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Sequenom Stock Soars on Fetal Sex Test
to 18 The biotech combines two ancient forms of confidence games, medicine and the stock company, into a potent new scheme, possible now because medicine has dropped the silly old pretense of putting the patient before profit. But scientific medicine is our best hope for a healthy life, and an equity play is better than a loan when investing in a speculative venture, because even though you risk every penny, you won't face Surfpuppy's fangs of death in bankruptcy court.— February 20, 2010 12:05 p.m.
Sequenom Stock Soars on Fetal Sex Test
to 13 Traditional methods are still best. Even though the hoochie coochie man, voodoo woman or witch doctor only had a 50-50 success rate, they predicted the desired sex nearly 100% of the time. This helped the lady through some difficult months. Sometimes the truth is wrong. Consider the pregnant question; "Do I look fat?". Any man who tells the truth to his eight months pregnant wife, can and perhaps should be killed with impunity on the grounds of mental cruelty. Best business practice for the witch doctor is to change towns regularly. Some recommend this for husbands too, but not you Surfpuppy because we would miss you.— February 20, 2010 1:04 a.m.
Sequenom Stock Soars on Fetal Sex Test
to 6 The test might also do well in the Moslem world, where women dislike examination by male doctors, and there are few female ones. Sequenon has a hit if it really works.— February 19, 2010 12:39 a.m.
Sequenom Stock Soars on Fetal Sex Test
to 9 Figures that Surf Puppy would father a litter of loan documents. He only remembers compounding her once, and now she won't roll over. It's so unfair.— February 18, 2010 4:49 p.m.
Sequenom Stock Soars on Fetal Sex Test
If the third world could select the sex of it's offspring, world population might actually decline, thanks to the overwhelming popularity of boys across the impoverished communities of the world. Thanks partly to abortion and fetal sex determination, China and India now have generations with more males than females. Since the traditional way is murder, I can't object on moral grounds, but the wide ranging social consequences shouldn't be ignored. Assuming their procedure works, Sequenon might have a big market around the world, with profound effects on demographics similar to the birth control pill.— February 18, 2010 2:12 p.m.
News Mixed in Unemployment Report
Homes are a hybrid, part investment, part consumer product. Broadly, we invest in land, and consume the construction. While land prices have dropped, construction costs remain steady, In some areas home buying is mostly consumer choice. The consumer should examine rents and vacancies, since that is the fallback when the market is not liquid. Many flippers are now landlords, and if they didn't over leverage may still come out OK, though they now may be working very hard for the bank. Renting may still be the best choice. I worry about industrial real estate more, I see the factories that won WW2 turned into parking lots. I fear that the corporations that shuttered our factories and sent production overseas may have neglected to write down the property in the ghost towns they created, and may have borrowed more on assessed value. I wonder how many corporate real estate portfolios are underwater? In the projected future earnings all this property has no doubt been subdivided and sold to eager home buyers.— February 16, 2010 2:57 p.m.
News Mixed in Unemployment Report
Real estate is a lot by lot proposition, there are plenty of ghost towns in the Southwest to remind us of the risk. I should have said Western Sun Belt, since I know less about Dixie which has seen population outflows over the last 200 years. As a child I played in a ghost town in the middle of Pacific Beach, for our parents the real estate play had risk, but growing up in an aquatic park was priceless. Pay no attention to assessed valuations. The home buyer, like the car buyer, is final arbiter of price. Buy a car based on where you want to go, a home based on where you want to stay, make sure everything is bolted down properly, set the seat back and enjoy. If you don't worry about your car blue book don't worry about the housing price, it's only important when you want to sell. I suspect that your home will perform better as an investment than your car. Stocks are another matter, for the player, cool wheels always come first, Hugh G's fine ladies won't believe the story about being a big time stock player unless you pitch it from a nice limo.— February 15, 2010 5:54 p.m.
News Mixed in Unemployment Report
Many people lost their shirts building San Diego, none of them homeowners who held on for twenty years. These figures should be sobering for developers and bankers, but may represent opportunities for home buyers. A desirable new home selling for less than construction costs is a steal, stolen from investors by the developer and mortgage broker. Sun Belt migration is a solid 200+ year trend, and when the current oversupply is sold out, prices will rise till development is possible again. Solid fundamentals will support Sun Belt housing prices eventually. Stocks are another matter, when banks make leveraged equity plays in highly leveraged corporations, there are obviously no grownups in the room, and the whole market may be childish fantasy.— February 14, 2010 3:12 p.m.
News Mixed in Unemployment Report
Modern banking amazes me, unlike the old timer who loaned on margin to speculators, the modern bank speculates directly with the depositors money. That's efficiency! It took the old timers over two years to collapse after the 29 crash, the modern banker will cut that to a matter of days, so he can get with his wife and family sooner. Warms your heart. I don't know if the stocks will bring down the banks, or the banks will bring down the stocks. but in a bear hug they will fall together, if the banks play too much in stocks.— February 14, 2010 2:36 a.m.
News Mixed in Unemployment Report
to 34 Plenty of blame to go around, after the loans were bundled and sold round the world. High leverage loans based on price perhaps didn't cause the hysteria, as the report suggests, but they certainly enabled it, by providing cash. The Federal Reserve, chartered to stop panics, has once again made one worse. Tucson is not tulips, luckily there is real value in three bedroom ranch style tract houses. This slide may hit bottom soon. The stock prices alarm me more now, I don't know how much leverage has been applied, but lending on share value was central to the 1929 disaster. Tulips aren't stocks, there is real value in a beautiful tulip, unlike some of these shares.— February 13, 2010 2:22 a.m.