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Commodities

10 Big Ideas … and 10 Ways to Profit

August 18, 2009
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10 Big Ideas … and 10 Ways to Profit

Not long ago, I was having a discussion with some friends about real estate when the focus drifted to Cape Cod housing prices, which had plunged in the 2007-2008 real estate collapse. The consensus among the group was that prices would eventually rebound, and that patient owners and investors would come out OK. And that was no surprise. Most people tend to extrapolate the future from the past … and for most of our lives, real estate prices have gone up. Then up piped my brother-in-law the geologist, commenting, “10,000 years ago Cape Cod wasn’t there … and in...

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Gas Prices Don’t Predict Green Stock Performance

July 20, 2009
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Gas Prices Don’t Predict Green Stock Performance

Oil and gasoline prices, as you likely have noticed, have been easing lately, even as we’re in the midst of what energy industry hands call “the summer driving season,” the period in which people tend to drive a lot for vacations and weekend visits and in general give energy traders reasons to bid the prices up. It’s hard to believe that one year ago a gallon of gas averaged $4.06 nationally, according to the Energy Information Agency. That was the highest weekly average since 1990–the low being early March 1999, when gas cost a mere 89 cents. Last week,...

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Off-the-Bottom is a Tricky Game

July 11, 2009
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Off-the-Bottom is a Tricky Game

Now, with all that said yesterday, the recent worries about the economy have led to some weakness in the overall market, especially the commodity stocks.  As of mid-day today, the Oil Services Holders (symbol: OIH) is down 21% from its June peak, the Energy Select SPDR (symbol: XLE) is off 22%, and the Market Vectors Agribusiness (MOO) is off 15%.  And many individual coal and shipping stocks have been pummeled. To me, though, these stocks aren’t down because of economic fears.  Instead, I believe it’s just the “off-the-bottom” phenomenon–that is, when stocks that have fallen 80% or 90% during...

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Commodity Stocks Ready to Move

June 12, 2009
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Commodity Stocks Ready to Move

While my heart is with growth stocks, there’s no question that many commodity stocks are doing well.  My bias against them at this time is that most lack any sort of sales or earnings growth.  And my own experience investing in shrinking or money-losing operations, frankly, is not good.  I usually lose money when I toil in such fundamentally unsound stocks. However, I’m also a tape-reader, and some of the best price-volume patterns today are found in a few commodity names, so I’m going to give you a few stock ideas, and let you decide what to do with...

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