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Nice 20% jump.

According to CNBC, Twitter has "...received expressions of interest from several technology or media companies and may receive a formal bid shortly.  The potential suitors include Google and Salesforce.com, among other technology companies, sources said."

http://www.cnbc.com/2016/09/23/twitter-may-receive-formal-bid-shortly-suitors-said-to-include-salesforce-and-google.html

CCXI stock took a 20% dive today. 

Is this a reaction to the initial results announced by the company regarding the Ongoing Phase Ib Clinical Trial of CCX872 in Patients with Advanced Pancreatic Cancer?

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/chemocentryx-reports-initial-results-ongoing-200500827.html

Mark P., what are your thoughts?

Well, Twitter's turned out to be a good stock pick so far.   

The stock got another nice bump today after co-founder Ev Williams said that the company has to consider M&A.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-08-31/twitter-jumps-after-co-founder-says-company-has-to-consider-m-a

It seems like most of the price action in the last couple of months has been due to takeover speculation.  The Q2 2016 results were a slight improvement for Twitter (company still losing money on a GAAP basis, but Monthly Active Users slightly increased both domestically and internationally).  However, this slight improvement doesn't justify the run up in stock price.

It will be interesting to see if Twitter gets a takeover offer.  Mark P, who do you think would want to acquire Twitter?

Arkad,

You might enjoy reading some of the work that Horizon Kinetics (http://www.horizonkinetics.com/) has done on indexing and ETFs.

Here is a short piece that HK did on international diversification.

http://www.horizonkinetics.com/docs/InternationalDiversification_June2015.pdf

Hope you're enjoying the 4th of July weekend.

Ran across this presentation the other day and wanted to share it with the community.  I think there's some real truth to what Scott Adams is saying.  Enjoy.

http://www.businessinsider.com/scott-adams-on-goals-and-passion-2015-2?op=1

Anyone have European bank stocks on their shopping list?

http://www.cnbc.com/2016/06/24/

I think the investors that are reaching for yield in this low interest rate environment are going to get burned at some point.

It seems like much of the market's movement has been based on accommodative Fed policies. 

If the market's movement had been primarily based on sustainable economic growth, I doubt the Fed would be so hesitant to raise rates.

Hi Arkad, welcome to the Capital Alligator Forum!

Passive indexing with dollar cost averaging can be a very effective investment strategy (especially for people who stick with it).  It sounds like this strategy suits you, so that's great.

I think you've identified a lot of the pros and cons associated with buying an international ETF vs. a U.S. ETF. 

I have a few additional thoughts though....

ETF providers usually construct their funds based on where a company is domiciled.  However, just because a company is domiciled in one country doesn't mean the majority of its revenues and earnings come from that country.  Along these same lines, many of the companies in an International ETF (VEU, for example) also do business in the U.S.  So, some portion of their revenues and earnings are coming from the U.S.

Thus, international and U.S. ETFs are not pure-plays on their respective regions.  So, you can't say that you have exactly 10% international exposure if you put 10% of your portfolio into an international ETF and the rest into U.S. ETFs.  You can't even say that you have 10% international exposure if you put 10% into an international ETF and the other 90% into a U.S. based company that only does business in the U.S.

The only way to know what percentage of revenues and earnings are coming from international vs. the U.S. is to drill down into the companies that are included in these ETFs.  Also, the mix of international vs. U.S. in each of these ETFs will probably change over time as the underlying companies receive more or less revenues/earnings from various countries.  As you can imagine, it could easily be a full time job to track this stuff.

The international ETFs probably do have a higher concentration of international business -- it's just hard to put a number on it without digging into the details. 

Also, the returns of the international ETF would have to be slightly better to overcome the slightly higher expense ratio.  Without performing some kind of valuation, it would be hard to assess relative attractiveness of an international ETF vs. a U.S. ETF.  But this may not be an issue for you if your main goal is to own some businesses that are domiciled outside the U.S.

You probably won't go wrong either way -- i.e., owning 100% U.S. ETFs vs. 80-90% U.S. ETFs / 10-20% International ETFs and rebalancing quarterly or annually.  However, you'll definitely want to factor in trading costs when you make your decision.

Twitter Invests $70 Million in SoundCloud Music Service

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/15/business/media/twitter-invests-70-million-in-soundcloud-music-service.html?_r=0

Hey Mark,

As I was doing some research on TWTR, I came across a series of articles that Aswath Damodaran had written on Twitter.  Mr. Damodaran is a Professor of Finance at the NYU Stern School of Business.  He teaches classes in corporate finance and valuation (primarily to MBAs).

Here's his latest article on Twitter:
http://aswathdamodaran.blogspot.com/2016/02/management-matters-facebook-and-twitter.html

His most current valuation for TWTR is here:
http://www.stern.nyu.edu/~adamodar/pc/blog/TwitterFeb2016.xls

If you're interested in reading his other articles, you can go to his blog and search for Twitter.

Mr. Damodaran has some interesting thoughts about Twitter's business; and it's helpful to see what assumptions he's making in his valuation.