Market Tamer

Where do you think you’d have to go to witness this incredible feat of prestidigitation and legerdemain: suddenly, magically, mysteriously make $7 trillion disappear?  In order to help you answer the question, allow me to clarify a bit. The $7 trillion does not really go away; it is still there, huge as ever. The key [...]

In my May 3rd newsletter, I focused on Polaris Industries, a maker of ‘big-boy’ (and girl) toys, like 4-wheel ATV’s. It is a good quality stock and had a strong upward seasonal tendency earlier this year when I first covered trade possibilities. Over the prior two months, PII had been cycling within a well-defined trading [...]

We have already established that Aristotelian thought did not anticipate the power of corporate spinoffs (see “Aristotle Did Not Anticipate Spinoffs”). In this offering, we will alert you to another interesting spinoff that is already in process. This particular demerger is intriguing because of the intricate web of partnering corporations whose synergies within their respective [...]

Try to imagine being “in the shoes” of Dr. John Lechleiter, CEO of the venerable pharmacy company Eli Lilly (LLY). Of the world’s top three “blockbuster drugs” that are due to lose their patent protection in 2013, Eli Lilly has two of them: 1. Cymbalta:  Although Lilly did manage to successfully manage a six month [...]

During both my college and post-graduate education, the wisdom of Aristotle was impressed upon me by instructors in multiple and varied settings. “Venerated” would be an understatement of Aristotle’s status within the pantheon of great thinkers. One of Aristotle’s frequently quoted insights is: ““The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.” Aristotle’s premise [...]

You know the feeling. You’re on a roller coaster, just coming over the top of the highest point. There’s that brief moment you experience weightlessness. Nearly every major index or sector ETF chart I look at looks the same. The one I’ll focus on is SMH, the ETF based on the semiconductor stocks. SMH is [...]

When you learn how to successfully trade options, one benefit that you soon discover is the ability to generate reliable monthly income. You don’t have to be correct on the direction of a particular stock or the market, you can profit based on option decay. You essentially build a trade that throws off cash when [...]

Many strategies exist in the world of stock option trading. There are the simple trades such as the long call or the long put that are common among beginners. And there are slightly more complicated trades that are still popular, such as the bull put and bear call spreads. And then there are the more [...]

In Friday’s newsletter, I covered indications of possible weakness in the major indexes and ETFs. The chart I used as an example, IWM, showed three strong drops from a down-trending resistance line, all on well-above-average volume. This is usually a high probability bearish trade setup. However, I stated ” If IWM doesn’t go below mid-April’s [...]

During the past several years, many widely publicized “what to invest in next year” stories have featured one or more investment gurus forecasting the imminent end of the long-running bull market in bonds – only to be proven wrong because they underestimated the weakness in the global economy and the persistent appeal of the U.S. [...]