Author: Flynn

One of the more interesting podcast I have found is FollowTheMoneyWeekly – ftmdaily.com/ftm-radio-show/ on the net. Two weeks ago Jerry Robinson discussed the problems Saudi Arabia was having since their budget and spending is based on $100 oil. Their investment assets are being sold to support their spending. In the last 6 months up to $70b in assets have been sold and at the current rate will be broke in 2018. Last week he talked about the crisis in the Middle East.

IBD TBP’s Market Pulse is “Confirmed Uptrend” as of 10/02/15 – a time to buy. It has been 8 days since IBD said we are in an uptrend. In my ETF portfolios, I have invested according to the rules I’ve previously mentioned. This week I plan to invest in the mutual funds identified by numbers I keep on Fidelity Funds. SRetailing is the number one fund in my Fidelity analysis and a corresponding ETF is XLY. XLY is not performing as well as SRetailing, but can be purchased, sold at anytime, and among the 20+ ETFs in retailing is the one which most closely matches SRetailing. I indend to buy XLY (instead of SRetailing) in some of my IRAs, maintaing a 7% stop loss.

My current investments:
IRA#1
None
IRA#2
None

My portfolio changes this weekend:
IRA #1 – Buy 100% SRetailing
IRA #2 – Buy 20% SRetailing

My portfolio market exposure after this weekend’s changes:
IRA #1 – 100% invested
IRA #2 – 20% invested

Listening to market experts from the major investment firms on various news shows is always interesting. They cannot says bear market, they cannot say sell. They say market fluctuations will continue or that you should lighten up on your equity portfolio. The Dow Jones Industrial, S&P 500, and Nasdaq indexes are all below their 200 day and 50 day moving average and the averages are moving down – all indications of a bear market.

IBD TBP’s Market Pulse is “Confirmed Uptrend” as of 10/02/15 – a time to buy – maybe. This is the 11th confirmed uptrend in the last 12 month. The previous 10 uptrends lasted between 1 to 50 days. I used market in correction or uptrend under pressure as an ending signal. Seven of the uptrends ended within a week and if I had waited a week, I would have had fewer losses. Especially harmful was the loss caused by the 7/16/15 confirmed uptrend which caused me to buy on 7/20/15. A week after that confirmed uptrend, it ended and waiting a week would have completely eliminated that loss ~20% loss I sustained in SBiotechnology. IBD states that “A follow-through day confirmes that an uptrend is underway” and “Not all follow-through days work”. Therefore I am going to make my buys based on the market pulse reading a week after a confirmed uptrend is issued. So while IBD now indicates it is a good time to start to buy, I am going to wait a week.

My current investments:
IRA#1
None
IRA#2
None

My portfolio changes this weekend:
IRA #1 – None
IRA #2 – None

My portfolio market exposure after this weekend’s changes:
IRA #1 – 00% invested
IRA #2 – 00% invested

last week the Federal Reserve Board (fed) decided to not raise interest rates and the market went down. So last weekend 3 fed governors came out and said they would raise interest rates soon. This week the fed chariman said we would raise rates. They figured perhaps rasing rates would help the market go up since not rasing rates caused the market to go down. The fed had used qualitative easing (qe) #1, qe#2, operation twist, and qe#3 to cause the market to go up. When the fed stopped its qe, other nations started and the market continued up. This week the market went down. Perhaps the market is trying to tell the fed something.
We are in the window dressing period. Portfolio managers report on the end of a month and end of a quarter. A portfolio manager with 1M to invest has a choice of buying a new stock and hope it goes up, or buying more of a stock he owns to push the price up on every share he owns. So the quess is next week will be an up week – at least through Wednesday.

Returns for the month of August were probably the worst I’ve ever had. September and October are suposted to be the bad months.
In August IRA#1 -16%, IRA#2 -7%, PDP PIE PIZ DWAS -3%, QQQ -3%, SPY/RSP -6%, Power4 -4%.
For the last 3 months, IRA#1 -25%, IRS#2 -8%, PDPetc -4%, QQQ new -5%, SPY/RSP new -7%, Power4 -4%.
August portfolio changes:
IRA#1 – Sold SBiotechnology on 08/24.
IRA#2 – Sold SmallCapGrowth, SHealthCare, SPharmaceutical on 08/24.
PDP PIE PIX DWAS – sold DWAS on 8/21.
QQQ – sold remaining QQQ on 8/21 – second month for this portfolio.
SPY/RSP – Purchased SPY on 08/21 – second month for this portfolio.
Power4 – Sold PTH on 08/12, PTF on 8/20, PEZ on 8/21.
All my portfolios lost money, but the portfolios invested in ETFs lost less because you can enter a stop loss order to sell at any time (I limit the loss to 7% from a previous close high). Mutual funds can’t be sold until the close of the market for a day, require minimum holding periods, charge extra fees for early sales, and have higher management fees. ETFs do cost $8 to buy and sell. Except for my 401k, which is restricted to mutual funds, I plan to invest in ETFs from now on. I did ask Fidelity, my 401k custodian, to motivate my company to move into the 21st century and allow me to buy ETFs in the 401k.

IBD TBP’s Market Pulse is “Market in correction”. Not a time to buy.
Obviously not every IBD TBP’s Market Pulse call of “Confirmed Uptrend”, such as the call on 08Sep, results in an up market.

My current investments:
IRA#1
None
IRA#2
None

My portfolio changes this weekend:
IRA #1 – None
IRA #2 – None

My portfolio market exposure after this weekend’s changes:
IRA #1 – 00% invested
IRA #2 – 00% invested

An interesting email I get each week is The Felder Report. The subscription to his weekly report is free. You can also read his report at http://thefelderreport.com/blog/. He thinks we are in a bear market.
Prank Curzio has an interesting podcast I listen to weekly. He is currently talking about how now is the time to invest in Europe. I feel with the cost of the influx of refugees will put Europe into a recession at best. He is into natural resources such as Gold Standard Ventures. He also favors KKR which has a dividend of 9%.

IBD TBP’s Market Pulse is “Uptrend under pressure”. Not a time to buy.
The Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC on finance.yahoo.com, $COMPQ on StockCharts.com) looked like it was slowly improving since 24Aug but on Friday closed below its 50 and 200 day moving average. Not a good sign. By the way, the charts on StockCharts.com are the most accurate I’ve found. They adjust the prices used in the charts by any distribution. Yahoo will show a 5% loss in a stock/fund if there was a 5% distribution.

My current investments:
IRA#1
None
IRA#2
None

My portfolio changes this weekend:
IRA #1 – None
IRA #2 – None

My portfolio market exposure after this weekend’s changes:
IRA #1 – 00% invested
IRA #2 – 00% invested

As you listen to experts on the market and economy, I urge you to review the quotes by the experts on the crash of 1929. http://www.gold-eagle.com/article/1927-1933-chart-pompous-prognosticators. An interesting event took place in 1933. On the chart it is event #20. “All safe deposit boxes in banks or financial institutions have been sealed… and may only be opened in the presence of an agent of the I.R.S.” – President F.D. Roosevelt, 1933. Currently Greek cannot use the money stored in their safe deposit boxes.

Ed Slott was on the 09Aug15 podcast Retire Secure by Jaome Lange. Ed is also on PBS a couple of time a year. He is the expert on IRAs and has some interesting idea on IRAs and the use in financial planning.

IBD TBP’s Market Pulse is “Uptrend under pressure”. Not a time to buy.
On Tuesday the Nasdaq went up 2.7% and the S&P500 was up 2.5%. The Market Pulse was changed to “Confirmed uptrend”. On Wednesday The Big Picture (TBP) said “The stock market got smacked with a nasty reversal…” and changed the Market Pulse to “Uptrend under pressure”. Obviously not every “Confirmed uptrend” indicates the start of a new bull market. Perhaps the best idea is to wait a week after a “Confirmed uptrend” to see if it remains unchange.

My current investments:
IRA#1
None
IRA#2
None

My portfolio changes this weekend:
IRA #1 – None
IRA #2 – None

My portfolio market exposure after this weekend’s changes:
IRA #1 – 00% invested
IRA #2 – 00% invested

Cash Reserves, a money market fund, paying 0.01% is the number 3 fund on my list. I am sure the only reason it is yielding anything is that Fidelity is forgoing management fees to subsidize the yield to prevent it from going negative.

This weekend’s Wealthtrack show which Consuelo Mack presents on PBS features Mary Beth Franklin. You can hear it on itunes or wealthtrack.com. Ms. Franklin is a retirement expert and the expert on Social Security. She presents many lesser known ways to take Social Security which could increase your monthly benefit significantly. So many people I meet have failed to maximize their Social Security based on her ideas and only take it as soon as they can. She also discusses Medicare part B premium which costs about $105/month per person but could cost as much as $335/month per person based on income. The formula for Medicare premiums is changing and will cost more starting in the next two years.

An interesting ETF is CROC. It is not a time to buy stocks, but this ETF is a double short on the Australian Dollar. Australia seems to be in a deep recession since it has a minerals based economy and the use of minerals – iron, coal, copper, etc. – is decreasing because the world’s economic growth, if there is any growth at all, is slowing. The same can be said for Brazil – BZQ. http://stockcharts.com/freecharts/perf.php?CROC,BZQ,$COMPQ – double left click on the “200 days” at the bottom of the chart and change it to 90 for a shorter term view. These ETFs are not a buy and hold investment and there are other similar ETFs, these are just two I happened to notice. Both have been making new highs over the last couple of months.

IBD TBP’s Market Pulse is “Market in Correction”. Not a time to buy.
My only investments are a very small number of shares in Block’s and Disney’s employee stock purchase plan – not easy to sell quickly.
The week before the plunge on 24Aug, Gary Kaltbaum was on a Fox Business Network show where he said he was in all cash and one of the other participants suggested he was Chicken Little. One thing to remember about the big brokerage firms – they get a lot of money from companies to push new stock, push additional stock, and write favorable analyst reports. They will never tell you to sell – it hurts their income. They will not even say we are in a bear market. For them, we are in a bull market or have increased volatility.

My current investments:
IRA#1
None
IRA#2
None

My portfolio changes this weekend:
IRA #1 – None
IRA #2 – None

My portfolio market exposure after this weekend’s changes:
IRA #1 – 00% invested
IRA #2 – 00% invested

Doug Fabian has an interesting weekly ETF report. This week’s report can be viewed at www.youtube.com/watch?v=bItZB6x7vZs. On of his key indicators is the 200day moving average line. If an ETF/stock/mutualfund passes below that moving average line, he sells.

James Rohrbach was a guest on one of Gary Kaltbaum shows this week. He produces a couple of reports each week where he says be in the NYSE and/or Nasdaq or be out. His latest signals for the NYSE was a sell on 7/24 and for Nasdaq was a sell on 6/29. He suggest the ProFunds or Rydex funds for intesting in the NYSE – SP500. When you think the market is in an up trend, send an email to Jim@rixindex.com and he will send you his latest news letter.

Returns for the month of July were poor.
In July IRA#1 -5%, IRA#2 +2%, PDP PIE PIZ DWAS +1%, QQQ -2%, SPY/RSP -1%, Power4 +0%.
For the last 3 months, IRA#1 -9%, IRS#2 +3%, PDPetc +1%, QQQ new, SPY/RSP new, Power4 +2%.
May portfolio changes:
IRA#1 – Purchased SBiotechnology on 07/20.
IRA#2 – Purchased SmallCapGrowth on 07/20, sold SBiotechnology on 07/27.
PDP PIE PIX DWAS – Purhased PDP on 7/17, sold PDP on 7/27.
QQQ – Purchased QQQ on 7/17, sold half QQQ on 7/27 – first month for this portfolio.
SPY/RSP – Purchased SPY on 07/17 – first month for this portfolio.
Power4 – Sold PTF on 07/07, purhased PTF on 7/17.

IBD TBP’s Market Pulse is “Market in Correction”
This was probably one of the worst weeks I’ve had. I think that if a federal reserve guy had not come out on Wed and indicated perhaps they would not raise rates in Sep. the market might not have had the big rally it had. Then on Thursday we had the newly improved gross domestic product number – this is at least the second time this administration has change the calculation to make it look better. As the Follow The Money Weekly podcast said on 29Jul15, “We do not have free markets – central planning by governments are controlling the markets.” China’s central planning is failing. Is our’s next?

My current investments:
IRA#1
None
IRA#2
None

My portfolio changes this weekend:
IRA #1 – None
IRA #2 – None

My portfolio market exposure after this weekend’s changes:
IRA #1 – 00% invested
IRA #2 – 00% invested

The Fox Business Block on Saturday reported that this week was the largest decline in the market since October 1987.
In that same business block, Gary B. Smith said he was scared and was buying gold.
Gary Kaultbaum was on Fox Business News Friday evening. He is 100% cash. He indicated his feeling is that this is the start of something big.
The 7 stocks/ETFs I own were all sold this week by the stop loss orders I maintain. I keep a table of the highest close since I purchase the stock/ETF and keep a stop loss order entered at 7% less than that highest close. I previously used 8% but found any investment which down 7% always went to 8% or higher loss.

IBD TBP’s Market Pulse is “Market in Correction” – In Marhew Glagani’s book “How to Make Money in Stock – Getting Started” he says in a market in correction there are 3 rules:
1. Don’t make new buys.
2. Protect yourself (sell to protect gains or stop losses).
3. Prepare now to profit in the next uptrend.

My current investments:
IRA#1
SBiotechnology has a price of 245.69, a sell price 264.79, a rank of 18, and is a Sell. I should have sold it last week and put up with the Fidelity phone calls when I broke their excessively stupid rule to hold funds for 30 days or they can limit in the future your fund purchaeses. My next buy will be presented as a buy this fund, or buy this comperable ETF and maintain a stop loss – no holding periods on ETFs. Most 401ks will not let you do that but any IRA will (as long is you are not in a fund only IRA). Fidelity will lose the fund management fee but charge me $8 to buy and sell. All in all they will lose money. As an example, if you hold 100k in SBiotechnology for 6 months, Fidelity currently earns about $370 and may earn more but currently, voluntaryly limits their total charge $575.
IRA#2
SPharmaceuticals has a price of 23.04, a sell price 23.67, a rank of 05, and is a Sell.
SHealthCare has a price of 225.75 a sell price 234.54, a rank of 16, and is a Sell.
SmallCapGrowth has a price of 19.90, a sell price 20.14, a rank of 07, and is a Sell.

My portfolio changes this weekend:
IRA #1 – SBiotechnology
IRA #2 – SHealthCare, SPharmaceuticals, SmallCapGrowth

My portfolio market exposure after this weekend’s changes:
IRA #1 – 00% invested
IRA #2 – 00% invested

After several down weeks, on Monday Stanley Fischer, The Federal Reserve’s vice chairman, made comments suggesting that perhaps the FED will not raise interest rates next month and the market went up for the week.
Doug Fabian, in his Friday podcast, said we are entering the red zone. The months of August, September, and October are notorious for having sudden market drops. The November through April period, especially during a presidential election year, is the growth season.
Fidelity has that dumb rule about holding a fund for 30 days or they may stop you from buying again and charge a fee. etfdb.com lists 35 ETFs with a objective similar to FBIOX. IBB and FBIOX have 90 day performance within 0.5% and ETFs can be sold any time and even have a stop order to sell if the sell price is hit during the day. It does cost $8 to buy and sell IBB but there is no holding period.
Fidelity has a new phone system which does not work. If you call and identify yourself as a customer with a userid and password, you are put on hold because all agents are busy. I called 7 times on 15Aug and hung up after 5 to 32 minutes on hold. If you want to talk to someone, do not identify yourself as a current customer and then they pick up immediately. 

IBD TBP’s Market Pulse is “Uptrend Under Pressure” – Not a Time to invest.

My current investments:
IRA#1
SBiotechnology has a price of 262.09, a sell price 264.79, a rank of 07, and is a Hold. It is only a hold because of the Fidelity short term trading rules for funds. When I finally got through to Fidelity (as a potential customer) to get the exact date, the guy did not know and his systems were down. The way I calculate it I will sell it next weekend unless it goes up at least $2.71.
IRA#2
SPharmaceuticals has a price of 24.39, a sell price 23.67, a rank of 04, and is a Hold.
SHealthCare has a price of 239.20 a sell price 234.54, a rank of 11, and is a Hold.
SmallCapGrowth has a price of 20.80, a sell price 20.14, a rank of 06, and is a Hold.

My portfolio changes this weekend:
IRA #1 – None.
IRA #2 – None.

My portfolio market exposure after this weekend’s changes:
IRA #1 – 100% invested.
IRA #2 – 60% invested.

Chris Mayer was on the 328th Frank Curzio’s podscast (15Jul15) where he talked about his research into the basis of his new book. In 2014 he studied eash stock which went up 100X since 1962 and found 365 stocks. The underlying principles he is now using to identify stocks which will go up 100X in the future. His book 100-Baggers has now been published. In the podcast he indicates his current best pick in HLTH. It may be worth watching.

The Follow The Money Weekly podcast on 29Jul15 made the following observations:
1. We do not have free markets – central planning by governments are controlling the markets. 18 different countries are buying up securities to keep their markets going including China which has purchased 147B to buy securities and keep its market up.
2. The US fed will soon have to start QE4.  
3. Since we will soon be giving Iran 150B dollars, look out as they spend more on their objectives to kill all the citizens of the US and Israel. The administration has stated some of this will be spent to support terrisam
4. The Chinese market has had the biggest drop since 2007 – remember what happened after 2007.
5. Since the deal with Iran is coming, Saudi Arabia is having Russia build 16 nuclear reactors so they can get the bomb before Iran can.
6. US House members who voted to prevent states from labeling GMO foods received an average of 109k contributions from big agriculture firms.
7. 3 US supreme court members voted for favorable results for the companies in which they held stock 90% of the time without recusing themselves.
 He goes on to say that we have the best government money can buy.

Interesting view of Buble 2.0 http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-08-05/housing-2006-redux-mortgage-fraud-and-speculation-come-roaring-back

Not sure SBiotechnology owned AQXP but it was up 482.12% on Friday. I wish I had owned it.
 
IBD TBP’s Market Pulse is “Uptrend Under Pressure” – Not a Time to invest.

My current investments:
IRA#1
SBiotechnology has a price of 265.56, a sell price 264.79, a rank of 04, and is a Hold.
IRA#2
SPharmaceuticals has a price of 24.39, a sell price 23.67, a rank of 02, and is a Hold.
SHealthCare has a price of 239.20 a sell price 234.54, a rank of 09, and is a Hold.
SmallCapGrowth has a price of 20.80, a sell price 20.14, a rank of 07, and is a Hold.

My portfolio changes this weekend:
IRA #1 – None.
IRA #2 – None.

My portfolio market exposure after this weekend’s changes:
IRA #1 – 100% invested
IRA #2 – 60% invested