Russian Professor Predicted Collapse of US in 2010

In December of 2008, Igor Panarin, a Russian professor and dean of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s academy for future diplomats, predicted the economic and moral collapse of the United States in the year 2010.

This former KGB agent says that by mid 2010, the US will be in a civil war causing the country to break into six parts.

He said that California will become the California Republic, and be under Chinese rule, and Texas will become part of Mexico.

PINES and QUIBS and PD’s Oh My! Minibonds Anyone?

by Fred Fuld III

Have you ever considered Minibonds(TM), which are also sometimes referred to as Microbonds, for an income portfolio or your retirement plan? These are bonds that are traded just like stocks on the New York Stock Exchange, American Stock Exchange, or NASDAQ for around $25 per share. They are almost like preferred stocks except that they pay interest instead of dividends and they usually have a specific maturity date. Sometimes they are referred to as PINES (Public Income Notes) or QUIBS (Quarterly Interest Bonds) or QUICS (Quarterly Income Capital Securities) or QUIDS (Quarterly Income Debt Securities). There are even a few that are issued as Perpetual Debt, which means that there is no maturity date.

The advantages of Minibonds to the issuers are that the interest is deductible to the corporation (unlike dividends which are not deductible).

The advantages to the investor are first, that the bonds are ‘safer’ than preferred stocks (in other words, if the corporation goes out of business, the bonds are generally paid off first before the preferred or common stock).

Second, the Minibonds (with the exception of the perpetual debt bonds) have some limited protection against inflation versus preferred stocks in that if interest rates go up after purchasing them, their value will drop, however the par value (usually $25) will be paid back at maturity. Whereas, preferreds have no maturity.

The third benefit is the small denomination, especially when looking at a $2,000 IRA investment.

A fourth benefit is that since they are traded like stocks, there is more liquidity than buying or selling a $5,000 bond.

However, these are still somewhat illiquid investments, with most have a very low daily volume and wide bid and asked spreads.

Some of the companies that issue these are lesser known, but some are major companies such as AT&T and Prudential.

Here are a few examples that are making distributions in January:

• Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises, Inc. 8.125% Senior Notes due 2026 (BWSN)
• Gladstone Investment Corporation 8.00% Notes due 2028 (GAINL)
• Hercules Capital, Inc. 6.25% Notes due 2033 (HCXY)
• Southern Company Series 2020C 4.20% Junior Subordinated Notes due October 15, 2060 (SOJE)
• Tellurian Inc. 8.25% Senior Notes due 2028 (TELZ)
• AT&T Inc. 5.350% Global Notes due 2066 (TBB)
• AT&T Inc. 5.625% Global Notes due 2067 (TBC)
• Southern Company Series 2020A 4.95% Junior Subordinated Notes due January 30, 2080 (SOJD)
• The Carlyle Group Inc. 4.625% Subordinated Notes due 2061 (CGABL)
• Prudential Financial, Inc. 5.625% Junior Subordinated Notes due 2058 (PRS)

Disclosure: Author didn’t own any of the above at the time the article was written.

Stocks Reporting Earnings Next Week

Are you concerned about your stocks tanking when they report earnings? Or may you re hoping for a spike in price.

It is going to be a busy week coming up due to company earnings announcements.

The following are a list of stocks that are reporting their earnings next week.

Please note: some may be reporting before the stock market opens and some may report after the market close.

CompanySymbolDate
Starbucks CorpSBUXTue, July 26
JetBlue Airways CorpJBLUTue, July 26
Coca-Cola CoKOTue, July 26
McDonald’s CorpMCDTue, July 26
3M CoMMMTue, July 26
General Electric CoGETue, July 26
Visa Inc Class AVTue, July 26
Microsoft CorpMSFTTue, July 26
Texas Instruments IncTXNTue, July 26
Alphabet Inc Class AGOOGLTue, July 26
Alphabet Inc Class CGOOGTue, July 26
CME Group Inc lass ACMEWed, July 27
Etsy IncETSYWed, July 27
Southern CoSOThur, July 28
Honeywell International IncHONThur, July 28
Altria Group IncMOThur, July 28
Tilray Brands IncTLRYThur, July 28
Apple IncAAPLThur, July 28
Amazon.com IncAMZNThur, July 28
Caterpillar IncCATFri, July 29
Exxon Mobil CorpXOMFri, July 29

7 Stocks Paying over 10% Yields

by Fred Fuld III

Many investors have been looking for ways to generate higher yields. Unfortunately, other than Series I Bonds, there aren’t many alternatives.

Interest rates are going up for mortgages and credit cards, but as for bank accounts, you are lucky to get over 1% on a certificate of deposit.

However, there are seven profit-making stocks that are currently offering yields of more that 10%.

All of these companies have market caps over $2 billion, have a trailing price to earnings ratio below 14, and a forward P/E ratio less than 15.

AllianceBernstein Holding L.P.(AB) is an asset management company with a market cap of $4.03 billion. The trailing P/E ratio is 10.44, the yield is 11.68%.


Arbor Realty Trust, Inc. (ABR) is a Mortgage Real Estate Investment Trust, also referred to as a mortgage REIT. This $2.32 billion market cap company has a P/E of 7.59, and a yield of 10.74%.


Another mortgage REIT is Chimera Investment Corporation (CIM), with a market cap of $2.15 billion. It trades at 13.19 times earnings and has a generous yield of 13.86%.


FS KKR Capital Corp. (FSK) is a $5.93 billion market cap asset manager with a very low P/E of 2.41. It pays a high yield of 13.26%.


Annaly Capital Management, Inc. (NLY) is yet another mortgage REIT, and has a $9.70 billion market cap. The P/E is a low 3.64, and the yield is a very high 14.26%.


Southern Copper Corporation (SCCO) has a market cap of $37.12 billion. This copper producer trades at 11.1 times earnings and yields 10.65%.


Last but not least, UWM Holdings Corporation (UWMC) is a mortgage finance company with a market cap of $5.50 billion. The P/E is 6.38, and the yield is 11.46%.

Beware of High Yield Issues

A few thing to be aware of regarding these high yields:

• The dividends are subject to change and elimination
• Putting limited partnerships (such as AllianceBernstein) in a qualified plan, such as an IRA, may have adverse tax consequences. (Talk to your account about this issue)
• Often there is a negative reason for stocks to trade at very high yields
• Many mortgage REITs use leverage to boost their yields, which creates added risk

Before making a rash decision about investing in any of these companies, do some research on them and be aware of the risks.

Disclosure: Author didn’t own any of the above at the time the article was written.

How US Gasoline Prices Compare to the Rest of the World

by Fred Fuld III

The number one financial topic that seems to be on everyone’s mind these days is inflation, and more specifically, the price of gas at the pump. Just in the last week, gasoline prices in the United States have increased by over 2.6%. That’s a lot for a one week increase!!!

The price is now around seven dollars gallon for high octane gas in California. As a matter of fact, the price oof gasoline in California is so bad, that the U.S. Energy Information Administration has two separate categories for the west coast: West Coast and West Coast Less California. I assume that the outrageously high price of California gasoline skews the west coast average.

Have you ever wondered how the US gas prices compare to other countries and how prices compare across the United States? The following is a selection of prices per gallon in US dollars from various American cities and countries around the world, based on recent averages.

Average Prices per Gallon of Regular Gasoline Around the World
Hong Kong $11.35
Italy $8.20
UK $8.66
Switzerland $8.57
Japan $4.74
India $5.06
US – West Coast $5.87
Canada $6.55
US – West Coast less California  $5.43
China $5.66
Australia $5.41
US – Midwest $4.97
Mexico $4.40
US – Rocky Mountain $4.92
US – AVERAGE $5.01
US – East Coast $4.85
US – Gulf Coast $4.63
Russia $3.53
Saudi Arabia $2.35
Iran $0.20
Venezuela $0.08

 

Sachin Khajuria: Founder of Achilles Management & Former Partner at Apollo: Exclusive Interview

by Fred Fuld III

The following informative interview was provided by Sachin Khajuria, the founder of Achilles Management and a former Partner at Apollo, one of the world’s largest alternative asset management firms. He has twenty-five years of investment and finance experience and holds degrees in economics from the University of Cambridge. He is also the author of Two and Twenty: How the Masters of Private Equity Always Win, which was recently released.

This interview contains a lot of great information about the private equity fund industry and the economy. Some of the topics included are as follows:

  • What a private equity fund is and does
  • How private equity funds differ from hedge funds
  • The possibility of a recession
  • The current high inflation rate
  • Stagflation
  • The current state of the stock market
  • Advice for someone who wants to get into the private equity field
  • and much, much more!

The Sachin Khajuria Interview

Enjoy listening to the great insights and information that Sachin Khajuria provides.

To stream the interview, click:

HERE

It may take a few seconds to load. You can also download the interview as an mp3 file by right-clicking (or Control clicking) HERE and choosing “save as”.

The Two and Twenty Book

The book, Two and Twenty: How the Masters of Private Equity Always Win, is available through Amazon and other book stores.

More Information about Sachin Khajuria

Additional information can be found about Sachin Khajuria and his company at Achilleslp.com.

Enjoy the interview!

All opinions are those of Sachin Khajuria, and do not represent the opinions of this site or the interviewer. Neither this site, nor the interviewer, nor the interviewee are rendering tax, legal, or investment advice in this interview.

 

 

 

Affiliate links are on this page

Investing & Stock Trading Books for Gifts & Stocking Stuffers

by Fred Fuld III

Do you still have some Christmas shopping to do? Need some last minute gifts or stocking stuffers? Why not some books about investing and trading stocks.

Check the investment stock book list below.

STOCK TRADING

How to Day Trade for a Living: A Beginners Guide to Trading Tools and Tactics, Money Management
by Andrew Aziz
The fundamentals of day trading and day trading strategies. Over 8,200 five-star ratings.

Trade Like Warren Buffett
by James Altucher
Most people don’t realize that not only is Warren Buffett an investor, but he is also a trader, and a successful one at that.

High-Probability Trade Setups: A Chartists Guide to Real-Time Trading
by Timothy Knight
How to use technical approaches to find the best stock trade setups.

Beat The Crowd: How You Can Out-Invest The Herd By Thinking Differently
by Ken Fisher
This book shows how a true contrarian investor thinks and acts, and why it works more often than not.

Stock Traders Almanac 2022
by Jeffrey A. Hirsch
Every stock trader should have this book.

Day Trading Journal
Wall Street News Network
A journal with over 100 pages of specially designed fill-in-the-blank pages to track all your stock, ETF, and option trades, whether they are long or short trades. Fields include: Date, Symbol, Company, Transaction Recommended By, Why decision was made to do this transaction, Buy or Short, # of Shares, Price/share, Commission, Subtotal of opening transactions, Total opening transaction, and much more.

Stock Trading Journal
Wall Street News Network
A logbook for tracking your stock trades and investments, similar to the Day Trading Journal.

LONG TERM INVESTING & WARREN BUFFETT

Berkshire Hathaway Letters to Shareholders
by Warren Buffett
What Buffett has actually said to his shareholders.

Business Adventures Twelve Classic Tales from the World of Wall Street
This is a book that was recommended by Warren Buffett

The Intelligent Investor: The Definitive Book on Value Investing. A Book of Practical Counsel (Revised Edition)
This is a classic investment guide and would make a great gift for the new investor.

Berkshire Beyond Buffett: The Enduring Value of Values
A book about Warren Buffett that Warren Buffett recommends!

WALL STREET HISTORY

Reminiscences of a Stock Operator – first published in 1923
by Edwin Lefevre
This is the classic book on investing, trading, market timing, and crowd psychology, just as true today as it was almost a century ago. It is based on the life of top notorious trader, Jesse Livermore.

My Adventures with Your Money – first published in 1911
by George Graham Rice
About a conman who make money off the early gold mining stock boom.

The PLUNGERS and the PEACOCKS. 150 years of Wall Street – published in 1967
by Dana L. Thomas
Written during the bull market of the 1960s, it provides an entertaining history of the stock market.

Den of Thieves – published in 1991
by James B. Stewart
The “newest” of these old books, it covers the insider trading scandals involving Ivan Boesky, Michael Milken, and other Wall Street financiers  during the 1980s.

Storming The Magic Kingdom – published in 1987
by John Taylor
A must read book about the fight for control of one of America’s most famous companies.

Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds (1841) by Charles Mackay included as part of Stock Market Trivia Volume 2(2014)
The Extraordinary Popular Delusions book was written in the mid-1800s. It has many chapters, but most are unrelated to investing, such as alchemy, witches, haunted houses, etc. However, three of the chapters have extensive and entertaining information about three of the largest investment bubbles in history: the Mississippi Scheme, the South Sea Bubble, and the Tulip Mania. These three chapters are included as the last half of the  Stock Market  Trivia Volume 2 book. (In interest of full disclosure, I wrote the Stock Market Trivia 2 book.) In addition, the trivia book includes such things as the chocolate chip cookie/stock market correlation, celebrity stock indices, weird stock certificates, and more.

Investment Trivia
by Fred Fuld III
This book will give you interesting, amusing, and fascinating trivia about investments, money, stocks, bonds, and Wall Street.

INVESTMENT FRAUDS, SCAMS, AND SCANDALS

Wolf Books

The Wolf of Wall Street
by Jordan Belfort
This is the autobiographical story about the guy who made hundreds of millions of dollars by pumping and dumping low priced and penny stocks. The book is filled with sex and drugs and every other kind of decadence.  A Martin Scorsese movie starring Leonardo DiCaprio was made from this story. Be forewarned: the chapter that took place in the hospital gave me nightmares for a couple weeks.

Catching the Wolf of Wall Street: More Incredible True Stories of Fortunes, Schemes, Parties, and Prison
by Jordan Belfort
This is the followup to the previous book. What happens when Belfort is arrested, how a case was built against him, and what happens after prison.

Madoff Books

No One Would Listen: A True Financial Thriller
by Harry Markopolos
New York Times bestseller about how Markopolos uncovered Madoff’s scam.

The Wizard of Lies: Bernie Madoff and the Death of Trust
by Diana B. Henriques
All about how Madoff pulled off the biggest Ponzi scheme in history. Over 130 five star ratings on Amazon.

The End of Normal: A Wife’s Anguish, A Widow’s New Life
by Stephanie Madoff Mack
An inside look at the Madoff family written by the widow of Mark Madoff and the daughter-in-law of Bernard Madoff.Over 200 five star ratings.

Betrayal: The Life and Lies of Bernie Madoff
by Andrew Kirtzman
An in-depth look at Madoff and his victims.

Theranos Books

Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup
by John Carreyrou
Named one of the best books of the year by NPR, The New York Times Book ReviewTimeWall Street Journal, and the Washington Post. An in-depth look at Theranos and Elizabeth Holmes. Over 2,600 five star ratings.

Billion Dollar Facade: The Rise And Fall Of Theranos And Elizabeth Holmes
by Phil C. Senior
Short 140 page summary of the Theranos scandal.

Books about Scams

Scam Me If You Can: Simple Strategies to Outsmart Today’s Rip-off Artists
by Frank W. Abagnale
Abagnale was the guy who wrote the book on scamming, Catch Me If You Can, which was made into a major motion picture.

How to Smell a Rat: The Five Signs of Financial Fraud
by Ken Fisher
How investment fraudsters operate and how to avoid them. Written my billionaire money manager and former long time Forbes columnist Ken Fisher.

Billion Dollar Whale: The Man Who Fooled Wall Street, Hollywood, and the World
by Tom Wright & Bradley Hope
Named a Best Book of 2018 by the Financial Times and Fortune, it is about the man who swindles $5 billion with the help of Goldman Sachs.

 

Disclosure: Article contains affiliate links.

Stocks Going Ex Dividend in August 2021

The following is a short list of some of the many stocks going ex dividend during the next month.

Many traders and investors use the stock trading technique called ‘Buying Dividends,’ also commonly referred to as ‘Dividend Capture.’ This is the strategy of buying stocks before the ex dividend date and selling the stock shortly after the ex date at about the same price, yet still being entitled to the dividend.

This technique generally works in bull markets and flat or choppy markets, but you need to avoid the strategy during bear markets. In order to be entitled to the dividend, you have to buy the stock before the ex-dividend date, and you can’t sell the stock until after the ex date.

The actual dividend may not be paid for another few weeks. WallStreetNewsNetwork.com has compiled a downloadable and sortable list of the stocks going ex dividend in the near future. The list contains many dividend paying companies, lots with market caps over $500 million, and some with yields over 2%. Here are a few examples showing the stock symbol, the ex-dividend date, the periodic dividend amount.

ConAgra Brands, Inc. (CAG) 8/2/2021 0.313 3.62%
Intel Corporation (INTC) 8/5/2021 0.347 2.47%
Starbucks Corporation (SBUX) 8/11/2021 0.45 1.51%
Walmart Inc. (WMT) 8/12/2021 0.55 1.56%
Southern Company (SO) 8/13/2021 0.66 4.20%
Target Corporation (TGT) 8/17/2021 0.90 1.41%
Molson Coors Beverage Co. (TAP) 8/27/2021 0.34 0.67%
Allstate Corporation (ALL) 8/30/2021 0.81 2.53%

The additional ex-dividend stocks can be found HERE . (If you have been to the page before, and the latest link doesn’t show up, you may have to empty your cache.) If you like dividend stocks, you should check out some of the other high yield stock lists at WSTNN.com HERE .

Dividend definitions:

Declaration date: the day that the company declares that there is going to be an upcoming dividend.

Ex-dividend date: the day on which if you buy the stock, you would not be entitled to that particular dividend; or the first day on which a shareholder can sell the shares and still be entitled to the dividend.

Record date: the day when you must be on the company’s books as a shareholder to receive the dividend. The ex-dividend date is normally set for stocks at two business days before the record date.

Payment date: the day on which the dividend payment is actually made, which can be as long at two months after the ex date.

Don’t forget to reconfirm the ex-dividend date with the company before implementing this technique.

Disclosure: Author did not own any of the above at the time the article was written; affiliate links are on this page.

Forget Gold & Silver: Check Out Rhodium

by Fred Fuld III

You have probably noticed that the price of gold has languished, and silver, even though it has had a few recent up moves, it is still struggling. But have you checked out the price of rhodium recently? In 2017, you could have bought an ounce of rhodium for just $800 an ounce. Last week, it traded for $29,200 per ounce, an increase of 3,500% in five years.

Even if you had bought an ounce two years ago, you would only have paid about $2500, still generating a return of 1068%.

Rhodium Chart
Source: Money Metals Exchange

So What the Heck is Rhodium?

You may have heard of the precious metals platinum and palladium, which are part of the platinum group metals. These metals include are ruthenium, rhodium, palladium, osmium, iridium, and platinum. Rhodium is considered to be one of the rarest of the precious metals.

It is one of the significant metals in catalytic converters, which is why you may have seen a dramatic increase in the news of the stealing of these emissions control devices. It is used in jewelry, as coatings for sterling silver, in nuclear reactors, aircraft spark plugs, automobile headlights, and many other uses.

Rhodium Mining Stocks

It is interesting to note that the rhodium mining stocks have not increased as much as the metal itself, but that could be partly due to the fact that all of these companies mine for other metals.

There are actually over a dozen stocks of companies that mine for rhodium. Once example is Anglo American Platinum Limited (ANGPY), a $35 billion market cap company that mines for platinum, palladium, rhodium, ruthenium, iridium, and osmium, as well as nickel, copper, cobalt sulphate, sodium sulphate, and gold. It has a sky high price to earnings ratio of 90, but it does pay a yield of 2.1%. The dividend is paid semi-annually. Over the last five years, the stock has moved up by 543%, not as much as the price of rhodium, but still not too shabby.

Another rhodium miner is Impala Platinum Holdings Ltd (IMPUY), which has a market cap of $14 billion.  The yield is 4.61%. This  South African companies mines for  platinum, palladium,  rhodium, chrome and nickel ores in Canada, South Africa and Zimbabwe.

Ivanhoe Mines Ltd. (IVPAF) is a $6 billion market cap Canada-based company that mines for platinum, palladium, nickel, copper, gold, rhodium, zinc, germanium, and lead in South Africa the Congo.

For a free list of over a dozen rhodium mining companies, click here. Maybe you can make money in your precious portfolio with rhodium.

Disclosure: Author didn’t own any of the above at the time the article was written.

Amazon Now Selling Coronavirus COVID-19 Test Kits

by Fred Fuld III

Did you know that you can now buy your own do-it-yourself do-it-at-home Coronavirus COVID-19 Test Kit from Amazon? Well now you can, and it doesn’t involve giving blood or jamming a stick up your nose.

As a matter of fact, it only involves spit. The kit is called the DxTerity COVID-19 Saliva at-Home Collection Kit, and it includes prepaid express return shipping and laboratory PCR (polymerase chain reaction) testing.

The test is authorized by the FDA for both asymptomatic and symptomatic testing.

The results are available within 24 to 72 hours of receipt of your saliva sample.

The DxTerity COVID-19 Saliva Kit sells for $110.

I haven’t tried it yet but I am getting ready to order it. It does have 5 star ratings.

Stay healthy everyone!

 

 

 

 

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