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violently. What really pisses me off is that these guys/gals will say just about anything not to accept blame. Sound familiar? It wasn’t me! Why blame the speculators? It wasn’t the shorts, we’re not to blame! The dog ate my homework! Give me a break! Think what you want, but a small group of people are again screwing everyone else over for their own, private greed. Does getting it twice in a year, firstly from shorts on your mortgages and now from speculators on your gasoline & food, feel really good back there? I’m not enjoying it!
Meanwhile, like my call on CVS. Drugs are looking good right about now. And I’m sticking to my guns on GA & PAY. GA had a nice recovery, but they sold it off after the earnings, which were pretty good. Just because an earthquake killed a few thousand in China and they now can’t log on to play the games, doesn’t mean you should sell the stock! Yuck! Those comments just made my skin crawl and were totally inappropriate, even for me. Sorry!
And how about CPST. Now even my nemesis is joining the bandwagon. Heaven help us!
[CPST 3.48 
0.10 (+2.96%) 
] : “Making a comeback,” Cramer said. “I think it makes an interesting” speculative play.
Just added Valence Technology (VLNC) to the list. Keep you posted.
Side note: If this store comes to your area, be afraid—be very afraid. Choux Factory My girlfriend and I found this place the other nite, and well it’s going to be the death of me. SOOOOOOO GOOOOOD!
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apppro’s take for 05/05/2008 @5:00 pm EST:
After all that silliness & sell-off on Friday, the news out of WMT was meaningless for CVS. BFD! Even Cramer said it best (hate the Cramer!)
blog stock pick: Giant Interactive (GA) & Verifone (PAY).
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apppro’s take for 05/04/2008 @9:00 am EST:
Jerry Yang, CEO of Yahoo, tried to oink out a few more bucks from MSFT and guess what:
Bulls make $.
Bears make $.
Pigs get slaughtered.
I don't own any Yahoo, but I feel the shareholders’ pain. Steve Balmar is an asshole! This entire thing is a flashback to how W. Buffet screwed over the monolines so that he could take over the industry on the cheap.
Only difference here is that MSFT won't take over squat, because 'The stock I cannot mention' already owns the space.
I just hope/pray that all this silly 1 up-manship on the part of these 2 pompous, egotistical asses doesn’t cause the market to tank on Monday. I really don’t give a hoot what these 2 stocks will do!
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apppro’s take for 05/03/2008 @11:00 am EST:
Haven’t really had all that much too say since my short, but well deserved blogation. I really blew my you know what on all that Bear and monoline insurer stuff. BTW, haven’t heard a peep out of Cramer lately about the up-tick rule. Figures, no real press in it now that the market is going up.
I own some (we never talk amounts) CVS for a while now. Hey, this time I’m like Warren B. in that I like to buy things I know about, and I do all my drugstore shopping at CVS. NYC has a drugstore of some kind or another every block – sometimes 2 to 3 on 1 block alone. Talk about over saturation! Sold my Starbucks ages ago. Where was I, oh yeah, I own some CVS and was watching late yesterday when I came home. CVS has a real blockage at $41.25ish; keeps going there or just above and then – BAM – right back to the high $39ish area. If we can break out of that pattern, then $49 would be a real easy step.
Right after earnings on Thursday, which were nice, it pulled right back to $39.50. Ended above $40, but still a real disappointment. Friday it popped right back to $41.50+. Now to the point, then on Friday @ 3:00pm it started to tank hard right back to $40.00. Almost a $1.50 swing in 10 minutes. Just plan ridiculous and with no big news either. No matter what you call it, it was a gang-shorting!
CVS chart
I did learn later from a reliable source that it appears that Wal-Mart Stores is going to make some kind of a bs announcement on Monday. Probably that the CEO had a high colonic over the weekend! This is what caused the sell-off? How can anyone invest when crap like this keeps happening? Do I hear reinstate the “Up-Tick Rule” and better (any) SEC oversight?
I do want to mention however, that I have become a little disenchanted with my CVS ExtraCare Coupons as of late. I actually would look forward to going shopping and using them. Sort of made a game of it: How can I get the most for my ExtraCare coupon $’s and feel victorious over CVS! I really do need a life! Well, now I get squat or even less then squat. Coupons for stuff I’ll never buy and forget about ExtraCare Bucks! Never see them anymore! Really, what’s the sense any more for shopping at CVS if I can’t get my coupon jollies. I could just as easily go to Duane Read and get a $5 coupon for shopping there. Just Kidding!
Oh well, time to go to CVS and pick up my meds. If I forgot to take them for a few days we all know what will happen then.
“And the ones your mother gives you don’t do anything at all. Go ask Alice….”
Side note: 10,000 year old dormant volcanoes erupting and earthquakes in the Central US, and we worry about stocks.
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apppro’s take for 04/26/2008 @9:00 am EST:
After a brief, but well deserved blogation, I’m back. Can’t catch a break can you?
I thought I would make a quick post in honor of Fleet Week. No, I meant Earth Day. There’s been a lot of talk this week about the old standards concerning global warming. Now they can even add food riots and water shortages. Getting to sound more and more like Armageddon (and we worry about our stupid little stocks). But until the end comes, you may want to recheck the water stocks I had listed on page 2.
I came across this fabulous article on Seeking Alpha that has some great info. I also want to remind you that the old standard GE is right up there with clean water. They suffered a nasty sell-off after earnings, so right now it’s a great buy. The Amazing 1 said he picked some up at $32ish. Nice
As my side note: The 1 thing no one really talks about is over population. There is a lot of talk of about decreasing carbon emissions, but nothing about decreasing the rate of population growth. I know a lot of people that shouldn’t be allowed to breed in the 1st place.
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apppro’s take for 04/06/2008 @9:30 am EST:
Now that Cramer has stolen my ideas, and the Congress is masturbating over Bear Stearns while at the same time issuing new banking and financial rules; I guess I’ll just take a short blogation. That should make many of you happy, too.
“You can check out any time you want,
but you can never leave.”
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apppro’s take for 04/01/2008 @6:30 pm EST:
Well I told you so, again! Now even Lehman is screaming about the shorts, and they say they have proof about Bear Stearns too boot.
Lehman says they have proof
If you listen to the end of the next video, Lehman’s CFO also discusses the issues.
Lehman’s CFO discusses shorts & SEC
When will everyone just say, “Enough is enough with these shorts!”
BTW: Was just listening to Cramer on Madmoney (Why? I have no idea!), and now he really pissed me off. HE TOTALLY STOLE MY UP-TICK RULE BLOG! Jerk! Plus he had the nerve to say, and I quote, “And why is it that only Cramer is saying this!” What an asswipe! I repeat:
“It’s my egg, you stole it from me!
Get off of my nest, get out of my tree.”
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apppro’s take for 03/31/2008 @5:00 pm EST:
I must be a whole lot smarter then I think if these 2 prima donnas are finally starting to see things my way. Both Cramer and Cashin are now in my camp on the Up-Tick Rule (#1 of the Golden Rules), and there was also some mention of a SEC note that banks should slow down on all that ‘mark to market’ that they’ve been doing. Just as I said!
Damn I’m good.
Video - CNBC.com - Cramer & Cashin
=========
Found these 2 articles on Tuesday morning. I don’t have links for both because they’re paid sites, but they show that more and more are listening.
Mon 11:19pm ABK [$$] Blame Game: The 'Uptick' Rule Debateat The Wall Street Journal Online
Tue 7:57am ABK [$$] I'll Keep Banging the Uptick Drumat RealMoney by TheStreet.com
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apppro’s take for 03/30/2008 @9:00 am EST:
I found this really great post in support of my ‘3 Golden Rules’. Some fabulous links. Check it out.
Yahoo ABK post on Up-Tick Rule
“It’s my egg, you stole it from me!
Get off of my nest, get out of my tree.”
Horton Hatches an Egg
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apppro’s take for 03/29/2008 @9:00 am EST:
The problem with this stock and this economy is >> does that sound familiar? Well it should! Every pundit and quasi expert /anal_yst / reporter keeps JAMMING IT DOWN OUR THROATS!
So what is wrong?
1. Unemployment really hasn't spiked to abnormal levels, so it's not that.
2. Inflation has leveled off, so it's not that.
3. Companies have been reporting reasonable earnings, so it's not that.
4. Retail sales continue, albeit at a low rate, so it's not really that.
5. Home foreclosures have NOT exceeded the long-term national average, so it's not that either.
6. The FED has made it clear that they are going to force feed the economy dollars to cure the ills, so it’s not their neglect.
7. And, just heard on local news that the FED was going to unveil on Monday some sort of Market “Hit Squad” to target violations. Sounds like a plan as long as they address the ‘3 Golden Rules’.
1. Reinstating the Up-tick rule
2. Cracking down on naked shorting
3. Instituting some rules on what should be said on National TV
So again, what is wrong? MAYBE NOT ALL THAT MUCH! OK, it may not be all that great either, but if we don’t stop the stupidity we’ll end up like some 3rd World Nation. All of the doomsday talk is now getting to even me. True sign of a bottom when I throw in the towel and sell?
Buy high—Sell low!
Stop all the write-downs.
Stop all the negativity.
Shut all those so-called experts the hell up.
Here are some links for you to look thru:
Unemployment rates - Unemployment rates by state from CNNMoney
Unemployment since 1942
National Unemployment Rates
Consumer Spending
Inside the Numbers
National Foreclosure Rates
Briefing.com: Holding onto Slight Gains
blog stock pick: Capstone Turbine (CPST)
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apppro’s take for 03/23/2008 @9:00 am EST:
And so it begins:
Lewis ready to fight cut-price Bear Stearns sale - Telegraph
See my 3/18 blog below.
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apppro’s The Fix 03/22/2008 @9:00 am EST:
I really do not want to spend a great deal of time rehashing the events in the Credit & Housing Markets that have occurred over the past 10 to 12 months. You all know my feelings that there really never was a crisis (maybe a small blip), but rather a perfectly contrived scenario by short sellers hell bent on recovering their loses (and then some) that they suffered during the Greenspan years since 2001. They never did get the markets back to that 9765 level in the DOW that they wanted, but they sure have done plenty of damage – both financially & psychologically.
When all is said and done, we will find that the only true housing problems occurred at the tail end of the 1% interest rate fiasco period; and that happened to ‘speculators’ and a few that shouldn’t have had a mortgage in the 1st place. As far as when the so-called housing crisis will end, you’ll only know that when all those obnoxious and stupid cable ‘Real Estate’ TV shows are finally pulled off the air. Knowing when the ‘credit crisis’ has passed will be much harder to tell because of all the shorts involved, so I need to quote a famous New Yorker, Yogi Bera, “It ain’t over till it’s over!”
What really is important is now to come up with ways to fix this; and fix it once and for all! Rep. Barney Frank has been pounding the airways with his plan. To me it’s just more Government regulations that accomplish nothing, except to put more costs on businesses; exactly the entities that its’ supposed to help! "Debating Govt. Regulation" Like Sarbanes-Oxley, these kind of fixes just create more problems and really don’t address the underlying causes > ‘Fear & Greed’. I do like Hillary Clinton’s proposals on freezing mortgage foreclosures, and Steve Forbe’s proposals on freezing the ‘mark to market’ frenzy of CDO’s & bank mortgages currently going on. (Sorry, no link for Steve.) These are both excellent ideas and should be quickly addressed.
However, if you truly want to fix the problem you have to spray the weeds’ roots with poison and not just spread fertilizer from above; and the roots in this case are all those that profit from others’ pain, while creating nothing. Who does that sound like? Yep – shorts. I also want to add to this group ‘traders’: people who just sit in front of computer screens pushing buy & sell keys while typing out rumors and innuendos. Sort of like bloggers. Just kidding!
A start that would bring some normalcy back to the markets, would be adhering to the ‘3 Golden Rules’:
1. Reinstating the Up-tick rule
2. Cracking down on naked shorting
3. Instituting some rules on what should be said on National TV
But in the end the only, best, and true way to get shorts or anyone for that matter to alter their behavior, is to hit them where it hurts > in their WALLETS! When there is less of an incentive to do something, human nature will dictate that you just won’t. The ‘Greed’ portion of the equation can be managed to some extent; the ‘Fear’ part is out of anyone’s control. Now we have to just figure out a way to do it, and guess who has figured out a plan? Yeah you’re right, moi!
Taxes are the way to go, the bane of any loyal American. No one wants to mess around with the IRS! Just come up with a tax structure that kills most of the shorts’ & traders’ incentives, while promoting those who want to invest in businesses and our future. Right now, the tax consequences for long-term investors is the same as it is for short sellers & traders. There is no reason why people should receive the same and equal benefits/profits from betting against the ‘greater good’ or from quickie gains, as those who are risking everything to expand and grow our society. “The good of the many out weighs the good of the few, or the one.”
With that said:
Bring back the 3 different classifications of capital gains, but with slightly different lengths. There must also be 2 separate rates for ‘Investors’ and those who are ‘Short Sellers’. Also, this year (“For taxpayers earning less than $15,000 annually the tax rate on long-term capital gains is only 5% and will be 0% after 2008.”) if you don’t have any real income, but only capital gains like all those shorts and day-traders (who have no legitimate income just capital gains); you will be paying almost NO taxes at all! Now that’s truly obnoxious and ridiculous – talk about pouring salt on an open wound! That MUST change!
Term Lengths:
Long Term: Over 24 months. >> Investor Term
Middle Term: From 8 months to 24 months. >> Not Exactly Sure Term
Short Term: Under 8 months. >> Day-Trading Term
Long Sale Rates:
Long Term: 8%
Middle Term: 15%
Short Term: 35%
This gives added incentives to invest for the long term and to cut back on all that day-trading.
However, this does NOT apply to gains from ‘short sales’. These will be taxed at a totally different level.
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