The reason I bring this up is I bought Morgan Stanley (MS) a few months ago instead of Goldman as a proxy for the financials... Goldman has outperformed (shocker) but when you have a direct line to the government, I suppose that helps positioning your trades. The fact they now are doing 20% of all trades in the market is beyond suspicious as well... this magical "underlying bid" is coming from somewhere, and I think it is pretty clear where. Hold on, I hear a black helicopter coming...
Anyhow, since I added Morgan (which at the time was the only financial I had), I've added other names in the sector. So I now have exposure to the space and don't necessarily need MS. I was quite underwhelmed by MS's quarter and while these two (GS and MS) have eliminated most of their competition this past 18 months - that's more of a long term theme. For now the stock action in Morgan Stanley is uninspiring. So I am going to sell my long position - I've had both a long and short on for a few months, trading from both sides.... instead now, I can play the sector through various other positions long, and still use Morgan as a short from time to time. No that you'd ever want to short anything in the paper printing prosperity era where all assets will be inflated over and above "natural prices".
I'm exiting this last 0.5% stake of Morgan Stanley around $22.20 - taking a 6% loss on this last batch but we've had quite a few good trades for profit since we started the position. There are too many stocks behaving well to have capital wasting away here.EDIT 11:15 AM - just saw this:
- Morgan Stanley has had “an exodus of some of our key people,” Chief Executive Officer John Mack said. Some of the employees left for non-U.S. companies, Mack said at the firm’s annual meeting today in Purchase, New York. Mack was responding to a question regarding the effect of compensation restrictions on the firm’s ability to retain workers.
Short Morgan Stanley in fund; no personal position
6 comments:
I think Oracle is even worst than chk. It's unreal how much Ellison gets pay.
No doubt in my mind that Bernanke is watching the charts and has noted that the S&P is stuck at 875. Expect an announcement or at least a hint at expanding the 300 bln QE initiative...with the S&P stuck at resistance and 10 yr yields back up to 3%...it will be too good to resist.
If I were short, I'd be VERY WORRIED heading into the Fed Meeting. Remember Bernanke's motto: "go big or go home". In his thesis paper regarding reinflating assets (which he has followed to a T), he speicifcally states that Japan faltered because they didn't didn't go "big enough" in their QE efforts. A mistake he's not planning to make.
Are you buying if S&P above 875?
Oracle is quite amazing - he just buys companies and rolls them into "growth" and has been doing it for 2 decades.
Anon #3, don't like doing much around Fed meeting - will see how things shake out around 3 pm. I would expect S&P 875 to be burst post Fed because market always moves 1%+ in both directions in crazy fashion. We do expect a lot of computers to be buyers north of 875 so we'll see how it goes.
Anon #2 - I almost expect him to hold off on a new QE for the next time the market shows a sign of weakness, why waste it now? I mean this market is all about reactions to govt announcements so they can spread them out every week or two. That's a great wild card to hold in back pocket. Hey surprise everyone we just expanded QE from $300B to $600B. Why? Umm.. well it makes no sense considering all the green shoots we see, but we want to.
when you see the green "applause" sign begin clapping and continue until the light goes off.
I don't have CNBC on during day. Just let me know when they say to clap and I will do so. Seal trained and seal approved (lion seal)
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