The Triple-Net Playground Is Getting Highly Disruptive But Agree Realty Is Still A Perfect Kid [View article]
>>Unfortunately, I do not see any value from articles from individuals who are not investing real money. If this is such a great investment, why don't you put some money on the line? <<
Well, if Brad had a stake in ADC then someone would accuse him of pumping the stock up so he could sell his at a higher price, or if he was short the stock, then he'd be accused to badmouthing it to drive the price down, etc. etc. As long as he discloses - which he always does - whether or not he owns the stock or whether or not he's short the stock, then you've got no room to complain. It's just another factor (along with your own research and that of other analysts) for you to use in deciding how much credence to give his conclusions about the stock. If you don't agree with him, no one makes you buy the stock in question. (shrug)
Disclosure: long ADC (and have been for quite awhile)
American Realty (ARCP +0.4%) withdraws its $9.7B proposal to buy Cole Credit Property Trust III after the latter twice rebuffed ARCP's approaches. That was despite the company raising its bid to $12.50/share in cash or $13.59 in stock from $12 in cash or stock. ARCP is also backing out after Cole Credit completed a merger with its external adviser, Cole Holdings. (PR) [View news story]
That's gonna leave a big, ugly bruise on someone's ego. :-)
President Obama is due to unveil a FY 2014 budget today that will look to cut the deficit to 2.8% of GDP by 2016 from a projected 5.3% this year. The proposal will include tax increases for the well-off but also spending cuts and an offer to use "chained CPI" to limit the cost-of-living increases on welfare programs. The package has little chance of becoming law as is, but the White House hopes it can kick off fruitful negotiations. [View news story]
About what you'd expect if you've been paying attention...
Well, you generally don't find many criminals breaking into a house who are considerate enough to stop and wait while you go unlock your gun safe and get your guns out and load them.
Another death from the avian flu has been reported in China, according to state media. The latest fatality brings the total to eight. What to watch: The airline sector has seen some of the hardest hits related to the health crisis due to demand concerns with Chinese airline stocks (ZNH, CEA) trading lower as well as a few U.S. carriers (ALK, DAL, UAL) heavy on routes to Asia. [View news story]
There's never a good time to panic, but this bears watching. Opinions differ on whether this can transfer human-to-human or via air contamination:
The number of people receiving disability benefits has jumped from 7.1M in December 2007 to an estimated 8.9M in March, or 5.4% of the civilian workforce. That compares with just 1.7% in 1970. The increase costs 0.6% of national output, or equivalent to around $95B a year. With the disability program giving people little incentive to leave and find work, Congress has started to make noises about reform. [View news story]
Disability is the new long term unemployment check (and one of the reasons why those UE headline numbers that the BLS spits out are worse than useless). They've made it much easier to qualify for disability over the last few years because they want more people dependent on a government check each month. That's a feature, not a bug, to the current regime. People dependent on government checks are much easier to get to vote a certain way when they're needed.
Small businesses are considering their strategies ahead of the introduction of the Affordable Care Act in January amid fears of a steep rise in costs because of a provision that will force them to provide health coverage to full-time workers. These include dropping coverage for all employees and paying fines instead - as this could prove cheaper - keeping the number of full-time staff below the magic number of 50, and forcing full-time staff to become part-time. [View news story]
This catastrophe of a law is going to hurt the public sector, too. My wife just had to cut back the hours on all of her part-time workers (she's the director of a small regional library), because her funding agencies (the local city and county governments) had nowhere near enough money to offer health care to the ones who were working over 28 hours per week. Just another small example of what a bloody disaster Obamacare is and will continue to be.
Illinois' Senate is set to begin a two-month effort today to introduce pension reform that will help address almost $100B in unfunded liabilities. One proposal is to place restrictions on cost-of-living increases on pension payments and another involves asking workers to forgo state-funded healthcare in retirement. The unions, of course are opposed, while the state's constitution makes it difficult to enact reform. [View news story]
Once the public employee unions rap them smartly across the knuckles for even suggesting that they get one red cent less than they're supposed to, I wonder if the Illinois legislature will go looking for new "sources of revenue" to fill the unfunded gap...you know, like raiding private pensions and retirement accounts in the state. They'll attempt it eventually, if not in Illinois this time then in some other state or, more likely, at the national level, since the gutless wonders in both parties have not the slightest inclination to cut even the rate of spending increases, much less to actually cut real spending.
4 Ex-Dividends To Consider, 2 To Avoid This Week [View article]
re: MFA's dividend...your chart above on this is a mess. The $0.50 dividend you have plotted on it is a *special* dividend (it's due to be paid on April 10 and is designed to make up for underpaying their dividend for the last couple of years). The $0.22 dividend you have that one "diving" to and which will be paid on/around April 30 is the company's next regular dividend and it's a $0.02 *increase* from the last regular dividend paid in January. The regular dividend does go up and down a bit...as is the case with all mREITS, depending on the interest rate/business environment they're operating in at any given time.
More on NFP: The 2 tick decline in the labor force participation rate means 496K left the labor force in March. 2.3M are "marginally attached" to the labor force - about the same as a year ago - and not counted in the headline unemployment rate. U-6 unemployment (which does count them) falls to 13.8% from 14.8% a year ago. A bright spot, those working part-time for economic reasons - often called "involuntary part-time workers" - fell a whopping 350K to 7.6M. [View news story]
"If you look at the 80-year moving average, this is a very positive report; much better job growth than March of 1933."
Spending on small kitchen appliances jumped 10% last year to $5.51B as new tech features drew in the baby boomer generation. The latest buzz is that edgy appliances to make tea and yogurt concoctions could be the latest craze. Look for Macy's (M), Williams-Sonoma (WSM), SodaStream (SODA), and Green Mountain Coffee Roasters (GMCR) to take advantage of the trend while J.C. Penney (JCP) and Sears Holdings (SHLD) have a little catching up to do. [View news story]
Well, it's not like anyone needs to invest money for their own future anymore, what with Big Brother Government around to take care of everyone's needs. Might as well blow your own money on the latest fads in kitchen clutter.
The Triple-Net Playground Is Getting Highly Disruptive But Agree Realty Is Still A Perfect Kid [View article]
Well, if Brad had a stake in ADC then someone would accuse him of pumping the stock up so he could sell his at a higher price, or if he was short the stock, then he'd be accused to badmouthing it to drive the price down, etc. etc. As long as he discloses - which he always does - whether or not he owns the stock or whether or not he's short the stock, then you've got no room to complain. It's just another factor (along with your own research and that of other analysts) for you to use in deciding how much credence to give his conclusions about the stock. If you don't agree with him, no one makes you buy the stock in question. (shrug)
Disclosure: long ADC (and have been for quite awhile)
American Realty (ARCP +0.4%) withdraws its $9.7B proposal to buy Cole Credit Property Trust III after the latter twice rebuffed ARCP's approaches. That was despite the company raising its bid to $12.50/share in cash or $13.59 in stock from $12 in cash or stock. ARCP is also backing out after Cole Credit completed a merger with its external adviser, Cole Holdings. (PR) [View news story]
Cramer's Lightning Round - Sell Phillips 66, Buy Valero (4/10/13) [View article]
Disclosure: long CLMT
President Obama is due to unveil a FY 2014 budget today that will look to cut the deficit to 2.8% of GDP by 2016 from a projected 5.3% this year. The proposal will include tax increases for the well-off but also spending cuts and an offer to use "chained CPI" to limit the cost-of-living increases on welfare programs. The package has little chance of becoming law as is, but the White House hopes it can kick off fruitful negotiations. [View news story]
http://bit.ly/Z8hBG1
3 Attractively Priced Big-Dividend Stocks [View article]
3 Attractively Priced Big-Dividend Stocks [View article]
Another death from the avian flu has been reported in China, according to state media. The latest fatality brings the total to eight. What to watch: The airline sector has seen some of the hardest hits related to the health crisis due to demand concerns with Chinese airline stocks (ZNH, CEA) trading lower as well as a few U.S. carriers (ALK, DAL, UAL) heavy on routes to Asia. [View news story]
http://bloom.bg/14TWKub
SNAP Food Stamp Participation: January 2013 [View article]
The number of people receiving disability benefits has jumped from 7.1M in December 2007 to an estimated 8.9M in March, or 5.4% of the civilian workforce. That compares with just 1.7% in 1970. The increase costs 0.6% of national output, or equivalent to around $95B a year. With the disability program giving people little incentive to leave and find work, Congress has started to make noises about reform. [View news story]
Small businesses are considering their strategies ahead of the introduction of the Affordable Care Act in January amid fears of a steep rise in costs because of a provision that will force them to provide health coverage to full-time workers. These include dropping coverage for all employees and paying fines instead - as this could prove cheaper - keeping the number of full-time staff below the magic number of 50, and forcing full-time staff to become part-time. [View news story]
Illinois' Senate is set to begin a two-month effort today to introduce pension reform that will help address almost $100B in unfunded liabilities. One proposal is to place restrictions on cost-of-living increases on pension payments and another involves asking workers to forgo state-funded healthcare in retirement. The unions, of course are opposed, while the state's constitution makes it difficult to enact reform. [View news story]
4 Ex-Dividends To Consider, 2 To Avoid This Week [View article]
More on NFP: The 2 tick decline in the labor force participation rate means 496K left the labor force in March. 2.3M are "marginally attached" to the labor force - about the same as a year ago - and not counted in the headline unemployment rate. U-6 unemployment (which does count them) falls to 13.8% from 14.8% a year ago. A bright spot, those working part-time for economic reasons - often called "involuntary part-time workers" - fell a whopping 350K to 7.6M. [View news story]
Spending on small kitchen appliances jumped 10% last year to $5.51B as new tech features drew in the baby boomer generation. The latest buzz is that edgy appliances to make tea and yogurt concoctions could be the latest craze. Look for Macy's (M), Williams-Sonoma (WSM), SodaStream (SODA), and Green Mountain Coffee Roasters (GMCR) to take advantage of the trend while J.C. Penney (JCP) and Sears Holdings (SHLD) have a little catching up to do. [View news story]
Cramer's Mad Money - Economists Don't Know Jack About Stocks (4/4/13) [View article]