375 Days – START

Its now been 375 days since American inspectors have been allowed to inspect Russian nuclear weapons facilities. 5 months since the original treaty was signed. In that time 900  questions asked by Senators have received written answers on the next START Treaty. The treaty has been endorsed by everyone from the Joint Chiefs of Staff to Condi Rice to our NATO allies.

The globe realizes that terrorism is the #1 enemy.

• Russia has a far bigger internal terrorist problem than the USA
• Their country is one of the most corrupt in the world.

Doesn’t it make sense to better secure these weapons to protect not only our troops, but our own lives. “Trust but Verify” was the credo when this started and it should be today.  So why are so many right wingers doing everything possible to destroy this treaty and give terrorist  a potential bigger less transparent supply of nukes  to choose from?

• Tom Friedman quote in an earlier Investors411 mentioned they don’t want Obama to have success. Imagine putting politics in front of the safety of Americans.
• There are many on the right ,like their #1 spokesperson, Rush Limbaugh who believe Pelosi & Reid are the terrorists and the administration is like Al Capone’s
• There are those who want endless war with the rest of the world.
• There are those who realize that the military industrial complex desperately needs to kill this treaty because it will cost $10 or perhaps $100s of billion of dollars  in revenue. Just imagine the  fear mongered money  to be made if the world started to rearm with nukes. Big campaign donations at stake here.

There is a very powerful oligarchy who make a lot of $$$$$ from fear. They know how to manipulate the frightened sheep, even in obvious cases like this.

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KISS & Stocks (Keep It Simple Stupid)

If you don’t understand a term look in up at Investopedia.com dictionary

AS ALWAYS, DO YOUR OWN RESEARCH BEFORE INVESTING!

DOUBLE CHECK ALL DATA, I MAKE MORE THAN GRAMMAR MISTAKES

Technicals, Fundamentals & Analysis

Investors411 record – 5 years of beating benchmark S&P 500

The Obama Tax compromised passed last night. It will have no short term impact on stocks, but an obvious long term impact because it raises GDP & deficits, and creates jobs. Reuters has an interesting  “all candy and no spinach” analysis “but at least it shows that President Barack Obama and Republicans can cooperate on fiscal issues.”

Investors are by the boatloads are getting out of Treasury bonds. This is really a massive move. The Tea Leaves here are saying these investors see an IMPROVING economy and that should mean inflation. Dave Moenning is a very credible analyst on why the “herd of investors” are getting out of bonds

“now that even amateur economists can see that the economy is improving and everyone and their grandmother is saying that it is time to “sell bonds and buy stocks,” no one wants to be caught with an oversized amount of government bonds on their books going into 2011.”

Reading The Tea Leaves -

The bears strongest case is the falling BDI – Lower trading prices show a slow down in in imports/exports. This translates into a right now very small drop in GDP for emerging markets. If it continues we have problems. Obviously housing, European debt & employment problems exist.

The bulls case – Fed Ex was the latest sign that American companies are improving (the herd believes this) + QE 2 juice + Obama compromise juice+ India & China growing at 8 to 10% GDP (a 1% slip not that bad)+ everyone panicking to get out of bonds (where does the $$ go – stocks)  = Strong set up for January earnings reports.

Relativity – The US dollar rises almost 1.00% two days ago and stocks loose some ground. The dollar falls 1/10th that amount and stocks rally more than the fell the previous day

Positions

• EEM - (Emerging Markets ETF) -1/2 positions sold
• #1 UWM - (2x small cap stocks ETF) – Sold last 1/2 bought at 38.75 sold at 40.34 Gain almost  +7%. First 1/2 of trade made +9% so total trade = +8%
• #2 UWM-
• #3 UWM

Mistake, at least in short term, to sell 1/2 UWM position early in day because the ETF was up 2% for the day. Still looking to buy dip/add to positions with leveraged ETF’s

New considerations

• EUO - an ETF that double shorts the EURO – Europe far more than the USA is taking fiscal medicine to solve debt crisis. More importantly they are becoming fiscally transparent while we remain opaque. So in short term Euro is going to suffer.
• PST - an ETF that double shorts 7 to 10 year treasuries. This would be a short term trade. The herd is stampeding to get out of Treasuries before years end.

The first would be, hopefully, more long term the second a trade.

Look for Paul R’s always enlightening remarks on stocks and sectors in the comments section of the blog. See POSITION section of blog for lists of potential stocks & ETF’s including ”YOUR Stock List.” -