Some folks crave chocolates, Bogart movies or double vodka martinis.
You get your kicks copping live stock quotes off the Internet.
You’re a quotaholic. You crave the action — live quotes, bid price, ask price, market depth, volume . . .
You can skip breakfast, but you won’t skip a quote.
You start playing the ticker symphony before dawn, copping pre-market quotes long before the opening bell.
By the closing bell, your back is aching, your vision is blurred and your head is ready to explode.
But life is good. Because you’ve succeeded in getting your adrenaline rush.
You ask your pals: “Need a quote? I can give ya a quote.”
They ask about Nortel and you draw a blank.
That’s what happens. A thousand quotes a day tends to scramble the memory bank and distort one’s view of the market.
Henry Howard Harper wrote a book called The Psychology of Speculation in which he described ‘tickeritis’ as the obsession to watch the market, as a condition in which one is “no more capable of reasonable and self-composed action than one who is in the delirium of typhoid fever.”
You got the fever.
If you’re tapped out, you can survive the day without executing a trade, but not without the almighty quote. It’s one of your basic needs.
Once the closing bell rings, you go into a cold sweat waiting for the morning action.
So you kill time by calling up charts — big charts, long charts, blue charts, red charts, purple charts.
Weekends, dark days for the market, are hell. One day, the big screen blows up and you’re miserable. Lost. Like a teenager without Playstation.
Telephone quotes just don’t cut it. How dare they water down your libations? So you splurge. You go out and buy a bigger screen.
The quotes get bigger. Your pals notice the bright glow back in your cheeks. They say: “Bre-Xer, you look like you’re in heaven.”
PRO'S THREE STARS
Dean Kim, technology analyst with Acumen Capital Financial Partners, covets three companies trading near year lows — CSI Wireless (CSY-TSE), Alternative Fuel Systems (ATF-CDNX) and Xplore Technologies (XPL-TSE).
Acumen has a buy recommendation on CSI, a provider of wireless and GPS (Global Position Systems) technologies that recently traded at $2.75 (year range, $2.30-$8.30).
“We expect revenue of $50 million this year and that’s a conservative estimate,” says Kim, adding that Calgary-based CSI has an opportunity for a $90 million purchase order with a decision expected by month end.
Kim rates Calgary-based Alternative Fuel Systems, which had a recent price of $1.11 (year range, $1.00-$4.70), as a speculative buy. The company develops products incorporating natural gas into diesel and gas engines.
“They’re the only alternative fuel company I know of that is collecting serious revenue,” says the Calgary analyst.
Xplore, which specializes in rugged mobile wireless computing, is rated a buy at a recent price of $2.95 (year range, $2.50-$5.20).
“We expect serious ramping of revenues this year, from $13 million to a potential $70 million,” says Kim.
Acumen Capital holds positions in all three stocks.
TRADING TIP
This one comes from a fellow who knows something about beating the market — Warren Buffett.
One of Buffett’s six basic characteristics of successful investing is the ability to think independently, meaning that if you don’t know enough to make your own decisions, you shouldn’t make any decisions at all.
To accentuate the point, Buffett quotes Benjamin Graham (the father of fundamental analysis): “The fact that other people disagree with you makes you neither right nor wrong. You will be right if your facts and reasoning are correct.”
SITE OF THE WEEK
Albertasecurities.com
The Alberta Securities Commission site offers valuable insights into rules, regulations and investor rights.
Under its investor education section, the ASC, the regulatory agency that oversees the capital markets in Alberta, there is a list of investor alerts or precautions and information of how to register complaints.
HOT STOCK: Quarry Capital Corp.
QUC-CDNX .75
Up 23 cents (+44.2%) on 158,700 shares (for week ending March 2).
Quarry precipitated a buying spree by releasing some knock-out financials. The Calgary-based oil-and-gas play showed net income of $575,897 for the quarter ending Dec. 31, a quarterly increase of 531 per cent from a year earlier. Cash flow from operations increased to 973,400, a 531-per-cent gain, and production skyrocketed by 753 per cent.
COLD STOCK: Canadian 88 Energy.
EEE-TSE $3.23
Down 76 cents (-19.0%) on 2,348,800 shares (for week ending March 2)
Canadian 88 improved its balance sheet by selling off some of its assets to Texas-based Hunt Oil, but shareholders weren’t impressed, pounding the stock on big volume. The Calgary-based operation sold its Caroline B pool natural-gas project in West Central Alberta and its Waterton gas property in southwest Alberta to Hunt for $176 million, applying the proceeds to its debt of $195 million.
