigence (though Sprint supports Wallet, rivals back Isis, which isn't faring that well either) and Wallet's reliance on NFC tech, which isn't supported by Apple and is deemed less convenient by many than standard card swipes. Google recently gave Wallet several new features, including a Gmail money-attachment option, but Larry Page reportedly shelved plans for a Wallet credit card. On top of Isis, competition is provided by Square, PayPal, and Groupon. [View news story]
LOL its best if you use credit cards as little as possible. If you look at how much data is shared when you make a purchase you'd blanche. And if you look at how much and how easily it is to commit credit card fraud you'd guard your wallet with a lock and key.
Digital wallets will make it that much easier. Lose your phone, lol card fraud from digital wallets. Brush up against someone when your wallet is on... thanks for your permission to sack your card. Accept a strange program, thanks hacker not only do you get my phone list and keystrokes to look at, you also get my credit card info.
No No No No. I like NFC but it should be used for discount cards and the like not credit card info or payments. And BTW don't ever use a public computer to pay your credit card or do bank transactions.
First Phase Of Correction Over, Dollar To Recover [View article]
It is funny, when the dollar slid the only thing the central banks seems to have done is try to shove down precious metals prices even more. Shouldn't they instead tried to support the dollar, or was it too crowded of a trade to make a dent. If so... that is scary.
Apple Is Fundamentally A Value Buy Even With 50% Drop In Earnings [View article]
Apple's profitability is keeping Apple afloat. In reality Apple should be spending this to acquire what it recently has been missing, a driver of innovation and creativity. This, however, is a fault with their organizational top down structure. To achieve anything great they must let at least skunkworks of potentially novel things to be developed and released.
Apple is a carefully managed business which doesn't allow trial products and doesn't tolerate mistakes well. Furthermore, it is highly political and any lead team management gets sacked easily for any perceived failures. Even if it paid 100 billion for talent it would only be wasted. Until there is another Jobs to run new product development competition will just keep closing the gap.
Since people like Jobs is a anomaly you can't count on Apple finding another Jobs like person. This means it must find other drivers of innovation or another business model. Sadly the one thing Jobs could do is force the company to work with other creative organizations even if internally they hated it. This included Samsung. As we can see, Apple once again is behaving in form as a proud, bellicose, intolerant, we are the best organization that thinks it can do it alone. Pride my friend comes before the fall. All the money in the world doesn't give a company that thrives on innovation value.
Apple's magic has been a simple but dangerous one, innovate better or die. To dispel the downside risk they would have to destroy their walled garden. The reason Apple sells at a discount is not that people underestimate the value, its the fact you must discount the downside risk in the stock which gives it at least a 20% haircut as is. Apple's recent trade in policy is to mask the fact they lost some large patent suits with Samsung for integrating more of the technology innovation from Samsung than what they paid for. And they bought a lot of innovation from Samsung.
Apple's lawsuit against Samsung alone is a huge toll on the company, not financially now, but in its ability to discover and integrate new technologies from Asia in the future. It has effectively declared war on its innovation supplier chain. This makes Apple's price a far value if not overvalued until they can prove they can make the new iPhone, iPad hit without Jobs (and I don't mean iTV that Jobs also dreamt up but set aside because it needed partners which Apple couldn't garner after their fiasco with their partners in the iTunes market).
As is, Apple doesn't even have anything new to launch that is even close to the same caliber of these. And yet... that's what they need to make the stock rise to new highs. Their recent great idea was to make a new proprietary charger socket on their phone to squeeze more money out of their accessory suppliers by monopolizing the supply with one manufacturer (which was struck down in court as anti-competitive, monopolistic, and ian inappropriate business practice).
I like Apple and have their products. Why? Because it has Job's Next computer OS worked into the operating system. It is interesting the best code in Apple came not from Apple but from Jobs developing code outside Apple and forcing them to use it, just like forcing them to work with Samsung, and forcing them to shift their focus and make products for markets outside the PC market.
Globus Medical: An Overlooked Company With A Moat [View article]
GMED doesn't have a big moat and there are many players and technologies competing for spinal surgeries and treatments which are a big threat. I actually think they would be much stronger if they aligned at least with a big equipment player in this field like Stryker or J&J.
Unusual given past patterns, the dollar (UUP -1.7%) is being unloaded across the board and in size along with stocks selling off. The euro (FXE +1.5%), cable (FXB +1.8%), the yen (FXY +3.1%), the aussie (FXA +1.1%), and the loonie (FXC +1.3%) are all sharply higher vs. the greenback. The Dow's now off 86 points. [View news story]
Actually Yen is a good trade now. Abbe can't afford another round of QE meaning that they can't dilute again.
A hard landing is acceptable as long as change ensues. The problem with the US right now is they are opting for no structural change and avoiding a severe landing that will force it to deal with reality. This will incapacitate it for decades if not permanently. As all capitalists know, downturns force an economy to adapt and change. Without them capitalism would cease to function.
Hulu Buyout Could Expose Extreme Netflix Valuation [View article]
I'm still waiting for a good paid torrent model, hopefully at a massive discount to the existing streaming services. Some say it will never happen. That's what they said about paid downloadable music.
Amazon is being smart to buy up affordable titles. Netflix may buy or make expensive new titles, but that's largely because their viewers have gotten tired of the old content. Staying on top this way will be a financial drag on it forever. What it needs is a content provider it actually gets along with. Apparently, with the way their current providers are making deals with rivals, Netflix has no real happy content providers.
Redbox Instant (CSTR, VZ) will be available soon to Roku users as the companies look to expand access to their streaming service. It's the second major deal of the week in the streaming space appearing like it could put some pressure on Netflix (NFLX -3.4%) and Hulu after Amazon landed a plush content arrangement with Viacom earlier. [View news story]
Netflix should worry more about Amazon and potential streaming services by content providers. In the meantime I don't see Netflix improving their infrastructure much. If anything that's where they should have a competitive advantage and the fact they don't is a sad testament to hype over substance. If their system worked leagues better than anyone else users would not mind staying with them and they would be a sweet buyout target. As is... any big player can get into streaming and be comparable in service and streaming quality.
What Next After Another Gold And Silver Sell-Off? [View article]
Sure gold and silver production can't keep up. But of course, none of these paper writers ever expects to have to deliver, just like the US never expects to ever pay off its debt and those doing mass QE never expects to ever have to sell the bonds they buy (because they can't without booking a massive loss and revealing that they enriched the member banks they buy them off of at the taxpayers expense).
UniFirst: This Uniform Company Could Rise 15% This Summer [View article]
In reality, just about everybody can start a uniform business and the current trend is security companies to pick up and deliver uniforms just in case you think that someone will try stealing your corporate uniform to get into your building. If your company depends on uniforms to designate employees and identify where they should be, you probably should be back in the 1980s. Otherwise, look into better security or at least a badging and check in system.
If you're too lazy to launder your own clothes get a laundry service. Companies pay a bundle letting uniform companies make money off them by providing uniform maintenance make me laugh.
A Safe Cash Cow With A 5.25% Yield And Growth Potential [View article]
Nokia blew so much cash when it was falling it eventually ran out and had to give their tech development to Microsoft because they couldn't afford to support Symbian or finance any other new OS. Yahoo similarly blew tons of cash before giving into Bing which makes it more like a zombie browser since it eventually couldn't even afford its own browser software technology. And these are the good outcomes. Most tech companies with weakening markets just simply eat it and die.
What Really Happened To Silver: A Different Perspective [View article]
The worst part is that this is selective entitlement and makes those least deserving wealthy (or keeps them wealthy) at the expense of the erosion of overall worth of the dollar.
As for silver, inflation has nothing to do with its fall. It purely has to do with people printing more and more silver paper they can short without physical silver to back it up. Thus silver and gold is also being papertized by printing tons of it without regards to the actual amount that exists in the world. In the end, paper silver means you own paper saying someone owes you something that they don't have but maybe could get you if you asked for it (don't bet on it).
Own These World's Leading Brands And Never Fear A Recession Again [View article]
Stocks: How 'Bad News Is Good News' Is Very Bad News [View article]
In fact, its almost impossible for the Fed not to stimulate the economy forever. If they did Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac run out of money fast and the TBTF banks run into problems again instantly from lack of QE support. To give you proof QE and stimulus can last forever look at Japan. Central bank de-legitimization of money supply just addicts the whole country to it and destroys all capitalistic fundamentals over time. Japan has been under the spell of QE for more than 2 decades and its only getting worse.
No one cares about fundamentals only the government and the Federal Reserve. Why? Because smart money recognizes that we now have a socialist monetary system and there is no reason to care about the real economy. QE is the beginning of the end of true capitalism.
Google (GOOG +1.1%) has spent $300M acquiring startups to bolster Wallet and has less than 10M downloads to show for it, BloombergBusinessweek observes. Chalk up the mobile payments platform's struggles to carrier intransigence (though Sprint supports Wallet, rivals back Isis, which isn't faring that well either) and Wallet's reliance on NFC tech, which isn't supported by Apple and is deemed less convenient by many than standard card swipes. Google recently gave Wallet several new features, including a Gmail money-attachment option, but Larry Page reportedly shelved plans for a Wallet credit card. On top of Isis, competition is provided by Square, PayPal, and Groupon. [View news story]
Digital wallets will make it that much easier. Lose your phone, lol card fraud from digital wallets. Brush up against someone when your wallet is on... thanks for your permission to sack your card. Accept a strange program, thanks hacker not only do you get my phone list and keystrokes to look at, you also get my credit card info.
No No No No. I like NFC but it should be used for discount cards and the like not credit card info or payments. And BTW don't ever use a public computer to pay your credit card or do bank transactions.
First Phase Of Correction Over, Dollar To Recover [View article]
Apple Is Fundamentally A Value Buy Even With 50% Drop In Earnings [View article]
Apple is a carefully managed business which doesn't allow trial products and doesn't tolerate mistakes well. Furthermore, it is highly political and any lead team management gets sacked easily for any perceived failures. Even if it paid 100 billion for talent it would only be wasted. Until there is another Jobs to run new product development competition will just keep closing the gap.
Since people like Jobs is a anomaly you can't count on Apple finding another Jobs like person. This means it must find other drivers of innovation or another business model. Sadly the one thing Jobs could do is force the company to work with other creative organizations even if internally they hated it. This included Samsung. As we can see, Apple once again is behaving in form as a proud, bellicose, intolerant, we are the best organization that thinks it can do it alone. Pride my friend comes before the fall. All the money in the world doesn't give a company that thrives on innovation value.
Apple's magic has been a simple but dangerous one, innovate better or die. To dispel the downside risk they would have to destroy their walled garden. The reason Apple sells at a discount is not that people underestimate the value, its the fact you must discount the downside risk in the stock which gives it at least a 20% haircut as is. Apple's recent trade in policy is to mask the fact they lost some large patent suits with Samsung for integrating more of the technology innovation from Samsung than what they paid for. And they bought a lot of innovation from Samsung.
Apple's lawsuit against Samsung alone is a huge toll on the company, not financially now, but in its ability to discover and integrate new technologies from Asia in the future. It has effectively declared war on its innovation supplier chain. This makes Apple's price a far value if not overvalued until they can prove they can make the new iPhone, iPad hit without Jobs (and I don't mean iTV that Jobs also dreamt up but set aside because it needed partners which Apple couldn't garner after their fiasco with their partners in the iTunes market).
As is, Apple doesn't even have anything new to launch that is even close to the same caliber of these. And yet... that's what they need to make the stock rise to new highs. Their recent great idea was to make a new proprietary charger socket on their phone to squeeze more money out of their accessory suppliers by monopolizing the supply with one manufacturer (which was struck down in court as anti-competitive, monopolistic, and ian inappropriate business practice).
I like Apple and have their products. Why? Because it has Job's Next computer OS worked into the operating system. It is interesting the best code in Apple came not from Apple but from Jobs developing code outside Apple and forcing them to use it, just like forcing them to work with Samsung, and forcing them to shift their focus and make products for markets outside the PC market.
Globus Medical: An Overlooked Company With A Moat [View article]
Unusual given past patterns, the dollar (UUP -1.7%) is being unloaded across the board and in size along with stocks selling off. The euro (FXE +1.5%), cable (FXB +1.8%), the yen (FXY +3.1%), the aussie (FXA +1.1%), and the loonie (FXC +1.3%) are all sharply higher vs. the greenback. The Dow's now off 86 points. [View news story]
China: The Morphing Dragon [View article]
Hulu Buyout Could Expose Extreme Netflix Valuation [View article]
Amazon Strikes Again, Netflix Falls Flat [View article]
Redbox Instant (CSTR, VZ) will be available soon to Roku users as the companies look to expand access to their streaming service. It's the second major deal of the week in the streaming space appearing like it could put some pressure on Netflix (NFLX -3.4%) and Hulu after Amazon landed a plush content arrangement with Viacom earlier. [View news story]