A Blog about Trading, Technical Analysis and other Super Important Things
Thursday, April 8, 2010
Afternoon Delight 4.8.10
It seems, from my vantage point, that BLOGGER goes haywire after 200 comments are reached... I'm trying an experiment here to see if a NEW THREAD solves the problem...
That's a shame 'cause I posted the easiest way to make a million in three short weeks on the end of the last thread. Now it has been lost for all eternity. Oh, well...
Trichet Says He Doesn't Expect Greece to Default on Debt as Crisis Worsens
is a form of medieval French, once spoken by Richard Fuld, and
translates as:
Trichet Says He Fully Expects Greece to Default on Debt But Can't Say So as Crisis Worsens Just Like it Did With Lehman Brothers as Banks Pull All Overnight Repos
Did any of you see the post over at Calc Risk about BAC and them pushing foreclosures, they are talking about seeing up to 45,000 in a month by december of this year, yet magically they predict that would be the peak.
they seem to have done really well projecting the turns so I trust that (maximum snark)
would someone else pls look at the xlf tick at 2:30.. anyway, my posts finally showed on previous thread..
what about this? ROME (Dow Jones)--The Bank of Italy has ordered a halt to further issuance of American Express credit cards in Italy.
The central bank took the action after inspections revealed compliance gaps by the card issuer related to rules covering usury, money-laundering and transparency.
The suspension was an "inevitable step" after the inspections found irregularities, a representative for the Bank of Italy said.
Distressed sales up to 29% of all sales. Sounds like a healthy real estate market to me.
First American CoreLogic today released its first monthly report on distressed sales activity. The report below indicates that distressed home sales – such as short sales and real estate owned (REO) sales – accounted for 29 percent of all sales in the U.S. in January: the highest level since April 2009. The peak occurred in January 2009 when distressed sales accounted for 32 percent of all sales transactions (Figure 1). After the peak in early 2009, the distressed sale share fell to 23 percent in July, before rising again in late 2009 and continuing into 2010.
This is just mind boggling. We're not even close to THE bottom in real estate, folks.
Among the largest 25 markets, Riverside, CA, had the largest percentage of distressed sales in January (62 percent), followed closely by Las Vegas (59 percent) and Sacramento (58 percent) (Figure 2). The top REO market was Detroit where the REO share was 48 percent, followed closely by Riverside (47 percent) and Las Vegas (45 percent). San Diego’s short sale share was 19 percent in January, making it the highest ranked short sale market, followed by Sacramento (18 percent) and Oakland (16 percent). Although the top 10 markets for foreclosures are all located in Florida, only two Florida markets, Orlando and Cape Coral, made the top 10 distressed sale list. The most likely reason: Florida is a judicial state where foreclosures process through the courts and take quite a bit longer than in California, Arizona or Nevada, where non‐judicial foreclosures are the norm.
I struggle a lot with the AXP business model in an extended bear market like this:
1. Unless you are really using a Platinum card all of the time, why pay the fee, similar argument for Gold. If you have the Centurion card then you don't care about the fees, but those are rare.
2. I've had two terrible tries at working with them in travel services to book vacations. It's not a good experience.
3. Continue to see amex accepted at less and less stores due to the extra haircut they take versus others. Their contention has always been that id didn't matter because Amex cardholders have tended to be larger spenders but I'm not sure that's as compelling as it used to be.
There are many more things to mention, but I think that current business model warrants a lot of questions if you want to be a "long term investor" in Amex.
I'd also mention that I'm pretty sure Amex charges the highest rates on average when you a carry a balance on gold or platinum vs. other cards that are comparable from MasterCard, etc.
just received an email from a cosmetic surgeon of whom I am not a patient but consulted with once and never returned..
Dear family of patients,
Look years younger with little down time - and save 50% (see below). .... Instead of $3500-$4,000, I am charging my existing family of patients $1,750 for a full facial procedure. I think this is fair, and it is also my way of thanking you all for your confidence in placing yourselves in my care.
An unexciting day as traders snuck out early or just watched the Masters on the trading desk. A little bit of bargain hunting in HY, and a decent 30y auction with an extremely strong direct bid. Who are the direct bidders? Well, anyone who has MBS exposure and wants to be hedged against widening spreads, that's who.
We did nothing. No point in hedging until the Greek nonsense has either broken out into a rampant contagion or been kicked down the road a few weeks again. There should be a bid under USTs here.
In my thread post, I even said that 1190 was possible (and I still have 1194 in mind as well)...
However... going back to the charts I put up yesterday, (52,51,54 day rallies)... We now have 43 days in the books on the present one...
We're also 21 days from my May "4th-5th" dates...
So... What do I care if we do a 21 day correction, or a 13 day correction (starting next week)...
The hardest part, FOR ME, isn't the incessant rally... Instead, it's trying to be funny until we have something REAL to talk about...
"With so much drama in the LBC it's kinda hard bein' Snoop D-O DoubleG, but I somehow, someway I keep coming up with funky @ass s*** like every single day!"
"D O double G Y D O double G ya' see Showin' much flex when it's time to wreck a mic "
Anecdotes from the (203) this week ...
Our mailman handed me my mail with broker statement on top and proceeded to tell me about him and his son trading in and out of 1k share blocks of ETFC, C and BAC over the past few months ... so. there's your volume, mailmen
Brought car in for oil change at the dealership and the gentleman who gave me a ride to work said ... "things really picked up in March, cars are moving now and they started making them again... it was dead there for a few months"
"I ONLY care about being RIGHT. I dont care about impressing you guys. I dont care about being unique, different, interesting (but wrong).
I am in the money management business. There is nothing else — except trying to be consistently and diversely CORRECT (especially in a way that accounts for reward/risk).
A few months back, I was in a meeting with the co-head of one of the top 5 hedge funds in the world. We spent an hour going over my trading history, pnl, and approach. My perf record has been good enough to get these types of meetings.
Then he says, “How come its not all priced in?” “How come this alpha exists?” So, this is a frustrating question bc I have a long-term perf record of >25% annual before fees. My wide peer group also has been successful around me, so I dont worry too much about “Why”. And then… at this point in the meeting I didnt really think either of us wanted to do a academic symposium on “alpha” although I think I have some thesis-worthy ideas… so I said — “You want my simple first answer?… People DONT WORK HARD.”
Even most people at top $B+ hedge funds with multi-million $ annual paychecks. And certainly most career “analysts” at some second rate mutual fund or pension fund. They just arent that interested in working hard. Just want to mail-in some platitudes about how “we have $100T in unfunded liabilities”… without understanding what they are actually saying. Whether or not its “right”.
CEOs, Senators, and now “Call me Ahab”. He says, nobody cares “if you’re right”. They rather keep spouting non-sense that “care about being right”.
But maybe I am “like a child”… I dont plan on changing. It seems to be working."
Test post #1
ReplyDeleteTiger teeing off NOW...
ReplyDeletetest?
ReplyDeleteThat's a shame 'cause I posted the easiest way to make a million in three short weeks on the end of the last thread. Now it has been lost for all eternity. Oh, well...
ReplyDeleteLefty will repost it later today.
@bruce
ReplyDeleteYou should have posted the "easiest way to get by 200 comments without your BLOG shutting down"...
That would have had some value!
Screw Tiger. Go Freddie.
ReplyDeleteA COUPLE of holes and FRED is 3 under.
he (Fred) killed me two weeks ago in fantasy golf.
ReplyDeleteBLOODY HELL. Another eagle.
ReplyDeleteFred has the most amazing smooth athletic swing. Poetry.
Everyone loves Freddy!
ReplyDeleteI've always been sort of partial to Jim Furyk and that swing.
ReplyDeleteHey just a thought since it was discussed yesterday, did we come up with a plan for when blogger craps out like this?
ReplyDeleteI've got Dread Cap bookmarked so I'd have no problem there, or Ra's, those seemed like good ideas.
Yeah, it did seem that the problem started yesterday and today around 200 comments.
ReplyDeleteThis may indeed solve the problem.
(Either that or everyone go away and stop commenting).
Bad info on the PGA web site. Fred at -2, Zach Johnson and..
ReplyDelete- Tom Watson - are burning it up !!!
Start a new thread at 150 ?
ReplyDeleteLB had some pearls of wisdom that were LOST from HUMANITY...!
GS can't seem to bust out above that 180, been stuck there a few hours now.
ReplyDeletethese sort of statements here seem to often serve as good warnings:
Trichet Says He Doesn't Expect Greece to Default on Debt as Crisis Worsens
Watson a 67. No Bogeys. Phenomenal.
ReplyDeleteCasey and Westwood scoring well. Bruce will be happy. He loves the English. You can tell.
Trichet Says He Doesn't Expect Greece to Default on Debt as Crisis Worsens
ReplyDeleteis a form of medieval French, once spoken by Richard Fuld, and
translates as:
Trichet Says He Fully Expects Greece to Default on Debt But Can't Say So as Crisis Worsens Just Like it Did With Lehman Brothers as Banks Pull All Overnight Repos
So how do we know that Papandreou and his cronies aren’t making a ton of money trading EUR/USD using inside info?
ReplyDelete@all
ReplyDeleteThis seems to solve the problem...
I'm going to do one of two things...
I'll either monitor the posts, and when we get past 150 or so, I'll start preparing another...
OR
I'll just LAUNCH a secondary one regularly around noontime...
Keep the comments within a manageable number...
What are you insinuating about Greeks? Are you suggesting we might be slightly dishonest scofflaws and the WIDE BOYS of Europe?
ReplyDelete@LB
ReplyDelete"LB had some pearls of wisdom that were LOST from HUMANITY...!
Maybe they ended up in Germany?
CV @ 2:31
ReplyDeleteAlso makes for faster loading on a wireless device.
If someone is blogging here in a wireless device...
ReplyDeleteThey need to GET A LIFE :-)
CV,
ReplyDeleteIf this doesn't fix the problem, I think you should demand a full refund.
Plus interest.
Actually Lefty, I do love the English. And I like them even better when I can understand the language they are speaking...
ReplyDeleteFrom other thread:
ReplyDeleteDamn you Manny! Now I can't get it out of my head - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iWVe3AB8OY8
I suppose you are watching the Masters here:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.masters.com/en_US/console/console.html?ts=1270752133779&video=ac&syn=&db=false&ref=www.masters.com/en_US/index.html&alt=
Liverpool kicking off in a minute... Tiger at Augusta.... Mr Market may slumber into the morning session...
ReplyDeleteHa ha Amen! I love it. Uh oh, I think I can't stop either.
ReplyDeleteWow, those are some sweet outfits, especially the tuxes, Amen.
ReplyDeleteS&P A/D 2.5:1
ReplyDeleteNYSE A/D 2.02:1
Damn...
Up, Up, and awwaaay, my beautiful, my beautiful ba-lloooooonnnnn!!!
ReplyDeleteAlright, I gotta get out of here for a bit. Am going loony tunes.
The 1.786x666.79=1190.89 is back in play (again.
ReplyDeleteDid any of you see the post over at Calc Risk about BAC and them pushing foreclosures, they are talking about seeing up to 45,000 in a month by december of this year, yet magically they predict that would be the peak.
ReplyDeletethey seem to have done really well projecting the turns so I trust that (maximum snark)
@ben: I posted that link here yesterday. UFB. Here's another post about increasing distressed sales. Not surprising to anyone here.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/04/report-distressed-home-sales-increasing.html
S&P A/D 2.5:1
ReplyDeleteNYSE A/D 2.02:1
Damn...
TIGER effect. JOHNNY in charge. The Pros are all watching the golf...
would someone else pls look at the xlf tick at 2:30.. anyway, my posts finally showed on previous thread..
ReplyDeletewhat about this? ROME (Dow Jones)--The Bank of Italy has ordered a halt to further issuance of American Express credit cards in Italy.
The central bank took the action after inspections revealed compliance gaps by the card issuer related to rules covering usury, money-laundering and transparency.
The suspension was an "inevitable step" after the inspections found irregularities, a representative for the Bank of Italy said.
Distressed sales up to 29% of all sales. Sounds like a healthy real estate market to me.
ReplyDeleteFirst American CoreLogic today released its first monthly report on distressed sales activity. The report below indicates that distressed home sales – such as short sales and real estate owned (REO) sales – accounted for 29 percent of all sales in the U.S. in January: the highest level since April 2009. The peak occurred in January 2009 when distressed sales accounted for 32 percent of all sales transactions (Figure 1). After the peak in early 2009, the distressed sale share fell to 23 percent in July, before rising again in late 2009 and continuing into 2010.
This is just mind boggling. We're not even close to THE bottom in real estate, folks.
ReplyDeleteAmong the largest 25 markets, Riverside, CA, had the largest percentage of distressed sales in January (62 percent), followed closely by Las Vegas (59 percent) and Sacramento (58 percent) (Figure 2). The top REO market was Detroit where the REO share was 48 percent, followed closely by Riverside (47 percent) and Las Vegas (45 percent). San Diego’s short sale share was 19 percent in January, making it the highest ranked short sale market, followed by Sacramento (18 percent) and Oakland (16 percent). Although the top 10 markets for foreclosures are all located in Florida, only two Florida markets, Orlando and Cape Coral, made the top 10 distressed sale list. The most likely reason: Florida is a judicial state where foreclosures process through the courts and take quite a bit longer than in California, Arizona or Nevada, where non‐judicial foreclosures are the norm.
Karen,
ReplyDeleteI struggle a lot with the AXP business model in an extended bear market like this:
1. Unless you are really using a Platinum card all of the time, why pay the fee, similar argument for Gold. If you have the Centurion card then you don't care about the fees, but those are rare.
2. I've had two terrible tries at working with them in travel services to book vacations. It's not a good experience.
3. Continue to see amex accepted at less and less stores due to the extra haircut they take versus others. Their contention has always been that id didn't matter because Amex cardholders have tended to be larger spenders but I'm not sure that's as compelling as it used to be.
There are many more things to mention, but I think that current business model warrants a lot of questions if you want to be a "long term investor" in Amex.
I'd also mention that I'm pretty sure Amex charges the highest rates on average when you a carry a balance on gold or platinum vs. other cards that are comparable from MasterCard, etc.
ReplyDeleteyou gotta check the last two http://www.bubbleinfo.com/ posts.
ReplyDeleteGreece seeks to curb bets against its debt:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.reuters.com/article/idUSLDE63729N20100408
Thanks K
ReplyDeleteHmm, who knew when Cage did Gone in 60 Seconds that it'd be the same length of time the unsuccessful auction on his home lasted.
ReplyDeleteI love how they describe the decor, lol.
What did I miss? Why is AMZN +4.6%?
ReplyDeleteNic,
ReplyDeletesounds a little like when the banned shorts on the banks yes?
Remember how that worked out.
Greece will default.
Ra,
ReplyDeletei heard a rumor that the p/e was too low on it.
Found it: Amazon to sell Kindle at Target
ReplyDelete@AR -Or why is EK +17%?
ReplyDeleteMcF
ReplyDeleteYou made me look. p/e 69.12 HAHAHA
But Vancouver is different remember.. lots of foreign money.. cash buyers.. LOL, that's what they were saying in so cal a few years ago..
ReplyDeleteIronworker
ReplyDeleteI can't find any news on EK that would explain their rise.
Sky rockets in flight...
ReplyDeleteAFTERNOON delight...
Ever had any afternoon delight, Karen?
XRT (weekly 3LB info)
ReplyDeletetrend=up
mid= 40.94
rev= 40.19
Reversed up week ending 2/19/10 and started trending week ending 3/5/10.
GTFOOH
Leftback,
ReplyDeleteKaren is unavailable for comment at this time.
I can not believe ISRG is flirting $340.. total insanity..
ReplyDeletelooking at the price % gainers and dollar gainers across the spectrum is, is, is...
True pain is looking at a monthly chart of AIG and seeing how far it fell. Never got to zero though (snark).
ReplyDeleteThere's a reason AIG didn't go to zero... I paid people off.
ReplyDeleteon the previous thread, i posted a RobotTrader link from April 6..
ReplyDeletehttp://www.zerohedge.com/article/battling-brains-pimco-must-be-sweating-bullets
CV: Liverpool 2 Benfica 0. But it's still early...
ReplyDeletejust received an email from a cosmetic surgeon of whom I am not a patient but consulted with once and never returned..
ReplyDeleteDear family of patients,
Look years younger with little down time - and save 50% (see below).
....
Instead of $3500-$4,000, I am charging my existing family of patients $1,750 for a full facial procedure. I think this is fair, and it is also my way of thanking you all for your confidence in placing yourselves in my care.
@karen
ReplyDeleteHis first name isn't Pete, and his last name isn't the compass direction of where Santa Claus lives is it?
UFB XLF.. the only thing i can say is volume was lower than yesterday..
ReplyDeleteThe Bond Report 4.8.10
ReplyDeleteAn unexciting day as traders snuck out early or just watched the Masters on the trading desk. A little bit of bargain hunting in HY, and a decent 30y auction with an extremely strong direct bid. Who are the direct bidders? Well, anyone who has MBS exposure and wants to be hedged against widening spreads, that's who.
Corpies: LQD -0.19%; AGG -0.10%; JNK 0.28%; HYG 0.17%;
Govies: TLT 0.05%; IEI -0.06%; TIP -0.10%
We did nothing. No point in hedging until the Greek nonsense has either broken out into a rampant contagion or been kicked down the road a few weeks again. There should be a bid under USTs here.
CV, what in the world are you talking about?! The cosmetic surgeon? His last name is Weiss..
ReplyDeleteCV,
ReplyDeleteROTFLMAO.....
Karen it is nice to know there is still innocence left in southern california :)
ReplyDeleteAs in...
ReplyDelete"You'd better wise up... Janet Weiss" (Rocky Horror)... :-)
Liverpool up 3-0. Come on, you Reds.
ReplyDeleteCV, by the way. YELLOW CARD.
ReplyDeleteokay, okay, i looked him up and get it now !! glad you could have a laugh on me.
ReplyDeletegoing to the beach in a huff. later all.
ReplyDeleteDon't be huffy.
ReplyDeleteDL,
ReplyDeleteI think she meant the bike brand?
b22/mcfearless
@LB
ReplyDeleteThat was not meritorious of a yellow card...
Cv was only illustrating the ABSURDITY of marketing efforts by a cosmetic surgeon, actually trumps the ABSURDITY of the service they provide...
It seemed like a VERY APPROPRIATE metaphor...
To me anyway :-)
ReplyDelete4-1 Liverpool.
ReplyDeleteTorres... Goodnight....!
Folks,
ReplyDeleteI'm not giving up on RELEASING THE KRACKEN...
In my thread post, I even said that 1190 was possible (and I still have 1194 in mind as well)...
However... going back to the charts I put up yesterday, (52,51,54 day rallies)... We now have 43 days in the books on the present one...
We're also 21 days from my May "4th-5th" dates...
So... What do I care if we do a 21 day correction, or a 13 day correction (starting next week)...
The hardest part, FOR ME, isn't the incessant rally... Instead, it's trying to be funny until we have something REAL to talk about...
"With so much drama in the LBC it's kinda hard bein' Snoop D-O DoubleG, but I somehow, someway I keep coming up with funky @ass s*** like every single day!"
"D O double G Y D O double G ya' see
ReplyDeleteShowin' much flex when it's time to wreck a mic "
Anecdotes from the (203) this week ...
Our mailman handed me my mail with broker statement on top and proceeded to tell me about him and his son trading in and out of 1k share blocks of ETFC, C and BAC over the past few months ... so. there's your volume, mailmen
Brought car in for oil change at the dealership and the gentleman who gave me a ride to work said ... "things really picked up in March, cars are moving now and they started making them again... it was dead there for a few months"
Anyone notice that M2 fell by 11 billion and consumer credit also fell 11 billion? Are they related somehow?
ReplyDeletera,
ReplyDeletethere is no relation as far as I know, two different sides of the ledger.
CV...Is this you, flame-baiting on another site?
ReplyDelete"I ONLY care about being RIGHT. I dont care about impressing you guys. I dont care about being unique, different, interesting (but wrong).
I am in the money management business. There is nothing else — except trying to be consistently and diversely CORRECT (especially in a way that accounts for reward/risk).
A few months back, I was in a meeting with the co-head of one of the top 5 hedge funds in the world. We spent an hour going over my trading history, pnl, and approach. My perf record has been good enough to get these types of meetings.
Then he says, “How come its not all priced in?” “How come this alpha exists?” So, this is a frustrating question bc I have a long-term perf record of >25% annual before fees. My wide peer group also has been successful around me, so I dont worry too much about “Why”. And then… at this point in the meeting I didnt really think either of us wanted to do a academic symposium on “alpha” although I think I have some thesis-worthy ideas… so I said — “You want my simple first answer?… People DONT WORK HARD.”
Even most people at top $B+ hedge funds with multi-million $ annual paychecks. And certainly most career “analysts” at some second rate mutual fund or pension fund. They just arent that interested in working hard. Just want to mail-in some platitudes about how “we have $100T in unfunded liabilities”… without understanding what they are actually saying. Whether or not its “right”.
CEOs, Senators, and now “Call me Ahab”. He says, nobody cares “if you’re right”. They rather keep spouting non-sense that “care about being right”.
But maybe I am “like a child”… I dont plan on changing. It seems to be working."
@Anon
ReplyDeleteThat sure isn't me...
If it SOUNDS like me I'd better change my literary style :-)...
CV is more likely to say things like "Release the Kracken"
My IQ isn't high enough to pen something like you just printed :-)
where was that comment posted? And I don't get the part about Ahab?
ReplyDeleteIn any event, def. doesn't sound like something CV would say imo.
Maybe that cognos dude?
Love your style! Eclectic genius!May even be on the RIGHT side of the IQ curve:-)
ReplyDeleteWhy leave your two telltale fingerprints if you were not waiting to be outed?
Please tell me that Harry
Wanger is BR and not
you!
@anon
ReplyDeleteActually, in your (6:27), I went back and studied the post... I see your point... The telltale signs...
#1 CAPS LOCK on words
#2 ... (3 dot endings to sentences)
UNCANNY... :-)
I promise you it wasn't me though...
I'm pondering, however, the idea that CV hasn't created an entire literary style in the BLOGOSPHERE...
OK that's enough pondering
NEW THREAD UP
Amens WRAP & LB's bond, (James Bond) report
Your right.Could have been almost anybody! Your way too smart to write tripe like that anyway.
ReplyDelete