24/03: Markets; catching-up

Quite too long since my last post; I had ambitions of running a daily account. Perhaps going forward I will be more successful.

Much interesting travel experiences in the last three weeks to eventually recount, including journeys to Dubai, London, Denver and Chicago. But those will wait for another day.

Some thoughts on the financial markets. As is self-evident, the last ten or so market days have witnessed a significant shift in sentiment, with the Dow up ~1000 points, or about fifteen percent, from its intra-day low. Chart patterns have been providing strong support for the rally, and the charts look promising for further market advances.

My own ability to profit from the action has been mixed. On the one hand, I took well-timed long positions in an aerospace firm and an airline just prior to the market bottom, holding them through some tumultuous periods of loss and finally selling (in dramatic fashion, from my Dubai hotel's public computer) for a handsome gain of nearly twenty percent -- though that's with the effects of leverage; I should add that I trade on a margin account. For the last week-and-a-half, though, I adopted too cautious a stance, reluctant to re-enter the markets for fear of a turn-around in the sudden bullish sentiment. I finally jumped back in today with a long position in a major bank, only to be rewarded by a precipitous decline of the share price into the close. We'll see what the coming days will bring.

01/03: Wknd w/ Skyteam, part 1

This evening’s post is being composed on board Portland’s functional and clean light rail network. I am visiting Oregon’s cultural capital as part of an extended tour of the Skyteam airline alliance – made possible due to the current economic climate’s exceedingly low airfares. Planned for my forty minute journey to the airport (PDX) is a review of part of my weekend’s travels. Part 2 will finish the travel review and, additionally, include anecdotal commentary on the successes and shortcomings of Delta and Northwest Airlines, and some words about Friday’s markets.

This weekend merits the happy descriptor of ‘among my most ambitiously itinerant ever.’ Free from class on Friday, I began the day with an exciting 4am wake-up. The morning saw me complete a load of laundry; pack for a harried eighty-hour marathon spanning over 10,000 miles, four destinations, and climates ranging from blizzard to balmy; commute down the well-worn path of Georgetown University GUTS shuttle bus, Washington Metro, and MARC commuter rail to Baltimore Washington airport (BWI); jet to Minneapolis aboard the state carrier of Minnesota; and be productively engaged for the duration of my approximately 2.5-hour flight, my labors facilitated by the enhanced space of an exit row seat. A note regarding the last point: I generally make an effort to work productively during my travels, to harvest a gain from the otherwise dead time of transit; I mention this explicitly because a weekend’s haul of 10,000 miles represents a treasure of time.

Minneapolis greeted me with a half foot of freshly fallen snow and bitter cold, all under a brilliantly blue heaven. Indeed, it would be difficult to generate more agreeable weather (from my perspective at least!). I rode the light rail to the city centre and proceeded to work and place some trades during the afternoon, the whole time ensconced at a Caribou Coffee within the downtown area’s maze of skyways.

Friday's early evening had me flying to Seattle, again on a Northwest Boeing 757 (though a -300 series this time, my first-ever ride on this variant), again in the relative comfort of an over-wing exit row seat. After a productive flight spent reading about development economics, I dashed aboard the express 194 bus into the neighborhood just south of the Emerald City’s Space Needle, where I thoroughly enjoyed a hearty meal at the unassuming, uncrowded Tandoori Hut. This hole-in-the-wall establishment is an old favourite of my Seattle visits. And, on a highly tangential note, I must report that the Indian version of rice pudding – the dessert that I enjoyed after filling up on spicy tomato soup, a lentil curry, and steaming plain naan – is just as addictively delicious as the Turkish recipe. Without further digression, here is the now famous restaurant:

An overnight flight to Detroit ensued, but unfortunately our Boeing 757 motored into car capital of America in too low a gear, and I missed my connection to Memphis. Thankfully, I rapidly accessed the Skyteam timetable on my computer while taxiing to the gate, and immediately upon disembarking knew to which gate I had to dash in hopes of a re-route. And that gate held a ready-to-push Delta jet bound for Atlanta. I sweet-talked my way on board, took the last open seat, and away we went. But, alas, take-off was delayed due to de-icing and inclement Atlanta weather, so I missed my tight New Orleans -bound connection at ATL. I finally arrived at the hung-over Big Easy (Mardi Gras was only a few days before) some two hours later than initially scheduled, although in the relative comfort of Delta’s F class, my first ride in the airline’s premium cabin, and an upgrade facilitated by a recent status match with Northwest. More on that strategic move in a subsequent blog entry.

Thus, Friday morning through Saturday afternoon is accounted for. More on my time through Sunday evening (i.e. the present moment) soon!

25/02: Turkish Airlines aircraft of the tragic Amsterdam incident

In light of Wednesday's tragic incident involving a Turkish Airlines passenger aircraft at Amsterdam's Schiphol airport, I went digging through my sizable cache of travel photos. I would like to preface by extending my condolences to the families of those who lost their lives.

Here's the photo of interest that I was seeking:


The above is a tarmac shot, taken at Istanbul's Ataturk airport in August 2008, of the boarding of my flight to Astana, Kazakhstan. (Why I was going to KZ will be left to the subject of another blog post, I'm afraid!) The aircraft is a Boeing 737-800 with winglets (not shown in the above snapshot), identical to the ill-fated ship.

Of particular interest is the registration number of the aircraft pictured above. The posted picture is obviously low-quality, yet in my high-quality version I can just make out the first four characters of the registration number, printed below the aircraft's tail and just forward of the horizontal stabilizer; these are: TC-JG. The last character, hazier, appears to be either a D or an E. I was, of course, curious about how the registration number of the Amsterdam aircraft compares, and I was surprised to learn that is it TC-JGE. It is possible, therefore, that I journeyed on the same aircraft some months ago -- a humbling consideration, indeed.

25/02: Markets, and my upcoming weekend travel

I've been sitting on cash for the last two market sessions and will likely do so tomorrow also, given a lack of free time during market hours. It's a pity, as the trading opportunities over the last few days in financial services stocks -- and particularly in Bank of America (BAC) shares -- have been extraordinary. BAC has been having epic intra-week price swings and unbelievable liquidity, epitomized by today's volume, which settled in excess of half a billion shares. Most promising of all, BAC's price movements are not altogether difficult to judge; the hypotheses of trendlines and support / resistance levels are being vindicated more often than not. To be sure, I'd not venture into a stock like BAC and then go hit Starbucks for a leisurely coffee break. Still, with a sharp eye to any price movements detrimental to his strategy, an investor can make money with BAC.

Shifting to travel, I have an ambitious schedule planned for this weekend. I've booked my first transcontinental journey on a Skyteam carrier, a move to take advantage of a recent status match to Northwest's Worldperks program, and I'll be visiting the cities of Minneapolis, Seattle, New Orleans and Portland, OR.

In contrast to my flying patterns of years ago, I no longer strive to fly to far-off airports only to return on the next flight out, a strategy that I once employed to rack up maximum miles while minimizing incidental costs. Nowadays, I like to enjoy my destinations, albeit at a frenzied pace.

I plan to arrive in Minneapolis around 10am on Friday and venture downtown on the light rail connection to work for several hours at a coffee shop. I'll then continue onwards to Seattle on a 5pm departure, where I'll hop onto the speedy 194 bus into the International District near downtown where some fabulous independent espresso bars are located. A red-eye to Detroit will await me afterwards, followed by connecting flights on Saturday morning to Memphis and onward to New Orleans. After visiting with a friend and overnighting, I'll continue on the home-stretch of the trip: westward to Portland, OR (via Salt Lake City) on Sunday morning for another day of working at coffee shops before jetting to Washington on a red-eye via Atlanta, arriving on Monday morning.

This will be my first succession of four transcontinental journeys in a row (after years of racking up too much experience on mere back-to-back transcon flights), and I'm excited. Of course, I'm also thrilled to soon sample the products of two airlines that I've hitherto experienced little: Northwest and Delta.

23/02: A return to trading

After a brief hiatus, I have today unwound my first equity trade, a short position in Apple (AAPL) that I held since late last week. Happily, it was a profitable bet, always a great way to kick-off a new trading sojourn.

I hope to offer my view of market conditions, itself molded by personal trading experience and morning digestion of the day's Financial Times, in subsequent posts on this blog. Tonight, however, a brief synopsis of my past experiences with trading:

I became aware of the markets in late middle school, when my dad would beam about the stratospheric (and doomed) ascent of Lucent Technologies (ALU), whose shares he held in a 401k account. I began soon afterwards to call the shots on an account that held my own (meager) savings. I vividly recall one of my earliest trades: a long position in Extreme Networks (EXTR) that I took on the Friday before the tragic September 11th attacks. Perhaps spurred by commentators' calls to "patriotically" hold onto long equity positions, I stubbornly did not sell until the stock rebounded to my original purchase price some three months later.

Despite visions of prodigal skill, I managed to only lose money in my initial years, and there were lengthy stretches in which I gave up my financial alchemy attempts, considering them foolhardy.

A golden age of my toying around with investing would come during my junior year abroad at the London School of Economics (LSE). My account was upgraded to options trading, I was breezing through my LSE Finance course, and I enjoyed many marathon late-evening sessions at the LSE library, real-time streaming quotes from New York blazing across my computer screen, rolling the dice on risky equity options. These weeks and months were a golden age for the experience and confidence I gained, yet sustained financial gain was as stubbornly elusive as ever.

And now -- to cut to the chase -- I'm ready to give the endeavor yet another go. More disciplined and patient, I'm focused on succeeding in areas where I earlier stumbled. I hope that my forthcoming experiences on the wild, chaotic markets can complement my thoughts on airlines and experiences with travel -- forming what might be, in the end, an altogether satisfying and readable account.

23/02: A christening

And with little fanfare and nary any notice, a new blog takes life:

Ad astra: airlines, equity markets & travel

This blog hopes to make a contribution to an ambitious combination of three oft-discussed topics; is the task hopeless? The blog's author hopes his unique perspective offers the elusive value-added. Without further adiu, behind the computer screen is:

• an undergraduate at Georgetown University (hence the 'Hoyas' term in the URL);
  
• an enthusiastic trader of the U.S. equity markets since middle school, known to trade the New York session during late nights at the LSE library in London;
• a passionate traveler, one who strategically games airline frequent flier programs to permit upward of 100,000 miles of travel per annum;
• a careful follower of airline industry news, no matter how minute and otherwise irrelevant to human welfare

Thank you for reading, and please share some love with a comment!