Investorial

The following piece is a reprint of my article at AOL Blogging Stocks.

50% off isn’t always a good thing! Fellow Blogging Stocks contributor Sheldon Liber and I have been scratching our heads about high payout yields from energy trusts battered by the decision from the Canadian government to tax trusts. On the surface, examining the energy trusts’ financials make it seem possible for them to sustain payouts at current rates, but for how long?

Well, income investors didn’t have to wait long. Energy trusts shareholders will be in for a rude awakening to start the week. Last week, many notable energy trusts delivered bombshells by cutting their payouts - in a big way too! (more…)

First, a correction is in order. In my previous post theorizing a Conservative government conspiracy about the income trust taxation proposal, I erroneously stated that the Conservative party held a slight majority government. In truth, they are trying to make a minority government work. So far this year, I’m looking like a genius with a few recent developments aiming to kill this bill. Let’s get caught up!

Two opposition parties, the Liberals and Bloc Québécois are trying to force special parliamentary hearings to probe the controversial tax — even though Parliament is not sitting — to vote on whether to call witnesses as part of a reconsideration of the tax. (more…)

Did you see last night’s Colbert Report? Stephen Colbert ran a great segment satirizing financial pundits, and even utilized some Jim Cramer-esque props! If anybody can point me to a video / link of the segment, I’d very much appreciate it. Here were Stephen’s topics as I remembered:

• Real Estate
• Oil & Gas
• The ridiculous anti-trust history of AT&T
• Soy Milk!!!

My favourite part was when he kept hitting the button to get a prediction but getting the reply to “ask again later …”. He finally got a “yes” and his priceless reaction was “There’s no substitute for research”. Get it yet, Cramer fanboys? (more…)

I’m lucky to count Larry MacDonald as one of Investorial’s readers. Larry is an economist, author of several business books and currently runs the Investment Ideas blog at Canadian Business Online. He is currently doing a series rounding up Canadian financial blogs. So far he’s profiled bloggers such as Canadian Capitalist, Bill Cara, The Dividend Guy, Yaser Anwar and many more. I have been consistently reading many of those blogs, and am discovering new ones through this process.

Investorial was lucky enough to also get mentioned by Larry in the round up. I guess I’m more well known for being (more…)

I seldom profile other investment / financial blogs here. But when I do, it’s because its content has earnestly captivated my fascination. I’ve been a long time fan of J.S. Kim’s writings ever since he launched Zen Of Investing. Besides being Asian (so am I), and also having a partner (Kaeho) blogging about martial arts (another passion of mine). J.S. displays a thorough understanding of investment, economical and even political issues (to a certain extent). His knowledge stems from his experiences being a former private wealth manager (wonder what happened there?).

His latest impressive article discusses 10 reasons why U.S. Dollar denominated bonds aren’t necessary the safe haven that most financial consultants advocate. Anyone who sees through the mindlessness of fee/commission driven advisers earn points in my book! (more…)

A quick update on the various mash-up experiments involving social networking and stock picking since I last reported on it. TheStreet.com has bought into a venture founded in part by one of its writers, James Altucher. You can read about the StockPickr.com joint venture from James himself.

Two things of note. A contrarian investor like myself by nature does not subscribe to the theory of the “wisdom of crowds”. I didn’t sign up to try out the StockPickr service, because I don’t anticipate putting it to good use. Having a big backer in TheStreet.com will certainly catapult StockPickr to the top of the social stock picking offerings (more…)