By: Gino Lattarulo

With Sirius XM (NASDAQ:SIRI) set to release earnings in about one week , the question that seems to be on the minds of the masses is: Will the results be enough to drive the stock to the next level of support and resistance or will it remain in it’s current trading range because everything is already priced in? Let’s talk about that for a bit.

I think it’s fair to say that ever since the stock action pushed through the $ 1.00 mark it has been about as exciting as watching a fly crawl up a drape. Every time it looked like something was going to make the price pop to the next level it just fizzled right back to that one dollar hard deck. There just hasn’t been any thrilling catalyst.  As usual, the exciting has become the norm.

12 years ago when you watched Mark McGuire smash a home run 1 out of every 10 at bats, it was exciting. But after awhile the fans and critics simply got used to the idea. It was just a given that he would hit a tape measure homer every three to four games and when it didn’t happen there was disappointment. ” Wow I wonder what’s wrong with Mark today”.  Never mind the fact that the man owns the lowest At Bats Per Home Run ratio in baseball history. It was just expected that he would perform this way. If, however, some obscure player from the Montreal Expos started spitting out dingers once every ten at bats, there would be pandemonium in Canada.

Stock performance is really no different.  Once a company sets a standard for their performance they have to continually ( and excitingly) exceed that performance to garner any lavish attention from Wall Street. Take APPLE (NASDAQ:AAPL) for example. Their recent earnings was effectively doubled over last year, and yes the stock did move up a bit, but blowing out earnings is so normal for this company that it really wasn’t huge news to Wall Street. They always want a bigger number than what is expected.Sirius is no exception either. Better than expected subscriber growth? nah….   Forward guidance of over a million subscribers?  nah…  That was yesterday’s excitement. Today’s climate not only dictates the ” What have you done for me lately” mentality, but the ” What will you do for me in the future?” mentality as well.

 So again, where will the catalyst come from? Earnings? Some fabulously statistical news event? Just like the Gulf oil spill, it’s all a game of hurry up and wait, politics, and posturing. Hey BP, how’s the clean up and restitution coming? Nah…

Peace

By Relmor Demitrius

Apple Inc. stock has broken resistance at the $258 price and is looking to make an upward move this week.  Bringing up our chart of Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) it appears a new up wave is forming.  Looking at the posted chart you will see Apple has been making new lows on their declines.  Notice the price points for the following dates: 5/7 the low was $225;  5/21 the low was $231; 6/10 the low was $242; 7/2 the low was $243.  If you notice the same chart you will see I am running a trendline right now that is holding support at around $249 area.  

Aggressive traders can find this trendline a nice buy, or an aggressive sell, depending on where you bought, your risk tolerances, and your expected direction.  As a short term trade, you will want to hold over the fibanocci retrace support of $258 level, mentioned above.  Medium term traders will want to hold over that trendline, knowing that breaks do occur.  So to be safe, were going to set up our stop losses right at that $242 support area for medium or even long term traders.  These will be your two support areas to watch.  If that support breaks, I would step aside for now.  Take a step back and reevaluate the chart at a latter date.  For resistance were looking at a nice sell target possible of $275.  Possible this leg will test the $280 level.  No time targets for these prices right now.

Fibanocci retrace resistance at $258 has broken, opening up the possibility of another test to $280 price.  Should be a good week for Apple if the main markets stay flat or advance.  This information is of course news neutral.

For up to date financial news, fundamental and technical analysis, and forum discussions on all investments and trades, visit www.kingofalltrades.com.

Disclosure:  No Position AAPL

By: Gino Lattarulo

Referring to Part 1 of ” The Future Of Digital Music”

So Who , or what, is going to win the digital music wars?  Will digital downloads from the likes of Apple iTunes (NASDAQ:AAPL) still be around in 10 years or will everything be self contained in a “Cloud” structure.

Lets look at the pros and cons of each and then I’ll give my .01 cent opinion.

Digital downloads: Let’s face it, MP3.com changed the world.  As soon as music files became coded for quick transfer over the Internet, the whole place exploded.  The need for tangible CD’s quickly diminished and was replaced by digital players.  The sound files have an infinite shelf life, limited only by the condition of the actual player itself.  The consumer can purchase an entire album of songs for a lower price ( including artwork ) without ever having to leave their home.  Not only that, but the likes of pioneering file sharing sites like Napster provided the masses with as much free music as they could consume.  It was, and still is, a time of mass confusion and evolving.

Cloud Formats: Online radio has evolved into personal web libraries.  Sites like Grooveshark and even Youtube (NASDAQ:GOOG) allow you to pull up any song in the world and create unlimited playlists for your own custom library of virtually any song in existence.  We can’t really lump Pandora or Slacker into the cloud category because they are exclusive to radio style streaming, meaning that the user has no control over what plays other than the music genre.

So what does all of this mean for the direction of your music?  Personally I think the future lies almost entirely in the clouds.  So to speak.  It will take some time to realistically widen the scope of the Internet to allow for such an increase in web streaming.  The obstacle here is still buffering and streaming coverage for mobile users, but as more and more mobile devices and hotspots (like your car) become tethered to the internet we will see the direction shift.  Devices like Apple’s Sky Dock, which has an FM modulator and boost antennae built in, is made for Sirius / XM (NASDAQ: SIRI) and enables the user to stream their iPhone.  Although this device is seemingly proprietary, it gives us a glimpse of the what will happen in the coming years with Cloud streaming.

The main trade off with the Cloud structure versus actual downloads is sound quality.  Online streaming is pretty much maxed out at 192 kbps while digital downloads can be had at CD quality bit rates.  On the other hand, in the Clouds you have any song you want at your finger tips without having to pay for it and you can store the songs in an online virtual library.  The next ten years will definitely be very interesting.  When I was a kid ( I mean younger) I always wondered what would replace the CD.  I only wish I could see the evolution of music 100 years from now.

Of course,  If there is actually anything left after the governments of the world get done burning everything to the ground, we’ll be back to playing tiger skin bongos and bone flutes for entertainment anyway.

Peace.

By: Gino Lattarulo

I am saddened  by the news that Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) has purchased and is closing down the LALA.com website, which is an online music service that provided (free) the ability to upload your entire music library to their servers to have a cloud like iTunes experience.  That in itself is no big deal.  What really drew me to this web site was the cost structure to pay for music.  A person could sample music from whatever artist they wish and then have the choice of downloading the entire collection in mp3 form for around $ 7.00 ( .89 cents per song ) or purchase the entire collection exclusively for online use for about  $ 1.00  ( .10 cents per song).  For a geek like me who has strayed from the shackles of tangible hardware players (except for my XM radio (NASDAQ:SIRI) and almost exclusively listens to music on the web, this was a perfect arrangement.  I even have access to it in my car.  Take a Netbook , FM transmitter, and Satellite Internet card and you are done.  OK , so it isn’t CD quality stuff but it’s a small price to pay for an unlimited library of music.  How long do we think it is going to be before the touch screen PC is manufactured into vehicles for this exact reason?  Not very long once the networks have beefed up bandwidth to offset inconsistent buffering issues. In any case, I think we can all guess why Apple purchased this LALA company.  They are squashing any threat to iTunes.  Not that there is a huge contest of course.  iTunes is obviously the king of the digital download land but cloud formats are quickly becoming the new sheriff in town and they are here to stay.  If I had to hazard a guess, I think Apple wants to use this LALA cloud structure for the Itunes experience.   If they are smart, they will. And we all know they are.

Enter Grooveshark.com. (more…)

By: Gino Lattarulo

Do we have a hallelujah on Sirius XM Radio (NASDAQ:SIRI) staying above the $1.00 mark  yet?   I think it may be time.

There have been a lot of questions and speculation on why Sirius XM dropped after such a good earnings report.  I read articles that the report was not good enough, there was manipulation, etc.  Same old Same old.  I like to keep things simple.  In my humble reality (which is fairly dizzy)  the stock was simply overbought.  How many times have you seen a stock that was overbought  blow away earnings only to watch it plummet?  Conversely we have seen oversold stocks stink up the joint with their earnings report only to see the price action rise.   (more…)