fxtrader07

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    • Mon Aug 11th 08:34 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Gold and Silver Turn Bearish: No Conspiracy Here
      Bill, please tell me, what's your time horizon on your advice?
      What i am seeing is that the herd of big short-term oriented players (hedgefunds AND HB&B) rotates thorug the sectors in ever shoeter periods. Three months ago oil 200$ and further rises in the prices of base metals and grains were advertised convincingly citing emerging markets demand as driving those forr years to come.
      Now, a quarter later everything has changed and the bottom will fall out of the global economy?
      Give me a break! news and interpretations of data are changed in a second in order to explain any major market move. To me this is all noise and you are obviously keen on participating in that great shuffling game of chasing this sector than that then the next one, back to the first. That may be fine advice for daytraders or speculators with a 3-6 months time horizon. But for investors?
      So you called people to get out of gold at 940$/oz and now you are mulling over whether 800 or 840$ might be a good re-entry. Pleazzze! We are talking about 10-15% correction stuff here that you try to time. Or is that buying at 800 or 840 or lower also just another short-term flip-flopping? Such as your Cara100 that is getting changed pretty frequently as well?
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    • Mon Aug 11th 07:20 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      While Gartman is Goldless, I Still Itch for Commodities
      @Mark: If gold or any other commodity stays flat you won't earn a dime. However, smart and efficient producers of the stuff will make money and create value for their shareholders. Buying commodities futures was certainly smart 3 years ago. But now, and in general, it is one of the dumbest thing to do and has in any case zero to do with investing and everything to do with pure speculation.
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    • Mon Aug 11th 07:02 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      The Emperor (Mr. Ackman) Has No Clothes
      Well, are you really so naive to think that Ackman ever believed the stuff he was telling the public day after day? All he needed to get done was to create enough fear and panick. Not to be right with his claims. I would certainly not be surprised to learn that he actually was now long the monoliners.
      That being said, the picture is not as rosy for ABK and MBi as you might think. They will be able to deal with their mistakes in the CDO business, sure. But their main business was insuring muni-bonds and if you look at the precarious state of the us economy and the quick deterioration of federal and municipal budgets (collapsing tax revenues!) this spells lots of trouble. I am cautiously long mbi/ABk, mostly senior debt, but expect substantial deductions from current book value estimates over the next 4-5 years.
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    • Mon Aug 11th 06:50 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      The Crude Reality
      just another useless 'technical analysis' humbugthat claims to have a clue about future oil prices. technicak analysis is not all total crap - it can serve you well at times. But certainly not this usual trendline, oversold, overbought, macd etc. etc. nonsense. This works a few times by chance and loses you money in the long run with 100% accuracy.
      But people never learn. Every day another sucker is born who claims to have a clue and a truly predictive system when in fact, he just assembled the right data in the right way to show some random correlation and some predictive power. 90% of the often disregarded 'simply buy and hold'-investors are better off in the long run than the gazillion short-term traders with their data-mined and curve-fitted 'systems' Go figure.
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    • Mon Aug 11th 06:41 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Market Doubts Setting in Again
      Bill, always enjoy your analysis (even if it sometimes runs painfully contrary to my positions) but where do you take it from that 'the same (i.e. reversing wealth effect) is happening in Europe? I mean, apart from the UK and mybe Ireland and Spain there has been no real estate boom or bubble to begin with. savings rates in Europe are rather high (much much higher than in th US anyway). So what 'wealth effect in reverse' are you talking about regarding Europe?
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    • Fri Aug 8th 08:59 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Sears Faces Risk If Economy Doesn't Improve
      bankruptcy is ruled out for shld. however, Lampert might be forced to sell the assets rather quickly now. if you liquidate the entire company, even in todays market environment you will get substantially more than the current $80/share. however, pure liquidation was not Lampert's objective and was certainly not see as the value maximizing option. But it served and serves as a sort of back-up.
      That being said I won't invest in shld even though it trades way below liquidation value. Lampert has proved to have no clue of how to run a retailing company not to speak of turning around one. chances are he continues to burn more cash and sink more money . Of course, very smart guys like bruce berkowitz from fairholme make the case for sears that you get eddie lampert essentially for free when you buy sears. However, I do not appreciate a guy like Lampert - so i do not want the fellow even for free
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    • Fri Aug 8th 08:50 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Fannie / Freddie Reality Check: Here Comes the Big Bailout?
      sorry for the typos - was typing it in an anry mood.
      @jjason: I like Wilkus and his company, too. It has become the largest position of my portfolio
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    • Fri Aug 8th 08:09 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      A Simple Momentum System for Beating the Market
      as far as i can tell there is sector and asset class rotation ata speed and with a power like never before. Imho this is precisely the to be expected effect of myriads of dumb quant funds chasing more or less the same momentum strategies. Since they follow price, not value they tend to actually hunt their own echos if they exercise a sufficiently large influence over the market. it seems to me, that this stage has arrived. so they rotate out of oil and oil stocks and out of solar into biotech and financials - producing a rapid price deline of the former and a rapid price jump for the latter. If both trends have gone far enough they will move on to the next sectors and assets. In the process, a growing market weight of that will tend to ever more shorten these cycles until they occur on weekly rather than multi-month cycles. Finally the speed at which the portfolios can be turned over will act as a natural border. When all is said and done though, longterm stock prices will rise nor faster or slower than without these momentum folks. But there will be a heck of volatility around the mean.
      What's my take? I gladly look out for value opportunities created by the brainless stampede of the momentum herd. They can chase the pennies (dwindling excess returns versus broad indexes of 2-3 percent per annum) while i will look to make the bucks (5-10%) outperformance on average.
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    • Fri Aug 8th 04:13 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Seven Reasons To Avoid Gold - And Why You Should Ignore Them
      regarding physical and investment demand for gold: the argument that higher gold prices have caused a declining physical (jewellery) demand are true, but this is as temporary a decline as is the perceived 'demand destrction' at $4/gallin for gasoline. people will adapt and gradually accept the new price levels. ever have and ever will. besides japan and the US there are now Indian and Chinese and other Asian central banks which will inflate their currencies rather than letting the economic growth come to a halt.
      Make no mistake, global money supply going to expand considerably faster than gold production - making an ounce of gold more valuable in the longer term against any paper currency. however, given the current asset deflation in the USA and global stock markets this ecessive money creation will translate into higher prices with a considerable time lag as the author has rightly pointed out. once the focus starts shifting from recession and deflation fears to the unfunded future obligation in the US, japan and Europe there will be a rush to gold unseen and unheard of in modern times. And nobody will ring the bell for you. I won't care whether this moment comes in two years or 4 years or 8 years - holding some physical gold (no ETFs, paper certficates etc) and some high quality major gold producers (GG, KGC, Yamana, ABX, or GDX etf) will be the best insurance and the best financial decision you can ever make to prepare for the truly rough times that are ahead. And no, the current environement will be like a walk in the park compared to the financial mess that is looming for the modern welfare states
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    • Thu Aug 7th 07:59 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      The Great Bubble of China: Next to Pop?
      great article offering a contrarian view. however seeing and calling a bubble is fruitless when it is not acted upon. in this sense, while many banking execs saw the housing bubble bubbling they still handed out all the silly loans. so it was a bubble nonetheless.
      of course, though, when china really collapses it will drag the world with it. after all, isn't everybody and his uncle pinning the hopes for a recovery on the global economy, now the the usa and europe are in/headed for a recession?
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    • Thu Aug 7th 07:49 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Investment Strategy: Be Prepared to Take Advantage of Tomorrow's Sunshine
      one of the best articles ever published on sa and great food for thought. demographics (retiring baby boomers and later on rising and peaking echo-boomers) are quite fitting into this picture
      the big wildcard is the lobal economy and emerging markets which may well manage to derail the established cycles. after all, with the presidential cycle decisevely broken this time it is not hard to imagaine that it will not really return to its old glory days. after all, band-aids and spending excesses by the govt are running out of ammunition given the ballooning deficits and uncovered healthcare and pension liabilities. on the other hand, those are exactly the stuff hyperinflation is made of - so high quality fixed income might be a good bet today but a terrible one 3-4 years from now
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    • Thu Aug 7th 07:24 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Mechel: Huge Upside - But Not for the Faint of Heart
      the real issue to worry about is the tax evasion charge - not the anti-monopoly commission. the author completely fails to consider it later on. all in all a poor article that basically sums up all the pros while omitting and keeping silent on basically all the cons. gl to the author with that approach.
      food for thought: the tax issue could be used by the govt to get mechel#s coal assets on the cheap or basically for free. well, that would change the investment thesis, no?
      and regadring the need for foreign money: russia has never before been in such a comfortable position vs. foreign capital as it is today. and in the end, greed always has won over fear. western companies have literally sunk billions in russia - and still continue to invest. go figure
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    • Thu Aug 7th 06:19 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Fannie / Freddie Reality Check: Here Comes the Big Bailout?
      usually like your articles but this mark-to-market nonsense is really getting annoying now. bnaks and lenders like fannmie and freddie have been primarily designed to transform maturities (borrowing short, lending long) and liquidity (borrowing cash and exchanging it for less liquid rather and often illiquid assets with no observable market - level 3 in todays accounting terms). Now, everybody demands to mark PER SE ILLIQUID AND BARELY MARKETABLE STUFF to market. HELLOOO??? The price of any asset is to quite an extent a function of its liquidity - that's banking 101. But this, of course doesn't say a thing about the earnings power of this asset or its likelihood of default or decline of its intrinsic value. But all of a sudden people demand mark-to-market as if the market (which is not even functioning properly these days) is any holy institution that carries the world#s ultimate wisdom. never mind that moods of markets change rather abruptly. want to require every oil company to mark their assets to market every quarter? wow, what a great help to investors that would be, no?
      Give me a break.
      If fannie and freddie can hoild their assets to maturity, which they easily can given the govt's authorization to support them by any amount necessary, then they have every right to write down by 1 or 2% and not to adopt that silly firesale market-price of 50ct/$.
      bears and hedgefunds have a field day with the public's illiteracy regarding accounting and valuing of assets.
      A lot of welath destruction and wealth transfer 8from ordinary citizens and shareholders to large banks and hedgefunds) would never have taken place were it not for this idiotic mark-to-market-mania.
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    • Wed Aug 6th 08:59 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Let's Get Greedy with Mechel Steel
      the real issue to worry about is the tax evasion charge - not the anti-monopoly commission. the author mentions the tax evasion charge at the beginning but completely fails to consider it later on. all in all a poor article that basically sums up all the pros while omitting and keeping silent all the cons. gl to the author with that approach.
      food for thought: the tax issue could be used by the govt to get mechel#s coal assets on the cheap or basically for free. well, that would change the investment thesis, no?
      and regadring the need of foreign money: russia has never before been in such a comfortable position vs. foreign capital as it is today. and in the end, greed always has won over fear. western companies have literally sunk billions in russia - and still invest. go figure
      View article »
    • Wed Aug 6th 07:24 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Merrill's Muddled Analysis: Another Reason I'm Bullish on Financials
      Tom, what about the trillions in off-balance sheet assets that banks had to bring bacl into their balances if the fasb had not been, uhm, 'persuaded' to extend the deadline for another year? Nobody can tell what losses they may add to banks but one thing is for sure: they will continue to tie up liquidity and hence impair banks' earnings power going forward.
      What about 'normalized' earnings? the past 4-5 years saw bubble earnings -from a credit and derivatives bubble. What di you think will these normalized earnings look like? and will bank stocks still look attractive in the light of these forward normalized earnings? I very much doubt it. This is a financial bubble bursting, not a cyclical downturn á la 1990. this is the real deal this time.
      may it be that you just happen to be overly optimistic (confirmatory bias anyopne)?
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