Wednesday, November 29, 2006

Water stocks- still the site leader – sign of things to come?

I have been saying for over a year that I would like to personally own a water company- that’s where I would put my own money. We still see water stocks as the leading inbound search phrase on our site consistently- backing up my thoughts.
As Mother Nature forced her hand with violent rain and wind storms causing turbidity issues, Vancouver recently had the largest boil water advisory in Canada for over a week
Bottled water prices varied at locations as supply and demand caused several locations to sell out. This was a short term problem in a major city area, and we saw the panic set in immediately. What are we going to do if the problems escalate on a global basis due to global warming, desertification, growing population, infrastructure problems and pollution ? Some say we could face water wars in the future.
I actually moved my spring water supply into the garage from the carport during our recent water crisis .
The investment community has used phrases like- water the next oil…
We can live without oil , but drinkable water is essential .
Personally, I would like to own a water source, but investing in water is the next best thing for now.

For more info visit our www.water-stocks.com portal

Wednesday, November 22, 2006

A time to be thankful, whether the market and your stocks are up or down

We can all find a reason to complain when we are loosing money on paper or in our accounts in the real estate or stock market, but think deeper at how fortunate we are compared to so many others, that we at least have the luxury to invest and take on risk.

As contrast, there are millions of people and a lot of them children, that staying alive is the risk. Finding food, water or medicine are the goals, vs. ours of building our wealth.

I am guilty of complaining, I admit it, but I also have a lot of days and moments when the reality of the news and conditions in the world slaps me in the face and says “snap out of it".

We are fortunate even in the midst of our capital losses. We are still in the game!
If you are winning- remember to give, share and spread the good fortune around to those in need.

Happy Thanksgiving to all…

Tuesday, November 14, 2006

New additions to our Renewable Energy Portal
This month the face of the renewable energy stocks portal - www.renewableenergystocks.com changes as OTCBB: XSNX leaves the site after being a featured company for two years and new companies- ZAP and Rotoblock join us this week.

ZAP (OTCBB: ZAAP) has been a leader in advanced transportation technologies since 1994, delivering over 90,000 vehicles to consumers in more than 75 countries. ZAP is at the forefront of fuel-efficient transportation with new technologies including energy efficient gas systems, hydrogen, electric, fuel cell, alcohol, hybrid and other innovative power systems. ZAP has structured its business activities in two parts: automotive portal and consumer products. The automotive portal will focus on building upon its independent distribution network by offering a line of electric and alternative fuel-efficient vehicles. Consumer products focus similarly on targeting new markets that advocate the use of advanced forms of transportation. The Company continues to expand its line of battery powered vehicles, scooters, off-road vehicles, mopeds and more, and has entered into the energy and electronics market with innovative battery technology. www.zapworld.com

Rotoblock Corporation (OTCBB: ROTB) is focused on the continued development and improvement of its energy efficient Oscillating Piston Engine to the state where its mechanical, ecological and economic viability leads to the profitable licensing of the manufacturer's rights to a proprietary patented design or a partnership for its manufacture. The Company was incorporated in Nevada, is headquartered in Santa Rosa, California, and has its operating labs in Vancouver, Canada. The Company has full rights to the patents of the original Oscillating Piston Engine and believes the Rotoblock Oscillating Piston Engine has particular and useful applications in developing countries such as China and India and will be including these areas in the marketing and commercialization phase of this engine. www.rotoblock.com



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Thursday, November 09, 2006

Water stocks- still the investors favorite

Investorideas.com has noted a growing trend following Hurricane Katrina, with inbound investor searches for the phrase “water stocks” and investing in water consistently dominating the diversified umbrella of sector portals – usually coming in at number 1,2 or 3 in terms of search rank


Water-stocks.com new featured company is WaterBank of America (OTCBB: WBKA), a manufacturer of hygienic ice cubes and bottled water with a strategy to create and acquire a “bank” of top quality springs to address global water scarcity problems.

WaterBank of America compensates Investorideas.com; see disclaimer on our site

To look at stocks in the sector
Visit Our Current List of Water Stocks in the Sector:
http://www.water-stocks.com/Water-Stocks/Stock_List.asp
Tech Stocks – Back In Favor

Investorideas.com has just initiated its Tech Stocks investor and industry portal - http://www.techsectorstocks.com


We have created stock directories for internet stocks – breaking them down into several sub categories including Internet Community (Social Networking) Stocks

We also have a directory of Semiconductor stocks , wireless, telecom and storage stocks.

Based on our usual formula for our investor and industry portals we have tried to create a destination where investors following the sector can start their due diligence with our resources and directories- but the bottom line decision is up to the investor or their broker !

Monday, November 06, 2006

The changing face of investor relations and the internet …

Ten years ago, when I started my firm our firm, Econ Investor Relations (prior to name change) offered public companies traditional IR and Pr services. Prior to using email on a regular basis and internet exposure, we would build a mail and fax list for shareholders and brokers following the company and send news out accordingly. We would republish news releases in Investors Business Daily, Barons and other investment papers and would see the shareholder list (NOBO) list rise in terms of number of shareholders. Direct communication by phone, following up, was critical. The internet played a minimal role in our services. In fact, my original website was AIMInvestor.com. It stood for “Analyzing Investors and Media “. AIM Mutual funds sent me a notice of suit for a Trade Mark Infringement for a substantial amount of $$ to change my website and relinquish the domain to them . It made no difference to me at the time, so I did in a heartbeat and Investorideas.com was born. As it turns out, now that I understand the power of the internet, it was a much better domain name in the long run!


Times have changed… Fast forward to today…
We have re-positioned our entire business model since 911 and phased out of traditional IR/PR and now focus on positioning companies within their industry sector and no longer perform IR services (we no longer take calls or emails from investors and brokers specific to individual companies)
We now operate our business online and it is 100% of my business model. Everything else we do supports our Investorideas.com hub of industry sector portals. The role has completely reversed from 10 years ago.

What we have learned in this transition:
We have found the life of a news release is shorter for investors – typically 2-3 days
Investors and brokers are very online savvy and can find news, research and info on the internet never found before
Message boards are more damaging to all parties than informative ( my opinion) and can be used to manipulate markets either way
The internet creates a more “fair” playing field for investors - news is immediate and so is disclosure in terms of requires SEC filings
Headlines with relevant key words are the most important part of the news release
Public companies that don’t keep their web site current , updated and search engine friendly are missing out on potential investors and business
The internet is a tool for inaccurate information- not only on message boards, so- investors need to determine validity of source
What’s hot in terms of industry sectors investors follow changes quickly – trends shift quickly from commodities to nanotech to renewable so staying on top of the news is imperative
Or… you can visit our site daily and sign up for some of our news letters and let us do part of the research for you

Saturday, November 04, 2006

Ethics and the Stock Market- can they co-exist?

I feel a bit like Kerry Bradshaw sitting writing this column- bringing up questions of ethics in a world dominated by greed and fear – it seems as complicated and non- answerable as some of her dating questions.

I have been in this business for over twenty five years and think I have “seen it all” until yet another dishonorable or inept member of the human race proves me wrong.
It’s been my experience over the years , that failures and resulting losses in the stock market are a combination of : lack of character, lack of ability, lack of execution and lack of funding on the part of all players from the investor to the CEO, and to firms like mine caught somewhere in the middle.

I have heard every lie, every excuse and every reason for ignorance imaginable. I once had a fund manager complain about a client we dealt with years ago, when their stock was spiraling downward. I asked him if the read the SEC filings referencing the convertible debt on the books – with no “floor”. His responded indignantly he did not read SEC filings! So there is one example ( out of many I could expound upon) of investors trusting a fund manager that did no due diligence, a company that entered into a bad deal to satisfy funding needs at the time , and my firm caught in the middle of a pile of crap at the end.

So maybe I should do more due diligence and pick better clients? With the recent onslaught of corporate SEC investigation and hedge fund investigations, there have been SEC filings/ charges against some of the previously most respected and well thought of companies and individuals in the investment community.

Would I have taken on Martha Stewarts Company on as a client pre-SEC? Yes – and I would now as well.

I think we all have to take a closer look at the reasons we participate in the investment community at any level and own our answers for ourselves. If we wanted to be purists we could volunteer for a Church or a non- profit…. Like there is NEVER ANY SCANDAL OR WRONG DOING THERE………

I think we should add disclaimers to news releases and filings for public companies and investing in general that are more in line with the requirements of the pharmaceutical industry …
Warning, investing in this company or fund may cause head aches, nausea, impotence and diarrhea!

So just like Kerry Bradshaw would wonder - If all men are dogs – why do we keep putting ourselves out in the dating world???- then comparably if the investment community is plagued with a lack of ethics and brains – why do we continue?... Because just like Kerry – we are looking for “Mr. Big”

Wednesday, November 01, 2006

Our Homeland Security investor and industry portal-
Homelanddefensestocks.com featured in article- Growth of the Homeland Security Economy click here
HomelandDefenseStocks.com, a website that gathers and publishes information about the homeland security and defense industries, has been inundated with requests from conference organizers who want their homeland conference listed on the site, said Dawn Van Zant, the Web site’s president. There are so many conferences now, Van Zant said, that conference planners are beginning to specialize in areas within homeland security. To differentiate their shows, they are focusing on topics like biometrics, maritime security and border protection.

Tuesday, October 31, 2006

What are investors searching for this week?
Consistently – investors for the last six months are looking for opportunities in the water sector
The search phrase “water stocks” has been in the top three for months, beating out energy even at its peaks.
The top searches coming into the week are: water stocks, followed by natural gas stocks, solar and renewable energy stocks, India stock market and nanotechnology stocks

For investors to research the sector – each one of our industry portals on Investorideas.com has a section for a current list of stocks in the sector.

Wednesday, October 25, 2006

virtual trading site based on Alexa - found this while on the internet tonight and found Investorideas.com trading at $3 a share...
investorideas.com
price: $3 per share , last price change: 2006-10-25 21:18:44 visit investorideas.com
InvestorIdeas.com — Our Investor and Industry content: Read news & exclusive articles, listen to CEO s & analyst interviews in audio format and gain in- depth industry knowledge with our online conferences. Our portals also provide a directory of stocks & FEATURED PUBLIC COMPANIES in each sector, research reports and industry links. Exclusive InvestorIdeas.com Content: InvestorIdeas.com RSS Feeds and Blogs, The Defense Market Report, The Insiders Corner with Michael Brush, Investing In India.
category: Investing/Guides
related sites
thestreet.com http://www.aaii.com/ moneyxperts.com http://www.homelanddefensestocks.com/ http://www.jetro.org/ cbs.marketwatch.com http://www.banknewsletter.com/ http://www.afii.fr/ members.aol.com investor.cnet.com
Former Homeland Security Stocks Leader - TASR - record revenue - stock up on the opening up about 8%
Is this an indicator for the small caps in the Homeland Security sector ?
TASR was the leader of the pack when the sector gained the favour of the retail small cap investors -
Today TASER International, Inc (TASR) reported -
Third Quarter Revenue of $18.3 Million, $2.4 Million Net Income and $0.04 Basic
Revenues for the third quarter of 2006 were $18.3 million, a 57% increase over the same quarter of the prior year and the third highest quarterly revenues in the Company's history. Income from operations for the third quarter was $3.7 million, a 471% increase compared with $654,000 in the prior year period. Net income and basic and diluted earnings per share for the third quarter were $2.4 million and $0.04 per share. Business also continued to improve sequentially as revenues in the third quarter of 2006 increased by $2.1 million over the second quarter of 2006 and operating margin improved to 20.4% of revenue as the Company continues to improve its operating leverage. The Company generated $3.4 million of cash from operations in the third quarter of 2006 which increased the total cash, cash equivalents and investments balance to $50.5 million. The Company also repurchased 300,000 shares of its common stock at a cost of $2.2 million in the third quarter.

Tuesday, October 24, 2006

Finding the "green" in greentech

Investing in cleantech technologies

From Bush’s interview yesterday on CNBC, discussing renewable energy to the news on the trading of the PowerShares Cleantech Portfolio (Symbol: PZD) exchange traded fund (ETF) launched today, the interest in cleantech is not going away, even with oil prices settling in recently .
With the Cleantech Venture Network® reporting today that North American venture capital investing had a record $933 million invested in Q3 2006 the trend is stronger than ever.
This is not going to change, even if oil has short term drops lower than existing prices . The long term trends tell us that cleantech or “green tech “ is smart in the long run and can be profitable if you pick the right stocks
Visit our renewable energy stocks portal for a list of stocks-

Friday, October 20, 2006

From North America to Dubai

Investorideas.com global reach expands with RSS feeds – our Renewableenergystocks.com RSS feed on , http://www.journalarchives.com, where we are the top featured RSS feed alongside global news from Dubai.

With the advent of RSS feeds our news now gets around the globe. Our reach extends beyond the day to day visitors on our site, which currently averages 10,000 visitors per day. Our featured companies news is distributed by RSS to other sites and new eyeballs.

Current Investorideas.com news distributors: (partial list)Google News, http://news.techrepublic.com.com/source.html, http://www.newsnow.co.uk, http://www.newsisfree.com/, Earthtoys.com, http://www.topix.net, http://www.journalarchives.com and a growing list of RSS feeds

Tuesday, October 17, 2006

Investorideas.com continues the Follow the Money series this week with Homeland Security spending and funding watch. Staying with our theme, that if you follow the money you can see the long term trends, then the Homeland security industry, as predicted, has long term legs.


Groups like Homeland Security Research Corp.- a Washington, D.C. based international market research and strategic consulting firm serving the homeland security community offer great industry stats and predictions at www.hsrc.biz

To read this weeks feature:
HomelandDefenseStocks.com Follows the Money in Homeland Security Spending, Funding and Contracts and the Impact on Stocks in Sector
Boeing and the Secure Border Initiative Looks to Surveillance, Sensors, Detection and Unmanned Aerial Vehicles Technology as Part of Comprehensive Solution

Click here for article :
http://www.investorideas.com/Companies/ViewDocument.asp?ID=4705

Next – we will look at Following the Money in water .

Thursday, October 12, 2006

The internet’s beginnings in defense sector and how internet security may be the next big thing…

I remember very clearly in the mid eighties working in an office where our computer tech person working on a data base program for us told me about the World Wide Web and how it was going to change the world.

That was the voice of opportunity speaking to me, but it was not something I really understood how significant it was until years later.

The internet- the web has and will impact human history on a monumental scale in terms of how we have become dependent on it as a research resource, global affordable information and communication tool, community and social and entertainment tool and as well as a significant commerce tool. The Internet is a collection of communities that now satisfies basic human community needs.

We talk to “friends” email friends, watch entertainment, buy stuff, sell stuff, exchange personal and business ideas and info, build virtual business, find and read news, research about recent medical breakthroughs….. And so on. It is an integral part of the personal and business experience on a day to day basis.

It has become part of the human evolution and gives pause to an anthropological perspective of human history comparables.
Looking at its beginnings – when in 1969- 1970 four host computers were connected together into the initial ARPANET- created by DARPA / ARPA --Defense / Advanced Research Project Agency- a new department within the Department of Defense. DARPA’s mission and creation was to position and assure the U.S’ lead in technology for military capabilities and to prevent technological surprise from adversaries.
Today’s adversaries are terrorists, and they are very adept at using the world wide web of today to their advantage in their plot to destroy the US


The evolution of the internet and the web from its beginnings and the first email sent in 1971 could be compared to mans first beginnings – how we evolved and developed language, followed by the creation of the information highways ( tribal movement) and commerce and trade, content ( comparable to art and culture) , search technology , peer to peer community ( building of towns ) , globalization ( our new world explorers) , building of bigger and bigger communities such as Myspace , that has become the biggest city on the internet .
So what is next?
Following the path of human history – we will need more and better infrastrucure, there will be more takeovers and acquisitions and wars. War on the internet may evolve into new internet security issues above and beyond viruses and worms.
New vulnerabilities have been found in wireless access.

If the beginnings of the internet were in the US Defense Department –with today’s global eCommerce economy and recent deals with US companies ( Google (GOOG) and YouTube ) in excess of $1 billion Us dollars –the US economy and defense are heavily reliant on its continued growth and security.
I think personally, the next big phase is security on the net and how to protect this virtual world of cities and empires


From an investors perspective it goes back to the Defense and Internet security sector and who will be the technology leaders ?...

Some examples of internet and network security stocks- Computer Associates, CyberGuard, CyberSource, Check Point Software, Computer Sciences, Entrust, Internet Security Systems, Novell, Netscreen Technologies, Rainbow Technologies, RSA Security, SCM Microsystems, Secure Computing, Safenet, SRA, Sybase, Symantec, Transaction Systems Architects, Watchguard Technologies.

for more info as well- check out and do your own research on our current list of stocks in homeland security at
www.homelanddefensestocks.com

Wednesday, October 11, 2006

Who says bigger is better? The small caps still have Upside? Several small cap fund managers think so...

A small and micro cap fund to look at- GSXAX- the GARTMORE SMALL CAP FUND.Take a look at this chart- for the past six months - http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=GSXAX&t=6m it peaked in May of this year - fell south for the summer, bottoming out in July and August and has come back to close to May levels recently.
... Similar to what I have seen on my site stats chart over the past six months.

"The fund typically invests at least 80% of assets in equity securities of companies with market capitalizations similar to those of companies in the Russell 2000 Index. Management looks at many factors when considering which securities to purchase for the fund, including measures of earnings momentum, relative value, management action, and price trend. The fund may also invest in equity securities of U.S. companies with larger market capitalizations and in foreign securities. "

The Russel Midcap has outperformed the Dow over the last 14 years - so what does that mean moving forward?
As I said in an earlier Blog, the average small retail investor does not own stock in any company in the Dow- we need to look finding profits in small caps. What looks interesting? Follow the money....

Tuesday, October 10, 2006

Are Homeland Security Stocks regaining investor favor?

Following 911 and for several years following, our site activity was dominated by Homeland Security Stocks. The sector was created following 911 and presented massive opportunity for new companies entering the space. With sub sectors from biodefense to non lethal to CCTV, we saw stocks in the sector rise significantly, led by sector leader in the small cap group- TASR, the non lethal king.
What we saw in the sector, as it settled, was it was very event driven and could spike immediately follow a terrorism event or threat.
The last two years the sector has matured and now trades with less volatility and more on contracts and revenue.
We saw the retail investor loose interest in the space as energy and commodity stocks took the lead.
Our site rankings for Homeland Security stocks moved from number one ranking to anywhere from 10-25 on our list.
What is interesting is a recent undercurrent of interest that is moving the Homelanddefensestocks.com (HDS) portal up our internal rankings and is now at number 5.
What does this mean? Maybe the cycle is changing and the sector may be regaining new interest from the retail small cap investor.

Monday, October 09, 2006

The first Follow the Money series release is out - following the money trail in renewable energy. I am a firm believer, from a long term perspective, small investors can improve their track record in investing if they research the money flow and see how the smart money is investing theirs.. When government, industry leaders and venture capital is putting in big money - chances are they are not only aware of the trends- but are creating them.
In renewable energy, some of the most successful entrepreneurs and CEO's of our time are betting on clean tech or "greentech " as it’s been labeled.
Read today’s release at :
http://www.investorideas.com/Companies/ViewDocument.asp?ID=4694

Saturday, October 07, 2006

Are the retail investors coming back to small caps? And what sectors are hot?

Looking at our site stats gives a fairly accurate picture of the retail investor activity, since we cover most actively traded sectors from oil and gas to mining to renewable energy.
We have seen activity that reflects the following trends recently-

· Site traffic reached a peak in March and April 2006, dropped, tried to regain those numbers in June and then suffered a dramatic downturn through the summer with the upward trend building on a slow, gradual curve starting mid September and increasing the last three weeks. This past week has seen the best traffic since the spring.
· As the large cap market and the Dow are reaching new highs – it is giving small investors some confidence to at least explore the market again and start some due diligence. Lets face it- the average retail investor does not own stock in the Dow
· Based on ,limited feedback we see - Most investors in the small cap space are currently long positions and are waiting to see to the share prices come back before they trade another stock
· What are investors searching for? Here are the top search phrases for inbound search on our site 1. Natural gas stocks- reflecting the recent volatility of lows and rebounds in the sector 2. Water stocks – a trend we have seen consistently building for months as investors realize that long term – investing in water may be bigger than investing in oil 3. saic IPO- something the defense sector has been tracking and anticipating for quite some time ( written about by Our columnist Jim Smith in Defense Market Report) 4. Online gaming stocks- reflecting the interest in the outcome of recent regulations and legislation impacting legal online gaming 5. Solar energy stocks – reflecting that renewable energy investors are still very much alive and active looking at the long term money flow and necessity of the technologies in the sector as oil is volatile 6. energy stocks – always on the mind of investors as it impacts the economy, the market and their portfolios if invested


So we do find that our site gives us a microcosm of the mind and trends of the small cap market based on what is being searched and site traffic in general.
If we chart our site traffic- we are on an upward gradual trend looking at reaching previous highs in the spring – that bodes well for the retail small cap market

Friday, October 06, 2006

Investorideas.com - New follow the money series - tracking trends in key sectors

With small caps in key sectors seeing a pull back from some of the highs in the spring and first quarter, we thought we would focus more on the long term trends and money flow to determine if the sector showed upside.

In all sectors that have big runs, you see a multitude of small companies enter the space to get in on the investor activity. You see companies change their business direction with an acquisition of a company or technology in a running sector.
For a while the market was flooded with new entries in the renewable energy stocks sector. Everyone had a bio-fuel or solar company.
In spite of the pull back and settling in the stocks, the driving force and money flow for investing in renewable energy remains strong

Our first Follow the Money series will take a look at what the long term prospects for renewable energy stocks are- stay tuned for the release shortly!