tedstr

Ten Reasons for an Imminent Stock Market Crash

Would someone please explain the difference between flash trades and pump and dump. Sorry but this whole rally is beginning to smell like manipulation.

There is nothing wrong with 1050-1200 on the S&P. But the fear of something less and the flash trading could easily set off a big sell off down to 800-900 with a recovery just as fast.

Marc Faber: Equities Safer than Dollars

Faber may be a smart guy but we need to stop all this alarmist talk and get on with fixing the problems.

I am a very typical consumer and I spend about 80% of my monthly purchases on things that stay in the US. My mortgage, education for my children, telcom, entertainment and food. I heat and cook my food with natural gas which is in vast oversupply and mostly American.

I fly mostly on American built planes, I buy mostly American built software and I hire Americans to run my town and educate and protect my family.

Yes my cars are foreign but my Toyota was built here by Americans.

Don't Ignore Low Interest Rates

Right but that PE includes one time charge offs. One of the problems in this recession (and many others) is that earnings enter a "get out of jail free" period. CEOs can write off all their mistakes with impunity which exacerbates the problem. I believe this is where we were in March. This recession is particulalry bad because of the huge bubble in financials.

Market Outlook: Expect a Major Shift in Bond and Equity Correlations

Dian, brilliant piece. I am moving into oil and gas MLPs as they seem a perfect "middle course" to take.....increasing commodity prices should play well for them though the high leverage ones could be in for some trouble. thoughts?

The Shallowest Generation

This is a moral dilemma. Less about economics. People forget that Democracy and Capitalism require morality otherwise they collapse into revolution and anarchy like any other failed form of society.

You glossed over the fact that Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton were also along for the ride. And that we have done much more over these past 20 years like continuing to be the world’s builder of airplanes, inventor of wonder drugs, dozens of which are obscure and do not get the headlines of Aspirin or Penicillin, designers of the PC and its operating system and software applications that have essentially powered the greatest improvement in productivity and distribution of knowledge since the printing press.

And yes we are also the world’s power plant. We have the capital and knowledge to find the oil that powers the world. We don’t own that oil anymore, but we find it and dig it up for the rest of the world and then get told how much we will get paid for it at ROI’s that are nothing greater than average.

We are also involved in defending ourselves against people who hate us for no reason other than our religion and our success and our support of their enemy, Israel. Our volunteer army has cost us a tiny pittance over the past six years. We spend less on national defense as a % of GDP during this war than any other war in history! By far!! And BTW, this is OUR war, not some abstract alliance defending Europe or Southeast Asia. We were attacked!

But we have a hard time with it because we have hundreds of billions in off shore tax cheats even though we have the lowest marginal tax rates in the past 50 years! Now that’s obscene and no one is really talking about that. If you want a revolution, get that one started.

If Obama gets in he needs to worry if he can keep George Bush’s legacy of safety for the past seven years.

You also did not mention that three of the richest people (two boomers) in this country have now dedicated themselves to giving away most all of their wealth and supervising it during their lifetimes. Ted Turner, Bill Gates, and Warren Buffet. And they are not giving it to art museums. They want to solve big problems like Malaria which is not even a US problem!! How much does Carlos Slim give to his poor country? Hugo Chavez?

We also still GIVE AWAY about 1% of our tax dollars to both our friends and ENEMIES. And in exchange we get complaints from countries like little children saying it’s not enough, give me more. Greed is not a unique American thing.

Your article was very well written but the world is a big place and America still does most of the heavy lifting that is making it a better place. We’ve just become a little too full of ourselves, a little too comfortable, and in some cases way overpaid.

Pay Little Heed to Economic Reports and Move On

better than that...the real story is the end of the Wintel monopoly. Intel chips in Macs and dual operating environments means every PC owner lusting after a beautiful Mac now has no barriers to entry. This is why their laptop business is booming and a wholesale switch to Macs is on. The phones are a sideshow to this phenom.

This is why Gates is retiring, Vista was an attempt to mitigate the damage by emulating an Apple interface, gone horribly wrong, and Balmer is gone nuts over MSN, his only lifeboat. Buy apple, sell MSFT

Our Coming Depression

You think the PE is going to 5! No question your well expressed comments are right about the asset deflation, general bubble popping, and moral realignment that we ALL need, but you are forgetting that only a small portion of all mortgages are anywhere near default and those 7 million illegal aliens weren't here in '29 to buy homes, cut our lawns, and continue to power our economy with cheap labor and consumer demand.

Clinton and Franklin Rains started this thing by insisting that everyone should be able to buy a home and Fannie was going to make it happen. OBama ain't going to pull the plug on that one.

There is a fire sale of incredible proportion going on now. Buffet knows a good thing when he sees it. So does Vikram Pandit. He got such a good deal with Wachovia now they are fighting over it. Paulson is going to look like a genius in 2-3 years when he makes a profit on on the debt he now owns returns to normal.....ah oops actually Obama will be credited as the genius.

I'd say this was capitulation. The blood is in the streets. Get ready to buy.