Dr. John Faessel's  Instablog

Dr. John L. Faessel

ON THE MARKET

Commentary and Insights

Turnaround Stock of the Year Reports 49% Revenue Increase

IceWEB Inc. (IWEB) OTCBB

Turnarounds have to start somewhere - (IWEB)'s is now officially underway

Yesterday one of my "Best Ideas for 2012" and my "Turnaround Stock of the Year" reported their second consecutive double-digit quarterly revenue increase.

I believe that this is just the beginning of the turnabout for IceWEB.

Here is a stock that's been crushed, down from about $70 during the dot com bubble to pennies and amazingly has survived. In fact, the now "new" (IWEB) is on a terrific roll, yet it's not recognized by the market. Obviously, the proof is in the pudding, but a close look will show that "its" happening and I believe that the stated growth is just the beginning. Growth for (IWEB) is in its infancy and these back-to-back quarterly revenue increases are the first official, "in stone" substantiation and attest to what's going on with the now completely reconstituted company. We are indeed at the tipping point for multi-bag returns.

(IWEB)'s quick story suggests a rare coming together of the numerous reasons companies prosper. Certainly first is that there is a backdrop of a 61.4% CAGR data storage explosion. Next, they have an award-winning product* and their product mix sells at a fraction of the cost of the competition at a price point that is consistently 30% lower than the high cost vendors such as EMC and NetApp. Exceptional new management and marketing hires also have brought added quality and dynamism to the storyline.

(IWEB) has another "one and only" feature: the plug-in and play 5-minute set-up time for their IceWEB 2000 appliance. And they include an "all inclusive feature set" - you buy [it] you get it all... unlike any vendors that I know of...

* (IWEB) won the #1 ranking* in the DCIG 2012 Midrange Array Buyer's Guide (a win over EMC, NetApp, IBM, HP, et all. and has been chosen as a Finalist in the Storage Hardware Product of the Year category in the 2012 Data Centre Solutions Awards.

So the reason for the turnaround is best and most simply put; ― its price ― features ― and performance!

It's an unbeatable sales offering that a growing list of premier customers have selected. (IWEB) claims an ever growing list of clientele that speak to the quality of their product line and all-inclusive service: the U.S. Army, The Department of Defense, the US Geological Survey, as well as multiple local and county governments, plus Google, Cisco, and a steady stream of sizeable orders from mid-to-large commercial and public sector customers have selected (IWEB)'s products.

Last month (IWEB) announced that one of the world's largest electronics manufacturers, a Global 50' Enterprise Corporation, has purchased a high performance IceWEB 7000 data storage system to upgrade their supercomputing environment. The IceWEB 7000 scales to a mammoth 1.8 petabytes for use in large data centers, supercomputers and cloud environments.

In my opinion we will shortly see more tier-one names bring exceptionally large orders for (IWEB)'s breakthrough product line. If I am right in my analysis just the name of one (and I believe there are more than one) of these premier players who have mammoth data storage needs that are beta testing (IWEB)'s products would ignite a buying frenzy in the shares.

For (IWEB)'s Q2 Financial Highlights:

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/iceweb-announces-second-quarter-2012-184700751.html

An important reason for this order surge; a recent hire brings a great deal to the table. Steven Toole, now (IWEB)'s Chief Marketing Officer was instrumental in driving sales for AppAssure. (Acquired by (DELL) in February.) AppAssure reported 194% sales growth year-over-year in 2011 and 19 consecutive quarters of growth. Toole has said that he sees "at least the same potential growth at (IWEB)", and he came to the company to repeat the impact he made at AppAssure. Toole also says the, "market that's far bigger than AppAssure's a market for Windows-only backup software." The "sell" is easier too as companies only buy backup once every five or so years, contrasted with (IWEB)'s market opportunity for storage that is not only 10x larger than the backup software market, but is growing at a much faster pace.

Prominently, much of Toole's sales force at AppAssure is now at (IWEB) and the industry buzz is that, "more are on the way."

Also notable; recent acquisitions in the data storage sector have been priced at exceptionally high multiples of revenue, some as high as 6 to 8 X revenue; this makes the IceWeb shares even more compelling.

I call (IWEB) my "Turnaround Stock of the Year" and I see multi-bag potential for this little company.

Turnaround Stock of the Year BARRON'S link: http://online.barrons.com/article/PR-CO-20120309-906516.html

Visit (IWEB)'s exceptional website: http://www.iceweb.com

Dr. John L. Faessel

ON THE MARKET

Commentary and Insights

Report from the Harvard Club Meeting

Star Scientific Inc. (CIGX) Nasdaq

"Gentlemen this is no humbug!"*

What, sir, is no humbug? This time, we refer to reputable opinion that;

1. "it is 'overwhelmingly likely' that multiple sclerosis [MS] is fundamentally an inflammatory disease, and not a neurodegenerative Alzheimer-like disease." ** (quotation source: the Mayo Clinic and Cleveland Clinic study published in the December 8, 2011 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine).

2. Anatabine reduces the incidence of hind limb paralysis in the standard mice model of Multiple Sclerosis and reduces the levels of peripheral cytokines associated with the model maintaining them at normal levels. (See Dr. Mullan's summary below.) ***

* I have always loved the epic proclamation enunciated back in 1846 when a surgeon, Professor John Warren, the first dean of the Harvard Medical School (and previous naysayer) on seeing ether first successfully demonstrated as an anesthetic, exclaimed to the assembled scientists and doctors: "Gentlemen, this is no humbug!"

So in a way it was providential that Star Scientific Inc, found its way to the Harvard Club to bring interested parties up to date on the fast-developing, multi-sided story of people, research, patents, and snowballing progress. The awesome setting of the meeting, in which there were approximately 125 participants, is worthy of a little ballyhoo itself, as it is somehow a propos of where Star generally finds itself at this juncture.

The Harvard Club website says this about their Harvard Hall: "Many architectural observers consider Harvard Hall to be the finest clubroom in the Western Hemisphere, if not the world." The atmosphere is thick with regency, power and prestige, and the crowd at the meeting looked the part. Food and bar were commensurate with the setting. Did I mention the string trio? I've been in a few of the world's fine rooms, but this place spun my head around, to put it mildly.

To introduce the day's agenda, Star's new Vice President for Communications, Ms. Talhia Tuck, led off with opening remarks and introduced the speakers that would follow. Of note: Ms. Tuck received her Bachelor of Arts cum laude from Harvard University and graduated from Harvard Law School. While at Harvard she was a member of the Editorial Staff of the Harvard Law and Policy Review. Ms. Tuck has also worked in the financial sector at Goldman Sachs as a financial analyst and in higher education administration as an admissions officer for Harvard University. For Ms. Tucks complete and exceptional bio link here.

The first speaker was Jonnie Williams, Star's Chief Executive Officer, who gave a bit about the company's development, its history, and its tobacco roots. Mr. Williams mentioned that Harvard had done research on Anatabine for two years before the Anatabloc™ product was released. He spoke briefly about the re-emergence of Star's "ambassador," pro golfer great Fred Couples, in the highly competitive PGA tour and mentioned that Fred's C-reactive protein [CRP] has dropped from 6.5 to 0.5. He noted that Anatabloc is now sold in 26 foreign countries and the company gets international orders daily. Williams went on to say how pleased he was with the sales response from General Nutrition centers (GNC) and that it won't be long before the product is carried in many more of its stores. GNC has over 7,600 locations in 53 countries.

Mr. Williams spoke briefly about the Star vs. Reynolds Tobacco (RAI) lawsuit and mentioned the petition to be heard by the US Supreme Court is in motion and will be responded to by Star by May 29, 2012 and be ruled on by the court sometime in June or after the courts summer recess. (Specifically, The US Supreme Court decision will not impact the mediation / settlement process that is ongoing in the Federal District Court in Maryland.)

Williams went on the say that Mr. Paul Perito, Chairman of the Board, President and Chief Operating Officer of Star Scientific, Inc. is acting as "gatekeeper" to all things related to the lawsuit. (Mr. Perito is the new president of the Harvard Law Alumni Association; he was Secretary of the Harvard Law School Association [HLSA] for the past 14 years, until 2010, when he was named First Vice President of the HLSA.) Mr. Williams said that the day's main focus would be on Anatabloc and the recent work at the Roskamp Institute on the beneficial effects of nutritional supplementation with anatabine in an animal model of Multiple Sclerosis [MS] that was announced by the company on Tuesday. Link here for the press release.

The next speaker was Michael Mullan M.D., Director of Roskamp Institute. His degrees include LMSSA (Medicine), MRCP (Psychiatry), and Ph.D. (Molecular Genetics) from the University of London, England.

Dr. Mullan and the Roskamp Institute have conducted research relating to the company's anatabine compound for a number of years. To set the stage for his comments, here is the summary from the patent claim (International Publication Number - WO 2011/119722 A2):

"A pharmaceutical composition comprising a therapeutically effective dose of an isolated form of anatabine or a pharmaceutically acceptable salt thereof can be administered to an individual to reduce a symptom of a disorder comprising an NF-kB mediated inflammatory component or to reduce the risk of developing such a disorder." (A Google search of NF-kB brought up 3,350,000 results.)

Star believes-and is willing to state in the patent application and make claims (54 claims made) to the effect-that NF-kB's are inhibited / reduced / mediated / moderated in hundreds of conditions referred to as embodiments in the patent. Striking is that page 11 of the patent application mentions 130 different types of cancer that may be addressed with anatabine.

Dr. Mullan first spoke to and thoroughly reprised with the supporting graphs the research that the Roskamp Institute has performed, essentially what he presented last June at a Roskamp Institute meeting. Mullan again played the videos that showed standard Alzheimer's-afflicted mice beginning not only to remember again, but becoming able to add critical new information to the cognitive equation and, thus, to change behavior so as even to improve their lot after the administration of anatabine. That's impossible for a "demented" mouse. A split screen video depicted for comparison a mouse fully impaired with the disease. He went on to say that CRP* levels also fell 50% in these test animals, indicating less inflammation. Dr. Mullan called the research "profound."

Dr. Mullan then went into the new research that Roskamp released on Tuesday (May 8, 2012). Roskamp used a standard mouse model of MS (multiple sclerosis), and the news was that the Institute had completed a successful animal study of nutritional supplementation with Star's / Rock Creek's specially formulated anatabine. The mice used in this testing were vaccinated to induce a severe inflammatory process in the brain, which has the effect of destroying neurons and causing progressive paralysis. The disease model looks very similar to that which occurs in human multiple sclerosis. Profound is that the anatabine dietary supplementation resulted in a dramatic reduction in the rate of paralysis of hind limbs. In addition to the better motor performance of the mice, there was evidence of suppression of the normal inflammatory response that accompanies neuronal destruction in this model.

Seeing the graphs and hearing Dr. Mullan present on the treatment with anatabine etc. is one thing, but watching the videos of the mice-with and without anatabine on board-was quite eye-opening, to say the least. Prominently, in the last part of the presentation Mullan showed a video of mice with paralyzed hind quarters that were in fact nearly immobile. The second part of the video showed anatabine-treated mice startlingly having a huge degree of mobility and demonstrated that the mice were able to move in what appeared to be an almost normal manner except that their tails were still quite flaccid.

If you would like to see two videos taken from my iPhone, send an email request to Dr.Faessel@onthemar.com. I will send the videos in two segments due to their size.

The videos are rather rudimentary, shot from the audience seating, however, you can see those anatabine-treated mice scoot around in Technicolor. Amazing...

*** Mullan's summary: Anatabine reduces the incidence of hind limb paralysis in the standard mice model of Multiple Sclerosis by about 66% and reduces the levels of peripheral cytokines associated with the model maintaining them at normal levels. These data are consistent with the reduction of NFK-B regulated inflammation seen in the Alzheimer mouse model and suggests the overall mechanism is one of reduced cytokine production secondary to reduced NFK-B activity.

The complete Roskamp report is available on the Institute's website at http://www.rfdn.org/ms_anatabine.html.

Dale A. Wilson MD was the next speaker. Dr. Wilson practices obstetrics & gynecology in Flint, Michigan and is one of the principal investigators in the clinical trials being conducted in the Flint area (and now elsewhere in the state). Participants in the study need to have elevated CRP levels in order to take part. Dr. Wilson explained that the process is a single blind study involving simply drawing blood and sending it to Roskamp for an analysis tracking high-sensitivity C-reactive protein [hs-CRP] levels. He went on to state that while he knows of no definitive or official results, he has heard numerous anecdotal stories from the clinic relating to the results of taking Anatabloc, which he characterizes as "very, very, very encouraging." It should be noted that Dr. Wilson has had a serious lung cancer (a Stage 3 adenocarcinoma), and in the talk he mentioned that he is now cancer free after taking Anatabloc. It is thought that results of the Flint Study will be released this summer.

Star Scientific and the Roskamp Institute had obtained institutional review board approval for the multi-site human clinical trial referred to as the above-mentioned "Flint" study related to treatment of neurological conditions as well as conditions associated with elevated blood levels of C-reactive protein [CRP], a marker of disease due to inflammation. My cardiologist tells me that a high CRP is actually predictive of a heart attack. The New England Journal of Medicine says that, "C-reactive protein is an inflammatory marker believed to be of value in the prediction of coronary events." The American Heart Association website says that, "individuals with elevated levels of CRP have a risk about 2 to 3 times higher than the risk of those with low levels. Over a dozen major studies demonstrate that baseline levels of CRP in apparently healthy men and women are highly predictive of future risk of heart attack, stroke, sudden cardiac death, and the development of peripheral arterial disease." A Google search of C-reactive protein [CRP] brought up 5,520,000 results.

Dr. Wilson mentioned that conditions that raise CRP such as coronary artery disease, cancers, autoimmune diseases allergies, thyroiditis, arthritis, asthma, macular degeneration, Crones, ulcerative disease of the bowel, fibromyalgia, lupus, ulcers, neurodegenerative disease such as Alzheimer's disease, multiple sclerosis and Parkinson's disease, and many other medical conditions are candidates for treatment with anatabine.

In January Star announced that it had completed a successful human clinical trial showing that Anatabloc lowers CRP levels in subjects' blood.

In a video Dr. Wilson states that, "Anatabloc turns chronic low grade inflammation off." The video link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=StVre96Vzr88

After Wilson's talk Jonnie Williams held a "question and answer" session in which he and Dr. Mullan fielded a variety of questions. Williams obviously didn't want to talk about the "Anatabloc™ skin cream," but he mentioned that Johns Hopkins Medicine has nine studies now underway testing Anatabloc and said that several of the ongoing studies would finish up this summer. He likened Anatabloc to a ferry boat, as opposed to a cruise ship, meaning that the cruise ship will be the eventual prescription drug that is derived from the isomer of anatabine while the ferry boat represents the Anatabloc product now already available. "So why wait for the cruise ship that's in construction?" he suggested. Other questions related to thyroid and the multiple Johns Hopkins studies. Williams talked about how his wife is cured of thyroid disease; let us recall that the distinguished Johns Hopkins professor, Dr. Paul Ladenson, has stated that, "aside from RCP-006 (now Anatabloc) there is no known compound that stops thyroiditis."

Over twenty (20) million Americans suffer from thyroiditis. I believe media impact will be great when the thyroid research is published.

If there was any "new" news mentioned it was probably during the Q&A, when CEO Jonnie Williams mentioned that he expected a global entity would be the first to license the company's technology to produce tobacco below detectable levels of nitrosamines (i.e., the cancer causing agents in tobacco) "this summer." Underscore global-in other words, not necessarily US Big Tobacco. As I said in my last report on Star: "somebody 'out there' is going to come in with a substantive down payment plus a licensing or royalty deal, and I think it's going to be sooner rather than later. It's going to happen."

One more observation before I close. Throughout the Harvard Club evening it was especially captivating to hear the assembled interested parties speak to their own, their families', and their friends' experiences using Anatabloc. Williams and Wilson both said that their families are taking Anatabloc, including some young kids, even grand kids. It seemed to be a major theme in nearly every conversation. The anecdotal stories of improvements in such a large quantity of varied health conditions were really quite remarkable.

All in all it was a heck of an evening.

To close, a factoid that's more than notable; Harvard numbers 17 Medal of Honor recipients among its alumni. The quote below captures the essence of the sacrifice of the Harvard warriors:

So nigh is grandeur to our dust
So near to God is man
When duty whispers low, thou must.
The youth replies I can

-- Ralph Waldo Emerson - Harvard College (1821)

** The Mayo Clinic and the Cleveland Clinic study was published in the December 8, 2011, issue of the New England Journal of Medicine by co-lead authors Drs. Lucchinetti and Ransohoff. Their findings support the understanding that MS is primarily a disease of inflammation, not neurodegeneration as some studies have recently suggested. Indeed, the authors conclude that it is "overwhelmingly likely" that MS is fundamentally an inflammatory disease.

To view the new Anatabloc™ website that includes a link to buy the product online or by phone: http://anatabloc.com/

I'm an investor in Star Scientific shares and have bought shares the open market and have no other affiliation with the company other than as a shareholder.

If you missed my previous reports-more specific in detail and scope on each of the Star Scientific (CIGX) themes-or wish to receive my Best Ideas for 2012, send a request to: Dr.Faessel@onthemar.com

Monday - 5-7-2012

Dr. John L. Faessel

ON THE MARKET

Commentary and Insights

Quote of the Day

"It [high-frequency-trading] should be called "front-running with a computer algorithm," and it should be a crime." **
~ John Genter ~

Stocks Crater on Lousy Jobs News*

Ugg - The un-Happy Anniversary of the Flash Crash...**

Crude-oil stockpiles have climbed to the highest level in 21 years ***

2- million miles of USA pipelines and the Government/ Media / Obama holds up 1,700 miles of the Keystone.

Stocks were hit hard off about 2% following the crummy Jobs report.* Volume was up 4% on the Nas and slightly below average on the NYSE. All the major indexes ended below their 50-day moving average. Recent "price" support held. Importantly the Dow Transports held right at the 50-day moving average and was off - "only" 1.07%. The EuroLand debt crisis also helped sink stocks as manufacturing and services output contracted. Another big unknown; France, Germany and Greece prepared for elections over the weekend. The Socialist Francois Hollande beat conservative Nicolas Sarkozy with 51.7% of Sunday's runoff vote. Spain remains the big 8-ball - it's only a matter of time before it blows sky high - ah la the Greek mess but much, much worse. The Euro just broke to 3-month lows and the MSCI Asian Pacific Index is off over 2%.

The QE3 printing press is being greased-up... "Money from no-where and chicks for free"... something like that... from a distant part of the brain that's been in repose....

* Terrible Jobs News:

Since Dec 2007 the U.S.population grew by 9.6 million while household employment is down 4.4 million. According Friday's data released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the civilian labor force shed 342,000 workers in April and remains below where it stood when the economic recovery started 34 months ago. IBD reported recently that more than 5 million workers and their families have enrolled in the disability program since President Obama took office.

The Economy Slows:

Recent news that U.S. GDP grew by 2.2%, less than expectations of 2.5% - and less than the 3% in Q4.

Earnings Remain Strong:

Analysts believe the companies will show 13 straight quarters of higher-than-expected earnings and record profits through 2014, with earnings rising up to 14% in 2012. To date EPS in Q-1 were up 7.1% in the S&P 500 (SPX) with 275 companies reporting [4.7% without Apple (AAPL)]. Not quite 75% have exceeded analyst expectations - that's above the long-term average of about 66%.

The Outlook:

Friday's McClellan Oscillator (favorite overbought / oversold'ness indicator) was a neutral minus 85. Investor sentiment remains decidedly Bearish. The key S&P 500 (SPX) channel low trend-line of f the December / March channel broke, but recent "price" support has held (so far). The Economy and the Jobs picture stinks and that will now bring more sellers into the market until stocks get a bit cheaper. (and they are already cheap by historical standard) That would bring the McClellan Oscillator down into the Oversold to the minus 200 or 300 region where a decent push higher will occur. Likely we now selloff to lower lows. Elections in Euroland could tweak the Indexes too as France looks to go more left than they already are. Many French with bucks want to leave for greener pastures. Also more than 25% of Jews in France want to leave says a poll. Link here for the story.

** On May 6, 2010 in a period of 10 minutes the Dow plunge more than 700 points its largest ever one-day fall in points wiping out $1 trillion in equity.

From Jan. 1 through April 30, 2010, investors had put $668 million into stock funds. By the end of 2010, they had withdrawn about $96 billion. In 2011, there were $135 billion in outflows. This year, there have been more than $15 billion in outflows. So $246 billion got spooked by the - A. Flash Crash and B. High-frequency trading that front runs every trade you make. No wonder volume is off so dramatically in the markets. And the SEC twiddles....

A new book due out next month is called Broken Markets: How High Frequency Trading and Predatory Practices on Wall Street are Destroying Investor Confidence and Your Portfolio) will be a must read for students of the market. Also ck out Sundays NY Post article by John Byrne; http://www.nypost.com/p/news/business/trading_isn_nyse_qQRukxDeMCY8fTpwDuttXO

*** Crude stockpiles have climbed to the highest level in 21-years and domestic crude output reached its highest crest since November 1999. Gasoline demand has fallen for 58 straight weeks and continues to post clear declines year-over-year.

Imprint this one in your head:

The USA has more than two million miles of pipelines that safely deliver trillions of cubic feet of natural gas and hundreds of billions of tons of liquid petroleum products each year. The Keystone XL Pipeline would carry oil only 1,700 miles from the Athabasca oil sands in Alberta, Canada to refineries near the Gulf of Mexico in Texas. The enviro Wackos are hanging this up despite the total blarney Obama spews about being for it... Is Government now our enemy? Looks like it...

--------------------------

The S&P 500 (SPX) closed Friday at 1369.10.

Short term 'price' support in the (SPX) is at 1377

Longer out it's at 1367 and 1358.

Let's again remember that the pivot point Breakout that occurred on March 16 was also at1369.

The 200-day moving average support is at (SPX) 1276

Declining tops resistance is at 1389

50-day moving average resistance is at 1386.

Short term 'price' resistance is at Thursdays high of (SPX) 1372.

Move. Stiffer resistance is at the recently posted cycle highs of 1393then 1422 established on 4/2/2012.

________

EuroLand Bond Yields remain well off highs, but have backed off last week's highs.

Greek 10-year yields 19.88%

Italy 10-year (gross) bond yield - 5.41% - off from highs of 7.26% on 11-24.

Spanish 10-year (generic) bond yield - 5.69% - off from highs of 6.7% on 11/24.

_____________________________

Friday's key indicators and metrics:

· McClellan Oscillator is Neutral at minus 84

· Natural Gas (Globex) 2.279

· Copper - 3.7210

· The Treasury 10-year yield 1.88%

· The 30-year Treasury is at 3.07%

· VIX - 19.16

· CBOE Put / Call Volume Ratio - 1.07

· 3-month $ LIBOR at 0.466

· Crude oil (NYMEX) $98.49

· Brent Crude $113.18

· Silver (COMEX) 30.432

· Gold (COMEX) $1645.2

· Euro - 1.3089

· US Dollar Index - 79.59

· Aussie Dollar - 1.0140

· Japanese Yen 12525

· Swiss Franc - 1.0901

· Canadian Dollar - 1.0038

* This week's Bullish Investor Sentiment is really not applicable as it doesn't take into account Friday's horrible Jobs news. Recall tho that cycle highs were established 7-weeks ago.

(High BULLISH readings in the Investor Sentiment Readings usually are signs of Market tops; low ones, market bottoms.)

· The Market Vane (Market Letter Survey) rose to 63% from 58% the prior week. It ticked Bullish cycle highs of 69% seven-weeks ago. In 2007 it ticked high of the cycle at 75% BULLISH.

· Consensus Index BULLISH investor sentiment fell another tick to 66% from cycle highs of 78% seven-weeks ago. In September 2011 the Index registered cycle lows of 28%.

· The AAII Investor Survey of BEARISHNESS swooned to 28.5% from 37.4% the prior week. It was 41.6% four weeks ago. On August 4th 2011 it posted cycle highs of 49.9% in Bearishness. Late December 2010 it was only 16% Bearish.

· The American Association of Individual Investors [AAII] Investor Sentiment Survey of BULLISHNESS rose to 35.4% from the cycle lows of 27.6% the prior week. It was 42.4% just six-weeks ago. For perspective January 2011 it ticked its highs in Bullishness at 63.3%. It posted absolute lows of the cycle at 25.3% in September 2011.

· The Citigroup "Panic / Euphoria" Model slipped again to a plus 0.03 from last week's 0.08%. Eleven-weeks ago it registered cycle highs of a plus 0.31 - a level not seen in 11-months, yet the model remains in mid-range in the Neutral zone.

The BARRON's Confidence Index posted a 68.5 from 68.3 the previous week. Just over two-months ago the index posted cycle lows of 66.9. One year ago it was 79.4.

The Confidence Index is the premier measure of how the bond markets trillions (total global is around $91 trillion and USA is 39% of that) are allocated: (The bond market is twice the size of the stock market.)

The Index is the High-grade bond index divided by intermediate-grade index. A decline in latter vs. former - generally indicates rising confidence, pointing to higher stocks.

For my Best Ideas for 2012 please send an e-mail request to: Dr.Faessel@onthemar.com