This is today's headline in the business section of the local newspaper, The Oregonian. The sectors that took the biggest hits were finance and managed care. This supports my conviction that Obama will serve big business interests less than Romney would. Suits me, even though my tiny retirement fund is shrinking again.

Market traders make more money on days when their morning testosterone is higher. A great article entitled "What Traders’ Testosterone Tells Us About Markets" explains the details, or you can scan my notes behind the cut.

Market participants aren’t the rational automatons of most financial theory. They are biological organisms responding with a neural and physiological apparatus designed millions of years ago. If what happens in markets affects hormones, these in turn alter behavior and feed back into the markets.

( notes on the articleCollapse )

Too many people
overvalue what they are not
and undervalue what they are.
--Malcolm Forbes,
American magazine publisher

CRISIS IMPLIES OPPORTUNITY
--old Chinese saying

....this is a "holy shit!!" for me....

from the Washington Post:
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Economy/Business News Alert: Apple surpasses Exxon to become world's largest company
August 9, 2011 1:35:58 PM
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Apple overtook Exxon Mobil as the world’s most valuable company Tuesday, as the computer company’s stock continued to defy a slowing market.

The changing of the guard is due in part to a market slowdown that has depressed oil prices and taken Exxon Mobil stock down significantly. But the switch is also a testament to Apple’s gravity-defying growth.

I LOL'd and it's short:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/asian-investors-anxiously-monitor-us-debt-talks/2011/07/31/gIQAAyq9lI_story.html?wpisrc=al_economy

I guess they're happy that we can keep steering their freight train toward that cliff. Obama is the pragmatic fall guy, demonized by most. He calmly goes about the business of finding something productive that we can agree on. He is willing to disagree with his own party, which is refreshing and hopeful. His positions make sense to me. I have long been disappointed that he could not take on big business more directly. I know he wants to, the socialist pig. Just now though with today's agreement we see that the guys with the corporate jets have as much control over the law as everyone who is afraid to see medicare cut.

http://www.telegram.com/article/20110710/NEWS/107109970/1237

Makes the case that as we age, we should get our ducks in a row for the possibility that we ourselves might not make the best decisions about money in our old age.