BA does almost nothing right. So why is the stock up 52%? We have all heard the old saw as to how “the market climbs a wall of worry.” There is, of course, an inherent truth in this. Investors always take on a bit of risk in exchange for their gains. One might imagine that this is a well-reasoned and well-researched risk. Yeah, well, you’d probably be wrong about that. For most of the past eight months, most investors haven’t even shown the common rules of life we try to teach grade school kids, like “look both ways before you cross the street,” or “don’t trust that weird guy in the rusty old Buick ...

By Adam Lass, Senior Editor, Taipan Publishing Group

This American company has gained 777% the old-fashioned way: selling junk in backroom deals.

As regular readers know, I am a Ford man.

Back when I was a kid, you had to make three really important choices. First, you had to pick a political party. Didn’t matter how well you knew the candidates – you picked a party and that’s what you were.

We are talking Democrat or Republican here. Libertarians weren’t much discussed, and backing the Socialists could get your parents blackballed at work. And if you wanted peace around the dinner table, you just went with the same side your folks did.

Second, you had to choose “your” baseball, basketball and football teams. We didn’t have rotisserie leagues back then, so there was no “à la carte.” You picked your guys, and you defended their every move in the schoolyard and on

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As the markets would tell it, the swine flu epidemic is little more than a tempest in a teacup. But, sad to say, the danger here remains far greater than it seems…

Before we begin, a word in honor of Monday’s stage-five rocket launch of a rally. Or should I say, rally on top of rally.

As a caveat, these words are being written some two hours and change before market close. Regardless of where that close may be, however, it simply must be said – watching what seemed to be nearly every risk-related asset in the world catch a gigantic bid simultaneously was, in a word, awesome.

(Your humble editor was so transfixed by the sight, he felt verbally transported back to his seventh-grade skateboarding days.)

The world, it seems, is pounding the table for a V-shaped recovery. Maybe even a slightly leftward-tilting V, to

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With Monday’s surprise announcement, China dropped a bombshell on global currency markets. Action to take: Get out of the U.S. dollar. Now. Right now.

Serenity Now! Serenity Now!! - Frank Costanza, Seinfeld

Let’s see, how can I put the appropriate subtlety and nuance on this…

Get. Out. Of the U.S. Dollar. NOW.

Do not pass go, do not collect $200, do not stop to conduct an impromptu inventory of your unmentionables.

In the slightly profane vernacular of internet slang, just GTFO. Do not walk, RUN, to the nearest exit. Barring that, find the most appropriate hedge for your dollar-denominated investments and GET THAT HEDGE ON. Toot sweet.

If you don’t know of a high quality dollar hedge off the top of your head – other than those oldies-but-goodies, gold and silver – then you’re in luck. I’m about to tell you (yet

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HIDDEN VALUE

Dear Reader, 

Here’s a stat for you to chew on. 

According to the Asian Development Bank, global assets shrunk by $50 trillion in 2008.

That’s one year of global GDP growth lost. 

As a result, the global economy is likely to shrink for the first time since World War II. And trade will drop to levels unseen since the Great Depression. 

According to Claudio Loser, a former IMF director, “This crisis is the first truly universal one in the history of humanity. No country escapes from it. It has not yet bottomed out.” 

But there is a glimmer of hope… 

This from Bloomberg: 

Asia is likely to recover with “vibrant” growth once the crisis recedes in 2010, Manu Bhaskaran, the Singapore-based head of

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Massive unemployment? No problem! Adam Lass of the Taipan Publishing Group says that no one is buying luxury goods right now but he gives us two puts in the retail sector that are playing out well during the crisis.

He also shares a British health care conglomerate that provides aid for troubled times and “sells even better when folks are broke.”

This from Adam:

Buy into Eastern Europe’s depression or just make 114% on ours: It’s your shot to call.

In case you hadn’t noticed, retail is in a bit of a pickle these days. The Conference Board’s latest consumer poll puts their Confidence Index down another 12.4 points, to yet another all-time low at 25.

Keeping in mind that anything below 50 is considered bad, I’d have to say that a score of half that ought to be considered really bad.

No shock there, I suppose,

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Gold didn’t do a whole heck of a lot in the Far East yesterday. A smallish rally into the London a.m. fix [5:30 a.m. in N.Y.] got smacked, but managed to gain that back and a bit more by 9:00 a.m. on the Comex in New York. Then the usual not-for-profit seller[s] showed up, and that was it for the day. The low came in after-hours electronic trading…shortly after the Comex trading pits closed. After that, it managed to tack on a few bucks before Globex trading closed in New York at 5:15 p.m.

Volume was so-so. Only 99,266 contracts were estimated to have traded, including a switch effect of 8,734 contracts.

click to enlarge

Silver’s action yesterday was similar to gold’s…with the exception that the ‘low’ for yesterday [such as it was] occurred in early morning trading in

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Most investors want to abandon everything and run for cover thanks to all the bad news, stock collapses and recession. Can it get any worse? Sandy Franks of the Taipan Publishing Group says, “no.” So what do you do with your money now?

Here she recommends to buy gold, invest in stocks with discrimination and keep your money liquid in treasuries.

This from Sandy:

The stock market did not react well to the government’s $787 billion economic stimulus plan.

On Feb. 23, 2009, the Dow tumbled to 7,114 – hitting an eleven-year low. The other major indices, including the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq, fell as well.

The latest economic numbers aren’t any better. The price of single-family homes plunged 18% and the Consumer Confidence Index, which was down slightly in January, plummeted more than 12 points in February to 25.

The combination of bad economic news and a tanking

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Alex’s Notes: My favorite part of this article was this:

Bluffing Into the Nuts

We’ll close with a quick poker analogy.

In No Limit Texas Hold ‘Em, to hold “the nuts” means you can’t be beaten – that your hole cards in combination with the board give you the best possible hand.

Needless to say, it is useless to bluff a player who is holding the nuts. Why would they fold? They know they have the best hand. If you raise such a player, they will happily call… or better yet shove their own stack in the middle, a reraise to put you all-in.

If the Fed or the IMF were to dump gold onto the market in this environment, I believe it would be the poker equivalent of bluffing into the nuts. I don’t think the powers that be are that dumb.

******

Written by Justice Litle, Editorial Director, Taipan Publishing Group  

Is

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Countries with strong commodity and cash reserves are going to be great markets on the far side of this financial crisis.

The first sentence of a Reuters article on Brazil’s Carinval is certainly… attention catching:

The 10 million extra government-provided condoms are poised, final touches being put on huge floats depicting Queen Cleopatra and Can-can dancers, and the Barack Obama masks are flying off the shelves.

Would have liked to have known the name of the company making those condoms, eh? That extra 10 million is on top of the 45 million already provided at Carnival.

But even “bigger” news to investors like yourselves is the fact that one float’s dancers were wearing costumes costing $13,000… A PIECE! And this in a massive global financial crisis that has caused even some of the mining towns in surrounding Brazilian states to cancel their parades.

By all estimates, though, folks are

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