“Where are the customers’ yachts?” It was a question the tour guide didn’t expect. He was taking a group of tourists through the financial district in lower Manhattan from the area now known as Battery Park. #-ad_banner-#Eventually docks appeared around the park. And because of its proximity to Wall Street, it became a favored location for Wall Street bankers and brokers to dock their very expensive yachts. So it was on this day that the tour guide was extolling the virtues of Wall Street moneymen. He told his audience that the yachts were the rewards for creating enormous wealth for… Read More

“Where are the customers’ yachts?” It was a question the tour guide didn’t expect. He was taking a group of tourists through the financial district in lower Manhattan from the area now known as Battery Park. #-ad_banner-#Eventually docks appeared around the park. And because of its proximity to Wall Street, it became a favored location for Wall Street bankers and brokers to dock their very expensive yachts. So it was on this day that the tour guide was extolling the virtues of Wall Street moneymen. He told his audience that the yachts were the rewards for creating enormous wealth for their customers. To which one lone voice asked, “Where are the customers’ yachts?” Selling Is More Lucrative Than Buying Now, I don’t know if this story is true. It was described in a book about Wall Street written in 1940 by Fred Schwed. The name of the book is “Where Are the Customers’ Yachts?” It’s a lighthearted look about a serious subject that every investor should read. But despite its humorous undertone, the message is dead on. There is far more money in providing financial advice to investors than there is in receiving financial advice from Wall Street experts. Read More

Since last June, I’ve sold nine portfolio holdings in my premium income newsletter, High-Yield Investing. All nine were for positive gains, between 2.1% and 74.1%. But I didn’t sell any of these stocks because I expected them to decline. Rather, most had lived up to their short-term potential and the time had come to cash out gains and look elsewhere for candidates with stronger upside. But there are investors who do actively bet against certain stocks by selling them short. In the simplest terms, this involves borrowing the shares and immediately selling them. A few weeks or months later, the… Read More

Since last June, I’ve sold nine portfolio holdings in my premium income newsletter, High-Yield Investing. All nine were for positive gains, between 2.1% and 74.1%. But I didn’t sell any of these stocks because I expected them to decline. Rather, most had lived up to their short-term potential and the time had come to cash out gains and look elsewhere for candidates with stronger upside. But there are investors who do actively bet against certain stocks by selling them short. In the simplest terms, this involves borrowing the shares and immediately selling them. A few weeks or months later, the shares are repurchased (ideally at a lower price) and returned to the original owner, with the trader keeping the difference. It’s “buy low and sell high” in reverse order. It’s a risky strategy. If you buy a stock at $10, the most you can lose is $10. And that’s only if it winds up completely worthless. But if you sell short at $10, the stock can rise to $20, or $30, or more. The more it rises, the more you lose. So in theory, the potential risk is unlimited (although in practice traders take steps to cap their losses). That’s… Read More

The S&P 500 isn’t just in record territory on the chart. It’s also on one of its best annual winning streaks ever. #-ad_banner-#2016 was the eighth consecutive year that the S&P 500 finished in the green. That is the second-longest annual win streak ever, even including its 1982 to 1989 run. The S&P 500’s best annual winning streak stands at nine years, stretching from 1991 to 1999. 2017 is the year the S&P 500 has a chance to tie this impressive streak. There’s no question U.S. stocks will have their work cut out for them this year. U.S. and global… Read More

The S&P 500 isn’t just in record territory on the chart. It’s also on one of its best annual winning streaks ever. #-ad_banner-#2016 was the eighth consecutive year that the S&P 500 finished in the green. That is the second-longest annual win streak ever, even including its 1982 to 1989 run. The S&P 500’s best annual winning streak stands at nine years, stretching from 1991 to 1999. 2017 is the year the S&P 500 has a chance to tie this impressive streak. There’s no question U.S. stocks will have their work cut out for them this year. U.S. and global economic growth remain stubbornly slow. The S&P 500’s average P/E ratio is at a multi-year high. And higher bond yields are attracting more attention from investors. Despite the usual bevy of challenges, I believe the S&P 500 is up to the challenge. There are three reasons the leading U.S. index is set to close the year at another all-time high. The S&P 500 Will Return To Earnings Growth In 2017 The S&P 500 has been trapped in a nasty earnings recession for most of the last six quarters. That streak was finally broken in the third quarter when earnings… Read More

Being extremely wealthy can be lonely. Most of us can only imagine what it is like to no longer be concerned about money or possessions. To be able to do nearly everything you have ever imagined, with the world truly being a playground of opportunity and adventure. If you want… Read More

Grab My New Book FREE! This Special Edition of Investing in the Next Big Thing tells you everything you need to know to get started in Pre-IPO Investing and includes an exclusive bonus chapter revealing 3 startups that I’m telling my clients to buy right now. They are 3 of the best… Read More

Working for IBM (NYSE: IBM) was the dream of many students in my business school. A job with the world’s leading high-tech company was far and away the most popular goal of both the graduate and undergraduate students. The talk was always very positive about the disciplined environment, the uniform of a dark suit, crisp white shirt, sober looking tie, the respect from others, and of course the relatively high pay for their sales representatives. When this company would visit the campus for career day interviews, it was insane. Everyone jockeyed to look their best and get an interview. #-ad_banner-#Perhaps… Read More

Working for IBM (NYSE: IBM) was the dream of many students in my business school. A job with the world’s leading high-tech company was far and away the most popular goal of both the graduate and undergraduate students. The talk was always very positive about the disciplined environment, the uniform of a dark suit, crisp white shirt, sober looking tie, the respect from others, and of course the relatively high pay for their sales representatives. When this company would visit the campus for career day interviews, it was insane. Everyone jockeyed to look their best and get an interview. #-ad_banner-#Perhaps best known for their work in the very early days of the personal computer, “Big Blue” is sometimes credited with its invention, a disputed fact. But one thing is for sure: they certainly popularized the PC. The world changed on August 12, 1981; the company announced the personal computer with the unheard-of price tag of $1,565. Just twenty years earlier, machines with similar capabilities could cost millions of dollars, demanded an entire office building floor, and required a large staff to maintain. This initial mass-produced PC was powered by an Intel 8088 microprocessor running at speeds measured in millionths of… Read More

In yesterday’s edition of StreetAuthority Daily, I made the case that investors should look to increased military spending by the new Trump administration and Republican-controlled congress as a strong catalyst for investing in the sector. The pick I shared in that article was a company that’s responsible for the construction of the bulk of the current U.S. Navy fleet. And since the Navy itself has said it will need at least 82 new vessels to maintain operational capacity, it is very likely that this company will continue to benefit. Another way to indirectly benefit from increased military spending in general… Read More

In yesterday’s edition of StreetAuthority Daily, I made the case that investors should look to increased military spending by the new Trump administration and Republican-controlled congress as a strong catalyst for investing in the sector. The pick I shared in that article was a company that’s responsible for the construction of the bulk of the current U.S. Navy fleet. And since the Navy itself has said it will need at least 82 new vessels to maintain operational capacity, it is very likely that this company will continue to benefit. Another way to indirectly benefit from increased military spending in general is with a recent pick made by my colleague Jimmy Butts, Chief Investment Strategist of Maximum Profit. —Recommended Link— 10 Stocks That Will Survive (And THRIVE) In The Era Of Trump Prime your portfolio for a chaotic 2017 with these rock solid, profit-packed stocks. They’re set to soar no matter which direction the market turns, so check out the list here… For those who are unfamiliar, Jimmy’s system uses two important momentum-based indicators to deliver “buy” signals on stocks when they are entering a period of rapid growth, and “sell” signals for when it’s time to book profits and… Read More

While the investing world continues to shovel money toward exchange-traded funds (ETFs) (full disclosure: I find myself using them more and more), it’s almost as if the grandfather of the ETF, the closed-end fund (CEF), has been reduced to a memory like dial phones or the Nehru jacket. But when I’m at a loss for finding value in an individual stock, I often find myself looking through CEF names like a millennial at a record shop. #-ad_banner-#CEFs can trace their origins back to the 1860s in Great Britain, when they were primarily used to raise money to build U.S. railroads. Read More

While the investing world continues to shovel money toward exchange-traded funds (ETFs) (full disclosure: I find myself using them more and more), it’s almost as if the grandfather of the ETF, the closed-end fund (CEF), has been reduced to a memory like dial phones or the Nehru jacket. But when I’m at a loss for finding value in an individual stock, I often find myself looking through CEF names like a millennial at a record shop. #-ad_banner-#CEFs can trace their origins back to the 1860s in Great Britain, when they were primarily used to raise money to build U.S. railroads. The first American CEFs appeared in 1893, 30 years prior to the first U.S. open-end mutual fund. Prior to the Crash of 1929, American CEFs claimed over $4 billion in assets, which was big money for the time. CEFs have evolved over the decades since, but their organization and basic features have remained relatively consistent. CEFs are and always have been professionally and actively managed, exchange-traded, internally leveraged, and income oriented. Recently, while screening a handful of CEFs, one piqued my interest: Calamos Convertible Opportunities and Income Fund (Nasdaq: CHI). As the name suggests, most of the fund’s heavy lifting… Read More

The biggest bull market in history was triggered by the Federal Reserve pouring money into the economy to prevent financial Armageddon during the 2008 meltdown. Since that time, the Dow has soared from a low in the mid-6000s to just below 20,000 in seven short years. The lesson we can learn here is that the government is the most powerful influence over stock prices. Investors who went long the market just before the bailout are sitting on handsome profits. Watching carefully for additional governmental actions in global economies is the way smart investors rack up outsized gains. The good news… Read More

The biggest bull market in history was triggered by the Federal Reserve pouring money into the economy to prevent financial Armageddon during the 2008 meltdown. Since that time, the Dow has soared from a low in the mid-6000s to just below 20,000 in seven short years. The lesson we can learn here is that the government is the most powerful influence over stock prices. Investors who went long the market just before the bailout are sitting on handsome profits. Watching carefully for additional governmental actions in global economies is the way smart investors rack up outsized gains. The good news is that I have identified another governmental “cash injection” that will likely fuel strong gains in the respective stock market. First, let’s look at what happened in the United States, then drill into how to profit from the next governmental cash injection. #-ad_banner-#The United States was on the brink of financial disaster. Stalwart financial institutions were failing. Century-old names like Lehman Brothers collapsed in the rubble of over-leveraged positions and decades of hubris. If you were investing during these risky times, you understand what it is like to be on the front lines of a global superpower’s economic collapse. Many… Read More