Motley Fool Money - Motley Fool Money: 09.10.2010

Episode Date: September 10, 2010

Can Google Instant find success? What do Apple's new apps guidelines mean for investors? Can money buy happiness? On this week's show, we tackle those questions and talk with CNBC anchor Maria Bartiromo about her new book, The Weekend That Changed Wall Street.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Welcome to the show. Thanks for being here. I'm your host, Chris Hill, and I'm joined by Motley Fool Senior Enlist, Seth Jason, James Early, and Charlie Travers. Guys, good to see you. Good to see you, Chris. Big show this week.

Maria Bartonimo from CNBC is our guest this week. She's got a new book out. We've got a lot to get to, including the latest from Apple, Amazon, Best Buy, and Oracle. But we begin with the big macro. On Friday, the government reported that wholesale inventories in July increased by their largest amount in two years. Earlier in the week, the number of people filing for unemployment benefits

was listed to be lower than expected. And also earlier in the week, the price of gold had an all-time high and more than $1,260 an ounce. Seth Jason, what's your headline this week? Wow, let's start with the two snoozer. at the beginning. Actually, the unemployment numbers, the claims number, which surprised people, was a little bit

interesting. Now, that may be a result of the fact that with the recent holiday, the bureaucrats out there couldn't crunch enough numbers to get the full data in. But if it's true that we've got unemployment claims dropping slightly, a little bit better than expected,

we'll always take not horrible economic news these days. And that's the new good, isn't it? Not horrible. James Hurley? Chris, I'm going with gold at a new high. I'm thinking I pulled those gold teeth out of my mouth and sold them too soon. I do think there's merit in the gold view to some degree in that we do have a very unstable global economy, but for the record, gold is not really an investment. It's more of a store of value. And the big problem is that nobody knows how to price it. In other words, it's a default. But I'm afraid,

so right now I should buy gold, right? That's the question. But MC Hammer apparently knows how to price it as we've discussed before, which is cash for gold business, that is apparently doing phenomenally well. So I'm a little bitter about that, but I don't know. I mean, I think some allocation is probably useful, but I wouldn't go all the way. Well, we've talked about this before. If you're afraid that all heck is going to break loose and the only thing you'll have to have to do is, you know, barter your gold coins for roast lizard on a stick, that's not what most people are buying out there. Visualize my finger quotes is gold. They're buying stubs and they're trading ETFs and things. If things really hit the fan, if the stuff hits the fan, guess what? You're not

going to be able to cash in your coupons for gold anymore than you're going to be able to trade your dollars for squirrels. Charlie Travers, what was your headline this week? Actually, the best article I read this week was Michael Lewis in Vanity Fair covering Greece and all the problems and how they backthored their way into the EU, you know, when it was formed. And the amount of corruption and just tax evasion is just mind-boggling for those of us over here in America. But that's contained in Greece. That would never happen here in America. All that balance sheet fakery, we wouldn't do anything like that here. On Thursday, Apple issued guidelines for software developers looking to create programs for the

company's App Store. Apple's been criticized in the past for keeping their approval process secret. So, is that, Jason, it's a good move by Apple, is it? Well, this is the small move. This document was interesting, and I do have to, go here first. They actually said we don't need any more fart apps. In other words, here I come, Android. Yeah, and I have to believe that you do. They do need more of those as many as they can get. Actually, the

real news from them, I thought this week was not only publishing those guidelines, but also completely rolling over on the development guidelines, which said that you pretty much couldn't use you know, Adobe's Flash to develop your apps or any other program and then port it to Apple.

Now that we thought we'd discussed this in the past that that would look like anti-competitive behavior probably. It seems like Apple seems to agree on that. And they also seem to have given up a bit on their harsh advertising policy. So it looks like Apple has decided they're too big to be that kind of bully. James? You know, what was interesting, if you saw the release is they did back down on Flash, but they know that high standards are what keep Apple, Apple. So they said, okay, you can you can develop, but you can't do this, this, this, this. So they wanted to still look strict. Like, we're going to really police you on this because it's their image. Okay, but I mean, for someone like me

who doesn't have a smartphone and doesn't necessarily care about apps, I mean, what's, what is driving the business decision here? Is it a fear of the Justice Department? Are they fearing like anti-competitive? Oh, I think it's definitely that. And what is interesting is at this point, this really, this really is a victory for Android and other smartphone operating systems because this lets developers develop an application and then port it to multiple platforms. And what Apple was trying to do was lock them into the iPhone and kind of reduce the development for other platforms. In fact that Android's were coming at a faster rate sure didn't help. I mean, stock is up 12%. Absolutely. Apple's old strategy only worked as long as they were to big dog, and now that

Android is dramatically outselling them. They can't play that game anymore. Time for the week in Google. Earlier this week, Google rolled out Google Instant, a new search feature that will predict what people are searching for the moment they start typing. Google says this should reduce the average query time by about four seconds. Gee, guys, what are we going to do with that extra four seconds? I mean, Seth? Man, this just goes to 11. I thought this was the weirdest

non-news, but I'm used to non-news from Google. But this was a week or once a week. This was like a big event. The newspaper article I read said that four seconds means 11 hours across the world are added every second in terms of extra time.

It's meaningless. It's a lot. And it's also replicable. anybody can do this. All you're doing is just sending data back and forth a little more quickly. This is as important as the Nexus 1 phone launch. And for those who remember that, it was not important. James? You know, Chris, though, if you type in something, I'm trying to give a clean word. Motley full money. I'll try it right now. As you're typing in something, though, it not only presents you with searches, but with paid ads for each keystroke if there is one available.

So, you know, it could compound their ad money, and you still see, you know, just the image of something. This thing is stupid. I just did. It didn't know I was going to type Motley Fool Money. It took me to Fool.com. Oh, well, that's a full different thing. What a horrible, horrible, Google, try again. Fail.

All right, also with Google this week. Comscore reported that in the month of August, Americans spent more time socializing on Facebook than using Google's sites for search, email, and video. All right, Seth, I know you're our resists. an curmudgeon when it comes to Facebook, but I mean, that's pretty big that it overtook Google. Because, again, it's not just searching. It's Gmail, it's YouTube videos. Facebook is definitely collecting a lot of underpants to go back to the South Park and go back to that South Park metaphor that nobody knows if that's worth anything. The difference with Google

is that when you go to Google to search for something, chances are you'll be interested in clicking an advertisement. Most of us have used Facebook in here. Steve Broido, how much stuff if you bought because of Facebook ads? Nothing. Wow. Big surprise. What if we gave you a check for $1,260? I would not know what to buy.

Charlie, James, you big Facebook addicts. I'm not on Facebook, Seth, but my wife and her friends are, and I would say Facebook's biggest accomplishment is bringing computer nerddom to women. I know, but are they doing anything that will make Facebook any money, is my question. Absolutely not. Here's where I stand on this. And I am not on Facebook either. I only have a cell phone because my wife got it for me.

But, you know, I agree that the social networking aspect to Facebook alone is not of financial significance. But what if Facebook added search, if they added video, if they added some kind of a shopping piece. They already have a critical mass. They have critical mass, but the information on Facebook is seriously inane garbage. We were talking about Twitter. That's the number one website in the country now. We were talking about Twitter in the same vein several months ago and how Twitter was just going to take over because of a – and that's gone nowhere fast as well.

Let me give you a little pushback from a recent guest on Motley Fool Money, David Kirkpatrick, author of the Facebook effect. I wonder what he had to say. Well, I mean, he said Facebook has the most targetable ad medium in history because of the specific information it collects about its users. And if they're able to monetize that in a way that doesn't invade privacy. That's the problem. The minute they try to monetize it, people are so attuned. They're so ticked off about privacy at Facebook already. The minute they try to monetize it, everybody will bolt for the next clone.

They don't have to monetize it in a sneaky way, though. I agree. If you're underhanded, it's bad. But if they say, hey, come do your shopping through Facebook, you can suggest stuff to your friends. I mean, that's cheesy. But something like that, it's not cheesy. I don't think. I hope for the sake of all those people who poured all that money into Facebook and want some return on their investment that there's a way to do this.

But I won't believe it until I see it. All right. Quickly, we'll go around the table. On a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being Google. one being geocities, where do you put Facebook's potential as a public company? Charlie Travers? 10 plus. 10 plus?

Wow. James? I was from a hot air. I was going to say five or six. I don't know what Charlie's taking this morning. I'll give it a three. Broido. Come on, Steve.

I'm going 10 plus with Charlie. I mean, I think you've got a lot of people sitting in the theater at Facebook. How many millions and millions and millions? It's a lot of people. Yeah, but it's people. some of them are people like you who just said, I'm not spending a dime. I'm not spending a dime yet.

You're not even playing Farmville. No, I'm not. Are you? But I think we've established if Facebook opens up a DVD store and the apocalypse hits. I'm sold. Coming up, Oracle hires an executive

who looks a whole lot like the CEO who just resigned from HP. It's high drama in Silicon Valley. Stick around. You're listening to Motley Full Money. Welcome back to Motley Full Money. You can follow the show on Twitter at Motley Fool Money. And as always, drop us an email. Radio at Fool.com.

Chris Hill here in the studio with Seth Jason, James Early, and Charlie Travers, as we dig into some of the companies making headlines this week. And what a difference a week makes, guys. Last week we were talking about Mark Hurd, the former CEO of HP, who recently resigned. Turns out he's got a nice new job with Oracle as co-president. Well, that's a shame. He was going to have a hell of a time with that 30-some million or whatever. Yeah. I think we were all worried about him with how he was going to be a good job. make the dollar stretch with that severance package.

Apparently, he and Oracle CEO Larry Ellison have been friends for decades. Charlie Travers, I mean, Heard, he left HP, but he was given credit for turning the company around, so Oracle shareholders got to be pleased about this. Well, I think Heard fits in there a lot better than people might think the prior co-president Charles Phillips stepped down in January after having an affair. So it seems like a perfect fit for the corporate culture. Oh, come on. At least use the word alleged.

Alleged, alleged. Alleged. No, Phillips did admit it. Yeah, we'll say alleged anyway. Alleged, alleged. It's not fair to these executives. You have to use alleged. They could never do anything wrong.

Right. But no, the Board of Directors over at HP did find dubious expense reports. Heard denied creating them. But regardless, if I was an Oracle shareholder, I would not be happy. We want our managers to basically be squeakly clean and not have any sort of air of a taint around them at all. So if I was an Oracle shareholder, I would not be happy, despite the fact that herd is kind of a Wall Street, darling. Any sense that this might be Larry Ellison's way of grooming someone? I mean, they've been friends for decades, but Larry Ellison is 66.

At some point, he's going to want to just step down and hand the reins over to someone. I think the hardware argument. I mean, isn't her ancient as well. I think the hardware argument is... He's not ancient. He's 53. It's more ancient than we are. As someone who's only 10 years younger, I don't like to think of that. as ancient. All right. So this geys are my kick around for a while. But seriously, I think the

hardware argument is the one that makes sense, which is that Hurd comes from HP and is used to being a hard-nosed sort of hardware company guy. And Oracle, having brought Sun microsystems in, Sun has always struggled, supposedly has some of the best tech available, but somehow can't manage to sell enough of it to make it worthwhile. Oracle's got that problem. Now, maybe Hurd is the guy who can turn this around. Well, one other thing I think we should mention is that HP announced that they're suing Mark Hurd. I love it when rich guys fight. Yeah.

It's great. It's fun. It's like a really rich mud fight. But, you know, they're worried that he's going to go over to Oracle and start spilling all of the HP secrets. I mean, is that valid? I would worry about it, too, and I'm sure there's non-competes and other things in there. But, you know, let's be honest, non-compete clauses are for small little peons like us. They don't really apply to the big guys. Best Buy announced it will start selling the Kindle in its stores this fall. Target and Staples already sell the Kindle,

and Best Buy already sells other E-readers, including Barnes & Noble's unfortunately named Nook. James Early, it seems a little odd that Best Buy is just getting around to selling the Kindle, but who do you think this is better for? Is it better for Amazon or is it better for Best Buy? I say proportionately Best Buy because they're hurting in some other respects, but really is the only reason you haven't bought a Kinsell? Kindle because you couldn't buy it at best buy. I mean, at the end of the day, it doesn't come down to distribution or availability.

It comes down to functionality, price, and format for all these. So I think it's sort of the same game for Amazon after that. Amazon's definitely the beneficiary. Right now, if you can get a Kindle there, Staples, Target, I don't think that moves the needle much, but what it does do is it convinces people that the Kindle format, and these all include digital rights management, is there to stay. And you can also already read your Kindle content on BlackBerry. on an iPhone, on an iPad, on Android,

and I'm sure it'll be on the upcoming new Windows phone OS. And so, in other words, people have a lot less to worry about. Kindle is the razor. The blades are the books. And Amazon wants to sell millions and millions of e-books, and this just helps them do that. I prefer the dot matrix printer analogy. It's a little bit crude, but at the right price,

it might be a decent e-reader. Well, and I have to believe it helps Amazon that, To your point, Seth, that it's just out there for people, almost to test drive. So even if you're not buying it at Best Buy or any of these other stores, at least you get to check it out and see what the functionality is like and kick the tires a little bit. Otherwise, you're like me and you're just paying $400, which is what they cost originally for this thing you've never seen.

Now, we've talked on this show before about James Early's borderline unhealthy fascination with Apple products. I think his young son has seven iPods. How many Kindles do you own? Oh, we just have the old ones. Oh, really? It's not in the teens. You're not like buying everything? No, that's the thing. Ours are the old crummy, clunky, first-generation ones. But really all you need is a screen you can read, long battery life. And that's what the Kindle has, that the iPad does not have, and the iPad will never have.

And that's why Kindles will continue to be popular with people who are just interested in plain books. And finally, remember when you were a kid and your parents told you that money can't buy happiness? Your parents were wrong. Money can buy happiness, and it's been proven by science. Guys, on Tuesday, I got my edition of my favorite publication, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. It's a page turner. This is my bathroom, too. Yeah, you've got to pick one up.

According to a survey of nearly 500,000 Americans, it was revealed that people's emotional well-being, their happiness, increases along with their income, up to about $75,000. So less than $75,000, if that's your income, it's hard to be happy. I mean, what do you think? Is that your number, James? You know, I think in this area you'd need to triple that at least. You know, not to be a weenie. Well, okay, to be a weenie. This presupposes, though, that happiness is sort of the ultimate human state.

I mean, you could have more money and have more security, right? Or have more adventure, I would argue. And then I think it also assumes people are spinning their money wisely. So maybe for everybody else, but if you give me more money, I will spend it wisely to increase my own happiness, at least. There's no diminishing marginal utility for James. I'm kidding, of course. Yeah, exactly. Charlie, what's Charlie Travers number?

Yeah, or just what's your recipe? I'd like to be like one of the Johnson and Johnson kids. Just wear that for a week or a month and see how unhappy you can get. Exactly. Steve Bruner, what about you, my man? The recipe for happiness is definitely cable television. And I don't know, have you guys seen Jersey Shore? that show is just delightful.

Makes me smile every week. Really? That's your go-to? So it's not money that's making you happy. It's going home. It's going home. It's entertainment. You and your new bride just sitting on the sofa and your new home watching Jersey Shore.

Just giggling. Yep. As long as I could catch ice road truckers when I'm on the elliptical machine, I'm great. Ice, what is Ice Road Truckers? I don't even watch TV and I've seen Ice Road Truckers. I've never seen Ice Road Truckers. It's one of those like reality,

like lifestyle, just my job. It's dangerous. They drive the frozen road in Alaska, a frozen river, excuse me, in Alaska, which doubles as a road in the winter. Yeah. It's like 50 below, and they get out and they're debating the problems of the day and things like that. They're driving over a frozen river. Correct. And if that sounds boring to everybody out there, I'm sure our description of it just makes it even better, right?

I mean, I don't mean to be a, you know, a spoiler or anything, but doesn't the fact that the TV show exists means that the film crew lived and therefore every, you know, like there was no crash? We'll keep that one to ourselves. It's a good show, actually. Drop us an email, Radio at Fool.com. The guys will be back later in the show to talk about the stocks that are on their radar. But coming up, CNBC host Maria Bartaroma will be our guest as she provides a behind-the-scenes look at the weekend that changed Wall Street. Don't go away. You're listening to Motley Full Money.

Welcome back to Motley Full Money. I'm Chris Hill. My guest this week is a lot of money. is the host of CNBC's closing bell, and she has a new book out, The Weekend that changed Wall Street. Maria Bardo. Welcome to Motley Full Money. Hi, Chris. Thanks so much for having me. So the weekend you refer to is obviously the weekend of September 12th through the 14th, 2008. For those who don't remember it vividly, Lehman Brothers' fate is sealed.

Merrill Lynch barely survives. For all intents and purposes, AIG becomes government property. what prompted you to want to write the book? Well, you know, I was covering that moment in time and the entire financial crisis so closely that I felt that I had such a privilege to be able to speak to the insiders and have a front row seat during this,

what I felt was really an extraordinary moment in time for our country. And I felt that I had to document it. I had to write about it. And so, you know, I had been collecting notes and collecting my interviews and I knew that I would, I mean, I was busy at work doing the story of the day, but I knew that at some point I would want to sit back and sort of digest everything.

And that's why I wrote the book. I just think it was really an extraordinary moment in time. And I think that in order to really understand where we're going in this economy and where the jobs will be and how things will progress, you need to understand what happened that weekend and how we came so close to the edge, the financial system that is. And there really are a lot of great behind-the-scenes stories in the book. And frankly, some of them are things that you almost couldn't make up.

One that stands out in my mind is when it's getting down to the wire and the various leaders from these banks are going through the books of Lehman Brothers, they start finding examples of just how bad it is. And I'm quoting directly from one of your sources who says, in Dubai you had man-made islands that hadn't been made, and people had bought houses on those islands and secured mortgages for them, but the islands didn't even exist yet. Right, it was extraordinary, but that was the kind,

I wrote that because I wanted people to understand why it was that so many people were saying that the books of Lehman Brothers were so much different and worse than, you know, other firms. But the truth is, when you consider that, And the fact that they had this real estate all over the world that was, you know, just losing value quickly. You could understand why so many people were running from Lehman. You're listening to Motley Fool Money. We're talking with Maria Bartaromo.

Her new book is The Weekend That Changed Wall Street. What surprised you the most when you were going back through your notes and putting this book together? I think I was surprised by the level of severity that we were faced with. and how close the system came to falling, and how industrial companies, the largest of industrial companies, were worried that they weren't going to make payroll because the commercial paper market dried up.

I think this truly was, I mean, we say it all the time, the worst crisis in a generation, the worst crisis since World War II, but it really was. And I think that, you know, your average person out there didn't really understand swap, CDOs, derivatives,

you know, all this jargon that we talk about, out. But they did understand that the value of their house had plummeted and the value of their 401k was plummeting. And they wanted answers. And I think, you know, it's really important to recognize how we got there and why debt is so troublesome. And, you know, I mean, that's why I think we are seeing change. You know, I don't buy into the whole idea that business is back to normal. And, you know, Wall Street hasn't learned anything. I do think we've seen change. And I think one of the big changes is the fact that the average person out there, whether it's an individual or an institution, recognizes that you cannot borrow forever and that debt is bad and that it will come back to haunt you.

And that's why we're so focused on deficits and $13 trillion debt that this country faces and what's going on in Greece, because we've just lived through it with these firms taking on so much leverage. Do you think it's something about the banks themselves that they are almost too big or too complex? Because, again, when you think about things like they're going through the books at Lehman Brothers and they're finding these bizarre toxic assets, it almost smacks of a company that is so large that it's impossible for someone at the top to get a feel for everything that's happening. Yeah, I mean, I think that, you know, too big to fail is not necessarily the problem as much as too connected to fail is. You know, I mean, I don't think big is bad. And I think that, you know, Jamie Diamond, who runs J.P. Morgan, would argue that having a large bank is positive for shareholders and employees because when you're in different cycles for various businesses, one business, which may not be doing as well as the others, will offset the others, which perhaps are not doing as well. So I don't necessarily think that too big to fail is an issue.

as much as I think too connected to fail is. And that's what we had with Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, AIG, and so many others. So much connection, not only to each other, but to institutions globally, which is why the global economy really did come to its knees. You know, who knew that AIG was ensuring everything from the derivative swaps in real estate to the bridge being built around the corner from you? You know, AIG is so connected, which is why the government, you know, I mean, at the end of the day, you know, the terms could have been much different, but the government

ended up taking 80% of the firm to sort of stop the bleeding. Now, you could argue that the terms of the AIG acquisition by government were so different than the Citig acquisition, and why is that? But, you know, that's a debate that will continue. But the bottom line is, too connected to fail, and that's still the case, by the way, today, is a real problem. You're listening to Motley Full Money. My guest is Maria Bartaromo from CNBC and author of the new book, The Weekend that

Changed Wall Street. Hindsight is, of course, always 2020 vision. Looking back now at the events of that weekend, is there one domino in particular that you look at and think, wow, if that didn't happen, this would have turned out much better? Or is it a case that everything was just far too connected? And this was almost inevitable. No, I think there were a couple of things that could have been done differently. I mean, for starters, for starters, you know, why is it that the government did not open the window to cheaper lending to Lehman Brothers and the other investment banks before the firm was facing such a disaster?

Because two weeks after the firm declared bankruptcy, the Fed opened the window to investment banks and allowed them to borrow money at the same rates as the commercial. So, I mean, there were steps, I think, that government could have taken. But I also think that Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson and New York Fed head, Tim Geithner, needed to make Congress understand the severity of this. And I think they actually used Lehman as part of that by saying, look, this is the first domino to fail, you know, to fall. Lehman is first. Who knows who's next? We need money for tarp. And so, you know, Congress, I don't think, would have readily put out the money, approved the money, if, in fact, they didn't understand the severity. And I think that's part of what happened.

One of the jobs you had before working in business journalism, you worked as a teller at an off-track betting location. That's right. Did that experience help prepare you for working on Wall Street? Well, it was a weekend job when I was in college. It was on a Saturday. I don't know. I mean, you know, I said to someone who asked me this once, I said, well, maybe the urgency and the, you know, the horse racing and the fast pace and dealing with money sort of planted a seed for me. I don't know. I mean, you know, I mean, it was a good job. It was a city job, and it was a nice salary. And I did it on Saturdays when I would come home from school, from college. Look, it was a great job. And I enjoyed it tremendously. I do not relate investing to gambling. I don't think it's the same. But at the end of the day, you're making a bet, right? You're betting on something. I hope that when you make that bet in the investment world, you've got some facts and some fundamentals to back up your bet rather than just a guess. So do you still bet on the horses? I'm looking for any tip I can get here. I never was a gambler. I never actually bet on the horses. I just carried out the trades or the or the bets. But no, look, I mean, you know what I do like? I like blackjack.

Really? Yeah, when I go to the Bahamas or, you know, on a vacation, I will always check out the blackjack table because it's fun. Any chance we're going to see you in like, I don't know. I mean, certainly the poker is televised. If there's like a celebrity blackjack tournament, we're not going to see either? No, I'm not that good. In fact, I always come up with a number. Usually it's about $100 that if I lose 100, I'm gone. I write it off to entertainment, and that's it. So if I lose 100, I don't think that that kind of number is going to allow me to sit at the table with some of those big shots. You're listening to Motley Fool of Money. My guest is Maria Bartramo, host of CNBC's Closing Bell, and her new book is The Weekend that Change Wall Street.

All right, Maria, before I let you get away, got to end with a round of buy, sell or hold. So let's start with the fact that you're teaching a class this fall at NYU's Stern. School of Business, so buy-seller-hold, the likelihood that Professor Bartaromo will be surprising her students with the occasional pop quiz. Bye. Okay. All right, students, you're on notice. Your book is filled with many luminaries from the financial world, and she's one of them.

Buy-seller-hold Elizabeth Warren being named to head up the new Consumer Financial Protection Agency. Oh, that's a definite buy. Why is that? because I think that she's done a great job. She's been very vocal about it. I think she probably gets the job. I'm fully expecting her to get the job.

Like you, she's a native New Yorker who attended NYU, buy-seller-hold, Lady Gaga. Well, I would have to say bye. I mean, she has been very successful. She clearly has a plan and a vision for herself. You know, I think I say you go, girl. And finally, she's been in The Sopranos, and she appears in the upcoming film Wall Street, Money Never Sleeps, Buy, Sell or Hold, the acting career of Maria Bardo. Sell that one. Sell?

I'm not going to become an actress. I'm having the best time of my life right now. I'll do this as long as they'll let me. The book is The Weekend That Changed Wall Street. It's available everywhere now. And Maria, I know you've got a birthday coming up this weekend, so I hope for your birthday. you get a spot on the New York Times bestseller list. Ah, thank you so much. Thanks for being here. Really appreciate it. Coming up, box office bombs and a look at the stocks on our radar.

This is Motley Fool Money. As always, people on the program may have interest in the stocks they talk about. Don't buy ourselves stocks based solely on what you hear. I'm Chris Hill and back in the studio with me, our trio of senior analysts, Seth Jason, James Early, and Charlie Travers. Guys, one story we did not get to earlier in the show, now that summer, is over. The official summer box office results have come out for the movie industry, and they were decidedly less than awesome. Revenue for the summer box office, down 1%. Total ticket sales,

that number was down 6%. That's the worst it's been in a while. Just quickly, last movie you saw in the theaters? Well, that's the problem. It's all on Netflix, streaming Netflix. So there's your answer. James? You know, I really can't remember. I mean, it was probably something with Marky Mark, but I mean, it was probably seven or a years ago. Charlie? Apparently, I'm the only guy here who doesn't live in a cave. I actually saw Inception and Iron Man 2 this summer. I saw Iron Man 2, but it was the only non-kid movie I saw.

I saw Toy Story 3 with the kids and despicable me and all that sort of thing. Steve, I believe you have a little box office quiz for us. I do. Now it's time to play. Guess the Box Office Bombs. I'm going to throw out a few 2010 summer releases. You tell me if they made or lost money at the domestic. domestic box office. That is, did their production budgets exceed their U.S. ticket sales?

For some perspective, Toy Story 3 had a production budget of $200 million, and it brought in around $409 million domestically. And internationally, by the way, it brought in another $622 million more. You really can't go wrong, betting on Pixar. You just can't. All right, Steve, what's first? Movie one, Robin Hood. Did it make or lose money at the U.S. box office? That's Robin Hood starring Russell Crow came out this summer. Oh, that one? Oh, that had to be a loser.

I thought you were talking about the Kevin Costner. I've never even heard of it, so I'm going to say loser. I totally agree. Yeah, no, no, no. No way. You are indeed all correct. It did lose money. Well, we have sound effects on this show.

We do. We're branching out. Production budget was $200 million. Domestically, it brought in around $105 million. Interesting. Foreign box office, around $205 million. So they still made money. Amazing.

They did movie number two, McRuber. Did it make or lose money at the US box office. There is no way that thing made money. Oh, I think it had to make money because I can't imagine production. If they spent a lot making that movie, they're idiots. James? I'm going to say losing my. I've never heard of it either. I agree with Seth here. Be on low cost.

All right. The production budget was 10 million. Domestically, it brought in around 8.5 million. Oh! Yes. James and I nailed it. That little? It got decent reviews. Holy Holy crap. You can really bomb on a movie. When you have a lot of explosions in your movie, and at least from the commercials,

seemed like that movie had a lot of explosions. You know, that's going to run up your production costs. Oh, that's just a can of gas, man. Ardex movie is the 18. Did it make or lose money at the U.S. box office? This whole quiz is a trick. They're all losers. Loser.

Now, I'm going to say that one's a winner. There's not enough of nostalgia. An approximate tie. I'm going to say, roughly matched. At a approximate tie, Charlie. Witter. Well, the production budget was 110 million. Domestically, it brought in around 7.

77 million. Ha! Take that, Mr. T. Even though you weren't in this one, I don't think. Maybe that was the problem. Maybe they should have brought Mr. T. back. I would have gone. Had he been there?

Would you really? You said that, but I mean, you're... No, I would. You would have waited for it to stream on Netflix. There you go. All right, Steve. Our final movie, Sex and the City, too. Did it make or lose money at the U.S.

Box Office? Lose money. You know, for the sake of humanity, I hope it lost money, because that would maybe ensure that they wouldn't make a sex in the city. Dude, do you pay attention to what your wife watches? I don't think she's seen this one.

Really? I don't think so. If she had, if she has seen it, she was smart enough not to tell me. Yeah, mine too. And try and take me with it. And the nanny. Yeah, they'll look together. Well, sex in the city, the production budget was $100 million.

Domestically, it brought in around $95 million. No way. However, foreign box office brought in another $195 million. I can't believe it cost them that much to make that. That's going to be all salaries. It's just a bunch of people sitting around a table at a restaurant complaining about men for crying out loud. Well, that probably...

That sounds like this show. That probably holds appeal for some people. All right, thank you, Steve. All right, guys, time to talk about the stocks that are on our radar, and Charlie Travers, let's start with you. Oh, yes, I got... Actually, I'm going to squeeze in two stocks for you, Chris. Okay. The first is in air quotes, R2D2.

My neighbor has a real R2D2 in his backyard, and this is like the coolest thing I've ever seen, or the creepiest. But that leads into my... What do you mean by a real? A robot? Full-size robot. Does it move? Not that I've seen, and I hope it doesn't.

It's a statue kind of. Yes. But my real space stock is orbital sciences. They do work for NASA with the space station, and they launch satellites up into space. What is the ticker symbol? ORB. All right, James Early. Chris, I'm going with a weird company called Almost Family.

The ticker is A-F-A-M. This is a home health care company that helps sort of elderly people in their houses. The business in general, I like. it and they've got a lot of good numbers. They have some clarity now with the new Medicare or health reform legislation, but there is an SEC investigation and a class action law statute related to allegedly unsavory Medicare billing practices, in other words, overbilling. So I'm not endorsing it, but it could be an interesting sort of growth value place. Oh, I'll endorse it. It's a hidden gem stock. We own it. And there were, it's a complex

like story with this billing thing, but what happened is Medicare had to fix how it billed in order to get people to stop abusing the system. They did make that fix. And almost family has for years, at least in my opinion, been one of the leaders in trying to clean up billing. And this entire industry has some really sleazy practices. Almost family has been one of the good ones. And so I think this will all blow over. But that gets me to my stock. And I can talk about it very quickly. Nokia symbol is N-O-K. You might remember them that seems like they used to make mobile phones that people use. I heard something about that. Yes. They just brought in a new CEO, a Microsoft executive, Mr. Elop, Stephen Elop, if that's how he pronounced his name, the guy who ran the office division.

And Microsoft Office has been a very good platform for them, much improved lately. I'm not sure he's a guy to turn around Nokia's phones. I think Nokia has just lost its mojo. I don't think the operating system they've got is really going to do much. And I think Nokia remains a low margin player worldwide and is therefore a stock to be avoided. continue avoiding it. But if they could produce a phone that weighs less than five pounds, it's going to be a minor. All right, Seth, Jason, James Early, Charlie Travers.

Guys, thanks for being here. Thank you, Chris. You're welcome. Thanks to our special guest this week. CNBC host Maria Barter Romo. Her new book is The Weekend That Changed Wall Street. If you missed any part of the show, you can find it at our website in motleyfoolmoney.com. You can also get a copy of our free report, the Motley Fool's top stock for 2010.

And our latest report at The Motley Fool is Five Red Flags, How to Find the Big Short Short, learn how to protect your wealth and tactically short the market's most vulnerable stocks. Just visit bigshort.fool.com to claim your free report, that's bigshort.fool.com. Our engineer is Steve Broido. Our producer is Mac Career. I'm Chris Hill. Thanks for listening. We'll see you next week.