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ADR Overview - Which Stocks Look Good, Which Don't

I love your model... SAY, as one of your attractive ADRs was implicated in a huge accounting fraud months ago. I look forward to reading about your attractive recommendations on AIG, Enron, Worldcom, and Bear Stearns.

Thats the problem with quant models, they don't have any insight into the true business models of the company -- and if blindly followed, will ensure that you get burned.

Understanding the MSNBC, Fox and GE Triangle: How Markets Work

The only thing shows is how many idiotic people there are. They can't read the news for themselves and make their own opinion, so they rely on these idiots - conservative and liberal - to invent their own opinions.

Personally, I can't stand anything that Fox stands for. However, I think that any extreme is dangerous. And now, the most moronic pundits are driving people further and further to the extremes. I admire people who an opinion, no matter how biased, but they are well-read on the topic (both sides) and have reasons for their opinion -- and have enough facts that they could argue both sides, if needed.


On Apr 24 09:02 AM China Expert wrote:

> As a recent convert to Fox, my family and I look forward to being
> presented the facts and then allowing us to decide our own options.
> The other networks feel that by sticking your head in the sand, negative
> things either don't exist or will simply go away. There is a reason
> why Fox is #1 in 9 out 10 categories. MSNBC's "Countdown with Keith
> Olbermann," which came in tenth with 1.3 million total viewers, was
> the only non-Fox News show to crack the top ten.
>
> Top 10 Cable News Programs, Q1 2009 (by total viewers)
>
> 1. The O'Reilly Factor: 3,438,000 total viewers
> 2. Hannity: 2,579,000 total viewers
> 3. Glenn Beck: 2,271,000 total viewers
> 4. Special Report with Bret Baier: 2,092,000 total viewers
> 5. On the Record with Greta Van Susteren: 1,977,000 total viewers
>
> 6. The FOX Report with Shepard Smith: 1,927,000 total viewers
> 7. The O'Reilly Factor (repeat): 1,457,000 total viewers
> 8. America's Newsroom: 1,445,000 total viewers
> 9. Your World with Neil Cavuto: 1,428,000 total viewers
> 10. Countdown with Keith Olbermann: 1,327,000 total viewers
>

Exclusive: Will Northern Trust End Up Holding the Bag for Massive Pension Losses?

Wouldn't you also have to net out any gains that these pension funds gained during their participation in these securities lending pools -- and over the life of the agreement. That is, if they had gained 5-20 bps per year, but suffered some losses... these gains should be subtracted before you question the merits of this program. Also, give the sophisticated nature of a client such as Exxon -- they didn't enter into this arrangement uninformed... and NT certainly didn't invest the funds unilaterally without consent.

Memo to Warren: AmEx Preferred at 15%, Warrants at $12

Apppro - why should Buffet bail you out? He has a fiduciary obligation on behalf of his shareholders in Berkshire not to make the same stupid mistakes as the rest of corporate america.

While I am not a shareholder in BRK, I wonder why everyone thinks he will come to the rescue of everyone. He's the ultimate capitalist, and as GE and GS know, he drives a hard bargain.

I am also humble enough to know that I shouldn't be writing him any memos nor making any recommendations. I can only watch, marvel at his patience, and try to learn a thing or two so that I can improve my own performance down the road.

GE: Betting on a Global Growth Story

Just a question about the "high growth hungry companies" recommended by William Taylor... these companies also have a high PE. What happens when they report in two weeks that their customers couldn't get credit, or delayed (cancelled) their purchases. I guarantee that GE wasn't the only company feeling the credit pinch. You can bet that if they felt it... it was felt all the way down the food chain. Yeah, I know.. someone's gonna point out the financial exposure that GE has. But EVERYONE either has to finance their receivables, or their CEO has heard the news (or more) that all of us had This is probably more analogous to right after 9//11 when companies pulled back on spending until they fully understood the scope of the problem.

In the week ahead, we will find out who was holding Wamu paper and will have to take further writedowns -- eroding confidence.

In this crazy environment, at the margin, most people are going to retrench and go high up the quality scale. The more uncertain, I firmly believe that this pays into GE's hand.

GE: Exceptional Total Return Potential at the Current Price

As a holder of GE, I have it setup on dividend reinvest -- and consider it my bond position. Granted, it may not double. But, as a relatively young investor with a long time frame, I'd rather own GE stock as my low risk investment than the 10 year bond. I am getting more than the 10 year treasury in a security that raises its dividend at a 11% rate -- put it on dividend re-invest and its a no brainer relative to bonds. Granted, I agree that there might be more attractive stocks. But, lets be sure to compare the risk adjusted return outlook for both securities. I love to go long leaps on securities for my risk --- but, for my safe investments, I'll hold GE all day long.

Obama Is Bad for the Economy - Barron's

As a longtime reader of BCA, I would trust any analysis done by their worst analyst over the best all time analysis done by Barron's. Secondarily, I recommend everyone read the piece in the NyTimes magazine about the formation of Obama's economic theory. As a Chicago GSB fan, any involvement by the great economic minds there has to be far greater than the idiotic ideas that come out of washington.

As someone who would be paying far more in tax, I personally have no problem in doing so...as long as I get my value for the investment. If anyone doesn't believe that tax rates will be going up as the Enron-like accounting lapses of the federal government come to light. We have not been accounting for any of the liabilities for social security or medicare -- if you think the subprime issue is big, you ain't seen nothing yet. Our government's been cutting checks that future generations will have to pay.

Granted I am not happy about higher taxes... I think that a combination of fairly draconian cuts and tax raises are needed to get back to any sort of fiscal responsibility. And if you don't believe so, please take a remedial accounting course, and go back to the fiction that we are using as government fiscal responsibility.

Adding Wood to Your Portolio: A Worthwhile Investment

If you want a good primer on Timber, listen to the Brookfield Asset Mgmt (BAM) conf. call. They own, and manage, institutional timber funds. As prices are down now, they are just letting the trees grow -- nice part about this business, if prices are low, you hold back the harvest, and the trees will only grow larger -- and thus, more profitable over time.

Meredith Whitney Threatens Severe Deflation For Your Portfolio

The most interesting thing she mentioned on her interview on CNBC -- was that she wished that all the banks would dump all their mortgages because it would be so much easier for the analysts - rather than lowering numbers each time the ABX / CDX falls due to some fund dumping securities. She's made some good calls -- although I'm questioning the rationale for dumping estimates for mark-to-market losses especially when she herself realizes that over the long run, they are worth more. There was an excellent job done by Berstein in looking at the mark-to-market losses experienced by AIG -- highly recommend that people read it.

Definitely not insinuating that there's no issues in the financial sector here. However, assuming that the fed is successful in putting a bid on the underlying securities in the bank's capital base -- one has to ask, what then is the true level of writeoffs over the next 18-24 months. If it's lower -- then the stocks move up significantly. If not -- the Whitney's right.