Year: 2007

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Fun Stocks

My investing journey III: 2004 to 2005

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Last Updated on September 22, 2007 by stlplace

After I got some moderate success on OPSW and GE in early 2004. I got a bit excited.

If I could use one word to summerize what I did my acitivies on stocks in those two years, it’s speculation. I did all kinds of speculations, luckily I did not get into really dangerous zone: margin, short and options. So my loss is still limited (a few thousand dollars each year). I did the following speculations:

1) Bet on earning: from PALM, Redhat (RHT), NetEase (NTES) to more speculative plays such as Look Smart (LOOK), the9 (NCTY), I never made a dime on betting ERs. The common scenario is I bought them right before the earning. The stock price already reflected best case scenario. Even if the company came out with a blow out (good) earning, there wouldn’t be much upside. But in reality 100% of time they did not beat the estimate by wide margin. So…I had to sell the stocks after earning to limit my loss.

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Stocks

Speculation day for Chinese stocks

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Last Updated on September 21, 2007 by stlplace

On Sept 20, 2007

ATV: up 20.10%

EFUT: up 49.92%

XFML: up 20.70%

It seems to me the domestic investors (or speculators to be precise) can not wait the Chinese goverment offically opens the H shares to domestic investors, they already came to the US 🙂

Categories
China Fun

Kids, Crocs and Escalator

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Last Updated on September 20, 2007 by stlplace

First a little update about the Typhoon Wilpa. Shanghai did not take the direct hit, or use my now retired boss words “we dodged another bullet”, he was referring to his condo at Florida during Hurricane season. More importantly, Shanghai suffered minimal human loss because of comprehensive preparation before the storm. More than 290,000 people moved out of vulnerable area. Unlike in the past, human lives are more treasured in China nowadays compared to properties. How is this related to Crocs?

Well, recently there are lots of accicent reports regarding Crocs wearing kids got hurt taking escalators. I read an earlier report and wrote a post about it. But now it seems more and more parents are worrying about the “safety of crocs”. I think they are shooting at the wrong target. I believe the escalator safety is a problem we have ignored from time to time, and now with the kidding wearing Crocs, this problem becomes more obvious.

These days I got more oppertunities to ride escalators because I work at Cloud 9. There is a huge escalator which takes one from the 1st floor to 4th floor. When I took it the first time, I was a bit shaky, because of its height. I don’t have kids, but I think if I ever take my niece there, I will probablly hold her instead of let her ride on her own.

IMG_5405

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China Stocks

Wuxi Pharma Beijing Bank

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Last Updated on September 19, 2007 by stlplace

I sold Wuxi Pharma Tech (WX) this morning, at $28.81. Not surprisingly the stock continued up after I sold it. I bought it a month ago at $21.80 so I’m happy. The stock is a bit expensive at current price ($30), considering its PE (about 100), profit margin, and its 2007 est. revenue. Another thing to consider is competition. It’s definitely more difficult than open economy hotels (Home Inns, HMIN), but I think it’s still doable (exp. and connections with big pharmas in the west).

Separately, Beijing Bank did IPO today in Shanghai, under tick symbol 601169. It started at 23.00, went as high as 25, and closed at 22.68. At current price, its year 2007 PE is more than 50. Crazy!

Categories
Stocks

Heelys one month after crash

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Last Updated on September 18, 2007 by stlplace

I normally don’t participating in stock discussion forums. But this one titled “company and stock did not connect” at Google Finance caught my attention a month ago. So I went ahead and commented:

Original comment: why is the good performance of the company disconnected from the horrible performance of the stock? When a company is more profitable than its previous quarter in the previous year, the company is more valuable. Anyone have any ideas?

My comment on Aug 16: The problem with Heelys is its prospect. In stock we not only look at its past, more importantly, we look at its future. With Heelys, the future is not clear (at best), not so good (in reality).

The inventory issue is not isolate problem. Their sales people may have pushed too agressively with the retailers for the “back to school” season. Now their typical strong Xmas sales is at risk.

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China Stocks

Secular growth, Mindray, New Oriental

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Last Updated on September 20, 2007 by stlplace

I was looking for a secular growth stock in China. By secular growth I mean the business grows continously without the normal business cycle. One benifit of secular growth is it usually does not go up or down a lot as economy cycle does. A side benifit of this is we (investors) can sleep better in the night 🙂

The opposite of “secular” is “cyclical”. For example, we normal think the following industries are “cyclical”:

1) Oil, metals and other commodities;

2) Real estate (we have seen the downturn in the US housing market lately);

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China

Bracing the typhoon

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Last Updated on September 18, 2007 by stlplace

It is said the largest typhoon in a decade, will hit Zhejiang province and Shanghai on tomorrow evening.

Heavy rain already came today.

IMG_5401

Categories
Fun Stocks

Landlord change and a Haigui blog

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Last Updated on September 17, 2007 by stlplace

The apartment we rent has experienced ownership change. The current owner can not resist the offer given by new owner (more than 15,000 Yuan per sqr meter), and she sold it. The apartment is about 20 years old, and near Zhongshan park. From my observations newer apartments (5 or 6 years old) in the area can easily fetch 20,000 Yuan. This is the status of Shanghai housing market. Hot, very very hot.

I also found an interesting blog written by a Haigui (I believe). This is westernford at blogbus. I like some of the pictures and words there.

Finanlly I am reading something not about finance, stocks,…

Categories
Stocks

Charlie Munger

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Last Updated on September 19, 2007 by stlplace

Charlie Munger is the Vice chairman of Berkshire Hathway, and chairman of West Co. Financial. He has background in law, real estate, and investing. I found his recent Q&A on the West Co. Financial’s annual stock holder meeting to be interesting.

Here is the Chinese excerpt translation by Deng Hang; and here is the original PDF file in English, it’s 22 pages long.

BTW, the Q&A is not just about finance and stocks. It talked other things in life too.

Categories
China Stocks

One dollar is 7.50 Yuan

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Last Updated on September 16, 2007 by stlplace

Week in review 09/09 to 09/15

1) One dollar is 7.50 Yuan. This is the rate I got from China Construction Bank ATM today, using my BoA debit card.

2) The China People’s Bank raised interest rate (by 0.27%) again in the weekend.

3) Moon cake coupon: there are many “moon cake coupon” flippers these days, as mid-autumn festival is approaching. Basically they buy the moon cake coupon from people who got it from Danwei, and resell it to make a profit. The catch is most moon cake coupons will expire on Sept. 25, just like the stock options expires on the 3rd Friday of each month in the US market 🙂

4) Lots of books about stocks, investing in the book store: from Warren Buffett to Peter Lynch, and many “experts” I never heard of.

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