Prediction Retrospective 2011

If you want to succeed, double your failure rate.
~Thomas J. Watson

You won't see only the winning predictions in this jungle; dead wrong predictions receive equal treatment. I'm not proud. I'd just as soon call this site "Monkey Throw Dung"...but I think that domain name is taken.

2011 was a great year in the stock market if you hail from the land of Myopia. Short-sighted trading, and not betting on the long term survival of many of the lower priced, early 2011, high flying stocks, would have kept the "what was I thinking" mantra from renting any space in your cranium.

Looking back on the first six months of 2011, here are a few of the highlights and lowlights:

A Good Trade or a Bad Trap?

On Jan. 25th, 2011 Sigmund said:

Could there be a spike in price and volume coming for Sunrise Assisted Living (SRZ) between February 2nd and 7th?

Not a bad call since the $7 SRZ made a run to $9, and then spiked to it's high of the year at just over $12. Then, as with many others, it flew south for the rest of the year. An easy call if you were watching the consistent volume spikes over the previous months leading up to the high of the year.

SRZ has since changed it's symbol to SRZzzzzzzzzzzzzzz until further notice.

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CIM4143CKDIV?

On Jan. 15th, 2011 Sigmund said:

What I think I was saying here is that one of my current favorite stocks, Chimera Investment Corp (CIM) is trading in the lower end of its current range (around $4.10) and might head back to the upper end of $4.30. With a current dividend yield of 16%, it may be time to hop the CIM train again.

..and the high of the year ($4.34) was reached soon after. But I got off the CIM train at the next stop. Current price is $2.74 with a 16% dividend yield.

On the same date regarding IRE...

I've been holding this one for a couple of months already but I think I can still get a better price, possible under $2 before the surge. Price target for 2011: $5 to $10. Pigs can fly, right? If my price target is not hit this year I would expect a true lottery pay out of 44 cents on the dollar which would put the share price at about $1.10 by year end.

Wrong on both counts. I had to bail on this one after the 1:10 split. Current price is $4.48. You do the math.

That old Irish saying is worth repeating...
"Tis better to spend money like there's no tomorrow than to spend tonight like there's no money!"

Did ya hear that, Greece?

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Return of the Black Lagoon

On February 25th, Sigmund said:

The following list represents stocks that show some buy volume yesterday that exceeds sell volume by enough to get my attention. Relative strength for these stock are also at the bottom of the barrel, but the recent historical price action has been in a range or uptrending.

I would be willing to hold these for a couple of weeks, and I won't get greedy so I'll try to get a stop in after an 8% gain.


HST, Host Hotels and Resorts, $17.94; target $19.37
POL, PolyOne Corp, $13.36; target $14.42
VSCP, Virtual Scopics. $2.21; target $2.39

And here's why the Black Lagoon stock screener is buried deep in the lagoon...

None of these stocks recovered except for POL when it ran up to $16 over the next five months. This is nothing but a case study that reinforces the need to dump stocks when they don't move in the expected direction. Current prices are $14.52, $11.56, and $0.90 respectively.

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Future Stars Stock Picking Wish List

On February 19th, Sigmund wrote:


If the market goes higher you can be sure that many of these low priced stocks will rise with gains that far exceed the indices, and could become some of the more respectable high fliers that everyone wishes they had not overlooked earlier, especially when they graduate over $5/share.


Click on the link to see the list if you want but I'll save you the trouble. 3 out of 19 are still barely treading water, and combined, worth about as much as my Roger Clemens Pawtucket Red Sox rookie card.

Actually, I'm still holding one or two of these and will re-visit the list during the 2012 bull market.

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Chart posted on March 29th:


Maybe in the future I'll do some triangulation of the CMI's expected direction and my own. I'll get back to you if the QQQ's finish up the year at $57.50.

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Dow 14,000

Praying to the Great Fibonacci can be treacherous business. Luckily "Fib" was in a generous mood this year...

On March 8th, Sigmund prayed...


Oh Great Fibonacci, please accept these 'never been licked' poison dart frogs as my humble offering, and allow the July 2nd 2010 bottom to be the foundation of the great C to D leg that will complete it's destiny by July (or August) of 2011...and while you're at it, allow gold to rise above 1500 dollars an ounce...and provide world peace , and if you have time, make Charlie Sheen the new leader of Libya as soon as possible.





Well two out of four ain't bad; gold is holding, and as of this writing, Charlie Sheen is still ruler of Libya.

I am still confident that the counter-intuitive Dow 14,400 will be achieved in 2012.
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On April 27th, Sigmund wrote:

Who Bought All Those Pre-9/11 Puts Anyway?

Still waiting...

Bueller, Bueller, Anyone?

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Silver Lining

On April 9th, Sigmund wrote this regarding Silver Standard Resources (SSRI):

... yesterday I actual put a stop in at a couple of percentage points below the current price. Round numbers on the spot price have that affect on me (20, 30, 40).
I have little doubt that silver will visit higher, round numbers in the future but someone else can ride the retracements down into the low 30's.

Monkey see, monkey do. An easy call as silver topped in April.

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The HMO Inverse Proportionality Rule

On May 1st, Sigmund wrote:

Since quality of health care and health in general for Americans continues to decline, that can only mean good news for the stock price of the health care industry.

It has and it is. See the list.

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Obviously, there's no crystal ball in this jungle. Following the trend will eventually prove to be the best course of action. Even more convincing, if I read it correctly, according to the Chinese calendar, 2012 is the year of the CMI 4.0. The 2012 Mayan calendar is a little harder to read; it's missing a few pages.