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Monthly Archives: April 2011

Is Zipcar (ZIP) a Good Buy?

April 17, 2011
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Is Zipcar (ZIP) a Good Buy?

One of the big news stories this week was about Zipcar’s (ZIP) initial public offering. The company, founded 10 years ago, has headquarters right near my house and I pass it frequently. If you don’t know, Zipcar is a car-sharing service that’s popular in cities (like mine, Boston) and among college students–basically with people who are unlikely to own cars. Members can rent cars, located in convenient spots, at an hourly or daily rate and they pay an annual membership fee. This allows a lot of flexibility because the cars are parked all around cities/college campuses and eliminate the...

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Focus on the Process, Not Just the Result

April 16, 2011
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Focus on the Process, Not Just the Result

My wife and I are amateur golfers; her parents have been playing for decades, and we both started getting into it a couple of years ago … until a bun showed up in the oven! That, of course, put the plans on hold, but with the baby now a few months old, we’re looking forward to some R&R on the golf course this summer, as a babysitter entertains the little one. Hopefully we’ll be able to get out every other week to play nine or 18. To prepare for the coming days of wearisome hooks and maddening slices (why...

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MercadoLibre: The Latin American eBay

April 15, 2011
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On to the current market, it remains a choppy environment. After a four-week pullback from mid-February to mid-March (bottoming as fears of Japan’s nuclear troubles reached a fever pitch), the market spiked back toward its bull market highs (and some smaller-cap indexes actually ripped to new peaks). Many leaders took flight. It looked like the bull run was ready to resume. But the action of the past week has thrown some cold water on that idea; many indexes are back to, or slightly below, their key 50-day moving averages, and more than a few leaders have given up a...

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Stock Market Analysis Video: An Interesting Week

April 15, 2011
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Stock Market Analysis Video: An Interesting Week

In this week’s Stock Market Analysis Video, Cabot China & Emerging Markets Report Editor Paul Goodwin says it’s been an interesting week in the market. The major indexes corrected sharply last month, but have bounced back nicely and found support. We think the long-term trend is up, but we’re cautious short-term, especially with earnings season underway. Stocks discussed: Rail America (RA), OpenTable (OPEN), Informatica (INFA), Youku.com (YOKU) and Sify Technologies (SIFY). Click below to watch.

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Why I Expect More Stocks Will Pay Dividends Next Year

April 14, 2011
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A few months ago, we surveyed you, our Investment of the Week readers, and asked what types of investments you wanted to read about. Small company stocks, technology stocks and oil and gas stocks were all popular choices. However, the investment class with the most votes by far, with 69% of readers expressing interest in it, was dividend-paying stocks. The subscribers to my Dick Davis Dividend Digest were among those surveyed, and they’re obviously interested in income-generating investments. However, they represented far less than 69% of the sample, leading me to conclude this is a topic of broad interest...

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