September 2009

All Wheel Drive Deisel Hybrid - 62 MPG and 0-62 in 4.8 Sec.

More Words of Praise for the SEC

September 19, 2009

We just got back from a trip to Virginia Beach.  We stayed in a beautiful Residence Inn with a nice ocean view, and had beautiful sunrises every morning if we wanted to get up that early. This really makes my wife feel good.  She is recovering from the effects of chemotherapy, and this takes a bit of time.  I traded stocks, but had to buy a new laptop when my old Hypersonic died.  It is repairable - it needs a new network and sound card - but I am not sure it is worth it.  Anyway, we made a quick trip to Best Buy and got a pretty decent HP machine.  It is really slick, and fast enough, although not as fast as I would have gotten if I had had more time.  Still, it was the fastest at Best Buy.  It runs Windows Vista, which seems to work OK, even though it does some strange things.  For backup I got a small 2.5" disk that is powered by USB and holds almost 500 GB.  It measures 3.25" by 5.25" and is about 0.5" thick.  Amazing!

Ken Huck was nice enough to send me the install program for FastBreak, and I got up and running easily.  Still, some Trade files do not work under Vista for some reason.

I have made some decent money in the market while on this trip.  I am trading 2 systems, one which trades mostly small caps, and is fairly volatile but quite profitable.  The other trades more stable stocks.  Naturally, the first system does better than the second, but the second is more stable than the first.  The small caps move in mysterious ways.  I did take profit in BCRX even though the system said to hold, and that seems the right thing to have done, at least now.

I also trade a few stocks in addition to the systems, if their charts look good.  For example, I bought some TX on 9/14 and over the week it went up a bit over 7%.  Not too shabby.  It may get picked by one of the systems, in which case I will already be a bit ahead.  Not so lucky with VMC, which went down 4%; although I have only held it for 2 days.

I am not pleased with Microsoft E-mail.  It does strange things with attachments, like hang instead of opening.  I may just go with Yahoo mail, although it would be a major pain to make the transition.

Interesting note from a Motley Fool Message Board:

http://seekingalpha.com/article/162021-20-companies-most-lik...

Audit Integrity, an independent research firm, has highlighted the top 20 companies that they believe have the highest probability of filing for bankruptcy. They limited this specific list to publicly traded firms that have over $1 billion market capitalization. In no particular order:

* Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. (AMD)
* Amkor Technology, Inc. (AMKR)
* AMR Corporation (AMR)
* Apartment Investment and Management Co. (AIV)
* CBS Corporation (CBS)
* Continental Airlines, Inc. (CAL)
* Federal-Mogul Corporation (FDML)
* Hertz Global Holdings, Inc. (HTZ)
* Interpublic Group of Companies, Inc. (IPG)
* Las Vegas Sands Corp. (LVS)
* Liberty Media Corporation (Capital) (LCAPA)
* Macy's, Inc. (M)
* Mylan Inc. (MYL)
* Oshkosh Corporation (OSK)
* Redwood Trust, Inc. (RWT)
* Rite Aid Corporation (RAD)
* Sirius XM Radio Inc. (SIRI)
* Sprint Nextel Corporation (S)
* Textron Inc. (TXT)
* The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company (GT)

Well, it should be interesting to revisit that list in about a year. Should I sell OSK?  It is down a little from where I bought it.  AMR would not be a surprise - it has been in and out of trouble for years. SIRI and RAD have been rather bad for some time also.  Maybe there will be some great going out of business sales at Macy's

Some of this Stuff Just Plain Comes from Mean People

September 23, 2009

I just fully invested my TDAmeritrade accounts.  Part trades a FastBreak system, and part holds some index ETFs to get more foreign stocks.  We will see how that goes.  The volatility is amazing.  YRCW is up 25% at this time.  Why???  Well, it appears that they are not going bankrupt, and there is a lot of short covering.  I knew it was a bit of a speculation, but still...

September 24, 2009

So just after I add money to the market, it craters.  Well, I think that this is just some profit-taking, and may be offset in a few days by end-of-the quarter window dressing.

Big Men, Small Dogs

September 25, 2009

I raised a bit of cash today.  Perhaps I will be able to put it to good use next week.

Free Speech and Child Abuse Courtesy of Westboro Baptist "Church" 

September 30, 2009

Decent, but still somewhat disappointing results for me this month.  This volatility really makes trading difficult.