- In the Money notes a Positive Hump Day, but would like to see some consolidation. I don' t know, when we get up here near the top of the trading range, I hate to meander for too long. I'd like to see us break out and crush the bears. Sentiment is down, so lets put this game away instead of fritter away the lead. (I love sports analogies!)
- Have we had enough of Suze Orman yet? I catch her while flipping channels on the weekend, and it seems it's always one of those "My husband left me, and I have $50,000 in credit card debt and the trailor is breaking down. I need to do some repairs, so I was thinking about marrying this guy who says he has a sick uncle that's going to leave him a big inheritance. He says it's enough to pay off his credit debt he ran up collecting guns, pay off his gambling debts, and then help me with my financial issues. What do you think?" (OK, I'm stretching it a little, but you get the idea...)
- My Black Box did get a sell signal on the Malaysian ETF. I don't own any, but have been adding foreign ETFs to track to see if the Black Box works with them.
- You want a Larry Kudlow link? Too bad, you're getting one! KLo talks about the Senate voting to extend the Bush tax cuts. Sounds like Larry got his Valentines Day happy ending, eh? In a 53-47 vote, the Senate has signaled clear support of a two-year extension of President Bush’s 15 percent rates on cap gains and dividends. There was another vote by same margin to patch up the AMT. This is very bullish, and investors everywhere should take notice.
- Some of the Fed commentaries have claimed Helicopter Ben was hawkish. Others have claimed he was less hawkish than feared. Just like everything else, people seem to have heard what they wanted to hear. I think Bernanke did a pretty good job of fence sitting today. On the one hand, the economy is growing, we're at full employment, and wage pressures are increasing. On the otherhand, higher energy prices, health care costs, and declining real estate threaten to slow down consumer spending.
- Kim Snider on Data Provides False Sense of Comfort for Baby Boomers. A cursory look at data from the Survey of Consumer Finances might lead us to conclude that Baby Boomers are doing okay with regard to saving for retirement. According to a new brief from the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College that conclusion would be false (see link for more!). Yeah, I think it's going to be a problem. Especially if we're in one of those longer-term secular bear markets.
- Ever since I started Empire of Debt, I added The Daily Reckoning to my bloglines feed. Here there are with more gloom, Nasty Dollar: Unfavorable Balances. They may be right, but the problem I see with taking a "We're all doomed" position 24x7 is that you can't be flexible enough to make any money. The Empire will fall whenever the Empire will fall, but we all have our lives to live in the meantime. (Of course, bulls and bears can both make money on the various gyrations from day to day).
- There are so many feeds, but so little time. Tons of good stuff out there daily by some pretty bright folks. Check out the links to my left (your right) for more...
