Cara's Commentary & Community Chat, Tuesday, Oct. 27, 2009

While we wait for prices to come to us, enjoy this youtube video. It's hilarious & applicable.

http://www.youtube.com/v/6KR2CiceeWg&color1=0xb1b1...

bsi87
Thanks! +1 for the link...

http://tiny.cc/jrb7C

around 12 pm eastern ( not sure...will get exact time )... possible movers... ese, itri, comv, bcon....

BA - estimates lowered at Barclays. BA 2009 and 2010 EPS estimates slashed to $1.36 from $1.78 and to $4.70 from $4.75, respectively. Reiterate Equal Weight rating and $57 price target.

BMY - estimates cut at Barclays. BMY 2010 by two cents to $2.16, maintain 2009 at $2.03. Reiterate $25 price target and Overweight rating.

DOW - price target increased at Barclays to $25 from $18 on solid 3Q results. 2009 and 2010 EPS estimates raised to $0.53 from -$0.02 and to $1.38 from $0.60, respectively. Reiterate Equal Weight rating.

-------------------

Note to bsi87:

Thanks for the scans.....'ppreciate it.

Released on 10/27/2009 10:00:00 AM For October, 2009
Prior 53.1
Consensus 54.0
Consensus Range Actual 51.0 to 55.0
Actual 47.7

Market Consensus Before Announcement
The Conference Board's consumer confidence index fell back to 53.1 in September from 54.5 in August as consumers became more worried about the jobs picture. Both major components declined. The present situation index declined in part due to more respondents indicating that jobs are hard to get. The expectations index decreased to 73.3 from 73.8 in August.

Turns out, not so confident, but the market started to tank a good five minutes before the report came out. Still, a less than confident consumer was worth 5 SPX points in about two minutes.

Prior: 53.1, Actual 47.7, Consensus: 54.0.

TOF - my short oil long gold trade improved immediately after the news, but not because gold did well, but because oil did even worse than gold. So gold is holding up, but only when you compare it to oil.

The GLD:SLV trade also improved too - silver tanking harder than gold on the news.

The buck rallied instantly on the news, too. As to why this is, I have no idea, its just what they do.

I know it's difficult to overestimate the depths this diver is capable of.

GLD/SLV/GDX gave Triple RSI sell signals 8 days ago.

FD: Long DZZ

Has anyone noticed that the BDI has been trending up nicely since bottoming out in late September? This chart looks similar to the Shanghai Composite Index.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/cbuilder?ticker1=BDI...

http://online.wsj.com/mdc/public/page/2_3063-econo...

This chart looks like a great contrary indicator...

Well, what do they say about missed opportunities?

http://www.reuters.com/article/basicMaterialsSecto...

TORONTO, Oct 27 (Reuters) - Canadian gold miner Kinross (K.TO) lowered its full-year 2009 production outlook and raised its average cost of sales estimate, as the company's production ramp-up at its Paracatu mine in Brazil is progressing more slowly than expected.

Highlights
Consumer confidence is falling backwards as pessimism grows over the jobs market. The Conference Board's index fell more than 5-1/2 points to 47.7 in October, barely above 47.4 seen in July. The assessment of current conditions is alarming, at 20.7 for a nearly 2-1/2 point decline and the lowest reading yet of the cycle. Job readings are very weak for the present situation with 49.6 percent, that is nearly half of the 4,000 sample, saying jobs are hard to get, that's up more than 2-1/2 points from September. This reading contrasts with improvement underway for jobless claims and will raise questions whether payroll contraction will deepen, not improve, in October.

The expectations component also fell, down 8 points to 65.7. Here the key reading is expectations for future income where fewer see an increase, 10.3 percent vs. September's 11.2 percent, and more see a decrease, 19.5 percent vs. 19.3 percent. These results are uncomfortably close to the worst levels for this reading in 40-plus years of data. Buying plans all decreased, down for cars, homes and appliances. Inflation expectations are unchanged at 5.3 percent one-year out.

Stocks, commodities and the dollar all moved lower in immediate reaction to the results. The one plus in the report is that the overall index, thanks to expectations for improvement ahead, is still well above the cyclical low of 25.3 hit in February. But if the jobs market doesn't begin to improve soon, confidence will continue to weaken and will very likely raise expectations for a turn lower in consumer spending.

A solar-specific international conference is underway this week in Anaheim, CA.

Solar Power International

As Bill has written before, alternative energy is and will be a significant story heading into the future - on every level - social, economic and investment. As investors the trick is finding companies that will emerge as the success stories. And believe me, I know just how difficult this can be (see ESLR and its calamitous fall). That doesn't mean I have given up on this sector as an investment vehicle. Just that I'm learning from my past mistakes.

thats gutsy - imho they make money in an up or down market - its tough to bet on a team that has a strong offense & defense - I am, however using them as a canary in the coal mine while gaming the faz

2nd order, buy stop 10.88/10.89 limit.

sell limit 17.15, middle of gap down

Always interesting to see perspectives. I've been watching USO/XOM and it's doing some heavy lifting to help keep things afloat.

I interviewed with a solar company, a div of a utility co, in nj last yr. Got to final rounds and suddenly they pulled the position. The reason stated was that there was a HUGE backlog of checks not being handed out by the govt to subsidize solar projects.

This means no one was willing to upfront the bulk of implementing commercial solutions. So "Cash for Sun" awaits.

There are several successful co's who have thus switched to a utility model, they come in and install everything, and charge the company a monthly solar power bill, vs the upfront capex expense.

Then you have hundreds of smaller mom and pop truck operations who install solar, that are running out of time and cash, waiting for govt to pick up a % of the solar panel costs.

Solar and efficiency is def the future, but where are the Nth million unemployed going to work tomorrow? Who is going to train them on solar?

If you look at the unemployment squeeze its pretty scary

A)new graduates who cant find a job
B)baby boomers who cant retire
C)currently unemployed
E)the next few 500M newly unemployed adding to this pile every week

Oh here is dow +72, time to put more money to work.

EDIT: I dont believe any of the above has an affect on Solar Stocks and price action. I am simply skeptical of the fundamentals. if you asked me to start a solar company with my own cash i would laugh. Unless you were best friends with Obama or the head of green energy at the white house.

while I'm watching paint dry, I thought I'd look for a higher probability short. MSFT looks interesting. RSI scan shows distribution zone. Lotta people wetting pants over Windows 7 so that would appear to be already factored into the stock. Nice big gap up 10/23. Max pain opts for Nov is 25 so there's some downward gravity there. Note Dec is 20 bucks...interesting but that's a ways off. But the stock looks like it's priced for perfection. Last Friday was the big gap - looks like a sell short limit order around 29.25 would be a low risk entry with a buy to cover order about 29.45 in case one is wrong.

No position.

added to position per order. Average cost 10.62.

ike,

do you think inflation or deflation?

I am torn. Can a larger picture of deflation be prevented by inflation? is that what we are seeing today? Without the govt keeping rates at zero, hiding housing inventory, bailing out everyone, extending unemployment, offering healthcare to everyone, etc etc etc, this is causing inflation by printing money.

But if they didnt do all the above, there would then be an implosion of prices resulting to deflation?

Is it a matter of choosing between lessor of two evils? will deflation over time win? this subject matter is foggy to me.

My target yesterday for the Euro was 140. Looking at the charts closer shows that's probably a pipe dream. The euro has held above the 50 dma since April 09, likewise the EUO has been contain by a falling 50 dma. So first target has to be moved to this area. There is a nice juicy gap on 9/8/09.

Slow Stochastcs and MACD indicated buy plus good volume. Time will tell.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/8328522.stm

Closed my short in the Canadian dollar - it hit my target (thereabouts) of 93.50, which is the 50 dma as well as a daily RSI of around 30, as well as being at support.

"This differential is entirely due to the low volume aggregation on the way up, in essence the entire run up has been a lite version of a 6 months long gap move up."

"all market participants realize there is insufficient accumulation interest to justify this 3 Sigma divergence."

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/spy-hits-3-sigma-...

What's your parameters for trading bear ETF options, volume wise? Most I've looked at seem to have very little option action, with wide bid/asks. Makes it pretty hard to capitalize on these down moves. Can get seriously stuck. . .

I will be picking on the nasdaq through options in QID and QQQQ on any lower-high attempt. it is the limper of these three horses. just close below 2130. don't try to be a hero mr QQQQ.

Humpty Humongous

Huumongous is sitting on his wall
Humongous ready to fall?
Get serious!
Wait! Let it fall,
Then quick, we'll have Stim 02 !!

Here's a chart of the Humongous Index etf, KBE. Note the wall (support), the BBand break, and the RSI closing in on the "zone". Nothing says Buy here, but I'm watching for a Pelosi punt (Stimulous 02). Not trading advice, just an opinion.
spot

Intraday 5 minute chart, support at 28.50.

I liked the MSFT short suggestion, so I got myself a Nov 27 lottery ticket. IV around 27, seems like a deal to me, but only Pat knows for sure since he's got the historical options price data. But does he want to share? No he does not! :)

Too many financial institutions looking very weak today. Have we seen a significant change in the way banks or HB&B do business. ??
No.
So George Soros, the angel of the US Democrats steps up and says:
"not yet time for regulatory reform"

A giant load of garbage, it's a way past time.
see: http://tiny.cc/Ow99b (Reuters)

took some off the table for 15% gain.

how am i suppose to read that?

A) sell off is a consolidation move before a lower high
B) it would have been much worse with heavy volume
C) its still just quant computers doing all the trading
D) all of the above
E) other

thought you would find this interesting..
Largest solar power plant in US to go online in Florida http://bit.ly/1QTvhS

The largest solar power plant in the United States may soon go live in Florida. The Desoto Next Generation Solar Energy Center will be able to convert sunlight into 25 MW of renewable solar electric power, twice the second-largest solar power system in the US. It is scheduled to go live on Tuesday [27 Oct 2009] and President Barack Obama will visit the facility on the launch day. The plant is located 80 miles southeast from Tampa and it covers 180 acres of land. It cost $150 million and took over 400 employees to build, though only a few employees will run it.

I am not a engineer, but common sense tells me Florida is prob one of the worst places to build a solar farm no?

Less sq footage and hurricane risk every yr. Also it rains like crazy!

Why not pick nevda or parts of tx or az?

What did I miss? Did they choose FL for the labor availability? Politics?

Dave - I agree, which is part of the reason I went long. I timed it poorly yesterday and sold, but I think it's a good buy in point here.

BA broke its 50 day SMA. Likely headed to horizontal support and 200 day at $43.

CC

I've been talking a lot about USD as of late. Unless the dollar tanks into the close, it looks like the trendline put in place since March will be broken. Take a look at UUP as well.

http://www.chartsandcoffee.com/2009/10/shorting-st...

Local Venezuela media are reporting that the Chavistas has taken physical control of the projects of KRY and GRZ in VZ.

I hope everyone heeded the many warnings and got out.

Will KRY's and GRZ's loss be RML's gain? I expect so, at some point.

Where else in the world are 30M to 50M of cheaply mineable gold simply waiting to be extracted?

I made the mistake of jumping the gun on this one yesterday. But I'm comfortable going back at it at $9.25 (the all time low). RSI is in single digits. While I was off on the timing, I'm still confident is not going to $0 within the next week or so - http://www.chartsandcoffee.com/2009/10/privatebanc...

...

ALOHA !!

Jock ... yep it all shows you the power of politics and what can happen when the politics goes against your position.

What I have learned about such politics comes from living in places like Venezuela for many years. What would happen to RML if Chavez is thrown out and a new anti-Russian regime comes into power? Its happened before.

In places like Venezuela "country risk" can be very personal ...

There are two significant events this week that could exert pressure for higher gold prices. Because of this, I expect to see major behind-the-scenes actions to try to suppress gold (and silver) prices until the middle of Thursday afternoon.

First, the U.S. government’s Treasury debt auctions will sell the greatest amount of debt ever sold in one week. The net debt increase of $153 billion is so high it will exceed the current authorized federal debt limit. Flooding the financial markets with so much debt is a sign of weakness for the U.S. dollar. As the dollars declines in value, the price of gold in U.S. dollars invariably rises.

Second, we will also see the expiration of options contracts in two days. If the spot price at the close of trading on the day that gold (and silver) options contracts expire is higher than the contract price on a call option, the owner will exercise the option to demand immediate delivery of physical gold. The higher the price of gold, the more call options that will be exercised. Conversely, a lower gold spot price will reduce the demand for gold for immediate delivery. There is a major block of call options at $1,050, so expect prices to stay below that level through Wednesday night.

As we have seen previously in 2009 with large Treasury debt auctions and options expirations, the price of gold was clobbered before these events, and not allowed to rise quickly until after the last Treasury auction closed on Thursday afternoon. I see no reason to expect a different pattern this week.

http://www.numismaster.com/ta/numis/Article.jsp?ad...

ALOHA !!

Jock posted - "In erratic countries like Venezuela (and others including IMO the US) you have to keep your finger near the sell button."

HA!! So true ... I think you need to have a "sell button" embedded in your finger tip! I have been selling the US DOLLAR since 2001 non-stop!

NYUGrad,

Another category: Those who were retired and have gone back to work after their income producing investments were trashed. This group has been the one getting the most jobs. Why? Social Security and Medicare allow them to work for less per hour without benefits and with more flexible hours.

My barber, whose business is not good, has had a number of customers coming in more often now that they have a job or are looking for one.

Edit: I forgot the main comment. Some of us remember the 1970s energy alternative companies whose time was short and not too sweet. not an area to invest in and hold, but nothing is anymore.

NYUGrad and ike,

A.Gary Shilling says the stimulus, etc. won't be enough to reflate away the problems. Louise Yamata says deflation in material goods (houses, cars, etc.) and inflation in consumer necessities (food, water, energy).

For some time I have been saying deflation in what we think we want and inflation in what we must have.

Both of the above say bonds are safe for the intermediate future. Shilling has been a bond bull for over 20 years.

So far not much of the Fed money has been reaching anyone other than the big banks.

I read an article, forget the source, that suggested the big banks are taking Fed money at 0% and levering up massively and investing it in short term treasuries. Its a form of carry trade, except you don't have to carry it very far. It works, until the Fed takes away the punch bowl.

Might explain the serious demand for short term treasuries. Imagine that one unwinding.

If Canada can follow through on this. I and my family will soon be waiting in line at the 49th parallel!

went long (being short oil) at the close - filled at 13.04 - playing for an api crude build after market

NYU,
IMHO
sorry so late on the reply - its a very tough question - shiller showed a rise in housing, but i still think that is a matter of stimulus as opposed to real demand. the dollar is in a long term trend down although i think we may have some covering in the short term pressuring prices higher short term (it is a VERY crowded trade) - strong international & emerging market demand for hard and soft goods is real demand and will inflate those prices. For us americans, i believe the winds of inflation are building and will ultimately lead to inflation as stimulus is used up - stimilus 2.0? maybe? its a hard call - tight stops, and trade the market you have, not the one you want.

Aloha Grym,
We are looking to buy property/house in Washington. I look at the banks and they are holding cash and houses. Realters say bids on houses can have an $80,000 difference. Great credit pre approved buyer by passed for the REO home to sell to the cash buyer at $80,000 less. This just happened to him this week.
He says smart buyers with cash are bidding low ,paying cash and then do the finance after. Great idea as it gets you down to the 75-80% loan to value for finance. Then the buyer holds cash(at low rates) and home too just like the banks.
It seems as if the banks can't decide if cash or assets are best at this point either so are hedging their bets holding both.

ALOHA !!

Its like clockwork ... Powerful interests are at play here, mainly US FED member banks. I am surprised nobody here plays these short term set-ups or at least if they do they never post about them.

szoya posted - "The net debt increase of $153 billion is so high it will exceed the current authorized federal debt limit."

I am not so sure the context here. I will assume he is referring to the US PUBLIC DEBT LIMITS now set at $12.104TRIL USD. If that is the case then he is flawed since any offsetting redemptions that exceed issues will lower the US PUBLIC DEBT not raise it. This is what disturbs me with US Treasuries and how they are reported. In the media and all the pundits act as if a US Treasury security is a one sided coin. It is not. Not only does a US Treasury DEBT COIN have more than one side ... it has more than two sides if you account for all the "non-marketable" issues that happen practically every day now. Leave it to our government to come up with a nine sided coin! HA!! It can be modeled after the Greek Hydra, the mythological beast with nine heads ... I mean what's next a three cup "man bra"(a TRI-BRO) for Barney?

Thanks for the rigged casino DUH MOMENT of the day!

Mish has a serious audience now. His blog posting on the latest Citibank folly - raising all cardmember rates to 30%, regardless if you're late, have a perfect FICO score, carry a balance, or pay flawlessly every month - got the attention of the beast, who responded in the person of Citi's VP of Public Affairs.

It is just possible that we're starting to move the needle, ever so slightly. It could also be that this particular stunt by Citi [borrow money at 0%, get a boatload of taxpayer dollars and 300 billion in guarantees, and then charge the selfsame taxpayers 30 percent on their balances!] actually resulted in some serious blowback from their cardholders.

Are we getting to a point of HB&B overreach in the public mind? I think not yet, but we're closer day by day.

http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2009/10...

2nd - I'm getting a funny feeling that there is a potential for another spike down on the dollar, which would give a boost to equities so your theory earlier that bears might get one last beating might be correct. I think we can look at UNG as a sense of what the bottoming process looks like. As of yet I don't see a capitulation sell on UUP. The catalyst for a surge lower I think is the renewal of the housing credit and opening it up to all home buyers...

There was a time when usury was a sin.

I suggest it wasn't because they were puritanical crazies, but because it was deeply wrong. It leads to distortions from the moneylender (ie printing free money - which is theft) and assymetric risk taking. It is one thing to invest $ in my business in a partial ownership stake and take the up with the down, if you do well I do well. It is entirely another to charge me for the use of money which a bank makes out of thin air, and have little risk in my business but no matter what profit from me whether I do well or not.

hey, the corleone family wanted to get out of "the business" i guess after being thrown out of las vegas, they landed at HB&B and citi

i'm sure some govt contractors would love to start a debtors prison.

thinking now...what really is the difference between someone loading to the max on tons of credit card with no reasonable chance of paying and someone going in and shoplifting from a store?

it is only the ABILITY of the BANK to absorb losses and the wish of the FED to socialize those losses to all of us THROUGH MORE AND MORE MONEY PRINTING - that puts us in the strange dissonant moral reality that somehow one is STATUS QUO (debt gorging) and the other is CRIME (shoplifting). To me they are within a few shades of each other! (somehow it seems worse when the target of the CRIME is an individual store versus society at large)

2nd - I have a bunch of cash freeing up tomorrow in my IRA accounts and I think I'm going to get back on the bull train. I like HIG a lot as well as GE, WMT, BAC, and even AAPL at this price...

If anyone else is following WEN, I noticed something that might be interesting on the chart. I think it is near a support line and it is currently a good price to buy. Note that they report earnings on 11/5/09. They are currently down 25% from August.

Show me a higher high
show me a higher low
otherwise I am executing the "if" part of my "if-than" scenario.

I did not mean for that to rhyme.

tof- Here's the thing.

I agree that things are bad. The question is, how bad?

We thought things were bad/going to get bad when DJIA was at 14000. We targeted DJIA 10000/SPX 1000 to the downside. So we overshot and hit 6500/666. Does that mean our original target was 'wrong?' Maybe the 6500/666 was 'wrong.'

Now we're floating around 10000/1000. Should we let the possibility that investors took it down too far affect our original target? Maybe, maybe not. Point is, no one knows.

There are massive stimulus programs in effect around the globe. How much should that affect the 'target?' I don't know. Should we be fighting the effects of the stimulus programs?

I just don't think we should allow preconceived notions of 9000/900, or 7500/750 influence us unduly.

Maybe 10000/1000 is base camp. A strong gust/a little uncertainty can take us down. But I wouldn't necessarily jump on the short train due to a strong gust.

Roubini says the U.S. recession appears to be over. But he warned that a new asset bubble fuelled by rock-bottom interest rates and a falling U.S. dollar could trigger another financial disaster.

“The risk is that we are planting the seeds of the next financial crisis.”

The culprit: Investors around the world borrowing cheap U.S dollars and using them to snap up equities, corporate bonds, commodities and other assets, driving up prices far beyond what could be justified by economic fundamentals or growth prospects.

“We have the mother of all carry trades,” Dr. Roubini said, referring to the practice of borrowing in one currency at low interest rates and investing the money in another currency or asset at higher rates of returns.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/globe-investor/inve...

"Show me a higher high
show me a higher low
otherwise I am executing the "if" part of my "if-than" scenario."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xz-UvQYAmbg

"My hope is alive
Way down in my heart
Although we are miles away
(background trio) [from Dow fourteen K]
If you ever need a helping hand
Just double down on TNA
As fast as you can

Don't you know that
There ain't no short-squeeze high enough
Ain't no sell-off low enough
Ain't no call spread wide enough
To keep us from Dow fourteen K"

Astrologer speak actually. Saturn entering Libra.

CNBC probably had a crowd of worried investors hanging on to every shred of hope offered by Kudlow and Cramer last October. This October they don't give a hoot.

" ... they don't give a hoot." and they probably don't even have a poot left to give. Sad, though, that they no longer have a source of hope - even if it came on a river of denial called CNBC.
spot

even if it came on a river of denial called CNBC

Man, you're a poet and don't know it.

I did say something about misspelling a word at least three days this week. That would be the first.

ALOHA !!

Buffet wants the US government and the State and all the other local governments to tax him more. He is complaining that his taxes are too low. I read something from the FT or somewhere over the weekend related to Germany and the EU where very rich individuals have taken up Buffet's plea to be taxed more. These German wealthy citizens have sent a petition to Merkel to levy more taxes on the rich.

In all of US history taxes have never been so high on a permanent percentage basis. I have lived in California since 1984 going to 2002 when I moved to Hawaii and taxes during that nearly 20 years never went down, yet neither did State, County and City spending. With all the massive taxation in California that State is still bankrupt! When I lived there as a kid I heard my parents complaining about the same thing. California is always in a fiscal crisis! Listen Warren, why don't you liquidate all your BRK shares, then sell everything you have and donate it all to the US Treasury. Lets say Warren raised around $30BIL USD. I think Bill Gates net worth is like $34BIL USD. Looking on the US Treasury Daily Statement for October 23rd and 26th. I see total outlays running around $9BIL USD per day so Buffet's entire lifetime of working at Berkshire is equal to 3.3 days of US Treasury outlays. Now lets say Warren wants to use his net worth to cover the US DEBT issue on October 22nd then that 3.3 days gets whittled down to ten minutes which is one sixth of the issue that day.

This idea that you can raise taxes on the rich and everyone who works in America makes no sense. All it does is give the US Treasury more ammunition to spend on wasteful government policies that end up ruining our kids future. For once make the US Treasury and Congress toe the line. Make them live on a budget like we do.

HERE IT IS ... Every government at every level is starving for more taxes.
They not only want "their cake" but they want to eat everyone's cake!
Check it out!

Double-digit property tax increases in city, Cook County suburbs

By Bob Secter Tribune reporter
6:17 a.m. CDT, October 27, 2009

Most Cook County residents are in for another round of sticker shock when new property tax bills arrive in the mail in a few days, with the median increase in many suburbs topping 10 percent and, in a handful, 20 percent.

Median increases in many city neighborhoods will also hit double digits, with some lower income areas seeing the highest percentage spike. The median rise in the West Garfield Park neighborhood will top 46 percent, according to figures provided to the Tribune by Cook County Assessor James Houlihan.

In all, four out of five homeowners in the city and northern suburbs will get higher bills than last year, In the south suburbs, 64 percent of homeowners will see bigger bills, yet the median tax bills in several south Cook communities will actually decline year over year.(more)

As it's often the case with that source, this is sensationalist shot in the sky with little substance. That's normal tendency during bear markets. Take a look at this for instance:

From 4Q’01 to 4Q’04, CNBC lost 69% of its Primetime Total Viewers
http://www.mediabistro.com/tvnewser/original/cnbc_...

"There is a fairly clear long-term correlation between the performance of global stock markets and the audience ratings of CNBC. The network had a difficult time attracting viewers in the first half of the decade, but has seen viewership increase from a 2005 bottom to record highs in 2008, coinciding with the subprime mortgage crisis." and a lot more on this trend:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CNBC#Ratings

And finally, another view on the numbers:
"A more detailed breakdown leaked on the internet reveals a 28% plunge in CNBC viewers during the core business day, between 5am and 7pm.
Executives at the network say the numbers are a return to "normality" after a record spike at the height of last year's financial drama."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2009/aug/09/tel...
(This last article has some interesting points about CNBC btw.)

Oh, and: "When discussing the network's ratings, CNBC management and press releases regularly suggest that considerable viewership, particularly during the daytime, is done "out of home" in places such as offices and hotel rooms.[44][45] As this demographic is not covered by Nielsen Media Research ratings, CNBC claims that the network's true viewership is considerably higher than what is measured."

Things are rarely what they seem...

When is enough ENOUGH!

http://bit.ly/20R3be

"In a stark reminder of how some battered financial firms remain dependent on government lifelines, GMAC Financial Services Inc. and the Treasury Department are in advanced talks to prop up the lender with its third helping of taxpayer money, people familiar with the matter said.

The U.S. government is likely to inject $2.8 billion to $5.6 billion of capital into the Detroit company, on top of the $12.5 billion that GMAC has received since December 2008, these people said. The latest infusion would come in the form of preferred stock. The government's 35.4% stake in the company could increase if existing shares eventually are converted into common equity.

The willingness by Treasury officials to deepen taxpayer exposure to GMAC reflects the troubled company's importance to the revival of the auto industry. Founded in 1919, GMAC has $181 billion in assets and is a major financier for 15 million borrowers and thousands of General Motors and Chrysler car dealerships."

They need the $2.8b for retention enemas (I mean bonuses). Where would GMAC be without all that top talent?

Tested twice on a top line above $12 and failed. Now at $10.63. Dividend potential squashed and put on hold per announcement Monday. Has a lot of debt. Losing a lot of money. Does not look good to me but what do I know. Good luck in Borneo.

Aloha,
Agree 100%, it's embarrassing now to realize how little I questioned 8 years ago . Thankful to Bill for providing a place that helped me really see beyond the curtain.

Amendment to my previous comments about 1929 program:

A prominent astrologist was mentioned several times.

Spot, 2nd_ave, Dr,

Maybe it's time to follow bill's suggestion and write to Immelt about programming.

I haven't noticed any difference in CNBC — but then, I leave the sound off.