BUY LOW

This photo shows almost the ENTIRETY of Microsoft in 1978.  In 2012, the company had 94,400 employees.  Microsoft was founded in 1975 but didn’t go PUBLIC until 11 years later.  In between, a lot of people had a chance to invest in Microsoft – to buy shares cheaply.  Those who BELIEVED did, but those who didn’t believe, just shrugged and stayed happy with what they had.  They probably thought the company would stay small.  Would you have invested in these young people?  How much of your money would you have risked?  Of course, when you are an insider you can see things a lot more easily.  From the outside, you hardly see anything other than reports.  The insiders saw how much effort the people in charge at Microsoft put into the business.  By the look of things, it was bound to succeed so the insiders had NO EXCUSE for not buying stock in the company.  

Deficits and ham

Someone is definitely in a panic over the government’s spending so much on the bailouts. The deficits are mushrooming. Yes, of course. There’s also this guy peddling a video entitled IOUSA. Here's the quote: “It is difficult to know what impact these changes will have on stocks, but I believe, in general, they will drive up prices. In addition to buying the world's best businesses (the Cokes, Intels, and Microsofts of the world), I believe you should have hedges in place for the coming devaluation of the dollar. In other words, you should be buying gold: plain, regular bullion gold coins.” Sure – like the man said: “If I had some ham, I could have some ham and eggs, if I had some eggs.” The woman at left has nothing to do with the credit mess, but it does no harm to have a pretty woman to look at while you go hungry or while you write a blog.

Microsoft shares

As I've been saying for many weeks now, buying is fun.... This is an abbreviated article from an everyday investor newsletter. Enjoy....

By Porter Stansberry: As longtime readers of my advisory can tell you, I haven't been bullish on the stock market in years. In fact, for the last couple years, I've been warning that stocks, in general, were vastly overpriced. Investors were too complacent. They had too little fear. It turns out that was very close to a huge top in asset prices. Stocks, bonds, commodities, foreign currencies all peaked over the next several months. It was easy to see this peak coming with three key points: the number of stocks trading at reasonable prices, the amount of insider buying in the stock market, and the spread between emerging-market bonds and U.S. Treasury bonds. Reviewing these key data points today shows we're building an important bottom in stock prices. And it's why I'm telling everyone I know that this is one of the great buying opportunities of the last 30 years. Looking through the list of cheap stocks, several great businesses jump out: ExxonMobil, Wal-Mart, Microsoft, Johnson & Johnson, McDonald's, etc. Any reasonable evaluation of the market would find plenty of safe and cheap stocks... thousands more than you would have found a year ago at the market's peak. What about insiders? Brian Heyliger covers insider buying and selling for my firm Stansberry Research. He follows corporate insiders on a full-time basis. Throughout this bear market, the ratio of buys to sells has been steadily increasing. In June, the ratio was in the high thirties – anything over 35% is bullish. But since then, the ratio doubled, hitting 63% in October... a level I've never seen before. What about that lack of fear? My favorite measure of fear is the spread between emerging-market debt and U.S. Treasury debt – the so-called "risk spread." Institutional investors consider U.S. Treasuries a "risk-free" asset. Emerging markets have much lower credit ratings, higher inflation, and a much greater risk of defaulting on their debts. Investors normally demand much higher interest rates from emerging-market economies. But... in big bull markets, near the very top, investors become so complacent, they begin to assume holding emerging-market debt is tantamount to holding U.S. Treasuries. Looking back historically, you can see this spread is a great indicator of global tops and bottoms in stock prices. In about a year, we've moved from a period of complete complacency to absolute terror. Paradoxically – and this is hard for most people to understand – you want to be a buyer of equities when everyone else is panicking. None of these factors mean that stocks have to go up or that they will. No one can predict the future – but you don't have to be perfectly right to do very well in the market. Yes, our economy is struggling right now with huge problems. Enormous risks threaten America's leadership in the world, the dollar's status as the world's reserve currency, our energy supplies, the rule of law in this country, etc. But all of these risks – all of them – existed a year ago, when stocks were almost 100% higher, on average. And all of these risks will exist 10 years from now, when stocks have gone up three or four times from their averages now. To do well as an investor, you have to buy when stocks are cheap. And stocks only get cheap when most investors are afraid. So you have two choices: You can r refuse to invest in stocks, or you can learn to buy stocks heavily when their prices offer you a reward for taking smart risks. That moment is right now. END OF ARTICLE

You might recognize the lady at the left - she didn't need to buy stocks, she used to own Monaco.

Media Panic

The Dow sits at about 8500 as we speak. By how the media is portraying the market, you would think that the sky is falling. I have already said that 8500 is about the lowest that the market will sink. Yahoo! news is writing something about the Dow "plunging." Is 150 points a plunge???? Give me a break. I strongly suspect they exaggerate (HYPE) everything just to get people to read their news articles. How unprofessional - really!!!! They have become tabloids and nothing more. I don't think they want the economy to improve since they favor a certain candidate for office (the one who wants "change"). If you have any money at all, now is the time to buy - the market can only go up. Buy 100,000 shares of anything that looks conservative and safe and in six months you will be happy you didn't panic like everyone else. Of course, if you don't believe me, get a second opinion.