Barron’s has one of their by now regular articles on MLPs this weekend as they interview their “MLP Roundtable”. These write-ups are invariably constructive, and the most recent one is no exception. As well as noting the many opportunities offered to build out infrastructure in support of America’s shale boom, General Partners (GPs) received a […]
Unlisted registered REITs (Real Estate Investment Trusts) have a well deserved reputation for enriching their sponsors more readily than their investors. A recent case in point is Strategic Realty Trust, Inc. (formerly TNP Strategic Realty Trust, Inc.), a REIT once run by Tony Thompson (who recently closed his broker-dealer and handed in his securities license). […]
IBM must be one of the least liked large cap stocks around. The criticisms are easy and familiar: they haven’t grown revenues in years, they are involved in financial engineering to prop up earnings, they are taking on lots of debt to support cashflows. Recently, Barron’s Roundtable noted that Fred Hickey had IBM as a […]
In reading the July/August edition of the CFA Institute’s magazine, an article called “Fragile Trust” by Susan Trammell caught my attention. There’s no doubt that popular confidence in financial services firms was sorely shaken by the 2008 crisis. But it’s still sobering to consider the results of a 2013 survey by Edelman Trust showing that […]
If you didn’t have the data, you might reasonably assume that any fund manager worth his salt was heavily invested in his own fund. This ought to apply to an overwhelming percentage of all the actively managed funds out there. In fact, as a recent article in Barron’s points out, it’s the exception rather than […]
Recently the Financial Times (FT) noted that the number of U.S. companies raising their dividends had hit the highest level since 1979. Much research has been done on the merits of companies that pay out a large percentage of their profits in dividends (high payout ratio) and those that retain most of their earnings so as […]
Denis Kessler, CEO of Scor, a large reinsurer, is the most recent critic of today’s low interest rate environment. It’s not only the stereotypical retiree clipping bond coupons that is suffering from current interest rate policy. Insurance companies typically hold substantial amounts of their investment portfolios in bonds, both because of regulatory requirements as well […]
Although the equity research business is dominated by large, sell-side firms hoping to generate trading commissions from their (usually bullish) recommendations, there are alternate business models out there. Prescience Point is a hitherto unheard of research firm with no known location (so presumably outside the U.S. since they’re not registered) and no publicly disclosed employees. […]
The chart above doesn’t look like much, but it represents a snapshot of the thinking of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) on interest rates. Their communication has come a long way since the days of cigar-chomping Paul Volcker in the 1970s, when they went out of their way to disguise their intentions. Alan […]
Recently Larry Fink who runs Blackrock waded into the debate over leveraged ETFs at a Deutsche Bank investment conference. Fink was highly critical of such products, which he said had the potential to “blow up” the industry one day. The other side of the debate includes Direxion, a provider of leveraged ETFs (Blackrock has none). […]
