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Lil' Kim- Black Friday UNCENSORED OFFICIAL Nicki Minaj Diss [HQ]Lil' Kim disses Nicki Minaj, Drake, Wayne, Young Money, and Diddy. New November 2010!
Lil' Kim disses Nicki Minaj, Drake, Wayne, Young Money, and Diddy. New November 2010!
Friday, November 26, 2010
Black Friday door-busters Black Friday Specials wal-mart
Nothing works off a tryptophan hangover like a predawn stakeout at the shopping mall in the earliest hours of Black Friday. But those splashy door-busters – the limited-time-only, while-supplies-last, early-morning offers – may not be worth the early rise.
More from SmartMoney.com:
• Holiday Gift Guide: The Best of Everything
• 7 Sales Pitches You Can't Resist
• Will You Every Pay for Shipping Again?
[Click here to check savings products and rates in your area.]
Door-busters can generate considerable buzz. After all, what shopper wouldn't look twice at a $300 HDTV or a $200 game console? But retailers are using the opportunity to clear out older models — without adding a clearance-sale sticker, which can prompt more thought and inspection on the part of shoppers. Every once in a while, a truly good deal does sneak in, particularly if the sales pitch is for a product that seems close to what you were already looking for.
To separate the good from the overblown, a few rules of thumb: Stores are less likely to offer big discounts on the latest technology, simply because retailers can move these products at higher prices without much fanfare, says Brian Tanis, the founder of sale-tracking site Offers.com. The better values may be hidden in less-talked-about stores, like Meijer or Shopko, or in a slightly more expensive item whose smaller discount and higher price tag are actually a better deal than a lower-quality, cheaper twin that you'll have to replace sooner. Model numbers for the same product can vary by retailer — on televisions for example, some brands offer different model numbers to membership club stores like Costco (NasdaqGS: COST - News) than, say, to Best Buy (NYSE: BBY - News) — so look at the features to see if the comparison is fair.
Here are three door-busters to skip, and better deals to consider:
1. $99 Sony Blu-ray Player (Models S270, S370)
These players, marked down from $179 in Black Friday ads at Target (NYSE: TGT - News), Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT - News), Walgreen's (NYSE: WAG - News), and Costco, among others, are billed as offering Internet video, but they aren't nearly as cheap as they seem. They're Wi-Fi ready, rather than coming with built-in Wi-Fi. You'll need an $80 adaptor to go wire-free, says Manu Sachdeva, the director of ecommerce for gadget marketplace Retrevo. "On spec it looks great, but most homes don't have or want Ethernet cables running [from the modem to] behind the TV," he says. A better bet would be the Sony S570 with WiFi, which Wal-Mart currently has on sale for $158 instead of $250, he says. Although it's a more expensive player, you'd save $21 on the whole setup.
[See 7 Black Friday Deals Worth Buying Now]
2. $300 720p HDTVs
Skip the 32" no-name sets on sale for $300 or less at Costco, Wal-Mart, Kmart, Sam's Club and Shopko – with resolution of 720p, they're nothing special, says Tanis. On the other hand, at $298, Target's expected 40" Westinghouse LCD HDTV is a rare bargain. It features cutting-edge 1080p resolution, and it's the cheapest of the higher-resolution sets in ads for Black Friday. (The next-cheapest 1080p door-buster of that size is a $400 Coby at Shopko.) Experts say the higher resolution doesn't really pay off in screens smaller than 50" unless you're sitting very close (less than 5 feet away), so keep that in mind when you're picking a set.
3. $299 160GB Playstation 3-Game/DVD Bundles
Best Buy has a bundle with two games (Little Big Planet and ModNation Racers) and one Blu-ray movie (Cars, which came out in 2006), while Sears (NasdaqGS: SHLD - News) has one with one game (Uncharted 2: Among Thieves), a voucher for an online game (PixelJunk Shooter) and a Blu-ray movie ("The Karate Kid"). The console alone also sells for $299 and games run between $10 and $70 — so it seems like a good deal on its face. But is a four-year-old movie or no-name game a deal? "Usually the games aren't the ones that people want," says Natali Morris, a senior editor for electronics review site CNET. You could wait for a sale or coupon and get a better price — without collecting a game that will sit in your drawer. For example, superstore Meijer has a similar deal on the console, which includes the same extras as Sears but goes a step further with a $50 coupon good for a future purchase. That's enough to buy a game you actually want to play.
More from SmartMoney.com:
• Holiday Gift Guide: The Best of Everything
• 7 Sales Pitches You Can't Resist
• Will You Every Pay for Shipping Again?
[Click here to check savings products and rates in your area.]
Door-busters can generate considerable buzz. After all, what shopper wouldn't look twice at a $300 HDTV or a $200 game console? But retailers are using the opportunity to clear out older models — without adding a clearance-sale sticker, which can prompt more thought and inspection on the part of shoppers. Every once in a while, a truly good deal does sneak in, particularly if the sales pitch is for a product that seems close to what you were already looking for.
To separate the good from the overblown, a few rules of thumb: Stores are less likely to offer big discounts on the latest technology, simply because retailers can move these products at higher prices without much fanfare, says Brian Tanis, the founder of sale-tracking site Offers.com. The better values may be hidden in less-talked-about stores, like Meijer or Shopko, or in a slightly more expensive item whose smaller discount and higher price tag are actually a better deal than a lower-quality, cheaper twin that you'll have to replace sooner. Model numbers for the same product can vary by retailer — on televisions for example, some brands offer different model numbers to membership club stores like Costco (NasdaqGS: COST - News) than, say, to Best Buy (NYSE: BBY - News) — so look at the features to see if the comparison is fair.
Here are three door-busters to skip, and better deals to consider:
1. $99 Sony Blu-ray Player (Models S270, S370)
These players, marked down from $179 in Black Friday ads at Target (NYSE: TGT - News), Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT - News), Walgreen's (NYSE: WAG - News), and Costco, among others, are billed as offering Internet video, but they aren't nearly as cheap as they seem. They're Wi-Fi ready, rather than coming with built-in Wi-Fi. You'll need an $80 adaptor to go wire-free, says Manu Sachdeva, the director of ecommerce for gadget marketplace Retrevo. "On spec it looks great, but most homes don't have or want Ethernet cables running [from the modem to] behind the TV," he says. A better bet would be the Sony S570 with WiFi, which Wal-Mart currently has on sale for $158 instead of $250, he says. Although it's a more expensive player, you'd save $21 on the whole setup.
[See 7 Black Friday Deals Worth Buying Now]
2. $300 720p HDTVs
Skip the 32" no-name sets on sale for $300 or less at Costco, Wal-Mart, Kmart, Sam's Club and Shopko – with resolution of 720p, they're nothing special, says Tanis. On the other hand, at $298, Target's expected 40" Westinghouse LCD HDTV is a rare bargain. It features cutting-edge 1080p resolution, and it's the cheapest of the higher-resolution sets in ads for Black Friday. (The next-cheapest 1080p door-buster of that size is a $400 Coby at Shopko.) Experts say the higher resolution doesn't really pay off in screens smaller than 50" unless you're sitting very close (less than 5 feet away), so keep that in mind when you're picking a set.
3. $299 160GB Playstation 3-Game/DVD Bundles
Best Buy has a bundle with two games (Little Big Planet and ModNation Racers) and one Blu-ray movie (Cars, which came out in 2006), while Sears (NasdaqGS: SHLD - News) has one with one game (Uncharted 2: Among Thieves), a voucher for an online game (PixelJunk Shooter) and a Blu-ray movie ("The Karate Kid"). The console alone also sells for $299 and games run between $10 and $70 — so it seems like a good deal on its face. But is a four-year-old movie or no-name game a deal? "Usually the games aren't the ones that people want," says Natali Morris, a senior editor for electronics review site CNET. You could wait for a sale or coupon and get a better price — without collecting a game that will sit in your drawer. For example, superstore Meijer has a similar deal on the console, which includes the same extras as Sears but goes a step further with a $50 coupon good for a future purchase. That's enough to buy a game you actually want to play.
Thursday, November 25, 2010
Supertrailer vh1 celeb rehab 4
Supertrailer: "Tune-in to the premiere of Celebrity Rehab Season 4 Wednesday, December 1st at 10/9c."
Sunday, November 21, 2010
long term stocks to buy
The following is a direct quote: "if they cant tell you what will go up 100% in a few days then motley fool are worthless and they suck at picking stocks."
I received that comment on one of my recent columns. Grammar issues aside, this type of get-rich-quick mentality scares the heck out of me.
Now, don't get me wrong. I enjoy stalking monster returns. Heck, I'll even reveal your best shot at snaring a 10-bagger a little later in this piece. But first, let me warn you against an investing mistake that leads to many a zero-bagger.
The warning
My worst investing decisions have involved three common elements:
•The allure of great upside.
•The "need" to act quickly.
•The lack of proper due diligence.
My visions of huge, unrealistic profits led to hasty decision-making, which led to losses. In other words, almost every time I've tried to swing out of my shoes to hit a home run, I've struck out.
To defend yourself against the kind of greed that leads to grief, put investing returns in perspective.
My critic earlier talked about 100% returns in just a few days. Let's think through that for a minute. If you started with $10,000 and made 100% gains every week, you'd be the richest person in the world -- surpassing Bill Gates' $40 billion -- in far less than six months.
I'll go one step further. Perhaps you're thinking of the huge gains we've had over the course of the last year. If you timed it right, you could have made more than 100% on Halliburton (NYSE: HAL) and Chesapeake Energy (NYSE: CHK), more than 150% on General Electric (NYSE: GE) and Alcoa (NYSE: AA), or more than 1,500% on Human Genome Sciences (Nasdaq: HGSI).
Although these are real returns some investors have achieved, they're not the sort of realistic earnings anyone can expect over the long term. You can't extrapolate Usain Bolt's 100-meter times to conclude that he could run a marathon in 70 minutes. Similarly, even the best investors can't generate 100% returns year after year.
What's the upper limit of reasonable?
Peter Lynch is recognized as one of the greatest investors of all time. He ran his Fidelity Magellan Fund from 1977 to 1990 -- less than 15 years, during one hell of a bull market. Even in those perfect conditions, he "only" averaged 29% annual returns.
If you're wondering about Warren Buffett, his returns are lower than Lynch's. If you got in on his company, Berkshire Hathaway, in 1965, you'd have generated average annual returns in the neighborhood of 20%.
Now, because of the power of compounding for 45 years, those returns are tremendous. A $10,000 investment back then would leave you a millionaire many times over.
Believing you can do much better than the 20% to 30% long-term annual returns of Lynch and Buffett is almost surely a road to overconfidence and failure. Doing half of what they did would make you a very, very rich investor.
Your best shot at a 10-bagger
Now that we're grounded in reality, let's talk about what it takes to snag a 10-bagger in 10 years, while limiting your risk.
For a stock to be worth 10 times its buy-in price in 10 years requires a 26% annual return. As the returns of Lynch and Buffett attest, that's huge!
Going after that kind of return, even in an individual stock, isn't for everyone. You have to have a mighty risk tolerance. That's why most people are best served allocating among index funds or ETFs, and holding for the long haul. In fact, I believe everyone this side of Buffett and Lynch should index at the core of their portfolios.
But for those of us who want to pick some individual stocks and go after a 10-bagger or two, small-cap stocks (i.e., stocks with market caps of $2 billion or less) are our best shot.
Large-cap stocks like Cisco (Nasdaq: CSCO) ($139 billion market cap) and Pfizer (NYSE: PFE) ($142 billion market cap) simply don't have the room to grow that their $2-billion-and-under brethren do. Now, large caps have their place in your portfolio, but that place isn't in the area dedicated to the 10-bagger.
To maximize your chances of achieving a 10-bagger in 10 years without throwing Hail Marys, focus on smaller companies that have:
•Strong balance sheets.
•Strong cash flows.
•Strong growth prospects.
Our small-cap experts at Hidden Gems have recommended Dynamic Materials, a maker of explosion-welded clad metal plates, to their members. This stock is a good place to start your 10-bagger research. To see the Hidden Gems team's entire write-up on Dynamic Materials, and the rest of their recommendations, click here for a free 30-day trial.
Anand Chokkavelu owns shares of Pfizer and Halliburton. He made a 100% return in just two days once: The sweater didn't fit, and he got store credit. Chesapeake Energy and Pfizer are Motley Fool Inside Value recommendations. The Fool owns shares of Chesapeake Energy
I received that comment on one of my recent columns. Grammar issues aside, this type of get-rich-quick mentality scares the heck out of me.
Now, don't get me wrong. I enjoy stalking monster returns. Heck, I'll even reveal your best shot at snaring a 10-bagger a little later in this piece. But first, let me warn you against an investing mistake that leads to many a zero-bagger.
The warning
My worst investing decisions have involved three common elements:
•The allure of great upside.
•The "need" to act quickly.
•The lack of proper due diligence.
My visions of huge, unrealistic profits led to hasty decision-making, which led to losses. In other words, almost every time I've tried to swing out of my shoes to hit a home run, I've struck out.
To defend yourself against the kind of greed that leads to grief, put investing returns in perspective.
My critic earlier talked about 100% returns in just a few days. Let's think through that for a minute. If you started with $10,000 and made 100% gains every week, you'd be the richest person in the world -- surpassing Bill Gates' $40 billion -- in far less than six months.
I'll go one step further. Perhaps you're thinking of the huge gains we've had over the course of the last year. If you timed it right, you could have made more than 100% on Halliburton (NYSE: HAL) and Chesapeake Energy (NYSE: CHK), more than 150% on General Electric (NYSE: GE) and Alcoa (NYSE: AA), or more than 1,500% on Human Genome Sciences (Nasdaq: HGSI).
Although these are real returns some investors have achieved, they're not the sort of realistic earnings anyone can expect over the long term. You can't extrapolate Usain Bolt's 100-meter times to conclude that he could run a marathon in 70 minutes. Similarly, even the best investors can't generate 100% returns year after year.
What's the upper limit of reasonable?
Peter Lynch is recognized as one of the greatest investors of all time. He ran his Fidelity Magellan Fund from 1977 to 1990 -- less than 15 years, during one hell of a bull market. Even in those perfect conditions, he "only" averaged 29% annual returns.
If you're wondering about Warren Buffett, his returns are lower than Lynch's. If you got in on his company, Berkshire Hathaway, in 1965, you'd have generated average annual returns in the neighborhood of 20%.
Now, because of the power of compounding for 45 years, those returns are tremendous. A $10,000 investment back then would leave you a millionaire many times over.
Believing you can do much better than the 20% to 30% long-term annual returns of Lynch and Buffett is almost surely a road to overconfidence and failure. Doing half of what they did would make you a very, very rich investor.
Your best shot at a 10-bagger
Now that we're grounded in reality, let's talk about what it takes to snag a 10-bagger in 10 years, while limiting your risk.
For a stock to be worth 10 times its buy-in price in 10 years requires a 26% annual return. As the returns of Lynch and Buffett attest, that's huge!
Going after that kind of return, even in an individual stock, isn't for everyone. You have to have a mighty risk tolerance. That's why most people are best served allocating among index funds or ETFs, and holding for the long haul. In fact, I believe everyone this side of Buffett and Lynch should index at the core of their portfolios.
But for those of us who want to pick some individual stocks and go after a 10-bagger or two, small-cap stocks (i.e., stocks with market caps of $2 billion or less) are our best shot.
Large-cap stocks like Cisco (Nasdaq: CSCO) ($139 billion market cap) and Pfizer (NYSE: PFE) ($142 billion market cap) simply don't have the room to grow that their $2-billion-and-under brethren do. Now, large caps have their place in your portfolio, but that place isn't in the area dedicated to the 10-bagger.
To maximize your chances of achieving a 10-bagger in 10 years without throwing Hail Marys, focus on smaller companies that have:
•Strong balance sheets.
•Strong cash flows.
•Strong growth prospects.
Our small-cap experts at Hidden Gems have recommended Dynamic Materials, a maker of explosion-welded clad metal plates, to their members. This stock is a good place to start your 10-bagger research. To see the Hidden Gems team's entire write-up on Dynamic Materials, and the rest of their recommendations, click here for a free 30-day trial.
Anand Chokkavelu owns shares of Pfizer and Halliburton. He made a 100% return in just two days once: The sweater didn't fit, and he got store credit. Chesapeake Energy and Pfizer are Motley Fool Inside Value recommendations. The Fool owns shares of Chesapeake Energy
Saturday, November 20, 2010
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