Mega Earnings Monday – 1,000 Reports This Week!
by Phil - April 26th, 2010 8:21 am
What a crazy week this is going to be!
Pre-Market we’re hearing from BLK, CAT (are we building stuff?), EXP, HTZ, HUM, LO, TUES and TZOO and later we will hear from BSX, CHH, OLN, RSH, RCII, TXN (major) and my "friendbuddypal" Cramer’s TSCM (if they are not delayed). Revenues at The Street have crept back up this year in a recovery that pretty much mirrors the market. The company does pay a nice 2.6% dividend, which works out to a nice $200,000 bonus on Jimmy’s 2.1M shares (6.7% of the company) so you know that bonus will be a priority for the company. Cramer was BUYBUYBUYing his own stock at $2.41 in January but sadly they have no options to hedge… They might make a nice pick-up after earnings if they disappoint and head back to $3 or less.
I’m full of useful information on hundreds of stocks right now because I’ve been researching our new Buy List but I’m not pleased with what I’ve been seeing so far and this week’s tidal wave of earnings, with 1,000 companies reporting means we’re in no hurry to dip our toes in the water. I told Members this morning I should probably be working on a Sell List, as it’s much easier to find companies I want to short than ones I want to buy. Even in the Weekly Wrap-Up, we featured a 1,900% downside hedge on the Russell to offset the 566% plays and other bullish plays we’ve begun to reluctantly take, just so we don’t feel too silly in this runaway market.
If you have never watched Jim Cramer discussing the sleazy, manipulative ways he used to game the markets – you really must take 10 minutes and watch this video, where Jim explains how any immoral bastard with $10M can yank the entire futures market around at will. He prefaces one of his favorite strategies with "this is blatantly illegal but.. I think it’s really important… these are things you MUST do on a day like today and if you are not doing it, maybe you shouldn’t be in the game." Are you playing the game or are you being played?
The biggest game ever played may be unwinding as we speak. Bloomberg reports that foreign-exchange profits from carry trades are disappearing as differences in central bank interest rates fail to increase fast enough to compensate for swings in…
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Digg“Goldman Sachs Are Scum:” Max Keiser on Goldman Sachs From July 2009
by ilene - April 17th, 2010 1:41 am
"Goldman Sachs Are Scum:" Max Keiser on Goldman Sachs From July 2009
Courtesy of JESSE’S CAFÉ AMÉRICAIN
Here is a video interview on France 24 television with Max Keiser speaking on Goldman Sachs from almost one year ago.
By the way, NO ONE who is a serious player on Wall Street is legitimately surprised by this, and probably no one in regulatory bodies are either, unless they are just showing up to collect a paycheck and obtain free Internet access.
The antics of Goldman Sachs have been getting by on a ‘wink and a nod’ from the regulators and the market for some time. Why? Because they are powerful, and because like Lehman and their off balance sheet frauds, they are almost ALL doing it on Wall Street as part of the franchise. Goldman has just been a pig about it, and probably burned some insiders and powerful investors in their fraudulent Abacus trade.
The excuses being made for Goldman by some on Bloomberg Television and CNBC are setting new lows in journalism. It was just a simple failure to disclosure Paulson’s involvement right? Almost a technicality. No one forced the customers to buy those fraudulently packaged and labeled assets or stocks (this was a favorite excuse from Joe Kernan during the Internet/tech bubble collapse). No involvement from the Ratings Agencies in the purposeful crafting of a fraudulent financial instrument. Guest Calls Cramer a ‘PR Man for Goldman Sachs’ and is ejected from the show by the resident money honey.
As you may recall, Mr. Cramer represents himself as highly experienced in manipulating stocks using CNBC reporters from his days as a hedge fund manager. So it might not be so outre to inquire if he is working the other side of that Wall Street scam these days.
Why, these derivatives were SO complex that the poor Goldman management barely understood them themselves. They were tricked by Paulson. Tourre is a rogue trader. Bernie Madoff ate their Series 7 cheatsheets. Compliance was seconded to the Riviera. Lloyd was busy doing missionary work in Bangkok. More regulation will just hurt the recovery.
Don’t just regulate them. Break them up. And audit the Fed.
I am glad the professor is from HEC. I did my international business MBA sequence (an extended field trip for adults, but the refreshments were good) at the ‘other’ business school in Paris at La Defense, ESSEC.
Toppy Tuesday – Happy Anniversary Bull Market!
by Phil - March 9th, 2010 8:26 am
It’s hard to believe that just one year ago today investors thought the world was ending!
Well, not all investors – we were BUYBUYBUYing at the time, as I recapped back in September whan we did our "Market Crash – Year One Review." Click on Cramer’s picture for the Daily Show’s March 4th, 2009 review of the magical moments that led us down to the bottom and here’s another great video from the evening broadcast on March 9th and, of course, there is my own legendary appearance on LiveStock from March 6th, but that’s summarized in the crash link, so save yourself 3 hours, although the first 10 minutes are worth it for people who want to learn about our buy/write strategy as I explained the logic of it as I recommended FAS at $2.41 using those hedges.
And what a wild year it has been as we’ve made an epic recovery. The only question is – have we come too far too fast? Should we be up 75% from our March 9th lows? We are still down 25% from our highs but let’s keep in mind that we made those highs thinking AIG was MAKING money, that FNM and FRE were great stocks for your retirement virtual portfolio, that Kirk Kirkorean was going to rescue GM, that BZH wasn’t some kind of scam, that BSC, LEH et al were "the smartest guys in the room." I urge you to click on Cramer and listen to the idiocy of the analysts who would tell you everything is all right even as it was all falling apart around them – why does everyone suddenly trust them again?
How could we not love this market? Markets do this sort of thing all the time don’t they? It’s all part of the "efficient pricing model" that always lets you know what a stock is truly worth like when GE was "worth" $30 in 2008 and "worth" $6 in 2009 and is now "worth" $16. This is not some biotech folks – this is GE, they’ve been around for 100 years and they have $170Bn in global sales. Did they really drop 80% in value in 2009? No. That’s why it was easy to pick a bottom – the valuations got ridiculous and, as fundamentalists, we siezed on the opportunity to BUYBUYBUY despite the negative sentiment.
Now, we are in a very different situation. Now…
Thrilling Thursday – Consumers Still Unemployed, but Shopping!
by Phil - March 4th, 2010 8:23 am
The MSM is so happy about the February Monster Employment Index!
They’ll tell you it’s up 10 points from January without mentioning that January was the worst month of the past 12 and, in reality, we are up just 2 points from last February when the shockingly poor data we were seeing sent the S&P all the way to 666 the next month. Today though, it is considered a reason to rally as people watching the MSM will believe anything the talking heads tell them because they don’t get shown the actual results and they trust their talking heads to have checked the facts carefully, rather than make them up, which is pretty much what they do.
We discussed the shenanigans of the ADP report in yesterday’s post and I did warn you that it was a fake rally based on happy headlines papering over poor data. As we expected, the market giddiness persisted until about 11:30 and then reality began to bite back. This was FANTASTIC for us as we were playing bearish into the rally but it’s very scary to hold bearish positions overnight but there’s no reason to hold options overnight when you pick up plays like our 9:54 Alert play on the DIA $103 puts, which averaged in at .77, hit $1 (up 30%) at 2:45 and finished the day at .94 (up 22%). You HAVE to learn to be satisfied with making 20% on day trades and cashing back out. Cash is flexible – overnight positions are not… In fact, since we did cash out yesterday, I was able to send out an overnight Alert to Members with a short on the oil Futures as they ran up to 80.50 which was good for a quick victory and then another this morning at $81, which is already up .30 with a .06 trailing stop (futures pay $10 per penny per contract so lots of fun for morning, pre-market trading!).
We went longer on our oil and gold shorts (in yesterday’s post it was GLL Apr $9 calls at .65) because we don’t expect them to resolve quickly but the chart on the left illustrates why we also firmly believe that this commodity rally is BS. This is a chart of the Employment to Population Ratio for Men 25-54 Years Old since WWII. Kind of puts a 2% year over year rise in the Monster Employment Index into perspective doesn’t it? 20% of the men in the United…
Weekly Wrap-Up – Buffett’s Daring Derivative Deal Does Well
by Phil - February 28th, 2010 9:30 am
I was going to talk about Buffett’s annual letter to investors.
Fortunately, I procrastinated and other people did some detailed reporting like Ravi Nagarajan, Andy Fry, Scott Patterson and Joe Del Bruno – who does a great job of pointing out that Berkshire’s 4th quarter results were propped up by Buffett’s $1.05Bn gains in derivatives betting (something Buffett himself once called "weapons of mass financial destruction" but, as we well know – if you can’t beat them…), which accounted for 1/3 of Berkshire’s $3.06Bn profits.
Buffett’s biggest bet was selling a put against the S&P 500 back in March – a move I said at the time was BRILLIANT and Buffett himself now says about his own options trading: "We are delighted that we hold the derivatives contracts that we do. To date, we have significantly profited from the float they provide. We expect also to earn further investment income over the life of our contracts."
What did Buffett do? Exactly what we teach you to do here at PSW - he took advantage of an irrational move in the markets and SOLD INTO THE EXCITEMENT, getting a fat premium from some sucker that bet the S&P would not hold 666 5 years from now. Buffett effectively sold $5Bn worth of puts that expires worthless at S&P 700 between 2019 and 2027, putting $5Bn in his pocket and holding aside $1Bn in margin, which is how much he’s already ahead on the bet. Like a good options trader, he has a plan and he’s trading his plan, making sure his investment is on track and patiently letting time do it’s work as it eats away at the put-holder’s premium.
What about the risk? Well I can’t speak for Buffett’s stop-loss technique but we’re talking about a company that has (had) $40Bn in cash using their excess margin to make a $5Bn bet that the S&P would not stay below 700 for 10 years. Buffett and I both tell people – NEVER buy a stock (or sell a put against one) that you are not willing to own for 10 years. The S&P was 5% below at the time and would have had to drop, perhaps, 20% more to cost him $1Bn so let’s call the stop 550 on the S&P where Buffett risked 2.5% of his cash against a posible 400% gain on his $1Bn risk allocation over 10+ years. While it is true that if the S&P dropped 50% in one day Buffett would be…
Thank GDP It’s Friday!
by Phil - February 26th, 2010 8:27 am
Wow, a 6% GDP!
I’m guessing as it’s only 7:30 but WOW! What an amazing economy this must be in the fantasy-land where they concoct these numbers. Let’s see, we have 138M working people so we must have added 8.6M jobs, right? NO??? Well, then the people who are working must be putting in a lot of overtime, right? No? I know, everybody must be making 6% more money than last year! No? Well, then it must be coming through in benefits, right? No? Hmm, this is a hard game isn’t it? I KNOW!!! Housing prices – with China-like GDP growth our housing market must be red hot and surely our homes are up 6% in value! No? Damn, I feel like I’m playing deal or no deal and I picked the case with the penny…
Just like our discussion about what total BS the CPI was – GDP is no different. GDP is the sum of Consumption, Investment, Government Spending and Net Exports which means a combination of inflation and government spending can boost our GDP even as real consumption falls and the rising dollar papers over export losses. In other words – I buy $100Bn worth of Toyotas (5M at $20,000 each) from Japan with the dollar at 85 Yen. Now the dollar rises to 93 Yen and I’m "only" buying $90Bn worth of Toyotas (5M at $18,000 each) and our GDP for that segment is up 10%. Wow – FANTASTIC!
Are we happy? Are more Americans working? Is there more shipping? Are there more sales at the Toyota dealership? No. Is Japan happy? Not at all, they are getting less money for the same cars. Another group that hasn’t been happy are the oil exporters, who shipped us an average of 10.5 Million barrels a day at an average price of $60 last year ($630M) and are now shipping us just 8.5Mbd at $80 last week ($680M). Sure they are still getting their $680M a day by choking off production and creating false supply shortages, but they miss the days when they were able to charge us $100 for 11Mbd.
Don’t worry my OPEC pals, JPM and the other oil manipulators are working very hard to make sure you once again have Billions of more American dollars that you can funnel to terrorists and this Democratic Congress turns the same blind eye to the shenanigans as the previous administration did so happy days will soon be…
Singing “Davos Done and We Need Another Loan”
by Phil - January 31st, 2010 7:40 am
Debt-O, debt-uh-oh
Interest come and we need another loan
Debt-O, debt-uh-oh
Interest come and we need another loan
Work our lives just to lose our homes
Interest come and we need another loan
Stack default swaps till they come undone
Interest come and we need another loan
Come on Economists, tell us some more BS
Interest come and we need another loan
Come on Economists, tell us some more BS
Interest come and we need another loan
6%, 7% – it’s a credit crunch
Interest come and we need another loan
6%, 7% – it’s a credit crunch
Interest come and we need another loan
Debt-O, debt-uh-oh
Interest come and we need another loan
Debt-O, debt-uh-oh
When interest comes we’ll need another loan
It was the best of times (with the IMF predicting 3.9% Global growth) and the worst of times (with Roubini saying we’re all doomed) at Davos this week as the men who rule the world gathered to divide the spoils over card games while vying with each other for podium and TV time so they could talk their various books from the safety of the Swiss mountains. Davos, a tiny village perched on a mountain with just two main streets, lacks the protests of other Global gatherings. During the annual meeting, the town is taken hostage by thousands of police. “Anyone who looks like a protester can be thrown off the train,” says Marco Leutholz, head of the local Socialist party (and that train often overlooks steep cliffs!). Sir Howard Davies (director of the LSE) writes:
The mood is certainly better than last year, when the world was ending, but it is worse than at the beginning of last week. Alessandro Profumo of Unicredit acutely observed that Davos is likely to accentuate whatever mood you arrived in, rather as alcohol does, I guess. So those who arrived nervous about the economic prospects are leaving even more jittery. If you arrived feeling pessimistic, you will leave somewhere between suicidal and homicidal.
The market background has not helped. Anxiety about Greece has grown over the past three days. In the circumstances, it was strange to see both the Greek prime minister and his finance minister here. Maybe the subtext was to show that there can be no crisis if they are munching muesli in the mountains, but though some may have been reassured, more people asked who was at home minding the taverna.
…
Manic Monday – Dubai, CitiGroup and GS Move Markets
by Phil - December 14th, 2009 8:28 am
What a morning it’s been already!
Last night, at about 11:30 EST, Abu Dhabi gave a $10Bn bailout to Dubai (until the end of April, anyway) with the following statement from Sheik Ahmed bin Saaed Al Maktoum, chairman of the Dubai Supreme Fiscal Committee: "We are here today to reassure investors, financial and trade creditors, employees, and our citizens that our government will act at all times in accordance with market principles and internationally accepted business practices." That was enough to send the Hang Seng from down 300 points to up 300 points in less than 30 minutes of trading (on both sides of their lunch break) while the Shanghai went from -2.2% to +1.7% and the Nikkei also reversed a 100-point drop, but only managed to get back to even at the close.
US futures trading also went wild, up over 100 points at the time but we’ve given up about half of those gains as of 7:30. Does it make sense that the Dubai crisis, which dropped us from 10,450 back to 10,250 when it came up, should be the catalyst to get us over 10,500 just because they were bailed out? Of course it doesn’t – that’s why we went to cash. This is one of the most ridiculously irrational markets I’ve ever seen. The other "good" news this morning is also the same old songs: Citigroup will repay their $20Bn TARP loan by diluting their stock by about 20% and GS says oil will go to $85 early next year.
I don’t know why they even bother to pretend anymore – they should just put 10 market-boosting statements on a chip that randomly plays one of them whenever the MSM needs a quote for the morning. People don’t seem to notice it’s the same thing over and over and over again so why even bother with the pretense? Speaking of pretense – I mentioned in the Weekend Wrap-Up that we expected this nonsense this morning but, had I realized that Greenspan AND Cramer were going to be on Meet the Press yesterday, I would have gone more bullish as those are the two biggest market hypers GE could have used for this week’s quotes.
Europe seems happy enough with Asia’s recovery and all the bull*** commentary (that’s bullISH – what were you thinking?) and they are up about a point ahead of our open DESPITE the FACT that Q3…
Familar Friday Morning – Deja Vu All Over Again!
by Phil - December 11th, 2009 8:28 am
I’m getting some real deja vu here.
Remember last Thursday, when Japan went up 3.8% and our futures jumped almost 100 points? No not yesterday, LAST Thursday. Yes, and that day ended up going down about 100 on the day, which was nice because we shorted into the pump (and we were already short for the week anyway. So yesterday felt a little like that with just about 100-point gap up in the morning, followed by a downward slope all day. Today is now feeling like last Friday, where we got another 150-point run-up on the futures but finished the day up only 50 points. As I’ve been pointing out for quite some time, 200% of the last two week’s moves advances came in very thin, pre-market trading – the balance of the rest of the day is selling, punctuated by stick saves into the close.
Our man Cramer says you should take this as a sign to BUYBUYBUY (and Retail of all the stupid things) but I say it’s time to RUNRUNRUN as the inmates clearly have control of the asylum and we have better things to do in the last two weeks of the year than play "guess what BS moves the market this morning." Last Friday it was the Jobs report, which we already knew would LOOK great as the seasonal adjustments made easy comps but we also knew it was a fantastic shorting opportunity (see last weekend’s Wrap-Up).
So we woke up this morning to the same nonsense as last week and what do we do? We short the market of course! While you were sleeping we Emailed a 3:54 am Alert to our Members indicating the Dow Futures were ripe for a short play at 10,400. We followed through with that play in chat and were stopped out at an average of 10,389, just 11 points but very satisfying at $5 per point per contract. We don’t play the futures very often – only when it’s obvious. Our next entry point is a cross below 10,390 with a stop at 10,395 (10-point trailing to be safe ahead of Retail Data). This morning we had an international pump-fest including:
- A regulatory change, designed to let them temporarily count billions in future tax benefits as capital.
- Moody’s Investors Service said it has no current plans to lower its top debt
…
Memo: Changes at CNBC Following Comcast Merger
by ilene - December 3rd, 2009 10:26 am
Memo: Changes at CNBC Following Comcast Merger
—–Original Message—–
From: CNBC Corporate Communications [mailto: all]
Sent: Thursday, December 03, 2009 7:32 AM
To: All
Subject: Exciting Synergy Opportunities With Comcast
Greetings Gang,
By now, I’m sure you’ve all heard that our parent company’s flirtation with Comcast has moved past the necking phase and we’ve now agreed to go all the way. I wanted to reassure all CNBC staffers and on-air personalities that whatever changes may come will be minor and will be made with the sole intention of wringing out cost savings and synergies.
Here are a few preliminary ideas we’ve received from Jeff Zucker as well as Brian Roberts and our new family at Comcast Cable Systems:
- Air times for CNBC’s various programs and segments will no longer be exact. Comcast will now give viewers a 2 to 4 hour window in which to expect a show to come on.
- Some programs, such as Power Lunch, will have their broadcast studios relocated to Transmission Facility Room B in scenic Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Personnel will be transported to and from tapings weekdays via the Comcast corporate shuttle bus.
- All employees, including on-air talent, will be required to complete the mandatory six week Comcast training program which includes a master course on coaxial cable maintenence and set top box repair.
- Jim Cramer will be expressly prohibited from recommending or endorsing the following stocks during the Lightning Round: Time Warner Cable, Dish Networks, DirecTV and Verizon.
Again, these are just some ideas that are being kicked around by our new corporate partner. Please keep all complaints and comments to yourselves for now. They are valuing NBC as a whole at $37 billion, amazingly, so let’s not screw this up.
We appreciate your loyalty and hard work.
Regards,
Mark Hoffman
President, CNBC
thehoffmeister@nbcuniversal.com
*clearly a parody, laugh a little before its too late
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Philip R. Davis is a founder Phil's Stock World, a stock and options trading site that teaches the art of options trading to newcomers and devises advanced strategies for expert traders...
Ilene is editor and affiliate program
coordinator for PSW. She manages the Favorites backup site
(