Liberty

http://i.imgur.com/w8aAS.png

I don't know, I hear that a lot, but it sounds like the broken window fallacy. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_window_fallacy Some technologies were developed because of the war, and getting women in the workplace certainly helped, but these could have been done without the war, and all the capital that went into blowing stuff up and making bombs could have been used much more productively otherwise. I feel like history has tried to justify the war by saying it was so great for the economy, but I kind of doubt it was actually true. But we'll never know, as there's no control group for history. There's actually something about that here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_window_fallacy#The_opportunity_cost_of_war But to your point: Yes, some uncertainty doesn't matter too much for the economy in the end, but some certainly does. If you start to lose all the institutions and infrastructure on which businesses depend, then that's a huge problem. Doesn't mean you can't bounce back fast afterwards (ie. Japan), but in theory you could have done much better if you hadn't been bombed back to the stone age in the first place.

I'll be surprised if the have more than 12 million in earnings...

I totally agree but it seems to me that, this may be the case b/c maybe the analysts interested in publishing a contrarian view are discouraged by their editors sometimes... I cite the case from "Confidence Game" where the author; Christine Richard said a financial reporter's performance is judged based on how the stock market reacts to their reporting. Also, she mentioned (if I remember correctly) how her request to cover MBIA's faux shell company; Negris Caulis was out right rejected by her editor. Along with that, I think we don't usually get a chance to hear the analysts who are right on the money about a company going down way before it's cool, because they're usually hushed away or the general news consumer isn't interested in listening to them (though I think the case is different for most of the members here). I too would like to see things change; maybe they would if we aligned the interests of the financial reporters with the buyside investors... but here's my guess; once things start to stabilize again (in w/e # of years) and the next bubble gets in the making and market sentiment goes up... once again the best of analysts shall again be ignored... and rinse, repeat. What do you think? I wasn't saying it's always their fault. The system is definitely structured in such a way that their interests are not aligned with most investors (who signs their paycheck? Who do they spend their day hanging out with?). The result is still the same, though.

One thing that bugged me a bit was the part about how analysts and journalists are so critical and always looking for the problems... I wish! Once something is crashing and burning, of course they are, but most of the time they don't dig nearly enough and are way too cozy with management.

Yeah, the battery would be an issue. But they could make the screen black, but when you flip to camera mode, it goes clear for the photograph. They have the technology to do that today, but hiding the battery and circuitry would be difficult around the rest of the phone. But they will do it one day! Heck, if you watch even the newer Star Trek's with Picard, their communicators were bigger than phones today, so technology has come a long way in a decade. Cheers! I'm not saying the laws of physics preclude it forever, just that we won't see it in the iPhone 5 :)

Am I the only one who had never heard of Yammer before this? Good for them for getting a billion, but I'm not sure if MSFT will get its money worth.

Lol, as soon as they invent the see-through battery and as soon as people aren't annoyed by having a random background constantly intruding into their content ;)

Thanks for sharing your epiphany. It reminds me of one of Buffett's stock answers in interviews, about how (I'm paraphrasing) if you could have told someone born in 1930 that the US would go through a depression, a world war, many recessions, the cold war, financial and political crises, social unrest, inflation, etc.. That he would probably never want to invest, but that in fact, over the past century people got much wealthier and many businesses did extremely well.

Thanks for posting that. His book was very interesting, good to hear the man speak. I just wish they would fire Joe.

Pointless and irrelevant trivia... Nintendo & RIM: http://i.imgur.com/h6E10.png

Funny how there's no reaction from the market. My working theory is that the market can't think further than the next quarter, so it can't conceive of 2014 :)

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/globe-investor/personal-finance/the-sad-end-of-saving-and-investing/article4257700/ There's starting to be more capitulation in the air. Contrarian indicator?

Some new info in there: Too bad about bigger cogen, but extra DP production capacity sure is nice! Fixed costs can be spread over more tons, and they'll be quite valuable, especially when DP move up from its structural bottom.

You beat me to it. ;) Great news for FTP! Looks like trading might have been stopped..? Note that the warrants will be priced from the final closing date, which should be around June 20. By then price should be even higher.

I wonder if that's the case in places like China and Africa, though...

Would we have fewer tobacco users without advertising? And without the industry's distortion and suppression of scientific findings over the past half-century? I get how it's a legitimate industry, and how it's hard to draw the line (what about a company that makes alcohol? what about a company that makes guns and cruise missiles?), but I guess we each have to make our choices. Buffett and Munger won't invest in cigarette companies, and neither will I.

http://www.grandich.com/2012/06/grandich-client-alderon-iron-ore-5/ At the end of the post there is: Wonder if someone will take him up on that.

Each person must decide for themselves if something is a good value for them, and I'm sure your decision makes sense for you. There's not one right answer for everybody. Personally, I spend maybe 10-14 hours a day in front of my computer, and usually keep each model for years before upgrading, so whether I pay 1000 or 3000 for a computer, it still ends up being a ridiculously low hourly amount and I feel I get a lot more value than the amount I pay. It matters a lot more that I'm happy with it, which is why I have a Mac Pro as my main desktop. I'd be more likely to consider a Windows computer now than a few years ago, though. Windows Vista was truly terrible and I wouldn't touch it with a ten-foot pole. But Windows 7 seems good. I still prefer OS X, though.

They sure close them fast. Now Fintechnix's turn: http://www.marketwatch.com/story/ebix-completes-acquisition-of-sydney-based-fintechnix-2012-06-13

Thanks for posting!

Question for you Dell holders out there: Does the company break out its operating margins by segment, and if so, what are they like for their service/SaaS segment?

Not very consequential, but it looks like Ping is going the way of the dodo. Not surprising, as I've never heard of anyone using it. http://allthingsd.com/20120612/apples-ping-to-end-with-a-thud-in-next-release-of-itunes/

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/millrock-and-vale-enter-option-agreement-concerning-the-audn-copper-gold-porphyry-project-alaska-2012-06-11-9173323

Indeed. And it is also having a huge health/quality-of-life costs in places like China where the air can be extremely foul mostly because fo it.