Are You Still In?

[mcbockalds]

Yesterday, in the mail, I got my copy of Bill Gross's June 2012 Investment Outlook and read it before going to bed. As the Sha Na Na song goes, "I couldn't sleep at all last night...."

 

Bill Gross is not your typical ranting, hairshirt fanatic crying, "The world is ending!" He is too smart, too educated, too responsible, too experienced, too controlled... to say that. But he certainly said the next Sha Na Na line, "Baby things weren't right..."

 

Well, of course the Sha Na Na couldn't be expected to include such unhip, uncool lines like Bill's:

 

"the 1% feed primarily off of money, not invention. They would have you believe that stocks, bonds and real estate move higher because of their wisdom, when in fact, prices float on an ocean of credit, a sea in which all fish and mammals are now increasingly at risk because of high debt and its delevering consequences."

 

"The global monetary system which has evolved and morphed over the past century but always in the direction of easier, cheaper and more abundant credit, may have reached a point at which it can no longer operate efficiently and equitably to promote economic growth and the fair distribution of its benefits."

 

"Euroland is just a localized tumor however. The developing credit cancer may be metastasized, and the global monetary system fatally flawed by increasingly risky and unacceptably low yields, produced by the debt crisis and policy responses to it."

 

With lyrics like that swimming around in your sleepy head, how could anyone sleep? Except perhaps for Federal Reserve economists who swim not in the real world (it is much too complicated and messy) but in their computer models of a much simpler world, where by mathematical design, crises and catastrophes never happen because they can't happen. Now that sounds like "Sha Na Na" land to me.

 

Cheers John

[RV_]

Tesla should begin delivering the new model S this Friday. The final week is here and I am having difficulty deciding whether to let it all ride, take half off the table at 38, or taking it all off the table. I am not asking for advice.

 

Several here are following this and some are even in it with me. It is my feeling that since others in the biz say it is a buy that it will be volatile this week especially if they are one day late. I think that buying now will yield a few bucks by the end of the week in profit but remember I am a complete beginner and do not claim to know what I am talking about with Stocks, I just followed this one and the owner from back in the Pay Pal day.

 

Many of you may have watched the historic docking of a commercial capsule launched by a private company succeeding and ushering in a new era of private enterprise space launches and exploration. That company, Space X, is also owned by Elon Musk, the one behind Pay Pal and Tesla. It ios expected that he will bring that company to IPO next year. I will be there too. I hope all have a great week,! (I hope I do too! )

 

http://www.thestreet.com/story/11584954/1/tesla-motors-inc-tsla-todays-featured-automotive-winner.html?puc=yahoo&cm_ven=YAHOO

 

http://www.thestreet.com/story/11584954/1/tesla-motors-inc-tsla-todays-featured-automotive-winner.html?puc=yahoo&cm_ven=YAHOO

 

http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2012/06/15/this-weeks-5-smartest-stock-moves.aspx

 

Safe investing!

Edited June 19, 2012 by RV

[mbnken]

Best luck to you whatever you decide. Hopefully it will be a nice run up for a successful company.

 

Investing in these times is exciting... sure beats sitting around posting gloom and doom reports or being so pessimistic that you miss the opportunities.

 

Go get 'em RV.

[ed6713]

Yesterday, in the mail, I got my copy of Bill Gross's June 2012 Investment Outlook and read it before going to bed. As the Sha Na Na song goes, "I couldn't sleep at all last night...."

 

Bill Gross is not your typical ranting, hairshirt fanatic crying, "The world is ending!" He is too smart, too educated, too responsible, too experienced, too controlled... to say that.

 

John. Are you referring to this Bill Gross,

 

http://www.forbes.com/sites/petercohan/2012/02/25/bill-grosss-bad-call-cost-investors-5-7-trillion/

 

or another one?

 

ed

[notop]

RV: may your endeavors be always prosperous.

[RV_]

Thanks guys!

I knew what was going to happen until this week. Now I am not entirely sure what will happen beyond Friday. More and more I am leaning towards taking half off the table and staying long on the rest. I don't have any other place to put cash that is worth putting it. I am sure everyone else does, but I am talking about anything I know, like I followed Tesla years before they went public. It is late and I am bushed. Hope all had a great Father's day. We did here.

[RV_]

Wow Ed,

That guy is seriously out to lunch. But I now see why it is hard to stay on track rather than following fears or being incapable of changing in light of new information that changed the game. I am sure the last maker of buggy whips was the best. But buggy whips were obsolete and irrelevant with the new fact of the automobile.

[mcbockalds]

John. Are you referring to this Bill Gross,

 

http://www.forbes.com/sites/petercohan/2012/02/25/bill-grosss-bad-call-cost-investors-5-7-trillion/

 

or another one?

 

ed

Oh my. Did you notice a few things wrong with the article? Did Gross actually say to sell all stocks like the author implies with his numbers? Did Gross continue to say sell all stocks over the last 4 years? Did you know that Pimco is not just a bond fund, but manages all types of assets? Did Pimco sell all its stocks back in Feb. 2009? Do you know how well bond funds have done over the last 4 years? This article reminds me of another one you referenced in the past and it too had some serious logical flaws. That said, Bill Gross way underestimated the boldness of Ben Bernanke to inflate the money supply in order to re-inflate the stock market. And so we sure do have a re-inflated stock market.

 

Cheers John

 

 

Edit I thought I would read some of Gross's Investment Outlooks later in 2009, for example August 2009 where he says,

 

"There is no investment potion for this new environment other than steady income-producing bond and

equity investments in companies with strong balance sheets and high dividend yields

, as well as selectively chosen emerging market commitments where nominal GDP growth prospects are tilted upward as opposed to gravitating to new lower norms."

So much for selling all your stocks.

Edited June 19, 2012 by mcbockalds

[mcbockalds]

Wow Ed,

That guy is seriously out to lunch. But I now see why it is hard to stay on track rather than following fears or being incapable of changing in light of new information that changed the game. I am sure the last maker of buggy whips was the best. But buggy whips were obsolete and irrelevant with the new fact of the automobile.

No RV, the guy who is out to lunch is the author, Peter Cohan. His "analysis" is inept and plainly wrong at a number of points. It is a very good example of the truth of the advice, don't believe everything you read. I do marvel at some of the trash masquerading as economic analysis.

 

Cheers John

[Jack Mayer]

No RV, the guy who is out to lunch is the author, Peter Cohan. His "analysis" is inept and plainly wrong at a number of points. It is a very good example of the truth of the advice, don't believe everything you read. I do marvel at some of the trash masquerading as economic analysis.

 

Cheers John

 

If you want to read some more balanced analysis I suggest John Mauldin. Google it. (John, I know you already read him....)

 

He is usually spot on. And at least he will say WHY he believes in something. His analysis is "approachable" and will allow someone who "wants" to think this stuff through to do so.....

[RV_]

Jack,

I took your advice months ago and get his weekly letter. Sometimes I read , other times after a few paras I delete it. Not out of disgust but just wasn't interested in the topic.

 

(Switching voice to any readers not Jack)

 

You guys have to understand that I am not a fanatic about the terminology and anxieties of investing. I am not into shorting or not, have no idea what most of the terms y'all use mean, and the raw fear generated by people who have had their faith shaken by the institutions they were conditioned to trust, and can't break that conditioning and keep going back for more just is a waste of time to me. I don't much care for the new equivalent of the elevator speech or pitch which I like to think of as the balloon pitch. Just as the wizard (who wasn't) gave when he lifted off for Kansas and left Dorothy behind.

 

"Oz: This is positively the finest exhibition ever to be shown -- well, eh...well, be that as it may, I, your Wizard, per ardua ad alta, am about to embark upon a hazardous and technically unexplainable journey into the outer stratosphere...to confer, converse, and otherwise hobnob with my brother wizards.

And I hereby decree that until what time, if any, that I return the Scarecrow, by virtue of his highly superior brains, shall rule in my stead, assisted by the Tin Man, by virtue of his magnificent heart, and the Lion, by virtue of his courage.

Obey them as you would me."

I sincerely believe that none of us, or them, have a crystal ball that works or we would not all be discussing whose Balloon speech we like the most often. Jack my contention is that I am perhaps at the advantage because of the very fact that I have no past "experience" bogging me down in my first foray into buying stock directly. Instead of trying to game the system and take advantage of the many insider info tips that do not seem to work for anybody in this thread I chose to approach it as an investment in a man at the helm and a company who has a product that I believe in, and who brought the original Tesla Roadster to Market choosing to build a supercar that 90% still haven't been able to wrap their conditioned minds around.

Making cars does not have to start with mass production of a consumer priced vehicle.

I still hear "It's too expensive"

Is a Ferrari too expensive for their market? Do they stay in biz with a niche market and do not even try to sell to the masses? How about the Hummer, the real one? It costs roughly twice what the Model S will cost!

I believed in a company that first did the supposedly impossible and made not only an all electric car in the super car class, but one that beat the million dollar ones, and cost less than the entry level super car the Porsche 911. They did that in 2008 and were a full production vehicle and most didn't even get it then. Most folks were unaware of their success in production two years before they went public. (2008 Roadster in production - 2010 IPO)

I still can't get folks to understand that it is not a new concept and has been in production and improving since 2008 with all of the first year production presold in the roadster. Their new car, the Model S, is starting deliveries of prepaid cars the day after tomorrow.

In other words, this is not an unproven company. They went IPO when they needed to raise capital because they needed to buy and refit the Fremont factory from Toyota and gear up production.

Everyone is still saying things like they can't do it, unable to read what they do not want to believe. Heck Elon still owns Space X outright pretty much. It won't go IPO until next year. Do we see a trend here? I do. Unlike those who bring a concept and a hope to the table, PayPal his first company was only sold after it was a success. Tesla only went IPO after it was successful and brought the roadster to market. They didn't IPO until after two years of successfully selling the Roadster globally. Space X made history with its launch and successful first private company to get NASA contracts and now global contracts to launch better an d cheaper than the other big boys.

Elon Musk is a rocket scientist. He has already shown his behaviors. He takes a concept and does it on his own or with a couple of friends and only after it is a success does he move on. Otherwise if it was all only about money, he would have declared Space X to IPO as quickly as Facebook did except it likely would not be a disaster. Tesla is in no danger of either being sold or failing at least until he finishes his current list of to dos including next year's launch of the Model X and then the consumer car after that.

Space X is in no danger of going IPO prematurely because then it won't have a string of successes behind it as it will by following his plan.

In other words I don't play the market. I invested in a man and a proven company that already did what they said they would as soon as he let us in. I have already decided to take only half off the table, if any, and go long with them for the rest if not all of it. You see I have no place to put it except back in the bank at no earnings but about $108.00 per thousand dollars of my money I let them use. I have never but once since I invested seen it go as low as my first block price, and only dipped to my second block price twice in two years. Since the Model S debuts in two days it has gone up 5 dollars in five days. I do hope that someone took my prediction and the circumstances under consideration and made some short term gains. It will drop in the next six months as the claims it is not in the black yet are bandied about. When in fact they have already told everybody they will be in the black in 2013 clearly.

Anyway, I invest in a company, I don't play the market as I do not know how. I try to buy low and sell high not the other way around in a panic. I might even at the last second sell it all and buy in again in six months perhaps even lower than my second block cost for half of my gains. Comments appreciated on that idea Jack.

Anyway, my way, despite all the rules I am breaking that others say are necessary to making some money, is working so far for me. And please don't call it luck anybody (not you Jack) as the long term members here have seen me writing about Tesla for about 8 years now and even more so since 2008 when they brought out their Roadster that I could not afford. Knowing a man and a company is not luck. Especially when I persisted when all the others said I was foolish and it would never come to market, then it did. Then that no one would buy it and the first two years were sold out and paid in full in advance. And now that they will not be able to sell the average 200 miles per charge High performance 7 seater, high tech model S luxury Sedan to the public who have already made down payments on the first years production once again. And now the falsehood that Tesla has to sell to everybody. No they only need to sell whatever their maximum factory capacity is. I believe that it will be past 40 by Friday. 38 at least by next week. If all anybody read was the trade stock market people they would only get a buy solid and maybe one fact or a run for the hills it is a loser! Motley Fool has been flip flopping to both extremes since it IPO'd!

Sorry, I am so excited!!!!!

:D :D

Edited June 20, 2012 by RV

[RV_]

No RV, the guy who is out to lunch is the author, Peter Cohan. His "analysis" is inept and plainly wrong at a number of points. It is a very good example of the truth of the advice, don't believe everything you read. I do marvel at some of the trash masquerading as economic analysis.

 

Cheers John

 

Does that apply to your posts and links too? It sure does to mine!

 

I declare my ignorance of playing the market in almost every post. I don't go with anybody but my own work and research. I sincerely believe that playing the market is gimmicks by and large and that those playing by the old rules are being deceived by the old deceivers who pretend to be the solid foundations of our economy and banking and investment structures. Buying and selling in the same day isn't investing to me. It is gaming no differently than the Casinos. Panics and prices are crazy because we all got a peek behind the curtain and saw who was working the levers and controls to their advantage, not ours when the big institutions failed, wailed, bailed, were never curtailed, and are back to saying the check is in the mail.

 

I sincerely believe it is Paradigm blindness. Joel Barker in the mid 80s did a video in which he dealt out cards and proved that we all see what we expect to see based on how we believe things are supposed to work. Even when we know we are being tested and tricked.

 

The way my Grandfather taught me the saying was believe nothing that you hear, and only half of what you see. Of course it goes back to before there was printing presses so applies to what we read too as that is hearsay of another kind. And as Joel Barker proved our perceptions in person can be manipulated as well.

 

I don't think it is about whether your linked articles are right, or another's. At least not for me. I could care less, but I doubt them because I have read their articles in the stock market trades and they are abysmally ignorant. I am still going to do what my own experience and gut tells me to do based on research and past behaviors as a good predictor of future behaviors. Besides, while it is just money, it is important for putting a bunch of my fellow Americans to work in Fremont California, and making the US the world leader in EV technology and production. If they succeed with my help and others, I am in. I can help and make changes as part of the whole. And I don't care what party they are, or what their first language was. And I can't wait to participate in literally reaching for the stars. I don't want to manipulate money to make more. I want to build things to do it, or at least help in the financing.

 

Edited June 20, 2012 by RV

[mcbockalds]

Does that apply to your posts and links too?

My posts and links are all sitting there for anyone to point out any errors of analysis. I welcome it. I can tell you however the job of finding errors in my posts and links won't be as simple as it was for me to find them in Peter Cohan's article. There are honest errors and then there is trash and the difference between the two is usually pretty easy to distinguish. I would also welcome seeing a defense of Cohan's article in light of the criticisms I pointed out about it.

 

Cheers John

[RV_]

You missed the humor in the statement when you said to not believe everything you read. So you were in effect saying don't believe anything you read except my writing. I pointed out the humor good naturedly and apparently that wasn't taken that way. I am sorry but that is for you to work out. I am going to another thread. I have been posting here only because that is where I started out on this. I don't know how many ways I can say I am ignorant of playing the market, and that I think all the analysts are BS. And that I don't care what they say. And to disregard anything I say, except to note if my "predictions" about Elon Musk doing what he said he would is reliable. See they aren't predictions. The plan has been laid out for years, and posted publicly on the Tesla website. I am simply parroting that back in both my posts and my investing. If you want analysis from me or me to read yours sorry. I don't know enough to give you a good challenging exchange. And don't care to. That sincerely said not in anger. Your anger is your problem, not mine. As much as this may be hard to believe, it just does not matter to me. I am fine in my world ignorant of all the market except what my investment is doing. I wish you the best in your endeavors to convince others of yours.

Safe investing! (Or not)

Edited June 20, 2012 by RV

[mcbockalds]

You missed the humor in the statement when you said to not believe everything you read. So you were in effect saying don't believe anything you read except my writing. I pointed out the humor good naturedly and apparently that wasn't taken that way. I am sorry but that is for you to work out. I am going to another thread. I have been posting here only because that is where I started out on this. I don't know how many ways I can say I am ignorant of playing the market, and that I think all the analysts are BS. And that I don't care what they say. And to disregard anything I say, except to note if my "predictions" about Elon Musk doing what he said he would is reliable. See they aren't predictions. The plan has been laid out for years, and posted publicly on the Tesla website. I am simply parroting that back in both my posts and my investing. If you want analysis from me or me to read yours sorry. I don't know enough to give you a good challenging exchange. And don't care to. That sincerely said not in anger. Your anger is your problem, not mine. As much as this may be hard to believe, it just does not matter to me. I am fine in my world ignorant of all the market except what my investment is doing. I wish you the best in your endeavors to convince others of yours.

Safe investing! (Or not)

I did not miss the humor. I am not angry with anything you said. I did not expect you to critically analyze any of my posts, because you have made it clear in the past that macroeconomics/finance is not one of your areas of interest.

 

If I have any anger, and I probably do, it is toward what I perceive as bad analysis. "Bad" analysis is not defined as analysis that I disagree with! Here are just a few examples of errors in thinking that lead to bad analysis: rationalization, oversimplification, unwarranted assumptions, faulty common sense, stereotyping, hasty conclusions.... I look for these and in "trash" analysis they are glowing and flashing to someone who is looking for them.

 

Finally, the reason I said that I welcome critical comment on my posts is not that I think I am never wrong, or that I think I can win out against anyone's criticisms of me, but because I don't want to be peddling bad analysis. Simple as that.

 

Cheers John

[RV_]

Thanks for the clarification John. I think that, as I said with no rancor, that a thread about making money today in the market will be more focused on what I want to learn a bit more about. I think I have been on this thread long enough as I have not participated except to say I am still in, and making money the whole time thus far. Money has always been easy for me, maybe because I am not ambitious or worried about it. My past investments have paid off and I am set for life. I am diversified in my holdings but that is because I am risk averse and believe in land and hard currency, in addition to select antiques and art as well as my funds and my one stock soon to be two. Nothing new here really. I am tickled at how knowing Elon will actually execute his plans pretty much on time and always has makes me look like I know something. I do. Listen to the guy making me money as far as stocks go.

[mcbockalds]

 

Federal Reserve economists who swim not in the real world (it is much too complicated and messy) but in their computer models of a much simpler world, where by mathematical design, crises and catastrophes never happen because they can't happen. Now that sounds like "Sha Na Na" land to me.

 

 

Well Alan Greenspan is finally starting to see a little bit of the light that a few other economists (Bill Gross, John Hussman, John Mauldin, and others) have been seeing for a few years. Greenspan says in the early part of the video, "...Macroeconometric models"...at the IMF, Fed,{and others}...are wholly inadequate in understanding how the complex financial system works both in the U.S. and globally. The consequence is that you can not forecast crises of any sort because they all are fundamentally financial crises."

 

Now doesn't that give you a lot of confidence? The Federal Reserve, our central bank, which is responsible for understanding the financial system and how it is affected by monetary and fiscal policies, the money supply, interest rates, the levels of loans, debt, and credit and on and on, does not have a model that understands the financial system!

 

Also, after Greenspan made that statement, I can't imagine why the interviewer didn't stop the interview right there and say something like, "Alan, did you really mean what you just said? Would you like to take back or re-phrase that just a little? Do you realize that you basically just said the the Fed, IMF, and central banks world wide have no clothes on? Are we really in that bad of shape?"

 

Greenspan just dropped a bombshell that I have yet to see any response to in the financial press that I read. We will see if anyone picks up on this.

 

Cheers John (I can't believe he said that.)

[Dan Zemke]

I'm still 100% in cash in all my accounts and have been since the end of March. I lost out on about 5% of potential market gain by not being invested (I sold some in Jan and Feb at lower prices than my biggest sale in March and collected interest that was lower than the dividends afterwards).

 

Last Friday, I bought SPY puts at $140 for Dec 22 and $135 on Jan 19. The last time I bet that the market was going to go down (spring of 1999) was a few months before the dot com bubble burst. But I shorted 4 internet stocks and lost a LOT of money. At least this time, I've limited my exposure by using puts instead shorts.

 

Dan

[ed6713]

It's been a truly remarkable 12 months for the stock market. Here's hoping you ignored the gloom & doom types. You don't suppose they will apologize to their paid subscribers for all the bum advice they passed out over the past year? Naa.

 

The DOW: up 20.54%

Nasdaq Composite: up 24.82%

S&P 500: up 23.60%

CBOE Mkt Volatility index (VIX) down 59.06%

 

The usual disclaimer applies "Past performance is no guarantee bla, bla, bla"

 

Here's hoping the positive trend continues. My personal guess is that the major indexes will end the year higher then they are now..

 

What do you think? Higher or lower??

 

ed

[bobofthenorth]

What do you think? Higher or lower??

 

It doesn't really matter. As long as there's a trend there's money to be made.

 

Right now its clearly positive but I'm keeping my stops pretty tight because I don't trust it long term.

[mcbockalds]

t I'm keeping my stops pretty tight because I don't trust it long term.

Given the Long Term view of the S&P 500, tight stops might be a good idea.

 

The enthusiasm must have been pretty high in the Fall of 1999 when the S&P was hitting new highs in the 1400s. But then not so much after that. Then enthusiasm was growing again in the Fall of 2007 as the S&P approached its 1999 highs. But once again not so much after that. Now the enthusiasm is growing yet again as the S&P edges yet again to the highs of 1999. Oh my.

 

Stocks For The Long Run (by Jeremy Siegel)? Well, maybe not. But I suppose they are better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.

 

Cheers John

[Dan Zemke]

It's been a truly remarkable 12 months for the stock market. Here's hoping you ignored the gloom & doom types. ... Here's hoping the positive trend continues.

Yes it has, and I fully participated in most of its gain.

 

Like any thoughtful investor, I didn't ignore the hopelessly optimistic types, nor did I ignore the gloom and doom types. I weighed both of their inputs along with many other sources of information to make my decision.

 

Am I hoping that the positive trend continues? Nope! As a buyer, I'm hoping for lower prices. Why would I be hoping for price increases?

 

Dan

[Ron]

I'm still 100% in cash in all my accounts and have been since the end of March. I lost out on about 5% of potential market gain by not being invested (I sold some in Jan and Feb at lower prices than my biggest sale in March and collected interest that was lower than the dividends afterwards).

 

Last Friday, I bought SPY puts at $140 for Dec 22 and $135 on Jan 19. The last time I bet that the market was going to go down (spring of 1999) was a few months before the dot com bubble burst. But I shorted 4 internet stocks and lost a LOT of money. At least this time, I've limited my exposure by using puts instead shorts.

 

Dan

 

It might be time to close the Puts on SPY since Ben just took a seat on the other side of the table - he has VERY deep pockets.

---ron

[RV_]

Higher.

But I am staying long on my one stock and pat on our two funds until then.

[rvman]

Derek,that has to be the shortest ever post from you