Discursive MonologueDiscursive MonologueReporting on the massive torrent of wealth from the United States to East Asia, the depreciation of the U.s. Dollar, and hedging strategies. Articles
Lessons from a Micro-Cap
2008-06-06 14:43:00 In October, I mentioned that I was taking a baby position in Enterprise Oilfield Group, an oilfield services company in Canada. I bought this stock because I liked the management, growth prospects, and performance relative to its peers. With a market cap of under $20 million at the time of my purchase and the trading ... More About: Investing , Micro , Lessons
Poverty terrified by the prospect of a McCain presidency; calls him a war-m
2008-04-28 03:49:00 Few (if any) presidential candidates have had the audacity to pledge a war during their bid for the Oval Office, but John McCain never was one for playing his cards close to his chest. In case you had not guessed by now, I am referring to McCains pledge of a War on Poverty . Why are ... More About: Calls , Timeless , Presidency , Prospect
Rooting against the Yankees - Why Wall Street banks always win, no matter h
2008-03-26 16:32:00 The Yankees don’t win the World series every year, but they always have good seasons and they always walk away rich. The commonly given reason for the success of the Yankees is that they buy their team. The Wall Street oligarchy has an even better win streak (perfect, in fact); and it is financed by ... More About: Banks , Matter
Why Americans might have to rethink that trip to Europe; the dollar isn?t d
2007-11-21 17:52:00 It is amazing that, despite the falling dollar and concomitant rising prices, many people still refuse to admit that the falling dollar will affect them in any meaningful way; or that it could get a lot worse. Most people don?t understand the long-term fundamental pressures that will invariably beat the dollar down, so their reasoning ... More About: Europe , Dollar , Trip , Americans , Rope
Risk aversion returning; it?s all in the commercial paper
2007-11-20 13:54:00 Have you ever been using a lawn tool powered by an internal combustion engine as it runs out of petrol? The engine wants to keep running, but it just doesn’t have the fuel to maintain power (or life). It sputters, gains momentum again only to throttle back down before starving for fuel and dying. Equities ... More About: Commercial , Risk , Paper
Funny Video Friday - Child get?s knocked over by splash at water park
2007-11-16 22:45:00 Now that my Internet connection has been restored, I managed to find a short, funny clip of a child getting knocked over by a big splash at a water park. The ride looks exactly like a ride at Cedar Point that was called Snake River Falls (I used to go there yearly when I was ... More About: Video , Funny , Funny Video , Water , Splash
Internet Outage
2007-11-16 16:26:00 I lost my Internet connection for almost two days, so I have been without news or posting capabilities (luckily, I write my posts at least a day in advance and set a publishing date). It turns out that someone unplugged my cable from the box. I just got it fixed, but I’m way behind on ... More About: Life , Outage
Foreign movers and shakers for U.S. Securities in August: Who bought and so
2007-11-15 13:29:00 As I wrote previously, August was the worst month in terms of foreigner dumping U.S. Securities that I have seen since I started paying attention to capital markets–on of the worst months in 5 years. There was a net sale of $34.86 billion worth of securities by foreigners, according to the August TICS data. I ... More About: Foreign , Reign , Movers
When a 40 percent discount is not enough for bank stocks; how sub-prime cou
2007-11-14 13:49:00 Yesterday, I wrote about how many banks are hiding their devalued assets in a balance sheet classification known as level 3–a category that allows banks to model the value of their assets according to internal models. I suggested that many of the values quoted on balance sheets are apocryphal and likely marked closer to par ... More About: Stocks , Bank , Prime , Discount , Prim
Financial stocks are worse than a blind date: You know that they are ugly,
2007-11-13 13:08:00 Recently, I spoke with a friend who wondered if it is time to buy big banks and investment banks now that prices are far from their highs. Merrill Lynch, Bear Stearns, and Morgan Stanley are all down more than 40 percent from their highs this year. Lehman Brothers and Citi are down more than 30 ... More About: Stocks , Financial , Blind , Ugly , Blind Date
Top Foreign Holders of U.S. Treasury Securities and trends
2007-11-12 13:52:00 On October 25, I gave a short presentation on this web site about the August TICS data, in which I showed that foreigners were net sellers of U.S. securities for the first time that I have seen. While U.S. stocks were a major portion of the securities dumped by foreigners, I saw something else contribute ... More About: Trends , Foreign , Securities , Treasury , Reign
Funny Video: Tokyo Hummer Owners
2007-11-02 15:07:00 One of my friends sent me a link to this Wall Street Journal video report on Hummer owners in Tokyo . There are some really funny quotes in the video. First, it is explained that “owners must go to great lengths to drive their Hummers down Tokyo’s famous jungle of narrow streets.” Then comes the first ... More About: Video , Funny , Funny Video
No more temporary solutions from the Federal Reserve and politicians; What
2007-11-01 13:04:00 What do Citigroup, Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Deutsche Bank, Barclays Bank, Royal Bank of Scotland have in common? All of these banks have requested and been granted a temporary exemption from Section 23A of the Federal Reserve Act (and Regulation W–dubya) since the middle of August. Citigroup, the gargantuan bank feeling a ton of ... More About: Politicians , Solutions , Politic
I pulled the trigger on Frontier Oil Corporation today
2007-10-29 16:41:00 Last week, I mentioned that I would be starting a project researching stocks from the Magic Formula Investing list. I have researched eight companies from our list of fifty. I covered two companies on this website: Drax Group Plc (LSE: DRX) and Frontier Oil Corporation (NYSE: FTO). I promised that I would announce any transactions ... More About: Today , Pull
Let Capitalism Work Or Become Insignificant
2007-10-29 14:58:00 On Tuesday, it was announced that Countrywide Financial, the largest mortgage lender in the United States, has decided to extend refinancing or modification offers on $16 billion in loans–82,000 borrowers–in order to obviate the inevitable problems that will come when the teaser rate period ends. Modifications typically involve a rate cut to prime rates. Given ... More About: Work , Capitalism
Politics are not for the faint (or pure) of heart
2007-10-26 15:49:00 I complain about the media from time to time. Mostly, I complain about the cheerleading played by CNBC and the Fox Business block, but I am shifting my sites to politics today. I really don’t like to play politics on this blog. I care more about money and monetary policy (which, I suppose, is one ... More About: Politics , Heart , Pure , Fain , Politic
The August TICS data just looked bad; no spinning this one positive
2007-10-25 14:23:00 In September, everyone became aware of the $45 billion decline in the Federal Reserve?s custodial holdings of foreign owned U.S. Treasuries. Most people implicated China and wondered if it was the beginning of the end for the dollar. I took the opposite position, suggesting that China was probably not as big a player in this ... More About: Data , Spinning , Positive , August , Spinn
Do you feel poorer? If not, you must be Canadian
2007-10-24 14:35:00 I check my bank accounts every week. The numbers keep rising, but I have this sneaking suspicion that I am getting poorer. My equity portfolio has been charging ahead all year long. I should be ecstatic; but, I’m not. My problem is that I haven’t been drinking the American Kool-Aid and I don’t measure my ... More About: Canadian , Feel , Adia
Frontier Oil Corporation (NYSE: FTO)
2007-10-23 15:52:00 Profile Frontier Oil Corp. (NYSE: FTO) is an energy company in the United States that refines crude oil and sells refined crude oil products wholesale. The company operates two main refineries in Wyoming and Kansas. There are 107,138,518 outstanding shares, giving Frontier a market cap of over $4 billion as of 19 October 2007. The current ... More About: Corporation , Investing
Drax Group Plc (LSE: DRX)
2007-10-22 15:10:00 Profile Drax Group Plc (LSE:DRX) is a power generation (primarily coal) utility company in the United Kingdom that appears on the investingeuro.com list. Based on the 343,966,804 outstanding shares and the 19 October 2007 price of 623.5 pence, Drax has a market cap of over £4 billion. From the balance sheet, I noted that the book ... More About: Investing
My latest project: Magic Formula Investing and bean counting
2007-10-21 19:55:00 Regular readers, undoubtedly familiar with my bearish musings, know that I think asset prices frothy globally. It’s getting harder for me to justify buying ETFs, even in strong economies given that prices have moved so high. This is the time to be selective. most recently, I have bough agricultural commodities and, since I bought DBA ... More About: Formula , Magic , Project , Investing , Bean
Problems in PC land?the old rig is getting long in the tooth
2007-10-21 17:50:00 In April, I had the displeasure of turning on my workstation to find that the video card had fried. I didn’t have a backup computer and, given that the computer was nearing five years old, I canned it in favor of the iMac that I’m using right now. Some time in August, I started to ... More About: Life , Problems , Land , Long , The O
How to time the market - follow this queue card
2007-10-13 01:48:00 Someone sent me an email forward at work today and I thought it was cute enough to share with my readers. It is related to my previous post, U.S. Equities are as fickle as the money managers who move them. The market seems to go up on any news piece, regardless of its gravity. The ... More About: Card , Market , Time , Timeless , Queue
U.S. Equities are as fickle as the money managers who move them; headline w
2007-10-12 14:31:00 I usually check on my investments once every day. I don’t make any irrational selling decisions based on what I see; I’m just curious. Today was different. Today, I checked my positions and the Dow nearly every hour because I was laughing about how capriciously the market has been moving lately. It is almost as ... More About: Money , Move , Equities , Managers , Headline
Kirby Daley: Europe, Japan not attractive markets; U.S. recession likely on
2007-10-11 14:42:00 I recorded more market commentary by Kirby Daley (of Société Générale’s Fimat) on CNBC Asia’s Cash Flow last several nights ago and typed up the transcript. In this Q&A, Mr. Daley explained that he doesn’t find the Europe an markets or Japan to be particularly fertile investments (especially given the likely effect of the strong Euro ... More About: Markets , Recession , Attractive
Book Review: Liar?s Poker, the wacky world of Wall Street
2007-10-09 12:58:00 On Sunday, I had the pleasure of reading Liar’s Poker : Rising Through The Wreckage On Wall Street , a memoir by Michael Lewis. Liar’s Poker came out in 1989, a year after Lewis left his short, successful career at Wall Street titan, Salomon Brothers. I have been dying to read this book for a while, as ... More About: Books , World , Book Review
An Interesting Proposition: A-Share, H-Share arbitrage; not my cup of tea
2007-10-08 16:41:00 The Financial Times recently featured a column, by Arthur Kroeber, called Dubious H-share allure in which it argued that trying to play the price discrepancy between companies co-listed in Shanghai and Hong Kong is a poor plan (no pun intended). The flawed plan is based on several ideas: the opening of the stock exchange in ... More About: Interesting , Share , Arbitrage , Prop , Position
Funny Video Friday: Baby Sloth
2007-10-05 23:51:00 I’m ready for the weekend. The video that I have this week will have one split over laughter and saying, “Awwwwwwwwww.” This video features a baby sloth that…well, it pretty much acts like a sloth. The baby sloth features its climbing instinct, only to be superceded by the much stronger (and more sloth-like) instinct to ... More About: Video , Funny , Baby , Funny Video , Friday
Auto Insurance Overview
2007-10-05 23:48:00 Every State has minimum coverage requirements for auto insurance. When I took a legal environment class in college, my professor explained why carrying more than the minimum is prudent for people who have savings or other assets. If, God forbid, you are involved in a serious accident, any damages beyond the minimum coverage may be ... More About: Insurance , Sponsored , Auto Insurance , Auto , Overview
Life Update: I had a birthday yesterday
More articles from this author:2007-10-05 01:20:00 I woke up yesterday and had a nagging feeling that something was different. I went to work and didn’t really feel like doing anything. I went through the grind and the work day finally came to a close. I returned home and an iCal alert popped up reminding me that I am one year closer ... More About: Life , Birthday , Update , Yesterday 1, 2, 3, 4 |
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