Week 24 Performance: Up 8.2%

Week 24
Dow 1.88%
S&P 1.71%
NASDAQ 0.73%
LiveRocket 8.2%

YTD
Dow 5.88%
S&P 5.05%
NASDAQ 6.26%
LiveRocket 23.65%

Since Inception (Nov 4, 2005)
Dow 7.8%
S&P 7.5%
NASDAQ 8%
LiveRocket 35.43%

I am travelling and will be brief this week. I'll let the numbers speak for themselves. Up 8%+. That's a great week.
You may recall that 2 weeks ago I pointed out that the Dow really wanted to hit 11,300. It is there.

Last weak I mentioned softness in tech: well, it's official. Start with the PC world.
I think the PC world is about to get exciting, but at a cost: parts vendors will be extra squeezed. I think Dell will be at the heart of this. We knew PC sales would start to slow down, and now it is all about market share. Dell will need to drop prices at the low end and also offer high end solutions against Apple. There are manufacturers that offer laptops that are much better than Apple in terms of hardware - Voodoo for example. Dell has released models. Nobody wins in a price war, except consumers.
Then there is the MP3 market. Apple iPod sales are still growing, but at a slower rate.
Then the consolidation in Telecom companies is hitting vendors like Juniper.

FINANCIALS
ET – Up 4.5%. Solid earnings. And a new 52 week high.

GHL – Down 2%+. After releasing phenomenal results (and I mean amazing - profit up 3x), GHL crashed. Midweek they rose 7% and hit a new 52 week high. Buy on the rumor sell on the fact. They are above $70 and staying there. Their P/E has fallen to 29. GHL will have erratic earnings - the nature of their business is similar to consulting: the business is not ongoing. For example, they advised NASDAQ on purchasing a chunk of the London Stock Exchange. Purchase made, the job is over. That's why they are also pursuing investment business as well, to smooth things out. But these earnings make one key criticism go away - that they are overpriced.
In any event, Goldman and Lazard did not have the drop that GHL did.

COMMODITIES & EQUIPMENT I find it remarkable that the market gives companies like JLG (and GHL, and ET, and GRP) such low P/Es. These companies are growing earnings 100%+ but the P/E is in the 30 range. The market loves high tech and gives those companies the higher multiples.

GRP – Up 15%. Amazing results this week. I was fretting for a few weeks about the market lack of support for GRP. I was worried that the market knew something that I couldn't see. Turns out, we were ahead of the market. Happens sometimes, and we get the rewards.

JLG - Up 7%, reversing a 2-week slide. I think a problem with JLG is that they are already sold out for the year, so there aren't many earnings surprises in the wings. They are planning more manufacturing facilities to meet heavy demand, but I think that they don't go online for a few more months. So we are treading water and consolidating. It is hovering around its 52 week high.

MDR - Up 6%. New 52 week high. Life is good.

TIE – Up ~18%. Hit a new 52 week high and we have a split announced. Splits are meaningless to me, but I like them anyway because the market likes them. I didn't hear China buying more planes, but the visit to Boeing was highly visible. Boeing is replicating an approach they took with Japan a long time ago: buy our planes and we'll let you build parts of them. China will make the rudders. BTW, TIE is opening a plant in China. Ahhhhh, synergy and a sign of partnership.

HI TECH - We are going to rotate out of our PC oriented holdings for a bit.
STX – Down 4%. We either wait out the summer or we jump now and come back.
MRVL – Flat
TRID – Up 7%, reversing last week.

HEALTH
NTRI – Up 11.5%. Someone is piling in.
TEVA – Down 1%. Another one we will dump shortly. It just doesn't fir our model.

Stops:
ET - $25
GHL -$68
GRP - $49
JLG - $27.5
JOYG - $64
MDR - $55
TIE - $56 (Strong resistance at $56. Let's allow for some extra exuberance here)
STX - $24.5 (we won't take a loss on this one.....)
MRVL - $55 (I want to be patient)
TRID - $27.5
NTRI - $48 (Keeping this one tight)
Teva - $38.5