Companies & Markets

Plagued By Indigestion, Fed Issues Asset-Bubble Warning

by Wolf Richter •  • Comments Off on Plagued By Indigestion, Fed Issues Asset-Bubble Warning

Hidden in the middle of the 25-page minutes of the last meeting, under the most wooden and convoluted prose, the Fed issued a doozie of a warning: it fretted about financial stability. It named soaring forward P/E ratios, stock buybacks, margin credit, and leveraged loans.

Corporate Earnings Goofiness Goes Hog Wild

by Wolf Richter •  • Comments Off on Corporate Earnings Goofiness Goes Hog Wild

Corporate earnings season has been a doozy before it even got started. The well-scripted song and dance, designed to pull a bag over investors’ heads, works marvelously: stalled revenues and earnings propel stocks higher. But the shenanigans are bumping into limits.

Plug Power, “Exhibit A” Why Most Hot IPOs Suck Long Term

by Wolf Richter •  • Comments Off on Plug Power, “Exhibit A” Why Most Hot IPOs Suck Long Term

Plug Power soared 68.4% in the first two trading days this year. Not because it got a buyout offer but because it made another one of its promising announcements. The stock is up by a factor of seven since July to close at … $2.61. Down from $1,500 in March 2000.

Fizzing Optimism For Wild Financial Engineering In 2014

by Wolf Richter •  • Comments Off on Fizzing Optimism For Wild Financial Engineering In 2014

Nothing could have been a more pungent metaphor for the current investment climate than the headline, “Macau gambling revenue hits record $45 bn in 2013.”

LEAKED Confession: Cesspool Of Greek-German Corruption

by Wolf Richter •  • Comments Off on LEAKED Confession: Cesspool Of Greek-German Corruption

Apparently, it has been impossible to sell Greece any weapons at all, not even a water pistol, without bribing officials at the Defense Ministry. But it takes two to tango. And in holier-than-thou Germany, the defense industry has been all too eager to dance with Greece.

When Soaring Margin Debt, Sign of Investor Confidence, Turns Into A Nightmare On Steroids

by Wolf Richter •  • Comments Off on When Soaring Margin Debt, Sign of Investor Confidence, Turns Into A Nightmare On Steroids

There have been three mega-crashes in my investing lifetime, and three concurrent peaks in margin debt. In April, margin debt broke the record set in 2007 and has continued to rise. Over the last three months, it has soared 10.9%. Are we there yet?

Unleash the lawyers! Mounting Costs Of NSA Scandal To Bleed US Tech For Years

by Wolf Richter •  • Comments Off on Unleash the lawyers! Mounting Costs Of NSA Scandal To Bleed US Tech For Years

Blowback: What’s rising for US tech companies like a pile of fuming manure? The costs of working hand-in-glove with the NSA to build a seamless, borderless, indiscriminate spy dragnet. Now add an all-American cost to the pile: class-action lawsuits.

Silicon Valley Frenzy: Big Bucks, Big Data, and Spying

by Wolf Richter •  • Comments Off on Silicon Valley Frenzy: Big Bucks, Big Data, and Spying

The government spy-services marketplace, part of Big Data, is juicy. Investors clamor to get in on it. Scores of startups have sprung up. The hottest one is Palantir. Its valuation jumped 50% in three months – to $9 billion! Its technologies, designed for the CIA to track terrorists, have transitioned to track you and me.

Microsoft Protests NSA Taps (I Hear The Crinkly Sounds Of A Bag Being Pulled Over My Head)

by Wolf Richter •  • Comments Off on Microsoft Protests NSA Taps (I Hear The Crinkly Sounds Of A Bag Being Pulled Over My Head)

That the NSA might have tapped into Microsoft’s “cloud” services, along with Google’s and Yahoo’s, turned into a publicity nightmare. Now Microsoft, which collaborates tightly with the NSA and other agencies on a host of projects, counter-attacks. With very mixed results.

The Stock Bubble In Context (Will The Last Bear Please Turn Out The Lights?)

by Wolf Richter •  • Comments Off on The Stock Bubble In Context (Will The Last Bear Please Turn Out The Lights?)

Stock market bubbles – they allow investors to make the mostest the fastest – don’t happen in a vacuum. They happen in a context. But this time, the context is different. Very different.