"In the middle east, we've seen the power of the Internet in the Arab Spring. I believe we are in for a lot more of that sort of thing and that it will not be limited to repressive governments, but to all large institutions that seek to control people and their free will. This is the cultural revolution that I referred to in my talk with Erick at Disrupt.

I think investors should be aware of what is coming and seek to invest in it where it is investable. I'm curious what the AVC community thinks of this investment thesis and where we should be looking for opportunities that fit into this thesis."

"In short, Google is borrowing $3 billion at a yield that is just about the lowest yield in modern U.S. history. The Federal Reserve has been trying very hard to convince the world to borrow dollars, and Google is simply taking its advice. If corporate tax rates decline in the next year or so — a bet that looks more attractive almost every day — and if the economy improves and interest rates rise, Google will have executed a very profitable trifecta: It could repatriate its cash at a lower tax rate and buy back its bonds at a discount.
And even if none of this works out, Google's cost of borrowing $3 billion will only be about 2.3%, which in an historical context is not very much. And if the dollar continues to depreciate, then borrowing dollars today in order to keep cash abroad will also prove to be a profitable strategy."

"Now I'll go to the e-commerce MyFonts.com business. MyFonts.com continues to grow, recording its highest quarterly revenue since inception during the first quarter of 2011. First quarter, 2011, MyFonts revenue was up 25% year-over-year. MyFonts revenue growth was driven by new user acquisition and the addition of Webfonts. Over 70,000 new users registered in MyFonts during the first quarter.
As we discussed on the last earnings call, MyFonts introduced Webfonts in January of this year as a way to offer customers a streamlined way to purchase and manage fonts for their websites. Webfonts enabled publishers of Webfonts -- of webpages to use any font just like print media. Before Webfonts, web designers were limited to a certain fonts like Times New Roman and Arial."

"This “highly sophisticated investor” argument has been used by Goldman, other banks and a remarkably high number of journalists (in my opinion just repeating the crap they have been fed by their sources) as a way of getting the banks off the hook. But it is a fundamentally flawed argument. The CDO bonds that AIG insured were rated AAA. If you have to be a rocket scientist to understand the investment and if anything short of perfect analysis of the bonds means you will be blown up – then by definition the bonds are not AAA."

"I got my data from Norgate Investor Services, (the same folks that provide my end-of-day feed). They only charge a one-time fee for the delisted data, while some of their competitors charge as much as 3x Norgate’s one time fee with the charge recurring annually!
Since adding the delisted database, I have not noted any great differences in the historical results of the systems I work with. I have stated a few times that it is my belief that short-term systems that hold stocks for a few days to a week are not likely to suffer greatly from survivorship bias. So far, this belief is proving to be true."

"However, if this is not done immediately, my group of startup CEOs and angel investors will begin targeting specific groups for elimination.
We will launch competing, fee-free events directly opposite your events. We will encourage angels investors, service providers and startups to boycott your events. You may even find our street teams outside your events handing out flyers.

This isn’t a joke and this is a threat: stop charging startup companies to present or we will do everything we can to put you out of business with a competing, free option."

"While you can place some blame on high frequency traders for skewing the data, Business Insider points to week-to-week performance benchmarking as one culprit. Our sell side experience leads us to agree, even monthly performance benchmarking is ridiculous for measuring fundamental investing given the vagaries of the market in the short term. The result is that a lot of fund managers have no choice but to engage in speculative trade-chasing covered by heaps of fundamental BS to maintain their firm's fundamental, disciplined image."

"Unfortunately, the average investor does not understand the math involved to know what the rebalance is doing to their capital, and they don’t know that since these funds rebalance daily, they need to rebalance almost daily, as well.
The bottom line is that these are good tools and have lots of advantages, but investors really need to understand them before diving in head first."

"The next frontier may turn out to be options strategies associated with these 3x and -3x ETFs. All eight of these ETFs are optionable and options activity seems to be picking up rapidly, particularly in BGU, the large cap 3x bull ETF, which currently sports an implied volatility of about 150 and a historical volatility in excess of 200."

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"Many investors believe that ETFs, especially the ultra or 3x funds, such as Direxion Shares ETF Trust Large Cap Bull 3X (BGU), are to blame for the roller coaster ride in market volatility that is being seen on Wall Street. This is actually not the case.
A research study conducted with data from LakeView Asset Management LLC, suggests that it is in fact futures that influences the activity of speculators and hedgers and therefore is the indicator for market volatility and manipulation, states Scott Rothbort for the Street.com."

"Before you buy any solar energy stock or fund, read this article carefully, thoughtfully, and also do a great deal of "due diligence" to try to determine the risk-versus-the-reward of it all."

"Obviously, given the 40%+ decline in major indices and close to double that for Financials, if you pick the bottom, you can realize an enormous return on the way back up. Do you think oil's headed back to $100+ when the global economy recovers? Then, ERX is the trade for you! However, picking the bottom is an act of god, so you'll definitely want to inject some caution and pragmatic thinking into your strategy.

There are various pairs/combos you can use for these. For instance, you can go long 3X with puts to create a neat hedge model, or you could use the 3X inverse to hedge the more significant long portion of your portfolio."

"Back in May this year, California announced an 800MW solar farm project as a part of plans to cut greenhouse emissions. As we can see, the state is really warming up to achieve its goal. No doubt other cities in the state will also come up with similar plans to tackle the greenhouse gas emission. Beginning in 2007, the California Energy Commission managed $350 million targeted for new residential building construction. It will use funds already allocated to the Energy Commission to foster renewable projects between 2007 and 2011. According to the California Energy Commission, the so called "New Solar Homes Partnership" will focus on new residential construction."