tylakewalker

Tighter belts = thicker waists: With less cash to spend, consumers are turning to high-fat fast food and canned goods. Still, America's march to obesity began long before the great recession.

I'm having a great recession and getting healthier. Quit drinking, quit caffeine, started growing my own food. started hiking. Change brings opportunity.

Expecting Big Things from Wireless Infrastructure Stocks

Don't get me wrong. I am bullish on the tower companies. I just don't see SBA Communications as a better pick than Crown Castle or American Tower. Crown Castle also does consulting. I don't think it does them much good.
disclosure; long Crown

Expecting Big Things from Wireless Infrastructure Stocks

"The rest of their revenue comes from consulting and construction services, where they are hired by wireless carriers. This sort of consulting business could be a boon to the company with such aggressive expansion from the carriers."

Nope. Wireless consulting is a very low margin business. You are lucky if you make any money. Tower companies only do consulting to push the carriers on to their own towers. The rent income is where the money is not the consulting fees.

With Boone Pickens' 'windmill in every backyard' (except his) plan on the backburner, Ray Harvey makes an awesome case against Pickens' calls for massive subsidization of the wind-power industry, and explains why the public "hasn't even begun to grasp nuclear energy."

I think it is important to research and develop several sources of energy including wind, solar, nuclear, sugarcane based ethanol, algae based biodiesel.
Is it not wise to diversify.

Ethanol's Persecution Complex: To Rehabilitate Its Image, It Must Understand the Issues

The most efficient and cost effective biofuel is sugarcane based ethanol. That is true today and it has been true for over 30 years. U.S. government policies are so deeply mired in politics and corrupted by lobbying that I have lost hope for this country. We will continue to argue and point figures while other countries rapidly develop effective alternative energies.

Rising Number of Renters Could Spell Trouble for Consumer Price Index

It's important to note that the marketwatch story compares 2008 rents to 2007 rents. old data. Read the 2009 Q1 earnings call transcript from Equity Residential and you will see rents are flat or down in most markets.

I am long EQR and UDR. I don't see rents rising in the near term. Too many job losses.

Why Buffett Doesn't Matter

Nice article Mike

Commercial Real Estate: From 'Best' to 'Worst of Times' in Seven Months Flat

You cannot have a meaningful discussion about "commercial real estate" unless you break it down to the smaller subsets. A REIT in shopping malls is facing different market forces than a REIT in multifamily or health care properties. Quit overgeneralizing to such an extreme.

U.S. Debt Default, Dollar Collapse Altogether Likely

I have never understood goldbugs. If things get as bad as the author predicts what good is some shiny metal bricks going to do me. I can't eat or drink it. I can't build a shelter out of it. I am concerned about the future and the mistakes our federal government is making. I believe we will have substantial inflation in the medium and long term. I'm increasing the size of my vegetable garden, planting blueberries, enriching my soil to increase yields. I have extra canned food, water, hiking gear and ammunition. If the US currency becomes worthless we will revert to a barter system. I will be trading my extra food and gear, good luck with your shiny pile of metal. And for the record, I don't think it will get that bad. I am long on US and Brazilian stocks.

Year-End Buyouts: Big Challenges for the Big Banks

Besides being "Too big to fail" Bank of America has proven "Too big to offer anything resembling good customer service"
Furthermore, these large banks are stealing from taxpayers. Boycott them, close your accounts with the large banks and open accounts with small banks and credit unions.

The roots of the crisis did not grow within the financial system alone, Henry Paulson tells the FT in a valedictory interview. Super-abundant savings from fast-growing emerging nations put downward pressure on yields and risk spreads everywhere, he says - implying future crises can only be avoided through global co-operation.

There is some quality finger pointing for you. I wonder if Henry is considering running for an elected office in the future. He appears to be practicing some of the prerequisite skills.

10 Clean Energy Stocks for 2009

To WACG

"The web is populated with idiots that have some weird need to spout opinions"

yes like you.

Why the negativity? No one forced you to read for this. You didn't pay for this article.

JP Morgan Initiates Coverage on Wireless Tower Companies

I like this business.
I believe demand for tower space will grow as end customers continue with a couple of key trends.
1) ditching the land line and making all calls wireless
2) expanding the role of the wireless phone into web browsing, file downloading and other applications that will increase the need for greater data capacity. carriers will have to add infill sites, add antennas to existing sites.

An infrastructure trend worth mentioning. Some carriers, most notably, Clearwire, are ditching the leased T1 lines and using microwave dishes for data backhaul. That is revenue lost by the local phone company and gained by the tower landlord.
The shift of resources continues to flow into wireless telecom and wireless internet. Just look at the FCC's taking of bandwidth from television broadcasting to wireless telecom.
long cci

The Return of Lending: Still Distant

Individuals and small business should close their accounts with large banks and open new accounts with smaller community banks and credit unions. You have a better chance of establishing a relationship and obtaining financing with a smaller lending institution. I recently opened an account with a credit union and I will be closing my account with BofA in the near future.

Crown Castle and the Tower Operators: The Foundation for Next-Gen Wireless

CCI processes applications quicker than AMT. The carriers want their sites on air as quick as possible. AMT customer service is decent and used to be the best but has slowly gotten worse and fallen behind CCI. When you have a search ring and you can choose between collocating on AMT or CCI I'm going to recommend my client chooses the CCI tower. I don't think AMT is a bad company, I just think CCI is better from a customer service standpoint. They are easier to work with, return calls quicker, more efficient process, etc,. Sometimes you can't get AMT to return a call. CCI has aggressively expanded AND improved their customer service at the same time. I am impressed by that. I admit This is only one aspect of the company but I wanted to add my two cents because of my past experience working with both companies.