Five for Friday (and the Weekend)
A few things for your consideration between now and Monday:
- On the heels of Anthony Bolton reporting his view that commodities are losing their luster, comes this Bloomberg story about the John Hancock Global Opportunities Fund paring its commodity-related stock holdings. Note the fund hasn't sold off all such stocks. You know I certainly haven't been big into commodities. But taking profits by scaling back if you have been invested seems prudent to me. I remember reading longtime newsletter writer Doug Casey some years ago. He said that gold stocks were to be traded, not bought and forgotten about. My hunch is the same is true for commodities across the board, though I'm no expert.
- Speaking of gold, you might be interested in the views of Bill Buckler, who writes The Privateer market letter based in Queensland, Australia. I've subscribed off and on over the years (currently not) and a subscription includes a complimentary subscription to his publication called Gold This Week. He makes these issues freely available to non-subscribers a week later -- and calls it Gold Last Week. I'm no expert on gold, or any of the metals, but Buckler is. You might want to check it out as well as his entire website.
- The Supreme Court of Canada will apparently decide next week whether or not it will hear BCE's (BCE/NYSE) appeal of a lower court ruling that may derail the company being bought by a group lead by Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan. Reuters reports the Canadian Supreme Court is aware of the June 30 deadline for court approval of what would be the world's largest leveraged buyout, and has earmarked June 17 for an oral hearing if it does decide to hear the appeal. The story continues.
- Very few people evoke emotions like Rupert Murdoch, at least among those staying attuned to the media. Some find him rather heroic for launching Fox News and having the good sense to hire Roger Ailes, who has made Fox the number one cable news channel in America. Others hate him, largely for the very same reasons, though still others credit him as someone with evil powers who should be stopped at all costs. I'm in neither camp, but I said upon buying The DirecTV Group (DTV/NYSE) that I liked the Murdoch people being in charge at the time. (Now John Malone's crew is now running the ship, which I like equally well.) Anyway, love Murdoch or hate him, no one can deny that he LOVES newspapers. This report profiles Murdoch's appearance at Speaking at the D: All Things Digital conference in California, where he talks about the rather dire future for newspapers in the US.
- A couple of weeks or so ago, I mentioned that one of this blog's most popular non-investing posts concerned creating a men's wardrobe. Another dealt with the benefits I've seen by consuming cod liver oil, extra virgin olive oil and extra virgin coconut oil. Now I'll link to a Spectator article from December 2006, called Men Behaving Beautifully. Here's part: Male skin is 22 per cent thicker than women’s, has a higher acid pH, more sebum and a tendency to dehydrate more quickly. This means that the formula used to create a male product really does have to be different. Annoyingly for us girls, men’s skin also ages more slowly. For both sexes, however, skincare rules are the same: ‘keep it clean, keep it exfoliated and keep it moisturised’. Well said, and better shaves may be among the benefits you'll gain by caring for your skin -- especially as you get older.
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