Comeback Kid

Hillary wins Ohio by 10 pts and beats Obama in Texes by two pts. Who predicted her triumph in Ohio ? See my blog post yesterday ! So that's more proof that Bunkerman understands the common man ! ;-)))) This win by Hillary will stop the Obama bandwagon instantly and cause a cessation of superdelegate leaking to Obama. The next big primary is Pennsylvania in late April, about six weeks away. This nomination contest almost certainly will go to the convention floor now. Floor fights over the lost delegates in Florida and Michigan will be likely be intense.

But the nomination swing votes are held by ... the Democratic party bosses ! The last nomination settled on the convention floor was in 1952 for Eisenhower. That contest was decided over delegate challenges. We are going to get a new lesson in party convention and nomination rules and tactics, reminiscent of the lessons we learned in 2000 in that tight election. That was decided by long forgotten clauses in the US constitution. This will likely be settled by a back room deal.

I see Hillary survived by raising million of $$$ in small, online contributions. A commentor to this blog deserves thanks from her. I suspect contributors' email boxes will soon have "personal" letters of thanks from both Hillary and Chelsea !

Markets

I bought a double load of C yesterday near the close with some of my gold & silver money. I don't believe the Dubai guy or the rumors. I think the Dubai guy was sticking a needle in his competitors in the Gulf - he has no inside knowledge. Vik Pandit seems to be doing a good job and is smart.

The doomsayers about credit default swaps forget the seller usually puts up collateral, as the article in yestersay's WSJ indicated. That is why the monoline downgrades are a bigger issue. Being AAA they did not have to put up collateral, so those credit default swaps are the problem. Swaps written by hedgies are collateralized. So the loss predictions by the doomsayers are just wrong. And for every seller is a buyer, who gets protection and lower losses. That is inherent in derivatives.

I am selling gold and silver weekly in double loads now and will buy stocks primarily. I am shifting some of the gold & silver profits to my Alpha Fund as I see generationally significant bargains now, suitable for big gains in the forthcoming years.

Costco reports good sales. Uh ... apparently weather does matter, as any thinking person knows.

My favorite four big banks [BAC, WB, C and JPM] are now priced at or close to book value ... WB is at 76% of book. No value is being given to their fine franchises as fear of more losses - after all the prior losses already reported - is driving rationality away. I will buy or each more over time as I sell more gold & silver.

Words of the Day - "L" words

"Labile" - adjective [$10]
Labile means 1. readily or continually undergoing chemical, physical or biological change or breakdown: unstable; 2. readily open to change: plastic.
Sentence: The labile 2008 Democratic Presidential nomination campaign bodes to be a new experience for most living Americans as it surely will now go to the convention floor and then morph again into a backroom battle of party bosses.

"Limn" - verb, transitive [$10] pronouned with a short "i"
Limn means 1. to describe; 2. to depict by drawing or painting; 3. (historical) - to illuminate (a manuscript); 4. (archaic) paint (esp. a miniature portrait).
Sentence: Everyday Bunkerman limns principal events of the day, if any, that affect markets and politics.

"Lugubrious" - adjective [$10]
Lugubrious means 1. mournful esp exaggeratedly or affectively mournful; 2. dismal.
Sentence: Early buyers of big bank stocks, such as Bunkerman, show lugubrious losses so far in them.

"Lucubration" - noun [$10]; also "Lucubrations" - noun, pl. - and "Lucubrate" - verb.
Lucubration means 1. laborious writing or study; 2. pedantry in writing or speech.
Lucubrations (plural only) means 1. a nocturnal study; 2. literay writings - pedantic ones.
Lucubrate means to write in a scholarly way.
Sentance: On a day or two every week, Bunkerman will lucubrate in a scholarly subject, like an aspect of philosophy. He is working one now on similarities between certain concepts in theology and philosophy and in quantum mechanics.