Roger McNamee: Mark Zuckerberg is “The One”
http://www.bloomberg.com/video/89124073/ It’s weird when you listen to someone that you’ve never heard of before—someone that you’ve never met—talk about his opinions on a complex issue and you both are in complete agreement. This is exactly what happens to me every time I hear Roger McNamee talk. We are both bullish on Facebook and Apple; bearish … Read more
My old trading setup: Testing “The Club”
As I was checking my computer for old files to back up (I’m selling my MacBook) I came across this photo of my trading desk: Click on the photo to enlarge it. On the right-side computer monitor, I had my list of longs and shorts arranged carefully under relevant categories. Longs occupy the top half; … Read more
Research in Motion is going to report atrocious numbers after the bell tomorrow. If there’s capitulation I will sell some puts.
As a reversalist, I like buying stocks that everybody hates. The more controversial, the better. If people hate a stock, then by definition there must be a lot of short sellers. And short covering is what makes stocks go up fast. Sometimes I’m the one doing the covering, which really sucks and I realize how … Read more
I used RightSignature and have something to add to the JCOM short case
Bronte Capital published a great analysis on j2 Global here. John Hempton found no evidence of fraud—JCOM is just using cash from operations to roll up competitors in the electronic fax business and then raising prices. But my issue with this is that the goodwill created during the acquisitions can hardly be called goodwill at … Read more
PCs will be like trucks. The new iPad is very disruptive to laptop PCs, which of course Apple also sells.
The easier thing to do is figure out who loses. What you really should have done in 1905 when you saw what the auto industry was going to do is you should have gone short horses. There were 20 million horses in 1900 and there are about 4 million horses now. So it’s easy to … Read more
SoundExchange: A rentier non-profit/mutual holding company; Pandora shareholders are playing a risky game of Monopoly
SoundExchange is a “performance rights organization” that collects royalties from service providers like Spotify, Pandora and Sirius Satellite Radio–and then distributes the royalties to artists. Here is a video explaining how the process works. SoundExchange retains very little of its earnings, distributing virtually all of its income to artists, so it is effectively a mutual … Read more
Digital Garage: a puzzle from Japan
You all know the “Asian asset value” thesis for Yahoo: buy the stock of a questionable American company to own a piece of some great Chinese and Japanese companies. Well I found a similar situation, but it’s more of a puzzle. Digital Garage (4819) owns 11,672,000 shares of Kakaku.com (2371) worth about $350M. It has … Read more
Pandora: sell-side double talk from Stifel Nicolaus; I message Tim Westergren
“Valuation remains vexing unless one believes, as we do, that the strategic value of becoming a mobile advertising platform justifies a value of $4 billion or more.” -Jordan Rohan Why even mention that the valuation is bothersome (read: excessive) if you really believe the stock is worth 50% more than its current price? If this … Read more
Did I really say Google was a short? I wasn’t serious or sane when I said that. Eat where you want to eat.
As a believer in Facebook, I have been verbally smashing Google lately. GoogleTV sucks, Google+ sucks, the paid ad business is a “bubble” (I hate using that overused word) and this and that. Well, no company is perfect and I carried my criticism too far when I said GOOG was a short. I never actually … Read more
I have become extremely bearish on Pandora. My price target is $5 because I think Spotify will destroy it.
Pandora.com’s free service is very limited. It does not allow users to replay or rewind tracks. It does not allow you to listen to a specific artist or song on demand. Pandora’s Human Genome Project is good at suggesting music that users like, but this feature is becoming commoditized. Spotify Radio suggests music. Grooveshark suggests … Read more
Hugh Hendry Interview: GDP Growth Of +5% Would Be A Hard Landing In China; The Yen Could SOAR From These Levels
Page 32 of Barron’s features an interview with Hugh Hendry, founder of Eclectica Asset Management. “If you talk about a hard landing in China, you talk about GDP growth of 5%, not minus 5% or minus 15%. The Chinese government prints money. It can build superfast railways and overbuild airports, because the rest of the … Read more
Breaking News: Facebook Clears At $40 Per Share On SecondMarket; I Talk To A Facebook Employee
Shares cleared at $40 on SecondMarket, a record high ($93.3 billion valuation). At the same time, volume was at a record low–20,000 shares. Consider that last week, volume was over 170,000 shares. There is simply a huge demand from buyers and not much supply from sellers. There were bids for 13 million shares vs. 2 … Read more
FB at $37 per share ($86 billion valuation): The Market Reacts To Facebook S-1
Last Wednesday, FB shares cleared at $33 and $40, on SecondMarket and Sharespost respectively. The bids for each Dutch auction were due at noon that day, five hours before Facebook filed its S-1. So this week is the first time we get to see the market’s reaction to the filing. Last night, the clearing prices … Read more
Update On Apple: It’s A Myth That Apple’s OS Is “Closed” While Android Is “Open”: Evidence From Jailbreaking
The Apple Meme Is Still Strong This is self evident unless you live in a cave. Even among people not remotely interested in technology, Apple comes up in conversation. I hear Apple mentioned on random commercials. Whenever a computer is depicted, it tends to be a Mac. This weekend I saw John Oliver’s standup routine. … Read more
The Efficiency Of The Indian Market And Foreign Investor Inflows/Outflows; Jubilant Foodworks Has 1/2 The Market Cap Of DPZ, Despite Having Less Than 1/8 Of The Franchises: “Bingo” In Poker
Last week I got a primer on investing in India from a local. I like looking at things that are off the map, and India definitely qualifies. I could only find two academic papers on whether their stock market is efficient! It isn’t. For one thing, there appear to be day-of-the-week effects! Now I am … Read more
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