This past Tuesday’s Inauguration our country began a new journey, a new direction, with a new regime in power in Washington. Or is it an old regime? Many in the new administration is from a previous one, the Clinton years. Regardless who is in power, they all face uncharted waters and rough seas to navigate. Lets wish them all the best regardless of one’s political opinions. Our country outcome is determined by the decisions that will be made. It is best that investors should put their personal opinions aside and focus on how to take advantage of new opportunities that will arise, regardless who is in power. One of the positives of any downturn is the opportunities that are sure to rise from such a crisis. Don’t let personal opinions get in the way of making money.
The weather here in DR continued to be rainy as the camp came to a close. Last night’s dinner was a joyful feast. It was a wondeful week in spite of some stormy days. As I write, there is a bit of sunshine coming thru the clouds and campers are beginning to make plans to fly back home.The markets closed slightly down in what turned out to be a very choppy week.
The major indices had a solid rally today after yesterday’s big sell-off. IBM’s fourth quarter earnings and forecast where much better than expected. That has been unusual news in this environment.$30 billion of Treasury bills were offered today with a yield of .03% that had three times more bids than needed. The demand for these remains very strong, despite the low rate of return.
UPDATE – Charts are posted now….Hello from the Dominican, where we just returned from a festive dinner. The Traders camp is going well and great to see such a serious group eager to learn yet have endure the pain and suffering in the evenings.Banks stocks were hit hard again today dragging the markets lower. The news continues to be bad and many times worse.This morning State Street warned today and was considered by some to be one of the better positioned banks. It fell 53%. NL expanded again today to 297, this is the highest level since early December. The 850 level failed and we are now testing the 800 mark.
Hello from sunny Dominican Republic. The Traders Camp is in full swing and a number of serious traders are at work enduring pain and suffering Caribbean style.Spiker Henry is here along with a couple of Spike Members as we all learn and broaden our trading horizons.
Hello from the Dominican where we are sitting on a balcony overlooking the Caribbean and enjoying a nice evening of warmth. A bit of rain set in, but soon we will make our way to endure in a nice Caribbean dinner.Reminder that the markets are closed Monday so picks are not due until Monday at 2pm NY time.
NL continued to expand a bit but about mid day we saw a very strong intraday rally ensue. NL have expanded over 200 now and we need to see this contained.The important event for the day was the release of the Democrats $825 billion stimulus package. The sell off we have been watching for the past several days is the……
Obama wants the second $350 billion of the TARP released as quickly as possible. That will total $700 billion which is less than the $865 billion that State’s pension funds have lost over the past year. According to the state fund managers they won’t be able to make enough through investing to pull themselves out of the hole so it will be up to the taxpayer to bail them out.
The Group end the week in Awesome fashion setting a new record. 88% of the picks traded were winners, gaining 2.65% for the week. That put the group up 3.41% for the year and an overall win rate of 65%. Fantastic!!!! The other piece of data that is very impressive is no trade has lost more than 3.5%. Great money management!We look forward to everyone’s picks this weekend. I will be flying up to NY to get a sushi fix and attend next week’s campers meeting.
Walmart guided below estimates for the quarter as other retailers indicated that this was the worst Xmas season they have experienced in 40 years. WMT fell almost 7.5% for the day. As one commentator indicated, if they are not buying at Walmart, they aren’t anywhere else. Despite the bad news the RLX reversed its early morning move down to finish up for the day.Tomorrow the employment numbers are expected. The consensus is for job losses of -520K.