By David Grandey

On Wednesday, leading stocks started to sell off, but you wouldn’t know it from the action in the indexes. The selling continued Thursday, and it hit the indexes as well. And then on Friday, the indexes were up (led by financial and energy stocks) while leading stocks were down again. It was pretty much a carbon copy of Wednesday — while the indexes were up, the big money was selling the leaders.

By Jim Nelson

Wall Street is constantly hung up on finding the next giant economy. Is China going to continue to grow as a superpower? What about India?

About 75% of Americans own at least one car. One in four owe more on their car than it’s worth.

These numbers are frightening, and they’re the reason many Americans are desperately trying to sell their vehicles. With the number of car owners finally dropping for the first time in decades, a new industry is starting to take off.

By Greg Guenther

Are you concerned about your financial future? Or maybe you’re worried that the world just isn’t safe anymore… If so, you’re not the only one. In fact, people across the country are feeding their fears by purchasing firearms.

By Greg Guenther

In today’s market, there’s plenty of pain to go around. In fact, a much-maligned retail tactic is making a comeback: layaway.

By Chris Mayer

For the first time since 1940, the yield on the 3-month Treasury bill went negative this month. Investors eagerly bought up a negative 0.01% yield. That means that they would rather lock in a certain 90-day loss than risk anything in the stock market.

We may be on the cusp of a great global boom in the automotive industry. That may be hard to believe, given all the ink spilled on the troubles at the mossbacked mastodons known as GM (GM), Ford (F) and Chrysler. But there are reasons to believe something big is afoot here in the land of wheels. And the investment opportunities it opens up are surprising.

The first little nugget comes from The Economist, which points out that in 2008, for the first time ever, consumers in Brazil, Russia, India and China (the BRIC countries) bought more cars than U.S. consumers. The year, despite all its troubles, may still hit 59 million vehicle sales, an all-time record. By the end of this decade, which is not far off, China will pass the U.S. as the world’s largest auto market.

By Byron King

“Global Demand for Oil to Plummet,” screamed the headline of the Financial Times on Dec. 10. Huh? No it won’t. Who are they trying to kid?

We don’t play politics at Penny Sleuth. Frankly, we can’t agree on politics. But that doesn’t mean smart investors should ignore what Washington’s doing. Some of the largest profits in history were spawned from legislation and court rulings.

Take solar energy for example. After the introduction of the Solar Energy Research and advancement Act of 2007, investors watched as solar companies’ share prices exploded.

“Taking the long view, we are running out of dirt.”— David R. Montgomery, geologist

Over the summer, Iran bought a large amount — more than a million tons — of wheat from the U.S.

Renewable energy has been a hot political topic, but it has also been just as hot as an investment. We have seen tremendous growth in wind, hydro and geothermal energy production, but one of the more recent markets to catch fire has been solar. To see just how explosive this market really is, there is no need to look any further than a couple of solar module producers, Trina Solar (TSL) and First Solar (FSLR). These two companies have recently signed some major deals, and it has shown in their stock prices. These companies have seen huge run-ups in the past few months.

Let’s first take a look at Trina Solar. It has recently signed contracts with a German company and three Italian companies. These contracts have TSL set to deliver solar modules that will produce approximately 88-99 megawatts of power over the next three years.