captainccs's Comments

TD Ameritrade-E*Trade Deal Needs to Happen

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 16:09:03 -0500

Sorry, forgot to mention, I have no position in AMTD or ETrade long or short. I'm an Ameritrade customer. Last time there was talk about taking over ETrade, I wrote to management, as an Ameritrade customer, to please NOT do it. I get good service from Ameritrade and I don't want theme ruining it with ETrade contagion.

TD Ameritrade-E*Trade Deal Needs to Happen

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 15:58:36 -0500

Please don't! Please don't! Please don't! Just let ETrade go broke, as they must as they keep shooting themselves in the foot and the head and elsewhere.

ETrade was my first online broker, via CompuServe, before Brenner-Lee invented the WWW (it was not Al Gore who did it). In time ETrade service deteriorated so badly that I had to switch to Quick & Reilly. When Bank of America ruined Quick & Reilly I switched to Ameritrade.

All Ameritrade needs to do is to wait for ETrade to go bankrupt and then pick up the costumers for free. ETrade is such a management mess that surely they will go broke any day now. Just watch and wait, don't help them by making stupid statements about buying that piece of junk.

Chinese Wind Power Maker A-Power to Set Up Factory in U.S.

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 09:13:21 -0500

APWR: No SEC filings.

How do you track them? How do you trust them?

Jamie Dimon Makes Best Case for Not Breaking Up Big Banks

Mon, 16 Nov 2009 07:24:19 -0500

How to say this in a language simple enough that even a bank executive can understand?

If a bank is too big to fail, it is too big and must be broken up.

Why is this so? Winding down failed banks is the same as dealing with huge storms, the storm sewer must be large enough to deal with the largest storm or even with a triple storm in the case of the perfect storm. Who or what is big enough to deal with the perfect storm? The government or rather. "We the People," or rather, "We the Taxpayers."

Insurance is based on the law of large numbers. A big insurance company can insure a large number of smaller companies but not a single huge company. When a huge company seeks insurance it will be served by several co-insurers backed by several re-insurers. You have to diversify the risk. If you cannot have a large enough private big bank insurer then the banks themselves need to become smaller to be safe, to have the risk diversified.

Dimon is just talking up his book, pay no attention to the self-serving banker. Too big to fail banks are semi-socialistic banks, profits are private while loses are public and that is NOT fair.

Sanderson Farms: A Leg Up on the Great Chicken Wing Crisis

Sat, 14 Nov 2009 20:59:08 -0500

>>>"Jumbo wings averaged $0.132 per pound, up 62.6% from the average of $0.812 per pound during last year’s third quarter. <<<

This math is a bit dyslexic :(

Could it be $1.32?

Blankfein Defends Goldman, Is Flippant with Facts

Tue, 10 Nov 2009 18:57:58 -0500

If AIG was not a bank why did The Fed save AIG? Could it be as a favor to Goldman Sachs?

CIT Group was a bank, why did The Fed not save it? Could it be as a favor to Wall St. banks?

I don't know the answers but it sure smells fishy.

CDS Regulation: Just One Simple Rule

Mon, 09 Nov 2009 09:29:59 -0500

>>>Warning: this post will require you to be able to intelligently ponder philosophical concepts and theories, and perhaps try to forget some assumptions you may already have. <<<

Say there are 100 houses worth $1 million each and you expect 1% (one house) to burn down each year. To come out even, you need to collect $10,000 per house per year.

Insure one house twice, collecting an extra $10,000. If that house burns down, you have a loss of $990,000. The solution is to never pay more than the real loss which in this case would be one house, $1 million and not $2 million.

Suppose you insured every house twice thereby eliminating the loss. It would not be insurance, it would be gambling. Insurance is defined as the transfer of risk. If you don't have an insurable interest if you don't have risk to transfer.

Former Citi CEO John S. Reed: Mea Culpa

Mon, 09 Nov 2009 09:03:29 -0500

Too big to fail is too big and needs to be made small enough to fail safely. If that is achieved by bringing back Glass-Steagall than, by all means, bring it back, with teeth!

Crops Headed for a Tough Harvest

Tue, 03 Nov 2009 08:25:53 -0500

Crops rotting on the ground? Buy fertilizer for the next season.

Market to Shine on Solar Industry Through 2011

Fri, 30 Oct 2009 09:06:06 -0400

All solar needs is a little bit of taxpayer money

taxpayer money
taxpayer money
taxpayer money

Then the solar tea parties begin....

First Solar's Ultraviolet Earnings

Fri, 30 Oct 2009 09:01:28 -0400

>>>with OPEC’s “October War” when they decided to stop shipping oil to countries that supported Israel. <<<

Please get your facts straight. It was NOT an OPEC embargo. It was an ARAB embargo. It was the ARAB member states of OPEC that withheld oil. not countries like Venezuela, a founding member of OPEC.

www.state.gov/r/pa/ho/...

Finding Opportunities in Wind Energy

Thu, 29 Oct 2009 11:38:14 -0400

Take a look at American Superconductor [AMSC]. It's American. It just reported the 3rd consecutive quarter with positive earnings. It supplies wind turbine makers and also has equipment for the grid so it has a more diversified customer base including the Navy.

Disclosure: short puts.

In Defense of Executive Pay Caps

Mon, 26 Oct 2009 08:29:44 -0400

Just let the damn banks fail. That cuts executive pay to the bone!

The Price of a Pound of Banking Flesh

Mon, 26 Oct 2009 08:28:45 -0400

Just let the damn banks fail. That cuts executive pay to the bone!

Not Everyone Likes Windows 7

Mon, 26 Oct 2009 08:10:37 -0400

>>>Now, where to begin with Vista?<<<

Just say No! Switch to Mac! LOL

Avoiding the Pitfalls of Confirmation Bias

Mon, 26 Oct 2009 08:04:58 -0400

The article implies that First Marblehead crashed on its own, that it had nothing to do with the general financial meltdown. While FMC did do a couple of dumb things, neither of them can take credit for the meltdown.

OK, beware confirmation bias. Now give me a real example.

Kenneth Feinberg, Pay Warrior

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 08:42:12 -0400

Why does the gov not cut the pork in the bills it creates in Congress? That would save trillions not just a million or two.

Better yet, let failing banks fail and stay out of business.

It's all posturing and nonsense.

End the Fed!

Wind Energy: Now Is the Time to Invest

Wed, 21 Oct 2009 09:28:17 -0400

>>>Looking at the wind energy supply chain we find many companies ranging from materials to components, turbines, wind farm project developers to independent power producers and utilities which allow the investor to fully participate, but this will be the topic for a follow-up article. <<<

That's the picks and shovels of wind farming! That's where I'm looking for aeolian investments.

What a Portfolio Approach to Climate Policy Means for Your Stock Portfolio

Mon, 19 Oct 2009 10:26:23 -0400

This is wishful thinking. China has four times the population of the USA. By the time China catches up in standard of living with the USA they will be consuming four times the energy the USA consumes. China is desperate to get energy from everywhere. Getting energy from solar and wind is not Chinese altruism towards the welfare of Gaia but an imperative necessity if they are to grow in standard of living. Let a thousand flowers bloom!

On Oct 19 10:16 AM Tom Konrad wrote:

> 3) China understands climate change, and they are making a stong
> push to build out both wind and solar.

What a Portfolio Approach to Climate Policy Means for Your Stock Portfolio

Mon, 19 Oct 2009 10:17:41 -0400

MPT is silly. It tells you to find losers to compensate for your winners to make sure you go nowhere, up or down. Why would such silliness applied to something else be a good idea? I thought the idea was to reduce greenhouse gases and pollutants.

Investing in green is no different from investing in anything else, you have to find companies that produce something useful and make money doing it. Forget the portfolio approach. Cherry pick! There are hundreds of companies to choose from just as there were hundreds of car makers at the beginning of the 20th century. In America they were pruned down to the Big Three. The same will happen in green. The one big difference this century is that instead of having vertically integrated behemoths (Ford had iron mines) it will have horizontally distributed value chains (Intel, M$, Dell, Oracle, etc.).

As investors we need to find the key value producers in the value chain either because they have a controlling technology (Wintel) or because they are the low cost producer (Dell). Everything else is of little interest.

Personally I believe liquid fuels are here to stay so I look for the key player who can replace hydrocarbon fuels with green, renewable fuels.

Without any doubt, electricity will continue to be a major source of power so I look for the key player who can bring down the cost of production and distribution.

You don't need a portfolio of 20 companies, you need two or three winners.

On EESAT and Energy Storage Opportunities on the Smart Grid

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 09:58:51 -0400

How soon will ZBB run out of cash? Reminds me of the dot-com no-revenues-but-great-... bargains. ;)

I just don't see investing in any energy related company that is not currently making a profit. I'll leave that to the VCs.

On EESAT and Energy Storage Opportunities on the Smart Grid

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 09:50:16 -0400

If you wait for a brown-out to start doing something about it, you'll have guaranteed blackouts before you solve the problem.

On Oct 16 08:46 AM jerrydd wrote:

>
> Your line that 'what was missing was buyers' is telling. Facts are
> we already have enough grid to handle the load. How many blackouts
> have you heard about this summer?
>

Too Big to Fail: Greenspan Adds His Voice to the Break-Up Chorus

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 08:15:20 -0400

Yes, if a bank is too big to fail, it is too big and needs to be broken up, like Standard Oil in 1911 and Ma Bell in 1974-82.

Bring on the trust busters!

First Energy Offers a Case Study of How Not to Implement Energy Efficiency

Tue, 13 Oct 2009 09:14:35 -0400

We The People must stop the government-industrial complex from overreaching, specially into our pockets. Good for We The People of Ohio!

Diana Farrell And The White House Theory Of Bank Size

Tue, 13 Oct 2009 08:23:36 -0400

The problem with excessive size is that large banks organized as a cartel, i.e. the Fed, can hold the taxpayers hostage. It's corporate socialism, the profits go to the bankers and the losses to "We The people."

It's time to call out the trust busters. Breaking up Ma Bell did wonders for communications. Breaking up mega-banks would do the same for the realm of finance.

Carbon Credit Trading: Ways to Invest

Mon, 12 Oct 2009 09:09:47 -0400

You got to wonder how many axes bloody Al Gore has to grind. Could it be that he promotes green to prompt some greenbacks in his bank account?

Shorting the Double Dip

Sun, 04 Oct 2009 14:28:55 -0400

Suppose consumption drops by 25%, that does not mean that all businesses that supply this market lose an even 25% of revenue and it does not mean that the bottom line also falls by 25%.

As consumers run out of discretionary spending power they change their buying habits, they might switch from Whole Foods to Walmart, or from JC Penney to Ross Stores. The businesses themselves have tightened inventories and have taken other defensive measures to improve margins.

As investors we need to avoid the me-toos and the also-rans. There are plenty good retail stocks to invest in.

How Much Natural Gas Remains in the USA?

Sun, 04 Oct 2009 13:53:00 -0400

Let's not forget that energy is fungible, it does not matter if it comes from NG, coal, cow dung, solar panels, wind farms, hydro dams, nuclear or geothermal. It's all one big ecology.

How Much Natural Gas Remains in the USA?

Sun, 04 Oct 2009 13:45:30 -0400

Proven reserves are reserves that can be extracted economically at current prices so "proven reserves" fluctuate with NG prices. Unproven reserves would be too expensive to extract at current prices but if the price goes up some "unproven reserves" become proven. A geologist can make intelligent guesses about the probability of gas in certain geologic formations and I suppose that can be part of the undiscovered reserves.

But, if you were to cap the 50 state capitols and the big one in Washington DC, and if you were to capture all that natural gas, the entire world could be supplied forever.

Shining a Light on Solar Opportunities

Sat, 03 Oct 2009 12:13:43 -0400

>>>So... even in Fargo, ND (lat. 46'52"N, no palm trees in sight) such a system would get on average 6-7 kWh of solar radiation per day, for every square meter of panel. <<<

Provided they are not covered by dust, leaves, bird droppings, snow or other crud.

Leave the military place.
Kill the DEA. Stop the war on drugs.
Fire the Obama Czars.