An article this week from Morningstar analyst Greg Wolper ldquo;Give Small Fund Shops a Chancerdquo; argues that investors who ignore small fund complexes may be missing out on growth opportunities. Itrsquo;s long been hard for small fund companies to get attention ndash; they donrsquo;t have the money to spend on advertising that the giants have. But Wolper writes that ldquo;lesser-known firms, and funds, have advantages that make it worth the time to seek them out.rdquo; He also makes a good point when he says that small fund managers can struggle when they try to cover too many asset classes and sectors. He says ldquo;a good small firm often focuses on one thing it does well.rdquo; We recently revamped our company sitemdash;USFunds.commdash;to make it easier for new and returning visitors to quickly learn about U.S. Global Investors and its focus on the global growth theme, which is at the intersection of emerging markets and ...

The earnings season beginning today (Tuesday) is shaping up to be an important one, as it could have a significant impact on a struggling stock market rally.

Since the stock market rally reached a pinnacle nearly two weeks ago, the Dow Jones Industrial Average has lost about 3.3% while the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index has fallen about 3.7%. And if this week’s earnings report come in below expectations, the rally that helped stock prices surge more than 50% could come to an abrupt end.

Fortunately, many of the companies set to report earnings this week are traditionally strong performers and for the most part, companies that have weathered the financial crisis. But not all of them have met Wall Street’s expectations.

The quarterly results for five companies in particular – Yum! Brands Inc. (NYSE: YUM), Alcoa Inc. (NYSE: AA), Costco Wholesale Corp. (Nasdaq: COST), Monsanto Corp. (NYSE:

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Abu Dhabi Buys Daimler Stake; Tata Launches Nano; Walgreen Beats 2Q Estimates; Banks Hurt by Plunging Commercial Property Prices; Gannett Furloughs Workers Again; Oil Nears 3-Month High; TreeHouse Foods Climbs on Private-Label Buying

Abu Dhabi’s state-controlled International Petroleum Investment Company (IPIC) said it would buy a 9.1% stake in the German automaker Daimler AG (DAI) for almost $2.72 billion (2 billion euros). It also pumped $1.41 billion into Aabar Investment PJSC, giving the Middle East emirate majority control in the IPIC, Reuters reported. Tata Motors Ltd. (ADR: TTM) announced it will begin sales of the Nano, the world’s ...

Is it possible to save and even grow your money in the midst of the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression? William Patalon from Money Morning believes so.

And in his first installment of a new series, he shows you exactly how you can do that with low-minimum mutual funds.

Just this week, a friend told me that he wanted to jump-start his long-neglected saving-and-investing efforts, but was worried it wouldn’t be possible on his current household budget.

I’d be willing to bet that a lot of folks are asking that very same question right now.

I mean, let’s face it: Everyone knows how important it is to save money. But in the middle of what may well be the worst U.S. financial crisis since the Great Depression, finding the cash to create an emergency fund – or to invest in a mutual fund that requires a $10,000 initial

...

 

 

U.S. Overtakes Germany In Wind Power

Alternative energy investors who watched their exchange-traded funds get hammered last year have reason to expect better times. A new report by Reuters says that the U.S. overtook Germany as the world's biggest supplier of wind power in 2008, and should become the global leader in solar sometime this year. 

The report was based on new industry data just made public. You can read the story here.

 

Update On Gold ETFs

With the SPDR Gold Trust (NYSE: GLD) trading at record levels in terms of bullion holdings, TheStreet's  Kevin Baker looks at prospects going forward for that ETF and others.

You can read the story here.

 

Stick With Index Funds In 401(k) Plans

This interesting analysis by investment researcher Morningstar looks at changes in 401(k) retirement plans at work and how they're changing. 

The piece reviews different options and suggests

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Keeping up with the "nowhere to hide in this market theme", lets take a look at target date funds. These are funds that adjust their weightings into various asset classes based on the your retirement date. For example, someone not retiring for 30 years would have a higher percentage of stocks vs bonds, and so on. To me, they are gaining in popularity due to a couple of main reasons:br /ulliThe baby boom generation is approaching retirement, thus more people than ever getting serious about IRA's and other retirement accountsbr //liliPeople don't want to do their homework on how to invest retirement money/liliMore people have become disillusioned with investment managers, and want to do their own investing without doing much research/li/ulWith 2008 wrapped up, we can see how all of these investments have done. And as it turns out, many of these funds were hit pretty ...

Hello Friends! Thanks so much for stopping by and visiting my blog, Stock Picks Bob’s Advice! As always, please remember that I am an amateur investor, so please remember to consult with your professional investment advisers prior to making any investment decisions based on information on this website.

Last week, on August 14, 2008, I chose to replace what I felt was a relatively weakly performing stock with something acting healthier.  This is certainly outside of my “rules” for trading, but I am trying to enhance the performance of my portfolio by trying to identify similar stocks that do meet my criteria as well but are technically, from my perspective, appear to be trading better in the market.  I am not sure if this will be a successful intervention but as I have always done on this blog, I wanted to …

During the last several years, Devon has been selectively trimming its portfolio. The largest divesture occurred in 2005, when the company sold 14% of its proven reserves for more than $2.3 billion. Devon used the proceeds to repurchase shares and pay down debt. The firm also recently announced it was exiting West Africa and Egypt, which accounts for about 5% of the firm’s proven reserve base. As a result of the all these sales, Devon now has a highly concentrated but eclectic group of assets.

At recent prices, Morningstar analyst Justin Perucki, CFA expects Devon Energy stock to return 31% over the next three years, which is more than the market seems to be expecting.

Track justin’s picks at:

http://trackthepros.com/categories.php?category_id=1368

...

Morningstar analyst Kish Patel believes these four Canadian Energy companies are ON SALE:

Sponsored by:

ECA) It’s a difficult feat to find a major natural-gas play in North America where EnCana hasn’t already established a dominant acreage position. From northeast British Columbia (home of the Montney tight gas and Horn River shale gas plays) to the prolific east Texas region (the Deep Bossier play), EnCana has an enviable opportunity set. What separates it from most of is peers is its patience with reservoir evaluation and its technical innovation. Add high-quality in-situ oil sands assets that will get spun out

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Hello Friends!  Thanks so much for stopping by and visiting my blog, Stock Picks Bob’s Advice! As always, please remember that I am an amateur investor, so please remember to consult with your professional investment advisers prior to making any investment decisions based on information on this website.

Earlier this morning, my Copart (CPRT) stock hit an appreciation target of a 30% gain triggering a partial sale of 1/7th of my position or 30 shares which were sold at $43.80/share.  This represented a gain of $10.08/share or 29.9% since purchase.  The shares were initially acquired 9/27/07 at a cost basis of $33.72/share.

As you may know, I use sales like today’s sale as a ’signal’ to buy an additional position if I am under my maximum of 20 positions.  Since, after yesterday’s sale of ResMed (RMD), I …