Matt Lauer Reveals His True Thoughts on Obama

Pay attention around the 1:00 minute point; this was bound to happen.

I am in Awe of This Dude

Yes, he really just did that. This isn't some fake Kobe Bryant commercial type manipulation. This is that real deal holyfield; dude just cleared the bar - which is at the same level as his neck! I was thinking how the hell is that possible but after some thought I figured it out. He has really low body fat and some strong ass legs, probably a football, basketball, or track and field athlete. The wonders of the human body never cease to amaze me.

Larry David - Creator of Seinfeld and Curb Your Enthusiasm Bears His Soul

They say sometimes there's a thin line between genius and insanity. I believe Larry David has crossed this line at some point, then returned back to genius, and launched some very successful shows such as Seinfeld and Curb your Enthusiasm. Larry David keeps it real, he says that the character on "Curb" is what he really wants to act like. I think everyone has a little but of Larry David in them. His writing is sharp, witty, intellectual, and covers many random irrelevant topics. This series of interviews really reveals his wit and amazing sense of humor.

Studying for another test

Another week, another test, one month out from graduation. I will be stuck in my room all day preparing for my Statics test. Some interesting articles to look at:

Inside a 9/11 Masterminds Interrogation
An NYTimes article about interrogating the alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed.

The Food Chain - In Fertile India, Population has outstripped Agriculture
Another NYTimes article, discussing India's potential for agriculture and the problems that need to be fixed.

Trading February 2008 +31% off $1,864

I really enjoy trading options. It allows me to make bets on my conceptual understanding of markets. Examining the market players and broad sector trends I can bet on certain swings by using options.

I had less than $2,000 invested, with 11 positions, and I made an average of 31%. I am very proud of the performance since I was limited to cheaper option contracts, which were less liquid and didn't have much open interest.

For example, in February, amidst the sub-prime fiasco, I noticed the increased pessimistic outlook by the market on Financials and Home-Building companies. At the same time I noticed the increasing price of oil and commodities, which can be attributed to the lowering value of the dollar due to the Fed's interest-cutting action. There are dozens of reasons, during February, why the market was bearish on Home-Builders and Financials. Using George Soros's theory of reflexivity applied to the financial markets, I noticed market players overreacting to the situation and dropping the value of these stocks very quickly.

I shorted Financials (Citigroup, Wells Fargo, Country Wide Financial, XLF Financial Index) and Home-Builder related companies (Lowes). I was long on commodities and oil using powershares commodity ETF DBC. The details of my performance for February can be found on my trading site. The positions that didn't perform as well were the ones which strayed from the general broad sector theory. I mean I still made profit because my speculation was correct but they weren't as dramatic as the home-builder and financial shorts.

Lesson learned: Create a broad sector based theory of the market. Filter companies based on individual performance and select them to test broad sector based theory of markets. If initial theory is incorrect or timing is wrong, exit position, cut losses and move on.

Funniest Commencement Speech Ever

Ali G is the man. This is his speech to the Class of 2004 at Harvard. Listen to all of it, wicked performance.



Part 1



Part 2

Check out 2 of my newest endevours!

I am proud to finally launch

Ares Trading

and

SNH Fitness

Check them out... SNH Fitness for awesome training motivation and fitness logs.
Ares Trading for market insights, news analysis, and some trading ideas.

CompuCredit - Theory Proved Correct

My position in CompuCredit (CCRT July 7.5 Puts) was doing really bad in May. I didn't cut my losses, and I was down 75%. Since I had until July I decided to ride it out, waiting for a market dip to cap off my losses. At this point CCRT was trading around $10 a share, I was feeling like a sap for making a wrong play, but I was willing to learn from it.

Well, now for the good news, on June 10th, 2:20pm the WSJ announced that the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and the Federal Trade Commission were seeking more than $200 million from CompuCredit and two affiliated banks for "deceptive marketing of credit cards to borrowers with weak credit histories."

In addition, the article states:
"It is important for all consumers -- including those in the subprime market -- to have access to credit card products," said Lydia Parnes, director of the FTC's Bureau of Consumer Protection. "But the marketing of these products must be truthful; it should not -- and cannot -- be misleading about the true costs and terms of the credit card."

Damn straight, those $100 set-up charges, monthly fees, ridiculous interest, and of course inactivity fees are an injustice to the sub-prime. It looks like things are changing already, ahead of the change of power in the White House.

The results of this news break - A 20% drop in CCRT's shares that day. The fundamental reasoning I had behind shorting this company proved true, and I'm glad I had the confidence to not panic and dump it. There's a lot more news associated with the case and I will summarize the key points this week.

So here is the recap and the game plan. Wait for more news to come out, probable it will be negative, and sell into a deep negative spike to lock in profit. I'm still down but it has come up since 75%. I'm confident this latest case will cause a sell-off by the third week of July.

Position Recap:

04/09/2008
+ 1 CCRT July 08 7.5 Put @ $1.43
-$143

04/10/2008
+1 CCRT July 08 7.5 Put @ $1.58
-$158

These two purchases average out to:

+2 CCRT July 08 7.5 Put @ 1.50
- $301

UNREALIZED PAPER LOSS:
As of 04/30/2008

2 CCRT July 08 7.5 Put @ 0.75

$150

- 151 (50%)

How does the world's greatest DJ make his hits?

This guy plays at shows around the world. He has much respect in the Trance scene and is adored by countless globally. In this interview he explains the secret to his success and his DJing skills. I always knew there was a secret with that guy.

Time is passing by like the stars in the sky

Another week is complete. Another 5 weeks until graduation, the importance of the event is grasping me. 5 years of hard work, in class, out of class, at work, at the apartment, and it has culminated to this final event. What do I do after graduating, what do I want to do? What do I see myself doing in the next 5 years? Am I climbing up the ladder leaning towards the right wall?

I want to travel to Thailand by the end of the year. I also want to take the GMAT and get it over with since they will last for 5 years. My worst fear is not landing a job when I go home. I have a feeling that I will end up in the west coast, I feel as if something is calling me there. The beautiful broads, the movie stars and the superficial lifestyle, and everything else that goes with it. The lifestyle you see in "Entourage", it's something every guy craves. The California weather is nice. Sunny days and cool nights by the beach, sipping mojitos, drinking Heineken and staring at the stars in the sky. Watching the day go bye.

Attack of The Fire Ant

AAAAHHHHH!!! ATTACK OF THE KILLER FIRE ANT!





The worst week in the recent history of my life has finished. Starting Monday I had a really bad cold with a fever, body aches, and common flu symptoms. I wasn't able to make it to work and I had to study for a test on Wednesday. I managed to get rest and felt confident walking into the test on Wednesday.

Glancing over the test, I realize I know how to do all the problems but it would take me all the time in the period to complete it. Half way through the test all the mucus and bodily fluids built up in my system try to escape through my nasal cavity. So here I am trying to concentrate, sniffing up the heavy mucus which is dripping out of my nose. I'm having a hard time breathing and I'm getting so loud with the sniffing that I'm managing to distract myself from the test. By the end of the exam I threw in the towel, turned it in a few minutes early, ran to the bathroom and blew all the crap out of my sinuses for about 10 minutes.

I decided to go to the health center the next day and I got all sorts of meds. Cough syrup, throat lozenges, decongestant pills, allergy anti-histamine pills, and nasal saline solution courtesy of the student health fee. The good news was that I wasn't infected, the doctor said it was viral and that she had the same bug which took her about a week to recover from. So things were starting to look good. I was very happy I didn't have strep or any kind of serious sinus infection. I took off from work and rested most of the day, reading and watching movies.

Thursday night I am feeling much better and I can feel a lot of my energy coming back. Half way through the Lakers-Celtics game, I decide to go to sleep early, feeling pretty confident about returning to work the next day. I wake up in the middle of the night (1:00am) scratching my face, palms, arms, legs, and scalp. Scratching does not do my actions justice, it was more like I felt my outer epidermis layer was in flames and somehow my fingernails would put out the fire. At first I think I'm in a dream, more so a nightmare, but then slowly I realize that I'm awake and I'm still scratching away trying to put out the burning sensation all over my skin.

(courtesy of Wikipedia)
This wasn't my arm but mine looked just like it. The Urticaria (hives) was concentrated around my mouth, ears, throat, forearms, armpits, inner thigh, feet, and random areas on my torso.

I run to the bathroom and look at my face. It's bright red, swollen, with random white raised clusters forming. My ears are bright red with big red pimple looking bumps covering the surface. I take off my shirt and realize that this pattern of white raised bumps and reddish rash was covering my body. It looked like a topographical map of the world projected onto my skin, which was now feeling like I had been doused in hydrochloric acid. I take off all my clothes and realize that this rash is everywhere. At this point I think I went into a mild state of shock.

I start getting cold sweats - whole body flushed and sweating profusely but internally I felt extremely cold and weak. I resist the urge to scratch and try to control my breathing. This really helped me get through the situation. I noticed a lump in my throat and a minor difficulty breathing, I could tell something was seriously wrong. I focus on my breathing and try my best to stay calm. I jump on WebMD and look up my symptoms - Hives. OK - I'm having a severe allergic reaction, excellent, got that figured out. Next, I step through all the symptom checklist provided by WebMD.

As soon as I select the option stating that the hives were around my face, throat, nose and mouth, WebMD tells me contact medical professional immediately. Now I get really worried. After reading some more I learn that an anti-histamine would help calm the allergic reaction. Luckily we had some Claritin, so I take one, take a hot shower, and check to see if there is any progress. The itching went down slightly, the hives on my hands went away but the rest of my body and face were still messed up. The part that really scared me was that I still felt a lump in my throat and had a really shallow breath. This is around 3:00am, I finally decide to drive myself to the emergency room and get it looked at.

I get to the emergency room. They give me steroids and benadryl through an IV. All my anxiety and panic dissipate into a slightly inebriated, drowsy, deep-sleep type feeling. The nurse tells me to wait in the in waiting room and that my conditions should improve, she tells me she'll check with me in an hour. I knock out in the waiting room, from the effects of the benadryl. She comes back wakes me up and my conditions (THANK GOD) had improved significantly. The doctor tells me almost verbatim what I read on WebMD, writes me script for steroids (Prednisone 40mg a day) for the next 5 days. I go home and find it very difficult to sleep, maybe from the stress, maybe from the steroids and the benadryl wearing off, perhaps a combination of all the factors.

By the morning, around 7:00am, all my hives had disappeared completely. There was no SIGN that anything at all had happened to me. I was perplexed - What had caused this crazy allergic reaction, which had me thinking I was close to death?

I noticed a bite on my knee and at first speculated it might have been a spider bite. Investigating my room I found tiny ants roaming around, with no particular source of concentration in any area. Using google I found that these weren't ordinary ants - they were fire ants, popular to Southern states and able to cause severe allergic reactions.

I'm feeling a lot better now, hives are gone, cold is on the way out. I'm taking steroids for the next five days which is acting like a stimulant and helping me document my catastrophic near-death experience. It boggles my mind that something so small can affect the human body in such a dramatic way. I'm never sleeping on the floor and I'm never underestimating an insect again.

Sick Again, Feeling Better

Well it seems I relapsed from whatever I had last week. This whole week I have been miserable with body aches, sore throat, runny nose, and a heavy fever. My condition has improved through lots of green tea, vitamin C, and fish oil. I also went to the health center today to get some meds and a note for missing class.