LIVING OFF DIVIDENDS & PASSIVE INCOME

I’m cheap.

I like to buy stuff when its on sale. The same applies to stocks. I recently bought Johnson & Johnson, and Google. Both are trading at historically low P/E and Price/Free Cash Flow ratios.

But, the market for bubble stocks seems to be alive and kicking.

LinkedIn (LNKD) just went public at 1,000 times earnings. Yeah, its trailing P/E is 1,000!

Even some established companies are ridiculously expensive. Salesforce.com (CRM) is currently trading at a trailing P/E of 300 and a forward P/E of 75. I can’t imagine who’s buying the stock at this level.

The CEO and other insiders are dumping stock like its going out of style. In the past year, they’ve sold $234 million worth of stock. And they’re continuing to sell it. Reminds me of CountryWide insiders selling the stock before the real estate bubble burst in 2007.  Read more... (171 words, 8 images, estimated 41 secs reading time)

Foreclosure is not a fun process.

Losing your house for any reason is a stressful, disheartening experience. And banks are notoriously difficult to deal with. Mainly because they’re not really interested in working out a deal with you. Especially if you have equity in your house.

That being said, I’m greatly amused by people who get the better end of the foreclosure process, especially when it comes to Bank of America. (I’m not a big fan of Bank of America – I have my reasons…)

Bank of America filed for foreclosure on a house in Florida, about six months ago. The strange thing was that the homeowners, Mr & Mrs. Nyergers, owned their home free and clear. They had bought their house with cash. They had never had a mortgage on it.  Read more... (370 words, 8 images, estimated 1:29 mins reading time)

I’m always in search of good books to read and a few people recommended Michael Lewis’ new bestseller The Big Short. I put off reading it because I didn’t really want to read yet another book about the subprime mortgage meltdown. However, I finally got the kindle version to read on my new iPad and was pleasantly surprised by how good it was. Actually, I wish I had read it earlier – the book was rather amazing. It was as fast paced and entertaining as his first book, Liar’s Poker.

Lewis describes the financial industry collapse induced by subprime mortgage bond derivative market from the point of view of a couple of hedge fund managers who shorted them. Not very large hedge funds either. Instead of focusing on well known managers like John Paulson, he focuses on relatively unknown and minor investors, with interesting personalities.  Read more... (426 words, 9 images, estimated 1:42 mins reading time)

Bob Parsons is the multi-millionaire founder of Godaddy, probably the world’s largest domain registrar company. Here’s an interesting video about the top 5 rules for starting a business that they don’t teach you in business school.

#5. Start small

Don’t go all in when first starting a business. Get a proof of concept first and make sure you have a fallback plan. Parsons worked at a day job for 3 yrs while he started his first business, which he subsequently sold for $64 million.

#4. The best business partner is no partner

As opposed to conventional wisdom, two heads are not better than one. Having a partner or investor usually ends badly. You too much time discussing and negotiating than doing anything productive.

#3. Solve your own problems  Read more... (333 words, 9 images, estimated 1:20 mins reading time)

Here’s a funny video explaining the true unemployment numbers that the BLS just released.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) announced today that the unemployment rate for November fell to 10%. This figure represents 15.4 million officially unemployed people.

In reality there are over 26 million Americans who are either jobless or underemployed. The “real” jobless rate takes into account part-time workers seeking full-time work, discouraged job seekers and persons furloughed from full-time to part-time status. The real rate of unemployment is 17.2% and is a more accurate indicator of the labor market.

Check out this hilarious spoof on the new iPod. Yes, its smaller than the Nano!

Discount iPods & iPhones

Thank god for creative young people with lots of time on their hands!