Stockmarket February

[sidewinder]

All my market bets are off today.  We are at a point where anything can happen.  So in order to avoid any financial unpleasantness at this point I am simply an observer of the market.

This doesn't mean things can't change rapidly over the next 2 days we are ripe for a correction to the jump of last week.     Yes, plaid is my favorite color.

[sunseeker]

Warren Buffett bought silver (leverage to the price of gold) after stating that he wasn’t interested in buying commodities of any discription (especially gold) for investment purposes.
Warren Buffett expressed his dislike of derivatives (especially shorting strategies) calling them weapons of financial destruction. In a recent interview I heard him admit to using them.

George Soros warned only recently that gold was in the ultimate bubble then bought a large position in GLD.

“Charlie Munger, Warren Buffett’s longtime business partner in Berkshire Hathaway, warns in a new column that the U.S. economic empire is crumbling before our eyes, thanks to federal debt and poor planning.”

http://moneynews.com/Headline/munger-buffett-economy-debt/2010/02/22/id/350529

By that measure the US economy must be in great shape and we all should be backing up the truck.  LOL

ATB 

[MetalMeister]

LOL!!!

Your link did not work on Munger.  Here is the original parable:

http://www.slate.com/id/2245328/

Here is the latest I can find on Greece (NOT GOOD

http://www.torontonews.net/story/605167

Listen to this!  The people of Greece feel like they have been used by the European Union.  Guess no one has told them about Goldman Sachs?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8535235.stm

Clashes have broken out between police and protesters in Greece, as up to two million people continue to strike over austerity measures.

Police fired tear gas at a group of some 50 protesters on the edges of the rally.

It is the second general strike in two weeks and coincides with growing anger at the EU's response to the crisis.

More than half-a-million civil servants have reportedly abandoned their posts, leaving the country paralysed.

Trains and ferries have been cancelled, the country's airspace closed to all flights, and tourist attractions closed, leaving travellers stranded.

The CRE front:

http://money.cnn.com/2010/02/23/real_estate/underwater_rates_rise/index.htm

Nevada was the state with the worst record at 70% of all mortgaged properties underwater. That was followed by Arizona (51%), Florida (48%), Michigan (39%) and California (35%).

SW, do you mean plaid like this?



Or plaid like this?

[sidewinder]

I got three monitors here and cant get the whole picture on all three together.  Can you modify the graphic to fit the normal size of the thread.   I always do a preview (the button right next to the post button on the bottom) before posting it can prevent blowing out the page.  That might help.  When these blowouts happen I usually won't bother to view the thread again until a new page loads, just too aggravating.  Thanks


From what I can tell it looks like that Commie Traitor Jane Fonda.  Another reason not to look at this again.   

[MetalMeister]

I don't know how to modify it down.  Tell me and I will do it.

That is Hannah Storm, the hot sports gal, in the pictures.

When you said something about plaid, I just assumed you were talking about the latest controversy:

http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/2010/02/23/2010-02-23_espn_supsends_kornheiser_for_storm_comments.html

I just assumed you were watching NASCAR news on ESPN when the scandal aired... 

[sidewinder]

NO! I had not seen that.  Hanna must have conjugal entanglements with the upper management who may or may not resign soon and join the ranks of those CEOs shipping out to African high ground in order to survive the 2012 polar shifts.   

[MetalMeister]

There.  I fixed Hannah up just for your screen, dude!

[sidewinder]

You da man YC

[MetalMeister]

This might explain a little of Ron Paul's questioning...

http://www.usatoday.com/money/world/2010-02-26-greece26_ST_N.htm

Even Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke has weighed in, telling lawmakers Thursday that the central bank is examining arrangements Goldman Sachs and other Wall Street firms have with Greece involving high-risk financial instruments.

Bernanke said the Fed is looking into companies' use of credit default swaps, a form of insurance against bond defaults. He made the comments at the start of a Senate Banking Committee hearing where he was testifying on the U.S. economy.

Iceland to vote on debt default by March 6.

http://uk.reuters.com/article/idUKTRE6071KM20100109

[Bottomfeeder]

Thanks for the pic fix YC....

[Beginner]

When will the China Bubble Burst?

An interesting video about the China bubble below.  If it took the US bubble ten years to burst (some say longer) how long will it take for the China burst?  An important consideration for China investors.

Incidentally, the US has always been consistently pro-communist China ever since the time the late Senator Joe McCarthy (representing US isolationism) was anti communist (perhaps Joe McCarthy was the only one true anti-communist in modern US history).  They said McCarthy was hounding artists, film directors and cinema actors as “communists” when in fact he was after the US Government’s top echelon.  McCarthy was after Dean Acheson’s State Department (filled with pro-communist China liberals and humanitarians and even some paid up US communist party members, all idealist dreamers of a new dawning for China.  McCarthy just never realized what he was up against.  He died after five years in office.  None of his three books are any longer available in print but thousands of books condemning him abound and his name has become an international dictionary term of opprobrium and abuse.

Now here is a video asking when the China bubble is going to burst - it is not about McCarthyism, by the way.  I just mention McCarthyism because McCarthy opposed covert US aid to the communist guerrillas in China after the Second World War. What I am saying is the US has consistently cultivated communist China from its birth (a communist dictatorship would reduce the population explosion for one thing).  McCarthyism - just my personal take on US historical influence in China)

But if the China bubble bursts that will have worldwide repercussions and may lead to world war.

Here is the video: http://www.brasschecktv.com/page/807.html   for what it is worth.  Sorry for the long introduction.  We are at a loss what stocks to pick so we analyse the political situation instead.  But maybe we should be careful what China stocks we pick or be aware when to sell them.

[MetalMeister]

Interesting video.

What I didn't hear really discussed was their own internal demand growth, which is huge.  No different than US when we were industrializing.  So many hundreds of millions of people still living in the stone age there and wanting a better life and willing to do anything to get it.

I think if China did blow a bubble it would be nothing akin to the US bubble bursts.

It was just a year and a half ago we started hearing about tons of layoffs and factories closing and now they are saying they will have 9.8% growth this year.  A lot of that has to be internal because my guess is exports to the world haven't picked up all that much.

BTWDIK.

[Beginner]

Talking of Wars and Stocks

Hi YC   .  Not sure I can answer the points you raise.  China is 1.3 billion people. 1.2 billion is in angry restless destitution and when a job is lost death by starvation can be the outcome.

0.2 billion Chinese are part of the Western economy and they are relatively well off although not so well off as their Western counterparts.  So the majority of Chinese are in dire straits and extremely restless and angry.  The Chinese Government has a very real problem.  All Chinese governments from time immemorial have had to deal with the huge gap between the extremely rich and the vast majority of desperately poor.

The present Chinese Government has its hands full trying to maintain law and order and avoiding total chaos.  Order is better than chaos, everyone will agree - even if it has to be sometimes maintained with a big stick.  In my other message I was talking of war as a possible distraction by the Chinese government if things in China were to get out of control - but war with whom? We do not know, although a vast under populated country like neighboring Russia, rich in raw materials, (a rapidly declining population of only 140 million people), might be tempting.  Russia is the largest country in the world, although largely uninhabitable and difficult to defend.

On another subject, but still on the subject of war, here we have Professor Chossudovsky of Ottawa University, talking of imminent war between the West and Iran. Nothing new, you may say, but it could also indirectly and ultimately affect China, if it becomes reality.

Here is the video:  http://www.brasschecktv.com/page/806.html

Again we have to have this wider perspective in order to attempt to see where the stock market might be heading.  For what it is worth.  Hopefully these predictions will come to naught.  War is the ulimate nightmare.

[MetalMeister]

Watched the video.

The war will be with the U.S.

Here's my hunch.  This is a letter I just wrote to my Pastor today.

You mentioned an Iran-China pipeline last Sunday night. 

The plans are now for a gas pipeline.  But an oil pipeline is certainly a possibility in the next few years as there is a proposed oil pipeline to connect Kazakhstan to Turkmenistan to the central Asia (non U.S. backed) oil pipeline in existence that flows directly to China.  Then it is a simple step to do a pipeline into Iran.

These articles and maps show the geopolitical energy setup in central Asia as well as the military interests involved and Iran’s nuclear sites.

My guess is that Israel bombs Iran sooner than later and the U.S. steps in also to cause regime change in Iran.  That will make Russia and China very mad at the Zionists as well as assure hatred from all the Muslim world which could lead to immense unrest around Israel, temporarily, and Israel reasserting itself in the region, by military force to stabilize things, and somebody from Israel blows up the Dome of the Rock during the military siege that would follow through Jerusalem and into “Palestine”.   A complete regime change in Iran could easily bring on a peace deal in the Middle East.  The U.S. would then greedily implement negative measures for oil and gas to China, probably initiate some negative measures for Russia and Western Europe’s dependence on Russia for energy.  That brings on WWIII and, as a sideshow, Israel gets stamped out because without Israel there the U.S. has no more reason to fight.  The U.S. will not be able to stand up to the might of Russia and China militarily so the U.S. economy gets flattened in the process very quickly because most of the countries of the world say no to continuing to support the U.S. through debt purchases.  The U.S. would be devastated economically and militarily because of vastly decreased oil purchasing ability.  Then everything is ripe for a one world currency and government with the fall of the dollar and a worldwide revaluation.

From there it’s pretty much all downhill…

It always goes back to the money and who is going to dominate globally.  Sad but true reflection on the U.S. current ambitions controlled by progressives through the governments for over 100 years now, who are in turn controlled by big banks and big oil.

No conspiracy theory here.  Just sizing up the facts and drawing a logical conclusion.


http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/GL21Ad01.html

http://www.voltairenet.org/article163566.html


http://www.ensec.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=199:iran-pakistan-pipeline-irans-new-economic-lifeline&catid=96:content&Itemid=345

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/bizchina/2009-04/24/content_7712041.htm

http://willyloman.wordpress.com/2010/01/13/pipeline-geopolitics-major-turnaround-russia-china-iran-redraw-energy-map/

[jjj000]

The U.S. will not be able to stand up to the might of Russia and China militarily so the U.S. economy gets flattened in the process very quickly because most of the countries of the world say no to continuing to support the U.S. through debt purchases.

I think I need to disagree with this part.  There is no Russian military "might" to speak of other than a nuclear arsenal (?).  China obviously has more cash on hand, and manufactures a lot of US military resources.  US would likely bring more production back stateside, or to a friendly country, preemptively to avoid too large of a transition once the Chinese cut us off.

If it were a US vs Iran-China-Russia scenario I would think the whole of the free world would put everything they have to back our side -- including resource rich countries like Australia, Canada, South Africa, and likely Brazil.  All of Western Europe on our side, half of the rest of South America (incidental), and much of the remainder of Asian countries.

Nobody else would want the US to lose that war other than a few Muslim and communist South American countries.  Hell, at this point I bet the Russians wouldn't even want us to lose that war.

Of course, I have no clue whatsoever what I am talking about... this is just what I think about such a hypothetical scenario.  I mean at this point it's pretty clear these wars can't be about just "the oil"... because from what I've read the US isn't even getting the lion's share of the oil in Iraq now anyway.  Or maybe we are and Halliburton is making a billion zillion dollars and it's just not public... who the hell knows...