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Monthly Archives: May 2011

RenRen (RENN): The “Facebook of China”

May 6, 2011
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My investment idea for today is really more of a research note than a stock recommendation. While the investment world is holding its breath during the run-up to the initial public offering of Facebook, the Chinese company Renren (RENN) (tagged with the catchy “Facebook of China” label) came public yesterday. RENN made a nice debut, officially offered at 14, soaring as high as 24 in early trading, then settling down at 19 for most of the day before ticking lower to 18 near the close. Trading action during the stock’s second day pulled it back to 16. The numbers...

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How to Become a Growth Investor

May 5, 2011
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I heard a statistic the other day that snapped my head back. The speaker said that in the U.S., 8,000 Baby Boomers are turning 65 every day. That’s a lot of gray. (It’s also one reason there’s likely to be so much resistance to any efforts to cut Medicare and Social Security benefits, but I digress.) I also know from talking to people on our Client Service side that the average new subscriber to a Cabot investment newsletter tends to be between 55 and 60 years old. That’s a critical age range, in which significant changes abound. By that...

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Living in a $100 Oil World

May 4, 2011
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Living in a $100 Oil World

As I’ve mentioned here before, one of the things we do at the Dick Davis Digests is identify the major investing trends of the day, and recommend ways to invest in those trends. For the past few months, one trend has been more resilient than any other: rising oil prices. Every single issue of the Digest since the beginning of the year has included at least one–and usually several–plays on rising oil prices. As consumers, politicians and economists all know well, oil prices have huge ripple effects in today’s world. Their most evident effects are seen in gas prices,...

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An ETF for Current Conditions

May 3, 2011
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An ETF for Current Conditions

Despite what I said yesterday, I’m not suggesting that you rush out and sell all of your stock holdings, nor am I suggesting that you load up on nothing but puts at this point in time. It would be prudent to take some gains off the table on any long positions you may have. It’s also not a bad idea to add some insurance in the way of puts on the main exchange-traded funds (ETF) like the S&P 500 SPDR (SPY). This would allow you to hang on to your stock holdings but have a hedge against a decline....

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The Phrase “It’s Different This Time” Can Be Costly

May 2, 2011
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The Phrase “It’s Different This Time” Can Be Costly

When you have been around investments and economics as long as I have, you hear certain phrases over and over again. These are a common few: •    Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. •    You can’t fight the Fed. •    A rising tide lifts all boats. Most of these sayings have some merit. One that I’ve heard on several occasions that tends to worry me is, “it’s different this time.” I’ve heard it often enough and been around this industry long enough that I actually used that phrase as an article title ahead of the recession in...

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