Of all the signs of gloating arrogance and contempt our billionaire plutocracy has for Main Street America this year none can top Steve Schwartzman the oligarch at Blackstone Group.

While low income American seniors turn down their thermostats to save money over this cold winter Schwartzman

complained that any attempt to make him pay actual income tax on his income was akin to

“when Hitler invaded Poland.”

“In any civilized society he would now be pariah.” (see Arends editorial below) but in America he is a hero.

Schwartzman, “who grudgingly issued a partial retraction” is the hero of almost every news outlet from FOX to CNBC who breathlessly hang on his every word.

As Yankee Bob put in in the comments section of the blog The oligarchy controls the media.

The Great Bank Heist of 2010

From Market Watch’s Bret Arends – Some money quotes -

“This was the year America finally took on the power and greed of the Wall Street banks. And the banks won.

They dodged the bullet of real reform, probably for all time. They bounced back to post huge profits, helped by legal theft from the middle class. They completed their takeover of both political parties — and bought themselves a new Congress even more pliable than the old one.

Middle-class America is flattened, devastated and broke. The bankers that caused it all have escaped punishment. They’re raking in huge profits. Oh, and the tax cuts just got extended for high earners, too!

Game over”!

Obama & Biden Sing

“So long to ya 2010″ – A 2 minute fun song/video from Jib Jab

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

• Municipal Bonds are a dark cloud on horizon. The Obama stimulus kept them afloat, now Meg Whitman & others say there are signs of danger.
• Fracking stocks. Yep, you read it right Fracking stocks
• President St. Louis Fed (a video) James Bullard on Republican Ron Paul & other critics. Another dark cloud on horizon will be the bombs thrown by Paul, who is in a powerful position & the Fed in 2010.
• Another day of slow melt up in light volume with small caps and techs leading stocks – the trend for many moons.

Reading The Tea Leaves -

Here the truth -

As most of you know, Investors411 has a great record over the last 5 years in making educated guesses on how to invest. However, some 50% to 80% of the money invested in US equities is controlled by a wealthy oligarchy that uses High Frequency Trades to find market imbalances and then  invest.

Basically they are shooting fish in a barrel while we make our educated guesses.

This is NOT your parents buy and hold market anymore. You can still outperform as Investors 411 has shown with YSL & leveraged ETF’s. But beware at some time American’s are going to wake up to how they are being used.

——

The overall condition of US stocks keeps slowly deteriorating. What’s holding it all together is the manipulation (maybe a kinder word would be the stimulation) by the Fed, Obama Tax compromise, low interest rates and other  entities/policies. $16 billion got printed & dumped yesterday.

One Bottom Line – Since the benchmark S&P 500 hit its lows of 667 in March of 2009 all the Fed/government stimulus has juiced markets to 1247.  Investors should be falling on their knees kissing the feet of the Obama administration – yet they (at least if you watch the #1 financial channel) CNBC) hate him

Positions

• EEM - (Emerging Markets ETF) -1/2 positions sold
• #1 UWM - (2x small cap stocks ETF) -
• #2 UWM
• EUO - (double short the EURO currency) Bought Friday at 20.76

Repeat from Monday –

UWM – Note that even though major US indexes makes small gains that the Russell 2000 (small caps stocks) usually does better than its other three sisters (see box above) UWM is an ETF that does 2x what small caps do.

EEM - Even though we are still in the green with this this ETF it is under performing US stocks. The BDI is a good forecast tool for emerging markets that rely on trade more so than more developed countries. The whole world, of course, relies on trade. So considering selling the remainder- hopefully in a rally

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.” (YSL)-

I took these two f lame throwing, anti big bank/financials photos from website CommonDreams

2010 Economic and Stock Forecasts

To make an overall forecast let’s look at the past decade and year & the mega trends So here’s the Good, the Bad, the Ugly Almost all the Bad emanates or is focused on the USA

The Bad

• Free Markets are NOT self correcting – This lesson has been taken to heart by many (see the good – yesterday’s Investors411 ), especially those outside the USA. Unfortunately , all you have to do is watch any of the cable business channels, read the WSJ, IBD or most business publications  to realize that they are fighting tooth and nail against any regulations and continue to have us (the taxpayers) pay for their greed. Even a new Consumer Protection Agency is being blocked by Republicans. Both parties are almost entirely owned/influenced/bought off by business lobbyists and their money.
  
• The Deficit -  Time magazine called it the Decade from Hell One reason is the HUGE deficits that started to build when Bush won in 2000. Frontline’s $10 Trillion and Counting chronicles how the deficit grew – cutting taxes, expanding  wars, huge spending programs etc. Once Obama got in office he added to the deficit to stimulate inherited stagnant growth. This only made the deficit worse. Add to this our love of credit and you have the potential for another decade that may be worse .
  
• Growth of Hate and Fear Mongering – "You’re either with us or Against Us" – The growth of hate goes far beyond the fact that we have far more violent crimes than any other industrialized democracy. We are taught to stereotype and hate everything – Europeans & Canadians (socialists), Mexican’s (illegal’s) Arab’s (terrorists) Russian’s (a threat) Chinese & Saudi’s (owning America) liberals (weak tree huggers) education (elitists) science (anti religion or anti business) and the list goes on and on. Hate and fear sells everything from products to politics and its growing.
• No Economic Progress – Nobel Prize winner Paul Krugman calls the last decade The Big Zero – No job growth (globalization a big factor), the Dow dropped from 11,000 to 8,500 under Bush, plus more in his editorial. The Dow has rebounded under Obama. However, that’s because Obama has kept the same  tax cuts, deregulation, expanding wars, and this time perhaps necessary spending  as the cornerstone of his economics. Another bubble is building . If your in the upper 1 or 2% economically this was the decade from heaven, but if you’re a working American you’re in a hell of a hole. It’s going to be a long time before we dig out.

Coming up - The Ugly – However, you can see why Investors411 has beat the US stock market Indexes for the past 5+ years by investing primarily outside the USA . (See below for this year’s results) Apologies – I did leave out 911 which was a horrific event and other acts of terrorism.

Coming up tomorrow the Ugly

YOUR Comments

• The Cynic comments on a very funny political Jib Jab video
• Stewart on Republicans. His comments are worth of entire editorial
• D on a web site that locates community banks. So get off your (skinnier ?) butts and out of those banks that caused the financial meltdown. (see yesterday’s updates)
  

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!

Investors411 record – 5 years of beating benchmark S&P 500 and most major US indexes

Technicals, Fundamentals & Analysis

Most Sections of blog have been revised (or are under construction for 2010) See Positions , Strategy , and Overview for changes

Significant rally in increased and a bit above average volume. A clear across the board day where some new money flowed into US markets.  Strongest bullish sign in several months . It would have been better if volume was larger.

• McClellan Index at +24.74 = A bit overbought. This means we have some wiggle room for US stocks to move higher before they reach +60 or overbought territory.
• The Dollar fell a significant -0.56% The inverse relationship helped stocks move higher .
• The Baltic Dry Index has moved up since 12/24 - Short term bullish , especially for China.
  

Right now this certainly looks like a market that has "wiggle room" to move higher into Friday’s monthly jobs report. The BDI is moving up and the dollar dropping should give bulls some additional ammo

Positions

The  Positions Section (also at top of blog) has the latest buys and sells (Usually updated over weekends)

These are positions I actually own

SELLING & BUYING

Results for 2009 . + 35.5% See POSITIONS (scroll down) for details

Monitor (see comments on right side of blog) was right @ 60% of gains came from two positions in China (FXI ) and Brazil (EWZ )

It now looks like it was a big mistake to sell UWM last week. Oh well, nobody goes broke taking a profit, even a tiny +2%

Check out some of YOUR recommended stock picks made over the last  2 week. Some have broken out big time and/or moved significantly higher Use the calender at top of blog.

Short term traders (not longer term investors) may want to go long (something like EDC, TYH or ROM )  until Friday’s job’s report. See POSITIONS

Long Term Outlook = CAUTIOUSLY BULLISH