“Theres never good reason for holding onto a stock for sentimental purposes.” This is like the biggest DUH I have ever heard. Business and pleasure don’t mix unless you’re a…well, we wont go there. But never did I think I would be a prime offender of this little mantra. I’ve been caught red handed. I just can’t seem to find the words to break up with SIRI XM. I made a T-chart with a list of the pro’s and con’s of our relationship and it came out a tie! So what’s a girl to do? All my friends say I should dump you. Cramer has been telling me for weeks to drop it like it’s hot. I’m holding on just…a…little…longer…. Besides, CEO Mel promised a press release after this Labor Day weekend so I’ll deal with you next week.
Speaking of dropping it like its hot, General Motors (GM) is up today, but sentiment has slowly fallen according to PredictWallStreet. While GM was experiencing a few weeks of bullish sentiment, I don’t see any breaks in the declining auto industry soon, so I’ve decided to cut my losses and short my GM shares. There’s no use sitting on a lost investment. I think sometimes the hardest part of investing is being able to admit you just blew it.
I ended up buying some Middleby Corp. (MIDD) shares yesterday which looks like was a good idea!
The hands down winners of my pseudo portfolio right now are FSLR and LDK. Yet, there is something about this alternative energy sector that is making me nervous, it seems to good to be true. I almost want to keep these little gems a secret, but once more people find out, I’d expect to see some drops in these stocks. Wait, what a perfect opportunity! I will monitor the sentiment for FSLR and LDK on the widget. If sentiment begins to drop pretty consistently, this will signal to me that maybe its time to get out because the price will most likely follow. Viola!
Hope everyone has a fantastic, lazy Labor Day Weekend! Stay safe, ride a bike, watch out for parked cars, get to the beach, and eat some BBQ food. Ciao.
October. This is one of the peculiarly dangerous months to speculate in stocks in. The others are July, January, September, April, November, May, March, June, December, August and February. -Mark Twain
The market is looking a little better this morning. NASDAQ was up almost 15 points and sentiment appears to be heading into the UP region in the 1 week sentiment graph. Stocks were up today after better than expected orders were made for durable goods. I don’t really know what that means, but apparently people are buying more shtuff. I’m wearing a really tight headband right now that I think may be impeding brain waves from fully manifesting themselves into thoughts. Durable goods, people buying stuff, credit crunch, I know these all add up to something….
Today I checked out a company called Middleby Corporation (MIDD). They manufacture and sell equipment to the food service industry. At first read, I almost decided to find another company. I can hardly afford Taco Hell right now, who the heck is going out to dinner every night? I think I’m deluding myself into thinking that $15 meals are okay because I’m sacrificing the time of making food for the higher price. But then again, time is money and if you factor in…Anyways $15 is expensive and I’m trying to stay away from restaurants of any sort.
However, Middleby Corp. produces completely innovative equipment that range from power saving ovens to reducing trans fat frier’s. There CEO is an aggressive, go getter with big visions for the company. Middleby has also been aggressively acquiring companies over the last year and using there profits to buy out more companies like TurboChef, whose ovens are used at Subway. Over the last few years, they have been growing at about 24%. The company is growing pretty standardly, but is also stable in its growth. In my opinion, the stock seems to be relativley inexpensive and attractive. Middleby seems to be a little know company that is one step ahead of the game with there new products and able to accommodate a greener society. Who doesn’t like that?
There’s a new stock in my life. We met at this little place down the street called Google, I don’t know if you’ve heard of it. My friend Seeking Alpha introduced us. I don’t want to jinx anything by saying it was love at first sight, but I’m comfortable with calling it lust. LDK and I have been in our relationship for one day. Yesterday was blue skies, but today I’m feeling a little let down by LDK. You’ve lost almost 4% since when I bought you yesterday and I’m the kind of girl that likes stable, steady relationships. If you’re the moody, fluctuating type, maybe this isn’t gonna work out. I’ll let this week slide; it’s not you, its my economy.
In other stock related news, everything is down. That pretty much covers it. Just kidding, but lets look at some of my BFF’s. FSLR is down today. I found an interesting situation on the sentiment graph at PredictWallStreet.com. Make a prediction first so you can see the graph, and select the one month graph with the price quote overlayed.
Between the 8/17 and 8/24 marker you can see the price (blue) line starting to move upwards and increase. You can see shortly after that sentiment (black) began to imitate this upward movement as people became confident in FSLR. OK, so thats easy to see. THEN, you can see that sentiment actually began to fall just a little bit BEFORE the price started to fall. So the price fell after sentiment did. Can you see it? It happens really fast, sometimes in the time of a day. Contrasting situation here. Sentiment follows price-this is the usual. But, when price follows sentiment, this is the golden ticket, Charlie. This is key. And while it doesnt happen often, it happens enough if your looking for it.
The idea here is that you could anticipate a fall in the price because shareholders became more pessimistic in this company before the price actually moved. The general attitude or sentiment for this company acted as the catalyst in moving the price. And you could of seen this on a graph before it actually happened in the market. Knowing that the price usually follows sentiment in FSLR’s case (just look at the 3 month overview) you could of well, predicted wall street!
This isn’t a fool proof method. Doy. Of course, any and every investor realizes you can’t predict anything in the stock market with 100% accuracy. But Web 2.0 tools like the PredictWallStreet widget serve as extremely helpful guiders in making decisions. Imagine combing this information with other analysis, and you could have an even better method for investing decisions.
Everything else in my faux portfolio is down (SIRI, GM, blah, blah) except for Apple and First Solar, Inc. Hooray!
I thought my narcissistic tendencies would lend me some help in producing a video blog but it turns out they have been of little assistance. I spent last Thursday working on the video blog that will hopefully be up in the next few weeks. After shutting myself in a room and filming the same 30 second clip about 20 times, things have progressed minimally. Practice makes perfect!
The market is bleeding today. Yahoo! Finance reports that 91% of stocks within the S&P 500 are in negative territory today. Sorta makes you want to take that money and hide it under your mattress after all.
This Yahoo! ad was placed in the Giants Stadium. The 404 marker to the right actually stands for feet from the home plate. I tried to crack a joke about checking Yahoo!’s stock price and receiving the error page, but the pun is just too obvious here.
Cramer has continued his Sirius XM Satellite (SIRI) bashing rampage, driving the stock down to a measly 1.35 today. There are different perspectives to this story, mostly involving Cramer as a Goldman Sach’s pawn. Irregardless, the stock has plummeted. I’m actually a little sad about this, as I’m sure other SIRI supporters are as well. For those of us who have been rooting for this stock since the merger, its disappointing to see it down every morning with little let up. PredictWallStreet.com shows that sentiment has been mainly in the DOWN position for the month of August even though the majority of todays predictors have predicted UP. Even glancing at the one month sentiment graph, you can discern a bearish trend that I don’t see easing up anytime soon, especially with Cramer on the loose. Like Sirius’ CEO Mel said, once the convertible issue is cleared up, then can the company progress.
Sticking to my aforementioned goal, I checked out LDK Solar Co., Ltd., a company which manufactures solar wafers in the People’s Republic of China. Another alternative energy stock that is on the rise and one of the few stocks today that is NOT in the red. This morning, LDK projected 2009 revenue above Wall Street estimates at $2.8 billion and $3 billion. LDK has expanded its wafer production capacity ahead of schedule and is thus confident in these projections. Clean energy sector stocks have been the buzz lately, as oil prices rise and going green has become more of a conscious life strategy than a celebrity trend. Sentiment at PredictWallStreet.com for LDK is relatively neutral, but with the gains this sector is experiencing I would expect people to become more confident in these companies. As with any popular stock, there is the chance of too many people jumping on the bandwagon, so timing could be everything here.
Here is a link to my page at PredictWallStreet.com. You can check out what predictions I have made and my accuracy rating.
I would absolutely love to watch the PayPer view movies with you that you purchased on my credit card. I could bring the popcorn, you could bring the Raisinets. But unfortunately I don’t live in North Carolina. I don’t even live in South Carolina or anywhere on the East Coast. In fact, I live almost clear across country from you. So I appreciate the cordial invite, but I’d rather you stop pretending to be a 20 year old girl from California and refrain from making fraudulent charges on my cute puppy and kitten expressions credit card. Best of luck in your criminal lifestyle.
Love always,
Kristy
Identify theft sucks, man. I got to use my bluetooth headset this morning though. An overwhelming sense of power swarmed over me. I noticed myself involuntarily yelling at the women on the other end. I quickly apologized explaining I was afraid she couldn’t hear me, but I knew deep down inside it was because that headset gave me a false sense of authority like I neva eva had before. Dangerous device…
Speaking of headsets, Research in Motion headset sales fell this second quarter because of the tightening economy. Like, duh. By raising the general average price, they were able to lose less in sales in dollars.
Price shot up at the beginning of August, most likely due to an influx of law abiding customers buying headsets. Now that the initial wave of consumers have there bluetooths, combined with the weakening economy, sales have dropped for RIMM. You can see that even when sentiment fell, the price remained high telling me that perhaps consumers were undervaluing and feeling particularly pessimistic about Research in Motion. Recognizing this contrasting situation is helpful in timing opportunities. However, while Apple’s iPhone remains the tyrannic leader of smarthphones, RIM’s Blackberry remains the leader in enterprise and corporate market and is not to be overlooked. In a tempestuous market like today, long term investments may emerge as winners. Tried and true stocks with worldwide exposure, like RIMM, may be perfect for the defensive portfolio when the market is experiencing such roller coaster dips.
I predicted SIRI would close down today but so far price is up. Yikes! I’ll check back tomorrow to see what it closed at today…
For the most part, I like Yahoo’s! front page news stories- they told me Russia was fighting with Georgia, that lay off season has begun, and that Michael Phelps eats 12,000 calories a day. I respect the array of stories, because frankly I had to get out a map for that Russia/Georgia one and the Phelps breaks keep things interesting. Seriously 12,000? That’s a lot of Wheaties.
Hello world. Hello Bear market. Hibernation is over I presume. Lot of red today smacked all over the market. If I was more skilled in my investing qualities, I would be shorting all over the place right now but from the warnings of peers and every online financial site, I’ll leave the shorting to the pro’s and chalk it up in my goals board.
As I was browsing around on PredictWallStreet this morning I found an interesting article pinned on Google’s sentiment graph. Clickity click here. Personally, I have never liked T-Mobile, as I have found them to have the worst reception out of all carriers. But a deal like this could be incentive to strengthen there satellites and is with out a doubt good news for the number 4 operator in the United States. Perhaps this is the time to start looking at T-Mobiles parent company Deutsche Telekom AG (DT) as holiday season is around the corner and the phone is set to launch around October. Right now sentiment is pretty normal for DT. If you want to see the sentiment graph, go make a prediction first on DT to see the chart. Lately I have been predicting and then checking the sentiment graph only to figure out I changed my mind on which direction the stock is going to go. Fortunately, there is a change prediction link at the top of the widget so fickle minds like me can have a re-do.
Suprisingly SIRI has an overwhelmingly large number of up predictions. About 72% of users predicted up. I predicted down based on the downish dips SIRI has seen in the last few weeks. I believe these to be temporary, but that we should still see SIRI down for some time until all this debt converting is figured out. I’m curious to check back tomorrow and see if my brain or the collective was correct.
The lack of funny in this post is even boring me so I apologize, but its been a slow Monday. Hopefully Tuesday is a little more tumultuous.
in an ugly grey suit, with a giant oversized check in his hand, balloons everywhere, and goes “Surprise, you’ve just won Publishers Clearinghouse Sweepstakes!” Except the house is Ed McMahon’s. And he didn’t win anything. The Donald just bought his house. Get it?
Ed McMahon’s, Publishers Clearinghouse pitchman, home was about to be foreclosed on after he couldn’t make $644,000 on mortgage payments. In yet another of his humanitarian efforts, the Donald bought his house and plans to lease it back to Ed. Donald, apparently the avid fan of Ed as a college kid, was baffled at how such a tragedy could occur. He told LA Times “How could this happen?” I don’t know, Donald, how could it?!
If I had to pick three people to be friends with right now they would be… 1. Donald Trump 2. Dina Lohan 3. Anderson Cooper. In that order. I just wanted to throw this out there since I was on the subject of Donald. Ya, we’re on a first name basis now.
Anddddd my portfolio is up today. FSLR is kicking some stock butt, along with GM and Apple (showoff). Man, I really bought SIRI at the wrong time. 1.92 just seemed so cheap at the time, I couldn’t help myself. It was like finding an item on sale I’ve wanted for a really long time but couldn’t afford. I could afford 1.92. But I could afford 1.48 even more.
This is the sentiment graph today for FSLR for one month at PredictWallStreet. You can see when the price (blue line) was gaining some momentum sentiment (black line) peaked in the UP section. What stands out here to me is that even though the price has dropped this week, sentiment has remained relatively high. Also, around 7/23 the price dropped yet sentiment had a temporary spike. It appears to me that investors have a a lot of confidence in this company despite its price fluctuations. This would indicate to me that this would be a good long term investment because regardless of its wavering price, sentiment remains strong and will eventually pick it back up. FSLR is a cute little snowball getting bigger as it rolls down the hill.
I went a little prediction crazy yesterday and predicted on a lot of companies I know little about it. Smart move. PSYCH! This is all just good practice for me to see what companies I’m good at predicting. The decrease in my accuracy percentage shows me I need to stay out of the retail industry. Get out Kristy, get out. Which is actually quite ironic! In the real world, I’m actually very skilled in the industry of retail. Cough**shopping**cough.
First Solar, Inc. (FSLR) is down today so it turns out waiting a day to buy was a good move. I made my purchase early this morning on WallStreetSurvivor.com. FSLR is down 4.52 (1.74%) which is almost as much as it was up yesterday. I’m watching the price and already its gone up from what I bought at! Watching the price can be a very addicting habit that I do not recommend. I’m like a moth to the light, attracted to the green glow of numbers. Must. Stop. Now.
Checking my stats on PredictWallStreet.com, I’m still a glowing four star-er, but my actual accuracy percentage went down about 3%. Yesterdays predictions show a lot of giant red X’s. I predicted up for 5 of the 7 stocks I predicted on yesterday. All this red is reminding me that it may be time for the bulls to leave – it’s a bears world now. I love all these animal references in Wall Street. It really spices things up. The opportunity for puns and metaphors is boundless. Likening investors to the instincts of two brutal and merciless animals seems quite appropriate.
My new goal for my portfolio (and blog) is to find new stocks and not just the usual cult favorites like Apple and Google. I’m doing too much piggybacking and I’d rather be blazing my own trail here. First Solar, Inc. was the beginning of this path and I hope to research more companies and hopefully diversify my portfolio as its been looking pretty wimpy lately.
I recently came across Dark pools- trading networks that have at large remained under the radar and out of the public eye. The phrase itself conjures up magical Harry Potter-esque images but these Dark pools are not some magical puddle in the middle of a forest. Dark pools are a sort of underground trading network between private banks. The banks stand as platforms for trading away from public exchanges and are used by hedge funds and institutionalist’s to buy and sell large blocks of shares without ever having to show there face. Through this anonymity, the risk of moving the public price of the stock is evaded by preventing piggybacking of other investors. Tabb Group consulting says dark pools account for 12 per cent of US daily stock trading volume and rising.
This immediately alarms me, without even being a serious investor or having extensive insight into what moves the market. The first of red flags raised is regulation. The SEC has no governance over Dark pools. The second red flag raised is information (withheld). If significant amounts of trading is happening in the dark, public markets cannot accurately reflect true investor sentiment and price quotes. Investors should be guaranteed information publicly as they have been for years on regular exchanges. Prices should reflect supply/demand and the general confidence in a stock. Excluding activity only means these prices are not indicative of the fullest information available aka price manipulation.
It’s surprising to me that more people haven’t begun to question this type of trading. Its surprising to me that this has even been allowed. Wall Street is an elitist club and Dark Pools are there new hang out place. The exclusivity of investing is innate to the market, but Dark pools seems to be taking it to another level. I think its only a matter of time before some light is shed on this issue.
I figured out that my thermos is actually the root of all my bad mornings. I’m not exactly sure who made my cute pink thermos but functionality was clearly not in the design. Yes, this means I spilled again today.
This is my predicting accuracy results at PredictWallStreet.com. My star power is still glowing at a strong 4. A lot of my predictions have been based solely on anticipation of what I have read in the news. I mean it’s very, very technical. Nonetheless, I believe sentiment can move the market. Investing is inherently an emotional thing, whether investors would like to admit that or not; humans are undeniably governed at some part by pathos. There are going to be times that these emotions obscure one’s logic. This is obviously not true for every investor, but being able to recognize this eclipse in others can be extremely helpful in understanding a stock trends power.
I just sold my Verizon (VZ) shares on WallStreetSurvivor. I admit that was a stupid buy that was based solely on company affiliation and no market insight whatsoever. Since I bought them they have been in the red and at this point I just don’t want to deal with them anymore so I’m taking my loss and getting out. My other stocks (my portofilio is extremely small), Sirius XM (SIRI), General Motors (GM ) and Yahoo! (YHOO), are also down today but I guess thats the nature of a bear market. I’m not really worried about these stocks because I bought most of them inexpensively (except Yahoo, did not see the 19’s coming on that one) and these are the few companies I have utter faith in.
From my post yesterday, I’m expecting to buy First Solar, Inc. (FSLR) but am attempting to time the buy right. I’m realizing this is one of the trickiest parts of investing. If any investors have any advice on this subject, I’d love to hear it first hand from you, drop me a comment. The financial blogosphere is brutal, let me tell you, I’ve seen your guys comments. Investoggers (Bloggers+Investors, I tend to do this a lot) jump at the chance to prove anybody and everybody wrong. I know I’m wrong…sorta. So save those comments for Seeking Alpha.
I’ve noticed the price went up 5.37 (2.14%) from just this morning. I guess I should of simultaneously being blogging and buying yesterday. I’m unsure if I should get in today or wait till tomorrow morning, hoping it drops a few. So this is where that risk factor comes in I assume. Looking at the sentiment graph shows sentiment isn’t too strong for FSLR so I don’t expect to see a pop tomorrow in the price, although it could be gradual seeing as how much today’s price rose. Something in my gut is telling me not to buy today but this is probably an instance of the pathos takeover I mentioned earlier. This play is defintley going to be a learning experience, I can already feel it. Yet I’m willing to lose a few fake dollars as compensation for learning. I mean I spend a lot more on college. Sometimes investing feels like walking through a long dark hallway trying to find my bedroom.
An iPhone application called “I am Rich” sold for $999. Once bought, it placed a glowing ruby with the words “I am Rich” under it. The description stated: “The red icon on your iPhone or iPod touch always reminds you (and others when you show it to them) that you were able to afford this.” Isnt this like America’s favorite past time? Spending money to spend money. The best part is some guy bought it. And now he’s pissed at Apple. I’m still laughing at this one.
You know you’re morning is off to a good start when you spill coffee all over you new white Banana Republic cardigan and you washed your car Monday and it rained Tuesday morning. These are the auspicious signs of an excellent work day.
I used to be a five star predictor at PredictWallStreet.com but thanks to some Exxon Mobile predictions, I lost a star and am only 63.64% accurate. But nonetheless, I’m still pretty proud of myself considering a majority of users are only 3 star predictors. I plan to remain at the top of the star hierarchy. Its quite a complicated tier of power in which one must behold the power of foresight. Five star-ers hold a unique power that is revered and praised throughout the land of Prediction.
I’ve hit a stagnant point in my stock relationship. That point of monotony that can only be fixed with something new and exciting. So today I’m browsing the message boards to find some new stocks to become acquainted with. I’ve noticed a lot of talk about First Solar, Inc. (FSLR), a company that designs, manufactures, and sells solar electric power modules using a proprietary thin film semiconductor technology. They are involved in every period of the products life, from creation to recycling. This company has seen massive growth- they announced second-quarter revenue of $267 million, over 3x more than revenue from the second quarter in 2007. There projected 5-year growth rate is 47.5%. The industry average is 31.6%. In May of this year, stocks hit a 52-week high of of $317.00. Today’s stock is at $251.18.
Clearly nothing less than impressive. Here’s there income statment for more impressive numbers, you know if your into that kinda stuff.
Looming on the horizon is an even more impressive deal for First Solar. They are currently contracted with Southern California Edison to design and supply a 2 megawatt system in Fontana, the largest rooftop plant of its kind in California.
First Solar has become a revenue growth powerhouse and is at the top of the solar industry. Why? Because there product doesn’t require expensive silicon like other solar manufactures. They use thin-film technology that is cheap and just as efficient. First Solar also focuses on utility and industrial clients, rather than the fickle consumer market. The Southern California Edison deal is most likely the first in a chain of huge contracts for the company.
As Americans watch gas prices rise, going green has never seemed more cool. In fact, it’s become the newest of cromo effect fads among celebrities and yuppsters alike. The presidential election has also helped shed light onto the endorsement of solar energy and made alternative energy a sort of hot button among many Americans. The need for alternative energy sources has never been more clear or prominent and First Solar is pioneering the way.
Check out the predictions for FSLR. 71% of people predict FSLR to close up today. Checking my BFF, the sentiment chart, shows that while sentiment is not extremely strong, you can see a few UP surges in the past month that I expect we see again soon.
I’ve made a few predictions today that I will post results for tomorrow to see how my star power is holding up. I’m realizing that there a few stocks I’m pretty good at predicting on. The chemistry is just there. Using the prediction widget can be a good indicator of showing what stocks you have an affinity with, what stocks you are better at predicting and feeling out to create better investing opportunities. If you thought you were best friends with Google but have consistently predicted there movements wrong, maybe its time to find a new clique to hang with.
I’m gonna go try and get some of this coffee out of my cardigan now. Happy Olympics. Ciao
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