a comment and my reply

DrGood commented on my post, asking whether the Canadian oil/gas royalty income trusts PGH, PVX,PWI aren't dangerous in a rising interest rate environment. My initial response was, I don't think so, because I'd always assumed that these high dividend payers (they're currently paying around 14% or so, though some of this is return of capital, since they are depleting assets) are correlated with the price of oil, not interest rates. But then I thought, hey, maybe I'm wrong (I am Just Another Loser on The Internet, after all) and maybe they will act more like preferred stocks and bonds and fall in price as rates rise.
So I looked at some charts on stockcharts.com. Let me simply line up the weekly price charts of PVX, the CBOT treasury index, and West Texas Intermediate Crude.



courtesy of stockcharts.com

Look and judge for yourself.
Maybe there is a bit more of a correlation with interest rates than I would have thought--look at the fall in treasuries in June-July 03 and the slide in PVX at the same time. Of course, Treasuries slid again in Apr 04, and PVX didn't change much.Surprising to me is that the correlation with crude prices is not as good as I might have thought, just by eyeballing it. Let me know what ya'll think.

Loser List for February 17, 2005

The resistance levels I identified on gold and the naz seemed to have held. I predict they will hold until they don't.
MUCL another penny breaks out--and Ron Sen is ashamed to admit he is long from about 0.17--way to go Ron.
ALGN still keep an eye out for a short below 9
ASTM may well have put in a short term bottom at 2.5--once it crosses 3, resistance is at 3.8
NAT if you want to "buy strength on weakness", now is your chance here, at 51 with a stop at 49-50
NDAQ--the poor man's CME-buy the whole friggen' nasdaq for 10 bucks
OCR -short- overhead resistance is at 32.5
PLUM consolidating above 5, does range contraction . . .?
VGZ-long with a stop at 3.68
CGREF if you're going to trade a penny stock with 7K daily volumes, this is as good as any. Long with a stop at 1.55
The canroys, PGH, PWI, and PVX all found dip buyers yesterday including jaloti
Wait. . .
Where's my disclaimer?

Haiku

Yahoo message boards
Give Jaloti lots of hits
Keep it comin', dogs!

The speed of light is too slow

Material Change links to an interesting article claiming exactly that.
(I think this is my best article title since this one.)

"Beaten, ----ed, and driven from the land"

I love the yahoo finance boards. What makes this post really special is that the words are those of the CEO of Overstock.com.
For more on the story, read the other posts in the thread.

Loser List for February 16, 2005

ALGN--might be time to short again, with a stop about 9
ASTM--wait, take out the fork!!Long and strong, until it crosses 2.5, then stick the fork back in!
CTCHC--five letters, a nice chart, and at 67 cents it's cheaper than a lottery ticket. What more do you want?
PMU--only three letters, but even cheaper at 60 cents. Buy a couple shares, what have you got to lose?!
CULS--the costco of American Samoa is a buy above 9.
DCTH support at 3 on this one.
NVTL nice entry point for a short with a stop about 14
TZOO--its still long above 50 and short below, but now range contraction is followed by ...
VGZ--nice little pullback, long if it stays above 3.75
CNR--pulled back, and there seem to be buyers in the mid 1.30s

Wait for the beep, listen to the disclaimer . . .

"Market" Haiku

Nasdaq stock market
Trades on Nasdaq stock market
Cheaper than the Merc

No big whup

Just a couple charts


courtesy of stockcharts.com
The COMPQ is at 2089--I've had 2090 marked as major S/R for a while


courtesy of stockcharts.com
GOLD on the daily broke thru the uptrend at the end of January--and now it's come up to that line from underneath. Next?

Loser List for February 15, 2005

CTCHC and PMU--if you want undadultered pure mo-mo penny stock plays, here they are--place your bets!
MERQ maybe a long above 46.5
PLUM consolidating for the next move up?
RMCF--breakout, then pullback--stop at 17-17.5
ASTM--stick a fork in it?
SYMC--risen back to resistance--short with a stop above 22.5??
TEAM--this chart keeps drawing me in but DON'T DO IT THE VOLUME IS TOO LOW!! (Sorry, I'm ok now)
TZOO--if 50 doesn't hold, look out below
KBH still looks like a good long entry above 110-112
KKD is going to zero.

Market Haiku

Go long gold, black gold
Short the buck against anything
Buy some smokes also

A beautiful chart

Time to short the dollar again . . .

courtesy of stockcharts.com

Rises to the level of the previous major low, and falls again.
A thing of beauty.

Multitasking

Loser List for February 14, 2005

ADAM may be a buy above 5
AFFX might have found support at 40
ALDN looks like a sell below 22.5, buy above 25
ARBA if you really have to catch a falling knife, you might try to buy this with a stop below 7.5
ASR--pullback after a breakout, maybe buy above 29 with a stop below 28
AVB if it can't get above 70, a short?
BEBE pullback after a breakout--buy, stop about 27.5
CENT is breaking out-- if you buy those, buy this
DCTH--if it shows a little strength here, might be a buy with a stop below 3
DDDC breakout above 6.
HANS uptrend, looks to have pulled back to support. Might be a buy with a stop at 37
ISCA a solid breakout above 55
OCR might be a short below 32
TINY gapped up and may have resumed the uptrend. Stop below 13.5
TZOO 50 looks to be the line in the sand here--Buy above, sell below?
WCG long and strong--as long as its above 35
AOC--maybe Spitzer's dogs have been called off--looks strong above 25.
KBH--don't fight the homebuilders--looks like a pullback to support at 110.
Has MRK put in a bottom? If your gonna buy, stop at 28 if you're short term, or 25 if you're longer term.
NFI has been a falling knife--and a lot of buyers caught it between 31 and 33--that may provide some support. But it's still a falling knife.
SU has broken out to new highs above 37. Since it has large fields of oil sands that are only profitable if oil stays above 25-30$ a barrel, do the buyers have a specific opinion on oil, as well?

Sunday Night Charts for 2/13/05

Tonight I want to focus on commodity charts. Though my long term view is that of a commidiites bull, I have been a bit of a Nervous Nellie lately, wondering if the bull might be faltering.
First lets look at the weekly chart of the CRB.


courtesy of stockcharts.com

Yeah, its cracked the uptrend line, and rose back to meet it underneath. Its crunch time--will it bounce off the uptrend line and head down, to confirm breaking it, and will it rise above the uptrend line again, making this just a fake-out uptrend violation? Tune in next week--at any rate, I wouldn't commit big bucks in new money either way.

Next let's look at the weekly chart of GOLD

courtesy of stockcharts.com
As many times before, nice bounce off the uptrend line--the technicals say perhaps a good buying opportunity in the yellow metal.

Now let's look at OIL -- West Texas Intermediate Crude

courtesy of stockcharts.com
Bit of a pullback, but still solidly in an uptrend. Don't fight black gold.

Finally lets look at CME weekly chart.

courtesy of stockcharts.com
Bit of a scare there, but the long-term uptrend is still in place.
My conclusion--don't sell commodities yet, and at least in the case of gold and oil, this may be a buying opportunity.

Remember the Alamo--and the disclaimer.

Sixth World's Roundtable--fundies

As promised, a quick take on the fundamentals of TM and A.
Again, also weighing in are Kaushik Gala, Ron Sen ,Levi Bauer and of course, Thomas Ott at Sixth World.
Somebody (Peter Lynch, maybe?) says that there are no extra points given for "degree of difficulty" in analyzing stocks--the complicated stories don't necessarily make you any more money than the simple ones. Somebody else (John Train, I believe, but I can't swear to it) once said that the auto industry was one of the great capital destroyers of modern industry--GM and F, over the past half-century, actually have had to consume capital in the form of constantly issuing new stock in order to stay alive. With that background in mind, let's look at some simple metrics on TM.
Price to sales is 0.74, which in the abstract sounds cheap, but it compares to 0.14 for F, 0.11 for GM, 0.6 for HMC, and 0.53 for the industry as a whole. Similarly, TM's PE is 11, compared to 7 for F, 5 for GM, and 10 for HMC, 15 for the industry as a whole. No screaming value here. Is Toyota a great company? No doubt--my wife drives a Sienna, and it has more room inside than my Ford Expedition, which is a larger, more expensive, and less fuel efficient vehicle. No one could argue that Toyota's products aren't among the best. But the way to make money on the stock of a great company is to buy it at a good price, and my brief take on it is that it's not cheap here.

As for Agilent, same sort of thing. Its PE is 33, compared to 24 for IBM and 23 for the industry as a whole. PS is 1.58, with IBM at 1.63 and the industry at 1.22. PEG, or price to earnings to growth (I know, some people swear by this metric and some people swear at it) is 1.62 for A, 1.66 for IBM and 1.3 for the industry. Again no screaming value here.

In summary, I don't see any great value here based on the fundies. Maybe Kaushik, Ron ,Levi or Tom will be able to demonstrate some value, and I bow to their wisdom. But for old Jaloti, I'd stick to trading the technicals on both of these, buying a breakout of the trading range and/or selling a breakdown.

Sixth World's Roundtable

This week's Roundtable stocks are Toyota (TM) and Agilent Technologies (A). Also weighing in are Kaushik Gala, Ron Sen ,Levi Bauer and of course, Thomas Ott at Sixth World.
In this post I'll take a look at some technicals on each of these stocks. I'm taking a little longer term perspective on these, so I'll be using weekly charts. As a little background, I tend to be pretty simplistic with regard to looking at technicals--I'm just not smart enough to put together twenty different charts and indicators, and besides, when I try to do that I lose money faster. Generally for me its one chart, a little price, a little volume, some highs/lows and a trend line or two.
From a technical perspective, to me these stocks do have something in common--the Chairman's bromide, "Range contraction is followed by range expansion."
First, Toyota--again, weekly chart.

courtesy of stockcharts.com
I've noted the trading range for the past 9 months or so between about 74 and 82. That's a pretty tight range. Additionally, you can see the long price by volume bars for that range, meaning a lot of the volume in the stock over the past 4 years has been in that range. I see this as additional "fuel" to accelerate a move outside the range--less supply of stock at prices above 82 or below 74. One other point is that the bottom of this range is at an old high from three years ago, perhaps providing additional support. So from a long term technical standpoint, I'd be interested in buying a breakout above 82 and selling a breakdown below 74. In between, I'd let the shorter term traders take the points.

Next is the Agilent weekly chart.

courtesy of stockcharts.com
Again, a tight trading range between about 20 and 30 for the past 9 months or so, and again, looking at the price by volume bars, a LOT of volume really between about 22 and 28 or so. Purely by the technicals, I'd be more tempted to sell a breakdown in the teens, and buy a breakout above 30.
Gala had an options play on A here.

I'll make at least a brief comment about the fundamentals a little later.

Weekend Wazzup for February 13, 2005

My roundup of the Fox News Channel' s "Cost of Freedom" Saturday Morning shows-- is here.
On the net, Random Roger had a different take on Bill Cara's review of ETFs. (Insert comment about it takes two sides to make a market here.) Roger also has his perspective on Bill O'Neill's 8% stop loss rule.
Speaking of Bill Cara, he has his usual thorough review of the week, and makes a couple option recommendations on SNDK and AAPL.
Also making option recommendations is GalaTime who reviewed his trade in DELL that is doing pretty well. Keep an eye on his option plays, he's had some really good ones.
Heavy on the specifics as well as the big picture is Ron Sen who started the weekend quoting Ringo Starr(I've always liked that song), and then moved on to a series of interesting looking charts. This morning he posted his section of the Roundtable on TM.
The Roundtable continues with Tom at Sixth World posting his thoughts on TM. Also to be weighing in on the Roundtable today (besides the aforementioned Kaushik Gala and Ron Sen are Levi Bauer and yours truly.
Speaking of Levi the Soothsayer of Omaha, he had a nice position sizing exercise worth reading.
Always worth reading is Chairman MaoXian's newsletter, which is out now. Slip him a little something to get it, and tell him Jaloti is the man! ;>) Check out his chat every weekday 8:30-9:30 Eastern time.
Also check out Byrne's Marketview who catches us up with Joe Granville(what a blast from the past).
Ugly chart had a nice and relevant quote from Adaptation.
And least but definitely not least is The Man, TraderMike who channels Alan Farley and quotes Gary Kaltbaum, and comments that all the hammers on Thursday have changed shorts to longs.
That's wazzup with my peeps. See you monday!

Tufte Redux

Way back here I posted my review of design maven Edward Tufte's day long course. I mentioned sparklines, a kind of embedded-in-text graphics he talked about and said I would post examples. I intended at that time to scan in and post some examples he gave out, strangely enough of his proposal for using sparklines in stock/mutual fund tables. I decided there might be some copyright issues, so I won't post his, but I created a simple example of my own to illustrate his concept.



Basically, that's all there is to it. The idea really is to include graphics right in with the text--like smileys ;>)

Another blog on my list

Added a new blog to my list: Byrne's Marketview. The commentary looks excellent, and the lagniappe was seeing the Ayn Rand, Hayek, and Dave Barry books on the profile.

Loser List for February 11, 2005

At the risk of being premature, let me ring the bell and call "Gold, short term bottom, dollar short term top"
ACU--filled in the gap, might be a buy above 17
ADAM--may have pulled back to support, buy with a stop at 5
AFFX--might have found support at 40. Buy with a stop there.
PENN still a nice uptrend--might be an entry point here with a stop about 65
PLUM--still looks peachy with a stop below 5
PNRA has pulled back--if 48 holds as support it looks good.
There still is no I in TEAM, and no volume either--but its a nice breakout.
TGA, baby, still long and strong with a stop below 6.
TONS may have given an entry, with a stop at 74
TZOO-below 50 would be the time to short, if you like shorting breakdowns(and who doesn't?). WCG--maybe support at 35?
CNR maybe an entry point in this one with a stop about 1.3
Miners like NXG,RGLD,RIC,MNG, NEM,NAK, VGZ all showing some strength--although it is a pretty V-shaped. Dead cat bounce, or start of a new sustained move??( I guess that's a matter of timeframe)

Don't forget the disclaimer . . .

Haiku

Ron Sen quotes Yoda
"Do or do not, there is no try"
Yoda's short the spoos

"Random" thoughts on Commodities, China, and Memes

Random Roger (as he often does) had an interesting observation the other day about commodities. He referenced a Jim Rogers quote to the effect that one can't be a good investor without understanding commodities. Roger makes the point that the supply and demand factors in commodities are important to understand, and that much of the recent strength in equities likely has something to do with commodity factors. My long term view has been that we would see continued strength in commodities, although of late I have questioned this. Certainly, there has been some weakness, and I think the next week or two will give us a good idea of whether commodities (ex-oil, which still is nothing but strong) are finished for now or whether the bull continues.
Taking it a step further, there has been a lot of talk that much of the strength in commodities has been due to the economic awakening in China. You can easily find a lot of statistics about the boom there-the equivalent of a city the size of Houston is built there every year, there are 4 times as many cars in 2004 compared to 1994, etc. However, this has become so commonplace an idea as to become a meme, and when something is so widespread everybody knows it, I wonder if it isn't over.
Fade the memes. Sounds like it could be a meme, eh?

Gold miners, jaloti and Bill Cara

I see Bill Cara is calling this morning to buy some gold miners. I said here that it looked like some of them may have put in a bottom. Now somebody who knows what they're talking about has said it too.

Loser List for February 10, 2005

ALGN- short on a break of 7.5
DCTH--has pulled back to 3--maybe a buy on a tight stop?
DESC--similarly, buy with a stop below 3.5
TEAM still looks like a buy above 11--darned low volume though
I'm in that TGA with a stop below 6.
WCG--this may be an entry point with a stop below 35
The gold miners from yesterday (BGO,MNG,RGLD) may indeed have put in bottoms-- but what's the timeframe?
LVLT down big, on huge volume--this stock has come back from the dead so many times I've lost count. Can it bounce again?

As always, you know . . .

haiku

Gala screens options
Finds the unusual volume
Thanks for Ideas!

Disciplined Growth Investors

New 13F from Disciplined Growth Investors. How can that not be a solid money management team--they're DISCIPLINED Growth Investors, for goodness sakes'.

Loser List for February 9, 2005

My biggest question is how low can that VIX go?
ACU stay with it long and strong above 19.
ACXM may be setting up a nice short with a stop above 23.5-24
ARBA was mentioned here; so far the technician was more correct than the fundamentalist.
OSTK looks like a short with a stop around 54-55.
Is PLUM finally looking peachy? Long and strong, as long as its above 5.
RIG--nice uptrend, but as always, entry point?
TASR--I think you could flip a coin as to which way this is going next.
TEAM--looks like a pullback after a breakout, if you're into stocks that trade 34K shares per day.
***TGA this is my play of the day. (Kiss of death). I plan to go long with a stop below 6--you probably ought to short it ;>)
ALEX has been in a nice long uptrend, and this may be a nice entry point, with a stop about 44.5
BGO might have found a bottom at 2.5. Or not.RGLD, NXG, MNG may also have found bottoms yesterday.

Quick, Watson. . .the disclaimer!

????Haiku????

Unfortunately
"Old McDonald Had a Farm"
Is not a haiku

Loser List for February 8, 2005

ACU--if it holds above that gap at about 19 looks like a long.
AVB--ran smack into resistance at 70. Short?
BEBE-breakout, if it can hold 29, may get some follow through.
CREE--Tom at sixth world and I have gone back and forth on this one--may have found support at 23, but realistically, there is probably too much chance of more downside.
ISCA--breaking out to new highs, but not very convincingly. Perhaps range contraction precedes range expansion?
LCBM--pause after a breakout? More upside coming?
NVEC--gotta figure the percentages favor the next move being down.
PENN--beautiful uptrend. Check it out if you haven't. Not sure about an entry point, though.
There is no "I" in TEAM, but there is a "U" in SUCK. (Sorry, TEAM is on the list but volume is awfully low--and there is no SUCK.)
TONS of steel, and tons of money if you've held since 20(not me). Nice chart, but again, entry??

Remember the disclaimer. Have a good day.

Haiku Maoxian

Range contraction is
Followed by range expansion
so says the Chairman

Loser List for February 7, 2005

USD has risen right to a previous low--the pattern has been for the next leg down to start here. If it doesn't, maybe the downtrend has paused?
ACU gap up open at 19, high at 19.5 but is low volume.
BEBE has broken out, open 28.27, high 29.38
DCTH may be at support at 3.2
FWHT in a downtrend, short if goes below 14.2
OMCL short if you can get it with a stop above 6.9
OSTK looks like a possible short at about 54.5 with a stop above 56
RESP breaking out to new highs at 59.85, nice complement to MO
RMI 3.5 is the line in the sand--might pop again if it can hold here
AA in a downtrend but has risen to previous resistance, short with a stop above 29.76, today's high
SOHU in a downtrend and gapped down, but there is support at today's low in the mid 14s. might short on a solid crack of 14.5
EK has broken out to new high of 34.8

Sunday night charts--A top in commodities?

My long term view has been that commodities will do well over the next few years. However--John Maynard Keynes once said, "When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?"

Let's first look at the weekly charts--

CRB

courtesy of stockcharts.com
Commodities really making a good show of breaking that long term trend line, wouldn't you say?
On the other hand, they are still above the 50d EMA and well above the 200 d EMA.

Gold,

courtesy of stockcharts.com
Right on that uptrend line. Time to decide--will the support hold or crack?

OIL (West Texas intermediate)

courtesy of stockcharts.com
A pullback, but still a solid uptrend. Looks like some nice support in the low 40's.
So, the CRB and Gold bull runs look like they might be in trouble. Oil still looks good.
What other evidence is there?
The gold ETF GLD was introduced on November 18, and Gold's high so far occured on December 1--a new product being brought in right at the top? Nah, couldn't be!

On Friday I caught Bob Pisani on CNBC make some comment about membership prices in the NYSE v. The Chicago Merc . The upshot was that NYSE seat prices have been in a range since the top in 1999, while membership prices in the CME have risen sharply since then.
As one might expect, NYSE prices topped out right around the top in share prices. If CME seat prices top out--that would be worrisome.

To put it together--while oil still looks bullish, gold and the CRB are making me a little nervous. If you're in, I might keep a tight stop. If you're not in, it might be prudent to see a little strength before getting in.

As always, the disclaimer.

Sixth World's Roundtable on NEM

I appreciate being asked to contribute to this august group.NEM is a stock I've followed for a while, mostly because of my interest in the mining sector. A key fact about NEM is that it is the largest cap non-ADR gold miner, at about $17 billion. Only the Anglo-American ADRs (AAUK) is larger at a whopping $35 billion. Barrick (ABX) is third at about $12 billion. According to Yahoo finance, the whole industry's market cap is only $118 billion. A couple years ago somebody (I forget who) told me that if the mutual fund heavyweights ever decide to give some sort of significant weighting to gold miners, then 1) the whole industry would rise significantly, since it is relatively small, and 2) companies like NEM, AAUK, and to a lesser extent ABX would do the best, because they are the only ones with anything near a big enough market cap for the big boys to play in without emptying the pool when they take a dive, as it were. As it is, institutions already own 71% of NEM's float, and insiders another 10%. I was interested to see the chart Tom posted that showed the tremendous money flow into NEM since the start of the gold bull.So. . .I think over the longer term, if gold continues its bull run, NEM will do okay--if the big boys are buying miners, they have to buy this one. Over the short run, however, I think Tom made a great case that its overextended and you probably will get a chance to buy this one lower.

Roundtable

Thomas Ott from Sixth World was kind enough to invite my to join his Roundtable discussion. I posted my brief take on this week's stock, NEM, here and here .
Thanks again for the opportunity, Tom!

Weekend Wazzup for February 6 2005

Fox News Channel' s "Cost of Freedom" Saturday Morning shows are summarized here.
Wazzup in the blogosphere--to pick a random spot--

Random Roger had a nice roundup of iShares v. CEF's for various foreign countries, and concluded that oftentimes the CEF might be the better "buy". In his Big Picture, he has a great Dick Vitale line about somebody being a "Dow-Joneser, always up or down"!

Also up is Sixth World's Roundtable, which discussed NEM.


Bill Cara talked about gold in his roundup of the week--He thinks gold will move up again when the dollar moves down. I also noticed he kinda likes the SBC-ATT deal, but not PG-G.


Ron Sen had a nice roundup as well--his email notednthe epidural steroid injection may have started to help the sciatica--hope you get better, Ron!


Email came from Roberto Pedone -- I checked out his blog and you should too.

You should also check out GalaTime, who had an interesting looking options play on TKLC.

Always interesting is Trader Mike who talked about that AskJeeves buying Bloglines story--like most everybody else, I'm asking what does it mean for me?

What Sunday means for me is that Chairman MaoXian's newsletter is out today--give him a little something for the effort to get it. It contains some great trading info. Talk with him (and some other notorious characters) in his weekday chat.

Finally,uglychart got my attention by mentioning shaolin monks. Xie xie nin.

Have a great week all!

Verizon Wireless Broadband

A few days ago, I promised a more complete review of mobile wireless broadband, and here it is.
At the risk of sounding like a shameless corporate tool, let me say that this service from VerizonWireless is pretty good-- its kind of like having WiFi everywhere.
First a little background. I run my operation primarily out of two separate undisclosed locations in the Valley of the Sun. One, let's call it Casa Jaloti, has a reliable cable internet connection, and is located in a hilly area that is notoriously poor for cellular phone reception. The second, lets call it Pueblo Jaloti, has an internet connection that is somewhat problematic. I don't have much control over the infrastructure there, I couldn't get my laptop hooked to the internet there, and I couldn't have access to my servers at Casa Jaloti.
Rather by accident (cheesy radio commercial) I stumbled upon VerizonWireless Wireless Broadband service using EVDO technology. The service is available in about 30 metropolitan areas right now, with more planned by the end of the year, and in much of the country that doesn't have the faster EVDO, you can get a slower but still slightly better than dialup 1xRTT signal. As an aside I don't really understand these geek acronyms, I'm just parroting them.
Anyway I signed up for the service. I received the 5220 PC Card (fits in the PC Card slot of laptops--see pictures below), and an installation CD. I paid 100 bucks for the card, and the service is 80 bucks a month with a one-year contract. I know, that's a lot of monthly jack. But stay with me. Note also that Verizon gives a 15 day get out of jail card return policy.
I installed the software and card, no sweat. At Casa Jaloti I only get a RTT (what Verizon calls National Access) signal, and even then with difficulty. Sometimes I only can log on when (I swear to God) I put my hand on the antenna. (I'm ordering a third party external antenna to see if this makes a difference). However, I do get a signal there and its comparable to dialup. This is what I expected--cell signals are sometimes problematic out there. For me, internet access at Casa Jaloti is not an issue; this at least gives me a reasonable backup.
Next I tried it at Pueblo Jaloti. I get a better signal there-usually EVDO (Broadband Access, in Verizon-speak), sometimes it slips down to RTT. I get speeds anywhere from 30 kbps download on National Access up to 300 Kbps on Broadband Access, according to dslreports.com, which is a good site for testing your connection. The speed would fluctuate wildly, even though I was in the same place. I got the impression this has to do with how many other customers are using the tower I'm connected to, but maybe that's just my simplistic view of things. I haven't tested ping latency, and I know at least for some things the geeks say this is more important.
I also tried it driving around in the car. Wow-795 Kbps while in the Wendy's parking lot. I seemed to get a much better and faster connection out there in the open. I felt like blogging while driving but somehow I thought it might be unsafe. Just a hunch.
Thursday I was at a rarely used third undisclosed location-lets call it Cueva Jaloti, because it might as well be a cave, deep in a building, right next to the underground parking garage. I can't even get a signal on my T-mobile cell phone there. Ever. I frankly didn't expect any signal-but there it was--RTT mostly, sometimes even EVDO. I got speeds up to 300Kbps at times.
Thus, with this I can get an internet connection anywhere in my area, and often a pretty good fast one. It was fine for most of the web/email/IM stuff that I do. You can even set up a VPN with it. I haven't done that, but I intend to, so I can access the Casa Jaloti servers from afar.
So, that's my story. Is it for everyone? No. The signal can be inconsistent, especially in a building. When its good, its very good--although its not like being an a LAN--300-500 Kbps is good, but a good cable/DSL/T1 hookup is of course better--I won't deny that for a minute. When its bad, its like the old days of dialup-but I always have been able to get some connection, so far, at least. If you're in one place all the time and can get broadband, you don't need this. But if you are even a little mobile and want a more reliable connection in more places, then check out broadband wireless from VerizonWireless.
FULL DISCLOSURE--yes, these are sponsored links--I might get a little something for the effort if you click them and sign up with Verizon. For the record, I'm paying full price for the service, and what I wrote is my honest opinion.

Haiku 2/5/5

Big tobacco wins
Jaloti says time to buy
Any other thoughts?

Tobacky

So MO, UST, et al are up big today with a favorable legal settlement. It's a good opportunity for me to give my view of tobacco. I believe tobacco stocks are EXCELLENT long term investments, although right here they are a tad pricey. I plan to add to my long term positions in these stocks on any pullbacks.

This is my qualitative big picture thinking. First let's leave aside the moral objections to investing in tobacco. If you have a moral objection to tobacco stocks, I respect it, and I wouldn't dream of trying to change it. My position is based on not having a moral problem with these companies.

Everyone knows these are wonderful businesses from a fundamental viewpoint, high free cash flow, addictive product, many smokers still worldwide, lots of room for Altria et al to grow in China, etc. I think most people would agree what keeps the price down is the liability risk. My view is that the settlement with the states' attorneys general did a lot to mitigate that risk in the future. Why? Because (money quote) it made the states and several large law firms partners in these companies by giving them a claim on their future cash flow. Heck, some states have even securitized this future cash flow by selling bonds against it. I think there is a lot of legal talent, both in state governments and in large law firms, people that write legislation and litigate it in court, that will not want to kill the goose that laid the golden egg, as it were. Thus, I feel pretty confident that further attempts to extort (perjorative word, I know, but that's my view) money from these companies will be fought tooth and nail by their partners in state governments and in private legal practice.

Tobacco. I don't buy the product, but I own the stocks.

More RSS

If you aren't into the RSS/newsreader game , why not? You should be. I wrote about it here.
Today's RSS feed of interest (to me at least) is the latest published patent applications (not patents granted, but applications) submitted to the US PTO.
via Paul Kedrosky.

Loser List for February 5, 2005

Gold is cracking the uptrend line on the daily chart, and touching it on the weekly, and all the individual gold stocks are oversold. Bounce here? Or is the bloom off this rose?
ATVI catches a bid at 23, but if it can't get above the high of 23.8 I'm out.
OXGN mentioned in the chairman's chat, opened at 5.68, went to 5.81, now at about 5.5. Its in a downtrend; this looks like a shorting opportunity to me--if you can get shares.
SGEN is in a downtrend, trying to rise, but can't get above 6.Short?
AOC catchin' a bid around 22.5
KBH those homebuilders just keep rockin. Probably don't want to chase here though.
TIP is back up with the strength in bonds.
FBR play that galatime mentioned the other day? It's an options play on earnings, which come out on Feb. 9, some maybe wait till next week?

Almost forgot . . . the Haiku

DJTCQ
Trump gets bankruptcy hearing
But who gets the hair?

Blogging

Random Roger had a nice post (not just because he linked me, although it helps;>)) that mentioned interactions amongst bloggers. I agree with him 100%--one of the many great aspects to this medium is that if what you say isn't quite right, somebody will let you know about it, to yours and your readers' benefit. I learned this early on, when I posted something that was flat out wrong, and Trader Mike pointed it out to me. At that time, I didn't even realize anyone was reading me, and here's a "name" in the market blog world leaving a comment on my site. Sure, I was chagrined at making a stupid mistake, but frankly it was one of the most encouraging things that has happened to me since I started this endeavor. Along the way, I've had very postitive interactions with Chairman MaoXian, Thomas Ott from Sixth World, Ugly at UglyChart, Galatime, as well as Roger and Mike and others, and I like to think that I get a little better at this (and maybe, heaven forbid, at trading and investing as well) with my interactions with my betters in the blogosphere.

Loser LIst February 3, 2005

A short list today.

ADAM seems to find bids around 5.5-5.7. More upside?
ATVI will drop to the top of the gap at 23 and rise again. Buy with a stop under 23?
Galatime's FBR straddle looks intriguing as well.

I'm not exactly sure why the list is so short some days. While there just may not be many set-ups, some days I suspect that its me. I tend to be pretty discretionary; perhaps more mechanical criteria might yield a more even distribution of possible set-ups. Some days everything looks like a possible play to me, other days almost nothing. Hopefully if I'm aware of this tendency, I can keep it from being a problem.

Haiku

Met Life buys Trav'lers
SBC buys ATT
Jaloti buys lunch

Loser List February 2, 2005

HIO junk bond fund has been in a slow steady decline since September. I'm not quite enough of a macro guy to know what that means.
IGR look this one up if you haven't. Global real estate fund, nice steady uptrend, nice divy too.
MFD also look this one up. Global utilities fund, again nice uptrend and nice divy.
AOC Spitzer may have called off the dogs and this may be a buy above 22.5
ACAS long term pullback buy above 33.
MNG seems to get bids everytime it pokes below 1.10
RIC ditto when down around 4.00
XMSR--"the rich man's SIRI" may have found some support around 31-31.5
CNR--Nicolas Darvas might start watching this one. At 1.51, all time high looks to be about 1.66
mandatory ASTM comment
ATVI gap up. Once again I'll invoke the Trader Mike rule #1 and say don't buy unless it cracks 23.6
ENWV again Trader Mike rule #1. Only look at it above 22. (Perhaps the Jaloti interpretation of this rule is "If you're going to buy the breakout, buy the breakout, not the #$&%$ profit taking pullback")
DCTH broke out, then pulled back to the old high of 3.4. I'm gonna guess Gary B. Smith would buy it above 3.4 with a stop just below.
ALGN has risen to the old low of 8.85. Short?
NVEC mentioned as a possible short yesterday. Still is today.
ASTM wouldn't do anything with this today but I do seem to get a bunch of hits everytime I mention it ;>)

Please, remember the disclaimer; check out the new donate button; if you need wireless think VerizonWireless; tip your waitresses; be careful driving home; buy bonds; THANK YOU, THANK YOU VERY MUCH!

Ron's Stock 'n Stuffer World

Ron Sen was kind enough to send me an email the other day. He's got a good-looking blog that I've added to my list. And he didn't have to make up a name, either!

I have seen the future . . .

mobile . . . wireless. . . broadband. And I don't mean Wi-Fi, I mean a fast wireless internet connection available over an entire metro area. For the last couple days, I've been using a new wireless broadband product from VerizonWireless that seems to pretty much deliver on what's promised. I plan on posting a more comprehensive evaluation and description in the next couple days, but for now, if you live in one of 20 or so US metro areas that VerizonWireless offers this product in, you might want to find out more.
Full disclosure: Yes, I am a Verizon affiliate and I get a piece of the action if anyone orders from this page. I am paying full price for the product, and I plan on telling the unvarnished truth about it, but, yeah, I have an incentive.
Like I said, I'll write more. In the meantime, any questions email me at harryjaloti@hotmail.com

UPDATE--I have since written a more complete review here.

Can't stop . . . The Haiku!

Random Roger says
CALPERS might buy the third world
Unless Google does

Loser List and Thoughts

DJ utilities breaking out to new highs
Gold trying hard to break the uptrend line
Oil the commodity and the stocks are still strong--I own some, but I drive an SUV so its a wash ;>)
ASTM is only a buy above 3.78
CME--I gave it its own post. I suppose if you've got more guts than me you might buy with a stop just below today's low; mostly, I think along with the CRB chart this may be a indicator of things to come.
GLD, the gold ETF, is down at 42. Along with the commodity chart, it looks like it has to hold here for the bull to remain intact.
AOC may get back in this one above 22.5.
LAB if this can stay above 9.8 this may prove to be a buyable dip.
CULS might be a buyable dip above 9--BTW this is an island warehouse club --Costco of Samoa, as it were. Whoever would have thought
TIP might be cracking the uptrend line.
NAT keeps rocking. Classic dilemna--probably best to wait for a pullback, but that might be 20 points higher.
ALGN short with a stop above today's high 8.7
NVEC thrusted above the 200 day, and now sinking. Might be a short.
URBN nice downtrend. Look at it for a short.

CME

I was going through my charts for the day, and I thought enough of this one to give it its own post. This is the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, kind of the ultimate commodity play if you will. It has had a nice long run, stumbled a bit, and now gapped down 10% but has maybe found some support at 186 or so. Somebody was disappointed with the earnings call this AM, I guess. When you put this together with the possible uptrend break in the CRB I pointed out the other day, is it meaningful? Is the commodities bull over, or just taking a break?
Or not?

ASTM--give the people what they want

ASTM opened up at 3.57 and is currently trading higher. Follow the Trader Mike Rule #1 and wait for it. Check after 10:00-10:15 Eastern time, and don't even think about going long unless it's above the 10:00 high.

Warren Buffett

always fascinates me. I came across this blogger who had a chance to meet him.
http://darrenjohnson.blogspot.com/2005/01/wisdom-of-warren-buffett.html
Make sure you read the comments--I love the net--it proves that it takes (at least) two sides to make a market.

Trader (M)Ha(ik)u(e)

Trader Mike's the Man
He's staying in cash right now
The trend's your friend, right?

Loser List

First two are breakout picks
ADAM above 6
ASTM buy above open 3.45

Next two might be buyable dips for a longer term timeframe
FRE above 65
PCL above 35 or so

Next six are definitely trying to bottom fish-should probably fade me on these;>)
GLG may be finding support at 15.5 or thereabouts
MNG also may be finding support at 1.0-1.1
RIC ditto above 4
VGZ may be also have support at 3.7
SU at 31.5 time for a bounce?
CREE may have found some support at 23.5-24, but I've been wrong on this one before. You should probably check out Thomas Ott at Sixth World on this one, he's had it right and I've had it wrong.

And some odds and ends
GLOW uptrend with a pullback--buy at 2
IDTI has risen right to 200d at 11.77 and congestion. Could go up or down.
OSTK might have found support at 52
SEGU seems to get a bid everytime gets to 7

Haiku

No haiku tonight
I have nothing more to say
See you tomorrow

Sunday Night Charts for 1/30/05

Quick review of a few long term (weekly candlesticks) charts as I prepare for the week ahead.

First is Nasdaq.


courtesy of stockcharts.com

Believe it or not, still an uptrend, bouncing off the trend line I drew previously.

Next is USD


courtesy of stockcharts.com

Still a downtrend, rose to touch the downtrend line, maybe even flirt with breaking it, but like it has done so many times before, and like I said last week and before, I'm looking for the next big move to be down.

Next is gold.


courtesy of stockcharts.com

still an uptrend. I'm still bullish.

Finally, the CRB.

courtesy of stockcharts.com

If I was going to just look at the chart and have no opinion, I'd almost think commodities were trying hard to break that long uptrend.

Naaaaah! ;>)

Have a great week!!

ASTM Aastrom Biosciences

This one seems to be a popular one, especially over at the Yahoo! message boards.
Here is my latest ASTM chart.



courtesy of stockcharts.com

I'm still long with a stop below 3. I think there is support below 3--see the fib retracement, as well as the previous high in early January. My only concern is the big overhang (see the price by volume bars) around 4, where previous buyers now holding at a loss may be tempted to get out. If they hang on, its "to the moon, Alice!"

Or not.

Weekend Wazzup

My round-up of this weekend:

Chairman Maoxian's newsletter is out. Slip him a little tip to get it (I'm sure he'd like a Benji but he'll take something smaller). Tell him Jaloti sent you.

Random Roger also has a newsletter ($40USD). He also likes to watch the Fox business block on Saturday morning like I do. It sounds like he saw more of I than I did—I missed Gary B. Smith's comment about fallout shelter stocks.

I managed to catch only a bit of the Business Block this weekend—mostly I was able to catch Jonathan Hoenig—one of my favorites. Jonathan still likes oil, as well as utilities. Specific stocks he mentioned included DUK, GMP, EE. Wayne Rogers mentioned BHP.

I doubt Hoenig is buying MRK, but Bill Cara is. Actually he's writing the April 05 27.5 puts, but he likes the stock. I still think there is a LOT of potential liablility out there from Vioxx, but if you listen to me over Bill Cara you need your head examined.

Trader Mike doesn't need his head examined; he has a nice set of links to IBD articles on when to sell. Trader Mike has been very encouraging to me as a blogger—he's a good, sharp guy and I try to read whatever he writes.

Another site I keep up with is Sixth World—Thomas Ott has also been encouraging of my blogging efforts. His latest scan has picked out NAVR, SWIR, and VRSN as possible plays.

Gala Time has also been scanning and screening—he's options focused, and he's picked up heavy institutional activity in DLQBS, the DELL Feb 42.5 call, FDNK, the FD Feb 55 put, and WMTBJ, the WMT Feb 50 call.

Finally, (and without a good segue) I've added Material Change to the blogs I followed—has to be a good blog—one of his favorites is Jaloti!

Tufte course notes and review

As promised here are my notes from the Edward Tufte course I attended on January 28.

Summary
Tufte charges $320USD for a roughly 6 hour course. This price includes a copy of 3 of his books “The Visual Display of Quantitative Information”, “Envisioning Information”, and “Visual Explanations” as well as two essays “The Cognitive Style of Powerpoint” and “Sparklines” and a poster. Retail price of these is about $120 USD. I thought there was very little material he presented that you couldn't get from the books or the website, with one exception—the sparklines material. Many of the points he made, while excellent points, sound obvious in cold print, and perhaps they are.
Clearly, the attraction is seeing the man in person, getting to ask him a question at a break, getting him to autograph your book (I did)

Though he is a good speaker, and clearly enjoys teaching, again, I'm not too sure that much is added by hearing him make the points rather than reading them. In fact, I thought his presentation could have been helped by better organization(His books and essays ARE better organized.) The crowd was easily 300 people--the hotel conference room was completely filled. The audience was somewhat diverse, although I got the impression that it was dominated by web designers and other "artists" types, since the vaguely pro-Macintosh and anti-big business sentiments he expressed seemed to go over pretty well.

My money quote: Don't pay your own money for the seminar unless you're a diehard fan—if your employer pays, though, it's a decent day. You're probably better off buying the books, and if you use these links, I can make a couple bucks off it as well.

Tufte hates bullet points, so just to be contrary let me summarize with some bullet points. He also says read books, not notes and took a slap at the many internet summaries of his lectures--saying they have no pictures. Thus I will post at least one picture. My interpretation of his points is in normal type, (my comments are in parenthesis, italicized)

• The important question about showing data is "compared with what?" must show casuality, show mutivariate data.

Documentation should be embedded in the chart.

Presentations stand or fall based on quality of content.

Design principles are based on the intellectual task--if the question is "compared with what?"--then show “compared with what?” Put another way,what is the thinking task that the presentaion is supposed to help with?

"Good design is clear thnking made visible" and conversely "bad design is stupidity in action" although he admits this is "a little too much of a slogan to be too profound."

He postulates that since design principles are rooted in cognition, they are universal and independent of media, culture, etc. He speculates this is beccause we are all human beings operating in a physical world and dealing with natural laws that involve causality and thus we must show comparison and causality and deal with multiple variables. Thus he believes the same design principles would be obvious to aliens.

Better to make comparisons adjacent in space rather than stacked in time, as an example put graphics on same page in a book.

For computer monitors, higher resolution bigger screen is better(doh!)

He compared Galileo to Feynman --both telling the truth, both are wiseguys

showed the phrase in galileo's book "dal monuimento annuo della Terra"--the yearly movement of the earth--the only place where he refers to the earth moving

After galileo theories accepted based on evidence

Biggest threat to "truth" is cherrypicking of data--although he admits that everybody does it--interestingly he admits that everybody is an advocate for some point of view (I think this is huge; it helps you deal with a lot of noise in the world, if you keep this in mind)

Science relies on replicating of data by other cherrypickers.

Magic involves hiding the truth-you don't tell people what you're going to do; you don't repeat.

Presentation of "truth"--tell up front what you're going to do--what is the problem, who cares, how to solve it, use repetition of main points.

Use the smallest effective visible difference in charts(more doh!--but actually quite profound when you think about it)

Have to guard your content from those who would screw with it--he gave the example of Newton's Principia with beautiful engravings that were all placed in the middle, violating the rule above of keeping graphics on the same page.

• There is no relationship between amount of detail and ease of reading. To clarify, add detail.
• "Clutter is a failure of design", not the result of too much data
• FINANCIAL DATA
• The central question, the thinking question of most financial data is what is the change over time?
• Although some advocate include zero on the graph, he says don't look at zero point, look at data.
• Show data horizonatally not reaching to a number which never occurs such as zero.
• Giving your audience the chance to confirm a previously known detail helps your credibility.
• When showing data reflecting money over time, must adjust for inflation(doh!) Must adjust for seasonality, cycles(another doh!)
  Don't trust display without footnotes--they show presenter takes care in his craft--embedded footnotes help credibility
• Bring causality in with annotation (adding a bunch of notes seems like a recipe for cluttering up a chart to me, but that's what he says)
• For tables/charts of standard financial data do what New York Times, Wall Street Journal, etc, do,--i.e. don't reinvent the wheel find another successful one “don't get it original get it right”
• That having been said, he shows how he has reinvented the wheel with "sparklines"-best described as little tiny graphs without grids that appear on the same line as text--graphics no longer a special occasion--will be everywhere.(I think this is probably one of the most original ideas I got from the course--that graphics could be right within the text--of course he did show an example of this in Galileo's book, with a little drawing of Saturn right amongst the Italian words. I'll try to enter a good scanned example of sparklines in a day or two)
• He advocated using sparklines in stock/mutual fund summary tables. (I think there may well be some merit in this. He then went on to give a poor/incorrect explanation of “closet index funds”. He also seemed amazed that the stock funds had similar performance—he seemed to think that it was only through sparklines that one would figure out that the average large cap stock funds performance was more correlated with the overall market and thus each. Oh well, he's a design expert, not a market guy.)
• WEB SITE DESIGN
  
• He spent some time railing about how we have to spend too much time thinking about operating systems, and applications, when content is what we should care about. It was a veiled anti-Microsoft, anti-software company rant, talking about being exposed to the "marketing experience" in applications and websites. (I thought this was ironic from a guy who's on tour, filling rooms of >300 people at >300 bucks a head, with his acolytes outside selling his books and posters. Don't get me wrong, I think it's great he can make money doing what he's doing--if I ever get the chance to charge a few hundred people a few hundred bucks each to see me do anything, I'll be there. My point is if he can make a buck doing his thing, why shouldn't Microsoft, Adobe etc. make a buck doing theirs?)
• On to some website nuts and bolts.
• Unfortunately, design often mimics bureaucracy.
• He says, that almost always, the best web site design is to ****get as much upfront as possible**** (very key, I thought, if not obvious)
• The best sites have 200-300 links on opening screen one should make everything clickable.
• People come to sites for content, not design
• Took a slap at these flash animation logos that open so many corporate sites—he says it must be recognized they're a waste since they all have "skip intro"(He's right of course but isn't it kind of an easy target?)
• Biggest issue in web site design is allocation of screen real estate. In many ways the computer screen is just another low resolution display like stone was 6000 years ago. Paper has an advantage in that it is higher resolution and portable.(He emphasized over and over the point about the screen being lower resolution. While it is technically true, I wonder about its practical significance. In my daily routine—and I see literally thousands of websites and pieces of paper every week—I never say “let me print that out so I can get a better look at it. Maybe I'm missing his point somehow.)
• 
  
• ANTI-POWERPOINT STUFF
• (This material all comes from his essay “The cognitive style of powerpoint” which can be obtained here. He offers it for sale on his website, but only on paper, not as even a PDF download, because either a) he wants absolute control over the appearance, b) he wants to make a couple bucks, or c) both (and why not?))
• --"a program whose preoccupation with hierarchy is almost medieval"(perhaps the best quote, and best "a-ha" moment for me all day)
  (Ironically, one wag has put together a powerpoint version of his essay.)
• Powerpoint comes with a cognitive style, an attitude, foreshortening of thought, low resolution, is inherently hierarchical, emphasizes decoration and fluff at the expense of content. It is presenter oriented. It probably works for the bottom 10% of presenters because it forces them to have points.
• We are used to examining serious things at 24 inches—computer screen, books; Powerpoint is designed to be seen from 20 ft, thus it is inherently low resolution. (Here his points about resolution of computer versus paper are spot-on, I think.)
• Bullets are often not subject verb--effects without causes.
• Much of his anti-powerpoint stuff uses the examples of NASA powerpoint presentations about the tile damage on the space shuttle columbia—these presentations arguably encouraged the ill-fated decision to let columbia re-enter.
• Incredibly, NASA even gave powerpoint “pitches” to the review board.
• His other point about Powerpoint (and it's a good one) is that it turns everything into marketing--”pitches”
• He's now giving a mandatory course for NASA employees

Anyway, that's my summary. Clearly, the man is brilliant, and he's got a lot that is worthwhile to say about design. His books are impressive, more impressive in my humble opinion, than the course. Any questions or comments? Either comment below, or email me at harryjaloti@hotmail.com

Finally a little something in the hotel lobby.

Perhaps I've been in Arizona too long, but this I thought this was obvious.

Remember . . .

if you click through on any of my links to Amazon.com books or ads on the sidebar, not only does Jaloti get a little revenue, but also a hippie's hacky-sack rolls into the gutter.

Welcome

to anyone stopping by from the YahooFinance ASTM board. Yes, I think ASTM has a good looking chart, and I'm currently long, with a stop below 3. Take a minute to check out my site--this is a good place to start. Also check out my daily Market Haiku. Any comments--email me at harryjaloti@hotmail.com

Friday Market Haiku

PG buys Gillette
Buffett makes some more money
Closer shave for me?

Loser list today

Really didn't see much of anything today that I could get interested in.
Some things I've been inalready have been working out ok, so I'll follow the Jesse Livermore example and make money by sitting, not thinking.

Tufte

Thanks (or should I say xie xie nin) to the Chairman for linking to me about Tufte. I'll post some observations when the course is done today.

Today

I'm at an Edward Tufte presentation today. So far I don't have the internet connection I thought I would have, so I may not blog as much as I thoughtI might.

Haven't seen too much in the market to interest me this AM, and it is Friday.

I'll try to get a better connection and post some things later.

Finally . . .the Haiku

Bloomberg wire tells me
Microsoft beat estimates
More blue screen of death?

Spam

Just got some spam with the subject line "Fw:Why These Morons Make Millions"

Of course, the best spam comment line I ever got: "Malinda, if homosexuality is a disease, then lets all call in queer to work tomorrow."

What's the best spam subject line you ever got?
Leave it as a comment or email it to harryjaloti@hotmail.com

Jim Cramer

Random Roger made a comment about Jim Cramer today. I guess I kind of have mixed feelings about Cramer--on the one hand, he's VERY entertaining, on the other hand, he has made some crazy cat calls (but who am I to talk?). At times, he's a pretty good contrary indicator. The most notable contrary call (of sorts)I can remember him making was at one point last year he said the market was rallying because it was convinced Bush would lose and needed to go. Irrespective of who one supported in the election, after that call it was pretty clear Bush would win just because JC called it for the other guy. Yeah, he's got people writing books bashing him; I hope I'm that successful someday, that people talk about what b*st*rd I am!
Anyway, put Cramer on TV and I'll watch.





Yes, I'm sick and I need help.

Loser List for January 27 2005

Longs-

ASTM--may be a buyable dip if it stays above 3

DCAI--could be a buyable dip above 20 with a stop at 19.5

MDTL--perhaps a buyable pullback at 20 with a stop at 19


Shorts-

ALGN--might take another poke at it if it stays below 8.85

RHAT--downtrend, rising to resistance at 11.3 or so, might be shortable below that


Rollers--

COBZ--buy at 20, sell at 22, lather, rinse, repeat

SU--buy at 32, sell at 35.5, lrr

caveat--I see these last two charts, rolling gently between support and resistance, and figure that when I see the pattern and finally decide to get on the train, then the support won't hold and/or resistance will crack. YMMV.

UPDATE--if you're new to my blog, welcome. Check out my other thoughts here. For some twisted comedy, check this out. Hope to see you again. Email me at harryjaloti@hotmail.com

Haiku

Bashed GOOG in the chat
It went up 12 points today
Just fade me, okay?

Cheap Stocks

These stocks popped up on a screener and look as if they might be cheap on a fundie basis.
I plan on reviewing them further.

PSEC
ISH
DRRA
OTT
APNI

watchlist for january 25

USD has risen right to resistance--I'm looking for another leg down soon

LONGS

NFI at 44.5 is right at a fib retracement--I may add some here

CNR at 1.32 is pausing after a breakout--may also add here.

PCL at 35--this is timber, one of my long term holdings--I consider this a buyable dip

ATVI at 21.5--may be a buy with a stop at 21

CEDC at 31.1 --looks like a buyable dip with a stop at 30 or so

DESC looks good above 3 with a stop about 2.75

GLOW, similarly at 2.25 with a stop about 2

SHORTS

RIMM looks like its rolling over--short at 70 with a stop at 72

ALGN at 8.85 broke down to a new low

As always, do your own DD, make your decisions, and the disclaimer

Market Haiku

This oversold bounce
Will not last for long they say
But how long is long?

Welcome

Welcome to everyone finding this site. I continue to be pleasantly surprised and gratified by the number of people stopping by to read what I have to say. I always want to hear what people have to say, email me at harryjaloti@hotmail.com. As it states above, I'm not a financial professional in any sense of the word, I'm just a guy with some money to invest, and therefore it behoves me to do the best I can with it, because its MY money. In case you haven't read it yet, let me refer you to my guiding principles, my long term view, an update to my long term view, a little nonsense about technicals and fundamentals, and my disclaimer.

Let me also take this chance to thank the fine sites that have linked to me, such as Trader Mike, Sixth World, and Phat Investor. (Love that word, phat, its a really --- phat word.)

Regulation SHO and Naked Short Selling

I haven't yet talked about Regulation SHO, the new rule to crack down on naked short selling--the practice of selling short shares you haven't really borrowed. (Some allege, more precisely, it is the practice of lending out the same share multiple times.) I think there is still a lot of uncertainty about this, about how serious the crackdown is, how it will all play out, and (most importantly), is there a play here. IBD has had some news on this, such as here (although I gotta say the article took on a conspiracy theory tone, like those articles about how the gold futures market was all a scam)

At any rate, the comprehensive explanation of the whole thing is here. From the regs:

"when a participant of a registered clearing agency has a net settlement failure in a threshold security for 13 consecutive settlement days, two consequences follow: (1) the participant must immediately take steps to close out the fail to deliver position; and (2) until the fail to deliver position is closed out, the participant and any broker or dealer for which it clears transactions must borrow the security that is the subject of the fail, or enter into a bona-fide arrangement to borrow such security before the participant or such broker or dealer may effect any subsequent short sales in such security. (italics mine) This pre-borrow requirement remains in place until the participant closes out the entire fail to deliver position. Therefore, a participant that has a close-out obligation for a threshold security may effect short sale orders for such threshold security up to the amount pre-borrowed."

In other words, you can naked short until we catch you, than you can't short till you cover.

Perhaps more useful is, can you play this? The thinking seems to be, if a stock appears on the list, there was naked shorting, which will have to be covered, thus there will be a short squeeze, so the play is when a stock appears on the list, go long for the pop that will occur as the naked shorts cover. I'm not really sure this is happening. Random Roger had a comment to a post on his site where the commenter indicated this was happening with a particular issue. Perhaps so.
I did a quick and dirty little experiment. I went thru the AMEX threshold list of issues that meet the SHO criteria for today. I found about 70. Curiously, many of them were iShares. I only found a handful(7) that had significant moves (defined by eyeballing the chart--no I didn't use numbers--I told you this was quick and dirty). Of these, only one, GFX, had a big move that seemed at all temporally related to being listed on the Regulation SHO threshold list.
Anyhow, if you want to keep track of these, here is the NYSE list, the Nasdaq list, and the AMEX list.

MONEY QUOTE--by my quick and dirty eyeballing of some AMEX stocks, getting listed on the SHO threshold list doesn't seem to be a catalyst for a quick short term move.

Loser's picks for today

SOHU may be a short below 15

VGZ might be "bottom-pickable" above 3.5

ADAM is a breakout at 5.25, if you're in to buying breakouts

ASTM might be a pullback buy above 3.5

DECK--35 is key, if it holds, it might be a buy

PLUM could be a pullback buy above 4.6

RMI looks like it might have support at 3.5