Month: December 2011

We told you so! Tests Find Mead Johnson Infant Formula Not Contaminated – WSJ.com

by

Readers of the SaxAngle making record profits this month.   Federal Health Probe Finds Mead Johnson Infant Formula Not Contaminated   Federal health investigators cleared an infant formula of suspected bacterial contamination that last week prompted retailers to pull a batch of the product from their shelves. In a joint statement late Friday, the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said tests of factory-sealed containers of the formula, made by Mead Johnson Nutrition Co., showed no contamination. “Based on test results to date, there is no need for a recall of infant formula, and … Read more

Is the stock market manipulated?

by

We were surprised like most market participants by the record volatility in the market and the insidious correlation.  The phrase “risk on” and “risk off” became the new descriptor for market behavior in 2011.  The last day of November the S&P 500 moved over 4.2% alone nearly erasing the entire month’s loss.  If you weren’t 100% invested you missed out on the whole month.  There’s an old saying that the market figures out how to screw the most people most of the time.  Whether you were long or short, Mr. Market had a trick up its sleeve for you. For … Read more

2012 Investment Predictions

by

First of all let me say, macro investing is not my style.  None the less like a chocaholic,  I can’t help myself.   So without further ado my 2012 predictions, they are: The trade down economy will continue to be resilient.  People will continue clipping coupons, searching for ways to make a dollar go further, and making less do more.  It’s bleak, depressing, and if you can find any untapped ideas, you’ll make a lot of money here.  As the lady said, let them eat cake.  I’m not talking about cheesecake either.  Long Mickey D. Short Cheesecake Factory. Dividends will … Read more

Volatility Cuts Hedge Fund Returns – Barrons.com

by

Volatility Minces Returns By BEVERLY GOODMAN | MORE ARTICLES BY AUTHOR Why John Paulson—and many other hedge fund managers—did so poorly in 2011. Where have all the stockpickers gone? Even John Paulson has apologized. It’s no secret that 2011 was a tough year. But investors who sought refuge in hedge funds—especially those thought to excel in choppy markets—were sorely disappointed. Not to mention none the richer. As of Nov. 30, the 2,000 hedge funds tracked by Hedge Fund Research are down, on average, 4.5%, trailing the Standard & Poor’s 500 by almost four points. “This is only the third year … Read more

Shale-Gas Boom Spurs Race – WSJ.com

by

Shale-Gas Boom Spurs Race States Vie for New Chemical Factories—and Jobs—Powered by Lower Energy Costs By JAMES R. HAGERTY The boom in low-cost natural gas from shale is driving investment in plants that use gas for fuel or as a raw material, setting off a race by states to attract such factories and the jobs they create. Shale-gas production is spurring construction of plants that make chemicals, plastics, fertilizer, steel and other products. A report issued earlier this month by PricewaterhouseCoopers LLC estimated that such investments could create a million U.S. manufacturing jobs over the next 15 years. West Virginia … Read more

Baby formula death setting up to be one of the major buying opportunities in some time.

by

This is setting up to be one of the major buying opportunities in some time.  Mead Johnson (MJN) since it’s February 11 2009 spin-off inaugural debut close of $26.43 had risen to a recent high 0f $76.53 on December 21 when the death of a new born baby was  linked to Enfamil which accounts for  the majority of MJN revenue.  Although there has been nothing conclusively  linking this death to the Enfamil batch a  number of retailers including Walmart have removed it from their shelves.  It’s important to note that the Company states this batch was tested for Cronobacter (the … Read more

How do you put your child through college without spending big bucks on them finding themselves?

by

– 3 Kings – from Cole Sax on Vimeo.   If you encourage your son to follow his dreams, you might wind up with one  that has marketable talents without spending big bucks on college for four years while  they try to find themselves.  Check out my 19 yr. old son, Cole’s, latest rocking’ ski video featured on Oakley’s web site featuring local phenom Alex Schloppy, X Games Gold Big Air 2011.  Excuse the puffing from a proud father but this video rocks.

‘s the next bubble?

by

Most people look at investing in bubbles as a human weakness.  The investment lore is filled with tragic stories of people investing at the top of crowd mania.  You don’t have to look far on the investment horizon to see the carnage.  The fabulous run up in value of single family homes culminating in the giant collapse of value of house values we are into now, the dot.com bust and attendant tech crash in 2000- 2002 and to a lesser extent the fabulous appreciation of stock prices in the 80’s and 90’s that created a decade of sub par returns in the … Read more

ECB Won’t Step Up Bond Purchases: Draghi – Bloomberg

by

This is really pretty incredible.  It’s surprising to me that more people  are not talking about this.  While the headline reads all doom and gloom, if you read the article, the ECB just provided unlimited loans to banks and without question many of these if not all will be buyers of their country’s soverign debt.  This is the defacto unlmiited support peple are calling for.  I guess they may have to spell it out better.   The ECB is resisting pressure to increase its bond buying, saying governments need to find a lasting solution to the debt crisis. The central … Read more

Zynga IPO Fizzles as Stock Falls 5% – WSJ.com

by

In the upside down world of good news is bad news, bad news is good news, this is actually a bullish event although on the surface people are interpreting it negatively. There is no surer way to hurt equity prices than by creating more supply.  Wall Street might not be good for much these days but they are great at floating stock when they smell the slightest opportunity.  If the Zynga IPO had stuck, greedy bankers would rush out as many overpriced deals as they could. Now they will hesitate on adding more supply to a weak market and this … Read more

Best and Worst Stocks of 2011 – Yahoo! Finance

by

Best and Worst Stocks of 2011 By Ben Steverman | Bloomberg – 19 hours ago The U.S. stock market returned almost nothing to investors in 2011. As of early December, the Standard & Poor’s 500 index had netted 0.9 percent — and actually lost 1 percent if dividends aren’t included. Such poor overall performance hides some wide variations: 80 stocks in the S&P 500 returned 20 percent or more in 2011, while 43 lost more than a third of their value. Bloomberg Rankings analyzed S&P 500 returns as of Dec. 2 to determine which stocks were best and worst to shareholders in … Read more

Buckle Up! – Barrons.com

by

This cover article from this week’s Barrons.  My only observation is how does one get a job by being this wrong?  Everyone they reviewed failed miserably on their forecast for this year.  Why would they be any better for 2012?  The guy who came closest to being right, Doug Cliggot is not on the panel anymore.  I guess why reward competence.  By the way he is super bearish and in September projected a year end of 1100 S&P 500 for 2011, two weeks left for a big market drop to fulfill this prediction.   Buckle Up! By VITO J. RACANELLI | MORE … Read more

‘| ZeroHedge

by

The Mother Of All Chart Porn – Presenting Goldman’s Top 100 Favorite Charts Submitted by Tyler Durden on 12/16/2011 08:51 -0500 Goldman Sachs goldman sachs Christmas comes early for chart porn addicts this year, courtesy of Goldman Sachs which has compiled its top 100 favorite charts together in one place. As Goldman’s Hugo Scott-Gall. says: This is a supplementary chart book to our final Fortnightly Thoughts of the year. In it, we take the best charts that we have published throughout the year and rearrange them to tell the story of the world. Our story is not just of 2011, … Read more

‘t Touch

by

Hedge Fund Titan Michael Platt Reveals The Three Things He Won’t Touch U.K. hedge fund manager Michael Platt, the founder of $30 billion fund BlueCrest Capital, discussed the eurozone crisis, European banks and opportunities for investing on Bloomberg Television’s “Inside Track.” via Hedge Fund Titan Michael Platt Reveals The Three Things He Won’t Touch.

JP Morgan Research Top Ideas for 2012

by

This is a 156 page report I’ve posted.  I’m not sure if its worth the additional storage I’ll have to pay my network provider.  In other words, it may be completely worthless.  But then again, like I say in my seminars, you should come to your own conclusions after listening to what others have to say.  A few days ago, I posted BAC Merrill Lynch’s research department’s top ideas for 2012.  Before you download this with baited breath, read this blurb from Dec 12, 2011 WSJ Blog. “J.P Morgan permabull Thomas Lee is at it again, issuing a note this … Read more

No hedge fund strategies have positive YTD results

by

Dow Jones Credit Suisse Core Index Performance Index / Sub Strategies Value** Nov 11 YTD 1 Year Annl* Std Dev* Sharpe* Dow Jones Credit Suisse Core Hedge Fund Index 92.97 -0.95% -7.03% -4.16% 6.38% 6.78% 0.67 Convertible Arbitrage 91.16 -2.35% -8.84% -8.50% 2.86% 11.51% 0.09 Emerging Markets 97.44 -1.43% -2.56% -0.56% 9.48% 10.84% 0.71 Event Driven 88.32 -0.76% -11.68% -8.96% 4.64% 8.32% 0.34 Fixed Income Arbitrage 99.14 -0.87% -0.86% 0.78% 7.51% 8.74% 0.65 Global Macro 89.57 -1.43% -10.43% -6.41% 5.66% 7.58% 0.50 Long/Short Equity 94.73 -0.94% -5.27% -2.60% 6.55% 8.46% 0.56 Managed Futures 95.31 0.52% -4.69% -0.30% 8.42% 12.33% 0.53 … Read more

Turmoil sparks hunt for high-yield stocks – FT.com

by

Turmoil sparks hunt for high-yield stocks By Michael Mackenzie and Dan McCrum in New York Fund managers have had to be nimble this year. A transformed trading environment has tested their investment strategies to breaking point. The S&P 500 index of US stocks may have fallen just 3.6 per cent in 2011, but this modest decline masks a year of sharp price swings against a backdrop of a worsening eurozone debt crisis and banking problems. A slowdown in emerging market economies and fears that the US economy could suffer prolonged stagnation have added to the volatility in equities. via Turmoil … Read more

For Europe, Only Way Out Is to Break Up: Kyle Bass – Yahoo! Finance

by

For Europe, Only Way Out Is to Break Up: Kyle Bass CNBC – 47 minutes ago   With no workable solutions in sight and a sovereign debt crisis only likely to get worse, the European Union is likely to see an ultimate breakup, widely followed hedge fund executive Kyle Bass told CNBC. Bass, the managing partner at Hayman Capital Management famous for making huge sums from the collapse of the subprime mortgage industry, said last week’s EU summit produced “a blank piece of paper” on which “there are no details,” causing him to conclude, “It won’t work.” via For Europe, Only Way … Read more

Bernanke Tells Senators Federal Reserve Has No Plan to Aid European Banks – Bloomberg

by

Since we know Germany has no plans to allow the ECB to bail out countries, there seems little hope for European banks that own lots of sovereign debts from countries under siege.  So if you can find ways to short European banks, this may be a good trade.   We own puts on Deutsche Bank (DB)and Barclays(BCS)  The weakest ones are the French banks but there are no ADRs to trade.   Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke told Republican senators the Fed plans no additional aid to European banks amid the region’s sovereign debt crisis, according to two lawmakers … Read more

The Week Ahead: Apple-HTC Smartphone Suit Moves Toward Ruling in U.S. – WSJ.com

by

Judgment Day Looms for Apple, HTC   By IAN SHERR Apple Inc.’s claims that some smartphones running Google Inc.’s Android software copy its inventions are approaching their first big judgment day in the U.S. The International Trade Commission in Washington on Wednesday is expected to rule on whether some phones made by HTC Corp. violate Apple’s patents. The ruling could lead to a ban on handsets sold by the Taiwanese company, which uses the Android operating system and is the No. 3 smartphone provider in the U.S. market, according to research firm Nielsen. via The Week Ahead: Apple-HTC Smartphone Suit … Read more

‘t As Easy As Advertised – Barrons.com

by

No Easy—or Cheap—Remedy for Volatility By BEVERLY GOODMAN | MORE ARTICLES BY AUTHOR Lots of new funds promise to remove uncomfortable price changes from your portfolio, but most are unproven and could be bad for your financial health. The only thing more alarming than this year’s market volatility has been some of the unsolicited advice given to investors who don’t even understand the problem. Several mainstream publications and television pundits have casually —and clearly without the benefit of much research—recommended that investors wary of market volatility try an array of expensive and unproven products. Among them: inversely correlated funds, which aim to … Read more

S&P 500 Dividend Aristocrats

by

Dividend paying blue chip stocks have been one of the soundest and least volatile of the equity investments this year. As of this date the S&P 500 Dividend Aristocrats are up 6.4% YTD.  If you add the current yield of 3.27% to that, you get an annualized return of almost 10%.  Very few hedge funds will surpass that this year.   In fact 44% of the total return of the S&P 500 over the last 80 years has been from dividends.  In many cases, the dividends paid by the common stock exceed the yield on the corporate debt of the … Read more

How can you buy below the market? Try selling puts below the current price.

by

We’ve added this explanation on put writing from the Options Industry Council.  One of our favorite strategies is naked put selling.  We only do this on securities we would be willing to own.  When we can’t find anything to buy at prices we like ( for example the market has risen to new heights), we may sell puts on stocks we would be willing to buy if they fell back to a level we were comfortable with.  If we get put the stock, we are no worse off than had we bought it at that price.  If we don’t’ get … Read more

Trading the Markets is a Humbling Experience

by

Just ask JP Morgan security analyst that put out this bold buy recommendation literally minutes before Texas Instruments warned and stock shed 8.15% after hours.   Hot Research PM | THURSDAY, DECEMBER 8, 2011 Texas Instruments May Boost Q4 Guidance J.P. Morgan says the chip giant will see strength in its OMAP products. Texas Instruments (TXN: NYSE) By J.P. Morgan Securities ($30.67, Dec. 8, 2011) After the close Thursday, Texas Instruments is scheduled to provide an update on business conditions for the fourth quarter. We expect TI (ticker: TXN) to raise the midpoint of its fourth-quarter revenue guidance from $3.4 billion (down … Read more

”s Gain – WSJ.com

by

Investor George Soros’s family fund bought about $2 billion of European bonds formerly owned by MF Global Holdings Ltd., the very debt that helped force the securities firm to file for bankruptcy protection Oct. 31, according to people close to the matter. Under the direction of MF Global’s former chief executive, Jon S. Corzine, the firm accumulated $6.3 billion of short-term debt issued by various European nations, mostly from Italy, in a bid to boost trading profits. Over the summer, this debt led to nervousness by investors, regulators and ratings companies, resulting in the firm’s collapse just over a month … Read more

Hedge funds braced for worst year since 2008 – FT.com

by

Hedge funds braced for worst year since 2008 By Sam Jones in London and Dan McCrum in New York Hedge funds are set to rack up their second-worst year in two decades after taking a beating from the eurozone crisis and an unexpected slowing in global economic growth. The average hedge fund manager has lost 4.37 per cent in the year to the end of November, according to data just released by Hedge Fund Research – losing money in six of the past seven months. Only in 2008, following the collapse of Lehman Brothers, did the industry fare worse. High … Read more

‘s promotion machine- the more bearish he bets, the more money he raises.

by

It’s interesting to note Kyle Bass’s, Hayman Capital Advisors Form 13F filings.  I’ve posted his most recent one from Sept 30, 2011.  .  Now I’ve posted his Sept 30th 2010 return below where he had just a fraction of the money he manages now.  The more bearish Bass gets, the more money he raises. Perhaps he’s more wily than smart.  Hayman Capital Advisors AUM based on these filings has risen almost ten fold.  The most recent 13F filing counts $739.19 million dollars.  A far cry from the $73.4 million in the Sept 30th 2010 filing.  There’s nothing to suggest great … Read more

"The insomniac hedge fund guy" is a moniker Harvey Sax, the portfolio manager for The Insiders Fund has used from time to time on email, blog , and social media posts. While Mr. Sax is the portfolio manager of The Insiders Fund, these posts are not communications from, nor endorsed by, Alpha Wealth Funds, LLC or any of its managed funds. References to Alpha Wealth Funds or its affiliates are for identification only and do not imply sponsorship or approval. All registered trademarks herein are the property of their respective owners.

© 2026 Insomniac Hedge Fund Guy