Turkey Day Portfolio

It's been awhile since I've posted my non retirement portfolio. Here's a quick snap shot. I didn't have time to add the % holding or holding period for each security. Anyways, I can say that the multi baggers (+100%) make up a huge percentage of this portfolio. To make the huge multi baggers, you've got to buy and hold. You may get decent returns in quick trading, but you'll never hit the big home runs. I'm looking to get back into J Crew (Ticker: JCG), they've posted really good numbers.

Ticker	% Return
Amgen (AMGN)	-5.25%
Biogen Idec (BIIB)	-7.26%
Boston Scientific (BSX)	-48.64%
Celgene (CELG)	+13.69%
Goldman Sachs (GS)	+16.37%
Genentech (DNA)	-1.71%
Genzyme (GENZ)	+277.26%
Invitrogen (IVGN)	+243.40%
Microsoft (MSFT)	-23.89%
Nymex (NMX)	-3.22%
Qiagen (QGEN)	+302.30%
Pfizer (PFE)	-4.49%
Sears Holding (SHLD)	+2.40%
Vertex Pharmaceuticals (VRTX)	+21.33%
NET UNREALIZED GAIN	+100.05%

Got Spirit Aerosystems and Sold

To my surprise, I was offered a few shares of Spirit Aerosystems (Ticker: SPR) ipo at $26 per share. I promptly flipped the stock and generated a net gain of 9.61%. I continued to trim the weeds today by selling half my holding in Boston Scientific (Ticker: BSX) and generated a net loss of 28.33%. Ouch! Finally, I picked up some Sears Holding (Ticker: SHLD) at $172.93. Ok, I've been trading too much and making my broker rich. I'm going to slow down a bit and see how the new positions work out.

Spirit Aerosystems Holdings IPO

I'm going to play the ipo game once again. This time, I'm trying to get my hands on Spirit Aerosystems Holdings (Ticker: SPR). They make wing components, fuselages and after market parts for Boeing and Airbus. The business is great right now with Boeing, but so so with Airbus. The company does 90% of its biz with Boeing. The initial price range for this ipo was $23-25. The shares priced tonight above the range at $26. This is a good sign and the stock should pop tomorrow. We'll see if they're nice enough to give me some ipo shares.

Sepracor Out, Nymex In

I finally decided to sell Sepracor (Ticker: SEPR) today at $54.13 for a 11.68% loss. It's not fun to take a loss, but I'll take it. I picked up a few shares of Nymex Holdings (Ticker: NMX) at $137.44. Yeah, a bit on the pricey side, but we'll see... I'll continue to prune my portfolio by getting rid of some more losers and reducing my biotech holdings just a tad.

Next Bio Take Over?

Is another biotech getting ready to be bought out? The market thinks Trimeris (Ticker: TRMS), which sells Fuzeon – an HIV inhibitor, is in play. The CEO just got the boot and they’re aggressively cutting costs with layoffs. The company is looking to earn $1.00 and generate $20 million in cash in 2007. The stock is trading around $11.80 and it is very cheap if the company can earn $1 in 2007. The bet is that Roche may make a move on this company since they already have a marketing agreement to sell Fuzeon. If there is a buyout, it’ll happen soon. Here’s what one of the analyst thinks about this potential buyout: "If this hasn't been resolved by [the fourth-quarter conference call], I'm going back to a sell' rating," said Jindal (analyst with ThinkEquity Growth Partners), who rated Trimeris "accumulate". It’s an interesting speculation, but as a rule I NEVER EVER invest in potential takeovers.

Hot IPO

Yeah, Nymex Holdings is going to pop big time on Friday, but I'm not referring to this ipo. I'm actually referring to Sony's PS3 release on Friday. The 60 gig with wifi retails for $600 and if you check out eBay, people are placing bids of $2300+. That's a nice 280%+ return. I'm sure the Nymex will do well, but not as well as the PS3 for a quick one day pop. Unfortunately, I won't be able to get my hands on either the Nymex ipo or the PS3. People are already setting up tents in front of the Best Buy store for a shot at the PS3. But seriously, I may nibble on some Nymex once it starts trading this Friday.

Barf Portfolio

It’s tax loss selling season. Here’s my barf, barf portfolio… You can't do better than this!

Ticker	% Return
Biogen Idec (BIIB)	-13.81%
Boston Scientific (BSX)	-44.36%
Microsoft (MSFT)	-25.67%
Pfizer (PFE)	-7.48%
Sepracor (SEPR)	-15.19%

Biogen (Ticker: BIIB) and Pfizer (Ticker: PFE) are keepers for the time being. I see more upside for Microsoft (Ticker: MSFT) with the upcoming release of Vista and Office Suite. That leaves Boston Scientific (Ticker: BSX) and Sepracor (Ticker: SEPR) on the chopping blocks. I piled up some hefty gains this year and need to dump some losers to minimize the tax bill to Uncle Sam. Sooo which one will it be...???

401K Update

It's been a looong time since I've updated my 401K portfolio so here's a quick peek. I've been contributing 18% of my salary into the 401K plan for the past 9 years. I'll be reducing it to 6% (maximum company match) once January rolls around in order to raise funds for the condo purchase in the end of 2007. As you can see, I favor the small and mid cap funds.

Tanox Gets Taken Out

After the bell today, Genentech (Ticker: DNA) announces that it will acquire Tanox (Ticker: TNOX) for $20 per share or $919 million in cash. I like this acquisition by Genentech. The company will no longer have to pay Tanox royalties for Xolair and gains access to Tanox's monoclonal antibody technology / pipeline. The M&A trend in biotech continues to move forward and I see more to come. Genentech is my favorite big cap biotech. I also like Celgene (Ticker: CELG) and Vertex (Ticker: VRTX) in the mid cap space.

Got Some NYSE

I've been eyeing the New York Stock Exchange (Ticker: NYX) for the past few weeks and today I decided to pick up a few shares @ $82.29 for my IRA. Today, the company announced a restructuring and got rid of 500 jobs. This was the right move in creating a lean mean money machine. This is the beginning of the big move. Hey, I've always wanted to own a seat on the NYSE. Now I own a small piece.

Short MasterCard? No....

MasterCard (Ticker: MA) continues to advance strongly. It shot up another 6.70% to close at $96.30 on strong volume. Jim Cramer from The Street.com had a good explanation for this run up in MasterCard (click: here). Apparently, this is a heavily shorted stock and they made the wrong bet. The shorts are just getting their heads handed to them and they’re helping to fuel this run up. There's still more room to go on the upside...

TD Ameritrade Down AGAIN!

What’s going on with TD Ameritrade? Can't log on! This is not the way to run an on line brokerage business. Reliability is a must. Their excuse is network problems related to the system integration between Ameritrade and TD Waterhouse… blah… blah…blah… This is the second time this year where they had this issue. They should have learned something from the first time around. I’m just a bit annoyed. I’m going to take my business elsewhere.

MasterCard Wows Everyone

Wow! That’s all I can say about MasterCard’s (Ticker: MA) earnings. This morning the company released results, which far surpassed everyone’s expectations sending the stock up 14.80% to close at $85.07. The analysts were expecting the company to report top line numbers of $871.1 million and bottom line numbers of $1.07 instead the company reported $902 million and $1.42. The company beat by $0.35, Wow… My biggest mistake in handling this stock was to buy, sell, buy, sell, buy... instead of just buy and hold. This stock is going much much higher…