Friday, June 19, 2009

Back from the Beast

New York City seems to be coping quite well ... so far. Of course the bears are talking gloom, but the bar was packed, as were the lunch rooms at the clubs. Even the dining room was quite busy.

Fashions seemed alive, too. I saw fewer men in "undertaker" uniforms, and less black in women's fashions. No 1970s era "earth -mother" fashions were in sight. Fashionable tailored pants or skirts several inches over the knee was the rule. The Apple store on Fifth Avenue was crowded at 3PM on a weekday. The fashion indicator is NOT 'flashing" a depression or even a severe recession.

I'll read more about Timmy's financial regulation reforms, but so far, it's OK. He included regulations for hedge funds and all derivatives - both good. I have some problems with relying on these agencies like the SEC. It's still obviously on the take from the Street, as it continues to approve these fraudulent ETFs designed solely for day trading. But I need to read more and will comment more fully later.

Hmmm ... the index of leading indicators is up again. The Philly Fed - for what that's worth - was OK. I guess that cancels the recent poor Empire State number. Net zero, I'd say.

US News & World Report (online): "The Labor Department reported today that the number of Americans collecting unemployment benefits fell for the first time since January, a sign that the economy is slowly recovering. Total unemployment rolls declined by 148,000 to 6.69 million in the first week of June, the largest weekly drop in more than seven years. The decline also breaks a streak of 21 consecutive weeks in which the number of people collecting jobless benefits for more than a week increased."

Sounds like the recession is over and growth is occurring. It's a long way back up, but ... up is up.

I suppose I'll be accused of "data mining". But gold nuggets found when mining are gold and up is up.

The recession ends when growth returns from whatever absolute level. That's the meaning of the terms. A "recession" has to have "recessing" - i. e., declines. Period.

An astute commentor suggested I look at RIMM for a buy. I had deferred for awhile, looking & thinking. I like what I see and plan to buy it for Fido Fund today. From my point of view, the Apple iPhone gets the business of the young and music/entertainment oriented consumer, while RIMM's Blackberry gets the business of the email oriented person. The markets are huge and both can do well. I like the revenue growth and new product innovations. Mrs. B has AAPL in her Sky Fund, so I'll put RIMM in Fido Fund.

Today is triple witching day so volatility could be large. If we get a pullback to the S&P 900 area, I'll probably add to many positions. Otherwise, I'll go over the Obama positions today to see what has had good dips.

Word of the Day

"Geminal" - adjective [$10]
Geminal means 1. of or relating to germs or of the nature of a germ; 2. in the earliest stage of development; 3. productive of new ideas.
Sentence: My language skills in French are rather developed, but for German, Polish, Italian and Spanish, they are much more geminal.

[In the spirit of a multilingual blog, I am switching to a penta-lingual "Word of the Week" for French, German, Polish, Italian and Spanish. I'll try one or two words of each a week and write a sentence using them. For some languages in which I have less skill, the words and sentences will be rather simple for awhile. Important words like drink, beer, wine and similar crucial concepts for humanity will be foundation for awhile.]

Das Worte der Woche

"Trinken" - verb, strong.
Trinken means to drink. The simple past Stem is trank. The past participle is getrunken. One can quickly recognize the common proto-Germanic roots of English and modern German. Compare drink-drank-drunk to trinken-trank-getrunken.
Der Satz: (A) Ich habe drei Biere gestern getrunken. OR (B) Gestern habe ich drei Biere getrunken. OR (C) Ich trank drie Biere gestern. OR (D) Gestern trank ich drei Biere.
Sentence: (A) I drank three beers yesterday. (B) Yesterday I drank three beers. C translates the same as A but uses the simple past tense instead of the conversational past. D translates the same as B, but also uses the simple past tense. German word order is quite sensitive. Putting the adverb, "yesterday" requires significant changes in verb-subject positions in German, versus no changes in English.

57 comments:

mfl59 said...

are you looking for a V shaped recovery Bunkerman? or more of a W? or perhaps an L?

Spin-em said...

welcome back Bunk...kinda boring around here..ya didnt miss anything.....

maverick said...

what clubs Bman?

Bud said...

bar was packed .........dining room was quite busy.......huh ?????

Bman you really crack me up


lmaoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Bunkerman said...

An inverse funnel for stocks. Slow drop, big drop, flat for six months, then poparoo back up to reverse teh big drop (to 1200), then slow rise back to old highs over a couple years.

GDP: A slow drop, then big drop (happened), then quick reversal to former 3% growth in the fall.

Harvard Club, New York Athletic Club. Yeah, yeah, you'll say no common man, BUT the NYAC has lots of small buiness people, not like Links Club, etc.

Bud said...

does paul volcker read this blog ??

wsj says he made a comment the other day that 'financial institutions taking demand deposits should be barred from proprietary trading'

mfl59 said...

new highs in the SPX within a few years? thats fairly ambitious sir...

Bud said...

A-fraud.............batting 140 in june ???


how much yankees owe this wife beating dirt bag........250million plus ??


well done brian cashman........well done indeed

Bud said...

don't worry A-fraud...........you can beat up on the nationals aa pitching staff

what ?? say that again ?.....they just played the nationals.......oops.........my bad.......i didn't know


LET'S GO YANKEES !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Bud said...

what a disgrace the new york yankees are...............what's the payroll .......200million plus ??? a new billion dollar ballpark...........a f'ng homer dome


what type of a person would root for such a scummy sleazy slimy sucky organization............i know what type.............sewer rats

Bunkerman said...

I watched a bit of the Yankee games this week at the AC bar - Aroid is dogging it.

He loafed out a graound ball for an out that Pete Rose would have gotten an infield single on.

And loafed getting up throwing later to let a guy make it to first base safe.

Lousy play.

Very unimpressive play by the overpaid guys. The younger guys looked good, though.

Bunkerman said...

I look for a market like 1974-1976.

After the new highs, it will depend on what crap Obama gets though. THat will cap future growth IFF it happens.

Bunkerman said...

Oh, the train was full, too, but that might have been due to the reains in NYC causing flight problems to Boston.

Uh ... a counter-example to data mining ?

maverick said...

where is mern?

Bunkerman said...

I'm not part of the "woe is us" crowd, mfl. Ya gotta have dreams.

Charrrrrgggggeeeeeee !!!

Bunkerman said...

btw, I deleted a late thread on the last blog. It seems without my calming presense, emotions ran a bit high.

Bunkerman said...

first time I ever did that. Some things are best not left in writing in perpetuity.

maverick said...

I was more concerned about a poster being deleted

maverick said...

no substitute teacher allows for chaos

Spin-em said...

yesterday was yesterday...today's today.......

Bunkerman said...

no, I would never delete a poster.

This is a free speech forum.

maverick said...

lol bman...I meant torched ....eliminated....eradicated...snuffed....vaporized...nada around

Bunkerman said...

ah ... lolol

Bunkerman said...

bot RIMM. about 75.

"long term position"

i. e., many months or more.

mfl59 said...

did you flip any RIMM yet Bunkerman?

Bunkerman said...

hahahaha ... such a jester.

Bud said...

'many months or more'


what a bunch of thumping tosh

Bud said...

while ace will be walkin in the mud and gettin wet like a jerkoff tomorrow

i'll be at renditions..........amen corner.......tpc #17.........carnoustie........cherry hills



'good for you mike'

Spin-em said...

'good for you mike'


looooooooooooooooooooooool

mfl59 said...

"getting wet like a jerkoff"

lmaooooooooooooooooooooooooo


sadly you may actually be right

mfl59 said...

put your scores in the computer big shot....I'm not coming down to Florida to get sandbagged....otherwise I'll have to take care of you myself..."jersey style"....

Bud said...

jersey style ??


watch it ace...........my cuz works for the philly fbi........

Bud said...

over/under on the number of times i yell 'fore' tomorrow .......1.5


i'll take the under........225 driver and 150 6iron may not go far...........but they go straight
........yeah...........grip pressure doesn't matter


'disguised as a pga pro'

Bud said...

i'm outta here............Bman get those bulgarian and romanian phrases ready for me


ops expo sturgis sturgeon sucking fag is back next week...........i need to welcome him

maverick said...

bud...do you mooch off family all summer?

mfl59 said...

no "danke vilemals jim" or any other nonsense before you leave?

Spin-em said...

lmaooooooooooooooooooooooooo maaan

Bunkerman said...

Hmmm usages of 'gern"

Ich habe Bier gern.

I like beer.

Ich trinke Bier gern.

I like to drink beer.

mfl59 said...

Bunkerman what are your thoughts on people with 800 credit scores unable to secure small loans?

Bunkerman said...

then there's the imperative:

Trinken Sie Bier!

Drink beer!

And ...

Ich werde Bier morgen trinken.

I will drink beer tomorrow.

Even better:

Ich werde Bier morgen trinken, aber heute abend werde ich Wein trinken.

I will drink beer tomorrow, but tonight I will drink wine.

Bunkerman said...

uh ... you left out a key word ... "unemployed"

also what's your definition of "small" ?

And I suspect credit card debt is available to such a person.

And it's always been a truism: get credit lines when you don't need them, since when you do, you won't be able to get them.

Bunkerman said...

hmmm, I guess I should have used 'roter Wein" = red wine.

Bunkerman said...

I have a high credit score [I presume] & just got a 100% car loan on The White Star at 1.9%.

Bunkerman said...

Hmmm .... "use of proceeds" - to leave the country.

That really sells a loan, too.

Bunkerman said...

Bud was probably thinking,

Geh zum Teufel, Jim

... but didn't have the guts to write it. So I did for him

;)

mfl59 said...

I would have thought a guy like you walks into the dealership and plunks down cash....

I know when Bud bought his Passat he did that...

maverick said...

no job killed the loan

Bunkerman said...

If a lender wants to give me 1.9% money, I take it .. as much as possible.

Bunkerman said...

"when they're giving away cheap money, get your share."

verdacity said...

Bunkerman - you bought RIMM today. That puzzles me. It gained more than 100% in < 3 months, on light volume, and now coming down hard, with volume. You bought based on fundamentals, but why today?

mfl59 said...

"when they're giving away cheap money, get your share."

indeed good sir...

those words will bring down the USA

Bunkerman said...

It's a long term hold ... I didn't understand it's growth potential until recently. I figured it wouild stall out and get hurt by corporate purcahse deferrals. But that's not happening.

So many people love them and its inroadsi into the consumer market.

Today ? I waited for earnings to hit. And I talked to people in NYC about the product. I figure the comapny is just conservative on guidance like AAPL - that stock often gets hit on such and those have been great buy points in the past.

revenues up 50% ... not shabby. And if they can to that in this environment, what can they do in good times ?

It's one out of 10 stocks in Fido Fund. I didn't overload. I can add if they knock it down to 60-65.

3 pts on a $75 stock isn't much, in my opinion.

Bunkerman said...

today is probably just "traders" dumping. ptui ...

Spin-em said...

have a greatdog party/weekend bunk

Bunkerman said...

thanks.

have a good weekend all.

mern said...

last post:

my income is still over 50 with the muni juice and some other income.

i cant borrow against a fully paid for home, using that and 350k in munis as collertal.

i can get 100k, at 7% fixed as in 2nd mortgage.

the contacts at JPM, wachovia and credit union were blunt. they are not lending, and its getting tougher to get a loan.

i got 225k at shields, at 4%, waiting for me.

i dont need the money but want the cushion in case, costa rica blows up.

the biggest rub to getting a loan on my home was its been on the market in the past 12 months. all the big banks wont budge on that. credit unions gave me wiggle room after i produced documents that showed my assets and i had to show 2007 tax return, they wanted 08 buts its not october.

ill leave you guys with some thoughts.........

been real, always had fun in here till yesterday.

nah pennsylvania doesnt have a heroin problem..... most popular guy in my class, free ride to laffeyette for soccer, biggest pussy magnet ever and a nice guy. DEAD, 37, needle in his arm.

his last 36 hours were just horrific. and ive got other friends there, that i hope this is a wake up call for, even some ivy alums.

and dont forget who said depressflation first!

that is one prediction i guarantee! i dont know when, but in the next 3 years or sooner, that will be a big buzz word.

vio con dios

in english......may jerry be with u

Bunkerman said...

hope things work out, mern.

But generalizing to the world/region from tragedies doesn't make much sense.

mental depression can hide in lots of unlikely places.