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Posts Tagged ‘BAC’

F’ing Dip Thursdsay – Do We Buy It?

Caution - Dips Ahead SignJust buy the f’ing dip.

That’s the great advice we had back on December 2nd, as it was pointed out by Captain Broccoli that we should just ignore all the so-called "facts" of the economy and "just borrow money at this ridiculous low interest rate and just buy the f’ing dip."  "It’s not a pyramid scheme, you  idiot," says the Captain – "It’s a dip buying scheme!"  So far, on every little dip we have had since December 2nd – the Captain has had the winning strategy – do we dare ignore his sage advice today?  

Yesterday we had the biggest pullback since November 23rd with the Russell and the SOX, two of our most over-extended indexes, falling 2.5% in a single day.  The Russell essentially gave up an entire month’s worth of gains in a single day because, as I have warned you over and over and over until I myself was bored hearing it, it has been a low-volume rally and the pure physics of the situation means that, when people finally want to sell stocks, there aren’t enough buyers in the world to support the prices they have run up to.  

The Shanghai, which we’ve been watching closely, dropped another 3% today to 4-month lows this morning.  We did the chart of the Shanghai vs the Hang Seng on Friday, when I was droning on about how weak the real Global economy is and how dangerous inflation was looking and how the government was papering it all over, etc.  Even so, I reminded Members in Chat that none of that reality mattered and we still had to buy the dips until it stopped working.  Is today the day or have we finally reached the end of the gravy train?  

We did some hedged buying on Friday with new long-term bullish trade ideas on AAPL, AET, BAC, GENZ and INTC (2) as well as shorter-term bullish trade ideas on CSTR (April) and ABX (quick 50% profit and done).  We also had a short play on PCX (up huge already) and hedged with RKH Feb $85 puts at $1.15 (now $1.80, up 56%) and rolled our losing QID position in the $10,000 Portfolio to the Feb $10 calls at an average of $1.15 (now .90, down 22%).  This is how we can be long-term bullish and short-term bearish.  Buying the f’ing dips
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Option Trader Closes out Bull Position in Homebuilder as Rally Bites

www.interactivebrokers.com

 Today’s tickers: KBH, BAC, LNG & ZION

KBH - KB Home – With markets in buoyant mood to start a New Year, investors continue to buy into the homebuilding sector. On Friday we noted bullish options activity on Toll Brothers and today with homebuilders up once more we’ve picked up on the rewards one investor is cashing in on in today’s activity on fellow sector member, KB Home. On September 17 we reported how an investor was loading up for a more-than 25% rise in shares at KB Home by using a January expiration call spread. At the time its share price stood at $11.35 while the investor bought $14 strike calls selling those at the $16 strike at the same time. In doing so the investor reduced the cost of placing a bullish bet from 50-cents to 35-cents. Fast-forward to today’s optimistic trading and shares in KB Home have rallied a further 5% today to stand at $14.25 allowing the investor to shed the now in-the-money $14 calls for 60-cents for a nice return 42% return. The investor isn’t yet out of the woods though and assumes the risk of a further rally in the stock to the $16 strike price where the short call position rests. In all likelihood those calls will expire worthless but the options market teaches us to never say never. The chances of these calls landing in-the-money within three weeks currently stand at one-in-five.

BAC - Bank of America Corp. – As ever, options activity in BoA is sky-high. Today there is at least some fundamental news to drive the frenzy. The nation’s largest bank by assets said its fourth quarter earnings would include a $2 billion impairment charge and a further provision of $3 billion following a settlement on its dispute over allegedly selling loans to Fannie and Freddie, the two behemoths acting as government sponsored entities in the nation’s mortgage market. Shares in the lender rose around 5% to $14.00. Options activity in the January 2012 contract exhibited…
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Tinsel Tuesday – Market Decorations Make Us Merry

I figured out how to get bullish!

Just read the Wall Street Journal.  On the front page we have "Nuclear Pact Adds Backers" above the fold along with a fluff piece on the weather in Europe.  There are 3 other featured articles on the front page of the World’s most widely-read financial paper and one is a fluff piece on the Jimmy Stewart museum, one is on the obscure concept of betting people are going to die (very fun and interesting but "The World’s biggest financial paper"?) and the last is on the SEC looking into Mark Hurd’s exit from HP.  On the left is "What’s News" with about 30 summaries of articles in the paper so one would think you could look this over and have a really good idea of what’s going on in the World.

I see that "Spain said its regional governments are on track to meet their budget targets" and Dow component Boeing (who fell off yesterday) announced a "$1 Billion commercial satellite deal with the Mexican Government" and Blackstone is starting a $15Bn fund and TD is buying Chrysler Financial for $6.3Bn and (and this is a real XMas gift to Wall Street) "A Senate deal to fund the federal government until early March doesn’t include money to enact the health-care overhaul or stepped up regulation of Wall Street" and also that North Korea held their fire during a South Korean artillery drill.  Wow!  All seems right with the World, doesn’t it?

If I just read the WSJ, I find no reason to be bearish at all.  Certainly there is no mention of Spanish Bond Yields rising 37% in a month to 5.5% at today’s $4Bn bond auction.  There is no mention of China’s Vice Chairman of National Development saying that China "needs to prepare for a long- term fight against inflation" or that oil imports into China are expected to fall off next year as their economy cools down.  You would think the fact that BAC, JPM and four other lenders facing a suspension of foreclosure activity under court order in New Jersey would be a news story or perhaps some mention of the 29-year high in sugar prices would be of interest to investors along with the limit-up trading in cotton to record highs for no particular reason other than…
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Trillion Dollar Tuesday – More Free Money!!!

Thank you Republicans!  

The party of fiscal responsibility has strong-armed the President and what little is left on the Democrats in Congress to extend the Bush Tax cuts for another two years at a cost of "just" $830Bn to the little people who still have to pay taxes.  They accomplished this by allowing the Democrats to extend $56Bn of additional unemployment relief to the 2M families who were cut off on Friday and were about to go their first week without checks with just 17 shopping days left until Christmas.  Of course, the Democrats don’t just bend, they BREAK and the Republicans also got a 30% reduction in the estate taxes that are projected to cost an additional $66Bn to the people who don’t have $5M estates.  Merry Christmas, rich folks – Lloyd bless us, everyone!  

"But Phil," you may ask "who actually does pay taxes?"  When your deficit is about as high as your net collections – the answer is: No one really – or no anyone who matters, anyway.  As I’ve often told you, our Corporate Overlords actually pay just 2.4% of our GDP in taxes, just $138Bn last year which was less than the $6Tn in bailouts they collected by a factor of 43 – no wonder they are doing so well!  As you can see from the chart, Estate and Excise taxes are barely a point on the graph and Individual income taxes are barely 6% while Employment Taxes have jumped from 1.5% of GDP in 1950 to 7.5% today – that’s a 400% increase but don’t worry, it only affects your first $106,800 in income – after that, ZERO!  That way, if you earn $1M, the jump in payroll taxes from $1,250 to $6,250 is just 0.5% of your income vs the 5% increase borne by a person earning $100,000 or less.  

Imagine if all 140M US workers were given an even $6,000 break ($840Bn divided by 140M) on their take-home pay by just eliminating those SS deductions (it’s not like they’ll ever get that money back anyway)?  Why everyone would immediately be taking home $500 more per month.  Of course we know that the poor people would only "waste" it on food, shelter and clothing so our wise government has guided the bailout to the places it will do the most good, with $670Bn going to the top 5% and $160Bn…
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Thursday Thrust – Just Buy the F’ing Dips!

It’s very sad when you can get your best financial advice from cartoon characters.

I apologize for the language but  this video pretty much says it all.  As the man in green says:  "Buy the f’ing dip, you f’ing idiot."  That’s the entirety of the market strategy we are being trained like Pavlov’s dogs to follow.  Also as the man says "Now, don’t forget this only works if you go out and tell all your friends and family to do the same.  That way, when they are buying more expensively than you, you can sell back to them and collect your money."  

Of course it’s a Ponzi scheme but it’s a gigantic, legal one and the best thing about it is that the Government FORCES everyone to play so you never run out of suckers.  When there is a lack of actual new sucker/investors to put money in, the Government steps in with stimulus or buys equities (QE1) or buy Treasuries from the banks so they can have free capital to buy equities with (QE2).  They debase the currency and drive inflation higher while talking it up even more so and virtually penalizing people for saving money and not shopping.  In this way, the US Government places a tax on every single citizen through a systemic devaluation of their lifetime accumulation of wealth as well as unfavorable savings and inflation conditions that are aimed to force money into equities and commodities.  

What is the logic to this?  Well, none if you are a government that actually cares about the long-term benefit of 310M people but we haven’t had a government that was "for the people" since they put two in the back of Kennedy’s neck so why complain about it now? What we should be doing is celebrating the sheer stupidity of the situation and enjoying the ride as this stock market roller coaster clacks up the tracks – towards a drop that is certain to have investors screaming all the way down but, for now, let’s listen to what the Bernanke Bears have to say in their latest cartoon about the Bank America crisis with WikiLeaks as well as their advice on NFLX and CRM:

Now, what could be more simple than that?  Just take all your money out of bank stocks and put it into NetFlix.  Well, maybe not NFLX as we…
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Bernanke Bears on Bank of America (BAC) and NFLX!

They are at it again!

Those fabulous Bernanke Bears have a great discussion about the merits of BAC, listening to WikiLeaks and investing in NFLX.  I am exploring the technology to have all of my posts read by bears as everything seems so much nicer when explained by a cartoon bear, don’t you think?  

 



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Who Cares About Put-Backs? All the Reflationistas, That’s Who.

Who Cares About Put-Backs? All the Reflationistas, That’s Who.

Courtesy of Joshua M Brown, The Reformed Broker 

The mortgage fraud cost estimates for banks are a bit like QB Ryan Leaf - all over the place and without any accuracy whatsoever.

We’re hearing estimates of anywhere from a few hundred million bucks to as much as $200 billion! And in the meantime, Bank of America ($BAC) is telling us that they’ve found nothing wrong in their foreclosure process and that after halting all activity in 50 states, they are now back in business in half the country.

There are currently 7 million foreclosures in the housing market that need to be worked through and any delay will be costly for large lenders like B of A.

Should the states or the courts decide that many of these securitized mortgage-backed bonds are structured fraudulently (no one knows which mortgage is owned by whom), there is a possibility that the banks may have to buy them back due to a clause on most of this paper called the Put-Back.

In the absence of anything even resembling a consensus on how big the costs of mortgage put-backs may be, the temptation is to simply say, Who Cares?  Well, I’ll tell you who cares…

For starters, how about hedge fund manager John Paulson?  With a stake in Bank of America of 167 million shares, Mr. Paulson has about 2 billion reasons to care about how big their put-back exposure is.

Mutual fund monster Bruce Berkowitz (Fairholme) has about 667 million reasons to give a damn (54 million shares held).

Hedgie David Tepper of Appaloosa Management, no slouch himself in the "reflation trade", has about 337 million reasons to care (27 million shares).

These three investors make up the Triumvirate of the Reflationista Trade.  These are the ultimate Don’t-Fight-The-Fed-ers.

That they are all in the same trade, BAC, is not a surprise – it is the quintessential call option on housing and employment. But they may not have bargained for the foreclosure mess that has hit the media with the gale-force wind of 2007′s sub-prime storm. Whether or not this particular storm blows over – or spills over – is very much of interest to Paulson, Berkowitz and Tepper, make no mistake.



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Yentervention Wednesday – Kan Baffles Bulls

Kaaaaaaannnnnn! 

As we discussed yesterday, it was meet the new boss, same as the old boss in Japan as Naoto Kan’s re-election sent the Yen to new highs as he was considered the least likely candidate to back intervention.  Well surprise, surprise this morning as Japan officially intervened in the FOREX markets and sent the Yen down a full 2.5% as they used their Yen to purchase an undisclosed basket of currencies.   

Since the Dollar is up today against both the Pound ($1.55) and the Euro ($1.29), we can assume the dollar is one of those currencies and demand for Dollars means upward pressure on rates so that should be the end of the TLT bounce for the moment.  Stock boys want bonds to die so the money can come this way and bond boys want you to fear the stock market so you will let them hold your money (and charge you fees) at ridiculously low rates of interest.  That’s they Yin and Yang of the markets. 

Investors were starting to doubt the government’s commitment to its pledge that it would take bold action,” said Yoshimasa Maruyama, a senior economist at Itochu Corp. in Tokyo. Kan and Noda in recent weeks repeatedly said that Japan was ready to take “bold” measures to stem the currency.  The Japanese government official said European and U.S. officials were informed of the move in an effort to avoid a negative reaction. It took a while to convince Europe because authorities there didn’t like the idea, the person said.

We’ll see if the stronger Dollar today puts pressure on commodities but we’re in pretty good shape as this rally, for a change, has not been led by commodities as the market is now flat to the August despite an 8% drop in oil prices (see USO on chart):

I often complain about rallies that are led by Financials and Commodities as those are things that suck money OUT of the economy and are not long-term drivers of growth.  The entire 2006-7 rally was this kind of rally and I bitched about it all the way up.  We also had housing back then, another type of commodity, but that’s so dead now it’s hardly worth mentioning, is it?  Actually housing is where we used a lot of commodities like lumber and copper etc.  33 months after the onset of the Great Recession, new home sales are still down 70% and non-residential construction is down 36% – that market is dead, dead, dead

We get housing starts next week but who really cares? …
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Mixed Sentiment Apparent in Bank of America Options Action

Today’s tickers: BAC, XRT, ZMH, GMCR, COF, YHOO, ZGEN & NYT

BAC – Bank of America Corp. – One massive options transaction on Bank of America today suggests one investor has made a bee-line for the hills. The trader observed ducking for cover appears to be expecting the recent rebound in the price of the financial firm’s shares to come to an abrupt end ahead of September expiration. Shares in BAC climbed 2.1% during the session to pin down an intraday high of $13.49. It looks like the options player sold shares of the underlying stock for approximately $13.35 each and purchased 100,000 calls at the September $14 strike for premium of $0.10 apiece. The trader, who is now short the stock and effectively long a stop loss, seems to be anticipating shares will falter ahead of expiration. Near-term pessimism by one trader was countered by longer-term bullish activity on BAC in the January 2011 contract where it looks like another investor put on a three-legged bullish combination strategy. The options optimist sold 10,000 puts at the January 2011 $12.5 strike at a premium of $0.84 each, purchased 10,000 calls at the January 2011 $14 strike for premium of $1.00 apiece, and sold 10,000 calls at the higher January 2011 $17.5 strike at a premium of $0.16 a-pop. The transaction nets out to $0.00 and positions the trader to make money if shares of the financial services firm rally above $14.00 by expiration day. Maximum potential profits of $3.50 per contract are secure in the trader’s piggy bank if the bank’s shares jump 29.7% to trade above $17.50 by expiration day in January. We note that open interest at each of the strikes described is sufficient to cover each of the three legs of the transaction. Therefore, it is possible that the seemingly bullish trade represents a closing transaction instead.

XRT – SPDR S&P Retail ETF – Options on the retail ETF were some of the most actively traded during the current session. The majority of the 171,000 contracts exchanged on the fund as of 2:50 pm ET were September contract puts and calls, but there were some longer-term positions established today, as well. Shares of the XRT, an exchange-traded fund designed to replicate the performance of the S&P Retail Select Industry Index, earlier rallied as much as 1.35% to an intraday high of $38.71. One big options player hoping…
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Goldilocks and the 300,000,000 Bears

Talk about feeling outnumbered!

As the guy in Airplane kind of said – "Looks like I pricked the wrong week to get bullish!"  Of course, as I often tell people I am neither bullish nor bearish – I’m rangeish – and our range is the 5% band between around Dow 10,200 and S&P 1,070, which takes us as low as Dow 9,690 and S&P 1,016 and as high as Dow 10,710 and S&P 1,123 before I really "flip flop" my positions.  Despite the fact that this is the range we predicted last October and is the range we’ve been in (other than a brief trip to 11,200, which we shorted the hell out of) all year – people still seem to find it necessary to call me either bullish or bearish as we navigate the channel.

I suppose I have been HOPEFUL for the month (now heading into day 14) that we will finally make a little progress and establish a higher floor at our usual mid-points while, at the same time, the MSM have decided that we are all going to die.  That does make me kind of bullish by comparison doesn’t it?  We are mainly in cash and we are well hedged to the downside so, unless we are REALLY heading much, much lower, there is little profit in speculating to the downside, other than our quick trades.  As PT Barnum once said:

"A man who is all caution, will never dare to take hold and be successful; and a man who is all boldness, is merely reckless, and must eventually fail. A man may go on "’change" and make fifty, or one hundred thousand dollars in speculating in stocks, at a single operation. But if he has simple boldness without caution, it is mere chance, and what he gains to-day he will lose to-morrow. You must have both the caution and the boldness, to insure success." 

Balance is the key to long-term success and we’ve had many conversations about that in Member Chat.  Our goal is to be neither bullish or bearish but rather to sell premium to both the bulls and the bears when conditions permit us.  As Ravalos said Friday in Member Chat:

"Ever since I became member (actually before I became member I was already following your newsletter for quite some time) I find it hard for me to BUY PREMIUM. Over time, I’ve realized that buying the


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Phil's Favorites

Jobless Claims Improve, Leading Indicators Decline: Economic Report Card

Courtesy of John Nyaradi.

Jobless claims improve while leading indicators decline in today’s economic report card

by Wall Street Sector Selector Staff

Weekly jobless claims declined to 424,000 from last week’s 432, 000 but stubbornly stayed above the all important 400,000 level for another week.

August Leading Indicators came in at +0.3% compared to 0.5% for July, as the economy continues registering weakness.

Good news came from July Home Prices which rose to +0.8% from the previously reported +0.7%.

But the biggest economic news of the week came yesterday when the Federal Reserve said it saw  “significant downside risks to the economic outlook, including strains in global financial markets.”

Global stock markets responded negatively yesterday an...



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Insider Scoop

Priceline.com Trades Higher on Q1 Earnings Results (PCLN)

Courtesy of Benzinga

Shares of Priceline.com Incorporated (NASDAQ: PCLN) are trading higher in the after-hours following the release of its Q1 earnings results. Currently, shares are up 2.74%, trading at $548.60; they closed the regular session down 0.67 %, at $533.97.

The company said that its Q1 EPS came in at $2.66 on revenues of $809.3 million; this compares to the Street's estimate of $2.46 per share on revenues of $779.5 million. Revenues rose 38.6% year over year.

"In the 1st quarter, the Group benefited from strong growth in our global hotel business, particularly at Booking.com and Agoda," said Jeffery H. Boyd, Priceline President and Chief Executive Officer.

He added, "Room nights booked grew by 55.8% and our international gross bookings grew by 79% compared to prior year...



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Zero Hedge

Fukushima Explosion Update: Core Presumed Intact As Sea Water Used To Bring Temperature Down, Radiation Level At 1015 Microsieverts/Hour

Courtesy of Tyler Durden

The damage control to the Fukushima explosion reported earlier is coming fast and furious. According to CNN, "the explosion at an earthquake-damaged nuclear plant was not caused by damage to the nuclear reactor but by a pumping system that failed as crews tried to bring the reactor's temperature down, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said Saturday. The next step for workers at the Fukushima Daiichi plant will be to flood the reactor containment structure with sea water to bring the reactor's temperature down to safe levels, he said. The effort is expected to take two days." While the government is trying to play down the threat from the explosion, it has nonetheless double the evacuation zone radius from 10 to 20 kilometers: "Radiation levels have fallen since the explosion and there is no immediate danger, Edano said. But authorities were nevertheless expanding the evacuation ...



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Chart School

The Mega-Bear Quartet and L-Shaped "Recoveries"

Courtesy of Doug Short

Note from dshort: I retired this chart series last summer in deference to my prefered inflation-adjusted series that aligns the S&P 500 2000 high with the Nikkei peak in 1989. However, I continue to receive requests for this version, despite the "V" shape of the the recovery since the March 2009 low. This chart series overlays the current S&P 500 with the L-shaped "recoveries" after the Dow Crash of 1929, the Nikkei 225 after Japan's 1989 bubble, and the post Tech Bubble NASDAQ. Click the chart below for a larger version and use the links to see various comparisons.


Click for a larger image

I've ...



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Sabrient

Sabrient Risers - 3/12/2011

Top 5 RisersStockRatingAnalysisVLOSTRONGBUYAn increasingly positive growth rate of past earnings, along with improving expectations for long term growth, make Valero a good prospect for high returns.KROSTRONGBUYKronos Worldwide has been gaining recognition from analysts as a good canditate for achieving higher than expected earnings along with higher overall projected valuation.SFIBUYiStar is one of the top candidates projected to achieve both higher than previously projected earnings in the short run and a higher earnings growth rate in the long run.AMATSTRONGBUYApplied Materials has been...

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Option Review

Bulls Scoop Up Sprint Nextel Corp. Calls

 Today’s tickers: S, FTR, JTX & SBUX

...



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OpTrader

Swing trading portfolio - week of March 7th, 2011

This post is for live trades and daily comments. Please click on "comments" below to follow our live discussion. All of our current virtual trades are listed in the spreadsheet below, with entry price (1/2 in and All in), and exit prices (1/3 out, 2/3 out, and All out).

We also indicate our stop, which is most of the time the "5 day moving average". All trades, unless indicated, are front-month ATM options. 

Please feel free to participate in the discussion and ask any questions you might have about this portfolio, by clicking on the "comments" link right below.

To learn more about the swing trading portfolio (strategy, performance, FAQ, etc.), please click here

Optrader 

Swing trading portfolio

 

One trade portfolio

...

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Stock World Weekly

Stock World Weekly

Here's the newest Stock World Weekly:  Illusion Based on a Fantasy 

Comments welcome... share your thoughts. 

Download Newsletter 3/6/11


Stock World Weekly archives here >

...

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Pharmboy

Biotech Junkies Update and Momenta Pharma Moving Forward

February is now past, and the Biotech Porfolio is loaded with winners and a miss (PLX).  MRK is down a bit, but I expect that trade to recover, and one could be more agressive and double down on it, or play another round at the Jan13 $30 options for roughly the same price.  Below is the summary, and note the grey boxes are ones that did not fill.  I am still a fan of BMRN, and like DEPO as well.  Now let's look at a few others.

Table 1.  PSW Biotech Plays Since January 2011

 

Our newest play is Momenta Pharmaceuticals (MNTA), who is pursuing a three-part business model which includes complex generic equivalents in partnership with the Sandoz division of Novartis, proprietary compounds, and follow-on- biologics (FOB).  It seems that this company is tied up in competition/litigation wit...



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Philip R. Davis is a founder Phil's Stock World, a stock and options trading site that teaches the art of options trading to newcomers and devises advanced strategies for expert traders...

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