Malkiel

Crystallex and the Venezuela Situation: Eliminate Emotion and Stick to the Facts

I don't think ordinary investors need to become experts in the Venezuelan economic or political order to see that this sweeping group of nationalizations, whether seizures or not, represents a troubling trend that should rightly give pause when considering an investment like Crystallex. Basically, with any number of much safer junior gold miner plays out there, the Crystallex situation is a speculative play that's over. Anyone who has gotten out with only an 8% loss should consider themself a survivor, as the stock may be a penny stock by week's end. And I will be amazed if anyone is foolish enough to try to buy up the worthless shares later, since even if the fears of seizure turn out to be wrong they will still govern investor behavior toward the stock forever more...

NVIDIA: Seasonal Slowness or Weaker General Demand?

I wouldn't worry too much about demand for these guys. Have you read any of the materials on Microsoft Vista? Or even have it loaded on your new pc? The one component above all else required to run it properly are state-of-the-art graphics cards, and seemingly 99% of the most recent pc's and laptops sold don't have the right cards, so as soon as the buying public realizes what they need to run Vista the pc makers will have to stop stuffing their systems with outdated cards and start buying the new good stuff by the freighterload. Expect that to happen in time for the Christmas '07 shipments.

Exxon Shares Sinking to Levels They Richly Deserve

You forget that Exxon's primary skill, like Halliburton's, is to manage to mysteriously be the only player in the game of musical chairs. In Exxon's case, as the only oil company in the Dow 30 their stock price is forever propped up by indexing. It's a cozy job if anyone else could get it...

Crystallex International Corp: Take Your Money and Run

I missed the detail about the primary company being based in Canada, but unless they have significant holdings elsewhere they will still be ruined by the new Chavez action. This property could be seized at any moment, even if permits were granted.

Crystallex International Corp: Take Your Money and Run

Bing! Sorry, too late, you lose. Chavez' nationalization announcement today just sounded the death knell for this little stock's price. Crystallex wasn't among the nationalized companies on this round, but clearly the stock price cannot stand now that the dictator has revealed his plan. Crystallex will only remain private until it has done the dirty work, then can be seized.

If the exchange has any integrity it will stop all trading in this stock until the practical effect of the other nationalizations makes itself apparent; otherwise, it will be a penny stock by the end of this week...

The Dirty Truth About Sirius Satellite Radio

You remind me of the luddites who take part in those "turn off your tv" weeks at local schools because they say "there's nothing worthwhile for kids to watch on tv"; but they would never consider watching Discovery, National Geographic, History Channel, Turner Classic Movies, etc., so their inbred lack of taste keeps them from ever getting it. In your case, Sirius and XM both offer a vast range of programming, including some great theme music channels and outstanding classical music, but only a lowbrow judges the whole venture solely by Howard Stern's output...

Cramer Level 3 Recommendation Should Bring More Upside After 6% Gain Friday

I love Cramer, but I can't find anything I like about this company's numbers. If this baby goes to 9 any time this year I would "SELL SELL SELL"...

The Inverted Yield Curve's Predictive Power

All of this historical data up through about 1995 reflects a closed economy as far as borrowing goes. Now that a nation with 4 times our population (China) is buying up all US bonds in sight in order to have something to do with their immense dollar intake from trade, and money is flowing freely throughout the world economy without significant legal barriers, the closed economy is no longer closed and old models of borrowing would seem to be invalid. In the absence of a new, time-tested model the evaluations of other sectors in the economy should stand on their own merit, and they seem not to indicate even a significant economic slowdown, never mind a recession.

Since Mr. Laffer's evaluation of this situation is so cogent and on the mark, I'll have to assume that all that "Laffer Curve" supply-side trickle-down nonsense from the '80's was ideological hooey unworthy of his real intellect...

Four Years Later: My Top 10 Net/Nets Beat All Market Indexes

Excuse my amateur's stupidity, but what exactly does "net/net" mean?

Exxon - The Most Evil (and Overpriced) of the Oil Companies

It doesn't matter how evil they are if they are the only oil company in the Dow index--the stock price is propped up by the automatic indexing factor. I fault the Dow for including only XOM, but then again having only 30 stocks in the index is probably a flawed concept...

'As January Goes, So Goes the Year' - True or False?

Norman Fosback took on this myth in his 1976 classic "Stock Market Logic"--see pages 151-154 in the last 1996 edition. His conclusion after an analysis similar to Eric's was that one could "flip a coin on New Year's Eve and you will have just as good a chance of being right about the February to December market trend as if you used the January barometer...and you will have your answer 31 days sooner".

A Contrarian Strategy For Quick Capital Gains

Dividends became fashionable again last quarter as a lot of public buzz got generated among the talking heads on CNBC about how investors are rediscovering dividends and becoming unhappy with share buyback programs which don't seem to lift share prices. Expect companies to begin to align themselves with the zeitgeist, offering dividends where they hadn't before or upping them if they had. This means that your indicator has run smack into the fad of the moment and won't have much utility for the rest of the year as companies get their hands slapped for trimming dividends and decide it isn't worth generating the commotion...

Missed Opportunities for 2006: Uranium, China, Food & Water

The mark of the end of the world is when the planet's teeming 12 billion residents reduce earth, wind, water, and fire to pure commodity plays...

Delusional Raging Bulls?

Alan Abelson is the one bear I can bear; his humorous musings in Barrons kept me laughing through the '80's as I watched the new Jazz Age unfold.

Someone needs to do one of those psycho-statistical studies of just how tightly bears revert to the mean; I suspect, in truth, that like puritans on the subject of sex all price expansion threatens to awaken lustful feelings that they can only keep in check by fronting grim sobriety to the world...

Sears Holdings: A Baby Berkshire in the Making?

To balance off Deric and Alexes' analysis, let me point out that one of the big assets Sears supposedly had that made it a ripe vehicle for Lampert's magic is a big inventory of real estate and leases from Sears stores, making the stores a cash cow for the new holding shell as they are closed and sold.

One problem I see with using Sears as the sacrificial caterpillar for a new wasp is whether the shareholder base is on board with the transformation. If they believe they are invested long-term in a retailer, and have sentimental ties to that image, they may resist Lampert at the point where the original Sears stores need to be shed from the holding company.

I'm also curious as to whether Goldman Sach (GS) is also working that "next Berkshire Hathaway" karma--will we see GS and SHLD shares at $10,000 by 2017? Stay tuned.

Cramer, by the way, is way high on SHLD and suggests even his small-pockets followers buy a share or two ahead of any of the small stuff he talks about on "Mad Money"...