Aalan

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  • Analyst Throws Water on Hope in Medical IT
    Good article. I bought one of these around election time, watched it go up 20%, took the money and ran. Still, it wouldn't hurt to revisit the list for news on the fundamentals; they can't all be dogs.
    Jan 06 20:39 pm |Rating: +1 0 |Link to Comment |View article
  • Depression, PMI and China
    There are helpful insights here. However, other sides to the story are being neglected. The Chinese government has enough in reserves to set up a healthcare/pension system that could mitigate older worker's obsession with savings--and/or, foster a systematic and persistent inflation rate which would make savings unattractive. This is in addition to the already-publicized plan to use the reserve warchest for infrastructure investments; with enough economic activity generated this way, perhaps the dearth of exports and consumer spending is not as serious an issue.

    All told, I think it's too early to tell whether China will suffer any real recession, much less depression. At worst, it's still a better bet than any other major country, IMHO.
    Jan 02 17:06 pm |Rating: +1 0 |Link to Comment |View article
  • Time to Buy Jacobs Engineering
    Why is this a better buy than FLR, URS, or any other engineering company? You're not telling us much.
    Dec 31 09:09 am |Rating: +1 0 |Link to Comment |View article
  • Have Commodity Prices Reached a Bottom Yet?
    Arie, the date labels on your chart are wrong. This is a monthly chart, right?
    Helpful article, thanks.
    Dec 31 08:09 am |Rating: 0 0 |Link to Comment |View article
  • More ProShares Ultrashorts Tomfoolery
    Mark, I like many of your articles, but you are barking up the wrong tree this time. It's not the fault of the fund if you used it for a purpose it was not designed for. You could have done the math before committing to a long-term strategy with it. You could have taken profits after you had tripled (!!) your investment. Stop whining and come up with another winning tactic.
    Dec 29 02:53 am |Rating: +4 -4 |Link to Comment |View article
  • IBM: It's All About Smart Grid in 2009
    The last paragraph rings false. PG&E has actually been dealing with several startups to meet its renewable energy goals. Perhaps other companies are more conservative, but the guy said "PG&E" and it's wrong.
    Maybe IBM does have a role to play in this trend, but I see no evidence that it's a pivotal role, or will make much difference in the stock's value.
    Dec 24 10:31 am |Rating: 0 0 |Link to Comment |View article
  • CEF vs. ETF Arbitrage in the Real Estate Sector
    I agree with Scott that the article lacks usefulness, but for a different reason. REIT CEFs typically pay out 15-30% yield, vs. 5-8% (?) for ETFs. So comparing NAV charts doesn't tell you anything; you have to compare total return.
    Dec 14 14:42 pm |Rating: +1 -1 |Link to Comment |View article
  • Timing the Addition of a CEF to Your Portfolio
    According to last quarterly report, the fund is leveraged to the max (-57% cash), while the T-bills it owns have run up in price parabolically. Yes, the bonds are safe, but their market value is not guaranteed, and can collapse precipitously. If this triggers a need to de-leverage, the dividend will be cut, as has happened to many other CEFs recently. Caveat emptor, as always.
    Dec 14 14:36 pm |Rating: 0 0 |Link to Comment |View article
  • A New Use for Solar Energy - Highway Right of Way
    I'm not quite seeing how wildlife is fitting in with your vision. Solar panels obviously create shade, which will form a micro-climate very different from the surrounding land, where shade-loving plants will flourish. This, in addition to offering attractive browsing opportunities for deer on other large herbivores, will offer habitat for any number of creatures not normally found in exposed areas--thereby attracting predators as well. So this could be an "attractive nuisance" for wildlife. Where's the benefit?

    Outside of that, there are some ideas worth exploring here.
    Dec 13 14:25 pm |Rating: +1 -1 |Link to Comment |View article
  • The Heart of Cleantech Sells at 50% Discount to the Broader Market
    Thanks for the reply, John. I think that gives us a better perspective. I'll take those 5 (or at least one); you can keep the 9 that are unprofitable.
    In a season when analysts are slashing estimates by 40-60% all over the place, forward PEs are meaningless.


    On Dec 11 11:09 AM John Petersen wrote:

    > Aalan, the PE ratios (for the 5 of 14 companies that have them) are:
    >
    Dec 11 13:55 pm |Rating: 0 0 |Link to Comment |View article
  • The Heart of Cleantech Sells at 50% Discount to the Broader Market
    I'm a cleantech fan, in principle, but.... How many of these companies were earning their price 9 months ago? If you calculate the "discount" by P/E ratios rather than by decline from 200DMA, I bet there's not much of a discount at all.
    Dec 11 10:45 am |Rating: 0 0 |Link to Comment |View article
  • The Treasuries Craze as Window Dressing
    The theory has merit as an explanation, but I don't see how you get to the next step--using it to predict the bursting of the bubble. Are big financial firms going to decide in the next week or two that they no longer need clean balance sheets?
    Dec 11 09:08 am |Rating: 0 0 |Link to Comment |View article
  • 'Second Half Recovery' Thesis Alive and Well in China
    Good article. I keep nodding in agreement with your central idea.

    But to be practical...

    I don't think we can predict how Chinese equities will perform. Even in a slowing economy, they are the best game in town, and the country's cash reserves are a potentially powerful weapon. So I wouldn't bet against emerging markets now.

    Shorting financials, yes; plenty of shoes left to drop.

    Shorting commercial REITs-- how do you do this? SRS pits you against the whole universe of REITs, including industrial, healthcare, and even timberlands, which could hold the index at support, or at least slow its decline. Besides, REITs pay huge dividends, so this gets really expensive if you are early.
    If you can't do it by ETF, you have to find individual stocks to short, which is a lot more heavy lifting.
    Dec 11 02:39 am |Rating: 0 -2 |Link to Comment |View article
  • Preview from Europe: Market Rally Was Running on Empty
    I love the car ad--where did you get that? And, right on about PREVENTING companies from getting "too big to fail."

    That said, I'm still looking for a nice bear rally--we need it.
    Dec 10 09:24 am |Rating: +1 0 |Link to Comment |View article
  • Investing in China's Next Boom
    I can't believe this.

    Even if you have all your facts right, your projection is speculative; and even if you have that right, you have your investment thesis exactly backwards.

    Or maybe I'm just too slow to understand why I should invest in a bubble that's about to crash, by your own account.

    (disclosure: long on China, and on REITs, but not on Chinese REITs).
    Dec 09 14:54 pm |Rating: 0 0 |Link to Comment |View article

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