Daily Archives: October 17, 2008

The Next Stocks That Could Go Under $1 (CHTR)(SIRI)(F)(LVLT)(ABK)(AIG)(NCC)(C)

95129cA year ago, it would have been hard to find people who would believe that Sirius XM (SIRI) or Charter Communications (CHTR) would trade below $1. Sirius had a 52-week high of $3.92. Its merger, which was to create one satellite radio company, was supposed to push that share price up. But, it has over $1 billion of debt to be refinanced next year. Today it fetches $.37.

Charter is in a pretty good business. As a cable provider it markets digital TV, broadband and VoIP services. The company has more than five million customers. It also has over $20 billion in debt. The stock changes hands at $.38. That compares with a 52-week high of $3.94

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Posted on: October 17, 2008 – 10:15 am in Micro Cap, , , , , , , ,

Warren Buffett’s Likely New Personal Investments (BRK-A, WFC, GE, GS, KO, KFT, NKE, BNI)

Buffett_imageThe New York Times has a new writer, at least for a day.  Warren Buffett has written an op-ed piece for the paper titled "Buy American. I Am." to shore up some hope for stability in the markets.  The Oracle of Omaha said that he is buying common stocks in his personal account.  In the past he has only held government bonds and shares of Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK-A), and recently he has announced support for Wells Fargo (NYSE: WFC) as the triple-a rated bank was listed as a personal holding of his.  As you will see below, we have put together a list of stocks which we feel Buffett might have added to his personal account.

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Posted on: October 17, 2008 – 9:14 am in Buffett, Insider Activity, , , , , , , ,

Rite Aid Problems Mounting (RAD)

Rite_aid_logo_2The problems are mounting for Rite Aid Corporation (NYSE: RAD).  Yesterday, the  drug store operator received a non-compliance letter from the NYSE over its shares trading under $1.00 for the last 30-day period.  The company is taking a special step to fix this issue, but it has continued issues that it require its attention.

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Posted on: October 17, 2008 – 8:14 am in Exchange News, Retail, Shareholder Issues, Stock Splits,

Housing Starts Tank

House_2 According to The Wall Street Journal, "Home construction took its third tumble in a row during September, falling to the lowest level in 17 years, and a sign points to further decline in the fourth quarter."

Housing starts decreased 6.3% to a seasonally adjusted 817,000 annual rate, after falling 8.1% in August to 872,000, the Commerce Department said.

Friday’s data on starts showed building permits decreased 8.3% to a 786,000 annual rate in September. Economists had expected permits down 2.0% to a rate of 840,000.

Douglas A. McIntyre

Posted on: October 17, 2008 – 7:50 am in Housing

Day Trader Alert: Baidu.com (BIDU, GOOG)

Baidu_logoBaidu.com, Inc. (NASDAQ: BIDU) is seeing a rather large surge in its shares this morning.  The frequently analogized "Chinese Google" has no news of its own.  But the real Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) is trading up nearly 10% after beating Wall Street estimates.  Traders are hoping that the slowdown in China also won’t roll over Baidu.com just like what was seen last night at Google.  Baidu.com shares are up roughly 5% pre-market at $236.00.  This is still only about 15% off of its 52-week lows and barely half of its 52-week highs.

So far we have seen almost 10,000 shares trade hands.  It does have stock options, and today is options expiration date.  If the market stays anywhere near stable today, traders will be looking to "the mini-Google" for some trades.

Jon C. Ogg
October 17, 2008

Posted on: October 17, 2008 – 7:32 am in China, Internet, ,

Top 10 Pre-Market Analyst Upgrades (BWA, CSTR, ESRX, JNPR, M, MAS, NSR, SKS, SYMC, UNH)

These are ten of the top Wall Street analyst upgrades we are seeing from this Friday morning with more than two hours to the open:

  • Borg Warner (BWA) Raised to Buy at Goldman Sachs.
  • Coinstar (CSTR) Raised to Neutral from Sell at Goldman Sachs.
  • Express Scripts (ESRX) Raised to Overweight at Thomas Weisel.
  • Juniper Networks (JNPR) Raised to Buy at UBS.
  • Macy’s (M) Raised to Overweight at JPMorgan.
  • Masco (MAS) Raised to Neutral from Sell at UBS.
  • NeuStar (NSR) Raised to Outperform at Baird.
  • Saks Inc. (SKS) Raised to Neutral at JPMorgan.
  • Symantec (SYMC) Raised to Outperform at FBR.
  • UnitedHealth (UNH) Raised to Buy at Goldman Sachs.

Jon C. Ogg
October 17, 2008

Posted on: October 17, 2008 – 6:49 am in Analyst Calls, , , , , , , , , ,

Rumor: Yahoo! (YHOO) To Cut 3,000 Jobs

Yahoo_logoBelieve what you will. Reports from Valleywag say that stories appeared in Fortune and at Google News saying that consultants from Bain, which is helping Yahoo! (YHOO) look at its business, have suggested that the portal company cut 3,000 people.

There will be no one left to work on the AOL merger.

The rumored target date is December 10. Yahoo! is expected to have lackluster earnings for the third quarter.

Douglas A. McIntyre

Posted on: October 17, 2008 – 6:41 am in Management Change,

Toyota Goes To “Zero Percent” Financing As Its Sales Go To Hell

Ford1Toyota is not supposed to have to give out any incentives to sell its cars. They perform better than other vehicles in customer satisfaction tests. They get good gas mileage. Toyota virtually invented the hybrid and its Prius has sold over one million units worldwide.

The Japanese firm says it is going to use it balance sheet to further cripple other car companies selling vehicles in the US. It will begin to offer “zero percent” financing on a number of its models.

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Posted on: October 17, 2008 – 5:28 am in Autos, , , ,

Armed Robbery At The Fed: Bank Problems Are Getting Worse (C)(MER)(JPM)(UBS)

FedBank earnings were hit hard this week. Even if the results at Citigroup (C), Merrill Lynch (MER), and JP Morgan (JPM) did not drive the credit system into insolvency, each company had forecasts which were somewhere between lukewarm and terrible.

Some analysts still cling to the childish notion that the $700 billion from the Treasury will save the day. The $60 billion that the Swiss government took off the books of UBS (UBS) falls into the same category.  Financial socialism may work, but it is taking its own sweet time.

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Posted on: October 17, 2008 – 5:09 am in Banking, , , ,

Google (GOOG) Earnings: A Perfect Proxy For Small Business

GoogGoogle’s (GOOG) earnings are ancient news now. The search company did much better than expected. The economy did not bring it down like a rhino killed off in the wild.

The company’s Q3 EPS of $4.92 was above Wall St’s forecast of $4.75. Revenue moved up a remarkable 31% to $5.54 billion. The number that almost no one expected was that the rate at which customers clicked on Google ad search links went up. Consumers are still interested in buying things and they find them mixed within the Google search results.

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Posted on: October 17, 2008 – 4:42 am in Earnings, , , ,

Media Digest 10/17/2008 Reuters, WSJ, NYTimes, FT, Bloomberg

NewspaperAccording to Reuters, policy makers around the world are trying to deal with the fact that the economy is moving into a deep recession.

Reuters writes that Google (GOOG) exceeded forecasts and its shares rose.

Reuters reports that banks borrowed $438 billion a day from the Fed last week, a record.

Reuters reports that many executives saw conditions weakening before the crash.

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Posted on: October 17, 2008 – 2:57 am in Press Digest, , , , , , , , , , , ,

Asia Markets And Europe Open 10/17/2008

ChinaMarkets in Asia were mixed.

The Nikkei was up 2.8% to 8,694. NTT DoCoMo rose 7% and NTT was up 8%.

The Hang Seng fell 1.4% to 15,012..

The Shanghai Composite rose 1.1% to 1,931.

In Europe, the FTSE opened up 1.7% to 3,927. The DAX was up 4.1% to 4,811 and the CAC 40 rose 1.4% to 3,225.

Data from Reuters

Douglas A. McIntyre

Posted on: October 17, 2008 – 2:28 am in International Markets