The Market Outfit

You don’t realize it, but in the next few minutes you are going to learn how vital information that you are receiving every night could hold the key to your happiness, protection, peace and prosperity.

Let’s begin with…

5 Little-Known Facts

• What has a dream got to do with the making of a world champion golfer?

• What did one of the greatest inventors of all time learn in a dream that you and I are still spending our money on the result over 100 years later?

• How did a dream lead a famous scientist to a discovery that got him the Nobel Prize for Physics?

• What type of dream was responsible for preserving the life of one of the most infamous persons the world has ever known?

• How did an unrecognized warning in a dream lead to the death of one of America’s greatest presidents?

Shortly, you too are going to uncover the simple keys that will allow you to understand your dreams and take action when necessary.

You will discover:

• Opportunities you should be taking to usher in a new and better life for yourself and your loved ones.

• the significance of dream symbols that bring prosperity such as fruits, trees, certain colors, and even numbers you see in the dream.

• That most dreams are time-sensitive - they should be acted on immediately for best results

• Why certain dreams should be cancelled and the simple prayers to pray and cancel them

• How to pray and exactly what prayers to pray for your good dreams to manifest… quickly

• A simple technique for remembering all your dreams when you wake up so you can take the correct action

Scientists Do NOT Want You To Find Out!

Did you know that the great composer Mozart received many of his most glorious compositions through dreams?

Or that Robert Louis Stevenson struggled for days over a short story that refused to take shape until a dream transformed it into the classic “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde?”

Or that Dmitry Mendeleyev, a brilliant 19th century chemist and physicist recreated the Periodic Table during his waking hours after it appeared to him in it’s entirety in a dream?

Or if Dr. Jonas Salk had chosen to ignore his dreams, the polio vaccine might never have existed?

Did you know that dreams inspired everything from Elias Howe’s invention of the sewing machine to Thomas Edison’s invention of the light bulb?

And here’s possibly… The Biggest Shocker Of All…

Did you ever know that the Theory of Relativity came to Einstein in a dream?

In her book, “Wake Up to Your Dream” Sandra Collier discussed how dreaming affected Albert Einstein.

Hear Einstein himself tell his dream:

“I was sledding with my friends at night. I started to slide down the hill but my sled started going faster and faster. I was going so fast that I realized I was approaching the speed of light. I looked up at that point and I saw the stars. They were being refracted into colors I had never seen before. I was filled with a sense of awe. I understood in some way that I was looking at the most important meaning in my life.”

Years later, Einstein said, “I knew I had to understand that dream and you could say, and I would say, that my entire scientific career has been a meditation on my dream.”

Whoa! That’s from the man acknowledged as the greatest scientist who ever lived!

Let me ask you a question:

“Do you even bother with your dreams?” Did you know that…

The Secrets of Your Greatness Have Already Been Given to You
in Your Dreams?”

Or (this is a scary one)…

“Do you ever consider that many times you have even received warnings in your dreams… and due to lack of understanding you may have unknowingly allowed some nasty things to happen to you?”

Let’s look at this sobering example…

The President’s Case

A few days before he was killed, Abraham Lincoln said that he was impressed by the number of prophetic dreams in the Bible.

When his wife asked him why he’d brought this up, Lincoln related a dream he just had.

He was wandering through the halls of the White House trying to find out where the sound of weeping people was coming from. His search led him to the East Room where he saw a coffin lying on a platform, guarded by soldiers and surrounded by a throng of mourners.

“Who is dead?” he asked in the dream.

“The president, killed by an assassin” was the answer.

The loud grieving sobs of mourners finally awoke Lincoln from the dream.

We all know the rest of the story… Lincoln was killed by an assassin’s bullet a few days later.

What Dreams Are You Ignoring?

In my course on dreams, I teach from a Biblical perspective and in simple-to-understand language:

How to recognize good and bad dreams

How to understand your dreams

the 9 dreams that bring riches, success and promotion

how to pray your good dreams into manifestation

how to cancel bad dreams through prayers

how to pray and stop bad dreams

and much, much more

Elisha Goodman

Elisha Goodman is an online dream coach and author of five books, including his free book: Passion Prayer of Jesus the Christ. His f.ree online dream advice and prayer coaching ministry (http://www.firesprings.com) is helping thousands all over the world use simple biblical principles to remember, interpret and bring their good dreams into manifestation through prayer. More on his coaching sessions here: http://www.firesprings.com/prayerdnabook.htm

Searching for the right mortgage? You may be thinking about what is best for you right now, but have you thought about what is best for the long term?

Consider a 15-year fixed rate mortgage instead of the more common 30-year mortgage. Think about it. Only paying for 15 years on the mortgage means that your home will probably be paid off before your children leave for college. You will be able to retire without a mortgage payment, which often delays retirement.

By cutting your mortgage term in half, you may be thinking that you are doubling your payment. You aren’t. In fact, 15-year mortgages are very affordable. The monthly payments are a little bit higher and the interest rates are usually lower.

What is amazing is the long term savings in interest. For example, if you were to borrow $100,000 at 8% for 30 years, you would pay the lender $164,000 in interest in addition to the original $100,000 borrowed. Borrowing $100,000 at 7.5% interest for 15 years results in a total interest paid of $66,862. That’s a savings of $97,293.

If the increased payment concerns you, there isn’t really too much of a difference. The 30-year has a monthly payment of $734, while the 15-year has a payment of $927. If you can find $193 extra each month, you could save over $97,000 each year. Makes a lot of sense when you think of it in those terms!

What if you simply invested that $193 each month instead of putting it towards your mortgage? If you were able to invest it every month, without missing a single month, for 15 years, you would earn $47,495, if you were able to find an account earning a steady 4% interest.

Yes, you are getting less of a tax deduction by paying less interest. But tax deductions aren’t dollar for dollar savings. If you are in the 28% tax bracket, you are only saving 28 cents for every dollar you pay in interest. Seventy-two cents goes to the lender and is never seen again. What do you think: is 28 cents better than just saving the whole dollar to start with?

Personally, I am really bad about being disciplined enough to put the difference into savings each month. I know that the money would just be absorbed by our living expenses.

Plus, with a 15-year mortgage you are gaining equity a lot faster. You own your home in half the time. You save thousands in interest. A 15-year mortgage could help you in becoming financially free and retire much sooner than a 30-year mortgage.

You may find that the 15-year mortgage is right for you. Do the math before you decide what type of mortgage to go with. Think long-term. It’s easy to simply look at the monthly payment, especially when you are trying to get into a costly home, but remember that you will pay much more for the home over thirty years than you will over fifteen.

Martin Lukac, represents http://www.RateEmpire.com, a finance web-company specializing in real estate/mortgage market. We specialize in daily updates, rate predictions, mortgage rates and more. Find low home loan mortgage interest rates from hundreds of mortgage companies! Visit http://www.RateEmpire.com today.

It’s a national sporting bloodline the likes of which have not been seen in Saskatchewan since Canada’s early hockey domination.

It doesn’t matter that most people have never heard of bunnock, just know that Canada has taken home the last thirteen Bunnock World Championships. They’re held every year in the town of Macklin and there are hundreds of bunnock players making sure that this legacy lives on.

So what is bunnock, you might well ask.

By modern sporting standards, bunnock is rather ancient. It got its start in the 1800s by the Russian cavalrymen, who found that bunnocks, or horse ankles, set up rather nicely on the frozen tundra of Siberia for a lawn bowling-slash-horseshoe pitching type game.

Although the game has undoubtedly existed in many forms, the official version starts out with 52 bones. The eight heaviest are marked as Schmeisers (throwers) while four more are marked as guards. The rest are ordinary soldiers. The guards and soldiers are equally divided, then set on level ground in two straight lines, 10 meters apart.

Four players on either side try to knock down the opposing team’s bones with the throwers. The guards must be knocked down first or penalties ensue. Each team takes turns throwing and the team knocking down the opposing team’s bones first is declared the winner.

The game immigrated to Canada with Russian German immigrants who would pull out the bunnocks at family functions and weddings.

The sport nearly died out before the Macklin Credit Union organized the first World Bunnock Championships fourteen years ago. So serious is the town of Macklin about the sport of Bunnock, visitors are greeted at the town limits with a 32-foot high replica of a bunnock.

The championships started out with only 80 teams and has grown to the 320 teams entered for this year’s championships. Over the years many countries have taken aim at the World Bunnock Championship, but no one has been able to match Canada’s domination at Macklin, where $30,000 in prizes are up for grabs.

Joked an organizer: As soon as someone else wins it will be like hockey, where a Canadian won’t win for fifty years. Actually, it’s a good excuse to have some fun and a good time. Perhaps the best thing is that everyone can play. Last year the youngest competitor was three and the oldest was ninety-two. It’s a sport that generations of families can play together.

The World Bunnock Championships are held every August long weekend. Macklin is near the provincial border between Provost, Alberta and Unity, Saskatchewan, southwest of North Battleford. First started in 1906, Macklin is growing fast and on a sound basis. Many of the original structures have been replaced by modern facilities, new commercial enterprises have been established and an ever increasing oilfield industry has been established. For golfers, there is the nine hole Lakeview Golf Course that has both level and rolling terrain with a scenic lake view setting.

Accomodation in Macklin on the weekend of the championships is pretty much booked up in advance each year, but there are four motels/inns in Provost to the west and another four to the east in Unity. There are campsites in the Macklin Lake Regional Park, but again they are booked up early. There is an airport with commercial flights at North Battleford, about 140 kms away and an international airport at Saskatoon, 250 kms to the east. Car rentals are available in both centers and there is regular bus service from both centers through Macklin.

Michael Russell Your Independent guide to Canada Vacation

The Health Savings Account (HSA) is an amazing tool that a lot of people have been talking about. It is meant to help you save money on insurance and make your life simpler, maybe even help you be healthier.

But do HSAs work just as well for older Americans? The answer depends on your age.

Let’s start with someone older than 65. Once you turn 65, you are eligible for Medicare, and that means you can no longer contribute to an HSA. If you had an HSA before you turned 65, a very interesting thing happens.

The HSA, which was basically an account that could only be used for medical expenses, suddenly becomes an Individual Retirement Account (IRA). It instantly changes status when you turn 65.

This is a very intriguing concept for all of us who are younger than 65. You already know that there is no “use it or lose it” condition for an HSA. You keep accumulating that money forever, you do not lose it at the end of each year.

So, if you’re not sick very often, you may accumulate a lot of money in the HSA. Then, once you turn 65, you can start pulling money out of it each year as income. Your withdrawals are taxable, but won’t it be nice to have another stream of income when you retire. Think of it as your “Healthy Life Reward Account.” The healthier you are in your life, the more money you’ll have left in your HSA. It could be tens of thousands of dollars!

If you are over 55 but younger than 65, you get even more benefits for your HSA. You are eligible for something called “catch up contributions.” This means that you can put more money into this tax-deferred account than those of us under 55.

In 2005, you can put $600 more than you health insurance policy deductible, and the amount of that catch-up contribution increases every year until it hits $1,000 in 2009. If I were you, I’d take good advantage of those catch-up contributions. Tax-deferrals are always nice to have when tax time comes around.

Daryl Kulak is the author of the book “Health Insurance Off the Grid - A Wonderful Way to Use Alternative Medicine and Save Money on Insurance Using the New Health Savings Account (HSA).” The book provides a nine-step plan to get your self-employed or small business health insurance costs under control using a unique approach you won’t find anywhere else. The book is available for sale as an e-Book or paperback at the Website http://www.healthoffthegrid.com

Microsoft is a difficult situation for me to evaluate. I think the company still has a lot of growth ahead in some areas. But, that depends on where management wants to take it.

There are three core businesses that are already well developed: Windows, Office, and Servers.

The moat in the first two are wide. The Windows moat is huge.

The business model in operating systems is great. You keep upgrading every few years; the hardware needn’t progress for you to find things to tweak and get people to buy the next step up. It’s insanely profitable.

I think the new launch (Vista) will be bigger than people expect (eventually) in how it allows for cross selling other Microsoft products (but we’ll see about that). I expect the press to be very negative at least until well after the launch, because there will always be some bugs and delays.

Games

Eventually, video games will be a big business for Microsoft. I hate the economics of the console business, but love the economics of the publishing (and development) side of things.

I’m sorry to see that Microsoft didn’t use its cash pile to buy up an established business here (publishers were cheap in the market a few years ago; an all cash deal would have worked well. Now, everyone thinks video games will be the next big thing).

The console wars are going well for Microsoft. The two keys to establishing a dominant console are launching first and getting good games on your platform. We’ll see how Sony (SNE) does this round, but I expect them to be the big loser.

Nintendo may surprise here. I think the Xbox 360 and Nintendo’s new console (Wii) will do very well. It’ll be interesting to see the breakdown of the consoles in both the domestic and foreign markets. I think Sony may still be strong overseas, but could be in a much poorer position at the end of this round than they were with the PS2.

Search

Long-term I am optimistic about search. I think Google’s position is much weaker than most people think. I don’t think Microsoft will be the only one to benefit here.

Search is a very natural cross sell with Windows. That’s the direction everything seems to be headed in (combining online and desktop search). For future growth in terms of market share I think Microsoft is in a better position than either Yahoo (YHOO) or Google (GOOG).

I also think we might see a couple other (largely unknown) search engines gain some share.

I think Google’s strength is its brand. Its dominance helps with advertisers more than users. I don’t think it has a lock on users. Also, I think Google has been poorly positioned for doing much of anything outside of keyword search.

I expect to see a lot more in the way of intelligent, social search inspired stuff. Years from now, much of search will have to be helping you find what you didn’t know you wanted to find.

Google is dominant in a different business: helping you find what you know you want to find (but don’t know the name / location). The two types of search are very different. Both will be important, but the growth in other forms of search will be coming off a smaller base and will likely integrate with keyword search. Google has the most to lose here.

Other Devices

Microsoft wants to perform well on mobile devices and on your TV. Compared to competitors it is very strong in these respects.

The strategy seems to be the one I would favor - to control the point of initial contact wherever software is used and then to only venture into the actual application or content side of the business where it is highly profitable to do so. In video games it will be highly profitable. In other areas it is less likely to be very profitable.

I expect to see more generic, web-based applications. These will be less profitable for everyone. Office should hold up well, but not as well as Windows. Basically, Microsoft needs to take what it has in PCs and import that to TVs, Handheld Devices, Consoles, and the Web.

That should be the strategy. I think that is the strategy. These aren’t unrelated businesses that need to be broken up to unlock creativity (as some have suggested). Rather, the profit potential for each is greatly enhanced by being part of Microsoft. If you take these pieces apart they are worth very little. There would only be the three businesses I started off talking about and the console / games business.

Internationally, there is going to be natural growth for Microsoft’s dominant businesses. It won’t be a tremendous growth rate, but it will be strong and will require virtually no additional investment to secure.

Obsolescence Issues

Overall, I like the future for software a lot more than hardware, because the marginal gains in the quality of hardware will slow greatly in the years ahead.

The question isn’t what can be done mathematically in terms of increasing specs; it’s what that translates to for the user. We are reaching a point where the individual user will not directly see the benefits of increased hardware performance as clearly as he did in the past.

Much of the research that goes in to this area will only serve to bring down prices and benefit memory intensive businesses - it will not provide as much of a “wow” factor for the user anymore.

This is especially true in games. The situation in desktop applications is already such that improving the software design is where most gains will come from.

Computing power is simply not a scarce resource for most individuals sitting at home or in a cubicle. Advances will benefit some users a lot and will trickle down to the end user (often via the web) through fast responses and cheap services. But, that’s a barely noticeable change.

You’ll see something here akin to the kind of thing you see in the brokerage business. It won’t be obvious, because price competition will never be as great in software.

Generally, you’ll just see the prices for doing anything electronically come down. That’s very different from what we’ve seen over the last few decades, where you also had advancements that attracted new users, because they allowed developers to do something differently, not just more cheaply.

This is a very long-term trend I’m worried about. It could weigh heavily on a business like Dell (DELL), because PCs are actually quite durable; once the rate of obsolescence slows, sales will have to slow as the cycle lengthens.

Management

I think Microsoft’s management is absolutely the best in the business. In fact, I think it’s one of the best in any business.

It would be hard for me to find more than a handful of people I’d rather have managing a business I was part owner of. I also think the current arrangement is a good one.

There is enough of a line between current operations and future investments in the Chairman / CEO split that investors will probably get the greatest benefit from the brilliance of the Chairman this way.

Everyone underestimates Bill Gates. It’s easy, because his great triumph came some time ago now. But, he’s interested in building something lasting. I trust him more than anyone in tech without a question. He always impresses me whether he’s talking about his own industry or some other topic. He has exactly the right kind of mind for someone running a business where the long-run is such a concern.

Qualitatively, I think Microsoft scores close to perfectly. I could cite the profitability stats, but I won’t, because you know they’re better than almost any other business on the planet - and that’s with a huge siphoning off of resources to investments in the future that aren’t required to maintain the cash cow, wide-moat Windows franchise.

Valuation

Valuation is a bit more troubling. Microsoft is not at the point on an EV/EBIT basis where I’d be buying the stock if there was a risk of no extraordinarily profitable growth in the future. In other words, at the current price, it clearly makes for a bad bond.

The key is earnings growth. I think you have to believe MSFT will have a real future in search, games, and non-PC devices that will fuel future, highly profitable growth.

I think that future is there. As far as a truly large cap stock (say $10 billion or more) it’s about as attractive as anything on the planet right now - and certainly it’s the most attractive stock of any very large U.S. business. Even though Intel (INTC) and Dell are cheap looking, I don’t like them nearly as much. Dell is an interesting situation, but I don’t understand the business well enough.

I have a better idea of where MSFT is headed - and I like it.

Conclusion

I don’t own shares of MSFT. I won’t be buying any either. I don’t normally own such large stocks. I prefer much smaller businesses, because the mispricings tend to get more out of whack. You aren’t going to see MSFT trade at an EV/EBIT of 7.5 or something like that, but you do sometimes get those chances in small (high quality) businesses.

There are a lot of chances to find wild mispricings without much of the future being a concern. Those are the situations I prefer to invest in, because businesses like MSFT have an awfully large anchor with the amount of capital they’ve got - plus, they tend to be less likely to be wildly mispriced.

However, if I had to own one business with a market cap of more than $10 billion and hold it for a lifetime I would buy Microsoft here without hesitation.

Geoff Gannon writes a daily value investing blog and produces a twice weekly (half hour) value investing podcast at:

http://www.gannononinvesting.com