Doctor Jack's Stock Medicine

[Jack Haddad]

Well, I was merely driving at the point that something which may legitimately be viewed as "silly" can nevertheless hold certain value, even if only for recreation purposes. With my investment style I tend to view a much longer time horizon than one week, but participating in a weekly pick contest has certainly given me pause to look at trading from a different perspective. Maybe a different segment of the brain evaluates short-term vs. that which evaluates long-term investments; if so, a weekly pick contest will exercise that synaptic pathway, similar to the "muscle memory" spoken of by your young patient.

My issue is not with respect to duration of trades, rather with engaging in something (simulator trading) that is not real... and because it's fiction and imaginary, I'm afraid that it will obscure my centration/discipline and result in bad trading habits. That's all. Trading/investing/stock picking is serious business!

[spikefader]

Since the pick has not been executed in real life (hypothertical/paper), volatility of that trade does not impact the market at all. Therefore, I refuse to get accustomed to such an imaginary and silly simulations.

Pffft. Come on Jack, do it for your brothers and sisters here at MM. Sure, you sound like a big fish in a little pond, but imagine you've just got 10k to trade with in POTW and size doesn't matter, nor even winning, but just improving the group numbers so we can beat Karel's mechanical fund performance. Who knows, you may even win a few if you're lucky. Please don't shy away from the bonding experience it offers us forum members. Let it be a little imaginary and silly....

[spikefader]

What leads you to believe I'm trading anything I post about? Except for the occasional stock, that is, like the ELN short.

I actually don't believe a whole lot of what you post Dave.

[Jack Haddad]

Something is unsually holding INTC up. Is there something in the brewing (release of their Woodcrest due any day)? Woodcrest is supposed to INTC's biggest gun release against AMD's duel -core. If the server paltorm does not receive a favorable market reaction, INTC s finished from a competitive stand-point.

Folks, shorted INTC at 18.13. The daily strength relative to the breadth of today's market just does not make sense to me. The stock is defying the laws of gravity.

[skiracer]

Pffft. Come on Jack, do it for your brothers and sisters here at MM. Sure, you sound like a big fish in a little pond, but imagine you've just got 10k to trade with in POTW and size doesn't matter, nor even winning, but just improving the group numbers so we can beat Karel's mechanical fund performance. Who knows, you may even win a few if you're lucky. Please don't shy away from the bonding experience it offers us forum members. Let it be a little imaginary and silly....

Doc,
Besides you get two trades a week, if you need to escape one, to recoup or embellish on the first one. An it gives us a chance to whup some pro ass. Actually the odds are against you as there will be almost 25 or so to 1 that one of us beats you. Maybe you better stay out of it.

[Jack Haddad]

A new daily low for AAPL is imminent. A close below 60 will compell AAPL to test a support of 58.25

Selling has intensified on heavy volume. Not good for AAPL here.

[Rob]

INTC Holding Up

Folks, shorted INTC at 18.13. The daily strength relative to the breadth of today's market just does not make sense to me. The stock is defying the laws of gravity.

Jack, maybe the subject of this article I found on Forbes.com has something to do with it (emphasis mine):

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Survey Suggests Higher IT Spending In 2006
Mary Crane, 05.31.06, 8:31 AM ET

Information-technology spending budgets are likely to increase, on average, 5.2%, year-over-year, in 2006 and 4.8% in 2007, according to a recent Merrill Lynch survey of 75 U.S. and 25 European chief information officers.

Overall IT spending growth should increase 7% to 8% in 2006, wrote Merrill analyst Richard Farmer, driven by a healthier small- and medium-business market which, according to distributors like Ingram Micro (nyse: IM - news - people ) and Tech Data (nasdaq: TECD - news - people ), have outpaced overall IT spending over the last couple of years.

So what are the CIOs spending their bigger budgets on?

Farmer said the highest-growth areas included laptops, applications software, networked storage, networking equipment and security.

The survey also found that 89% of the respondents said Apple’s Boot Camp, which allows Windows XP to run on Intel (nasdaq: INTC - news - people )-based Mac computers, won’t impact future Mac purchases. The other 11% said they will change their spending plans less than 1%.

The bottom line, Farmer said, was that most CIOs are unwilling to pay a premium for Mac computers.

In the overall server market, the survey found, Hewlett-Packard (nyse: HPQ - news - people ), IBM (nyse: IBM - news - people ) and Dell (nasdaq: DELL - news - people ) were winners over Sun Microsystems (nasdaq: SUNW - news - people ). CIOs perceived these companies’ products to be more power efficient -- a quality 28% of the survey respondents said mattered in their purchasing decisions -- than Sun.

Farmer said Sun’s poor showing was likely due to the recent introduction of its more power-efficient platforms like the new T1 Niagara servers, which he said were still in the "tire-kicking stage."

But the survey offered some good news for Sun Microsystems. About 75% of the survey respondents said they think Sun’s Solaris operating system is better on x86 servers than Linux.

"Although it’s too early to call a trend, we have heard anecdotally of instances where Solaris is replacing Linux," Farmer said. "This would be bullish for Sun if it became widespread."

Finally, in the ongoing market-share battle between number-one chipmaker Intel and its number-two rival, AMD, Farmer said 80% of the CIOs surveyed expected no change in their chip preference for server purchcases. Still, a weighted average of the survey responses showed a small 1.4% shift in AMD’s favor.

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That, coupled with the horrendous beating INTC has taken in recent months--maybe that could account for it.

[Jack Haddad]

Folks, shorted INTC at 18.13. The daily strength relative to the breadth of today's market just does not make sense to me. The stock is defying the laws of gravity.

Covered short at 18.00

[Lyehopper]

My issue is not with respect to duration of trades, rather with engaging in something (simulator trading) that is not real... and because it's fiction and imaginary, I'm afraid that it will obscure my centration/discipline and result in bad trading habits. That's all. Trading/investing/stock picking is serious business!

Doc.... I don't understand why you and Jack bother posting on this forum.... Seems you fellas are way too professional and serious for us. Seems like posting here is a big waste of your time. What do you gents get out of the $$MM$$ experience anyway?

[Jack Haddad]

Jack, maybe the subject of this article I found on Forbes.com has something to do with it (emphasis mine):

--------------------------------------------------------

Survey Suggests Higher IT Spending In 2006
Mary Crane, 05.31.06, 8:31 AM ET

Information-technology spending budgets are likely to increase, on average, 5.2%, year-over-year, in 2006 and 4.8% in 2007, according to a recent Merrill Lynch survey of 75 U.S. and 25 European chief information officers.

Overall IT spending growth should increase 7% to 8% in 2006, wrote Merrill analyst Richard Farmer, driven by a healthier small- and medium-business market which, according to distributors like Ingram Micro (nyse: IM - news - people ) and Tech Data (nasdaq: TECD - news - people ), have outpaced overall IT spending over the last couple of years.

So what are the CIOs spending their bigger budgets on?

Farmer said the highest-growth areas included laptops, applications software, networked storage, networking equipment and security.

The survey also found that 89% of the respondents said Apple’s Boot Camp, which allows Windows XP to run on Intel (nasdaq: INTC - news - people )-based Mac computers, won’t impact future Mac purchases. The other 11% said they will change their spending plans less than 1%.

The bottom line, Farmer said, was that most CIOs are unwilling to pay a premium for Mac computers.

In the overall server market, the survey found, Hewlett-Packard (nyse: HPQ - news - people ), IBM (nyse: IBM - news - people ) and Dell (nasdaq: DELL - news - people ) were winners over Sun Microsystems (nasdaq: SUNW - news - people ). CIOs perceived these companies’ products to be more power efficient -- a quality 28% of the survey respondents said mattered in their purchasing decisions -- than Sun.

Farmer said Sun’s poor showing was likely due to the recent introduction of its more power-efficient platforms like the new T1 Niagara servers, which he said were still in the "tire-kicking stage."

But the survey offered some good news for Sun Microsystems. About 75% of the survey respondents said they think Sun’s Solaris operating system is better on x86 servers than Linux.

"Although it’s too early to call a trend, we have heard anecdotally of instances where Solaris is replacing Linux," Farmer said. "This would be bullish for Sun if it became widespread."

Finally, in the ongoing market-share battle between number-one chipmaker Intel and its number-two rival, AMD, Farmer said 80% of the CIOs surveyed expected no change in their chip preference for server purchcases. Still, a weighted average of the survey responses showed a small 1.4% shift in AMD’s favor.

--------------------------------------------------------

That, coupled with the horrendous beating INTC has taken in recent months--maybe that could account for it.

A very possible effect, Rob. I have been on the phone frantically with other managers and none of us have a clue. I hope there isn't some hidden crooked analyst upgrade.

[gdb]

He will not play your game so you throw a fit?

I for one welcome Jack's insight on this forum. The more the merrier. His trades are telling me all I need to know concerning the caliber of trader he is.

He gave his reasons for not wanting to participate in the POTW. With all due respect, your posts are adding nothing to his thread. How about changing subjects?

Doc.... I don't understand why you and Jack bother posting on this forum.... Seems you fellas are way too professional and serious for us. Seems like posting here is a big waste of your time. What do you gents get out of the $$MM$$ experience anyway?

[Jack Haddad]

He will not play your game so you throw a fit?

I for one welcome Jack's insight on this forum. The more the merrier. His trades are telling me all I need to know concerning the caliber of trader he is.

He gave his reasons for not wanting to participate in the POTW. With all due respect, your posts are adding nothing to his thread. How about changing subjects?

Thank you kind, sir.

[skiracer]

He will not play your game so you throw a fit?

I for one welcome Jack's insight on this forum. The more the merrier. His trades are telling me all I need to know concerning the caliber of trader he is.

He gave his reasons for not wanting to participate in the POTW. With all due respect, your posts are adding nothing to his thread. How about changing subjects?

He's been here about two weeks and you can tell exactly what kind of a trader he is already. Amazing. I posted 4 trades over the last 3 weeks that gained close to 30 % , and make about $8000, that don't hardly get a mention but Doctor Jack is the one getting the message out there regarding his plays. I haven't seen anything that I would write home about yet. I have nothing against the guy but please spare me. What's wrong with wanting to get the guy involved with our little game. It's the same level playing field for everyone and professional or not I would put my game plan against his anytime just to see how we do against one another for the fun of it. None of us here are afraid or embarrassed with how our picks do each week. No one's going to call him a stupid shit if he comes in last. It's just a friendly community with a friendly competive game going on. What's the big deal. I would like to see him put one up there that's good enough to win it all and take the top spot one week. Otherwise keep a record of his buys to document just how well they are doing. Anything else is you know what and doesn't hold water in my book. By the way you should put up a pick for the game. Every week that you lose should make you that much more persistent in finding a stock that will evertually take that top spot. An if you also own it, which in my opinion is the only way to play any of your picks, makes it that much better.

[Lyehopper]

Do you find my posts "silly"?

He will not play your game so you throw a fit?

I for one welcome Jack's insight on this forum. The more the merrier. His trades are telling me all I need to know concerning the caliber of trader he is.

He gave his reasons for not wanting to participate in the POTW. With all due respect, your posts are adding nothing to his thread. How about changing subjects?

This post is very reminiscent of "The Stock Boy" and "Adman"....

Hey gdb.... What are you contributing to the forum? You've posted three times (total) on this HUUUUGE forum.... and two of those posts were negatively directed at me.

Why don't you play the POTW gdb? Are you a "professional" that's afraid of being locked up by the SEC too? Did your sister attend Princeton by any chance?

The "Docs" refusal to answer my post directly tell me something about the caliber member he is proving to be....

[Lyehopper]

He's been here about two weeks and you can tell exactly what kind of a trader he is already. Amazing. I posted 4 trades over the last 3 weeks that gained close to 30 % , and make about $8000, that don't hardly get a mention but Doctor Jack is the one getting the message out there regarding his plays. I haven't seen anything that I would write home about yet. I have nothing against the guy but please spare me. What's wrong with wanting to get the guy involved with our little game. It's the same level playing field for everyone and professional or not I would put my game plan against his anytime just to see how we do against one another for the fun of it. None of us here are afraid or embarrassed with how our picks do each week. No one's going to call him a stupid shit if he comes in last. It's just a friendly community with a friendly competive game going on. What's the big deal. I would like to see him put one up there that's good enough to win it all and take the top spot one week. Otherwise keep a record of his buys to document just how well they are doing. Anything else is you know what and doesn't hold water in my book. By the way you should put up a pick for the game. Every week that you lose should make you that much more persistent in finding a stock that will evertually take that top spot. An if you also own it, which in my opinion is the only way to play any of your picks, makes it that much better.

Hey Gura! You need to create a member ID that braggs on how dandy a trader you are dude.lol.... You could even make it a female member who also thinks you're a sexy hunk!.... You could call her "The Stock Girl".... SsSsSsSssssss