Portfolio Surges on flat day

AMD +.24
BAC -.14
EGO +.48
KBR +.64
PWE +.21

My commodity and recovery portfolio completly outperformed the market today. Gold rose higher and it seems as if KBR is starting to break out as it's been higher all week. AMD continues to perform and Cramer reiterated it a buy tonight on his show. I should be getting another PWE dividend this upcoming week too. I am impressed with the KBR chart today, as oil broke up. I really do like it's clean balance sheet and how its tied to international growth. With EGO, KBR, and PWE they all lack limited US exposure which I like because our country could not produce a real stimulus plan. They all will continue to go higher in 2010 as the economy recovers. The economy is recovering too, and I am confident that Bernanke will not let us go back into a recession. He won't be raising rates anytime soon and my portfolio is a reflection of that as I believe the dollar will remain weak for the foreseeable future.

I hope everyone has a happy holiday!

Surging into the end of the year

AMD +.48
BAC +.25
EGO -.17
KBR +.23
PWE +.04

KBR and PWE announced their upcoming dividends today. AMD, my stock of the year again rallied huge. I am now up 100% on it. I'm at a fine line between taking profits, but I feel like taking a chance and holding onto it for the 4th quarter results. I've been saying that this thing will get bought out and a great quarter could make that happen. I also think BAC can rise from here now that they finally found a CEO. I thought it was weird that they actually hired an insider because I thought after the repayment of tarp they would draw more interest from the outside. But either way, it means uncertainty is out of the way and it can go higher.

Today took away the gains from yesterday

AMD -.03
BAC -.42
EGO -.90
KBR -.13
PWE -.20

So todays sell off took away ALL my gains from yesterday. We saw gold get absolutely creamed as the dollar rose to 3 month highs. Meredith Whitney creamed the banks as investors saw sell offs after the Citigroup equity offering. It could have been worse really, as AMD, KBR and PWE were slightly down. I will be staying with my 5 positions to year end while I try to raise some cash to start off 2010. I caught a double in AMD and I am very happy with it. So from now till the end of the year I wouldn't be a buyer or seller of anything (except the fundamentals dramatically change) so I won't be doing any recommendations. Volumes are low as people have taken profits and i don't see there being a lot of rush to re-enter the market for the rest of fiscal 2009. But hey, nice beat by RIMM, I did not see that coming. Must have been the big blackberry purchase from me :)

Starting off the week strong

AMD +.04
BAC +0.00
EGO +.43
KBR +.12
PWE +.42

I won't be providing updates the next 2 days as I will be away on a business trip. EGO provided another strong day for me. Exxon purchasing XTO brought every oil and natural gas company to the upside. I was looking at the action in TIE and saw it up 6% on twice the volume today, defiantly sold that way too early. I think the Citigroup equity offering could also be interesting if investors can get in on it. And I hope the next 2 days are as good as today!!

AMD takeover news, KBR wins 2 contracts

AMD -.13
BAC -.18
EGO +.26
KBR +.14
PWE +.10

Quiet day overall.

AMD: I read this article about speculation that INTC was going to buy NVDA. There is absolutely 0% chance of this happening. If Paul Otelleni thinks anti-trust regulators are after him now, they will be crushing him if he bid for NVDA. I don't think this administration has any desire to let Intel run the show in both processors and video cards. Now, thats not to say that NVDA might be a good take over target (Market cap only 8 Billion), but Intel will not be the buyer. AMD also announced that gross margins will be higher in 2010, I truly believe they are in the middle of a turn around story. I still hold steady that AMD will be the one taken over, not NVDA.

BAC: Hire a CEO. Thanks.

EGO: Gold flat again today and EGO rallied for the 2nd day. Still a perfect hedge in a portfolio, lost cost producer of the commodity. If the dollar rallies and gold begins to fall, might want to add some more shares.

KBR: Some bullish news out of them. On Tuesday they received a contract from Saudi Aramco and last night from Dupont for maintenance service and that is a three year contract. I really like these constructions names around here because they have defiantly been battered recently. This will be the first quarter of holding KBR so I'll be excited to see how their quarter shapes up.

PWE: Oil has hit a small bear market as its dropped $10 in a week. Still a good company with a monthly dividend and you can't go wrong there.

Market flat, Eldorado in the green

AMD, KBR, and PWE are my laggards at the moment with BAC briefly in the green and EGO up .21. That shows a nice sign of strength since gold is down for like the 5th consecutive day. I think we may be into a quiet rest of the year as volumes have dramatically fallen off. People seem to have taken profits and are content with letting the rest of the year run out. I think KBR has been down like everyday since I bought it, those companies seem to be in their own bear market at the moment. I am contempt with letting it ride out. It's rainy and miserable here today (as with everywhere in the North East) so I'm relaxing by the fire and enjoying that my year goal will be reached; I will end the year net positive. Stay warm!

AMD Surges, commodities sell off

AMD +.66
BAC -.39
EGO -.33
KBR -.13
PWE -.25

Again, AMD is just carrying me. Intel announced that they will NOT be interesting the graphic chip market and that sent AMD and NVDA souring higher, I almost couldn't believe that NVDA is a $16 stock. I am not excited about Intel right now; they have anti-trust issues on the front burner, they admitted that they couldn't compete with AMD and NVDA in the graphic markets and I am expecting market share to be taken by AMD over this upcoming quarter. I am up 80% in AMD currently and couldn't be happier!

Citigroup is looking to repay the tarp now as they are the lone instiution to be under government control. This was expected after BAC announced they will repay the tarp. Gold has sold off huge in the last 3 days, same with oil which is hurting EGO, KBR and PWE (all have been down multi days in a row). All the commodity trades (oil, gold, shipping) have been on a multi day losing streak and seem out of favor for the utilities and dividend paying stocks.

And I just read on CNBC that the BAC board will be meeting tomorrow to discuss a CEO replacement....finally! I think them repaying the tarp opens up a door for them to take an outsider to run the bank. At this point, I'd rather have them just pick a CEO because the stock is definatly suffering due to the uncertainty of the choice.

Commodity stocks are down, which ones should we buy?

Well, EGO, KBR, and PWE have been selling off for atleast the past 3 days and since I own all three I think they are buys. I've also been saying that FWLT and DSX can be bought as they come down. These are all international growth stocks and they are related to countries that have actual stimulus plans with building and infrastrucutre and as the ecomomy recovers these stocks should all be going higher.

If you are looking for a good yield play, I recommend LLY and its nice 5.2% yield.

AMD surges, BAC to repay Tarp

AMD +.73
BAC +.11
EGO -.33
KBR -.29
PWE -.26

Lets start with BAC first. Ken Lewis made his last big move as the CEO of the company by raising the equity needed to pay back the Tarp. This is great. The company will not have the US government in their business or pressing Ken Lewis or the next CEO. I also think this opens up the opportunity that an outsider will be interested in taking the job now that the government will not be breathing down BAC's neck.

Now, for the company with no news, AMD. AMD surges 10% today, but why? Twice as much daily volume on no news. Now, I said I thought AMD would get bought out because the other big name tech companies want to keep INTC and NVDA honest. Could this be it? It also shattered the 52 week high, and again this is on twice as much volume. All I know that is if your short AMD, you are covering.

Jobs report is tomorrow, will clearly headline the market. As long as we can keep politicians off TV we will be all set! :)

Flat day for now

Pretty quiet day for me, slightly in positive territory. The NASDAQ is higher, as AMD is as well for the 3rd day in a row. Gold and EGO again are dramatically higher as investor's continue to pour into the commodity. Bank of America and Penn West are todays laggards. Now only if stories of Tiger Woods could turn the market then we would see some dramatic action. We also saw an intra day rally in the dollar which sent the market lower. That inverse trade has to change through some fiscal policy because if it doesn't investor's will continue to sell the dollar if it means a higher stock market. Hope the rest of the day is well.

Dubai can't rattle the markets

AMD +.16
BAC +.38
EGO -.08
KBR -.20
PWE -.18

The market was down around 90 points today and then rallied towards the end of the day. I think this is clearly an example of people still wanting to reach performance by the end of the year and that people want to be buying. I think the Dubai situation is completely overblown and that debt will be backed and everything will be okay. Goldman Sachs added the big banks to their conviction buy list; too bad they can't pick a CEO for Bank of America because then that would be nice.

We still want to be a buying:

I think if you want to get cyclical you are getting a steal for DSX again, as its 45 cents below where I thought it should be bought.

For defensive names, I think MO can be a buy here. It could be a nice entry point because its ex-dividend date is in December.