Tuesday Member Post

What did you think of the IBD Big Picture conclusion that the market was back in a confirmed rally? Jonah Keri said a lot of positive things, then he ends the article saying that losers outnumbered the up stocks by a wide margin on the NASDAQ, and the IBD 100 was flat--seemed liked he contradicted himself on the market status.

Jazz

zmann

Any thoughts on reloading oil puts this morning?

Anybody else have LUM puts. When will they open this mess?

As you probably know, I’m juggling many, many, things right now. I’m posting in “5? different places: my blog, phil’s blog, private happy trades, email alerts, and then, public happy trades. So, forgive me if my replies are slow. I’m doing my best. Thanks!

Greene, click on the “Email Alerts” tab on top of my members’ site. Thanks!

WYNN 119! Time to sell into the enthusiasm…

Theres gotta be a short squeeze in WYNN today, after the run yesterday and then the earnings gap.

Happy – are you doing with ONXX on the earnings news? Selling into the initial excitement perhaps?

BIOD- congrats on those FFIV puts!
WYNN- NICE win for all!

AAPL – does anyone know what time they’ve scheduled today’s product announcement ?

AAPL – 10 am PDT

FAB- thanks I was wondering about that!
NILE- Didn’t have for earnings but did Creditspread Aug 75/70 for .40. Stock needs to drop over 10% before a problem

Good morning folks.

Optrader, in response to yesterday’s AHR question, yes, looks like bottom may be in. I puked looking at the chart since mid-July, which mirrors many many financial related stocks.

AHR reports earnings tomorrow morning. Earnings should be good. The keys will be a) if they maintain the dividend, and b) whether or not they have had meaningful pressure to de-lever in a way that resulted in forced asset sales. If management handles the call right, this can be back to 10+ very fast.

Stock is a good way to play. Even Jan $7.50 options look attractive. Looks like the shorts are starting to cover, but price is still way too low.

CLWR- someone on this blog likes this stock, is it a good time to start looking at it? I AM NOT being a wiseass I read some good things about it a few weeks ago after it was mentioned.

BWLD got an upgrade this morning.

NMX has put their HQ up for sale and are in talks for a merger that according to CNBC could take place in the next few months.

FNFTE stopped out 2.45 profit

Re reloading oil puts: I’m still short some of the smaller refiners but a lot of damage has been done in among the E&P stocks and I’m actually looking to get more long once the market finds its groove again. Of late, I’ve been adding to things like CHK and would add there again and to SWN and NFX but not before today’s meeting.

CRK had a nice beat as expected and the stock is starting to come back up after a punishing month.

In service: OII continues to run. Like HAL at these levels long.

BBG reported a beat but they failed to strip out the large one time gains in the numbers so it’s not as good as it looked and cost control was, well, not controlled. The stock was up strong early and if we get a gift from the Fed and a rally it probably goes higher but then I’d be adding to my puts.

RL-not going out of business today, nice jump from $87 yesterday

Lithium Bottlerocket: Congrats

I got out my LUM puts a short while back after nice gain DAMN!!

AHM the 2nd caught AHM missed this one.

JCI
Time to start building a position on the 1% pullback today?

thanks you, thedraz.

Oil wants to shoot up to the moon.

GS running.

TRID up a dollar.

DRYS – up +$3.26 to $56.95

No one expects the Fed to cut rates today. They hope Bernanke says something that soothes, and hints at a cut later in the year.

size123, check your settings and make sure you have delivery set to go to your inbox!

I think it will be a win (i.e., bullish) if the Fed merely tones down the anti-inflation hawkishness in their statement and “recognizes” that they might need to cut at a not-too-distant point in the future. Not enough for Cramer, but probably enough for most people to stop selling until the next bit of bad news.

Thanks, Dragon…and congrats on PCLN.

CME
took some off at +35.4%!

Happy, I got the email confirmation for the alert, so I don’t understand why I am not getting any alerts.

Happy -

On your site, I think you have the wrong close price for CME.

CLWR – I am the one who likes it and owns it talked about it earlier. I own stock and periodically write Puts on it trying to get more on the cheap and/or collect premiums. So far just gained and covered the puts and just own the original shares bought around $24 week of the IPO. It is a good stock that I hope will double in year or two.

Wait till today afternoon, see how tech. & general market is doing and if almost same as now, look at Sep 20/25 Puts – you should be able to get stock around $23s – a price I think will hold for a while.

Another catalyst is Sprint’s earnings later this week – they announced a WiMax sharing deal with CLWR and if they say good things about their WiMax strategy, it could move CLWR big.

EMC-Taking a Hit! Down 4%

BBD, can you email Jared about signing in to Wang’s? Thanks!

FFIV – hello dragon – what are your thoughts about FFIV.

Happytrading- already did, no worries I know you are swamped.
Msquare-Thanks for your input

CME
580!!

email alerts, part of my member service.

BBD --

I’ve been benefitting from EMC, so thank you for all the info. Do you think this has anything to do with today’s drop:

Press Release Source: VMware, Inc.

VMware Announces Extension of Exchange Offer
Tuesday August 7, 6:00 am ET

PALO ALTO, Calif., Aug. 7 /PRNewswire/ — VMware, Inc. announced today that the exchange offer by VMware and EMC Corporation has been extended and will now expire at 11:00 a.m., Pacific Time, on August 13, 2007, unless further extended. Any such extension will be followed by a public announcement no later than the next business day after the offer was scheduled to expire. The offer had been previously scheduled to expire at 11:00 a.m., Pacific Time, on August 9, 2007.

The offer is being made to certain employees of VMware and its subsidiaries in the United States to exchange all of their outstanding stock options to purchase EMC common stock for options to purchase VMware Class A common stock, and to exchange all of their restricted EMC stock for restricted VMware Class A common stock.

The depositary for the exchange offer has advised VMware and EMC that, through 11:59 p.m., Eastern Time, on August 6, 2007, a total of approximately 10,277,000 shares of EMC stock underlying EMC options and approximately 3,197,000 shares of restricted EMC stock were validly tendered and not withdrawn, representing approximately 83.6% of the outstanding shares of EMC stock underlying EMC options and approximately 55.0% of the outstanding shares of restricted EMC stock eligible to be tendered.

before you get too wildly carriedaway by resetting mtgs, better idea is to figure out what percent of the economy housing is, and what percent mtg arent performing, you’ll be surprised by how small the numbers are relative to the economy

bmb,
that’s a fascinating post. thanks.

I am not worried by resetting mortgages. What worries me is the general impact on consumer spending, as any mtg payments at the higher rates is going to cut down on other things. Its like paying 5 bucks for gas instead of 2.

Thanks, Happy.

JASO
up 10+% on upgrade

STP
going up with it!

BMB- Funny that you brought that up as I saw the same stat on Saturday. It will matter if a good % can’t reset these things like some people in Cal that are paying interest only loans.
THEDRAZ- Thanks for posting that I read the headlines but didn’t open it up

Glad I could contribute SOMETHING, BBD.

CFC said on their call that roughly 1/3 have been refinancing before their mortgages reset, so those numbers are likely inflated to a degree.

Happy OIH alert. RIG looks great as a buy down here watching for a breakout above 100.
Scoping AUG 100@2.00

anybody know when the fed announces their decision?

Option Dragon

In response to your query on my zmansenergybrain.com site regarding the Calyon service sector upgrade:

I think the guys at Calyon love sticking it to the boys at Op Co who got scared of the broad market and downgraded a ton of things yesterday. B of A was busy downgrading the sector last week as well.

I’d say for 2/3rds of the Oil Service names, they’re having the their all time dream date of year. Especially guys like RIB/ GSF who have long lead contracts which aren’t impacted by the day to day, w to w, or m to m moves in oil and gas prices. These are deep offshore operators who are seeing contracts move in only one direction due to global tightness: UP!

The only pocket of weakness in the group would be the onshore guys and you’ll note that the most exposed to drilling on land is is BHI which they only labeled ADD while everyone else including my slug of a position in HAL rated Buy.

GME-nice move from Friday’s gap down. Although I bought Oct’s Someone joined me and bought the Jan calls congrats.

Happy
FSLR seems to be heading for $100 too.

Windy
AAPL Aug $145′s doing exactly what you want.

Mortgage resets

http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/

Extract

Major Disconnect in Subprime

Late last Friday I gave a call to Dave Donhoff at No Bull Mortgage and was wondering about subprime and Alt-A, and how they were affected by these treasury gyrations. Before I go further, let me say that Dave is one of the good guys. He has not had a single returned loan or foreclosure on one of his customers in the last 6 years. Although Dave has not been tracking exactly what I wanted he did offer this:

* Almost all stated income loans everywhere vanished last Friday.
* Almost all 2/28 ARMs vanished last Friday.
* While this was eventually expected it was not expected by everyone overnight.

As we were talking I was fortunate that a representative of major mortgage lender who had a scheduled appointment stopped by to see Dave. That person agreed to talk to me on condition anonymity so I will honor the request. But here is what I found out from that major lending insider.

* Subprime rates have risen by as much as 190 basis points at his organization in just the last 2 weeks!
* Many other lending institutions have done the same thing.
* The definition of prime has tightened considerably, everywhere.
* Any variance from prime raises the mortgage rate.
* Small differences in FICO score now matter (sometimes by a lot).
* Every little thing adds up.
* 90% LTV rates are higher than 85% LTV rates which are higher than 80% LTV rates.
* 100% LTV rates are very difficult to come for subprime and even Alt-A.
* Condos vs. homes matters significantly.
* There were 3 rate increases in the last 2 weeks even as 10 year treasury rates rallied.
* Second mortgages have nearly vanished – no market.
* 2/28 arms – gone.
* Someone who is “really clean” but is not prime (but close) and is putting down 20% has had a 70-80 basis point hike in the last 2 weeks.
* The bankrate charts might not show it, but in the last two weeks nearly every loan rate went up even as treasuries rallied significantly. The primest of prime was perhaps flat.

FSLR/solar plays
will be interesting after the Feds!

AAPL – If you want some ‘before the meeting exposure’, you can follow the guys at Gizmodo

http://live.gizmodo.com/gadgets/apple/apple-town-hall-07-live-5001042.php

Optiondragon re RIG: I agree, prime to buy.

Energy in general looks to be holding and ready to spring up if the market is agreeable. If the fed is “sensitive to credit concerns” today I think oil goes green and the XOI which is holding support gets a nice dead cat bounce. XOM, HAL, APC, CHK, RIG all will bounce nicely on that scenario. But the fed has to play ball.

WYNN pop

MGM looks like it’s moving.

Zman, true that. Energy is a techincal buy and weak holders are out. Big Shorts are short term covering locking in profit on the cycle.

GS
192+!!

FSLR 104+

MGM- Good call Phil.

Doog1- I like the looks of your MPEL. As of March there were some heavy hitters
in the stock; Marsico, Wellington, and Janus. Chart looks good to me..

If I told you, you could buy GS at 175 one month ago you would have not believed me and then ask where.
its looks like now but we still feel there is a s chance of a recession if something doesn’t change.

someone knows something?
Today we see if the Bernake Put exists or not.
Just change to a dovish statement thats all.

WYNN incredible strength it is going to hold unless Fed screws it up. That flatline in the middle of the day was an invitation. But the fed looms so cautious or get a scalp.

NOV
moving up!

GS
screaming!!

oh no, I didn’t get into WYNN yesterday! How did I miss that (!!!)

I thought I locked some 120 calls near the close, must’ve missed by a nickel. Crap!

Holy smoking reversals! HAL up with OIH flying.

EOG jumping

HAL – looks like the company is feeling comfortable to re assert that buyback. Sweeettt!!!

If energy run continues the NFX 50s and the SWN 40s are attractive here. That if depends on your thoughts on the fed. If people like what they say these should zoom but are still down on the day at present.

Check out that hockey stick of a minute chart on NFX!

goog looks great right now look at the bounce! im very tempted to get in before the FOMC but i dont think i will

SPWR
regaining power!

windywheel
NOV- do you mean you sold the AUG 115′s yesterday at $2.45? IF so just let it play out. FYI I bought NOV 110′s yesterday but one again nothing big

option
do you have a target on RIG. Thanks

WYNN/LVS
took more profits off! LVS now looks a bit more attractive.

Happy – no real opinion as they’re gas midstream and storage. I’m focused mainly on stuff that turns to the right and makes holes in the ground. That’s being said, storage is very full and processing volumes are very high at present so fundamentally they SHOULD be doing gangbusters. But I haven’t looked at the books.

you can get out of half now and then hold for the fed or hold for a retracement to 104.10 with a zone and 108.80 with a zone as per stockconsultant.com as one source, but many variables and crosscurrents so caution the knee jerk reactions to the fed are going to be a doozie!

GME
chart shows today’s move likely to be a breakout path!

anyone looking at csco into earnings tonight

Su will run like you wouldn’t believe if people like the FED statement as oil is still down on the day. If the economy is “saved” so is oil and nobody benefits more from higher oil (except maybe Happy’s Solar Plays)

STP
looking at Dec 45 calls!

GME is great looking too. Hey they are getting ready to move money into retail for the holiday season . Nasdaq will fly soon if this is it.

STP – earnings 8/9 before the market

Happy, Optiondragon…too late to get in GME?

OPTRADER-have you notice with the increase in VIX, these creditspreads are getting nice again?

GME
I’m waiting for the Feds.

WYNN
got stopped out!

Ebay showing great strength again – last Friday it flagged the move when it held up in the face of the market declines and Monday it took off like a rocket and continuing today, up almost 2% again!

Thank you, gentlemen!

optrader- thats what Im doing and with optionhouse I can throw 100 contractsaround and not be constantly digging myself out of a commission hole.

no webcast for apple..

ICE
not enough of a run before the Feds. I’m looking to get out 1/2 at even. If the Feds are nice, and things run, I’ll go back in.

yawwwwn…..if you’re planning on taking a break from the market today now might be the time just once you’re back in an hour when the statement is made!

OPTRADER- I hear ya! I just like the monthly income of these type of plays. I don’t have to be right just not wrong by stock dropping 10% or so.

CFC, anyone think it might be a good idea to short this or other financials ahead of the fed?

AAPL – on line store down for update. very consistent with new item announcement meetings.

KeyserSoze
You are becoming a fountain of info. Thanks

SWN going parabolic on the minute chart.

focus after Feds, if good news
OIH’s, solar plays, perhpas metals!

happy, sage,
what about if he doesn’t say or do anything different, will that be considered bad news? and what would you focus on in that event? DIA puts, or other specifics?

Optrader – you get $0.75 from E*Trade with no flat fee? I’m getting $7.99 + 0.75 each right now.

BBD, I also bought BCSI calls. It sure looking good.

j

Happy,

What s the best trade just after the fed, in case interest remains same and in case interested rate is lowered ?

Thx

Philippe the belgian

Anyone looking at financials for after Fed plays?

HAPPY – for that list I’d add SU, XOM, HAL CHK on the longside.

Windy – if they don’t address the mess I’d be surprised and yes, I think it would sell off the markets. Then I’d be looking at XLE puts as they have a much smaller premium than OIH’s or XOI’s

AAPL

Juliet,
I have been meaning to ask you , do you still have FCSX? I sold Aug 55′s against Jan that day it spiked

zman- xle puts thanks good one.

Live AAPL MAC news
//live.macnn.com/

Did Jobs say “And one more thing” yet?

CMG – Wowee!

ramana
I guess my creditspread is safe LOL. Sh*t I wish I had went long.
CMG-ditto

CMG amazing I’m scared of that one…..

zmann,

Bullseye SWN. What else do you see in your crystal ball?

wiiboxer, 2:15

does AAPL make a tablet laptop ?

Z, thanks for the addtions!

SWN – Not waiting for the Feds.

sage
thanks

Opttrader: Re: E-Trade. Did you say you pay 0.75 but no minimum w/ them ? If so, how did you get that ?

TOL puts
Not sure what you mean by “bad”. Bad for short positions, or long? In any case, unless they actually lower the rates, I don’t think the housing sector will go any where. The initial reactions in this sector may be with the rest of the market, but, they still have a long-term downward bias.

AAPL -

does not make a tablet (for now).

PCU!!

I bet Phil is dreaming of being in front of his 5 screens right now… T-10 minutes

thedraz,

Since there were no analysts present, it may take a while for the news to perculate into the market. Maybe I’m just being optimistic.

major oil pump in progress.

2:13 PM

GGC anyone? Looks like it might have formed a base… ready to pop back up before earnings tomorrow? Next stop 22… maybe?

Looks like bad initial reaction to the Fed statement… direct from the FOMC website:

For immediate release

The Federal Open Market Committee decided today to keep its target for the federal funds rate at 5-1/4 percent.

Economic growth was moderate during the first half of the year. Financial markets have been volatile in recent weeks, credit conditions have become tighter for some households and businesses, and the housing correction is ongoing. Nevertheless, the economy seems likely to continue to expand at a moderate pace over coming quarters, supported by solid growth in employment and incomes and a robust global economy.

Readings on core inflation have improved modestly in recent months. However, a sustained moderation in inflation pressures has yet to be convincingly demonstrated. Moreover, the high level of resource utilization has the potential to sustain those pressures.

Although the downside risks to growth have increased somewhat, the Committee’s predominant policy concern remains the risk that inflation will fail to moderate as expected. Future policy adjustments will depend on the outlook for both inflation and economic growth, as implied by incoming information.

Voting for the FOMC monetary policy action were: Ben S. Bernanke, Chairman; Timothy F. Geithner, Vice Chairman; Thomas M. Hoenig; Donald L. Kohn; Randall S. Kroszner; Frederic S. Mishkin; Michael H. Moskow; William Poole; Eric Rosengren; and Kevin M. Warsh.

is this time check thing a cheap accounting ploy to pump up the comments number in advance of the boss checking in when he comes back from the beach ?

this is not a dovish statement, more like neutral to hawkish. IMO.

Fed – LOL, zmann

AAPL – down -$1.95

THANKS BEN!

SKF – Glad I bought some (avg. $82.70). Initial reaction definitely not what Market bulls wanted – already up $2.50 – wish had bought more ):

Your tax dollars not at work. I want a refund Ben. I spend more time on each of my comments than they spend shuffling the 63 words in their monthly statement. See, I just did.

“Although the downside risks to growth have increased somewhat, the Committee’s predominant policy concern remains the risk that inflation will fail to moderate as expected. Future policy adjustments will depend on the outlook for both inflation and economic growth, as implied by incoming information.”

Global expansion is the biggest problem, this creates inflationary pressure. In other words the fed believes, oil, metals, timber, food, everything that we use in our daily lives to prosper will continue to rise in price because of demand.

GOOG staying positive, this market cannot handle another 200+ point drop again, that would be disastrous.

kustomz,

actually that would be partly due to the weak dollar. I still think the Fed has to raise rates at some point soon.

13350, we need a bounce at this level

exactly, even I hope the fed raises interest rate to kill this never ending house slowdown and cut down inflation and also kill this commodity bubble.

DRAGON

FWLT earnings tomorrow bmo. Any plays? I still hold a few Aug 120 calls, remnants of last earnings play.

thx
ss

thanks Z on EIA. They have been saying this for years now

Markets getting uglier!

what kind of plays are you guys seeing out there? is anything bouncing or are we still churning?

Happy,

Still living ?
What to do now ?

Philippe

I like that bottoming tail on the hourly Q’s. Just what it’d look like before it went higher…

i’m not liking PSW so much without phil around

OIH’s, NOV
going up!

wynn, total BS downspike few min back. Bought some calls on that drop. What were they thinking? short term memory loss?

No surprises from the Fed. So, we’re trading technicals, which means we should be going up!

I went to check out prices and thought about picking up the newly designed mac for my wife for our anniversary.

Their online store was down. On their debut day. good one guys.

snap back! closing higher ….

What a swing the SPY went up 1.00 in about 10 minutes!

biodieselchris – The Apple store is usually down when they announce new products, should be back online by now. Ah… no, not yet. Wonder why…

check the monster OIH waking up!

now, lets hope for ginormous short squeeze

like HK August 15s for earnings tomorrow. JP Morgan just upgraded last week and I while that analyst is not my favorite he’s unlikely to do that if he feared the quarter wasn’t in the bag.

biodieselchris, they always take the store down during one of steve’s talks.. It’s back up now with all the new goodness..

WFR
we need wait for it to at least break 60 before adding. It hasn’t gone below the support, so, I’m not worrying about it. The weekly chart is pinching in, once it opens up, WFR can run. Patience my friend.

IMB, was up $3 in the morning, 30 min back was down almost 50 cents and now up $2. WOW, I envy all those day traders

AAPL – Depending on the scope of product changes, the Apple Web store could be down a couple hours. They always do a planned shutdown during the event and then “re-open” later in the day. With this announcement there were a lot of little things that probably touch a lot of pages (iMac, iWeb, iLife, the new Numbers program). Not a lot of really big market moving news but probably enough to create a lot of internal work for the layout guys.

Sage, I hope BIDU wld follow GOOG.

Windy
If you like, email me after the market. Let’s work on your profolio together.

MR-up 13%

Phil, are you saying that there are no good broker shorts left out there?

happy,
thanks so much.

VDSI-taking half off on this run.

RIMM
I’m in

CRK up 9%, HAL at HOD, HK breaking out!

Any thoughts on ONXX?

Sold the AAPL Aug 140s for 2.05 against my Sept 140s. Bought them back a half hour ago for 1.40 and now just sold them again for 2.05. Kinda fun!

OIH’s, NOV
screaming now!!

Thanks Phil, bon appetit!

If anyone has Aug NMX calls out there, what are you doing with them given today’s news? Rolling to Sep/Oct or just cashing out?

Tripled the call action in the HK Aug 15s in the last hour.

Phil – Cramer in fact came on right before the decision to say that he did NOT want a rate cut because it would cause panic in the markets Is that a 180 from last Friday?? I think so!

HK

Z – I guess you have many followers. I am in.

If you got in on the HK 15 Augusts at $0.40 (offer) when I originally started spouting about it earlier the prudent man might dump some on the mid or heck even take the bid at $0.60. 50% in an hour.

DOH – I hate when that happens

Sage,

Cramer is a master at hedging his words. He did a show last week (“worst case scenario”) so he can claim to be right no matter which way the market goes

phoenix
JCI-I bought both Oct 115′s and 120′s. That way we get the 3 for 1. Goodluck my friend!

Spent much of today rebalancing the risk in my portfolio, with market so volatile:

Rolled FSLR & DRYS (sold puts) into Sept., to gain time in case today’s gains don’t hold.
Sold Aug AAPL calls against leaps & stock and bought back (sold) puts, so less bullish on s/t.
Sold Aug GS calls, on spike, against leaps.
Looking at puts on XHB on homebuilders as this spike is too tempting.

BBD – what do you mean 3 for 1 on JCI

What a great day!

Rocked with MGM SPY and QQQQ calls (thxs guys)

ELON ( why wasnt it me that bought those 100 calls $10,000.00 profit in about 2 hrs!!)
can’t complain when a stock you own goes up 22% in a day!

and my TMA and FNM puts that i bought this morning are higher crazy

Argh. So the last two fun trades I’ve wanted to make, buying calls on GME at 38 (last week or two) and XLF at 32 (yesterday), I’ve missed thanks to extra sleep and extra vacation, respectively. Bah!!

BBD – duh .. thanks

PCLN --

Looks good for you, Dragon!!

JPL
JCI-split date Oct 3
CSCO-looks pretty good
pcln-even better
Goodnight all

BBD – thanks!!

Congrats Dragon!!

Hey, where’s Karmcon these days?

PCLN Short squeeze tomorrow. Big time.

CSCO see’s 90′s like growth going forward, ups guidance. I say its a home run. 12 to 17% growth range going forward raised from 12 to 15%

WHAT!!!! CSCO is going to fly tomorrow anyone else listening to this CC.

HLYS – Down >7% AH. Wow.
PCLN – At this point, I think optiondragon has insider information on WYNN and PCLN. Unbelievable.

kustomz, wasn’t that one word “CSCO” enough

Should have posted this earlier …

Liveblogging Cisco Systems fourth quarter conference call
http://tinyurl.com/2f4f3v

Cramer? This guy just doesnt have the ability to be totally truthful, must be from all those years of running a hedge fund. Mortgage companies were giving money AWAY, i have seen it first hand…if you made 40k a year you had 600k availble to purchase a home.

Thats just plain nuts and asking for trouble. In reality your yearly income would have to be 180k to qualify for that amount….the banks are far from being out of the woods. FARRR.

The problem isn’t people not having the ability to get credit the problem is people that got the credit weren’t in a position to payback that credit. Cramer Cramer Cramer? He wants the banks to throw bad money after bad money. NUTS? I think so.

mj “CSCO”…agreed!!

flow loans hit lower levels than 9/11

link

that’s a pretty steep drop — and we are at the early end of the ARM rate reset calendar, so hopefully these things are not tied too tightly together

Cramer … CNBC should have fired his a$$ for that meltdown (watched the video this morning finally). Instead, they run commercials with it.

Market … Opttrader, the market could be rallying because this washout cleared out a lot of folks and it may be time to fry the bears again. Where is the real bad news gonna come from … mortgage companies ? getting old already. Bear Stearns ? may have weathered the storm + WS and Fed probably came to the rescue. Unless Goldman or Merrill blows …. the party may come back for options expiration week next week.

Or not …

Australia Increases Key Rate to 11-Year High of 6.5%.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aUdNM4lkINsk&refer=worldwide

I guess this means us$ goes down tomorrow? See us$ YTD gains against world currencies – it gained against Burundi, Botswana, Congo, Ethopia … maybe the gainer’s list will shorted before the year is over.

1. China threatens to trigger US dollar crash
http://tinyurl.com/28ot7x

2. WYNN volume was the highest ever 10M today versus avg of 1.7M. Buying some leaps here might be good.

3. MDR amazing results once again.

“In June 2004, the Fed began to raise the short-term target rate, eventually taking it to 5.25%, where it has been for the past year. Such a boost usually leads to a rise, as well, in long-term rates, which are important to rates on 30-year conventional mortgages and corporate bonds. This time, it didn’t. Mr. Greenspan expressed concern that investors were willing to accept low returns for taking on risk. “What they perceive as newly abundant liquidity can readily disappear,” he said in August 2005, six months before retiring. “History has not dealt kindly with the aftermath of protracted periods of low risk premiums.”

Greenspans confession.

Money not accumulating interest is a waste of money, i think this drying of the well will lead to other opportunities. There are billions of dollars in oil money looking for a home. Do oil countries build infrastructure…NO they look for investments outside their respective countries. What ever reason they find they will use, and this market goes higher. After all the nervous neely’s get washed out.

China has an interest in propping up the dollar, keeps their exports cheap, tough talk is all it is and how tough of a stance can we take since China keeps this boat afloat? Last thing China wants is a global recession. I HOPE.