Louise Yamada: S&P 500 Groping for Support, New Leaders Emerging

When the market was tanking a couple of years ago, she said that the S + P was going down to 600, maybe as low as 450. She'a another self promoter who gets over because people have short memories.

In case you didn't happen to see it because they removed it almost as fast as they posted it!

Get ready California for another round of increases from Blue Cross and Blue Shield. But this time they are trying another strategy to stick it to us! Instead of increasing to the full amount of 16.4% on April 1. They are going to split the increases between reducing your coverage benefits and increasing your monthly premiums for a total of 16.4%!!!

THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU HAVE "WALL STREET CONTROLLED HEALTH CARE!!" It's time to get rid of the middle man (the insurance companies) that haven't healed a single person and do nothing but take profit out of the system and yet go out of their way to get rid of you if you get sick! It's time for a system that ONLY removes the middle-man; and that system is Single Payer. It will free up billions for businesses and individuals alike. The money should go directly to medical professionals and institutions that actually provide care and NOT for Wall Street Investors and bonuses for Health Care Executives!

Please read:

Excerpts from AP on March 21, 2011

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Anthem Blue Cross, the largest health plan in California, said Monday it will delay and reduce rate hikes that would hit some 600,000 policyholders at an estimated cost of $40 million.

Anthem is one of four major health insurers in the state who earlier agreed to put off premium increases for at least 60 days at the request of California Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones.

Los Angeles-based Anthem said it will delay a planned 16.4 percent premium increase from April 1 to July 1 and reduce it to 9.1 percent. The company also said it will put off increases in deductibles and co-payments from April 1 to Jan. 1.

Taken together, the premium and benefit changes would amount to a 16.4 percent cost hike for policyholders in the middle of the year and might have forced people who thought they had met their deductibles to put off treatment, Jones said at a news conference.

Last week, Blue Shield of California announced it was withdrawing its plan to increase health insurance rates for individual policyholders in what would have been the third such rate hike since October.

The three hikes combined would have raised rates by as much as 87 percent for some of its 200,000 policyholders, according to the state Department of Insurance.

Two other insurers -- Aetna and PacifiCare -- also have agreed to delays.

Anthem proposed a 39 percent increase last year at a time when its parent company, Wellpoint Inc., is making billions in profit, but Anthem eventually reduced the increase.

"If you buy health insurance in California, your only hope right now is that publicity and politics might convince some executives to scale back the rate increases, at least for a few months," said Doug Heller, executive director of Consumer Watchdog, a Santa Monica-based advocacy group. "Insurance companies with huge profits aren't nice guys just because they gouge us a little less."

A 5 minute discussion saying essentially, "We don't know what direction the market is headed"
No offense to the parties involved, all well respected.

This only emphasizes how difficult it is to call market direction. Trading range for sure, take small profits and be happy. Never loose sight of what is moving these markets,the fed pumping- but spending $3 [or more!] to make $1 will end badly.

This reply is in response to Blue Cross Ins replies from John, Bruce K & Forest Gump.

First thing you need to understand is that the US government is the largest health insurer in this country. Just look at the number of people covered under Medicaid, Medicare, and the Veterans administration. As for your worthless arguments that we would loose more freedoms if there was a one payer system Get Real.

You three have been drinking the republican cool aid way to long. The republicans are not for us middle class or poor citizens they are only for the rich. The republicans need to change their party plank to say ���THE USA Of THE CORPORATIONS, FOR THE CORPORATIONS, AND BY THE CORPOATIONS��� because they sure do not care about anyone but the rich and the corporations.

Also don���t be confused by the verbal vomit that tax cuts create jobs. Company���s create jobs, not rich people. The company���s they own create jobs, not them.

I defy you dissolution want-a-be republicans to prove with real hard evidence that we would be better off with the current system instead of a single payer system. I am in sales and speak with many people from foreign countries where there is a one payer system. I have yet to speak with one of them that would want our health care system over their country���s single payer system. In fact everyone of the 50 plus customers from foreign countries that have visited our company in the past two years likes their system and they have no idea where the news media gets these stories about shortages and problems with their health care system.

In addition with hard facts please show me when jobs were created by giving the rich tax breaks. Go all the way back to your hero Ronald Reagan. Just show us all the evidence and back it up with facts instead of the verbal vomit from the republicans.

Good clip.. it's like a pop quiz for newbies: "IF you can understand what she's saying, then you pass." Technical analysis along with fundamentals makes an investor. Keep up the good work.

Most of these stock promotionals seem geared to inducing the reader to buying and selling, buying and selling--always chasing a potential hi-flier with little attention to the equal if not greater importance of conserving capital. If the 1-2% advantage of mid-cap funds over big caps constitutes a "stellar performance," I fail to see anything worthy of a standing ovation. Moreover, that's past performance--which appears to be the only reason the guest offers for going with the current "hot crop" (the "spry young ones with new tech").

Someone has to pay the bills at Yahoo, so the priority given to "promotion" over "information" is understandable. But if you can purchase a Microsoft or Intel with a dividend of 3%--and during a world-wide financial crisis if not "depression"--you're doing the smart thing--putting "safety" first; "speculation" second. Many of the professional "hypsters" talk as though 2008 was a blip rather than a symptom of a major underlying problem in the world's economies. Even today's rush to gold suggests that there are a significant number of investors who foresee a financial tsunami comparable to the natural one we've just seen.

Rukeyer always referred to the technical chartists as "elves." Even the guest acknowledges a difference between "the charts" and "reality." The elves deserve a look now and then--as much to confirm investors' behavior as to dictate what it should be.

Anything related to Japan, Egypt, and Portugal and Greece are emerging ! To the down side ! and the US !