This morning at 5:48, a fax touting a company called Superlattice Power, Inc. came across my office fax machine. The fax came from The Energy Bull which is in the business of "providing bullish picks in the energy and alt-fuel sectors." According to the fax, Superlattice Power Inc.(SLAT) "is an emerging leader in the development and marketing of the next generation of lithium-powered batteries worldwide." SLAT is much better than the usual junk penny stocks that cram fax machines... Read Full Story

Ignore the government right now. Paulson is speaking in both Wall Street and Washington gibberish. Bush said the mortgage giants are “very important institutions.” That's all I need to know. Despite its claims, this President is ot a conservative. He loves government interventions. Plus, he wants his party to win the next election. Bush is already being compared with Herbert Hoover and if he doesn't do something to try and save the housing market and the economy, they'll be linked... Read Full Story

Noted value investor, Sir John Templeton is dead. Pneumonia struck him down at the ripe age of 95. Sir John is famous for having founded Templeton Growth back in the 1950s and making early bets on the rebound in Japan. Sir John was buying international equities long before Long before Mark Mobius or Jim Rogers trading securities. Sir John was not just about money however. Through his foundation, he gave away $60 million a year for research into religion and science. Read Full Story

Home prices are falling. Oil is trading north of $138/bbl. Banks are hard up for cash. Has the financial world been on a repeating loop for the last year? Weren't we supposed to be past ugly things like writedowns, dilutive offerings, shareholder lawsuits and arrests? Maybe we've fired up the DeLorean and no one told me. Let's see, the Celtics were playing the Lakers, that would indicate that it was the 80s. Donald Trump is ubiquitous and annoying. However, George Michael is out of... Read Full Story

It's good to be king and have your own way.- Tom Petty Not only is Dick Fuld a billionaire who runs the 4th largest investment bank in the U.S., but he can also throw underlings under the bus when he screws the pooch. It's good work if you can get it. Don't tell me that Erin Callan wasn't doing her master's bidding while she was deliberately misleading investors about Lehman. Don't worry though, this is Wall Street. They're not being shown the door for leading the bank to a 3... Read Full Story

The market is taking a beating today. Why? The jobs report and oil. Let's ask ourselves, are these new phenomena? Hasn't news like this been reported for the last twelve to eighteen months? Just about everybody is taking a beating, but especially financials. Isn''t this also an old story? You mean there are still lots of bad loans out there and people who won't be able to pay their credit card bills, and this matters? It seems that we priced so much optimism into the market that... Read Full Story

These lists appear every quarter on investing websites, no doubt culled a lowly staffer burning the midnight oil, scouring the EDGAR database. Despite how much you might appreciate their efforts, ignore the info. It's not that helpful to know what Berkshire Hathaway bought after the fact. You'd want to know beforehand. What would be even more exciting would be knowing what is Mr Buffett's personal brokerage account, outside of Berkshire shares. I know that 99% of his networth is in... Read Full Story

He's upped his stake in Ford. He's wiling to pay $8.50 a share. Either he is going to slash and burn the company to profitability(harder than it sounds) or he's going to flip it to another buyer like the Chinese or Indians. Interesting thing about Ford, their problems are only in North America. Unfortunately, that's the biggest car market as of today. If you read their last earnings release they doubled their income in Europe and south America. They even earned a profit in Asia... Read Full Story

Seems like a stupid question, doesn't it? I'm being totally serious though. Maybe you can know ROA and ROE and other profitability rations, but do you know how the company makes those numbers? Actually what I'm asking is how well you know the company's represented by the stocks you own? If you're a technician or a momentum investor, feel free to tune me out. This may begin to sound an awful lot like the teacher from "Peanuts." Have you done more than read the Yahoo! Finance summary... Read Full Story

Last quarter, they were so happy to announce that they turned a surprise profit. I wrote about it last month. Now it seems that they are going back on their pledge to be profitable in 2009, much to everyone but my own surprise. I guess high gas prices do matter after all. "In a statement, Ford said rising prices for commodities, particularly steel, and an accelerating consumer shift from larger trucks and sport-utility vehicles would make it impossible to meet a key milestone in its... Read Full Story