FeedPosted Jan 28th 2011 5:30PM by Sheldon Liber (RSS feed)
Filed under: Competitive Strategy, Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A), Chevron Corp (CVX), Oracle Corp (ORCL), Books, Options, Bargain Stocks, Chasing Value™, Oil
The market is getting gently hammered today, but that only presents more opportunities from my perspective.
I am in Ixtapa, Mexico, nearing the conclusion of my first ever week long rest during a 35 year working career ... and counting. In some ways I am hoping to mold my future working environment from seashore to shining seashore -- all around the world -- taking advantage of modern technology. I am thinking of it as "have beach (+Internet), will travel."
Continue reading Chasing Value: Profiting from Ixtapa -- Buffett, Gold, Oil, Options and More
Posted Dec 12th 2009 4:10PM by Daleela Farina (RSS feed)
Filed under: Newspapers, Interviews, Columns, Books, Entrepreneurs
James Altucher is a financial journalist for The Wall Street Journal and founder of Stockpickr.com. His articles cover every angle of the market; he also stars in feature videos with other financial luminaries. He is the author of Trade Like a Hedge Fund, Trade Like Warren Buffett, SuperCa$h, and The Forever Portfolio.
He has taken a controversial path lately with numerous articles in the New York Post and Huffington Post. Some articles include: "Global Warming Is a Myth," "Should Insider Trading Be Made Legal?" "School of Hard Cash," "The Internet Is Dead (as an Investment)," and "5 Myths the Recession Taught Us."
Rumors of a new addition to the James Altucher library have entered the blogosphere, so I met with James to discuss a possible new book and the response from his recent aggressive views on finance and the stock market.
Continue reading You can profit from James Altucher's insanity
Posted Dec 9th 2009 2:30PM by Beth Gaston Moon (RSS feed)
Filed under: Competitive Strategy, Amazon.com (AMZN), Next Big Thing, Sony Corp ADR (SNE), Books, Technology
Want that brand-new Stephen King or Anita Shreve novel beamed to your Amazon (AMZN) Kindle? Well, you may be waiting a few months. In a preemptive strike against e-reader technology, publishers Simon & Schuster - part of CBS Corp. (CBS) and Hachette plan to delay the electronic-book editions of about 35 popular titles by four months. The supposed strategy is that desperate readers will pay the full retail price for these volumes, rather than the discounted $9.95 for the electronic version.
E-readers are a hot gift item this holiday season, and products like the Kindle and the soon-to-be-released Nook from Barnes & Noble (BKS) don't seem to be a flash in the pan. E-book retail sales are expected to hit $201 million in 2010, up from $150 million this year. While this is still a fraction of actual, tangible book sales, the growth rate cannot be ignored.
Continue reading Two publishers battling the e-readers
Posted Oct 30th 2009 1:00PM by Tom Johansmeyer (RSS feed)
Filed under: Competitive Strategy, Wal-Mart (WMT), Amazon.com (AMZN), Target Corp. (TGT), Books
Small book retailers were buying in bulk from major online booksellers because they could really save some money. One was buying up to 70 copies of a particular title -- it was $5 less a pop from the big guys than it would have been from the publisher. Finally, however, the big retailers have become wise to the trend and taken action, according to the Wall Street Journal (subscription required).
Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT), Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN), and Target (NYSE: TGT) have decided to cap the number of books customers can buy online, a measure intended to prevent smaller competitors from treating them as partners. Walmart is limiting customers to two copies of a particular book, with Amazon placing the border at three and Target at five.
Continue reading Major booksellers didn't realize they were suppliers to rivals
Posted Mar 19th 2009 3:00PM by Zac Bissonnette (RSS feed)
Filed under: Books, Politics

We've all been wondering what President Bush would do after leaving office with the lowest approval ratings in history and now we have our answer: He's writing a book.
"I want people to understand the environment in which I was making decisions. I want people to get a sense of how decisions were made and I want people to understand the options that were placed before me," he told the Associated Press.
Continue reading Will you be buying George W. Bush's book?
Posted Mar 3rd 2009 5:00PM by Zac Bissonnette (RSS feed)
Filed under: Scandals, Books, Politics

Disgraced former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich has
signed a six figure contract with Phoenix Books to write a book exploring "the dark side of politics that he witnessed in both the state and national level."
If by witnessed, you mean created, then yeah. Illinois state representative Jack Franks moved to preempt Blagojevich's effort cash in on his infamy by introducing a bill that would require politicians convicted of corruption charges to turn over the proceeds from any related book or movie deals to the state.
Continue reading Blagojevich signs a book deal
Posted Feb 23rd 2009 3:15PM by Zac Bissonnette (RSS feed)
Filed under: Walgreen Co (WAG), Abbott Laboratories (ABT), Altria Group (MO), Kroger Co (KR), Kimberly-Clark (KMB), Nucor Corp (NUE), Books, Wells Fargo (WFC)

Back in 2001, Jim Collins had a monster of a business bestseller with his book
Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap. . . and Others Don't. In it, Collins explored companies that have become hugely successful and found that success generally comes as a result of focusing resources on things that you're good at instead of mindlessly diversifying.
Arkansas Business writer Jeff Hankins read the book again to see how the companies profiled have weathered the downturn. The companies profiled were
Abbot Laboratories (NYSE:
ABT),
Kroger (NYSE:
KR),
Kimberly-Clark (NYSE:
KMB),
Walgreens (NYSE:
WAG),
Altria (NYSE:
MO),
Nucor (NYSE:
NUE),
Pitney Bowes (NYSE:
PBI),
Wells Fargo (NYSE:
WFC) and tragically, Fannie Mae and Circuit City. Gilette was eliminated from contention because of a merger.
Continue reading From Good to Great to Bankruptcy: Jim Collins' book revisited
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