All Things ETF

Have you seen the pirate movie- Pirates of the Caribbean- At World's End ? In the movie, Jack Sparrow, the main pirate character in the movie, has been rescued from Davy Jones Locker by his pirate crew only to find himself stuck somewhere between the land of the dead and the living. The crew (including Jack) only means of getting back to the land of the living is by figuring out the cryptic clues provided by an ancient Chinese chart of maps. Well they figured out alright-how to get back, by deciphering a clue where 'up was down' and down was up'. Like the market right now- 'up is down' and 'down is up' . Hah, hah. I am serious though. The market really sucks? I seem to be losing money in certain oil and gas stocks even though oil has been climbing to new highs daily. I am like what the heck. Yes, it seems like I am always losing lots of money in the market, but sometimes blue-chip investments touted as safe sometimes can be really just as unsafe. My tho...

Wow, the market is in a serious sideways funk. Every sector is taking it on the chin. Even, if you try trading options- which I have, you will still lose a crap load of money; I have. Nothing seems to be working. I have been in only one (real) Bear market in my lifetime and that was in 1987. However the subsequent losses after the initial plunge on "Black Monday" of 1987, was not as persistent and severe as this one. Wow! Stay tuned for the next post, maybe we will find the light somewhere.

Yes, the trend is always your friend my fellow investors, but it can also be your enemy. Knowing when the trend has turned into some sort of market bubble will help you prevent huge losses to your portfolio and other financial assets. The two industries in focus right now are the financial and the oil and gas indutry . Which group is a potential bubble, a bubble about to burst, or a bubble that has already burst is the million dollar question of the day. In previous articles, I spoke of building a long-term bank portfolio because I believed that many bank and financial stocks were beaten down sufficiently enough to take another look at the sector. We started with BBT Corporation ( BBT :$32.73), iShares Trust- Dow Jones US Fin Sec ( IYF : $81.70) and JP Morgan ( JPM : $42.32). Our fledgling bank portfolio of three stocks was up by 3.01% as of 5/11/2008 but is now down over the last trading week of 5/19/2008 by about -2.64% . Do we continue building our bank portfolio or do we tak...

Wow, what a horrible week! I lost $742 dollars in the currency markets or 33% of my original investment. I consider myself lucky though, I had only invested $ 2,250 . Still, I could not get it right. Luckily I have a secret weapon to handle all of this insanity. Meet the newest member of the family. It's Pepe at 3 weeks! Wow-e-e. Isn't he sweet! My insanity cure all! Trading on the Forex can be ver-r-ry tough. For example, I tried trading the EUR/USD pair, but that position completely reversed on me after a few days; of course, I reversed my positions but the pair stabilized and went the other way. I tried the USD/JPY pair as the dollar was showing some good strength against other currencies based on the Feds interest rate cut a few weeks ago, but that position just ended up stalling for three days. I tried the EUR/JPY pair, but nothing there. That pair again just stalled then went south after three days of flip flopping around. In the meantime I just kept losing money. By...

Well its Sunday April 13, 2:44 am in the morning and I could not sleep. Went out the other night and drank to much, Hah. Didn't want it to end. I am becoming a lush. lol. Thought, I would do a little update as I couldn't stop thinking about an article I had read in Reuters on Friday April 11, 2008- " Bank rally is a bit premature : James Saft ". He makes the case that the recent rally in the banking/financial sector is very premature, because many banks have not cleaned up their balance sheets yet, and that the downward trend in financial stocks since last year may still have a ways to go before investing in the financial sector becomes a good idea again. Well, I thought that article made a bit of sense. I for one was thinking that the banking and financial sector may have been beaten down a bit too much and there may be an opportunity to make some money, ' moulah' , 'dinero' , somewhere in there- but I was also thinking if its worth the risk? How woul...

The trend is your friend and so far the trend has been down. There hasn't been much to cheer about these days. As long as there is a freeze in the credit markets the equity markets will continue to suffer. Borrowing money is how American businesses grow. No money, no growth. I think the Feds have done a good job in providing liquidity to the markets. Banks and other financial institutions are now in a better position to re-lend that money to their clients at better rates. However, what if banks continue to cautiously lend and continue to tighten credit standards so that not even their best borrowers can qualify? What would be the long-term effects of such stringent lending policies? Which industries would be the most affected and how can an investor profit from such a scenario as this continues to play out in the credit markets over the next 6 to 12 months? These are issues that I will try to consider as I make my stock or bond recommendations over the next 6 to 12 months. The stoc...

Got a call back from Jason Haynes, a financial specialist at Wachovia Bank, on our lending issue. The question is: if you had a pretty decent long term relationship with your banker, with all things being equal on your business end, why would your bank decline your request for additional capital? Mr. Haynes replied that, " Wachovia's adheres to pretty conservative and strict lending procedures already, and their lending process is not so much market driven versus the quality of documentation the client is providing for the loan," your debt to income ratio - business and personal, and of course your credit scores . Increasing debt ratios, poor credit scores and improper or bad documentation, could cause your loan to be declined. So, depending solely on your relationship with your banker to get you that loan that your business need may be a bad idea, although maintaining a good relationship could help you in the long run, if your banker keeps you abreast of any new loan ...