Is this the beginning of a new bull market or just a last-gasp bear market rally? We just don’t know. We’ve got a hunch is all. According to value investing guru David Dremen, it doesn’t matter much, either. As he put it recently in Forbes:

The big question preoccupying the talkers at CNBC is whether the post-March upturn is the beginning of a new bull market or only a pause in a bear market that will last for years. Don’t obsess over figuring out the answer. Markets are always perverse and unpredictable. Instead of trying to time your next buys and sells, think about what is going to happen over the next decade and how you will cope with it. You should be thinking about the purchasing value of the dollar.

Dremen, like your Notes editors, believes we are in for a bout of “wild inflation” – something along the lines

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Building Wealth: Five Steps Towards Becoming a Millionaire

by Alexander Wissel, Editor in Chief, Investment U

Just over six years ago, we wrote to our subscribers about the smartest path to $1 million. With the rollout of the new Investment U course, “Building a Million-Dollar Portfolio From Scratch,” it seemed like a perfect time to revisit the five easy steps that we can all take to reach - and exceed - that seven-figure milestone…

“What’s the best stock that I should put my money in - How do I become a millionaire?”

We get this question, or something like it, almost every day from Investment U subscribers, family members and close friends alike. And while I respect the simplicity of the question, the answers of how to begin building wealth are a little harder to vocalize.

For instance, when I was in insurance, I took calls everyday from folks who

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By Dr. Steve Sjuggerud Yesterday's DailyWealth might have been the most dire essay we've ever published. We explained "The Coming Great Inflation," and we shared a few ways to position yourself for when it arrives. I know this may sound contradictory... but I think stocks could rise dramatically over the next 18 months or so. I believe stocks could have one of the greatest bear-market rallies in history. I know our government is spending more money than at any time in history... by far. The government is completely tied up with promises it can't possibly pay for – promises like universal health care and Social Security. The looming story is the government will print money at a wild pace, driving the dollar down. Then, nobody will want our government debt, so interest rates will skyrocket. I know the bill will come due some day. And ...

 Notes from theInvestment Underground 

Thursday, March 12, 2008 Recoleta, Buenos Aires, Argentina

Free money is destroying America… 19% interest on your money… Going long on banks… Getting out of gold… "Shorty" Guzman vs Bernie Madoff… More Greenspan guff…

*** Porter Stansberry says "free money is destroying America." We couldn’t agree more. The idea that the government can ‘fix’ things is as bogus now as it was during the Great Depression. The government, by creating the biggest credit bubble of all time through the Federal Reserve, caused the economic disaster we now all face. The idea that it can now solve the problem through more free money is an outright sham.

As Porter says in today’s DailyWealth:

Nowhere in history will you ever discover a market whose efficiency was improved by government interference. Likewise, history is bereft of even

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BBy Dr. Steve Sjuggerud/BBRBR "No one should have a favorite child," Bill Gross told Barron's over the weekend. But Bill's "favorite child" is "about as good a deal as any in the bond market today.".BRBR Bill Gross is known as the Bond King – for good reason. He's the world's biggest bond-fund manager, responsible for some $800 billion in invested assets. He's also the best bond-fund manager who's ever lived. Even today, he's still as good as it gets: He beat 99% of his peers over the last five years.BRBR Bill's "favorite child" fund has less than $1 billion in market cap. But he told Barron's it was his "focus every morning."BRBR The fund yields 23%. It's the Pimco High Income Fund (PHK). According to Bill, "It isn't a high-yield fund anymore; 40% of its assets are high-yield, but 60% are investment-grade."BRBR Since 1970, investment-grade bonds have paid about two percentage points higher than Treasury ...

Currency markets stabilize (for now)…  Data packed holiday shortened week…  China cuts rates… Indian rupee falls… And Now… Today’s Pfennig!

Good day…The dollar settled in at the slightly higher levels it reached Friday morning and is trading in a narrow range heading into a holiday shortened week. Trade desks across the globe will be mostly staffed by the backups as the big bosses take Christmas week off. Volume will likely be lighter, which can sometimes lead to an increase in volatility.

The data calendar is empty today, but chock full tomorrow and Christmas eve. Markets will be closed on Christmas day, and most will be closed again on the day following Christmas (known as boxing day). GDP, Personal Consumption, U of Michigan consume

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By Rob Fannon, editor, Phase 1 Investor

Genentech has reigned as king of the biotech industry for more than three decades.

A three-hour chat in a San Francisco pub launched the company in 1976. On its first day of trading in 1980, the stock tripled – and has risen 20-fold since. Today, Genentech’s portfolio includes three of the world’s top-selling biotech drugs – Avastin ($2.5 billion per year), Herceptin ($1.7 billion), and Rituxan ($2.5 billion).

But the king of biotech is now a buyout target. While I don’t believe the takeout bodes well for buyer or seller, the deal should mean big profits for biotech investors. Let me explain…

In 1990, Swiss drug company Roche acquired a majority stake in Genentech. Roche became Genentech’s exclusive European distributor. Today, Genentech’s drugs represent 30% of Roche’s pharmaceutical sales. And as Genentech’s largest shareholder, Roche has multiplied its money about 40

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