Quick Election Thoughts

Obama/Biden vs. McCain/Palin should be interesting as history gets made either way with an African American President or first ever female Vice President. It should be an exciting sprint to the finish although I am quite surprised with the pick of a Governor from Alaska. She is younger than Barack Obama and has one year of being Governor on her belt – how are they going to attack Obama on experience and age now? Anyways, I’ll go more into this as the debates approach or maybe a little bit during the Republican National Convention.

If you want some good video footage, head over to The World According To Me by Ayaz and From My Perspective by Summaiyah, she’s got some good quotes from the speeches if you want to take a quick glance. Ayaz put up good videos from all four nights, some real good stuff over there.

If there is one speech you want to watch and want to see a relative new face… then watch the Governor of Montana Brian Schweitzer – who gave a very good speech. I had never heard of him before but he certainly brought the crowd to their feet.

Here’s a tidbit on McCain/Palin:

Year Alaska was admitted into the Union: 1959
Year John McCain was born: 1936

Hence, John McCain is about 22-23 years older than the state of Alaska.

UpDown.com Virtual Investing

Recently I stumbled upon a virtual investing site called UpDown.com which provides you with a fictional $1 million to start investing. You can compete it real contests which can earn you real money depending on which place you finish – some even provide prizes for the top 50 investors. Also, every month you are eligible to earn some cash if your portfolio for the entire month out performs S&P 500.

I take a little pride in investing (virtually) and ever since winning $800 prize way back in high school I have joined contests to see how well I can do. I think it’s fair to say I end up in the positive more than I end up in the red so that’s a good sign. Think you are good? Why not give this a shot just to see. You can always just buy a couple of stocks and let it sit long term or do daily trading… whatever suits you.

Here is a brief summary of my portfolio so far:


I’ll give a little detailed description of my portfolio right now where in about less than a week I am up 2%. I have a couple of big technology stocks in Apple and Google which do bad when the market goes out but definitely out perform the market on the good days. I shorted on a couple (which are currently paying off but I would never short in real life). Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and BlackRock are the ones I shorted on and all three have declined this week. It’s a careful balance on when to cover those shortrs and not get too greedy. Also, I am hoping for Sirius Radio to shoot through the roof soon as it is awaiting a merger in the upcoming weeks or months so I will be holding on to that.

The one stock that has just exploded these past few days is little known Pyramid Oil Company (PDO) which I had bought at a measly $12 per share and it has jumped $2 already. I had thought about Exxon Mobil (XOM) but the price on that is a little steeper than I want to invest in an oil stock. I stuck to the smaller alternative and so far so good.

I’ll keep updating every now and then to see how my portfolio is doing against the S&P and I already know that people like Mike, Justin and my sister have joined in on this. I have a mini group just to compare how everyone does against each other so if you decide to join, let me know. It’s a fun little thing that you can check in on every now and then or heavily follow if that’s the type of investor you are.

Once again, the site is called UpDown.com and it’s free to join. What can beat that?

Quote Of The Day: Barack Obama

Definitely the quote of the day by far. Barack Obama speaking to a South-Asian community and hauling in a record $7.8 million in one fundraiser in San Francisco, California.

“Not only do I think I’m a desi, but I’m a desi,” he said, using a colloquial term that describes South Asian immigrants. The remark was greeted with laughs. “I’m a homeboy.”

He said that when he went to Occidental College, his first roommate was Pakistani. And in his dorm, he said with a laugh, “Indians and Pakistanis came together under one roof … to cause havoc in the university.”

To applause, he said he became an expert at cooking dal and other ethnic dishes, though “somebody else made the naan,” the trademark Indian bread.

As if he didn’t already have a huge advantage within the community, I am sure he certainly picked up several more points with this record fundraising and that quote up there.

[Source: San Francisco Chronicle: Shakil Bhai to Summaiyah to Me]