In Search of the Perfect Investment

Stocks fell heavily yesterday. Retail is not doing well. The summer has its usual doldrums.

I don’t own retailers. I believe the country is way over-retailed.

Best to be in solid stocks. See my list in the right column.

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Obsessions:

+ Nothing excited members of our investment club this week more than WAZE, a free traffic app for your iPhone or Android.

Nothing will save you more money or more time in your travels than WAZE. Trust me. This free app is simply amazing. On the screen you can see a list of the useful alerts it will give you. It puts little icons on your map as you drive, warning you  of police, cameras, construction, etc. Here’s how it guides you around snarled traffic.

Download WAZE from the Apple store, or on Google Play. It’s free.

+ WAZE sucks battery power. Keep it plugged into your car’s cigarette lighter or buy a MOPHIE, add-on battery pack. I have one for my iPhone and love it. Buy Mophie from Mophie, not from Amazon. Click here.

+ I really want to buy a Tesla. Everyone I know who has one loves it. You can drive over 300 miles with the bigger battery option on a single charge. It will fully charge overnight. I was surprised at how much you can actually save on gas versus driving a large, luxury 22-MPG car. If you drive 30,000 miles in a year, you can save about $4,300 in gas. It’s a great looking car and accelerates like a rocket. It’s totally quiet. Electric cars are our  future.

Tesla’s web site is useful and fun.  Click here.

+ China has banned its government PCs from running Windows 8. I suspect China is annoyed at Microsoft for dropping support on Windows XP, which most of its government Windows machines still run. Microsoft sometimes shoots itself aggressively in the foot. I use Windows 7. It works.

+ I’m signing up for the Robin Hood Investor Conference. It’s October 20 and 21 at the Grand Hyatt in New York City.

Tickets are not cheap — $7,500. I went last year and loved it. It probably paid for itself in tips. Click here.

+ This Patek Philippe 18-carat gold perpetual calendar chronograph wristwatch with moon phases and a tonneau-shaped case sold for $5.7 million at Christie’s in May 2010.

+ We saw the Broadway show, After Midnight, last night. Super show. Highly recommended. And packed. I thought the economy was ailing. It’s not, based on last night’s sold-out house.

+ Worried about how Alibaba does its accounting? Read this piece on Bloomberg. Click here.

+ I’m eying some real estate syndications. They pay 8% dividends and will deliver an IRR of 12% to 15% when they’re sold down the pike.

+ For god’s sake, if you’re trying to get me to invest in your company and you promise to send a sample which retails for $5, send the thing. I’m meant to give you $100,000 and you can’t remember to send a $5 sample. I should expect your company to succeed? I don’t make this stuff up.

+ JPMorgan’s bank by photo app from your iPhone works super. Saves so much time. Also great is its wiring money from your PC app. Brilliantly designed. I couldn’t be happier.

+ Your online broker has its quirks. For example it can’t figure out your basis of “free.” STWD gave all its shareholders free shares in SWAY. Fidelity hasn’t figured out the SWAY shares were free. It shows I’m losing money on them. Great for the IRS, bad for my accounting.

+ ETFs have become huge. Everyone is buying them instead of buying shares. I smell an upcoming disaster — like an ETF flash crash. I’m increasingly leery of them. I can put my own ETF together by buying a bundle of stock… Heck, why not?

Harry Newton, who is cutting his sugar intake. Or at least trying to. Sugar really is poison. all of us eat far too much of it. Orange juice is the worst.