Just saw where some meatpacker is having to recall millions of pounds of meat because it is contaminated with "listeria"(not sure if that is exact name) bacteria. It killed 20 or so people a couple of years ago and many hundred became very ill. It seems we read about somanella(sp?), etc. every few months.

I guess/think the surebeam system will continue to become more popular.

Man,

What a market!!!

Crazy

Benwhoisveryhappyyheiswrong

It's been a hell of a ride, but things are certainly looking good right now. I am really looking forward to option expiration day tomorrow!

The only trade I have right now that is really doing badly is CKR. If I ever meet Carl Karcher, I'm going to kick his ass.

That might make that happy star stop smiling 8^)

Wellcome Back Kendricks
Putanero

Kendricks,

I think Carl is in his mid 80's now, so you might just ask him for your money back. Hell he may be dead.

I never have like restaurant stocks. Just to much capital expenditures with generally low, low margins, and over capacity.

Carl started out with a hotdog stand in downtown LA and opened his first Carl Jr's in Anaheim(sp?) CA about sixty years ago.

I remember you telling me about that stock after you had made the investment. I satrted to say something.

Benthesecondguesser.

What do you guys feel tomorow has in store for us?

Oh man the whole portfolio is green except for a couple of retailers and my SURE bet. But SURE did 30% yesterday, and I took some off the table.

Back into the mongering money!

Tomorrow?? Too far in the future for me to predict.

Hey Kendricks

Hello guys. As far as CKR goes, when I entered the trade last month, the stock was selling for 4.90, and I sold Oct 5 calls against it for .70. If the stock were assigned, this would have resulted in an 18% profit in one month. Had it only fallen to 4.20 (a 14% drop) I would have broken even. Today it closed at 3.48. But, you can't win them all. Anyway, Ben, as a favor to you, I'll spare Carl his richly deserved ass kicking. I still just might bitch slap the son of a bitch, though.

Since the price offered by the future CKR options doesn't justify staying in the stock, I intend to sell on Monday, and put the money into something else. Fortunately, ARXX, CCK, and CKFR have more than made up for this debacle.

Look for the markets to gap up in the morning on the MSFT news. What happens after that is anyone's guess.

This is my GUESS of what I think the economy (in general) will do in the next year.

I beleive there are still problems with some company's accounting practices and just plain bad corporate strategies/investments that will surface in the news and keep the stock market low. Also, I forsee other domestic issues and new laws that could threaten growth next year depending on the election results. If terror attacks happen more than they are now, that could introduce economic problems. I think that we will see a lower low. My guess is that we will rally weakly before the holidays. Then hover through them. And then possibly grow a bit until/unless bad news hits. Then the new low. After that drawn-out low, I think the problems will be absorbed by the otherwise good economic conditions and we will have a period of sustained growth.

That's my 2 cents. And it truly isn't worth even that! And, you guys know that last sentence is probably the only thing I'll end up getting right! lol.

Hombre needs to add an "edit" function, so we can change predictions that didn't work out.

The way to be a sucessful analyst and prognosticator is go on CNBC on Monday predicting an up market and the following Friday go on CNNFN and predict a down market. Six months later you just remind everyone that you were on the show where your prediction is most accurate.

Hell, nobody remembers what these guys say anyway, unless they remind you of their accurate forcasts and stock picks.

Stock Brokers have been doing this for years with their clients(Of course not me).

SURE is interesting. May take some more profits today and buy back after the end of the month conference call. I suspect another drop to $2 but I dunno.

As always my thinking is clouded by wishfulness, based upon greed, and skewed by a build-up of spermatoza. It's so bad they're swimming around my brain.

I gotta go to TJ this weekend.

Again, anyone check out TIVO. It is now up 30% in the past month.

Put at least some beer money on it.

Hey Ben, do you remember that time when, a week in advance, I picked the close of the Dow EXACTLY, to the number? I must be the greatest analyst and prognosticator who has ever lived.

Of course, it could also be true that a blind man shooting in the dark will occasionally hit the bulls eye, if he squeezes off enough rounds...

Any thoughts on FRNT? Trading at 5.12 (below intrinsic value), with the Nov 5 calls selling for .60, it looks like a pretty good covered call trade to me.

Kendricks,

You are a quick study.

How about the weeks you came in last?

"PERFECT"

Now here is how to sell options:

Options Account
Fidelity National Financial
Price
Date Description Price Per Share

7-10-02 Bought 1000 Shares FNF $27,905.00 $27.91

7-10-02 Sold 10 October 30 calls ($1,425.00) ($1.43)

7-10-02 Net Cost Per Share $26,480.00 $26.48

10-18-02 Option Expired




If Shares Are Called on October 18, 2002

Net Profit From Stock $2,000.00
Net Profit From Options and Dividends $1,425.00
Net Profit $3,470.00
Percent Return Days 11.59%
Annual Percent Return 99 Days 42.16%

FNF closed at $29.99 today. One penny below my strike price.
I can sell the November 30 calls on Monday for $1250.00.

I had reather be lucky than smart.

And the winner is:

Putanero Dow 8050

The big loser, thank God, was Ben.

And I'm predicting 8050 again for next weeks close.
Putanero

Date.........DOW.........Change...NASDAQ.......Change..S&P.......Change
17-Aug-02....8,778.06.............1,361.01.............928.77
24-Aug-02....8,872.96.....1.07....1,380.62.....1.42....940.86.....1.28
31-Aug-02....8,663.50....-2.42....1,314.85....-5.00....916.07....-2.71
08-Sep-02....8,427.20....-2.80....1,295.30....-1.51....893.92....-2.48
13-Sep-02....8,312.69....-1.38....1,291.40....-0.30....889.81....-0.46
21-Sep-02....7,986.02....-4.09....1,221.09....-5.76....845.39....-5.25
28-Sep-02....7,701.45....-3.70....1,199.16....-1.83....827.37....-2.18
05-Oct-02....7,528.40....-2.30....1,139.90....-5.20....800.58....-3.35
13-Oct-02....7,850.29.....4.10....1,210.47.....5.83....835.32.....4.16
18-Oct-02....8,322.40.....5.67....1,287.86.....6.01....884.39.....5.55

DOW 8,400

Put me down for 8,500.

Oh, c'mon. There have been some very successful prognosticators.

Lets not forget Elaine Garzarelli (predicted the crash of '87; then established the Smith Barney Shearson Sector Analysis fund.) Lets just ignore '88 to '90, shall we???

Sam

About your ummm... Tivo.

Perhaps you should check out this article.

http://slate.msn.com/?id=2072037

Put

With many thousands of people making predictions, it is inevitable that some will be correct. Imagine the following experiment - every single person on earth "predicts" the next flip of a coin. Probablities suggest that about 1/2 will be correct.

Those who are wrong are eliminated, and the other 3,000,000,000 guess (I mean, predict) again. now, 1.5 billion people have two correct predictions in a row. They continue, and now .75 billion have three in a row. If this continues, almost 6 million people will have correctly guessed ten in a row, and will be feeling pretty damn proud of themselves.

If this continues, with half of all guessers being elimiated, and those who guess correctly continuing - some lucky bastard will eventually correctly predict 32 consecutive coin tosses in a row... and the odds of him being right again on the next flip are 50-50.

The fact that TIVO has $70 million in assets, and $120 million in liabilities, is enough to deter me from "investing" in it. Personally, I try to avoid putting money into companies with a negative net worth of $50 million.

The stock may still go up, of course. Just understand that you are placing a speculative bet on the hope that TIVO will have great future earnings, since the stock itself has no intrinsic value.

Thank you for going over an elementary math under a not so realistic or useful assumption.

It is plausible that many economic theories give prognosticators a better-than-50/50 chance. Shifting the odds from 50/50 to 70/30 drastically increases the chance of a person correct several times in a row. It is also very plausible that each prediction is not mathmatically independent, i.e. there could be common causes/elements shared by various economic events.

Not to mention, counting their winning "streak" is not at all essential in evaluating prognosticators. It is far more important to figure out who made a correct prediction when everybody else was saying the opposite. And, the more massive the impact of the events they correctly predicted, the more valuable they are.

I have Tivo's rival Replay TV. These products are collectively called hard-disc-video-recorder or HDVR. You pay for the machine (hardware) which is updated by a programming service via telephone line. I am happy with Replay TV. It literally chagned my TV viewing habit. Before owning Replay TV, I never followed weekly dramas and sitcoms. Now, I watch Sopranos, Six Feet Under, and Sex and the City, all without being tied up to the TV at the time they broadcast.

But, I have also noticed that this concept is not a easy sell. I told the virtue of the product to many of my friends, and nobody gets it. And I understand. This is a product that nobody really NEEDS it. VCR does a similar job. What they get with Replay TV is a seemingly tiny extra convenience and digital quality. Once you have the product, that extra is not that tiny.

Now, back when Replay TV and Tivo first came out, the Replay TV hardware sold about 200 dollars more than Tivo ($500 vs 300). With the additional $200, Replay TV offered a free programming service for life. With Tivo, you have an option of paying monthly ($12 each) or one-time permanent fee (something like $200). This has not been true for a while. Replay TV dropped their price. They now sell their hardwares at similar prices with Tivo's (around $300).

I am happy with one-time $300 expense on my Replay TV. I am not sure if I would pay one-time $500 or $300 plus monthly payment of $12 for Tivo.

Nice to see you haven't lost your knack for missing the point, Byron. The true giants in the field of investment are the first to admit that they have no idea what the world will look like in a few years, as there are far too many wildcards and unknown variables. As Mark Twain once put it, "The art of prophecy is very difficult, especially with respect to the future..."

Those who do claim knowledge of the future are snake oil salesmen. The cleverest often make predictions contrary to the herd, so that on the rare occasions when they are right, they can point to their past "brilliance", knowing that the world is full of suckers who will eat there bullshit up as fast as they can dish it out. Bon Appétit!

There are two opposing hypotheses here.

You say every single prediction is random and has EXACTLY the same probability of being correct, REGARDLESS OF the predictors' knowledge and experience on the market. I am saying it does not have to be.

In the extreme term (but TRUE to your logic), you are claiming that, MY prediction on economy has EXACTLY the same chance of being correct as those by "the true giants in the field of investment".

I don't believe that.

That was an excellent example of the "straw man fallacy". That is not what I said at all.

Indeed, I said that the "true giants in the field of investment are the first to admit that they have no idea what the world will look like in a few years, as there are far too many wildcards and unknown variables."

Of course, knowledgeable investors know better than to buy stocks that are selling for 80 times earnings and 120 times intrinsic value, but that is a far cry from claiming to be able to pick market tops and bottoms.

Someone knowledgeable in the fields of finance and economics may be able to analyze a company, and assess whether or not, in a given instance, the risk of investment is justified by the potential for reward. Still, this is more a risk v. reward assessment than it is a prediction.

For example, if Warren Buffett predicts that a certain company is likely to have a bright future, this analysis is worth far more than your opinion, or even mine. Still, I have never heard Warren claim to be able to pick tops or bottoms, or to tell where the Dow will be two years from now.

I was not talking about picking tops or bottoms. That's too micro, and is the equivalent of predicting Brownian movement of particles in the soluton.

However, there are attempts to forcast general health of economy for the next two months and two years. These are forecasts, not predictions. That they contain variables is a given. Weather is unpredictable. Natural disasters are unpredictable. Wars are unpredictable. Yet, these forecasts are not totally useless or baseless. Economy is, in large part, cyclical. And "some" elements of technological advancements are predictable. In addition, we make adjustments after variables (say, earthquakes) are incorporated into the equation.

Thus, the probability of each forcast being correct does not have to be 50/50 or, more importantly, mathmatically independent.

Byron, I recommend that you subscribe to as many newsletters as you can find, track their performance, and report your findings back to us in a couple of years.

Ahhh.... All is well with the world. All that's missing are the gratuitous sex details...

I'm thinking that the two of them (Kendricks and Byron) should put their heads together and write "The Intelligent Whoremonger: Value Investing in TJ Putas." Kendricks and Byron could write the parts on short- and long-term investing, respectively.

Byron, Kendricks' view of investing is heavily influenced by Benjamin Graham (value investing) and his current living desciples (Buffet, and others).

The idea from this point of view is not to be seduced by the prognostications of various "gurus", or to get too caught up in the fluctuations of the market. The idea is to buy stocks based on careful assessments of the company's health, ability to generate income, and intrinsic future value (relative to the price of the stock). That involves keepin' your nose stuck in newsletters, getting all the info you can about various companies.

So the "couple of years" comment wasn't entirely an insult.

Kendricks Put me down for 8,500.


Putanero 8050 again for next weeks close.


Ben 7900

Ldvee, Byron, Sam, T bone, Dogster ????

Dow 7850

8,650

"Every statement about the future is a lie." Kiyosaki, or Peter Lynch, or someone like that. Or not. Maybe it was Ray Kroc ...

It's a cute point, that nobody knows the future and therefore ANY prediction is by definition not yet true, and therefore must be considered false. It misses the point, however, that we do not seek to create statements that are CURRENTLY true, we seek to create statements that TURN OUT LATER to be true.

I'm confused already.

i'm in at 8400, see last friday's post

7850

Kendricks Put me down for 8,500.


Putanero 8050 again for next weeks close.


Ben 7900

Sam Dow 7850 7800(adjusted for 100 point rule)

T Bone 8,650

Ldvee i'm in at 8400, see last friday's post

Dogster 7850.... Dogster's pick doesn't count for two reasons: 1. Same as Sam's(are you listening Super) 2. Disparaging remarks made about Oklahoma. BEN'S RULES

Okie dokey

Then put me down for 7900

Ok Dogster gets a reprieve. 7900

Wait a minute. Dogster is trying to pull a greyhound fast one on Benito.

Dogster has lost his Dow guessing privileges until next Saturday.

Ldvee,

Nice choice on SURE.

No fair, stork broker!

Ben the censor: Have you ever thought of opening/moderating a rival website?

Y'all gotta read this:
http://www.maddogproductions.com/ds_stocks.htm

SURE has been profitable. Sold half at 100% profit, hanging on to the rest and hoping for a dip to 3 to buy more.

They're on to something. FDA is getting ready to approve hot dogs and such for irradiation to solve the listeria problem. It will really pop then. Word has it the 2nd week of Nov but I'm not SURE.

Purely a speculative buy in a losing money start-up.

Ldvee,

I hate to invest in companies that are not making money.

That has been my problem with SURE from the very beginning.

I guess I am just to conservative.

What do you think about LWIN. I sold it at $55 for a nice profit about three years ago. It went on up to around $100. Now selling for .29. It just has never been able to become profitable.

Up a nickle (20%) today.

I don't know much about the wireless business except stories like yours $100 to 29 cents, amazing, also very bad for the 401K employees. Bet the execs sold at the top. I have a buddy who has made a substantial bet on LVLT.

SURE is the only non-profitable company I've invested in. I know a lot about it and they do have a unique solution to a health problem, meat tainted with bacteria.

Most start-ups don't make a profit for a while.

Hmmm ... has it been 5 or 6 sucker rallies in the current market?

AND THE WINNER IS:

Dow closed at 8444, almost at its high for the day.

Ldvee by a nose at 8400

Kendricks a close second at 8500

Actually Dogster was the big loser. Ben's rules...

Seemed to be a pattern of Kendricks and Ldvee being very good forecasters.

Lets see how it goes this week.