My wife and I went to apply for a mortgage as we saw a piece of property that interested us. Considering that I am always interested in knowing the state of the market I asked the mortgage broker how business was.
She said, “we are really busy right now.”

I looked at her and asked, “how come?”
She replied, “no idea, but it seems people are getting it into their minds to buy.”
Of course there is a spring effect and that now is a time to buy due to seasonal effects.  Though …

On March 17, I said that the world has changed. I wrote.
I will not keep you in suspense, but the world changing event is the fact that the Fed has allowed investment banks to come to the Fed bank teller for money. That has changed everything. What this single action means is that investment banks will be able to tidy their bottom lines, letting the market recover. Though it also means investment banks will have to allow themselves to be regulated.

When I invest one of the things that I do is get feedback from the locals. If I am investing in Latin America I get a local contact that gives me the lay of the land in South America. I happen to be lucky because I have family that lives in South America, North America, Europe, and the former Eastern Bloc countries.

Via Long and Short.
And you know it hurts my feelings, if nothing else, that the Swiss franc is worth more than the dollar.-Paul Volcker in an interview this week with Charlie Rose

Yes the famous Paul Volcker who brought stability back to crazy America. Volcker was in office from 1977 to 1987, and to be fair let’s see how well he did against the Swiss Franc.

I have been watching a trend among companies that has me deeply concerned. It has me so concerned that I wonder if we are not about to hit a second bubble?

Christian’s posts over the last few days and an article about Warren Buffett got me thinking and I think it’s time for a post to the good ol’ Investor Geeks. I think the morons on TV have gone on long enough and I think we Investor Geeks are on the same page, so listen up!

Up, down, up, down it would seem that the entire market has gone nuts. I have also taken my time to post a blog entry talking about the state of the market. Part of it due to a cold I was working off, and other part is that I am busy finding buying opportunities.

I’m speaking on a panel that will hopefully help some Bryn Mawr and Haverford students get jobs after college. You can see me 7pm EST on 3/18/2008 at this link:
http://www.haverford.edu/cdo/opportunities/events/

I wanted to provide a counterpoint to some recent articles posted on Investorgeeks that have suggested commodities are not a good place to invest. More specifically, that the commodities boom is a high risk area of investing and potentially a giant bubble.

I have a different opinion. I personally feel that investing in commodities is the only way to ensure in the coming years that your portfolio is not decimated by hyper inflation.

The Present State of the US Economy

Before we discuss this further, we need to do a quick summary of the present state of the US (world) economy:

I will be releasing my market sentiment blog entry tomorrow, and it is positive. Though what I want to comment on is how the world has changed for the better. What do you think it was?
I will not keep you in suspense, but the world changing event is the fact that the Fed has allowed investment banks to come to the Fed bank teller for money. That has changed everything. What this single action means is that investment banks will be able to tidy their bottom lines, letting the …