Author/Editor
Alan Gula
Publisher
Stansberry Research
Description
Monthly newsletter recommends undervalued, “blue chip” and “next boom” stocks. Portfolio holds about 20-30 positions and is billed as conservative. Formerly edited by Porter Stansberry.
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3.7
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I can’t remember exactly when I started subscribing, because I now subscribe to numerous info sources, some free, some expensive, but I probably started in late 2008. Until then I had been out of the market and into real estate for a number of years (made some, lost some, but fortunately didn’t get creamed), so as luck would have it I had some cash on hand. My daughter had decided to get married and wanted me to help finance her expensive wedding so I had taken out a new mortgage and promptly realized I would have to invest some of it to offset the cost.
I first subscribed to Steve Sjugerrud and found his advice to be very sensible, especially the part about buy long when everybody else panics, because that’s probably the bottom. I didn’t immediately buy his recommends, being conservative enough not to jump in before doing some due diligence. Instead I kept reading and bought some obvious picks like F, GM, BAC, etc. One of the e-mails I received after subscribing to True Wealth was written by Porter in which he recommended shorting GGP (General Growth Properties), the second largest owner of premium shopping malls in the US because they needed to refinance some $3B in mortgages but couldn’t find money anywhere and would soon go BK. This avice was part of one of his sky-is-falling libertarian rants. The situation sounded interesting enough (“too big to fail”) to warrant a further look. Turned out he (or his researcher) didn’t look far enough because what they missed (easy enough to find with a little internet research) was that Bill Ackman was buying millions of GGP shares, which had come down from $60 to 46 cents. A little more research told me that Ackman, along with John Paulson and Bruce Berkowitz had made a lot of money during the crash. Concluding that Ackman probably knew more that I did (and is considerably wealthier) I decided to follow him instead of Stansberry, and invested the princely sum of $610 (plus $12.95 commision) in 1000 shares @ 61 cents. Subsequently I followed Sjugerruds’s advice and continued to buy as the price increased (he says buy when everybody hates the stock but it keeps going up). That one stock, contrary to Stansberry’s prediction, eventually went to $20 including the HHC split, just as Ackman had predicted. I was able to cover my mortgage pretty much with that one investment in less than 2 years by going contrary to Stansberry’s advice.
I like Sjugerrud’s letter and now read it religiously because it’s full of good advice, although I invest in only some of his picks. I read Porter’s stuff too, but listen with only one ear even though he says a lot of interesting things because I don’t trust his judgment; I believe his ideology and his emotions get in the way of his objectivity. He may be right about the “end of America” but I doubt it will be nearly as bad as the picture he paints which reminds me more of the aftermath of WWI in Germany when paper money was carried in wheelbarrows. Germany had been devastated by war, and the Allies were sucking it dry with “reparations”. This country is in much better shape than that. We have a great infrastructure (although it needs maintenance), a very productive agriculture and valuable extractive industries, especially natural gas. We have one of the best stocks of residential housing anywhere, thanks to easy-money mortgages; the empty houses aren’t going anywhere, and eventually will be reoccupied. The big banks and offshore investors are taking the financial hit of the defaults as the people they screwed bail out. As was published in Fortune last month, out of the $14T national debt the Chinese really only own less than 2 trillion. A lot of the rest is owed by us to ourselves (like Treasury to the Social Security Trust Fund). If our money and credit are so worthless why is everybody piling into Treasuries? And the jobs problem has been coming on for many years as our wages flew way past the prevailing rates for manufacturing in Asia and elsewhere. This is a structural problem not easily rectified until wages come back into balance, and is not something the Govt. can resolve in a couple of years.
We have come out of many worse situations successfully.When the chips are down Americans tend to come together, not fight each other. Just look at what happened in New York during and since 9/11. We may lose wealth and status before it’s over, but I’d much rather live here than in some 3rd-world hellhole behind gates with a 24-hour guard.
To get back to the topic of these posts, I feel as many of the other posters do that most of the advice is good, the unrelieved marketing hype is very annoying, some of the newsletters are better than others although each has its place (I also subscribe to Retirement Millionaire) and at least the less expensive letters are well worth the low price. They certainly beat a lot of the other garbage that’s out in the newsletter market.
Basically everybody who thinks this is a scam complains about the other offers that come with the news letter. Hey these guys are in business to make money, so sure they are going to try to sell you other stuff. I feel that for 50 bucks, this is a no brainer, I mean I lose 50 bucks on a hand of black jack, so really, to me this is no rip off. There is quite a bit of interesting information in these letters. The reality is that the facts in the video are spot on, they are delivered in a shocking manner but you cannot agrue with the facts and the history of our economy, and as we all know history has a tendency of repeating itself. So for me, 50 bucks, this thing is a value at this price.
This letter appears to be nothing more than a sales tool for additional stock letters. Granted I’m a new subscriber, but this just seems to a general market analysis and has rarely offered any new stock picks.
I saw the video advertised on a TV commercial and decided to watch the Loooong tiresome video that keeps you hanging on for everything with “Soon I will give you all the answers, but first let me tell you a story”, time after time he does this but I hung on to hear the answers. After all if I don’t my family won’t make it behind the barricades in time! Or they won’t have enough food and water because of the food riots!
Of course the video scared the hell out of me! To tell a father that his kids are going to grow up in a
post-apocalyptic Mad Max type of world isn’t encouraging. After all, unlike most of you I’m not what you would call a big “investor”. Don’t get me wrong I would love to invest, but unless the newsletter (or you) can tell me of a conservative investment that has a huge payout for $100.00 a month, then I’m in trouble. I can’t buy farmland! I’m just getting by now paying the bills. I was involved in a huge accident while on duty and depend on the state for my disability check. Some people live week to week, I live month to month.
Say all these predictions come true? Goodbye state monthly? My 3 elementary age children aren’t going to be happy campers with nothing to eat. I guess from then on out it’s deer meat and rain water? (good thing I live in the country I guess, huh?)
Seriously, all these buy/sell formulas are great but what the average family needs is to keep food on the table and a roof over head. The only gold I want to sell is my wife’s wedding ring! In the misted of all that if the only thing I lost were my investments, then I would feel lucky.
My guess is that I won’t be subscribing, but thanks for scaring the hell out of me. As they age old adage goes, “you need money to make money!” Anyone want to give some away? LOL!
Which letter, Leo? The latest issue (September) had two shorts, the August issue had one short, and the July issue had two longs. Don’t get the marketing materials mixed up with the paid newsletters like Chris did a few months back.
Dick, I didn’t get mixed up, (and you proved again that you work for S&A) you have presented get rich quick “advise” in the form of a newsletter. NOT marked advertising but in an actual newsletter (sometimes the exact same information is marked clearly “advertisement”). But the good news is that since i began complaining about it, the occurances have decreased, someone must be listening, Is it you Dick
I watched your video and the only thing that scared me was i already saw this coming. I have never had much money, and I’ve been hurting these past 5 years. I took notice in the way things have been going. I also watched the news today and it dawned on me that with that video started a revolution. They never said your name one time but, the first thing to come to my mind was you. You did the world a great justice i just hope you know that when this all goes down, everyone is going to look to you for guidance hopefully you do the right thing again.
In the October 2011 issue of Porter Stansberry’s Investment Advisory he said: “From November 2008 through March 2010, we were extremely bullish on stocks. And we were right: The period from March 2009 through March 2011 was one of history’s greatest increases in stock prices in the shortest amount of time. Stocks hadn’t doubled in two years since the election of Dwight Eisenhower.”
Yes, it was an exciting two years. However, I noticed right away that he got off the bus in March 2010 and missed the whole second year of the rally. Also, he got on the bus, according to him, in November 2008, so he must have suffered a pretty serious drawdown between then and the March 2009 bottom.
I went back to check, and he was indeed bullish in his November 2008 issue. However, he also was very bullish in his October 2008 issue, where he recommended buying Ebay and said: “My friend and business partner, Steve Sjuggerud,tells me stocks have experienced their worst 12-month period since the terrible bear market of ’73-’74. Many of you, I’m sure, have suffered declines in the value of your assets. Many of you, I’m sure, are nervous about owning stocks and are probably very reluctant to buy stocks now. That’s how bear markets work. Mr. Market doesn’t want you to buy stocks at great prices. He’ll try to scare you away. Don’t let him. Now is the time to buy.” [emphasis added]
So I’m not sure why he counts his bullishness from November – he was very bullish in October, too. He wrote that on October 3, 2008, when the S&P 500 closed at 1099.23.
His March 2010 letter was indeed very bearish. But then I thought: Was he really bullish all the way to March 2010? I didn’t remember it that way, so I looked at some earlier issues.
February 2010 was headlined: “The Nightmare Scenario Unfolds: China Abandons the Dollar.” The second article was “The End of America is Imminent” and he made some short sale recommendations. He concluded by saying: “In light of the concerns I have about the dollar, I believe it’s time to be extremely cautious with our portfolio positions. I don’t want to own stocks that don’t pay substantial dividends or won’t benefit from the coming inflation. That means we need to sell several long held deep value stocks: Nokia (NYSE: NOK), Valhi (NYSE: VHI), and Chunghwa Telecom (NYSE: CHT). While these stocks are still cheap, they simply don’t provide enough of an ongoing dividend to give us the margin of safety we need right now.
“Likewise, I think it’s time to sell some of the assets we picked up at absurdly low prices during the market panic last spring. High-yield bonds are no longer providing enough of a cushion in terms of higher yields, so we will sell HYG. And we’re selling our real estate fund, C&S REIT Income (NYSE: RNP). We earned nice gains on both positions, but it’s time to move on. Higher interest rates will hurt both of these positions. I’ve also increased the risk ratings on virtually all our positions. It will be difficult for stocks to maintain their current prices in the face of an extreme disruption to the global economy and soaring interest rates. Now is definitely the time to have a hedged portfolio.” [emphasis added]
I don’t see how he can call that “extremely bullish on stocks” with a straight face. He wrote that on February 19, 2010, when the S&P 500 was at 1109.17. He really was bullish in the previous letter, written on January 8, 2010.
So his “extreme bullishness” actually ran from October 3, 2008, when he said “now is the time to buy,” through February 19, 2010, when he said “Now is definitely the time to have a hedged portfolio.” During this period, the S&P 500 moved from 1099.23 to 1109.17. He made only 10 S&P points during “one of history’s greatest increases in stock prices in the shortest amount of time.”
By shifting the beginning and ending of his bullishness period by a month each, he gives a totally misleading picture of his investment acumen – or lack thereof. Even using his false claim– November 2008 to March 2010 – he made 219 S&P points, or 23.5%. That’s less than one-fourth of the available returns in “one of history’s greatest increases in stock prices in the shortest amount of time.”
One of the most important things to me is a newsletter editor who admits his mistakes readily and is honest with his subscribers. I don’t see that here, and will not renew.
Bravo Farm Girl. But I am surprised Stansberry or one of his flacks didn’t post a review contradicting what you wrote, as they usually do. I am guessing you wrote it so well they are stumped, good job!
nil
I took these guys up on their money back guarantee because I was curious about their teasers. I looked over their recommendations for the first half of 2012 and was not overly impressed. They generally seemed to consist of poorly timed “tips” on specific stocks recommended because of some grand story of profits that might come in some distant future, such as a new cure for cancer, or a new replacement for gas and oil. April, as I recall was major banks, which he lamented in May fell below the recommended 25% stop (no big surprise to those of us with an instinct for self-preservation). His particular favorite is coal. Yep, the nasty sooty black stuff that should be left in the ground.
The Agora company does have a stable of well-practiced writers (or one writer with a lot of aliases) who are always entertaining to read. If you can’t guess what the teasers are talking about you can usually find out here at gumshoe. The “secrets” aren’t totally unknown, often they’ve been touted for years. S&A reports in one promo piece that they consider naked puts to be “their greatest secret”.
When I called the tool-free number and asked for my money back it was promptly and cheerfully refunded to my credit card. If I recall correctly it was a real person who answered, not a machine. In any case I got through to them right away, no waiting on hold a long time. Kudos for their service.
This guy is really smoking something. Hope you were not a sucker that fell for his dollar Armageddon video on youtube. Fact is dollar has creamed all other world currencies in the past year. One point in the video he says that Indian have stopped accepting dollar. In the past year, Indian Rupee has been in a free fall against dollar. Dropped from 40 Rs to dollar to $57 Rs to dollar. He talks about alternate reserve currency by Chinese, Russians and Euro nations. Really? you trust these jokers more than America.
One more thing, that gold chart he shows every few seconds… reminds me of the housing bubble chart before it went pop. Beware of buying any asset that has had a 500% run up in the past decade. It is running on steroids and then some.
I dropped SIA to focus on two Stansberry offerings from which I get more value, namely Daily Wealth Trader and 12% Letter. SIA offers 2 stocks per month along with a ton of economic and political commentary. I’m willing to put up with longwinded prose if the picks are commonly exemplary, but they’re not. SIA has the occasional big hitter but average otherwise. Subscribers get a regular diet of promo emails for other Stansberry newsletters and services which usually have a link to a video. You can short circuit the video by closing your browser tab. You’ll get a message window that let’s you skip the video and takes you to a page with the text from it. You can then scroll to the bottom to get to the service their pitching. I get the same stuff again from 12% and DWT. I don’t mind as long as these two keep performing, which they do consistently.
Here’s all you need to know about this doofus, in his own words: “Last December, the European Central Bank (ECB) began lending money (giving it away, really) to the region’s banks, in an effort to prop up sovereign bond markets. This was a signal that the ECB would not let European Union states default on their debts. The central bank was choosing inflation over default… as we knew it would. And to prevent a default, we know it would have to print trillions of new euros.
That’s why we decided for the first time since early 2010 to become aggressive buyers of stocks and commodities.”
Translation: We went to cash too early and missed the huge 2011 upturn.
“We predicted 2012 would be the best year for stocks since 2007. We bought inflation-sensitive businesses, like big banks and insurance companies. But then… everything turned around. New fears emerged that Europe’s central bank wouldn’t ride to the rescue… that perhaps Spain and Italy would be forced to default. And we were stopped out of many of our new positions.”
Translation: We bought back in at the highs, and got stopped out with severe losses.
I have subscribed on and off to PSIA for four years. I say on and off because after the first year, I cancelled but then came back in to the subscription after a compelling offer that came out to come back an try again. The company has always held its integrity, though you may not know it based on the reviews here, in that Porter and his team are very transparent. He is happy to show when he failed, as evidenced by this year’s “report card” when he gave himself an “F” due to having the premise right but the timing wrong. He advocates strong trailing stop loss parameters on all positions, provides great argument for each position, and does routinely follow up on any items of interest for those positions. The style and flow of writing is not overly bombastic, but believable and enjoyable. All of the offerings at Stansberry are worth what you pay for them and more, and as my maturity as an investor has grown, so too has my appreciation for them running the shop like they do. A piece of criticism heard a lot is their analysts don’t harmonize, and while that bothered me before it no longer does. Porter’s point is he pays them to present their arguments with facts as they interpret them, and he doesn’t pay them to be “yes” men. I have to say I support his position, candor, and drive to be the best at what he does. I mark them as a 4 for consistency due to the results over the last year, and that was enough to drive the overall rating to a 4, in my opinion.
Very well written, most of the picks I have invested in have been in positive territory.
Stansberry has a policy that the newsletter writers cannot taste their own cooking. They can’t buy any of their recommendations. Thus I believe that the subscribers get only their 2nd best recommendation because they have invested in their first pick. Example: Stansberry keeps on touting NLY yet you would never have heard a peep about AGNC which has considerably higher returns.
Beware!
I have subscribed to a number of Porter Stansberry’s newsletters, and Weber’s Global Opportunity Report for a few years. While they are an interesting read, the Stansberry newsletters’ recommendations and follow-ups did not create a sense of safety. There is no broad fundamental view on the conditions that drive the stock-market rises and falls within which the stock pick are referenced. Persuasive reference to context is missing.
I have recently subscribed to Sean Hyman’s Ultimate Wealth Report and despite the many negative and vitriolic, even, comments about him personally (and not his actual stock picks for the most part), I find his detailed weekly investment advice a priceless education in the field of investment fundamentals.
While Hyman’s technical, fundamental and sentiment analysis all appear to be extremely well grounded, and he is a technically qualified and licensed analyst, the fact the Hyman is a pastor who has an investment philosophy based on conservative Biblical advice on investment seems to enrage some beyond reason. Hyman does not base his recommendations on something ‘God revealed’ to him–his reports are pragmatic and down to earth, with great attention to detailed analysis in his weekly almost hour-long reports which are usually in the form of a video. His investing approach will make sense for long-term investors, and not so much perhaps for those who are interested in playing the market.