Parisian Family Office, CEO. Started Wall Street, '82. Drexel Burnham alum. Founded Chippewa Partners, Native American Advisors, '95. Chippewa, raised on reservations. Conservative. NYSE/FINRA arb. Pureblood. Trading WON/CANSLIM methodology from PAMELOT, TN farm, GHOST RANCH, MT, on the Yellowstone River, or CASA TULE', their winter camp in Los Cabos, Mexico. Will always be, a relentless optimist with radical gratitude.
Wednesday, September 08, 2010
from ZeroHedge.com
This is getting really ridiculous. In the week ended September 1, domestic equity mutual funds saw a near record $9.5 billion in outflows: the biggest one week outflow in 2010 since the $13.4 billion redeemed in the Flash Crash week. The trend developing is simple: retail investors withdraw increasingly greater numbers in weeks in which the market is down even a little, and withdraw just a little in weeks in which the low-volume melt up presents them with an opportunity to get out at a better price level. Of course, the common thread is that as we have said for 18 consecutive weeks, retail just wants out. And now that, courtesy of Mary Schapiro, retail has finally put two and two together, and knows that even the regulators are concerned about redemptions, which are perceived by the SEC as being a function of distrust in market structure, we now fully expect more and more redemptions. Year to Date the total pulled out is a whopping $64 billion, incidentally with both inflows and the market having peaked at the same time in April. On thr other hand, if the market were tracking mutual fund redemptions (whose net liquidity is now down to just 3.5% of assets and getting worse by the day), the S&P would be in the 900 range. Once the destructive impact of the Fed's daily meddling in the stock market is eliminated, it will get there. The longer stocks are artificially held up at current artificial levels, the greater the crash when reality and anti-gravity finally meet.
Tuesday, September 07, 2010
Remember this........
Success has nothing to do with money and everything to do with how you feel about yourself.......here's more to chew on.........
Sept. 7, 2010 -- Money may shape your outlook on life, but it can only buy so much when it comes to your daily happiness.
"More money does not necessarily buy more happiness," write researcher Daniel Kahneman of Princeton University and colleagues in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Researchers found income can positively affect how you view your life, but it doesn't necessarily affect your daily emotions. Other factors, such as health, caregiving status, loneliness, and smoking are more likely to color your daily emotional state.
The study, based on more than 450,000 responses to a daily survey of 1,000 U.S. adults, showed that how people rated the quality of their lives -- on a scale from one to 10 -- rose steadily with annual income levels.
But the quality of people's daily emotional experiences leveled off at a certain stable income level, suggesting that there may be a salary cap on money's ability to buy happiness.
"Perhaps $75,000 is a threshold beyond which further increases in income no longer improve individuals' ability to do what matters most to their emotional well-being, such as spending time with people they like, avoiding pain and disease, and enjoying leisure," write the researchers. Participants' emotional well-being was measured according to their responses to questions about emotional experiences on the previous day.
The results showed that as incomes decreased below $75,000, the participants reported less happiness and increasing sadness and stress.
Researchers also found that the emotional pain of unfortunate events, such as divorce, disease, or being alone, was exacerbated by poverty.
Sept. 7, 2010 -- Money may shape your outlook on life, but it can only buy so much when it comes to your daily happiness.
"More money does not necessarily buy more happiness," write researcher Daniel Kahneman of Princeton University and colleagues in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Researchers found income can positively affect how you view your life, but it doesn't necessarily affect your daily emotions. Other factors, such as health, caregiving status, loneliness, and smoking are more likely to color your daily emotional state.
The study, based on more than 450,000 responses to a daily survey of 1,000 U.S. adults, showed that how people rated the quality of their lives -- on a scale from one to 10 -- rose steadily with annual income levels.
But the quality of people's daily emotional experiences leveled off at a certain stable income level, suggesting that there may be a salary cap on money's ability to buy happiness.
"Perhaps $75,000 is a threshold beyond which further increases in income no longer improve individuals' ability to do what matters most to their emotional well-being, such as spending time with people they like, avoiding pain and disease, and enjoying leisure," write the researchers. Participants' emotional well-being was measured according to their responses to questions about emotional experiences on the previous day.
The results showed that as incomes decreased below $75,000, the participants reported less happiness and increasing sadness and stress.
Researchers also found that the emotional pain of unfortunate events, such as divorce, disease, or being alone, was exacerbated by poverty.
They don't have a clue..........
The Obama administration is in full panic mode with just two months away from the mid-term elections and facing a record low approval rating, it is throwing the kitchen sink at the economy to make sure it doesn't enter November with a 10% unemployment rate.
Over the weekend, we saw a flurry of micro stimulus programs announced, which will have no measurable long-term impact, and in some cases result in growth declines in the future, yet likely result in a very short "sugar high" boost to the economy.
It's just more of the same from this President. In the past week, the Obama Administration has preemptively claimed victory on two fronts; a military pullout in Iraq, and the American economy (and conveniently right in time for Labor Day). Of course, he “exaggerated” the pullout in Iraq. There are still 50,000 troops on the ground, and the troops he did pull out are merely being replaced with private mercenary contractors like those from Blackwater. So, in Iraq, nothing has changed.
The administration’s proclamation that they have “stopped the bleeding” in terms of the economy is a similar misrepresentation of the facts. Its not that they have stopped the bleeding, America has almost bled out!
Counting U-6 measurements of those not considered by the Labor Department as unemployed because they are either off jobless benefits or are working part time, the jobless rate of the U.S. has hovered near 20% for over a year at least. During the Great Depression at its peak, unemployment reached 25%, but even this comparison is misleading. The population of the U.S. during the 1930’s was around 122 million, meaning far less working age adults than there are today in our population of 310 million people. In fact, the actual number, not percentage, of unemployed and underemployed today far exceeds that of the Great Depression. The number of desperate people, the critical mass of poor in a country, can have a far more insidious effect on its social environment than the abstract historical “percentage”, at least in my view.
Given the real state of unemployment, why has there been such euphoria over the economy in the past few days? Well, August private employment numbers from the Labor Department of 67,000 jobs created “beat Wall Street estimates”, that’s why. Set aside the fact that 121,000 temporary government jobs were cut equaling an actual net loss of 54,000 jobs. At least the privet sector is alive, right? Wrong. Here’s the rub…
Mainstream analyst estimates have become an incredibly pervasive delusion among investors and the public lately, a delusion that now has the financial sector dancing to whatever tune the government and the central banks wish to play.
Analysts forecast monthly unemployment reductions or increases based on….? Certainly weekly unemployment benefits filings are a part of the prediction process, and perhaps a few other statistics which are questionable themselves, but at bottom, these estimates are a blind guess involving very little concrete math. A guess completely subject to the whims of the analysts themselves. This “guess” is then for some reason treated as a legitimate reference point by the entire market for determining the health of the economy. It becomes a purely fabricated psychological indicator with no basis in reality. Want to pump up the stock market for a couple weeks? Why not guess lower job creation than is liable to occur. Or, if you are the Labor Department, tweak the numbers up a little above estimates and then “revise” them down in another month or two after everyone has forgotten. Bankers and economists projected 40,000 new private sector jobs created in August. Labor Department numbers were 27,000 above that. Result: stock market jubilee and a declaration that the recovery is in full swing.
Over the weekend, we saw a flurry of micro stimulus programs announced, which will have no measurable long-term impact, and in some cases result in growth declines in the future, yet likely result in a very short "sugar high" boost to the economy.
It's just more of the same from this President. In the past week, the Obama Administration has preemptively claimed victory on two fronts; a military pullout in Iraq, and the American economy (and conveniently right in time for Labor Day). Of course, he “exaggerated” the pullout in Iraq. There are still 50,000 troops on the ground, and the troops he did pull out are merely being replaced with private mercenary contractors like those from Blackwater. So, in Iraq, nothing has changed.
The administration’s proclamation that they have “stopped the bleeding” in terms of the economy is a similar misrepresentation of the facts. Its not that they have stopped the bleeding, America has almost bled out!
Counting U-6 measurements of those not considered by the Labor Department as unemployed because they are either off jobless benefits or are working part time, the jobless rate of the U.S. has hovered near 20% for over a year at least. During the Great Depression at its peak, unemployment reached 25%, but even this comparison is misleading. The population of the U.S. during the 1930’s was around 122 million, meaning far less working age adults than there are today in our population of 310 million people. In fact, the actual number, not percentage, of unemployed and underemployed today far exceeds that of the Great Depression. The number of desperate people, the critical mass of poor in a country, can have a far more insidious effect on its social environment than the abstract historical “percentage”, at least in my view.
Given the real state of unemployment, why has there been such euphoria over the economy in the past few days? Well, August private employment numbers from the Labor Department of 67,000 jobs created “beat Wall Street estimates”, that’s why. Set aside the fact that 121,000 temporary government jobs were cut equaling an actual net loss of 54,000 jobs. At least the privet sector is alive, right? Wrong. Here’s the rub…
Mainstream analyst estimates have become an incredibly pervasive delusion among investors and the public lately, a delusion that now has the financial sector dancing to whatever tune the government and the central banks wish to play.
Analysts forecast monthly unemployment reductions or increases based on….? Certainly weekly unemployment benefits filings are a part of the prediction process, and perhaps a few other statistics which are questionable themselves, but at bottom, these estimates are a blind guess involving very little concrete math. A guess completely subject to the whims of the analysts themselves. This “guess” is then for some reason treated as a legitimate reference point by the entire market for determining the health of the economy. It becomes a purely fabricated psychological indicator with no basis in reality. Want to pump up the stock market for a couple weeks? Why not guess lower job creation than is liable to occur. Or, if you are the Labor Department, tweak the numbers up a little above estimates and then “revise” them down in another month or two after everyone has forgotten. Bankers and economists projected 40,000 new private sector jobs created in August. Labor Department numbers were 27,000 above that. Result: stock market jubilee and a declaration that the recovery is in full swing.
Best laugh of the weekend............
The space between Senator Chuck Schumer and a TV camera is the most dangerous place on earth.
Friday, September 03, 2010
I guarantee it ...........
At any cocktail party, there is always one guy who owned a stock that rose 1000% during the previous month or two. And the later it gets at the party the more shares of it he owned.
Thursday, September 02, 2010
Labor Day humor for working stiffs.........
For only the second time in my adult life, I am not ashamed of my country. I want to thank the hard working American people for paying $242 thousand dollars plus additional expenses for my vacation in Spain. My daughter Sasha, several long-time family friends, my personal staff and various guests had a wonderful time. Honestly, you just haven't lived until you have stayed in a $2,500.00 per night suite at a 5-Star luxury hotel. We only booked 70 rooms for our friends, staff and family. Thank you also for the use of Air Force 2 and the 70 Secret Service personnel who tagged along to be sure we were safe and cared for at all times.
Air Force 2 only used 47,500 gallons of jet fuel for this trip and carbon emissions were a mere 1,031 tons of CO2. It costs only $11,500 per hour to operate Air Force 2 and each additional plane for the other members of our party group. These are only rough estimates, but they are close (who's counting?). That's quite a carbon footprint as my good friend Al Gore would say, so we must ask the American citizens to drive smaller, more fuel efficient cars and drive less too, so we can lessen our combined carbon footprint.
I know times are hard and millions of you are struggling to put food on the table and trying to make ends meet. I do appreciate your sacrifice and do hope you find work soon. I was really exhausted after Barack took our family on a luxury vacation in Maine a few weeks ago. I just had to get away for a few days. Will write more from Martha's Vineyard where we will spend our sixth vacation this year with more of our family and friends.
Cordially,
M. Obama
Air Force 2 only used 47,500 gallons of jet fuel for this trip and carbon emissions were a mere 1,031 tons of CO2. It costs only $11,500 per hour to operate Air Force 2 and each additional plane for the other members of our party group. These are only rough estimates, but they are close (who's counting?). That's quite a carbon footprint as my good friend Al Gore would say, so we must ask the American citizens to drive smaller, more fuel efficient cars and drive less too, so we can lessen our combined carbon footprint.
I know times are hard and millions of you are struggling to put food on the table and trying to make ends meet. I do appreciate your sacrifice and do hope you find work soon. I was really exhausted after Barack took our family on a luxury vacation in Maine a few weeks ago. I just had to get away for a few days. Will write more from Martha's Vineyard where we will spend our sixth vacation this year with more of our family and friends.
Cordially,
M. Obama
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