Game On For Activision Blizzard

ATVI has bounced back nicely and since it is my biggest holding it tends to swing my account a lot. I have not checked it recently, but I'm sure it is finally recovering from the blood letting.

I'm still really bullish on ATVI and I'm glad I didn't do any profit taking at 36 even though it dropped back down to 31. This article Game On For Activision Blizzard is exactly what I've been saying for a while. The fact that the article talks about the Activision lineup and barely mentions the Blizzard side.

Blizzard has its sight set on 2009, where it plans to disseminate the next chapters for World of Warcraft and Starcraft, two online game titles that have fanatical followings globally.

Is even better since I think the Blizzard side has a lot more potential for huge successes than the Activision side. I don't think I've seen a better pair of companies combined into one. This is going to be big. This is one I'm going to be holding for the next nine months or so. Unless of course it triples, then I'll probably get worried and sell a bunch.

A Bear Market

Yes yes yes, all profits are gone for the year and what was looking like a stellar year may be a negative at this point. I took a real beating on FNM and FMC, but now that the blood letting is mostly over I'm willing to hang onto them. Edison took a giant leap back in the Enron days and they came steadily back over next two year (Just look at this chart and see the drop in 2001 and stellar 3 year return). I don't see why this will be any different. I'm planning on holding what I have and maybe buying some more in a few months if it starts to recover. As I've said before I like all my investments and I'm in them for the long term. Nothing has really changed except a general downturn in the market. FNM and FMC are not huge holding.

I agree with this article on dealing with a bear market.


Most of the negative has come from ATVI (Activision) dropping back down after a meteorific upturn. I'm excited about the Blizzard merger and hanging onto it especially since Blizzard is set to launch some refreshes to some of their most popular titles.

USG purchase

I made another USG purchase this morning. It is a building materials (mostly wall board) stock that I have been holding for the past six or so months looking for the bottom of the housing market. I just bought some more about a month ago. I think Warren Buffet was also getting in at around that time. It has gone down more (-9.6%) since then, but I'm looking at it as a really long term buy and trying to hit the bottom with consecutive purchases to bring my cost average down as it continues to drop. With the flooding in the mid-west I'm betting there will be a lot of wall board purchased in the next six months so I'm buying more and may do another purchase in a week depending on what the stock does in the next few days.

This was a 2.2% (of my account) purchase of USG, and puts my complete USG holdings at 5.5% of my account. Before this purchase it was down around 15% and now it is down around 11%. Think long term...

I also really like the 5 year chart.

My account has continued to fluctuate. It opened yesterday at +8.2% for the year and is sitting today at +10% for the year. There was a big drop in FNM and FMC and I'm continuing to look at it. GE dropped a bunch more and I'm really glad I sold it when I did. Wouldn't go near it right now. I got the papers for the Activision/Blizzard deal and voted for the merger last night. I rarely proxy vote so this is one I'm really excited about.

ATVI/Activision - That's what I'm talking about

I love it when a stock takes a gigantic leap forward, especially when it is my biggest holding.

Activision shares soar after 4Q results fly past estimates.

What I like most about this is that this doesn't even take into account the fact that Blizzard is becoming part of Activision. For years I wanted to invest in Blizzard, but was unwilling to do so through Vivendi since I just don't believe in the movie business at this point. Blizzard is set for another hit with the next generation of StarCraft and already has the biggest game of all time in World Of Warcraft (do the math on a game that cost $8 million to make and now has 10 million subscribers paying $15 a month). This is a stock I'm going to be holding for a while, but I may have to do a little profit taking. It is now at 25% of my account and I think that is a bit too much, but I may hold out until it is 30%, then take some of the profit out of it. Decisions, decisions...