The investment..speculation, out right gambling thread

Parent Cafe
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<p>So you’re comparing Q3 to Q2? That doesn’t make any sense for a lot of companies because of seasonality.</p>

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<p>If you’ve taken accounting courses, then what you’ve written is rather bizarre.</p>

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<p>BCE, I’m talking about Q3 GDP growth, July to September and the third quarter financial results of various corporations. If you find it bizarre that I look at recent quarterly earnings report then so be it.</p>

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<p>Here’s your post.</p>

<p>People spent $36 billion in Q3 at Apple.</p>

<p>There are at least a few people buying stuff at Apple.</p>

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<p>BCE, since corporations have been releasing quarterly earnings recently and the GDP data released reflected Jul to Sep, I presumed people realize I was talking about quarterly data and not annual data.</p>

<p>Yes, AAPL’s Q4 2012 revenue is $36B vs. estimate of $35.8B but fiscal-fourth quarter earnings of $8.67 a share missed the $8.76 estimate. Sure, it’s higher than last year’s same quarter’s $7.05 but that was a miss too if I recall correctly. But that didn’t stop people from snapping it up. The Q1 2012 and Q2 2012 beats among other things helped propel the stock to $705.07 despite the Q3 2012 miss.</p>

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<p>I don’t like aapl that much. This qtr the company will benefit from new products. What about the qtr after?</p>

<p>And profit margins are going down. I don’t like that.</p>

<p>Microsoft did not rally into the release of their new tablet or Windows 8 launch. I guess investors aren’t too excited about these new products.</p>

<p>Spain did not have a government spending problem before the financial crash.
Now, a mess. Private sector. Public sector. The country is in a depression.</p>

<p>[Spain</a> jobless rate above 25% for the first time | Mail Online](<a href=“Spain jobless rate above 25% for the first time | Daily Mail Online”>Spain jobless rate above 25% for the first time | Daily Mail Online)</p>

<p>I would love to continue to comment on banks, but I really can’t right now. :slight_smile: What I can say is they are so poorly run, it blows my mind. Still, even after 4 or 5 years after the start of the financial crisis. There is one bank in particular that is held in pretty high esteem, and is a joke and it isn’t Wells. Echhh… ;)</p>

<p>I made one trade this week and that is it. I am long spr which is not good. i am long Amgn which was mentioned by krlillies. I have no idea where AMGN is trading and I am not going to look it up. :)</p>

<p>There was an article about SS that was quite good. It mentioned that private retirement plans like Iras were failures. Made financial people rich, but didn’t do much for investors. The average retiree only has $170,000 of net worth. SS is under attack by both parties which is a shame because the amount of destitute people is going to rise dramatically if
SS is cut. The US is becoming a third world country.</p>

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<p>"I don’t like aapl that much. This qtr the company will benefit from new products. What about the qtr after?</p>

<p>And profit margins are going down. I don’t like that.</p>

<p>Microsoft did not rally into the release of their new tablet or Windows 8 launch. I guess investors aren’t too excited about these new products."</p>

<p>Cramer owns aapl in his charitable trust, isn’t that good enough for you??</p>

<p>I don’t know many people who are particularly excited about anything that microsoft does since Ballmer has been in charge.</p>

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<p>“Cramer owns aapl in his charitable trust, isn’t that good enough for you??”</p>

<p>Is that a joke? :)</p>

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<p>[So</a> Sorry – How You Deal With That?](<a href=“http://blog.themistrading.com/so-sorry-how-you-deal-with-that/]So”>So Sorry – How You Deal With That?)</p>

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<p><a href=“Junk Bonds Grow More Popular and Turn Even Riskier - The New York Times”>Junk Bonds Grow More Popular and Turn Even Riskier - The New York Times;

<p>This is one bad investment. These junk bonds. Some people never learn. I guess people who buy this junk work for institutions. Other people’s money.</p>

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<p>Stock market is closed due to Hurricane Sandy, but the Chicago futures markets are open. Futures traders will be trading stock index futures and options.</p>

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<p>I hate to say this but when the market reopens, it may be a good opportunity to buy.</p>

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<p>I think the odds favor a short term buy of the S&P 500 as well.</p>

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<p>Unfortunately particularly if the storm causes a lot of damage. Some of my best results occurred after the market reopened after 9/11.</p>

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<p>Futures are open but I was wrong about stock index futures trading. They ain’t moving either.</p>

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<p>[Storm</a> will keep financial markets closed Tuesday - Yahoo! Finance](<a href=“Storm will keep financial markets closed Tuesday”>Storm will keep financial markets closed Tuesday)</p>

<p>It looks like we will have to wait until at least Wed.</p>

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<p>** Apple Reorg **
“Apple Inc. (AAPL) said Scott Forstall, the head of mobile software, and John Browett, who leads retail operations, will depart……</p>

<p>Executives Jony Ive, Bob Mansfield, Eddy Cue and Craig Federighi will be given more responsibility as part of the changes…. Ive, who already heads industrial design, will take on responsibility for so-called human interface, which governs the way customers interact with Apple products.” ([Apple</a> Says Forstall, Browett Leaving as Cook Revamps Management - Businessweek](<a href=“Bloomberg - Are you a robot?”>Bloomberg - Are you a robot?))</p>

<p>“Eddy Cue will take on Siri and the nebulous cloud of Maps in addition to iTunes and App Stores, as well as iCloud, and Craig Federighi will fold iOS into his OS X supervision as Apple “brings together the OS teams.”</p>

<p>Bob Mansfield, who had previously been on the way out at Apple, will now head a new group called Technologies covering all of Apple’s wireless and semiconductor teams. That’s an interesting new department, and one that could have significant control over Apple’s future given its deepening emphasis on semiconductor design in-house.” ([Scott</a> Forstall, John Browett To Leave Apple As Ive, Cue, Mansfield And Federighi Take On New Roles | TechCrunch](<a href=“http://techcrunch.com/2012/10/29/scott-forstall-to-leave-apple-as-ive-cue-mansfield-and-federighi-take-on-new-roles/]Scott”>Scott Forstall, John Browett To Leave Apple As Ive, Cue, Mansfield And Federighi Take On New Roles | TechCrunch))</p>

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<p>Hopefully there won’t be job cuts. </p>

<p>[Disney</a> Buying Lucasfilm for $4 Billion - NYTimes.com](<a href=“Disney Buying Lucasfilm for $4 Billion - The New York Times”>Disney Buying Lucasfilm for $4 Billion - The New York Times)</p>

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<p>"Hopefully there won’t be job cuts. "</p>

<p>Hopefully someone besides Lucas will write the next Star Wars film.</p>

<p>The merchandising will be out of control.</p>

<p>re Forstall, the article I read said he is being kicked out because he refused to sign the apology over the maps fiasco, and it is the final straw for him as he didn’t play well with others. Without Jobs there to protect him, he was on borrowed time.</p>

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<p>I wonder if Disneyland will now have a Star Wars ride…</p>

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<p>I’m still in cash except for PBA and GG and work has been incredibly busy so not trading is best for me for a while. A few unrelated tidbits:</p>

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<li>The guy that replenishes the drinks (coffee, tea, soft drinks, water) in the office kitchens had an iPhone 4 or 4S.</li>
<li>Median house price in Newton, MA (where my mother lives) is now $800,000. Up 5% from last year.</li>
<li>I’ve been talking to fellow computer science guys about hardware and software and buying stuff. We all have tons of hardware and software and it looks like we’re not going to be spending much going forward. It looks like we’re all pretty unhappy with Windows 8. The other two guys are unhappy with Apple’s mobile stuff given the way that the continue to roll you over ever few years (but doesn’t everyone do that?) but they are both considering going from Windows to Mac because of the tablet-centric nature of Windows 8. At this point, it’s pick the best product where the companies can’t obsolete your hardware or software.</li>
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<p>One of the guys saw me running a free software package that is bundled with Microsoft Office. He’s paid $200 for Office for a bunch of computers (he likes to be legally licensed on all hardware and software) and he’d like a platform where he didn’t have to pay out several hundreds of dollars for each new machine. The free software that I’m running only runs on Mac OS X.</p>

<p>My daughter now has my fast desktop and she loves it. I took her iMac and I’m working on getting my development environment set up. I tried setting up Ubuntu on VirtualBox but the new version of Ubuntu is significantly different from what I’m used to so I used an old Windows XP VM instead. That’s working fine for getting into the office.</p>

<p>I next need to get X-Code installed (need to find the disk) so I can use local development tools and then I need to get Synergy working so that I can connect my laptop to the iMac. I spent an hour on this a few days ago and was unsuccessful but I’ll keep trying until I find a solution. The processor on this 27-inch iMac is relatively slow compared to my old Sandy Bridge desktop but I really don’t need that much computing power for what I do. What would be grand, though, is another 27-inch monitor next to it. That would be an extra $1,000 from Apple.</p>