Disqus - Latest Comments for marketfolly

Re: Hedge Fund Paulson & Co Buys Even More Cadbury (CBY)

marketfolly — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 20:22:27 -0000

from publicists when asked for his comments on the book. Said he thought it a bit too "gossipy tabloid" rather than reputable financial journalism. Maybe he was a bit upset at how he was portrayed.

Re: Hedge Fund Lansdowne Partners Favors Large Caps In Developed Countries

marketfolly — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 12:03:41 -0000

Hey thanks glad you enjoyed! No unfortunately the documents are confidential and can't be posted up. We do it this way so we can cover future updates. If we were to post the documents themselves, we don't think we'd receive any future ones.

Re: How Long Can The Rally Last?

marketfolly — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 17:22:43 -0000

hey thanks for the comment. Yea definitely RIMM has a lot of work ahead, but at the same time they do have a loyal consumer base. But the smart phone industry is highly competitive and cut-throat so will be interesting to see how it plays out. Always have to monitor the fundamentals to identify which companies to play and then the technicals to figure out how to play them.

Re: Financial Headlines for 2010…

howardlindzon — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 15:47:10 -0000

email me howard at lindzon dot com with your size and address bro

Re: Financial Headlines for 2010…

marketfolly — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 15:45:27 -0000

haha damnit, i'll custom make a DOW 50K hoodie then

Re: Financial Headlines for 2010…

howardlindzon — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 14:34:51 -0000

That is one that will never happen. You owe me a hoodie

Re: Financial Headlines for 2010…

marketfolly — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 14:22:39 -0000

Ratings agencies finally rate something correctly

For sale: 1 helicopter equipped with printing press

Doug Kass says market is both at a top and a bottom right now

John Thain joins Ameriprise Financial as independent financial advisor; seeking clients & contractor for decadent office bathroom

Goldman Sachs trademarks phrase 'vampire squid', inserts into company values

Dick Bove says he's never seen so many 'buys of a lifetime', inks deal with CNBC for new show, Insane Money

Crude oil to be priced in shares of AAPL

Zimbabwe introduces Quadrillion dollar bill

Re: Bill Ackman of Pershing Square Talks General Growth Properties (GGWPQ) & Target (TGT)

marketfolly — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 10:40:54 -0000

Douglas, thanks so much for your comprehensive post about your experiences with the retailer. Very insightful stuff and this is the kind of impression they have made on customers and members of the community and it's very impressive. Don't worry about being unfamiliar with Ackman and his hedge fund gang as everyone is new to a topic at some point. While (as you point out) he doesn't come across as a corporate raider, he is definitely pushing for change. I don't think he personally thinks he can run the company better, but he has identified changes that they can make in order to run more efficiently and position themselves better going forward. He indeed is very well-spoken and has always been that way, which of course downplays what he is there to do: institute change. I wouldn't view it as a tyrannic takeover by any means, but yes it must be odd to people like yourself who have never heard of him and then he all of a sudden barges in.

He is a successful hedge fund manager that runs investment funds worth billions of dollars. If you type in "Ackman" on the search bar on our site you'll find plenty of other information on him. His father was involved in real estate and as such he has taken on knowledge in that regard. He is very well known within the investment community and I'd almost venture to say he 'leverages the public' in that he is always getting out and promoting his ideas and investment positions so that everyone will better understand and not be afraid. On one hand I'd say he has good intentions, but on the other hand he's running a fund that is dependent on performance results, which means that he eventually needs shares of TGT (and his other positions) to head in the direction he is wagering.

Hope this helps and again sincere thanks for taking the time to pen your comment, very interesting stories.

Jay
@marketfolly

Re: Contrarian Signs

marketfolly — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 23:29:43 -0000

haha I just laughed so hard.

I'm with you though on the contrarianism... cash4gold, random people asking me if they should buy some, etc. But on the other hand you have a bunch of prominent hedgies in the play. Tough call. But like you said, draw a line in the sand and you're all set.

Oh, forgot to add that I guess you could also consider all the hedgies being in the metal a contrarian sign as well.

Re: Whitney Tilson & Hedge Fund T2 Partners: October Commentary

marketfolly — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 13:57:05 -0000

haha good ole Perot, I have seen the old stuff and obviously heard stories. A friend knows his grandchildren well. Should get him to do a reunion tour

Re: Warren Buffett's Recommended Reading List

marketfolly — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 12:03:24 -0000

glad you enjoyed!

Re: Market Folly Custom Portfolio Ranked #1 On Alphaclone Leaderboard

marketfolly — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 12:03:04 -0000

Yep, correct.

Re: Market Folly Custom Portfolio Ranked #1 On Alphaclone Leaderboard

Ben — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 10:19:07 -0000

Ah ok, I think I misunderstood. So 50% hedge = 75% long 25% short right? Whereas 100% = market neutral? In any event I will check out alphaclone. Thanks,
Ben

Re: Market Folly Custom Portfolio Ranked #1 On Alphaclone Leaderboard

marketfolly — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 02:19:06 -0000

Hey Ben, thanks very much. The actual cloning on the site uses short SPY but if you were to re-create the portfolio for your own investment, you could also just buy SH (short S&P ETF).

In Alphaclone you have the option to go long-only, and hedge with: 25%, 50%, 75%, and 100%. Obviously each hedging metric shifts portfolio performance around a bit. Surprisingly though, long-only still performs quite well too. We chose 50% as we wanted a decent amount of protection from severe drawdowns as we've had 2 recent periods (2002, 2008) with such occurrences. Our goal is to outperform over the long-term and believe that protecting from losses is the top priority.

You can check out Alphaclone completely free with the 14day free trial if you like (http://bit.ly/alphacloning). That way you can play around all you want, as it's easier than someone just taking a bunch of static screenshots for you once inside.

Hope this helps a little bit and let us know if you have any questions. Same goes for the AlphaClone team, they're very helpful.

Re: Market Folly Custom Portfolio Ranked #1 On Alphaclone Leaderboard

marketfolly — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 00:52:50 -0000

Look forward to revealing it as we shift our focus to managers we think will outperform in the future!

Indeed Atticus will be going separate ways so they'll have to replace it or something of the sort.

Not sure what' sup with Par, have never really looked at it in-depth!

Re: A Look Back and Forward at ATP Gas Value Plays

Todd Sullivan — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 15:43:16 -0000

thanks Jay...

Re: A Look Back and Forward at ATP Gas Value Plays

marketfolly — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 15:41:37 -0000

Have seen Titan in person it's a beast. Solid company but rich here, we owned it previously but dumped it on spike. Will re-evaluate if it ever pulls back.

Re: Market Folly Custom Portfolio Ranked #1 On Alphaclone Leaderboard

marketfolly — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 12:40:46 -0000

Fully agreed Fein Group is very impressive and I'd say it's better than the MF clone across the board if you take into account drawdowns and volatility. But for gloating purposes we'll leave the total return metric as the top metric haha ;)

Re: Thematic vs Thesis Driven Investing

marketfolly — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 20:29:41 -0000

Good stuff both in the post and comments. My immediate reaction was to compare it to financial markets where you have so many various strategies being employed. Many of them work, and it just depends on the goals, timeframes, risk tolerances etc of the manager and investors as to which one you pursue. But the overriding commonality between the comparison is you do what works best for you and what you're comfortable with.

Thematic vs Thesis seems most comparable to Global Macro (secular theme) versus Bottom-up Fundamental (Thesis or company specific) if you were going to shift it to publicly traded companies. Interesting to see these differences drawn across different types of investment (public vs private) though certainly.

Re: David Einhorn Sells More Punch Taverns (LON: PUB)

marketfolly — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 18:10:08 -0000

haha nice, he's sellin kool-aid to the masses!

Re: What We're Reading ~ 11/2/09

Ben — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 17:19:18 -0000

Ha thanks,
I tried the page 2 thing but couldn't get it to work.
Normally I would just pony up but I really don't like lining Rupert Murdoch's pockets if I can help it.

Re: What We're Reading ~ 11/2/09

marketfolly — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 14:13:47 -0000

Hah thanks, thought it was a nifty trick. Unfortunately not sure how to get to page 2. Hmm, maybe try googling the title and then 'page 2' and see if anything pops up. I'll play around and see if I can come up with a solution.

Re: Paolo Pellegrini: Short Treasuries, Long Oil & Sees 'Anemic Real Returns' In Equities

marketfolly — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 00:44:31 -0000

very true. It's prudent to at least be aware of the technicals and patterns that exist because sometimes they almost become self-fulfilling. We post up trading videos every once in a while from Market Club. We don't really cover a ton of trading material specifically though.

There is this 'rules of trading' piece though that has been quite popular: http://www.marketfolly.com/2008/11/dennis-gartm...

And then also if you search our site for "paul tudor jones" anything that pops up under him should be related to trading as he is one of the hedge fund greats when it comes to trading. Hope this helps a little bit.

Re: Paolo Pellegrini: Short Treasuries, Long Oil & Sees 'Anemic Real Returns' In Equities

marketfolly — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 21:56:01 -0000

Very true but you have to consider that incorporates an element of market timing that some investors either aren't comfortable with or are horrible at. But those who got it right so far are evaluating what to do next certainly.

Re: Notes from Peter Thiel’s Singularity Summit Talk (2009)

marketfolly — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 00:33:32 -0000

Hey thanks for your notes, enjoyed them. We track hedge funds on our blog and have covered Thiel's fund (Clarium) numerous times. What's interesting to note is that while he might have great ideas and be quite philosophical, these are not (at least not yet) realistic trading or investing strategies as evidenced by his fund's poor performance numbers. There is a big difference between an idea and its execution.

While he is still up handsomely since inception, the past 2 years for his fund have been far from impressive and just thought I'd note that. I enjoy Peter and his thoughts, don't get me wrong, but just thought I'd toss that into the mix as well.

@marketfolly