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What’s in your pumpkin? Halloween’s record year:
Bottom Line: Happy Halloween! It certainly has been for many retailers this year. We’re spending a record amount on Halloween this year and the odds are you’re participating. We’re on pace to have spent more than $8 billion dollars on the festivities today. That’s up about 8% from last year and means that the average person is spending about $79 on Halloween this year.
72% of us have or willing be participating in Halloween in 2012 and 42 million children will be trick or treating. It’s also interesting to see that only 22% adults cited the economy as a consideration and to the level or participating today. That puts Halloween in a category that few other days of the year can claim. It’s recession proof.
http://www.cnn.com/2012/10/30/living/halloween-by-the-numbers/index.html
Bottom Line: Even if you don’t get into the day to day movements of the
The systems have all been tested and are stable. So it will be back to trading today & it’s likely to be frantic.
Since Friday…
http://www.cnbc.com/id/49617351
Could
Bottom Line: It seems wrong at this stage to consider the “bright side” of
Years ago in the days where I still owned a small business, I participated in a project sponsored by the US Chamber of Commerce to study the impact of money spent at local businesses vs. large businesses. The result was that a dollar spent at a local company touches seven hands before it leaves the community. A dollar spent with a national or international company touches about 4 hands before it leaves the community. It’s that principal that’s being applied to the potential positive economic impact of this storm. But I disagree in this case…
Yes the initial sugar rush of insurance money could create a lot of new economic activity. It’s good for all of the companies and people employed to rebuild the affected areas. Over the long run it’s a different consideration tough and we can relate.
If you were in
It’s that last principal I want to hone in on. The problem with inferring economic benefit from insurance money is that it excludes the long term consequences of these disasters and claims. Fewer insurance companies offering policies. Higher prices for those policies. The long term affordability of life worsens after these types of events and that implication isn’t “worth” the initial economic “benefit” of these tragedies in my view.
http://www.cnbc.com/id/49617715
Warren Buffet bets big on Real Estate:
Bottom Line: My biggest call of 2012 was the real-estate turnaround. At this stage we don’t need Warren Buffet to confirm the turn around we’re seeing in real-estate but it does serve as an exclamation point.
Yesterday Warren Buffet announced the acquisition of Prudential’s real-estate business. This includes nearly 60,000 new real-estate agents across the country. The acquisition increases Berkshire Hathaway’s footprint in real-estate by nearly 500%. That’s a very big statement regarding real-estate from the most successful investor in modern times.
Google’s answer to Siri now available for the iPhone:
Bottom Line: Google continues to play a coy game of “I told you so” with Apple. Apple’s thumbing of its nose at Google hasn’t exactly worked out. The new maps feature replacing the previously Google powered service has been such a bust that it resulted in the developer of it and the iOS leaving Apple. You Tube is still most downloaded video app on the iPhone 5 and now…
Google’s voice recognition software has been superior to Siri and now they are going to bring it to the iPhone. Google has enabled an app that will work with other Google apps (maps and YouTube for example) on the iPhone. It’s not fully integrated for the iPhone the way Siri is but if you search with Google, view video on YouTube and use Google Maps – then it’s a Siri replacement for you. And another game won by Google.
http://allthingsd.com/20121030/googles-siri-rival-now-available-for-ios/?reflink=ATD_yahoo_ticker
Google’s new tablets & phone – but one isn’t worth your time (if you use data):
Bottom Line: So after Google had an Apple like leak occur on Monday – the decided not to reschedule their event that was cancelled on Monday. They instead confirmed leaks regarding their new products. So about those products…
Google announced two tablets and a new smart-phone. The tablets are interesting but the phone isn’t worth your time or money. The products:
- Nexus 4 Smartphone
- Nexus 7 Small tablet
- Nexus 10 Tablet
The number corresponds to the size of the screen. So what about them? The Nexus 10 is a nice looking tablet. Its specs are virtually as polished as the iPad minus the superior Retina display technology of the latest iPad. The benefit is the price of $400 to start (or $100 cheaper than the iPad). The Nexus 7 also is a nice tablet from a capability standpoint that puts it squarely ahead of the Kindle Fire in the like class and a legit competitor to the Mini iPad. It’s really about the preference for the Droid based OS or Apple’s iOS. The 4 though…
The Nexus 4 is simply a bad product. Why? Because it’s network capability is already dated by three years. Apple was rightly panned when it realized the iPhone 4S over a year ago with dated network speed capability. Google simply has no excuse for releasing a new phone that requires you paying a top price for outdated technology.
