Down goes the Dow

agip,

Perhaps you saw Michael Slagowski Idaho high school athlete that broke 4:00 last Friday. He also has the seasonal best of 1:48 in the 800m. I saw him run a couple of times as a junior and had a feeling he would be a good one. I sent his name to the Oklahoma State coaches where I ran in college. He ended up at Penn State but I think lead OSU to recruit Garrette Calhoun who has run 1:51 this year. Calhoun's father was a good masters athlete a few years back. Boise area has some excellent coaches and summer programs for prep athletes. My wife would get a kick out of me running the summer meets against the kids.

Igy

Ghost of Igloi wrote:

agip,

Perhaps you saw Michael Slagowski Idaho high school athlete that broke 4:00 last Friday. He also has the seasonal best of 1:48 in the 800m. I saw him run a couple of times as a junior and had a feeling he would be a good one. I sent his name to the Oklahoma State coaches where I ran in college. He ended up at Penn State but I think lead OSU to recruit Garrette Calhoun who has run 1:51 this year. Calhoun's father was a good masters athlete a few years back. Boise area has some excellent coaches and summer programs for prep athletes. My wife would get a kick out of me running the summer meets against the kids.

Igy

I saw that mile yes - great stuff. It is always so rewarding when you see someone promising early on and then see it come to fruition. I remember seeing Robby Andrews run at the Armory early in HS - he ran some sort of insane last lap of an indoor mile - a 26 or something like that with a crazy look in his eye - I put down in my calendar to check on him in a few years and yeah he did ok.

1:51 is solid - hope Calhoun can build on that.

Do you ever see ostrander running around Boise? I hope she can make it to adulthood intact, but she seems so small...there's no firm rule on this but the bigger stronger girls seem to survive their late teens better. or at least that's my impression.

agip,

Yes, I saw her in the foothills recently. If I am running a certain area of the foothills I see the BSU women and men teams if they have an off competition weekend. I have even seen Nick Simmons a couple of times in the foothills over the years. An Olympic Trails marathon qualifier works at my PT's office and was an assistant at BSU. Says Allie is starting to run again with a focus on the Trials. Another client was a top high school coach and is now a volunteer assistant at BSU. So I get some color from time to time.

Perhaps you remember Richie Harris 3:50 miler back in the 1980s, ran with a bandanna, he has a running store here is Boise. I met Rich years ago when he was a freshman at Colorado State. His brother Tracy is one of the top high school coaches here and a good runner in his own right. The running world is a tight circle, one of my client's son was a 8:48 high school runner, is now a sophomore at BSU and has run 13:50ish this season.

Igy

here's one for the 'whoops' category - John Paulson, who seems to have got exactly one major bet right in his life, said in 2010 gold would be in the $2500-$4000 range by now, and that 80% of his net worth was in gold.

Instead, gold has fallen 7%. I suppose housing has done ok too, but not spectacularly well.

yeaouch.

http://www.businessinsider.com/john-paulson-gold-at-4000-double-digit-inflation-real-estate-2010

John Paulson scared the pants off of a packed audience at New York's University Club recently as he warned them of huge changes in the economic environment in the years to come.

Forbes' Bob Lenzer reports Paulson's saying:

“If you don’t own a home buy one."

”If you own one home, buy another one, and if you own two homes buy a third and lend your relatives the money to buy a home.”

Paulson has been bullish on housing for a while now (he runs a housing recovery fund), but this is him hitting super-bull territory. His reasoning is that home prices are great, the bond market is dead, and commodities like gold, which he also has a big prediction for, are on the rise.

According to InfoWars, he told the audience that he thinks the price of gold will hit $2400-$4000. And a whopping 80% of his assets are in gold.

Given his expectation for further money printing by the Fed – and that in 1980 the gold price rose by 100% more than the correlation implied – Paulson noted that the price of gold could hit $2,400 based only on monetary expansion, and as high as $4,000 per ounce based on a projected overshoot.

Lastly, he noted that 80% of his assets are denominated in gold.

Paulson joins David Stockman and other economic wing nuts in a crowded field. Whatever they say, do the opposite.

Q1 2016 S&P 500 Earnings with 72.5% Reported (4/29/2016)

121 of 312 beat GAAP Earnings or 39%

228 of 311 beat non-GAAP Earnings 73%

177 of 310 beat on sales 57%

S&P 500 GAAP estimated earnings for the quarter continue to be marked down by Wall Street: 4/15 = $24.10, 4/22 = $23.34, 4/29 = $22.76

S&P 500 GAAP estimated earnings for 2016 continue to be marked down by Wall Street: 4/15 = $109.30, 4/29 = $106.52

Same trend can be seen in non-GAAP earnings for Q1 2016 estimates at these observation dates: 3/31/2015 = $30.91, 6/30/2015 = $30.70, 9/30/2015 = $29.94, 12/31/2015 = $28.84, 3/31/2016 = $25.94, 4/15/2016 = $25.68, 4/29/2016 = $24.97

Wall Street forward one year operating estimated for the S&P 500 is $121.36 or 21.8% higher than where the market is tracking today. On 3/31/2015 the estimated forward operating earnings for the S&P 500 was $135.03

Lastly, the S&P 500 on a non-GAAP basis traded at a quarter ending PE of 20.68, last time this high was 9/30/2009. The GAAP PE for the same time period is 23.55, last time this high 12/31/2009.

IGY

When you say "beat", do you mean they beat their estimates? And who is making these estimates? TIA.

Neophyte,

Companies set expectations for earnings, these numbers can be lowered prior to reporting for the quarter. It comes in a ranges, say $0.15-$0.18 EPS. Wall Street analysts take that information and set an expectation of for example an average of $0.16 EPS for the quarter. The companies try to steer toward a number, so those companies not meeting expectations get punished by the market. You saw that last week with Apple's earnings. Also, companies have continued to reduce their numbers as the business environment has deteriorated.

Hope this helps.

Igy

Neophyte,

Also, as you can see from the numbers I posted Wall Street has substantially reduced their earnings expectations over the past year. It seems unlikely that even Wall Street's reduced expectations for quarterly and year end earnings can be met.

Igy

Ok so WS bases their earnings expectations on the company's own expectations. So why don't companies UNDER estimate, so they can look good when they beat expectations?

Wall Street neophyte wrote:

Ok so WS bases their earnings expectations on the company's own expectations. So why don't companies UNDER estimate, so they can look good when they beat expectations?

What WS actually pays attention to is beating the analysts' estimates. So companies do everything they can do to reduce guidance to analysts going forward....so they can "beat" their number.

Remember how a couple of weeks ago you heard from people like Igy, how the sky was falling because eps was going to be down 7-8% or something like that? And that's simply a joke, all part of the "game". It's all part of beating the analyst projection or the "whisper number", and then the stock goes up even though the GAAP earnings are down. Quants like me don't even see these analyst forecasts--we just look at the GAAP numbers in our computer programs (I haven't looked at a company earnings report in years)--but it appears that this game fools a lot of investors.....and the down revisions game for Q2 has already started.

But the other fellow said the WS analysts just base their estimates on estimates the company offered. Now you're saying that's not true?

What I'm saying is that companies "game" the analysts (of course, analysts aren't stupid and look up the prospect of "surprises"). What the companies give the analysts is a pessimistic version of what they actually expect. Talk down the projections far enough so they can claim to "beat" the forecast, which is what the companies actually provided previously.

What I'm also saying is to ignore this whole game. Look at real eps over 1,3,5 year timeframes. Compare earnings growth to revenue growth and price performance. Compare real numbers to real numbers.

Neophyte,

Traders follow other traders moves and believe they have some special knowledge as "quants." in reality any Tom, Dick or Harry can purchase trading packages that offer these "ouija board solution" to investment heaven. In a speculative market where valuations matter little, trading works and no fundamental analysis is required. If you are looking for the next big move in the market track corporate earnings and they are going down. By the way corporate earnings have been in decline for 18 months and the action of the markets reflect it. Of course one can believe that this era is different which has proven to be the fool's mistake for a hundred years.

Igy

Neophyte,

Here is a little magic. Rub your arm against it. Feel the power.

http://www.google.com/search?q=stock+trading+software&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&hl=en&client=safari

Or believe that the secret to wealth is saving, controlling spending, pay attention to valuations and fees.

Igy

You don't have even 1% of the math required to understand what quantitative is. You failed to understand even the most basic statistics within the last 2 weeks.

coach d wrote:

What I'm saying is that companies "game" the analysts (of course, analysts aren't stupid and look up the prospect of "surprises"). What the companies give the analysts is a pessimistic version of what they actually expect. Talk down the projections far enough so they can claim to "beat" the forecast, which is what the companies actually provided previously.

What I'm also saying is to ignore this whole game. Look at real eps over 1,3,5 year timeframes. Compare earnings growth to revenue growth and price performance. Compare real numbers to real numbers.

That's what I suggested...companies lowball their estimates so they look good when the real numbers come in. That makes perfect sense, but that other guy doesn't seem to get it. He said the analysts copy estimates from the companies which makes no sense at all.

Thanks for clearing that up.

coach d,

Took it already, that is why I believe your quant is nothing special.

Igy

Analyst,

I said a company sets an expected range for EPS, Wall Street compiles that as an average expected EPS. Companies try to steer expectations to the EPS numbers. coach d discussed the manipulation of the EPS and not me. The fact that anyone would manipulate the EPS number illustrates the spirit of this era.

Igy