Look before you leap! All year long rumors have been swirling around that E*TRADE (ETFC) was on the auction block being prepared for an acquisition by a bigger fish interested in its customers and superior trading platform. I have not used E-TRADE so I do not have first hand experience. However, this has been acknowledged broadly and I have received very positive comments from regular users when I have written about it.
The leading suitor seems to be TD AmeriTrade Holding (AMTD), with Charles Schwab Corp (SCHW) mentioned as perhaps having similar but less conspicuous interest. For Schwab it may be as much about keeping E-TRADE out of a competitors hands as chasing the business.
Fourteen stocks have been reviewed so far with eight of them potential contenders for 2010. These include some picks from 2009, some old dependables and a few more on the speculative side.
During the year I have written on occasion about selling put options (naked puts) because the premiums offered were very generous and from my perspective assumed market collapse. This was reflected in my July post Serious Money: The world's dumbest market
Today I am considering four naked puts and two more stocks. The options are all based on stocks now in review.
The clock is ticking away the time before the year ends and I have only begun to sort out the possibilities. In Part 1 of this series, I discussed breaking up my potential picks into three categories: contender, on the fence, and out of the running until the 10 stocks have been identified.
Four contenders have been considered so far: American Eagle Outfitters (AEO), Anadarko Petroleum (APC), Anglo American ADR (AAUKY) and Diageo plc (DEO).
Six more are included in today's review: EZCorp Inc. (EZPW), General Electric Company (GE), Wells Fargo & Company (WFC), Annaly Capital Management ( NLY), Intuitive Surgical Inc (ISRG) plus Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.B). These include the remaining five from 2009 and one more familiar to most investors.
TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says at least one country is getting it right when it comes to economic stimulus.
How in the heck can you get 16% industrial growth and lower-than-expected consumer price inflation? How is that possible? Yet that's what we saw from China last night, and that's a tonic to pretty much everyone who is waiting for our own stimulus to kick in.
And we need it.
On Monday, Fluor (FLR) (Cramer's Take), the giant construction company, when asked if it could quantify the value of stimulus dollars currently in backlog, said "Really, the only stimulus funding we have seen directly has been the award that we got at Savannah River for some nuclear soil remediation. And, it was, I would say, we're less than $0.5 billion."
The market continues to befuddle the bears as the third quarter earnings and stock prices continued to move in a positive direction.
During this period Washington has taken charge of the auto industry and helped prop it up with the "cash-for-clunkers" program. They continue to subsidize the real estate market with first-time home buyers incentives, and very low interest rates. The banks are being refueled by the Federal Reserve with interest rates as low as zero, while all the time currency stability has been sacrificed. This has driven gold prices to new highs.
This is the third review of my 2009 stock picks through September 30 (see: Chasing Value: 9 picks for 2009 -- APC, GE, ISRG, WFC and more). This years picks have annihilated index comparisons, so much so that I must attribute some of my good fortune to luck. However, I do believe the original reasoning was sound and the outlier nature of the gains certainly a result of an oversold market living in fear.
TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says the bears simply won't hear the positives -- but he'll keep hammering them home.
Lots of things are coming together for housing, but nobody seems to care. We had Wells Fargo (NYSE: WFC) (Cramer's Take) the other day offer attractive interest-only mortgage loans to those in trouble, a bet that eventually housing will go higher. We had Fannie (NYSE: FNM) (Cramer's Take) allow people in trouble to rent to stay in their homes, and the government is going to extend the tax credit for homebuyers and broaden it. Plus, mortgage rates went under 5% again.
Today was one of those days where it felt like it would be an up-day and most traders were feeling good, but the last hour's trading came down so far so fast that traders had little feel whether we'd have an up or down session until right before the closing bell.
Oil inventories were not a huge surprise like the week before, but the data sent oil much higher and then a weak US dollar only added to oil price gains. Some may use the Beige Book as the reason for the sell-off, but it might be how little the government expects Wall Street executives to work for if they are a TARP bank.
Wednesday morning kicked off with news that Wells Fargo (NYSE: WFC) saw third-quarter earnings rise to $3.24 billion (56 cents per share) from $1.64 billion (49 cents per share) last year. The results handily trounced the consensus estimate of 37 cents per share.
Wells Fargo also reported revenue of $22.47 billion , which was better than both a year ago and the consensus estimate. The company stated that net charge-offs for the quarter came in at $5.1 billion (2.5% of average loans), compared to $4.4 billion (2.11% of average loans) in the second quarter. The bank did note that it expects credit losses to continue increasing, but at a slower pace thanks to a slowing of the pace of deterioration.
"Banks had taken a brutal beating over the last two years was brutal; the S&P Sector SPDR Financials dropped 72.0% from its high last September to its low in March," notes Brandon Clay.
"The painful declines in bank stocks appear to have stopped for now, as bank stocks have exploded off the March lows. As we've observed, financials have 'friends in high places.'
"Banks in general are showing promise as credit becomes easier. There's still a long way to go for complete recovery, but the trend is pointing up.
Today was one of those up-days that might be a disappointment to many bulls because the gap-ups were not met by follow-on buying throughout the day. A better weekly joblessness report may have been muted by Asian central banks intervening to protect the US Dollar.
Deutsche Bank upgraded Clorox (NYSE: CLX) to Buy from Hold on valuation and believes upside to earnings forecasts is likely. The firm raised its target on shares to $66 from $65.
Kaufman Bros. upgraded eBay (NASDAQ: EBAY) to Buy from Hold on expectations improved Marketplace fundamentals will serve as a positive catalyst for shares. The firm raised its price target on the stock to $29 from $22.
Roth Capital believes Zumiez (NASDAQ: ZUMZ) is well positioned for improved results and margins. The firm, which upgraded shares to Buy from Hold and raised its target to $22 from $16, said September back-to-school results bode well for the holiday season and demonstrate that Zumiez can drive conversion during peak shopping periods.
Northrop Grumman (NYSE: NOC) was upgraded to Sell from Conviction Sell at Goldman.
Adobe (NASDAQ: ADBE) was upgraded to Outperform from Neutral at Baird.
Monster Worldwide (NYSE: MWW) was upgraded to Overweight from Neutral at JPMorgan.
Starting your own business? Need some extra space for your needlepoint habit? You're in luck ... office space comes cheap these days. In fact, rent for office space is sliding lower at the fastest rate since 1995. In the third quarter, office rents dropped 8.5% on a year-over-year basis.
Falling prices typically go hand in hand with falling demand and in fact, vacancies are on the rise as layoffs increase. New York-based real-estate research firm Reis says the office vacancy rate has hit a five-year high of 16.5%. Last quarter, tenants returned 19.6 million square feet of commercial rental space to their landlords.
TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says the faction supporting Greg Curl as new CEO doesn't realize he would be a step backward for the bank.
From day one my money's been on Brian Moynihan to run Bank of America (NYSE: BAC) (Cramer's Take). But the drumbeat grows louder from Charlotte, N.C., that Greg Curl's the man.
Why?
I think the reasoning is simple. Bank of America is like the Balkans. It's got all of these little countries within it and they all want hegemony. Nation's Bank. Bank of America. Fleet Bank. Ken Lewis always reminded me of Josip Broz Tito, holding together Yugoslavia as long as he was alive, although knowing Tito the way I did, he would never have overpaid for so many painful acquisitions.
Last week's sleeping bull market was brought back to a woken bull market. Despite warnings from Nouriel Roubini that things were up too much too fast, the services sector actually came in above the expansion line after 11 straight months of contraction. This caused most of the excitement for the day.
Look before you leap! All year long rumors have been swirling around that E*TRADE (ETFC) was on the auction block being prepared for an acquisition by a bigger fish interested in its customers and superior trading platform. I have not used E-TRADE so I do not have first hand experience. However, this has been acknowledged broadly and I have received very positive comments from regular users when I have written about it.
Fourteen stocks have been reviewed so far with eight of them potential contenders for 2010. These include some picks from 2009, some old dependables and a few more on the speculative side.
The clock is ticking away the time before the year ends and I have only begun to sort out the possibilities. In 
The market continues to befuddle the bears as the third quarter earnings and stock prices continued to move in a positive direction. 
Today was one of those days where it felt like it would be an up-day and most traders were feeling good, but the last hour's trading came down so far so fast that traders had little feel whether we'd have an up or down session until right before the closing bell. 
Wednesday morning kicked off with news that 
"Banks had taken a brutal beating over the last two years was brutal; the S&P Sector SPDR Financials dropped 72.0% from its high last September to its low in March," notes 
Today was one of those up-days that might be a disappointment to many bulls because the gap-ups were not met by follow-on buying throughout the day. A 
Starting your own business? Need some extra space for your needlepoint habit? You're in luck ... office space comes cheap these days. In fact, rent for office space is 
Why is gold marching higher? Ask the central bankers
Newspaper ad revenue of 28%, 8 quarters of double-digit drops
Closing Bell: Earnings working against stocks (BCRX, DELL, DHI, INTC, LEAP, PCS)
