Stock Report

What's up with the stock market?

They say it has to do with the housing market crisis that has suddenly bloomed in recent weeks. I guess no one had the foresight to understand that when you give poor people low interest loans to buy homes, and then jack them up to double and triple rates they cannot pay them.

Sounds like a lame excuse to me.

Let's face it, they used the so-called oil problem for a while when stocks plummeted, too. I am not an expert on the stock market, and what motivates it, but when approximately 85% of my net wealth is linked to it, I have to take notice.

MasterCard came out with its stock over a year ago. I took a risk and gambled that it would do very well. Now, almost 70% of my personal investment portfolio is connected to this stock. Dumb? Perhaps, but you wouldn't say that if you made as much money as I did, when the stock jumped from $50/share to $170/share. Those were good ol' days. Now the same stock is hovering around $140/share (still not quite to the crisis point, but still enough to create a panic for me), which is a large wallop on any person's wallet, when they are invested in it.

The banking industry is losing its proverbial shirt because of these interest rates. As a result, I have decided to attempt to capitalize on it--in any event--by buying heavily into Deutsche Bank Ag Namen (Symbol: DB) and Credit Suisse Group (Symbol: CS). I am always drawn to foreign stock. I suppose I like the foreign tax. (Not really!)

I hope that my gut feeling over this proves to be correct after the end of next week!