Arkady's Thoughts

You have probably heard some of the rumors that a bill festooned with thousands of earmarks passed the house recently and making it's way through the Senate. This is the Omnibus Appropriations Act of 2009 a bill responsible for much of the federal program funding that our bloated government requires for daily operation. Courtesy of PatriotRoom .com an article on Politico suggests this bill may be in danger of being struck down not just by every single Republican, but some Democrats as well, including Bob Nelson. Bob Nelson is a surprising opposition member considering he lead the liberal Republicans Snow, Collins and Specter on the unfortunate passing of the stimulus bill. The Omnibus package passed the house largely along party lines with 16 Republicans supporting and some 20 B lue dog Democrats opposing for a total of: 245-178 Critics of the GOP opposition point out that 40% of the earmarks belong to the Republicans and frankly I find this extremely appalling . How can the par...

Yesterday Obama's foreclosure plan was unveiled and today House passed a bill that allows bankruptcy judges to modify loans . As of now Harry Reid plans to pull over spineless liberal GOP members to shove another travesty upon responsible Americans. If you are wondering why anyone would oppose a bill that apparently helps the housing a crisis, a leading catalyst of our current financial malaise, let me explain. First of all, despite all of Obama's lies as of now it does not appear that any programs or any provisions reward people who were responsible. He has said on multiple occasions that his plan will not only help struggling homeowners, but in the spirit of equality our dear leader indicated that the rest of us will not be left in the dust. As of now, we are left in the dust and worse yet, we are on the hook for all the unfortunate souls who were too stupid to read English language of the mortgage terms they were signing. Meanwhile because my CC company lost my payment a...

Liberals are continuing their assault on investors, traders and the stock market. Peter DeFazio introduced the Let Wall Street Pay for Wall Street’s Bailout Act of 2009 bill in another utterly audacious attempt to stifle private enterprise. What is especially sad, the purpose of this bill as officially stated is to pay for TARP! TARP was shoved down our throats by the liberals, largely rejected by the GOP and force fed to the American public. This bill was introduced several weeks ago, but I am just learning about it now and someone that participates in the market find this to be repulsive and disgusting to the core. The way it will work, is to simply levy a .25% on every transaction. So let's say for example that you have a 200,000 account and make $1,000,000 worth of transactions, which is as easy as buying and selling several hundred shares of things like BIDU, APPL, IBM, etc. With this tax, you are paying an extra $2,500 win or lose! This is important, you can lose your shirt ...

If you have been reading any of my articles then you know my general dislike for conspiracy theories and those that espouse them. Specifically Ron Paul's supporters and 9-11 T ruthers the embodiment of everything wrong with tinfoil hat wearing nutcases. I could care less you think there was a 2nd gunman or the bullet was embued with magical properties, but do not accuse our government of killing almost 3,000 of our citizens. Conspiracy theories will always be around us, like festering tumors in the heart of society and I have largely come to terms with that. I have written my theory as to why people turn to this dark "science" and stipulate that an absence of religion must be a primary explanation. For those of you who know me, this might sound hypocritical because I am an atheist, but my atheism does not push me into believing that some shadow organization is trying to control the world. I find it amusing that conspiracy nuts destroy the concept of religion and level a...

As I wrote a few days ago , the market found itself at a very critical level and had to hold in terms of supply and demand. Down 7,000 is both a psychological and technical level that if breached would usher in a new wave of selling and it did so with 4-5% across the board drops. The MSM will certainly try to explain this as a response to AIG's 60+ billion loss, but of course that is not true and has little to do with today's action. In fact AIG's cash losses are a mere 2 billion, but the assets that they insure dropped 60B in value. Oops? If anything, our mindless torpid government pledging ANOTHER 30 Billion to this company would be a catalyst for a sell-off. So right now, one would wonder what the correct course of action is for those who have been holding on desperately to their 401Ks and watching their accounts wither away. At about these levels, we are looking for capitulation, a mental white flag where the pain becomes too great and people sell in droves. We shoul...

Despite what many individuals (most of whom have no idea what they are talking about) and some pockets of the mainstream media, capitalism and free market did NOT cause the financial and housing crisis. In short, there is a great deal of government involvement in our financial sector and the constant meddling caused the bulk of this crisis. Without Fannie and Freddie buying up large swaths of CDOs (a collection of risky, non-risky loans), banks would not be so willing to sell these loans off in such a hurry. Of course Fannie & Freddie would not have operated on massive 60 to 1 leverage margins , had it not received an implicit guarantee from the government to be bailed out. When organizations that hold half the mortgages are called GSEs (Government Sponsored Enterprises) do we really have a free market system? No, we have institutions operating in ways they were never intended to operate, causing other banks to over leverage (like Bear Sterns) and subject themselves to m...

I have not done a stock market post in a while, but this one is important considering the latest developments. The latest time I spoke about Dow 7000 and why a hold of that support line is extremely crucial. Unfortunately it seems like the break will happen inevitably and doing so will essentially open the flood gates. I have provided a chart for you that someone else made and it illustrates a very obvious long term pattern, a chart of the S&P 500. Don't mind the wave count, but do realize that flirting with 2001 lows really illustrates the weakness of this market. If in the next few weeks Dow 7000 or in this case S&P 750~ is broken then expect the market to shave off another 50% of it's value! There is good news in all of this though, once a breach of that vital support occurs, a reflexive bounce will occur via a powerful bear rally. Thi rally could be a 30-50% move and will provide an opportunity to exit all long-term positions, however for the most part it will o...