PeakOiler

There's No Shortage of Those Who Want to See the Dollar Go Lower

A weaker dollar is curtains for the USA because, if you haven't noticed, the USA is a country of consumers, where roughly 80% of the GDP is based on consumption. You think the US exporters will benefit? No, because their input costs, particularly energy, are priced in USD and those costs will rise rapidly (see oil prices today).

A weak USD simply fortifies the vicious circle of economic collapse for the USA. And if the USA continues this race to the bottom, the rest of the world will follow automatically, because the USA has been the consumer engine for all exporting countries.

Think of a country's currency as the stock of the country. The lower that currency sinks the lower the economy goes.

Can Traditional Print Newspapers Survive Creative Destruction?

Eye strain reading online, but not when reading a newspaper?? It's quite the opposite with me. There are so many ways to make your online reading easier, the most obvious is increasing the zoom level of the web page.

I don't know how anyone can justify the selfishness of cutting down trees, expending vast amounts of fossil fuels in the process of cutting, pulping, paper rolling, and delivery of an individual newspaper. Clearly these processes have no future in the delivery of digital information.

International Bancshares: The Best Operated Bank, Or a Bank with Something to Hide?

The IBOC stock might be good as a pair trade - short IBOC and buy an honest bank with prospects for growth. Clearly IBOC has proven itself as able to fend of the shorts so far, so the pair trade strategy adds an element of safety. If and when IBOC's dishonesty gets rewarded the stock should plummet even in a rising market.

M3: The Money Supply Sure Doesn't Look Like Deflation

The first question to ask is: where is the newly 'printed' money going? Answer: it's not going into the normal money stream, rather it's being used to bring the banking industry balance sheets to a semblance of balance so that it can function as it used to do before the credit bubble burst.

So those expecting inflation from this putative money printing are completely wrong. Inflation is dead for many years to come, and the great danger is continuing deflation as occurred in the lost decade in Japan. An enormous amount of (credit) money has gone to money heaven and cannot be replaced until another credit boom occurs. The Fed merely plants seeds for bubbles to grow over time, and right now they are only planting seeds to get the banking system on a solid footing.

Inflation is dead for at least another decade.

Procera Networks Could Climb to $2.50 Without Too Much Difficulty

Seems expensive at 8 times book value, with more than 50 million shares out. They've been around for a while without a great deal of revenue growth until recently. There has been some insider selling, and while that could mean anything, there hasn't been any insider buying as late. Why not if they have some hot new product?

Rich Pzena: A Working Man's Buffett

Rich Pzena makes some interesting comments about the future of the stock markets, and appears to be investing for safety with an expectation of regression to the mean in terms of ROI. I think the secular mean has changed for the worse, however, and hence the current markets cannot be compared with those during the early 1980's. At that time, inflation was the burden; today, it's deflation (the drying up of credit). The recovery from inflation spawned the era of massive credit expansion, and we are now in a secular move to wipe out the bad debts from that bubble. Things ARE different this time.

Why AMCON Could Be Valued at $100+ Per Share

The negatives: according to Yahoo Finance, the market cap ($20M) is less than the long term debt ($34M); DIT has only $350K of cash; revenue growth has been non-existent, growing at less than 2% per year over the past three years. Where's the potential for growth?

I will give you this, on a cash flow basis the company is pure gold, the stock trading at less than two times leveraged free cash flow. The best investors look at the cash generated by the business, and DIT has been a cash machine.

Observations on the Total U.S. Debt

Lots of nonsense in this report. Social Security does NOT 'hit the wall' in ten years. In ten years Social Security stops running a surplus and runs out of money in 2052 only if no increases in the payroll tax are made, and if the economy stagnates. Small increases in the payroll tax can keep SS funded for many decades. The BIG problem is Medicare/Medicaid, which is roughly five times the problem that SS is perceived to be. Someone has believed the BS the Bush administration promoted a few years ago, when Bush was trying to destroy Social Security by offering a defined contribution plan. Just imagine the returns to a defined contribution plan in the past four years!

And dorv562 in comments above (his first) is utter rubbish. The US has more oil than anyone else? Not even close. Global warming a hoax? Right, peer reviewed science is useless according to dorv. "Those politicians calling themselves Democrats are so obsessed with unequally portioned wealth they will destroy our manufacturing and wealth creation and we will all be equally poor ". My friend, give your head a shake. Bush and his Republican friends have destroyed the world's economies all by themselves, Democrats need not apply. The richest Democrats understand that the 'every man for himself' policies of Republicans is a race to the bottom, leading to a class system that would put the US among the worst places in the world to live. Democrats know that the strength of the country is dependent on the health and welfare of the massive middle class, and the rich cannot prosper without a strong base.

As the last 20 years has demonstrated, the US will continue its collapse until the country brings forth a universal health care system. It can't compete in the world where every other developed nation has the safety net of health care and well funded pension system.

Even the most optimistic scenarios don't play well for China, Nouriel Roubini says. "The world where the U.S. was the consumer of first and last resort... and where China was the producer of first and last resort... is changing."

Smegma, I can't decide if you're a complete idiot, a troll, or a satirist. My first choice is door # 1.


On Apr 10 04:24 PM Smegma wrote:

> There you go again, Comrade Roubini.
>
> The US consumer is the greatest consumer in the world. Our appetite
> for consumption will remain at the healthy levels seen in the middle
> of the decade. And it will be supported by growing credit, which
> will continue to be supplied (and in ever-growing quantities) by
> the Chinese and others. (The recent report showing declining consumer
> credit is a lagging indicator.)
>
> US bonds are rated Triple-A, our economy is headed for an "I"-shaped
> recovery, and US deficit and debt levels are forecasted by the administration
> to be halved in less than four years. Further, the stock market has
> proven that investors are long on America. Why in the world would
> China or anyone else think twice about loaning us as much as we want?
>
>
> Roubini and his terrorist-loving confederates should move to Iran.

Why I Think Paul Krugman Is Wrong

"Why you both are sick & crazy" - Reardon Steel

As you live, so you judge. Get some help.

Seabridge's Growth at Mitchell Deposit Provides Promising Opportunity

Find me a gold company making a nickel on 0.5 grams grade and I'll find you a ski hill in Florida. Seabridge has been touting this since time immemorial but gold needs to be 2000 per ounce minimum. Same holds true for Galore EXCEPT that the copper grades are economic there helped along by the gold credits. Copper grades at Mitchell are in the same category as the gold - pathetically poor.

I expect Seabridge to keep touting this goat range so da boyz can unload their free shares.

Well written and presented article however, even if it is promotional.

Greenspan Yet Again Blames Others for Housing Bubble

Greenspan does everything possible to avoid responsibility for the debacle. But he forgets that he actually said earlier:


"The solutions for the financial-market failures revealed by the crisis are higher capital requirements and a wider prosecution of fraud -- not increased micromanagement by government entities."

Trouble is, he alone, as Fed head, had responsibility for setting higher capital requirements, and for ferreting out fraud. And he failed to act even though he recognized the problem.

Sir Alan will never admit it, but he's become a joke. Perhaps the Queen should rescind his knighthood, then he may understand his role in the world's financial collapse.

Has the U.S. Layoff Trend Turned?

"Has the U.S. Layoff Trend Turned?" Paul's answer: "Who knows".

Like, why bother.

Stocks Are Cheap: A Response to Tim Knight

Consider the source Greg, it's a technical analysis bear blog. They wouldn't know value if they stepped on it. If the market ever gets traction on the upside, the bears will shortly thereafter crawl into their dens and go into hibernation. By just about any valuation metric you choose, there are many, many cheap stocks. But that doesn't mean they can't get cheaper. In fact, my humble opinion is that they may get as cheap as they did in 1974, when the Dow stocks traded at slightly over book value and yielded 7%. Today the Dow stocks are trading at 3 times book and yield about 3%.

You are right to be trading, even day-trading here. But I agree with you that trading truly cheap stocks with great balance sheets is the way to go.

Do Not Trust This Market

Evans-Pritchard is a complete idiot who sees danger and cover-up at every turn (check his trashing of Bill Clinton in the 1990's without a shred of evidence), don't get sucked into this garbage. He's not even an economist!

As for gold, well it appears that gold is about to jump the shark today ($1000 USD), and you know how the Fonz show went after that episode. You won't get a better shorting opportunity than today, Friday Feb. 20th.