but the war is/was driving many industries.

lots of money being spent

11/8/2006 10:44:57 AM

It's not good for a country to be spending money on a war that is achieving little gains, whether financial or political. I suppose you could argue that it's great for the select few who have their hands deep in the oil, but remember it's Americans' taxes footing the ball for the war and the same group of Americans are not "reaping" the benefits.

11/8/2006 10:47:00 AM

I don't see the war as a major factor for the economy. This war is very helpful for a few industries that have to do with defense (or offense) but that's not necessarily a great thing. Other industries would have benefitted if the money were spent elsewhere. And it isn't that we have a spending problem for consumers, we're bullish as hell, so we don't need the govt. do to it for us like we did in WWII.

On a side note, this is great news for my little stem cell company (ASTM) although it doesn't even do embryonic research, lol

It bounced 5% this morning.

11/8/2006 10:53:36 AM

All in all, I think it'll be a good Christmas season. Americans got a little swagger in them after this election.

11/8/2006 10:54:38 AM

Good Christmas season for whom?

Consumers or shareholders?

11/8/2006 11:12:00 AM

goddamn liberals

goddamn unions

leave me and my dear, free market the hell alone.

[Edited on November 8, 2006 at 12:38 PM. Reason : although i'm pissed at the GOP, and my portfolio gained a little today, so whatever]

11/8/2006 12:37:45 PM

^agree

11/8/2006 12:38:14 PM

Quote :

"On a side note, this is great news for my little stem cell company (ASTM) although it doesn't even do embryonic research"

yup

11/8/2006 2:00:48 PM

picked up some CBB - it might get acquired

still mulling over BEAS

11/8/2006 2:01:41 PM

ASTM is up 11% now.

11/8/2006 2:03:59 PM

CSCO up 1.29 in after hours!

11/8/2006 4:34:21 PM

http://www.marketwatch.com/tvradio/player.asp?bcpid=275898297&bclid=86272812&bctid=302034025

11/9/2006 12:50:10 AM

CSCO done us proud...its pulling the broader tech sector up with it

(front page of marketwatch.com)

11/9/2006 10:37:17 AM

and goldman sachs ups their price target for CSCO to 35

I got dollar signs in my eyes


The one thing i'm mad about... i dumped STX last week, and now it's up again. oh well, my gains in other positions far outweigh that minor debacle.

11/9/2006 11:07:13 AM

AKAM is having a nice runup.

11/9/2006 11:46:27 AM

Dear BobbyDigital:

We get it, you have a lot of stock in Cisco.

11/9/2006 11:52:37 AM

Just wanted to make sure.

11/9/2006 12:15:13 PM

John Chambers is one of my favourite CEOs.

among other things i like about him; back during the bubble when everything was going nuts, he came out and warned that his own company's shares were too high and that people should buy only if they plan to hold for a long time (i think he meant a decade or more). noone listened, and everyone got pummeled at the end of the bubble. when Chambers says bullish times are ahead for his company, i believe him.

11/9/2006 12:35:21 PM

AKAM and TRID drop...for no reason.

11/9/2006 3:55:02 PM

guys, sign up for this free newsletter.

it lets you know what's going on in the deal world. it won't tell you the pulse of the market day to day, but you'll start noticing where the deal money is going, and how and when PE exits, M&A activity, and other events affect stock prices.

i scan it regularly for intelligence i can use on the job as well as in trying to spot moves in the market.

there's also some pretty neat sounding jobs posted every now and then:


http://hosting.mansellgroup.net/enablemail/ThomsonNewLetter/HostedWires/NewsLetters/Nov9-06.htm

11/9/2006 4:19:54 PM

you know whats more fun that checking your portfolio everyday?

Looking at it about once a year and seeing 12% growth since '02


passive investing, hooray

11/9/2006 6:55:49 PM

Who's it with?

11/9/2006 7:00:47 PM

somebody give rally a prize...somebody finally figured it out...almost..

11/9/2006 7:39:24 PM

The goal of investing in stocks should be to parallel the trends of a diversified index as close as possible. NOT the DJIA though.

[Edited on November 9, 2006 at 7:41 PM. Reason : .]

11/9/2006 7:41:08 PM

seriously by the time you pay all the capital gains & transactions fees and all you'd be better off just investing passively instead.

Any information you get from a newspaper, blog, newsletter, etc has already been factored into the price of the asset.

If you fuck with your investments enough to reduce a 10%/yr gainer down to an 8%/yr gainer that is gonna have some serious long term effects.

11/9/2006 9:37:27 PM

Riddle me this, folks. I'm an investing n00b, but I do plan to create and max out a Roth IRA before year's end. Would it be better to do this as soon as possible, or wait for a hiccup in the market? It seems like investing when the market is at an all-time high is setting yourself up to lose money. In general, I am not going to be picking stocks. The capital is currently in a money market account earning over 5% for maximum liquidity, but I realize this is only low to modest growth. If I invest this money at a low point in the market, it seems more likely to grow, whereas if I invest it now and soon witness a market downturn, I will have to wait until the market recovers just to break even. Thanks for any advice.

11/9/2006 9:38:46 PM

Quote :

"passive investing, hooray"

Better than gambling?

11/9/2006 9:42:02 PM

Coz, set it up to dollar cost average it in. Put 1/12 of the max in each month.
This is the best way to invest in the market.

11/9/2006 10:20:16 PM

Yeah, but I haven't even opened it. IRS limits $4000 per year, right? I have enough funds elsewhere to max it out this year and at least get that $4000 base going into next year. Is this wise?

11/9/2006 10:27:42 PM

Well, you actually can contribute for tax year 2006 until April 15th 2007 (or whichever day due to weekends)

So you can still do it over the next 5 months and dollar cost average a bit.

11/9/2006 10:57:00 PM

Thanks.

11/9/2006 11:48:19 PM

Quote :

"Riddle me this, folks. I'm an investing n00b, but I do plan to create and max out a Roth IRA before year's end. Would it be better to do this as soon as possible, or wait for a hiccup in the market? It seems like investing when the market is at an all-time high is setting yourself up to lose money. In general, I am not going to be picking stocks. The capital is currently in a money market account earning over 5% for maximum liquidity, but I realize this is only low to modest growth. If I invest this money at a low point in the market, it seems more likely to grow, whereas if I invest it now and soon witness a market downturn, I will have to wait until the market recovers just to break even. Thanks for any advice."

Just go ahead and open it. If you plan to keep maxing it out and you aren't going to touch it for several decades it won't make a difference.

[Edited on November 10, 2006 at 7:54 AM. Reason : Wasn't dollar cost averaging disproven?]

11/10/2006 7:53:10 AM

Quote :

"The goal of investing in stocks should be to parallel the trends of a diversified index as close as possible. "

I thought you were supposed to set a goal and not try to mimic any specific index?

[Edited on November 10, 2006 at 7:55 AM. Reason : quote]

11/10/2006 7:55:12 AM

Mimicing a diversified index is pretty ideal if your goal is a relfective portfolio. The idea is to reduce vulnerability by spreading out.

11/10/2006 10:58:26 AM

Dolby (DLB) up 38% today (and more than that since I bought it a month or two ago)

11/10/2006 11:42:53 AM

This is what my dad told me, so take it for what it's worth:

Stocks are random. Shit happens, stocks go up and they go down. Regardless, many stock traders are like sport gamblers: they think they "know something" that everyone else doesn't. Most people will not be able to "win" over and over and over again.

However, most experts will agree that over a long period of time an index that reflects diversified companies will go up. Sure, the DJIA (a bad index, but most popular so I'll use it) goes down sometimes but look at a 30 year chart--it's soaring. Based on this, you should seek to match the overall trend (diversified stocks going up over time) as close as possible.

It's conservative and boring, but if you are investing in stocks to have an egg in the future it's what you should do.

[Edited on November 10, 2006 at 11:51 AM. Reason : .]

11/10/2006 11:51:26 AM

^ there's a good amount of truth in that as well as the passive investing comment

the guys that do really well generally have disciplined strategies and substantial time (and often capital) commitment to executing those strategies.

the rest of us do it because we're drawn to the dynamics of the marketplace, and to not take a shot at it would be a disservice to our core instincts.

11/10/2006 12:19:14 PM

Quote :

"to not take a shot at it would be a disservice to our core instincts."

Post of the week. You are a prick.

11/10/2006 12:22:18 PM

Bought 152 shares of UCTT @ 12.85

to add to the 215 I had purchased at 13.15

wasn't filled after 10 minutes, so i cancelled it.

bought 100 shares of TRID instead @ 19.51

[Edited on November 10, 2006 at 12:40 PM. Reason : asdg]

11/10/2006 12:31:44 PM

Lucky bastard. Wish I bought my TRID at $19.

11/10/2006 2:14:37 PM

AKAM up 4% again today.

this is starting to become a pattern.

Buy at 46, sell at 50, buy again at 46, sell at 50, $$$profit

11/10/2006 4:35:52 PM

Quote :

"I guess you don't understand how thi society functions. The odds of you retiring a millionaire are close to nothing."

-nutsmackr

http://brentroad.com/message_topic.aspx?topic=444122&page=1

haha

[Edited on November 11, 2006 at 6:12 PM. Reason : asfdaasdf]

11/11/2006 6:12:05 PM

well, we can't all have a basic understanding of math.

11/11/2006 7:05:52 PM

his only saving point is that the million dollars of then won't be close to what a million dollars is worth now maybe....but i agree - you have to be stupid to not have a million in available $$ by the time you hit 59.5

11/11/2006 7:10:10 PM

^^and that's a major factor that divides raging capitalists like you and me from socialists, those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat (well, ok...sometimes they know defeat).

^i'm talking about in today's dollars, because my pay will increase along with inflation, and therefore I will never "feel" the difference as I ramp up my investing to compensate for inflation, and the end result is that the only difference will be that I have to subtract inflation from the rate of return I expect to get, which I've already done.

11/11/2006 7:49:58 PM

what about Sirius (SIRI)?

how low does the price have to be to make it a worthwhile buy? I mean, I think the market for satellite radio will have a lot of growth, and there are really only 2 companies poised to compete in the market, and Sirius has made some good additions (NASCAR, Howard Stern), but they keep losing money big time.

At what point do you think the financial problems will be adequately represented in the price of the stock? has it bottomed out yet?

11/12/2006 4:40:46 PM

SIRI is never a good buy unless you're speculating that XM is going to swallow up and merge with them. There is no room in the market for 2 offerings and they will both end up dying unless they converge. The signing of Stern was a seriously desperate attempt to port his entire listener base to satellite. The most recent numbers I've seen suggest that less than 10% of his listener base has subscribed so far.
XM has realized that getting people to make the move is difficult unless you can constantly show the terrestrial radio listeners what they are missing. They now have Opie and Anthony do the first 3 hours of their show on Free FM and the rest on XM and cover the walk between buildings as they go to the next studio. Only subscribers can listen to the second half of the show.

What it comes down to is that they both provide a very expensive service and are hemorrhaging money because they can't lure enough subscribers from the free models that have been in existence for over 80 years and are ingrained in American culture. The hugely wide availability of iPod and other music playing hardware takes away pretty much any motivation to subscribe for purely music reasons. Why subscribe to an expensive radio service for music when you can control what you hear and be your own DJ with your mp3 player? It comes down to being able to provide content that is unavailable anywhere else. Right now that's limited to Stern (a couple of other talk shows) and some sporting events. Odds are the people that are going to subscribe for those reasons for the most part have.

They both fucked up by taking too long to get the hardware standard in most new cars

I just find it very hard to believe that these companies can expect to make money any time soon without:
1) Expanding their offerings considerably - perhaps video or special 'OnDemand' channels. A receiver that can access PodCasts or even better capable of recording/playback. Even better if they had some sort of 'Premium' service where you could record songs into a mp3-like format.
2) Finding a way to combine with other services. When is the last time you looked at your cable bill? Odds are if you are on TWW you are easily paying Time Warner over $100 monthly for cable and internet. A lot of people already have Netflix, Blockbuster, Cell Phones, iTunes and all sorts of other services and bills. Cable and Phone companies are consolidating their offerings with the "Triple Play"
3) Avoiding the downfall of Iridium [lnk]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iridium_(satellite)[/link]
I think there are a lot of similarities


To summarize I just don't think it's a good investment unless the status quo changes. If I begin to hear rumblings of a possible merger I might consider picking up SIRI - but other than that I'm staying far far away.

11/12/2006 5:57:01 PM

Pretty spot on, but I think you are seriously underestimating "some sporting events".

11/12/2006 6:14:19 PM

the odds of retiring a millionaire are pretty good if you are disciplined, have the right portfolio and adjust it with time as you get older and the markets change, and don't get caught up in the emotion of investing provided you have a decent income.

11/13/2006 12:15:02 AM

Another interesting perspective--
Here we are on TWW scouting out perspective stocks, usually one at a time, usually a tech stock. Someone occasionally mentions an index fund or a mutual fund...but I've never really paid much attention to slow growth, until now.

I was recently going over a family member's stock portfolio and noticed that they've had some decent gains for the year. After doing a bit of research, I just put this together. All %'s are as of several minutes ago. I used the opening price on January 3rd, 2006 as the basis. I did this analysis real fast and I'm hoping I have all the numbers right (someone correct me if I don't).

As of ~11am, their portfolio is up 24.42% since the market opened this year. Out of 21 stocks in the portfolio, only 2 have decreased in value--Intel and Lucent, both of which you could describe as tech stocks. The others have all increased. Some by a lot (Bellsouth at almost 60%), others by a little (GE up just 1%).


Big winners:
Bellsouth (BLS: 59%)
Comcast (CMCSA: 56%)
Sears Holdings (SHLD: 54%)
BNP Residential Properties (BNP: 48%)--this one was more of a fluke, it was recently bought for way more than the stock was valued per share so it jumped
Qwest (Q: 47%)
Morgan Stanley (MS: 36%)
AT&T (T: 36%)
Disney (DIS: 34%)
Exxon-Mobil (XOM: 32%)

Losers:
Lucent (LU: -6%)
Intel (INTC: -17%)



Stocks in the portfolio: (note that this is geared more for dividends than for growth)
Allstate (ALL)
AT&T (T)
Bellsouth (BLS)
BNP Residential Properties (BNP)
Bristol-Myers (BMY)
National Retail Properties (NNN)
Comcast (CMCSA)
Disney (DIS)
Duke Energy (DUK)
Equity One (EQY)
Exxon-Mobil (XOM)
General Electric (GE)
Intel (INTC)
Lucent (LU)
Morgan Stanley (MS)
Progress Energy (PGN)
Qwest (Q)
Raytheon (RTN)
Sears Holdings (SHLD)
The Southern Company (SO)
Verizon (VZ)


I have these stocks in a watch list in my Scottrade account. It makes me sad when I see my stocks (AKAM, GOOG, STX, TIE, TRID, TASR, and SCUR) in the red, and then I click this watch list and they're all in the green. Well it doesn't make me hugely sad since they're a relative, but I wish my stocks were doing this well.

[Edited on November 13, 2006 at 11:22 AM. Reason : correcting stock tickers]

11/13/2006 11:20:50 AM