ONE-TWENTY TWO: Trading Financial Markets
Exploring the poetry in financial markets for students of money and economy since the year 2000.
(This is an excerpt from an article I originally published on Seeking Alpha on April 20, 2012. Click here to read the entire piece.) American Public Media’s Marketplace has a partnership with Gallup called “Attitude Check.” On April 19, Gallup appeared on Marketplace to announce the latest results of its poll of the saving and … Read more
(This is an excerpt from an article I originally published on Seeking Alpha on March 7, 2012. Click here to read the entire piece.) When Energy Conversion Devices (ENERQ.PK) filed for bankruptcy in mid-February, I wrote “The Solar Fun Is Done For Now.” I should have also said that the “horror show has just begun” … Read more
(This is an excerpt from an article I originally published on Seeking Alpha on March 6, 2012. Click here to read the entire piece.) In late September, selling in the stock market was intensifying, and I wrote a piece summarizing a list of stocks where insiders were buying their own stock. The performance since then … Read more
This is an excerpt from an article I originally published on Seeking Alpha on January 1, 2012. Click here to read the entire piece.) In my last post updating the current list of buy candidates for the “commodity crash” portfolio, I neglected to include fertilizer stocks. Phosphate and potash producers – like Mosaic (MOS), Potash … Read more
I am a big fan of trading on insider buying (for example, see “The Market Is Ignoring These Insider Buys, But You Should Not“). So when I read that Jon Corzine had invested $3M of his own money in now bankrupt MF Global, shivers went up my spine. In “Why MF Global’s Collapse Matters“, Brett … Read more
A friend and I have actively discussed how best to position ourselves for the near-term, bearish risks in the market. As my favorite technical indicator, T2108 – the percentage of stocks trading above their 40-day moving average (DMA), hit oversold territory, he asked my opinion about adding to his SSO put spread. Puts on SSO … Read more
Time for a little fun with gold. As a child of the 1980s, I took particular interest in a fun October 13, 2010, Bloomberg interview with A-Team star Mr. T., the celebrity pitchman for Gold Promise. Gold Promise is a service run by Cash America International, Inc. (CSH) that allows people to sell their gold … Read more
Last week, the iShares Barclays TIPS Bond Fund (TIP) surged to a fresh 2-year closing high on the same day the Federal Reserve issued its latest monetary policy statement. (TIPS = Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities – I will refer to “TIPS” when discussing the actual bonds and use “TIP” to refer to the ETF that uses … Read more
Mohamed El-Erian recently quantified the odds of deflation at 1 in 4, or 25%. His analogy to describe the dangers ahead seemed to be a recipe for inaction (and fear): “…ask yourself the following question: would you accept a lift from a person who has a one-in-four chance of getting into a really bad car … Read more
For many of us, investing over the last 10 years has been much more difficult and a lot less fun than it was in the 90s. In the 90s, it was easy to accept the religion of “buy and hold”, keep the faith that assets are pre-ordained to increase in value, and drown oneself in … Read more