oh yeah chris thanks for the email. i only had a few minutes to look it over but they had a thread on ACTC (stem cell company) i watched some vieos on there and I’m very interested into stem cell companies. the stuff they can do with it is amazing, I dont see how these companies wont make huge fortunes in the years to come. I think we will see the next break out bubble in biotech companies.
slice your finger off…sprinkle this powder for a few weeks and presto you grow a new finger.
I spend most of my time on that website just reading and reading. Ultimately at the end of the day, it is only peoples opinions, but there are some really consistent players there that offer great insight. I just like to see what invester sentiment is towards certain picks before I dive in on my own analysis.
Sold out of my GLD puts for breakeven earlier since I didn’t like where the charts were heading. Sure enough, GLD is knocking on 90 now. I had decent profit on GLD yesterday if I would have sold, but held onto my puts too long thinking we would test the 85-86 level once again before the reversal. I’m still holding my WFC and BAC puts as of right now which are up about 30%. I also have my two ‘drug through the dirt’ plays that I decided to hold onto because I’m an idiot. I bought FAS 17.5 calls last Friday for 2.50 when the market looked like it was going to make a reversal. Held on too long hoping for the reversal, broke some ground rules here, and now I basically have them written off as losses and am banking on anything right now. Cat isn’t too bad and seems to be holding well. We’ve tested the 31 level a few times and it seems to be holding. I still have a couple of weeks left, but the time value is wasting away here. Oh well, like I said I wrote these two off, mainly the FAS calls so now they’re ‘lottery tickets.’
Sold my BAC puts for a 18% profit and my WFC puts for a 57% profit around 3:30 today. I wanted to take my profits before AH’s and Premarket trading, not to mention any news that may begin to come out on the ‘bad banks’ coming out tomorrow, etc. Still have my FAS calls and my CAT calls for giggles. Trying to decide what I am going to play tomorrow/ going into the weekend if I do decide to hold over the weekend.
After digging deeper into drys situation I may buy into it tomorrow. the loan covenants breach is no real news every dry-bulk shipper is in breach of these covenants. the value of ships has dropped off the cliffs. the only thing disturbing was the filing for up to $500 million in new shares. drys still has the best fixed chartered rates in their sector and the best/newest fleet.
I’m hoping for another hard sell-off Friday morning then i will load up on drys.
The main thing that i like about drys is it’s business is about China’s need for commodities. even though its been effected tremendously it will undoubtedly bounce back, their developing country needs steel,coal, fertilizer, grains.
oh i forgot to mention i bought 4k shares of STEM thursday :beer
it’s doing nicely. i still dont know all i want to know about them so i thought i’d dip in for atleast a trade.
DRYS is a horrible shipper to own IMO. The management at DRYS is HORRENDOUS to say the least. I’d buy GNK if I was going to play dry bulk shipping. I actually bought Feb 10 puts for a flip this morning after it broke that 7.50 level of support. It’s testing it again right now, but there is so much buying strength going into DRYS right now that a reversal here is probably unlikely. I’ll liken it to the terms of ‘trying not to catch a falling knife.’ Here is an interesting read on DRYS from HSM some guy posted up:
"I bailed on it today (5000 shares at an average under $10), and only lost .50 cents a share. Read the SEC filings. In the past month, DRYS issued ALL of the Cantor Fitzgerald shares at an average price under $7.00. Now, Merrill will offer an additional $500 million worth of shares (at today’s price, somewhere in the 60 million share range), for a total number of outstanding shares of approximately 128 MILLION.
That’s a TRIPLING of shares between November and the end of January (from 43 to 128M). This for a company that supposedly had $700 million in cash, and a credit line of another $500 million or so. Was the burn on the cash $300 million or more per month lately? Hell no. I smell a rat in the accounting department (if there is one) and I smell a class action coming. The largest amounts of cash going out of the company were to the CEO himself, for cancelled transactions that were entered into when only a fool would have done so. How much was it - $160 million - I lost track of all the related entity nonsense lately. And the claims of “plenty of cash” are problematic, as well, as is the statement that the spinoff was “on track” for the first quarter of 2009 - statements that were made less than two months ago by the CEO himself.
I don’t much care, because I’m not suing over .50 a share. But this company is a serious scam, and if the FACTS set forth above don’t bother you, then you are as dumb as all of the vulture scumbags like smellypuppy tell you that you are. The revelations from yesterday (least of all the disturbing news about the potential for a “third party” (probably named George) walking away with the Primelead drillships and leaving the debt for DRYS ought to have you taking a close look at what the hell is going on. Where is “EXP” these days? Can he tell us all why this flurry of apparent bad news is actually good? "
Just be careful with DRYS.
On a side note, sold my CAT calls for a 60% loss this morning after the stock broke a major resistance level. Still holding my FAS calls for the heck of it.
Bought DRYS 10 Puts at 2.70 this morning and they’re now at 3.90 with much more bottom to go! The CEO of DRYS just lowered his stake from 26% to 18%! Not a good sign by any means! I also bought C Puts with anticipation of shareholders selling due to bad bank stipulations. The worst performing banks will not be able to survive well with the bad banks’ rules.
Chris
you are correct about the ceo he is self dealing in this company and has in the last 3months taken drys to its knees.
as for the filing of $500m worth of shares. i dont think they are unloading them currently well atleast they wont unload all of them now. but those 2 points are why im being very cautious when to buy in. the CEO does not care about shareholders. he could very well throw those shares out for nothing.
as for the companies comparison genco and drys. I still would take drys. they are close on their dry shipping value imo. but drys has 2 drill ships that make over 1.1 million dollars a day gross aroun 700k net profit / day. they have 2 more being delivered end of next year.
to compare their cape size ships drys has 7 and gnk has 6 and they make about the same on their time charters. drys just signed their un-sold ship to a time charter for 21k, which brought down their average and imo was a dumb move as the rates for these ships have been moving up and china hasnt re-negotiated prices on iron yet.
I believe GE (george economou ceo) will do anything he can to make sure they keep the drillship newbuilds.
the other numbers you mention are wrong. they had 400million in cash and 1.2 billion in credit lines.
the ceo stole 180 million in fees for cancellations lol
when they guy mentions EXP is talking about EXP trader ??
GNK just had talks with its bank over its line of credit due to loan covenant requirements. loan covenants are basically the equity of the ships, which have plunged. navios maritime filed the same $500m sell of shares yesterday but no one seems to have noticed because DRYS got hyped up on its recent huge upswing.
drys is making payments its not in serious risk of BK, but again I’m getting more and more sick of this malaka ceo pocketing money from this company because his net worth has been cut by 75%.
Trust me im being careful with drys. If they could boot the ceo the company would prosper.
chris
careful with those puts if drys closes up higher, 7.28 currently you should think about selling them. if it continues back below than you should have a str8 drop to $5.50 is the next resistance level.
I need to get into options. i would bought a ton of puts on this baby yesterday.
I hope you make a killing on those puts. then i can load up on drys at low price and go back up with her.
I love money ,is that bad to say?..Trading baskets has been a pleasure in this market…Basket trading is a one key trade with some brokers,essentially I put my 10-15 favorite etfs and or stocks and I can buy the entire basket simultaneously and sell the same way…
This market is flip flopping all over the place…
the ceo didnt lower his stake though. its been diluted lower by the share offering that poster mentioned in your earlier post. the cantor fitzgerald part.
rookie what trading platform do you use ??
I have a limit order placed while I’ll be out for the last hour of the day today at 3.75 when I bought at 2.70. The charts scream lower, but I won’t hold over the weekend. I’m not holding anything over the weekend when it comes to options. Too much volatility. I could have locked in 3.90 earlier, but I felt it had further to go. I think we get an EOD selloff and that should bring DRYS down a bit further being under that last level of support now. The only thing that worries me is the velocity of the drop in DRYS. Some correction is needed and I feel a bounce is expected soon. I want to be out of my puts by then. I should be, because I don’t see a bounce coming this afternoon.
well it was a good trade. I still expect drys to continue to fall into monday.
rookie what trading platform do you use ??
I use Realtick for my day trading/scalping…Fidelity for basket trades and bond funds etc…I also have a sweep account at work for size orders…
Just sold my DRYS puts for a 40% profit. I’m holding C puts going into the weekend on the bad bank delay. Very risky move, but I don’t have a whole lot tied into them.
What a pleasure to wake up and get my dividends delivered straight to my account (Bond Funds)…No shoveling snow fees for the month,no broken toilet repair costs,no management cut taken out,no unpaid rents,no DSS changes,no water bill looming to kill last months profits,no eviction costs,no roof repair costs…
I know this is the trading thread but it just baffles me why people are so happy on RE…My experience in comparison to the worst stock market in 70 years is that income properties are a real @#%&*^% job and aggravation…Talk about a circulation of money leading to nowhere…One month you feel like you did the right thing then next month you are mauled with bills bills and more bills…I will gladly take a lower ROI to simplify things…These thoughts are exactly the reason why I don’t believe in leverage for RE…Why would someone want to tie themselves into multiple water bills and expenses as I wrote above vs just having one or two free and clear properties with zero mortgages making money…Leverage is no good in RE…I’m glad I only put a diminutive portion of capital into RE…DO I make money?..Yes but it is aggravation and I dont even manage the properties…
I know this is the trading thread but it just baffles me why people are so happy on RE...
I am happy with my rental business because I can set my own schedule; work only 12-16 hours per week; and still enough money to do what I want to do. For me, going to an office every day would be miserable. I don’t like to have a schedule and I don’t like to work every day. I know that I’m spoiled, but I absolutely hate setting an alarm clock (although I usually wake up at 6am anyway) and I hate “putting in time”.
What I do like is getting up in the morning and deciding what I want to do today. I like watching the news and the early part of the stock market before I go to work. I like being home before the closing bell so that I can look at any trades I have going. I like being able to take off anytime I like and deciding at the last minute that I’m taking today off. In other words, I like the FREEDOM that my rental property business allows.
I also really like that the profits from the rental business are a LOT more reliable than stock market returns. What we’ve seen in this stock market thread is that people are only posting their winners. Anyone that is claiming that they only make money trading stocks is LYING (I’m not talking about anyone in particular). I see “I made 50% today” and “I made $5,000 today” types of posts, but I’m not seeing any “I lost $5,000 today” posts. Anyone that actually trades stocks knows that they aren’t all winners, but that’s the impression we get from the posts I’m seeing here (makes me sorry that I started this thread). I was hoping that this thread would show the reality of stock trading - both the good and the bad, but that clearly isn’t going to happen. We all know that for every person that is as successful at stock trading like RookieNYC, there are literally thousands who have lost their butt in the market.
The other BIG reason that I like the rental business is that I am in control of the results. With stocks, I have absolutely no control over what a company does. I can’t control that the accounting department is cooking the books. I can’t control that the company is making risky liar loans. I can’t control that a clinical trial goes bad when a patient dies. I can’t control that our idiot government comes out with another bailout de jour, etc, etc, etc.
No shoveling snow fees for the month,no broken toilet repair costs,no management cut taken out,no unpaid rents,no DSS changes,no water bill looming to kill last months profits,no eviction costs,no roof repair costs.
Those are all normal operating expenses and should not alter your cash flow over time. In the rental business (like the stock trading business), the cash flow is lumpy. Any particular property in any given month can be good or bad. The key to either business is what happens over the long term. Moreover, when you only have a few rentals, this lumpy cash flow effect is amplified. With a larger number of rentals, it all smooths out as each month is closer to the average.
If I had the cash to put money into bond funds and live off the dividends (and had confidence in the bonds), I would do so. It doesnt get any better than that! However, I don’t have that much cash and therefore I can’t do that. In my opinion, the next best thing is to operate my rental business. Of course, you are correct that there are headaches (as in every business). Dealing with those headaches is the price I pay to be semi-retired with my rental business.
Mike
I’ve posted my losers? Anyone that only posts their winners is lying. People lose money. However, to say that the RE business is more reliable in terms of profit than the market is ignorance. If you keep tight stops and know what you’re trading from a fundamental AND technical point of view, it isn’t that hard to consistently make profit. Right now, with the volatility as high as it is, you can slaughter the market by going to with flow and riding fear swings. A swing trader cares not if the market is going up or down, just as long as it is going where he intends for it to go. You’re only trading a days length at the most, so risk is lower vs being long anything, which we all know is a sure way to deplete your account right now. It’s great that you make consistent and reliable returns in RE. However, there are many who would argue that the market isn’t as bad as many people make it out to be. It all has to do with your trading style and level of experience. :beer
Mike before I post the following responses you know I have the utmost amount of respect for you…So don’'t take offense to me debating some of these issues…
With a larger number of rentals, it all smooths out as each month is closer to the average
This I totally %100 disagree with…With more units comes more aggravation…More leverage,more debt,more tenant issues,higher likelyhood of evictions,repairs,damages,renovations,higher taxes over time…But I do see your idea that more is better and things would average themselves out…This would hold true IF rents were a sure thing,they are not…It would also hold true if expenses didn’t go up 3x as fast as rents…We all know as landlords that the market sets the rate for rents,not our expenses…
I also really like that the profits from the rental business are a LOT more reliable than stock market returns. What we’ve seen in this stock market thread is that people are only posting their winners. Anyone that is claiming that they only make money trading stocks is LYING
I firmly believe that I’m the one that brought culpability to these boards when speaking of stock trading and I’m sure you would agree…Dream trading is rampant on this forum,or I say use to be…I guage my year by % up or % down…I post ideas that people can invest with and profit from and at the same time I admit my mistakes…Losing $$ trading is part of trading,but not all are net losers…
At the same time I do realize my responsibility in posting that I am very different than %99.9 of people on this forum but at the same time I don’t want people to feel that RE is the only way to make income…I’m not talking trading here…When the stock market stabilizes closed end funds and bond funds will hammer RE returns for years to come…Its not a bad idea to have some income producing properties,I always said that its best to have numerous forms of income…But to say that one is better than the other is unfactual,this theory only pertains to the individual running the money…
The other BIG reason that I like the rental business is that I am in control of the results.
Are you really?..You dont control the tenants if they pay you or not…You dont control if they vandalize your properties,you dont control the taxes going higher or the water or insurance…You most certainly have more control than an idiot like me who uses property managers,but in control of the results %100 you are not…But the way you do it is the right way,that much I will say…But then the debate goes on if your rentals make more than a high paying job…If you are happy that is all that counts,for me the action is the juice…
If I had the cash to put money into bond funds and live off the dividends (and had confidence in the bonds), I would do so. It doesnt get any better than that! However, I don’t have that much cash and therefore I can’t do that.
One piece of advice on the doom and gloom end of the world buy canned goods mentality…You have to invest when people hate stocks…I’m not doubting that we possibly see %20 lower in this market over 2009,but over the longterm you better place your bets on the long side…History always repeats itself and betting against this country over the longterm is a mistake…