- Michael Covel on the prediction markets. Bottom line: Nothing is predictable, so stop trying.
- Jim Kingsdale thinks that solar and wind will drive natural gas prices higher.
- A Dash of Insight on ETF strategies.
- Think we’re seeing record gas prices? Not even close.
- Good point. If speculators are causing higher oil prices, why are iron ore prices skyrocketing? There are no speculators in iron ore.
- If you must guess, guess more than once and take an average. You’ll improve your odds.
- Why Goldcorp (GG) offers great growth along with low risk.
- How to play $200 oil. Don’t fight it, learn how to play the game.
Archive for June, 2008
Monday News and Views
Monday, June 30th, 2008Weekend News and Views
Sunday, June 29th, 2008- The Big Pictue is quoting Paul Desmond of Lowry Research about what to expect of the Dow going forward.
- Investing The Middle Way on why gold may be regaining its shine.
- Wow. A 53-year low for GM. I’d bet that in 1955, if you surveyed investment professionals to name one company that was rock solid for the long term General Motors would be toward the top of the list. Amazing, just amazing.
- Famous guru’s have had a rough year so far.
- Dr. Duru on why he’s still hanging on to his gold.
- And Scott Wright on why the grains are still cheap. And he’s right — if you think people are upset about high gas prices wait until the same thing happens with food prices.
Friday News and Views
Friday, June 27th, 2008- Andy So has some long ideas for an upcoming crash.
- Trader Mark is looking at an oversold market making a triple bottom.
- Mebane Faber on the performance of commodities during years of high inflation and years of low inflation.
- Barry Ritholtz on how the IRS has thrown in the inflation towel by increasing the standard mileage rates to 58.5 cents per mile.
- John Fout on the folly of blaming speculation for high prices. Remember the ’70s.
- Lance Lewis likes Golden Star (GSS).
- And Ned Schmidt has some agri-foods thoughts. Bottom line: If it’s not in your portfolio, it ought to be.
Thursday News and Views
Thursday, June 26th, 2008- Blog for Trading Success on the collapse in market volatility and what it could mean.
- Zen habits has 7 tips on how to get a lot done.
- Saj Karsan on historical price/earnings ratios.
- Greg Newton has the goods on Congress’ favorite hedge fund manager. The guy is positioned for the price of oil going down. Who woulda thought?
- What analysts think about Silver Wheaton’s (SLW) latest financing transaction.
- Cam Hui says that the real message from the Fed is to stay long commodities. By the way, he’s right about following the Baltic Dry Index to track global economic strength.
- Nicholas Vardy busts 6 economic myths. My favorite:
- 6. Myth: Oil companies are unfairly exploiting U.S. consumers and deserve to be taxed for excessive “windfall profits.”
- Reality: With gas priced at more than $4 a gallon (and more than $12 in Europe), it’s no wonder oil companies have become the political whipping boy of U.S. presidential politics. But looked at through the green-eyed shades of a financial analyst, oil companies aren’t extraordinarily profitable, either in relative or in absolute terms. Oil and gas companies made $86.5 billion in profits last year. It is a lot of money, yes. But high-tech companies made $103.4 billion, the retail sector $137.5 billion, and the financial services industry took in $498.5 billion. Nor are oil companies unusually profitable, making about 8.3 cents in gross profit per dollar of sales. Electronics companies make 14.5 cents per dollar and computer equipment makers take in 13.7 cents per dollar. Bill Gates’ Microsoft makes 27.5 cents per dollar of sales. And with 60% of U.S. oil imported, a good chunk of those profits from high oil and gas prices are going into the pockets of governments in the Middle East, Venezuela, and Russia and not back to Texas or Exxon shareholders.
- Lance Lewis thinks that the Fed’s statement means gold is about to get hot again. He also lists his favorites.
- And Anheuser-Busch (BUD) has turned down the bid from InBev. It says BUD needs to get its sales up. That’s embarrassing. If you can’t sell beer, what can you sell?
Wednesday News and Views
Wednesday, June 25th, 2008- Fed holds rates at 2%. Along with comments that had nothing for everybody.
- Scott Reeves on those evil oil speculators.
- Eric Bolling on how to solve the oil crisis. Notice he doesn’t blame evil speculators.
- The Bespoke boys on the stock market’s rising short interest.
- Tom Iacono wonders if inventory changes for the Gold ETF (GLD) have anything to do with the price of gold.
- Dr. Enzio von Pfeil has some ideas on how to survive stagflation. Bottom line: currencies other than the dollar and commodities.
- Chad Brand on the bullish case for oil. The money point: The U.S. consumes 25 barrels of oi per person per year. Japan: 14. China: 2. And India: 1. What if China and India moved up to 5-10 barrels per person per year?
- And Jim Rogers is adding hard asset producers to his index mix.
Tuesday News and Views
Tuesday, June 24th, 2008- Barry Ritholtz understands the value of technical analysis
- But Felix Salmon takes the opposite view. I’m with Barry on this one.
- In Five Things, Kevin Depew explains why you can’t blame high oil prices or high-anything-else prices on speculators. Although trying to do that very thing has a long history.
- John Tierney on why cartels don’t last even though the diamond cartel made a good run at it.
- The Bespoke boys say that consumer confidence is about as low as it has ever been. And that’s not generally bad for the stock market.
- And Scott Reeves has an interesting piece on how language is not used to communicate, but to confuse the unsuspecting. Be sure and try out the Universal Buzzword Selector. You too will be able to come up with impressive sounding nonsense like, “Synchronized incremental projection.”
If the dollar has bottomed will gold go down?
Tuesday, June 17th, 2008The little guy is bearish
Monday, June 16th, 2008Individual investors are more bearish on the stock market than at any time since 1990-1991.
Think oil prices are more volatile than ever?
Friday, June 13th, 2008The gold/oil ratio
Tuesday, June 10th, 2008Tom Iacono comments on why gold is so cheap in relation to oil. The last paragraph says everything that needs to be said:
Gold is at $900 because that’s where it is. It was much lower a few years ago and it will be much higher in another few years – that’s how things work with fiat money systems as they work their way toward their eventual conclusion. I wouldn’t spend too much time worrying about the month-to-month stuff.
Indeed.
