Put Down Your Phone Now!

The great smartphone time-suck July 24, 2014     Put Down Your Phone Now!   The great smartphone time-suck How Facebook is taking over the world Plus: The most manipulated numbers on the planet?   Greg Guenthner coming to you from Baltimore, MD... Greg Guenthner Are you "addicted to being distracted"? Don't worry-- there's an app for that. A smartphone-obsessed millennial created an app called Moment to help you monitor your smartphone use. The app gives you what are called "nudge" updates on how much time you spend with your nose in your phone. The goal, of course, is to make you aware of the time you're wasting with your face glued to the tiny screen. Of course, knowing how much time you're wasting on your phone probably won't get you to put it down anytime soon... It's no secret that the entire world has a serious smartphone addiction. Have you tried talking face-to-face with someone lately? Chances are, they weren't paying attention. Instead, they were probably surfing the web, playing a game, taking pictures of their food, taking video of a nearby animal, or updating their Facebook status. Ah yes, Facebook stock is climbing to new highs this morning. The social networking giant crushed lofty earnings expectations--and mobile phones are one of the big reasons it was able to do so. Facebook reports that a staggering 654 million users log onto their accounts every single day from their phones... If you were skeptical of the power smartphones hold over us, these ridiculous numbers should convince you otherwise. Facebook's revenue jumped by 61% during the second quarter due to mobile advertising. That especially dramatic considering the company was making $0 on mobile ads just two years ago at the time of its initial public offering... Now, I'm not saying you should sell your house and put all of your money in Facebook stock. Don't feel like you have to chase after shares as they surge higher today. There are plenty of ways to play the mobile revolution, from chips to apps and even optics and the phone makers themselves...         Underground Bank Could "Kill" Your Local ATM From New York to Sao Paulo to Hong Kong, cities around the world are installing an entire fleet of new ATMs, allowing millions of people to get cash from a new "underground bank." A venture capital firm predicted that the value of any "account" from this underground bank could increase by 500% by the end of 2014. So if you want to protect your money from the conventional banking system and target a 500% gain in the meantime... everything you need to know is in this message.           Rude Numbers Targets, Predictions and Wild Guesses   $14 billion is currently sitting in Facebook's bank account. The social media giant reported a big earnings beat last night, revealing that more than 60% of its advertising revenue is now coming from mobile users... 717,950 additional vehicles are now being recalled by General Motors. GM announced the six new recalls in the U.S. Wednesday afternoon, MarketWatch reports, citing several safety issues... $1,298 marks the spot for gold futures. The yellow metal has dropped back below $1,300 after two straight days of losses... $3.24 is the price of copper this morning. Dr. Copper continues to surge off its June lows near $3... 1,984 is where you'll find S&P futures just before the bell. Stocks are set for yet another green open today...     Rude Trends When to Buy... When to Sell   From my "angry-for-no-reason" email pile: "Shame on you for featuring the earnings beat statistics when the forecasted earnings are some of the most manipulated and quietly adjusted numbers on the planet!" screams a reader... Uh...OK. Here's the thing: I wasn't talking about earnings estimates. I was reporting on actual second-quarter earnings (so far). You know, actual numbers that companies have reported. But even so--why get fired up over earnings estimates? Of all the dubious data floating around, you're miffed that individual companies are making bad guesses at future revenue and earnings? Feels like an overreaction to me... Also, I think it's fair to say that all earnings--whether predicted or from the past--should be taken with a few grains of salt. Investors reaction to the earnings is what really matters... What else? "Shouldn't one short North American if it is dropping?" asks a curious reader. "Just sayin'." A few thoughts on shorting... First, I'm not sure how good of an idea it is to try and short a 30-cent stock. For chuckles, I checked with my broker and saw that there are no shares to borrow, anyway. So there's that. Also, I'm not necessarily interested in shorting a stock just because it's going down--for many of the same reasons that I wouldn't buy every stock that's going up. The market's never that black and white. Furthermore, shorting is tough. Really tough. Especially in this environment. I'm sure you've heard the old saying "stocks take the escalator up, and the elevator down". It's one of the simplest--yet completely true--statements about how the market operates. Panic is a powerful emotion. When the floodgates open, stocks drop fast. This makes it incredibly difficult to "catch" the move lower. [Ed. Note: Send your feedback here: rude@agorafinancial.com - and follow me on Twitter: @GregGuenthner]     Ignore At Your Own Peril Today's Must Read Links   A Little-Known IPO Hint: How to Get In Before Stocks Go Public! 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