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Pretty much you've been valid in your arguments with FCEL, but you're off on your example given.
% profits (or losses) are based on amount of investment (amount of cash out)
You have to compare the same amount of investment in $ not amount of shares.
100 shares of a $20 stock is $2000
The same $2000 gets 2000 shares of $1 stock.
A 25% change in the same money invested is more than %10 no matter how many shares you get for that $2000. The risks are likely much greater with the $1 vs $20 stock, but it is still calculated on amount invested in $.
Of course amount of $ change when you invest more or less money. Example: you won't get the same $ return if you put $200 in a savings vs $2000 in the same act, but it will be the same % return.
Now you can talk about the volatility, fundamentals, risks, value vs growth vs speculative, etc between different price ranges of different stocks, but basic numbers and calculations for returns or losses don't change.
About 90% hit and lot of chart setups abundant for more of the same Mon, Tues. Might have a bit of bouncing, but might just continue trend down.
Over 150mil sell-side imbalance which means either way a lot of money flowing around to create more volatility.
Heat map of the major Indices.
The Russel (right bottom corner) clump of greenish in the left corner of the Russel is the Energy sector.
Well that was a real nice round. Wonder if we can get more like that today?
SPY 400 next week?
Just a FYI for anyone who is having issues with no T&S feeding in ToS platform (Ameritrade) for UVXY that still continues this morning. I brought it to the attention of TDA, and they confirmed that the issue was on their side also and not my pc or on my side, and they are working on the issue. Not sure if other platforms are having the same prob, but that's where it's at on ThinkOrSwim (T&S still not feeding as of now just for the U).
2/11/22 6:08:00 MW Oil is the hottest sector, and Wall Street analysts see upside of up to 48% for favored stocks.
Analysts favor Canadian oil companies but also some large U.S. players, such as ConocoPhillips, Schlumberger and Valero
Energy is the best-performing stock-market sector this year. Given today's strong economic growth and high inflation, many believe oil prices could remain at current high levels for years or maybe even more higher.
Below are two screens of stocks derived from the holdings of three exchange-traded funds that invest in oil and natural gas companies.
An oil price review
First, here's a chart showing the price movement of forward-month delivery contracts for West Texas Intermediate Crude Oil over the past 10 years:
That steep but brief plunge on the chart is April 2020 , when demand for oil tanked during the early days of the COVID- 19 pandemic, storage sites were full and those holding front-month futures contracts essentially had to pay people to take the oil off their hands.
Oil price expectations from here
So what lies ahead for oil prices?
In a report provided to clients on Feb. 10 , analysts at BCA Research said they believe prices will rise over the next decade in the face of increasing demand and declining supplies. Those threats to supplies include government action that curbs fossil-fuel production as well as "climate activism at the board level at major energy suppliers and in the courtroom."
In other words, the best intentions to reduce carbon emissions can push oil pries higher because alternate energy sources take a long time to be available in sufficient quantity to curb demand for fossil fuels.
The BCA analysts favor long-term exposure to oil through ETFs.
Three energy ETFs
If you agree with the above scenario you might want to consider a broad investment in the sector through one or more ETFs. Here's a quick look at three of them:
You might wonder why a foreign single-country ETF is included in the list, but Canada stands out with its expansion of fossil-fuel production. The iShares S&P/TSX Capped Energy Index ETF has outperformed the other two ETFs in recent years, while underperforming longer term.
Here's a comparison of total returns, with dividends reinvested, for the three ETFs and the SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (SPY) through Feb. 9 :
S&P 500 sector 2022 1 year 3 years 5 years 10 years 15 years 20 years Energy Select Sector SPDR Fund 24.1% 64% 31% 20% 33% 81% 355% iShares Global Energy ETF 21.7% 55% 22% 24% 18% 49% 262% iShares S&P/TSX Capped Energy Index ETF 19.0% 98% 49% 11% -10% -11% 177% SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust -3.7% 19% 78% 117% 310% 328% 510% Source: FactSet
The iShares S&P/TSX Capped Energy Index ETF has shined over the past one and three years. You can also see how dramatically the oil price decline from mid 2014 through early 2016 hurt the energy sector's long-term performance.
A look ahead for the ETFs
Here are forward price-to-earnings ratios for the three energy ETFs and SPY, along with expected compound annual growth rates (CAGR) for revenue and earnings per share through 2023, based on consensus estimates among analysts polled by FactSet:
S&P 500 sector Ticker Forward P/E Two-year estimated sales CAGR Two-year estimated EPS CAGR Energy Select Sector SPDR Fund XLE 12.7 3.8% 14.1% iShares Global Energy ETF IXC 10.7 4.3% 9.4% iShares S&P/TSX Capped Energy Index ETF CA:XEG 8.6 4.1% 9.7% SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust SPY 20.2 6.5% 9.1% Source: FactSet
From the forward P/E ratios, the energy ETFs might be considered cheap relative to SPY, however, they "earned" investors' mistrust during the long decline of stock prices from mid-2014 through early 2016, and, of course, early in the pandemic.
Analysts don't expect to see spectacular revenue growth for the energy portfolios over the next two years. However, they do expect better earnings growth than they do for the broad U.S. market -- especially for XLE.
Two energy stock screens
The three energy ETFs together hold 63 stocks. The two screens below show which ETF or ETFs hold each stock.
First screen: dividend yields
Given what appears to be a healthy environment for oil prices, a broad round of dividend cuts, such as those we saw early in the pandemic, appears unlikely. With that in mind, the first screen of the 63 stocks held by the three ETFs is simply by dividend yield.
Here are the 21 stocks held by the three ETFs with the highest dividend yield (over 4%), along with a summary of analysts' opinions of the stocks. Share prices and consensus price targets are in the currencies of the country where the stocks are listed. Company Ticker Country Dividend yield Share "buy" ratings Closing price -- Feb. 9 Cons. Price target Implied upside potential Held by Petroleo Brasileiro SA ADR Pfd PBR.A Brazil 16.05% 57% 12.26
14.79 21% IXC Petroleo Brasileiro SA ADR PBR Brazil 14.66% 50% 13.42 14.09 5% IXC Enbridge Inc. CA:ENB Canada 6.32% 57% 54.44 55.16 1% IXC Kinder Morgan Inc Class P KMI U.S. 6.22% 21% 17.37 19.15 10% XLE, IXC Peyto Exploration & Development Corp. CA:PAY Canada 6.09% 67% 9.85 13.83 40% XEG Pembina Pipeline Corp. CA:PPL Canada 6.07% 39% 41.49 43.97 6% IXC GALP Energia SGPS SA Class B PT:GALP Portugal 5.99% 52% 10.02 11.72 17% IXC ONEOK, Inc. OKE U.S. 5.88% 29% 63.64 66.00 4% XLE, IXC Williams Cos., Inc. WMB U.S. 5.58% 68% 30.47 32.09 5% XLE, IXC Freehold Royalties Ltd. CA:FRU Canada 5.41% 87% 13.30 16.60 25% XEG TC Energy Corp. TRP Canada 5.28% 35% 65.85 67.32 2% IXC Eni S.p.A. IT:ENI Italy 5.06% 67% 13.25 14.81 12% IXC TotalEnergies SE TTE France 5.04% 71% 52.40 55.55 6% IXC ENEOS Holdings, Inc. JP:5020 Japan 4.79% 78% 459.00 550.67 20% IXC Inpex Corp. JP:1605 Japan 4.71% 78% 1,147.00 1,371.11 20% IXC Suncor Energy Inc. CA:SU Canada 4.59% 64% 36.59 43.50 19% IXC, XEG Exxon Mobil Corp. XOM U.S. 4.46% 35% 79.00 80.75 2% XLE, IXC Valero Energy Corp. VLO U.S. 4.41% 81% 88.84 94.41 6% XLE, IXC Chevron Corp. CVX U.S. 4.12% 74% 137.79 144.41 5% XLE, IXC Phillips 66 PSX U.S. 4.11% 79% 89.45 99.31 11% XLE, IXC OMV AG AT:OMV Austria 4.07% 50% 56.46 62.51 11% IXC Source: FactSet
You can click on the tickers for more about each company.
Then read Tomi Kilgore's detailed guide to the wealth of information available for free on the MarketWatch quote page.
Don't assume dividends are distributed quarterly, as is common for U.S. stocks. Some companies only distribute annually.
Also note that the highest-yielding stocks on the list are American depositary receipts of Petroleo Brasileiro SA (known as "Petrobas") common shares (PETR4.BR) and preferred shares . Unlike traditional preferred stocks issued in the U.S. , this Petrobas preferred issue has no par value. (More information about the Petrobas ADRs is available in this filing from Dec. 21, 2021 with the Securities and Exchange Commission .)
Any stock with a dividend yield above 14% has a built-in warning. If investors expected the dividend to be safe, the share price would be higher and the dividend yield lower. So this is an investment that might best be left to professionals or other sophisticated investors.
Second screen: analysts' picks
Going back to our combined list of 63 stocks, here are the 18 favored by at least 80% of analysts polled by FactSet, sorted by 12-month upside potential as implied by consensus price targets. You can see that analysts favor many of the Canadian oil and gas producers in lockstep: Company Ticker Country Share "buy" ratings Closing price -- Feb. 9 Cons. Price target Implied 12-month upside potential Dividend yield Held by Birchcliff Energy Ltd. CA:BIR Canada 88% 6.63 9.78 48% 0.60% XEG Tourmaline Oil Corp. CA:TOU Canada 100% 45.59 63.40 39% 1.58% XEG Parex Resources Inc. CA:PXT Canada 100% 26.85 36.73 37% 1.94% XEG ARC Resources Ltd. CA:ARX Canada 100% 14.49 19.42 34% 2.76% XEG Whitecap Resources Inc. CA:WCP Canada 93% 9.02 11.69 30% 2.99% XEG Enerplus Corporation ERF Canada 85% 14.77 19.07 29% 1.10% XEG Secure Energy Services Inc. SES Canada 100% 6.12 7.81 28% 0.49% XEG Tamarack Valley Energy Ltd. CA:TVE Canada 85% 4.90 6.25 28% 2.03% XEG Freehold Royalties Ltd. CA:FRU Canada 87% 13.30 16.60 25% 5.41% XEG Cenovus Energy Inc. CVE Canada 100% 19.09 23.29 22% 0.73% IXC, XEG Santos Limited AU:STO Australia 88% 7.50 8.90 19% 1.95% IXC Shell PLC UK:SHEL United Kingdom 80% 20.28 23.87 18% 3.25% IXC Diamondback Energy, Inc. FANG United States 85% 128.88 144.36 12% 1.55% XLE, IXC ConocoPhillips COP United States 86% 92.95 102.25 10% 1.98% XLE, IXC Pioneer Natural Resources Company PXD United States 82% 221.82 241.53 9% 3.08% XLE, IXC Schlumberger NV SLB United States 90% 39.40 42.66 8% 1.27% XLE, IXC Valero Energy Corp. VLO United States 81% 88.84 94.41 6% 4.41% XLE, IXC EOG Resources, Inc. EOG United States 82% 113.31 118.03 4% 2.65% XLE, IXC
Source: FactSet
As always, do your own research and form your own opinions about which investments, whether through ETFs or other funds or a combination of those and/or individual stocks, match your investment objectives.
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- Philip van Doorn
I'm guessing they are going to wait to Mon for emergency hike maybe.
https://www.federalreserve.gov/aboutthefed/boardmeetings/20220214closed.htm
Closed Board Meeting on February 14, 2022
Government in the Sunshine Meeting Notice
Advanced Notice of a Meeting under Expedited Procedures
It is anticipated that the closed meeting of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System at 11:30 a.m. on Monday, February 14, 2022, will be held under expedited procedures, as set forth in section 261b.7 of the Board's Rules Regarding Public Observation of Meetings, at the Board's offices at 20th Street and C Streets, N.W., Washington, D.C.. The following items of official Board business are tentatively scheduled to be considered at that meeting.
Meeting Date: Monday, February 14, 2022
1.Review and determination by the Board of Governors of the advance and discount rates to be charged by the Federal Reserve Banks.
A final announcement of matters considered under expedited procedures will be available in the Board's Freedom of Information and Public Affairs Offices and on the Board's Web site following the closed meeting.
Fed Refuses To Release 60 Pages Of Correspondence On Pandemic Trades Scandal
Tyler Durden's Photo
BY TYLER DURDEN
WEDNESDAY, FEB 09, 2022 - 10:30 PM
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/fed-refuses-release-60-pages-correspondence-pandemic-trades-scandal
Having cost the jobs of three top Fed officials, including the Dallas and Boston Fed presidents as well as that of Vice Chair Clarida, one would think that matters relating to (potentially extremely lucrative) insider trading by members of the Federal Reserve should be fully in the public domain. One would be wrong.
In response to a Reuters Freedom of Information Act, the Fed said that there are about 60 pages of correspondence between its ethics officials and policymakers regarding financial transactions conducted during the pandemic year 2020 which have become an extremely sore spot for the Fed, with members of Congress demanding full transparency as to who knew and did what, when. The only problem: nobody is allowed to see them, as the Fed "denied in full” to release the documents, citing exemptions under the information act that it said applied in this case. Exemptions traditionally involve matters of national security, so how exactly alleged insider trading by a bunch of millionaires threatens "US Democracy" is something we would love to understand.
The disclosure of trading by two regional reserve bank presidents during the pandemic led them to resign last fall, and prompted Fed chair Jerome Powell to overhaul Fed ethics rules and request the central bank's inspector general to investigate.
The FOIA responses to Reuters for the first time quantify how much back and forth may have occurred over policymakers’ personal trading in a year when markets first cratered, then rebounded on the basis of both massive federal fiscal stimulus and an aggressive rescue effort by the Fed.
Reuters reports that it had requested release under the information act of any 2020 communication "regarding the propriety of individual financial transactions" exchanged between the Fed's general counsel or ethics staff and members of the Board of Governors, then Dallas Fed president Robert Kaplan, or then Boston Fed president Eric Rosengren.
Fed FOIA officer and deputy board secretary Margaret McCloskey Shanks responded to Reuters that staff had identified "approximately 47 pages of information" involving Fed board members and around 13 pages involving either Kaplan or Rosengren. However release of the documents was denied.
"The responsive documents contain predecisional and deliberative information, as well as information that is subject to attorney-client privilege," she wrote. There was, she said, nothing in the documents that was "reasonably segregable" and not exempt from release under FOIA.
Gunita Singh, a staff attorney at the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, said the FOIA exemption cited by the Fed is meant to "protect agency candor" so U.S. government staff and officials can discuss issues freely as decisions are being made.
The response from Shanks did not detail what current discussions or deliberations warranted withholding the information.
Demands for more disclosure from the Fed about the ethics scandal has been widespread, with public interest groups and elected officials including Elizabeth Warren calling on the central bank to release more details about policymakers' stock trading and the guidance or opinions provided to them by ethics officials.
The inspectors general’s investigation of Fed trading during the pandemic is still underway. The Fed is also still finalizing the procedures and rules for the new ethics regulations adopted because of the controversy.
The Fed has released the substance of one email sent from its ethics office to policymakers at the height of the crisis. In late October, after a New York Times report, the Fed released a March 23, 2020, email from its ethics officer which noted that Fed rules were meant to avoid even the appearance that officials used their access to market moving information for personal profit.
Policymakers were advised to "consider observing a trading blackout and avoid making unnecessary securities transactions for at least the next several months," or until Fed meetings and decisions moved back to normal from the emergency footing of that spring.
The advice was ignored by at least three Fed officials.
The ethics scandal blindsided the Fed last fall after reports in the Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg about Kaplan's active trading in stocks during the pandemic and Rosengren's investment in real estate securities.
That activity was noted in the annual financial disclosure reports that Fed policymakers are required to file. Both officials initially responded that their trades complied with Fed ethics rules, but said they planned to divest nevertheless. They eventually resigned.
Deputy Virginia AG resigns amid scrutiny over Facebook posts praising Jan. 6 rioters
BY CAROLINE VAKIL - 02/10/22 02:07 PM EST
https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/593738-deputy-virginia-ag-resigns-amid-scrutiny-over-facebook-posts-praising
A deputy attorney general overseeing election issues in Virginia has resigned amid questions over posts she shared on Facebook praising the rioters who stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, and claiming falsely that former President Trump won the 2020 election.
Monique Miles stepped down from her position serving under the state's new Republican attorney general, Jason Miyares, after The Washington Post contacted her office about the social media posts on Thursday. The Post was the first to report news of her resignation.
“This information was unknown to the Office of the Attorney General prior to this morning,” Victoria LaCivita, a spokesperson for Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares' (R) office, said in a statement. “Ms. Miles has resigned from her position at the Office of the Attorney General.”
"The Attorney General has been very clear - Joe Biden won the election and he has condemned the January 6th attack," she added.
The Post noted the Facebook posts originally came from one of three personal accounts that Miles has on the social media platform, and the outlet verified the posts' authenticity with four people who have engaged with Miles on Facebook.
In one post on Jann. 6, 2021, Miles wrote: "News flash: Patriots have stormed the Capitol. No surprise The deep state has awoken the sleeping giant. Patriots are not taking this lying down. We are awake, ready and will fight for our rights by any means necessary."
In another post on Nov. 16, 2020, she said Trump was going to get a second term, according to a screenshot of the post provided by the newspaper.
"These left wing violent loonies better realize that DJT is getting a second term," she reportedly said at the time, referring to "Donald J. Trump."
She also claimed in other posts that there was proof voter fraud had taken place in three battleground states, according to the Post.
The newspaper reported Miles' role included working on election-related issues. Her responsibilities included providing the Virginia Department of Elections with legal advice and representing Virginia in lawsuits related to elections.
In an email to the Post, Miles said the posts had been taken out of context and suggested the newspaper was unfairly going after Black conservative women.
“The posts were made at a time when the news was still developing re: the facts around the election, the court cases, the Rally on the Ellipse and what happened at the capitol,” Miles wrote to the newspaper. “That was before all the audits occurred. These posts have been taken out of context.”
McCarthy says Jan. 6 rioters did not engage in 'legitimate discourse'
Cheney: Jan. 6 investigation is about 'fidelity' to the Constitution
She told the Post that she believed Joe Biden is the president since he was certified and wrote that "What we know now about the election today is very different from what we knew on Election Day 2020 or even what we knew on the day that President Biden was inaugurated in January 2021."
The Hill has reached out to Miles for comment.
Updated at 3:03 p.m.
Sold my bank stocks today WFC, BAC, also a bit of energy (they were in the long account so tax not too bad). All up near 52 wk highs, but I just don't feel good about the near future here.
I think the best we can do near term is maybe go in a channel sideways. I just can't see the exuberance in the past to get going again for awhile. There's still so much overvalued in my view, so that's the play I'm making. If I'm wrong, nothing lost, nothing gained, but I'm still there no matter to live another day.
Nice busy day trading though, doing real well there. Too much flippin to list. LOL I think tomorrow going to be another rowdy day. Even being older and more seasoned than days gone by, I still get enjoyable adrenalin rushes with days like today.
By the way, anyone loose their time sales on U? Using ToS platform and it stop feeding and went blank. Still have the L2 and every other stock is working fine, just the T&S on U. Just me and my prog or has anybody else experiencing it?
Table of Historical Inflation Rates in Percent
(1914-2022)
YEAR JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT NOV DEC AVE
1914 2.0 1.0 1.0 0.0 2.1 1.0 1.0 3.0 2.0 1.0 1.0 1.0 1.0
1915 1.0 1.0 0.0 2.0 2.0 2.0 1.0 -1.0 -1.0 1.0 1.0 2.0 1.0
1916 3.0 4.0 6.1 6.0 5.9 6.9 6.9 7.9 9.9 10.8 11.7 12.6 7.9
1917 12.5 15.4 14.3 18.9 19.6 20.4 18.5 19.3 19.8 19.5 17.4 18.1 17.4
1918 19.7 17.5 16.7 12.7 13.3 13.1 18.0 18.5 18.0 18.5 20.7 20.4 18.0
1919 17.9 14.9 17.1 17.6 16.6 15.0 15.2 14.9 13.4 13.1 13.5 14.5 14.6
1920 17.0 20.4 20.1 21.6 21.9 23.7 19.5 14.7 12.4 9.9 7.0 2.6 15.6
1921 -1.6 -5.6 -7.1 -10.8 -14.1 -15.8 -14.9 -12.8 -12.5 -12.1 -12.1 -10.8 -10.5
1922 -11.1 -8.2 -8.7 -7.7 -5.6 -5.1 -5.1 -6.2 -5.1 -4.6 -3.4 -2.3 -6.1
1923 -0.6 -0.6 0.6 1.2 1.2 1.8 2.4 3.0 3.6 3.6 3.0 2.4 1.8
1924 3.0 2.4 1.8 0.6 0.6 0.0 -0.6 -0.6 -0.6 -0.6 -0.6 0.0 0.0
1925 0.0 0.0 1.2 1.2 1.8 2.9 3.5 4.1 3.5 2.9 4.7 3.5 2.3
1926 3.5 4.1 2.9 4.1 2.9 1.1 -1.1 -1.7 -1.1 -0.6 -1.7 -1.1 1.1
1927 -2.2 -2.8 -2.8 -3.4 -2.2 -0.6 -1.1 -1.1 -1.1 -1.1 -2.3 -2.3 -1.7
1928 -1.1 -1.7 -1.2 -1.2 -1.1 -2.8 -1.2 -0.6 0.0 -1.1 -0.6 -1.2 -1.7
1929 -1.2 0.0 -0.6 -1.2 -1.2 0.0 1.2 1.2 0.0 0.6 0.6 0.6 0.0
1930 0.0 -0.6 -0.6 0.6 -0.6 -1.8 -4.0 -4.6 -4.0 -4.6 -5.2 -6.4 -2.3
1931 -7.0 -7.6 -7.7 -8.8 -9.5 -10.1 -9.0 -8.5 -9.6 -9.7 -10.4 -9.3 -9.0
1932 -10.1 -10.2 -10.3 -10.3 -10.5 -9.9 -9.9 -10.6 -10.7 -10.7 -10.2 -10.3 -9.9
1933 -9.8 -9.9 -10.0 -9.4 -8.0 -6.6 -3.7 -2.2 -1.5 -0.8 0.0 0.8 -5.1
1934 2.3 4.7 5.6 5.6 5.6 5.5 2.3 1.5 3.0 2.3 2.3 1.5 3.1
1935 3.0 3.0 3.0 3.8 3.8 2.2 2.2 2.2 0.7 1.5 2.2 3.0 2.2
1936 1.5 0.7 0.0 -0.7 -0.7 0.7 1.5 2.2 2.2 2.2 1.4 1.4 1.5
1937 2.2 2.2 3.6 4.4 5.1 4.3 4.3 3.6 4.3 4.3 3.6 2.9 3.6
1938 0.7 0.0 -0.7 -0.7 -2.1 -2.1 -2.8 -2.8 -3.4 -4.1 -3.4 -2.8 -2.1
1939 -1.4 -1.4 -1.4 -2.8 -2.1 -2.1 -2.1 -2.1 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 -1.4
1940 -0.7 0.7 0.7 1.4 1.4 2.2 1.4 1.4 -0.7 0.0 0.0 0.7 0.7
1941 1.4 0.7 1.4 2.1 2.9 4.3 5.0 6.4 7.9 9.3 10.0 9.9 5.0
1942 11.3 12.1 12.7 12.6 13.2 10.9 11.6 10.7 9.3 9.2 9.1 9.0 10.9
1943 7.6 7.0 7.5 8.1 7.4 7.4 6.1 4.8 5.5 4.2 3.6 3.0 6.1
1944 3.0 3.0 1.2 0.6 0.0 0.6 1.7 2.3 1.7 1.7 1.7 2.3 1.7
1945 2.3 2.3 2.3 1.7 2.3 2.8 2.3 2.3 2.3 2.3 2.3 2.2 2.3
1946 2.2 1.7 2.8 3.4 3.4 3.3 9.4 11.6 12.7 14.9 17.7 18.1 8.3
1947 18.1 18.8 19.7 19.0 18.4 17.6 12.1 11.4 12.7 10.6 8.5 8.8 14.4
1948 10.2 9.3 6.8 8.7 9.1 9.5 9.9 8.9 6.5 6.1 4.8 3.0 8.1
1949 1.3 1.3 1.7 0.4 -0.4 -0.8 -2.9 -2.9 -2.4 -2.9 -1.7 -2.1 -1.2
1950 -2.1 -1.3 -0.8 -1.3 -0.4 -0.4 1.7 2.1 2.1 3.8 3.8 5.9 1.3
1951 8.1 9.4 9.3 9.3 9.3 8.8 7.5 6.6 7.0 6.5 6.9 6.0 7.9
1952 4.3 2.3 1.9 2.3 1.9 2.3 3.1 3.1 2.3 1.9 1.1 0.8 1.9
1953 0.4 0.8 1.1 0.8 1.1 1.1 0.4 0.7 0.7 1.1 0.7 0.7 0.8
1954 1.1 1.5 1.1 0.8 0.7 0.4 0.4 0.0 -0.4 -0.7 -0.4 -0.7 0.7
1955 -0.7 -0.7 -0.7 -0.4 -0.7 -0.7 -0.4 -0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 -0.4
1956 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.7 1.1 1.9 2.2 1.9 1.9 2.2 2.2 3.0 1.5
1957 3.0 3.4 3.7 3.7 3.7 3.3 3.3 3.7 3.3 2.9 3.3 2.9 3.3
1958 3.6 3.2 3.6 3.6 3.2 2.8 2.5 2.1 2.1 2.1 2.1 1.8 2.8
1959 1.4 1.0 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.7 0.7 1.0 1.4 1.7 1.4 1.7 0.7
1960 1.0 1.7 1.7 1.7 1.7 1.7 1.4 1.4 1.0 1.4 1.4 1.4 1.7
1961 1.7 1.4 1.4 1.0 1.0 0.7 1.4 1.0 1.4 0.7 0.7 0.7 1.0
1962 0.7 1.0 1.0 1.3 1.3 1.3 1.0 1.3 1.3 1.3 1.3 1.3 1.0
1963 1.3 1.0 1.3 1.0 1.0 1.3 1.3 1.3 1.0 1.3 1.3 1.6 1.3
1964 1.6 1.6 1.3 1.3 1.3 1.3 1.3 1.0 1.3 1.0 1.3 1.0 1.3
1965 1.0 1.0 1.3 1.6 1.6 1.9 1.6 1.9 1.6 1.9 1.6 1.9 1.6
1966 1.9 2.6 2.6 2.9 2.9 2.5 2.8 3.5 3.5 3.8 3.8 3.5 2.9
1967 3.5 2.8 2.8 2.5 2.8 2.8 2.8 2.4 2.8 2.4 2.7 3.0 3.1
1968 3.6 4.0 3.9 3.9 3.9 4.2 4.5 4.5 4.5 4.7 4.7 4.7 4.2
1969 4.4 4.7 5.2 5.5 5.5 5.5 5.4 5.7 5.7 5.7 5.9 6.2 5.5
1970 6.2 6.1 5.8 6.1 6.0 6.0 6.0 5.4 5.7 5.6 5.6 5.6 5.7
1971 5.3 5.0 4.7 4.2 4.4 4.6 4.4 4.6 4.1 3.8 3.3 3.3 4.4
1972 3.3 3.5 3.5 3.5 3.2 2.7 2.9 2.9 3.2 3.4 3.7 3.4 3.2
1973 3.6 3.9 4.6 5.1 5.5 6.0 5.7 7.4 7.4 7.8 8.3 8.7 6.2
1974 9.4 10.0 10.4 10.1 10.7 10.9 11.5 10.9 11.9 12.1 12.2 12.3 11.0
1975 11.8 11.2 10.3 10.2 9.5 9.4 9.7 8.6 7.9 7.4 7.4 6.9 9.1
1976 6.7 6.3 6.1 6.0 6.2 6.0 5.4 5.7 5.5 5.5 4.9 4.9 5.8
1977 5.2 5.9 6.4 7.0 6.7 6.9 6.8 6.6 6.6 6.4 6.7 6.7 6.5
1978 6.8 6.4 6.6 6.5 7.0 7.4 7.7 7.8 8.3 8.9 8.9 9.0 7.6
1979 9.3 9.9 10.1 10.5 10.9 10.9 11.3 11.8 12.2 12.1 12.6 13.3 11.3
1980 13.9 14.2 14.8 14.7 14.4 14.4 13.1 12.9 12.6 12.8 12.6 12.5 13.5
1981 11.8 11.4 10.5 10.0 9.8 9.6 10.8 10.8 11.0 10.1 9.6 8.9 10.3
1982 8.4 7.6 6.8 6.5 6.7 7.1 6.4 5.9 5.0 5.1 4.6 3.8 6.2
1983 3.7 3.5 3.6 3.9 3.5 2.6 2.5 2.6 2.9 2.9 3.3 3.8 3.2
1984 4.2 4.6 4.8 4.6 4.2 4.2 4.2 4.3 4.3 4.3 4.1 3.9 4.3
1985 3.5 3.5 3.7 3.7 3.8 3.8 3.6 3.3 3.1 3.2 3.5 3.8 3.6
1986 3.9 3.1 2.3 1.6 1.5 1.8 1.6 1.6 1.8 1.5 1.3 1.1 1.9
1987 1.5 2.1 3.0 3.8 3.9 3.7 3.9 4.3 4.4 4.5 4.5 4.4 3.6
1988 4.0 3.9 3.9 3.9 3.9 4.0 4.1 4.0 4.2 4.2 4.2 4.4 4.1
1989 4.7 4.8 5.0 5.1 5.4 5.2 5.0 4.7 4.3 4.5 4.7 4.6 4.8
1990 5.2 5.3 5.2 4.7 4.4 4.7 4.8 5.6 6.2 6.3 6.3 6.1 5.4
1991 5.7 5.3 4.9 4.9 5.0 4.7 4.4 3.8 3.4 2.9 3.0 3.1 4.2
1992 2.6 2.8 3.2 3.2 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.1 3.0 3.2 3.0 2.9 3.0
1993 3.3 3.2 3.1 3.2 3.2 3.0 2.8 2.8 2.7 2.8 2.7 2.7 3.0
1994 2.5 2.5 2.5 2.4 2.3 2.5 2.8 2.9 3.0 2.6 2.7 2.7 2.6
1995 2.8 2.9 2.9 3.1 3.2 3.0 2.8 2.6 2.5 2.8 2.6 2.5 2.8
1996 2.7 2.7 2.8 2.9 2.9 2.8 3.0 2.9 3.0 3.0 3.3 3.3 3.0
1997 3.0 3.0 2.8 2.5 2.2 2.3 2.2 2.2 2.2 2.1 1.8 1.7 2.3
1998 1.6 1.4 1.4 1.4 1.7 1.7 1.7 1.6 1.5 1.5 1.5 1.6 1.6
1999 1.7 1.6 1.7 2.3 2.1 2.0 2.1 2.3 2.6 2.6 2.6 2.7 2.2
2000 2.7 3.2 3.8 3.1 3.2 3.7 3.7 3.4 3.5 3.4 3.4 3.4 3.4
2001 3.7 3.5 2.9 3.3 3.6 3.2 2.7 2.7 2.6 2.1 1.9 1.6 2.8
2002 1.1 1.1 1.5 1.6 1.2 1.1 1.5 1.8 1.5 2.0 2.2 2.4 1.6
2003 2.6 3.0 3.0 2.2 2.1 2.1 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.0 1.8 1.9 2.3
2004 1.9 1.7 1.7 2.3 3.1 3.3 3.0 2.7 2.5 3.2 3.5 3.3 2.7
2005 3.0 3.0 3.1 3.5 2.8 2.5 3.2 3.6 4.7 4.3 3.5 3.4 3.4
2006 4.0 3.6 3.4 3.5 4.2 4.3 4.1 3.8 2.1 1.3 2.0 2.5 3.2
2007 2.1 2.4 2.8 2.6 2.7 2.7 2.4 2.0 2.8 3.5 4.3 4.1 2.8
2008 4.3 4.0 4.0 3.9 4.2 5.0 5.6 5.4 4.9 3.7 1.1 0.1 3.8
2009 0.0 0.2 -0.4 -0.7 -1.3 -1.4 -2.1 -1.5 -1.3 -0.2 1.8 2.7 -0.4
2010 2.6 2.1 2.3 2.2 2.0 1.1 1.2 1.1 1.1 1.2 1.1 1.5 1.6
2011 1.6 2.1 2.7 3.2 3.6 3.6 3.6 3.8 3.9 3.5 3.4 3.0 3.2
2012 2.9 2.9 2.7 2.3 1.7 1.7 1.4 1.7 2.0 2.2 1.8 1.7 2.1
2013 1.6 2.0 1.5 1.1 1.4 1.8 2.0 1.5 1.2 1.0 1.2 1.5 1.5
2014 1.6 1.1 1.5 2.0 2.1 2.1 2.0 1.7 1.7 1.7 1.3 0.8 1.6
2015 -0.1 0.0 -0.1 -0.2 0.0 0.1 0.2 0.2 0.0 0.2 0.5 0.7 0.1
2016 1.4 1.0 0.9 1.1 1.0 1.0 0.8 1.1 1.5 1.6 1.7 2.1 1.3
2017 2.5 2.7 2.4 2.2 1.9 1.6 1.7 1.9 2.2 2.0 2.2 2.1 2.1
2018 2.1 2.2 2.4 2.5 2.8 2.9 2.9 2.7 2.3 2.5 2.2 1.9 2.4
2019 1.6 1.5 1.9 2.0 1.8 1.6 1.8 1.7 1.7 1.8 2.1 2.3 1.8
2020 2.5 2.3 1.5 0.3 0.1 0.6 1.0 1.3 1.4 1.2 1.2 1.4 1.2
2021 1.4 1.7 2.6 4.2 5.0 5.4 5.4 5.3 5.4 6.2 6.8 7.0 4.7
2022 Available Feb. 10
Legal crime, unenforceable and rights given to people of power to commit harm and mayhem for their own gain, no matter what degree of criminal nature it is.
Jeremy Grantham a legendary professional asset manager is agreeing. Timing is the issue of course, many have been saying the same thing for over a yr now, but the fed façade seems to keep going somehow, but the more extreme things get, the harder a reversal can be. Is it not if but when? Who knows.
If one gets the time, this interview is well worth watching and covers many of the issues that you folks here talk about. According to Grantham, we're now in a super bubble and projects a crash compared to 29 crash. Buffet also has talked about a disastrous fan hitting recently. Will it be next month, next yr, or not at all? My crystal ball has totally gone in the crapper, so beats me.
But I believe that the Fed can't completely contain the mayhem of inflation, the money printing, the political cluster f#*!, etc with their old ways and can only minimally contain the crud that's been created over the years and decades, not to mention the virus, corporate welfare, and the world shipping system. Can only fake through so much until the house of cards fold, or at least a lot of pain to a lot of people.
Again, well worth the watch, this guy is pretty smart cookie. But even the smartest guys can be wrong.
Calling a Super Bubble: Front Row With Jeremy Grantham1/26/2022byBloomberg Markets and Finance
Maybe eventually, but not for awhile, maybe decades. Again, concentrations and the processing still has it's limits and of course, expense. GM is one that is going after lithium at the Salton Sea, and others are exploring that resource. Buffet has been involved there for years (discontinued at times, now getting revived a bit). Saudi Arabia is probably ahead of the game on desalination methods and discovering more efficient means to extract lithium out of the oceans, but I don't really care for their control over "black gold", let alone being ahead in "white gold". The US is a baby in that respect and we better hurry up and grow up in this industry. We've been placid way to long and not putting our efforts and money in our own tech and development, instead relying on basically our adversaries for cheap goods and high profit to big corp and top 1-10%. Now we're going to pay and if we don't put intensive effort(and big money) into our own structure (less profit for the top and maybe an expense for them short term), we're going to pay way too much and many won't be able to pay at all for things like the Tesla. Tesla and other auto makers need to be able to sell and make affordable to the bulk of the population, not just the very upper middle class and the top. This is the only way to increase the value of the company. Anything else will limit and put a cap on how far Tesla can go.
In reality it is about 30 most abundant depending on where your researching. But that's not the issue. Sure, you might be able to go in your back yard and find some lithium in some rocks, but the concentration is not enough for anything. Which makes processed battery grade Lithium product comparatively more rare and demand for it can get more than the supply. Mining, processing into battery material is a pretty intensive and time consuming process. As of now, about 3/4 of concentrated lithium mining is only in three countries, Australia, Chile (with the Lithium triangle), and China. But here's the real problem in my view is that China has control of over half of all that and they have 3/4 of all the big battery factories in the world. As I understand, the big auto makers including Tesla are trying to curb that and find or create different sources, but they are really late to the party and we are going to be dealing with the problems(expense) of that tardiness. Not just Tesla's problem though, but all EV manufacturing. Tesla might be ahead of the others in addressing this issue, but it's still a problem. Pricing in Lithium is going up, supply and demand issues are being an effect. Along with all of the geopolitical problems, how it's all going to play out is yet to be seen, but it is going to get more expensive.
I just watched that video (just catching up). I've been spending a lot of time with many of the issues that Grantham talked about. The more extreme things get (in about everything in life), the harder and more extreme things are in reverse or other side of the pendulum gets. Society in general, especially in the US has been getting pretty extreme and is really due for the elimination of those extremities towards the other direction. That includes the stock market which I feel that this little piddle of bearishness is nothing compared to what we have created and continuing to create for ourselves. And the more we ignore this process the harder it's going to be and in essence only delayed the inevitable breaking point.
So what's the answer to where do we put our money to at least somewhat protect and muddle through and even profit. As Grantham covered, having buckets of cash on the sidelines isn't really an answer. He also covered an issue that I'm well aware of. You and I are in the older generation and there isn't enough time in our lives to get through another long term recovery like the 29 crash or even more current history bubbles that I've succeeded in profiting and getting through, but it's it's taken many yrs or really decades and quite a bit of sacrificing that the current younger generation isn't in positions to do either physically or mentally. There is a lot of population that still hasn't recovered from just the housing bubble crash and never will. Other than the top 10% and an index number, most have taken many many years to get close to previous real worth. Same with the Covid Wars and all that has entailed from it. Many people will never recover back to before Covid.
Our gap between rich and poor has just gone extreme. Of course the answer to that is for the gap to shrink and become more equitable. But that answer, the only answer and solution, is being fought and will always be fought by big corp and the top 1% who are getting way to much power.
Knowing my time is limited, I can only try to prepare for my children (now adults) and grandchildren (oldest being in the marines now for two years).
But it's quite the conundrum and difficulty for direction and long term strategies no matter how much time I'm putting into it. Not to mention the cultural mayhem that's been created purposely for power control.
The more time I spend, the more I'm seeing everything (lot of what that interview was covering) and knowing what has got to be the results and consequences of everything going down (especially in the political spectrum).
No matter what the new world brings, there going to be a lot of hell to pay for a lot of people. If I succeed in helping my offspring get through it all, my success will be others demise. When there is only 10 apples in the basket and Johnny takes 9 of them, it's pretty tough on Dick, Jane, Terry, Peter, Paul, and Mary to live on the last one.
If not, maybe this.
This unsourced picture allegedly shows ousted Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein being dragged out of his hiding following his capture by US troops 13 December 2003 in an underground hole at a farm in the village of ad-Dawr, near his hometown of Tikrit in northern Iraq. AFP PHOTO/HO (Photo credit should read /AFP/Getty Images)
yep, makes it real busy in this market. Really utilizing all my monitors lately. Shorting quite a bit, not buying long right now. I can't really see, no matter what the fed does, how we're going to get out of another recession. A lot of bleeding going to be done I think.
Shorted it quite a bit in extended hrs, hoping for a spike up on the news at open so I can short some more. In a bull market it would of been great, but not right now, same with Tesla, sold into the earnings, last ones ah after the call. Glad I did, next day look what it did. I don't think we're done in the correction nor will be for a couple of months. Not that my opinion means anything but with my money. LOL What makes UVXY finally a good daily trader. Great volatility lately. Only con is one has to be right on top of it almost constantly to catch all the scalps.
Well said, right to the point. Give you a cigar or whatever your preference. LOL
If Dr. Kevorkian was still around (may he rest in peace), he might of had a easier way to go than dying of covid or heart failure. I wonder if the guy had all the other shots with no problem (and major life style changes) that would have been required as has been required way before the Covid Wars for any major transplant. My sister, who is a RN (just retired end of last yr at 70 in CA, to her relief and mine) assisted in many major operations and transplants (pretty much everything but a heart transplant) and these requirements have been put in place for over half a century. Covid vax would be no exception.
Quite a few oxymoron's in that article like "fighting for his life" but "refusing to get a Covid vaccine". Odds of being a new GOP or Rumpian and his parents saying "his body, his choice". Still even after years now of this crud it just boggles my mind.
Hospital refusing heart transplant for man who won't get vaccinated
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/brigham-and-womens-hospital-boston-refusing-heart-transplant-man-wont-get-vaccinated/?ftag=CNM-16-10abd6g
BY PAUL BURTON
UPDATED ON: JANUARY 25, 2022 / 4:43 PM / CBS NEWS
A Boston hospital says it won't consider performing a heart transplant on a patient who refuses to get vaccinated against COVID-19, CBS Boston reports.
DJ Ferguson, 31, is fighting for his life at Brigham and Women's Hospital and in desperate need of a heart transplant.
His father, David Ferguson, is speaking out passionately on behalf of his son who, he told CBS Boston, "has gone to the edge of death to stick to his guns and he's been pushed to the limit."
DJ's family says he was at the front of the line to receive a transplant but hospital policy stipulates that he's no longer eligible because he hasn't received the vaccination. And David Ferguson says his son simply won't.
"It's kind of against his basic principles — he doesn't believe in it," David Ferguson says. "It's a policy they are enforcing and so, because he won't get the shot, they took him off the list (for) a heart transplant."
Brigham and Women's released a statement saying, "Like many other transplant programs in the United States — the COVID-19 vaccine is one of several vaccines and lifestyle behaviors required for transplant candidates in the Mass General Brigham system in order to create both the best chance for a successful operation and also the patient's survival after transplantation."
Dr. Arthur Caplan, the head of medical ethics at NYU Grossman School of Medicine, explains that being vaccinated is necessary for this type of procedure.
"Post any transplant, kidney, heart whatever, your immune system is shut off," Caplan said. "The flu could kill you, a cold could kill you, COVID could kill you. The organs are scarce, we are not going to distribute them to someone who has a poor chance of living when others who are vaccinated have a better chance post-surgery of surviving."
DJ is a father of two children with a third child on the way. His family says they're not sure what they plan to do. They're thinking about transferring him, but he may be too weak to be moved.
"We are aggressively pursuing all options, but we are running out of time," David Ferguson said.
And while the family says DJ has received great care from doctors and nurses at Brigham and Women's, they just don't agree with the heart transplant COVID vaccination policy.
"I think my boy is fighting pretty damn courageously and he has integrity and principles he really believes in and that makes me respect him all the more," David Ferguson said.
Which is why the family is sticking by his side and hoping for the best. "It's his body. It's his choice," Ferguson added.
Even now in my long account. Yay. Started about 10 and averaged down to about 7. Time for trend up now? Looking for an enter in trade account here maybe on the next dip or continuance. We'll see how it plays out, might get some action. Lets go PL.
House Jan. 6 committee subpoenas Twitter, Alphabet, Meta and Reddit
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/01/13/meta-alphabet-twitter-reddit-subpoenas-house-committee/
By Tom Hamburger
Today at 4:21 p.m. EST
The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol has issued subpoenas to four social media companies who have so far provided “inadequate response” to requests for information and records relating to the spread of misinformation and efforts to overturn the 2020 election.
The subpoenas were issued to giants in the industry, including Alphabet, Meta, Twitter and Reddit.
“We cannot allow our work to be delayed any longer,” said the committee’s chairman, Rep. Bennie G. Thompson (D-Miss.), in a statement. “Two key questions for the Select Committee are how the spread of misinformation and violent extremism contributed to the violent attack on our democracy, and what steps — if any — social media companies took to prevent their platforms from being breeding grounds to radicalizing people to violence.”
Thompson said that despite months of engagement “we still not have the documents and information necessary to answer those basic questions.”
In a letter sent this week to Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Meta, Thompson cited reports that Facebook disbanded a Civic Integrity Team that was to focus on election misinformation “and reduced the application of tools used to restrain the spread of violent content. However, despite repeated and specific requests for documents related to these matters, the Select Committee still has not received these materials.”
A letter to Alphabet, formerly known as Google, asked for specific information regarding YouTube, a platform it described as providing “ significant communications by its users that were relevant to the planning and execution of January 6th attack on the United States Capitol.” The letter noted that Stephen K. Bannon live-streamed his podcast on YouTube in the days before and after January 6, 2021, and that images of the Capitol insurrection were carried live on YouTube.
“The Select Committee believes Alphabet has significant undisclosed information that is critical to its investigation, concerning how Alphabet developed, implemented, and reviewed its content moderation, algorithmic promotion, demonetization, and other policies that may have affected the January 6, 2021 events,” the letter said.
Twitter was similarly reprimanded in a letter accompanying the subpoena. Thompson writes that “Twitter has failed to disclose critical information …For example, Twitter has not produced important documents relating to warnings it received regarding the use of the platform to plan or incite violence on January 6th.”
Similar complaints were lodged in a letter to the CEO of Reddit which hosted “r/The_Donald,” which grew significantly on Reddit before migrating to a separate website in 2020. Thompson’s letter said that site “ultimately hosted significant discussion and planning related to the January 6th attack” and he criticized the company for not responding to previously requested information.
Talking about dogs. Cute video with an Anatolian shepherd dog puppy in training.
Anatolian shepherd dog puppy in training
You might get some smiles with the blog.
A subreddit for cute and cuddly pictures
Biden regulators could rain on Trump's SPAC parade
https://www.cnn.com/2022/01/11/investing/trump-spac-stock/index.html
By Matt Egan, CNN Business
Updated 7:57 AM ET, Tue January 11, 2022
What on earth is a SPAC?
New York (CNN Business)Former President Donald Trump is plotting a return to Wall Street with a new media company taking aim at Big Tech.
But Trump Media & Technology Group's path to the stock market faces a formidable obstacle: President Joe Biden's regulators.
Biden's top cop on Wall Street, SEC Chairman Gary Gensler, is openly skeptical of SPACs, or Special Purpose Acquisition Companies. And Trump's SPAC deal features a host of red flags, including the backing of a Chinese firm with a checkered regulatory history, that have captured the attention of federal authorities.
That's why legal experts tell CNN that securities regulators are likely to heavily scrutinize Trump's SPAC, slowing down or even derailing the deal altogether.
"There is a huge risk the SEC will shut it down," said Thomas Gorman, a partner at the law firm Dorsey & Whitney and former official at the SEC.
Robert Lamm, chair of the securities and corporate governance practice at law firm Gunster, said that although he's not involved in the Trump deal his experience tells him the SEC could tap the brakes on the Trump SPAC by demanding the entities improve their disclosures.
"They are going to do everything they can to slow this deal, to the point that it can't go," said Lamm, who has represented companies on disclosure matters, often involving dialogue with the SEC.
The SEC declined to comment.
Regulators are investigating the Trump SPAC
In October, Trump announced plans to launch a new media company that will "stand up to the tyranny of Big Tech." Trump Media & Technology Group (TMTG) simultaneously made public a deal to merge with a SPAC company called Digital World Acquisition Corp.
SPACs raise money from the public and promise to use those funds to acquire private firms. It's an increasingly popular way for private companies to go public, without the hassle and costs of a traditional initial public offering (IPO).
SPAC deals, also known as reverse mergers, were once frowned upon. But in recent years SPACs have become all the rage, with celebrities, former politicians and professional athletes getting involved.
As soon as I see a Chinese-sponsored company, with this kind of regulatory history, a red light goes on."
," SAID CHARLES WHITEHEAD, PROFESSOR AT CORNELL LAW SCHOOL
Almost immediately, the Trump SPAC generated enormous enthusiasm among some investors — and raised serious questions among experts.
For starters, TMTG has no known revenue or product. An Apple App Store listing indicates the venture plans to launch its social media app Truth Social on February 21.
As CNN previously reported, TMTG posted an investor presentation in December that appears to contain errors and seems to have been partially copied and pasted from the internet. (One slide defines a user as a "sales representative who travels to visit customers," a definition that is hard to square with the fact this is a media company, not a sales platform.)
TMTG's new CEO is former Republican Congressman Devin Nunes, who has no business experience in technology or social media.
And Digital World has already disclosed that federal regulators are investigating the deal.
Yet, based on Digital World's closing price on Monday, TMTG has achieved a staggering market valuation of $11.4 billion, according to Renaissance Capital, which provides IPO-focused ETFs and pre-IPO research.
Neither TMTG nor Digital World responded to requests for comment.
SPAC backer has a history with the SEC
Authorities are already familiar with Arc Capital, a Shanghai-based firm that is helping take Trump's media company public. Arc, also known as Arc Group, is the sponsor of Digital World.
In exchange for a stake in the company, sponsors typically provide financial support to get SPACs off the ground, giving them the capital needed to hire lawyers, executives and other staff. SPAC sponsors tend to buy equity in the SPAC at "more favorable terms" than investors in the IPO, the SEC notes.
As the Washington Post recently reported, Arc has a history of SEC investigations after the firm "repeatedly helped create or finance companies with little or no revenue, no customers and office locations that point to P.O. boxes."
To protect investors in Arc deals, the SEC has resorted to a rarely used enforcement tool: Stop orders.
Gary Gensler, chairman of the SEC, has made clear he is concerned about "inherent" risks involved in SPAC deals.
In 2017, the SEC stopped three Arc-backed companies from selling shares to the public, finding that they "materially misstated the nature and scope of their businesses." And the agency suspended trading in a fourth Arc-related business.
Although no charges appear to have been brought against Arc in these cases, the fact that the Trump deal involves a company whose transactions have been halted by the SEC is raising eyebrows among legal experts.
"As soon as I see a Chinese-sponsored company, with this kind of regulatory history, a red light goes on," said Charles Whitehead, a professor at Cornell Law School.
Since 1995, the SEC has only issued 42 stop orders, according to the agency.
"You don't want a stop order because it's such a black mark," said Whitehead. "Normally, if there is an irreconcilable difference with the SEC, you withdraw your registration statement. Stop orders are uncommon because no one wants to get to the point of a stop order."
Arc did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
Timing is key in the Trump SPAC
Legal experts said the SEC is likely to look most closely at whether Digital World misled investors about the timing of its deal talks with TMTG.
In late October, the New York Times reported that Trump began discussing a merger with Digital World long before the blank-check company went public and before such talks were disclosed to investors.
That would call into question the accuracy of Digital World's disclosures and whether it really is a blank-check company. Some investors who bought Digital World when it went public last year may not have if they knew Trump was the merger target all along. Others would have done so but didn't because they didn't know Trump was involved.
"A blank check company is supposed to be a blank check company, not a hideaway for the Trump media company or anyone else to access the public markets," Whitehead, the Cornell professor, said.
Who's to blame for inflation? It's complicated
Who's to blame for inflation? It's complicated
The Times reported Trump had been discussing a deal with Digital World CEO Patrick Orlando since at least March 2021. However, in a filing last May, Digital World told investors it did not yet have a merger partner.
"We have not selected any specific business target and we have not, nor has anyone on our behalf, initiated any substantive discussions, directly or indirectly, with any business combination target," Digital World said in that filing.
Last month, Digital World said in a filing that federal regulators are investigating the deal and are seeking documents and communications between the firm and TMTG. The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, or FINRA, is also looking into trading prior to the deal's announcement, Digital World said.
Disclosure scrutiny
Ashley Ebersole, a former SEC attorney who is now a partner at Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner, said the timing in the deal talks could become the crux of an SEC enforcement action.
If the SEC finds evidence the promoters of the deal knew these discussions had to be disclosed and "intentionally hid it from investors," Ebersole said, this will become the basis for a potential "fraud charge by the SEC."
Ebersole, who represents clients targeted by the SEC and other regulators, said this would also give investors the ability to demand their money back.
Jill Fisch, a business law professor at the University of Pennsylvania Law School, said regulators will focus on the accuracy of disclosures — not the merits of the merger.
"The SEC doesn't decide if a merger is good or bad for stockholders," said Fisch. "That's not the SEC's job. The SEC is concerned about whether investors have the opportunity to evaluate the deal."
Investors unfazed by regulatory scrutiny
Gensler, the chairman of the SEC, has raised concerns about SPACs broadly.
In July, the SEC charged a SPAC, a sponsor, a merger target and the CEO with "misleading disclosures" ahead of a proposed deal. Gensler said in a statement at the time that the case illustrates "risks inherent to SPAC transactions" as those who stand to earn profits from a merger may conduct "inadequate due diligence and mislead investors."
And at a conference last month, Gensler worried that investors in SPAC deals "may be making decisions based on incomplete information or just plain old hype."
The Trump SPAC has generated considerable excitement among some investors. Although it remains off its peak, Digital World is trading about 450% above where it was before the Trump deal was announced.
Matthew Tuttle, CEO of Tuttle Capital Management, said trading activity suggests little worry about the regulatory risk around the Trump SPAC.
"I don't think there is any concern, but there should be," said Tuttle. "I would be scared to buy this. I would be scared to short this. All I do is watch it in amazement."
Tuttle added that given the enormous attention this deal has attracted, regulators are likely to scrutinize it very closely.
"If there is the slightest hint of wrongdoing, they are going to try to bring the hammer down on this thing," he said.
'Nobody saw that coming'
But this is a sensitive situation for the SEC, an independent agency run by a bipartisan five-member commission.
Blocking the Trump SPAC would open the agency to charges of political bias and a legal fight with a former president who has a legendary history of bringing lawsuits.
Lamm, the Gunster attorney, noted that Congress controls the SEC's budget and the midterm elections this November could give Republicans control of both the US Senate and the House of Representatives.
"Does the SEC want to take a chance that its budget will be cut?" he asked.
Gorman, the former SEC official, said agency officials will be extra careful here, spending more time to review the case. But he said they won't shy away from acting, if it's warranted.
"They know Trump will be litigious. That's okay, they are litigious themselves," Gorman said. "They're not going to let him go out there and sell junk."
During his time running the SEC, Gensler has repeatedly stressed the agency's role in protecting investors, in everything from crypto markets and trading apps to SPACs.
"If the SEC lets this go and it drops to zero, investors will get hurt," Tuttle said of the Trump SPAC. "That would be a massive PR black eye for the SEC."
Tuttle added that the SEC will seek to avoid a repeat of Archegos. That little-known US hedge fund imploded last year, catching regulators and investors off guard, and causing sizable losses to Wall Street firms.
"Archegos you could get away with. Nobody saw that coming," said Tuttle. "But this is not coming out of left field. This is Donald Trump."
Just made another 6+% on day trade LAC. Paid me to put a few more into long account.
https://seekingalpha.com/news/3787154-lithium-americas-grabs-two-analyst-upgrades-on-coming-catalysts-valuation
Lithium Americas grabs two analyst upgrades on coming catalysts, valuation
Jan. 11, 2022 10:43 AM ETLithium Americas Corp. (LAC), LITALB, SQMBy: Carl Surran, SA
Lithium Americas (LAC +6.1%) pops in early trading after winning two upgrades: Piper Sandler upgrades shares to Overweight from Neutral with a $41 price target, and Deutsche Bank hikes the stock to Buy from Hold with a $34 PT.
Piper analyst Greg Tuttle says Lithium Americas "holds the keys to a multitude of game changing catalysts" related to the Thacker Pass mine in Nevada, which could receive court permits later in the current quarter.
Tuttle sees management's willingness to deploy capital for road work development on the heels of provisionary permits for Thacker Pass as a positive signal.
Also, Tuttle notes the Cauchari project in Argentina likely will come online in H2 2022, as the joint venture already is priming its facilities to prepare for a slow ramp process.
Deutsche Bank's Corinne Blanchard raises shares primarily on valuation following a 28% drop since late November.
Blanchard taps Lithium Americas, Albemarle (ALB +1.5%) and SQM (SQM +3.2%) as her top picks in the space, seeing the trio as well positioned to benefit from tight supply and rising electric vehicle demand leading to a growing deficit.
ETF : LIT
Millennial Lithium shareholders recently approved Lithium Americas' ~$400M offer to buy the company.
A couple of upgrades this morning for LAC. About 7.5% profit just made for my buys yesterday in less than 24hrs. Not too bad for a hard market. Lets see what the day brings.
January 11, 2022 04:44 AM ET (BZ Newswire) -- News
Deutsche Bank analyst Corinne Blanchard upgrades Lithium Americas (NYSE:LAC) from Hold to Buy and announces $34 price target.
Copyright © 2022 Benzinga (BZ Newswire, www.benzinga.com/licensing). Benzinga does not provide investmentadvice. All rights reserved. Write to editorial@benzinga.com with any questions about this content. Subscribe to Benzinga Pro (http://pro.benzinga.com).
January 11, 2022 06:41 AM ET (BZ Newswire) -- News
Piper Sandler analyst Greg Tuttle upgrades Lithium Americas (NYSE:LAC) from Neutral to Overweight and raises the price target from $32 to $41.
Copyright © 2022 Benzinga (BZ Newswire, http://www.benzinga.com/licensing). Benzinga does not provide investmentadvice. All rights reserved. Write to editorial@benzinga.com with any questions about this content. Subscribe to Benzinga Pro (http://pro.benzinga.com).
Been a pretty good success in short term account even after tax bite in and out of dips and surges (sometimes intraday, sometimes a day or two, sometimes longer), in long term account looks like 20 day on a weekly is acting like support for the moment, it might retrace enough to fill the gap at about 25. All depends on the general market (it's in a downtrend with that near term) and I think the market is going to be a bit volatile near term at least and just have to keep on the toes for any enters or exits trading. Long term lithium and LAC is in pretty good shape fundamentally and can see that continuing barring any annihilations from some virus, wars, or meteor landings. Analysts are still giving a moderate buy rating with $23-24 for low end, but even at that low LAC is still way up percentage wise for my long anyways. Some people don't give any heed to analysts (varies with who the analysts are), but more do so it does affect sentiment overall and in turn effects the sp. Last year they were exuberant, but this year I see them toning it down a bit and being more conservative generally with most securities, but one never really knows.
I read his twitter feeds and not sure if what he emails directs to any link of the whole or if you read the whole "Does Not Compute" post. But I found it quite compelling. Really it's simplistic in nature but one naturally fights the realization of the whole thing. We get life trained in a certain reality of things flowing in a certain track, which we believe that it will be contained to how things always work. And when they don't, our minds are in disarray. I guess that is where we need to learn to "think out of the box" better and realize when it's needed to do that or to know when that no matter how much thinking is done, it won't compute and just "it's how the world works" . Anyway, I thought I would post the whole thing.
https://www.collaborativefund.com/blog/does-not-compute/
Does Not Compute
Jan 5, 2022 by Morgan Housel
A lot of things don’t make any sense. The numbers don’t add up, the explanations are full of holes. And yet they keep happening – people making crazy decisions, reacting in bizarre ways. Over and over.
Historian Will Durant once said, “logic is an invention of man and may be ignored by the universe.” And it often is, which can drive you mad if you expect the world to work in rational ways. A common cause of everything from divisive arguments to bad forecasting is that it can be hard to distinguish what’s happening from what you think should be happening.
Two short war stories to show you what I mean.
The Battle of the Bulge was one of the deadliest American military battles in history. Nineteen thousand American soldiers were killed, another 70,000 missing or wounded, in just over a month as Nazi Germany made an ill-fated last push against the Allies.
Part of the reason it was so bloody is that Americans were surprised. And part of the reason they were surprised is that in the rational minds of American generals, it made no sense for Germany to attack.
The Germans didn’t have enough troops to win a counterattack, and the few that were left were often children under age 18 with no combat experience. They didn’t have enough fuel. They were running out of food. The terrain of the Ardenne Forest in Belgium stacked the odds against them. The weather was atrocious.
The Allies knew all of this. They reasoned that any rational German commander would not launch a counterattack. So the American lines were left fairly thin and ill-supplied.
And then, boom. The Germans attacked anyway.
What the American generals overlooked was how unhinged Hitler had become. He wasn’t rational. He was living in his own world, detached from reality and reason. When his generals asked where they should get fuel to complete the attack, Hitler said they could just steal it from the Americans. Reality didn’t matter.
Historian Stephen Ambrose notes that Eisenhower and General Omar Bradley got all the war-planning reasoning and logic right in late 1944, except for one detail – how irrational Hitler had become. But that mattered more than anything.
A generation later, something similar happened during the Vietnam war.
Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara viewed the world as a big math problem. He wanted everything quantified, and based his career on the idea that any problem could be solved if you obeyed the cold truth of statistics and logic.
One of the key measures of success during Vietnam was body count – how many Viet Cong did American troops kill? Are more Viet Cong dying than Americans? It was easy to track, easy to show on a chart, and became an obsession.
Then there was the logic: If enough Northern Vietnamese were killed, you could break the spirit of the enemy who saw their chances of victory diminished. More enemy bodies was equated with being closer to winning. William Westmoreland, who commanded U.S. forces, explained in 1967:
We’ll just go on bleeding them until Hanoi wakes up to the fact that they have bled their country to the point of national disaster for generations. Then they will have to reassess their position.
The war was turned into a math equation. If enemy dead outnumbered American dead, Americans would win. Ice-cold logic.
But the bodies piled up, and the war went on. And on. And on.
The “equation” would work only if the North Vietnamese leaders were calm, rational actors who would “calculate costs and benefits to the extent that they can be related to different courses of action, and make choices accordingly,” as one paper put it.
But they weren’t.
Edward Lansdale of the CIA once told McNamara that his statistics were missing something.
McNamara said, “What?”
Landsdale said, “The feelings of the Vietnamese people.”
You couldn’t capture that on a chart. But it meant everything. In 1966 New York Times reporter Harrison Salisbury wrote:
I seldom talked to any North Vietnamese without some reference coming into the conversation of the people’s preparedness to fight ten, fifteen, even twenty years in order to achieve victory. At first I thought such expressions might reflect government propaganda … but … I began to realize that this was a national psychology.
Ho Chi Minh put it more bluntly: “You will kill ten of us, and we will kill one of you, but it is you who will tire first.”
That’s exactly how it played out in America, where statistics meant nothing against feelings.
Westmoreland once told Senator Fritz Hollings, “We’re killing these people at a rate of 10 to one.” Hollings replied, “The American people don’t care about the 10. They care about the one.”
That was hard to reconcile in the statistical mind of someone like McNamara. It was like defying the laws of physics, or a typo in a math equation.
But that’s how the world works.
Some things just don’t compute.
Investor Jim Grant once said:
To suppose that the value of a common stock is determined purely by a corporation’s earnings discounted by the relevant interest rates and adjusted for the marginal tax rate is to forget that people have burned witches, gone to war on a whim, risen to the defense of Joseph Stalin and believed Orson Welles when he told them over the radio that the Martians had landed.
That’s always been the case. And it will always be the case.
One way to think about this is that there are always two sides to every investment: The number and the story. Every investment price, every market valuation, is just a number from today multiplied by a story about tomorrow.
The numbers are easy to measure, easy to track, easy to formulate. They’re getting easier as almost everyone has cheap access to information.
But the stories are often bizarre reflections of people’s hopes, dreams, fears, insecurities, and tribal affiliations. And they’re getting more bizarre as social media amplifies the most emotionally appealing views.
A few recent examples of how powerful this can be:
Lehman Brothers was in great shape on September 10th, 2008. Its Tier 1 capital ratio – a measure of a bank’s ability to endure loss – was 11.7%. That was higher than the previous quarter. Higher than Goldman Sachs. Higher than Bank of America. It was more capital than Lehman had in 2007, when the banking industry was about as strong as it had ever been.
Seventy-two hours later it was bankrupt.
The only thing that changed during those three days was investors’ faith in the company. One day they believed in the company. The next they didn’t and stopped buying the debt that funded Lehman’s balance sheet.
That faith is the only thing that mattered. But it was the one thing that was hard to quantify, hard to model, hard to predict, and didn’t compute in a traditional valuation model.
GameStop was the opposite. The statistics showed it was on the edge of bankruptcy in 2020. Then it became a cultural obsession on reddit, the stock surged, the company raised a ton of money, and now it’s worth $11 billion.
Same thing here: The most important variable was the stories people told and the emotions they suddenly stumbled upon. And that was the only thing you couldn’t measure and couldn’t predict with foresight. That’s why the results don’t compute.
Whenever something like this happens you see people shocked and angry about how the market has become detached from fundamentals.
But Grant was right: It’s always been like this.
The 1920s were giddy. The ‘30s were pure panic. The world was coming to an end in the ‘40s. The fifties, ‘60s, ‘70s, were boom to bust, over and over. The ‘80s and ‘90s were insane. The 2000s have been like a reality TV show.
If you’ve relied on data and logic alone to make sense of the economy you’ve been confused for 100 years straight.
Japan is offering companies a 40% tax rebate to raise wages. But most companies aren’t, in part because raises just aren’t part of the Japanese business culture.
Meanwhile, JPEGs of apes have risen in value several thousand percent in the last few months, in part because that is part of the crypto culture.
Economist Per Bylund tweeted this recently:
The concept of economic value is easy: whatever someone wants has value, regardless of the reason (if any), and its value is higher the more it’s wanted and the less there is of it.
Not utility, not discounted cash flow – just whether people want it or not, for any reason. So much of what happens in the economy is rooted in emotions, which can, at times, be nearly impossible to make sense of.
To me it’s obvious that the one thing you can’t measure, can’t predict, and can’t model in a spreadsheet is the most powerful force in all of business and investing – just like it’s the most powerful force in the military. Same in politics. Same in careers. Same in relationships.
A lot of things don’t compute.
The danger, and you see it often in investing, is when people become too McNamara-like – so obsessed with data and so confident in their models that they leave no room for error or surprise. No room for things to be crazy, dumb, unexplainable, and to remain that way for a long time. Always asking, “Why is this happening?” and expecting there to be a rational answer. Or worse, always mistaking what happened for what you think should have happened.
The ones who thrive long term are those who understand the real world is a neverending chain of absurdity, confusions, messy relationships, and imperfect people.
Making sense of that world requires admitting a few things.
John Nash is one of the smartest mathematicians to ever live, winning the Nobel Prize. He was also schizophrenic, and spent most of his life convinced that aliens were sending him coded messages.
In her book A Beautiful Mind, Silvia Nasar recounts a conversation between Nash and Harvard professor George Mackey:
“How could you, a mathematician, a man devoted to reason and logical proof, how could you believe that extraterrestrials are sending you messages? How could you believe that you are being recruited by aliens from outer space to save the world?” Mackey asked.
“Because,” Nash said slowly in his soft, reasonable southern drawl, “the ideas I had about supernatural beings came to me the same way that my mathematical ideas did. So I took them seriously.”
The first step to accepting that some things don’t compute is realizing that the reason we have innovation and advancement is because we are fortunate to have people in this world whose minds work differently from yours. Beyond Nash are people like Elon Musk and Steve Jobs, whose personalities are equal parts brilliant and absurd, and the absurd can’t be separated from the brilliant – you have to accept the full package. We’d never get anywhere if everyone viewed the world as a clean set of rational rules to follow.
The next is accepting that what’s rational to one person can be crazy to another. Everything would compute if everyone had the same time horizon, goals, ambitions, and risk tolerances. But they don’t. Panic selling stocks after they’ve declined 5% is a terrible idea if you’re a long-term investor and a career imperative if you’re a professional trader. There is no world in which every business or investing decision you see should align with your own view of the world.
Third is understanding the power of incentives. Bubbles are technically irrational, but the people who work in bubbles – mortgage brokers in 2004 or stockbrokers in 1999 – make so much money from them that there’s a powerful incentive to keep the music playing. They delude not only their customers, but themselves. Nothing gets people to look the other way like easy money.
Last is the power of stories over statistics. “Housing prices in relation to median incomes are now above their historic average and typically mean revert,” is a statistic. “Jim just made $500,000 flipping homes and can now retire early and his wife thinks he’s amazing” is a story. And it’s way more persuasive in the moment. If you look, I think you’ll find that wherever information is exchanged – wherever there are products, companies, careers, politics, knowledge, education, and culture – you will find that the best story wins. Great ideas explained poorly can go nowhere while old or wrong ideas told compellingly can ignite a revolution.
Novelist Richard Powers put it: “The best arguments in the world won’t change a single person’s mind. The only thing that can do that is a good story.”
It’s hard to compute, but it’s how the world works.
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Jan 5, 2022 by Morgan Housel · @morganhousel
That's one nice chart. The 200 day is pretty close to straight linear. Wonder how long it will continue. Looking like a chance of another little trend break upwards within a couple of weeks (depending on what the market does generally). It's funny how today after it reaches $62 JPM raises price target from $52 to $62 (maintains overweight). I know it's just about the algorithms and process the analyst uses, but it still feels like "oh now you tell us" kind of thing. LOL Most bullish whale trades 1/21 Calls at $70. On my watch and study.
Tech-Spec getting wrecked and think we might have a bit more wreckage to come short term, with some of the more higher spec being totaled for quite a while. Been hearing "buy the dip, any dip" is on it's last legs right now in that sector. Maybe in the second half of this year, some of her plays may pan out, and there will be specific few tech and spec jumping out to be leaders and successes, but I think it will be more on plain luck, not her philosophy so much. She's no Buffet that's for sure.
If your talking some of the big names like GOOG or MSFT, there might be some bargain hunting there with those type, but all these really high valuation stocks of 21, there will only be a few comparatively that rise above. So I can't have the faith in being heavily invested in those sectors or her abilities to pick them. To be honest though, I'm not at any time any more than 15-20% of the whole buying speculative stocks even when they were doing gangbusters (not counting day trading or short term), that's just my philosophy and my own rules.
There is a big time rotation of money out of spec-tech right now with retail and institutional and I think we have a little more rotation to go. The whole sentiment for that is in a downward trend right now. Once it settles down a bit, maybe take a look again at that time.
Have to wonder what benchmarks she's using. Liquid nitrogen temperature? Not using any, just not looking or caring? Maybe alternative realities, just don't understand.
One still has to go through pick and choose, but those two sectors are the best and quite a few up trending for now anyways. It could change without notice, got keep watch constantly in this market. Cathy Wood is down over 20% last I checked for 21 which is a total failure in my view especially given the 2021 market was a very easy yr to succeed. I just don't see or understand that for last year nor can give her any faith for this year. But maybe because I'm not part of her HOOD (Urban dict). LOL
Pretty flat today (at the moment), but Energy and Financial Sectors of S&P have been consistently on top recently.
list of Energy stocks.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/investing/markets/indices/SREN/components/
List of Financial stocks.
https://www.tradingview.com/symbols/SP-SPF/components/