It’s fitting that Sotheby’s (BID) makes it to Wallstrip before Ebay. Score another one for the bluebloods and Thurston Howell’s of the world. Loveeeee.
Sotheby’s has embraced technology to stay a leg up on arch rival Christie’s. It is also the world’s oldest auction house. Here is their Wikipedia page .
Here is their Google Finance page . There are no public market competitors.
I have written about Sotheby’s in the past as a ‘loose money’ market indicator. Here is n excerpt from April:
My personal favorite indicator these days is Sotheby’s. Sotheby’s is a global auction house selling expensive shit. The stock is rocking like never before. Very Wallstrip worthy. It is spiking past 1999 highs when the internet Billionaires were whipping around money. Historically, that has never been good. Now it’s the Emerging Market Billionaires blinging themselves up and buying art. This silly Sotheby’s indicator is my one of my major concerns. Seems like way too much money out there.
Sure enough we had a major swoon in August. I have to say that watching Sotheby’s crash made me nervous back in August, but it has rebounded sharply for now. With the fed in loose mode and bazillionaires coming out of the woodwork, this Sotheby’s run may just be getting started. Brian has a detailed look at the technicals and recent price action:
Disclosure – No position.
Working for Amgen the last many years I have seen corporate waste like you would never believe. Now that the company is in trouble they are making even poorer decisions that will have a major negative impact on it’s future pipeline. Coming from the inside, I would definitely be weary of this company for investments now or in the long term. Amgen is in the process of eliminating many key R&D positions with years of industry experience. These are the very positions, such as field clinical research staff, that would have carried the company into the future. However, now they are making poor decisions by relying on contract companies to develop the pipeline What sense does that make? Do you really want to count on someone else outside the company to save your house in the event of a hurricane? No you wouldn’t! You would want to be there to ensure it was protected. Amgen is taking an unnessary risk that will ultimately increase the amount of time required to develop it’s pipeline. They plan to dismiss the staff that interact closely with the very Doctors that prescribe and enroll research subjects. It makes no sense and therefore no sense will come out of it. Bottom line I would change my position on this stock because it will drop futher with the negative results from research studies.