In Today’s Post: Holdings Watch - I cut back on the CHK holdings after a 50% run in the first half of this week but continue to hold December and January calls. Commodity Watch Natural Gas Preview - a somewhat wordy look at this week’s storage number which I expect to best the Street estimate and which should (...)[More...]

The inflation picture is starting to look downright ugly -- the rate is not only high, but it is accelerating at a frightening pace. This morning it was announced that the CPI [core price inflation] rose 1.1% in the month of June, up sharply from 0.6% in [More...]

Director of Equity Research Dirk van Dijk, CFA has done a little research comparing the last time the world saw an oil shock, 1980, with numbers leading up to the current oil price situation we are experiencing globally. We sat him down to get an idea of [More...]

We are maintaining our Buy rating on software maker CDC Corp. (CHINA), as we still think that the company is well positioned to leverage the growth opportunities in small-to-medium business enterprise software and China's online-game market. In addition, the stock is trading at a lower valuation than its peers and does not reflect the company's... [More...]

As gas prices cross $3.50 per gallon and oil approaches $120 a barrel, the New York Times had a few interesting facts in an article on the front of its Business section today: 'In 2008, U.S. drivers are expected to use 9.26 million barrels of gasoline a day, down 0.3% from 2007.' Now that's what I would call inelastic demand. 'Global oil stocks at the beginning of 2008 could cover 67 days of demand, down from 72 days at the start of 2007 and over 90 days in the 1990's.' If it really were just speculation driving the price of oil, there would be people hoarding it, and inventories would be going up, not down. 'Mexico's oil production in the first quarter of 2008 was 7.8% below the first quarter of 2007.' &l [More...]