GlobalSpeculation.com
Bargain hunting for the sport

You can argue with defective reasoning as I have in my life, or you can just let it be — like I’m going to. The fact is that you can make a lot of money by buying companies cheap. Or, at least I can. Or, at least I believe I can. I don’t claim to come up with my own material myself. Credit is due to Viking86 in allowing me to mostly use his cheatsheets. I was jotting down notes on reasons to own a few companies that I own, and I figured that they were worth sharing.
The case for China Armco (AMEX: CNAM):
1. Financial Backing
On June 11, 2010 China Armco Metals, Inc. (“we”, “us” or “our”) entered into a Guaranty Cooperation Agreement with Henan Chaoyang Steel Co., Ltd. (“Henan Chaoyang”), a related party, in order to provide additional liquidity to meet our anticipated capital requirements to fuel the expected growth of our recently launched scrap metal recycling facility and the expansion of our metal ore trading business in the coming years. Under the terms of this guaranty, Henan Chaoyang agreed to provide unlimited joint guarantees to our subsidiary, Armet (Lianyungang) Renewable Resources Co., Ltd., for up to five (5) years for a few credit lines below (I’ve adjusted them):

a. Bank of China Lianyungang Branch’s project loan in the amount of RMB 90 million (approximately $13.2 million) which was guaranteed in 2009,
b. Bank of Communications Lianyungang Branch loan in the amount of RMB 50 million (approximately $7.3 million) which was approved on June 10, 2010 and is in the process of closing,
c. Bank of Jiangsu loan in the amount of RMB 30 million (approximately $4.4 million) which is pending lender approval, and

d. ING Bank, N.V. Hong Kong Branch, $15,000,000 line of credit till Dec. 7, 2010.
e. Bank of China’s additional loan for working capital of RMB 130 million (approximately $19.0 million) which is pending lender approval. (This is in addition to the $13M of above)
f. *Also note that they were trying to renew the $12M facility through DBS (Hong Kong) Limited in March 31,2010
The Financial Backing Totals $39.9M as of right now and $70.9M in potential loans pending approval (Not sure about the $12M DBS as it wasn’t mentioned in the last 8-K. This is equivalent to $4.34 in stock price using the fully diluted shares below.
2. Guidance
a. China Armco Metals, Inc Reaffirms FY 2010 Guidance
Monday, 17 May 2010 07:11pm EDT
China Armco Metals, Inc reaffirmed its fiscal 2010 guidance and expects revenue to exceed $220 million with net income exceeding $12 million.
b. This breaks out to $0.74 in earnings for 2010 given the sharecount below. This is also implying 5.4% net margins. Historically, CNAM is pushing 7% margins and back when Gary Liu from China Direct was their IR, he was hinting at higher margins for their new line of business. I’m not crazy in thinking this way, am I? I was advised around 8-12% net margins on their new business line http://www.chinavesting.com/stocks/CNAM/DueDilligence.pdf
c. It is my understanding that they can easily expand using available land nearby. Given the current capacity, and the latest available prices, we are looking at $400M top line without expansion
3. Big Purchases
a. The CEO recently bought $2,000,000 (400,000 shares) at $5 on June 30, 2010. (These CEO purchases, especially this one could indicate one of two things: 1. that the company is in need of cash and the CEO needed to give the company $2M to finance something, or 2. That the CEO believes that buying the stock at $5 is a good way to say, “Hey, look over here, we are a steal!” [Anyone get that joke?])
b. The CEO also bought $5,000,000 (1,000,000 shares) at $5 on April 14, 2010.
c. Private Placement bought $10,000,016 (1,538,464 shares) at $6.50 May 28, 2010.
i. There are 1,538,464 5-year warrants at $7.50 (Will bring in $11,538,480).
4. Shares Outstanding
a. My calculations are rough, but I’m guessing 14.8M shares not including warrants and 16.3M shares fully diluted (not including the employee compensation programs initiated late 2009).
b. Further, on April 20, 2010 we entered into a Securities Purchase Agreement with nine accredited and institutional investors for the sale of 1,538,464 shares of our common stock at an offering price of $6.50 per share resulting in net proceeds to us of $9,112,973. We believe that we are in a well-capitalized position to finance our continued expansion.

Other resources: Notes on Apollo
http://www.proactiveinvestors.com.au/companies/news/7901/apollo-minerals-has-much-to-gain-from-china-armco-minings-investment-7901.html
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=52316755
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=52295630

Useful Resource for valuation:
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=52209895&txt2find=cnam|2011
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=48486365
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=47780898
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=47873212&txt2find=cnam|margins
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=47778476
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=48496837
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=47386839&txt2find=cnam|12|margin

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My Forecast:

My Base Guidance: http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=49290164
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=47386839&txt2find=cnam|12|margin

2010 & 2011 valuation model with revised FD :

I have revised my valuation model of CNAM for 2010 & 2011 taking into account full dilution including all 3.076M new offering shares (half stock and half warrants) on top of the 4.7M old dilutive shares for the worst possible scenario in order to come up with a conservative eps projection. This scenario results in a FD= 16.97M shares for 2010 and FD= 17.86M shares for 2011 compared to 10.1M O/S reported in the 2009 10K.

1) the new 2010 contract value for recycling is already $100M (10 months of 23,000 Tons each to be delivered b/w Mar and Dec 10 at $435/Ton value, 2) 2009 revenue = 86.9M representing a 57% yoy growth of the distribution business, 3) net margins for both 2008 and 2009 was 6% without the most recent sourcing contract for brazilian manganese ore securing 16 months of supply at a low price and the more recent multi-year contract with ATT securing the supply of different metal ore types from different countries at a favorable price in the face of a predicted 40% avg price increase of ores in 2010. This all means that the distro business will enjoy a nice increase in both revenue and margin as compared to previous years.

Based on the announced plan to ramp up capacity of the new recycling plant to 100% capacity = 1M Tons/yr by 4Q, we can assume the following 2010 quarterly production based on a linear ramp up:

1Q= 10% capacity= 25 KT (roughly equal to 1st month of the new contract=23KT)
2Q= 40% capacity= 100 KT
3Q= 70% capacity= 175 KT
4Q= 100%capacity= 250 KT

Since the $100M contract will deliver 69 KT per quarter starting April 2010, there will be some excess production that can be sold to the market. Assuming only 1/3 of the excess production per quarter is sold at the current market price of $440/ton, I came up with a total of 46M annual revenue for the excess production of recycled scrap. For the old distro business, I assume a 15% revenue increase vs. 2009 resulting in 100M revenue. I also assume 8-12% net margin for the recycling business and 5-7% for the distro business to determine the net income. For 2011, I assume 90% of recycling plant capacity will be sold at a very conservative 2011 estimated price of $460/ton (based on the existing plant only, no capacity expansion included in estimate a, but is included in a totally wild guess b) and a 20% increase of distribution revenue vs. 2010. This results in 414M for the recycling business and 120M for the distro business for 2011. Here are the results:

Total 2010 production= 550 KT
Excess production after satisfying new contract= 550-230= 320 KT
assuming they can sell half of that for the year to other clients at same price of $440/Ton, results in 320×440/2=$70M

(These Estimates are non-GAAP)
Low End Estimate 2010
2010 rev= new contract + sale of excess prod + existing reselling business(assumed =82M in 2009)
rev= 100 + 0 + 100= 246M
2010 net inc low end= 100(.08) + 0(.05) + 100(.05)M=$13.0M
2010 net inc low end EPS = $15.3/16.97M FD = $0.766

Realistic Estimate 2010
2010 rev= new contract + sale of excess prod + existing reselling business(assumed =82M in 2009)
rev= 100 + 46 + 100= 246M
2010 net inc low end= 100(.10) + 46(.06) + 100(.06)M=$18.76M
2010 net inc low end EPS = $18.76/16.97M FD = $1.11

High End Estimate
2010 rev= new contract + sale of excess prod + existing reselling business(assumed =82M in 2009)
rev= 100 + 46 + 100= 246M
2010 net high end= 100(.12) + 46(.07) + 100(.07)M=$22.22M
2010 net inc high end EPS = $22.22/16.97M FD = $1.31

2011 Estimates
Low End
2011 rev= recycling + (sale of excess prod doesn’t exist=0) + existing reselling business(assumed =82M in 2009)
rev= 414 + 120= 534M
2011 net inc low end= 100(.08) + 100(.05)M=$39.12M
2011 low end EPS = $39.12/17.87M FD = $2.18

2011 Estimates
Realistic
2011 rev= recycling + (sale of excess prod doesn’t exist=0) + existing reselling business(assumed =82M in 2009)
rev= 414 + 120= 534M
2011 net inc = 414(.10) + 120(.06)M=$48.6M
2011 EPS = $48.6/17.87M FD = $2.71

2011 Estimates
High End
2011 rev= recycling + (sale of excess prod doesn’t exist=0) + existing reselling business(assumed =82M in 2009)
rev= 414 + 120= 534M
2011 net inc high end= 414(.12) + 120(.07)M=$58.08M
2011 high end EPS = $58.08/17.87M FD = $3.25

Here’s the beauty of the whole thing… Imagine that they double their capacity for their recycled scrap business via expansion?
2013
Realistic
2013 rev= recycling + (sale of excess prod doesn’t exist=0) + existing reselling business(assumed =82M in 2009)
rev= 828 + 150= 978M
2013 net inc = 828(.10) + 150(.06)M=$90.0M
2013 EPS = $90.0/20.0M FD = $4.50

The alternative argument if you still think that this is expensive is to use a reverse argument.

A $4 stock without any growth should have earnings of $0.50 to be in equilibrium. Last year’s net income was around $5M. The current fully diluted market cap of 16.97M Shares * $3.63 is $61M. That said, note their guidance is $12M. That puts the market cap  at $96M for a company that isn’t going to grow past that. So, basically we are trading at a P/E of 5.65 for a company that is growing at over 100% in net income in 2010, and likely to grow at least 50% in 2011 (Without doing anything that they haven’t planned to do).

My friends sometimes are confused to discover that I’ve turned down fairly large investors. Their argument usually is, “Good god man! What are you thinking?”

There is a particular investor that I try to avoid. So far, the experiment is working beautifully. This type of investor usually introduces himself/herself to me with the phrase, “What are your returns over the last [Insert Time Period Here].” Another common phrase is, “If I give you [Insert Dollar Amount Here], how much can you make me in the next [Insert Time Period Here].”

To be honest, most of my strength comes from knowing a few of my weaknesses. Part of this is anticipating the weaknesses of others. The problem with the statements above is that I find that this is the type of investor that is prone to panic at the bottom and trying to put more money in at the top. To illustrate this more effectively, I want to kind of talk about how this has worked in my experience.

I am 100% confident that when it is time to buy, all in, that the dollar value of whatever accounts I will be managing (if liquidated at that moment) will be significantly lower than they were the month before. When people see their account numbers go down, they get afraid. If you study mutual fund flows, most of the people out there take a lot of money out at bottoms and put it back in at market tops. It’s my belief that the average mutual fund investor loses money. Knowing this, my goal is to avoid the investor that seeks a track record and disregards the philosophy behind it. It’s my belief that it is this investor that will force you to sell when it is time to buy. Since the goal is to be able to buy low and sell high, working with people who may force you to sell low is not advantageous, and thus, I avoid this type of investor.

When stocks are low, and cheap: they naturally don’t want to buy them. After the gains have been realized and you have a “track record” suddenly everyone wants to buy! What you usually run into is people who want to buy after the money is made — as if there is still more money to be made.

So, how do I do it? Well, I don’t know really. I just keep talking about the stuff that interests me. Over time, people with similar interests have by chance run into me and we’ve exchanged ideas. I’m a believer in the whole “not screwing up” philosophy — that is to say that as long as I don’t screw up, people won’t abandon me. In this case, knowing that markets gyrate wildly, picking your investors is as important as picking your stocks. I think I’ve done an incredibly good job of that. I work with some great people.

I like this guy:

http://wefe5433.blogspot.com/p/about-me.html

I was asked the other day, for probably the thousandth time, what made you the way you are? I’ve attached a 4 page .pdf document at the end of this. Honestly, I’m just a summation or product if you will, of all my previous experiences. Yes, it is true that I don’t know how on earth I got an MBA. Statistically, I should have failed several classes that in my opinion didn’t make one bit of sense, but are considered by most entry level Corporate Finance classes. These were required courses, and I did a good job of blending in with the rest of my classmates. My goal was to slide under the radar undetected and simply squeak by. My grandma requested that I finish my MBA and honestly… that’s the majority reason I did. Great Success.

Without going into lots of depth in all my life experiences where I’ve used basic statistical analysis, the Socratic method, scientific theory, and empirical evidence to guide my logic and reasoning — I’ll just pull the one that cracked the bull-whip and caused the transformation within me that can be summarized by a quick quote:

Our default reflex is that the world knows what it is doing, and that is extravagant nonsense, -Jeremy Grantham

http://glenbradford.com/files/Stocks/EurekaMoment.pdf

Yep, the headline says it all.

When a stock bottoms, it goes up from there.

Why?

DJSP, CEO is buying, he paid something like $6.20 for his shares recently.

CNAM’s CEO just bought $2M of his company @ $5

LPIH is just a bottom.

“They pretty much ask what I think they should buy,” he said. “If they have balls they buy it, and if they don’t, they watch it go up.”

I ran into resistance while I was trying to score some points on the board for value investors in the land of academia.

I am curious if any of my readers would know of any MBA program that would be interested in spearheading an initiative like this… I’d be glad to get down and dirty and lift this off the ground.

http://www.glenbradford.com/Buffettology101.pdf

See the emails below that made me give up (temporarily). I’m not into waging wars, I’m into helping those who can help themselves. I realized that I wasn’t making or going to make any headway when I did make the meeting and was asked to see psychological counseling. That’s a leading indicator that people are biased to writing you off. Do note that I am part of Purdue’s President’s Council. I believe in Purdue. I’m a Boilermaker. But, you won’t see me support anything I don’t believe in, as it isn’t in line with empowering success.

——————————
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Glen,

Donations to Krannert are always welcome, of course. However we do not sell spots in the curriculum in return for donations.
Guest speakers in classes are also welcome, assuming they have been invited by legitimate faculty at the faculty’s discretion.
None of this changes the fact that you are not and cannot be a legitimate faculty member and therefore cannot be involved in any way in offering a class.
If there is demand for your services I suggest you continue to pursue offering them independently of Krannert and Purdue.

I am not personally aware of any finance elective that you have taken – several of the faculty members that teach our finance electives indicate that they have not had you in a class. This has no impact on the above discussion – even if you had taken all of our electives you would not be able to teach a class. However, I noted that you list yourself on your resume as having a finance concentration; I do hope that you will be sure to have taken the 10 elective credits of finance that are required to make that claim.

Diane Denis

_____________________________________________
From: Bradford, Glen Richard
Sent: Wednesday, February 24, 2010 1:39 PM
To: Denis, Diane K
Subject: RE: Joy – Proposal

Diane,

Thanks so much for your quick response. I’m aware that you have structured an incredibly strong academic curriculum. I’m presently taking it and learning a lot.

I was curious that if I was able to find a professor willing and able, if I could somehow get something like this going. On that same note:

1. Would donations to Purdue assist?
2. Would getting prestigious alumni and people on board assist?
3. Is there anything that I can do that would assist in this cause?

Ideally, I would run a test on 2nd years for 0 credits (for fun), and have a faculty member sit in on these in module 4 and go with it from there. If it’s successful, possibly it could become an elective?

My goal here isn’t to change everything and be a radical. The goal is to just gauge potential demand from the students (which I am seeing a lot of), and collaborating to see how I can meet it, or see if Krannert can help empower success.

Glen

_____________________________________________
From: Denis, Diane K
Sent: Wednesday, February 24, 2010 12:53 PM
To: Bradford, Glen Richard
Subject: RE: Joy – Proposal

The finance area has put together a carefully sequenced academic curriculum – this course does not fit into that curriculum.
In addition, you do not in any way meet the faculty qualifications required by Krannert and by the AACSB, which is the business school accreditation body.

Diane Denis

_____________________________________________
From: Bradford, Glen Richard
Sent: Wednesday, February 24, 2010 11:22 AM
To: Denis, Diane K
Subject: RE: Joy – Proposal

Diane,

Joy pointed me in your direction.

I know that I’ve emailed you previously to get a syllabus for at least one course you teach. I’ve talked to Joy about this and I’ve given a presentation to students and had 50% who wanted to take the course if available.

A little about myself. I’ve been paying my college tuition by trading in the stock market. I’ve run portfolios that are diversified across 10+ companies, all of which aren’t losing money (which some would argue is impossible) and I didn’t lose money June 2008-June 2009 (market crash).

I wanted to help out Krannert in differentiating ourselves from other MBA schools and put us in the top 5 MBA programs in the world. This class I am proposing would be an elective that I firmly believe would do just that. It’s the culmination of many years of my own research and I want to enable MBA students to be able to see the huge unharnessed potential out there that they can harness today.

<< File: Buffettology101.pdf >>
Glen Bradford
CEO ARM Holdings LLC
www.glenbradford.com
www.armholdingsllc.com

None of the above is intended as investment advice. I can’t guarantee the information I gathered is from an accurate source. I may buy or sell any stock or security without prior notice.
Disclaimer: http://www.glenbradford.com/disclaimer.php

_____________________________________________
From: Dietz, Joy G
Sent: Wednesday, February 24, 2010 7:11 AM
To: Bradford, Glen Richard
Subject: RE: Joy – Proposal

Dr. Diane Denis is the area coordinator for Finance.

Joy Dietz

_____________________________________________
From: Bradford, Glen Richard
Sent: Tuesday, February 23, 2010 6:29 PM
To: Dietz, Joy G
Subject: RE: Joy – Proposal

Who did you suggest I meet with to try to get this off the ground?

Glen

_____________________________________________
From: Dietz, Joy G
Sent: Monday, February 22, 2010 1:20 PM
To: Bradford, Glen Richard
Subject: RE: Joy – Proposal

Thank you for filling me in.

Joy Dietz

_____________________________________________
From: Bradford, Glen Richard
Sent: Monday, February 22, 2010 12:09 PM
To: Dietz, Joy G
Subject: RE: Joy – Proposal

I’ve been running around the local banks this morning, otherwise I would have made this meeting.

With regards to promoting my own business using the Krannert facilities, I’m trying to do my best to open the minds of the MBA students at Krannert and empower their success. I tried doing a lecture on Uncommon Sense, which I recorded and put on YouTube, but I discovered that my target audience isn’t at Purdue. I did my best to design a class that would open the minds of Krannert MBAs to put us in the top 5. I’m confident that if implemented, we would be there in 5 years. Just because it’s possible and easy does not mean that it’s going to happen. That’s why I’m doing the proposal today to get feedback to see if I should change my approach.

Glen

_____________________________________________
From: Dietz, Joy G
Sent: Monday, February 22, 2010 7:36 AM
To: Bradford, Glen Richard
Subject: RE: Joy – Proposal

Glen,

I cannot be at the presentation, and I’m concerned about today’s event. It seems like you are promoting your own business using Krannert facilities.

I’ve been wanting to talk to you and think that we should talk today. I’ve sent you a meeting request for 10:30 a.m.

Joy Dietz

_____________________________________________
From: Bradford, Glen Richard
Sent: Saturday, February 20, 2010 2:25 PM
To: Dietz, Joy G
Subject: Joy – Proposal

Joy,

This has been several years in the making. I’ll be giving and video recording a presentation on it at 3:00pm on Monday in RAWL 3070. You are welcome to attend. I invite you to bring influential colleagues.

I am confident that for each student that takes this, on average an extra $1,000,000+ will be made by them in their lifetime.

I know there has just been a huge shift in the Krannert Curriculum. I think that in 5 years time if this class is added to the curriculum, the value of a Krannert MBA would put us in the top 5.

http://www.glenbradford.com/Buffettology101.pdf

I’ve been to several case competitions and the financial assessment skills of the MBAs at the competition are never more than textbook caliber. My mission in life is to empower success. This is probably the easiest way to empower hundreds of MBAs that I can ever think of.

Thanks for consideration,

Glen Bradford
CEO ARM Holdings LLC
www.glenbradford.com
www.armholdingsllc.com

I’m guilty of randomly opening to pages of Security Analysis by Ben Graham and reading a few of them before bed every night.

This night, something was different. Chapter 41:

A study done by the Business school at the University of Chicago came upon 2 conclusions:
1. Low-price stocks tend to fluctuate relatively more than high-price stocks.
2. In a “bull” market the low-price stocks tend to go up relatively more than high-price stocks, and they do not lose these superior gains in the recessions which follow. In other words, the downward movement of low-price stocks is less than proportional to their upward movement, when compared with the upward and downward movement of high-price stocks.

Do note that this study was 1926-1935, so the data is limited. I say, so what? I think it’s more accurate than one would think. Graham takes it to the next level! This is very important.

Some Reasons Why Most Buyers of Low-Priced Issues Lose Money. The pronounced liking of the public for “cheap stocks” would therefore seem to have a sound basis in logic. Yet it is undoubtedly true that most people who buy low-priced stocks lose money on their purchases. Why is this so? The underlying reason is that the public buys issues that are sold to it, and the sales effort is put forward to benefit the seller and not the buyer. In consequence the bulk of the low-priced purchases made by the public are of the wrong kind; i.e., they do not provide the real advantages of this security type.

This is why Tim Sykes does a good job of making a great deal of money by shorting penny stocks that people recommend to him… and it’s why I go out and find my stocks by sorting through thousands as opposed to getting tips at the watering hole, from the hairdresser, from the taxi driver, or from spam emails claiming the best stock ever.

Back when I was growing up as a Hoosier in Indiana, I frequently played this basketball game called “Around the World.” Basically, you shoot 3-pointers as you work your way around the 3-point line. I wanted to use this concept to illustrate how easy it is to build a portfolio of undervalued companies if you’re looking hard enough. I frequently get asked questions like, “What’s the best dividend stock?,” “How do you protect yourself against a double dip?,” “How do you invest outside the USA?”

(Note that the day I wrote this, PSEC dropped the dividend. Gross!)
The corner shot. Prospect Capital Corporation (NASDAQ: PSEC) is a company that I’ve come to own because they acquired Patriot Capital, a company that I owned. I figure if they are smart enough to acquire Patriot Capital, I might as well take a look at Prospect. I did. It really doesn’t take a genius to figure out that this is a steal. I’m not that smart, but I can sit on a 15% dividend, a P/E less than 10, and growth that you have to see for yourself. Take a look (below). Nothin’ but net.

Working towards the middle. I’m a convert. I believe that peak-oil will cause oil analysts to “re-evaluate” their price forecasts where supply determines price more than demand. Longwei Petroleum (OTC:LPIH) may feel like a 3-point shot but to me it feels like a layup. Uplisting to the AMEX is imminent as all the requirements are met. 2011’s $0.71 EPS isn’t bad for a stock less than $3 that is growing rapidly and helps insulate you from the high prices of peak-oil that I think will become more visible around early 2012. Swish.

The middle shot. China Armco Metals (NYSE: CNAM) is not a company that you can price using past performance. In fact, past performance is a terrible indicator of future performance in this situation. Their ability to strategically position themselves with lines of credit greater than their Market Capitalization is enviable. Most companies in this space can’t even touch this. We recently saw double digit prices and I’m confident we will see them again. Backboard ballin’.

The far edge shot. I just flew down to Miami, FL to visit DJSP Enterprises (Nasdaq: DJSP). The decline in stock price likely came with a few big players getting out and going short. Recently the CEO of DJSP stepped in and began buying a notable portion of the float on the open market. In my opinion, the wave of foreclosures is being postponed by various government programs. Give it 180 days. There will be a lot of people scrambling to get back into foreclosure processing companies like DJSP. I’m confident that DJSP will get back to business with their merged, larger client. When a stock bottoms, it has to go up. DJSP bottomed at $5. Bounce off the ground, backboard, net!

Quick Shots. Look, I hate the idea of Gold. That said, I’d rather hold gold than any currency printed by global governments if I had to pick for the next 5 years. SPDR Gold Trust ETF (NYSE: GLD) is one way to play this. If I was you, I’d take cash to a local gold boutique and buy real gold with cash — just make sure you know what you’re doing. To me, China letting the Yuan float is really them saying, “We are tired of buying overvalued US Treasuries.” Go forth and short them with ProShares Ultrashort 20+ year Treasury ETF (NYSE: TBT). Also, it’s almost a race to short the Australian Dollar. The housing bubble is in Australia, not China. Kiss’d the rim.

Disclosure: Glen Bradford and his managed entities own Prospect Capital, Longwei Petroleum, China Armco, and DJSP Enterprises.

Feel free to disagree with me, but I’m just going to assume from the start that you want money. Given the two options of wanting more or less money, most people want more. That’s a lousy argument for me to use for justification, but it helps to have assumptions like this.

So, I’m asked a lot of questions about money. I just want to help people help themselves. I’m not here to help people that don’t pay it forward. So, although it’s incredibly unlikely that anyone who reads me would find themselves asking the question, (Q1) “Why don’t I have any money?” in vain. At this point, I think that most of the people that read me would be more likely to ask the question, (Q2) “What should I do with my money?” That’s at least the right start. What is money?

Money, in my opinion, is a store of value with which you can buy someone else’s effort at a particular moment in time. To get it, you generally have to assist someone else in doing something. So, if you are struggling with Q1, you really should be asking yourself Q2. Most people I know make at least some money. Much past that, it’s what you do with it that determines whether you amass a lot of it or not. Obviously, spending less than you make is a good start to building up to Q2. That said, if you want to have a lot of money, like I am assuming you do, figuring out how to help others is a good start. People that help society the most tend to acquire large sums of money.

At that point, you may ask yourself again, what’s the point of having large sums of money? Well, those that do make the decisions on how society allocates its time and effort. So, you have people that helped a lot of other people getting to make larger and larger decisions on behalf of society. Maybe you can start by trying to help these people help everyone else? I mean, that’s what I do. Was that helpful?

Hey, I’m Glen Bradford and I could be on your team. I specialize in questioning everything, taking nothing for granted, valuing thousands of different opportunities, and picking the best ones to put my money into. I guess I must be pretty good at this, cause it’s paid my college from scratch, allowed me to write for TheStreet.com, and other people are giving me their money to invest. I rarely talk about what’s popular, because I’m usually talking about things before they happen — and in terms of popularity, I would be a lot more ‘cool’ if I talked about things that everyone else was talking about. Keynes puts it best, “Worldly wisdom teaches that it is better for reputation to fail conventionally than to succeed unconventionally.” So, what should you avoid?

1. Don’t buy US Treasuries. Inflation, likely through monetizing the deficit, is going to surprise anyone who thought these were a store of value. The only people that should be buying these are foreign central banks to give their local economies a stronger export advantage. At some point in the future, you may want to short them by buying TBT (ProShares UltraShort 20+ Year Treasuries).

2. Don’t only invest in the USA. The long term outlook for the dollar is quite bearish. In fact, over the next decade, emerging economies will outperform developed economies on a relative basis. Buy US Listed Chinese Microcaps. The valuations here are ridiculous. Across the board a monkey can throw darts and hit 5-year 5-baggers. Most of them are priced to go bankrupt and are stick it to the man with double digit growth rates. I’ll let the rest of the clueless investors fight over fractions of a percent in annual returns.

3. Don’t short oil. There are two leading scenarios: Oil will double in the next 5 years or global economies will slump due to higher energy prices or both. When supply drops and demand is relatively inelastic at the current prices, the price rises to regulate the demand. Also note that it is likely that the US shifts to natural gas, probably starting with fleets for starters, but eventually moving more mainstream.

4. Don’t bet nominal housing prices will decrease. A lot of the stabilization has come from higher home prices. If home prices, regardless of the huge oncoming invisibly foggy wave of foreclosures, start to slide, the FED will combat this by printing more money to increase their nominal values. Interest rates are nil right now and can only go higher if housing stabilizes, but higher interest rates squeeze housing. Good luck raising rates, FED.

5. Don’t buy and hold. Historically, in periods where inflation rises above what it was forecasted to be, prices are more unstable and markets become more volatile. Be ready to trade or have someone who is ready to trade for you. Mutual funds are going to suffer as suckers sell bottoms and buy tops — just like they always do.

6. Don’t expect perpetual growth. The growth that we’ve experienced since the 1960’s in my opinion results from cheap energy sources. Fact. The ones we use the most are set to get more expensive, fairly rapidly.

7. Don’t bet on the European Union staying together. It’s likely that the irresponsible constituents will get kicked out after they are systematically deleveraged. That is, unless George Soros and others like him step in and profit from forcing them to panic.

Well, if you can avoid making those mistakes or at least have an awareness of them, you’ll likely come out ahead of where you would be otherwise. Blind diversification protects you against ignorance, but it’s not going to make you money like it has in the past. The best form of protection for the individual investor is going to be their understanding of the extent to which they don’t know what is going to happen. Overconfidence reigns supreme and people love making deals, even if they are foolish ones. Don’t be a fool. Avoid losing. That said, I can only help you if you can help yourself.

Disclosure: No positions.