Taipan Publishing Group

Profit From the Fed's P an B Campaign

Printing and Bailing R Us -that's the new name for the Federal Reserve. As they ramp up the presses and bail out the banks, one thing is for sure: Gold prices will soar. The fact is, money supply is...

Critical Value Alert

The iShares MSCI Germany ETF (EWG) will make a lot of people a lot of money in the next 12 weeks but not everyone. This chart shows EWG trading at a critical support level. A rule of thumb for...

Time to Buy Munibonds?

After a year of free fall, is it time to buy munibonds now? It may be. High-yield munibond funds like the Legg Mason Partners Municipal High Income (STXAX) have made some gains in the past few months...

Chipotle Serves Up a Tasty Meal for Shorts

Chipotle Mexican Grill (CMG:NYSE) is another highflier that's been beaten up in this tough market. If you haven't eaten there, Chipotle makes amazing burritos. The trouble is, with the price of food...

Grain Spike Crushes Corn Flake King

The US dollar isnt the only thing shrinking these days. After struggling for months to keep margins up in the face of skyrocketing grain prices, Michigan cereal giant Kellogg Co (K:NYSE) has decided...

Starbucks Throws in the Towel

In a sign of the times, the mighty Starbucks is in retreat. The iconic coffee company will be closing 600 U.S. stores and laying off as many as 12,000 employees. Starbucks is still growing outside...

Is There a Doctor in the House?

Ever heard of "medical tourism"? Ten or 15 years ago, that would have been a head scratcher for most folks... a total nonsense phrase. Now it's a big phenomenon. Here's how medical tourism works....

Bigger Than America and More Powerful

Turn on the evening news or glance over the headlines of the country's newspapers and you'll see the same stories repeated over and over: U.S. home sales down 15% from last year; the DOW and S and P...

Natural Gas Boom Spells Short-Term Doom for Fertilizer Stocks

When it comes to commodities, sometimes one man's ceiling is another man's floor. The faster the price shoots up for a basic input like crude oil or natural gas, the tougher it gets for some...

Diamonds Aren't Always Forever

It's funny to think that financial stocks were once the big driver of the equity bull market. Now they're acting more like a millstone around the market's neck. The latest casualty is the two...

The Coming IPO Resurgence

"It's always darkest just before it goes pitch-black." That's the kind of humor you'll find on Despair.com, a purveyor of antimotivational posters. Right now, despair is what they're feeling on Sand...

Beating the Bear

Today is Thursday. But as tomorrow is July 4th, it feels a lot like Friday. Hopefully you'll be heading to the beach, throwing some steaks on the grill, or finding some other distinctly American way...

Sidestepping the Manhole

Opportunities can be hard to spot. Thomas Edison said it's because they walk around dressed in overalls, looking a lot like work. In the markets, opportunity can wear some very strange clothing....

When Microsoft Attacks!

VMware is a sexy tech company that made investors a lot of money on the way up. It had a huge IPO in 2007 and climbed to lofty heights. But a few weeks ago, my friend Cash McDash called out VMW as a...

Why the Agriculture Boom Won't Go Bust

The global agriculture boom is still in its early stages. On the surface, the global population is growing at a seemingly small slow 1.1% per year. That works out to about 203,900 new mouths to feed...

With Inflation on the Warpath, Gold Is a Must-Own

Gold recently rallied 3.5% in one day, the biggest surge in years. Inflation concerns continue to haunt the market, and the U.S. dollar is getting slammed. The stock market is sinking, and the Dow...

The Singapore Profit Play

For the past five years, the Singapore dollar has strengthened against the U.S. dollar. But news of scorching first-quarter GDP growth of 7.2% year over year has made Singapore a hotbed of investment...

Still the Big Thing in Agriculture

We're still at the early stages of this run. Potash stocks have had their ups and downs, but there's a lot more ups than downs to come. Potash prices have just started to move. Last year a ton of...

The Falling Market Profit Plan

Back in April, I told Death Cross Trader subscribers that the market would take a major tumble. I suggested a ?Falling Market Profit Plan? that would guarantee strong profits. It?s a secret index...

Hurricanes and Heat Waves Put Natgas Traders on Edge

Natural gas prices are up about 75% from the beginning of this year. With all the fuss over crude oil and the cost of food, it?s easy to overlook what a dramatic move this is. But natural gas could...

Two Strong Buys in a Tough Market

So I had a flashback recently. (Not an acid flashback, mind you -never tried the stuff -but a market flashback.) It was almost 10 years ago on the nose: August 1998. I was a wet-behind-the-ears...

The "Smartest Guys on Wall Street" Haven't Got a Clue

Dear Justice, I am just back from a quick trip into the city, and I?d like to tell you that things are looking up here. But it just ain?t true. Rather, there?s a new buzzword floating about Wall...

Anvil Mea Culpa

Behold the Philly Bank Index. You?ve likely seen this chart before, but the carnage has worsened since the last time we posted it. It?s not a pretty sight. Wall Street?s downward spiral has made many...

Shoot-Out at the Inflation Corral

Today we'll hear from a colleague down under, Dan Denning, about the coming boom in Australian resource stocks. But first, in the spirit of Friday, some quick takes on a few notable events of the...

The Coming Boom in Australian Resource Stocks

It takes nearly five hours by plane to get from my new hometown of Melbourne, Australia, to the Timor Sea, the body of water that lies off Australia's northwest coast. I've made the trip several...

South Africa in Shambles -129% Profit Strike on the Horizon!

As Taipan scours the globe for investing and trading ideas, we sometimes find opportunity in adversity. The latest chance to do this comes in South Africa, as Sandy Franks explains. Tomorrow we'll...

Buy When Everyone Says Sell

When does a milestone become a gravestone? That's the fear with Dow 12,000 these days, as the major indexes make headway in the wrong direction. As I write, the Dow is below 12K for the third time in...

I'd Like to Buy the World an Ounce (of Gold)

It was nearly 40 years ago, in 1971, when photogenic people from a few dozen countries got together on a hill top and sang, "I'd like to buy the world a Coke." In one of life's little ironies,...

Anatomy of a Double Play

Last week was a thing of beauty for the bears. The major indexes were all hit hard, with the Dow and the S and P looking ready to explore new depths. The Dow also closed below 12,000 on Friday, an...

Tech Leaves Dow and S And P Behind

This is a long-term weekly chart of the Powershares QQQ Trust (QQQQ:NASDAQ). It represents the Nasdaq 100 index -in other words, the biggest tech stocks around. The blue and red lines are the 20and...

OPEC Gives and Takes Away

The world is running out of cheap and easy oil. The latest OPEC production jump is a flash in the pan. Demand, however, is expected to increase by 2 million barrels a day by 2009. There is already a...

New York State Bleeds... And Leads

As goes New York, so goes the nation. That motto may seem like typical NYC bluster. But, whether the rest of the country likes it or not, both Wall Street and Washington place enormous confidence in...

Hoarding Chocolate as Cocoa Hits 28-Year Highs

Cocoa supplies are suffering as the crop deteriorates. In the largest producing area, the Ivory Coast, cocoa farmers are forced to curtail spending on fertilizer and pesticides due to high prices....

South Africa in Shambles

This is the chart I showed my Taipan Trader subscribers on June 6, 2008, and we're already showing gains on the play I recommended. I'm showing it to you now because this move is too good to pass up.

Weak Market? Not for Coal Stocks

Over the last few weeks, the major market averages have been stuck in a severe sell-off. But coal stocks, on the other hand, continue to appreciate in value. That?s why I feel that every Taipan...

Open Mic Friday

"Because it's Friday! Friiiday! FR-I-I-I-I-I-DAY!" -The 96 Rock "5 O'Clock Whistle" (Atlanta, GA, circa 1993) Your humble editor was first turned on to classic rock in high school. Eighth grade meant...

Who'll Stop the Rain?

"There's a bad moon rising," as Creedence used to sing. That translates to flood waters rising for much of the Midwest. Small towns dotted along the banks of the mighty Mississippi are in danger of...

I Left My Grease in San Francisco

San Francisco is one of the most beautiful towns in the world. I have a relative or two there -including one who lives on Marina Boulevard, just a stone's throw from the sailboats -and I try to visit...

Oil's "Magic Number" Has Silicon Valley's Wealthiest Venture Capitalists Cheering

With summer vacation right around the corner, oil prices just hit $139 per barrel... While this is bad news for travelers, it's good news for well-prepared investors who understand the powerful...

Western Addiction and the Kingdom's Big Bluff

As the sheiks bicker, so go the days of our lives... or something to that effect. With the recent news from Saudi Arabia, the crude oil soap opera continues. It's easy to get caught up in the...

When Insiders Bail

Last time we talked to Cash McDash, he left us on the edge of our seats with the promise of an exciting new short pick. So rather than beat around the bush, this week we dive right in. This bearish...

Revealed: The Biggest Profiteers of the Banking Crisis

A banker, they say, is someone who wants to give you an umbrella when the sun is shining... and then takes it back when it rains. The banks have gotten themselves into a heck of a bind, as we have...

At Lehman, a Rising Star Falls

As recently as a month ago, Erin Callan was on top of the world. The WSJ did a glowing piece on her rise through the ranks. Conde Nast's Portfolio magazine dubbed her the most powerful woman on Wall...

Wall Street Fiddles While America Burns

Dear Justice, I could write to you about oil today. It would be so easy... the headlines are chock full of crude gyrations. One moment they're touting a pending drop as soaring prices cut into...