Those Who Are Not Familiar with Reggie Middleton's Work...

Can now learn about his many accurate and timely calls including every major market crash and nearly every major corporate collapse over the last 3 years. Also available, social media links and recent media appearances with streaming video. See More About Reggie Middleton.

Crains NY ran a happy, go lucky article today:

The stubbornly dismal economy means at least one thing: an extended stay in the spotlight for a handful of star analysts whose defining characteristic is their extraordinary bearishness. And, of course, their accuracy.

There's Albert Edwards, a London-based analyst from France's Société Générale, who believes the Standard & Poor's 500 will sink to 450, a sickening 57% drop from its current level. There's David Rosenberg, chief economist at Toronto money manager Gluskin Sheff, who warns that deflation is going to pull down the U.S. economy for years.

And then there's the New York star of this gloomy show: Reggie Middleton, a Brooklyn entrepreneur who turned to analyzing global markets after a stint buying and renovating apartments in Fort Greene and Clinton Hill. (See “Prophet of doom,” April 19.)

Bad as things may be for the economy, Mr. Middleton warns that they're poised to get much worse. Prices of real estate, stocks and bonds are all headed for serious falls... Wages will decrease, unemployment will increase. Fun, eh?

...

The culprit, Mr. Middleton says, is Washington. The bank bailouts, nationalization of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and other interventions during two presidencies prevented the market from bottoming out in 2009 like it should have, he says. Now that the economy is weakening again and the heavily indebted U.S. government has fewer rescue options, the reckoning is coming. Markets of all kinds in the United States and Europe will get hit—hard.

“In my opinion, the amount of risk in the system is even higher than in 2008,” he says, adding this rare dash of hope: “2013 might be a good time to start taking a look at buying assets again.”

Mr. Middleton has been startlingly accurate in the past. He forecast the collapse of the housing market in 2007, and in early 2008 warned of the demise of Bear Stearns weeks before it happened. Earlier this year, he said that Ireland's finances were in terrible shape long before Standard & Poor's got around to downgrading that nation's credit rating.

For those of you who don't follow my blog, Mr. Elstein (the article's author) was referring to:

Many have labeled me a Permabear, particularly my detractors and those in the media (who are decidedly not detractors but still paint a pessimistic bent on my outlooks, see sidebar below). I am nothing of the such. I am what will be soon be known as a realist, as opposed to being a pessimist or optimist. No, I am no Permabear. My proprietary investment style (see "The Great Global Macro Experiment, Revisited")

dictates that I switch between extremes of bullishness and bearishness contingent upon the extreme policy errors of central bankers. As a matter of fact, I was as bullish as can be in residential real estate in NYC form 2000 to early 2004. I leveraged up on all the "in the money" distressed real estate I could find in areas of heavy gentrification, literally extracting 4 digit returns. That doesn't mean I disobeyed the laws of math though. As 2004 progressed, the writing on the wall became larger and more pronounced... Enter 2005 and math said turn bearish, common sense said turn bearish, and not to be one to look arithmetic in the face and argue, I grew bear claws and donned a ruffled brown grizzly coat! After liquidating my real estate, I took a year off and started shorting every industry that was even tangential to real assets. That was 2007. By the first quarter of 2009, I had a cumulative return in my portfolio of about 452% averaging roughly 50% cash (see Updated 2008 performance). I sensed the market was oversold, but the fundamental and macro outlooks was still quite negative, hence I pulled my profits one weekend in March (but let a few underwater positions ride). This weekend, coincidentally, happened to be the beginning of the rally that shouldn't have been, and I fought the faux bull to my detriment I got hurt in the artificially engineered, central banker and government synthesized rally of 2009, and my cumulative return was almost halved.

We believe Reggie Middleton and his team at the BoomBust bests ALL of Wall Street's sell side research: Did Reggie Middleton, a Blogger at BoomBustBlog, Best Wall Streets Best of the Best?

There are several ways through which you can interact directly with Reggie:

Mr. Middleton Receives Positive Press Coverage, Worldwide!

“His work is so detailed, so accurate, it’s among the best in the world,” says Eric Sprott, CEO of Sprott Asset Management, a Toronto firm that manages about $5 billion and subscribes to Mr. Middleton’s research.

Reggie Middleton Featured in Property EU, one of Europes leading real estate publicatios

Those who wish to download the full article in PDF format can do so here: Reggie Middleton on Stagflation, Sovereign Debt and the Potential for bank Failure at the ING ACADEMY-v2.

• Las Vegas Business Press
• NY Daily News - Giants claim defunct firm Lehman Brothers owes team $300M

• MarketWatch (Herb Greenberg Blog)
• Las Vegas Review Journal (Allegiant Air)

• Las Vegas Review Journal (WYNN)

• CNN.com (Blogger Bunch) May 7, 2009- Will Banks Fail?
• CNN.com (Money & Mainstream) May 14, 2009 (see above)
• BBC World News Today (multiple appearances, see above)

Older Press Coverage and Media Appearances (samples no longer available)

• CNNfn
• Fortune
• PC Magazine
• PC World
• BET
• Real Estate Finance Today
• Interactive Week
• eWeek
• Computer Shopper

Awards

Hedge Funds Post: Best Blogs 2008

SoUp9lMCxRg

This is an excerpt from part two of a multi-part series on the companies vying for dominance during the 3rd major paradigm shift in personal and enterprise technology over the last 30 years. This one will be a biggie (not smalls) and promises to create an investment behemoth out of the winner and relegate the losers to relatively niche markets. This is saying a lot considering the size of the companies participating in the battle for the pole position. I created this series to provide a truly objective, truly informed, and truly analytical (from an empirical perspective) knowledge source on this very important intersection in personal computing and distributed media. This series will end with a full BoomBustBlog style forensic report on the company we feel has the most to gain from these wars from an investor's perspective. Those who are not familiar with my hard-edged, yet objective analytical work should reference past performance and media appearances for a quick background.

It is imperative that readers first review “There Is Another Paradigm Shift Coming in Technology and Media: Apple, Microsoft and Google Know its Winner Takes All” before moving on so as to get a thorough background as to what is at stake, who the players are, and what mobile technologies are being released into the consumer and enterprise realm. This is a lengthy, meaty, objective and information packed post that was initially intended to go out to subscribers only (click here to subscribe to our research services). I welcome you to compare it to the research you find available from technology, financial and strategic advisory firms, including and particularly Goldman Sachs (click here to see what I mean, then return to this point to continue reading) and let me know whose analysis is more accurate, in depth and thorough (not to mention less expensive).

GOOGLE, INC

Summary

Despite an increasing proportionate share of licensing and other revenues, advertising will apparently continue to drive Google’s revenues in the medium-to-long term. The Company’s dominant share in the search engine market is expected to be maintained, with other competitors failing to gain the operative, technological and strategic influence to deter its pace of ad revenue growth. Of late, the Company has been initiating to broaden its revenue base as is evident from some of the recent and planned launches of newer products and services funded through revenues generated by its online ad programs

Google’s next major launches – Chrome web browser (production version), Google Chrome OS and Google TV – (expected by the end of 2010) are expected by analysts to fare much better than its Nexus One phone. However, uncertainties over consumer acceptance, pricing and technological edge of newer services offerings over competing products in the market are making it quite difficult to gauge the near-term financial impact of these launches. I would like to make it known that it appears nearly all of the financial analysts and many of the technology analysts fail to grasp the gist of Google’s phone strategy. The Nexus One was a proof of concept, proven in the market place by HTC’s Evo, which (one month after being released) is constantly sold out in nearly all retail outlets, Sprint stores, indirect retails stores, and the Sprint.com site itself. It is also the first phone that is widely accepted as not only being a credible threat to the IPhone but actually superior to the IPhone as well. It should not be lost on anyone that the IPhone is what has driven the stellar burst in Apple’s revenues, profits and mindshare over the last three years. To that end, the Nexus One, and more aptly the open sourced Android OS has proven to be a raging success.

With the cult-like adherence to Everything Apple, cultivated by the viral marketing engine that is Apple, it is very, very difficult to get objective comparisons and reviews of practically anything in a product category that Apple is present in. Yes, even the stalwart geeky tech site's have bitten the Apple, so to speak. Cnet, Wired, etc. are so Apple biased as to be borderline embarrassing. I know they report on what (and how whatever) brings the page views, but come on fellas!!! BoomBustblog thrives because it tells the truth in the financial and economic space, not matter how unpopular or controversial. Is it time to open up a BoomBustBlog, Technology edition????

What this abject bias does, despite irritating the hell out of those of us who are not plugged into the Matrix, is mask the exciting technical revolution that is occurring due to the intense competition borne from the weakening of the Wintel hegemony, the advent of a slew of new technologies across the telecomm, media, semiconductor and software industries and the new business models cropping up as the world finally embraces the World Wide Web as an actual permanent and primary platform for basic business, social and economic transactions.

This post will surmise the qualitative aspects of the companies and products listed below. I will follow up with full forensic analyses of not only the companies, but the business model and market share potential of each, as well as a thorough valuation scenario analysis. One of these companies will probably take over portable computing, and I think it will pay to hitch onto the right one. The next Microsoft is in the making. Hey, Microsoft may even be the next Microsoft. Don't sleep on them, although it does appear that they have been asleep themselves. We won't know until the Windows Mobile 7 OS is released. I recommend all who are interested in this tech, media or investments send the link to this article around the web, for it is one of the few (if not the only) truly unbiased reviews of the products that compete with Apple in the ultra portable and handheld space.

An Overview of the New Windows to the Web

376 - blog

From the top left hand corner, clockwise: The Amazon Kindle 2, Asus EEE PC, Apple IPad, Archos 5 Internet tablet, HTC Touch Pro2, Apple Itouch 3rd Generation, Archos 9 Internet Tablet, Sony Vaio. The paper under the Apple product is a testament to the viral marketing ability of Apple. My son did not want his ITouch to touch the floor!!!