SPY

‘s High-Tech Spy Network: Just Had An IPO?

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In the high-tech world of espionage, deep pockets prevail.  Not this time though, as Chinese spies have mined substantial amounts of data.. through Facebook.  Proving that the social data mining machine is a double-edged sword, the spies gathered email addresses, phone numbers, names, and details on family members on a number of high-ranking military officials.  The fake account of United States Navy admiral James Stavridis befriended a number of other officials for an undisclosed amount of time before the intrusion was identified.  Considering the number of ‘spoof’ accounts of a number of famous celebrities and the sensitivity of these high-ranking … Read more

Index Funds, Where Are We Now?

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Index Funds, Where Are We Now?   While following important economic news as it continually streams through headlines, its akin to wrapping your mouth around a fire hose to quench your thirst; however it’s essential to consider how these developments are affecting your investments. Take a look at how a couple of major indexes and index funds have performed since the beginning of the year…   PowerShares DB US Dollar Index Bullish (NYSE:UUP) -1.53% U.S. Equity: SPDRS S&P 500 Index (NYSE:SPY) -1.22% Technology: PowerShares QQQ (Nasdaq:QQQ) 0.94% Europe, Australia-Asia iShares MSCI EAFE Index (NYSE:EFA) -15.77% Energy: United States Oil (NYSE:USO) -1.82% Precious Metals: iShares Comex Gold Trust (NYSE:IAU) +9.57% Fixed Income: iShares Barclays … Read more

Sign of a top? GLD Moves Into Top Spot, Surpasses SPY As Biggest ETF – Focus on Funds

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GLD Moves Into Top Spot, Surpasses SPY As Biggest ETF Is $5,000/Ounce The New Target In Gold’s Run?MKM: Buy Silver ETF (14% Upside); Pair Utilities With October Calls By Murray Coleman Here’s another rather stark sign of our times: – The SPDR Gold Trust (GLD) on Friday moved past the grand-daddy of all ETFs, the SPDR S&P 500 (SPY), as the leader in overall assets. According to data provided by State Street’s (STT) Global Advisors ETF unit today, here’s a breakdown of assets as of Friday’s close: GLD: $76.67 billion SPY: $74.38 billion But something to keep in mind about … Read more

Chart of the day: Rolling 3-Month Correlation Between Oil & S&P500

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Over the past few years the correlation between oil (especialy WTI Crude Oil) and the S&P500 has been remarkably consistent with an average of about 0.75 (scale from -1 to 1).  However, over the past month that strong correlation that traders had become acustomed to has diminished at an exponential rate.  Over this past month, the rolling 3 month correlation (rolling windows give a much more accurate measure) has fallen to its lowest level since the early 2000s (less than 0.20). Basically, the Energy sector and oil have been moving less in tandem with each other on a day to day basis than they have in years.  Source: Bespoke Investment … Read more

‘s Focus Growth Fund: A Brief Analysis

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by: Dr. Osman Gulseven In a recent article, I discussed the top holdings in Morgan Stanley’s portfolio. According the latest 13F filings, Morgan Stanley’s (MS) year-to-date performance was mediocre and below the S&P 500 (SPY) return. The investment banks mutual funds have been lagging behind the market since the last decade. The mediocre performance of investment banks portfolio shows that they take hard-earned money and invest in under-performing assets. They also charge management fees and hidden costs such as front-end/back-end loads, plus commissions you never heard of. Some companies charge up to 3% in management expenses. I was checking which funds … Read more