If I had a nickel for every time that I heard the term ?Sell in May and go away? this year, I could retire. Oops, I already am retired! In any case, I thought that I would dig out the hard numbers and see how true this old trading adage is. It turns out that
?If there is no monetary stimulus and no fiscal stimulus, obviously we are going to continue to grow slowly. We could be in secularly slow growth for decades,? said Harvard economics professor, Ken Rogoff.
?If you want to succeed, double your failure rate,? said Thomas Watson, the CEO who built IBM into a global force from the twenties to the fifties. He also said, ?I think there is a world market for maybe five computers.?
There is no doubt that the crisis in Spain is getting worse, threatening to drag down the rest of Europe, and ultimately the US, with it. Over the weekend, Standard and Poor?s downgraded the debt of 11 Spanish banks, after downgrading the country?s sovereign debt weeks earlier. Further downgrades are a given so expect them
This certainly promises to be an interesting week for the markets. On Thursday, we get the Department of Labor?s weekly jobless claims at 8:30 AM EST. If we clock a fourth consecutive week over 380,000, or go even higher, then an exact repeat for last year?s summer slowdown will be in play. So will the
Dilbert cartoonist Scott Adams argues that you should invest in companies you hate, because only the most unprincipled and rapacious firms make the greatest profits. Moral bankruptcy is a great leading indicator of success, and the best ones can get you to balance your wallet on the end of your nose and bark like a
?The investor in America sits at the bottom of the food chain,? said John C. Bogle, founder of the Vanguard Group of index funds.
Come join me for lunch for the Mad Hedge Fund Trader?s Global Strategy Update, which I will be conducting in Scottsdale, Arizona on Thursday, May 3, 2012. A three course lunch will be followed by a PowerPoint presentation and an extended question and answer period. I?ll be giving you my up to date view on
I knew that Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner was early for our meeting at the San Francisco Mark Hopkins Hotel, as the line of silver Secret Service GM Suburbans was illegally occupying some of the most prime parking places on Nob Hill. I?m glad they changed the color. I was getting tired of the perpetual black.
?At some point in 2011, knuckles are going to be turning white, and we'll see whatever rabbits Ben Bernanke is going to have to pull out of his hat,? said David Rosenberg of Gluskin, Sheff & Associates