Google Stockscreener is a service by Google that allows stocks to be screened. It can be found by going to Google Finance and clicking on the little link that says “stockscreener” next to the search field area.
What makes Google Stockscreener different from other stockscreener services is that it gives you a real time distribution chart that shows how many companies are in a particular area. For example, if you select a PE ratio of 15, Google shows a population distribution chart of
companies with different PE ratios and whether they are on the high or
low end of the scale. As you slide the PE ratio to the right or left, the number of companies showing up in the results list will change automatically without having to click any submit button.
So far, compared to the other stockscreener services, I have to say Google is very impressive for a free service. It does have its problems, however. It is currently beta so the issues have yet to be fixed. One annoying issue is that once you pull up list of stocks and click on each of them to take a look at a specific company, it loads the profile. However, when you click to go back it takes you to the first page on the search results so it is hard to go from one company to the next unless you open a new window for each.
... Read MoreThe rapid increase in the price of oil has led some such as Barack Obama to believe that speculation is the cause of this. This is an interesting but not so obvious theory.
The demand for oil still remains strong in the US but is weaking with higher prices. Americans actually drove less miles this year than they did last year. According to the Federal Highway Administration Americans travel fell .4 percent in 2007.
Since then prices have increased further and travel is expected to fall even further. Americans have been cutting back on SUV purchsase and the driving of large vehicles.This means oil consumption in the US will most likely remain flat or actually decrease slightly.
If US consumption is going down, then why are oil prices going up? The oil industry states that it is due to supply and demand that is causing the price to increase.
Regarding demand, many have been blaming China and the US. Americans didn’t just start buying large trucks and SUV’s the past year. This has been an ongoing trend that recently has stopped.
China has been using oil in factories and for automobiles. However neither the US nor China have had anything drastic happen recently regarding ... Read More
Along with record oil prices Exxon Mobil is nearing records and currently valued at $468 billion dollars. Some other companies have passed this mark in the past but now some of them are worth half of their $500 billion dollar + valuations. Will Exxon Mobile be the exception?
Microsoft, GE, and Cisco were once all $500 billion dollar + companies. Have a look at the charts below:
Exxon Mobil (XOM)
Microsoft (MSFT)
Cisco (CSCO)
General Electric (GE)
... Read More
The weak dollar has made importing things more expensive in the US. Almost everything is imported in the US including basic building materials such as steel and cement. These things will put upward pressure on homes.
However, the upward pressure on houses will mostly effect new homes that are under construction. Existing homes are less likely to feel this price pressure.
With existing homes, a major factor that will offset any particular increases in price is the fact that the housing market is very weak right now.
Credit tightening has made it more difficult to get home loans to buy homes. Speculation has led to a very large number of houses on the market which has a downward effect on prices. Speculation has also eliminated many participants in the home market by either bankruptcy or over leveraged owners. These people will not be in the housing market for probably another 7 years or more. They have also stopped the misconception that houses will always go up in prices.
Trend following behavior has also stopped. People have little interest in buying homes when the prices are going down. The trend following behavior was to buy when prices were going up.
These factors will all put downward pressure on both new and existing homes. The profit margins of new homebuilders will get squeezed as material prices increase and the ... Read More
Recently, small investors looking to buy stocks nearing lows often see their investment strategy evaporate by large company takeovers. A recent example of this is Countrywide which has had its stock plummet since the mortage crisis.
An investor that believes in buying for the long term may have purchased low but not at the bottom. So the investor may temporarily be at a loss. If the company turns around years later the stock may go up significantly.
However, when the stock goes down after purchasing and a larger investor, in this case Bank of America comes along and offers to acquire the company at a lower price than the investor paid, then this “temporary loss” becomes a permanent loss.
Bearn Sterns is another example of this. The company had its stock plunge to around $5 a share recently.
... Read MoreObviously the housing mortgage problem was bigger than many people thought. No, the losses aren’t just from subprime. Subprime assumes that people were paying a higher interest rate than average because of poor credit. The truth is that creative loans and loose money made it possible for people to purchase homes using stated income while still getting rates much lower than prime while underestimating true income levels.
Another thing that has added to the mess is the ability for homeowners to borrow money against their equity as housing values increased to extremely high levels. This allowed homeowners to borrow extra money while seemingly having very low risk levels to the bank.
This obviously wasn’t the case as borrows took on too much debt and the value of the homes were inflated beyond sustainable levels. Now that the prices of homes have dropped, homeowners are forced to pay down debt as opposed to getting new debt.
The effect that this has had is that it has slowed spending in many different areas of the economy such as car sales, furniture sales and home improvement sales.
Some of these homeowners took on too much debt and are late on mortgage payments. As a result, the companies in the mortgage business are finally seeing the deep losses as a result of this and will probably see more to come.
Everything has been going ... Read More
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21182357/
... Read MoreRecently Warren Buffett has been buying railroadcompanies. It owns shares of Union Pacific Corp., and Norfork Southern Corp..
Also Berkshire Hathaway has been buying call options for Burlington Northern Santa Fe. And Buffett has stated that he was slow to realize what a good investment railroads are because of the past poor performance of the industry. But he now says the railroads are healthier today than in past years, making them an appealing investment.
This is still a little bit puzzling because the return on equity of most of these railroad companies is pretty poor. For example, Warren Buffett’s yardstick for performance is return on equity of 15% or greater. Many of these companies have return on equity of less than 15% and have plenty of debt as well. {mosgoogle}
The performance of US railroad companies seems to be less than that of its Canadian rivals. Canada is rich in commodities, which require heavy transport. The US which uses railroads for manufacturing has and using them less than in the past because of the off shoring of manufacturing to outside of the US to places such as China.
It’s true that railroads are more fuel-efficient and economical ... Read More
Hedge funds and private equity bolts share a similar tax structure. Until recently, private equity firms were relatively unknown. Hedge funds only made news when one failed, and rarely did you see, a hedge fund manager in a magazine headlines.
Today, however, we see that many private equity firms make magazine
headlines and are even featured in television shows such as Charlie Rose.
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Household income crept higher and the poverty rate edged lower last year, the government said Tuesday, while the number of Americans without health insurance rose by 2.2 million to 47 million people.
Median household income rose 0.7 percent to $48,200, adjusted for inflation, the Census Bureau reported. But more people had to be at work in each household to get there.
That’s because median earnings for individuals working full-time year-round actually fell for the third consecutive year. For men, earnings slipped 1.1 percent to a median of $42,300, while for women, earnings sank 1.2 percent to a median of $32,500.
Author’s Commentary
This is not surprising considering that since 2000 and many businesses have moved parts of their operations overseas to save costs. The transfer of American jobs outside of the US will have an effect on income levels in the United States.
What was originally ... Read More