•  The point is, with valuation unknowable and the government changing the rules almost daily, and in an environment where stocks routinely pack a year of gains into a week or a day, everyone is a trader. Citigroup (C) was up 117% from Monday through Thursday. It's down 76% for the year and 66% for the last decade. Prince Allaweed seems like a nice guy, and he has a cool manger, but he's not exactly Jessie Livermore.
  
  
• The US is quite obviously becoming a socialist nation. That's good for a trade - but "concerning" for the long term.
  
  
• I'm not a doom-and-gloom guy (don't worry, I'm not going to go on a 3-hour screed). I'm a trader. If you're a trader, you gotta understand what you're betting on; people who think the government can "save us" or "decide who's big enough to fail" are either wrong or selling mutual funds. The government may as well decide specific people are too important to die for all the actual authority they over the business cycle (NB: When they thaw out and reanimate Walt Disney and/ or Ted Williams, I'll change my view).
  • STOCKS
  • RELATED ARTICLES
  • ALSO BY...

  SEARCH:

  Quote, Unquote: Biased Credit Rating Agencies?
  Airlines: People Won't Fly, So We'll Raise Fees
  Trading Radar: GDP Highlights a Thin Week
  California Oversteps with HDTV Regulations
  Goldman, Beaten But Unbowed
  

  Don't Let Retail's Flashing Lights Fool You
  Get On the Winning Team
  Market Strong Despite Bad Macro News
  Mulling the Market Reaction to Same-Store Sales
  Three Rules For Shorting
  
  
  
  
• I bought General Motors this week, as I'm quite confident the Big 3 are going to get billions from Washington. I'm equally confident the Big 3 will all be bankrupt in less than a decade. Markets and stocks are like frogs, you can make them jump but you can't make them fly.
  
  GM is jumping. Because I'm a trader, I have no intention of hanging around for the landing. (Update: I spent the weekend ruing the fact that I didn't take the gains I had on GM. The one trade I made Monday was selling GM at the open.)
  
  
• What makes the current situation a killer is the number of bubbles blowing up at once. It's not just credit. It's the Ag names, crude oil, coal names, steel and pretty much anything BRIC.
  
  Good charts for this bubble are 10 years of US Steel (X), 10 years of Potash (POT), and 10 years of Arch Coal (ACI). They all look more or less just like Cisco (CSCO) from 95 to 2002. Bubbles are bubbles. They've always existed - and always end the same way.
  
  
• That said, this bubble is the first time the whole world (rather than LTCM or Silicon Valley) is bursting at once. Dubai will be a huge, unfinished ghost town in 10 years. Our grandchildren will laugh at us the way we chuckle at Herbert Hoover. Our grandchildren will be right.
  
  
• I'm long the US dollar via the UUP ETF. I've taken most of the position off, but I think it's worth noting that the dollar, while horribly flawed, is better than other currencies in the world.
  
  
  Click to enlarge
  
  
• I'm long Wal-Mart (WMT) and McDonald's (MCD).
  
  
• I'm short Toyota (TM), which is the one position I have in any real size; mostly to offset to the long positions. Also, I think they are more or less as doomed as any other automaker. My biggest fear with the position, having spoken to our elected officials lately, it's not impossible they think Toyota is a US company and, as such, somehow deserve billions of dollars.
  
  
• I grew up in retail. This is shaping up to be the worst Christmas ever. Black Friday is a scam, in terms of retailers actually making any money.
  
  
• Also, the moon landings were faked, though I doubt that will come up in any conversations.
  
  
• Also -- and I assume, since I'm keeping Carl or Joe's seat warm, this will be the case anyway -- but I'll need a computer, so I don't feel completely lost. And if I'm not caffeinated there's a distinct chance my heart rate will fall under 100 beats per minute, and I won't talk like an auctioneer on coke. I'm not saying I have a problem with that - just that Fast Money would forcibly give me an espresso enema if I refused their iced coffee.
  
  And no one is allowed to look me directly in the eye or refer to me by name. Or touch me. Especially the union guys.
  

Other than the above, I'm looking forward to a relaxed, enjoyable morning. See you early on Friday!