The domestic natural gas industry has fallen on hard times due to a supply glut and a sharp fall in commodity prices over the course of the last year, but with last week’s latest news things are beginning to look up again.  T. Boone Pickens, the long time crude oil bull turned alternative energy maven, has begun working on legislation that is gathering very impressive bipartisan support.  The conveniently named NAT GAS Act (New Alternative Transportation to Give Americans Solutions) was introduced by Pickens along with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV), Senator Robert Menendez (D-NJ), and Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT) in a letter to President Barack Obama on July 8th, 2009.  The group’s legislation provides a real fundamental shift in the way investors should analyze natural gas companies, especially those in the natural gas transportation industry such as Energtek, Inc. [[EGTK.PK]].

This proposed bill represents one of the

We are presenting a list of companies which we believe are currently mispriced, based on our estimate of fair value, by the market. We develop our fair value ranges by projected free cash flow out one year and estimating an appropriate FCF multiple based on our assessment of risk and the strength of the balance sheet.

Cisco Systems [CSCO: 19.57, +0.84 (+4.48%)] Recent Price $17.04 Value Range 21.86 – $38.41 Cisco Systems, Inc. designs, manufactures and sells Internet protocol (IP)-based networking and other products related to the communications and information technology (IT) industry, and provides services associated with these products and their use. The Company provides a line of products for transporting data, voice, and video within buildings, across campuses, and around the world. Its products are designed to transform how people connect, communicate and collaborate. Cisco Systems, Inc.’s products, which include primarily routers, switches, and products that the

MWW Automotive Group [[MWWC.OB]], a full-service global design, engineering and manufacturing firm providing customized accessories for leading international vehicle manufacturers, recently announced that the company’s wholly owned subsidiary, Modelworxx GmbH, in Munich, Germany has entered into an agreement with ABT Sportsline GmbH for worldwide distribution of its Volkswagen and Audi products.

Modelworxx has developed and is manufacturing a diverse line of innovative high-tech running boards for a variety of automobiles, including Audi, KIA, Mercedes, Mitsubishi, Opel, Toyota and Volkswagen. As a leading supplier of customized OE accessories for the global automotive industry, ABT Sportsline GmbH is one of the world’s largest distributors of Volkswagen accessories and performance tuning of Volkswagen vehicles. Under the terms of the agreement, ABT Sportsline will carry the entire Modelworxx product line and also select U.S. -designed and manufactured products for worldwide distribution.

Gerold Haas, chief executive officer of Modelworxx, stated, “We are happy to have

It’s time for another quick look at the United States banking system. Whoops! Nothing happening there. Are they still alive?

Federal Reserve Bank Credit has increased by $1.2 trillion over the past twelve months. What has increased in the banking system? Excess reserves in the commercial banking system have increased by about $800 billion. Tracing this “stuff” a little further, in round figures, the currency in circulation outside of the banking system has increased about $100 billion over the past year, about $100 billion has gone to foreign central banks in liquidity swaps, so there is another $200 or so in funds that the Fed has pumped into the system that is somewhere in Treasury accounts. But who is counting?

I am still concerned with what the United States banking system is doing with the money that has been pumped into it. The answer is, very little!

Looking at the H.8 release

When most investors think of the telecom sector and wireless providers, Verizon [VZ: 28.62, -0.02 (-0.07%)] and AT&T [T: 23.44, +0.06 (+0.26%)] come to mind first.  These two companies form a duopoly of the domestic market.  Market penetration is nearing 90% in the US, so growth is limited, as these two companies are forced to compete for existing clients to survive as well as continue to steal market share from Sprint-Nextel [S: 4.36, -0.10 (-2.24%)] and T-Mobile.  They are also attempting to jump into unique markets everyday in hopes of adding revenue and improving margins. For instance, VZ and T have been rolling out fiber optic backbones for even faster internet speeds and enhanced TV picture quality. While this appears to be the new generation and face of telecom, there is one company that

I’m sure quite a few eyes rolled when reading the title of this article. “Green Shoot” has been thrown around the financial media incessantly over the past few months, to the dismay of many. The thought that a new menu item at McDonald’s [MCD: 56.86, +0.09 (+0.16%)] is a glimmer of hope for the economy is, admittedly, a little preposterous. While I don’t believe the the 1/3 pound premium sandwich signals a recovery, it does say something about the future of consumer spending. If there is one company that knows a little something about the everyday consumer, it is McDonald’s.

Now, the most obvious argument against the idea of using this big burger as an economic indicator will be brought up by anyone that saw the CNBC special on Mickey D’s back in

The markets had a rough day, with the Dow Jones down 0.97% to close at 8447.00.  The NASDAQ and S&P closed at 1835.04 and 919.32 respectively, down 0.49% and 0.85%.  Gold and crude oil both headed to lower prices today, with gold settling at $927.40, and oil down $0.91 to settle at $69.89.  The 10-year saw prices fall with the yield ending at 3.537%. 

H&R Block [HRB: 17.23, +1.56 (+9.96%)] released earnings yesterday, reporting a profit of $706.9 million, or $2.09 per share, better then the earnings of $543.6 million, or $1.66 per share, released the same period the year before.  H&R Block missed on revenue, reporting that revenue fell 2.9% to $2.47 billion as opposed to the average analyst estimate of $2.52 billion, H&R Block however did beat earnings estimate of $2.05 per share.  The company’s tax unit was hurt as it saw a weak tax season,

There’s been a slew of good news lately, including improved consumer sentiment, lower than expected job losses, increasing wages, and a contracting TED spread.  The stock market has been up for 12 of the past 14 weeks, and the Dow recently broke even for 2009.  Public officials including President Obama and Fed Chairman Bernanke have declared the worst to be over.

Unfortunately we are not yet in the clear.  The yield on the 10-Year Treasury Note increased 60 basis points during the one-month period from May 12 to June 12.  Oil prices rose 23% over the same period.  Keynesian economists argue that interest rates and oil prices are higher due to the expectations of economic recovery.  While the recovery may partially explain the increase in these prices, it doesn’t explain all of it.  The Treasury continues to auction billions of

Through the 90’s, Cisco Systems [CSCO: 18.91, -0.12 (-0.63%)] was known as one of the “4 Horsemen of IT” and was even the largest company by market cap ($500 B) at the peak of the tech bubble in early 2000.   The web is the driver of all information worldwide over the past two decades, thus all recent tech trends revolve around the internet: mobilization, cloud computing, virtualization, social networking and much more.  Consequently enough, Cisco is the dominant provider of the networking gear that runs the internet.  More specifially, Cisco’s bread and butter has been the ethernet switches and overall routers markets with approximately 70% and 50% of the market share, respectively.  To sustain revenue growth, companies like CSCO must adapt to tech trends and enter new markets outside of its core business.

Breaking Ties

On March 16th, CSCO unveiled its two-year secret project: the

It is becoming clearer and clearer what it means to have government involved in the affairs of banks and businesses. Where all the initial talk was about the “moral hazard” presented by government bailing out the private sector and how this just means that in the future banks, and other organizations, will just take on more and more risk because they know that if things go bad, the government will be there with a rescue net to save the institution.

Now, we are seeing the other side of the bailout business. In the AIG [AIG: 1.46, 0.00 (0.00%)] case executives and others were angry because the government interfered with bonuses and other executive decisions. And, we have the government putting lids on executive pay. And, we have government wanting to rewrite mortgages, and cap interest rates on credit card debt, and so on and