LinkedIn's IPO up to $42 and $45/share

LinkedIn is a business-oriented social networking site. It was founded in December 2002 and launched in May 2003, and mainly used for professional networking. As of late March 2011, LinkedIn has well-over 100 million registered users from more than 200 countries and territories worldwide.

Yesterday, LinkedIn raised the expected IPO price range from $32 to $35 for its shares to between $42 and $45. This increases the valuation of the company from $3.3 billion to $4 billion.

The surfacing symmetrical nature of LinkedIn and other social networking companies such as Facebook, Groupon, and Twitter, to the dot-com crash of the early 2000s does not worry investors. This is summed up by Aydin Senkut, a LinkedIn investor and founder of Felicis Ventures, “the difference between now and then is that companies preparing to go public today have better track records and more significant revenue, in part because of better government regulation”. But, is this enough to legitimize LinkedIn's valuation of $4 billion when its total revenue in 2010 was $243 million with net income being a mere $15.4 million?

To learn more about the social networking bubble, click here.

DO NOT SELL INTO A FREE FALL: Reasons Why you Shouldn't Panic and Sell your Stocks

“If you sell at the bottom, you will miss out on an eventual recovery. If you really want to get out, wait for a bounce and then sell some of your stock holdings. Don't sell into a freefall.”

For new investors, I suggest to be invested in the market for the long term – ride out waves, be brave, use episodes of panic selling to buy more stocks.

Remember that in the stock market, one thing distinguishes the professionals from the amateurs: The professionals panic first. Here’s an example. On the days you see markets take a huge hit, (i.e. when the market falls several hundred points) – as it did last week - is not because individual investors decided to ditch their stocks. If not individuals, then who dropped the ball? It’s none other than the fund managers of pension funds, mutual funds and hedge funds. Individuals are generally more focused on the long-term.

Before you panic and sell your stocks, ask yourself these two questions:

1. Why do I own these funds? (i.e. owning an emerging-markets fund or gold fund)

2. Does it still seem like a good idea now?

Now let’s address two economic worries.

Worry # 1: Worried about deflation (a period of falling prices, i.e. the Great Depression)? Then invest in treasury securities. These are resistant to being defaulted, and the interest payments can buy more goods and services as prices fall.

Worry #2: Worried about hyperinflation ( a period when paper money becomes virtually worthless)? Then invest in gold or inflation-adjusted Treasury securities. Although neither of these investments will make you rich quick, it will stop you from having a panic attack. Neither investment will make you rich.

Now let’s look at behavior when news about your investments hit the news. When stock prices fall, people panic and sell when they shouldn’t. When stocks skyrocket, like that of gold stocks, people buy. It’s not surprising that investors chase performance.

Let’s look at the evidence. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, tech stocks illustrated strong gains. People bought at high prices prior to the dot-com bubble burst in March 2000. Billions were lost. History repeats itself in 2006 prices of homes were rising and shares in this were selling at the rate of cancer in its late stages. The housing bubble popped in 2007, sending billion (yet again) down the drain.

Conclusion: Hold your ground. Do not sell when you’re in the trenches. You either buy or hold.

Better Days Ahead for Pharma Firms

Remember Zalicus (ZLCS) and Zynex (ZYXI)? Refer to 5 Star Buys.

Valuations for pharmaceutical companies should rebound once investors look past today's patent expirations to tomorrow's new drugs, says Morningstar's Damien Conover.

Must Watch Business Movies

1. The Social Network

The Social Network: On a fall night in 2003, Harvard undergrad and computer programming genius Mark Zuckerberg sits down at his computer and heatedly begins working on a new idea. In a fury of blogging and programming, what begins in his dorm room soon becomes a global social network and a revolution in communication. A mere six years and 500 million friends later, Mark Zuckerberg is the youngest billionaire in history... but for this entrepreneur, success leads to both personal and legal complications.

2. Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room Links

Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room: A documentary about the Enron corporation, its faulty and corrupt business practices, and how they led to its fall.




3. Wall Street I & II

Wall Street: A young and impatient stockbroker is willing to do anything to get to the top, including trading on illegal inside information taken through a ruthless and greedy corporate raider whom takes the youth under his wing.

Wall Street Money Never Sleeps: As the global economy teeters on the brink of disaster, a young Wall Street trader partners with disgraced former Wall Street corporate raider Gordon Gekko on a two-tiered mission: To alert the financial community to the coming doom, and to find out who was responsible for the death of the young trader's mentor.

4. Inside Job

Inside Job: 'Inside Job' provides a comprehensive analysis of the global financial crisis of 2008, which at a cost over $20 trillion, caused millions of people to lose their jobs and homes in the worst recession since the Great Depression, and nearly resulted in a global financial collapse. Through exhaustive research and extensive interviews with key financial insiders, politicians, journalists, and academics, the film traces the rise of a rogue industry which has corrupted politics, regulation, and academia. It was made on location in the United States, Iceland, England, France, Singapore, and China.

20 Rules for Investment Success

1. Focus on stocks with each of the last three years' earnings up 25%+, return on equity of 17%+ and recent earnings and sales accelerating.

2. Recent quarterly earnings and sales should be up 25% or more.

3. Avoid cheap stocks. Buy higher-quality stocks selling at $15 a share and higher.

4. Learn how to use charts to see sound base patterns and exact buy points.

5. Cut every loss when it's 8% below your cost. Male no exceptions so you can always avoid huge, damaging losses. Never average down in price.

6. Follow selling rules on when to sell and take profit on the way up.

7. Buy when market indexes are in an uptrend. Reduce investments and raise cash when general market indexes show five or more days of volume distribution.

8. Learn how to recognize important tops and bottoms in market indexes.

9. Pick companies with management ownership of stock.

10. Buy mostly in the top broad industry sectors, i.e. the ones stated below.

(a) Natural Gas
(b) Energy Services
(c) Energy
(d) Natural Reserves
(e) Chemicals
(f) Materials
(g) Gold
(h) Health Care/Medical Sector
(i) Transportation
(j) IT Services

11. Select stocks with increasing institutional sponsorship in recent quarters.

12. Current quarterly after-tax profit margins should be improving, near their peak and among the best in the stock's industry.

13. Don't buy because of dividends or P-E rations.

14. Pick companies with a superior new product or service.

15. Pay close attention to those with an IPO in the past 8 years.

16. Check into comapnies buying back 5% to 10% of their stock and those with new management.

17. Don't try to bottom-guess or buy on the way down. Never argue with the market. Forget your pride and ego.

18. Find out if the market currently favors big-cap or small-cap stocks.

19. Do a post-analysis of all your buys and sells. Post on charts where you bought and sold each stock. Evaluate and develop rules to correct your major past mistakes.

20. Invest in the "5-Star Buy" picks.

*Adapted from Investor's Business Daily Magazine.

Tech Watch: QR Codes and MS Tags

Quick Response codes (QR codes), Microsoft Tag and other two-dimensional codes are expected to achieve widespread use this year – and for good reason. Consumers want immediate access to what’s relevant and QR codes are being used to make that possible.

QR codes similar to the barcodes used by retailers to track inventory and price products at the point of sale. The key difference between the two is the amount of data they can hold or share.

When you scan or read a QR code with your iPhone, Android or Blackberry Smartphone, you can link to digital content on the web; activate a number of phone functions including email, IM and SMS; and connect the mobile device to a web browser.

In short, QR codes connect people with each other and to multimedia digital content.

Microsoft developed their own proprietary software to create codes known as MS tags. Unlike QR codes, which can be read by a number of different readers, MS tags can only be read by the Microsoft Tag Reader.

MS tags presently allow for more possibilities for creative graphic designs, such as incorporating images and logos into the tag. Nevertheless, those capabilities have to be weighed against the reach and ease of use of open-source QR codes.

QR code Generators – There are a number of sites for generating QR codes and they’re all free. An Internet search for QR code generator will offer many choices. One is Kaywa, a site created by Datamatrix, which is another pioneer of 2D codes. You can use it to create QR codes that link to a web page, text, phone numbers, or SMS. Another with even greater capabilities, including customizing the color and format of your codes is Kerem Erkan.

QR code Readers – The QR code reader app on the iPhone is i-nigma. For the android it’s Barcode Scanner and for the Blackberry it’s Barcode Assistant.

Microsoft Tag Generators – To create your own MS tag, click here.

Microsoft Tag Readers – To get the MS tag reader, click here.

Applications for QR Codes and MS Tags

Sharing – There’s no limit to how, or even how much, you can share with QR codes. While a video or landing page is easily shared, you could go further and share an entire eBook and even multiple pieces of content that share a common link. Test out the QR code below!

Community – Sharing is how you build community, and one of the favorite arenas for doing this is Facebook. You can use Likify to create a QR code that links your mobile device to a fully functioning LIKE button for your Facebook page.

SEO(Search Engine Optimization) and SMO (Social Media Optimization) –QR codes and MS tags enhance both your search engine and social media optimization. Now you can increase traffic to those searchable objects to further optimize them by encouraging more sharing.

Social Proof – To help build a community offline, it can be helpful to use your vibrant online communities as social proof of your influence and expertise. As one example, you can use QR codes or MS tags to link to specific blog posts that have earned an abundance of activity.

Analytics - QR codes most commonly link to urls, which is why link shortening services bit.ly and goo.gl now automatically generate a QR code for sharing your shortened links. Using goo.gl as an example, you simply click on the “more” link after you create your shortened link, where you are taken to a page that not only gives you the QR code, but useful analytics.

MyQR.co is another site that provides analytics and the ability to customize the color of your QR codes

This screenshot shows how bit.ly serves up analytics and a QR code for a shortened link.

Practical Uses of QR Codes/MS Tags

Where QR Codes/MS Tags could be used:

• The back (or front and back) of your business card.
• Your brochures and other marketing materials.
• The sides of trucks and trailers.
• Product tags and packaging
• Convention and event nametags
• Restaurant menus
• Event ticket stubs

What QR Codes/MS Tags could link to:

• Installation instructions
• Sources for replacement parts and service
• Directions to your business
• The process for hiring your professional services
• Valuable coupons and special offers
• Recommendations for complementary products and services
• Free mp3 downloads
• Customer feedback forms

5 Star Buy: Paramount Gold and Silver Corp. (PZG)

Paramount Gold and Silver Corporation is a precious metals exploration company. The firm explores and develops mines and also secures strategic land for future exploration. While its major focus is on Mexico, the company has also created an international alliance for exploration in Argentina, Chile and Peru.

PZG has discovered significant gold and silver mineralization while drilling the Don Ese target at its wholly owned San Miguel project in the Sierra Madres of Chihuahua, Mexico.

Right now, it’s price stands at $3.25. PZG’s 52-week price range is $1.15 - $4.52. Speculators believe that “this has the 2nd highest upside potential in this segment of the market. Its upside is 226.5%. Its consensus target price is $13.55 based on the average of all estimates”. Other sources have 1 year estimates of $14.04.

Conclusion: I would buy now - but for those who are willing to risk waiting for a lower price, any price below $3.25 is a definite call to buy. Do not second guess yourself.