Turn Up Tuesday – POT Gets Really High
by Phil - August 17th, 2010 8:29 am
BHP offered to pay $38.4Bn for POT this morning.
Is BHP high or is this market seriously undervalued? Well, for one thing, POT turned them down saying the offer ($130/share – CASH) "substantially undervalues PotashCorp and fails to reflect both the value of our premier position in a strategically vital industry and our unparalleled future growth prospects." CEO Dallas Howe continues: "We believe it is critical for our shareholders to be aware of this aggressive attempt to acquire their company for significantly less than its intrinsic value. The fertilizer industry is emerging from the recent global economic downturn, and we feel strongly that PotashCorp shareholders should benefit from the current and potential value of the Company. We believe the BHP Billiton proposal is an opportunistic effort to transfer that value to its own shareholders."
Considering POT closed at $112 yesterday, so a 16% pop in the offer but POT was at $85 at the beginning of July and hasn’t been over $130 since the 2008 crash, although they did top out at $239.35 so I suppose a very patient investor could imagine that within 5 years, $200 is not an unreasonable goal. Still, is that enough reason to turn down $130 of cash now, with the proverbial 1.3 birds in the hand being worth 2 in the bush?
Back on July 12th (when POT was trading at $92.81 and the Dow was at 10,200) my premise for looking for S&P 1,100 and Dow 10,700 was that Corporate America’s Non-Financial companies were sitting on a $2Tn pile of cash and, as an old M&A consultant, it seemed pretty obvious to me what was going to happen to that money.
We’ve had plenty of M&A activity recently. In fact, M&A activity in the first half of 2010 saw 5,345 deals (up 49% from last year), the highest level since 2007, indicating that companies are INCREASING their confidence in the economy despite the BS spin you are getting from politicos who NEED you to believe things are worse than they seem and the MSM, who push fear like heroin to create a NEED for their product.
POT’s board of directors is very confident that they don’t NEED BHP’s money and BHP may NEED POT badly enough to want to sweeten the deal – frankly I’m surprised at the timing because I would have waited for another dip and the fact that BHP (one of the World’s largest resource companies with $50Bn in annual sales)…
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Digg9 Fabulous Dow Plays Plus A Chip Shot (Members Only)
by Phil - July 7th, 2010 7:24 am
We were discussing what to invest in in a terrible market this morning in Member Chat.
I thought it would be handy to add this post to our Buy List because 9 of my 10 picks below are Dow components and there are very easy ways to hedge our Dow purchases against disaster so it will be a good opportunity to construct a self-contained virtual portfolio filled with dividend-paying stocks that are suitable for a long-term retirement account that we can buy using our discount strategy.
Let’s say we allocate $5,000 to each of these positions and we intend to buy $2,500 in the first round and hold $2,500 on the side in cash, in case the Dow does fall more than 20% and the majority of our stocks are put to us in a second round. In the below list, XOM and WMT are more expensive but others are less so you can buy 100 of the big boys (price-wise) and see what’s left or allocate a double helping for those two, so you’d be buying 100 shares for about $4,000 a block (after our discount) and hold back $4,000 on those two.
This is acceptable because we do have $50K in cash sitting around and A) We don’t really believe the Dow is falling below 8,000 B) When the stock is put to us our margin requirement will only be about $25K (assuming 50% margin for stocks held) as our short puts will be gone C) We will have a disaster hedge. On all of these plays, the upside is at least 25% so that’s also our built-in cushion, all the way to Dow 7,307 so we really only need our protection to kick in below 8,000.
Aside from our weekend 500% DXD disaster hedge, which is perfect to cover this group, we can do a very simple, margin-free hedge like the DIA 2012 $95/80 bear call spread for $5.50, which pays $15 if the Dow is below 8,000 in Jan 2012. So $5,500 put into this play returns $15,000, offering us an additional 20% downside protection, now down to Dow 5,845. If that seems silly to you (it does to me) then a $2,500 hedge that gives us an additional 10% downside protection would seem to be plenty.
Once we have that hedge in place, we can aim to make it free by selling puts. To make up $2,500 over…
Financial Regulation Friday – Finally!
by Phil - June 25th, 2010 8:22 am
Yipeee, financial regulation!
That’s all I’m going to say about it. I’m sure there will be thousands of places to read all about it all weekend. I’ll just say that it’s about freakin’ time SOMEBODY did SOMETHING to reign in the madness. Whether it’s a good bill or a bad bill doesn’t really matter as much as the concept that financial institutions NEED to be regulated. The rest we can get right over time. I consider this to be a huge market positive because the Financial sector has grown like a cancer on the markets since deregulation. When corporate profits totaled $4Tn in the 80s, the Financial sector made $400Bn – now that coprorate profits are $6Tn, the Financials make $2.5Tn – that’s 40% of all the money earned in corporate America and ALL of 2 decades worth of growth going to the Financials!
Not only that, but that $2.5Tn is AFTER bonuses and dividends that add another $2.5Tn to the total so out of $8.5Tn earned in corprorate America, 60% goes to one sector. That’s what a cancer does, it sucks resources away from the healty organs in the body and eventually grows big enough to kill it. America has gone from a country where investors make money by investing in companies that build things and sell things and create jobs to a country where investors gamble with "investing institutions" and, rather than put money into creating energy solutions, we trade 6Bn barrels of oil per month back and forth on the NYMEX in order to decide who will end up taking delivery of 25M barrels (0.4%) at the end of the month.
Why do they do it? The fees, the fees, the fees, the fees. Even the stock market has become a casino and not only do the financials make the fees but they build a culture that tells you to BUYBUYBUY and SELLSELLSELL every other day so they can rake and rake and rake those fees but that is not enough for them – they also have to insert themselves in as Market Makers where they make money on the spread every time you buy and sell but that is not enough and they then track your trading and write programs to analyze your trading patterns so they can bid against you – YOU, their CLIENT!
That’s still not enough so they game the…
The Worst-Case Scenario: Getting Real With Global GDP!
by Phil - June 6th, 2010 8:27 am
$10,500.
That is the per capita average GDP for the 6Bn ape-like creatures on this planet who have pockets and purses. Of the still hairy and pocketless apes, there are only about 1M left and they are mainly prisoners so we won’t be worrying about them but it would be nice to consider the plight of our ancestors once in a while… Anyway, so 6Bn of us fill in those last 3 images in the planetary labor pool with the vast majority of us STILL FARMING and, of course, a select group of us are still hunting and gathering and contributing very little to the GDP.
None of our problems are new – as noted in this 2005 cartoon:
The United States of America with it’s highly evolved population of shopoholics has a per capita GDP of $46,381 – VERY IMPRESSIVE but we rank 6th! Brunei does a little better than we do and Singapore is up at $50,523 (so let’s hear it for corporal punishment) and Norway (one of my top choices of countries to flee to when it all hits the fan) is at $52,561 but Luxembourgh ($78,395 – banking) and Qatar ($83,841 – oil) simply trounce us in earnings power per person. For those of you who like to think Capitalism is all about keeping score – they must be better than you because they make more money, right?
Below the US, per capita GDP drops off fairly quickly. Rounding out the top 10 are Switzerland ($43,007 – watches and more bankers), Hong Kong ($42,748 – don’t tell China!), Netherlands ($39,938 – legal drugs!), Ireland ($39,468 – free beer when on wellfare!) and Australia ($38,911 – beer comes in oil cans plus gigantic bouncing rats). 20th on the list is Germany at $34,212, Greece is 25th at $29,882 (but not for long), 30th is South Korea at $27,978, 40th is Slovakia at $21,245. Lithuania comes in at 50 with $16,542 (1 ahead of Russia) and it steadies out there with emerging market star Brazil in 75th place with $10,514 and, keep in mind – that is where you FINALLY get to the average leverl of economic activity for the world.
Another BRIC in the global wall is mighty China, with a per capita GDP of $6,567 for each of their 1.2Bn persons and India’s Billion people average out at less than half of that, at $2,941, ranking 128th and still ahead of 53…
Goldman Sachs-Bulls with Butterfly Wings are at it Again
by Option Review - April 27th, 2010 5:22 pm
Today’s tickers: GS, WU, DSW, MGM, WMT, BAC, EEM, WLP, HD & MMM
GS – Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. – Goldman-optimists are once again employing bullish butterfly spreads on the stock in order to efficiently position themselves to profit from an eventual rebound in the investment banking firm’s share price. Goldman Sachs, one of the top tickers on our ‘most active by options volume’ market scanner, glowed green amid a sea of red today as its shares inched up 1.75% to $154.69 as of 3:20 pm (ET). The bullish butterfly spread initiated on GS this afternoon yields maximum benefits to the investor responsible for the transaction if shares of the underlying stock jump back up to $175.00 by October expiration. The parameters of this spread are a bit different than the larger-volume butterfly spread we reported on Monday afternoon, which prepared an investor to reap maximum profits should Goldman’s shares rally up to $160.00 by expiration day. Today’s transaction involved the purchase of 2,000 calls at the October $160 strike for an average premium of $12.80 apiece [wing 1], and the purchase of another 2,000 calls at the higher October $190 strike for $3.90 each [wing 2]. The body of the butterfly was established at the central October $175 strike where 4,000 calls were sold for $7.20 a-pop. Net premium paid for the spread amounts to $2.30 per contract. The net cost of the trade pales in comparison to maximum available profits of $12.70 per contract, which the trader pockets if Goldman’s shares surge 13% over the current price to settle at $175.00 at expiration. The butterfly-spreader starts to make money as long as shares of the underlying stock increase 4.9% to surpass the breakeven point to the upside at $162.30 ahead of October expiration.
WU – Western Union Co. – Shares of the world’s largest money-transfer business surged 9.25% to an intraday high of $19.57 after the firm posted first-quarter earnings of $0.30 per share, which satisfied average analyst forecasts. A couple of analysts raised target share price estimates for Western Union following the positive earnings report. WU’s target price was bumped up to $23 from $19 at Susquehanna, in addition to the move up to $21 from $18 at D.A. Davidson today. Western Union’s current CEO, Christina Gold, is also reportedly handing over the reins to the current COO, Hikmet Ersek, on September 1, 2010. One Western Union…
Semiconductor HOLDRS Options Heat Up in Late Trading
by Option Review - March 24th, 2010 4:30 pm
Today’s tickers: SMH, X, WMT, SYMC, MOS, SKS, GE, GENZ, DVN & ADBE
SMH – Semiconductor HOLDRS Trust – Massive bearish positioning on the Semiconductor HOLDRS Trust, which holds shares of common stock issued by 20 different companies engaged in the semiconductor business, indicates shares of the underlying stock may be set to tumble lower ahead of expiration day next month. Shares of the SMH are down 2.40% to $27.92 with thirty minutes remaining in the trading session. It appears one investor purchased 50,000 put options at the April $27 strike for an average premium of $0.41 per contract. Such a large stake in bearish put options suggests the purchaser is perhaps paying for the privilege of securing downside protection on a long underlying stock position. If this is the case, the put contracts yield protection should shares of the SMH trade beneath the effective breakeven price of $26.59 ahead of expiration. Of course, it is also possible the trader does not currently own shares of the SMH. In this scenario the investor makes money if shares fall another 4.75% below the current price to breach the breakeven point on the puts at $26.59. The sudden flurry of options activity on the Semiconductor HOLDRS Trust lifted the overall reading of options implied volatility 7.8% to 26.35%. SMH-investors exchanged more than 131,900 contracts this afternoon, which represents nearly 72% of total existing open interest of 183,473 contracts.
X – United States Steel Corp. – Shares of iron and steel producer, United States Steel Corp., rallied 0.65% during afternoon trading to $63.75. Bullish traders anticipating continued share price appreciation for U.S. Steel purchased out-of-the-money call options in the October contract. Nearly 5,600 calls were coveted at the October $75 strike for an average premium of $4.68 apiece. Investors holding these call contracts stand ready to accrue profits if shares of the underlying stock surge 25% to surpass the effective breakeven share price of $79.68 ahead of expiration day in October. We note that U.S. Steel’s share price last traded above $80.00 during the final days of September 2008.
WMT – Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. – The largest retailer on the planet experienced a slight pullback in the value of its shares this afternoon perhaps on news the firm may sell $2 billion of 5- and 30-year senior notes. Shares edged 0.40% lower during the session stand at $55.68. Options traders expecting lower volatility…
UnitedHealth Bulls Have a Fever – the Only Prescription is More Call Options
by Option Review - March 16th, 2010 4:20 pm
Today’s tickers: UNH, BZH, WFC, GE, XLB, WMT, BAC, COF, HOG, ETFC & STJ
UNH – UnitedHealth Group, Inc. – Health and well-being company, UnitedHealth Group, commenced the trading session in the red after Goldman Sachs Group removed the firm from its ‘Conviction Buy List’. However, UNH is still rated as a ‘buy’ at Goldman, and the company’s shares recovered this afternoon to stand 0.60% higher at $32.73. A fire-storm of bullish activity descended on UnitedHealth during the middle of the trading day. Investors gobbled up April contract call options perhaps to position for continued bullish movement in the price of the underlying shares. Options players purchased 42,600 call options at the April $34 strike for an average premium of $0.87 per contract. More than 50,000 calls changed hands at that strike, which blows the 4,333 contracts of open interest at that strike right out of the water. Investors long the calls are positioned to amass profits should UNH’s shares rally another 6.5% to breach the breakeven price of $34.87 by April expiration. Wild-and-crazy options activity on the stock lifted the overall reading of options implied volatility 5% to 43.06% as of 2:05 pm (ET).
BZH – Beazer Homes USA, Inc. – Single- and multi-family homebuilding company, Beazer Homes USA, attracted bullish options players today amid a 4.65% rally in its share price to $4.95. Beazer was upgraded to a ‘buy’ rating and a target share price of $6.25 at Citigroup yesterday. Plain-vanilla call buying took place at the near-term March $5.0 strike where investor picked up 2,100 contracts for an average premium of $0.14 apiece. Investors long these contracts are hoping Beazer’s shares rally another 4.25% from the current price to surpass the effective breakeven point at $5.14 ahead of expiration on Friday. Optimism spread to the April $5.0 strike as traders coveted 2,200 calls for an average premium of $0.32 per contract. Call-buyers in the April contract profit if shares jump 8% and trade above the breakeven price of $5.32 by expiration day next month. The surge in investor demand for options on Beazer Homes lifted the overall reading of options implied volatility on the stock 15.8% to 61.92% this afternoon.
WFC – Wells Fargo & Co. – The bank holding company’s shares increased more than 0.65% during the session to $30.09, inspiring bullish options activity on the stock. Investors positioning for a continued rally in the price…
Boggling
by ilene - March 16th, 2010 12:05 pm
Boggling
Courtesy of TraderMark at Fund My Mutual Fund
Seriously? Sleepy mega caps that now move like Chinese small caps? These 2??
Truly we are in the Twilight Zone market. Somewhere Alan Greenspan must be so proud of his disciple.
Weekend Wrap-Up, Still Trying to Get Bullish
by Phil - March 14th, 2010 5:20 am
I’m having writer’s block this weekend.
Usually when I can’t think of what to write it helps me to go over our virtual portfolios so I started this morning reviewing the Buy List but I didn’t get far because it was silly. Of 43 plays on the buy list, 39 are doing well – too well in fact to the point where it’s hard for me, in good conscience, not to say let’s kill the whole thing and get back to cash as we’re up about 20% in 2 months and that’s just ridiculous – most people would call that a good year and go on vacation.
The Buy List was 100% bullish and we did catch a good bottom on our early February entries. I was gung ho bullish then because I felt comfortable that the 10,000 line on the Dow would prevail and that we were good for a run back to the top (10,700), following, more or less, the pattern we had in 2004 (see original post for charts). Well that’s pretty much what’s happened since then but that’s not making me happy because I see no reason we won’t complete that pattern and begin falling off a cliff shortly.
As you all know, I’m not a big fan of TA, or patterns for that matter but the reason I started looking for patterns was to try to get a handle on how long market could really keep going up before falling victim to exhaustion. To me it seemed we weren’t at that point on Feb 6th but now that we’ve put in that big push back up – if we can’t punch up to new highs on all our indexes then I do think it’s time for the markets to take a break.
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Clearly I’ve been too bearish for the past couple of weeks and we are now 224 points over 10,400 on the Dow which is where I turned bearish as the January data made me lose faith in our ability to get back to 10,700. I should have stuck to the TA because we’re a lot closer to 10,700 than we are to 10,400. With the Russell and Nasdaq exploding to their own new highs. You can see though, from the above chart, why I do want to wait to see the NYSE, Dow and S&P confirm this move up – it’s not far now!…
Thursday Thoughts – Stuck in the Market Middle
by Phil - February 18th, 2010 7:59 am
This is not too encouraging:
If we can’t break over our falling 50 Dma then it’s very likely we’re forming a lower channel that will center around our 5% line at 10,165 but we need to keep in mind that the 200 dma is WAY down at 9,552 and doesn’t even make the 3 months chart so we have to seriously consider that our 10% line at 9,650 may still be in play if the markets can’t show us the money by next week (this week is options expiration so it’s hard to believe anything we’re seeing here).
I have been contending that we are following a similar chart pattern to the one we had in 2004 this year and Barry Ritholtz has found a good comparison chart for us and so far, so good, as we expect a healthy downward consolidation as we work though our remaining issues this quarter (I’m hoping we turn around after May earnings):
Keep in mind that 10,300 on the Dow is NOT a breakout, 10,300 is the EXPECTED bounce off the 5% rule at 10,165. NOT getting a 1% bounce off a 5% drop (as we didn’t in early Feb) is a negative sign that indicates an expected further leg down. This will mark our 2nd test at this level and we see how the last one went on day’s 2 & 3 so let’s keep a close eye on today’s movement and, of course, without confirmation of our bounce levels from the S&P (1,105), Nasdaq (2,225), NYSE (7,100) AND the Russell (625) - we’re certainly not going to get excited about anything the Dow does.
We have lots of fun data today with the PPI and Jobless Claims ahead of the bell and, at 10am, we get Leading Economic Indicators and the Philly Fed (which has been AWFUL lately) followed by Natural Gas Inventories at 10:30 and Petroleum Inventories at 11. After the bell we’ll see the Fed’s Balance Sheet and the Money Supply and Fed Govs Lockhart & Bullard will give their outlooks on the US Economy.
DAI and WMT both had less than exciting earnings this morning but the news we should be paying attention to is the Pew Report estimating a $1,000,000,000,000 funding gap between the pension, health-care and other retirement benefits promised to public employees and the money set aside to pay for them.
The Pew report said its estimate of the funding gap would…
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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
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