Zune #2 In Sales Behind iPod - Gizmodo

Zune #2 In Sales Behind iPod - Gizmodo
NPD Group says MSFT Zune is a distant second to iPod in unit sales and dollar share.

Motorola's ROKR E6 released in China, US next? - Engadget

Motorola's ROKR E6 released in China, US next? - Engadget
Motorola's new ROKR will have a touchscreen, 14.5 mm width, handwriting recognition, 2 megapixel camera, and a bar code reader. Its currently available in China for $545. The software switched from iTunes to RealPlayer so more audio options are available.

Google slashes IPO price | CNET News.com

Google slashes IPO price CNET News.com
Just some old news about Google when it slashed its IPO price to $85. This was the beginning of the madness.

NYX P/E of 103

The New York Stock Exchange stock currently has a price to earnings around 103. Yet, the stock is still shooting upwards. Its had a large movement up from 87 to 93 in the past week. Why is this stock still a good investment? According to Jim Cramer of CNBC, he predicted this company will earn $10 a share in earnings in 2008, and then he placed a 28 P/E ratio on it then discounted the price target of $250. Here's the link to his comments: http://madmoneyrecap.com/daily_recap_openingsegment_110906.htm.

GOOG: Insider Transactions for GOOGLE - Yahoo! Finance

Insiders at Google have been holding onto their shares since late June 06 according to Yahoo's Insider transactions page. They may have known about some good news for a while and were waiting for a better time to sell. Yet, even with the stock hitting all time highs, they're still not selling. Maybe there's still more room to go up.
GOOG: Insider Transactions for GOOGLE - Yahoo! Finance

S & P 500 Stocks with Dividend Yields above 5%

CZN	CITIZEN COMM CO	S&P 500	6.80%
PGL	PEOPLES ENERGY CP	S&P 500	5.10%
PGN	PROGRESS ENERGY INC	S&P 500	5.30%
WM	WASHINGTON MUTUAL	S&P 500	5.00%
WIN	WINDSTREAM CORP	S&P 500	6.00%

Source: Stock Screener Results - Yahoo! Finance

Alpha Trends

Alpha Trends
A video blog of technical charts and trading. Also has some lengthy articles.

Google’s Document Program

I’ve been trying Google’s new Docs program and it’s pretty great. It’s quick to start typing new documents, and the saving is automatic. It’s a good place to write down notes, and since it’s on the internet, I could do it from anywhere. The other option would be to constantly carry around a USB drive or e-mail myself notes. I’m not using it for my longer writing projects since a typing delay occurs. Letters appear a few microseconds after I type them. The editing quality of the word processor is pretty basic, but it is sufficient for a portable word processor. Tables can be edited easily. Documents can be saved on the server or published to a blog.
I haven’t seen any revenue generating advertisements on the side by Google. They would take up space on the workspace, but I’m guessing they’ll inevitably appear. With their acquisition of JotSpot, the abilities of the program should improve since I saw the JotSpot website a couple of years ago and it was much more advanced than Google's current offering.

A Web Site to Call Your Own - New York Times

A Web Site to Call Your Own - New York Times
Microsoft is giving away a free .com website with other features such as e-mail, calendar, and accounting. Advertising is also being tied into the service. It's called Microsoft Office Live Basic.

Stocks Yielding Above 5% in the S&P 400 Midcap

CAR	AVIS BUDGET GROUP, I	S&P 400 MidCap	22.50%
NYB	NEW YORK CMMTY BNC##	S&P 400 MidCap	6.10%
HPT	HOSPITALITY PROP TR	S&P 400 MidCap	6.10%
PIR	PIER ONE INC	S&P 400 MidCap	5.80%
FNT	FIDELITY NTL TTL GRP	S&P 400 MidCap	5.40%
ETM	ENTERCOM COMMUN CP	S&P 400 MidCap	5.30%
LRY	LIBERTY PROPERTIES	S&P 400 MidCap	5.20%
GXP	GREAT PLAINS ENERGY	S&P 400 MidCap	5.10%
DQE	DUQUESNE LIGHT HLDGS	S&P 400 MidCap	5.00%
EAS	ENERGY EAST CP	S&P 400 MidCap	5.00%
WON	WESTWOOD ONE INC	S&P 400 MidCap	5.00%

Stock Screener Results - Yahoo! Finance

Top Yielding S&P 600 Small Cap Stocks as of November 1, 2006

Top Yielding S&P 600 Small Cap Stocks as of November 1, 2006

NEW	NEW CENTURY FINANC##	S&P 600 SmallCap	18.60%
SRT	STARTEK INC	S&P 600 SmallCap	7.40%
LXP	LEXINGTON CP PTY TR	S&P 600 SmallCap	6.80%
SR	STANDARD REGIST	S&P 600 SmallCap	6.60%
NNN	NATIONAL RETAIL PROP	S&P 600 SmallCap	6.00%
TRST	TRUSTCO BANK NY	S&P 600 SmallCap	5.80%
SNH	SENIOR HSG SBI	S&P 600 SmallCap	5.80%
UNTD	UNITED ONLINE INC	S&P 600 SmallCap	5.80%

Source: Stock Screener Results - Yahoo! Finance

CVTX on the rise

This has been an amazing ride for CVTX in the last few months. The stocks gone down to 9.45 after bad news about Ranexa, but now the stocks climbed back up to 14 without much news. The earnings are supposed to be released on October 31, 2006, with probably some information about Ranexa sales. It's been about a 50% return since the 52 week low, and no ideas if this from a short squeeze, institution accumulation, or insider buying.

http://finance.yahoo.com/charts#symbol=CVTX;range=1y

For the Super-Rich, It’s Time to Upgrade the Old Jumbo Jet - New York Times

For the Super-Rich, It’s Time to Upgrade the Old Jumbo Jet - New York Times
$150 million for the plane, and $50 million for interior design. Or rent a plane for an around the world trip for the reasonable price of $50,000 to $70,000 per person.

TXN run up to 35

This has been happening for the last few quarters. The company will keep on providing good numbers, but in the middle of the quarter some analyst will downgrade the stock and TXN will drop to 28. Then spectacular earnings come out, and the stock rises up to 35. Look at the chart over the last year. There seems to be some resistance at the 35 level that the stock hasn't been able to break through for the last year.

Cost of Living Website

http://www.cityrating.com/costofliving.asp

Start with a salary in one city, and this website will tell you what salary you'll need to live in another city as comfortably as the original city.

NY Times on Google Payment Service

Google's payment service offers cheaper rates than Paypal, 20 cents plus 2 percent of the purchase price. Google's also offering a discount for its payment service when a user also uses its advertising service. This could be a big turning point for Google similar to when Microsoft introduced Word for its Windows application. Google can leverage its dominance in search and advertising to create more earnings from payment services.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/29/technology/29google.html

another good time to buy txn

TXN is back to its lower level of its trading range. The chart shows its well below its 200 day moving average. Investors who have bought the stock before at levels below the 200 DMA have been rewarded well in the short term in the last year. The market also had a bad week when TXN had good news in its mid-quarter update. I see this stock back to $35 before the company reports its quarterly earnings.

Skype Toolbar

Skype Toolbar for Internet Explorer adds Skype functionality to web browsing. It's main advantage is turning telephone numbers on webpages into SkypeOut links. This allows browsers to click on a link to make a phone call to a landline through Skype. The fee for calling a landline through Skype is $0.02 per minute for calls to America. For example, to look for a pizza store, search for the pizza store name and location in the toolbar, then the search result will have the phone number highlighted with a SkypeOut link. Clicking on the link will make the phone call to the pizza store through Skype. Skype Toolbar allows people to use Skype more seamlessly with their daily activities and, it is a good revenue generator for Skype and for eBay.

Comcast pushing telephony

When calling Comcast, they will say their only special is for the three package special of internet, cable, and telephone service for about $100 a month. When asking them about cable alone, they won't give a special rate for 3 to 6 months as before. Instead, they will ask for $64 a month for cable alone. Same with the internet service, it's much higher than it was before when added to a cable service. Comcast seems to be pushing its telephone service heavily in the urban markets; however, many young people in urban markets use primarily cell phones and see no need for a cable based landline.

Microsoft Drop

Microsoft dropped from 27 to 24 on Friday after a news announcement about a change in strategy. The company lost tens of billions in market capitalization dollars due to a statement about their future plans. Their financial situation is sound, although they have given away a significant amount of their liquid cash. If they had done this with the 32 billion given away in a special dividend, the reaction would not have been so severe. Investors would have thought that Microsoft could afford to take a gamble.
Currently, Microsoft's competition is pressuring it to take gambles in their future planning. Google recently released a beta version of their calendar program. It has amazing functionality with drag and drop features. Entering an appointment by typing out a statement is much simpler than entering an appointment in Microsoft's Outlook. Google is trying to combine their Gmail service and Calendar service into a competition for Microsoft's Outlook. Their Gmail service is nowhere near as organized as Outlook. Gmail's tagging system is a unique idea, but Outlook's folder option is easier to use with drag and drop. Blogger can be seen as a challenge for Microsoft's Word, but it's organizational ability has the same problem as Gmail. It's a list of documents in a linear organization. With more drag and drop abilities, Google's offerings can become more competitive with Microsoft. Too bad I won't be able to patent this idea now; Google has the technology to advance itself further.
Microsoft has already developed a PC based software architecture based on drag and drop organization. Now, it has to transfer this idea to the web.
Google and Microsoft have complementary ideas, either they join together or each company develops what it lacks.