| So Long, Farewell, Goodbye, The End! Dear Readers, Thanks for your support and readership. Starting Friday or thereabouts you can contact me through GreenbergMeritz Research & Analytics at www.greenbergmeritz.com. I will no longer maintain a public blog. I will, however, continue to appear on TV. May the Hostile React-o-Meter spin outta control, outta control, I tell ya. The beat goes [...]  No Uptick Rule: Convenient Scapegoat? From the “you have only a few more days to kick me around” department: I’ve written here previously about the uptick rule and whether it is the cause of all that ills the financial world, er, the stock market. I won’t sit here and argue whether it should be reinstated. [...] Everything’s Coming up Rosy! When I was sitting there last night in the little studio I use in San Diego, doing Larry Kudlow’s show on CNBC, all that kept going through my mind was Ethel Merman singing, “Ev-uh-rything’s com-ing up ro-ses…” The high point, for me, was when Don Luskin, frustrated with my use of [...] Market Mirror: Look No Further Than 3M 3M provides an interesting window into the economy and the market. The first quarter was strong, but much of that was helped by the weak dollar and U.S. organic growth slipped by nearly 3%. Furthermore, the company said the second half will likely be weak. And this is from a company [...] SEC Sues Short-Seller: They All Must be Bad The SEC today sued a short-seller on charges of spreading false rumors. According to the SEC, the rumors even spread to the media. You know what’s coming next from the the Baloney Brigade, as journalist Gary Weiss calls it: This surely must be proof that all short-sellers are bad, deceitful, rumor-mongers. Just [...] Starbucks: Am I Wrong? I’ve been a big fan of Starbucks, the stock, saying to anybody who will listen that if I were allowed to buy a stock and put it on the shelf for a few years — buying more as it falls — Starbucks would certainly be one that I would consider. Among [...] Texas Instruments: About those Auction Rates Texas Instruments has done an impressive job paring its holding of auction-rate securities, slicing its holdings by $473 million, or nearly half. The remaining $551 million has been reclassified as long-term investments “due to reduced liquidity for these securities,” the company said in its first quarter earnings report. If nothing else, [...] Time to Have Pity for Patrick Byrne? Updated to include the words “every morning hedge machines” in the transcript. I’m beginning to wonder if it’s time to start feeling sorry for Patrick Byrne, the Overstock CEO whose comments at times, such as today, appear to be detached from any sense of reality. Speaking on the Fox Business Channel today [...] A Few Minutes with Ted Oglove If you missed my piece in the Weekend edition of the Wall Street Journal on Thorton (Ted) Oglove, you can read it here on MarketWatch. Ted is one of the greats of forensic analysis. His book, “Quality of Earnings,” is a staple for many investors. His comments: They’re pure, simple [...] The Economy: All the Kings Horses…. But look at Intel. Look at IBM. Loot at United Technologies! And on and on and on, from the Pollyannas, about how the economy is on the mend. GE? Blame it on Immelt. Reality: Intel, which is horrible at forecasting, delivered an upbeat forecast even though a company like Seagate, which [...] News Wizard |