Stock Tips Investment: STOCK NEWS

Showing posts with label STOCK NEWS. Show all posts

Monday, July 16, 2012

RPT-Wall St Week Ahead: Earnings, Bernanke Promise Active

English: A frame from a screencast from the US...

The frame shows Chairmen Ben Bernanke responding to a question posited by John E. Sweeney Full Committee (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Investors are looking at an onslaught this week. If it's not corporate earnings, it's Ben Bernanke talking about economic issues before Congress. Recent warnings from a number of companies, including chipmaker Advanced Micro Devices, helped drag the S&P 500 lower for six straight days before a Friday rebound.

The S&P 500 and Dow erased losses for the week, barely finishing higher by 0.2 percent and less than 0.1 percent, respectively. The Nasdaq composite fell 1 percent for the week.

With a slew of companies set to report results this week, the hope among investors is that the bad news has been factored in, but the broader picture remains lackluster. That may limit the market's gains even if companies clear a low bar.

'Expectations have been beaten down a lot,' said Robbert Van Batenburg, head of equity research at Louis Capital in New York. 'The problem is we're dealing with a global slowdown, and I'm sure that's going to be reflected in some of the comments you're going to be hearing.'

Data showing slower growth in Europe, China and the United States has weighed on the stock market, while U.S. companies have warned about overseas weakness and a stronger dollar hurting profits on exports.

The minutes from the Federal Reserve's June meeting suggested it is not ready to inject more monetary stimulus into the economy, but traders will be hanging on Federal Reserve Chairman Bernanke's every word for mention of such a possibility and how he views the slowing economy. ... Continue to read.

Best & Worst ETFs & Mutual Funds: Industrials Sector

English: The Mutual Fund Store office, 37308 Six Mile Road, Livonia, Michigan (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

To identify the best and avoid the worst ETFs and mutual funds within the Industrials sector, investors need a predictive rating based on (1) stocks ratings of the holdings and (2) the all-in expenses of each ETF and mutual fund in every sector and style are here.
Figures 1 and 2 show the five best and worst-rated ETFs and mutual funds in the sector. Not all Industrials sector ETFs and mutual funds are created the same. The number of holdings varies widely (from 20 to 368), which creates drastically different investment implications and ratings. The best ETFs and mutual funds allocate more value to Attractive-or-better-rated stocks than the worst ETFs and mutual funds, which allocate too much value to Neutral-or-worse-rated stocks.
To identify the best and avoid the worst ETFs and mutual funds within the Industrials sector, investors need a predictive rating based on (1) stocks ratings of the holdings and (2) the all-in expenses of each ETF and mutual fund. Investors need not rely on backward-looking ratings. My fund rating methodology is detailed here.
Investors should not buy any Industrials ETFs or mutual funds because none get an Attractive-or-better rating. If you must have exposure to this sector, you should buy a basket of Attractive-or-better-rated stocks and avoid paying undeserved fund fees. Active management has a long history of not paying off. ... Continue to Read.

Saturday, July 14, 2012

Already in a Recession? Not So Fast.

Recession special at Gray's Papaya shop (Photo credit: Ed Yourdon)

By Robert Johnson, CFA | Morningstar

A couple of notable economists, including Lakshman Achuthan of ECRI, have recently indicated that they believe the economy may have already drifted back into yet another recession, and it will just be a matter of months before we realize it. The data we have today (although I caution these figures could be revised again) do not support that conclusion.

While many commentators define a recession as two negative quarters of GDP growth, the official statisticians look at four metrics: industrial production, retail sales adjusted for inflation, personal income less transfer payments (unemployment, disability, Social Security) adjusted for inflation, and employment. Most of the metrics are currently improving after hitting lower growth rates earlier in 2012. Only retail sales are in a clear downward trend, and that is largely because of falling gasoline prices, which is actually a good thing for the economy.

I have posted the year-over-year growth rates for these metrics for December 2007, the last time we went into a recession. In every case, current readings are ahead of the December 2007 readings. Some of those 2007 indicators had been in a freefall for some time before the official December 2007 recession start date. That doesn't seem to be the case just yet this time. ... Continue to read.

The Rich, Very Rich, and, Now, the 'Volatile' Rich

Income tax (Photo credit: Alan Cleaver)

The rich tend to be lumped together as one economic group, as if people earning $250000 a year (or even $1 million a year) are pretty much the same as those making $50 million. But a new analysis of top incomes tells us that there is a big difference between the super-rich and the merely rich in how they earn money. The paper, from Roberton Williams of the Tax Policy Center, compares two sets of 2009 IRS data. One group is American tax filers reporting income of $1 million or more. The other is for the 400 top earners in America, who made an average of $271 million each. Americans with an adjusted gross income of $1 million or more make about a third of that from salaries and wages. Capital gains used to account for more than a third of their income, but since 2000 that share has fallen to 17 percent. Today, the largest share of their take comes from "other income" - mainly earnings from partnerships or S-corps, as well as other capital gains. The "fortunate 400" - or top 400 earners - make much more of their income from capital gains and other income than from salaries and wages, which account for only 9 percent of their income. Capital gains as a share of their income has also fallen, from 72 percent in 2000 to 46 percent in 2009. ... Continue to read.

Friday, July 13, 2012

Roadmap to the Best & Worst Sectors for ETFs & Mutual Funds

English: The Mutual Fund Store office, 37308 Six Mile Road, Livonia, Michigan (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Each quarter, we provide the most comprehensive review of equity ETFs and mutual funds available. We review the Best & Worst ETFs and Mutual Funds by sector and style. We also identify the overall best sectors and investment styles for ETFs and for mutual funds. We begin the 3Q12 series with our Sector Roadmap report. Over the next two weeks, we will publish 20+ reports on each sector and style. We will also publish a Style Roadmap report and a review of how well investors allocate assets to the best ETFs & funds.

Only one sector, Consumer Staples, earns my Attractive rating. See Figure 1 for my rankings of all ten sectors. My sector ratings are based on the aggregation of my fund ratings for every ETF and mutual fund in each sector.

Investors looking for quality sector funds

that hold quality stocks should look no further than the Consumer Staples, Information Technology and Health Care sectors. These three sectors house 33 of the 37 Attractive-or-better rated funds. Figures 4 and 6 provide details. The primary drivers behind an Attractive fund rating are good portfolio management, or good stock picking, and low total annual costs.

See Figures 4 through 13 for a detailed breakdown of ratings distributions by sector. See my free ETF & mutual fund screener for rankings, ratings and free reports on 7000+ mutual funds

and 400+ ETFs. My fund rating methodology is detailed here. ... Continue to read.

Thursday, July 12, 2012

China’s ‘5 apocalypses’ signal global recession

English: China Premier Wen Jiabao deliver the Report on the Work of the Government at the Third Session of the Eleventh National People's Congress on March 5, 2010 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif. (MarketWatch) — America’s facing not one but four “fiscal cliffs”: Bush-era tax cuts, Pentagon budget cuts, social-program cuts and the continuing battle over “Obamacare.” China, though, has even bigger problems.

Five months ago, we quoted World Bank President Robert Zoellick’s warning of “a spreading crisis” in China that could consume the $75 trillion global economy. Back then we bluntly asked: “China? Or America? Who will crash the global economy first?” Think: China. See First Take: China headed for a landing.

Reuters China’s slowdown has markets on edge all over the world.

China’s economy of 1.3 billion people continues slowing, according to the latest GDP-forecast downgrade from Premier Wen Jiabao, reported Keith Bradsher of the New York Times. Earlier this week, MarketWatch’s Carla Mozee reported that China’s slowdown is already impacting stocks in Brazil, one of China’s leading trading partners. Full story: Brazil stocks drop on China slowdown worries.

So let’s shift our attention away from election-year bickering and ask: “Will China push America into a recession and new bear market?”

“China might already be in recession,” warns Trefor Moss in his brilliant “5 Signs of the Chinese Economic Apocalypse” in the journal Foreign Policy. Actually, five huge apocalypses. “The numbers show that the country’s storied growth engine has slipped out of gear. ... Continue to read.

Gold ETFs are Nearing Breakout Levels

NYC - FiDi: American Stock Exchange Building (Photo credit: wallyg)

Gold prices have stabilized in recent weeks, moving within a range between the May low and June high price. But as gold nears a couple key support levels, a breakout is becoming a possibility. Gold-related ETFs provide a way for investors to participate in the movement of gold prices - both directly and indirectly. Four actively traded gold-related ETFs provide slightly different trade set-ups, but all are affected by the movement of gold prices. With the potential for a big move to ensue following the breakout, now is a good time to watching gold-related ETFs. The SPDR Gold Shares (ARCA:GLD) ETF is one of the most popular gold ETFs. The ETF seeks to replicate, net of expenses, the price movement of gold. After hitting an all-time at $185.85 on September 6, 2011 the ETF has been in a downtrend. On December 29, the ETF put in a 52-week low at $148.27, a level that has not been seen since. This is primary support, which if broken, would break a large triangle formation signaling a further slide in the price of the ETF. The long-term targets for such a move are $123 and $111.50. Before that occurs, though, there is support at $150 and also $148.60. On the other hand, a rise back above the June 6 intra-day high at $159.20 could spark some buying interest, propelling the ETF into trendline resistance currently at $165. ... Continue to read.

Wednesday, July 11, 2012

Gold Miners are Cheap, Cheap, Cheap!

Super Pit gold mine at Kalgoorlie in Western Australia is Australia's largest open-pit mine (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Gold mining shares deserve their own discussion. I am bullish on gold without qualification. I am also bullish on gold miners…but with one very large qualification: they must produce positive cash flow. I think the bull market in gold is intact. And I think gold prices will make highs within a year. However, gold stocks have done poorly. Few have been spared. Like the other mining companies, they suffer from the same affliction: an eager willingness to take whatever cash they generate and dump it right back into the ground.

So even though the four largest listed gold miners — Goldcorp, Barrick, Newmont and Newcrest — generated $47.5 billion in operating cash flows in the last decade, they spent $62.5 billion in new mines, acquisitions and other capital expenditures. The big four have made no money in one of the greatest gold bull markets on record. In fact, they’ve lost money. How did they make up this deficit? They sold more shares to the ever-gullible public — always a sucker for a good story about buried treasure. The number of shares outstanding rose 117% in the decade. I’ve railed before about the management of gold miners. And I’ve tried to find gold miners in which the management teams do intelligent things. But it is hard. Even when you think you have found a team that says all the right things and looks as if it can do it, it does stuff that makes you scratch your head.... Continue to read.

Top stock fund is still a bad bet

The Mutual Fund Show logo (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

BOSTON (MarketWatch) — In the mutual fund business, performance forgives all sins. But when investors overlook flaws that would be deal-breakers if not for good recent results, they're headed for trouble.
Consider Berkshire Focus Fund BFOCX -1.20% , which had the best performance of any technology fund in the year’s first half, according to investment researcher Morningstar Inc. But despite that strong showing — and even because of it — this fund is the Stupid Investment of the Week. Stupid Investment of the Week showcases concerns and characteristics that make a security less than ideal for average investors, in the hope that spotlighting trouble in one situation will make it easier to avoid elsewhere.
The one tradition for this column — which is not intended as an automatic sell signal — is that a fund leading its peer group as the year reaches its midpoint always earns a booby prize for its fast first-half results. The basic premise is that hot funds with fabulous but volatile short-term performance regress to the mean, so investors who buy after the hot streak only experience the next downturn. Yet the calendar itself does not dictate the sustainability of an investment track record; sometimes momentum can be sustained long enough so that a shareholder who jumps after a hot fund could come away happy.

That said, if you wanted to bet on which funds would be unable to sustain momentum, it’s the ones with characteristics that typically send a fund to the dog house. Even all-time losers such as the now-defunct Steadman Funds, American Heritage Fund or Frontier Micro-cap Fund — which generated massive losses for anyone fool enough to stick with them — topped the charts for three- or six months. ... Continue to read.

Tuesday, July 10, 2012

Bond ETF Market Forecast to Hit $2 Trillion

Deutsch: ETF-Tower in Frauenfeld (Eidgenössisches Turnfest) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

ETF Trends offers news, articles, and research tools for ETF investors and investing. Although the first ETFs were stock-based funds, the fixed-income side of the business is rapidly catching up as nervous investors continue to shun equities and pile into the perceived safety of bonds.

BlackRock’s iShares predicts that assets in global fixed-income ETFs will grow to over $2 trillion from $302 billion currently, over the next decade. In the U.S., iShares forecasts that the bond ETF segment will likely grow to $1.4 trillion from $222 billion. “The dynamic forces driving the long-term expansion of the fixed income ETF market have been especially evident this year, with the market attracting some of its strongest asset flows to date,” said Jennifer Grancio, head of iShares global business development at BlackRock. “Yet even after a decade of continuous growth, fixed income ETFs are still just scratching the surface of their potential.” Risk-averse investors are favoring bond ETFs over equities. Fixed-income ETFs listed in the U.S. have gathered $35.1 million year to date, according to data from the ETF Industry Association. [Bond ETFs Remain Top Draw in June]. At the end of June, there was $1.2 trillion in U.S.-based ETFs. There was $564.1 billion in U.S. equity ETFs, $246.5 billion in international stock funds and $222.1 billion in the fixed-income category. There are fixed-income ETFs tracking U.S. Treasuries, corporate bonds, muni bonds and other sectors. ... Continue to read.

Hedge funds plow most into commods in 2 years as third quarter

Commodity Futures Trading Commission (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Hedge funds and other big commodity investors pumped a notional $13 billion into U.S. energy, grains and metals markets in the week to July 3, the biggest influx in at least two years, after a debt deal in Europe sparked a buying frenzy across the sector. Led by surges in soybean, corn, gold and oil positions, the funds, known by the regulatory moniker "managed money", increased their bullish net long positions to above $77 billion for the week to July 3, according to Reuters calculations based on the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission's weekly data. Reuters data shows it was the biggest weekly increase in net longs since at least 2010. Just five weeks ago, net longs held by hedge funds and other money managers in commodities were at their lowest levels for this year at $56 billion. The 19-commodity Thomson Reuters-Jefferies CRB index surged 7.3 percent during the week to July 3, the biggest five-day rally since August 2009. ... Continue to read.

Monday, July 9, 2012

China slowdown weighs on emerging market funds

China's FIRST McDonald's (Photo credit: flickr.Marcus)

As China slips, the second-half performance for many emerging market mutual funds might soon follow. In recent months, investors have been pulling hundreds of millions of dollars out of stock funds that invest mainly in companies associated with the big four emerging market nations of Brazil, Russia, India and China. But it's China that is causing most of the worry for fund investors, amid signs that the world's second-largest economy is slowing more sharply than expected. Even emerging market bull Jim O'Neill, chairman of Goldman Sachs Asset Management, who famously coined the BRIC acronym, said he's been a bit surprised by the slowdown in China. But that said, O'Neill remains convinced China's economy will be more than enough to make up for any weakness in the other BRIC nations. "It is making the trajectory that I predicted difficult to stick with," O'Neill said about the slowdown. But he added, "I find it hilarious that people question the thesis on the basis of two quarters." ... Continue to read.

Sunday, July 8, 2012

Avoid Overdiversification in Your Portfolio

Investment Frontiers Symposia (Photo credit: apec2011ceosummit)

Everyone talks about diversification but hardly anyone mentions the tyranny of overdiversification. Portfolio diversification has been a foundation of investment management for decades. The basic idea is to hold different types of investments within the same portfolio to avoid getting crushed if and when the market tanks. Diversification isn’t designed to prevent losses, but rather, to minimize them. While most financial professionals advocate diversifying your investments, the problem of overdiversification is almost never discussed. What is it?

An overdiversified portfolio is one that holds too many of the same types of investments. Instead of owning a well-designed basket of various investments that complement each other, the investor who suffers from overdiversification ends up owning investments that appear different, but are essentially the same. What’s the end result? A portfolio with too much of the same thing.

Below is a snapshot of Portfolio X, which consists of just five holdings. Can you identify which holdings are overlapping? If you said ticker AGTHX, FCNTX, and QQQ – you’re right! Each of these investments, despite having different labels, own the same types of stocks; large cap growth companies. Owning these three investments within the same portfolio is a classic example of overdiversification.... Continue to read.

Friday, July 6, 2012

How JP Morgan's 'Whale' Loss Got Bigger

English: Category:JPMorgan Chase (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Back in May, the big news was that

J.P. Morgan Chase (JPM) had lost $2 billion on a derivatives hedge gone wrong. I wrote an article then entitled, "The Moral of J.P. Morgan's Derivative Debacle," which explained what was going on from a derivatives perspective--at least as much as was possible from the information available at the time. Recently, media outlets are reporting the $2 billion losses have swollen to anywhere from $5 billion (according to theFinancial Times) to as much as $9 billion (according to a New York Times quote of J.P. Morgan's internal worst-case estimate). Many people read this news and think "Wow! Derivatives are so dangerous and complex that J.P. Morgan doesn't know if it's lost $2 billion or $9 billion!"

In fact, the ballooning of the loss estimates has less to do with derivatives than it does with a micro-cap rubber plantation in Indonesia. Allow me to explain... Continue to read.

Recent Corn Rally in Context of Twenty Years of Corn Futures Prices

English: A display of six ears of field corn with dented yellow kernels (Zea mays var. indentata) which won ribbons for "best of show" at the Steele County Fair in Owatonna, Minnesota (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Since the launch of the Teucrium Commodity Trust Corn Fund ETF (CORN) in June 2010, investors who were unwilling to open up a futures account have been able to take long and short positions on corn via the CORN ETF, which holds a basket of corn futures. Investors who are new to corn or to commodities in general may have been surprised by the big move in CORN, which is up 20% in the past two weeks and 28% over the course of the past month. No doubt they probably believe that the move in CORN (and corn futures) is likely to soon be exhausted. While CORN/corn may indeed be about to peak, I would urge new arrivals on the commodity scene to study the history of agricultural commodities prices over the years and note that extreme price moves are not uncommon, particularly when unusual weather patterns are involved. The chart below uses monthly bars of corn futures over the course of the last 20 years. Note that while the June-July 2012 move in corn looks impressive, it pales in comparison to the spikes in corn prices that occurred in 1994-1996, 2005-2008 and 2010-2011. In other words, this could be just the beginning of a huge move in corn prices, particularly given that the price move of the last month or so comes on top of a much higher base. Corn may be putting in a top soon, but a fat-tailed spike is not guaranteed to top out at the prior highs of $8.00 per bushel. As an aside, if you are going to trade CORN or corn futures, it would certainly help to become a weather guru, but be forewarned that understanding the weather nuances that affect corn prices is no easy task. ... Continue to read.

Thursday, July 5, 2012

PIMCO Great Return

Green Day Concert Stage (Montreal) - Green Day is Ever Green (Photo credit: Anirudh Koul)

PIMCO Total Return ETF (NYSEArca: BOND) manager Bill Gross promised big things when the fund launched earlier this year, and the ETF has not disappointed. In short order, the ETF has already attracted more than $1.7 billion in assets under management, including an impressive $200 million that entered the fund just last week.
And BOND, being an unabashedly “actively managed” ETF, the quick progress of the fund has turned heads on both the retail and institutional fronts as actively managed products have simply failed to become briskly embraced by investors until now, as a general rule. Two months ago we highlighted BOND, noting encouraging early performance of the ETF versus its well known and established mutual fund version counterpart, the PIMCO Total Return (PTTAX).
This trend has certainly continued, as BOND has rallied an impressive 3.81% since inception in March of this year with PTTAX up only 1.99% during the same time period. Currently, top holdings in BOND include U.S. Treasury Notes, FNMA (Fannie Mae) and SLMA (Sallie Mae Student Loan) obligations, as well as FHLMC (Freddie Mac) securities, and the fund charges what we believe is a generous 0.55% expense ratio.
In the world of actively managed mutual funds, and much less actively managed ETFs, where the ultimate goal of the product is to deliver alpha to some stated benchmark, we find that expense ratios on similar products to BOND typically range well north of 1%. ... Continue to read.

Wednesday, July 4, 2012

Dividend Income Versus Dividend Growth

Income Tax Cocktail (Photo credit: Kenn Wilson)

Just because a stock pays a dividend, it doesn't mean that its growth days are behind it. Apple(AAPL), which plans to pay its first dividend later this quarter, is still projected to grow earnings by 22% per year over the next five years. Apple plans to pay a quarterly dividend of about $ 2.65 per share. That equates to a dividend payout ratio of about 26% of earnings, based on forecasts of $ 10.33 in per share earnings for the next quarter and a low dividend yield of about 1.9%. The conventional wisdom is that the higher the payout ratio, the lower the future earnings growth.
Let’s say that a firm has $ 100 in capital and income of $ 10, for a return on capital of 10%. If it pays out 70% of earnings as a dividend, it would pay a $ 7 dividend and keep $ 3 as additional paid in capital. The next year, capital starts out at $ 103, and if we assume that the firm earns a 10% return on capital again, earnings would grow to $ 10.30 for 3% earnings growth. The more earnings the firm keeps, the greater the capital base and the faster earnings will grow. For example, if the payout ratio had been only 20%, the capital base would have grown to $ 108 and the 10% return on capital would result in earnings of $ 10.80, for 8% earnings growth. Of course, the higher the payout, the higher the current dividend yield is likely to be. Because utilities companies typically have steady capital needs with few growth opportunities, they tend to have high payout ratios and higher dividend yields, while tech firms have historically had low payout ratios as they often have many growth opportunities. ... Continue to read.

Benjamin Graham Was A Crappy Hedge Fund Manager

Jack Bogle, the outspoken godfather of index funds and passive investing strategies, didn't approve of a recent Wall Street Journal article defending hedge funds.

In particular, he took issue with the author's reference to Benjamin Graham, the legendary Columbia finance professor who literally wrote the book on Security Analysis and mentored Warren Buffett.

Bogle wrote a letter to the editor. Here's an excerpt: Citing Benjamin Graham as the first "hedged fund" operator is an especially unfortunate example. "The trick," Mr. Rice writes, was Graham's "clever way to make money . . . whether it [the market] continued to rise, or started to fall." ...

Proposal for New Hedge Fund Fee Structure: 1% + 33% of Alpha

By The Big Picture

One of my pet peeves is the way that insiders -- whether corporate CEOs, hedge fund managers, or elected politicos -- capture compensation (or credit) for normal cyclical gains they had little or nothing to do with.

This is the approach favored by the Crony Capitalists — those people pretending to be free market participants, and who merely pretend to be creating value. They are taking credit for structural successes that would have occurred with or without them. What they are actually doing is capturing value, not creating it — and then transferring it from its true owners (shareholders/investors) to themselves.

This is wrong; it is legalized theft.

If you want to see a good example of how CEOs transfer shareholder wealth to themselves, a good place to start is Roger Lowenstein’s 2004 book, Origins of the Crash: The Great Bubble and Its Undoing. The section on CEO compensation is astounding; these guys were essentially getting wildly overcompensated for being CEOs during a bull market. The prime example was the CEO of Heinz, who gave himself (with the tacit approval of his Board of~~Crony~~ Directors) a $90 million bonus. And this was back in the early 1990s, when $90 million was real money.

Why Do You Want To Be A Hedge Fund Investor?

www.ritholtz.com

Earlier this year, Goldman Sachs Asset Management announced that it would launch a new mutual fund that — apparently — will bring the joy of hedge fund investing to the masses. For as little as $1,000, the Multi-Manager Alternatives Fund (GMAMX) allows mom-and-pop investors to put their life savings into some of Wall Street’s riskiest and most expensive products. This “fund of funds” will, according to its prospectus, let investors gain exposure to the trading strategies of hedge funds...

Public pensions fare well with hedge funds

Big public pension funds reaped strong returns from their hedge fund portfolios in 2012, with most of them handily surpassing their own benchmarks and well-used industry indexes. The hedge fund portfolios, for the most part, achieved close to what chief investment officers wanted, despite a 1,500-basis-point difference between the best and worst performers, according toPensions & Investments' analysis of the returns of 19 hedge fund portfolios from 17 U.S. public retirement plans with aggregate hedge fund assets of $60.7 billion.

Daniel Loeb surfing to the top of the hedge fund charts again

Something must be in the water over at 399 Park Avenue, where Daniel Loeb's hedge fund Third Point is headquartered. His Third Point Ultra fund has already gained 12.42 percent this year through the 13th of March, according to data from HSBC’s Private Bank.

The portfolio added 3.3 percent alone between March 1 and March 13. By comparison, hedge funds have returned about 4 percent year-to-date, according to HSBC.

The roughly $1.7 billion Ultra portfolio is a levered version of the firm’s flagship Offshore fund, which manages about $5.7 billion and has gained 8.5 percent over the same period. ...

CHART: Hedge Fund Gold Allocation Falls

After taking a cursory look at the recent 13-Fs filed by hedge funds, it became apparent that hedge funds were scaling back their exposures to gold. George Soros was among the big names that unloaded his position. According to Goldman Sachs' new Hedge Fund Trend Monitor report, hedge funds in aggregate scaled back big time.

Despite low turnover, hedge funds notably reduced holdings of underperforming long-time favorites Apple and gold while raising allocations to rallying Financials. For the first time in three years AAPL was not the top stock in our VIP list, instead ranking as the third most frequent top-10 holding... Continue to read.

10 Publicly Traded Hedge Funds That Pay a Dividend
Investing in publicly traded hedge funds is a great way for an investor to see returns through capital appreciation and dividend payments in the financial sector. When it comes to investing, many think of the process as a choice between growth and value stocks; you’re either taking on risk in search of capital appreciation, or you’re seeking out stable sources of current income through dividend payments. Luckily, Wall Street has many investment options and investors don’t have to make a clear-cut choice between capital gains and dividends. There are a lot of misunderstandings about dividend stocks out there; make sure you’re investing for the right reasons, check out 5 Common Misconceptions About Dividend Investing. ... Continue.

Hedge Funds Love These 3 Outperforming Semiconductor Stocks ...
Do you like to follow the buying trends of smart money investors? We ran a screen to find semiconductor stocks currently in favor by hedge fund managers. We began by screening the semiconductor industry for stocks that are rallying above their 20-day, 50-day, and 200-day moving averages, indicating that these stocks have strong upward momentum.
We then screened for those with bullish sentiment from institutional investors, with significant net institutional purchases over the last quarter representing at least 5% of share float. ... Continue.

10 REITs Absolutely Adored By Hedge Funds
After identifying the most popular stocks among hedge funds (see our full Top 10 here) according to their third-quarter 13F filings, we have decided to break down the top 10 REIT stocks that hedge funds love. The REIT industry, notably specialized REITs in hospitality and healthcare, should see positive growth from a rise in job growth and expansion due to freeing up of the credit markets. Our list includes 400 hedge funds and prominent investors that are required by the SEC to disclose their public equity holdings quarterly. In descending order, we have outlined the most-loved REIT stocks based on the aggregate number of funds owning each. ...Continue.

Apple Stock Hit by Panic Selling: 'Someone Yelled Fire'(Yahoo) Forget the "fiscal cliff." The real panic on Wall Street is over Apple's stock. Nearly every mutual and hedge fund has piled into Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) during its spectacular rise over the past few years. Now, these same funds are scrambling for the exits as the stock goes through an equally spectacular decline. Apple plunged to a six-month low Thursday as funds rushed to take profits on the stock before it's too late. Shares are now off 25 percent since late September-shortly after the iPhone 5 launch and a month before the iPad Mini introduction. The stock, once up 74 percent on the year, is still up 30 percent for 2012. That's why Wall Street is getting out while it can. ...

Billionaire George Soros’s Latest Stock Picks (InsiderMonkey) George Soros is best known for the fortune he made shorting the British pound in 1992, but he currently invests a considerable amount of money in equities and so is required to report many of his long positions in 13F filings. We’ve gone through the 13F for the third quarter of the year and compared Soros’s holdings at the end of September to three months earlier. Read on for our impression of his moves and compare them to what he's bought and sold before. AIG. American International Group, Inc. (NYSE::AIG) became Soros’s largest 13F equity holding during the third quarter with a position of over 15 million shares being reported in the filing. A number of value investors have been getting into the insurer over the course of the year, and at a P/B ratio of 0.5 it certainly looks cheap compared to the book value of its equity. We also like its earnings multiples- it trades at 9 times forward earnings estimates- and revenue was up strongly in the third quarter compared to the same period in 2011. Fellow billionaire Dan Loeb had initiated a position during the second quarter of 2012 and we think that it still looks like a good buy for investors. ...

Duke Energy CEO Jim Rogers still facing issues as tough year nears an end (BizJournals) In late 2011, Jim Rogers seemed almost golden. He was about to close his last big merger deal. He was poised to take a corporate chairmanship tailored to his penchants for energy policy and reshaping the utility-business model. He was ready to bask in the spotlight of a national convention he’d helped bring to Charlotte. But by late 2012, it’s evident things have not gone so well. “It has been a year of challenges,” the Duke Energy Corp. chief executive concedes. “Nothing in life is perfect.” Dan Fogel, associate director of the Wake Forest University Business School’s Center for Energy, ...

Argo unveils emerging markets hedge fund (InvestmentWeek) Argo Group has launched an emerging markets hedge fund investing in bonds and currencies from a universe of over 40 emerging market countries. The Argo Local Markets fund aims to hold between 20 and 30 positions and has been launched with an initial $7m of seed capital. It will offer investors weekly liquidity and has a mandate to take on moderate leverage. Argo chief executive Kyriakos Rialas said: "The case for investing in emerging markets is compelling. ...

Argentina's President Is Making Great Political Theater Out Of Paul Singer Seizing The Country's Naval Ship(BusinessInsider) Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner is turning her feud with hedge fund manager Paul Singer into a political rallying cry in Argentina. The President has refused to pay Singer's firm Elliott Management the $1.3 billion it owes the fund after it defaulted in 2010. de Kirchner says it's because Singer was given multiple chances (in 2005 and 2010) to restructure, like other hedge funds did, and take a haircut to recoup at least a portion of their losses. Singer, needless to say, did not. Instead, he decided to capture one of Argentina's naval vessels as collateral, and got Ghana to give him an order to detain the ARA Libertad last month. ...

Tom Steyer New Investments
FARALLON CAPITAL Hedge fund billionaire into politics (DailyDemocrat) Hedge-fund billionaire Tom Steyer staked millions of his own money to take on big oil and then to close a corporate-tax loophole costing California $1 billion a year -- and won both times. Ever heard of him? Don't worry, you will. With his latest behind-the-scenes win at the polls as the man who stared down big business by standing up for Proposition 39, this Stanford MBA and top Obama fundraiser has become an out-of-nowhere big-time political player in California. So what does Tom Steyer want now? "I am an enormous lover of California and to the extent that I see something wrong, I will be involved in trying to fix it," Steyer, 55, said Monday. "What form that takes, I don't have a fixed idea." ...

This Hedge Fund Returned Nearly 25% Last Quarter
Artis Capital Management was a top performing hedge fund during the third quarter. Coming in with the fourth best Q3 performance, the fund’s picks had a weighted average return of 25.5% during the first half of the year, and returned 24.6% for the third quarter, boosting the fund’s year to date performance to 56.4%. Artis Capital was founded in 2001 and is a San Francisco-based hedge fund with a focus on public technology companies. ... Read more.

More ETFs Play Hedge Fund Copycat
What if you could emulate the actions of the most successful hedge fund managers for a fraction of what they cost? Two ETFs that debuted this summer are trying to do that by using public filings to replicate their portfolios. And a third, which launched early this month, promises to add another hedge fund dimension to ETF copycats by adopting what its sponsor calls the only true market-neutral strategy in the lot. Researchers have been trying to emulate hedge fund strategies since the 1990s ... Read more

BMW Pininfarina Gran Lusso Coupé.

BMW and Pininfarina are two of the most tradition-swathed names in the motoring world. Each is a byword for cutting-edge technology, style, dynamics and aesthetics. With the BMW Pininfarina Gran Lusso Coupé, the two

time-honoured companies are unveiling the outcome of their first collaboration at the Concorso d’Eleganza Villa d’Este 2013. The BMW Pininfarina Gran Lusso Coupé is a one-off and represents the exclusive interpretation of a luxurious BMW Coupé as seen through the eyes of Pininfarina.

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All Time Record Gold Transactions Reported By LBMA

The precious metals have been weak again in May with gold falling 4.4% despite this weeks’ recovery. Silver is down 7% and platinum by 2.6%. Palladium has recovered from recent weakness and those who accumulated on weakness are set for the best month since November after it surged 6.6% in May.

Weakness in gold and silver is leading to robust demand internationally as store of value buyers accumulate gold and silver on this dip. This is particularly the case in Asia where premiums remain robust and supply demand imbalances remain. ...

6 Tips to Work From Home Successfully

The future of work is the work itself, not where and when the work takes place. Workplace flexibility programs are already catching on and will soon become standardized as more millennials enter the workplace. All workers, not just millennials,want freedom and flexibility and some are even quitting their jobs to becoming freelancers in order to gain that freedom. oDesk.com has 3.3 million registered freelancers, and Intuit predicts that by 2020, 40% of Americans will be freelancers. When it comes to working from home, 13.4 million people (9.4% of all American workers) work from home at least one day per week compared to just 9.2 million in 1997 according to one Census Bureau.

Today's top Green Energy Good News

Russia is funding research into powering its airplanes with solar energy. The airline industry is being hurt by high fuel prices, and solar-powered planes would not only be cheaper but also would remove a major source of carbon pollution that contributes to global warming.

Texas is set to double its wind energy generation from 60 gigawatts to 120 gigawatts in 2013.

Britain has made substantial investments in wind energy and its technology. British PM David Cameron is touting his country’s green expertise on his trip to India to promote trade with that country. ... Continue.

High-Dividend ETFs with Reasonable Valuations

Investors have picked over the ETF universe in search of any kind of yield in an extremely low-rate market for bonds. As a result, ETFs tracking many traditional high-yield sectors have been bid up to expensive levels, but there are still places investors can go for income without paying nosebleed valuations. “Unfortunately, valuations [for dividends, high-yield junk bonds, MLPs, and REITs] are approaching sky high levels in many instances as more investors fall in love with these products ... Continue.