I missed a lot at the end of the day. Had to play chauffeur for a niece and when I returned for the final 40 minutes, I was puzzled by the flat action on the market..... till it dawned on my thick skull that my Datek Streamer had frozen solid.
So to answer the question, no, I did not catch the MLCO action on ICGE. In fact, I made a number of buys at the close, I held ICGE and a few others, and not even sure of the correct prices !
I don't use L2 and presume I miss much with my choice. But as well, I don't get subjected to the headfakes and other mkt manipulations done by the MoniedMob (MMs).
As I'm sure many traders feel, the manipulations, machinations and Machiavelian movements of the moribund marketeers of old musty money demonstrate nothing more than the fear they feel at their power dissipating.
They are capable, as yet, of causing great harm to those who choose to remain ignorant about the history of wealth. That history says the holders of great wealth will stop at nothing to protect the power it affords.
Traders and investors in high tech are merely the newest threat to that power. Dispersal of wealth to too many dilutes their ability to buy people and principles outright. Us NASDy folks are just too cavalier and too.... too.... (ugh) democratic in our willingness to share the wealth with as many who come aboard and work to achieve it.
They try to stop an entire revolution - an evolutionary phase, actually - with dramatic events like the April/May debacle... and they failed. Sure, they sensed a weakness and exploited it. We had grown complacent in our trading. Some were over-margined. They struck, they created panic, and they left behind gross valuation distortions in their wake .... making it a tougher task to sort out where the proper valuations are.
Please don't dismiss this as a paranoid conspiracy theory either. I'm the last person to consent to conspiracy talk. But I learn well my history, and believe small groups of conspirators exist wherever wealth is concentrated.
We got took. A normal seasonal dip was twisted like a corkscrew into our weaknesses. No surprise; few traders were seasoned enough to recognize that the Mobsters of Mildew viewed us as a threat. We were in a war ... without realizing we had an enemy wishing us harm.
I won't defend corruption where (and if) it exists, but the current SEC actions against Tokyo Joe are a case in point. Relatively speaking, he's a little guy. If he pumps & dumps, while helping many gain wealth, they nail him. But when the mighty Lehman Bozos p&d KOREA or undercut their own investors with price targets that range all over the landscape, where's the SEC then?
Half of the targets are so high they'll never be met. The other half are easily surpassed. Many brokerages are guilty of this to varying degrees. I do think there are competent analysts and fairly ethical investment houses but most that we call the first tier do not fit this description, but are bent on introducing chaos for their maximum advantage.
So I do believe every trader should use L2 and I certainly will soon enough.
But the greatest weaknesses they can exploit yet can be found in our reliance on systems. Do this because the TA says to do it. Do that because this system works for others. Double down. Go to cash. Hold overnight. Whatever.
When too many mimic a successfull system, they change the price movements. Hell, I could be a broker's agent.... make a few successfull stockpicks, gain a following, then lead them to a disastrous move or two that enrich my bosses... who knows?
That's no reason to be paranoid or fearful. It's cause to be aware. Know what their game is. Think of the games they might invent next. Be aware that their intent is to limit our gains while they consolidate and attempt to grow their power.
There's no doubt they control the media. Why do you think CNBC exists? They yammer away and convince many that the market moved this way and that because of our concern that pencil prices in China may cut the demand for #2 lead, when, in fact, nobody at all was thinking that.
We just assume that someplace "out there" is a group of better informed folks that were paying attention to Chinese pencil-buyers. Nonsense. In most cases, it's poppycock.
Long term holders are content with 10% and 15% annual gains. That's who they like.... the patient folks who accrue a small nest egg. Traders like us? We are too eager, we accrue too fast and too much, by too many.
And the Internet itself is a threat to them. What we call dogcoms actually are part of an information explosion they still can't control, but you can bet they're going to try. They'll try to shake out traders from netcos, reduce the mkt caps, let the bigger sharks gobble up the new minnows, and consolidate the power in fewer hands.
Why do ICGE and VNTR, with lovely P/Es, remain so beaten down? So GE and GM & Ford can catch up, launch their own stuff, and maintain their power? Nawwwww.... I must be paranoid.
Personally, I intend to utilize a significant chunk of my gains to defend the anarchy and individualist nature of the Internet. My life has never been about the acquisition of extraordinary material comfort. I like to share. And educate. And laugh.
I want to build an investor site some day that targets the 'little guy', informs them about the market, inside and out, and helps them get and maintain a little more of an edge. I'm not sure that site requires profitability; breaking even might do. But I also want to create or help others create and maintain their sites.... assuring a broad diversity of opinion and information is forever maintained as an alternative to the media controlled by the current power brokers.
Not cause I wish the MMs harm. I simply believe the concentration of wealth in too few hands will ultimately lead this nation and world to a despotic state. That hardly makes me a Commie. I'm more the Jeffersonian Libertarian, who consorts with penguins.
Per usual, I've gotten off the subject of ICGE, haven't I? My point, if I have one, is that the Internet is much more than a technological advance. Our presence on this message board is made possible by the Net. And all the opticals, hardware, storage systems, networks, software, etc. etc, that make the Net expand and grow rely on a common impulse that tells us we are building something very important for the next few generations.
Are we really here for the money alone? For the Lamborghini? For the fast life? Or do we share the innate and often unconscious sense that there's more going on?
I think information is power. Out of the hands of medeival priests, it has grown our world into fairer, more democratic nation-states, where middle classes grow and civilization grows more civil. With the Net, the information can be disseminated more widely still. Subservient masses in overly controlled countries can get an inkling of the alternatives.
It isn't the end-all and be-all of the human journey. But it's the next important step. And all those MoldyMugs who intend to play their games to maintain a concept of power that is surrendered at the entry to the grave ... well, they will fail to block progress.
Progress can be delayed, but not stopped. For us traders, it is paramount, however, that we not only recognize what is occurring and who's doing what to whom, but that we sometimes band together and say enough is enough.
After all, if we fully recognize the real value of a particular company, based on its fundies, growth, efficiency and brilliance of management ..... as some did with Microsoft and AOL and Cisco not long ago.... and make it clear to enough others.... then we can create growth and can limit the influence of the Mordant Morticians who try to embalm the living.
I want to make a few bucks and do what I can to insure that the Net does not devolve into the major media commercial schlock that we call television today.
So I'm holding ICGE and think others oughta too. IMHO, it is terribly undervalued. They provide a form of venture capitalism that helps mostly high quality tech companies grow, they do so efficiently and profitably, and its few critics have been unsuccessful in proving that its value as an incubator or its financial value bears any serious flaw.
I'm not saying Buy & Hold and defend it to death. But I am saying that an effort to shake us out at this price is merely an attempt to create a lower price that 'they' can buy in at .... gaining the spoils of their nasty one-sided war.
Enough people buying and holding and refusing to sell cheap can limit the manipulation & fluctation. At this price, it oughta be easy to do.
That's why I held on. So what's your plan? :^) |
