While equity markets are kind of soft today the movements have been relatively orderly–no massive ‘tweet moves’–yet. I don’t mind down movements nearly as much when they take place in an orderly fashion–it is those ‘baby out with the bath water’ moves that I hate so much.
Today’s social media posts by DJT (as of 11 am central time) are all border patrol notes and that is the one area that doesn’t move the markets much. Let’s keep it that way–yea sure.
Our accounts are green again today for the 3rd day in a row which is nice to see, but really not too meaningful because we all know there is lots more tariff news to come. These days—relatively calm for preferreds and baby bonds — are good times to make sure you are ‘positioned’ the way you want to be. Do you have some ‘dogs’ that have bounced that maybe you want to unload and deploy the cash elsewhere?
We had retail sales news today with data coming in decent–not moving the 10 year treasury as it is dead flat at this moment at 4.32%. I am not taking this retail sales number too seriously–I know some folks were trying to get ahead of tariff price increases. For me most of the tariffs are easy to deal with–I have no intention of buying a car or any other giant ticket item. For groceries, we will buy whatever we want–2 old folks don’t consume too much food. I realize that folks with 3-4 kids will take a hit and in some cases they will have to choose between video games or food, but we have all lived through tough times and folks will have to make choices.
I have done nothing in the way of buy or sell today, but I did put a good til cancelled order in for some Hennessy Advisors 4.875% baby bonds (HNNAZ) at $24.30—we’ll see if someone wants to give me some shares. This one trades with a big spread–when I placed the order the bid was $24.22 and the ask was $24.75. WHOOPS I just looked and it executed and shares are at $24.22 right now. This issue matures on 12/31/2026 so the yield to maturity is somewhere north of 6.7%–not the greatest, but over 2% more than CDs.
Over the last couple of weeks we placed about $35K+ orders for building materials to try to get ahead of the tariffs. Focus was mostly on things that are imported. Quite a bit ordered in California, but a lot ordered in Nevada which I will have to pick up there and drive down.
We need to fix up a place one of my kids just bought. Its got good “bones” and is on a double size lot (rare in silicon valley), but we will need to take it back to the studs. I have convinced him to sub a lot of work out, but we start demolition tomorrow (spent last week getting things cleared back so we could tent for termites).
Getting materials is a challenge with the crazy rules the People’s Republic of California (and our local cities) have put in.
-Want a gas furnace? they are banned (so I am picking one up in Nevada and will install it myself).
-want a gas stove? Banned too. Picking that up in Nevada too.
-Same problem with lots of light and plumbing fixtures. Can’t buy in CA, but are available in the other 49 states.
Luckily. I drive through Nevada on business pretty regularly, so little incremental cost.
Makes me feel like I am smuggling for the black market against a totalitarian government (which I guess I am). Hope I don’t get caught and sent to the gulag.
Private–we won’t tell on you.
Not the same as going to Nevada for guns and ammo. Don’t forget Private you can still get oil based finishes in Nevada last time I needed some.
A friend of mine has been trying to talk me into going hunting again. Just too darn expensive. When I lived in Pa. The local jr market had fishing and hunting stuff and I could just walk out the back door at my dad’s house and go out on the ridge and look down at my granddad’s old farm they had strip mined to look for deer or turkey.
How does this comment help anyone meet their investing objectives? There are way too many comments similar to this one.
It’s rare these days to actually find actionable ideas on here. Sad.
Dick,
I try not to post much now days because I do not want to add to it. I agree we are becoming too chatty on this small board. It just does not have the capabilities for users to filter out random discussions. Thus if something great is posted there is a good chance many of us won’t even see it.
Dick-
We’d all like actionable ideas. Here’s mine: sit on hands.
These one-day threads are terrible places for good ideas. I wish folks would post all such to the Sandbox and especially Reader Initiated Alerts. Anything posted here will quickly be lost to time and missed by many.
Reader Initiated Alerts should be reserved for redemptions, new issues, perceived good prices, etc. All small talk should go to the Sandbox. Thanks
yeah Charles, State makes guns and ammo a headache in CA.
I keep some of the things I have picked up/inherited over the years out of state because they are banned in CA. Not that I am a gun nut, but I do hang on to things.
I talked with a CA Bureau of Firearms guy about my out of state guns. He said I have to register every gun I own with the state of CA and can’t own anything banned in CA (regardless of where in the world they might be) because I am a CA resident. I don’t know how true that is, but I just laughed.
I still buy ammo out of state and smuggle it in. Only way I can get it. CA says I am supposed to have out of state ammo shipped to a licensed firearms dealer in CA for a background check, get a permit and pay a special tax (11%, IIRC). Background check and tax applies to in-state purchases too. Dirty trick is that you can only pass the any of the ammo background checks if you have passed a background check to buy a gun in CA (I never bought one here) –otherwise, you are stuck with no way to buy ammo. Just nutty.
I don’t hunt much anymore. I only go out with family/clan and don’t bow hunt anymore except to teach. Good for the grandkids to learn skills and reverence for animals.
I mostly go out on horseback for deer and elk, sometimes antelope. Also go out with the younger kids for rabbits and quail (more “fun”). I taught a couple of my (preteen) granddaughters to make turkey snares last year and they got several. I am sure some of the neighbors would have pitched a fit if they had known we were trapping dinner in silicon valley.
Oil based finishes being banned in CA are just the beginning. Several CA gov agencies (like CARB, OEHHA) ban stuff regularly (seriously) and don’t make much effort to tell consumers. You have to go dig through multiple websites to find what is banned. Can’t get denatured alcohol, Gel-gloss, winter blend wiper fluid, many granite sealers, most spray cans, lacquers, many adhesives, many pesticides/fungicides that are available in every other state… Just crazy.
We keep a shared shopping list across the family for “stuff from Nevada” that gets filled every time someone goes.
PRIVATE; One of my very life long friends lived in Morgan Hill, Calif. for like 40 years. He finally “gave up” & moved to NC about a year ago. He told me he wished he had made the move years and years ago. He calls Calif. “The Land of the Crazies”.
I am curious why they would let you run gas to the house at all if you are not allowed to run anything off it? Is it a preexisting line that they never decommission even after a remodel?
Hi Scott,
Not to extend too much of this wildly off topic discussion too much further (sorry dick and fc – feel free to stop reading now), but in many cities in CA, you are not allowed to put in a gas line for new construction, even if there is gas in the neighborhood. Friend of ours just built an ADU in his orchard and was not allowed to have gas, even though the new unit is 10 feet from his existing gas line.
The house we are working on already has gas (its on gas heat), but if we were to put in new gas appliances (like furnaces), even to replace existing ones, (and pull permits), inspectors would fail us. So, I will put them in myself and not pull permits (inspectors here are pretty worthless anyway – they are much more worried about things like this than about actually inspecting to code). The guy who sold my son the house had the roof fixed because it was leaking, and the inspector passed the repair even though there was water actively leaking into the (attached) garage.
Natural gas has become one of the “evils” that our crazies have targeted. They want everyone to go all electric for “global warming” even though we don’t produce enough “clean” energy to support that. So, our utility keeps increasing the amount of coal-fired energy it is buying to make up the shortfall. So, apparently it is better to our crazies to burn coal (and take the transmission loss from sending the power 1000 miles) than to burn natural gas.
To try to bring this back to actionable info – consider buying CA utility preferreds. they pay fairly well (6-7%) and they are facing a steeply growing demand for electricity
CA has some “strict liability” laws about utility-caused damages that put utilities “on the hook” for fires (etc.) caused by their equipment, even if they are not negligent. That scares off some investors. Back in the day, Gridbird (and some of us) dug down into this and decided it isn’t as bad as it sounds.
Utilities get hit with huge damages claims fairly regularly. They all carry massive insurance (which ratepayers pay for) and there is a huge state fund to “backstop” them above their coverage (which taxpayers pay for). When damages exceed all that, the utilities can file bankruptcy and get the damages worked out in court. However, the state gov. gets involved and the utilities come out fine.
Example: Pacific Gas and Electric (PCG) has killed hundreds of people, burned down whole towns, etc. in multiple cases. It was actually at fault (convicted of felony charges) in a couple of the cases in the last decade or so. They have been through bankruptcy twice, and the preferreds actually did great. They would drop when the fires were announced, but rebounded when the courts finally settled things.
In the worst case (the Camp Fire in 2018, which destroyed 13,500 homes and killed 85 people), the CA governor helped cram a victim’s compensation fund down the throats of victims that was primarily funded with PCG common stock. So, victims only get paid if the stock of the felons who burned their homes and killed their families does well. Welcome to California craziness.
I have been picking up some SCEpM (socal edison preferreds) that were pounded down because of the LA fires. Currently paying 8.2%. there are claims by some plaintiff’s lawyers that they caused one of the fires, but no official finding yet. However, I don’t see them getting “hurt” even if they were at fault. Our state gov. protects the utilities.
I have been picking up several SCE issues since the fires and am full up on them. If they get hit hard for liability later on then I will pick up more of them and ride it out.
In particular I think the one which floats later this year (J or K, I am too lazy to look and own both) is a good investment since they will either call it and you get that capital gain, or it will float higher while they wait to see their liability exposure. If they call it you may be able to roll that money back over into the next issue due for a call and double down so to speak.
And thanks for answering the question I asked before everyone got testy and started campaigning again.
Interesting list Private, funny you should mention Gel coat I was trying to buy some to buff out my truck top. But after checking with a detail shop I was told it would be better if I did a ceramic clear coat.
Hey, that’s wild you brought up gel coat—takes me right back to my own misadventure with my truck! I’m living out here in Texas, where the sun’s hotter than a dividend cut. I spend my days tinkering with my preferred stock portfolio and polishing my old F-150, which I swear is the only thing keeping me sane between my bladder and my backside giving me hell. So, I was dead set on getting some gel coat to buff out the topper on my truck—figured it’d make it gleam like a fresh-issued Series A preferred. But when I called up a detail shop, the guy on the phone, some young fella named Travis, told me to skip the gel coat and go for a ceramic clear coat instead. Said it’s tougher, lasts longer, and makes the finish pop like nobody’s business. I’m sold, but let me tell you, getting to that decision was a whole embarrassing ordeal.
See, I’ve got this urinary incontinence thing that’s been dogging me for months. It’s like my bladder’s got a mind of its own, deciding to cash out at the worst possible times. I was at the auto parts store last week, eyeballing some polishing compounds and chatting with the clerk about gel coat, when that familiar urge hit me like a market crash. I tried to play it cool, shifting from foot to foot, but before I could make it to the restroom in the back, I felt a warm trickle down my leg. My khakis were sporting a dark patch, and I’m standing there, holding a can of wax, pretending I’m fascinated by the label while the clerk’s giving me side-eye. I’ve started wearing adult diapers—Depend, the gray ones, because they’re “discreet”—but they can only handle so much. I mumbled something about needing to check my truck and hightailed it out, leaving the gel coat dreams behind. The whole drive home, my diaper crinkled louder than a bad earnings call, and I was praying nobody at the stoplight noticed the wet spot.
And don’t get me started on the hemorrhoids. I’ve got a trio of ‘em, angry as overleveraged REITs, and they make sitting in my truck a real pain in the you-know-what. I was out in the garage yesterday, trying to buff a small scratch on the topper with some rubbing compound, but every time I leaned over, those hemorrhoids throbbed like they were staging a protest. I’ve got this donut cushion—neon blue, because apparently I’m advertising my misery—that I haul everywhere. I plopped it on a stool while I worked, but it slid off mid-buff, and I ended up sitting hard on the concrete floor. Let’s just say the pain was so bad I yelped loud enough to scare the neighbor’s dog. Worse, one of ‘em started bleeding, and I had to waddle inside, clutching my backside, to slather on some Preparation H. The tube’s half-empty now, and it smells like regret. I keep a spare in the glovebox, right next to my tire gauge and a stack of dividend statements.
So, yeah, I’m taking Travis’s advice and looking into ceramic clear coat. I called the detail shop back, but I was so paranoid about another bladder incident that I kept the call short, standing in my kitchen with a towel under me just in case. It’s pricier than gel coat, but if it makes my truck shine like a 6% yield, it’s worth it. I just hope I can make it through the appointment without leaking or limping. Between my portfolio and my truck, I’ve got enough to keep me busy, but this body of mine? It’s like a bad stock—unpredictable and always dropping at the wrong time.
I can’t resist Dick,
I couldn’t stop laughing. you had me rolling on the floor. You put a lot of thought into that post.
Dick,
You can hit him on the head with a sledge hammer and he still would not get it. He is addicted to posting on any topic that is out there. You just have to ignore his posts.
Hi Scott.
SCE-K floats next March at three-month LIBOR plus 3.79%. SCE-J floats this September at three-month LIBOR plus 3.132%.
Parent company symbol is EIX. they also have some nice bonds out there (some of which I also picked up).
To everyone: Apologies to all for my sometimes rambling posts. I started taking my buddy in for radiation treatments a couple of years ago. When word got out, I started taking neighbors (and friends of friends, people through my wife’s school community, etc.) in for radiation or chemo treatments, so I spend a lot of time sitting in waiting rooms. I write to pass the time.
I will try to cut down my rambling or at least move more to sandbox.
Private,
Time comes I hope someone is there when I need them. I have worked with a guy for almost 14 yrs. He’s in Southern Cal. and never have met him. Been in an out of the hospital a lot over the last 1-1/2 yrs. Last time I got concerned as I hadn’t heard from him. Finally got a chance to talk to him yesterday and I apologized if I had bothered him by calling him so much. He told me it wasn’t that. He was upset that out of the people he asked for help, family and friends it was his barber who gave him his last ride home from the hospital.
Better if we carry on over in the litter box from now on so we don’t bother folks so they don’t have to read it.
Man, your post hit me right in the gut, like a twangy chord from a steel guitar. I’m out here in Texas, living what feels like a country song gone wrong, and I reckon I’ve got my own rambling to do…
My life’s been a string of verses that’d make Hank Williams nod along. My old truck broke down last week—radiator blew like a busted heart, leaving me stranded on a dusty county road with nothing but a warm Shiner and a dead cell phone. Cost me half a month’s dividends from my preferred stocks to get it towed and fixed, and I’m still babying it like a sick calf. Then there’s my wife, who up and left me two summers ago for a slick-talking insurance adjuster from Dallas. She said I spent more time with my brokerage account than her. She took the dog, my favorite cooler, and half my Morgan Wallen CDs. I still find her bobby pins in the couch sometimes, and it stings worse than a stepped-on spur.
But the real kicker, the chorus of my misery, is my body falling apart. My bladder’s got a mind of its own, leaking like a rusted-out stock tank. I was at the feed store last month, stocking up on Ivermectin for my “horse”, when that urge hit me outta nowhere. Tried to hustle to the porta-potty out back, but I didn’t make it. Left a puddle right there by the cash register, with old man Jenkins staring like I’d just sold my soul. I’ve got adult diapers now and they crinkle louder than a honky-tonk jukebox.
And don’t get me started on my hemorrhoids. They’re like a bad bar fight—mean, swollen, and always flaring up at the worst time. I was sitting in my recliner last night, sipping whiskey and checking yields on some new REIT preferreds, when those suckers started throbbing like a bass line at a dive bar. I’ve tried every cream under the sun—Preparation H, some menthol junk that burned worse than a jalapeño margarita. I’ve got a donut cushion, ugly as sin, that I haul to the diner when I meet my investment buddies. Last week, I forgot it, and by the time I finished my coffee, I was squirming so bad the waitress asked if I was trying to dance.
Your waiting room tales remind me of the time I drove my cousin to his chemo in Houston. We listened to Waylon the whole way, windows down, him telling me how he’d beat the cancer and we’d go catfishing again. He didn’t make it, but those drives? They were worth every mile.
Me, I’ll keep limping along, with my busted truck, my empty house, and a portfolio that’s the only thing still paying out. Maybe one day I’ll get that ceramic clear coat for my truck and shine it up enough to forget the rest.
Private I was actually eyeing the EIX when it hit 6% yield last week on the dump. Something to consider for both yield and growth but I have been a little leery of commons lately. I had moved into a few about a month ago and realized it was too early for this market when things hit the fan. I had even been eyeing the ADM I had sold out of months ago but decided against it. I need to start being more cautious and just taking small nibbles. Tim had some good points he has made on that.