It’s a stupid thing to do; but worth exploring, nonetheless.
Best case scenario:
The market books a 1-2% loss, setting up for a move up tomorrow. The important thing is for the damage to be limited and fenced off from the banks. In order for this rally to sustain, we need the banks to lead the way.
Naturally, what I am hoping for is sheer madness. I suppose I am just being a sentimental jelly sandwich eater.
At the moment, I am quite busy preparing for the big feast. Believe it or not, as blasphemous as it may seem, the stock market is not at the top of my list today. I made a few trades this morning, some good, others not so much. I’m just going to sit with what I have, at least for another day and see what sticks.
As an aside, not to get all commy on you fervent capitalist type, but, CEO compensations need to be met with the sharp blade of the guillotine. That’s just one man’s opinion.
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What’s your favorite Thanksgiving day treat Lord Fly?
Equal salaries for all. Everyone’s time is worth the same amount.
For some reason or other I recall Weds. AM strong (on ave.)and then a PM sell off on the day before Thanksgiving.
Fri. AM (half day trading) is usually bearish.
No stats. Just recalling the past twenty years or so.
Are you a Ron Paul suporter?
Is the dollar rally over?
I agree, guillotine the CEOs. The next best thing is the market going to zero.
Fuck down 1%, we are closing UP, baby.
We shot up 1,000 points in two days and at 1:38pm we are only down 30 points? Bullshit. The laws of nature say we should sell off 200-300 points minimum just as reflex to that substantial two-day rally. But we are basically even.
We close green. Let them eat turkey!
Poof! CEOs compensation packages will become like soupy bat guano.
Dear Turkey Gods, please give me one more rally to unload my remaining longs.
Uhhh, just woke up, what’d I miss? I need a drink. Captain Morgan’s and warm apple cider, mmmmmm, ahhhhh. Hey, I’m up 2%, sweet.
Athlete salaries also need the guillotine.
Watching Nardelli from the big three with his hand out for a bail out is sickening. He basically stole 200 million in compensation from Home Depot by running the place into a ditch. He should be shot.
Execs like him hurt the whole system. He gives honest thieves a bad name.
CEO compensation reform…sounds like a great idea…but how do you do that when the board, the compensation committee and the CEO all sleep with each others wives…probably at the same time?
Only way it can happen is shareholder revolt…company by company and hope it catches on.
To think that hedgie manager made over a friggin BILLION last year. Seriously…who deserves that kind of compensation? Answer: NOBODY
Can you believe this BS!
RUSSIAN ANALYST PREDICTS DECLINE AND BREAKUP OF USA
Tue Nov 25 2008 09:04:22 ET
A leading Russian political analyst has said the economic turmoil in the United States has confirmed his long-held view that the country is heading for collapse, and will divide into separate parts.
Professor Igor Panarin said in an interview with the respected daily IZVESTIA published on Monday: “The dollar is not secured by anything. The country’s foreign debt has grown like an avalanche, even though in the early 1980s there was no debt. By 1998, when I first made my prediction, it had exceeded $2 trillion. Now it is more than 11 trillion. This is a pyramid that can only collapse.”
The paper said Panarin’s dire predictions for the U.S. economy, initially made at an international conference in Australia 10 years ago at a time when the economy appeared strong, have been given more credence by this year’s events.
When asked when the U.S. economy would collapse, Panarin said: “It is already collapsing. Due to the financial crisis, three of the largest and oldest five banks on Wall Street have already ceased to exist, and two are barely surviving. Their losses are the biggest in history. Now what we will see is a change in the regulatory system on a global financial scale: America will no longer be the world’s financial regulator.”
When asked who would replace the U.S. in regulating world markets, he said: “Two countries could assume this role: China, with its vast reserves, and Russia, which could play the role of a regulator in Eurasia.”
Asked why he expected the U.S. to break up into separate parts, he said: “A whole range of reasons. Firstly, the financial problems in the U.S. will get worse. Millions of citizens there have lost their savings. Prices and unemployment are on the rise. General Motors and Ford are on the verge of collapse, and this means that whole cities will be left without work. Governors are already insistently demanding money from the federal center. Dissatisfaction is growing, and at the moment it is only being held back by the elections and the hope that Obama can work miracles. But by spring, it will be clear that there are no miracles.”
He also cited the “vulnerable political setup”, “lack of unified national laws”, and “divisions among the elite, which have become clear in these crisis conditions.”
He predicted that the U.S. will break up into six parts – the Pacific coast, with its growing Chinese population; the South, with its Hispanics; Texas, where independence movements are on the rise; the Atlantic coast, with its distinct and separate mentality; five of the poorer central states with their large Native American populations; and the northern states, where the influence from Canada is strong.
He even suggested that “we could claim Alaska – it was only granted on lease, after all.” Panarin, 60, is a professor at the Diplomatic Academy of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and has authored several books on information warfare.
Developing…
So Ackman has a 7% stake in GGP ehh? Man’s on a buying mission…
I thought that company was BUSTO…
Go ahead, walk it on up. Are folks really thinking we are gonna go straight up, through Christmas?
Good grief, Charlie Brown.
Feels firmer (she said sweetly).
WANTED: RISK MANAGER
Scope of work:
Monitor and verify that the institution is not too deeply involved in the business of playing russian roulette.
Pay commensurate with how may limbs/torso parts remain at the end of the fiscal year.
Juice, you can borrow my guillotine, or build your own. I call call it the gee-atine, with a soft g sound. That’s because it’s made from the G string of an electric guitar. It has a small piece of wooden dowel knotted on each end to serve as a handle. You approach the target from behind, whip that shit over his head, and pull your arms down and away. The string will just about pop the head clean off as it slices through soft tissue, clear down to the spine. Just watch out for blood, it sprays everywhere.
This market is shiat!
C is going down
Release the Turkey Gods before I’m forced to eat Melba toast this Thanksgiving!
we test new lows before year end.
The Doakes designed golf course they showed a few minutes ago (Eastern Colo.) on CNBC looks alot like the Doakes design I have been to at Lubbock, Texas (Rawls Texas Tech course) if anybody has been there.
A nice link style design also.
Snipe6 – what gage guitar string? Probably at least a 16, no? Anything thinner would snap I assume?
With the Gov. printing all this money shouldn’t the long term trade pair be GLD and TBT? Or am I just dub as a stump?
Thickest you can find is best, just make sure it’s G; B & E are too thin, and E,A,D could come unwound, that would suck! Piano wire is probably even better, but I don’t have a piano.
Disclosure: I play with Ernie Ball “Slinky” strings.
All according to plan.
The G string for acoustic guitars is wound.
Not that I’ve ever sawed a neck with one.
New lows next week. USA will lose it’s “AAA” rating next year and plunge into a GREATER GREAT DEPRESSION lasting decades. You’ve been warned.
Time to rally.
Look who’s back after meeting the margin reaper.
Whats up guys, I’ve been out back warming up the rally monkey with a mixture of PCP and methamphetamine. Pretty soon he’ll bust right out of his bamboo cage.
D-dog .. pray do tell: how short are we today? Just want to know how bad your head will be getting ripped off should we experience the scheduled turkey day rally, with trimmings wednesday.
agree with the dog.
Devil Puppy! Welcome back.
How was the “medieval stockade?”
The guy named Pete with the big cucumber for a schnozz on CNBC, says that banks need to lend, and free up the capital. I just don’t get who the hell they are supposed to lend to.
Also, why does TBT act so irrationally?
Fly, your thoughts on TBT????
Let me guess, Devil Dog “generational lows next week”.
This is about the fourth “next week” in a row from you. Yawn.
Picked up some SRS and FXP at deep discounts earlier.
The Russian analyst is a smart man. If anyone can explain how we can grow our way out of this mess, when there are no growth drivers on the horizon, I’d love to hear it.
In the ’80s growth was driven by the computer revolution, in the ’90s it was internet and telecom deregulation, in the ’00s it was a completely fake manufactured boom in housing in which we poured trillions of dollars in an economically unproductive asset class (and worse, we were so bold as to borrow against the inflated housing values to finance current consumption). So what pulls us out? Biofuels and alternative energy? I understand something like 40% of those projects are underwater and future venture financing rounds are on hold indefinately.
The depression has already begun. So far, $6 trillion in housing wealth has been destroyed and $9 trillion of stock market wealth (U.S. only) has vanished.
We are going to short squeeze today. Everyone is short after the big gain, but guess what, Dow is creeping to even. If we are down less than 100 at Noon (3pm, I’m west coast), then we squeeze to green.
On another note, Alan Blinder twitches like a nutcase…
I think Fly should make himself a giant bowl of oatmeal and bring back the golden bull.
Money is flooding into treasuries because of today’s announcement.
TBT is a buy here.
Jeff Macke
02:26:08 PM
Position in WMT, MCD, MSFT,
Up the Creek Without a Paddle
Greetings from New York where I’m this close to closing up the trading shop and calling it a year. Though the tape, ironically, has no actual finish line I still measure everything by the calendar year. It’s a legacy from once running other people’s money (OPM), when it’s all about results for the year.
Right now I’ve got a portfolio full of cash, dribs and drabs. I’ve stubbed my toe more than once but have double digit gains in a year when “flat” wins. I’ve been sidelined through the Friday-Monday rippage and, frankly, I’m having a hard time caring. Last year I closed up shop when the Fed gave us what, in retrospect, was one of the all-time Selling Opportunities on December 11th and 12th. It’s worth noting that what made it a sell signal was that the Fed did a liquidity jam job on the 12th after the market reacted poorly to the results the FMOC’s regular meeting the day prior. The market traded in what was regarded as a shocking 3% range that icy December Wednesday, with the S&P 500 closing at 1,486 and it was enough to make me back off and head home for the holidays.
That’s right, folks. For those of you with faith in the Fed’s ability to decide just what can and cannot be “allowed to fail”, the market is down over 40% in the 11.5 months since what has now become regular daily manipulations and liquidity jams. I get daily e-mails telling me I’m too cynical and generally surly. The truth is, I’m not enough of either. I’ve had a good enough year that I’m done putting “real” capital in play until 2009. I’m truly thankful for that and the embarrassment of riches that is my life. Regardless, if I’d been cynical enough to really put the pedal to the metal on my “Shenanigans” call of December, 2007 and just gone 100% short and had the squash to stick to the call, I’d be up a cool 43%.
Is the Fed pronouncing Citigroup (C) “too big to fail” bullish? Maybe for a trade. For an investment, the Fed has been trying to dig out Citigroup since at least August of last year. The stock is down more than 80% since the FOMC’s “liquidity Boost Wednesday” on December 12th of ought-7. Mr. Market and the decisions of management decide which companies live and which ones die. The Fed, in all its branches and using only the best of intentions, can delay the day of reckoning. At best.
The existing and incoming government’s fervent conviction that they can “save” industries and “create jobs” through wild spending and force of will has me thinking the balance of ’08 is edgeless. Yup, I’ve actually stopped working in response to the government’s insistence that they can make me do so. As I understand it, I am the personification of the general nature of all socialist movements. But that’s a story for anther post.
For now, I’ve got my trading bat largely on my shoulder, even as I mentally toy with the idea of a short of the S&P 500 with an 860 closing stop. The days are short, the year is aging and “playing not to lose” is the path to a certain butt-kicking, regardless of your endeavor. Short of a thunder-bolt of inspiration, my trades will be a tenth their normal size from here until January. I wouldn’t trade at all if I didn’t need to stay loose and have a ton of air and type to fill on a daily basis.
Here’s what I’m watching, for those of you looking from trading ideas from the openly apathetic:
*
Biggest regret of 2008, beyond ever looking at Microsoft’s (MSFT) balance sheet? That I’m now long Citigroup, American International (AIG) and — most maddening of all — am about to buy into the Big 2.5 automakers, all thanks to the spendthrift ways of my elected officials. Think it’s not “Patriotic” to have a problem with government bailouts? Thomas Jefferson said “the tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants”. Does that sound like a guy who’d get squeamish about letting companies die from their self-inflicted wounds?
* Trade I’m happiest about in 2008? Selling the USO for a $4 loss at $105. Todd-O talks smack about being on the other side of my long position in the first place. He was right, I was wrong. Any chucklehead can buy stocks. If you want to last beyond the trend du jour, you have to learn how to get out of positions. I stand firmly behind the purple crayon technique.
* The network has asked politely that I not share my semi-retirement for the balance of 2008. In response I politely pitched the idea of dedicating a full block of Squawk Box this Friday to a Banjo Jamboree. I’ll be hosting with the lovely and extremely able Becky Quick, who has offered that she can play the spoons “but not very well”. Since I don’t plan to start learning the banjo until tomorrow, I assured her she’d have nothing to be embarrassed about, quality wise.
* How do you connect the dots between “taking the rest of the year off” and “working the day after Thanksgiving”? With a house full of in-laws, Minyans.
* A longtime friend and Minyan just pinged me to let me know he’s taking the other side of what’s left of my Wal-Mart (WMT) long. He says he’s convinced Lee Scott’s exit and the predictably horrid holiday season will lead to multiple contraction. I responded that Wal-Mart is an investment, not a trade, and will be as long as I consider them perfectly positioned and a preeminent operator. Then I kicked into a little Foggy Mountain Breakdown. Who else am I staying long into my hibernation? McDonald’s (MCD) and the aforementioned, accursed, Microsoft. One’s perfect for a recession and falling gas prices. The other satisfies my desire for self-abuse and hunger for something to rue.
* Finally, an anecdote which seems as meaningful as Joe Kennedy’s famous (if apocryphal) tale of selling before the ’29 Crash after getting a stock tip from the kid shining his shoes: I was running errands this morning and got to talking to my deli guy. He knows me from the show, and my deli shopping. We often chat markets. He was more terse than usual today. “Your whole stock thing is crooked” he said with disdain, handing me a pound of turkey. And he’s right. But I’ll worry more about that next year.
I actually bought the guitar just for the case, to start with. You know, like the old gangster flicks with guys carrying violin cases packed with “Kansas City Typewriters”.
I also thought I’d maybe build a rifle into the guitar, ala’ Ted Nugent, but that didn’t work out either.
But the gee-uillotine functions well.
Mike Mish Shedlock
01:40:00 PM
No positions in stocks mentioned.
This Rally Has Legs
In regards to Professor Depew’s bullish % indicators, I note the S&P 500 recently turned green, with the other indicators still in the red. After watching these numbers for many months, the pattern seems to be when one turns green a rally continues until they all turn green. Likewise when one turns red there is a selloff until all of them turn red.
This rally could last a while this time, especially since the Elliott Wave count we have suggests we are finally in a corrective wave 4 up. That wave 4 can easily last another 150 S&P points from here, or more.
So far every rally attempt has fallen apart and unlike the other rally attempts there appears to be more skepticism about this one. That is a healthy sign for the bulls.
Finally, like some of the other professors I do not think the lows are in, but there are counts that would make that possible. In my opinion, risk reward favors the upside here, at least for a while. In regards to gold specifically, there are many fundamental reasons for the rally to continue and we may finally be back in a seasonal favorable pattern through January.
Macke is a very angry man. He reminds me of the panda.
Rally coming!!! I just checked on the monkey, and the mixture is getting him all amped up!
Vitaliy Katsenelson
01:25:10 PM
No positions in stocks mentioned.
“Stuff” Stocks Look Cheap!
“You should buy Freeport McMoRan (FCX), Caterpillar (CAT), PACCAR (PCAR).” That is what I hear from friends of mine, who are in the biz, all the time. They tell me how cheap these stocks are — 3, 6, 8 times earnings. “You are a value guy! How come you are not loading up on them?” they say.
Minyans, let me tell you when I’ll buy “stuff” stocks (if I ever do, because I’ve never really cared for the cyclicality of that business). It’s when everyone stops telling me how cheap they are and that they are “buys.”
These stocks are very similar to housing stocks two years ago: housing stocks were down 50% and looked cheap. Value managers bought just to see their stocks get cut in half again and again.
One needs to subnormalize earnings in this environment for all stocks, but “stuff” stocks need to see their earnings to be “sub-sub-sub-sub normalized.” I’ve said it before, but it is worth repeating: the global economy just started its journey into a recession; demand for “stuff” will drop off the cliff most likely to a lot greater degree than anyone imagines.
I hear from my friends in Russia that the construction business that was booming only in September is dead. Like deader than dead. It doesn’t matter if projects were finished or not, investors took their money and ran. Russia may appear like a special case since its prosperity is directly linked to commodity prices, but the slowdown is happening in the rest of the developing world like China and India… and the list goes on.
“Stuff” stocks are likely to bottom when they look expensive. Their “E’s” will be low or negative. Also, consumers were not the only ones that over-consumed “stuff.” Emerging markets over-consumed earthmovers, tractors and factories. They still have huge overcapacity at a time when the global economy is slowing down.
I really thought Macke was going to get caught short and ripped to shreds. Nice to see him get out now, takes balls.
Good luck everyone, I gotta go now.
You’ve all no-doubt noted that God’s bank, JPM is up big.
Until things start to look a bit better (i.e. less than one huge panic per week), TBT is not a buy.
I said it before and I’ll say it again – TBT can suck my ass.
QLTI will go into play day after thanksgiving being bought by company led by hedge fund on west coast. being put on dinner table and carved up.
The ruskies are trying to play hard ball with the US these days. They think they smell weakness. Now that we’ve had the world trade center knocked to the ground, and people crawling out of caves to short our financials I have only one thing to say.
Pick your battles carefully boys. Particularly when you mess with the US.