October 24, 2008 3:29 AM PST

Future of DJ30 and S&P500 are halted at limit level.

With U.K is likely in a recession, let’s see what will happen after 3 hours.

Update: So DJIA down almost 5% today. Not huge though. Errrr, wait a minute, when did we get used to 5% drop a day?

It is rumored now that Wachovia may sell itself to Wells Fargo. Geographcially, it is a perfect combination that Wells Fargo is able to expand its branchs to merely touched east coast.

We will see more acqusitions coming out because the bailout bill reduces the risk of acquiring banks’ assets. Private equitiy firms will actively participate in these talks so watch out.

UPDATE: September 29, 2008 5:13 PM
Well, finally it is Citigroup eats Wachovia. Stock price droped 90% a day, cheers shorters! As we’ve seen so far, Citigroup was being conservetive till today’s acquisition of Wachovia’s bank operatings due to huge than any one’s write down in the first half of this year.

UPDATE: So errrrr, Well Fargo vs. Citi?

The stock market is driven by forces that extend well beyond the political influences of the President or Congress. Regardless of whether Obama or McCain wins the presidency in November, any resulting difference in stock market returns will likely be minimal based on recent historical precedence.

So according to Parnel that we still have a few years of bear market to suffer. Short?

link: Separation of Stocks and State

Think about every man in GTA4 is like this. WOW.

Incredible animation

link: Video: Lifelike animation heralds new era for computer games – Times Online

The title says it all.

Mint.com is far much better than Quicken Online. Its interface design is very clean and has minimized page refreshing need.

I love the compare with average feature, also the saving suggestion feature, even though it only gives me one suggestion so far.

And it is free.

I am very confident that the market isn’t fully recovered yet.

• This is an extreme situation that higher P/E is caused by lower earning, which is used to be caused by higher price in bull time. (source:seeking alpha)
  
• Job data continuing suffering loss in March, the biggest drop in five years. 80,000 jobs were lost during March. Government jobs increased by 13,000. Temporary jobs dropped by 21,000.
• International markets is still suffering. I expect it will affect multinationals’ profit in coming quarters.
• No encouraging news but more and more write-downs.

Best mobility; best integration with various financial institutions; Ajax interface

However, I’d suggest Intuit should make it a free “beta” service in purpose of marketing and charge when it has more features built-in.

At $2.99/month (advertised as “less than a latte”), it is too pricey for its simplest function. My speculations:

• People who may give Quicken Online a try is very possible who’ve used client money software before. They wouldn’t be likely to pay additional money every month to accept this minimized-function Quicken.
• The website is somehow too “heavy”. The loading time limits its mobility. Also, its functions are too limited that a simple cheap local financial management software plus downing financial data from banks would be a stronger competitor to it.
• Some banks already provide their customers very advanced online banking system. For example, Bank of America. People who may be satisfied with QOB is highly possible to only have limit accounts or a single main account, which they can manage using their bank’s own online system.

After all, if Intuit keeps improving QOB’s functions and keep its interface simple and clean, more customer would pay monthly for its core integrating feature.

Today is March 17, 2008.

Costly experience:

• There is a history that one of the biggest financial company will die in recession. Usually it also means the end of recession.
• In recession, for financial company, fair value changes rapidly, and book value is not core measurement.
• Going short in recession works for most of time.
• Hedging can reduce loss.
• Gold rises in recession.
• Treasury notes rises too.
• Gamble on Friday is not wise. No flexibility at all.
• I must stick at GT90 and/or limited price at anytime.
• The one who robs in recession is the winner on market. Short the others.

Interesting thoughts from Google group:

• At $2 per share, stock holder should buy the firm and turn it around in a couple of years.