Suitably Flip: CNBC Portfolio Challenge

CNBC Portfolio Challenge

This is the archive for the summer 2008 Portfolio Challenge.

If you're looking for the November 2008 Portfolio Challenge, click here.

Handcrafted by Flip on October 31, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - The (Real) Winners' Circle

This morning on Squawk Box, the two "finalists" (and odd word, since the contest ended a week and a half ago) were being interviewed - Edward Burke and David Allen Lesser. They won't be revealing which of the two won and which came in second until Power Lunch (12-2), nor - so far as I know - have they announced the names of any of the other top 6 overall finishers or the Week 10 winner.

The two have even been kept isolated during their trip to New Jersey, so they can't simply ask each other what their final portfolio values were and determine who won. I'm not sure I understand the point. Are you finding it more suspenseful? Or needlessly drawn out, following 10 days of tabulating?

Update [1:00 pm]: The site is down.

Update [2:00 pm]: Results:

Grand Prize ($500,000): Edward Burke
First Prize ($250,000): David Lesser
Second Prize ($100,000): David Price
Third Prize ($50,000 each): Andrew Krussell, Bradford Pine, and Jeffrey Elwyn

[T]he last week of currency trading is what propelled our Grand Prize winner. While a strong performer in stock trading, Edward Burke blew the doors off everybody else with his extremely active currency trading skills in the EUR/USD. There were some pretty wide daily swings in the euro, and he capitalized on most of them. Other contest winners traded currencies as well, but with more modest results.

Week 10 winner... ?

Update [3:30 pm]: Week 10 winner: Mitchell Schaffer

Update [8:00 pm]: Looks like they've updated the site with everyone's final rank (mine: #98).

How did everyone do?

Previously:
Winners To Be Announced Monday, July 28
Announcement Of Winners Punted To Next Week
The (Empty) Winners' Circle

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive.

Handcrafted by Flip on July 28, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Winners To Be Announced Monday, July 28

That's per an ad on CNBC this morning, not the website which is as nebulous as ever. They say they'll be devoting a whole day of coverage to it (oddly enough).

Also, in a comment on yesterday's post, Max informs us that he received "prize papers" this past Monday (total portfolio value: $2.659 million) to fill out and return. I wouldn't say that's necessarily a guarantee of winning one of the cash prizes (they may be asking anyone in contention to complete the paperwork, so things can move faster once they've verified the rankings and weeded out the filthy cheaters). But it does seem to bode well for at least one of our readers, who edged out Max by just $3,000.

Anyone else who's received paperwork from or been contacted by CNBC (beyond form responses to email inquiries), give us a holler.

Update: Don't panic if you haven't heard anything from CNBC yet. It sounds like some people with higher final portfolio values than Max have not received any paperwork.

Update: Okay, contenders, stay by your phones and computers. CNBC is continuing to contact winners through today's close.

Let us know if you get a call!

Update: Here's the email regarding Monday's broadcast.

Dear CNBC Viewer,

Thank you for your inquiry about the names of the finalists and grand prize winner to the CNBC.com Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge.

Please tune to CNBC Monday, July 28, beginning on "Squawk Box" at approximately 7:15 AM ET when CNBC's Brian Shactman will begin interviewing the three finalists about their specific trading strategies that catapulted them to the top spots.

The grand prize winner will be announced during "Power Lunch," which is seen on CNBC Noon-2 PM ET.

You can also log onto CNBC.com beginning Monday during "Squawk Box" for updates and videos of the finalists.

Thank you for your interest and participating in the CNBC.com Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge.

Regards,
Manish Gupta
Customer Care

Drop me a line and I'll add your email address to a list to be notified as soon as the winners are announced.

Previously:
Announcement Of Winners Punted To Next Week
The (Empty) Winners' Circle

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive.

Handcrafted by Flip on July 25, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Announcement Of Winners Punted To Next Week

A reader points out that the contest website has just yanked the modifier "this week" from its guidance on when you should "tune in to find out the winner's (sic)."

In fairness, it's only been six days. The wheel can only turn so fast before the hamster sicks up.

Previously: CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - The (Empty) Winners' Circle

Handcrafted by Flip on July 24, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - The (Empty) Winners' Circle

It's been 3 days since the contest officially ended and so far, we have no winners. In prior weeks, it's taken up to several days (and occasionally more than a week) for the admins to crown the weekly winner, so I think we can likely expect at least another day or so of waiting. It's frustrating, yes, but given the frequency and variety of technical glitches that arose during the contest, it stands to reason that CNBC would have their work cut out for them, tabulating, verifying, confirming, investigating, etc., lest they announce the winners prematurely, then realize someone had cleverly cheated or a stock split hadn't been properly accounted for.

For what it's worth, the contest website indicates only that the announcement will come this week, as in:

AND THE WINNER IS.... Tune-in to CNBC this week to find out the winner's (sic) of the Million Dollar Prize Pool.

On Friday, we compiled a bunch of finishing scores from readers, with portfolio values ranging as high $2.66 million and Week 10 gains exceeding 73%.

Whether those were enough to grab a chunk of the million dollars and/or the Superbowl prize package, we'll just have to wait and see.

To recap, our best-performing readers were:

Final portfolio values:

Dave Sage: $2.662 million
Taylor: $2.591 million
Khaled Helmi: $2.572 million
Patrick McHugh: $2.549 million
Jim Medlar: $2.489 million
Keith J: $2.476 million

Week 10 gain:

Keith J: 73.3%

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Handcrafted by Flip on July 21, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (7) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Friday, Week 10

[Scroll to the bottom for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Here we are, folks. The final day of the final week. Someone's about to make a lot of money. A few people, actually.

Since equity portfolios are only reallocated at the end of each day, there's no more stock trading to be done, but you can continue trading currencies until 4 pm. And don't forget to answer the last 6 trivia questions to wring out those $12,000 remaining bonus bucks

For some reason, CNBC has seen fit to take down all ranking information, so we're flying somewhat blind on this final leg. On Wednesday, they pulled down the leaderboard, but starting last night, players can't even see their own ranks, which is an unexpected frustration for those in contention for a share in the million dollar prize pool.

We've got several of those elite traders in our very midst and we hope they'll be checking in throughout the day to let us know how they're doing. With our newly limited visibility, here's what we know.

At Wednesday's close, the top three overall traders enjoyed the following portfolio values:

John Collins - $2,625,827.89
Khaled Helmi - $2,475,577.48
patrick mchugh - $2,472,662.10

Readers are likely familiar with Khaled by now, as he checks in fairly regularly. Patrick stopped by yesterday to let us know he cashed in his chips at Thursday's close and will finish with a total portfolio value of $2,548,623.96. Khaled had an up day yesterday too, but he may want to keep his current total quiet for the time being, since the competition can still trade currencies and would probably like to know where he stands. Hopefully he'll check in with us after the close to let us know where he finished.

Two other readers (Scott Cole and Brian) were ranked #25 and #20 at Wednesday's close, so they're also likely in contention for those top 6 spots that share in the prize pool.

For what it's worth, I'm at $2.084 million and would guess that's somewhere around #100 ($1.854 million the day before translated to #221).

A lot of our readers have seen tremendous gains this week (many up more than 40% through Thursday), thanks to skyrocketing airline stocks and two days of what turned out to be dynamite picks among the earnings reporters. The best week-to-date performer I'm aware of in our flock is Tammi Alcorn, who'd put up 54.2% by Thursday's close. We're rooting for Tammi to take home that Super Bowl prize package and she seems to have an excellent shot at it.

I'll be updating this post throughout the day, so check back later both for trivia answers and to see how our top players are doing.

For those of you that came upon this blog for the first time during the contest, I hope you've enjoyed your stay. We know you have a choice in financial blogs and we hope the next time your plans call for stock market commentary, you'll choose SF again.

Anyone who hasn't chimed in by comment or email in the past and wants to stay in the loop regarding similar projects and special content in the future (or just to say hello), feel free to drop me a line.

And with apologies to site decorum, I'll go ahead and leave the tip jar open for one more day. Thanks again to all of you who've pitched in already.

Good luck today!

Update [12:00 pm]: Well this is exciting. It looks like we've got a horse race between two readers for the best weekly gain. In late morning trading, Tammi was up another 5.6%, giving her a gain of 62.8% for the week, if we were to close at these prices. Bill Bilkey (who nearly won the Week 8 prize) began the day with a week-to-date gain of 41.9%, but is up another 16.2% intraday, leaving him with a gain of 64.9% for the week.

Update [12:30 pm]: Hold the phone. From the comments, reader Keith reports he began the session with a week-to-date gain of 55% and is currently looking at an intraday gain of 13%, which should put him at roughly 75% for the week. Yowza. Tammi and Bill might still have their work cut out for them. Keith's big week has put his total portfolio value at roughly $2.5 million, which might also put him in contention for one of the overall cash prizes. Along with Brian, Scott, Khaled, and Patrick, we've got an official herd of contenders charging toward the finish line.

Update [2:45 pm]: Add Dave Sage to the herd. With 90 minute of trading remaining, Dave was showing a total portfolio value of $2.663 million.

So we've got Dave, Patrick, Khaled, Brian, Scott, and Keith all with legitimate shots at the money prizes.

Think one of them will win the big one? Think they can take all 6?

Update [3:20 pm]: I'm not sure how long it's going to take us to figure out where everything stands, following today's close, but I'll update this post with any details about the Week 10 and overall winners (whether gleaned from CNBC or via updates sent in from our contenders about where they finished) as soon as such info's available.

Update [3:50 pm]: For anyone who wants to send in their final scores (and please do) and finishing ranks when available, note that your portfolio value will probably continue to fluctuate until about 4:30, since the system uses 20-minute delayed quotes and the actual closing tick often doesn't hit the board until a few minutes after 4:00.

Update [4:30 pm]: Well, it's done. Someone's $500,000 richer. It's anyone's guess how long it'll take to find out who.

It's not me, though I'm pleased to have finished with a total portfolio value of $2.224 million, boosted by a very decent 6.1% today and a 50% gain for Week 10.

We've got some preliminary results rolling in from the leading contenders too...

As we already knew since he went to 100% cash yesterday, Patrick finished with $2.549 million, including bonus bucks.

Khaled has written in that he finished with $2.572 million, after adjusting for today's bonus bucks.

From the comments, Taylor finished with $2.579 million (don't know whether that's after today's bonuses - I'm going to assume people are not manually adding the bonuses in, unless they state otherwise).

Keith finishes with a total portfolio value of $2.464 million and a weekly gain of 73%.

Jim Medlar finishes with $2.489 million.

Brian Dennison finishes with $2.414 million.

Dave Sage finishes with $2.662 million.

Jim McTiernan finishes with $2.342 million.

I'll update these tables as results continue to come in:

Six highest known final portfolio values (including final bonus bucks):

Dave Sage: $2.662 million
Taylor: $2.591 million
Khaled Helmi: $2.572 million
Patrick McHugh: $2.549 million
Jim Medlar: $2.489 million
Keith J: $2.476 million

Highest known Week 10 gain:

Keith J: 73.3%

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Friday July 18th

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: In the July 17 Mad Money post, "Oil Down, Banks Up?" which fictional realm does Mad-man stock guru Jim Cramer reference?"

Answer: Bizarro World

Squawk On the Street: "Question: Which "eye-catching" word or phrase is NOT found in managing editor Allen Wastler's Two-Way Street blog post of July 8?"

Answer: "Perp Walk"

The Call: "Question: In Bob Pisani's "ETFs: An Investor's Primer" which fund-accessible nations are named?"

Answer: Brazil

Power Lunch: "Question: In the Fast Money post, "No Guts No Glory - Pt. II" what animal metaphor is used to describe value investing?"

Answer: Head in a lion's mouth

Street Signs: "Question: In a July 15 CNBC interview, Jim Rogers used which metaphor in discussing a Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac bailout?"

Answer: Band-Aids for cancer

Closing Bell: "Question: In the feature, "Sucker's Rally? Stock Gains Likely to Be Short-Lived" which analyst used the phrase, "sucker's rally"?"

Answer: Kathy Boyle

That's all folks! No more bonus bucks to be had. But scroll back up and refresh the page to keep tabs on our weekly and overall prize contenders to see if they manage to pull it off.

Handcrafted by Flip on July 18, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (25) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Thursday, Week 10

[Scroll to the bottom for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Watch this space for today's updates, picks, and reallocation methodology.

It's the penultimate day in the portfolio challenge and we're in a full sprint to the finish. Yesterday was a banner day for readers of this site, as our 5 earnings picks put up an average one-day gain of 21.6%. Folks holding our prescribed airline basket did even better, with a one-day gain of 34.6%.

This managed to salvage yours truly from a recent airline-induced downward spiral, clawing back to #221 in the overall rankings with a total portfolio value of $1.827 million. I'm delighted to have heard from many of you who saw similar surges on Wednesday. Anyone holding that airline basket on Wednesday likely has a fighting chance at the final weekly prize (the Super Bowl package).

Most notably though, the airlines vaulted reader Khaled Helmi to an incredible #2 in the overall rankings, with a total portfolio value of $2.476 million.

As of Wednesday's close, the top 5 were thus:

John Collins $2,625,827.89
Khaled Helmi $2,475,577.48
patrick mchugh $2,472,662.10
Edward Burke $2,442,728.07
Jeffrey Elwyn $2,432,237.48

Of course we're rooting for Khaled to usurp John Collins by week's end and take home the grand prize, but second place does pay a decent consolation of $250,000.

Today, we've got people in airlines, oil, and office furniture (see yesterday's post for specifics). Be sure to check back later for updates on how these allocations are performing.

And special thanks to those of you who were so generous as to hit the tip jar I so crassly debuted yesterday. You know... so far, there's a perfect correlation between putting out the tip jar and days with 30%+ gains.

And that's not a pattern I'm prepared to mess with.

Update: Looks like another day of across-the-board gains for our new crop of earnings picks. Those office furniture names did particularly well and are both showing double-digits gains (as of roughly 10 am):

HNI Corp (HNI): +27.8%
Knoll (KNL): +17.3%
McMoRan (MMR): 3.5%
Kinder Morgan (KMR): 1.8%

Update: Sweet fancy Moses. With oil plummeting again today, folks holding our airline basket (including this guy) are enjoying another sensational day (up almost 13% as of roughly 1:30 pm).

The very last set of picks will appear in the next update.

Update: Here we go - the 47th and final reallocation of the contest.

Once again, there's a slew of contest-eligible names (more than 40) reporting earnings after today's close or before tomorrow's open. Each company's punch card has been carefully fed through the Flip-o-Matic, and out were spit 4 earnings picks for today's final trades.

In no particular order, they are Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), Sensient Technologies (SXT), Evergreen Solar (ESLR), and Citizens Republic Bancorp (CRBC).

For those of you participating in the crowdsourcing experiment in pursuit of the final weekly prize (or for anyone in pursuit of the overall prize who just wants another option), we're prescribing just two allocations today. One with the 4 earnings plays and one with our 4 favorite airlines.

Pick whichever one you like. Or, if you've got multiple portfolios still in the hunt, why not help yourself to one of each?

Earnings: AMD, SXT, ESLR, CRBC
Airlines: CAL, AMR, UAUA, DAL

Don't forget to enter your trades by 4 pm ET.

Consider all of the above to be for entertainment purposes and not meant to be used as real-world investment recommendations. The goals and strategies of the Portfolio Challenge are not to be confused with those of sensible investing.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Thursday July 17th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: In the video feature, Best Trades Now: Healthcare, Energy & More, what does Edward Perks call "a tremendous performer"?"

Answer: Canadian Oil Sands

Squawk On the Street: "Question: In the post, "Crazy Money: Wells Fargo Options Rocket," Matt Nesto reported that the August $27.50 call contract gained:"

Answer: 933%

The Call: "Question: In Carmen Wong Ulrich's post, How to Know If Your Money Is Safe, what is her third piece of advice to depositors?"

Answer: Know the guidelines

Power Lunch: "Question: In the slideshow, “10 Recession-Proof Jobs,” what is the nurse doing?"

Answer: Administering an injection

Street Signs: "Question: Cramer Flashback: In the Feb. 21 post "Stay In The Game" what does Cramer compare the excitement of speculation to?"

Answer: Cheesecake Fantasy

Closing Bell: "Question: CNBC Stock Blog: On Tuesday, Jim Rogers specifically said he has been short:"

Answer: FNM

Handcrafted by Flip on July 17, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (29) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Wednesday, Week 10

[Scroll to the bottom for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Watch this space for today's updates, picks, and reallocation methodology.

Meanwhile, as we enter the back half of the final week of the contest, I'm turning the tables on you and rolling out a perfectly tactless tip jar.

It's been a gas hosting this daily forum over these last 10 weeks and I'm terribly appreciative of all of you who have been reading, commenting, celebrating, commiserating, and sharing strategies. If you've managed to squeeze any value or enjoyment out of these 50+ posts, daily trading ideas, and answers to nearly 300 trivia questions (or if you're looking for an easy way to pay down an unrelated karma debt), clicking the link below is sure to brighten both of our days.

It should take about 2 minutes, it's completely safe, and it'll help defray the early production costs of "CNBC Portfolio Challenge: The Motion Picture" (Jim Cramer is attached to direct, Eddie Murphy is slated to headline as the entire Hausse family).

Thanks!

Update: From the comments, Kathryn notes it's still possible to see a partial leaderboard, if you go to your portfolio manager, select any portfolio, then click Top Players in the Contest Extras box in the lower right corner of the screen.

The top 5 players (overall) are:

Edward Burke - $2,307,453.35
Holly Williams - $2,299,881.04
William Guarisco - $2,273,951.78
Ashley Hausse - $2,156,184.10
Les Hausse - $2,131,695.04

Update: Looks like this was the right day to pass the hat. Of the 5 earnings plays I highlighted yesterday, all 5 moved significantly higher, with 3 posting one-day gains of more than 25%:

Wells Fargo (WFC): +32.8%
Delta Air Lines (DAL): +26.6%
First Midwest Bancorp (FMBI): +26.5%
RLI Corp (RLI): +13.1%
Piper Jaffray (PJC): +9.1%

Today's picks will appear in the next update.

Update: There are at least 60 contest-eligible names reporting earnings after today's close or before tomorrow's open. We're going to focus on 4 - two energy companies (McMoRan Exploration and Kinder Morgan) and two office furniture companies (HNI Corp and Knoll).

For those of you participating in the crowdsourcing experiment in pursuit of the final weekly prize, let's go with the following allocations, according to the last digit of your phone number:

1-3: HNI, KNL, CHK, GDP (oil, including earnings reporters)
4-6: CAL, AMR, UAUA, DAL (airlines)
7-0: HNI, KNL, MMR, KMR (all earnings reporters, oil and furniture)

Important: If you're using more than one portfolio for this project, kindly allocate the first portfolio according to the surname initial scheme, the next portfolio to the allocation directly beneath it, and so on, until you've reallocated all participating portfolios.

For example: If your phone number ends in 7, and you're using 2 portfolios, your allocations would be:

7-0: HNI, KNL, MMR, KMR
1-3: HNI, KNL, CHK, GDP

In all cases, each position should be set at 25%. Don't forget to enter your trades by 4 pm ET.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Wednesday July 16th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: According to the Stock Blog post, "Stocks That Gain on Hurricanes" which company had "just announced" a share buyback?"

Answer: Toro Company

Squawk On the Street: "Question: In the CNBC.com feature, "Can You Beat The Market With This ETF Portfolio?", which ETF is weighted 30%?"

Answer: SPY

The Call: "Question: According to the Featured Slideshow, "10 World Famous Gemstones", which ruler owned the "cursed" Koh-i-Noor diamond?"

Answer: Queen Victoria

Power Lunch: "Question: According to the CNBC.com special report, Powering the Planet, which is the "biggest" U.S. geothermal player?"

Answer: All of the above

Street Signs: "Question: According to a By The Numbers post, "Biggest One Day Drops in Oil", how much did the S&P Energy Sector drop Tuesday?"

Answer: Nearly 3 percent

Closing Bell: "Question: In the Cramer blog post, "How to Survive the Banking Meltdown", which bank ranked "Almost as Bad as the Worst"?"

Answer: Washington Mutual

Handcrafted by Flip on July 16, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Tuesday, Week 10

[Scroll to the bottom for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Watch this space for today's updates, picks, and reallocation methodology.

Oddly, it looks like CNBC has decided to obscure the details of the leaderboard from us for the last few days of the contest. Replacing the scoreboard is a "winner's (sic) board", complete with lovely headshots of the weekly winners, but no Week 10 or overall rankings or standings.

Needless to say, this changes things somewhat for anyone vying for one of the top 6 spots who planned to incorporate the leaders' latest scores into their ongoing optimization of their own risk appetite. Unclear whether that was deliberate, and if so, what the rationale for this unannounced change in the gameplay might be.

Update: Today's reallocation is going to be an exciting one. We've been playing airlines and earnings reporters all contest long, but today, they're one and the same. Delta will report tomorrow before the closing bell and if you're looking for some last minute professional-grade volatility to make a final push for the leaderboard, I'm not sure you can do better than to load up on airlines today.

For a change, our airline basket is already doing well today, with oil having tumbled $10/barrel. But these stocks are still down unfathomably large amounts year-to-date and could be poised for a heckuva day, now that they'll have an actual earnings catalyst to focus renewed attention on their valuation.

That said, there are many contest-eligible stocks reporting earnings after today's close and before tomorrow's open, including a handful of financials which look pretty interesting, in the wake of the recent sell-off. For our participating portfolios, then, here are our reallocations for this afternoon, based on the day of the week you were born:

Mon-Wed: CAL, UAUA, AMR, DAL (airlines)
Thu-Fri: GMXR, CLR, CHK , DAL (oil operations + Delta)
Sat-Sun: FMBI, PJC, WFC, RLI (financials)

Important: If you're using more than one portfolio for this project, kindly allocate the first portfolio according to the birthday scheme, the next portfolio to the allocation directly beneath it, and so on, until you've reallocated all participating portfolios.

For example: If you were born on a Saturday, and you're using 2 portfolios, your allocations would be:

Sat-Sun: FMBI, PJC, WFC, RLI
Mon-Wed: CAL, UAUA, AMR, DAL

In all cases, each position should be set at 25%.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Tuesday July 15th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: In the Stock Blog post, "Five-Star Picks: Fuel and Fertilizer", which stock supposedly has "at least 50 percent upside"?"

Answer: Potash

Squawk On the Street: "Question: In Jim Goldman's preview, "This Week's Tech Earnings Bonanza", what is the FIRST stock mentioned?"

Answer: Alcoa

The Call: "Question: Web Video Hunt: In Monday's CNBC.com video, "Commodities Explosion", which precious-metals play was John Roque's pick?"

Answer: GoldCorp

Power Lunch: "Question: On Monday, Goldman Sachs' Abby Joseph Cohen told CNBC that the fair value of the S&P 500 is:"

Answer: 1,400

Street Signs: "Question: Picks & Pans: In "Options Bubble on Financial Trouble," whose "implied volatility" shot up 101% Monday?"

Answer: WaMu

Closing Bell: "Question: In Monday's video roundup "Best Trades Now: Financials, Medical Suppliers & More" which one is a 10-day earnings reactor?"

Answer: Harley-Davidson

Handcrafted by Flip on July 15, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Monday, Week 10

[Scroll to the bottom for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Watch this space for today's updates, picks, and reallocation methodology.

Here begins the 10th and final week of the contest. We start the week with at least one of our readers in the top 10 - Khaled Helmi with $1.996 million. A bunch of you are hovering somewhere just beneath the leaderboard, with 5 full days to claw your way into the monied ranks.

Good luck to everyone in the home stretch - if something exciting is happening to you, let me know about it.

Update: Today's slate of contest-eligible earnings reporters (reporting after today's close or before tomorrow's open):

State Street (STT)
ADTRAN (ADTN)
Eaton (ETN)
Polaris Industries (PII)
U.S. Bancorp (USB)
W.W. Grainger (GWW)
Johnson & Johnson (JNJ)
Novellus Systems (NVLS)
Equity Lifestyle Properties (ELS)
Genentech (DNA)

(BOK Financial (BOKF), JB Hunt Transportation (JBHT), Trustco Bank (TRST), and Westamerica Bancorporation (WABC) are also contest-eligible set to report tomorrow, but haven't indicated whether they'll do so in the morning or afternoon.)

On Friday, I mistakenly included NVLS on the slate, thinking they would report this morning. In fact, they report this afternoon, so here it is again.

Of the eligible names, my favorites are ETN, USB, NVLS, and ELS. If you're near the top of the heap, bear in mind that by "favorite" I mean most likely to go up dramatically, which is not necessarily the same as most likely to go up. These picks are meant for portfolios hungrily seeking volatility, not those trying to edge up a few notches in the rankings while guarding against catastrophic downside.

For those of you participating in the crowdsourcing experiment and pursuing the final weekly prize (Super Bowl tickets, plane fare to Tampa, lodging, etc.), not an overall prize, today's reallocations are listed below, according to the first letter of your last name.

A-F: ETN, USB, NVLS, ELS
G-L: CAL, AMR, UAUA, DAL
M-S: CLR, CHK, NVLS, ETN
T-Z: USB, ELS, AMR, DAL

For example: If your last name is Pennypacker, and you're using 3 portfolios, your allocations would be:

M-S: CLR, CHK, NVLS, ETN
T-Z: USB, ELS, AMR, DAL
A-F: ETN, USB, NVLS, ELS

In all cases, each position should be set at 25%.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Monday July 14th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: In a July 8 Stock Blog, commodities king Dennis Gartman said corn could come off its highs by how much?"

Answer: $1

Squawk On the Street: "Question: In the slideshow "Stock Picks for 20-Somethings", what color is the Nokia handset case (and accompanying pencil)?"

Answer: Fuchsia

The Call: "Question: According to Jane Wells, the world's most expensive house has been owned by:"

Answer: Oil tycoon Roman Abramovich

Power Lunch: "Question: In a July 11 "Two-Way Street" Reader Mail post, correspondent "Rob" uses what device as a critique of the blog?"

Answer: A Freudian reference

Street Signs: "Question: In Jim Cramer's blog post "A Bottom For Fannie and Freddie" what term does he use to describe Bush market policies?"

Answer: Laissez-faire

Closing Bell: "Question: In Friday’s article, “Oil Rises Sharply, Closes Near $145 on Iran Fears”, which nation’s Defense Ministry is mentioned?"

Answer: Iraq

Weekly Bonu Quiz:

Question: "Forcing trades is sometimes referred to as ____-trading."

Answer: Over

Handcrafted by Flip on July 14, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (9) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Friday, Week 9

[Scroll to the bottom for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Watch this space for today's updates, picks, and reallocation methodology.

After a couple of bumpy days, I don't know if we've got any participants left on the weekly leaderboard, but folks in the oil basket did have a terrific day yesterday. Hopefully today's session will vault one of our readers into that top spot, because a bunch of you have indicated a burning, burning yearing for this week's this week's prize - a guaranteed seat at the 2009 World Series of Poker. One reader has even offered to buy the prize off of the winner, assuming he or she isn't sufficiently interested in it to foot the tax bill on the $17,000 prize.

So let us know if it looks like you're in contention.

As for the overall leaderboard, we've still got one reader in the top 25 - Khaled Helmi at #19. Since the top 6 finishers share in the $1 million prize pool, and with 6 trading days left in the contest, I'm fairly confident that one or more of you who've been bouncing around the top 100 or so are going to walk away with some of that filthy lucre.

If, as of tonight's system updates, your ranking is in the top couple hundred and you're interested in pooling your portfolio with other top-100 readers and sharing pro rata (based on your July 11th ending portfolio value) in the combined cash winnings of that pool, drop me a line.

Based on my reading of the contest rules, this wouldn't violate the letter or spirit of any of the restrictions, but I'm going to try to confirm with CNBC that such an arrangement wouldn't get anybody tossed from the contest.

(We'd also need to discuss the tax impact, so any tax lawyers and/or CPAs that want to weigh in, weigh in.)

Update: Remember that your first reallocation that will count toward the Week 10 prize (Superbowl tickets) needs to be submitted by today at 4 pm. If you're participating in the crowdsourcing experiment, the first day's allocations are listed below, according to the month of your birthday.

Jan-Mar: CAL, UAUA, AMR, DAL
Apr-Jun: CAL, UAUA, NVLS, PACW
Jul-Sep: GMXR, CLR, GDP, CHK
Oct-Dec: GMXR, CLR, NVLS, PACW

For example: If you were born in August, and you're using 3 portfolios, your allocations would be:

Jul-Sep: GMXR, CLR, GDP, CHK
Oct-Dec: GMXR, CLR, NVLS, PACW
Jan-Mar: CAL, UAUA, AMR, DAL

In all cases, each position should be set at 25%.

Also Important: If you've got one or more portfolios that may be in contention for the overall prize (as at least a few of you still do), the above allocations are not necessarily for you. The daily subgroup segmentations are designed to maximize the chances of one reader winning the weekly prize by pursuing multiple, extremely volatile, usually anti-correlated portfolios in parallel, with no regard for how the non-winning portfolios perform. This was illustrated in visceral fashion this week with the biblical sell-off in FCSX.

That said, if you're looking to goose your score on Monday with some earnings reporters that might surprise to the upside, you may want to take a look at Novellus Systems (NVLS) and PacWest Bancorp (PACW), both represented above. M&T Bank (MTB) will also report, but to me it seems less likely offer a significant upside surprise. NVLS looks like it might be the safest bet of the three, while PACW could offer the best shot of a really enormous beat.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Friday July 11th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: In the Fast Money post, Fallen Foreign Buys, which emerging-market ticker does trader Tim Seymour actually like?"

Answer: ERJ

Squawk On the Street: "Question: In Matt Nesto's Stock Blog piece, "Dow-Rohm Deal: Coat-Tail Winners," which firm is "even...considered a spec chem"?"

Answer: Intl. Flavors & Fragrances

The Call: "Question: In her post "Buy or Rent? Learn the Rule of 15", Carmen Wong Ulrich says "If I were to sell my home today, Id...""

Answer: Rent for at least a year

Power Lunch: "Question: In the Thursday Stock Blog post, Three New Energy ETFs You Should Know, which one was NOT on the list?"

Answer: Dynamic Energy Exploration

I'll be out of range when the Street Signs and Closing Bell questions are published. Someone mind posting the answers in the comments?

Street Signs: 2:00 pm
Closing Bell: 3:00 pm

Handcrafted by Flip on July 11, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (15) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Thursday, Week 9

[Scroll to the bottom for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Watch this space for today's updates, picks, and reallocation methodology.

So, after our wonderful Tuesday that rocketed some of our readers to the top echelon of traders, Wednesday was a fair bit hideouser. Even so, two of our flock remain in the top 25 - Carmen Florea at #12 and Khaled Helmi at #25. Jim McTiernan had ridden the airline rally into 23rd place, but Wednesday's selloff bumped him down to #32. Likewise, my airline-heavy portfolio slid from #72 to #126, going into Thursday's session.

If I'm missing you on either the weekly or the overall leaderboard, let me know so we can duly tout your performance.

Update: There are at least 4 contest-eligible earnings reporters on the menu today: Lawson Software (LWSN), Fastenal (FAST), Rockwell Collins (COL), and General Electric (GE). We'll be plucking those first two and mixing them in with our oil and airline baskets.

For today's weekly prize-seeking crowdsourcing participants, let's do this final reallocation according to the last digit of your zip code. I have no idea if the last digits of zip code are roughly evenly distributed or not, but that'll just be part of the thrill, eh?

1-3: CAL, AMR, UAUA, DAL
4-6: CAL, AMR, LWSN, FAST
7-8: GDP, CHK, GMXR, CLR
9-0: GDP, CHK, LWSN, FAST

Important: If you're using more than one portfolio for this project, kindly allocate the first portfolio according to the zip code scheme, the next portfolio to the allocation directly beneath it, and so on, until you've reallocated all participating portfolios.

For example: If you live in 10017 (hi, neighbor!) and you're using 3 portfolios, your allocations would be:

7-8: GDP, CHK, GMXR, CLR
9-0: GDP, CHK, LWSN, FAST
1-3: CAL, AMR, UAUA, DAL

In all cases, each position should be set at 25%. Don't forget to enter your trades by 4 pm ET.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 9: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday
Week 8: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 7: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 6: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 5: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Thursday July 10th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: In CNBC's "Top States for Business 2008," Texas is No. 1. Which state won the Most Improved State for Business title?"

Answer: Indiana

Squawk On the Street: "Question: In a spooky Two-Way Street blog post on "omens," CNBC.com's Allen Wastler refers to which paranormal concept?"

Answer: All of the above

The Call: "Question: CNBC Stock Blog: On July 9, what did Dinosaur Securities' David Garrity say was the "real trade" in the iPhone story?"

Answer: Nokia

Power Lunch: "Question: In Wednesday's Stop Trading post, Financials Fallout, which entity had Jim Cramer "consistently concerned"?"

Answer: Bank of America

Street Signs: "Question: On Wednesday, which strategist told Squawk Box Europe that commodities are likely to become "horrendously volatile"?"

Answer: Peter Toogood

Closing Bell: "Question: In Vince Farrell's post "Signs the Fed Will Defend Dollar?" he suggests what fate "could be avoided" by Fed action?"

Answer: "Another Bear Stearns"

Handcrafted by Flip on July 10, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (10) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Scoring Anomalies Resolved

Around 2:00 this afternoon, the weekly and overall contest leaderboards were adjusted. The week-to-date leaders now range from 29% to 34% - quite a bit more reasonable than the 90%+ they were showing previously. Most (if not all) of the names on the weekly leaderboard changed during the switch (and the ones that disappeared also disappeared off the overall leaderboard), but it's still not clear whether it was a system bug or a cheating scheme. The response I got from CNBC Customer Care only acknowledged that there was an apparent error and that they were working on it.

I'm pleased to report that following the adjustment, our readers Carmen and Jim jumped from 20th and 30th in the overall rankings to 17th and 23rd. My 73rd place standing didn't appear to enjoy any similar goosing...

Anyone else in the house who finds themselves on either adjusted leaderboard, please let me know.

Wednesday's trivia answers, contest commentary, berating of the Associated Press, new earnings picks, and portfolio reallocation methodology are over here.

Handcrafted by Flip on July 9, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Wednesday, Week 9

[Scroll to the bottom for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Watch this space for today's updates, picks, and reallocation methodology.

Well, the good news is our airline baskets performed magnificently yesterday, as oil continued to sell off, putting multiple subgroups up 17% or more week-to-date. Two of our readers (Carmen and Jim) now sit at #20 and #30 in the overall standings, with impressive portfolios of $1.94 million and $1.92 million, respectively. Yours truly has vaulted to a respectable #73, with just over $1.8 million.

The bad news - the weird news, anyway - is that our many participants enjoying 17-18% week-to-date gains have been unable to reach the weekly leaderboard, where the top 10 scorers are each showing 2-day gains of more than 90%. Since Monday's top scorer only showed a gain of 11%, this seems mathematically impossible, based on the Tuesday price change of the 4 best performing contest-eligible stocks (ABK, NWA, MTG, and PSMT), which booked an average gain of 35%. Admittedly, that's just the equity portfolio. Currency trading continues throughout the day and can theoretically generate limitless gains. But with $1 million in buying power (including the 10:1 leverage available to a currency portfolio with a $100,000 cash balance), one would need to generate a one-day currency gain of roughly 40%, on top of a perfect equity allocation, to achieve the gains ostensibly achieved by all top 10 weekly gainers.

Additionally, 4 of the top 10 weekly gainers appear on the top 25 overall leaderboard, meaning it's unlikely that the irregularity is explained by people using Bonus Bucks to heap huge percentage gains on tanked portfolios with very low starting values. This also means that the phenomenon appears to be distorting the overall rankings, which could well impact the distribution of the $1 million kitty.

Needless to say, it seems very likely that there's either a major system bug rearing its head or folks have uncovered a spectacular new way to cheat. I've emailed Customer Care to see what's what and will update with any response.

Anyone else concerned about the problem may also want to email Customer Care to make sure they're aware of the situation.

Update: Damnit, Mahmoud, behave yourself. Some of us are holding airline stocks here.

Keep an eye on the weekly petroleum report, due out at 10:35 am, which ought to be another another oil moving event. Folks are expecting crude stocks to fall by 1.9 million barrels.

Update: Actual decline in crude stocks: 5.9 million barrels. Looks like today is a day to be in our oil basket, not our airline basket.

Even so, the oil "rebound" that's got the AP so titillated amounts to less than1% (following a 3-day decline of 6.5%).

A rebound of less than 1%, despite Ahmadinejad strutting his ballistic manhood and an unexpectedly large drawdown in crude inventories... Seems like the general sentiment among oil traders may still be pointing downhill.

Update: From CNBC Customer Care, regarding the 90%+ weekly gainers (emphasis mine):

Thank you for notifying us of this apparent error. I have forwarded this problem to the engineer who is responsible for this (Weekly Leaderboard) calculation.

We appreciate your taking the time to send us your comments, as we are always looking for ways to make our contest more enjoyable and work better for all contestants. Our contest planners are aware of this problem, too.

Regards,
Arv Donavan

Update: And now, oil is down for the day. Someone wake the AP, which is still insisting it's a "rebound" (in a story timestamped 11:36, nearly 15 minutes after oil crossed below the centerline).

Update: Who's in the mood to reallocate?

We've got at least 6 eligible earnings reporters on today's slate - AAR Corp (AIR), Shaqw Group (SGR), Chattem (CHTT), Marriott International (MAR), FCStone Group (FCSX), and Texas Industries (TXI). It's those last 3 that we'll be inviting into our portfolios this afternoon.

Those participating in our crowdsourcing experiment (for the weekly prize, not the overall cash prizes) are invited to reallocate according to the day of the month of your birthday, as follows:

1-8: MAR, FCSX, TXI, GDP
9-16: MAR, FCSX, TXI, DAL
17-24: UAUA, LCC, CAL, DAL
25-31: GMXR, GDP, CHK, CLR

For example: If you were born on the 22nd and you're using 3 portfolios, your allocations would be:

17-24: UAUA, LCC, CAL, DAL
25-31: GMXR, GDP, CHK, CLR
1-8: MAR, FCSX, TXI, GDP

In all cases, each position should be set at 25%. Don't forget to enter your trades by 4 pm ET.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 9: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday
Week 8: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 7: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 6: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 5: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Wednesday July 9th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: In the Fast Money Future Trades slideshow, what Dublin, Ireland-based firm is recommended for a "futuristic" portfolio?"

Answer: Amarin

Squawk On the Street: "Question: On Tuesday, which strategist told "Market Insider" Patti Domm that stocks are actually bottoming?"

Answer: Byron Wien

The Call: "Question: CNBC Stock Blog: What factor(s) did HSBC's Jim Steel recently cite as making precious metals "safe investments"?"

Answer: All of the above

Power Lunch: "Question: In Suze Orman's Web Extra video, "What to Do with Old 401(k)s," she advises the caller to:"

Answer: Open an IRA rollover

Street Signs: "Question: In the article "Top Global Agriculture Picks" which companies did Victor Badin recommend?"

Answer: Bunge

Closing Bell: "Question: In a July 8 feature, Boone Pickens told CNBC he's sticking with $150 oil for 2008. But where did Lehman Bros. see oil?"

Answer: $127 a barrel

Handcrafted by Flip on July 9, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Tuesday, Week 9

[Scroll to the bottom for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Watch this space for today's updates, picks, and reallocation methodology.

Looks like another day of blessed oil weakness (now down $8 $9 $10/barrel from Thursday's intraday high), which means another day of strength for the airline baskets being carried by 60% of our participating portfolios.

Yesterday's earnings pick Pepsi Bottling Group (PBG) is also preparing for a nice day, having beaten expectations by $0.03 per share this morning.

Update: Things look even better for yesterday's preferred earnings pick Helen of Troy (HELE), having beaten expectations by $0.12 per share on a non-GAAP basis.

At roughly 11:30, HELE was up 13.0%, while our four airline stocks were enjoying an average gain of 10.6%.

PBG, for whatever reason (possibly because the market has grown accustomed to its quarterly upside surprises), is trading down.

Update: Today, as second quarter earnings season begins to dawn, we've got a relative embarrassment of riches in our pool of eligible earnings reporters (compared to the recent drought, anyway).

The five candidates are Alcoa (AA),International Speedway (ISCA), Wolverine World Wide (WWW), Acergy (ACGY), and Sealy (ZZ). For our purposes (i.e. attempting to grab the names with the best chance of big one-day pops), we'll be going with the alphabetical bookends - AA and ZZ.

Folding those two into our oil and airline baskets, we arrive at four allocations. So far this week, we've allocated according to last names and phone numbers, so for this one, let's go back to birthdays.

Jan-Mar: UAUA, LCC, CAL, DAL
Apr-Jun: UAUA, LCC, AA, ZZ
Jul-Sep: GMXR, GDP, CHK, CLR
Oct-Dec: GMXR, GDP, AA, ZZ

For example: If you were born in August, and you're using 3 portfolios, your allocations would be:

Jul-Sep: GMXR, GDP, CHK, CLR
Oct-Dec: GMXR, GDP, AA, ZZ
Jan-Mar: UAUA, LCC, CAL, DAL

In all cases, each position should be set at 25%. Don't forget to enter your trades by 4 pm ET.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 9: Monday, Tuesday
Week 8: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 7: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 6: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 5: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Tuesday July 8th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: In Julia Boorstin's July 7 post about NBC Universal's Weather Channel buy, which of NBC's Web sites does she mention?"

Answer: Hulu.com

Squawk On the Street: "Question: In Fast Money's July 3 post, "Our Favorite Inflation Trades", what was Guy Adami's play?"

Answer: Long Lockheed Martin

The Call: "Question: In the feature, "ETFs Provide Cover When Markets Get Crazy," which ETF does John Schloegel recommend?"

Answer: All of the above

Power Lunch: "Question: Web video hunt: On July 7, Stifel Nicolaus' David Lutz weighed in on financial stocks. He recommended buying:"

Answer: Mastercard

Street Signs: "Question: On Monday, Rebecca Darst said banks were rattled by the options action surrounding which stock(s)?"

Answer: Zions Bancorp

Closing Bell: "Question: CNBC Stock Blog: On Monday, hospitality analyst Jake Fuller panned which casino stock?"

Answer: Las Vegas Sands

Handcrafted by Flip on July 8, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (23) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Monday, Week 9

[Scroll to the bottom for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Watch this space for today's updates, picks, and reallocation methodology.

Is today the day for our lowly airline basket to, ahem, soar? In pre-market trading, oil fell below $141 per barrel (from Thursday's close of $145.29), pushing our all-airline allocation up nearly 8%...

Update: As for today's reallocation, we've got two eligible earnings reporters (Helen of Troy and Pepsi Bottling Group). For our purposes, I like them both. But I like HELE a little better, so it's going to be a bit better represented in this set of subgroups.

Let's reallocate according to the last digit of your phone number, as follows:

1-2: UAUA, AMR, CAL, DAL
3-4: HELE, AMR, CAL, DAL
5-6: HELE, PBG, CAL, DAL
7-8: GMXR, CHK, CLR, GDP
9-0: HELE , PBG, CLR, GDP

For example: If your phone number ends in 7, and you're using 3 portfolios, your allocations would be:

7-8: GMXR, CHK, CLR, GDP
9-0: HELE, PBG, CLR, GDP
1-2: UAUA, AMR, CAL, DAL

In all cases, each position should be set at 25%. Don't forget to enter your trades by 4 pm ET.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 9: Monday
Week 8: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 7: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 6: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 5: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Monday July 7th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: In the Energy Source blog, what did ex-CIA agent Robert Baer say about Exxon and Chevron vis-a-vis Iraqi oil?"

Answer: They won't get major fields

Squawk On the Street: "Question: According to the feature, "Failed Merger Roundup," which would-be acquiror(s) pulled the plug on a deal with PHH Corp.?"

Answer: GE Capital Solutions

The Call: "Question: In Carmen Wong Ulrich's blog post on wages, what wildlife phrase does she use for wrangling with debt?"

Answer: A bunch of crazy salmon

Power Lunch: "Question: In the story "Earnings Season Kicks Off with Little Hope Ahead" who sees "panic selling...more likely than panic-buying"?"

Answer: Matthew Tuttle

Street Signs: "Question: In the Stop Trading! blog post "Big Money Makes Its Move" which sector/idea does Jim Cramer call "horrible"?"

Answer: Retail

Closing Bell: "Question: In the CNBC Stock Blog post "Top Food Stock Picks for Lean Times", what ingestible image is displayed on the page?"

Answer: Beer being poured

Weekly Bonus Quiz

Question: "Traders break patterns into two types; continuation and _______."

Answer: Reversal

Handcrafted by Flip on July 7, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Thursday, Week 8

[Scroll to the bottom for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Watch this space for today's updates, picks, and reallocation methodology.

Hideousness returned to Wall Street yesterday to ruin everyone's day once again. Everyone except for a few of our intrepid readers, that is, who managed to add to their early week gains and maintain their spots atop the leaderboard. For Week 8 (which, remember, ends today), we've got at least two fearless traders still on the board - Bill Bilkey in 2nd place with 17.9% and Fred Green in 7th place with 17.0%.

Today, Bill's in the oil basket and Fred's in the airline basket, so whichever way oil prices thrash (so long as they thrash big), one of them will have a very nice shot at the weekly prize. Of course Steve Bournazos also has the luxury of playing negatively correlated portfolios, but the smart money's on our guys.

Go get em, fellas. Bring home that weekend of hanging out with a stranger in a Bentley!

We'll put up some picks for the first day of Week 9 (with a seat at the World Series of Poker on the line) today between 11:00 and 12:00 pm ET. Remember that because of the holiday, your first allocations need to be set today to count for Monday of Week 9.

And since the market closes early at 1 pm today, it's possible that any trades made after that time won't get booked until Monday's closing bell. The rules specify a trade cutoff 4 pm (not the closing bell) and they explicitly state that, "Each week will end at 4:00:00PM on Friday, other than Week Eight, which will end at 4:00:00PM on Thursday." But I wouldn't risk it.

Update: From CNBC:

REMINDER: In observance of Independence Day, equity and currency trading for week 8 will end today, July 3rd at 1:00pm ET. Currency trading for week 9 will begin on Sunday, July 6th at 5:15 pm ET. Equity trading for week 9 will begin on Monday, July 7th at 9:30am ET.

Not so much a "reminder" as it is a last-minute change in the rules, but there it is. Make sure to book your first Week 9 trades by 1 pm ET.

Update: This is going to be a very easy reallocation. The only eligible earnings reporter between today and Monday's open is Brazilian pulpmonger Aracruz Celulose (ARA). So for our participating portfolios, we'll stay split into airlines and oil stocks, but replace WDFC with ARA.

If you're joining us for the first time in Week 9, that means you're invited to establish the following allocation(s), according to the first letter of your last name, as follows:

A-F: CAL, UAUA, AMR, DAL
G-L: CLR, CHK, GMXR, GDP
M-S: CAL, UAUA, AMR, ARA
T-Z: CLR, CHK, GMXR, ARA

For example: If your last name is Varnsen, and you're using 3 portfolios, your allocations would be:

T-Z: CLR, CHK, GMXR, ARA
A-F: CAL, UAUA, AMR, DAL
G-L: CLR, CHK, GMXR, GDP

Make all trades by 1 pm!

And if you're arriving here after 1 pm and missed the chance to make your reallocation in time, I'd go ahead and submit the trades anyway, then email CNBC to gripe about the sudden switch, noting the relevant passages from the rules:

Participants can enter equity trades seven days per week, at any time except during the period each day, if any, when maintenance is being performed on the Site; provided, however, that trades will only be priced and executed as of 4:00:00 PM on market trading days.
...
Each week will end at 4:00:00PM on Friday, other than Week Eight, which will end at 4:00:00PM on Thursday.

Update: Looks like the airline basket (with the WDFC kicker) fared best, gaining around 2.5% including bonus bucks. That ought to put Fred Green over 19% once the system updates. Will it be enough? Can bear the suspense?

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 8: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday
Week 7: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 6: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 5: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Thursday July 3rd

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: On July 2, strategist John Carter told CNBC he sees the Dow below 10,000. Where did he suggest putting your money?"

Answer: Both

Squawk On the Street: "Question: According to "Warren Buffett Watch," the bear market bit Berkshire Hathaway. What was its Tuesday closing price?"

Answer: $120,100

The Call: "Question: In Darren Rovell's post on Nike's "Air McFlys," what Back to the Future "science" term did he quote?"

Answer: All of the above

Power Lunch: "Question: According to the Fast Money Trade School article, "All Or Nothing Options", who is expected to trade binaries?"

Answer: All of the above

Street Signs: 2:00 pm
Closing Bell: 3:00 pm

The site now reads: Questions unavailable. Please check back later.

Presumably another half trading day issue. I'll update with the answers to the Street Signs and Closing Bell questions, if and when they appear.

Update: In the comments, Diane points out the following note that has popped up on the contest home page:

JULY 3rd BONUS BUCKS UPDATE: Due to the July 3rd early market close, all contestants will receive a total of $12,000 bonus bucks for all July 3rd trivia questions and $2,000 Bonus Bucks for the week 8 weekly quiz. Enjoy your holiday!

Handcrafted by Flip on July 3, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (8) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Wednesday, Week 8

[Scroll to the bottom for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Watch this space for today's updates, picks, and reallocation methodology.

Yesterday turned into a better day than it started out for many of our participating portfolios, with the majority finishing in positive territory. By my best estimates, about 30% of you should have at least one portfolio eking out double-digit week-to-date gains, which means we've got a big menacing horde of folks lurking just under the leaderboard and well-poised to barge in there today.

We've also got at least ~~two~~ ~~three~~ FOUR players already on the board who've been using their own tweaks - Fred Green in 1st place with 14.2% and Katie Dobbyn in 9th place with 12.1%. Update: #10 Jeff Ausfeld is also one of ours. Sorry for the oversight, Jeff. Update: #7 Kate Kennedy alerts me that she's also among our numbers.

Nice work, team. Cripes.

It's the first time we've had a participant in the top spot since Week 6, so it's a special day indeed.

Remember, this is a holiday-shortened week, so this afternoon's will actually be the final reallocation that counts for Week 8. Check back around 2:00 pm ET for that exciting conclusion.

Update [9:35]: Dynamite. All four earnings-reporting picks (UNF, SHLM, AYI, and FDO ) beat expectations (by $0.10, $0.01, $0.03, and $0.06 per share, respectively). FDO (Family Dollar) and UNF (UniFirst) look like the biggest winners, trading up 12.4% and 8.4% just after the opening bell. AYI (Acuity Brands) seems to be the least buoyant (down 5.7% shortly after the open), having missed revenue expectations and issuing cautious guidance for the rest of the year.

Our oil basket is also doing nicely today - with an average gain of 7.2%. Even the airline basket is trading a bit higher.

Let's have a look at this week's Plinko board and see how our 45 sub-subgroups (3x5x3) are scattering.

So far, so good, but remember this includes intraday prices, so that Wednesday distribution is subject to change.

Update [1:45]: We've only got one eligible earnings reporter on today's slate (WD-40 Company), so let's split out into airlines and oil stocks, with and without the WD-40 kicker.

For this final Week 8 reallocation, let's go with the first letter of your last name, as follows:

A-F: CAL, UAUA, AMR, DAL
G-L: CLR, CHK, GMXR, GDP
M-S: CAL, UAUA, AMR, WDFC
T-Z: CLR, CHK, GMXR, WDFC

For example: If your last name is Vandelay, and you're using 3 portfolios, your allocations would be:

T-Z: CLR, CHK, GMXR, WDFC
A-F: CAL, UAUA, AMR, DAL
G-L: CLR, CHK, GMXR, GDP

In all cases, each position should be set at 25%. Don't forget to enter your trades by 4 pm ET.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 8: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday
Week 7: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 6: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 5: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Wednesday July 2nd

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: In the article, "Stock Picker Likes Sunnier Second Half", who might gain from "the little guy...going out of business"?"

Answer: FedEx

Squawk On the Street: "Question: Mmm: Food stocks. When Alexia Howard spoke to CNBC on June 24, which one was "at the top of her list"?"

Answer: Sara Lee

The Call: "Question: On June 25, Erste Bank's Ronald-Peter Stoferle predicted a massive gold price rise. What is the "total demand for gold"?"

Answer: Approx. 3,600 metric tons

Power Lunch: "Question: In the blog post, "Options Action: Make $$$ on Financials", Stacey Gilbert talks up a strategy for:"

Answer: Citigroup

Street Signs: "Question: Guest Blogger Vince Farrell marvelled at Goldman Sachs' market-moving ability. Who did Farrell say Goldman "unloaded" on?"

Answer: Citigroup (not an error, same answer as previous question)

Closing Bell: "Question: In Fast Money's Web Extra, "Steel In Second Half?" what event seemed to drive up MacArthur Coal?"

Answer: Arcelor upped Mac stake

Handcrafted by Flip on July 2, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Tuesday, Week 8

[Scroll to the bottom for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Watch this space for today's updates, picks, and reallocation methodology.

Yesterday, a third of our participating portfolios got off to an enormous start, thanks to Robbins & Myers' (RBN) incredible 23% gain and a nice jump in our oil stocks to boot.

Today, we've got 5 subgroups allocated to various airlines, oil companies, and four earnings reporters (SMSC, MSM, IRETS, and ROS). Check back later to see if one or more of those groups manages to parlay yesterday's jump start into a truly obscene week-to-date gain.

Update: Well, that's interesting. Investors Real Estate Trust appears to have just changed its symbol from IRETS to IRET. It's up 5.8% shortly after the opening bell, so I hope CNBC doesn't get tripped up by the change. And by "hope CNBC doesn't" I of course mean "am certain CNBC will."

Update: None of our 5 subgroups are doing quite as wonderfully on this major downer of a day on Wall Street (only two are currently in positive territory). So let's everyone move their participating portfolios into tomorrow's groups, whatever allocations you had coming into today.

Impressively, our airline basket is down more than 10% today. Yes, it's ugly for portfolios holding that basket today, but for our "perfect permutation" strategy - immune to even the largest one-day drops - we can't afford to pass up the opportunity to buy such a tremendous dip. They might keep plummeting of course, but they'll have at least the occasional violent jerk upward and we can't pass that up.

With that in mind, here are today's reallocations. Just 3 groups (airlines, oil stocks, and earnings reporters), so let's go by the day of the week you were born, giving the extra day to the earners.

Mon-Tue: CAL, LCC, UAUA, AMR
Wed-Thu: CLR, CHK, GMXR, GDP
Fri-Sun: SHLM, AYI, FDO, UNF

Those earnings reporters are A. Schulman, Acuity Brands, Family Dollar, and UniFirst, respectively.

For example: If you were born on a Saturday, and you're using 2 portfolios, your allocations would be:

Fri-Sun: SHLM, AYI, FDO, UNF
Mon-Tue: CAL, LCC, UAUA, AMR

In all cases, each position should be set at 25%. Don't forget to enter your trades by 4 pm ET.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 8: Monday, Tuesday
Week 7: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 6: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 5: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Tuesday July 1st

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: In Monday's Stock Blog post "Four Stocks to Watch This Week," which of the companies discussed posts earnings today?"

Answer: Constellation

Squawk On the Street: "Question: His name is Bond. Kingsmill Bond. In the post "From Russia with Agri Picks," which Bond pick is a sugar specialist?"

Answer: Astarta

The Call: "Question: Wilbur Ross told CNBC Monday that the oil price run-up is a bubble. What empirical factor did he cite?"

Answer: No lines at gas stations

Power Lunch: "Question: In Fast Money's blog post "Second Half Options" what "trend" does Pete Najarian suggest following?"

Answer: Oil leading the market

Street Signs: "Question: In the CNBC.com Video Roundup, "Volatility-Beaters: Steel and Internet Stocks", what steel name did Timna Tanners pick?"

Answer: U.S. Steel

Closing Bell: "Question: In a hypothetical letter penned by Bill Gross to "President Obama", what did the Pimco CIO say the markets needed?"

Answer: "Tough love"

(By which he means onerous regulation, incidentally.)

Handcrafted by Flip on July 1, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Monday, Week 8

[Scroll to the bottom for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Watch this space for today's updates, picks, and reallocation methodology.

Criminy. How about that Robbins & Myers (RBN)? Halfway through the seesion, it's up 21% on a Street-crushing third quarter earnings report and fourth quarter guidance.

That's not just good. That's David Brent good.

The RBN boost endows our Group 2 allocation from Friday with an imposing one-day gain of 7.8% (8.1% after adjusting for Bonus Bucks and currencies). Not a bad way to kick off this abbreviated Week 8.

We only had 3 groups on Friday, so anyone with at least 3 participating portfolios ought to have this allocation somewhere. Stay tuned for today's reallocations...

Update: 5 groups today, including some of our favorite airlines and oil stocks, as well as 4 companies that report earnings this evening or tomorrow morning, namely Russian telco Rostelecom (ROS), Investors Real Estate (IRETS), Standard Microsystems (SMSC), and MSC Industrial Direct (MSM).

Let's allocate according to the last digit of your phone number, as follows:

1-2: CLR, CHK, GMXR, GDP
3-4: CAL, LCC, UAUA, AMR
5-6: UAUA, AMR, SMSC, MSM
7-8: CLR, GMXR, SMSC, MSM
9-0: SMSC, MSM, IRETS, ROS

For example: If your phone number ends in 8, and you're using 3 portfolios, your allocations would be:

7-8: CLR, GMXR, SMSC, MSM
9-0: SMSC, MSM, IRETS, ROS
1-2: CLR, CHK, GMXR, GDP

In all cases, each position should be set at 25%. Don't forget to enter your trades by 4 pm ET.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 8: Monday
Week 7: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 6: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 5: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Monday June 30th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: In his blog, Darren Rovell paid tribute to the late George Carlin. Which of Rovell's terms refers to options trades?"

Answer: Long straddle

Squawk On the Street: "Question: According to the blog post, "Air Products: Cutting Edge of Alt Energy?", how does Jim Cramer describe the U.S.?"

Answer: Saudi Arabia of coal

The Call: "Question: In the CNBC.com video "Go Short" how does Options University strategist Ron Ianieri define a "speculator"?"

Answer: "Everyone in the market"

Power Lunch: "Question: According to the CNBC Stock Blog "Powering Your Portfolio: Uranium" what is uranium miner Cameco's other business?"

Answer: Mining gold

Street Signs: "Question: In Fast Money's Web Extra video "Najarians Sweet Trade" which home builder rated the opinion, "I'd stay away"?"

Answer: Lennar

Closing Bell: "Question: Which U.S. airline announced on Monday June 23 that it plans to lay off 950 pilots?"

Answer: UAL

Weekly Bonus Quiz:

Squawk Box: "Question: In shorting, the difference between where you sell a stock and where you buy it back is called _____."

Answer: Profit

Handcrafted by Flip on June 30, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Friday, Week 7

[Scroll to the bottom for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

See updates below for today's reallocations (the initial allocations for Week 8).

So, yesterday was, to put it mildly, a fugly one. Of our 4 allocations, one did manage to register a pre-Bonus Bucks gain despite the massive market sell-off, putting our best-performing subgroup at roughly 18% week-to-date. Unfortunately, it appears we may not have many folks in that subgroup, since only one player in the whole contest had reached 18% as of Thursday's close. Still, readers of this site currently account for at least 3 of the top 10 spots on the board.

Khaled Helmi is in 2nd place with 16.0% and Pam Pandeline has two portfolios on the board, at #3 with 15.3% and #10 with 12.7%.

If yours is one of the other names up there and you've been participating in the crowdsourcing experiment (or if you've just been reading the site), go ahead and sound off so we can cheer you on with mild envy. Our goal of course is to dominate that board with as many site visitors as possible (and ideally to see folks grab a few of those weekly prirzes). And I have a feeling David Barton is toast. (Unless of course he's one of our own, in which case, go David Barton!)

And for anyone on the board, please let us know which allocations you're in today, so we can follow the horserace in real time, rather than waiting several hours for the hamsters in the giant CNBC wheel in Jersey City to power the adding machine through its daily figurin'.

Check back later in the day for updates and for the first set of Week 8 allocations (which need to be submitted by 4 pm today).

If you'll be joining in for the first time in Week 8, drop us a line to let us know so we can keep a rough count of participating portfolios.

Update: Looks like Pam's #3 portfolio is in the airlines (LCC, CAL, UAUA, and AMR) and Khaled's is in solar (CSIQ, FSLR, SJR, and ESLR).

Update: In case anyone's looking to skip out early this afternoon, let's go ahead and put the first set of Week 8 allocations on the board now.

Between Friday evening and Monday morning, the ranks of U.S.-listed companies reporting earnings is pretty small, so primarily we're just dividing into two groups and taking opposite sides of the oil bet (via oil operations companies and airlines).

The one contest-eligible earnings reporter on the slate is Robbins & Myers (RBN), a manufacturer of engineered equipment for the energy and industrial sectors. Based on its historical volatility, thin analyst coverage, and track record of beating expectations, it looks potentially interesting. Since its price movements tend to correlate somewhat with oil stocks, we're going to keep it away from the airlines (unlike rational, real-world investors, we need to shun diversification when all that matters are steep, concentrated moves). So we'll have a single airline allocation and two oil allocations - one with RBN and one without.

For these three, let's allocate according to birth month, as follows:

Jan-Apr: CAL, LCC, UAUA, AMR
May-Aug: RBN, KWK, CHK, GMXR
Sep-Dec: OXY, KWK, CHK, GMXR

For example: If you were born in September, and you're using 2 portfolios, your allocations would be:

Sep-Dec: OXY, KWK, CHK, GMXR
Jan-Apr: CAL, LCC, UAUA, AMR

In all cases, each position should be set at 25%. Don't forget to enter your trades by 4 pm ET.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 7: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 6: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 5: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Friday June 27th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: Print's not dead at CNBC! Name the editor of CNBC.com's new "Bullish on Books" blogger."

Answer: Gloria McDonough-Taub

Squawk On the Street: "Question: In Fast Money's Web Extra segment "Najarians Sweet Trade" which food & beverage purveyor did Pete Najarian praise?"

Answer: McDonald's

The Call: "Question: In the CNBC.com feature "Shorting Stocks Could Be Way to Play This Market" which strategist predicted "one ugly decline"?"

Answer: Kathy Boyle

Power Lunch: "Question: In the slideshow "Lifestyles of the Super Rich" how much do the swank Christian Louboutin pumps go for?"

Answer: $2,500

Street Signs: "Question: In the Web video "Inside Look at Offshore" which firm's oil rig did Janet Shamlian report from?"

Answer: Chevron

Closing Bell: "Question: On The Money blog: In the post entitled "Cheap Is Sexy" which phrase is the blogger's own advice?"

Answer: "Vote with your wallet"

Handcrafted by Flip on June 27, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (11) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Thursday, Week 7

[Scroll to the bottom for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Watch this space for today's updates, picks, and reallocation methodology.

Since we've been having such a fine week so far, I thought it might be interesting to take a closer look at what's actually happening to all of these sub-sub-subgroups as the week progresses.

By yesterday's closing bell, we had carved up Week 7's participating portfolios into 56 groups. On Friday, we split the group in half to go into Monday with just 2 distinct allocations. We subdivided into another 4 groups on Monday and another 7 groups on Tuesday (2*4*7=56). Yesterday, we subdivided again into 4 new allocations, but we won't be able to see that impact until the end of the day, so for now, we're looking at just the 56 permutations in effect at yesterday's close.

The cumulative week-to-date gains of those 56 possible portfolio paths is illustrated below. (Note: percentage gains include Bonus Bucks and assume an initial stock portfolio value of $1 million. Actual results may vary, depending on Bonus Bucks participation and initial portfolio value.)

If you tilt your head to the left, it's a little like Plinko. (And so is our strategy.)

You'll notice our best performing subgroup is enjoying a week-to-date gain of roughly 16%. There are actually two subgroups with nearly identical performance effectively tied for that lead. Both of these groups are well ahead of the average pace (in lime green) required to hit the typical weekly winner's score of roughly 25% by Friday.

The blue and red lines represent the week-to-date performance of the S&P 500 and the Dow Industrials (also adjusted for Bonus Bucks), respectively. The bold black line represents your hypothetical performance if you'd left your entire portfolio in cash and only collected your daily bonus cash.

While 2-in-56 are not spectacular odds (though presumably a fair bit better than you might find in the wild, with nearly 1 million portfolios in play), it's worth noting that if you're participating in the experiment with at least 4 portfolios, you have about a 15% chance of finding yourself in that top group, with a week-to-date gain of roughly 16%.

The weekly leaderboard on the contest site seems to be blinking in and out, but last time I was able to get it to load, it showed a top score of 17.1% belonging to Lance Baker. Dennis Mantel held second place with 16.9% and Mark Deren was in third with 14.4%. The rest of the top 10 fell between 13% and 14%.

Given that we've got at least a few hundred portfolios participating (many belonging to players using at least 4 portfolios), I'm assuming that multiple folks on that leaderboard hail from our ranks. If the actual week-to-date gains booked by participants in our highest-scoring subgroups are coming in at 13-14%, rather than 16%, it could be that people have missed a bonus question here and there, and/or that their portfolio values at the beginning of the week were significantly above $1,000,000 (which serves to reduce the percentage gains offered by the bonuses).

Assuming you can get it load, have a look at the leaderboard and let me know if you find yourself on it. I know we've got at least one up there - #6 Khaled Helmi (with 13.6% week-to-date) sent me a note when we kicked off the experiment to let me know he was participating. And there's a tight cluster of top players showing 13.6%, so hopefully some of those are ours too. Khaled is likely carrying the airline basket today (last name beginning with G-L) and the airlines were mostly higher in after-hours trading yesterday.

Check back this afternoon for an update on today's performance and our final Week 7 reallocation scheme. If the dynamite earnings turned in last night by Herman Miller and Bed, Bath & Beyond (and their big after-hours gains) are any indication of how the rest of our fresh crop of picks will do today, one of you could be one step closer to boarding your private jet to the Caribbean.

Update: Turns out Khaled's leading portfolio is not one that's participating in the experiment and is currently positioned in energy stocks, not airlines. That's another smart play (one of our four allocations for today is also an oil basket), in that it's bound to swing significantly one way or another, assuming continued volatility in energy prices.

Oil Update [11:00]: My, what a hideous day. OPEC and Libya are playing the boogeymen, pushing oil higher and everything else lower. As such, our only group with its intraday head above water at the moment is Group 1 (the oil basket), despite a number of nice upside earnings surprises among yesterday's picks. Still a lot of session left, though. Should oil prices pull back, any of the other three groups could be in the running for best daily performance. So at your leisure, go ahead and throw any participating portfolios into the following allocations (the last reallocation of Week 7), according to the last digit of your phone number:

0-3: MU, PALM, SJR, TIBX
4-6: OXY, DVN, CLR, GMXR
7-9: LCC, CAL, UAUA, AMR

Note the slight change in the airline basket from yesterday (DAL replaced with CAL).

Important: If you're using more than one portfolio for this project, kindly allocate the first portfolio according to the phone number scheme, the next portfolio to the allocation directly beneath it, and so on, until you've reallocated all participating portfolios.

For example: If your phone number ends in 8, and you're using 2 portfolios, your allocations would be:

7-9: LCC, CAL, UAUA, AMR
0-3: MU, PALM, SJR, TIBX

In all cases, each position should be set at 25%. Don't forget to enter your trades by 4 pm ET.

For reference, in addition to the 4 names in the "0-3" group, 5 other contest-eligible companies will also report earnings either after today's close or before tomorrow's open (ACN, KBH, PAYX, SCS, and SNX).

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 7: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday
Week 6: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 5: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Thursday June 26th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: In the CNBC.com video, "Fed Expectations" what was Robert Podorefsky's reaction to talk of a Q3 Fed rate hike?"

Answer: "I don't see it"

Squawk On the Street: "Question: In the Fast Money blog post "Are Options Accurate?" Jon Najarian called ORCL & RIMM earnings with what tracking system?"

Answer: Big Thunder

The Call: "Question: Warren Buffett told CNBC that U.S. inflation is "exploding." He joked to Becky Quick that if he were Fed chairman, he'd:"

Answer: Resign

Power Lunch: "Question: In Sharon Epperson's blog post, "Shorting Oil The Way To Go?", she cites "a very large energy trader." Who?"

Answer: None of the above

Street Signs: "Question: CNBC Stock Blog: On June 23, Longbow Research's Lee Klaskow said Midwestern floods had done one good thing. What?"

Answer: Pullback for rail stocks

Closing Bell: "Question: In the blog post "Fertilizer Stocks: Room To Grow" which stock did Michael Judd call "a great long-term holding"?"

Answer: MON

Handcrafted by Flip on June 26, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (9) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Wednesday, Week 7

[Scroll to the bottom for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

See updates below for today's updates, picks, and reallocation methodology.

To recap, yesterday was a solid follow-up to Monday's fine start to Week 7 for our crowdsourced strategy. The Dow, S&P 500, and Nasdaq are all down week-to-date, but our best performing subgroup is up nearly 9% through Tuesday.

Even better - at least two of yesterday's four picks (Jabil Circuit and 3COM) are poised to gap up today, having posted results well in excess of analysts' expectations last night. Based on after-hours trading, they were suggesting Wednesday jumps of 7.8% and 6.3%, respectively, which ought to be another shot in the arm for many of our participating portfolios today.

As for the other two picks in the new crop (HB Fuller and Monsanto), the former came in a penny shy last night, while the latter reports this morning.

Among the 7 subgroup allocations we split out yesterday, the above pairs (JBL/COMS and FUL/MON) were each paired both with airlines and and with oil stocks, so whichever pair does better (presumably JBL/COMS) could enjoy an additional boost, as long as oil moves decisively in either direction.

That ought to leave our surviving portfolios with a sufficiently enviable 3-day performance to remain strong contenders for that $32,500 private jet jaunt to Turks & Caicos.

This afternoon around 2 pm, once we know which subgroup is prevailing, we'll post today's reallocations.

While we're waiting, let's play Fed Policy Pick'em.

The Federal Reserve will announce the results of its June meeting at 2:15 this afternoon. Trading in fed funds futures implies the market sees roughly a 90% chance that they'll leave the target rate unchanged at 2.0%, roughly 10% that they'll hike it to 2.25%, and a tiny chance that they'll cut it to 1.75% or 1.5%.

What do you think?

Update: Poll closed. 82% of you got it right - no change to the fed funds target rate.

Update [10:00]: More good news. No one seems to mind HB Fuller's narrow earnings miss, perhaps because they reaffirmed their full year guidance. Shares jumped 6% right out of the gate.

Monsanto beat expectations, but guided toward the lower end of its previously issued forecast. Shares were down 4% shortly after the open.

Jabil Circuit, meanwhile, is a rocket - now trading 17% higher. Participants in yesterday's Groups 1 and 5 (Sunday and Thursday birthdays, plus anyone using multiple portfolios who played either the Sunday or Thursday allocations) are having a blowout day thus far. Both groups (whose allocations were LCC/DAL/COMS/JBL and COMS/JBL/FUL/MON) are up more than 6% intraday, including bonus bucks.

Update [11:00]: Sweet fancy Moses. Thanks to a much better-than-expected crude oil inventories report (showing stockpiles swelling by 830,000 barrels, compared with the 1,700,000 barrel drawdown expected), oil prices have fallen several dollars per barrel and our airline stocks are off to the races (LCC: +5.3%, DAL: +8.8%, UAUA: +5.3%, AMR: +7.2%). That leaves Groups 1 and 6 with astounding 10% intraday gains (with Groups 2 and 5 enjoying very respectable 6% gains). If the session were to close at these prices, our best performing subgroup would be looking at a week-to-date gain of nearly 20%.

Update [1:00]: The race is still on between Groups 1 and 6 for the biggest one-day gain, but 5 of the 7 allocations are up solidly, so if you've got portfolios in any of those groups, by all means keep on rolling.

For today's reallocations, let's go with the first letter of your last name, as follows:

A-F: OXY, DVN, CLR, GMXR
G-L: LCC, DAL, UAUA, AMR
M-S: MLHR, LEN, BBBY, CAG
T-Z: CAG, WOR, XRTX, DFS

For example: If your last name is Spitzer, and you're using 3 portfolios, your allocations would be:

M-S: MLHR, LEN, BBBY, CAG
T-Z: CAG, WOR, XRTX, DFS
A-F: OXY, DVN, CLR, GMXR

In all cases, each position should be set at 25%. Don't forget to enter your trades by 4 pm ET.

Seven of these names (MLHR, LEN, BBBY, CAG, WOR, XRTX, and DFS) are selected earnings reporters. For reference, seven other contest-eligible companies will also report earnings either after today's close or before tomorrow's open (MKC, PKE, RIMM, RHT, ORCL, NKE, and CKR).

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 7: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday
Week 6: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 5: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Wednesday June 25th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: The CNBC.com video "Underweight on China" Erwin Sanft says BNP Paribas downgraded a raft of Chinese stocks. How many?"

Answer: 10

Squawk On the Street: "Question: In Tuesday's edition of "Lightning Round OT" What was Cramer's exact take on Dominion Resources?"

Answer: "A real good one"

The Call: "Question: Kiplinger's issued a list of stocks that "Warren Buffett would love." Name one. (Hint: You'll find the list on our site.)"

Answer: Tiffany

Power Lunch: "Question: On June 24, Melissa Lee sat in for Maria Bartiromo in "Maria's Market Message" Web video. What story did she lead with?"

Answer: Fed meeting

Street Signs: "Question: In his auto blog, Phil LeBeau mocked Jim Cramer! Finish Phil's phrase: "While Cramer may know stocks, I think he's...""

Answer: Crocked

Closing Bell: "Question: CNBC Stock Blog: Neil Hennessy is a frequent CNBC guest and master stock picker. What was his Web Extra pick for Tuesday?"

Answer: ARG

Handcrafted by Flip on June 25, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Tuesday, Week 7

[Scroll down for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Watch this space for today's updates, picks, and reallocation methodology.

To recap, yesterday was a great start to Week 7 for our crowdsourced strategy. Generally speaking, stocks ended the day mostly lower, but half of our participating portfolios (the oil baskets) wound up with one-day gains of 5.6%.

Today, we remain poised to capitalize on oil volatility in either direction, by keeping half the portfolios in oil stocks and half in airlines (which received yet another unholy trouncing yesterday), and we've mixed in two companies reporting earnings before the opening bell - Symmetry Medical (SMA) and Kroger (KR).

This afternoon around 2 pm, once we know which of our subgroups is prevailing, we'll post today's reallocations.

Update [10:00 am]: Good news: both KR and SMA turned in strong results this morning and are trading up 5.9% and 12.8%, respectively. So-so news: neither the airlines nor the oil stocks are able to get off the ground so far this morning, what with oil prices being stubbornly steady. Lots of day left though...

Update [3:30 pm]: It's still not clear which group will finish in the lead, but all 4 are positive on the day, so let's have all participating portfolios execute today's reallocation. For this one, let's go back to the day of the week you were born to determine your allocation:

Sunday: LCC, DAL, COMS, JBL
Monday: LCC, DAL, FUL, MON
Tuesday: CLR, FTO, COMS, JBL
Wednesday: CLR, FTO, FUL , MON
Thursday: COMS, JBL, FUL, MON
Friday: LCC, DAL, UAUA, AMR
Saturday: CLR, FTO, CEO, GMXR

For example: If you were born on a Friday and you're using 3 portfolios, your allocations would be:

Friday: LCC, DAL, UAUA, AMR
Saturday: CLR, FTO, CEO, GMXR
Sunday: LCC, DAL, COMS, JBL

In all cases, each position should be set at 25%.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 7: Monday, Tuesday
Week 6: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 5: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Tuesday June 24th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: Cramer Flashback: On May 27, the Mad Money guru called SPX the ultimate New Tech stock. What does it leverage?"

Answer: All of the above

Squawk On the Street: "Question: In her Monday blog post on foreclosures, what did Carmen Wong Ulrich say "matters most"?"

Answer: Home expense/salary ratio

The Call: "Question: In the CNBC.com feature, "The Future of Oil: What the Experts Are Saying," who is Peter Beutel paired with?"

Answer: Addison Armstrong

Power Lunch: "Question: According to CNBC.com’s video report “Foreclosure Tour Hits Manhattan” how many Q1 residential foreclosures were there?"

Answer: 23

Street Signs: "Question: In Diana Olick's post, "Harvard and Housing: A Silver Lining?" Eric Belsky cited a "significant amount" of this:"

Answer: Immigration

Closing Bell: Question: In the CNBC Stock Blog, "Brokerage Stocks: Go Long," what did Ryan Lentell call "probably the best set-up firm"?"

Answer: Goldman Sachs

Handcrafted by Flip on June 24, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Monday, Week 7

[Scroll down for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

To recap, on Friday we split our portfolios evenly between the two following allocations, which will determine the first day of performance in this 7th week of the contest, during which we're competing for the fabulous Turks & Caicos getaway.

FTO, CLR, CEO, NOA (oil operations)
UAUA, LCC, DAL, WAG (airlines)

Update: Even before the opening bell, Group 1 appears poised to be the victor. Walgreen's (WAG) earnings missed expectations slightly, while North American Energy Partners (NOA) trounced theirs and was up nearly 15% in pre-market trading.

Oil was also trading higher, despite some give from the Saudi government during this weekend's oil summit, which should also favor Group 1 over Group 2.

Update [11:15]: Mid-morning, we've got Group 1 showing an intraday gain of 5.4% (including bonus bucks), while Group 2 is wallowing in a 4.7% loss. Come back around 2 pm for today's reallocation for any participating portfolios you've got in Group 1.

Update [1:20]: There are two contest-eligible companies reporting earnings tomorrow before the opening bell: Symmetry Medical (SMA) and Kroger (KR). Both could be interesting, Kroger as an oil-sensitive proxy for the consumer economy generally (which may be further jounced tomorrow by the Consumer Confidence report) and Symmetry as a stock that's been beaten up lately, in the wake of its unexpected Fiscal 2007 loss. SMA is not widely followed and the analysts that do cover it have drastically reduced their expectations (i.e. the bar for an upside surprise has been significantly lowered) and these forecasts are pretty well scattered. These two stocks are also negatively correlated, so for our strategy it makes sense to play them both, but keep them separated.

Let's add each one separately into both our airline and oil baskets, resulting in the following 4 groups, designated by birth month.

Jan-Mar: FTO, CLR, CEO, SMA
Apr-Jun: FTO, CLR, CEO, KR
Jul-Sep: UAUA, LCC, DAL, SMA
Oct-Dec: UAUA, LCC, DAL, KR

For example: If you were born in August, and you're using 3 portfolios, your allocations would be:

Jul-Sep: UAUA, LCC, DAL, SMA
Oct-Dec: UAUA, LCC, DAL, KR
Jan-Mar: FTO, CLR, CEO, SMA

In all cases, each position should be set at 25%.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 7: Monday
Week 6: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 5: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Monday June 23th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: In the June 20 Kudlow Caucus, which panelist called the $300 billion housing bailout bill a "boondoggle"?"

Answer: Stefan Abrams

Squawk On the Street: "Question: CNBC Stock Blog: on June 20, what did Jeffrey Frankel cite as an element in an investment brainstorming process?"

Answer: The Hulk

The Call: "Question: How does Sharon Epperson's blog post, "Big Oil Heads Back To Iraq," describe the oil majors' Iraqi deals?"

Answer: Unlikely to depress prices

Power Lunch: "Question: The article "Picks for Banking Bloodbath" praises Banca Transilvania. Where is the financial firm based?"

Answer: Cluj

Street Signs: "Question: In the Web video report "Staubach's Real Estate Deal" what is the "biggest compliment" to ex-Dallas QB Roger Staubach?"

Answer: The real estate guy

Closing Bell: "Question: In the Fast Money blog, "Post-Washout Rally?" which indicator did Jon Najarian look to first for a pro-rally case?"

Answer: VIX

Weekly Bonus:

Question: "What tool did 17th century rice traders contribute to the financial markets?"

Answer: Candlestick charts

Handcrafted by Flip on June 23, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Friday, Week 6

[Scroll down for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Remember yesterday, when I said something like, "Tomorrow is a quadruple witching day, so it could be a volatile one"?

We split the participating portfolios into all-airlines and all-oil allocations, and thus far, today is not disappointing from a volatility standpoint. Our airlines are down nearly 11% overnight. (The oil stocks are up modestly.)

The good news is that this week had begun to crumble already (our crowdsourced strategy falls down when all the volatile stocks conspire to move downward on the same day... all the ones we picked anyway). And the better news is that Week 7 begins today. Remember that the first day of a given week's performance reflects the allocations you set by 4 pm on the previous Friday. So while it may not be a member of our crowd that goes to Annika Academy (which was the second-least popular prize anyway), I have high expectations for the Turks & Caicos getaway.

As for this first day of allocations, let's harness the insanity underway in the energy sector and maintain a bifurcated set of oil and airline-heavy portfolios. If the market continues to freak out about energy on Monday, the oil stocks should move higher. If people settle down and/or if oil pulls back, this latest plummet in airline valuations may begin to look comically out of whack.

There are only two changes I need you to make:

For any participating portfolios holding yesterday's oil allocation (FTO, CLR, GMXR, CEO), replace GMXR with NOA.
For portfolios with yesterday's airline allocation (UAUA, AMR, LCC, DAL), replace AMR with WAG.

NOA and WAG are North American Energy Partners and Walgreen, both of which report earnings Monday morning and should tend to move directionally with their respective portfolio-mates, adding a little extra juice to both the upside and downside come Monday.

Update: Not that it particularly matters, but the airlines have recovered quite a bit, and are now trading down only 6.7%.

For posterity, if prices were to close out the day at their current levels, our best-performing subgroup would score a weekly gain of 13.0%. Decent, but well shy of our high-water mark from last week of 19.9%.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 6: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 5: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Friday June 20th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: According to Darren Rovell's June 19 Sports Biz blog, Notre Dame will start a series vs which team in 2010?"

Answer: Army

Squawk On the Street: "Question: CNBC.com Web video: In "China Fuel Prices" (June 19) Peter Boockvar called this a "major problem" for China:"

Answer: Food inflation

The Call: "Question: Two-Way Street blog: In "Reader Response: Let's Drill!!! (Mostly)" what non-human animal anatomy does a reader mention?"

Answer: Panda's head

Power Lunch: "Question: In Bob Pisani's "Regional Banks Stage Rally" which bank anticipated "some increase in the cash dividend during 2008"?"

Answer: BB&T

Street Signs: "Question: In "Lower Crude Bad For Stocks?" Carter Worth tells the Fast Money team how he'd trade if crude pulls back. How?"

Answer: Long technology

Closing Bell: "Question: "Investing in a Tough European Retail Environment" mentions one optimistic "recovery" in UK retail. Which company?"

Answer: Kingfisher

Handcrafted by Flip on June 20, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Thursday, Week 6

[Scroll down for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Watch this space for today's updates, picks, and reallocation methodology. [See updates below]

In the mean time, let's take a quick poll on the June Business Outlook Survey, due out from the Philly Fed at 10 am. The index, which measures business sentiment among manufacturers, increased from -24.9 to -15.6 last month. Economists expect it to rise again, to an estimated -10.0, which would be the highest reading this year

Business Outlook Survey - Current Activity Index

What's your prediction?

Update [10:00]: Wa-waa.

The survey’s broadest measure of manufacturing conditions, the diffusion index of current activity, decreased slightly, from -15.6 in May to -17.1 this month.

Looks like the pessimists (25% of you) were right.

Update [10:45]: Onto the business at hand. Anyone with Pier One (PIR) is yesterday's allocation is getting murdered today, as the retailer posted a quarterly loss 2/3 larger than Wall Street expected. It looks like we may only have 1 or 2 groups (out of yesterday's 6) who wind up adding to their gains today, but there's only one reallocation left in this ~~atrocious~~ challenging week anyway, so everyone's scores get reset tomorrow (for purposes of the weekly prizes, anyway).

Alas, there aren't any contest-eligible stocks reporting earnings after today's close or before tomorrow's open anyway. So for those of you with PIR-less portfolios, let's just split them down the middle and go all in with our airline and oil baskets.

Tomorrow is a quadruple witching day, so it could be a volatile one. And no matter which way it shakes out, one of these groups ought to do quite nicely, while the other equally suffers (which - it can't hurt to repeat - is how the crowdsourced strategy is supposed to work).

Last Friday, the boys got the oil and the girls got the airlines, so this week, let's switch it up.

Girls: FTO, CLR, GMXR, CEO (oil)
Boys: UAUA, AMR, LCC, DAL (airlines)

Of course, if you're using more than one portfolio, you get to play both. Just split your participating portfolios evenly between the two allocations, with any tie going to your gender. Make sure to enter all trades by 4 pm (Eastern) today.

Update [2:30]: Indeed, it's looking like 2 of yesterday's 6 groups will enjoy net gains today, with the best performing group being #6 (CCL, PRGS, DVN, IHS), which is looking at a respectable intraday gain of 2.4% (3.4% including bonus bucks).

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 6: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday
Week 5: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Thursday June 19th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: CNBC.com managing editor Allen Wastler enjoys a stogie in his byline photo. What brand of cigar?"

Answer: Cuvee Blanc Churchil

Squawk On the Street: "Question: In "Health Care Stocks: Schwab's Rx" why did Paul Alan Davis praise Express Scripts?"

Answer: It's "part of the solution"

The Call: "Question: In the story, "Crude? So What? These Characters Still Find Work in Ads", which figure is called a "contemporary...icon"?"

Answer: Stewie the baby

Power Lunch: "Question: In "Energy Plays: How to Profit From the Oil-Price Boom" Jordan Kimmel offered his "excellent" stock picks. Name one."

Answer: MCF

Street Signs: "Question: Web video hunt: In "LeFrak's Stock Picks," Richard LeFrak joked that FedEx should shift from what to what?"

Answer: Airplanes to smart cars

Closing Bell: "Question: In Fast Money's "Web Extra: Nat Gas Plummet?" the traders also discussed solar energy. The following stock(s) were mentioned:"

Answer: Intel

Handcrafted by Flip on June 19, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Wednesday, Week 6

[Scroll down for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

As of yesterday's close, our best performing subgroup is up 11% week-to-date. Nothing to sneeze at, but a little disappointing after our Best Buy and Goldman Sachs picks both panned out marvelously (insofar as both companies soundly beat Wall Street expectations when they reported earnings yesterday), but then proceeded to trade lower anyway in what turned out to be an ugly day in the markets.

Even so, nearly everyone's portfolios should be up for the week and a bunch have already crested double digits. With three days of performance yet to hit the books, I'm liking our chances of poaching that golf package.

Update [9:30]: Okay, well FedEx and Morgan Stanley didn't work out precisely as hoped. Both failed to impress Wall Street with their earnings this morning and promptly began pointing lower. Of course, that's exactly what the crowdsourcing strategy is here to insulate us from and we've got a significant number of portfolios holding neither stock. Those same portfolios (yesterday's Group 1 - holding LNN, IHS, APA, DVN) also happen to be heavily oil-concentrated, so keep your eye on the crude inventories report, due out at 10:30.

Update [9:35]: Bah. Lindsay Corp's earnings fell short of expectations too, sending the shares plummeting. So much for Group 1. On the bright side, Group 4 has no LNN or MS; its only holding among these three turkeys is FDX, which has actually begun to rebound. As the package delivery business is very airlinesque (and since Group 4 also holds United and American), we're now pulling for the crude inventories report to go the other way (to show a smaller-than-expected drawdown).

Update [10:30]: There it is. The weekly drawdown in both crude oil and gasoline was 1.2 million barrels (versus an expected drawdown of 2 million barrels). Distillate fuel inventories rose by 2.6 million.

Update [2:45]: All groups are floundering today, so let's everyone go ahead with the following reallocations in all of our participating portfolios. Make sure to enter all trades by 4 pm (Eastern) today.

Today's segmentation methodology: day of week of birth.

Sat/Sun: DVN, KWK, HK, APA
Mon: CCL, PIR, CC, DVN
Tue: CCL, PIR, CC, UAUA
Wed: CCL, PIR, PRGS, IHS
Thu: CCL, PRGS, CC, IHS
Fri: CCL, PRGS, DVN, IHS

Carnival (CCL), Progress Software (PRGS), Circuit City (CC), IHS Inc. (IHS), and Pier One (PIR) are earnings reporters, while the others you may be starting to recognize from our go-to pile of oil operations and airline stocks.

For reference, it looks like there are three other eligible earnings reporters at your disposal: Healthways (HWAY), Actuant Corporation (ATU), and J. M. Smucker (SJM).

Important: If you're using more than one portfolio for this project, kindly allocate the first portfolio according to the day of week of birth scheme, the next portfolio to the allocation directly beneath it, and so on, until you've reallocated all involved portfolios.

For example: If you were born on a Thursday, and you're using 3 portfolios, your allocations would be:

Thu: CCL, PRGS, CC, IHS
Fri: CCL, PRGS, DVN, IHS
Sat/Sun: DVN, KWK, HK, APA

In all cases, each position should be set at 25%.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 6: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday
Week 5: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Wednesday June 18th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: In her blog post, "Foreclosures: What You're Asking About," what did Carmen Wong Ulrich offer Steve the Angry Renter?"

Answer: His own blog post

Squawk On the Street: "Question: Cramer prefers gold to silver. So why did he say he likes Pan American Silver, in June 9's Lightning Round OT?"

Answer: "A winner" among peers

The Call: "Question: Warren Buffett Watch: According to Adolphus Busch IV, how big a stake does Berkshire Hathaway's CEO hold in Anheuser?"

Answer: 5 percent

Power Lunch: "Question: The slideshow, "Which Costs More?" (June 10) says Budweiser is pricier than crude oil. How much IS a barrel of beer?"

Answer: US$447.25

Street Signs: "Question: CNBC Stock Blog: In "Two China Solar Energy Stocks" Gerald Jordan praised, yes, energy plays. Which one(s)?"

Answer: All of the above

Closing Bell: "Question: In "'Non-Toxic' Financial Stock Picks" which bank did Ben Steverman call "the anti-Countrywide"?"

Answer: Hudson City Bancorp

Handcrafted by Flip on June 18, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Tuesday, Week 6

[Scroll down for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

We're off to a good start this week, with 100% of participating portfolios in the black and half of them returning 6.7% or more on the first day. If a couple of yesterday's picks pan out today (earnings reporters BBY, TCL, and GS, with some oil and airlines on the side), many of you should be looking at double-digit week-to-date gains by today's close.

The average weekly prize winner has managed 26.1%, so anything above 9.7% by Tuesday is potential Annika territory.

Today's new allocations and subgroup segmentation methodology are available below.

Update: Looks like we're 2 for 2 so far today, with BBY and GS both beating Wall Street expectations and moving higher in pre-market trading. Mumbai-based TCL hasn't reported yet.

Update: Despite Best Buy's beat, persistent retailer-wariness dragged the shares lower during the regular session. Even so, all 5 groups remain positive for the day (as of 1:20 pm), even before bonus bucks. None too shabby on a day when all major indices are moving lower. At this point, the best performing subgroup is Group 3 (GS, TCL, HK, UAUA), with an intraday gain of 5.0%, including bonuses. If we were to close at these prices today, our best performers would realize a week-to-date gain of 12.2%.

The leading group could well change by day's end, so I'd again encourage all participating portfolios to go ahead with today's reallocations. Make sure to enter all trades by 4 pm (Eastern) today.

Today's segmentation methodology is brought to you by the first letter of your last name.

A-F: LNN, IHS, APA, DVN
G-L: MS, LNN, FDX, UAUA
M-S: MS, LNN, IHS, APA
T-Z: IHS, AMR, FDX, UAUA

For example: If your last name is Vorshtein, and you're using 2 portfolios, your allocations would be:

T-Z: IHS, AMR, FDX, UAUA
A-F: LNN, IHS, APA, DVN

In all cases, each position should be set at 25%.

Four of these names (MS, LNN, IHS, and FDX) are earnings reporters; the others constitute that airline/oil pairings.

For reference, there are at least three other eligible earnings reporters on deck (CLC, KMX, and CMC), but they seem somewhat less suited for our purposes.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 6: Monday, Tuesday
Week 5: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Tuesday June 17th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: In Bob Pisani's blog post "Using Analysts As Contrarians?" which financial firm's employee is mentioned by his full name?"

Answer: Merrill Lynch

Squawk On the Street: "Question: In Monday's "Stop Trading!" segment, which stock did Jim Cramer say "suffers from a lack of momentum"?"

Answer: Nokia

The Call: "Question: CNBC Stock Blog: On June 16, Jonathan Vyorst offered CNBC his stock picks. But which one was an exclusive "Web Extra"?"

Answer: American Financial

Power Lunch: "Question: Full disclosure: In "Stocks Your Dad Would Love," which of Brent Wilsey's picks is in his portfolio?"

Answer: Harley-Davidson

Street Signs: "Question: In "Take Your Position: Financials" Fast Money's Guy Adami says "take at least half your position off the table" for:"

Answer: Lehman Brothers

Closing Bell: "Question: In Vince Farrell's "Raising Rates Would Spark a Rally" he quotes Stefan Abrams on the worst thing for stock prices:"

Answer: Rising rate of inflation

Handcrafted by Flip on June 17, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (6) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Monday, Week 6

[Scroll down for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Watch this space for today's picks and contest updates.

Unfortunately, we didn't quite win Week 5 after all. After Friday's rebalancing, our own Hugh Daniel slipped from 1st to 4th. His 19.9% return made for a terrific week, but it wasn't quite enough to take home the TAG Heuers.

Annika This week's prize is a 4-day trip to Annika Academy in Orlando, including nine holes with Annika herself.

The allocations we set on Friday will be the first to count toward this week's performance. See updates below for today's picks and subgroup segmentation.

Update: So far, things are looking good for Group 1 (MMR, REXX, DPTR, LEH), which is enjoying an intraday gain of 4.4%, thanks to another increase in oil prices and a favorable market reception to Lehman Brothers' earnings release.

Update: Spoke too soon. Airline stocks are staging a bit of a late morning rally, leading Group 2 (LCC, AMR, UAUA, LEH) to pull nearly even with Group 1. At 11:30, all 4 Friday groups were trading higher, despite the Dow and S&P 500 moving lower today.

Update: Pulling into the close, Friday's Groups 3 and 4 are vying for the best finish, with both showing an approximate one-day gain of 6.8%, including bonus bucks. All 4 groups are doing nicely, so let's have everyone proceed with the next reallocation and keep as many portfolios alive as possible.

We've got 5 subgroups today, assigned according to the last digit of your phone number, as follows:

1-2: BBY, TCL, HK, UAUA
3-4: GS, BBY, HK, UAUA
5-6: GS, TCL, HK, UAUA
7-8: BBY, TCL, GS, UAUA
9-0: BBY, TCL, GS, HK

Best Buy (BBY), Goldman Sachs (GS), and Tata Communications (TCL), all report earnings tomorrow morning, while Petrohawk (HK) and United (UAUA) are part of our ongoing oil/airline pairings.

Remember to enter those trades by 4 pm today.

If you're looking for additional potential founts of volatility, at least two other contest-eligible companies will report earnings after today's close or before tomorrow's open: Adobe Systems (ADBE) and FactSet Research (FDS).

Important: If you're using more than one portfolio for this project, kindly allocate the first portfolio according to the phone number scheme, the next portfolio to the allocation directly beneath it, and so on, until you've reallocated all involved portfolios.

For example: If your phone number ends with a 7, and you're using 3 portfolios, your allocations would be:

7-8: BBY, TCL, GS, UAUA
9-0: BBY, TCL, GS, HK
1-2: BBY, TCL, HK, UAUA

In all cases, each position should be set at 25%.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 6: Monday
Week 5: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Monday June 16th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: Where did "Managing Asia" blogger Christine Tan get her Masters degree?"

Answer: University of Auckland

Squawk On the Street: "Question: On June 5, Cramer sang the praises of Yum! Brands. How high did he say the stock would go?"

Answer: Past $45

The Call: "Question: "Beloved Characters as Reimagined for the 21st Century" told of toon & toy updates. What was "the industrys nightmare"?"

Answer: Earring Magic Ken

Power Lunch: "Question: The May 27 Fast Money University segment had bad news for some -- but possibly good for others. What was the topic?"

Answer: Natural disasters

Street Signs: "Question: Darren Rovell called Kimbo Slice the fiercest athlete since Mike Tyson. Whom did Rovell see Slice fight on May 31?"

Answer: James Thompson

Closing Bell: "Question: In "Utility Stocks Hotter with Deregulation," which stock was Dan Eggers' "top idea right now"?"

Answer: PEG

Weekly Quiz:

Question: "A series of higher highs and higher lows signals what kind of trend?"

Answer: Uptrend

Handcrafted by Flip on June 16, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Friday, Week 5

[Scroll down for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Pow! The ladies are in charge today on this 5th and final day of the crowdsourcing experiment, with their all-airline allocation showing a whopping one-day gain of 11.4% (as of an hour or so into the session). It's looking like a fine ending to the week, but bear in mind things could change dramatically by the end of the session (as they did yesterday for airline stocks).

The men's allocation (oil operations stocks) is up around 1.0%.

How are both of our negatively correlated portfolios trading higher? WSJ's MarketBeat credits the menacing date.

Stocks (unlike some people) apparently favor Friday the 13th, at least when the spooky date falls in June.

There have been 11 incidences of Friday, June 13, since 1928, and nine were up days for the S&P 500, noted Howard Silverblatt, senior index analyst at Standard & Poor’s. On Friday, June 13, 1941, the S&P fell 0.2%, and Friday, June 13, 2003, it fell 1%.

On the whole, there have been 1,108 up days and 9,798 down days in June for the index since 1928, “so it’s unusual” that those Friday 13ths in June would so often work out well, Mr. Silverblatt said. The S&P is up by more than 1% as of this writing, which is now freaking us out.

If prices were to close at these intraday prices, it would bring our leading subgroup up to an approximate gain of 24% for the week (including bonus bucks through today). The weekly leader was up 17.7% through yesterday, so we just might pull this off. [See update below...]

I don't know if we've actually got any participants who fell into that final sub-sub-sub-subgroup (we started the week with about 100 participants and 300 portfolios involved, so maybe), but anyone who bought yesterday's airline portfolio (which should be anyone using at least 2 portfolios, male or female) ought to be having a good day. More than enough to make up for some early-week ugliness.

Picks for Day 1 of Week 6 are listed below. Golf with Annika is on the line, so let's stay focused.

In the mean time, please drop us a line if you were participating in the experiment and you've got a portfolio that might be in contention for the Week 5 prize.

Update: Even more good news. This is my bad for not recognizing the name sooner, because he e-mailed last week to let us know he would be participating, but it turns out the current weekly leader (the one with the 17.7% gain through yesterday) is SF crowdsourcing experiment participant Hugh Daniel.

Hugh was using all 5 portfolios in the experiment, so he was able to use both the oil and airline allocations yesterday afternoon, but alas, the chart-topping portfolio wound up getting the oil stocks. Still, this means that if crude stages another afternoon rally and wrecks everyone's huge airline gains, Hugh's oil allocation ought to improve enough for him to hold the top spot.

Update: Here we go - the first batch of allocations for Week 6. Bear in mind these are devised with the crowdsourcing experiment in mind, which is to say they're best used in portfolios you don't believe can catch up to the overall leaders by the end of the contest. Together, we'll coordinate the stock allocations across these few hundred portfolios in order to maximize the chance that one of the participants wins the weekly prize.

And given the tentatively promising way the experiment's inaugural week is turning out, it's worth repeating a point I mentioned in Wednesday's pep talk, after a lot of our portfolios suffered some hideous losses: This strategy will necessarily result in big losses for many of the portfolios. The daily allocations are designed to be volatile and to move in opposite directions. So ideally, on any given day, half the group will be up big and half will be down big.

But given that only one player can win the weekly prize, big losses are no worse than moderate gains, since your score effectively resets every Friday. (Plus, if you're starting from a smaller base, your daily bonus bucks give you a larger percentage bonus.) Recognizing this, and steeling yourself against the brunt of the steep declines is what enables us to execute this strategy, which might give you a 1/100 chance of winning a weekly prize (a lot better than 1/250,000 in the general population).

With all that said, here's today's lineup.

Let's go back to square 1 and run the first segmentation by birth month again:

Jan-Mar: MMR, REXX, DPTR, LEH
Apr-Jun: LCC, AMR, UAUA, LEH
Jul-Sep: MMR, REXX, DPTR, SBR
Oct-Dec: LCC, AMR, UAUA, CAL

Each allocation is either heavily oil- or airline-weighted, with one of each spiced with a bit of Lehman Brothers (LEH), which reports earnings Monday morning and, well, has been in the news lately. The only other eligible earnings reporter (that I'm aware of) is ~~Adobe Systems (ADBE)~~, but Lehman seems a little more prone to post-earnings hyperactivity right now, which is exactly what we're looking for.

Important: If you're using more than one portfolio for this project, allocate the first portfolio according to the birthday scheme, the next portfolio to the allocation directly beneath it, and so on, until you've reallocated all involved portfolios.

For example: If you were born in November and you're using 2 portfolios, your allocations would be:

Oct-Dec: LCC, AMR, UAUA, CAL
Jan-Mar: MMR, REXX, DPTR, LEH

All stocks should be set to 25%. Make sure to get your allocations set by 4 pm today.

And if you're a new participant (or didn't check in last time), it'd be helpful for purposes of budgeting the daily segmentations if you can give us a shout and let us know how many portfolios you'll be using in the experiment. You don't have to do this to participate, of course, but a more accurate count will enable us to better optimize the the strategy.

(Correction: Adobe reports after the close on Monday, not before the open, so it was never a good candidate for today's picks to begin with.)

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 5: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Friday June 13th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: In CNBC.com's Earnings - Highlights section, what is the first tab that readers see?:

Answer: Expected Announcements

Squawk On the Street: "Question: In May 29’s Sell Block, which telecom stock(s) did Cramer suggest to sell on “any strength”?"

Answer: Vimpel Communications

The Call: "Question: In May, Warren Buffett told a Madrid audience what his "three bedrock ideas" are. Which did he mention first?"

Answer: Stock = piece of a business

Power Lunch: "Question: According to Diana Olick, how many U.S. construction jobs were lost between the 2006 sector peak and May 2, 2008?"

Answer: 457,000

Street Signs: "Question: Which CNBC anchor also writes the "Managing Asia" blog?"

Answer: Christine Tan

Closing Bell: "Question: In his June 5 blog, Phil LeBeau said this automaker matched Toyota's efficiency -- but not its public perception:"

Answer: Chrysler

Handcrafted by Flip on June 13, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Thursday, Week 5

[Scroll down for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Watch this space for today's picks and contest updates.

Meanwhile, let's take a quick prediction poll on this morning's unemployment report (due out at 8:30). A week ago, initial jobless claims clocked in at 357,000, a decrease of 18,000 from the previous week. This week, analysts expect an increase to 370,000.

What are you expecting?

Update: Poll closed. Actual number: 384,000.

Smart crowd. That was in the range of your second most popular answer. And 69% of you correctly guessed that the number would surprise to the upside.

Update: Shortly after the open, it looks like Groups 1 and 4 (last names beginning with A-F and T-Z) will be vying for the biggest gain today:

A-F: NDN, CASY, LCC, CAL: 6.3%
G-L: NDN, CASY, KWK, GDP: 2.0%
M-S: ENS, KWK, GDP, CHK: 1.3%
T-Z: LCC, CAL, AMR, UAUA: 4.9%

Happily, everyone's looking at gains so far amid a market rallying retail sales data, but a nice rebound in airlines (whose stupefying recent declines we looked at last night) and a solid earnings surprise from Casey's General Stores (CASY) are contributing to the bookend groups' big moves.

If everyone's been following along, our best performing subgroup should be looking at an approximate week-to-date gain of 14.7%, including bonus bucks through today. Weekly leader Paul Dorell was up 12.3% through yesterday, so we've got a decent shot at this.

And for the first time during the contest, there are no eligible companies reporting earnings after today's close or before tomorrow's open (that I can see anyway - if you come across one, let me know). So for the 5th and final reallocation of this week's crowdsourced TAG Heuer poaching experiment, let's simply bisect the surviving portfolios into oil operations and airlines. As long as oil prices move tomorrow, one of these two ought to have a good day.

Boys: EAC, OXY, WLL, CLR (oil)
Girls: LCC, CAL, AMR, UAUA (airlines)

If you're using multiple portfolios, just divide them up evenly (or however you want) between the two.

Update: Reader Dominic notes that Synutra (SYUT), a Chinese baby formula manufacturer, is set to report earnings tomorrow and the company is indeed contest-eligible. I'm unable to confirm the timing of the release (if it's after 4:00 pm, it's not of much use to us today), but assuming it's some time tomorrow morning, this could be an interesting play.

Almost no analyst coverage, only recently came public, hugely volatile, etc. If your gameplay involves what would ordinarily be an irrational negative risk tolerance (which it should), you may consider swapping this into one of the slots in your oil and/or airline basket. No guarantees it moves higher, but there's an awfully good chance it's going to move big.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 5: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Thursday June 12th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: Web Video Hunt: On Wednesday's "Squawk Box," Sequoia's Mark Kvamme discussed bringing a Web site to TV. Which one?"

Answer: funnyordie.com

Squawk On the Street: "Question: In "Stocks Could Be Hostage To Oil Prices All Summer" which defensive play did Richard Sparks recommend?"

Answer: PetroQuest

The Call: "Question: In the Two-Way Street blog post, "Missing Ron Paul: Readers Respond", which CNBC.com reader used the phrase "corporate lapdog"?"

Answer: Frosty
(Specifically, it was, "Blow it out your a**, you corporate lapdog." Got to love the Paulnuts.)

Power Lunch: "Question: In "The Surest Sign It's Time to Sell" (Feb. 19) Cramer gave timeless stock advice. What was his "rock solid" sell sign?"

Answer: Heavily shorted & hyped

Street Signs: "Question: In Bob Pisani's blog post, "Global Theme: Inflation Worries" how many nations does he specifically name?"

Answer: Six

Closing Bell: "Question: In "Surging Crude Means Picking Shrewd" why did Christopher Zook praise Applied Materials?"

Answer: Solar growth opportunity

Handcrafted by Flip on June 12, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Wednesday, Week 5

[Scroll down for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Watch this space for today's crowdsourcing experiment picks and contest updates.

Out of the gate, it looks like yesterday's Group 7 (the Saturday babies) is positioned to have the best day, but with all groups heavy into oil stocks or airlines, things could change dramatically by the end of the session, depending where oil prices go after today's crude inventories report.

Update: Crude underwent a steeper-than-expected drawdown last week, so the oil-heavy groups ought to improve somewhat (Groups 3, 5, and 7 - the Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday birthdays). Still, it may not be enough to make up for another crummy round of earnings reports (QSII and KFY are both trading lower, despite reporting basically in line with expectations). There's not much second-guessing we can do, either, since this lonely week has only 2 or 3 contest-eligible earnings reporters each day. Even so, our top group is sporting a week-to-date gain of roughly 7.5%, including bonus bucks through today.

Today, however, is a little different. We've got no fewer than five eligible earners to play with, in addition to our oil/airline see-saw.

99 CENTS Only (NDN)
Casey's General Stores (CASY)
China Medical Tech (CMED)
School Specialty (SCHS)
ENERSYS (ENS)

And for any surviving portfolios participating in the weekly winner experiment, let's separate into the following four groups, with the following four allocations, according to the first letter of your last name:

A-F: NDN, CASY, LCC, CAL
G-L: NDN, CASY, KWK, GDP
M-S: ENS, KWK, GDP, CHK
T-Z: LCC, CAL, AMR, UAUA

Important: As with yesterday, if you're using more than one portfolio for this project, allocate the first portfolio according to the last name scheme, the next portfolio to the allocation directly beneath it, and so on, until you've reallocated all involved portfolios.

For example: If your last name is Uumellmahaye, and you're using 3 portfolios, your allocations would be:

T-Z: LCC, CAL, AMR, UAUA
A-F: NDN, CASY, LCC, CAL
G-L: NDN, CASY, KWK, GDP

Quick postscript: Just to clear up any confusion, you shouldn't be using the above allocations in any portfolios you're attempting to carry into one of the top 6 overall spots at the end of the game. On Friday, we launched this experiment as an attempt to grab the weekly top spot for one of the participants, the strategy for which involves going after maximally concentrated and volatile allocations each day, which ideally are negatively correlated with each other. An unavoidable consequence of that strategy (indeed part of its deliberate design) is that a lot (as many as half each day) of portfolios will get clobbered. But since only one person wins the weekly prize (and since your performance essentially resets every week, if you're forsaking the overall prize to focus on the weeklies), having your portfolio clobbered is no worse than coming in 2nd in the weekly standings. In fact, it's considerably better, given that you'd start the following week with a lower initial value, and reap more of a boost from the daily bonus bucks.

This week has shown us some impressive volatility (mostly to the downside), which takes some intestinal fortitude to work through, but if you can avoid the understandable tendency to flinch, we'll have a good shot at pulling down one or more of those lavish weekly prizes.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 5: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Wednesday June 11th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: Web video hunt: On Tuesday, Toll Bros. CEO Robert Toll told Power Lunch home prices may be stabilizing. Who interviewed him?"

Answer: Sue Herera

Squawk On the Street: "Question: CNBC Stock Blog: According to Dan Eggers, what is the key to picking energy utility stocks?"

Answer: Deregulated environment

The Call: "Question: In John McCain's June 10 CNBC interview, whom did the presidential candidate say he'd enlist to strengthen trade?"

Answer: Our traditional allies

Power Lunch: "Question: In "Congress to Summer Workers: Drop Dead," Jerry Bowyer refers to which "universal laws of science"?"

Answer: All of the above

Street Signs: "Question: In "Oil Services Stocks Are Price-Proof" Federated Investors' Phil Orlando says oil prices may sink as low as:?"

Answer: $110 to $100 range

Closing Bell: "Question: In "Answering Your Credit Questions" blogger Carmen Wong Ulrich says the "big secret" of the credit industry is that it's:"

Answer: "Very unregulated"

Handcrafted by Flip on June 11, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Tuesday, Week 5

[Scroll down for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Hmmph. Well this week is continuing in lackluster fashion. Of the three earnings reporters we included in yesterday's picks, two are happily trading to the upside today (PLL and STEI). The third however (CMGI) is doing atrociously, down more than 20% in late morning trading.

I'll offer only the brief self-acquittal that during this week's crowdsourcing experiment, we're using all eligible earnings reporters, not just the "extra special" ones that we'd been carefully screening for prior to this week. Accordingly, some spectacular failures were inevitable (and, frankly, tolerable, given the massively multi-player strategy which counts on a single portfolio navigating the week successfully). That said, I'd be remiss if I didn't apologize to the managers of those portfolios that wound up with CMGI in them today, per yesterday's allocation matrix, for the sea of red they're seeing in one or more of their portfolios today.

A mild consolation is that the reduction in portfolio value will now make each day's bonus bucks count for a greater percentage gain, putting you in a stronger position to win next week's top honors. I know, it's very mild.

Anyway, let's not wallow. We hit a bit of a bump, but today's leading group (which looks like it'll probably be #8, #1 or #5 - folks born in October, November, or December, whose phone numbers end in an 8, a 1, or a 5) should be up 5-7% week-to-date (including today's intraday moves and bonus bucks through the end of the day).

Now, because our leading groups have yet to knock it out of the park this week, all participants who lent portfolios to the experiment (and particularly today's Group 8, 1, and 5 and yesterday's Group 4) are encouraged to implement the next allocation round.

This time, after zeroing out all existing positions (before 4 pm), set those maddening little slider bars to 25% for the following names, according to the day of the week on which you were born.

Sunday: LCC, CAL, AMR, SKYW
Monday: QSII, KFY, LCC, CAL
Tuesday: QSII, KFY, KWK, GDP
Wednesday: QSII, LCC, CAL, AMR
Thursday: QSII, KWK, GDP, CHK
Friday: KFY, LCC, CAL, AMR
Saturday: KFY, KWK, GDP, CHK

Important: As with yesterday, if you're using more than one portfolio for this project, allocate the first portfolio according to the birthday scheme, the next portfolio to the allocation directly beneath it, and so on, until you've reallocated all involved portfolios.

For example: If you were born on a Tuesday, and you're using 3 portfolios, your allocations would be:

Tuesday: QSII, KFY, KWK, GDP
Wednesday: QSII, LCC, CAL, AMR
Thursday: QSII, KWK, GDP, CHK

Side note: On the first day, Group 4 prevailed. On the second day, Groups 8, 1, and 5 are all in contention. Any Lost numerologists in the house?

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 5: Monday, Tuesday
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Tuesday June 10th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: In Fast Money's June 6 Web Extra segment, "The Week Ahead," what topics did the traders offer predictions for?"

Answer: Oil, Apple & inflation

Squawk On the Street: "Question: In "Lehman to Raise $6 Billion, Expects $2.8 Billion Loss" (June 9), who offered insights to CNBC's Squawk Box?"

Answer: Greenlight's David Einhorn

The Call: "Question: In Cramer's May 15 Sell Block segment, "The Newest Mortgage Offenders," why did the Mad Money guru slam IndyMac?"

Answer: Diluting shareholders

Power Lunch: "Question: CNBC Stock Blog: In "Playing the Food Chain," what did stock picker Doug Cliggott warn investors to be wary of?"

Answer: Need for credit growth

Street Signs: "Question: How much did Warren Buffett bet that Wall Street pros cannot beat the S&P?"

Answer: $320,000

Closing Bell: "Question: Yodel for profit: In "Great Dividend Plays from Switzerland" which company did David Costa recommend?"

Answer: Adecco

Handcrafted by Flip on June 10, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Monday, Week 5

[Scroll down for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Welcome to Week 5. As discussed on Friday, we're undertaking a new endeavor this week in an attempt to vault one of this site's readers into the top spot to walk away with those fancy watches.

We split up the participants into 4 groups, each of which received a different allocation of 4 stocks.

To recap, Friday's allocations were:

Group 1: XIDE, RBS, LEH, AIG
Group 2: CAL, LCC, DAL, SKYW
Group 3: XIDE, BWS, VC, ICON
Group 4: KWK, CHK, CLR, XTO

The selections are deliberately concentrated in specific sectors (respectively, financials, airlines, consumer goods, and oil and gas) to avoid the smoothing effects of diversification and they're deliberately focused on volatile (and when possible, negatively correlated) sectors. Hopefully, at least one group will move significantly higher during Monday's session, but it should be noted that one group's upside will almost certainly be another's downside.

Specifically, with oil's record-setting one-day jump on Friday, there's a decent chance we'll see a follow through rally or a notable reversal. Groups 2 and 4 (airlines and oil and gas) will therefore both likely incur big moves, and those moves will likely be in opposite directions. Per our collaborative strategy, we're seeking to advance one group each day with a big enough move that 5 of them strung together will endow one lucky sub-sub-sub-subgroup with an unmatched weekly gain by Friday.

The downside (indeed an invited consequence) is that at least one subgroup should incur large downside moves each day. But since only one player can win the weekly prize, second place and dead last are nearly equivalent, which is what makes this crowdsourced permutation game work. And the good news is we (ideally) get to catch significant upside every day in a volatile market without having to guess the daily direction of the market (or oil prices, the dollar, interest rates, economic data, etc.).

Stop back in this afternoon around 2:00 pm, at which point we ought to know which of the 4 groups has performed the best, and the new set of subgroup picks (and subgroup segmentation methodology) will be posted.

Of course all participants are invited to adopt any and all of those picks for their portfolios, but it's particularly important that members of the winning subgroup come back for the new allocations, which will be similarly coordinated in pursuit of enabling one lucky reader to snatch those ritzy Swiss timepieces.

Update: Okay, barring any major afternoon disruptions, it's pretty clear at this point that Group 4 (the oil and gas group) is going to close out the day with the best performance - up 2.8% midway through the session.

Happily, Group 4 is by far our most densely populated group (a lot of October-December birthdays apparently), so we're moving a nice load of portfolios into Day 2 with that identical performance.

For today's reallocation (before 4 pm), members of Group 4 (and anyone else who so chooses, but especially Group 4) should first zero out all existing positions, then climb into the following picks, according to the last digit of their phone numbers:

0: CXO, VQ, GDP, EAC
1: LCC, CAL, AMR, SKYW
2: LCC, CMGI, PLL, STEI
3: CXO, CMGI, PLL, STEI
4: CXO, VQ, CMGI, PLL
5: CXO, VQ, PLL, STEI
6: CXO, VQ, CMGI, STEI
7: LCC, CAL, CMGI, PLL
8: LCC, CAL, PLL, STEI
9: LCC, CAL, CMGI, STEI

These represent a mix of oil stocks, airline stocks (paired, as noted previously, for their high volatility and negative correlation), and earnings reporters (CMGI, PLL, STEI) in various configurations. (Hopefully phone numbers are somewhat more evenly distributed than birthdays.)

For example: If you're in Group 4, your phone number ends with the a 5, and you're using 3 portfolios, your allocations would be:

5: CXO, VQ, PLL, STEI
6: CXO, VQ, CMGI, STEI
7: LCC, CAL, CMGI, PLL

In all cases, each position should be set at 25%.

Below is your visual inspiration, from today's "Million Dollar Dish" e-mail update.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 5: Monday,
Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Monday June 9th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: According to the slideshow "Fallen Stars: Celebrity Foreclosures" how much did Aretha Franklin owe in back taxes?"

Answer: $19,193

Squawk On the Street: "Question: In June 5's "Web Extra: Suspicious Stock" which Fast Money trader wanted to share his/her investment doubts?"

Answer: Guy Adami

The Call: "Question: In the June 6 edition of CNBC.com's Kudlow Caucus, which panelist(s) predicted a recession?"

Answer: All of the above

Power Lunch: "Question: On Friday, Cramer warned that "safety stocks aren't safe" now. But he did say one stock was "about to rip." Which?"

Answer: Intrepid Potash

Street Signs: "Question: In "Riding the Energy Stock Elevator" why did Jerry Castellini say he likes Southwestern Energy?"

Answer: Shale development

Closing Bell: "Question: Find the CNBC.com Web video, "Farmer Meets Fast Money." Now: what state does farmer Roger Neshem hail from?"

Answer: North Dakota

Weekly Bonus Quiz:

Question: "Investors looking for stocks priced less than intrinsic value are referred to as ______ investors."

Answer: Value

Handcrafted by Flip on June 9, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Friday, Week 4

[Scroll down for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Today, we're going to do something a little different.

As you've likely come to realize during the contest, it's on Friday that you make the first allocation that will affect your performance in the following week. So the Week 4 Jamaican Getaway is now out of your hands and we're onto Week 5's his-and-hers TAG Heuers watches (worth a cool $11,500).

One of the readers of this site is going to win those watches.

This week's picks (depending on how Friday trading goes) saw cumulative returns near (or even above) 20%, notwithstanding a few dogs. Now it's time to weed out the dogs. (I guess you don't technically *weed out* dogs, but "it's time to put the dogs down" or "send the dogs to live on a farm" seems a little morbid.)

Here's what I propose. In previous posts, I've discussed last year's popular multi-account strategy (back when players could legally register unlimited accounts). Namely, you'd register around a thousand accounts, choose several promising stocks each day, divide your portfolios into a few big blocks, and assign each block of portfolios into one of the chosen stocks. The next day, take the block in the stock that did the best and repeat. By the end of 5 days, you were down to 1 portfolio, which had made a nearly perfect series of moves throughout the week. In theory, anyway - so long as you could sweep up the biggest gainer somewhere in your multiple daily picks.

This year, of course, you can only register one account. However, as we mulled in our Are People Cheating? post, one could theoretically crowdsource the same strategy, if one could only organize the trades of a sufficiently large group of people. To quell any worries, I'm confident this does not violate the contest rules, nor is hairsplittingly cheating, since neither I nor the group collectively shares an interest in the winnings. Whoever wins wins. And the rest of us derive some measure of entertainment (and possibly some snickering self-satisfaction in having successfully gamed the game). Still, if you're not comfortable participating, then by all means don't (or is it "by no means do"...). But you can take further comfort in the knowledge that we're doing it all very transparently and publicly, so it surely also passes the very scientific "New York Times test" of ethical conduct.

So here's how it goes down. Each day for 5 days (today, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday), I'll lay out a series of allocations, along with a segmentation methodology. You match yourself up with the appropriate segment and allocate your portfolio(s) accordingly. Since there are very few companies that report earnings bewteen Friday's close and Monday's open, this first day will have very few groupings, which leaves us more flexibility to cover more of the gamespace later in the week, when the possible permutations will be much greater. Each participant will also be asked to make the same allocation in each of their 5 portfolios (or as many portfolios as they choose to lend to the experiment) on Friday only, for the same reason.

And make sure to answer all the Bonus Bucks questions, since they're worth a crucial 5-6% per week (depending on your portfolio value).

Today, we'll have just 4 segments and let's break them out by birthday:

Group 1: January-March
Group 2: April-June
Group 3: July-September
Group 4: October-December

If you do choose to participate, please allocate your portfolios (each the same way) according to your group as follows, by 4 pm today:

Group 1: XIDE, RBS, LEH, AIG (25% each)
Group 2: CAL, LCC, DAL, SKYW (25% each)
Group 3: XIDE, BWS, VC, ICON (25% each)
Group 4: KWK, CHK, CLR, XTO (25% each)

Throughout the process, this won't require emailing or other coordination (which would quickly become a logistical nightmare). Just return here each day to see if your group was the highest scoring group from the day before, and if so, grab your new subgroup picks and reallocate. That said, on this first day, it will be very helpful if you can shoot me a quick email, to let me know you're participating and how many portfolios you plan to use. You don't have to do this in order to participate, but getting an idea for how many portfolios are involved will help in budgeting the sub-segmentation throughout the rest of the week.

For reference, several thousand contest participants are visiting the site each day (representing tens of thousands of portfolios), so if you're very quiet... you might already be able to hear that precise Swiss ticking sound.

And if it works out, well, there are 5 more weekly prizes that need winning too.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Friday June 6th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: In the blog entitled "Lousy Volume?" Bob Pisani reported that total volume in all NYSE-listed stocks is"

Answer: Up 23%

Squawk On the Street: "Question: In "Eaton's On Fire" which steel stock did Jim Cramer suggest buying on a pullback?"

Answer: Cleveland-Cliffs

The Call: "Question: In "Top Videos: Hottest-Selling Funds, Lehman & More" what type of meat does Cramer reference?"

Answer: Fried chicken

Power Lunch: "Question: CNBC Stock Blog: Bernie McGinn says forget subprime -- buy bank stocks. Which one did he call a "tremendous franchise"?"

Answer: Bank of America

Street Signs: "Question: In "What Options are Saying about Lehman" Rebecca Darst said "the question...on everyone's lips" is whether there is a"

Answer: "Bear Stearns-like setup"

Closing Bell: "Question: Web Extra: In "Go Off The Rails" the Fast Money traders take on a newspaper's analysis of rail stocks. Which newspaper?"

Answer: The New York Times

Handcrafted by Flip on June 6, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (18) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Thursday, Week 4

[Scroll down for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Busy day, so commentary will be light, but here's an update on yesterday's crop of 4 extra special picks.

Collective Brands (PSS): +4.4%
AD Telecom (ADCT): +5.2%
UTi Worldwide (UTIW): +3.8%
Ulta Salon (ULTA): +9.1%
Average: +5.6%

This is turning into a strong week. I'll go back and check, but I think we're up to 15ish% through yesterday's close and 21ish% intraday today (including bonuses).

The weekly leader had notched up 23% as of yesterday's close, so we'd need to have another great day tomorrow to make any kind of run up the leaderboard.

Check in this afternoon for today's batch (will probably go up around 2 pm) and we'll give it a whirl.

Update: Yep, something like 20% on the week, as of this morning's intraday trading. To get there though, you need to have loaded at least some of your allocation with Tuesday's back ups Guess (GES) and Bob Evans (BOBE), which turned into skyrockets on Wednesday. Those were on our list of 5 eligible earners for that day, but they were not among the 2 tagged as extra special. The cumulative weekly performance of just the extra special picks would be a few percentage points lower.

Update: Looks like we might get our double-digits after all. PSS is now looking at an overnight gain of 11.8%, bringing the average up to +7.0%.

Update: Here are today's eligible earnings reporters, for your consideration.

The Cooper Companies (COO)
Take-Two Interactive Software (TTWO)
Wimm-Bill-Dann Foods (WBD)
Focus Media Holding (FMCN)
National Semiconductor (NSM)
Quiksilver (ZQK)
Signet Group (SIG)

Let's give extra special consideration to those last 4 (given the amount of analyst coverage, the difference between the high and consensus analyst estimates, recent revisions to those estimates, the stock's historical volatility, the company's earnings surprise track record, today's price moves, and various subjective considerations).

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Thursday June 5th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: In his June 4 blog, what did Jim Goldman call "the only real issue" in the Yahoo-Microsoft drama?"

Answer: Fiduciary accountability

Squawk On the Street: "Question: On June 3, George Soros said oil prices will not "crash" any time soon. What reason(s) did the billionaire cite?"

Answer: Prices' strong foundation

The Call: "Question: In the slideshow, “States with the Biggest Declines and Increases in Home Prices,” where does Wyoming stand?"

Answer: Up 6.34%

Power Lunch: "Question: What comparison site did "On The Money" blogger Carmen Wong Ulrich recommend to help avoid hidden bank fees?"

Answer: Bankrate.com

Street Signs: "Question: Doug Kass shorted Berkshire Hathaway again this week. What was his "artistic" characterization of Warren Buffett?"

Answer: Mozart of marketing

Closing Bell: "Question: In April's "Living With Volatility" Edward Egilinsky said "historically" a risk reduction strategy might include:"

Answer: Alternative investments

Handcrafted by Flip on June 5, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (9) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Wednesday, Week 4

[Scroll down for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Looks like yesterday's picks are not going to move the needle so much today. Williams-Sonoma (WSM) beat expectations, but lowered revenue guidance, which left shares trading slightly lower in pre-market trading. Vimpel (VIP) met expectations, which had shares trading up moderately. Combine the two, and you're looking at a pre-market gain of something like 0.5%. But hey, it's still the right direction.

Since there were only 2 (and since you need at least 4 at any time), hopefully you also loaded up on some of the backups, because Guess (GES) and Bob Evans Farms (BOBE) are ready to advance nicely, following upside earnings surprises. SAIC (SAI) is poised to move higher too, just not as much.

Come on back at around 2 pm ET for today's crop. [Update: Picks added; see below]

In the mean time, are you curious whether your Portfolio Challenge performance has been beating the market? Yes, contest strategies and real world investing strategies are wholly distinct (our thrashing monkey forex experiment would have been unwise in the wild), but since the market has declined a couple percent since the contest began, even a dead monkey would've generated some alpha over the last 3 weeks.

So let's find out. You need to go collect two numbers from your favorite portfolio: "Stock Portfolio" (on the portfolio-level screen, in the grey "Balances" frame at the top-right of the page, just under the words "Portfolio Stats" ) and "Total Bonus Bucks" (the bottom line on the Bonus Bucks page).

Copy and paste these three numbers into Excel (or anywhere else that'll let you do some figurin') in A1 and A2. Then enter the following formulas:

In A3: =((A1-A2)/900000)-1
In A4: =A3+0.0185

You'll now see your cumulative equity gains to date (in A3) as well as your active return (in A4). Your active return is kind of like alpha, except you're not getting dinged for your psychotic volatility. But it's still accurately described as the amount by which you're beating (or underperforming) the market - in this case the S&P 500, which declined 1.85% between the end of the first day of the contest and yesterday's close.

It's also worth noting that this calculation doesn't account for the fact that you've benefited not just from Bonus Bucks themselves, but from their extra buying power. So even though we're backing out your Bucks balance, your active return as calculated above was boosted a bit (or dragged a bit lower, if negative) thanks to this source of free leverage.

If you can't be bothered to run the calculation, you can eyeball it based on a couple of benchmarks. Again, these refer to the "Stock Portfolio" value, which is only found in that out-of-the-way spot described above (not "Portfolio Value" or "Total Portfolio Value" or "Stocks Intraday").

"Dead monkey" portfolio value: $1,098,000 (assumes all Bonus Bucks questions answered correctly and no trading activity). Cumulative return: 0.0%. Active return: 1.85%.
"Market performance" portfolio value: $1,081,350 (assumes all Bonus Bucks questions answered correctly). Cumulative return: 1.85%. Active return: 0.0%.

For what it's worth, the vast majority of portfolios are not only lagging the market, but faring worse than the departed simians (i.e. they'd be doing better if they'd just answered Bonus Bucks questions and done no trading).

Update: As advertised, below are today's eligible earnings reporters:

Comtech Telecom (CMTL)
FuelCell Energy (FCEL)
Financial Federal (FIF)
Greif Brothers (GEF)
Martek Biosciences (MATK)
Star Bulk Carriers (SBLK)
AMERCO (UHAL)
Ciena Corporation (CIEN)
MDS Inc. (MDZ)
Vail Resorts (MTN)
Smithfield Foods (SFD)
Analogic Corporation (ALOG)
Blyth Inc. (BTH)
Del Monte Foods (DLM)
UTi Worldwide (UTIW)
ADC (ADCT)
Collective Brands (PSS)
Ulta Salon (ULTA)

Those final 4 may warrant an extra special look, if you're looking for names that might deliver one-day pops in the next session (based on the amount of analyst coverage, the difference between the high and consensus analyst estimates, recent revisions to those estimates, the stock's historical volatility, the company's earnings surprise track record, today's price moves, and various subjective considerations).

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 4: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Wednesday June 4th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: In "Cap-and-Trade Craziness" what energy resource does Larry Kudlow NOT mention?"

Answer: Geothermal

Squawk On the Street: "Question: CNBC Stock Blog: Thomas Winmill likes miner Freeport McMoRan for a "special reason." What special reason?"

Answer: Molybdenum production

The Call: "Question: In "The Right Way to Watch Mad Money" (May 28), what proverb does the CNBC.com editor paraphrase?"

Answer: "Give a man a fish.."

Power Lunch: "Question: In "Is The Oil Rally Over?" (May 29) Joe Terranova told the Fast Money traders he's playing oil by:"

Answer: Staying short Hess

Street Signs: "Question: Web Video hunt: On May 27, CNBC interviewed "The Buffett of Brazil." Name him."

Answer: Arminio Fraga

Closing Bell: "Question: In "Ethanolics Anonymous" what does guest blogger Jerry Bowyer cite as a driver of the ethanol trend?"

Answer: All of the above

Handcrafted by Flip on June 4, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (12) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Tuesday, Week 4

[Scroll down for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Yowza. We went hunting for volatility with yesterday's picks and it looks like we bagged a couple of bucks. Unfortunately, it's not all upside volatility, but on net, we're in tentative good shape.

Yesterday's three extra special picks were Lululemon Athletica (LULU), NCI Building Systems (NCS), and Toll Brothers (TOL). Toll Brothers didn't report earnings until this morning, but Lululemon and NCI reported yesterday after the close, giving us an after-hours preview of today's action.

Lululemon was, well, a lemon. They met analysts' expectations, but slightly lowered guidance for the rest of the year. Shares plunged 11.2% lower in extended PM trading (though they've recovered most of that today).

But NCI slaughtered expectations, sending shares 16.1% higher after hours. NCI, can I just say...

Those moves are subject to plenty of change during the regular session, but at this point, it looks like a decently upward average move between NCI and Lululemon.

And this morning, Toll Brothers came through for us too. As expected, it swung to a loss, but a significantly smaller loss than analysts were looking for. In mid-morning trading, shares are up 4.3% over yesterday's close. Along with NCI and Lululemon, that gives us an average intraday gain of 3.1% on yesterday's picks. I'll take it.

Here's today's crop of contest-eligible earnings reporters for your consideration.

Guess (GES)
Bob Evans Farms (BOBE)
SAIC (SAI)
Williams-Sonoma (WSM)
~~Hovnanian Enterprises (HOV)~~ [See update below]
Vimpel Communications (VIP)

Following our usual convention, the bold green names are ones you may want to give some special attention. Handle these with care - particularly Williams-Sonoma (recently labeled a "deathbed stock" by Motley Fool). But if you're looking for the next one-day double-digit gainer, it (or they) just might be hiding among these three (based on the amount of analyst coverage, the difference between the high and consensus analyst estimates, recent revisions to those estimates, the stock's historical volatility, the company's earnings surprise track record, and various subjective considerations).

Update: With thanks to Thiru in the comments, it turns out homebuilder Hovnanian is not eligible for the contest. It should be (May 9 market cap was $563 billion and average volume is 4 million), but it's not. So we're left with WSM and VIP.

Update: Have you noticed that none of the top 5 portfolio managers has made a dime off of currency trading? 4 of them have done no currency trading whatsoever, while the other is actually down almost $3,000 in his currency portfolio.

We've been over this before, but I think this is additional support for the idea that the time you might spend currency trading is probably more wisely spent trying to make better equity trading decisions. I put on a couple of dollar-bullish positions when currency trading re-opened and plan to let them stew for the duration of the contest. I'm not saying that's an advisable strategy, only that currencies have thus far proven to be of very limited significance in the game.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Week 4: Monday, Tuesday
Week 3: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 2: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 1: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Week 0: Pre-game

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Tuesday June 3rd

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: In "Hotel, Restaurant CEOs Worry About Slowing Demand," what factor gives Starwood's Barry Sternlicht hope?"

Answer: Middle East prosperity

Squawk On the Street: "Question: Web Video hunt: On Monday, what did Holland & Co. chairman Mike Holland blame for high oil prices?"

Answer: Supply & demand

The Call: "Question: On May 22, 5-star manager Neil Hennessy gave CNBC.com his Web Exclusive stock picks. But which stock did he slam?"

Answer: None of the above

Power Lunch: "Question: On The Money blogger Carmen Wong Ulrich says how many U.S. young adults pay their bills late?"

Answer: 41%

Street Signs: "In his Friday “Game Plan,” Cramer said banks may bottom soon. But he warned of possible “catches,” including:"

Answer: Weak Toll Bros. earns

Closing Bell: "Question: CNBC Stock Blog: Jason Votruba likes small-cap energy. What Web Extra stock(s) did he recommend to CNBC.com?"

Answer: Woodward Governor

Handcrafted by Flip on June 3, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (8) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Monday, Week 4

[Scroll down for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Welcome to Week 4, Portfolio Challengers. This is your big chance to win that $30,000 Jamaican Getaway, so trade smart (though you've already burned one day of weekly performance with whatever allocation you had set up by 4 pm Friday).

For those of us volatiliphiles who like to play the earnings reporters, the cup runneth a bit dry this week as we enter the real nadir between earnings seasons. That said, the companies that do report off-cycle are frequently foreign-based, which means (to the extent they're contest eligible) there may be some less transparent, less well understood, less closely followed names out there. That spells potential for big swings in your portfolio.

For Monday, you've got 5 to pick from. I'd take an extra special look at the last 3 on the list (in bold green). These are each a bit radioactive, but just might have a nice one-day pop in store (based on the amount of analyst coverage, the difference between the high and consensus analyst estimates, recent revisions to those estimates, the stock's historical volatility, and the company's earnings surprise track record).

ABM Industries (ABM)
Layne Christensen (LAYN)
Lululemon Athletica (LULU)
NCI Building Systems (NCS)
Toll Brothers (TOL)

Lululemon is a Canadian athletic apparel company that went public less than a year ago. It's got a decent amount of analyst coverage, but it's exceeded consensus estimates every quarter. NCI and Toll are in the non-residential and residential construction businesses, respectively. You can play both of these in the Portfolio Challenge with a clean conscience, even if you're agnostic or bearish on housing and construction in general. These are volatile stocks that have taken unholy pummelings and whose consensus estimates have been adjusted significantly downward in recent weeks and months (which means the bar for an upside surprise has been significantly lowered). And based on the last several quarters, the one thing you can be relatively assured about Toll Brothers is that its results will be some kind of surprise.

For all five of these names, one thing you'll want to look closely at is the Monday intraday move. You'll be buying at Monday's closing price, so an upward anticipatory jump could spoil your Tuesday upside, while a backslide could give you a little extra juice on your winners.

Along those same lines, since the field of eligible earners is so barren, you might want to peruse the gutter this afternoon for the daily losers that might rebound Tuesday (looks like HRS and ICOG might be candidates).

(Consider all of the above to be for entertainment purposes and not meant to be used as real-world investment recommendations. The goals and strategies of the Portfolio Challenge are not to be confused with those of sensible investing.)

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Monday June 2nd

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: On Friday, Dow Chemical CEO Andrew Liveris said Dow uses how much of the U.S.' electricity to make its products?"

Answer: 1%

Squawk On the Street: "Question: Energy strategist John Kilduff used which social-psychology term in his oil blog "The End of Daze"?"

Answer: Herd mentality

The Call: "On May 28, homeland security analyst Brian Ruttenbur praised which firm for its fingerprint-verification tech?"

Answer: AuthenTec

Power Lunch: "Question: On Friday, Rebecca Darst said options traders are looking at chips. What reason(s) did she cite?"

Answer: All of the above

Street Signs: "Question: Fast Money's Karen Finerman loves "bargain real estate." But what conclusion did she reach on Maguire Properties?"

Answer: She likes "the dynamic"

Closing Bell: "Question: CNBC Stock Blog: For 2008, Manny Weintraub scoffs at the "Sell in May, Stay Away" adage. Why?"

Answer: Lots of bargains

Weekly Bonus Quiz:

Question: A growth stock investor is primarily concerned with capital appreciation as opposed to:

Answer: Dividend payouts

Handcrafted by Flip on June 2, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (7) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Friday, Week 3

[Scroll down for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Are people cheating in the Portfolio Challenge?

That's what a growing number of you are scratching your chin and wondering aloud, based on the comments and e-mails coming in lately. And you sniveling tattletales may have a point. After all, cheating did turn out to be rampant last year.

Or rather, "cheating" turned out to be explicitly permitted last year, insofar as cheating was limited to the registration of multiple accounts by a single trader. The contest admins presumably didn't anticipate that failing to explicitly prohibit the practice would fundamentally change the game, but it was apparent by the end of Week 1, when trader Nancy Beaumont was not only atop the leaderboard, but occupied several of the other top slots. She ultimately won an at-large bid for the (now defunct) final round, after CNBC ruled that since the practice wasn't proscribed, it had to be allowed.

Of course, at that point, many more traders (your humble narrator among them) sat around creating hundreds of legal accounts to use from Week 2 onward. The only trick was using a different e-mail address (one where you could actually receive mail) for each account. And with administrative access to a single web domain, that's fairly trivial. With hundreds of accounts (and without this year's 25% allocation limit), the dominant game strategy became to allocate your - say - thousand accounts into 4 or 5 stocks (with each account going 100% into a single stock) on the first day of a new week, then take the couple hundred in the stock that did the best and reallocate them into another 4 or 5. Repeat for 5 days and you're down to a single portfolio that has a good chance of outscoring the field. You've essentially captured every permutation of one-day positions in stocks you identified as offering volatility on the holding day. It didn't matter whether stocks went up or down, as long as at least some went up and the moves were large.

In response to the multi-account perversion, this year not just a different e-mail address, but a different identity is required to register multiple accounts. From the rules:

Each individual Participant can register only once and must provide a single CNBC.com account (with associated email address and password) which he/she must use when participating in the Contest. ... Any attempt (successful or unsuccessful) by any Participant to register multiple times by any means, including but not limited to through the use of multiple email accounts, as determined by CNBC in its sole discretion, may result in disqualification of all accounts and Portfolios submitted by that Participant.

The concern that many of you have voiced is that traders may be registering multiple accounts on their own behalf, using the names and addresses of spouses or other family members. Among the evidence cited is the appearance of two men with the last name Fox, who live not far from each other in southern California, and who together occupy 3 of the top 5 spots on the leaderboard. James Fox, who won Week 1, maintains the top ranking, while Curtis Fox holds the #2 and #4 spots.

Some of you have mentioned other pairings that have appeared on the leaderboard and arrived at the dark inference of mock trading malfeasance.

A couple thoughts:

First, every player can maintain 5 portfolios, so Curtis' double billing isn't in itself problematic. Second, people with the last name Fox and people who live in southern California are both large population sets. So simple coincidence isn't a crazy theory.

But for sake of argument, let's assume that at least one of the pairings observed on the leaderboard involved more than mere coincidence. It seems to me that there's a wide spectrum of possible impropriety, ranging from pretty innocuous to pretty blatant cheating.

The rules don't specifically address the possibility of using another real person with a real email address as nothing more than a shell through which to manage additional portfolios on one's own behalf, but that would pretty clearly seem to violate the spirit, if not the letter of the rule. And it would presumably trip the "by any means, including but not limited to through the use of multiple email accounts, as determined by CNBC in its sole discretion" clause.

But there are some lighter gray areas - is it prohibited for a husband to encourage his wife to register an account and to share his trading ideas on a daily basis? Ditto for siblings, cousins, etc.? Presumably not.

Some muddier middle ground might involve one or both of the following two twists:

1) The management of the combined accounts is done in a coordinated manner (i.e. diversifying picks across all portfolios), thus giving the individual or the group an advantage over individual traders. A reasonable person could probably interpret this either as cheating or savvy (per the Eric Cartman theory, it just depends on whether you succeed at it). Here, for instance, we discuss game strategy and specific trading ideas, some of which some of you have acted on, and in some cases done well. I doubt if the contest admins would take umbrage at that. But what if we began coordinating our trading, such that none of us were duplicating another's exact allocation? We'd have a much better chance at one of us winning than if we didn't coordinate. Would that be cheating?

2) The coordinator is not only the one making trading decisions, but is also the beneficiary of the accounts not in his own name. This is somewhat moot in the husband-wife scenario, but in the case of brothers, cousins, etc., this tweak might be enough to shove you into non-compliance, because it's then pretty clear that the arrangement serves no purpose other than to thwart the new rule.

Of course, that last distinction would be difficult to probe, as the trading behavior of two family members simply coordinating strategy would be indistinguishable from that of one family member using another's name and address to set up a dummy account. I suppose the contest admins could look at the users' physical locations while trading, in search of co-located traders who are supposed to live at least several towns apart. But the level of badwill involved in such an investigation, especially given that it wouldn't be dispositive (family members from the same region getting together regularly would be a reasonable explanation), makes this seem like an unsavory remedy for CNBC. A simpler solution might be simply to have all prospective winners sign affidavits affirming compliance with a more explicit version of the non-duplicate clause.

In short, I'm certain there are at least some people cheating (out of the hundreds of thousands playing), probably in many clever ways. Whether the few instances of curious pairings on the leaderboard involve cheating (at any point on the smarminess spectrum) is a lot less clear. Still, given the turmoil yielded by the vagueries of last year's rules, there's every chance that this will once again come to a head at some point during the contest.

All thoughts and comments on the issue are eagerly invited.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Friday May 30th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Question: On Wednesday, Cramer revealed his Wind Index. Which "Windex" stock was NOT one of his previous calls?"

Answer: Ameron

Squawk On the Street: "Question: In the slideshow 10 Most Expensive States to Buy Gasoline, which state was No. 3?"

Answer: New York

The Call: "Question: On May 21, Lee Klaskow described his "holy trinity" of rail freight. Which company was closest to his model?"

Answer: Burlington Northern

Power Lunch: "Question: CNBC Stock Blog: How did BlackRock's Bob Doll view a possible InBev-Anheuser deal?"

Answer: It's the correct trend

Street Signs: ""Behind the Wheel" blogger Phil LeBeau is optimistic about the auto industry! Why?"

Answer: Alternative-fueled cars

Closing Bell: "Duke Energy CEO Jim Rogers sees an "ominous sign" in his customers' behavior. What sign?"

Answer: Delaying bill payment

Handcrafted by Flip on May 30, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (27) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Thursday, Week 3

[Scroll down for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Busy morning this morning, so commentary up here will be light. Feel free to use to the comment thread to talk amongst yourselves. Are people encountering more technical issues than usual over the last day or so? The volume of irregularities being reported in via e-mail has definitely ticked up.

As for yesterday's one-day volatility picks, it looks like we've got two beats trading higher (TiVo and Ansoft), one miss trading flat (Sycamore) and one miss trading down (Golar). If you allocated a portfolio evenly into the four yesterday afternoon, you're up about 0.3% as of 10:15 am.

Eh.

I'm not sure why TiVo's not getting a bigger bump - they demolished expectations.

Update: Okay, that's a little more like it. TiVo's been steaming along throughout the session and now sits 6.5% above yesterday's close. That brings the average one-day return of yesterday's picks up to roughly 1.6%. It's not yesterday good, but still good enough to outpace the market, even on this very bull-friendly day.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header.

Thursday May 29th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "In "The Steady Rise of Oil" (April 18) what transportation metaphor did Sri Jegarajah use?"

Answer: Garage the station wagon

Squawk On the Street: "In "Housing Issues Scarier Than High Oil Prices" Wilbur Ross said how many U.S. public firms are run badly?"

Answer: 1%

The Call: "On Tuesday's Mad Money show, which Cold War phrase did Cramer reference?"

Answer: Warsaw Pact

Power Lunch: "In "(Oil) Drilling For a Better Portfolio" how did Gerald Jordan describe Weatherford Intl.?"

Answer: Sort of mini-Schlumberger

Street Signs: "How did Sports Biz blogger Darren Rovell feel upon learning tennis star Ashley Harkleroad posed for Playboy?"

Answer: Sorrowful

Closing Bell: "CNBC Stock Blog: On May 20, which bank did Jeffery Harte say had the best management team?"

Answer: JPMorgan

Handcrafted by Flip on May 29, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (8) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Wednesday, Week 3

[Scroll down for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

And gap up they shall.

All three very special picks from yesterday (Daktronics, WuXi PharmaTech, and Chico's) went on to beat their respective earnings expectations. And since we were aiming for volatility as well as upside surprises, those one-day positions might pay off handsomely.

Shortly after the open, they were all enjoying bounces, but none as splendidly as Daktronics, which not only walloped expectations, but issued strong guidance for 2009.

Daktronics (DAKT): +17.6%
WuXi PharmaTech (WX): +1.7%
Chico's FAS (CHS): +6.1%

Of course, they can always drift back down during the session and we can't sell them until the close, but all in all, it looks like a decent day.

Here are a few fresh ones, using the same screening and evaluation criteria as before. In addition to being eligible for the contest, each of the companies below will report earnings today after the close or tomorrow before the open (meaning they have the potential for significant one-day moves if bought before 4 pm today). Of these 16 names, the final 4 (in bold green) might be worth some extra attention (based on the amount of analyst coverage, the difference between the high and consensus analyst estimates, recent revisions to those estimates, today's price move, the stock's historical volatility, and the company's earnings surprise track record).

Men's Wearhouse (MW)
Apollo Investment Corp (AINV)
Dyncorp Intl (DCP)
Omnivision Tech (OVTI)
Dress Barn (DBRN)
DSW INC (DSW)
Big Lots (BIG)
H.J. Heinz (HNZ)
Joy Global (JOYG)
Costco (COST)
Mechel OAO (MTL)
Sears Holdings (SHLD)
Golar LNG (GLNG)
Ansoft Corp (ANST)
Sycamore Networks (SCMR)
TiVo (TIVO)

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

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Wednesday May 28th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "In the last paragraph of "Stocks Dont Like Obama" Larry Kudlow concludes that:"

Answer: McCain can still win

Squawk On the Street: "In "Emerging Money: Up For '08" how many of Tim Seymour's trades were part of the Emerging Money Top 20 list?"

Answer: Three

The Call: "CNBC Guest Blog: In "Calling Out The Confidence Game" what ancient pseudo-science did Jerry Bowyer refer to?"

Answer: Phrenology

Power Lunch: "In a May 27 CNBC Stock Blog, how did Dan Genter describe corporate dividends?"

Answer: Weapon of choice

Street Signs: "On May 27, what small- and mid-cap businesses did "market pro" David Twibell praise?"

Answer: Regional & community banks

Closing Bell: " In May 27's Lightning Round, what energy play did Cramer recommend?"

Answer: Frontline

Handcrafted by Flip on May 28, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Tuesday, Week 3

[Scroll to the bottom for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Welcome to Week 3, the week with the most desired weekly prize - the Sony Style HD Home Entertainment Package. This week's also notable in that it's the first full week of currency trading (assuming the system holds up - we're already getting at least one report of malfunction this morning).

After suffering early technical troubles, currency trading went live again last Wednesday. In the 6 days since, high-scorer Tara Arriola has managed to turn her $100,000 allotment into $140,000. That's certainly impressive, but compared to the board-topping equity gains (more than $400,000 over 2 weeks), it appears that the currency portfolios will be less meaningful than one might've guessed (and than I did guess), despite the 10:1 leverage they offer and the fact that you can trade continuously throughout the day.

Even with those rules in place, there's apparently just not enough buying power and/or volatility even for superlative currency traders to make gains that compare to the superlative stock gainers. The contest winners (and presumably each weekly winner) will continue to be home run hitters on the equity side. That said, the rankings of the heaviest hitters can certainly be shuffled by currency returns. To wit, James Fox has been usurped by Kevin Wheat atop the contest leaderboard.

With $9,000 in currency gains, Wheat hasn't scored nearly as well as Arriola, who's netted $40,000 so far. But Fox hasn't done any currency trading. So his stock lead over Wheat (totaling just $4,000) was easily wiped out by Wheat's currency gains.

Bottom line: currency trading matters. But even if you do quite well, the small initial allocation means that (notwithstanding the leverage and continuous trading), its ability to contribute to your overall performance is still significantly less than that of the stock portfolio. If reallocating most of your currency trading energies to equity trading enables you make even slightly better stock picks, it's almost certainly the way to go.

To that end, here's your crop of eligible stocks that will report earnings tonight or tomorrow morning. Of these 13, you may want to take a closer look at the last 3, if you're looking for stocks that have the capacity to gap up tomorrow (based on the amount of analyst coverage, the difference between the high and consensus analyst estimates, recent revisions to those estimates, today's price move, the stock's historical volatility, and the company's earnings surprise track record).

Company	Symbol
RBC Bearings	ROLL
Cogent, Inc.	COGT
Shanda Interactive Entertainment	SNDA
China Nepstar Chain Drugstore	NPD
Dollar Tree Stores	DLTR
American Eagle Outfitters	AEO
Donaldson	DCI
Polo Ralph Lauren	RL
National Bank of Greece	NBG
Toronto Dominion Bank	TD
WuXi PharmaTech	WX
Chico's FAS	CHS
Daktronics	DAKT

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

To receive additional updates by e-mail, drop a line here with the word "Subscribe" in the subject header. (We promise you won't receive a "disgusting" e-mail reply.)

Tuesday May 27th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Realty Check: Who sparked Countrywide CEO Mozilo's "disgusting" e-mail reply?"

Answer: Daniel Bailey Jr.

Squawk On the Street: "The other black gold: On May 22, super-trader Jon Najarian said coal is up more than oil. He recommended buying:"

Answer: Consol Energy

The Call: "In his June investment outlook, Pimco's Bill Gross warned that U.S. inflation statistics were:"

Answer: "Not reflecting reality"

Power Lunch: "In "$135: The Biggest Loser" the Fast Money team warned of companies hurt by oil prices. Which stock did they PAN?"

Answer: PetroChina

Street Signs: "On May 9, Jim Cramer assailed AIG -- and its CEO Martin Sullivan. What did the Mad Money guru call the company?"

Answer: Moronic

Closing Bell: "Web Extra: On May 23, what natural-gas equipment stock did Shawn Reynolds exclusively pick for CNBC.com readers?"

Answer: Exterran

Weekly Bonus Quiz:

Question: "An investors _______ size is the dollar value being invested into a particular security."

Answer: Position

I hope everyone got this one right, because it's verbatim the same question from last week. Let me know if anyone gets a different question.

Also, please let me know if you have any idea what these guys are all about. They confuse me. It's like some strange, finance-themed mime routine.

Handcrafted by Flip on May 27, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (7) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Friday, Week 2

[Scroll to the bottom for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Crummy day out there, huh? Slightly better-than-expected home sales data seems unable to jazz anyone to the point of shaking off the oil specter. Plus, I gave you what turned out to be a couple of lemons with yesterday's extra special volatility picks. But hey, at least they were volatile...

The good news, of course, is that today effectively begins Week 3 in the contest (since the first holdings to be scored in the upcoming week will be the positions you establish today by 4 pm). And since it'll be a 4-day week, today's trades are that much more important.

The even better news, according to our super-scientific internal polling, is that the Week 3 prize is the one you'd be most willing to accept (and pay the tax bill on).

Sony Style HD Home Entertainment Makeover

Bring High Definition and the ultimate in theatre technology into your home. This Sony Style HD Home Entertainment Package includes: a flat panel 52” LCD with Full HD 1080p, high-resolution video and surround sound with depth and clarity. You also get the most from the Blu-ray disc player which is enhanced by the advanced audio performance of the Sony Style home theater system with BRAVIA® Theatre Sync™ technology*. Products come with a 3 year extended service plan and white glove delivery.

With an approximate retail value of $5,000, it's still going to be a supplemental punch in the teeth from Uncle Sam, but of all the weekly prizes, the Sony setup handily won highest worth-the-tax-bill honors.

So let's revisit a couple strategy points in anticipation. As discussed, this year's rules make the contest much less of a daily moon-shooting exercise than last year. Multiple accounts are prohibited (beyond your allotted 5), allocations are capped at 25%, and there's no weekly at-large bid for the final round. Still, with nearly 700,000 active portfolios, the 6 highest scores over the 10 weeks (not to mention the highest score each week) will show superlative returns. Returns high enough that a cool-headed, steady run of smart and lucky bets over those 10 weeks will likely give you an impressive - but ultimately worthless - aggregate performance by comparison. Because out of those hundreds of thousands, several are bound to stumble into a series of huge gainers that can't be matched with cool-headed, steady, smart and lucky moves. If even 1 in 100,000 portfolios stumbles into such herculean returns (say it's 300% in aggregate), then your very impressive 180% return will be every bit as useful as a -100% return.

So despite the rules changes, the game does remain a home run contest. Even if you're batting 1,000, if you never get it over the wall, you may as well be armless. That's why I've been advocating strategies like the daily all-ins with earnings reporters in the equity portfolios and the "thrashing monkey" approach to currency trading. It doesn't mean it'll always work out - just as swinging away doesn't guarantee you a home run. But it does put you in a position where you have an opportunity to win, if your daily theses are right more often than their wrong.

Anyway, that's the extent of my strategy jawing, with the following two caveats thrown in for good measure. 1) If you do stumble into a herculean return (e.g. one of your portfolios sees in quick succession a takeover announcement with a huge premium, a nicely levered currency position that suddenly shoots off, a left-for-dead stock that unexpectedly avoids bankruptcy, etc.), it may make sense to wall that portfolio off from the others and stop being so idiotically risk-seeking with it. 2) I could be completely wrong about everything. Early next week, once the leaderboard is a couple weeks seasoned, we'll be able to make somewhat better predictions about what kind of aggregate gains the overall winner will put up by the end of the contest. That, in turn, should give us a better feel on just how risk-seeking we should be.

But for the time being, swing away.

As far as I can tell, we've got just 4 eligible stocks reporting earnings between today's close and Tuesday's open.

Company	Symbol
Modine Manufacturing	MOD
Vodafone Group	VOD
Bank Of Montreal	BMO
Bank of Nova Scotia	BNS

Since you need at least 4 names to fully change out any of your portfolios, you may also want to browse the gutter for any rebound candidates among today's double-digit losers (US Airways, perhaps?).

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Friday May 23rd

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Fast Money talked oil plays in the article, "At $133 Who Wins?" What was Guy Adami's trade?"

Answer: Get long oil services

Squawk On the Street: "Market Insider: How did Birinyi's Jeff Rubin rate Boone Pickens' forecasting?"

Answer: Insight most investors lack

The Call: "According to "SUVs And What They're Worth," first-quarter new SUV sales:"

Answer: Plunged 23%

Power Lunch: "CNBC Stock Blog: In "Restaurant Stocks: Feast and Famine" which firm was praised for sales "actually doing the best"?"

Answer: Red Robin Gourmet Burgers

Street Signs: "The Best Premium Liquor Brands slideshow praises Moet & Hennessey's 10 Cane rum. What gives it its essence?"

Answer: Trinidadian sugar cane

Closing Bell: "On May 21, why did Jim Cramer suggest buying Freeport McMoRan?"

Answer: Chinese demand

Handcrafted by Flip on May 23, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (7) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Thursday, Week 2

[Scroll to the bottom for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

So how's everyone doing on the currency trading? Me, I've managed to turn a small profit on my simplistic "undervalued dollar" strategy laid out yesterday. If you joined me in those positions, you're already looking at a cool $1,600, so... almost as much as a single trivia question. Whee!

If anyone out there is employing the ultra high-turnover thrashing monkey strategy we discussed, let us know if you're having any success.

I do hope some of you latched onto those 3 extra special stock picks from yesterday, because if you did, they're showering you with handsome one-day gains. (2 of them are, anyway. The third is basically flat.)

As of 12:00 pm:

Longs Drug Stores (LDG): Up 11.3%
Sanderson Farms (SAFM): Up 8.7%
Global Sources (GSOL): Up 0.2%

We'll see if can't suss out a couple of Friday winners this afternoon.

Update: Okay, let's get to it. Same convention as yesterday. The following represents a (probably incomplete) list of the contest-eligible stocks that will report earnings either today after the closing bell or tomorrow before the open.

Among these 13, the 4 in bold at the bottom of the list look somewhat more interesting from an upside volatility-seeking standpoint (based on market cap, number of analysts covering the stock, the range of analysts' estimates, today's price move, historic volatility, and tendency to gap up or down following earnings releases). Among those 4, the 2 in green are worth some extra attention.

Company	Symbol
Aeropostale	ARO
CA	CA
Foot Locker	FL
Gap	GPS
Pacific Sunwear of CA	PSUN
SkillSoft Corp	SKIL
Universal Corp	UVV
Verigy	VRGY
Zumiez	ZUMZ
Alkermes	ALKS
Black Box Corp	BBOX
Aruba Networks	ARUN
Nordic American Tanker	NAT

Alkermes is a Massachusetts-based drug delivery biotech - a smallish company at just $1.4 billion and one whose quarterly earnings have been hard to pin down, despite a lot of analyst coverage. And when it beats expectations, it tends to gap up. 3 quarters ago, it beat expectations by 4 cents and popped more than 12% the next day. This quarter, the high-end estimates are looking for $0.06 per share, 4 cents above the consensus of $0.02. On the other hand, the stock ran up 5% today already, which ought to dampen any further upside that might follow a cheerful earnings report.

Black Box is a little (almost ineligibly small) IT infrastructure company with scant analyst coverage and a tendency to whipsaw around earnings reports. It too is up today (2.5%) in advance of its earnings release, so the remaining upside could be dampened.

Nordic American Tanker is a Bermuda-based oil tanker operator. The stock has been on a tear lately, as the company is enjoying macro tailwinds (e.g. rates are climbing and the industry is shifting steadily toward NAT's dual hulls), but it's pulled back today for whatever reason, just before it releases earnings.

Aruba is a networking and peripherals company that does a lot of work for the federal government. This stock has had the bujeezus drubbed out of it over the last few months. Maybe deservedly so. The catalyzing event for the drubbing was last quarter's pre-release of disappointing quarterly results due to the delay of the federal budget (and consequently a steep fall-off in government-related revenues). The stock is hugely volatile and its market cap is even smaller than BBOX. Recent analyst upgrades have done little to dig the shares out of the mud, but the earnings report might be enough of a trigger. If things look good (or even okay) and this stock is revived, the one-day upside could be significant.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Thursday, May 22nd

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "Web Exclusive: Which stock did Will Muggia recommend specifically for CNBC.com readers?"

Answer: Chesapeake Energy

Squawk On the Street: "What did Goldman Sachs' Abby Joseph Cohen call a "pretty good hedge against inflation"?"

Answer: Equities in general

The Call: ""Rail moves everything," said Neuberger Berman's Gary Kaminsky. Which railroad stock moves him?"

Answer: Kansas City Southern

Power Lunch: "Options trading: Rebecca Darst says which dental technology firm saw "unusually bullish call activity"?"

Answer: Align Technology

Street Signs: "On May 19, Jim Cramer called which agriculture stock a "great buy"?"

Answer: All of the above ~~Syngenta~~

My. Bad. Many thanks to Roger (et al) in the comments for the correct answer. I answered Syngenta based on Stop Trading!: Ag Stocks Still the Play:

Monday, 19 May 2008

Regular viewers of Mad Money know Cramer’s been bullish on agriculture stocks.
Syngenta is one of the few among them not yet at its 52-week high. He called SYG a “great buy,” saying, “Anytime you get a discount…I’d pull the trigger.” That goes for Bunge and Monsanto too, he said.

Bunge and Monsanto were the other choices presented. In my view, he only explicitly called SYG a "great buy" but advised "pulling the trigger" on all three. Apparently that's the wrong interpretation. We got this mess fixed up within the first few minutes after the hour, so hopefully not too many of you missed these points thanks to my error.

Closing Bell: "By The Numbers blog: Which "winning energy stock" had the greatest 6-month percentage change (as of May 20)?"

Answer: Hess (yes, I'm sure)

Handcrafted by Flip on May 22, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (17) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - A New Fly In the Ointment

[Wednesday's trivia answers are over here.]

With the triumphant (and, so far as I can tell, remarkably smooth) return of currency trading this morning, everything suddenly seems almost too quiet (knock on wood). While the tech problems to date have been significant, it's to CNBC's and their IT partners' credit that all pistons now seem to be firing cleanly.

With one exception - a brand new bug to add to the taxonomy, so far as I can tell.

The problem, as tipped to me by a reader, concerns Mechel Open Joint Stock Company (MTL), a Russian mining, steel, and power company, listed through an ADR on the NYSE. Yesterday, Mechel underwent a kind of stock split. The company's ordinary shares themselves didn't split, but the ADR:share ratio changed from 1:3 to 1:1. Whereas each NYSE-traded ADR used to represent 3 shares of the company's stock, each now represents just 1. So the shares appear to have fallen from $169 to $56 overnight (a 67% decline), but on an adjusted basis, they were essentially flat.

In the case of a normal stock split, the system adjusts accordingly and everyone gets on with their lives. But the ADR ratio adjustment must have been a contingency they didn't plan for (and are presumably unaware of).

From the rules:

13. Special Processing of Corporate Actions:

The Contest will process stock splits, mergers and acquisitions, halted/suspended trading, delistings, spin-offs, special cash dividends and ticker symbol changes. These corporate actions will be processed after the close of the markets on the date they occur, and will not count towards a Portfolio’s Equity Account’s number of daily trades.

Certainly it sounds like an ADR ratio adjustment fits the spirit, if not the letter, of that rule. And CNBC's own charting feature shows MTL trading on an adjusted basis in the 50s (not the 160s) before yesterday, so it'd be hard for them to claim this corporate action doesn't warrant a pricing adjustment. Nonetheless, portfolios containing MTL have taken a 67% hit in that position.

But while this was clearly an oversight, the section of the rules immediately following the passage quoted above suggests a troubling out for the contest admins, should they be feeling uncharitable.

In the event that a Participant believes that his/her Portfolio does not properly reflect a corporate action, the Participant must email the Site’s support department no later than 11:59:59 PM on the date of such corporate action, with the stock symbol, type of corporate action, effective date, and the name(s) of the affected Portfolio(s). Adjustments, if any, will be determined by CNBC in its sole discretion, and all such decisions by CNBC are final and binding and are not subject to appeal.

Mechel dates the change May 19th. The actual adjustment (the split, if you will, and therefore the action requiring special processing) is dated May 20th by the NYSE (yesterday), which would suggest it's too late to appeal the mistake. But given the 1-2 day lag in the normal trade execution and portfolio rebalancing process that so beleaguers contest participants, it seems pretty reasonable to assume that a portfolio manager with a splitting stock would expect to see the adjustment take hold the day after the special action (if not later).

I don't see any reason why they'd try to resist this appeal, but past experience and a lot of shared stories from readers suggest there are few problems that are easily and painlessly solved. If anyone else is holding MTL or another ADR that underwent an adjustment (or, frankly, any other oddball special action that you think wasn't processed properly), let us know.

We'll keep you apprised of any resolution.

Update: The issue has been resolved; the contest admins have made the proper adjustments to the portfolios containing MTL.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive.

Handcrafted by Flip on May 21, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (6) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Wednesday, Week 2

[Scroll to the bottom for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Don't forget - currency trading resumes this morning at 9:30.

Update: Anyone tried it out yet? I've just put on a couple of trial positions and so far, so good. I may have mentioned once or twice that currency trading ain't my cup of tea, so I basically split the $100,000 allocation down the middle, with half going long USD/CAD and half going short EUR/USD. If I didn't muck it up, these should both be dollar-bullish positions, with one half measured against the Canadian dollar and the other against the Euro.

You're welcome to join me in that allocation if you don't already have (and don't plan to formulate) a currency strategy any more sophisticated than "the dollar is undervalued relative to euros and loonies" and you're interested in taking the refurbished trading platform for a test drive.

And any currency gurus out there who want to share a few insights with other readers, please have at it in the comments.

In the mean time, CNBC's in-house currency tutoring service has put up a couple of video lessons.

Axel Merk, Manager of the Merk Hard Currency Fund sits down with Sue Herera to discuss the International currency arena: The long-term decline of the U.S. dollar, why Axel advocates buying baskets of currencies and the differences between hard currencies and Asian currencies. Key lessons to help you with your currency trading strategy.

Remember, with the 10:1 leverage, you've got $1,000,000 of currency buying power (even more than your initial stock portfolio allocation) and you can place a seemingly limitless number of intra-day trades, so there's a real opportunity to get ahead (or make up lost ground) with currency trading. The leverage also means there's a real opportunity to lose your shirt, but (to mix metaphors) in a home run competition, losing your shirt is just as bad as coming in 2nd, so you need to swing for the fences. Put otherwise, training a monkey to process random trades that washed your whole portfolio in and out of different positions all day would probably be a better strategy than doing no currency trading. If you don't have a monkey handy, you can perform this task yourself.

I just bought and sold $5,000,000 worth of USD/CHF contracts over 10 trades to confirm that this is the way it works, and indeed it is. Of course I flushed away a couple thousand dollars in about 60 seconds, thanks to the bid-ask spread, but these are the things I do to bring you the goods.

Also, I used a portfolio that was already in the crapper.

For those of you sniffing out volatility on the stocks side, you've got a whole bunch of eligible companies that are reporting earnings tonight or tomorrow morning. For purposes of whittling down to the most likely earnings surprisers and the biggest potential movers, in bold are the companies whose market cap and number of analysts covering the stock are both below the group median. And the three in green are names to which you might want to give extra special consideration.

Company	Symbol
NetApp, Inc.	NTAP
Gamestop Corp.	GME
Computer Sciences Corp	CSC
Salesforce.com	CRM
Suntech Power	STP
Limited Brands	LTD
Hormel Foods	HRL
Patterson Dental	PDCO
Synopsys	SNPS
Dick's Sporting Goods	DKS
NetEase.com	NTES
Nordson	NDSN
AnnTaylor Stores	ANN
Semtech	SMTC
Tech Data Corp	TECD
Barnes and Noble	BKS
Toro	TTC
Bristow Group	BRS
Gymboree	GYMB
Columbus McKinnon	CMCO
Stage Stores	SSI
Sanderson Farms	SAFM
Longs Drug Stores	LDG
Global Sources Limited	GSOL

Global Sources (Bermuda-based, China-focused marketing firm) is as volatile as can be, and currently is down more than 40% year-to-date. Very few analysts cover it and they're frequently way off in their projections. None of this argues for an upside surprise, but there's a good chance of a surprise of some kind and if it's a happy one, the stock's got lots of room overhead.

Sanderson Farms (big chicken outfit out of Mississippi) is another thinly followed small-cap. What sticks out about SAMF is the range of analysts' forecasts regarding tomorrow morning's earnings report. The "consensus" is looking for a loss of $0.07 per share, but the EPS range stretches from a loss of $0.18 to income of $0.07. And last quarter, actual results exceeded the consensus by 1,400%. Here, you're betting contrary to the popular opinion that rising prices of commodities found in (in this case) animal feed will put pressure on profitability. But so far, Sanderson has managed to push it through via higher chicken prices.

Longs Drug Stores is a standout among the less-watched subgroup simply because it's gotten a lot cheaper over the last week. It could be that people think they've got the drop on the earnings report and that it will disappoint. Or it could be that people are pooh-poohing the company's decision to partner with Google in the launch of the slightly controversial Google Health. To me, those both seem like potential opportunities - driving shares lower just in time for you to grab some at bargain prices, right before the earnings catalyst.

Wednesday, May 21st

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "According to Boone Pickens, how much is the U.S. sending overseas for oil?"

Answer: 4x the Iraq War's cost

Squawk On the Street: "On Tuesday, Jim Cramer said it was "time to ring the register" and sell. But what railroad stock was he BULLISH on?"

Answer: CSX

The Call: "Short seller Doug Kass mentioned Warren Buffett and a famous tyrant in a CNBC interview. Which tyrant?"

Answer: Napoleon Bonaparte

Power Lunch: "Which "gloom & doom" figure told CNBC Monday "I think the economy really stinks"?"

Answer: Marc Faber (whiner)

Street Signs: "What "Web Extra" Internet stock did Darren Chervitz recommend exclusively for CNBC Stock Blog readers?"

Answer: Shutterfly

Closing Bell: "In "How To Prosper On Retiring Boomers" which stock did Jordan Kimmel link to the post-WWII generation?"

Answer: Research in Motion

Handcrafted by Flip on May 21, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (9) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Currency Trading Resumes Wed. 5/21

[Tuesday's trivia answers are over here.]

If you're a registered participant in the Portfolio Challenge, you've probably received this rather surprising e-mail:

We're happy to tell you that Currency Trading in the Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge will be operational as of Wednesday, May 21st at 9:30am ET. Although Currency Trading will begin later than Equity Trading, Week 2 will end on Friday May 23 at 4:00PM (Eastern) for both parts of the Contest.

Don't forget that 10% of each of your portfolios has been allocated to currency trading, and you can virtually trade currencies in real time. Everyone's Currency Account has been reset to 100,000 CNBC Bucks.

New to the currency markets? Don't worry - we've got a special series called "Cashing In" available in Contest Central to help you learn the basics. You can also check out CNBC.com's comprehensive coverage of the currency markets to help guide your trades.

Of course, time will tell whether it actually works this time, but I need to eat some tentative crow for having predicted that currency trading would never get back online.

Anyway, this should be interesting. Have a read through the rules (the currency trading appendix is at the end) ahead of time if you haven't already, as they're pretty involved.

Unlike stocks, currency trading is available throughout the session and trades are processed in real-time, rather than at the end of each session, as with stocks. That means there's an opportunity to gain serious ground on stocks-only traders. What's more (and I neglected to notice this until now), the currency portfolios employ 10:1 leverage, meaning you've got $1,000,000 of buying power. Also unlike the stock portfolio, there is no maximum number of currency trades you can make in a given day (though there is an artificial transaction cost of 1 pip ($0.0001) built into each trade).

If (and it's still a meaningful if) everything works this time, the portfolio leverage and unlimited real-time trading could well mean a savvy currency trader out there winds up stealing the lead from an equity trader, despite the 1.5 week head start.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive.

Handcrafted by Flip on May 20, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (8) | TrackBack

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Tuesday, Week 2

[Scroll to the bottom for answers to today's Bonus Bucks trivia questions.]

Well, James Fox is proving himself no one-trick pony. Still atop the leaderboard, he's off last week's pace (returning 6.5% per day on his initial $900,000), but not by much, adding another 4.4% yesterday (ex-bonus bucks). I'm guessing he hung onto his Solar Fun (SOLF), which would have been good for another 10% yesterday. And since he bought it last week before its huge run-up, it may now account for as much as a third of his allocation. Even so, SOLF would have only given Fox's overall portfolio 3-4% yesterday, so he's doing something else right too.

Meanwhile, I've managed to maintain my tied-for-first-place standing in the currency trading.

Update: Currency trading is back! Details here.

See all related posts in the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive:

Tuesday, May 20th

Throughout the contest, each day's answers will be at the top of the CNBC Portfolio Challenge archive as soon as the questions are published, so bookmark accordingly.

Daily Trivia:

Squawk Box: "In March, Bernie McGinn was on the money with his Ford pick. Early this month, what pharma stock did he recommend?"

Answer: PFE

Squawk On the Street: "Energy Source blog: What did John Kilduff say about Iran's possible market vulnerability?"

Answer: It's more self-inflicted

The Call: "Berkshire Hathaway Portfolio Tracker: What was BRK's top holding by dollar value (as of March 31)?"

Answer: KO

Power Lunch: "According to Paul Forward of Stifel Nicolaus, how much coal does America have?"

Answer: About a 250-year supply

Street Signs: "In "Short Stories," what did Fast Money trader Pete Najarian call "the most confident plays"?"

Answer: Coal & NatGas

Closing Bell: ""States with the Highest Foreclosure Rates" slideshow: How many Nevada households got notices as of April?"

Answer: 1 in every 146

Handcrafted by Flip on May 20, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

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CNBC Portfolio Challenge

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - The (Real) Winners' Circle

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Winners To Be Announced Monday, July 28

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Announcement Of Winners Punted To Next Week

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - The (Empty) Winners' Circle

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Friday, Week 10

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Thursday, Week 10

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Wednesday, Week 10

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Tuesday, Week 10

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Monday, Week 10

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Friday, Week 9

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Thursday, Week 9

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Scoring Anomalies Resolved

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Wednesday, Week 9

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Tuesday, Week 9

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Monday, Week 9

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Thursday, Week 8

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Wednesday, Week 8

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Tuesday, Week 8

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Monday, Week 8

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Friday, Week 7

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Thursday, Week 7

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Wednesday, Week 7

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Tuesday, Week 7

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Monday, Week 7

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Friday, Week 6

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Thursday, Week 6

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Wednesday, Week 6

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Tuesday, Week 6

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Monday, Week 6

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Friday, Week 5

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Thursday, Week 5

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Wednesday, Week 5

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Tuesday, Week 5

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Monday, Week 5

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Friday, Week 4

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Thursday, Week 4

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Wednesday, Week 4

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Tuesday, Week 4

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Monday, Week 4

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Friday, Week 3

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Thursday, Week 3

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Wednesday, Week 3

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Tuesday, Week 3

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Friday, Week 2

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Thursday, Week 2

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - A New Fly In the Ointment

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Wednesday, Week 2

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Currency Trading Resumes Wed. 5/21

CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge - Tuesday, Week 2