I am So Lucky That I found your blog and great articles. I will come to your blog often for finding new great articles from your blog.I am adding your rss feed in my reader Thank you…

You need more rest i think…

This thought occurred to me since you always encourage people to learn, learn, learn, and particularly in your responses to justsomeone’s inquiries above. I’d like to know some of your favorite or recommended literature for acquiring knowledge about finance, investments, economics, etc. I’ve spent an absurd amount of time reading places like wsj.com and money.cnn.com, as well as investment and personal finance books. I guess I’m interested in hearing what a seasoned professional such as yourself might recommend since the books I’ve covered so far have gotten to the point of too simple and boring, and I’d like to get some more depth and detail without having to delve into my dry, bland college econ textbooks.

Thanks always for these informative postings and discussions. Keep it up.

Very simple rule that I try to live by, “treat others the way you’d like to be treated”. It has been working pretty well for me to this point so don’t worry about that changing.

Hope you enjoy the show. Spread the word.

I love your enthusiasm and fully appreciate the depth of your question. To be perfectly frank, volumes have been written and will be written on the topic of globalization.

I think that we need to look at gloablization from a very long term perspective. We are truly only in the infancy of this dynamic. I benchmark the development of globalization from when the Berlin Wall came down. That was just 20 years ago which in the grand scheme of things is like yesterday.

The free flow of capital, goods, adn labor have benefitted many and cost others, but overall increase in global GDP has been significant.

That said, we saw excesses in the late ’90s in emerging markets which impacted developed markets and now we are obviously seeing excesses in developed markets primarily the U.S. that are impacting the eemrging markets.

The challenge for world leaders is how do we accrue the benefits of global trade across asset classes (goods, services, capital, labor) while minimizing the costs let alone the abuses.

In my opinion, the emphasis needs to continually put on rewarding risk prudently taken and managed while punishing those who abuse the system.

How does one advance in a global market? There is no doubt that one needs to be more skilled and educated in order to be able to pursue opportunities. Unskilled labor continually moves to the lowest cost provider.

This process is both difficult and challenging but it is so far along and deeply established that I do not see it reversing.

Regrettably from an educational standpoint the U.S. is only ranked between 15th and 20th in the industrialized world in academic performance adn this has long term implications for our country’s ability to compete.

I believe that there will clearly be increased regulation that comes out of the summit this Spring to monitor markets such as credit derivatives.

This is an abbreviated response to a very broad issue.

Our economies are so deeply entrenched that there will be little turning back from this juncture.

Jeff Gundlach at TCW is one of the best in the business. Bob Rodriguez at FPA is also very sharp.

Again, make sure you do you homework thoroughly and fully understand the risks. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to ask.

In reading an article today about refinancing, I have learned that it is prudent to ask lenders whether they will perform a “consolidation and assignment” of the existing loan which will have the bank absorb your current loan and thus eliminate an origination tax on the new loan. Most lenders will probably not offer this service unless asked.

Hope you see this and hope it helps.

IBM had a very solid 3rd quarter. This global enterprise is clearly demonstrating that they can manage their operations in challenging times. They are not overburdened with excessive debt. The stock and company is obviously subject to the overall economy but I think IBM will be a long term winner.

I will offer you one other piece of insight. Companies are measured on a relative value basis in terms of their Price/Earnings ratio. The Price is the price of their stock while their earnings is “earnings per share”. The overall market as measured by the S&P 500 index has a P/E ratio of app 12 to 13. That appears to be cheap by historical measures but the reason for that is that the market is seriously questioning future earnings of companies. If earnings are lower then that P/E ratio would obviously go up.

IBM’s P/E ratio is 9.6. I would view this as attractive. Like any company, though, the question keeps coming back to the comapny’s ability to perform and generate future earnings.

Hope this proves helpful.

Thanks for coming back for another “ride”.

The income (revenues minus expenses) for IBM is $11.9 billion, which is a 14.3% growth rate over the last 5 years.

On the MSN site, I went to the company page which I am attaching here. Let’s talk more over the next days, weeks, as you become more familiar with these concepts. GREAT JOB!!

http://moneycentral.msn.com/companyreport?Symbol=IBM