SmallCap

Oil Sands will be increasing production not decreasing it. http://www.wsj.com/articles/as-oil-slips-below-50-canada-digs-in-for-long-haul-1421114641 “It’s not well understood just how robust the oil sands are. If you stopped expansion of the oil sands tomorrow, you would have no decline in the production base for decades,” Cenovus Chief Executive Brian Ferguson said. “What we do is design for 30-year flat production lives” at oil-sands fields, he said

I've heard that fifteen minutes can save you... Sorry couldn't resist :) I am also in Michigan and found that the best way to save on insurance is to not get any speeding tickets. I have been very happy with Michigan Auto owners for home, cars and I also bought a 100K life insurance policy because it cost me 110 per year and saves me around 85 a year on my other policies. I don't mind paying 25 a year for 100K of life insurance. Since you are in Michigan I will put in a simple plug for my independent agent who is the best at understanding and explaining insurance options of anyone I have met. His Name is Lowel Winne (269) 906-5112 and if you tell him you are as crazy about saving on insurance as Seth Getz, he will understand and take the time to explain all the options.

I was talking with someone who is in the oil/gas industry and he pointed out something that was interesting. The extra-low prices noted for Marcellus natural gas reflects that there is more supply than the existing transport system can handle. As transportation increases those prices won’t be so low. The lowest price last week in the Northeast, reported by the publication, Natural Gas Intelligence, was $0.53 per mmBtu. However, the highest price last week was $8.10. It reflected too little transportation to supply enough natural gas to those needing it. There is much potential natural gas demand (power plants in the winter in particular) in the Northeast U.S. Also I don't know how much of an impact this will have in the NE but the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant was shut down for good the other day, after 42 years of service. It and very old coal plants need another fuel to replace them. Natural gas has all the advantages. Interesting times.

has anyone on this board ever been "pitched" what ended up being a good investment? I am massively skeptical of any investment that I am being pitched. why would they go through all the bother of pitching me one something instead of taking advantage of it themselves.

have any of you taken a good look at this website? they plan to offer commission free trades forever. What are your thoughts, would you do this? here is the link to the FAQ section of the website https://robinhoodapp.zendesk.com/hc/en-us I have received an invitation code that can be used to start an account, only problem is I don't have an IOS device.

The way things are going these are all going to become "small caps"

Opinion: OPEC is wrong to think it can outlast U.S. on oil prices http://www.marketwatch.com/story/opec-is-wrong-to-think-it-can-outlast-us-on-oil-prices-2014-12-02 can't vouch for his numbers but it brings up some interesting points.

please forgive the slight hijack of this thread but it brings to mind a question that has been bugging me for a while and i wonder if any of you have any insight into it. The question is where did ALL the oil, gas and coal originally come from? The standard answer that I have always seen is that it came from vegetation millions of years ago being fossilized. This answer has been very unsatisfying for me because it brings up these questions. How is it possible that ALL of the fossil fuels came from vegetation by my very nonscientific back of the envelop kind of thinking it just doesn't seem possible that all of that fuel, not just the stuff we can get to but all of it, all the stuff that is over 10 miles down, all the stuff under the bottom of the ocean, all of it that is so dispersed that we can't pull it out. all of it that has been seeping out into the oceans for those last millions of years all came from the vegetation on the surface of the earth. If you took all the vegetation on the surface of the earth now and fossilized it just how much BOE would it produce? And lets also take into account that all that vegetation millions of years ago had to become fossilized. how much of our current vegetation is becoming fossilized? are we making more fossil fuels now? what was so different millions of years ago that we made fossil fuels then but not now? Then also how did it get down into the ground so far? what caused there to be MASSIVE pockets of coal miles down that is miles deep? how would that much vegetation end up piled up on top of each other in a way that it would be turned into fossil fuels? How did so much oil ended up miles down under the ocean bottom, what caused that. I know that much smarter people then I were the ones to say that this is where fossil fuels come from, so maybe I should just accept what they say as fact but each time I hear about it I end up feeling very unsatisfied with the answer. anyone else have any insight or better theories about where all the fossil fuels come from?

here are some pictures of what I am grateful for, sometimes a picture is worth a lot of words. and for good measure here is an incredibly cute(yes i'm biased, so sue me) video of my 4 year old girl reading to my 2 year old. I have much to be grateful for. Also I would be grateful if someone would tell me how to include the images in the message instead of as attachments:)

Ok so I know it's cliche but somethings are still really worth it and taking a time to be grateful is one of them. I know and respect so many of you on this board and I so enjoy our common pursuit of finding dollars for 50 cents. But we don't have many times when we just share a little bit of what we are grateful for. So please chime in on the things in life you are grateful for.

I keep hearing a reoccurring phrase on these oil and gas related threads that goes something like this. oil producing state (Russia/SA) can't survive with oil prices below certain price point because their budget calls for certain price level. I'm beginning to wonder if this is a self reassuring phrase used to validate and justify our investing in this area with the market constantly bombarding our confidence with dropping oil prices. We cling to these thoughts that SA will HAVE TO cut production because they can't survive at prices below____ Looking back at the long term prices of oil these same countries not just survived but thrived as recently as 8 years ago with oil between 30 and 70. now I know that is 8 years ago and we all get comfortable at what ever level of income we currently have and don't ever want to take a pay cut. so while there will be a lot of griping about the lower prices are we deluding ourselves that the pain will be strong enough that those countries will take the steps in order to curb production. Think of those countries in terms of being companies... PennWest recently said they wouldn't consider decreasing their production levels unless the price went below 70. Even then it's no guarantee that they would curb production in a significant way. If a company who's cost per barrel is significantly higher then that of say SA won't think about curbing until that point then what makes us think that SA will curb production? PS. an ever growing portion of my portfolio is in this area so I feel the pain but just want to make sure I am thinking about it circumspectly and not deluding myself with false hope.

Just finally got around to reading this book. I get the sense both from the pre launch PR and the book itself that he expected that the book would be a shot across the bow of the US market and that it would change behavior and regulation, Basically validate the good guys and bring down the bad guys. He also seems to be doing a great sales job for the exchange created by the RBC guys. So since this book has come out besides a bunch of people complaining about being screwed is anyone aware of any changes that have come about as a result of this book? Is the new exchange working as planned and is it being used? any changes in regulations or practices on wall street?

Something I have been wondering lately, is there a predisposition among investors, value investors in particular for going long on investments as apposed to going short. Just from memory it seems that 98-99% of all the ideas discussed on this board are long ideas with a few random short comments thrown in but I don't remember seeing a fully laid out short thesis. Also almost all the investors we admire seem to primarily go long on investments (I can think of a few exceptions to this). My own experience for what it's worth, I have never gone short any investment ever and now I am wondering why that is. Am I predisposed to optimistically think that something will go up and not down? Do I not have the right mental models to think about when and why something will go down and not up? Maybe I just haven't hung out in the right circles ( I spend too much time with you guys :) for me to think about shorting an investment. I would think that "value" investors as apposed to the poorly named "growth" investors would have many of the mental models necessary mental models and would be quick to spot investments that are priced significantly higher then their intrinsic value. So I would expect to see a lot of short ideas on this forum but I see very few. one possible reason that I see and I don't know how to explain the math for this but my fuzzy logic tells me that there are simply more long opportunities out there then there are short opportunities, anyone able to correct my thinking on that? Part of the reason I have been thinking about this is the fact that I am always looking for a niche area to play in. To date I have always played in the nano cap market with a few investments in microcaps because I never felt like I had any edge in the major market companies whose every move is studied by legions of people who are much smarter then I am. So I have played in my small cap sandbox, but recently been thinking about what opportunities there are in going short.

Elon Musk Just Made It Way Cheaper To Live Off Solar Power http://finance.yahoo.com/news/elon-musk-just-made-way-200019467.html The loan option, called MyPower, is structured like an energy payment, in that the customer pays off the loan by paying their energy bill — and it's a win-win, because these payments can end up being cheaper than your traditional power bill. And after 30 years, the power is free. Here's how it works, according to SolarCity founder and CEO Lyndon Rive: customers take out a 30-year loan on a solar power system at 4.5% interest. SolarCity installs and maintains the system at no cost to the customer, and the customer pays for the power — and in the process, pays off the loan. Typically loans available for homeowners to fit themselves with solar utilities are usually offered by third-party banks and municipalities in partnership with solar companies, and do not take into account how much power is being produced by the system. That means if the system underperforms, the customer loses money. Instead, with SolarCity's direct financing, "you only pay based on the production of the system," which SolarCity will monitor and guarantee against drops in performance, Rive told Business Insider.

Chevron sells stake in Canadian Duvernay shale field to Kuwait http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/10/06/us-chevron-assetsale-idUSKCN0HV0SU20141006 It values Chevrons stake in Duvernay at 5 bil PennWest has some holdings in Duvernay, can'r remember exactly how much.

Had some limit orders trigger today. finally Bought some LTS - Lightstream Sold some PWE Puts for Jan 2016 $7 strike- I think of it like a long term limit order at a $5.30 price point (18% discount to current price) and if it doesn't get filled then I got paid 25% interest on my money to wait.

My largest and only TV is 32" too. I guess we're TV brothers :D Only on a value investing board would you find such people, every house I go in besides mine has a monster TV hanging on the wall in every living room. My kids were literately jumping for joy and high-fiving one another when we replaced one of our 2 tube TVs with that 32" HDTV two years ago. We still have the tube TV in the other living room though, I didn't want to get too crazy. That's my experience too. Even the poorest people I know have cable (which we don't have) and a TV larger than 45 inches. We actually bought our 32" as a floor demo with a small scratch on the non-screen part, so we got a discount. It was a good value... I still don't have a flat screen TV, still using an old tube TV. Prices are dropping to the point where I think it's worth it for me to upgrade. My wife really wants one :)

Just curious how you all would apply your thinking on this subject to the topic of steroids and other performance enhancing drugs in sports?

This was the first book i read that really got me excited about investing in stocks. I read this book when i was 16 and previous to that point had only studied and invested in Mutual funds. So while I have moved on past a lot of what he talked about this book will always have a place on my shelf and in my head because of how it got me to start thinking about investing in companies. Even though I don't follow his rules they still come to mind.

Just read this article on the long term storage of unsold cars going on around the world. Does anyone have any insight into the situation or any numbers to go along with this anecdotal evidence? Something surprised me and I question that this number is true is where they state that there are more working cars then there are people in the world. gave a number of 10Bil and I just have a hard time accepting that number. does anyone have any numbers to put this into historical perspective? and if it's such an anomaly then how do we benefit by it? http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-05-16/where-worlds-unsold-cars-go-die?utm_content=buffer66ba8&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer

I agree Morgan on the situation of your friends, we have some of the same friends it seems. But what you wrote interested me This used to make a lot of sense to me when I worked for an hourly wage but now I work in a capacity where I am billing out at a monthly rate and my hourly rate on the surface looks like it's 300-400 per hour which if I could bill 40 hours a week I would be doing great but I can only bill out a few hours a day so it makes it hard to make this comparison but still your point is good.

Welcome to “The Truman Show” market. In the 1998 film by that name, actor Jim Carrey is ignorant of the fact that his life is a hugely popular reality show. His every action, unbeknownst to him, is manipulated while being broadcast to millions of TV viewers worldwide. He seemingly lives in an idyllic seaside community where the manicured lawns are always green and the citizens are always happy. These people are, of course, actors. The world Truman inhabits turns out to be phony: a gigantic sound stage created for a manufactured “reality.” As Truman starts to unravel the truth, his anger erupts and chaos ensues. Ben Bernanke and Mario Draghi, as in the movie, are the “creators” who have manufactured a similarly idyllic, if artificial, environment for today’s investors. They were the executive producers of “The Truman Show” of 2013. A global audience sat in rapt attention before this wildly popular production. Given the U.S. stock market’s continuing upsurge, Bernanke is almost certain to snag yet another People’s Choice Award for this psychological “thriller.” Even in “The Truman Show,” life was not as good as this for investors. Here is Yahoo's short summery http://finance.yahoo.com/news/seth-klarman-welcome-truman-show-140227976.html Here is the longer ZeroHedge piece http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-03-08/seth-klarman-born-bulls-bitcoin-truman-show-market

Uccmal, you say this practice has to stop... how would you go about stopping it?

I started playing bridge at age 9, I would partner with my dad against my two teenage siblings. I think the game is great and really improves the thinking. Bridge and chess are the two games that I think have had the most positive impact on teaching me how to think. I haven't played bridge in many many years. just can't find players.

Parsad, do you have a estimated time frame that you think you would have filled your orders and could actually share the idea on the board?