Back to Life....

After 3 long months hiatus from the investment community, I have finally selected my next home... Scotia McLeod. They are, what I believe, the most entrepreneurial of the bank owned investment firms, and I am incredibly excited to start building my empire along side some key individuals who are among the "best of the best" when it comes to areas of insurance, estate, and progressive portfolio council. (As always, the team is key)

I will quickly be following up with details on my investment philosophy and all the work that my mentor and I have been pushing forward over the last few months. We are in a very important part of the presidential election cycle and caution must be taken. The animal spirits are alive and kicking up a storm. Perceptions in the stock market are taking more bullish forms each day. It's amazing what can flourish in an environment where fundamental strength is non-existent, and yet the crowd wants to believe in what it sees... So up we go.

Risk management is the song we must sing.

How To Guarantee Income In Retirement...

The importance of Yield.

The Equity markets have moved in sync with the high-yield bond markets.

But as you can see in chart number 2, that doesn't mean an investment in each had the same result.

Chart 2 shows the same ETF's but adding dividends and coupon payments for the high-yield.

We are hosting 2 seminars this Fall that warrants attention:

1. Dividends (below)

2. How to Guarantee Income in Retirement. (Above)

Let me know if you would like to discuss these further... Regards.

An important event...

*With our recent acquisition of a company called Genuity, we picked up the number 1 Bank analyst and the number 1 Telecom analyst in Canada.

Call or email me to RSVP: (403) 781-1606

Best Regards.

Eric

Marketable Ideas.....

Well here we are.....

It is volatile months like July that makes one realize the benefits of leaving the "long only" business, and focusing on a more active (directional) mandate.

It seems like we've been at this inflection point forever, with the end of the world one possibility and a new bull market the other. But what is the bull case really built on? Terrible economic numbers and European bank stress tests that failed to consider sovereign bond holdings, this is only the biggest risk to the banks.

Economists, for what it's worth, seem to have all gone negative, but for opposite reasons. The fact that the long bond can be at all-time highs - a deflation worry - while gold is also at all-time highs - an inflation worry - illustrates the unparalleled disparity of views.

FinReg (aka the Volcker Rule) is starting to have an impact on the hedge fund industry. Morgan Stanley is selling down its stake in its successful Front Point Partners and Goldman Sachs has decided to spin out its prop trading business. Major industry changes lie ahead...

While most thinking is still bearish, the resilience of this market to all the negativity makes me unwilling to take on much directional exposure wither way. In other words, I'm looking to protect investors no matter what the market brings.

Best Regards and Safe Investing.

The Shape of Market Bubbles.

In my recent reviews of major worlds markets, I included a chart of the amazing bubble in the Shanghai Composite Index. In this post we’ll build an overlay of four major bubbles across market history to see the variety of shapes a bubble can take. But first let’s take a long view of the index. Incidentally, the index’s latest close was 2586.21. So a fall to the area Guppy mentioned is about a 10% correction from this point.In my recent reviews of major worlds markets, I included a chart of the amazing bubble in the Shanghai Composite Index. In this post we’ll build an overlay of four major bubbles across market history to see the variety of shapes a bubble can take. But first let’s take a long view of the index. Incidentally, the index’s latest close was 2586.21. So a fall to the area Guppy mentioned is about a 10% correction from this point.

The next chart centers the Shanghai Composite. The peak is the center of a 3000-market day timeline. Markets are open approximately 250 days per year, so this is a snapshot of a little over eight-and-a-half years with plenty of room left to track the future behavior. The dramatic rise took place over about one year with a dramatic collapse of about the same duration. The symmetry of this these two years is astonishing and, as we’ll see, not necessarily characteristic of bubbles.

Now we’ll add the Nasdaq Tech Bubble. The Nasdaq was a bit less aggressive in the early stages of bubble formation, but the collapses are remarkably similar.

Worst Oil Spills In History

An interesting pictograph of large oil spills throughout history and the one we are experiencing in the Gulf.

I find it fascinating that, through the wonders of media, this spill is being depicted as the worst disaster in history... (A political reaction due to the location being in the good old U.S. of A.)