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Friday, June 26, 2009

Week 11: Grade A - Head of the Class at Cog Hill Posted by Nate on June 23, 2009 at 4:23pm

Week 11: Grade A - Head of the Class at Cog HillPosted by Nate on June 23, 2009 at 4:23pm
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Delete Discussion While hiking the rolling Ravines of Cog Hill #2; Grade A proved that he is about to be a force to be reckoned with his straight towering drives and control around the greens.

Lucky Lefty didn't hurt himself in the GGW Cup pursuit with a consistent second place finish. The Silent Assassin in a 3rd place finish flashed the skills that make him the reigning GGW Cup champion. Country Strong is waiting in the wings for another course to overpower. Quick Draw now has a handicap. Watch Perry step up to the plate.

As usual the TaylorMade Kid made mincemeat of the skins collecting 7, Lucky Lefty and Grade A do not need a social worker since they collected 4 and 5 skins respectively. The Medicine Man took holes #17 & #18 for the final two skins.

Match play was most interesting with the Silent Assassin over Country Strong 5 & 3. Quick Draw beat the Medicine Man, 2 up. The Rifleman beat up on Double D 4 up and took over as the early leading contender for the Match Play Championship.

Grade A and Lucky Lefty did not want to spoil their professional relationship and both kissed their sister. (That means a draw for those of you with dirty minds). Their match was all square but Grady, with the higher handicap on Saturday, went to the Head of the Class.

No newsletter is complete without a shout out to Way Cool who after a forgettable round, promises next week at Woodbine things will be different.

Wednesday, June 24, 2009

10 Golf Tips To Help Investors Tee Off

Great rules to live by. If you love golf and money!!!



10 Golf Tips To Help Investors Tee Off

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Shopping For A Financial Advisor

Do your research and use referrals to do this. Very important. If the advisor did well by your friends they should do well by you.





Shopping For A Financial Advisor

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Like I said, who knows what they are doing?

Who Should Go to Jail?

By Matt Koppenheffer
March 6, 2009 | Comments (45)

Recs
46

As the nation’s collective temper flares, we’re all beginning to consider tossing the people responsible for today's financial mess in the slammer and throwing away -- no, melting -- the key. And with our economy in disarray and major banks like Citigroup (NYSE: C) and Bank of America (NYSE: BAC) potentially on the brink of collapse, it's tough to fight that sentiment.

On Thursday, Rep. Barney Frank once again brought this issue to the forefront, pushing for state and federal authorities to chase down the bad guys and acquaint them with nice, cold concrete walls. "Rules don't work," Frank said, "if people have no fear of them."

Sounds good to me. But who do we lock up?

Incompetence isn't enough
Sometimes it just doesn't matter what your IQ is, what school you went to, or what position you hold -- idiocy can creep up and slide into bed with you. Even more irresistible is an idiocy that is supported by seemingly everyone around you.

"What? Home prices never go down? That sounds fishy, but everyone else seems to think it's true." Remember when your mother asked whether you'd jump off a bridge if everyone else did it? Some people, even smart ones, have been jumping off that bridge their entire lives.

My guess is that a heck of a lot of the problems that we're facing today were born of people doing dumb things. Building a financial model that assumes housing prices will never fall? Dumb. Buying a $500,000 house with 2% down and a three-year interest-only loan? Dumb. Giving a mortgage loan to somebody putting nothing down? Yup, that's dumb too.

Last I checked, stupidity is not a crime, but that doesn't mean there aren't people who fully deserve to be behind bars.

The easy ones
When the market is going up and investors are optimistic about the future, running an investment fraud can be a cakewalk. When the market falls 50%, though, and investors are clamoring to get their money back, the wheels can come off very quickly.

Bernie Madoff and Allen Stanford are poster children for the greed that's led to a lot of today's problems, but they're far from alone. Head over to Google and do a news search for "fraud" or "wire fraud" -- even the "smaller" schemes that are now being uncovered are in the millions or hundreds of millions of dollars.

It's pretty clear that not only do these unsavory players need to be jailed posthaste, but the regulatory agencies that have apparently been playing a lot of Minesweeper over the past few years need to get on the ball.

The high-profile ones
Executives at major financial institutions like Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS), Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS), JPMorgan (NYSE: JPM), and the two mentioned above, along with the once-mighty Bear Stearns, Lehman Brothers, Washington Mutual, Merrill Lynch, and Countrywide, were unquestionably in the middle of this whole mess. They were loaning, they were structuring, they were reselling, they were buying and holding -- and now they are either going belly-up or writing down billions while a government IV pumps in fresh funding.

In some cases, the best we can probably do is to say that leadership at these companies was incompetent. Investigations, though, seem like a good idea. If there is an industrial chemical accident, there will be an investigation into the root cause of that accident. We've just had the equivalent of nuclear meltdowns at multiple financial organizations, so I think some extensive digging is in order.

At the same time, the ratings agencies -- Moody's, Fitch, and Standard & Poor's -- were slapping high ratings on what we now know is, in many cases, complete junk. Incompetence across the board will be tougher to argue here, given that internal communications from S&P have already been recovered that suggest the company was rating anything and everything that was put in front of it. As one analyst reportedly said, "We rate every deal. It could be structured by cows and we would rate it."

There was a lot of money riding on the work that the investment banks were doing -- and the ratings that the ratings agencies were providing. Would anyone be surprised if there was more than plain old stupidity involved in all cases? If we want to keep from playing this same tape over again, it's important that those who were more than incompetent are dealt with.

Don't forget the little guy
No politician wants to call out Average Joe Middle-Class -- after all, that's the bread and butter of elections. But I'm no politician, so I'll head right for that third rail.

While some politicians have made some vague references to borrowers who were unscrupulous, I've yet to hear anyone talk about aggressively going after the fraud that was taking place on the ground floor of the housing market. Lying on your mortgage application? That's fraud. Appraisers inflating home values? Bam! Fraud. Cracking down at this level is just as important as taking down higher-profile cases.

The greed factor
In all the criminal fallout that comes from our financial mess, there will be a lot of different names for what people have done. At the end of the day, though, it all really falls under one big, bold banner: greed.

Sure, there are those who think that the mess was caused by low interest rates, or the government pushing lenders to give loans to lower-income folks, or any of a number of other reasons. But I disagree. Those things may have enabled the problems, but greed was the ultimate cause.

When greed is good
This isn't to decry greed entirely. Greed drives people to invent things and build businesses, and I expect that it will continue to bear fruit for a long, long time. Without the potential to profit in a big way, would Sergey, Larry, and the early Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) investors have pushed to make the company what it is today? Would Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ) have come up with a fraction of its life-saving treatments? But just like nuclear weaponry, greed in the wrong hands or out of control can do a heck of a lot of damage.

Arresting the out-and-out criminals of the last five years will be an important step in cleaning up and moving on. Recalibrating regulations that keep greed on a productive path will be even more crucial in preventing future meltdowns.

Monday, June 22, 2009

Hickory Hills Match Play

The Golfers Gone Wild Tour made a long trek to one of our favorite stops, Heritage Bluffs Public Golf Club in Channahon, Illinois. Located about 5 miles south of Joliet on I-55, Heritage Bluffs played host for our tenth week tournament.
After a bit of morning rain, the GGW’s afternoon tee times allowed play in perfect conditions. There were several picturesque holes. The course was tough (125 slope) but fair, the greens rolled true and several blind landing areas made it ideal for shot makers. Only a closed clubhouse at the conclusion marred a delightful day.
It was Doubly D-lightful for Dennis Dudley. First, with a net 67, Dennis won the tournament over a competitive field of 8. After winning at Lost Marsh last year, Double D continues to make a reputation of playing his best on tough courses. Double D hit a daily double by also beating his opponent in 1 on 1 match play.
Three other matches were played. Rifleman (-2) beat Silent Assassin, 5 & 3. Way Cool (-6) beat Lucky Lefty 4 & 3. And TaylorMade Kid (+6) beat Cadillac Blue, 5 & 4. In addition to the Double D (-6) win over Country Strong, 5 & 3.
All four winners on Saturday remain undefeated. Ironically, for each of the match losers, it was their second GGW match play loss this year. All four now are vulnerable, meaning with the triple elimination format; they are OUT with another loss.
For three of the Match Play losers, it wasn’t a complete loss on the day. These were the only players to win skins money. Cadillac Blue won the first 7 skins with a par on #7, rated as the hardest hole on the course. Country Strong won the last 7 skins with a par on #18, extending his tour lead in skins won. And, Lucky Lefty won the 4 skins in the middle with a par on #11.
However, for two weeks in a row, two birdies yielded no skins. Rifleman and Silent Assassin, competing in a match, both birdied #8 to push the hole for their match and force a skins push for the benefit to the field.

Way Cool also got a “birdie”; the hard way. Wayne had a net 69 to finish second. Way Cool with excellent ball striking throughout the round, included a well struck shot that brought down a real bird in mid-flight. A unique Way Cool expression, “Can’t Kill Nothing, Won’t Nothing Die”, certainly was not applicable on this day.
Next week, Golfers Gone Wild Tour will hold a Father’s Day Weekend tournament at Cog Hill #2 in Lemont. Check your email from the Tournament Director for tee times. Cog Hill is always well-maintained and gives us a tough challenge. Given his previously noted skill on tough layouts, GGW needs to try and stop Double D from doubling up on tour victories.

Saturday, June 13, 2009

GMIB Not What It Seems

Some people who engage in this benefit, think that there is a guaranteed interest rate on their money. It is not. In most cases you have to annuitize the contract to access the benefit. It works if you think the market is going up and you keep locking in higher values. You have to be careful and entertain the thought of getting out of the contract before you annuitize and when the contract is above the GMIB value. You come out ahead if you do it that way. Here is a definition of the GMIB from Invetopedia.

Investopedia explains Guaranteed Minimum Income Benefit - GMIB
Receiving a guaranteed minimum income benefit ensures that an annuitant will receive a payment regardless of market conditions. This minimum payment amount is predetermined by assessing the future value of the initial investment. This option is only beneficial to annuitants who plan to annuitize their annuity.

Thursday, June 11, 2009

Amazing Low Score on GGWT (61) Net!!

The Golfers Gone Wild Tour convened at Cardinal Creek Golf Course on Saturday, June 6. Cardinal Creek has a unique 27 hole layout located in Beecher, Illinois. The course features an upgraded clubhouse and GPS on all the golf carts. GGW played the Center and North nines. But several fairways were in poor condition, with clearly deferred maintenance. One player was quoted calling it “a pasture more suitable for cows and sheep”.

Fortunately, we didn’t encounter any livestock on the course. But even if there were, Country Strong probably would have slaughtered them just like he did the rest of the GGW Field. Ron Wynne lived up to his nickname, “Country Strong” and shot a blistering low 61 net. He also set 2009 season records for low net, low gross and skins won in a single round.

Country Strong led a competitive 3some with TaylorMade Kid (64) and The Gambler (65) both shooting well under par net. However, Ron dominated the skins game, winning the first 16. Grade A and The Gambler stopped a complete GGW skins rout by taking skins at #17 and #18 to end the day.

Caught up in the blood and carnage, was the TaylorMade Kid, who actually had a great round. Taylor tied for low gross round for the year with 85, played numerous holes at par and had a sand save birdie on #13. But, each of the pars was pushed and even the birdie was matched by Cadillac Blue.

With the skins wins, Country Strong took the huge lead in total skins with 34. He also jumped three others to now rank with the 2nd lowest handicap. Complete Tour statistics for all including current handicaps are attached. The GGW Match Play Tournament has also been finalized with a triple elimination format. Individual schedules are included in the attachment.

Heritage Bluffs in Channahon, Illinois will be the next stop for Golfers Gone Wild on Saturday, June 13. Heritage Bluffs Golf Course will play long (6617 yards) and tough (132 slope) website link http://ping.fm/3rGm1 It should also be in better condition than Cardinal Creek. After being completely gutted last week, the GGW field should be definitely motivated to prevent another Country Strong Slaughter.

Saturday, June 6, 2009

Advisors Face Risk Of Jail Time For Misleading Clients

Just be careful. We need honest and ethical advisers. So watch out. If you don't do right you could get put away. Now you are advising about how not to drop the soap!!!

Advisors Face Risk Of Jail Time For Misleading Clients

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Consumer stocks to sell now: #1 -- Pacific Sunwear (PSUN)

Consumer stocks to sell now: #1 -- Pacific Sunwear (PSUN)

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I just think that it is about need not greed. We talked about this before. Do not ride this stock train up and down. Get out with a profit. Take your money and put it in something else that is trading low. When it goes up take your money again. Who cares about capital gains taxes. 75% of something is better than 100% of...... well you know the rest. Read the article above on bloggerstocks it is a good one.

Thursday, June 4, 2009

Update

The Golfers Gone Wild Tour returned to Glenwoodie Golf Course, Saturday, May 30, two weeks after torrential rains left four holes submerged, canceling our first engagement.
After missing the rainout for a weekend in the Bahamas, Kappatain Styles put the heat on Glenwoodie. Continuing his excellent early season form, Jeff shot a net 67 and easily beat a small field of 8 players by 4 strokes.
The Glenwoodie greens were tough as usual on everyone, but K Styles led out a powerful 4some, including Country Strong, Grade A and Way Cool. Everyone in this grouping routinely hit 240+ yard drives off the tee to quickly navigate Glenwoodie’s 122 slope layout. The other 4some obviously must have come out just for the fresh air, since they took more than 5½ hours to complete the round. Note to Rules Official: There has got to be new pace of play rules. With some players out of rhythm, at least one player out of patience and all players running out of time; the last 4some eventually completed the round. Regardless, K Styles stayed focused to hit par on tough #11 uphill over the Butterfield Ravine and winning four skins. Country Strong with birdie on #17 and par at #18, also won four skins. But, the skins leader on the day was Lucky Lefty. Miller won 6 skins total. Four skins on the front with par on #7 and two more on the back making a key par at #14, a 205 yard par 3. Double D won the first three skins and Cadillac Blue picked up one with par at #12.



With his victory at Glenwoodie, Kappatain Styles became the fourth player to win on Tour this season. Lucky Lefty placed second, besting Wynne and Grady by 2 tenths of a stroke net, and extended his lead in GGW Cup Points. Complete Tour statistics for all including current handicaps are attached. Cardinal Creek Golf Course in Beecher, Illinois will host the Golfers Gone Wild this Saturday, June 6. Check your email from the Tournament Director for tee times. Glenwoodie was a first win for Kappatain Styles. Who from the GGW will emerge from Cardinal Creek?

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Go to WWW.WYID.Blogspot.com to view Obam's Speech in Cairo.
Obama's speech in Cairo. He is good.

Wednesday, June 3, 2009

Football Season Is Comng!!!!