Money to Burn

The first time I met Charlie Tango was back in January 2006 when I picked up a mooring while skipping a Beneteau 37 out of St. Vincent WI. Yesterday Charlie and I met again but this time I was skipping a 10’ Sunfish out of Young Island – I told Charlie I was using restraint in view of the recent Global Financial Crisis

It only takes a few days in St. Vincent and her islands of Bequia, Canouan, Mustique & Mayreau to ask: crisis what crisis? A new high speed ferry, new airports, more cars, more smart phones, massive hotel and housing projects and of course karaoke bars everywhere. Inflation is getting to be a problem – the price of Sunset Aged Premium Rum is now $24 (EC) up from $12 only two years ago. The local currency is weak but the locals don’t care because they never hold it preferring to own “stuff” like cars, houses, sail boats and small business enterprises.

Next week I will return to my reality of volatile weather and volatile stock markets. I see the Getting Technical Q1 selections are flat vs. a loss of 1.4% for the TSX Comp. The Getting Technical Focus list is up 3.5% over the same time period. The biggest winners are Viterra +22%, Onex & CAE +7% and the iShares Energy up 4.8% One big loser was the iShares Global Gold down 4.5% I don’t have access to my own charting software so I have to poach from stockcharts.com – but we can see the weekly on CAE probably too far above the 40-week but the relative vs. the S&P500 is once again turning higher – this is a stock picker’s market