This Is Not An Investment Site -- Stay Away! Do Not Make Any Investment Or Financial Decisions Based On Anything You Read Here -- May 21, 2015

Updates

Later, 6:04 p.m.: S & P 500 ekes out record close. The S&P 500 ended mildly higher, above its previous record close of 2,129.20 to post its 10th closing high for the year.
 

Original Post

The Dow is up a respectful 20 points considering it is flirting with all-time highs. The Dow's 20-points-on-the-up-side might be due to the price of oil, up 3%. I haven't read any stories why oil is up 3% today -- only two real explanations: the strength of the dollar and/or the strength of ISIS. If ISIS were not simply a JV Team, the story would be getting much more play here in the US. Consider:

• ISIS is close to taking Iraq, having just taken Ramadi, home of Iraq's largest refinery
• ISIS is said to control 50% of Syria, taking another city, Palmyra
• ISIS is on its way to controlling Libya
• ISIS is forcing Saudi to fight a war in Yemen, something new for the effete princes
• Tunisia youth rushing to join ISIS in Syria, Iraq

Palmyra? Palmyra is on the road to Damascus, sitting about halfway between Deir ez-Zur (Syria) in the northwest and Damascus to the southeast. ISIS controls Deir ez-Zur; until ISIS captured Palmyra this area -- halfway to Damascus -- was free of ISIS.

Meanwhile, the president tells us that the US Coast Guard has nothing to fear but the fear of oceans rising, all of 0.000001 inch. If the US Coast Guard can't handle that impact on the nation's coasts, we're in more trouble than most people think.

Back to Iraq. There is so much Iraqi fatigue in this country, folks have forgotten how important Iraq is in the Middle East. Of course, it's now a balkanized country, which Joe Biden recognized ten years ago: Kurdistan, Baghdad-Basra, and "the Sunni rest." Short term, Iraq has become a non-entity on the world stage, in some kind of "no-man's land." No major power is embedded in Iraq. No global worries about Iraq's oil production going to zero. Short term, outside of the Mideast, no one cares. And as long as there is a glut of oil, no one cares about the Mideast. Long term, it depends. And in the US, "long term" no longer matters.

By the way, Vox provides 27 maps that purports to "explain the crisis in Iraq," dated August 8, 2014. The National Geographic, long known for its quality maps, should do so well. Instead we have National Geographic with this iconic cover:

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McDonald's

Speaking of which, I need lunch. I see Yahoo!Finance has a story on the travails of McDonald's. Everyone has a suggestion on what McDonald's needs to do. Not gonna happen.

[The new CEO] said at the meeting in Oak Brook, Illinois, that he was proud of the decision announced last month to raise pay for workers at company-owned stores to $1 above the local minimum wage, as well as offer help with college tuition to workers at all stores.

Labor organizers and workers have dismissed the move on pay in part because they say it leaves so many workers out in the cold. The vast majority of the more than 14,300 McDonald's restaurants in the U.S. are owned by franchisees.

On Thursday, protesters delivered a petition of support to McDonald's that organizers said had 1.4 million signatures.

During the meeting, the company got support from at least one shareholder, who stood to note that actress Sharon Stone and Amazon.com CEO Jeff Bezos were among those who have worked at McDonald's. If the chain paid $15, he said, those people would still be working at McDonald's.

I'm not sure about that (that Sharon Stone would still be working at McDonald's) but had I known, I would have enjoyed working there with her. It would have been interesting to listen to her aspirations as a teenager. 

Okay, gotta go -- lunch time. But I will leave you this story on Tesla's $7,000 home battery. I'm going to stop by Wal-Mart on the way to McDonald's and see if Wal-Mart has a cheaper home battery. LOL.

For the average U.S. home to rely solely on solar panels and Tesla's new batteries, the complete system would cost roughly $98,000, according to analysis by Bloomberg New Energy Finance. Even that glum assessment assumes a house in a sunny region such as Southern California.

So defection from the electrical grid will remain well out of reach for most Americans, and even those who manage the feat will waste a lot of capacity thanks to solar panels and batteries that are rarely used to their full potential.

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Apple Shares Could Rise 50%

At least that's what Morgan Stanley is saying. Analyst raises target from $190 to $195.

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Grilling Chicken

Grill Companion.
Grilling Companion.