Daniel Houston

Drop in Factory Orders May Be Telling Us Something

I think if you use earnings growth (see: tickersense.typepad.co...) instead of YOY SP%, you'll get a tighter and clearer fit between the two variables. that said, factory orders (and durable goods orders, if you prefer the substitute) seem to be saying YOY Q1 SP earnings growth will come in 0 to negative.

Income Savings at Lowest Level Since Depression

i'm by no means a cheerleader, but please, give me a break.

Is Someone Manipulating This Rally?

McHugh's work has always seemed beyond nutty to me. Some people can't accept what's happening. He's always looking the markets to tank - except the gold market.

Will Housing Bring Down the Economy?

dictionary.com, my friend.

No-Reason-Rally: Likely to Unwind

The old "there is value" defense. Snore...

My mother uses that one when she wants to justify something she can't come up with a reason for justifying.

Move Inc. Attacks House Prices Site Zillow.com

A realtor thug. And I thought Ted Haggard was the biggest loser I'd seen this week.

Housing Sector Recession Will Last a While, Won't Cause Full Blown Recession

3 month 10 year spread: -47 bps...

welcome to recessionville.

shorting any time the market hit a 52 week high and holding for 3 months with a spread inversion that large made a profit 23 out of 23 times. data only comes from 3 economic cycles though.

Inverted Yield Curve: Understanding Its Implications

"Presently, the whole curve is rising, which is signalling inflation."

Um, what are you talking about???

Bulls and Bubbles Are Not Synonymous

edit...bull markets = busted bubbles

Bulls and Bubbles Are Not Synonymous

The author set this up so he could have an argument with readers about semantics. Read it over. His commentary contains nothing that can be applied to an investment or trade. The whole point of the article is to be confrontational by saying only declines of 80% constitute bull markets. Pretty immature considering the point of articles on this site are to add value, not fulfill the author's need for attention. The slew of 1 point ratings are well deserved.

Housing Weakness Poses a Significant Threat to GDP and Stocks

John Wang, your comments represent a very hollow analysis, in my opinion, primarily because you're focusing on assets and not equity. Wealth created by credit can very easily go to zero even if the asset that was purchased on credit does not.

Who cares about the value of the estates? It's the value of homeowner's equity that matters, my friend - and this figure has already gone to zero for many a buyer in 2005 and early 2006 (perhaps most buyers, in fact because down payments on housing have been so tiny recently). So a huge number of investors in the proverbial dot-condos have in fact lost their virtual wealth, same as the investors in dotcom stocks before them. Their investment has gone to pot.


I wrote this on another blog and it may clarify things:

"For one, a fallout from a housing speculation bust is not the same animal as the fallout from the dotcom speculation bust. The difference is debt. It looms around for consumers after a housing bust, but not after a stock bust. Yes there were margin calls when the Nasdaq crashed - but for most individuals, even those aggressively invested in technology shares - their financial obligations did not persist beyond the original capital they invested. Their 401k's and IRAs may get hammered, but that's about it. This is not true of the money that has recently flowed into housing. "


Additionally the comment, "as prices drop, there will be buyers" doesn't truly support your argument because it lacks a timeframe. Yes at some point there will be buyers, but when? If they don't come in before a hard landing then it's tough luck. And there are plenty of instances in plenty of markets that say at times buyers don't return quickly enough.

Housing Weakness Poses a Significant Threat to GDP and Stocks

Your correlation chart has some problems. Please post the correlation of the NAHB index and the SP for the 10 years prior to the study. You may find that the correlation relationship is actually 0 to inverse from 1985-1995. In my opinion, this is a huge bias problem in your collection of data, because we only see the data that fits.

Get Your Rally Shoes On Because This Rally's Got Legs

thank you for your answer, Herb. good luck.

Company Guidance Close to the High End of its Historical Range

Nice work.

Get Your Rally Shoes On Because This Rally's Got Legs

hmmm...all these "fundamentals" you point to have already happened. your pointing to them as reasons to buy stocks seems to contradict the efficient market hypothesis on which you base your firm's name.

your citing of all these economic variables seems meaningless unless you can show that each variable has, in the past, actually given managers an edge from which to build a trading strategy.