Let’s Say You’re Dead: Give Your Heirs a Break

Please note that this is a sister publication of WallStreetNewsNetwork ( http://WStNN.com ) and eventually everything on this site will be transferred over there.

by Fred Fuld III

Most people who think about estate planning are aware of and have probably set up wills and living trusts, and possibly medical advance directives and durable powers of attorney.

However, because so much is done online, your heirs may not be aware of all your cyber accounts. Are they aware that you have PayPal (PYPL)? Do you have any savings accounts with an online bank? What about online brokerage accounts where you have opted out of paper deliveries?

There are a lot of issues to consider beyond the will and trust. Here are just some of the tasks that you should consider to make things easier for your heirs with regards to online accounts.

Keep Track of All Your Online Accounts

The first place to start is identifying all the online accounts that you have along with logins and passwords. Some people like to type out a list on a Word document or text document. I personally don’t like that idea, unless the file is well protected and encrypted. Otherwise, if your computer is hacked, the hacker will have access to everything.

Others just write down a list of all those logins and passwords on a piece of paper. I have a friend who’s list is currently three pages long. I don’t like this practice either as it takes a long time to search through, since it is not alphabetized, and find the particular website that you are looking for.

I personally like using an Email and Website Password Logbook. These journals have alphabetized pages, so that all the accounts that begin with A are in the first section, all the Bs in the second section, and so forth. That way, I don’t have to look all over the place to find the password I want.

Since everything is handwritten on a hard copy, it can’t be hacked. (Just don’t lose it.) It is also a central repository for all your online accounts, which will make it simpler for your heirs to find everything.

Requirements for Account Liquidation Upon Death

It might be helpful to make your heirs aware of the requirements to liquidate online monetary accounts and stock brokerage accounts. For example, the requirements for PayPal are:

• A cover sheet from the Requestor (or a person who is duly appointed or authorized to administer the estate of the deceased customer) identifying the account by the primary email address and request to have PayPal account closed
• A copy of the death certificate for the account holder
• A copy of a government issued photo ID (such as a driver’s license, passport or state-issued ID) of the Requestor
• Legal documentation or a copy of the will that identifies the executor of the estate
• State issued documentation if a living will is not present

Most online bank and brokerage accounts will require similar documents.

Facebook Accounts After Death

Social media accounts have special requirements in the event of death. As an example, Facebook (FB) has two options upon the death of the accountholder.  You can either have your account permanently deleted, which you can setup now while you are still alive, or you can have a Memorialized Account and it can be controlled by a legacy contact. Your legacy contact can be identified now also.

Twitter Accounts After Death

Twitter (TWTR) allows the removal of the account of a deceased person or an incapacitated person, with the submission of appropriate documents.

LinkedIn Accounts After Death

LinkedIn has an online form that can be filled out in order to remove the profile of someone who has passed away.

Instagram Accounts After Death

Instagram has similar options to Facebook. The account can be memorialized or it can be removed. For removal, they request the following:

• The deceased person’s birth certificate
• The deceased person’s death certificate
• Proof of authority under local law that you are the lawful representative of the deceased person, or his/her estate

For other social media accounts, check out their Help link.

Email Accounts After Death

In terms of the deceased emails, this can be a delicate issue. You probably want your heirs to have access to your email accounts, especially those connected to bank and brokerage accounts, and accounts that are exclusively phone app based.

If there are any emails that you are uncomfortable with your heirs seeing, they should obviously be deleted, now.

Then there is the issue of if and who to contact about your passing. A friend of mine who I hadn’t contacted for a couple months had passed away shortly after I last called him. I received no email notification about his passing or the memorial service, even though I was on his email contact list. I only found out about it a month and a half later after reaching one of his relatives when I discovered my friend’s phone was disconnected.

Therefore, it would be helpful to provide a list of who you want contacted upon your death, along with emails, and possibly phone numbers.

You probably don’t want your heirs to do a mass email of all contacts, including the plumber you emailed two years ago, all the email newsletters that you subscribe to, the restaurant that you made an online reservation with, and so forth. So some filtering will be necessary.

Online Bank Accounts and Bills After Death

If you receive many of your bills by email, your heirs will need access to both your email account and your online bank account. Many bank customers have set up their account to autopay various bills.

Heirs need to review all bills, contact the bank right away, make sure that important bills, such as mortgage payments, are continued to be paid, and determine which other accounts may need to be cancelled, such as cable TV bills.

Online Stock Brokerage Accounts After Death

Remember that some brokerage accounts may be exclusively app based, such as Robinhood or WeBull. Most brokerage account liquidations will have similar requirements for submitting documents, however, the big issue is the sale of the stocks and bonds in the portfolio; in other words, when and how it is that done, or can the existing stocks be kept and transferred to the heirs. I suggest that you contact your own broker to get the details on the requirements and policies, if you want that info available for your heirs.

Your Cell Phone After Death

If you use dual-factor identification, access to your cell phone will be necessary. But even if you don’t, you will probably want your heirs to have access to it. Important phone calls may come in for a while, and heirs may need to access some of your finance related apps.

In your central password holding resource, don’t forget to include your cell phone’s passcode. I use this Password Logbook which sells for less than $7 on Amazon (AMZN).

Living Trusts

If you haven’t already, talk to an attorney about setting up a living trust and transferring your online bank accounts and your online brokerage accounts into the trust.

Anyone who has dealt with the death of a parent or other close relative knows the hassles involved. If you want to help out your heirs, it is a good idea to be proactive, especially when it comes to online accounts.

Disclosure: Author owns PYPL, AMZN, and TWTR. Affiliated links

How to Invest Like a Billionaire

Do you want to be a billionaire? If so, maybe you should invest in the companies that made the billionaires so rich.

Forbes Magazine has just come out with its latest billionaires list. Seven out of the top ten billionaires have founded and/or are the head of companies that are publicly traded, providing investors with a selection of stocks to invest in.

The following is a list of the billionaires and their stocks.

Rank	Name	Net Worth	Company	Symbol
#1	Jeff Bezos	$112 B	Amazon	AMZN
#2	Bill Gates	$90 B	Microsoft	MSFT
#3	Warren Buffett	$84 B	Berkshire Hathaway	BRKA
#4	Bernard Arnault	$72 B	LVMH	LVMH
#5	Mark Zuckerberg	$71 B	Facebook	FB
#7	Carlos Slim Helu	$67.1 B	América Móvil	AMX
#10	Larry Ellison	$58.5 B	Oracle	ORCL

The Yummies are Causing the All-Time Stock Market Highs

Many have wondered why the stock market continues to make all-time highs, almost every day. This exceptional rise may be due to the Yummies, the Young Upwardly Mobile Millennials. Yes, the Millennials, also known as Generation Y. Many traits have been ascribed to this generation, but you don’t ever hear the members referred to as being invetor-oriented.

So let’s look at the facts. Legg Mason Global Asset Management, the 20th largest asset manager in the world, produced the 2017 Global Investment Survey, and the Summary of U.S. Results are very enlightening.

For example, did you know that Millennials invest more in non-cash investments than the Generation X or the Baby Boomers? As a matter of fact, 77% of Yummies apply their funds toward these assets, versus 75% for Gen x and 69% for Baby Boomers.

Let’s look at some definitions before continuing. Legg mason consideres Millennials to be between the ages of 18 and 35, Gen X at age 36 to 52, with Baby Boomers ranging from 53 to 71 years old.

Some other interesting factoids about the Yummies. They invest three times as much as Boomers in non-traditional investments. Plus, a far greater percentage of Yummies put their money into investment real estate than the Baby Boomers.

But what is most amazing is the fact that 11% of the Yummies invest in gold and precious metals versus only 7% of the Gen Xers and a measly 2% for the Baby Boomers.

When the respondents were asked which investment categories they believe offer the best opportunities over the next 12 months, 46% of the Yummies said domestic stocks, with Gen X and Boomers closely agreeing, both at 42%. International stocks came in second as an investment opportunity in the opinion of the Millennials.

Finally, 87% of Yummies have saivings, investments, or both but only 81% of Boomers have these assets, and just 75% of Millennials.

Many wonder why the FAANG stocks, Facebook (FB), Apple (AAPL), Amazon (AMZN), Netflix (NFLX), and Google (GOOG), continue to rise. So now you know. If you are wondering who is driving up the price of stocks and cryptocurrency, you need look no further than the Yummies.

by Fred Fuld III

Disclosure: Author owns AAPL and AMZN.

Why Twitter is a Screaming Buy

Twitter (TWTR) took a huge dump a few days ago on July 27 when it reported earnings, and by the end of the day, the stock dropped by around 14% from the previous day’s close. A couple weeks ago, it had been trading over $20 a share, and now it is less than $16 a share, at the time I am writing this.

The company reported negative earnings, as usual, so why is it a screaming buy? Let’s start off with the company’s biggest asset, President Donald Trump. Yes, Trump provides an advantage to Twitter that no other company has. He tweets almost every single day, and on many days, he tweets multiple times a day. No other president, or for that matter, no other head of state, has ever tweeted so much in the history of mankind. (You know what I mean.) Trump doesn’t use Facebook, he doesn’t use LinkedIn, he doesn’t use Snapchat, he doesn’t use Instagram, he doesn’t use any of the other social media platforms, he doesn’t even send out mass emails. He uses Twitter.

Trump is Twitter’s Biggest Asset

So, the President of the United States is providing free advertising for the company. Imagine the free advertising that Blue Apron would get if Trump ordered from them every day (and told everyone about it).

One of these days, someone is going to figure out how to monetize this unique feature. It may or may not be Jack Dorsey, Twitter’s CEO. It may or may not be Anthony Noto, Twitter’s COO. Or it may be someone new that the company brings in. But someone is going to do it.

Earnings?

But what about earnings? Yes, Twitter hasn’t been generating a profit. But look at Facebook (FB). The company lost $56 million back in 2008, and finally turned it around in 2009 with net income of $229 million. Everyone complains about Amazon (AMZN) not making any money. It lost $278 million in 2014 then showed a profit of $618 million the following year. LinkedIn generated losses in 2010 and 2011, then went profitable in 2012.

Here’s the thing about earnings. When you have income, you have to pay taxes. Once that money is paid out to the IRS, it is dead money; it is money that doesn’t benefit the company. However, applying excess cash flow to tax deductible expenditures, such as more employees, buildings, equipment, machinery, research and development, marketing, and advertising, will benefit the company. These expenses help the company grow and keep taxes low. As long as revenues keep increasing, it pays off in the end, as it did for Facebook, LinkedIn, and Amazon. (Yeah, yeah, I know, Amazon has an outrageously high price-to-earnings ratio and forward P/E, but look at the growth rate of revenues and earnings. Income for the latest fiscal year spiked 292% over the previous year.)

6 Revenue Increasers

But what can Twitter specifically do to increase revenues and earnings? Here is a list of suggestions.

1. Offer ads that appear by every tweet made by Trump. These ads could appear either above or below the tweet, or both.
2. Offer ads that appear by every major celebrity tweet, especially those with over a million followers.
3. When you check your lists, there should be an ad above or below the lists.
4. In the left hand column, under Trends for You, an ad should be available to advertisers. It would not be intrusive to users who first log on, but would be a great location for advertisers when users scroll down.
5. Aggressively go after major advertisers to pay for promoted tweets (Amazon book of the day, Wal-Mart deal of the day, Priceline travel deal of the day, etc.)
6. Set up a Tweet Bank. There are tweets that I want to save that have interesting links, gifs, or pictures. However, when I look for them after a month or two, they are very hard to find, even if I check my Like list. It would be nice if there was a little Save icon next to the Direct Message icon, where I could save the tweet into my Tweet Bank. (This isn’t really a profit making suggestion, just a user enhancement making idea.)

By the way, this is not a stock recommendation (in spite of what the title of this article says). I never give investment advice. This is just a suggestion for your own research and entertainment.

One of these days, Twitter will turn around. The bird will fly. It’s just a matter of who, what, and when.

Disclosure: Author owns TWTR and AMZN.

Article originally published on WSTNN.com on August 4, 2017.

The Yahoo Annual Meeting

Me and Marissa Mayer, CEO of Yahoo!

I have attended a lot of annual shareholder meetings over the last several years when they are located within a reasonable driving distance, including the meetings for Apple (AAPL), Disney (DIS), and Twitter (TWTR). Today, I attended the Yahoo! Inc. (YHOO) annual meeting today, held at the Santa Clara Marriott in Santa Clara, California. I have been a shareholder of Yahoo! for many years.

One of the first things I noticed when driving into the parking lot was a bunch of protestors. I'm not exactly sure what they were protesting since the signs said something about Yahoo! and whales and ivory, which Yahoo! has nothing to do with.

There were almost 100 attendees at the meeting. After the introductions and formal business, Marissa Mayer, the CEO, first showed a video then went over the company's status, progress, and future. She first talked about how the company had over 400 feature launches and 30 major launches. She pointed out that there was an 8% increase year-over-year in GAAP revenues, and a 45% increase in Mavens (Mobile Video Native Social) GAAP revenues. The number of mobile users is in excess of 600 million, tripling the number from 2012.

Some of the goals she discussed were:
1. Play to Strengths to Increase User Engagement
2.  Drive Mavens Revenue Growth
3. Simplify the Business to Improve Execution
4. Efficiently Align Resources

The company is selling off over 4,000 non-strategic patents, exiting six offices around the world, and reducing workforce by 15% by the end of 2016.

Mayer mentioned that Yahoo! now has 1 billion users, one of only three companies to reach this level, the other two being Facebook (FB) and Google (GOOGL).

The meeting ended with a question and answer session.

You can see the entire annual meeting here:



Disclosure: Author owns YHOO, AAPL, DIS, and TWTR,

How to Invest Like a Billionaire

Have you ever wondered how the richest people in the world became so rich? In many cases, it is due to one stock, often for a company they founded. If the stock made them rich, why not you?

On March 21 of this year, Forbes Magazine came out with the 2015 Billionaires Edition, which contains a list of the richest people on the planet.

Although, many of these billionaires may own stocks in several companies, there is usually only one company that put them on the billionaire map. The following is a list of the richest people and the stock that made them rich.

Bill Gates

1. Bill Gates, Microsoft (MSFT)

2. Amancio Ortega, Inditex (ITX.MC)

3. Warren Buffett, Berkshire Hathaway (BRKA)

4. Carlos Slim Helu, América Móvil (AMX) (AMOV)

5. Jeff Bezos, Amazon.com (AMZN)

6. Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook (FB)

Warren Buffett

7. Larry Ellison, Oracle (ORCL)

8. Michael Bloomberg, Bloomberg L.P. (private)

9. and 10. Charles & David Koch, Koch Industries (private)

11. Liliane Bettencourt, L'Oreal (LRLCY)

12. and 13. Larry Page and Sergey Brin, Google (GOOG) (GOOGL)

14. Bernard Arnault, LVMH (LVMUY) (LVMHF)

If you like interesting stock lists like this, make sure to check out many of the free lists at WallStreetNewsNetwork.com.


Book now available: Buying Dividends Revised and Expanded

Book now available: Stock Market Trivia Makes a Great Gift!

Over 20 Stocks Reporting Earnings Next Week

Looking for some interesting moves in some stocks next week. Check out the companies that will be reporting earnings this week.

If earnings exceed analysts' expectations, the stocks can shoot up. If the numbers underperform, the stock can tank. Then again, occasionally, stocks don't move the way you would have expected.

Anyway, many traders use earnings plays for trading strategies. Also, option traders look for high implied volatility of stocks for for option selling strategies.

Here are many of the stocks reporting earnings this week:

Monday

Halliburton HAL

Tuesday

BP BP
3M Company MMM
Apple AAPL
Chipotle Mexican Grill CMG
eBay EBAY
AT&T T
Twitter TWTR

Wednesday

Boeing BA
United Technologies UTX
Facebook FB
Texas InstrumentsTXN

Thursday

Bristol-Myers Squibb BMY
ConocoPhillips COP
Ford F
Mastercard MA
Altria MO
Amazon AMZN
Amgen AMGN
LinkedIn LNKD

Friday

Chevron CVX
ExxonMobile XOM

If you like interesting stock lists like this, check out many of the free stock lists at WallStreetNewsNetwork.com.

By Stockerblog.com

5 Ways to Protect Yourself From a Stock Market Crash

Don't be the fish in a Bear Market

The first day of this year, 2016, the stock market tanked. As I write this on Wednesday, January 6, the Dow Jones Industrial Average is down 237 points.

If you are concerned about the stock market and you think we are heading into a bear market, there are certain ways to protect yourself on the downside.

Here is a list of five ways to trade which can provide some protection during a period of falling stocks.

Short Stocks 

1. You can short stocks. If you have never shorted a stock before, this is what happens in simple terms. You borrow stock, you sell the stock, and eventually you have to buy the stock back eventually to return the stock that was borrowed, hopefully at a much lower price. (You don't actually see all this happening; it all happens electronically.) The different between what you sale the stock for and the price you buy it back is your profit (or loss). Traders should be aware that this can be a very risky trade and the potential loss from selling short is infinite.

Buy Put Options 

2. You can buy put options to protect stocks that you currently own, or you can buy a put on a stock you believe is going to drop. A put is the right to sell a stock at a certain price within a set period of time.

Here is an example. A stock is trading at 50, you buy a put with a strike price of 49. The strike price is the price at which you can put the stock to someone. You pay 1 for the option. If the stock drops to 45, your one dollar option increases to at least 4 (the difference between the 49 and the 45). If the stock closes at 49 or higher, then the option expires worthless, so your loss is limited to the cost of the put.

Writing Covered Calls

3. Writing calls against your stocks is one way to help protect your portfolio on the downside. Maybe you don't want to sell out of you stock positions, but you want some way to help reduce the loss on the downside. You can write covered calls. There is the chance that your stock could get called away if the stock starts to rally, but it just means that you made money on the transaction.

An example would be if the stock sells at 50 and you write a call with a strike price of 51 for 1. If the stock remains at the same price at option expiration, you make 1 per share. If the stock goes up to 53, you will get called away at 51 making 1 on the stock plus you collect another 1 for the sold option, for a total profit of 2. If the stock drops to 47, you lose 3 on the stock but you make 1 on the sold call for a net loss on 2. Without the written call, your net loss would be 3 on the stock.

Bearish ETFs 

4. Bearish exchange traded funds, also known as Bearish ETFs are investments that have a goal of providing the daily inverse of a stock index. The bearish ETFs are very volatile investments that are designed for short term trading, and not as long term investments. They achieve their performance through the use of various financial instruments including futures contracts, options,  collars, swap agreements, short positions, and other derivatives.

Double and Triple Bearish ETFs 

5. Double and triple bearish ETFs can provide a 200% or 300% opposite return of a sector or market. Listed at WallStreetNewsNetwork.com are over a dozen commonly traded triple bearish ETFs which investors can use to get a 300% play.

An example is the Direxion Daily S&P 500 Bear 3X Shares ETF (SPXS). This ETF has the goal of making 300% of the inverse of the performance of the S&P 500. What that means is, if the S&P 500 drops 2% in one day, the ETF should go up in value by 6%. Alternatively, if the S&P 500 rises by 2%, the ETF should drop by 6%, which would be a significant loss.

Another one of the bear market protection tools is an ETF called the ProShares Trust UltraPro Short QQQ ETF (SQQQ). The goal of this fund is to replicate three times the inverse of the NASDAQ 100 index using various types of derivatives. An example of what that means is that if the stock market, in terms of the NASDAQ 100 drops by 1%, this ETF should rise by 3%.

This index includes such stocks at Amgen (AMGN), Apple (AAPL), Baidu (BIDU), Cisco (CSCO), eBay (EBAY), Facebook (FB), Google (GOOG), Intel (INTC), Microsoft (MSFT), Netflix (NFLX), Starbucks (SBUX), Tesla (TSLA), Whole Foods (WFM), and Yahoo (YHOO).

Investors can be more specific in terms of what sectors will drop, or will drop the most. If you think energy stocks will tank, you could buy the Daily Energy Bear 3X Shares ETF (ERY), which attempts to track 300% of the inverse of the Energy Select Sector Index. For financial services companies, an option is the Daily Financial Bear 3X Shares ETF (FAZ).

For those that are bearish on gold, a triple bearish gold ETF called the Daily Gold Miners Bear 3X Shares ETF (DUST) is available. The ETF's objective is to make 300% of the opposite of the NYSE Arca Gold Miners Index.

For a free list of the most commonly traded triple bearish ETFs which can be downloaded, go to WallStreetNewsNetwork.com.

Just remember that losses on the double and triple bearish can be substantial when the stock market rises.

One other option is to just ride out the market drops. Let's hope for a nice bull market for this year.

Disclosure: Author has various positions, including bullish, bearish, and neutral option positions, in DIS, AAPL, EBAY, YHOO, and TWTR.

By Stockerblog.com

Financial Carnival for the End of August

A financial carnival is a group of interesting links to various articles of interest to investors and others looking for interesting items relating to personal finance, the stock market, venture capital, real estate, and money.  Here is a great list of reads I came across recently for the end of August.

Amazon launches 1-hour alcohol delivery service in the U.S.
Amazon (AMZN) now beginning to deliver beer, wine, and booze.

'Spam King' guilty of posting 27 million Facebook (FB) messages
27 Million?

Where to Get Non-Recourse Loans for Your Art, Rolexes, and Other Fine Items
Need some quick cash to invest in a startup? How about borrowing against the Picasso hanging on your wall?

Get What's Yours: The Secrets to Maxing Out Your Social Security
Are you familiar with the technique of filing for Social Security and suspending it at the same time at the age of 66, then having your spouse file for spousal benefit, then both of you apply for full benefit at age 70, in order to get tens of thousands in additional Social Security benefits? I hadn't heard about it or other techniques in the book. If you are approaching retirement you better check this out. No wonder why the book has 839 reviews and an overall rating of 4.5 stars.

Watch Sony's (SNE) prototype drone do a vertical takeoff
Big enough to carry 22 pounds

Passport Power Ranks
A ranking of passports by country

Most Expensive Listed Home in California Sold
Sorry you missed out on buying this one for only $47.5 million

Electric Surfboards
I'd like to be the VC that invested in this company


Passive Investing is Broken. Here's how to fix it by Tom Sosnoff

Protect Yourself From Crashing Stock Markets with the SQQQ ETF

Last Friday morning at 8am, I wrote an article called 5 Ways to Protect Yourself in a Bear Market. Since then, the stock market has, well to put it bluntly, crashed. Using the Dow Jones Industrial Average (since that is the index that the media likes to use), by the end of the day on Friday, the index was down over 530 points. Then yesterday, Monday, the stock market was down 588 points (and had actually dropped around 1100 points intra-day). Today, the market tanked again, falling over 200 points. Hopefully, you did something to protect your portfolio.

One of the bear market protection tools is an ETF, an exchange traded fund, called the ProShares Trust UltraPro Short QQQ ETF (SQQQ). The goal of this fund is to replicate three times the inverse of the NASDAQ 100 index using various types of derivatives. What that means is that if the stock market, in terms of the NASDAQ 100 drops by 1%, this ETF should rise by 3%.

This index includes such stocks at Amgen (AMGN), Apple (AAPL), Baidu (BIDU), Cisco (CSCO), eBay (EBAY), Facebook (FB), Google (GOOG), Intel (INTC), Microsoft (MSFT), Netflix (NFLX), Starbucks (SBUX), Tesla (TSLA), Whole Foods (WFM), and Yahoo (YHOO).

Since the close last Thursday, SQQQ has risen from 24.33 to 31.10, an increase of 27%. The nice thing about using an ETF such as this is that you don't have to short stocks, you don't have to use options, and you don't have to use margin. Not a bad over three business days.

However, you should be aware that if the market goes against you, in this case if the market rises, your loss on the ETF can be substantial. If the market goes up 1%, you would lose 3% on the ETF.

The triple bearish ETFs are just another tool at your disposal to protect your portfolio and make money when stocks drop. They should only be used on a short term basis. For a free list of other triple bearish ETFs, go to WallStreetNewsNetwork.com.

Why Did Donald Trump Register the DonaldTrumpSucks.com Domain Name?

A domain name is, in simple terms, the address for a website. For example, Apple.com, Google.com, and Yahoo.com are all domain names. Domain names are often referred to as URLs (Uniform Resource Locators) or website addresses. Usually, it is what comes after the http:// or the https://, and sometimes you see a www thrown in there.

Some people actually register domain names as investments, which for the right name, can pay off handsomely. For example, whoever originally registered fb.com, eventually got lucky and sold out to Facebook (FB) for $8.5 million. The person who owned loans.com sold to Bank of America (BAC) for $3 million, with mortgage.com going to Citigroup (C) for $1.8 million. There are many other high priced domain sales that can be found in the Stock Market Trivia book.

Donald Trump, the outspoken and currently lead-running Republican presidential candidate, owns the DonaldTrump.com domain of course. Well technically, the registration shows the ownership as the General Counsel of The Trump Organization, originally registered back on March 7, 1999. It is registered through GoDaddy (GDDY).

But when a friend hinted that I check out the owner of DonaldTrumpSucks.com, I expected that it might have been registered by a Republican opponent or possibly someone on the Democratic side. Yet it turns out that this domain is also owned by The Trump Organization.

DonaldTrumpSucks.com Registration

What is interesting is that this particular domain was registered on Christmas Eve, December 24, 2014.   Was that the day that Trump really decided to run? This domain was also registered through GoDaddy. 

Now it is all over the news that Trump's company has registered over 3,000 domain names, and according to an article by the International Business Times, the organization buys tens of thousands of domains every year. 

Some of these purchases are for legitimate purchases. For example:

trumpequities.com
donaldtrumpbriefcases.com
thetrumpexperience.com
trumpwatches.com

Trump isn't buying all of them them for investment though. Apparently, many are purchased for guarding against "predators." Here are some of the domains acquired by Trump:

trumpnetworkmarketingsucks.com
trumpnetworksucks.com
trumpcorporationsucks.com
trumporganizationsucks.com
trumpnetworkfraud.com
trumpnetworkponzischeme.com

All of the above point to a generic GoDaddy web page. However, it is interesting to note that if you go to TrumpSucks.com, it brings you to Trump's campaign web page at donaldjtrump.com. TrumpSucks was registered back in the year 2000 and its current registrar is Domain.com.

The problem with acquiring the anti-Trump domain names is that there are thousands variances of domain names that people can come up with. One example, that I would rather not put in writing but begins with an F is owned by an individual who apparently has had it registered since 2004. For that matter, another domain, which has as its last part, a word that begins with the letter S is also owned by an individual, and was registered just a couple years ago. Neither of these domains have developed web sites.

But even without the dirty words, there are other top level domains such as .net and .org that could be used with the anti-Trump words, As a matter of fact, an individual just registered donaldtrumpsucks.net today! And donaldtrumpsucks.org was registered exactly one month ago. Both with the registrar of, who else, GoDaddy.

I'm not sure what the intent of these individuals are. Maybe they think they can resell their domains to the Trump Organization. Have fun dealing with the Trump lawyers.

But is there an investment angle to this, other than trying to find a good (bad) domain to resell to Trump? The one investment that sticks out is GoDaddy, due to its popularity as a domain registrar. Potential investors should be aware that, although the stock reported a 16.5% increase in revenues, it generated a loss of over one dollar a share for the latest quarter. Also, it carries over a billion dollars in debt.

It will be interesting to see how the Trump domain activity plays out. If anyone has any ideas on an investment angle to the Trump domains, please post in the comment section below.

How to Get In on IPOs and Invest in Stocks Commission Free

If you had the ability to buy a stock without paying a commission, would you be interested? How about if you could sell the stock without paying a commission? How about if you could make an investment for as little as $10 in Berkshire Hathaway (BRK-A)? If that wasn't enough, how about if you could get in on some initial public offerings, better known as IPOs?

Well now is your chance. There is a brokerage firm called LOYAL3 which can provide you with all of the above. LOYAL3 provides the ability to invest as little as $10, in many stocks, fee-free. Enrollment involves only three steps and takes just a few minutes.

Investors can buy fractional shares, in custom amounts or various increments, with the option to invest once or with automatic monthly stock purchases. There are no account management fees, account minimum fees, or cancellation fees. LOYAL3 makes its money by performing services for companies on its platform, and charges them for those services. The link below provides more information on the fee-free stock investing.

Invest Fee-Free. LOYAL3 is the only online stock platform that charges $0 fees. Enroll!

But that is just the beginning. Let me tell you about the icing on the cake. LOYAL3 participates in various IPOs, which allows the small investor to get in on some deals that generally wealth investors and institutions can only get. Some of the IPOs that LOYAL3 has participated in include AMC (AMC), Globant (GLOB), GoPro (GPRO), and Santander  (SAN). Click the link below for more on the IPO opportunities.

IPO Stock at LOYAL3.comOwn IPO stock in 3 easy steps.Learn more at LOYAL3.com.

I should let you know that I have an account with LOYAL3 and participated in one the recent IPOs that the company was able to get some shares in, and made roughly 60% the day the stock went public.

Here are the limitations that you should be aware of. First, there are only a certain group of stocks that you can purchase but they are extremely popular companies, many of which you probably do business with. Here are some of them:
Apple (AAPL)
GoPro (GPRO)
Google (GOOG) (GOOGL)
Berkshire Hathaway (BRK-A)
Amazon (AMZN)
Alibaba (BABA)
Walt Disney (DIS)
Coca-Cola (KO)
Facebook (FB)
Starbucks (SBUX)
Microsoft (MSFT)
Intel (INTC)
Walmart (WMT)
McDonalds (MCD)

Second, in regards to the IPOs, you are not guaranteed that you will be your entire allocation that you request. In addition, there are minimum and maximum investments for the IPO.

LOYAL3 is a member of FINRA and SIPC. I can tell you that the sign-up process is simple and the customer service is excellent. This is a brokerage firm that is definitely thinking outside the box.

Stocks that the Billionaires Own

Last month, Forbes Magazine published its Richest People in America issue which ranked the top 400 wealthiest people in the United States. Investors might want to take a look at what stocks the billionaires own, to get some stock purchasing ideas. It made them rich, maybe they will make you rich. Here is a list of some of the wealthiest Americans and the stocks they own.

Bill Gates - Microsoft (MSFT)

Warren Buffett - Berkshire Hathaway (BRK-A) (BRK-A)

Larry Ellison - Oracle (ORCL)

Christy, Jim, Alice, and Robson Walton - Wal-Mart (WMT)

Mark Zuckerberg - Facebook (FB)

Sheldon Adelson - Las Vegas Sands (LVS)

Larry Page - Google (GOOG)

Sergey Brin - Google (GOOG)

Jeff Bezos - Amazon (AMZN)

Carl Icahn - Icahn Enterprises (IEP)

Steve Ballmer - Microsoft (MSFT)

What is interesting about this list, is that most of the people on it started a business which is now a publicly traded company, which made many investors wealthy who invested at the beginning. If you like interesting stock lists like this, check out the stock lists at WallStreetNewsNetwork.com.

Stocks with the Best Income per Employee

A few days ago, I wrote about the Revenue per Employee Ratio. Today I'm writing about the Net Income per Employee. It is one thing for a company to generate a lot of sales, but investors are looking for stocks that generate a profit.

To calculate the Income per Employee, also known as the Profit per Employee, you take the net income that the company had for the latest quarter and divide that number by the number of employees. The higher the number, the greater the profits that are generated by each employee on average. It is another way of looking at the efficiency of companies and comparing stocks.

If you look at the technology sector, you can see some interesting comparisons. Here are some examples:

Apple	(AAPL)	$480,137
Facebook	(FB)	$375,730
Google	(GOOG)	$245,447
Microsoft	(MSFT)	$226,535
Amazon	(AMZN)	$1,535
Cisco	(CSCO)	$104,935
Advanced Micro Devices	(AMD)	$7,591
eBay	(EBAY)	($4,667)
Dell	(DELL)	$12,239
Intel	(INTC)	$95,892
LinkedIn	(LNKD)	($4,001)
Yahoo	(YHOO)	$105,738
Hewlett-Packard	(HPQ)	$17,329
Oracle	(ORCL)	$96,661

The above is shown in the order of Revenues per Employee which was shown in the original article, to give you an idea of how the Income per Employee compares. As you can see, the first four, Apple, Facebook, Google, and Microsoft, are in the same order for both Revenues per Employees and Income per Employee.

Over the last 12 months, the Apple stock price, in first place, is up 50.9% and Facebook, in second place. is up 93.0%. 

If you like interesting stock lists like this, check out WallStreetNewsNetwork.com.

Disclosure: Author owns AAPL, MSFT, AMZN, YHOO, EBAY, INTC

By Stockerblog.com

Stocks with the Best Sales per Employee

Years ago, I wrote about the Sales per Employee Ratio, back in 2007, and again a more comprehensive article in 2009, also referred to as the Revenue per Employee Ratio. It's actually a fairly simple ratio to calculate. You take the total revenues that the company had for the latest quarter and divide that number by the number of employees. The higher the number, the greater the revenues that are generated by each employee on average. It is one way of looking at the efficiency of the company.

I heard about this ratio when I was hearing a presentation from a small telecom company a long time ago, and they were comparing themselves to AT&T (T). The small telecom said that the company was generating thousands of dollars more in revenue per employee and therefore more productive than the big blue chip telecom. It's an interesting concept that can be used to compare stocks.

If you look at the technology sector, you can see some interesting comparisons. Here are some examples:

Apple	(AAPL)	$2,218,481
Facebook	(FB)	$1,580,085
Google	(GOOG)	$1,172,017
Microsoft	(MSFT)	$841,889
Amazon	(AMZN)	$697,016
Cisco	(CSCO)	$628,949
Advanced Micro Devices	(AMD)	$551,776
eBay	(EBAY)	$525,746
Dell	(DELL)	$517,578
Intel	(INTC)	$501,051
LinkedIn	(LNKD)	$484,973
Yahoo	(YHOO)	$395,016
Hewlett-Packard	(HPQ)	$352,189
Oracle	(ORCL)	$329,574

You would normally think that manufacturing companies would naturally have a lower Sales per Employee ratio that software or Internet company. Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) is a perfect example, which is one of the lowest on the list. However, Apple (AAPL) which is primarily a manufacturing company is at the top of the list. Cisco (CSCO), which is also in manufacturing is near the top.

Software you would expect to see higher on the list, such as Microsoft (MSFT), which is number 4. However, Oracle (ORCL), which is also a software company is at the bottom of the list.

What about returns? If you look at the top two, Apple is up 50.9% over the last 12 months, and Facebook is up 93.0%. If you look at the bottom two, Hewlett-Packard is up only 37.0% and Oracle is up only 22.5%. Maybe the Sales per employee ratio warrants a closer look.

If you like interesting stock lists like this, check out WallStreetNewsNetwork.com.

Disclosure: Author owns AAPL, MSFT, AMZN, YHOO, EBAY, INTC

By Stockerblog.com

Facebook Stock News Summary

Facebook (FB) just announced earnings this afternoon. Here is the summary in case you missed it:

Revenues increased substantially,, beating estimates
Earnings nearly tripled
82% increase in advertising revenue
Chief Financial Officer David Ebersman is leaving
Daily mobile users were 609 million, up 43 percent

Facebook stock is currently up about 1% in the aftermarket.

Seattle to Use Facial Recognition: Top Facial Recognition Stocks

In spite of privacy concerns, the city of Seattle has decided to use facial recognition technology to fight crime. Seattle is the largest city in the United States to have a police department utilizing facial recognition software. A grant from Homeland Security provided funding for the project.

Facial recognition is the technological process automatically identifying a person from a digital image or a video, by comparing comparing facial features to an extensive facial database. 3D facial recognition is the latest trend, which is more accurate and can be used with profiles of faces. Facial recognition systems are employed by law enforcement, national security governmental agencies, casinos, banking, mobile devices, and even social media.
  
According to WallStreetNewsNetwork.com, ther are about a dozen stocks involved in facial recognition technology, with some having it as a small part of their business and a few pure plays. Some of the major players that have facial recognition as a small part of their business include Facebook (FB), Google (GOOG), 3M (MMM), which has the Cogent BioTrust biometric logon software and the CAFIS facial recognition authentication system, Apple (AAPL), which has the iPhoto software Faces and the Polar Rose facial recognition company, and Safran (SAFRY), which owns L-1 Identity Solutions.

As for companies that are more pure plays, there is Nxt-ID, Inc. (NXTD), a Shelton, Connecticut company which provides biometric solutions for the law enforcement facial recognition markets. The company has MobileBio FaceMatch, a modular facial recognition system for smartphones, tablets, laptop, and desktop computers, and 3D FaceMatch Biometric Identity Systems, which combines 3D facial recognition, 2D facial recognition, and optional fingerprint biometrics. This very low cap stock, at $93 million, generated a loss of seven cents a share for the latest quarter.

An extremely low cap player in this industry is AccelPath (ACLP), which has developed and marketed 3-D facial recognition for the security industry. Products included 3D SketchArtist, 3D FaceCam, and OmniEye Wellcam.

To access a free list of all the companies with some involvement in the facial recognition industry, go to WallStreetNewsNetwork.com. Although there are many privacy issues, this is a growth industry of the future.

Disclosure: Author owns AAPL.
 
By Stockerblog.com

Free SmartScan Trend Analysis for Stocks

While the broader market continues to move higher on almost a daily basis, choosing the best stocks is more important than ever. Should you own large blue chips or momentum stocks like Netflix (NFLX) and Tesla (TSLA)? When is the right time to buy and when is it too late to get in?

You can analyze any symbol using MarketClub’s  Smart Scan and Trade Triangle technology at no cost. Let's say you wanted to see the analysis for Facebook (FB), or you can choose any other stock. You can check it out HERE.

The analysis shows what to look for next, a full complimentary analysis, the latest Trade Triangle entry and exit signals, and current market data. You can even use it to check an ETF or even a futures contract.
  This service allows you to quickly examine some important questions such as:
- Have the indexes bottomed out or peaked?
- Is a reversal in the near future?
- Is it too late or too early to go long
- Is it too late or too early to short?

The information is free and informative. You can check it out at the following link:
http://club.ino.com/trend/?symb=AAPL&a_aid=CD3111&a_bid=6ae5b6f7

Stocks that Own the Highest Priced Domain Names

A domain name, or domain for short, is what you type in the web address bar at the top of your web browser. It is usually what comes after the "http://". For example, WallStreetNewsNetwork.com is a domain name. The interesting thing about these domains, is that they can be very valuable. If you had registered some of the one word domains many years ago, you could sell them for very high prices.

Many large publicly traded corporations understand this and have been willing to pay extremely large amounts for certain domains. The following is a list of the highest priced domain names and the names of the stocks that purchased them, along with the purchase price:

fb.com Facebook (FB) $8.5 million
loans.com Bank of America (BAC) $3 million
social.com Salesforce.com (CRM) $2.6 million
mortgage.com Citigroup (C) $1.8 million
fly.com Travelzoo (TZOO) $1.5 million
vista.com Vista Print (VPRT) $1.25 million
mercury.com Hewlett Packard (HPQ) $1.1 million
sky.com British Sky Broadcasting (BSYBF) $1 million
o.co Overstock.co (OSTK) $350 thousand

Also, don't forget to check out:

Stocks that Own the Shortest Domain Names: One Letter Long

Sales data came from Domaining.com

Are Facial Recognition Stocks Staring You in the Face?

You may have seen the term 'facial recognition' in the new recently, for several different reasons. Facial recognition is the technological process automatically identifying a person from a digital image or a video, by comparing comparing facial features to an extensive facial database. 3D facial recognition is the latest trend, which is more accurate and can be used with profiles of faces. Facial recognition systems are employed by law enforcement, national security governmental agencies, casinos, banking, mobile devices, and even social media.
A Slap in the Facial Recognition Industry
Facebook (FB), which utilizes facial recognition, was criticized by the German government which outlaws such usage, since facial recognition is now mentioned in Facebook's latest privacy policy. A year ago, Facebook removed the software for European users, but wants to reactivate it again. And just a couple months ago, Congress pressured Google (GOOG) to leave out facial recognition software in the 'Google Glass' smart glasses.
Through the Looking Glass of Facial Recognition Stocks
According to WallStreetNewsNetwork.com, ther are about a dozen stocks involved in facial recognition technology, with some having it as a small part of their business and a few pure plays. Some of the other major players include 3M (MMM), which has the Cogent BioTrust biometric logon software and the CAFIS facial recognition authentication system, Apple (AAPL), which has the iPhoto software Faces and the Polar Rose facial recognition company, and Safran (SAFRY), which owns L-1 Identity Solutions.
As for companies that are more pure plays, there is Nxt-ID, Inc. (NXTD), a Shelton, Connecticut company which provides biometric solutions for the law enforcement facial recognition markets. The company has MobileBio FaceMatch, a modular facial recognition system for smartphones, tablets, laptop, and desktop computers, and 3D FaceMatch Biometric Identity Systems, which combines 3D facial recognition, 2D facial recognition, and optional fingerprint biometrics. This very low cap stock generated a loss of three cents a share for the latest quarter.
To access a free list of all the companies with some involvement in the facial recognition industry, go to WallStreetNewsNetwork.com. Although there are many privacy issues, this is a growth industry of the future.
Disclosure: Author owns AAPL.
By Stockerblog.com