Urbane Gorilla!

Wells Fargo Is Doing Worse than It Seems

Yep.. My little credit unions have been bought out twice now. First by Wells Fargo and next by Chase. My Credit Card Company was bought out by Bank of America. In each instance, I got screwed. I will once again move my business to a smaller bank. The large banks are no longer worth supporting. Even with the bailouts, they expend their energies in trying to weasel another buck out of their customer base. You cannot buy a little bank and step on the same customers that bailed them out. To Hell with the big banks.

@Urbane_Gorilla


On Oct 24 11:46 AM najdorf wrote:

> ebworthen: Your claim is the kind of idea for which really good data
> exist - don't use anecdotes. Most large banks are growing their
> deposit bases through acquisitions and many consumers preferring
> banks who can offer more services, more locations, clearer government
> backstop, etc. Read the SEC filings on WFC, BAC, JPM, etc. and you'll
> see that it's true.
>
> The lesson of the crisis w/r/t deposit banking is that if you rate
> chase at small banks who have to pay high rates to attract funding,
> you face a significant risk of either rate cuts when they stabilize
> or having to deal with the vagaries of the FDIC takeover process.
> The FDIC or the banks they re-sell to can cut rates and terms, make
> you do a lot of extra paperwork and mailing, etc. People who want
> clarity and simplicity are often banking with the TBTF banks.

6 Dividend Stocks for Current Income

Yahoo Finance is notorious for not posting dividend info. Click on their interactive 1 year chart though and choose 'events' and 'dividends' from the drop down list. You have to hover over the 'D' on the chart.

For example, AOD (Alpine Dividend ETF) registers as paying no dividend on the summary page, yet shows a 12 cents per share monthly on the chart.


On Oct 21 08:37 PM MJJP wrote:

> I checked some of your suggestions and Yahoo shows no data on dividends
> being disbursed on many of those mentioned and also they are in the
> PK category.

Geothermal Is Getting Red Hot, Part II

I live up in Grass Valley, CA and did look at buying in Cobb, which is up in the mountains just west of Santa Rosa, CA. They recently shut down geothermal power generators there which had been operating for many years (Sorry, don't know all the particulars) and I'm not aware of any major quakes in that area..At least nothing like San Francisco and LA.. I really don;t see the correlation between quakes and geothermal..

@Urbane_Gorrilla ;=)


On Sep 08 08:18 PM singularityjumper wrote:

> I think the earthquake component is being downplayed. Here in Nor
> Cal wine country it is under strong suspicion and more stories are
> linking geothermal to seismic activity.
>
> The problem is the oblique nature of it all. As the Switzerland project
> happened, the project was immediately shut down. If we start to see
> other seismic activity near geothermal projects, the authorities
> will have no choice put pull the plug and protect the community.
> Did the geothermal project cause the quake? Maybe and maybe not.
> Makes no difference because authorities will shut it down as a precaution.
>
>
> I honestly believe this will become a huge issue with geothermal.
> There is no way you can tell the community that the project won't
> cause potential earthquakes.
> Your investment in any of these companies can come to grinding halt
> literally overnight.

Pinning the Blame on the House Republicans

The day the GOP voted down the TARP bill, the markets lost $1.2 Trillion. Clearly anyone with an ounce of sense recognized the reaction to Congress' failure to pass that legislation then as a failure of our legislature to recognize this horrendously large problem. As a Republican (but not a GOP), I lay that loss firmly in the GOP's lap. In fact, clearly any attempt at corrective legislation by the Obama administration is met by hostility and heel dragging in any field of endeavor. Factually, the GOP (Gasbags On Parade) would rather see the net worth of individual Americans tank, and would rather see the 18% of Americans that don't have insurance suffer just so they can gain political points. A very sad indictment of the GOP.

@Urbane_Gorilla

S&P 500 Stocks with the Highest Short Interest

The snarky answer would be 'yes!' .. What a high short float means is you probably have a very volatile stock. Simply put, if the shorts are right and there is bad news associated with the company, then most probably, the stock will sink. However, if any news is interpreted as 'positive', or 'not as bad as we thought' then buyers come back in and the shorts scramble to cover, which drives the stock price higher. The news can either be valid, or 'subjective' such as 'Gee! The government won't let (company name goes here) sink into the muck!'

Luck! ;=)


On Aug 28 05:04 PM PseudonymName wrote:

> Does a large amount of short interest mean that these are primed
> for a pull back or are they ready to pop when the shorts get squeezed?

Chinese Stocks Break Below 50-DMA

Just bear in mind that the Baltic Dry normally is affected by import of raw goods to China (As well as other countries - but this is a China article). If China has been stockpiling materials, then the BDI may only reflect the end of it's stockpiling for the present. A more telling shipping indicator might be 'container shipping' such as Seaspan (SSW) as that would be the indicator for manufactured goods being shipped out of China. The container chart can be viewed here : shipping.capitallink.c...

Luck! ;=)


On Aug 15 01:58 PM Bill L. wrote:

> The Baltic dry index paints a similar story; in March when the markets
> made a new low, the Baltic dry index (as well as China) show a bullish
> divergence. However, the Baltic Dry index has been in decline now
> since June. As China is such a large exporter, you would expect these
> to mean converge, thus bringing the valuation and prices of China
> related stocks back down to earth.
>
> The Baltic Dry Index divergence marked the bottom... could possibly
> be marking a top here as well.

The Whitney Whiplash

I think we can now call what happens when Whitney speaks it a 'Whit-lash'...

What (or When) Is Up with Natural Gas

Just a couple of points:

Natural gas is primarily used for heating, but also is used for electricity generation. The normal seasonal price increases in natural gas begin in July, move up through October (Air conditioning season), retrace and then ramp back up till January when prices drop again. A chart of the normal seasonal pricing can be found here (presuming seeking alpha has fixed their problem of including links):

www.spectrumcommoditie...

Even though commercial use of natural gas is down (factories, chemical production), we should still see something like the same pattern as normal, albeit maybe at a reduced rate.

What Went Wrong with California, New York, and New Jersey?

This is true. I worked in a County position involving tracking people. We consistently found people with 'cloned' SS#'s. But SS could care less. It fascinated me that there are many Americans walking around with illegal usage of their SS#s, that don't know about it, that SS will do nothing about and will never draw against the increased income as SS knows that the secondary numbers are illegal.. It's an American Ponzi scheme..


On Jun 28 12:47 PM FloridaBoy2 wrote:

> Illegals do pay taxes under a fictitous SSN. I firmly believe the
> problem only gets lip service from the government because many businesses
> want the cheap labor. These people do not come here to sightsee,
> they come here for jobs. The construction trades, meat, hospitality
> industries and agriculture employ them in large numbers. Taxpayers
> end up subsidizing this cheap labor. If the law was enforced and
> stiff fines imposed the problem would be greatly diminished.
>
> On Jun 28 09:30 AM a. palmer jr. wrote:

California's Default Is Certain

Just a note.. Calif has lost 25% of it's income...(We always spend more than we take in.. LOL! ) .. People discussing this subject have to ask themselves "Would an average family be able to survive a 25% drop in income after racking up their credit cards?"


On Jun 28 08:37 AM a. palmer jr. wrote:

> I don't understand why California is in this mess...it looks like
> a solution is simple, if you have the will to pull it off. It's
> just a matter of simple mathematics as taught in elementary school;
> to balance their budget they either have to take more in or quit
> sending more out or both. In California's case right now it's both.
> I know that will make some people unhappy but they shouldn't expect
> money for nothing anyway. I'm sure the movie stars won't mind maybe
> 1% more on their taxes if we'd ask them and I'm positive the illegals
> in California wouldn't mind going back home for awhile while Arnie
> gets the budget balanced. The welfare moms could work, as a last
> resort, in a McDonalds or Taco Bell to help out, like I said, only
> temporarily while the problems are being solved.

Chinese Real Estate: Getting in on the Next Bubble

For 16 cents less, you can have E-HOUSE HOLDINGS ADR (EJ), which exhibits teh same chart and has actually turned up (10% today) .. Looks ready for another run to me.

Housing Market Has Clearly Bottomed for Now

B.S.

Kongzhong: Time to Accumulate?

Actually, KONG came up on my screener a month ago . I checked fundies ..Amazing numbers. Loved the business model ..And I sat like a bump on a log waiting for a pullback ..Ha! Never happened. The only concern I had was the total lack of institutional holdings .. Based on the percentage of insider ownesership, I figured that there just had to be a ton of retail ownership .. That bothers me a bit as retail buyers could panic and dump at a minor pullback ..Still..

Luck! ;=)
On Jun 15 03:40 PM Apple Diner wrote:

> This guy's article is really flogging this stock. He must be in deep
> for massive losses. LOL!

FAS and FAZ: A Short-Seller's Dream?

Wrong. I've heard a couple on Stocktwits. One in particular is @milktrader, who has been using this system for a considerable period of time.

I did run a backtest and couldn't handle the potential damage caused by a long intense run as noted by 'joethebull', but then look at the professionals that got hammered during this period anyway.

Luck! ;=)


On Jun 12 07:34 PM Sicall wrote:

> Who would be dumb enough to loan stock on a triple leverage ETF ?
>
>
> I have heard people say they are in this trade but i believe its
> an urban myth.

Why Is the U.S. Stock Market Stalling?

The market has had a nice run and it is time for it to rotate into other vehicles. Over the last week, that has been the dollar. When the dollar is strong, commodities and the market drop. We had a $2 surge in the dollar over the weekend.