Tuesday, September 13, 2011

Stocks Made Strong Gains Today

The stock market had a 2 day rally today. This made it difficult for us to do any shorting in the last two days. We expect tomorrow to be different.

Here are the numbers for today.

Dow closed at 11,105.85  up 44.73  (+0.4%)
Nasdaq             2,532.15  up 37.06  (+1.49%
S&P 500           1,172.87  up 10.60 (+0.91%)

Tomorrow we have picked one stock to short. We are going with LCC. US Airways closed today at $5.64. This was up 0.79 (+16.29%). 

Considering the effects of Hurricane Irene, August traffic for the airline was up 1.1%. This is after canceling about 25% of its traffic from August 27 to August 29. Overall, the industry was profitable in the last quarter. This came as a surprise to some because there was a  40% jump in airline fuel during the last quarter.

We believe that the stock will settle around $5.24 by the close of trading Thursday.

The housing market is still trying to gain a footing. Until this happens travelers will be putting all their extra money in their houses.

Saturday, September 10, 2011

Market Down For the Count

The market still can't get any traction. Stocks remain at the bottom of the tank. And there are concerns about the Euro. Stocks in the housing sector remained depressed.

Dow closed on Friday at 10,992.13     -303.68    -2.69%
Nasdaq                            2,467.99      -61.15      -2.42%
S&P 500                         1,154.23       -31.67     -2.67%

Here are our picks for shorting and how they performed.
TIN closed at 31.05 up +0.16%
SWS closed    5.25  up +3.55%
MTG closed   2.37 down -12.22% (MTG might suffer the same fate as PMI, unless housing recovers)
CONN closed 8.02  up  +4.16%
CALP closed 10.45  up + 0.19%

At the beginning of the week we were looking at GKK trading at 3.17, and it ended the week 3.38. We also looked at LIZ trading at 5.52. LIZ closed at 5.05 so this was a good short for us. The final stock we liked was CEDC trading at 7.10. Friday it closed at 6.08. This one was a home run for us.

Investors were disappointed with Ben Bernanke because he did not detail any new programs to stimulate economic growth. Also, there are concerns that Greece might default. Add this to the downgrade of the US by Standard and Poor's we we can understand why stocks are declining.

Look for our sell short picks for Monday.

P.S. Please pray for the families of all those that were killed or injured in 911 tragedy.

Thursday, September 8, 2011

How Will Market react to President Obama's speech?

Great speech from the President earlier this evening. More jobs will definitely help the housing market.

Some millionaires are crying themselves to sleep tonight. They might have to pay a bit more taxes.

The market was down again.

Dow down  -110.05  (-1.04%)
Nasdaq       -19.80   (-0.78%)
S&P            -12.72  (-1.06%)

These were our picks to short.

TIN  closed at 31.00 up +0.01
SWS closed at 5.07 up + 0.11
MTG closed at 2.70 down -0.18
CONN closed at 7.70 up +0.15

MTG was our only winner. The other three picks were solid but did not perform as we expected. SWS and TIN were flat again. We were blown away by CONN.

For tomorrow we will go with CONN, SWS and TIN. We would add another pick, Caliper Life Sciences. CALP closed up 41.14% and had a great volume of over 39 million shares traded. That was yesterday. Tomorrow is a new day and some investors will be cashing in their profits.

Wednesday, September 7, 2011

Three Day Losing Streak Comes To A Halt

The stock market had a fantastic day.

Dow rocketed and closed up +275.56 (+2.47%)
Nasdaq                            up +75.11  (+3.04%)
S&P                                up  + 33.38 (2.86%)

Remember our picks for shorting? TIN and SWS? The timing was off a bit. Thursday will be the day! SWS closed at 30.99 up 0.45%. And TIN closed at 4.96 up a whopping 3.77%.

Two more picks for Thursday. Conn's Inc., and MGIC Investments. Conn closed up 38.79%. One of it's best days. And MTG was up 25.76%. Another surprise, when you consider that the housing market is still in bad shape.

Pay attention! Our picks are all for shorting.

Let us know how you are doing.

Have a great day.

Tuesday, September 6, 2011

Stock Picks That Made You Money Today

The market was down again today.

Dow was down -100.96 (-0.9%)
Nasdaq down     -0.50   (-0.26%)
S&P 500 down  -8.73   (-0.74%)

Our picks did okay. Central European Distribution (CEDC) was the big winner for our followers. CEDC closed at 6.49. This represented a loss of 0.61 or -8.59%.

Another pick Gramercy Capital Corporation (GKK) closed at 3.05, down 0.12, or -3.79%.

Our third pick Liz Clairborne (LIZ) was unchanged at 5.52. Early trading dropped LIZ to around 5.30 but it rebounded very well.

For Wednesday's trading we pick SWS Group Inc (SWS) and Temple-Inland Inc (TIN). SWS closed today at 4.78 (+27.47%). We believe SWS will close around 4.20 tomorrow.

We believe the other pick TIN will have a closing of 30.46.

Many experts expected the housing sector to lead the way to recovery. So far we are still waiting. TIN and GKK are carrying the load.

Good luck and have a great trading day tomorrow.

Sunday, September 4, 2011

Short Sell Picks Week Of September 6, 2011

This is a short week and an emotional week. We celebrate Labor Day in America with unemployment still sitting at 9.1%.

We remember 9/11 with heavy hearts. It's hard to focus on making money with so many emotions floating around. But we have to get the job done.

Our first pick for the short sell is Gramercy Capital Corporation. GKK last close was 3.17 up 0.38 (+12.81%). Gramercy Capital is a commercial real estate finance and property investment company. On September 1, 2011 the company announced a settlement of Gramercy Realty's mezzanine loans. The deal transfers 317 properties to  KBS Debt Holdings LLC. Gramercy will continue to manage the properties through December 31, 2013 for an annual fee of $10 million.

Another short sell pick is Liz Clairborne Inc. LIZ closed at a respectable 5.52 up 0.46 (+9.09%). Unfortunately, we believe LIZ will fall back to around 5.23.

And finally, Central European Distribution Corporation should fall to about 6.95. CEDC last closing was 7.10 which was up 0.58 (+8.90%).


Friday, September 2, 2011

Stocks lose for the week... Storm clouds ahead

It was another rough and tough on Wall Street. The market was down again. Terrible job numbers. Companies just are not hiring. Banks are being sued. Could a recession be on the horizon?

Dow closed down a lot. -253.31 (-2.2%)
Nasdaq                          -65.71  (-2.58%)
S&P                               -30.45  (-2.53%)

The spot light shone on Corelogic Inc. CLGX was up again. The company closed at 11.42 (+0.62%). Is this company really looking for a buyer or a possible merger? Or is this just hype? Personally, I don't see any deals happening this year.

Our short sell picks for the week did very well. The lone holdout was Camelot Information Systems, CIS. The company finally came around to our liking. It closed down at 5.22 (-8.42%). At the beginning of the week it was trading at 5.62.

We will be doing some analysis over the weekend. The housing sector need a serious look. There is so much going on with bad mortgages. We will post on Sunday evening. Hopefully there will be about 5 or 6 good short sell pick to start next week's trading.

Have a great weekend.

P.S. If you have an adjustable rate mortgage, your rate should be dropping. Touch base with you lender. Ask about your LIBOR.



Thursday, September 1, 2011

Stock Market Had Another Nose Dive Today

The market was down today. Any hopes of a rally were dashed.

Dow was down -119.96 (-1.03%)
Nasdaq              -33.42 (-1.30%)
S&P                   -14.47 (-1.19%)

Our watch list picks are on track. Special attention to Bank of America. BAC closed at 7.91, down -3.18%. When we posted our short sell picks on Monday, BAC was at 8.39. This is recap of the other picks.
HIG Monday 19.42 closed today at 18.30
VQ  Monday 11.76 closed today at 11.23
MILL Monday 3.65 closed today at 3.37
MTG Monday 2.93 closed today at 2.41
CIS Monday 5.62 closed today at 5.70

We missed on CIS. All the other picks would have made you money.

It looks like Bank of America will be taking some more hits and will sink lower. The Federal Government is expected to sue B of A and Goldman Sachs. The U.S. Federal Housing Finance Agency will be suing more than a dozen banks. The lawsuit is claiming that the big banks misrepresented the quality of mortgage securities they assembled and sold.

This lawsuit is one of many that Bank of America is facing over bad loans and mortgages. Most of these loans were from Countrywide. We believe that BAC will fall another 0.50 by the close of the market on Monday.

August Is History! Let's Look To September

August 2011 will go down in history as the worse August in 10 years. However, the glass is half- full. Stocks are beginning to have some traction.

Dow ended the day up 53.58 (+0.46%)
Nasdaq was also up      3.35 (+0.13%) Barely up but we'll take it.
S&P 500 up as well      5.97 (+0.49%)

We blew it today with Corelogic (CLGX). First we panicked, then we got greedy. As mentioned yesterday we shorted 9,000 shares. Early morning trading CLGX just jumped. We got out of the position sort of. We keep 4,500 shares. Then in late trading we had the chance to close out at $10.97, but got greedy. Held ground. CLGX closed at $11.42.

My watch list which was posted two days ago is doing well, with the exception of BAC. It just keeps going up. We were happy with MTG which was down 0.20 and with CIS, down 0.41.

Tomorrow is the day BAC goes down. More problem mortgages. Why did they buy Countrywide? Nothing but lawsuits over questionable foreclosures, robo-signing a bad loans.


Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Is The Stock Market Starting A Rally?

The market had another good day. It wasn't as rocketing as yesterday, but there were some positive signs.

Dow closed  up 20.70 (+0.18%)
Nasdaq up        14.00 (+0.55%)
S&P 500 up       2.84 (+0.23%)

Our watch list performed as expected. Some of the highlights were BAC down 0.27 (-3.22%). Great stuff. And MTG down 0.13 (-4.44%). MTG is still feeling the effects of the housing slump.

One of the really big surprises was CIS. We missed this one big time. CIS was up 0.70 (+12.46%).

Corelogic Inc (CLGX) was another surprise. CLGX closed at $11.35 up $2.56 (+29.12%). We started the day with 5,000 shares shorting at $11.02. This was around 10:45 am. Everything looked fine and dandy. Then after lunch CLGX started to climb. We took 1,000 more shares at $11.07. Then another 1,000 at $11.06; and another 1,000 at $11.25; and finally another 1,000 at $11.43 just before the market closed. This leaves us shorting 9,000 at $11.10. We are hoping and praying that CLGX drops to $10.65 by lunch time tomorrow.

Corelogic is the first company to integrate a consumer's tax return with its Mortgage Builder Software. Income verification is crucial in mortgage underwriting. This product will definitely have an impact in reducing mortgage fraud.

In addition to CLGX falling, we are hoping for BAC to be down about 0.39.

Happy trading and short 'til you drop.

Monday, August 29, 2011

The Stock Market Was Booming Today

Today was a great day for the stock market.

Dow was up 254.71 points.
Nasdaq was up 82.26 points.
S&P 500 was up 33.28 points.

We have the following stocks on our watch list.
We believe that they will present opportunities for short selling.
Stock             Close         Gain/Loss
BAC              $8.39           +0.63 (8.12%)
Bank of America

HIG             $19.42           +2.23 (12.97%)
Hartford Financial Services

VQ              $11.76           +2.78 (30.96%)
Venoco Inc

MILL            $3.65            +1.38 (60.79%)
Miller Energy Resources

CIS               $5.62            +1.12 (24.89%)
Camelot Information Systems

MTG             $2.93            +0.47 (19.11%)
MGIC Investment Corp

We are paying special attention to MGIC Investment. The housing sector still has about another year to recover. Companies in the mortgage insurance are hurting. Radian and PMI Group are facing an uphill battle.

Let's see what tomorrow brings.