Stocks and Trading Thread - Channeling your inner Mono

[Admiral Yi]

Jessica Yellin has said that because of the divergence of long term and short term unemployment and the drop in labor force participation, the old line of 6.5% unemployment to start raising rates might no longer be in force.

[Baron von Schtinkenbutt]

Since I disappeared from the thread after my last post:

- AAR was American Airlines' preferred stock issue.  It was one of the few preferred stock offerings that was not from a utility or financial institution.  Since the dividends were technically interest, though, reinvestment was not an option and they didn't qualify for the capital gains rate.

- BKCC is a joint venture between the BlackRock asset management company and the private equity firm Kelso & Company.  They provide mezzanine capital for mid-market businesses.  They are small-ish (< $1B total assets) in Wall Street terms.

BKCC reports earnings a week from Thursday.  Since its Q4, it should include some information about the dividend going forward.

American has been rocking my casbah, though.  As part of the bankruptcy and merger, the new company made good on all the AAR debt to the full amount owed (par + unpaid interest) in the form of convertible preferred shares in the new company.  Half my holding has converted so far, and between payout and appreciation I am already at a 110% gain.  That doesn't count the several quarters of interest I received before American went tits up, either.

[MadImmortalMan]

Went short with 20 June puts on Phillip Morris yesterday.




Question: Who's in Tesla? Anyone shorting it? I'm having trouble convincing myself one way or the other. It's not like the Netflix-Amazon dichotomy. Tesla has both the super-positive outlook and also the crazy stupid valuation.

[Admiral Yi]

Apart from Dorsey4arbitrage short selling Treasuries (which I expect he's regretting immensely now) I'm pretty sure you're the only Languishite who engages in other than plain vanilla trades.

[MadImmortalMan]

Why it concerns me:

Douglas Kass ‏@DougKass 4m

I understand the TSLA narrative has shifted to batteries, but TSLA sells at mkt cap of $1.4 mill/car compared to GM at $6k F at $11k

How many more cars do they have to sell next year to bring it down to the 10k per car range? That's a crazy amount of growth already built in to the stock price.

[Alcibiades]

Dissuaded at $35 a share

[Caliga]

Apart from Dorsey4arbitrage short selling Treasuries (which I expect he's regretting immensely now) I'm pretty sure you're the only Languishite who engages in other than plain vanilla trades.

Not sure what you mean by 'plain vanilla trades' but I place limit orders, stop orders, bracket orders, etc.  I'm guessing you mean trading options and if so yes, I don't do that.

[Admiral Yi]

That's what I meant.

[MadImmortalMan]

I made roughly 70% more money from my trading hobby last year than I did from my actual job. The wife is now looking for some overseas jobs. London, Dublin or Singapore.

Shit. There will be expectations on me to do this professionally and I don't know if I can do it.

[Admiral Yi]

How hard is it for the spouse of someone with a work visa to get one as well?

[Phillip V]

I made roughly 70% more money from my trading hobby last year than I did from my actual job. The wife is now looking for some overseas jobs. London, Dublin or Singapore.

My dream.

[Alcibiades]

I made roughly 70% more money from my trading hobby last year than I did from my actual job. The wife is now looking for some overseas jobs. London, Dublin or Singapore.

Shit. There will be expectations on me to do this professionally and I don't know if I can do it.

Sell me your secrets, for free preferably. 

[stjaba]

I made roughly 70% more money from my trading hobby last year than I did from my actual job. The wife is now looking for some overseas jobs. London, Dublin or Singapore.

Shit. There will be expectations on me to do this professionally and I don't know if I can do it.

Sell me your secrets, for free preferably. 

Yes, I would gladly track your all your trades if you are that successful. My stock picking track record is miserable. That's why I just stick all my money in SPY now.

In fact, I have come to the conclusion that it is almost impossible for most people to beat the market in the long run, in the absence of proprietary information or the like. Or rather, that is the conclusion of the book A Random Walk Down Wall Street and I found the book's explanation convincing. That being said I'd happily follow someone's else strategy if there was a chance it is consistently better than the market in the long run.

[MadImmortalMan]

Look at a chart of the S&P for 2013. You didn't have to be a genius to make money. 

[Barrister]

Look at a chart of the S&P for 2013. You didn't have to be a genius to make money. 

I thought about pointing that out, but thought I'd leave you your little bit of glory and admiration.