money

April, 2010

" You know that you are going to have a bad tax session when you walk into the office and find out your tax preparer committed suicide."

~  Yours Truly
The Professional Opinion

S&P 500 Index: 1169.43

Instead of leading off with the LEI,  Bob points out that the market has registered mid-term off-presidential election year bottoms in every case during the past 50 years.   Following these bottoms,  significant market rallys have taken place following each off-election year bottom, and that is noteworthy.

The next two pages in the newsletter illustrate the trend.

Bob's target range for the S&P 500 index now extends in the mid to upper 1200's range.  These numbers may go higher buy it depends on the sustainability of the market recovery and the ability of the fed to correctly remove excess liquidity from the economy without doing more damage to same.

The FED

Ongoing Problem - Flat M2 Growth

What is M2?

M2 represents money and 'close substitutes' for money.

Economists use M2  to quantify the amount of money in circulation and in explaining economic monetary conditions.

M2 is also key economic indicator used in forecasting inflation.

What will fix it?

1.  Banks need to start lending.

2.  Commercial and Industrial loans need to improve.  Companies are more interested in deleveraging than in borrowing to expand their businesses.

When will it be fixed?

Not any time in the near future.


Summary

The economy is turning around so stay fully invested and buy on the dips.

 
Coastal Turkeys
I was going to say that this is fair representation of our current leadership in government but I haven't yet figured out how to do that without insulting the turkeys. 

Personal Portfolio
YTD
In light of the way the so-called health care bill was passed, I think the teleprompter and it's liberal minions
can now be aptly described as enemies of the state. They certainly cannot be described as representatives of the people.  Representatives of their party maybe, but most certainly not representatives of the people.
Election season will prove entertaining to say the least.  

Enough said.

The financial stocks continue to lead the pack and the portfolio for another month. I would look for another nice bump up in the month of April.  I think Citigroup will be a contributing factor.

The large caps have been performing nicely as well.

Beat the pants off Bob's portfolios this month.  I think he should re-examine his weightings in international funds.

Other than that,  not much else interests me this month.



Finance

Personal Portfolio

An overall 13% return year to date is not bad at all but I have come to the conclusion that I don't think I would want to do this for a living.  I've made back all the losses since late 2007 and am only 4% off my all time high. This has been the result of a lot of ongoing research, some fairly active trading and a little bit of luck.  It gets tiresome but I think it is necessary for the foreseeable future.   

HUN

I've begun lightening my concentration in Huntsman, taking it down to a more reasonable 6% of the portfolio.  My largest holdings are in a taxable account and I hear long term capital gains dividends are going up to 20% next year:

Tax Rates

Courtesy of our government - the finest institution money can buy.


A Speculation

Citigroup

Listening to the various financial shows over the last month yielded an interesting bit which I thought was worth looking into and that was the fact that other financial and insurance CEO's all seemed to like the the new Citi CEO,  Vikram Pandit.  Heck, even the govt seems to like this guy.

C

This could work out quite well - if you buy enough.  I think I'll buy enough and see what transpires in April.
Where am I?
Where am I?   Hint:  This is not Nevada.