Cara's Commentary & Community Chat, Fri., Feb. 20, 2009

At this moment, gold and silver are vertical (7:22am est)

Good morning.

There are NO Cara 100 Changes to report at this time.

Maybe we should send her on a mission Bill.

"The third analogy puts dollar bills end to end. If you laid one dollar bills end to end, one trillion dollars would stretch nearly from the earth to the sun. It would take a military jet flying at the speed of sound, reeling out a roll of dollar bills behind it, 14 years before it reeled out one trillion dollar bills!"

source; http://www.321gold.com/editorials/mccoach/mccoach0...

People who have the money to invest are waiting on the sidelines. No amount of stimulus seems to convince them to get back in the market. Rick Santelli is the man; Obama’s “plans” are absolute trash.
Here is 10 year old cover

ALL of these politicians are bought off crooks.

Last night I saw a few of Nancy's foes on MSNBC telling the American public that "Government" doesn't "create" jobs.

Except THEIR JOBS of course......and are WE paying dearly for that idiocy or what?

I'm wondering....at what point do we hit the streets like they do about DAILY in places we disparage, like FRANCE? We could take a lesson from Italy for instance, that overthrows a government like we change underwear.

I could probably overcome my aversion to violence to cleanse the planet of these criminals. Citizens NEED to ask....how much of OUR future is this costing? Someone estimated it could be 10-20% annual GDP to save the banks.
Hey! I have an answer...let them go belly up and let the little Mom & Pop community banks buy the few solvent morsels left over and let the rest hit the dirt like they are destined to.

Remember, these giant Ahole banks used to be little bits of local community banks that know their local customers and conditions....before they were bought up in Wall Street's quest for citizen slavery.

Three out of four at new lows right now. What's Geithner thinking? He needs to get out there right now.

Gold: 50dma crossed the 200 DMA

Technicals point to launch.

will the "V" or the "W" give you better mileage should PM take off? probably doesn't matter, just get in the "VW" and drive away...

It pays to hold both.
Miners are being held down by someone. Last time we had metal prices here the miners were also gasping for air at altitude. Not this time, but they will have to catch up sooner or later.

Makes the miner volatility a decent trade lately. Until you miss the train.
So I've been trading around core positions. Bought a lot yesterday.

Bought more physical a few days ago. 200 ounces silver and five more gold.

2nd...have you been watching GFI? It's doing our dance again.
Check it out this AM. Closes at 10.99 and where are we today?

CONGRATULATIONS Vinod. Pharmacy is a fabulous career. They make great $ and can work where they choose. Awesome.

Roubini is predicting a sovereign is about to go broke.

Man, if that happens it could get interesting very quickly.

"He can still pull it off if he finds it within himself- we all have it in there somewhere. I can imagine facing Obama and Volcker at the table. He just needs to get it done. Or let Volcker take the reins."

The perception at this point is that Volcker seems to have been pushed aside by Summers and the rest of the crew. Unfortunately, Volcker is probably the one person who might be able to actually start to turn things around. His presence is only window dressing during media events right now.

Congrats! my significant other is a pharmD. Make sure your daughter goes for the pharmD designation. extra 1 or 2 yrs but well worth it!

You should be proud. Heck i am proud i found my partner who is now my "sugar mama" jk. But there is a great confort in knowing there is a shortage of pharmacists. Your daughter will be able to walk into any retail pharmacy and make $100k ($150-200k with overtime) per yr for the foreseeable future.

And if she hates dealing with angry, grumpy, clients yelling at her in a retail pharma environment, she can also go to "industry" and work for pharma companies and prob start at $90-100k base salary. and if she ever gets laid off from a "industry" job, her unemployment is a $100k retail job!

its the greatest job security field over $100k for those with the smarts to make it out. If she goes to industry, she will most likely be forced to move to NJ, as all the pharma's are based here.

sammas- can you elaborate?

Santeli took on the other three morning show pied pipers and he held back this AM. He flat out named the CDS market leverage cause of the melt down and the other three skipped to the popular tune.

Nice to see honest frustration in the face of corruption and an inept response by the elected officials....

Go Rick,,,I hope he inspires more straight talk!!

Just broke 1000 intraday. Got pounded back down immediately, of course.

[edit: that was April gold, btw]

$9 Canadian? it was $9cdn yest. what kind of upgrade is that? These analyst ratings should be banned from the industry.

What is their relevance? Not a criticism of you Vadym. i just never understood the value of the analyst calls of switching their rating from buy to hold after a bank stock has fallen from $100, down to $5.

So what do we do about having to pay for OTHERS homes and crappy investments?
At least trading (on our level) is HONEST.

What's that quote about communism and capitalism being the same?
One is man exploiting man and the other is the opposite.

What business would happen in America if there wasn't one person exploiting another on a massive scale? It's a pretty picture to paint of modern society, one that excludes the laws of nature, but it isn't a realistic view.

For GLD lovers, GLD now owns (or "claims to own" according to Kaimu) 1,029 metric tons, and is the 7th largest world holder of gold, just behind Switzerland. It may pass Switzerland today.

From the bottom of this past October, SLW has outperformed SLV by a factor of somewhere between 2 1/2 or 3 to 1. Over time that should continue, or at least I am ready to play it that way. I bought a core position in SLW last Nov.-Dec. at an ave. px of $3.07, but have traded around that core on the way up. The results are discouraging. I would have been better off simply staying long the core all the way up with no trading. The swings on SLW have been breathtaking, way beyond my extremely meager trading skills.

I reentered my trading position yesterday at $6.65 and I think that's it. I am sitting tight, no more trading. Gold is on the cusp of breaking to a new all time high, then on to low Earth orbit. Eventually, silver, the "poor man's gold", will outperform.

I watch the circus on CNBC every day and am amazed. none of them really have a clue what is happening or where it's all going. Gold and silver are headed to levels beyond the comprehension of even those of us here. We did not create this unmitigated disaster, all we can do is try to survive. It has only begun.

Long SLW, EGO, AUY, FCX, DGP.

any thoughts on the new 'support' levels for the djia and sp500 ? many thanks

im not disagreeing with you, except that once you know slv is a fraud, then your trade is no longer honest. im just saying why not slw or the silver miner of your choice instead?

"… JERUSALEM – Israeli President Shimon Peres chose hard-line Likud leader Benjamin Netanyahu on Friday to form a new Israeli government, giving Netanyahu six weeks to cobble together a coalition"

This is right up there with Mussolini getting the nod from Victor Emmanuel, right up there with Hitler getting the nod from Von Hindenburg.

Meaning, this sets Israel up with the worst possible government to deal productively with the Palestinians and company...Let Obama put another 60 thousand men into Afghanistan and then watch the middle east games begin.

Or,

if your predictions turn correct, why don't you make money on them so YOU are the master? :)

Otherwise what's the point in predictions at all?

So your real point is investors should shut them down by refusing to trade. You have a point.

Good point. I intent to participate meaningfully, but am always eager to learn more. As we all know, predictions, or the "vision thing" as Bush Sr. once said is only one component of a successful trade. The reason our business is not like teaching 4th grade in Peoria is because we need both the macro vision, the specific plan, and then the plan needs to be executed. Anyway, think about it. Have a great day Vad.

I see your point, but do we really know if it's a fraud?
What other frauds are we unknowingly supporting?
There are bound to be more Madoff's and Stanfords left standing naked when this tide fully recedes.

We all have bank accts for instance....what's a person to do?

Trading is hard enough without having to moralize about individual trades with sketchy info.

2nd - not sure what Tim can do other than shut the banks down or nationalize them. They're all insolvent.

ALOHA !!

At the end of the first quarter 2009 the US FED has stated they will no longer extend "swap lines" to European countries who have funded their bank loans to the failing Eastern European economies with US Dollars. This will put a short squeeze on anyone shorting the USDX. Naturally, this would be bad for the Euro, Swiss Franc and Pound, but I am sure those country's central banks must be calling the US FED day and night asking for an extension at least. What happened to global central bank coordination?

I have thought about this and I find this something similar to the IMF announcing "gold sales"! In the past all the IMF had to do is announce they would sell gold and the POG would tank. Now that tactic has been overused and nobody even blinks now!

Could this "swap line" threat be the new IMF GOLD SELL?

In a FIATWORLD where stability and transparency and honesty are missing it becomes anybody's guess except for those who are behind the closed US FED doors.

Beware though and keep a wary eye out for a POG takedown right before April. Whether it is a successful ploy or not remains to be seen and there is over a month left before the elimination of European swap lines is enacted. Both the USDX and POG would benefit, but the USDX need to be seen as the #1 safe harbor, so that is why I believe in such a competition the COMEX prices would be sat on at least in US trading hours.

BAG O TRIX!!

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Because the people who produce such shows are in her court.

Well I just want to point out one minor difference between Netanyahu and Hitler. (You always know the discussion has gone to "that point" when Hitler makes an appearance).

Netanyahu gave up power. He was prime minister before, from 1996 through 1999.

Not like I'm a supporter or anything, I'm just saying. He's neither Hitler nor Mussolini. Probably not the ideal architect of peace in the middle east either, but that's just my opinion.

BRK/B again at 52 wk low.

APA - 2009 estimate lowered at UBS because of the poor pricing environment. Buy rating and $115 price target.

FSLR - numbers raised at Morgan Stanley through 2010. Systems integration business should be the main earnings driver. Overweight rating and new $190 price target.

"Because the people who produce such shows are in her court."

AND that's what must change (i.e, media ownership) in order to make the show happen. I suspect that at some point, an independent media org., maybe even PBS, will one day garner the courage, or understand which way the wind is blowing, and break open this clubby triangle of media, politics and business for the people to understand. And they'll be so pissed by then, that they'll think about the message this time (instead of flicking over to their favourite sitcom)

"not sure what Tim can do other than shut the banks down or nationalize them. They're all insolvent."

How about more of the same?

Treasury Auction Schedule:

91-DAY BILL 02-23-2009 $31B
182-DAY BILL 02-23-2009 $30B
2-YEAR NOTE 02-24-2009 $42B
5-YEAR NOTE 02-25-2009 $32B
7-YEAR NOTE 02-26-2009 $22B

Yields remain far from their lows while the flurry of Treasuries continues at a pace Madoff would be proud of.

Equities: I'm riding this storm, the market can't keep falliing straight down can it?

FSLR - numbers raised at Morgan Stanley through 2010. Systems integration business should be the main earnings driver. Overweight rating and new $190 price target.

Incredible. And in the meantime poly producers are getting hammered as if they were in a death march to bankruptcy. I don't buy it. This is not a situation where winner takes all. But HB&B would have you believe it were so.

This stinks like a classic Wall Street set up.

As Bill mentioned in the Daily Report, a correction in gold is probable from the 1000 mark. I project the probable target is low 900s to mid 800. A break below 960-965 will confirm the short term bear.
This coming correction is very healthy and will enable a rise over 1000 soon. It will also allow you to back up the truck and make tremendous money.
I am playing the metal and not the miners. That tends to keep my sanity in check.

Feb. 20 (Bloomberg) -- Luxury homeowners are falling behind on mortgage payments at the fastest pace in more than 15 years, a sign the U.S. financial crisis that began with the poorest Americans has reached the wealthiest.

Sharky, this may be the best opportunity for Middle East peace. The liberals in Israeli politics have clearly demonstrated their ineptitude and inability to bring change.

Netanyahu's an arrogant sod (even Bill Clinton remarked upon this) and tipping Israeli/Iranian (given the nuclear issue - most likely outbreak of hostilities in near future) relations may give Obama or the Israeli people themselves the opportunity to bring about clear and definitive outcomes to this issue. Especially the Israeli's themselves. They must vote for a strong, workable government prepared to negotiate a POLITICAL solution.

All they have now following this election is another fractured, weak temporary regime

Nevermind, took profits on it too.

I find it hard to buy the notion of "nationalization".

Bill has mentioned C, BAC, and JPM consist of 90% of the CDS market - $600 trillion, not counting other toxic off-the-balance sheet stuff that is not known to public.

I'd guess no government official wants to take those blackholes over. They probably will prefer zombie banks to angry voters who will be paying for the blackholes in the next 5 to 10 generations. JMO.

tof- What would I do? I would call in most of my cards and find out exactly how bad things are at each bank. For the ones that fail the stress test (to use his term), I would take them over. Most importantly, I would remain in the public eye every day, making sure I keep them informed of all that is happening. Basically, just send the message that (a) I'm in control, (b) I either know or will find out what's happening at each bank, (c) I will keep the public appraised of what I know/find out, and (d) I have a plan to handle the crisis. How hard can that be?

My definition of stink bid is putting in a limit order to buy a stock well below the current price.

Yest before i left my office SLW was above $7.15. I put in a limit order for $6.50 usd. not thinking it would be met. you know the rest.

So today i might for fun put in a stink bid before i leave, at yest lows at $6.28.

Disclosure: holding slw right now.

EDIT: CTAB Advisors would prob make a profit on the stink bid by selling put option vs me just putting in a stink bid. I was just too afraid i guess to try it. but the concept is you sell a put option and bank the premium. if the stock doesnt go below the strike price you keep the premium and end of story. but if it goes below the strike, you as the seller of the put have to buy the stock at the strike. so for yest, i could have sold $6.50 puts, once the stock tanked i would then be forced to buy slw, however my cost basis would be lower, since i would have also made income on the premium of those put options.

ugh, these are such near-sighted and ridiculous comparisons.

bush never staged a coup. he was elected twice. sure it was controversial the second time around but the voting was still very very close. this never occured in hitler's germany or il duce's italy.

hitler killed over 10 million people directly, nevermind the many millions more indirectly through the actions of his army, air force and navy.

bush didnt even remotely come close to overseeing military action like that.

russia killed 40,000 in one week during the wars in chechneya. never mind how many hundreds of thousands starved to death in ukraine, belarus and georgia during their wars the past few decades, and there were few if any comparisons in the mainstream media about yeltsin or putin being hitler.

there are about 2-3 million palestinians living in very bad conditions, though these conditions arent as bad as how tens of millions of africans live, and yet their leaders arent accused of hitlerian similarities.

both people's deserve to be treated better and have their rights respected, i find it odd that only those victums of isreali aggression are accused of genocidal tendencies while 1 million sudaneese have been killed this past decade and only a small slice of the collective pie will even call that a genocide, and ill be few if any people know the name of the sudanese leader responsible, or depict him as a stalin or hitler.

there has been no peace through the mideast since the dark ages. the idea that any single politician be they isreali or arab will personally ensure the region displays an deep misunderstanding of the regions history. i dont think any politician is capable of restoring peace to the region and im not defending isreali's out of false loyalties, i see the errors of both sides, but i see the big error in these casual comparisons to historial paraiah's that have no basis in fact, rationale or reason.

"We're back to AM spikes and PM pullbacks in the metals and miners."

Yes, but it's only been a couple of days, right? The long-term trend is up IMO... Any pullback should provide buying opportunity.

Anybody got their eye on the refiners? We might have another crack at them while dodging the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.

The elite European and US banks will all become nationalized at some point. This problem has been caused by all of the world's central bank's credit orgy which took place over the last 30 yrs or so. The liabilities of these big banks will be put on the shoulder's of the productive people (tax payers.) I think this is the reason for gold's rally. The once mighty yen is now weakening just as the Euro began to do last year. The dollar will be next. The major currencies will replace the bank stocks on the long march down. Because no sovereign will tolerate a strong currency in this type of environment.

The positive part of all this is that maybe (I won't hold my breath) more people will question the validity of the idea of central banksterism and also question the people who support it. That would be the best thing to come out of this disaster.

As I was walking past the street corner the other day, I noticed a crossing guard scolding several young people about their attempt to walk against the light. From behind me, I heard a young boy refer to the crossing guard as “Hitler”. People just don’t know their history; I thought to myself.

anyone notice any non-financial capitulation going on today?

Frankly...Israel is fighting for it's survival. Muslims breed. Israelies don't. They would easily be overwhelmed. It may be an inevitability

So watching the gold action this morning at around 9:00 EST on my futures app before market open it appeared to me that there was a big struggle to move (April) gold over the 1000 mark, and a large struggle to keep it from going there. Lots of volume during this time. But once it broke through, once I saw that trade hit 1000 (perhaps it was 1000.4, not sure), it almost immediately dropped down 3 points, volume fell off, and while there are occasional ticks here and there, things are relatively quiet.

I think it was Goldman Sachs that said POG was going to 1000. Now they get a news announcement tonight saying it hit there intraday. What's the motivation here? Now I'm suspicious. One might think the POG was being manipulated. But by whom? And why? Who would WANT gold to break 1000 and have the muscle to shove it across the line?

http://tinyurl.com/dh56dm

Interesting about Pelosi. Does Senate majority leader Harry Reid have a similar arrangement for flying to and from Nevada?

Update on the oil action yesterday. March contracts finished the day up 14.04%.
USO finished up 6.21%, UCO 11.97%.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_iV5yDiKxCdk/SZ7O8XEHHdI/...

I agree 100%, the charts are very toppy with neg divergence. This illustrates an irrational euphoria in gold. The masses of dumb investors are selling bonds and cramming it all in gold. This is exactly what I said a few weeks ago when I said 2009 being a repeat of 2008 so far. Equities tanked and gold topped in march 2008. This is exactly the same situation we are staring at now.

I'm tempted to buy DZZ, although I shouldn't. Anyone brave to short gold?

Nemo, with respect, Muslims are not dogs, and they don't 'breed'.

And yes, the Israeli govt. and its people are certainly concerned by the demographics of their region.

Democracies don't however punish people for the race, religion, colour or creed.

"From behind me, I heard a young boy refer to the crossing guard as “Hitler”. People just don’t know their history; I thought to myself."

I'm glad to hear the boy at least knows the name Hitler, I've come to believe most younger Germans don't.

"Geneva burns."

Ah that would be Zurich doc. Geneva's full of politicians. Not much value in them as a collective asset :)

Bill mentioned yesterday that he thought there was a solution to the financial problems at GE Capital. I just don't think I can see the light at the end of the tunnel for GE right now. I think GE has some great industrial/medical/infrastructure/technology businesses but I have no reason to think that they won't be overwhelmed by the problems on the Capital side.

So how does this one end up? Will GE have to separate their Capital businesses from their industrial businesses and be separately taken over/nationalized? The amount of debt on the balance sheet just looks horrendous in this climate. Even the eternal optimist in me has a gag reflex looking at their debt load.

procreate

better yet, how many bankers? the 'work' of designing derivatives is not the primary function of a bank. all that is needed is a source of investment capital available for lending to responsible borrowers. if they can take it back to basics, we're good.

as for investment bankers, it's time they pulled the plug on the magic carpet ride-

Last night I held Aladdin's lamp
And so I wished that I could stay
Before the thing could answer me
Well, someone came and took the lamp away
I looked around, a lousy candle's all I found

Before i leave i just placed a stop limit sell order in the trigger price 6.7x-6.80 range.

Also put in a stink bid at $6.30. So if it tanks it will get me out higher than i bought yest and hopefully back in near yest lows.

should be back around 3pm. good luck everyone.

The stock gets to the $6s before the decline is over, IMO. The dividend should have been cut at the last board meeting.

As Wm. J. O'Neil says, "what seems low, usually goes lower ..."

How low will the FAS and UYG go before they close the fund. Will this also close out FAZ and SKF.Hard to believe you could buy a 3X financial that is trading at .20.
Bob

They can simply do reverse splits.

The fact that GE (or any other company receiving government assistance) pay any dividend at all right now is absurd. Continuing to pay a dividend here is equivalent to trying to shovel as much government money out the window before the boat sinks. No one who received government assistance should be allowed to pay a dividend until all loans are repaid.

How can the simultaneous pay out of cash dividends and receipt of government loans be tolerated? If those dividends are retained it would result in lower borrowing requirements. Why are my tax dollars paying shareholder dividends? Filth.

If I read Bills commentary correctly, he still sees the glass as half-full. Just curious what it would take to change his mind, a decisive break of Nov lows in the S&P? I'm not being facetious, just curious since he hasn't really talked about it in an IF-THEN scenario...

As I've posted in the past 2 weeks, I've turned glass half empty. The only thing that would flip my opinion is resolution to banking crisis upon full exposure of all the garbage: All mortgage not just subprime, CDO's, CDS, and eastern europe exposure. And the resolution needs to be more than just giving banks more money!

Does anyone think these puppies won't be going to 0 before this is over?

well, i think C and BAC are going down (at least, as far as shareholders are concerned). not sure about the others.

and placed limit buy 6.25. Similar yoyo worked for me several times now. Beats buy and hold for sure.

To me, the glass is more half full short term than it was at the beginning of January 2009 when every asset was overbought. At least now some assets are on sale. I'm a contrarian though.

"I do like Mark's PXP play as a long for oil, TSO and VLO were really beat down when gasoline was $4 at the pump, maybe the same thing will happen again. The refiner thought just popped out, not a suggestion for anything more than a few days, which could be rough going. No trade is working aside from PM's, might be that way awhile."

I recall remarks that refiners, with bottlenecks of oil from overpumped oil wells (big oil trying to maintain cash flow), may have quicker and greater pricing power once crude recovers.

Big oil and the cartels parking ladened tankers around the world might have to wait a little longer to see pricing power return...

Could be because Warren was clearly early on GE and various other investments. Losing cash is bad.

Yep, GE is toast. That glass is nowhere near half full until at least they drop the dividend. Then if the administration were to make some hard choices it would raise one eyebrow. Meanwhile I'm keeping my PM's and looking for equities exits cause I think this sucker's headed down for a good while (on the order of years).

QT - Save your bandwidth.... the guy just doesn't like Jews

So what is a Jew anyway? (No this doesn't get all anti-semitic, it's a story from my time in Israel)

One of my good friends is an Israeli, born in Israel, yet an complete and total atheist. He has very pithy remarks about the (I forget the term, but they wear large black hats) very devout jews from his homeland. They do not have to work, you see, and are supported by the state. And they all vote for Shas (according to him) and Shas drags in religion at very annoying times - such as when the power company wants to move large turbines on Saturday when traffic is light, but one is apparently not supposed to work on Shabbat, and so "these people" as my friend calls them threatened to bring down the government if the turbine were moved.

I think, in some circumstances, my Israeli friend doesn't like Jews either. And he wasn't the only one I met in Israel who felt that way about Shas, and about the ultra conservatives.

So if someone "doesn't like jews" here perhaps he just doesn't like the ones that won't let you move power turbines on Shabbat. :)

One of the banking industry's top guns issued a major warning this morning...

"We're near the cliff's edge, very close to capitulation, the mood is very gloomy," said Jean-Claude Petit, head of equities at Barclays Wealth Managers France.

"I not sure that governments and central banks are realising what's really going on," he said.

http://tinyurl.com/bjj2dc

Vadym Graifer
Let us know when you have open house. I would like to try it out

Chicken, welcome to the growing club of glass half-empty'ers :) Some would say this means we're at a bottom. Eh, maybe, but this time i'm sticking to my guns

regarding oil, tanker storage, etc. Everybody expects a bounce and new higher trading range. I say our new trading range is $35-$45 with risk to the downside. Nobody wants to cut production, every economy in world imploding, what's gonna drive it higher?

The other day I noticed how much ABX lagged behind the other miners during the daily price movements. I first noticed it when ABX dropped out of its up-channel on my chart.

Take a look at today:
GG: 31.76 +0.74
GDX: 36.87 +1.23
ABX: 36.89 +0.45

I traded my ABX for GDX the other day and I think it was the right move. What gives w.r.t. ABX? Is it hedged or something?

Fascinating day, wow. So far today, just today, SLW is outperforming SLV by a factor of almost 4 to 1. So let me toss this out; when silver goes parabolic ( I said when, not if), the performance ratio between SLW & SLV will widen, not narrow.

Reloaded my trading position SLW yesterday at $6.65, I am done trying to trade it, staying fully loaded. Still love the core position I bought back in Nov., Dec., at $3.07. I should have just bought and held. These swings are incredible, way beyond my meager skills. I am staying with my position. This is just getting started; panic has not started, but it is coming, it is coming.

Bill, I think you are being much too kind with the term queen Pelosi. I prefer calling her !@#$% Pelosi.

I am by no means an expert, but ABX lost 54 cents a share in recent qtr vs an estimated 30 cents; could have something to do with it. They also pay little divs, so your gain is purely cap appreciation (they appear to be hedged in copper, roughly 400 million lbs production; gold production was an estimated 7.8 million ounces, so yeah, how did they lose money). They probably have a high production cost-per-ounce.

proudPapa,

"...it seems like insurance is one big scam just like the banks..."

I am fearful that may indeed be the case. As a test I've written to cash in one life policy to see if the other two with the same company are still viable.

Have begun buying into SH inverse S&P and inverse Europe EFU — I guess that puts me in the "We are only half empty," camp.

While I'm not as worried about name-calling of a public figure, it would be nice to have comments with some content as well.

"Does that translate into a thumbs-up for OSG, which I've been watching and is close to its 52-week low...just asking..."

Well, there's a relevant question.... IMO, assuming the economy doesn't just simply implode going forward but starts improving and OSG can service their debt on a sustained basis, then in a long term sense they could be a ticket to handsome profit. I would certainly rate it higher than GE at this point... According to kaimu, energy consumption remains strong, translating to ships moving energy cargoes. So why are they on their death bead? I can't help believe they shouldn't be except for the fact that my research leads me to believe crude consumption is down a considerable 6%. Expressing this in terms specific to manufacturing (unrelated?), a 5% increase in productivity typically translates to a 100% gain for bottom line. This explains a lot when you see productivity numbers move.

Korvus
Here's a virtual hearty handshake for trying to keep the wheels spinning here.
This can be a tough crowd at times.

shark_attack
Lets talk about people who destroy us?
All those smart people on Wall Street rant and rave about people who could not pay their mortgages and will receive help from the gov't. Where were those smart walls street people when the lenders and banks were pushing these people to buy home they could not afford? They were too busy counting their own profits made on the selling of those mortgages to the banks and brokerage firms. Now they are mad because the housing market has died and they no longer are receiving the big fat pay checks.

cashing in half at 2.50...

Bill asks this morning how far the government will go.

Newly appointed Transportation Sec Ray Lahood is floating the idea of a new tax for roads and bridges.
It would be based on miles driven, requiring all cars and trucks to be GPS chipped and utilize gas stations to collect the tax.... no pay > no gas.

Time to gather the hoes an pitchforks, tar and feathers and head to Washington.

See the proposal http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29298315/

vinod- re the rally you're looking for-> what if we plunge to 6000? i would hedge the bet (assuming you have one) with a few PM calls, which should do well in that event.

of course, we could all learn from SiO2 and let straddles take direction out of the picture. not an option for retirement accounts, of course. maybe they should call them non-retirement accounts.

Holding up well today...

2nd
sold my OEX put to early this morning
In my view disappointment over the government plans or lack thereof. We’ve moved away from feelings of fear but that of quiet desperation. Helpless and hopeless
And when economy improves, market will move on its own timeline

OMG, that has got to be the stupidest idea i have ever heard. Can you imagine the nightmare of trying to manage these GPS chips, data collection, hacking, etc!?

Here's an idea, increase tax on fuel, it's the same friggin thing!!! Except the chip idea punishes those who bought into urban sprawl that was force fed them by city development committees, business people who drive long distances for some productive capacity, and rewards people who drive in congested centers where public transport is available. Not to mention does nothing to encourage better mileage and conservation.

Man, I'm visibly shaking with the rage at this stupidity...

ALOHA !!

vinod I agree ... I recall awhile back Bill mentioned some sort of weekly series on CNBC where some "real estate expert" got on a bus and toured the country talking up real estate and house flipping etc. I do not recall the exact name of the show or the reporter, something like the REAL ESTATE ROADSHOW ... hummm? Maybe Bill remembers or someone else here.

Also there were a number of TV shows, one called "FLIP THIS HOUSE" and I think they are still on TV. What sort of ratings must they be getting? Or are they coming back now that everyone thinks this is the bottom since OBAMA will bailout the underwater mortgages? WHO KNOWS ...

I would be more apt to follow ML ROSENBERG'S advice ...

Thats the way all BUBBLES are ... I recall the "HYPE ARTISTS" during the TECH BUBBLE, some are still employed and Henry Blodgett is host of some internet TECH SHOW and Mary Meeker is still employed. Why aren't those two in jail?

Then I recall GEORGE GILDER who was touting GLOBAL CROSSING and many others! If you followed his advice and did not sell you lost your ass!

Every BUBBLE has its MCs and its RINGMASTER !!!

AL are you listening? Take the blame for something before you die!!! God save all these crooks and their legacies!!! I cannot even imagine the criminal who is contributing to the GEORGE BUSH PRESIDENTIAL LIBRARY ... I will contribute to it if they build in SAN QUENTIN! HA!! Right alongside the DICK CHENEY SHOOTING RANGE! Although those two Vietnam War draft-dodgers are laughing all the way to the bank!

You get what you vote for ...

So we all have to tighten our belts? We need bigger government, more intrusion, and higher taxes? Hope tax money didn't fund her trip to visit the pope this week, because I'm not sure what that has to do with anything. Would the public be outraged if she went on a jaunt to see a big statue of budhha?

Jock, Nice story. i didn't even know there was a Jewish quarter in Mexico and I have traveled there extensively.
Bob

senators ask for investigation after deliberately falsified data provided by the CFTC is included in report on oil price run-up:

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/08/14/america/...

look like Paulson wasn't that bad?

proudPapa- LOL

can't recall if it was '07 or '08 i posted something about a burned out hippie strolling down the streets of SF at 4 am with a guitar singing 'brain damage' from 'dark side of the moon.' now he sounds like a prophet:

The lunatic is on the grass.
The lunatic is on the grass.
Remembering games and daisy chains and laughs.
Got to keep the loonies on the path.

The lunatic is in the hall.
The lunatics are in my hall.
The paper holds their folded faces to the floor
And every day the paper boy brings more.

And if the dam breaks open many years too soon
And if there is no room upon the hill
And if your head explodes with dark forebodings too
I'll see you on the dark side of the moon.

The lunatic is in my head.
The lunatic is in my head
You raise the blade, you make the change
You re-arrange me 'til I'm sane.
You lock the door
And throw away the key
There's someone in my head but it's not me.

And if the cloud bursts, thunder in your ear
You shout and no one seems to hear.
And if the band you're in starts playing different tunes
I'll see you on the dark side of the moon.

"I can't think of anything to say except...
I think it's marvelous! HaHaHa!"

jock,

I think you mean 0.2% not 2%

The word "effective" is very subjective.

come on, man...leadership is NOT silence...

ALOHA !!

This ties into the US FOREIGN POLICY especially where Israel is concerned. Lets not be politically correct here since most of banking in the USA and Europe has been controlled by those with a Jewish heritage, who were the "moneychangers" during the times of Jesus? It does not take a genius to see a link between US FOREIGN POLICY with Israel and the banks(owned by Jews) that control the US CONgress! Lets go to the other side of that coin regarding US FOREIGN POLICY ... If Arabs controlled most of the major US Banks would the US CONgress still support Israel?

I am not anti-Jewish as much as I am pro-honest money and a free America! I prefer to return the US Constitution values of LESS GOVERNMENT, because the LESS power government has the less influence it has on our lives and the lives of foreigners.

Lets face it ... the US FOREIGN POLICY since 1960 has been a dismal failure. Please don't hand me the standard line I hear ... "Well, no more 9-11s have happened!" ITS THE MONEY STUPID!! It has nothing to do with who our enemies are from one year to the next. Ask Iran about that and if Saddam were still alive you could ask him about US FOREIGN POLICY and how predictable it is! Your our ally one year and our enemy the next! With FOREIGN POLICY like that who needs allies!!

Even the US Constitution is predicated on COMMON LAW ... The basic two tenets are:

1 - Do all that you say you will do.
2 - Do not interfere with the affairs of others.

I try to live by the above two principles ... I wish our own government would!

After this financial CRASH I think the US Constitution needs a new amendment where we instate separation from State and Banks! What has brought this country to its knees faster than anything, even Religion, has been CORRUPT MONEY! We as a Nation need to deal with that, because it is the only "cure" for the present and the future!

Fazeli - Oops, you are right. I dropped a decimal point. Jews are 0.25% of world population, winning a % approaching 25% of all Nobel Prizes. That's 100 times the random distribution.

I tried not to be subjective. To me, those Nobels indicates\ effectiveness across the board.

Here is the count:

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Judais...

Just about time!

ALOHA !!

The thing about Rosenberg is that he GETS IT !!! He is not tied to these usual suspects who want you to believe that gold's single purpose is a hedge against the USDX or inflation. ITS NOT THE ONLY HEDGE!!!! Gold, has no counterparties and no liabilities. You will never see GOLD in front of the US CONgress lying about what it did with all the BAILOUT money! You will never see GOLD renovating its office with a $300k commode! You will never see GOLD filing for Chapter 7! You will never see GOLD on CNBC touting its share buy-back! You will never see GOLD WORTHLESS!! What financial or monetary entity in the World today can claim that? WORTHLESS ... NEVER! Not in over 5,000 years of human history has GOLD ever been worthless!

Rosenberg is DEAD ON! Something I have known since 1979 and something the US FED would dearly like you to remain forever ignorant about! Does the US FED have an agenda with GOLD? Hummmmm???? Well, if we had no futures market like the LME and COMEX then these fiat money systems would have died off a long time ago, but paper, even futures, contracts can be printed in infinite quantities. What kills those powers is the C WORD ... We are on that path!

Mr Mortgage had some very unkind things to say about the kind of paper Wells was taking in during the bubble years based on their requirement sheets. He even produced scans of these sheets to show us all. I wouldn't know a sheet from the Constitution, but they looked official. And Mr Mortgage sure has called all the others pretty accurately.

In addition, he claims they have a whole pile of seconds that he thinks are practically worthless given the number of people that are under water. Wells is supposedly carrying those on their books at close to face value.

And - didn't they get all of Wachovia's bad paper?

I haven't heard anything unpleasant about USB. Heh in fact I have a bank account with them!

ALOHA !!

JPM and GS are the key US FED agents, they hold the "tangible assets" beyond just cash. Tangible or hard assets are real wealth. In both cases these two banks have duped investors in ETFs and Funds to supply these banks total control of the tangible assets. Investors pay for them but those two banks "own" them ... What is 9/10 of the law again? Read your ETF prospectus.

To see both banks tangible assets go to the Heirarchy Reports I have posted here in the past. Those reports list all subsidiaries and each of the top banks, rated Peer #1 Group banks, have thousands of "subsidiaries" attached to the parent company all over the World and in all commodities. To be clear the former founder of GS invented futures markets. I wonder why?

Their ultimate goal is to own the vast majority of the World's resources and leave "so called investors" holding the DEBT! If they own the US CONgress then they can accomplish that. Look how far they have come so far.

"Give me control of a nation's money and I care not who makes the laws." - Mayer Amschel Rothschild (from over 230 years ago before the USA was a Nation) ... PLANNED CHAOS!

I am with you 100% 2nd.

let's see how they play it...

If BAC close betwee $5 to - $6, MM will take almost all of the option buys down (both call and put).. is that where we are going?

"banks may have to be nationalized for 'a short time'"

LOL- from the shareholders' POV, might as well be nationalizing their gold bars 'for a short time.' 'A short time' is what they have left to unload their remaining shares.

Financials are rallying because I just threw in the towel this morning at my puke point for FAS at $4 bucks a share. Easy come easy go.

If the banks will need in the end $3 to $5T anyway, why doesn't the government capitalize C, BAC and a few others with say $3T, taking an ownership of say 90%? Wouldn't this fix the banking crisis?

Let gold to to $2 or $3k, so what (gold bugs will be happy too). Banks's shareholders value is toast anyway.

Why don't they do this instead of piecemeal solutions which will take forever to have any effect. Our industries are intact and advanced, we do not have industrial or productivity problems, we are more advanced than ever. Don't let the banks sink the world.

$3-$5T of government investment will be needed anyway, there is no way around it. Let the world on. Bankers will lose their power, and that's a good thing too.

Now in Europe, they need $30T to do the same.

Still holding slw.

what a crazy market. panic in, panic out several times in the past three hours.

My guess is Monday will be ugly too, IF news of more crazy policies are announced for U.S and EU banks.

its either panic in or panic out before the weekend.

Thanks for the post Grym, you hit it out of the park.

I believe so. I noticed that panic sellouts in financials are good indicators for bottoms lately.

The Obama administration believes a privately held U.S. banking system is the "correct way to go," White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said Friday. Gibbs was responding to a question about whether the nationalization of some U.S. banks may be necessary for a short time. Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd said in a TV interview Friday that such a step may be necessary.

So this is why financials are rallying.

Some of those smart people did manage to make some good money, some even tax free. So, the scheme worked for them. Too bad it was all legal and at the expense of the entire country or the world. Now I grew to understand that all this so called capitalism is all about stealing money and not getting caught.

Its small potatoes compared to Madoff, but this is where I live so it hits home a bit more. They raided this guys house and found his basement full of millions of dollars in gold coins/bullion, bought with stolen client money:

http://tinyurl.com/as27n6

excellent trade, bobbyo...

NICE!

why the heck am i living a FIAT Life?

working an honest day for fiat money, and paying taxes and bills with the fiat money? When others are just taking it for free!

I agree with you pookie. But I think the reason they don't want to do this is because "those buyers" who "didn't do their DD" are pension funds and municipal governments (edit: and insurance companies? does anybody even know who holds these things?)

Wipe out the CDS's and you probably wipe out a huge chunk of municipalities, thus no/lower service, higher property taxes, etc.

Of course, free market will make it so eventually anyhow. Doing it now would let us move on quicker, but it's political suicide. Even if govt isn't overthrown and the world is a better place in 3.5 years, people will remember the pain, and not consider that it could have been worse.

From my post two days ago:
"Per retracementlevels.com (free this week), next stop liable to be down around 756 given that support at 786 has failed. See http://www.setupvalues.retracementlevels.com/
Select "To Go Long/Exit Short"-Daily-SPX"

http://caracommunity.com/content/caras-commentary-...

Today's SPX low: 754.25 -- close enough in my book!

Thanks 2nd. I was actually hoping for some real news concerning the banks when I saw the financial's spike.I got in. I was hoping for a multiday retracement. When I actually saw the news I got out. This Oboma team is actually going to have to do something and it is probably going to piss off somebody. You can't make everyone happy. Please Timmy do something. Please.

I have a friend who's brother works at Wells in Las Vegas, he does car loans.
This guy was a vice-president of a bank in Calif. it is a long story but he ended up being a loan appraiser for car loans. He would tell his boss (35 year old college kid) he would not approve this loan. The kid would say "approve it old man", how did it turns out? 3 out of 5 of his loans are bad. This seems to be what we are dealing with, unparallel greed and fraud by the banks. How many bad loans are out there, 66 trillion to 1000 trillion dollars. Nobody knows the extent of the damage and if they do know they aren't telling. In my mind the whole free market has been destroyed. How can anybody get a handle on this market with all the manipulation. Government(ppt), hedge funds, bank hedge funds, no up tick rule, naked shorting, what is happing in America.

and not by just the tried message from wall st, of split your money into many baskets, which is totally BS. as blindly splitting your money into 100 stocks is a great way to diversify away your profits.

But diversification in education and the mechanics of which you invest is something i am self learning from great resources such as this blog. that is the true goal. You can diversify Time; when are you invested, when are you not invested. when are you working a career job, when you are not.

when to buy a rental building cash, when to not own any real estate.

How come they never taught me this at the mighty Stern School of Business at NYU? yet they force fed me FIFO and how to calculate a straddle but not when to use one. how a put-option works on an exam but not when to use it in the real world.

You know, I have friends who graduated with me working or used to work at wall st IB companies such as GS, MER, UBS, etc, asking others if they should buy Johnson and Johnson or make statements like "dude i can't even look at my 401k, i am sure its down but it will eventually go up" And i am the dumb one for not contributing all these 10 yrs? Its funny how life works out. it sure is a marathon and not a sprint.

ALOHA !!

NATIONALIZING WHAT? Banks? Please-e-e-e ... these guys were DOA back in Sept 2008! Look at these share prices ... who are they kidding? What are we saving these banks for? Are we going to wait until "fractional reserve banking" is healthy again? It was never healthy to start with ... Are we going to wait until the debts and deficits are paid down? They have never been "paid"! Are we going to trade bank bailouts for social security/medicare bailouts? They all need BAILOUTS ... the future will not wait ... tomorrow will come anyway ... you cannot stop time!

It does not matter about NATIONALIZATION any more ... its like the USSR before they collapsed in 1989. These are all "band aids"! Nothing more!

Like I have been saying this is the unwinding of the US EMPIRE. The US EMPIRE is based on fiat money and we are the FIAT KING ... the World's Reserve Currency squandered. Empire is unwinding because it is Empire and that is what Empire has always done, even when there was a gold standard. Which is why this "unwinding" will be worse, because there is no "real money"! There really is no "safety net" ... Believe all you want in the sanctity of BIG GOVERNMENT and the TOO BIG TO FAIL doctrine. Just don't lose sight of what is most important and that includes everything government is not, like family and community and self sufficiency and productivity. Resilient communities need to replace IRON CURTAIN political mentality. Government will not serve you. It's really "us against them", like it was when our Founding Fathers went against the KING, we must do so also, once again ...

Don't be fooled!

- ELIMINATE THE US FED
- ELIMINATE INCOME TAXES

The two solutions above will remove the fuel that powers the polit-bank cartel that now rules our lives and our futures.

Something to ponder ...
"Twentieth-century macroeconomic theory — both Keynesian and monetarist — championed the idea that a growing economy needs easy credit. But this is a false theory. Credit should be supplied by the free market, in which case it will almost always be offered intelligently, primarily to producers, not consumers.

Would lesser availability of consumer credit mean that fewer people would own a house or a car? Quite the opposite. Only the timeline would be different. Initially it would take a few years longer for the same number of people to save enough to own houses and cars — actually own them, not rent them from banks. Prices would be lower because credit would not be competing with money to bid up these goods. And, because banks would not be appropriating so much of people's labor and wealth, the economy as a whole would grow much faster. Eventually, the extent of home and car ownership — actual ownership — would eclipse that in an easy-credit society. Moreover, people would keep their homes and cars because banks would not be foreclosing on them. As a bonus, there would be no devastating across-the-board collapse of the banking system, which, as history has repeatedly demonstrated, is inevitable under a system of central banking and other government-created credit factories."END
Robert Prechter Jr.

Credit to "producers" not consumers ... what a radical concept!! Of course 70% of US GDP is consumer based ... ooops!! How crazy is that? We'd need to base our economy on something real other than credit and debt!

WE THE PEOPLE ...

Do not forget the Declaration Of Independence. Take some time and read it. That document, and it is a LEGAL document, gives us permission to take back our future. We owe it to our Founding Fathers otherwise they and all those in every war ever fought will have died in vane.

Declaration link: http://www.ushistory.org/declaration/document/inde...

Vote them all out ... Can we at least be as half as bold as the Russians were when they toppled Communism?

Don't let the suits and the CEO titles and the lofty offices deter you!

QUESTION AUTHORITY ...

Today I was assigned 200 shares of ERX for which, one month ago, I sold put options with a strike of $40 for $6.70 each. So my cost basis for these shares is $33.30. ERX closed at $25.23 today, so I am not too happy about this trade. Once these shares actually appear in my account, I will set a sell limit order for them at $35. And will never sell puts on ultra-longs again, since value erosion eats up the put option premium. I am not too worried about value erosion now because I have a much larger ERY short in my account, and ERY loses much more on price fluctuations than ERX. Let's see how it plays out...

A better trade for me was the sale of February put options on BTU with a strike price of $25 for $3.30 each. So today 400 BTU shares were assigned to me at the cost basis of $21.70, while BTU closed today at 23.98. I was a bit upset during the recent BTU rally to $29+, feeling that I was out of the game. Now I am back in the game! BTU has a great price chart with higher highs and higher lows since November 20, and if the market turns around next week (which I hope it does) and takes BTU with it, then another higher low will be in place. Given the 2.3% annual growth in demand for coal in the world until 2030 and the excellent balance sheet of BTU, I am not worried holding it long term.

My feeling is, we're in a multi-year bear market, so I think the best I would hope for is a tradable bottom, kind of like we had back in November. I'd definitely be happy with that. But I'm not sure (other than something technical) what would actually cause the bottom to be made, so I'm kinda cautious. But I did end up buying some berkshire hathaway. After it came back $100 on massive volume (4x normal, just like when it rallied last time) I just couldn't resist.

Let me look at the technicals. Hmm, today was the biggest volume day since - November 23, 2008. That's a good sign. We didn't end up closing at the low for the day either. And we bounced off support of the previous bottom at 750. And we're at RSI 22 for the RSI-7. Perhaps we can make a circumstantial case here. Its possible we will rally from here.

What do you think?

I know I've been harping on this a lot lately, guess I'm just thinking out loud and trying to put some numbers to what I think is going on/needs to happen.

As I've said previously, I doubt we'll enjoy a bull market or growing economy until the debt that drove the last boom (basically since 1983 or so) is cleared up. Yesterday I was looking at consumer credit, but I think I need to look at total credit since government spending drives the economy as well. So the following is a quick analysis.

Following data taken from http://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/z1/Current/...

L.1 Credit Market Debt Outstanding (in billions)

1985
Total credit market debt owed: 8,623.0
Federal government: 1,589.9
The rest: 7,033.1

2008
Total credit market debt owed: 51,796.3
Federal government: 5,800.6
The rest: 45,995.7

Non-fed credit market growth in 23 years = 38,962.6 billion

I subtracted out the federal governments portion, cause they'll just keep on spending, but the rest are constrained. Now considering that real household incomes haven't really changed in that time, you basically need to unwind the whole kit and kaboodle.

$39 trillion dollars of credit created over 25 years. Too lazy to do the math, but that strikes me like a heck of a chunk of GDP coming just from credit growth (averaged would be $1.7t/year which alone would represent 13% of current GDP, but of course there would be greater growth in later years).

How do you wipe out $39 trillion in debt? Gradual repayments (drag on GDP) or writeoffs (bankrupting banks).

The trade off is either continue to bailout the banks to ensure gradual repayments, and expect no strong growth for a very long time. Or let the banks die, wipe out a good chunk of debt, and start growing sooner.

Vinod - THANKX for posting that Time cover. I had forgotten it. "The Committee to save the world" - The 3 "free marketeers". How CONFIDENT, how ARROGHANT, how WRONG!

Nationalization means distribution of debt not removing the debt.

About my picks....

About a week ago, maybe 2, hard to remember I said gold would see $1000.

I also expressed great bearishness about the market in general which has, and will continue to be fulfilled.

Have an awesome weekend Bill.

Headline should read:
The 3 "free marketeers" - Kicking the can down the road.

http://tinyurl.com/bhxoz6

When the aid to the pres is saying this, that leads me to believe capitulation or some form of another govt intervention is near.

bobbyo, I also want to mention that my daily trade updates give a very "skewed" impression of my trading record, making it look much better than what it really is. I have a tendency of adding to losing positions and to sell only when I have a gain (although in the past couple of months I did write explicitly about taking some losses by selling my VLO position and a part of my SWC position). So what you don't see, for example, is the damage that my account is experiencing from holding and adding to my ESLR position. Or the damage it had experienced from the collapse of GIX.TO (I have 5000 shares at the average cost of about $2). Or the damage it had experienced from holding/adding to UXG (I have 7000 shares at the average cost of around $4 -- I don't know exactly since I have traded it a lot on the way down).

In order to compensate for this "skewness" I try to give reasoning behind my trades, so that others could see whether they like the reasoning or not.

Also, I'm not saying that everything we built is a house of cards, but maybe 1/3 of what we built was basically over-capacity: too many houses, too many stores, too many highrises, too many cars, etc.

That 1/3 was basically demand brought forward from the future. We are in that future now, and need to wait for that 1/3 of demand to be absorbed in a more natural, non-credit-driven environment.

Somewhat related:

I had an epiphany on the way home just now. We worry about nationalization and the repeal of the free market. But didn't we abandon the free market when we adopted fractional reserve lending? Mucking with the supply/demand curve of money? And if fractional reserve lending is not free market, it changes the context within which we think it needs to be fixed, a la Kaimu's much appreciated rants.

If there was no fractional reserve lending, it's almost as if no dollar would ever have to be written off. That may not be 100% true, but a heck of a lot closer than today.

This epiphany has opened my brain to a whole new realm of thoughts...

edit: I believe it's what Kaimu has always been speaking of, and while I agreed, I don't think I fully understood.

"Volcker, a former chairman of the Federal Reserve famed for breaking the back of inflation in the early 1980s, mocked the argument that "financial innovation,'' a code word for risky securities, brought any great benefits to society. For most people, he said, the advent of the ATM machine was more crucial than any asset-backed bond."

NYUGrad-

Thanks for the link. That one quote above shows Volcker instinctively understands two things:

(a) What the American public needs to hear. This guy knows how to 'connect' to J6P.
(b) The need to demystify our lofty financial institutions. People making millions a year in bonuses while playing with OPM (AND tilting the odds in their favor b/c they don't have the ------- balls to play a fair game) NEED secret codes and handshakes. Otherwise we would see them for the sorry --------- they are.

I wouldn't be folding his speeches into academic presentations. Put him in front of the cameras.

Considering the uncertainty in the overall economy wasn't the market quite range bound. No real whip saws like you would expect. Was it too complacent?
Bob

bankers were too busy worrying about driving government-issued cars and eating brown-bag lunches to inflict max pain on anyone else....

"Long term investments vs. short term trading. Two different ball games really."

Bob, I actually try to avoid taking positions that I would not be comfortable holding for many months (or several years, if needed). That is, I try to buy at "value" levels, and if the stock keeps falling, then I just wait and don't worry about it. If it rises, then I sell with profit until my holding in a stock is reduced to the core position (in some cases, the core position size becomes 0 if I find better alternatives). So my short term trading always has a flavor of accumulating a long term position.

"NEW YORK (AP) - The trustee in charge of untangling the mess left behind by Bernard Madoff told a packed auditorium Friday there was no indication the disgraced money manager had bought securities for his clients for over a decade.
"We have no evidence to indicate securities were purchased for customer accounts" in the past 13 years, said Irving Picard, the court-appointed trustee overseeing the liquidation of Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities LLC. "This is a case where we're going to be looking at cash in and cash out"—the definition of a Ponzi scheme."

It is an OUTRAGE that this guy isn't behind bars.

Business Week article. http://tinyurl.com/dju6bd . How many more times can this work? Kind of the opposite of "crying wolf".

and D) they are afraid to make the tough call. Thank God they are not in charge of our military...Oh, right, they are.

Excuse but I just don't get it. I've been watching the video of Obama's visit to Canada, the press conferences, etc... Harper and Obama blathered on about "dialougues on sustainable green energy", "sustainable energy", "battling climate change", etc. Where's the climate change? where's the credible science backing up this concern? There is none, we all know it, and yet they still drivel on about it. What's up? Is it just marketing .. a variation on P&G's proven "new and improved" strategy? This is getting mind-boggling. It's about the economy, stupid - and especially the banks. Fix it, and stop wasting our time and resources on this lame sideshow. Nobody gives a s**t about all this green stuff, except a few tree-huggers who have never taken a responsible equity position in anything meaningful. What's it going to take to drive a stake in this old Al Gore campaign platform?

there seems to be a disconnect. Are Morgan's brokers/client up in this market? If not then wouldnt these accounts be fleeing? then why pay a salesman all this money when his/her accts are never coming back? what don't i understand?

http://tinyurl.com/berr85

Morgan Stanley’s joint-venture brokerage with Citigroup Inc. will pay brokers as much as $3 billion to ensure they stay after the new entity is formed, a person familiar with the matter said.

Top producers may be eligible for 105 percent of their annual production, the person said, speaking on condition of anonymity because the plan isn’t public. Brokers must stay at the firm for nine years to fully benefit from the plan, the person said.

Morgan Stanley is paying the bonuses to limit departures of brokers who might be poached by other firms such as UBS AG and Credit Suisse Group AG as U.S. banks face compensation restrictions after receiving government rescue funds. Citigroup and Morgan Stanley, both based in New York, have gotten a combined $62 billion in government money since October.

Bob -

Consider this lecture from S. Fred Singer, Ph.D. in Physics from Princeton University, founding dean of the School of Environmental and Planetary Sciences at the University of Miami, the founding director of the U.S. National Weather Satellite Service, and served for five years as vice chairman of the U.S. National Advisory Committee on Oceans and Atmosphere.

http://www.hillsdale.edu/news/imprimis/archive/iss...

what war of information? humans are consuming and destroying this planet. go to china and walk around a while. the air aint peaches and roses. go to some of the rain forest humans are cutting down.

i am not a scientist and i dont know your or Gore's definition of global warming. but we as humans are killing this planet. this is a fact.

NYUGrad -

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601110&si...

New Flash Feb 20, 2009: Sensor drift omits 193,000 square miles or Artic sea ice - the size of California. Time to portage ;)

Cheers.