Scary Day for the Markets! Wait It's Halloween!

Today I couldn’t make up my mind with what I wanted to do. I saw an opportunity when WIRE came down. It has come down about $10 to the $27 range after reporting its earnings. The thing that I can’t figure out is why? The company posted stellar earnings of $1.51 per share vs 0.48 a year ago and guided higher for the future. They continue their conservative balance sheet management and their P/E ratio is now around 5.0. So they’ve gone down from $36 to $26 in about two weeks. My take is that I have to take advantage of this and sell SCUR and buy WIRE. I can only get 200 shares but even if it bounces up by half that’s a profit of $1,000 and something I have to take. I don’t think that I can pass this up.

In broader terms, some reports today indicated some economic weakness which seems to have spooked investors. Consumer confidence dropped in October and that caught the bank economists off guard as they were expecting a rise as a result of the recent stock market gains. Once again we see the accuracy of the bank economist’s predictions. The other major negative was the Chicago PMI report on manufacturing fell more than economists expected. Once again, no surprise there. There was also a report that said that employment costs were up. Oil prices also rose. All in all a pretty scary day for the markets.

End of Month Blues?

Consumer spending fell by 0.1% in September while economists were expecting a rise in spending by 0.3%. The good thing is personal incomes rose by 0.5% after economists were expecting a 0.3% rise. Prices fell by 0.3% largely due to energy prices. So what the net of all these numbers means is that consumers have more money in their pockets, but right now they are not spending like they were. It appears as if they are saving.

The above numbers also mean that I should be an economist since they also appear to be able to predict as well as I can. This is going to be a confusing time for the Fed. Everywhere you look you can spot conflicting numbers and measures. One says the economy is fine, one says the economy is slowing, still another says the economy is growing. So what’s a Fed to do? Personally, I’m hoping they drop rates and let the economy move a little. I don’t think the inflation rate is too high right now to worry about risking a recession by raising rates.

So word on the street according to the business news this morning is that today and tomorrow are going to be down days as fund managers sell to take profits for their monthly returns. Boy the competition and pressure must be intense for them to perform as a lot of them seem to be trading, rather than managing money. So I’m expecting CLRK and SCUR to drop over the next couple of days then continue their climb upwards.

Great Earnings so Sell the Stock

CLRK posted it’s third quarter earnings last night. They posted 8 cents vs expectations of 4 cents. Fully diluted of 5 cents. So it looks like they beat all around. Their revenue increased 21% to $17.1 million, their Gross margins are 56% and got another US patent. They expect to see revenues from the SC Johnson deal in Q4. They are increasing their guidance for Q4. All is well, right? No way! This morning an analyst at Merriman Curhan Ford (Obviously not the brightest bulb in the chandelier – pun intended) downgraded CLRK from Buy to neutral. Well we’ll see whose right in the next 12 months. Go CLRK.

In broader news, GDP in the US grew at 1.6 percent vs forecast of 2.1 percent. On the plus side the deflator fell to 1.8 percent from 3.3 percent forecast was for 2.8 percent. The deflator is the main inflation indicator in the GDP report.

So the market is down overall, CLRK is down 1.45% and SCUR is down 2.26%. CLRK was down over 7% at one point so it is showing some strength. Which is a good thing. Ah one to Q4….

Judgment Day

What a crazy and confusing couple of days it’s been. The Fed left rates alone. Then there is the unexpected decline in oil stocks so back above $60 goes the price of oil. But wait we’re not done yet. Durable goods orders are the highest they have been in six years. Wait again. New home prices fell by 10% last month and I’m sure I left out a lot more. So the markets may be a little mixed up until we get some clearer signals. What we need are some more companies with some solid earnings.

Speaking of earnings, it’s judgment day for CLRK. They are reporting earnings after the bell today. I’m hoping that some of the deals that they have signed will bear some fruit. All we have to do now is just wait and see.

Waiting For The Fed.

Today looks to be a mild wait and see day. Everyone will be waiting for the Fed to show us the way on interest rates. Here I am again ranting about how everyone will be hanging on the words of a few senile old men. These guys will be making decisions that will impact us all. Yet likely none of them has ever held a real job where they have actually worked for a living yet they are more than happy enough to decide what we will pay in terms of interest rates. You gotta love em.

Does anyone really feel sorry for Skilling. Should this guy even be allowed to go to prison. How about the death penalty for this guy? He literally wiped out a lot of his employees, A lot of them lost everything. At the very least he should be doing hard labour. Maybe doing a full days work for 24 years will teach him something?

CLRK looks to have gotten hammered the last couple of days but is reporting earnings on Thursday. I expect them to beat. SCUR seems to be holding it’s own, but we would like to see it back into the $7.00 range.

Trust Your Gut

Nice track record, huh? I say the market will go up and it tanks. I say the market will go down and it rallies. Well yesterday I said market wouldn’t do much and it rallies to a new record. Perhaps I should give up trying to predict the market movement on any given day. But I would say that this teaches me about how difficult it is to predict what the market will do on any given day.

But I still say that no matter how much people try to make it a scientific discipline, the stock market is still more about social science than anything. People can take all the empirical measurements and predictions they like but in the end it’s all about the way people feel and think. All your charts and figures can be telling you a stock is going to soar and in the end if people don’t like the stock for ,what ever reason, they won’t buy it and the price won’t go up. I think the best tool a trader can have is his gut feeling. If his gut feeling is telling him to get out of a stock then he better do it, because more often than not the gut feeling trumps the empirical evidence. Always go with your gut feeling when trading stocks. If the numbers say the stock you’re looking at should go up but you get a feeling of doubt then it’s best to stay away and look for somewhere else t o put your hard earned money.

$5.8 Billion Loss? Someone Give These Guys a Medal

I’m not expecting too much from the markets this week because the Fed is meeting. We all know that life must stop until the Fed pronounces it’s decision on interest rates. My guess is that the market will wait for the Fed, despite some good earnings posted by companies. That or the market will start to focus on the stinkers. This morning AT&T posted earnings of 63 cents a share easily beating analysts forecasts. But my guess is today’s focus and perhaps rightly so will be on Ford’s loss of 62 cents a share.

Ford posted a total quarterly loss including restructuring costs of $5.8 Billion! How is this possible? I fail to see how companies can post losses of this size and still be allowed to remain as going concerns. But one thin is for sure. You can bet that the top executives at Ford won’t be taking any pay cuts or be losing their bonuses. I’m sure in the boardroom it will be all congratulations on the cuts. Their will be pats on the backs and kudos all around for those execs. And, oh yeah, how ‘bout bonuses and perhaps raises for a job well done. How will they get the money to pay for all this? Perhaps they can ask the workers to take pay cuts? Well the union won’t easily concede to that so my guess is that middle management should bend over and get prepared for some cuts.

I’m hoping that both CLRK and SCUR can show some modest gains through the Fed meeting and into their respective earnings at the end of this week and early next week. We’ll be watching.

Sometimes Life Happens

Sometimes life gets in the way of making money in the stock market or day trading. Today I had a busy day at work and was unable to watch the market at all. It is days like these that make the day traders nuts. If you take a position in a volatile stock and can’t watch it during the day, then you could be out a lot of money. That’s why I chose to position trade.

My goal is to find stocks that I think will do well or are moving upward quickly and jump on their bandwagon. Because I take this philosophy, I can afford to not pay close attention to the markets. I’ve known all the reasons for buying the companies that I have bought; and I have a reasonable chance of making money over some time period. My time periods can be days, weeks, or even months.

Aside from Google, the earnings weren’t very good for quite a few companies, especially or Caterpillar. Because of the way I’ve been picking my stocks, I don’t have a lot to worry about if I can’t watch the market all day. Life still goes on. It’s not going to upset me if I can’t watch the market. So the markets can go down and it won’t hurt me too much.

So today I had to spend more time living then I otherwise would have liked but you know I did manage to get a lot done. My stocks are fine and the world has not ended. Make sure that when you pick stocks, your not worrying about them constantly or else you need to look at other investments because you will give up a large portion of your life to watching over and worrying about stocks. Relax, have a beer. Enjoy life.

See Saw Day? Or Dow Above 12,000?

Yesterday the Dow did trade over 12,000, although it didn’t last. The futures are kind of flat this morning. Yesterday Apple and Ebay beat expectations, but AMD reported lower than forecast earnings. Citigroup, Bank of America Honeywell and Pfizer all beat forecasts while Coca-Cola posted improved results. Also on the earnings front, McDonalds hit their recently raised forecasts. All this points to a good day for the markets and a close over 12,000.

So why then are all the futures so flat? Well I think it has a lot to do with OPEC meeting to discuss production cuts. Part of the reason the market was doing so good was the recent slide in oil prices. If OPEC decides to cut production to get prices over $60.00 per barrel then it could put a damper on Wall Streets recent party. I personally can’t see oil staying over $60 for too long. High oil prices only promote more conservation and investment in alternative fuels. What OPEC’s greed will end up doing is ensuring that people find alternative sources of energy and thereby reducing the overall demand for oil, driving the price down, then more supply cuts and so on…. In the end they will be hurting themselves. But hey, what do I know.

Inflation? Yes? No? Maybe?

Yesterday saw an up tick in the wholesale price index and an increase in the price of oil. The market reacted expectedly by selling off. This morning, as I write this, the stock futures are all pointing up. So what’s the difference today?

Well after the market close yesterday, Intel reported better than expected (although lower) earnings and said that it was gaining market share back. IBM beat expectations and got an upgrade from Goldman Sachs. Yahoo reported lower than expected revenue but earnings that matched expectations. Yahoo shares were up in after hours trading however as the company announced that its long awaited search technology is now live. Motorola reported lower earnings of 39 cents a share vs last years 69 cents per share; as expected, their shares were trading 8% lower.

This morning saw the CPI number released. The report showed that the CPI was down by an unexpected 0.5%. This is most directly attributed to the fall in the price of oil. The core CPI, however, rose 0.2% which was in line with expectations. Since the Fed is meeting next week, the market took the news as good. The Fed should leave rates alone next week.

Also this morning, JP Morgan blew away their expectations posting earnings of 92 cents vs the 86 cents that analysts were expecting. Look for shares of JPM to take off in early trading.

SCUR managed to hold over $7.00 so we’re happy with that result. CLRK actually slipped below $20.00 yesterday for a brief period but managed to finish over $20.00 closing at 20.24. I’d like to see CLRK gain back all the ground it lost yesterday. Although I like to see the stocks rise, I realize that they can’t keep rising day after day, and so they must take a break when they have come too far too fast.

Why I Love Wall Street

Looks like the negative sentiment, while still there, may abate a little. Seems that the new home builders survey is suggesting that they feel the housing market may have bottomed out. Was this the factor that caused the Dow to pair its losses? Perhaps the market is so earnings focused that they can push out any inflation fears? What is the real level of inflation anyway? I for one think the CPI is a terrible way to measure inflation. But until someone comes up with a better measure, I guess it’s all we got.

CNN Money had a great article today.

http://money.cnn.com/2006/10/17/news/newsmakers/bc.financial.wallstreet.pay.reut/index.htm?postversion=2006101715

Now if anyone can read this and tell me why these salaries are necessary or even justify them to me, I’d greatly appreciate it. If there is any group of people that are grossly over paid it would have to be these analysts, brokers, traders, investment bankers etc. I’ll throw real estate agents in with that group. Now probably 80% of those people are making under $75k, so imagine what the top tier people are making?

Someone post a comment and clue me in please…

Inflation Jitters?

Sorry for my absence yesterday, but I was out of town on a family emergency and unable to get any internet access. But the world merely goes on blissfully unaware of your existence whether you’re online or not. Looking back over the days I was away, I see SCUR is still over $7.00 and CLRK announced a $100 million stock shelf.

SCUR looks like it is strong, but looking at the futures this morning, today will be a test of support. The futures are all negative this morning and we expect the market to decline. Two reasons for this are the price of oil has climbed back to the $60 mark and the core wholesale prices have risen higher than expected. Both these things point to inflation and potentially higher rates, which the market doesn’t like. So look for the market to at least open low and then we’ll see if SCUR can hold $7.00.

CLRK announced that they filed for a $100 million stock shelf. They plan to use funds for general corporate purposes including acquisitions, marketing and research and development which is standard language for these filings. Basically what it means is that the company is setting aside a certain amount of stock that it may sell in the future to raise money for any number of things. So I’m hoping that management will be smart about the extra shares. I have some faith in them as so far they have managed the company well.

Is That Love in the Air?

No it's snow.

Insane is the only word to describe it. Apparently there are over 300,000 people without power in Buffalo this morning. They actually got over two feet of snow in buffalo. In October? Wow talk about your Friday the 13th. Apparently 80% of the roads are impassable and several counties and towns have declared a state of emergency.

But what about the markets on this Friday the 13th? Well the Dow is sitting at 11,947.70, a mere 53 points away from 12,000. So is Friday the 13th going to be a lucky day for the Dow? I don’t think so, and let me tell you why? Despite good news from GE and Microsoft, market will at least open lower on slowing September retail sales. Yes, right now the focus is on earnings, which makes the read on September retail sales interesting. If retail spending is slowing now it will have an effect on company’s earnings in the future. Since stock prices are based on future earnings, look for the market to drop.

Also a lot of the big players are reluctant to hold big positions over the weekend so they may pair down some of their holdings. And let’s not forget the Friday the 13th effect. Are there any people that are still superstitious on Wall Street? There are plenty of superstitious traders out there. When they are on a roll, they are reluctant to change anything they are doing for fear of breaking the good luck. But does this mean people believe in Friday the 13th enough to let it affect their trading? I guess we’ll never know.

I Actually Called One Right?

It’s nice to have a day go your way. I called CLRK going over $21 and it closed at $21.50. I also said, and this was more of a stretch, that SCUR would cross $7.00. SCUR crossed $7.00 and stayed over $7.00, closing at $7.14 up 27 cents. Sometimes it’s amazing to see things go your way. Maybe I should buy a lottery ticket? Or maybe I just lucked out and found my own lottery ticket in CLRK? Well one thing’s for sure, I am enjoying this moment. Hope it continues….

What a Difference a Day Makes.

Today everything in our world seems ok again. Yesterday saw a negative reaction to Alcoa’s earnings, then there was the OPEC production cuts, the Fed, and finally to top it off, the plane crash in New York. These factors all contributed to the negative numbers seen on the markets yesterday. Ah, but today is a different day. What’s new today you ask?

Well for one, oil is down almost a dollar to its lowest level in a year. So much for those OPEC cuts. The real test of oil will come this morning when the inventory numbers are released at 10:30am ET. Watch for oil to head lower should inventories increase. Saudi Arabia also said that they would likely not make any production cuts until at least the end of November.

It also looks like the markets are looking past Alcoa’s earnings as Pepsi, Costco and Harley Davidson all reported stronger than expected earnings. McDonald’s also said third quarter sales were higher than expected and raised it’s earnings forecast to 68 cents per share from 63 cents per share. Clearly Wall Street will see that as good news and continue the rally as strong earnings begin to flow. The Dow, Nasdaq and S&P futures are all up this morning suggesting stocks will start positive. All we need is good news from the oil inventory report to ensure the days finished positive.

Looking at my two plays, SCUR is still hovering below $7.00. Like most stocks yesterday, it was down a few cents to $6.87. I’m looking for it to cross $7.00 today and then will base our decision to sell on its direction after it crosses $7.00. If it can’t hold and heads back down then it will be time to take our profit and move on putting our money to better use. I’m looking at Encore Wire to put my proceeds from SCUR. WIRE was down 86 cents yesterday to close at $33.36. I’d like to pick this stock up in the $32’s but I don’t know if that will happen.

CLRK surprised us yesterday with a 25 cent gain to close at $20.99. While a close over $21.00 would have been great, I’ll gladly take a 25 cent gain on a day where a lot of stocks were in the red. Today I’m looking for CLRK to cross $21.00 and hold there.

Accident?

So just when you think your stocks are doing OK in a ho hum market, a plane goes and hits a building. Well that sent markets into a tailspin. It looks like they are trying to recover but they may not make it before 4:00pm. I don’t want to make light of the situation or any casualties, but this incident illustrates the way the market reacts to events.

If you look at the chart you can see the knee jerk reaction as the market dives. When the dust settles, they are thinking that the crash is an accident. The more it begins to look like an accident, the more the Dow recovers. Now if you were a day trader, it would be a perfect opportunity for you to buy. Now the gut reaction is that it is terrorism, especially with North Korea on everyone’s mind. But when you look at the circumstances terrorism is a good knee jerk reaction. I can’t blame the markets for selling off, but I know people capitalize on things like this.

Good Earnings? Sell, Sell, Sell!

Only Wall Street can be disappointed in a company that nearly doubles its third quarter earnings. Wall Street was looking for Alcoa to come in with earnings at 77 cents per share but Alcoa came in at 61 cents per share. Alcoa warned the street earlier that there was weaker demand from housing and automotive sectors and that aluminum prices would come down. They still managed to nearly double their earnings from last year. This begs one to ask the question, Did Wall Street effectively take this into account? Was Alcoa’s guidance effectively priced into the stock or is this another case of the institutional guys selling on news? Some say that Alcoa’s news will set the tone for the markets for the day, and indeed the futures were lower this morning. I, for one, don’t think the entire market will move according to the fortunes of one stock.

The other major company out with earnings was Genentech. Genentech beat the street by two cents yet shares still fell in yesterday’s after hours session. What gives? These guys actually beat the street. Well it looks like sales of some of its cancer drugs seemed to be tapering off, so that sent Wall Street running. Perhaps this is another case of selling on the news?

I expect to see more rhetoric coming out of North Korea. Whether it is enough to affect the markets is anyone’s guess. But when you have a country like North Korea and a group of leaders with enough collective brain power to dimly light a 40 watt light bulb anything can happen.

Today may shape up to be an interesting day.

Ho, Hum

It looks like the markets are taking North Korea’s saber rattling in stride. Markets seem more focused on what is happening with third quarter earnings. The first of the third quarter earnings reports is coming from Alcoa tonight. Alcoa will be the first Dow component to report earnings for the third quarter. The market will place a lot of weight on the numbers that they post.

On a more personal note, CLRK seems to be coming back a little and SCUR is flat. The Dow is up barely a point and NASDAQ is down barely a point. Looks like a rather bland finish for the day. Perhaps Alcoa will spur the markets tomorrow.

North Korea Leads the March into Earnings Season

I got a nice surprise after coming back from a three day Thanksgiving weekend in Canada. Although the markets were closed here, the US markets were open. Both my stocks managed nice gains despite the rhetoric and nuclear tests by North Korea. CLRK finished at $20.91; maybe people are finally getting the idea of the LED lights being a good thing and CLRK being the leader. SCUR managed to finish at $6.86. I’m hoping to watch this climb over $7.00 in the next day or two.

So I guess the topic of the week for oil, gold and the markets is going to be North Korea. Today the saber rattling is about North Korea threatening to launch a nuclear missile. I think the US should let China take the lead on this and allow China to smack North Korea around. After all China is starting to play ball and seeing that reforming their economy is starting to pay off for them. Now if they can get their human rights together then we’d see them develop into something of a good international citizen. But in the meantime, the US should allow China to walk into North Korea and put a stop to things. This accomplishes two things. First the US is telling China, we think you’re capable of handling this and trust you to put a stop to it. After all, China is a neighbor to North Korea and could be in the line of fire. Secondly, the US doesn’t have to bear the cost of invading another nation. The US needs to save its resources for Iraq, and having China take care of North Korea would save them a pile of money.

We are also on the verge of earnings season so the market may be a little nervous to move too much further up until some companies start to come out with some decent numbers. I don’t see the markets moving too much higher this week, but the potential for them to go lower is definitely there. The one thing that will propel the markets higher is if North Korea backs down.

Sometimes You Just Have To Go Along For The Ride.

It looks like the Dow won’t be setting another record today as the unemployment report was weaker than expected. Economists forecast the addition of 120,000 new jobs but there were only 51,000 jobs added in September. This still managed to push the unemployment rate down to 4.6% from 4.7%. Stock futures stayed unchanged on this news. Last check put the S&P futures down 4.70, suggesting a lower open to the markets. Now I’ve called for Dow records before and the markets turned lower. Now I’m expecting them to turn lower so watch the markets take off.

Yesterday was a great day for me. SCUR was up $0.55 to close at $6.96. So looks like it’s making its way back over $7.00. Once it crosses, we’ll see if it will stick. CLRK gained $0.83 to close at $19.42. It’s coming up to a huge psychological barrier at $20.00.

This weekend is Thanksgiving in Canada. Looks like I have a lot to be thankful for this weekend. When I started this I was really worried about the markets and their ability to move upwards. The returns I have to date are pretty darn good. So far I have made $984 on CLRK and $980 on SCUR for a total of $1964. That works out to a net return after commissions of 17.86% in the six weeks I’ve been doing this. I don’t think that is too shabby. I think that we should sit back and enjoy the day and see where the markets take us today.

OPEC Loves Money

Oil is back over $60 this morning. Looks like the governments in OPEC really love to keep that money rolling in. It seems that since the price of oil has fallen in the $60’s OPEC has seen the pressure come off the Fed to raise rates. They have also noticed that the US economy is slowing and not heading into a recession, so why not capitalize and keep oil in the $60’s? So this morning OPEC announced they would be cutting production by 1,000,000 barrels. The news caused the price of oil to rise above $60 and the futures to turn negative.

On a positive note, September retail sales rose 3.8% which was slightly lower than the forecast 3.9% but it looks like the markets will take this as a bit of good news. So today’s battle on the markets will be between the effect of oil prices and the retail sales.

I look to SCUR to add to its gains from yesterday as it gets ready for another attempt to clear $7.00. I think that CLRK might stay in the high 18’s for a while before it heads towards $20.

Stand Back or Get Trampled

CLRK was on a bit of a pullback from the tear it went on yesterday. So after a run like that there’s two directions a stock can go; up or down. In today’s case it looks like some people decided to take their profits. The other thing that could happen is that the shorts get caught off guard and then rush in to cover their positions, driving the stock higher. My guess is that there aren’t a lot of short positions out on this stock so there was no covering to push the stock higher. The result if that the profit takers won out on the day. Maybe CLRK can get some analyst coverage over the next couple of days. Hahaha.

SCUR looks to be starting another trip towards $7.00 so we won’t cut it loose just yet. My guess is that it will make a third attempt to stick over $7.00. If it doesn’t then it will surely come down in a hurry so we must be ready for that. When we see the inability to stay above $7.00 we want to make sure that we’re in the front portion of the pack as they head for the exits.

Looks like the Dow is really moving and 12,000 is now in sight. It isn’t unrealistic to see the Dow over 12,000 by Friday. This morning it didn’t look like it was going to be much of a day until we got some news on oil inventories, the economy and treasury yields started to fall. Funny how a slowdown is now beginning to be seen as a good thing. What that means to the market is that the Fed is done raising rates and they might possibly start thinking about lowering rates.

Now with the Dow hitting new records, my take is that the general public will now start to pile into the market either on their own or through mutual funds. Investors see new records as people making easy money and greed kicks in. They see other peoples’ wealth increasing and they want to increase theirs as well so in they pile.

Even though I still see the foundation of this rally as shaky, I can’t ignore the rush of money that will now flow into the market. All this means is that the institutional players will make more money as the public drives the market higher. Short term players must guard against the institutional guys taking their money off the table and sinking the market. Longer term people may want to take some profit and buy back at a lower price.

Easier said then done.

Where to from here?

Well the Dow finally made its record. Now this morning it looks to be coming undone. Well I did say it would be a volatile week. The Dow futures are currently pointing down after Walmart lowered its sales estimates.

Oil gained a bit of ground after Kuwait said that any OPEC production cuts would be voluntary. But let’s not forget that the oil inventory numbers are due out this morning. So if the inventories rise more than expected, I’m looking for a stampede toward the exits for oil. Maybe $55/barrel oil is a lot closer than we think.

Ben Bernanke is speaking this afternoon in New York so the markets will likely be hanging on his every word trying to get his take on where things are going. We could see some movement in the markets on his comments, but I doubt it.

SCUR was down a few pennies and looks like it is consolidating at this price level. I’ll give it a few more days to try and mount some kind of recovery. If none is in sight, we’ll have to take what’s on the table and move on.

CLRK closed at $19.00 for a one day gain of over 9%. Looks like my long term stock has turned into a short term play. We’re gonna stick to our original plan and hold CLRK long term. Should we make any money on the short term stuff, we can always by some more CLRK. Why was it up so high? They signed a licensing deal with Osram Sylvania. One of Osram Sylvania’s subsidiaries is going to produce light fixtures for CLRK’s colour LEDs. Now that there is a large player like Sylvania selling LED products on behalf of CLRK, they should get wider penetration of their lighting systems. The other thing the market is looking at is the potential for further deals with Sylvania for the white light products. If all goes well with the colour deal, Sylvania will want to do one for the white lights and become a market leader in a new technology.

All we need now is a couple of analysts pushing it up…

More Ranting About Politicians.

It doesn’t look like the Dow is going to be hitting any records today. So call me a liar. Well maybe if it goes down quite a bit today it won’t hit the record close for a while. But I do think it’s in the interest of Wall Street to let the Dow hit a record. Think of all those folks that will be streaming in to the markets, only to have Wall Street sell of when 12 or 13,000 is broken. That would be more conducive to large profits for Wall Street.

We do know that the price of oil has fallen almost two dollars this morning and is currently below $61. If the inventory report this week shows an increase, hopefully the markets will be spurred on to reach new highs. I think once oil breaks $60 then we’ll be heading to the low 50’s or high 40’s.

Yesterday we were talking about politicians. Then later at home, I was watching the news and a story comes on about former city councilor and now Immigration and Refugee Appeal Board Judge named Steve Ellis offers to accept a claimant if she has sex with him. Fortunately, or unfortunately for Ellis, her boy friend got the whole thing on video. Just more proof that politicians are not only useless for any sort of public good, but only after their own interests. If you want to see the whole story here’s the link:

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20061002/irb_judge_061002/20061003?hub=TopStories

The video is on the right in the video section. Enjoy.

A little while ago I sent a letter to the Finance Minister of Canada talking about how unfair it was that people who work under federally regulated companies could not do what they want with their pension money when they leave. They have to keep it in federally regulated locked in accounts and are unable to do anything with the funds until they reach retirement. People who work at all other companies are free to use their funds. Rather than talk about that you can read the September 19th post for the particulars.

What this post is about is that I emailed the letter to three people; the Finance Minister, The Prime Minister and my member of parliament. So far I have received responses from the Finance Minister’s Office, and the Prime Minister’s Office. I guess my MP is too busy to reply, and he’s not even in the governing party.

I sent my email on the 28th of August. On the 31st the Finance Minister’s Office sent me a nice and short form letter reply. I have since wrote back and am awaiting there reply. The form letter as well as my reply is below:

Does as soon as possible mean before the next election? Am I now to petition all Federally regulated employees and forward that to the minister to get this issue looked at? The previous Liberal government was at least looking into it, what happened to that information? I've read several letters to that commission asking for the withdrawal of the Locked in pension requirement. Yet where is there any action?

Dean
re-FINEMail@fin.gc.ca wrote:
August 31, 2006
2006FIN194479Mr. Dean
Dear Mr. Dean:
On behalf of the Minister of Finance, the Honourable James M. Flaherty, this is to acknowledge receipt of your correspondence of August 28, 2006.Please be assured that your comments will be brought to the Minister's attention as soon as possible.Departmental Correspondence Unit


Now is that cool or what an actually acknowledgement from the Minister’s Office. Wait it gets better. Yesterday, over a month from the original email, I received a reply from the Prime Minister’s Office. I hate to think how long it would have taken had I used regular mail. But the PM’s office say that they will pass my concerns on to the Finance Minister but my email was addressed to the Finance Minister, I only cc’d the Prime Minister. Below is the email I received along with my reply:

Prime Minister/Premier ministre wrote:
Dear Mr. Dean:On behalf of the Right Honourable Stephen Harper, I would like to acknowledge receipt of your recent e-mail correspondence regarding pension funds and locked-in RRSPs.Please be assured that your comments have been carefully reviewed. I have taken the liberty of forwarding your message to the Honourable James Flaherty, Minister of Finance. I am certain that the Minister will wish to give your enquiries every considerationThank you for writing to the Prime Minister.Executive Correspondence Officerfor the Prime Minister's OfficeAgent de correspondance de la haute directionpour le Cabinet du Premier ministre
And my reply:

Thank you for your prompt response; however, I have already forwarded my comments to the Finance Minister directly. His office is doing an excellent job of humouring me as well.

I know the previous Liberal Government was looking into this issue as I have seen several submissions to the commission looking into federal pension rules from concerned people like me with funds stuck in locked in retirement accounts that could be combined into our regular RSP's as with most of our provincial counterparts. Instead we are forced to keep second accounts and pay double the fees. All this to ensure that the friends of the government, in the executive offices of the banks, earn more profits at the expense of the little working guy.

I would assume that the Finance Minister's pension from his days as an MP are not subject to the same restrictions as mine or any other federally regulated employee? Perhaps the government enjoys being condescending to the little guy? Perhaps these working "stiffs" are not smart enough to control money that is rightfully theirs? I really fail to see the logic in the government not doing anything to amend this archaic pension legislation.

I it really necessary to go through the exercise of collecting signatures on a petition, starting a website etc. to get the government to look at this issue? Or is there someone in the public service that actually see how unfair this is? I know that the Finance Minister doesn't care. He's earned enough as an MPP and now as an MP to care. When he gets out he will have enough connections to get a high paying job. But the rest of us are having a hard time and need access to additional funds or at the very least need to be able to manage their investments without watching them dwindle under the burden of additional fees.

Please let me know whether you will look at the work of the pension commission and work to get this restrictive legislation changed.

Regards,

Dean


I think that my MP has gone missing.

Ya Just Gotta Love Politicians

Oh yeah baby! The accuracy of my predictions is uncanny. IF I say the Dow will break the record today, you can be damn sure that it is going to go down, or at least wait until tomorrow to break the record. Perhaps, tomorrow, I should say that the Dow will tank, then wait and see the rally that you’ll get.

Well, I’m happy that CLRK is up a quarter at least. SCUR is only down pennies so it seems to be holding it’s own.

The replies to my open letter to the Canadian Finance Minister seem to be pouring in. I’ll have to get them posted to the blog shortly. One of the good things about form letters and having teams of people to answer your correspondence is that you can get replies to your emails sent out quickly. I guess if you’re the Canadian Government, then over a month long is quick. Actually I think that the job the current PM is doing is quite sad. The Finance Minister is also misguided and incompetent.

Take for example the recent and much touted, by the government, one percent cut in the GST (Goods and Services Tax). Although the tax was much hated and loathed by the general population, the government decided that they would reduce it by one percent, instead of eliminating it. Now that meant that they had to scrape the direct cut to income tax rates that the previous Liberal government had already put in place. Well I haven’t noticed the huge difference this one percent cut has made to my life. A quick canvass of my friends, family and colleagues reveals the same thing. I think people would much rather see the effect of a direct tax cut on their pays than a one percent tax cut in the GST. It also turns out that a lot of establishments that had the taxes built into the price did not pass this tax cut onto consumers. The only people that benefit from this tax cut are the people buying new Mercedes and BMW’s. In other words, the upper class, elite, friends of the conservatives, what ever you want to call them. All it means is that the friends of the current government are making out quite nicely while the rest of us have to pick up the slack.

God I love politicians.

Well at least we’re marginally better than the politicians in the USA. They look like they’ll be having a blast with Foley for quite a while.

The Death of Online Gambling?

This week looks like it’s going to be a volatile week. I expect the Dow to be in and out of record territory all week. There are quite a few economic reports coming out this week, starting with today’s construction spending and manufacturing and ending the week with the unemployment report. I think we should do OK heading into Christmas as the market is coming off the best third quarter it’s had in years, and as I said before a new record will cause greed bells to ring in peoples heads. Not wanting to be left out, the public will rush back into the markets.

I’m hoping for a good week from CLRK and would like to see SCUR shake off its downgrade. CLRK finished below $17.00. We’re still looking for it to hold above the $17.00 range. SCUR dropped to $6.33 on Friday after a downgrade and we’re looking to see it shake that off this week and head back towards $7.00.

My favorite event of the weekend occurred on Saturday. Congress approved a bill that would make it illegal for banks and credit card companies to make payments to online gaming sites. This would effectively prevent any online gaming sites from charging US players. As most of the online gaming sites derive the majority of their revenue from the US, this will have a major impact on their revenue. As can be expected, the shares of most of these companies are plunging on overseas markets. Shares of these companies are down anywhere from 20% to over 60% in European trading.

I expect that this caught a lot of these company’s shareholders off guard. I think this is another case of the institutions running for the exits and the little guy waking up and, not being able to trade in Europe, finding himself in a world of pain.

I wonder how much of this ban is to protect Vegas and Atlantic City? After all I would assume that all the major casino players would have developed online gaming sites. Maybe they were slow off the mark with sites of their own and couldn’t get market share form established players that saw a market and were quick to launch? I’m not very familiar with the gaming industry but it strikes me as strange that in the USA where they pride themselves on freedom to choose, that the government would tell people that they can’t spend their money as they wish. Especially the Republican Party.

Shame, shame.