The Federal Government certainly threw Northrop Group a bone today in the form of a $40 Billion contract to produce refueling tankers. The stock was up 6% in after-hours trading but the company still looks like a great buy. Read more…
A quick look at a chart of AMD and you might just think its a print of someone’s heart monitor. From pennies to $20 to $2 to $48 back to $5 then to $40 and now $7. You might say that this stock runs in cycles. Read more…
IBMs announcement of a stock buyback plan really lifted wall street today. But why do buybacks rock the street as much as they do, and why do investors love to see it happen? Read more…
The credit card company Visa will IPO sometime around March 20th to raise around $19 Billion. While this would be a good chance for the company to raise more capital, it looks like a selloff rather than an attempt to raise money. Read more…
That’s the new buzzword on the street. Bank of America which is hurting greatly from the subprime credit crunch, has proposed an offer to Congress, asking for the creation of the Federal Homeowner Preservation Corporation. Read more…
Very few people put enough emphasis on short interest and its effect on your investments. Short interest is simply the amount of shares that are sold short for a particular corporation. Ford has a short interest of 209,000,000 shares, meaning that 209Million shares are held short right now. Read more…
As the baby boomer generation starts hitting retirement age not only are they going to put a drain on social programs, the new worry is that they might drain wall street. Read more…
Casino stocks have been beating hard by fear of recession but it might just be time to get in heavy. Sin stocks are companies that benefit from gambling, smoking, drinking or whatever else might be on society’s black list. I’m starting to like the prospects of one sin stock in particular, Boyd Gaming. Read more…
Leverage is one of the best tools of profit. Leverage is what fed the real estate boom and continues to feed the popularity in forex trading. Unfortunately for equities investors, leveraging your stock purchases means borrowing from your broker. These margin accounts can be hard to get and require a significant account size which puts a large disadvantage on the small investor. For investors familiar with options, obtaining leverage is easier, cheaper and requires a much smaller investment. Read more…
While gold prices continue to make record highs on fears of inflation and high oil prices, the buying may be a bit exaggerated. As we saw in 2006 when oil prices were fueled by speculation when the price went from the $70s to $50 by May 2007, the gold market may be lead by speculation more than anything. Read more…
You would never think that the markets would drop due to worries of inflation, which is one of the biggest reasons we have advances and bubbles on the markets. Today the market suffered a quick loss after worries that inflation might pose a risk to the markets. Read more…
After news that Toshiba would be conceding the format war to Sony, an investment in Sony looks overdue. For the last year, Toshiba and Sony have been battling it out to see which format, HD DVD or BluRay would win over the public and the new high definition format war. Toshiba is ready to give up, cut its losses on HDDVD and toss the win to Sony, which will now have 100% control over the next generation high definition format. Read more…
If there is one thing that can crush a trader, it is his heart. Emotions are the number one reason why traders fail and the rock solid institutions collect more and more money. Read more…
Trailing stops are my favorite investing tool. The trailing stop allows an investor to sell a stock after a drop of X points, set by the investor. The trailing stop is a great way to lock in profits and avoid runaway sell offs. Trailing stops are very common in forex and futures trading and have recently made their way into popular equity platforms. Read more…
Just like personal credit scores, the bond markets have their own credit system that decides a corporations credit rating or score. Bond ratings range from D all the way to AAA, the top of credit score. Read more…
Recession is the hated word on Wall Street. Its thrown around by the media and the Federal Reserve but why is this word so important? It might just be important because we make it important. Read more…
We love DRIPs. Otherwise known as Dividend ReInvestment Plans, DRIPs are nothing more than an investment program where the dividends from stock ownership are automatically thrust into purchasing more shares of the corporation. Over the last 50 years, Altria, formerly Phillip Morris has operated the most successful Dividend Reinvestment Program. Read more…
The bid for Yahoo was interesting to say the least. Software giant Microsoft and owner of MSN putting in a bid for Yahoo shows the concern over the internet marketing business currently controlled by Google. Read more…
I’m loving this company as an investment in emerging markets. Tata Motors recently signed an agreement with Boeing to provide parts for the 787 Dreamliner and plans the release of a $2,500 car aimed at Indian drivers. Read more…
Nothing has changed the way markets work as much as hedge funds. While these funds are relatively new on the scene, they attract big dollars with the promise of hefty, unregulated returns. So far all we’ve seen is increased volatility. Read more…
As an investor, we love stock splits, it eliminates the high dollar value of stocks and makes it look like we own more. (When in reality, you still have the same percentage of ownership) But the best part of stock splits might be that the fact that Wall Street goes crazy after a big company stock split. Read more…
Oil is the most in-demand commodity today. Each and every day, 82 million barrels of oil is pumped and virtually all of it finds a buyer on the same day. About 80million barrels is normal crude oil, traded on the markets at the current prices. The other 2 million is a mix of heavy Saudi Crudes that have very few uses in industry. Read more…
