Jim Cramer
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Cramer on BloggingStocks: Don't paint everything with the jobs brush
TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says there's good in this market -- remember that.
Does unemployment trump everything? Does it trump Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) (Cramer's Take) sales? Does it trump 3G and 4G? How about Chinese orders? How about General Mills' (NYSE: GIS) (Cramer's Take) numbers? Yum!'s (NYSE: YUM) (Cramer's Take) business? Does unemployment trump pending home sales? Or order pick-ups in autos and a subsequent bottom?
That's what you have to ask yourself when you sell. You have to ask yourself whether 40,000 or 60,000 jobs trumps everything good that has happened. You have to ask yourself if the government were to take 100,000 of those people and give them jobs taking care of federal lands and parks or working at the post office or having them go into a conservation corps, whether we would be up and not down.
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Cramer on BloggingStocks: This market knows something we don't
Just as when Doug Kass says, "Tell me something I don't know," I think this market knows something we don't know, either about a turn in commercial real estate to rival that of residential -- the real estate investment trusts are holding in well -- or a second stimulus plan, a real one that will put more people to work.
The employment numbers aren't good enough to merit this kind of rally, and we know the layoffs for June were preposterously high. We know that the auto build will be slightly better than expected a few months ago, but it's still pathetic and the auto idlings are about to start.
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Cramer on BloggingStocks: The post-mark-up could sting industrials
TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says stock prices may roll back, but techs and financials should be fine.
The pain of the aftermath of mark-ups never goes away. We knew what was in store for us, as the mark-up folks don't like to play on the last day, especially with the newly vigilant Securities and Exchange Commission. I have to believe that this SEC will now become more interested in "the tapes," which would show clients asking brokers to take stocks up as much as they can, something that we know is against the law.
What comes up from mark-up must come down, and the most important "come-downs" should be in the industrials, because we have the least visibility in them. I do not believe the techs have as much to worry about, nor the banks, because both have excellent earnings prospects for the coming quarter. Why sell Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) (Cramer's Take) here? Why sell Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) (Cramer's Take)? And why dump Wells Fargo (NYSE: WFC) (Cramer's Take) or Bank of America (NYSE: BAC) (Cramer's Take) or JPMorgan Chase (NYSE: JPM) (Cramer's Take) when those have the best possibilities of good news ahead? I can see locking in some Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS) (Cramer's Take) gains, but that's going to be the best quarter of all.
The pain of the aftermath of mark-ups never goes away. We knew what was in store for us, as the mark-up folks don't like to play on the last day, especially with the newly vigilant Securities and Exchange Commission. I have to believe that this SEC will now become more interested in "the tapes," which would show clients asking brokers to take stocks up as much as they can, something that we know is against the law.
What comes up from mark-up must come down, and the most important "come-downs" should be in the industrials, because we have the least visibility in them. I do not believe the techs have as much to worry about, nor the banks, because both have excellent earnings prospects for the coming quarter. Why sell Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) (Cramer's Take) here? Why sell Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) (Cramer's Take)? And why dump Wells Fargo (NYSE: WFC) (Cramer's Take) or Bank of America (NYSE: BAC) (Cramer's Take) or JPMorgan Chase (NYSE: JPM) (Cramer's Take) when those have the best possibilities of good news ahead? I can see locking in some Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS) (Cramer's Take) gains, but that's going to be the best quarter of all.
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Cramer on BloggingStocks: Warning: The financial media can be hazardous to your portfolio
TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says you'll miss some great opportunities if you blindly believe all the bad news.
You want a rebuke to the "never-ending woes of commercial and residential real estate mortgage bonds"? You get one every day in this market, and today is no different. Look at what is up big today: Genworth (NYSE: GNW) (Cramer's Take), Lincoln National (NYSE: LNC) (Cramer's Take), Wyndham (NYSE: WYN) (Cramer's Take), Regions Financial (NYSE: RF) (Cramer's Take) and Zions (NASDAQ: ZION) (Cramer's Take). Each in its own way needs the residential or commercial real estate markets to be robust to thrive, and if the myriad articles I read about the horrible state of the mortgage bond market and the dim commercial real estate prospects were true, why would you be making money in Wyndham, a gigantic timeshare company? How could Regions and Zions be rallying? They are among the worst of the worst; unless you consider Genworth and Lincoln National, which are supposed to be roadkill because of all of their mortgage bonds.
You want a rebuke to the "never-ending woes of commercial and residential real estate mortgage bonds"? You get one every day in this market, and today is no different. Look at what is up big today: Genworth (NYSE: GNW) (Cramer's Take), Lincoln National (NYSE: LNC) (Cramer's Take), Wyndham (NYSE: WYN) (Cramer's Take), Regions Financial (NYSE: RF) (Cramer's Take) and Zions (NASDAQ: ZION) (Cramer's Take). Each in its own way needs the residential or commercial real estate markets to be robust to thrive, and if the myriad articles I read about the horrible state of the mortgage bond market and the dim commercial real estate prospects were true, why would you be making money in Wyndham, a gigantic timeshare company? How could Regions and Zions be rallying? They are among the worst of the worst; unless you consider Genworth and Lincoln National, which are supposed to be roadkill because of all of their mortgage bonds.
Cramer on BloggingStocks: Bears, we miss you
We need some doom-and-gloomers to go higher here. I didn't hear any last week and it is worrisome. Without some avowed bears, we could be stalled here until we see some earnings even though seasonally this is a terrific time.
I say that because as I looked for things to talk about on Friday's show, I was hoping to find some stocks where there have been big negative bets made and really couldn't. Natural gas had been thick with bears and those stocks are still going down, but I don't see a lot of bearish bets being made. We had some in retail, but they seem to have dried up since Bed Bath & Beyond (NASDAQ: BBBY) (Cramer's Take). Tech? Boy, I don't see any bears at all going into what should be a remarkably negative period, at least historically.
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Cramer on BloggingStocks: Real estate turnaround
TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says the endless worries will prove bogus, and jobs creation could spur a real lift.
Alt-A. Endless bank foreclosures. Commercial real estate. These are the big three worries that will not be killed by data, rigor or common sense, no matter what happens.
Doesn't it occur to anyone that there already should have been a big spike in commercial real estate losses by now? That the decline in the economy has lasted long enough that it should have manifested itself? Doesn't anyone think that there should have been a big commercial real estate bad-debt bump at a Citigroup (NYSE: C) (Cramer's Take) or a JPMorgan Chase (NYSE: JPM) (Cramer's Take) or a Wells Fargo (NYSE: WFC) (Cramer's Take)?
Alt-A. Endless bank foreclosures. Commercial real estate. These are the big three worries that will not be killed by data, rigor or common sense, no matter what happens.
Doesn't it occur to anyone that there already should have been a big spike in commercial real estate losses by now? That the decline in the economy has lasted long enough that it should have manifested itself? Doesn't anyone think that there should have been a big commercial real estate bad-debt bump at a Citigroup (NYSE: C) (Cramer's Take) or a JPMorgan Chase (NYSE: JPM) (Cramer's Take) or a Wells Fargo (NYSE: WFC) (Cramer's Take)?
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Cramer on BloggingStocks: More stimulus, please!
Tough data point, the employment number. Lagging. But when you see it, the number doesn't feel like it's lagging. In fact, it is thesis-busting, as in, "We aren't getting better, let's stop fooling ourselves." It just feels like, "Come on, we know the truth, we need to have a second stimulus plan."
That will be the battleground for the second half of this year: further budget-busting vs. putting more people to work, because we sure aren't doing a great job of putting them to work.
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Cramer on BloggingStocks: Red Roof's shoddy deal
What didn't they take private? What didn't they lever up? When I read about Extended Stay's bankruptcy and Red Roof's default Tuesday night I started thinking, did anyone besides me ever stay at places like this? Did anyone ever realize the marginality of these places? Did they simply look at some numbers on some pieces of paper and say, "Yep, that's money in the bank"?
And sure enough, Citigroup (NYSE: C) (Cramer's Take) was the lender to Red Roof, a deal two years old that has already gone sour. Maybe this was one of those have-to-keep-dancing-until-the-music-stops deals by Chuck Prince, the foremost clown of all of the bankers of the era.
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Cramer on BloggingStocks: The return of the accidental high-yielders
It didn't take long, but the accidental high-yielders are back. There's PPG Industries (NYSE: PPG) (Cramer's Take) back at 5%, where it was before it told us that March was a good month and April better.
There's Emerson Electric (NYSE: EMR) (Cramer's Take) over 4% even though last week it said orders lately had been better than expected. Or Honeywell (NYSE: HON) (Cramer's Take), so close to 4%, amazing, given that it reaffirmed earnings last week.
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Cramer on BloggingStocks: Learning the lessons of Nortel
Nortel's a reminder that owning tech can be such an incredible losing proposition. For much of the 1990s it was a given that Nortel was going to be the biggest competitor if not the destroyer of Cisco (NASDAQ: CSCO) (Cramer's Take), Motorola (NYSE: MOT) (Cramer's Take) and certainly of Lucent and Alcatel. It seemed to have the inside track on everything that would make the Internet better and faster and more compelling. It was the pin-up for the hottest in communications tech and you had to be long it at all times.
But Nortel became the poster boy for something else in the early 2000s, the sign that I keep on my PC -- "Accounting irregularities equals sell." While Nortel's business, along with all of the network and dot-com-related businesses crashed badly in the wake of Net crash, Nortel was never able to get back in the game because of some accounting irregularities so broad that it brought down all of the executives who ran the company.
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Cramer on BloggingStocks: No worries at JPMorgan
TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says the bank has the least to worry about and can gain from new federal regulation.
Sometimes you just have to step back from the small-picture hubbub and make some assumptions about the new landscape if legislation passes.
If you look at the health care legislation you know that it is going to cut out some profitability for companies that have relied on the government for big profits, which means the companies that have the most Medicare exposure. So you go with the health maintenance company with the least Medicare exposure -- WellPoint (NYSE: WLP) (Cramer's Take). It simply can't get hit as badly as a Humana (NYSE: HUM) (Cramer's Take) or a UnitedHealth (NYSE: UNH) (Cramer's Take) because it doesn't have the exposure.
Sometimes you just have to step back from the small-picture hubbub and make some assumptions about the new landscape if legislation passes.
If you look at the health care legislation you know that it is going to cut out some profitability for companies that have relied on the government for big profits, which means the companies that have the most Medicare exposure. So you go with the health maintenance company with the least Medicare exposure -- WellPoint (NYSE: WLP) (Cramer's Take). It simply can't get hit as badly as a Humana (NYSE: HUM) (Cramer's Take) or a UnitedHealth (NYSE: UNH) (Cramer's Take) because it doesn't have the exposure.
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Cramer on BloggingStocks: 'Groundbreaking' days are here again
You just feel like telling President Obama, "Look, stay focused on getting us out of this severe recession in a responsible way without too much budget busting and things will all come together."
Instead, you wake up, and every day's historic ... including a lot of days you don't want to be historic. Or sweeping. Or groundbreaking. Like this one.
The only thing we really want to hear is that the U.S. growth rate is going from negative to positive, or even less negative. Now in our faces is the World Bank news from China that growth there is being raised from 6.5% to 7.2%. From the Chinese I can take all sorts of sweeping and groundbreaking and even, yes, revolutionary.
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Cramer on BloggingStocks: What can Brown do for you? Nothing good
TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says FedEx posted a hugely disappointing quarter, and the implications for the economy are ominous.
FedEx (NYSE: FDX) (Cramer's Take) sure doesn't put its money where its mouth is. For the second quarter in a row the company said, "We are at the bottom." But then it slashed guidance deep enough for me to think, "We are nowhere near the bottom" -- it slashed guidance by about half! That means this quarter just reported proved nothing and things are deteriorating, not getting better.
This wouldn't be such a big deal if the previous "we are at the bottom" call hadn't been used by many people to call a bottom. Remember, FDX is in a unique position: huge worldwide transporter of all sorts of goods with a trusted economist, Fred Smith, at the helm.
FedEx (NYSE: FDX) (Cramer's Take) sure doesn't put its money where its mouth is. For the second quarter in a row the company said, "We are at the bottom." But then it slashed guidance deep enough for me to think, "We are nowhere near the bottom" -- it slashed guidance by about half! That means this quarter just reported proved nothing and things are deteriorating, not getting better.
This wouldn't be such a big deal if the previous "we are at the bottom" call hadn't been used by many people to call a bottom. Remember, FDX is in a unique position: huge worldwide transporter of all sorts of goods with a trusted economist, Fred Smith, at the helm.
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Cramer on BloggingStocks: Don't fight the Obama phalanx
Please don't tell me we are back in the world of no institutional memory again. That all that happened is we dropped enough points to freak everyone out, get the bears out of hibernation and then it is onward and upward. Nothing would shock me, especially the vehemence with which everyone hated the market again Monday.
If you replay what happened, most of the issues stemmed from statements made by the same Europeans that have said no more stimulus is needed, the same Europeans who have been in denial the whole way publicly, but believe me they have been stimulating like mad because their banks are a much larger size relative to their gross domestic product than ours and are in many ways worse off.
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Cramer on BloggingStocks: Tech's unjustified super bull market run
One after another after another, these software charts are amazing. And, I might add, a bit scary. How did McAfee (NYSE: MFE) (Cramer's Take) make that kind of move just on security software? Didn't Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) (Cramer's Take) just say -- admittedly for the 4 millionth time -- that it was going to give away free anti-virus software? Or Citrix (NASDAQ: CTXS) (Cramer's Take)? What's that all about? How could it return to those levels?
There were rumors of a Cisco (NASDAQ: CSCO) (Cramer's Take) takeover a week or two ago, and, amazingly, when it didn't come true, the stock hung in.
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Before the bell: Futures decline as oil falls sharply; GM's bankruptcy plan approved
Entrepreneur's Journal: Key steps for telesales success
The week in preview: Focus returns to earnings: Alcoa, Chevron, Family Dollar
