Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee

This HBO film will debut in May. The Sioux are still alive. Make sure you watch it.

Lazlo Birinyi's TICKER SENSE......

Birinyi's Ticker Sense (note I have it linked on this blog under Lazlo Birinyi) submits: As of 2:55 PM today, the 70 basis point gain in the S&P 500 ranks as the third most positive market performance on a Fed day since the tightening cycle began in June 2004. However, we also looked at the S&P 500 return in the one week following Fed days. 71% of the time the market's direction in the one week period after the Fed day is the opposite of the direction it takes on the day of the announcement.

Tribal Mismanagement..........

There are 315,000 entries in GOOGLE under "tribal mismanagement".

If all of the tribal fiduciaries that I have met who are supposed to be looking out for tribal 401-k assets were truly fiduciaries there would thousands and thousands of Native Americans far better prepared for their retirement.

Best bumper sticker this week.............

"Don't steal. The BIA hates competition."

Atlanta Journal Constitution

Our local daily is about as liberal as you can get for a major newspaper east of Washington, DC.

Mike King is the stand-out writer and if it weren't for Michael Vick coverage and our state, flag waving, booze-loving (only 6 days a week tho) governnor's daily deeds there wouldn't be much to it.

Readers get to call or email the paper every day with some excellent humor and satire. Frankly, the Vent Guy has either gotten much brighter or they replaced him with a Yankee.

Either way, today's best vent was a rant on Georgia and I quote the AJC here, "We are near the bottom in education, tops in lack of health-care, gridlock and foreclosures, yet we re-elected a governor whose big idea is to improve the fishing. No wonder Yankees think we are stupid."

Merrill Lynch

No surprise the guy running Mother Merrill had a 30% increase in his compensation to near the $50,000,000 mark for 2006. Not bad work if you can get it. With the S&P 500 up a fraction of that % increase maybe the customers will vote with their feet.

Come to think of it, just where are the customers yachts?

Dirk Kempthorne, hero to Native America or bum?

This guy has one of the roughest jobs in America. Every day he has to talk out both sides of his mouth to Native Americans on what a good job they have done in the Interior Department in looking out for Indian Country and then try to protect Interior and apparently U.S. taxpayers from an onslaught of litigation for government transgressions with Indian money.

The beat goes on

New Passports for Canada and Mexico

The new passport rules to Canada and Mexico for Americans will be a massive inconvenience.

It doesn't appear that our government has any plans to inconvenience the Mexican invasion force. Day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year they come.

Rod Stewart............

Phillips Arena in the ATL was rocking last night with Mr. Stewart. At 61, he can still sing. I don't know if he could ever dance but he can strut and march as good as Mick tho he doesn't have Mick's prance. His band was very good with a great drummer. Rod is more of a marcher than a dancer and his ass-wiggling and butt-slapping must be a trade mark as it was the first time I had seen his show. The crowd looked old. I had as much fun watching the crowd try to dance in front of their folding chairs, most of them having a hard time wiggling around. All in all, a great show with some excellent music and solid musicianship. He still has it. Unfortunately, I did not get to see Rachel Hunter.

REAL FEAR.........

It's been years since I have stepped foot in a brokerage office. Too scary. As a money-manager I take hundreds of calls every year from brokers pitching every type of "new" and "unique" investment product on earth. I guess the older I get the more fearful I am of having to listen to a broker or commission-type financial planner tell somebody with serious money how to plan their retirement. It is usually the broker planning their retirement with the clients commissions.

The best way to describe my fear would be to make the analogy that having to rely on a salesman/stockbroker to safeguard retirement money would be like relying on a pothead to safeguard the Fritos. Never forget, those stockbrokers fancy titles are not awarded for achieving investment results; they are for charging fat fees and big commissions.

Next week I have to go to a brokerage office and extricate an account for an elderly widow who is a new client of Chippewa Partners. I should bring an attorney along for what the broker did to this lady over the years. Sickening.

Michael Vick

A walking example of a tremendous gifted athlete, extreme wealth and sheer stupidity.

Sensible retirement planning..........

I have mentioned this writers work in the past as I think he is spot-on nearly 100% of the time and often wonder why he is still working for Dow Jones but Jonathan Clements in todays Wall Street Journal has a great piece for every American who is planning on retiring in say the next 15 years. If you are interested in the article send me an email and I will get you a copy. If you want to survive retirement this is a great piece.

Musings after the King Holiday.........

Do you know the Dow Jones Industrials closed in positive territory all of 136 days in 2006? The icy blast gripping the nation is much harder on birds than natural gas prices. The unseasonably warm weather in Georgia over the weekend was for the birds. Tom Brady is the real deal in the area of pro quarterbacks, cool as a cucumber under intense pressure. Another short week of trading will be good for the bulls. It gives Wall Street more time to spend the bonus money.

RSP

For a core holding component of your portfolio, that is, if you run a "core and satellite" strategy like we generally employ at Chippewa Partners, you might want to own the Rydex S&P Equal Weight ETF. This fund weights its portfolio in equal amounts vs. rewarding larger positions to companies with the biggest market capitalizations. This difference means smaller members of the S&P 500 can influence returns just as much as its largest constituents like General Electric, Microsoft, or Bank of America. And that adds up: This ETF has returned 12.5% over the last three years, two-and-a-half percentage points better than the S&P 500. I pitch this name to everyone, everywhere, in every meeting, in every seminar. When I tell stockbrokers or folks who call themselves financial planners to own it they usually look at me with the same blank stare that I get when somebody mentions the word "calculus" to me. It is a market beater, pure and simple. Do the math, run the historical returns. Small beats big over time, even in the S&P names.

ARRS

It looks like the Needham conference has some Arris Group shorts nervous.

Thinking about escalating.............

America needs to send 20,000 more troops to Iraq like we need a tax hike or open borders. George W. had his way and got his war. This was George's war, not America's war. Protect our access to Iraqi oil and let the chips fall where they may. It wasn't pretty back when and it won't be pretty going forward. War is hell.

What a tilt.............

Boise State and Florida would be!

2007........He's off............

I put my Dad on a plane this morning back to his home in Minnesota. He turned 84 a couple of weeks ago and is doing well. Slowing down some, losing his old friends faster than he would like and more apt to enjoy watching golf than playing it. It's probably hell to get old and we all are headed that way faster than we care to admit. It's another year and time for focusing on "dollars up and pounds down"!! Some of you far away I haven't wished a happy 2007 from me to you. To old friends, partners (clients) of the firm, long-ago classmates, acquaintances along the way, I wish you and your families a healthy 2007. It has tremendous promise for a fun and very exciting year. Thank you as well for your support, friendship and ideas during 2006. For some who lurk if you'd like to connect, you know how to reach me!

Native American humor............

My Dad was asked today what kind of Indian he was. He smiled as only an 84-year old can do and said, "there's only two kind of Native Americans, those who are Chippewa and those who wish they were".

Best bumper sticker of the weekend.........

Jimmy Carter is to foreign policy what Rosie O'Donnell is to pole vaulting!

Go ahead, check this out...............

http://sagebrushpatriot.com/america.htm

Soft Dollars...........

At Chippewa Partners we have never allowed the use of soft dollars to pay for investment services. Never will. Another word for "soft dollars" is theft. Plain and simple. Trading to generate payments for services rendered with client assets should be stopped. Will it happen? Not a chance. Wall Street makes too much money in soft dollar payments. Money managers, including mutual funds and hedge funds, often pay Wall Street with “soft dollars” — inflated commissions that include the cost of trading (typically 1 to 2 cents a share) plus an additional few cents a share that can be directed to pay for research and other services. Soft dollars are controversial because clients pay for the higher commissions, while the services often benefit the manager the most. Higher commissions result in greater expenses for the fund and potentially lower returns for investors. In the late 1990s, the Securities and Exchange Commission cracked down on the use of soft dollars by mutual funds, concerned that investors were being duped into paying for services enjoyed by the manager. Massachusetts is now investigating whether hedge funds are improperly using soft dollars to pay for space in these hotels and failing to disclose to investors that they are covering a major expense.

In 2007 in America...........

With 70% of Americans overweight we need far more walking shoes prescribed than pills. We need more fathers and fewer sires. We need lower taxes and fewer earmarks. We need more politicians with guts and fewer lobbyists. We need lifetime health care for the maimed and damaged coming home from Iraq. We need immigration, social security and tax reform. We need to stop waste in the Federal goverment. We need less Hollywood and more statesman in our next President. And we need fewer space stations and better access to health care in Native America. Anything else would be just great.

2007

The world lost a prolific writer, philospher and teacher on September 25, 2006. His name was John (Jeff) D. Cooper. He was an avid hunter and known for his honest speech that he refused to temper with political correctness if it was at the expense of the truth. He stood fast by his code of morals, a philosophy of life which he often espoused: "Understand the problem; pull your weight. Appreciate. Be completely honest and trustworthy in all things." Words we all can memorialize as we enter 2007. It will be a great year. Believe it.